Hearts

Hope everybody had a great Thanksgiving with your family and friends. We did around these parts. God was good and is good . . .  all the time!

Saturday's weather couldn't have been any prettier for our visits. We had a larger than normal crowd of new friends joining us. Friends of Mr Matt joined us and took some video of our visits. Then we had a mom and her daughter joining us. The young lady is going to LSUS, hearing about us in one of her classes. Everybody is doing ok. Turner is fine, not much to  say. Richard was in true form and showed our new friends his new hang out. Dale did not get out of his chair. He said his feet were hurting from his day job on Friday. Won't tell you what he was doing, but it had something to do with standing a lot. Dale's camp is looking pretty rugged, so Tim told him he was going to come back and try and clean up some of the mess. White Robert was there and is moving into camp with Dale. Partly to watch over him and because the authorities are beginning the work on the overpass where Robert was staying. Matt and Tim took their friends to the other camps and we went by to visit Smokey. I continue to be amazed at the caring hearts of these men. Smokey had a bag of books, crackers and snacks he had put together for Dale. So after our visit with Smokey we went back to Dale and gave him Smokey's bag of goodies. Our final stop was at the JJ house where Dave and Willie were busy working on the house.

Tim and Karl continue to stay with us after our visits on Saturdays and work on the center or at the Bright House II. Tim was able to fix our outside door and go on the roof and continue putting up more tar on our leaks. Karl has completed all the sheet rock removable in the house. Amazing hearts of these men.

I guess the highlight of the week and maybe the year was witnessing the baptism of Tim on Sunday. I have been involved in many baptisms over the years at Grace and I don't remember seeing so many people walk up front with Tim in supporting him in his new life. It was awesome. Hat and mr brian have pictures up of the event. Following the service, Hat and Joey had a super lunch for everybody. What a day! More to come on this!

With school out for the week, we did not have our afternoon activities with the children. Join us next week if you can.

Ok, I've got a riddle for ya'll! What is cold, usually frozen, clear, tastes great during the summer months, has been non exsistent at the center since it was built in 1947? You need more clues! Grace has supplied the need for 17 years? You give up? Answers? The answer will be next week!!

What a great Tuesday evening we had at our mens Bible fellowship. Matt read from Mark 7, Jesus talking to the  Pharisees about obeying God's laws. Calling them hypocrites, saying one thing and doing something else. Jesus saying to them, you cleverly ignore the commands of God so you can follow your own laws. We have to be careful, we do not go so pragmatic in the way we worship, we forget about why we worship. We talked about our traditions, do they lead us closer to God's heart or have they become just habits we do on Sunday mornings?

The final statement made Tuesday night was from Smokey telling us, he gets up every morning and reads his Bible asking God to lead him this day. Smokey said this is my horoscope for the day! Wow, on AOL every morning is a site for people to go read their horoscopes before they start their day. No need for this site if folks would follow Smokey's recommendation! Awesome!

Ok, I can't wait until next week! The answer to the riddle, ICE!! By the grace of God, Momma T's perseverence and the talents of our plumber, we now have a working ice machine!! Can we have an Amen! I saw Ms Abbie Tuesday afternoon and asked her to come into the kitchen before she left. I told her, hate to say tell you but I will not be bringing anymore ice from Grace. Sorry! She had this awful look on her face. I told her, go open the door on this new machine over there. She did and the screams of joy could be heard all over the building! She said, I want to take some new ice home right now! Ms Sarah and Mr Scott, if you ever need to borrow ice, you know where to come!!

Thanksgiving evening was very nice. Krysten heated up some chili from one of our meals last month. We fixed a salad and had peach tea. We had a new family join us to help out. Ms Kelly, who works with Dr Phil, and her adorable kids and husband, helped all evening. We had Michele, an old friend come back to help us, after being gone for over 3 years. She has a huge smile and said it felt like coming home when she walked in. She plans to come every week. I am guessing we had 20 or so folks from the neighborhood join us. We had a new family come from the other side of I 49. I sat down with a lady and said to her, you look familiar? She said her name was Caroline. She had not been with us for 7 years. She made an impression on us, because every week, she would push her mother, who was in a wheel chair over 10 blocks to visit with us. As she was leaving, we went out and check Ms Lisa's picture wall and there they were! Caroline said, she has the same picture in a storage box. It was the last picture she had of her mother. Very cool.

I know it sounds good to some, saying we served 150 people each week, but to be honest, I enjoy evenings like this past Thursday. You can sit down with our neighbors and talk with them, find out what is going on in their lives and how we can become brothers and sisters to each other in Christ. Thanks to all who came and helped out, it was a joy and a blessing to be a part of the evening.

The JJ house continues to make progress, all the sheet rock is hung. Dave and Willie are starting the process of taping and floating. Just amazing to see the house come to life

Prayers for Momma T's dad, he fell the first part of the week, broke his leg and is in the hospital. Prayers for our missionaries in Haiti. They are just about finished their time there and heading back home Saturday. Amazing group of people. Prayers for all who are traveling this weekend. Continued prayers for James' mom. She is recovering from heart surgery.

When I first started coming to the Cedar Grove neighborhood, I had no idea what was going on. I was involved with the tutoring activities Faith was doing. Gradually I became consumed by the desire to do more. Leading to taking over the leadership of tutoring as the congregation pulled out.

As I started getting to know the children, I thought if I was nice enough, smiled enough, gave out enough snacks, worked harder, worked longer, magically all the problems the children were having would magically disappear. The children taught me, it is not about mr brian but about God. I slowly started to realize, it is not our task to change hearts, it is our jobs to lead our neighbors to Christ and let Jesus change their hearts. Only then will we see real change in our community.

The recovery circles we experienced at Glide and then the ones we have experienced here are about hearts, leading each other to a closer relationship with Christ. This is one of the major benefits of the mens Bible fellowship, is not about us learning the laws but how we can use the laws to draw closer to God and in turn change our hearts.

Tim's baptism is a start of something our community should be about. We are not just another non profit wanting to do good, but we are about changing hearts through the relationships we have with Jesus Christ. To see all of you standing up with Tim, supporting him, encouraging him, lvoing him as he became a new man in Christ, was inspiring. Another testimony, it is not about us but about Christ. Thank you for being such an amazing group of brothers and sisters in Christ.

Enjoy your holiday break this weekend. We need to be thankful for everything God has done, continues to do and will do for us!! Amen!