Our friends living outside were full of life Saturday morning. Scott and I were greeted with cheers and hugs. Hot coffee was a treat. Joey and Jerry need firewood for their campfire. Donations of some jackets given out last week will be surely used this week. The basketball team continues their practices, while the girls turned our kitchen into a pizza baking shop. With donated dough, cheese and pepperoni, the girls made pizzas for everybody, they were delicious.
Our afternoon reading times continued on Monday and Wednesday, while Lauren and her group continues helping the children with their homework on Tuesdays.
Tuesday evening, Rickie led our men's Bible fellowship, sharing from Daniel chapter 3, talking about the blazing furnace. Rickie asked us, are we going to be consumed by our fiery furnace or let God handle our problems?
Abbey hosted our students from Centenary on Wednesday and Thursday. The kitchen, 2nd story, children's area all looked cleaner from their efforts.
Thursday got started off by our friend Willie and Ms Abbie sharing their gifts of songs and words. We kind of rocked the boat by starting chapel at 4:45, due to the cold, in order to get us warmer with some praising and singing, it worked! Arriving in the fellowship hall for supper, we thought we had arrived in Little Italy! Our homemade pizzas were being made and served for supper. Our young friends from Cypress Baptist joined in on the fun and helped cook, serve and clean up. Always a treat to have them with us.
Prayers for Dr Phil. Lisa said he had a mishap with his bicycle and the bicycle won! He was having knee cap surgery Thursday evening. Momma T was going to see him, how was he doing Momma T? Did everybody receive Joey's 4th newsletter? Continue your prayers for our brave Christian warrior as he continues his journey in the Philippines. It was not a good week for my wife. We met with her doctor and it was decided, she needs to have a temporary pouch attached. That procedure will be done this coming Tuesday. She will be in the hospital for several days. Once that is done, allowing her older surgery area to heal, the doctors will decide if more surgery will be needed. She has a long road ahead of her, your prayers will be greatly appreciated.
Our Thanksgiving meal will be this coming Thursday. Lots going on, all your help will be needed. We will have the pastor from Grace, Juan sharing the Word. We will open up the pantry so the community can pick out items they will need for their Thanksgiving meals. We will give out frozen turkeys.
I was again amazed in our Tuesday night Bible fellowship by the reading of the Word. You always hear, the Bible is a living book. I don't care how many times you read a passage, it is always different. Maybe you are in a different point in your life. Maybe a new person in your group has a different perspective. You just never know what God is up to! I remember hearing about this story when I was the sound man for a children's play at Grace many years ago. I was amazed about hearing the 3 young men defying the king and being thrown into the fiery furnace and not dying.
There were several of our young basketball team players listening to this story told by Rickie. These young Jews, would rather die than bow down to something they felt was wrong. Their faith was strong enough to be bold in their decisions to say no! The timing couldn't have been better, our young basketball team needs to hear from men of God. Matt and Rickie are good role models for our boys. Coming to Bible study the boys will be ridiculed at school and in their neighborhoods, but Rickie told them, it is ok, because you boys serve a God who will take care of you the rest of your lives.
Rickie pointed out when the 3 young men were thrown into the furnace, there was a fourth person already there. In verse 25, the king said, Look! I see four men walking around in the fire, unbound and unharmed, and the fourth looks like a son of the gods. Rickie said, you guys, have someone who goes before you in your struggles. You have someone who has been through all the trials you will face in your life. You have a man, who has tasted evil and defeated it.
The end of verse 28, the young Jews, trusted in God and were willing to give up their lives rather than serve or worship any god except their own God. Rickie said, we need to let go of our hatred, our jealousy, our pride and turn it all over to God. God is bigger than anything we can throw at Him. He will make a way where there seems to be no way to go! Amen.
Hope you all have a great week. See you around the center.
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