In Awe on Mother's Day

Wow. I am totally and completely in awe of God this morning.

Today, I had the honor and privilege of stepping into the pulpit at County Line Baptist Church as their Pastor; and even though God had given me a sermon this week I found myself simply without words. Being a Pastor is the fulfillment in my life of God's promise when He called me into the ministry and of Philippians 1:6 ... and I stand in awe that God has allowed me, a sinner saved by Grace I did not deserve, to serve Him in ministry. Wow ... just wow.

Today being Mother's Day the message the Lord laid on my heart was from 1 Corinthians 13:4-7, and the main concept for us to remember was/is: Just as our mother's loved us by giving us life, God loved us so much more by giving us the greatest gift of Life, His Son, Jesus. We must love in all things friends ... willing to love in all circumstances ... and give to Christ our full and total obedience. He is so worthy, and loved us so much, that He freely died for us (see Romans 5:8) so that we could live forever. This my friends, is love.

I pray that today is a blessing for all mom's, and that you are being loved upon by those around you whom you have cared for with a never-ending love. God bless you always and may you feel the joy of the Lord around you each and every day.

God's Timing is Perfect!

Note: Most folks have seen this news on either Twitter or Facebook, but I thought I would make it official and post it here on the blog.

This past Sunday, May 2nd, County Line Baptist Church in Deatsville, AL, voted to call me as their new Pastor. To say that Lisa and I were in shock is an understatement; but more correctly stated would be to say that we were in awe of how awesome our God is!! When the Lord sent me there several months ago to fill the pulpit, the prayer of my heart that morning was that God would make it completely clear if my family was to serve at this church, and in His perfect timing we feel that He has done that very thing.

I can say, though, that this is a bitter sweet piece of news for us. You see, we absolutely love the church that we are serving in now (New Vision Baptist Church), and more importantly we adore the folks that we serve alongside.

Yet, when I was called into the pastorate almost 10 years ago I told God that I would go anywhere He sends me, and so that covenant I made with Him as well and standing on Philippians 1:6 as my life's verse ... we have always had peace in our hearts that the Lord would one day see fit to use me again in the pulpit, and allow me the privilege of serving Him in the capacity as Pastor of a congregation. And so, this coming Sunday (Mother’s Day) we begin a new journey anxiously looking forward to seeing how God will reveal Himself in this new endeavor; and we await with joy in our hearts at the opportunity to watch Him grow our church and our community. God is so good my friends … and we are rejoicing today!!

May God bless you and keep you always …

In His service,
Bro TJ

Update - April 20, 2010

Just a short update since I really have not said much recently.

Today I hit double digits on the road to retirement. Yup, I now have 98 days left in the military ... and those are calendar days, folks. So, if you factor in weekends, trips away for work, plus a few days of leave in there for some ministry stuff ... I'm looking at about 58 days left in the office. Not bad, not bad at all. For those that have asked I have been offered a fantastic job for after my military career, but at this time (sadly) I am just not at liberty to divulge any other information on it. However, that should change in the coming weeks so stay tuned for more info.

To update all on the ministry issue, I had another meeting last week with the pastor search committee and well, God is definitely at work. While I am never one to put the cart before the horse, I honestly believe that God is working things out, that He has cleared the fog from our eyes because we are focused totally on Him, and that this church is where we should be. The committee told me that they are planning on presenting to the church during the first week of May their choices for pastor, and so I can only say that if this is God's desire for us to be there then it will be. Lisa and I are being faithful and obedient, and standing in amazement at God's perfect timing and peace that He has delivered. I thank you for your prayers friends, they are more than coveted and appreciated.

Lastly, I've managed to lose just over 28 pounds in the past 2 months and since I've really taken to running almost everyday I have been enjoying it immensely. I have a good friend at work who helps motivate me, and I am most thankful for his constant encouragement. (Thanks, Zak.)

Well, that is about it from here. Like I said it was a quick update to keep you up-to-date cause I have not said much here lately. I'm praying that all is well in your world, and that your eyes are fixed on the Author and Finisher of our faith -- for without Jesus in our sights we have no hope of tomorrow!! God bless you.

Update on Ministry Prayer

I want to take the time to thank you all for praying and remembering our family as we consider this ministry decision ahead of us (please see the previous blog entry if you need background info). I had a great meeting with our Pastor on Sunday evening and want to pass on something he reminded me of: (let me prep it by saying sometimes you just cannot see the trees because of the forest) ............ he said that God is not the author of confusion. If we are tossing about so much on this and not sure of what we should do, can we really plunge in and say that God is leading us in this direction?

(pregnant pause is inserted here)

Yeah .... that's what I said as well.

So, while I have not come to an official decision and made any phone calls, I think it is pretty safe to say what direction we are leaning on this. We are still praying of course and wanting to be sure, but I think the decision has already been made for us. I feel if the Lord wanted us to be there it would be clear and without doubt, I just want to be sure that my own emotions are not blocking things so I'm going to take the rest of this week to pray and then decide.

Speaking of this week, I'm getting ready to head to Colorado Springs this afternoon for work. I am really hoping to have a decent travel day and definitely have dinner with an old friend in the ministry this week. I found out yesterday that the hotel I'm staying at is directly across the street from "Focus on the Family", so maybe I will have a chance to go visit and look around a little bit. Well, that's the latest from here. Praying your day goes well today and that you take the opportunity to tell someone that Jesus loves them, because the whole world needs to hear! God bless you.

Ministry prayers are needed

Well, I promised several folks I would give an update as to what is going on with me, and this seems to be the easiest way to update everyone at once. I'm sorry it has taken so long to write this, I have actually been working on it for a week now to find the right words.

During the last two weeks of February, I was invited to preach at County Line Baptist Church (which is about 3 miles from our house) and to be honest it was really good to preach God's word again. I confess to you that I went there solely to preach the Word and fellowship with other believers, but after the message last Sunday night the pulpit search committee asked me if they could meet with me and I agreed.

The meeting simply began with one of the deacons saying to me, "If our church was to call you as pastor would you be interested in serving?" Well, I was floored, honored, and suddenly very terrified about being a pastor again ... but I'll come back to that later.

We talked for a while about the church's vision and about what they feel God has called them to do, and then of the ladies on the committee said to me, "Our church has a desire to grow, to reach people for Jesus Christ, and we are willing to do whatever it takes and go any distance to reach people .......... we'll knock on doors, we'll send letters, we'll visit .......... we see God using this building as an outpost to reaching the committee and our city." I also discovered the church is debt free, has 3 deacons, and a core group of about 20 folks who are sold out to reaching the lost, and have a desire to ONLY see Christ lifted up. Wow. I was floored for the second time in one meeting. So, you are probably asking what's wrong with this church and why is TJ having problems with it? (Well, if you're not asking this I am ... hence the purpose of this entry.)

You see, we went through some struggles in the previous pastorate, and I guess we are terrified of entering these types of situations again. Now, I understand and have been around enough churches to realize that not every congregation is perfect and there are always challenges, especially in the area of getting folks out of the pew, but to think that this church wants to reach out is really an eye opening experience. I said to the committee that I believe the SOLE purpose of a church is "to connect people with Jesus Christ" and they emphatically agreed.

Additionally, the church is without youth and for that matter many young people in attendance, but the infrastructure to do so is in place. What I'm saying is they already have Sunday School teachers for each age group, and even dedicated nursery and youth workers, but without the people in attendance those gifts are not being used. This of course, is a major downfall for us since we have a 15 yr old daughter who desperately needs to be in a youth group with her peers, even though I'm sure she would love to continue going to the youth group she is in now; which if she did sadly would split up our family on Wednesdays and quite possibly most Sunday nights.

So now that I've said all of this and you've been patient enough to read it ... I like to ask for your prayers for any word that you receive from God on this. I'm scheduled to preach there again on Easter Sunday (Apr 4), and right now we are praying that the Lord would give us His peace and allow us to answer the church's call (either yes or no) before then and that we would only be in God's will. Would you join us in that prayer? Would you join us in praying that only God's Will would be done in this? Would you also pray specifically for County Line Baptist Church that the right man, God's man, would be called to lead them? I don't know if I am that man, but I know I can go to the One who has the answers and He promises to bring peace (reference Philippians 4:6-9). So, would you please join me?

Our family is praying and talking constantly, and we only want to be in the Lord's will. Thank you in advance and may God bless you.