Ever heard of Cher Ami? No? Well allow me to take a moment and enlighten you. Cher Ami was a carrier pigeon that was owned and used by the Army Signal Corps in France during World War I. He is credited with helping save the Lost Battalion of the US 77th and with 12 successful missions. For his service he was awarded the Croix de Guerre (Cross of War) a French honor given to those who were foreign allies of the French. In his last mission he delivered his message despite having been shot through the breast, blinded in one eye,covered with his own blood and a leg barely hanging on by a tendon. What honor, what commitment, what... wait a minute he was a bird for crying out loud. While he is now stuffed and found on display in the Smithsonian in Washington DC he is not there for acts of great heroism, he was after all only a bird. He is there because he did one thing and one thing only... what he was trained to do. You see as a bird trained by the signal corps he was taught, when released, to fly home. It was instinct, not even second nature, it was the only thing he knew.
What is your first instinct in life? Are you driven by self and your own gratification? By a desire to serve Christ? Maybe you live to please others. Chances are you are like me and you are a mix of two or even all three of these things. You see we react to this life based on our training and we have learned to train ourselves to do all of these things because we please others from 9-5 Monday through Friday, we please our selves when we go home in the evenings and God? well He gets our Sundays, at least the rainy, cold but not to cold, I've got nothing better to do Sundays. Now I know that I am being a little harsh here but I am just trying to drive home the that Christ is not first nature in our lives because we choose not to allow Him to be. Jesus Himself said the greatest commandment was to "Love God" followed by loving our neighbors or living for others. God first, then family and friends and in that formula we will find true satisfaction for ourselves. Just something to think about. Thanks for checking it out.

See ya real soon!

It has been a while since I have been here last. Let me share with you a few things I have learned since the last post... 1) Tennessee football is still alive 2) Jedi masters carry green lightsabers 3) My wife is even more amazing and talented than I ever thought 4) A church can decide what to do with $200,000 and not only not fight about it but have so much faith in the teams making the decisions that they hardley even question it 5) My kids are really good soccer players 6) Vertigo under water is not fun 7) Vacation is now only 3 days away.

I must say it has been a great couple of weeks and I only see it getting better. I will keep this short because I am preparing for vacation and the next two Sunday series and the next Wednesday series. So in keeping it short I will say this, in all of our lives we reach a point where we either stop moving forward or we press on. Sometimes we allow lifes circumstances to slow our forward progress, but a principle that I have learned in football is never stop churcning because you are rewarded for forward progress. That being said, here is your preview of the upcoming series - Jesus while speaking to us simply said "GO!"

See ya real soon!

So I am learning to scuba dive and it is awesome. One element that we have been made to practice over and over is clearing our mask, that is to fill our masks with water and then blow the water out leaving us with a clean, empty mask and we do all of this while under water. Pretty cool huh? The problem is I am not very good at it. It usually takes me more than once to clear it and then I don't always get it cleared all the way. Some of the time I decide that I have cleared enough out and rather than continue to fool with it I will leave a little bit of water in the bottom of the mask. Not enough to bother me but enough to know that it is still there. It is not even enough water to bother my instructors, they think I am doing a good job. As I thought about my lessons the other day I thought of how this resembles my and so many others approach to our Christian lives so much of the time. What I mean is this, we do enough to feel like we are doing our duty but we don't give it everything, it's even enough for the people around us to even think we are doing a good job but we just aren't giving it everything. Eventually we forget what it feels like to give it our all and settle for something less as normal. Well I make this promise to you right now, from now on I will clear my mask all the way, no short cuts or stopping short for me and as for my Christian life and relationship I want to experience everything God has in store for me so no cutting corners there either. I wonder will you join me in this challenge? Let's just see what happens when we give God everything.

Carpe diem- "Seize the Day" is a common phrase used to inspire minds and hearts to do great things. However according to wikipedia this is not the most accurate translation of this phrase. According to the contributors of this ever so popular site a more precise translation would be "pluck the day" as in plucking or picking fruit. When Leeanne and I lived in North Carolina we had a big apple tree in our side yard. It put out a ton of apples every year which were good for eating but great for making pies... mmmm mmmm. I can remember going out there and picking apples off of that tree for myself or Leeanne or Kortney to eat. It was very simple, I would just reach up and "pop" just pull one right off. Sometimes after getting it off of the tree and inspecting it I realized that maybe it wasn't the one I wanted and was then faced with a choice, would I keep it and eat it anyway or would I throw it in the yard for the local wildlife (aka. a squirrel or the ginormous groundhog that lived in the barn) to eat. I never had the option of attaching it back to the tree though, once I picked it there was no putting it back. Every day is coming and once it arrives there is no putting it back and once it arrives you have a choice - survive it, walk through the day to day specifics or pluck it, that is use it for something that is beautiful and good. Just as the picked fruit would be used to eat and the time spent getting it was great time together with my family every day can be a time of sharing life through Christ with others. That is sharing with them something that is good and beautiful. Hebrews 13:16 says "And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased." "Pluck the Day" everyday for now is the time to make something beautiful out of the day that has been given to us.