Last Week

One of the highlights of my week is meeting on Thursday mornings with a group of new believers. Last week, Bill had a message on his heart. So I had him preach it to 4 of us in the chapel of the Memorial Union. It was amazing. Click here for more on that.

Notice the curtain that you can pull over the cross if it offends you. Welcome to Iowa State University.

Moroccan tea from Cafe Milo is a must for last minute sermon preparation. Especially when you're fighting a cold.
The main point of my message from John 3 was, "Missing the point of life is easy, even though God has made it hard to miss." Then I had four points on "How to miss the point of life."

It wasn't that great, so I won't bore you with all four points. But I thought the opening story (via youtube) was a good contrast of two guys- one who missed it, the other got it.

Have you ever seen this on a t-shirt? Sillyness, right?
Well, not for Michael Jordan. Start watching his closing remarks at about 7:53...

Then you have a guy building his house on a rock... start at about 1:53 to hear his words to his family and then skip to the end around 6:40.

What a contrast. Just when you thought Jordan was going to close his speech by thanking people and, perhaps God, he goes off on how much the game of basketball has been there for him.

That's a great way to miss the point of life: live life for _______ (insert "sports" or anything else that doesn't matter for eternity)

Here are some pics from church history class. We went to Des Moines and visited the Greek Orthodox church.

Father Basil shared about the history of the Greek Orthodox church. I have a lot of thoughts on this. Too many for now.
Afterwards Stan made some poor man's lemonade at Chili's. I think his drink reached the supersaturation point with sugar.
Friday night I got choked up as I watched a beautifully redemptive wedding. Congrats to Dan and Allissa. Bless your new life together. I wish I had more time to tell the world how God blessed your broken roads.
On the home front...

Somehow putting the first letter of their name on a pancake (here with peanut butter), makes all the difference.
Tonight I finished "Oliver Twist" (illustrated classics) with the kids. Makai was noticeably quiet in the other room.

He was busy making crafts. It was a small miracle that he only wrote on the paper and not the walls, computer, NEW WASHER...heaven knows we don't want that 1978 (?) beauty marked on...