Fun times to rid us of boringness!

This month we have been going through a series called “One Month to Live.” This has been an intense time in my life for God teaching me so many things about prioritizing and living my life to the fullest extent and making every second, every minute, every hour, and every day count. I can tell you the countless number of things that I’ve learned but honestly there isn’t enough time or space to do it. But I have to show you this video. This is a story of a woman at our church and I just don’t think we put people’s real life stories out there enough. So here is one that you must hear.

Visit the website and let me know what you think about the video.

Monica Pryor

Yesterday was a really great day!

• Sunday was awesome. I absolutely love teaching kids how to find Jesus and how He wants to take care of them their entire life. And by absolutely love I went like 15 minutes over in the 10 o clock service! Oops, sorry Laurie
• High School D-teams started last night. I am so excited to get in on the lives of some teens and I am praying that they take a bigger step up this year and change our community.
• Incredibly fun night with my wife and Josh and Renae. We haven’t had as much time to hang out with them now that I don’t live in the basement any more. But it was a blast and it should happen a lot more often.
• Bigger and Bigger steps at Brookwood are happening. I am loving that God has placed me in a church that is growing and faithful to God’s word! I love what is happening and am humbled that God has let me be a part of it.

last week I was 5-3 once again. That puts me at 10-6 for the year.

NCAA last week: 4-1

NFL: 1-2

So this week here are my picks for the weekend:

NCAA

Notre Dame over Purdue

Memphis over Arkansas St.

LSU over Miss. St.

Clemson over Maryland

Upset pick: Alabama over Georgia.

NFL picks:

Minnesota over Tennessee

Carolina over Atlanta

San Diego over Oakland

There they are weigh in and let me know what you think.

Ok so I’m going to catalyst and I’m pumped! If you are going I want to know what are you excited about? Who do you want to hear speak?

I am really excited for Giglio, but I am so excited to hear Steven Furtick speak, its crazy.

So what are you excited about if you are going to Catalyst?

Me too. So I will satisfy that desire with one of my favorites:

Booyah!

So I have learned so much in the past few days. Reading has such a big impact on my life. Today I want to look at a verse that most of you out there know. But look at it from a perspective that you might not have done before.

John 14:6

Jesus answered “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Now most of us have seen this verse and usually teach it in this way. There is no way to the Father except through Jesus Christ. There is no way to get into heaven except through the life of Christ. He is the only way that we gain acceptance by the Father except through Jesus.

But let’s look at a different part. “I am the truth” See we often read the Bible searching for the truth of God’s words. But Jesus said I am the truth.

Maybe some of you ask yourselves what really is truth. In this age of relativism it is important to talk about truth and where we stand. The reality is that Jesus is truth. Does this demean the Bible in some way? No reflect back on the first chapter of John. But regardless everything that we believe in or that we consider truth is summed up in the person of Christ.

He is the truth. When we want to know how to believe or how to deal with something or how to minister look at Christ period. The reality is that until I really looked at Christ being “The Truth” did I ever engage in studying how he really did things.

He spoke to crowds regardless of their standing in society.

He trained and chilled with those closest to him.

He found the least of those (me) and He spent time with them meeting there needs first and then speaking Himself aka Truth into their lives.

He respected people and didn’t demand anything from them.

He wanted the best for everyone.

He committed Himself to purity

He relied on the power of the Father to transform lives instead of His own deity.

So tell me what does this mean for you?

Its funny sometimes the sayings that we adapt. This is one that I have lived alot of my life by. Practice makes perfect. It was baseball, then basketball, and then ministry. I’m only 22 so sometimes I wonder just how much any wisdom that I have gained is really worth.

Practice honestly, never makes perfect. Never. However, practice does make better. But the reality we need to grasp is how much better does it make us? If we continue to do the things that we have always done, just because we do them and have practiced does that make it effective?

The truth is the way that we get better is sometimes to honestly look at our life and see it in a new perspective. We always need people in our life that will help us look at our life in an honest and objective way. If you want to get to the next level it will take alot more than practice. It takes honesty and humility.

So practice but remember to stay focused on your goal and if things need to be changed, then don’t hesitate. Do it.

My schedule is going to get more crazy and strenuous in the coming weeks which excites me and dissapoints me at the same time.

Basketball starts tomorrow night. So if you are in the Greenville, SC area. I invite you to the South Campus at Brookwood Church at 7:30 to see some ball being played. I am really out of shape but in a little better shape than I thought I would be at this point so I’m feeling ok about where I’m at.

On Wednesdays we are in the process of upgrading our childcare. It is an awesome opportunity to teach and train some great childcare workers how to give even more value to the kids. It is really cool to see kids growing in their faith and it is even cooler to be a facilitator in that.

Sundays very soon will be breakthrough times for kids. There is something coming that is going to blow the minds of our kids and prepare them for something our church has never seen. Or any church for that matter. But… I can’t reveal what it is yet!

So my schedule is getting packed and packed but I just love what I do. Nothing brings me more joy than seeing people grow in their faith, especially kids. I’m so humbled by what God has allowed me to do on a weekly basis. It’s ridiculous how cool my job is!

Ok so the past two Sunday’s at Brookwood have been incomparable to anything that I have personally seen in church. Last week leading off with our “One Month to Live” series. And continuing that this week. Last night we also had our Volunteer Appreciation night where over 1,000 Volunteers arrived to be congratulated and served on their night.

Then Perry delivered a stammering message to the people letting them know how incredibly proud he was of their efforts and that we are just beginning.

Now I’m sure that you have heard this before about “just the beginning” or “best days are ahead”. It’s pretty much VisionCasting 101. But Perry is a different human being. He doesn’t deliver messages like these. And on top of that He is celebrating 15 years of Brookwood. from 75 to 7500 in 15 years is incredibly huge and can only be explained by the supernatural presence of God in this place.

Yesterday was life changing and like Perry said, “Brookwood’s best days are ahead!”