Some Major Encouragement

I will be touching on these verses on Wednesday night (tomorrow). As I was reading them, I was struck by the glory that was to come to Christ, and the encouragement it gives to all of us. Here it is:
Ps 22:22 ¶ I will declare thy name unto my brethren: in the midst of the congregation will I praise thee. Ps 22:23 Ye that fear the LORD, praise him; all ye the seed of Jacob, glorify him; and fear him, all ye the seed of Israel. Ps 22:24 For he hath not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted; neither hath he hid his face from him; but when he cried unto him, he heard. Ps 22:25 My praise shall be of thee in the great congregation: I will pay my vows before them that fear him. Ps 22:26 The meek shall eat and be satisfied: they shall praise the LORD that seek him: your heart shall live for ever. Ps 22:27 All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the LORD: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee. Ps 22:28 For the kingdom is the LORD'S: and he is the governor among the nations. Ps 22:29 All they that be fat upon earth shall eat and worship: all they that go down to the dust shall bow before him: and none can keep alive his own soul. Ps 22:30 A seed shall serve him; it shall be accounted to the Lord for a generation. Ps 22:31 They shall come, and shall declare his righteousness unto a people that shall be born, that he hath done this.


Doesn't that just make you cry AMEN! Praise God for His goodness.

A Message From The Hope Family

We called the Ronald McDonald House today and they have a room for us! We are in Letchfield IL for the night and we will continue on to Chicago in the morning. Breanna is holding up but in a lot of pain. Tell everyone we miss them and please continue to pray for us.
Love and Prayers,
Terry and Karen


The Hopes will be pressing on to Chicago tomorrow (Sept. 30). We are praying for healing. We want the doctors to find an answer (from God) and have a cure. Please join us in this prayer!
Scott

WOW! Those are some great pictures of the picnic! Thanks to the photographer, Jeremy Holeyfield and Robin Bardin for the post and the blog! Great job guys!

OK, Sundayschool class, get ready for Romans. We can camp ut in Romans for quite some time, as you know, but we will try to limit it (for now) to just a couple of Sundays. Harry Kite has been itching to teach and he has some great stuff lined up for us after we finish Romans.

For now, you can read as much of Romans as you can take. Specifically: 2 Cor. 13:1 compared with Acts 20:2; Romans chapter 1-to get an idea of the theme of the book; 2:11; 3:29 and 3:19,23.

Happy reading and don't forget to pray before you start! That is an important aspect of your study time. Come with questions and I'll see you on Sunday.

Scott

Church Picnic 2008

Ike-Carumba!!!

I was unaware how much wind it takes to shake the house. I can assure you that it takes a bunch, and a bunch is what we got.During the day, yesterday, I was confounded as to what project I should begin working on, here on the farm. The weather man was threatening all kinds of things, from tornadic extremes to flash flooding, all coming from Mr. Ike as he was looming below us like a cat in the weeds. I, for one, thought we were too far inland to be affected too much from a hurricane. "Aww, we'll get some rain, maybe a bit of wind." Brother, was I wrong!Anyway, I didn't know where to begin. I hated to get knee deep into something outside, just to get rained on and get all my tools wet. I needed to work on laying tile in the spare room, but we have chicks brooding in there. So, I did what any respectable man would do in this situation, I paced the floor. I don't sit well. I get antsy and fidgety. I tend to drive my wife nuts in times like this. "What should I do?" I shouldn't have asked her that.She suggested, in her sweet, loving tone, that I mix some "mud" (that's construction lingo for "mortar") and lay those already cut, waiting to be put down for years, tile sitting in a back closet.I did. I got out the mix and crunched up all the little clumps into a bucket that had been collecting moisture for ever, and mixed it up with water to FINALLY set those tiles. I get the feeling that every time I can't figure out what to do with my day, she has a list of things that need done. I don't ever have that list. I don't keep such a list. I am a man and I prefer to fly by the seat of my pants, thank you very much! God gives us wisdom in the voice of our wives.I felt pretty good at having finally gotten to those tiles. In fact, I asked myself, just what took so long. Sad thing is, I didn't have an answer. Now they just need to sit for a couple of days, then I can grout (or weeks, or months, or years...).I felt ambitious by now. I was looking for other odd jobs that I can conquer. Things to do on a rainy day that had not produced an ounce of rain yet. I sharpened some knives, cut a hole for the new cat house (why do you need a house for cats?), and even put in some time, outside, on the new chicken tractor.I was watching the sky the whole time. We even joked about how calm it seemed, that it was just the "calm before the storm". Around 4:00 pm, it did look awfully dark on the horizon. The sky turned a grey that seemed to veil all light. Still, it had not rained much.During dinner, we heard the radio sound the alarm for tornado warnings in Arkansas, just below us. Still, the weather radio never went off for us. Darker and darker the sky went. "This will pass us by without much fan fair," I'd thought.That evening, I gave the girls their bath and got them ready for bed, as usual. My wife had finished making apple sauce and cleaning up and was ready to read the girls their bedtime stories. I came into the office to upload some pics onto the blog (which you see below), all was normal. We went to be around 11:00 pm without much talk of thought to ol' Ike.I think it was around 2:00 am that I first heard the rain. It sounded like a million, no, billion drummers beating a march cadence on our metal roof. It was coming down hard! There was a point at which I thought the glass on our bedroom window might break. Around 4:30 am, I noticed the wind. The only way I can think to describe it is like being stuck behind a jet aircraft exhaust. It was a constant blast of air that shook the house. This is not to mention the gusts! I have no idea of wind speed, but it must have been nasty.From that point on, I slept very little. All I could think of was how happy I had been to get the new metal roof on the barn and not have to worry about leaks again. Then I thought about the wind ripping it off the barn. I tend to worry like that, I need to quit that. It can't be healthy.Still, the weather radio never went off, not until around 6:00 am to inform all of flash flooding. No tornadoes! I thought for sure we'd see those! I am thanking and praising God for His hand!I got up to go assess the damage and see if I could find the chicken tractors and pieces of metal roofing. I have to admit that I was surprised to find no missing metal or chicken tractors. The tractors especially as they are PVC and light weight. I am confident of the squat design to prevent the wind from rolling them, but this was a different wind that we have not experienced before. By golly, they were still there and intact! Praise God! Now I am more confident in their design than before.We lost electricity until about 8:00 am. We decided to fore go the showers and go to church anyway. I am glad we did, but I feel yucky and I need a shower. Until next time...

A Good Article By A Fellow Christian

I found this good article posted on another blog. http://www.homesteaderlife.christianagrarian.com Check it out, I feel it is worth the read.

Don't forget, there will be no Sunday school this week as we are meeting in the Sanctuary in between services for a business meeting. See you all there!

Sunday School

Hello class! This will be the last week we spend studying the Holy Spirit from the book of Acts. The following week we will move into Romans, which is exciting for me as Romans has come to mean a lot to me and my spiritual walk, I look forward to it.

I have word that Harry Kite would like to try his hand at teaching again, so you can look forward to that as well in the near future.

For this week, if you would like to read ahead, check out the following verses:
Gen. 1:2; 41:38
Isaiah 40:13; 48:16; 61:1; 63:10-14

Compared with the following:

Isaiah 11:2; 28:6

We will be taking a look at the question of a capital S and a lower case s. Good reading!

God bless you all and I look forward to seeing you Sunday.