Belize here we come

Okay, so February 1st was my last blog. It is now the nineteenth and I'm happy to announce that Sunny and I are both fully funded to go to Belize. Is that crazy or what? Two days ago, Sunny was close to half funded and I had nothing. Then, yesterday, a person I know contributed $2000 to our trip. That, plus what Sunny had, put us at 3/4 funded and we needed to have 3/4 by mid-March to get the plane tickets. We were $750 short of being fully funded. Susan had taken this person's check and Sunny's money to the church to turn it in. Before she got home, I was checking my email and found that someone else put $750 towards our trip; making it 100 % funded!
God is so good!! It is hard to put into words how I felt when I received this news. All I can say is that there is no doubt that God wants us to go. I personally want to thank all that contributed and all of the prayers. It is not over yet, so please keep us in your prayers; Sunny and I and the team that we will be going with. Pray for the people we will be ministering to as well. This has been a good lesson for me on the power of prayer. I asked that we would be funded early and we were. What I did not expect is to have it all come in at one time. God still continues to amaze me.
Taking it to the street; 1) Allow God to guide you to try something new.
                                  2) Trust that if he wants you to do whatever it is he will provide.
Pressing on with excellence!!
Keith

Change your world III

So, going along with the same scripture we looked at in the last blog; Acts 8:9-24, and remembering our quest to have the power of the Holy Spirit at work in us, we saw that Simon had pride and bitterness in his life that blocked him from the receiving the Holy Spirit. Why do you suppose the others didn't receive the Spirit? I'm not a theologian and I probably have more questions than answers so bear with me. Does this mean that, in order to receive the Spirit, I need to have someone lay hands on me to receive the Spirit? I don't find this to be biblical. When the Spirit first came nobody laid hands on anyone. Here's what I'm thinking; these people believed in Jesus but they were still following Simon. He had built up a following. Look at vs. 10 and 11 again. I think they were distracted by Simon. Just him being there took their focus off where it should have been. They placed their trust in a man, not in God. Translation; when we put our trust in anything other than God we have effectively shut the door on the Holy Spirit to work in our life. So what is your focus on? Are you being distracted? If so by what? What is it that you are focusing on whether intentionally or not?
Pressing on with excellence!!
Keith

Change Your World

 I've been trying to figure out what the key is to drawing upon the power of the Holy Spirit, because I'm convinced that if the power of the Holy Spirit was in our lives it would change our world. So, for the next few blogs we will explore this issue. I've written before about the fruit of the Spirit and I believe that these fruit are the what of the power; meaning, that if we have the fruit of the spirit; love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, faithfulness, goodness, gentleness, and self control, that is how the power is manifested in our lives. So, what would your life look like if no matter what happened you had the fruit of patience. Can you imagine having peace most of the time? Or being kind and loving? How would your life look if you had goodness and gentleness, faithfulness, not to mention self control. See, if Christ followers had this power, and we do, it stands to reason that we are wasting our lives if we don't utilize it. This is not self help, this is a God intervention that allows us to be different from the world. So, we will explore what it takes to tap into His power. Are there things that we can do? Romans 8:6 is my life verse and I think it is the answer. But how do we do this? That is what I will be writing about over the next few weeks.
Pressing on with Excellence!!
Keith

Passing it on

 I wanted to comment about what we talked about in the last post. One of the things that I learned over the years is that, left to my own devices, I cannot change anything on my own. No matter how much I wished I could change, I could not do it myself; the power wasn't there. I have learned to allow  the Holy Spirit to control my mind. When the Holy Spirit controls my mind, then I act differently, almost without trying. It just happens. So when it comes to my kids I teach them to do this to the best of my ability. I only have them for a little while. I teach them how to make good choices to the best of my ability. What I'm trying to do is to prepare them because I know someday they are going to be put in a position to choose for themselves. I pray they will make the right decision, but, ultimately, it is their decision to make. To do that they will also need to learn to trust Him. If you know that God loves you, and is with you, and cares about you. Then you can have confidence that what is happening to you is for His glory and good. The best I think we can do is to prepare them for that day. If they screw up they will at least know where they can turn. If they learn how to allow the Holy Spirit to control their mind and are guided by the Spirit then they are in good hands and I don't have to worry about their future. Are you passing it on if so how?
Passing it on with excellence !!
Keith 

The Gifts Of The Spirit

I had been a Christian for a good 16 years before I really accepted Christ's forgiveness, When I finally did, I grew more spiritually in the next four years than I did in the sixteen years prior. I found myself asking why or how that happened. I think it is because of the influx of the Holy Spirit and with it the fruits of the spirit. The fruits of the spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. I could not produce these on my own, I tried and tried and failed. It also seemed that the harder I tried, the more I failed. I knew what I needed to do but I couldn't do it on my own. The spirit produces these in me as I turn my will over to him. When this does happen, things change rapidly. You actually give a rip about others, you care. You let others go in front of you. You know instinctively when to shut up. You are quick to forgive and fast to straighten out situations when you were wrong. You are able to say no to yourself. These are how the fruits of the spirit showed up in my life. How about you? Do you have the gifts of the Spirit? Is life different for you? Do you want it to be?
Pressing on with excellence!!
Keith

The Present of the Present

Well, since it’s Christmas, I thought it only fitting that I should look at another gift that God gives us. That is the gift of the Present. Right now is where we can enjoy the peace that God gives us. Not in the past or in the future, only right now.

Too many times I find myself worrying about what is going to happen in the future or re-hashing what has happened in the past. There is nothing wrong with mulling over what has happened in the past. Especially if it concerns making things right. But I can’t spend all my time there. If I do then I miss out on what God is doing in my life right now. It is also good to think about the future and make goals to give me something to strive for. But if I spend all of my time there, once again I miss out on what God is doing right now.

Sometimes I worry about only having a small amount of money in my wallet till payday. And I’m not grateful that I have money in my wallet right now. I don’t know what the future may bring but right now I’m okay. I need to think about how good it is right now rather than to worry about what it could be. I don’t know what the future holds, but God does.
But at this moment I have food, clothes, money, and a place to live. I have a wonderful wife and 2 great kids. Things are really better than I deserve.

What are you thinking about right now? The Bible says in James 1: 17 that everything that is good and perfect comes from God. Can you see anything good in your life right now? If so then know that God is working in your life right now. The time is now. It is the only place that you can enjoy the Presence of God.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Pressing On With Excellence,
Keith