E-mail Encouragement: Are You Excited?!

Are you excited? Not for anything specific, but just excited. When you're excited about something you tend to show it. That said, here is this week's quote...

Enthusiasm is excitement with inspiration, motivation, and a pinch of creativity.
~ Bo Bennett

You've probably heard that "enthusiasm is contagious, be a carrier". If you are working this week, normally people "wear down" toward the end. What can you do to keep the morale up? Maybe buy that "downer" a soda or snack that they really like and tell them it was "just because" or something like that. If you are at home, maybe do something nice for your family member, that is out of the blue. What about in the assembly? I challenge everyone to pray on Saturday and/or Sunday for God to give us good night's of rest, easy "get ready" time on Sunday, and that God would prepare our hearts and minds before hand to come together with the family to learn about and praise Them (Father, Son, Holy Spirit).

This week will be a smile week. See if you can smile before the other person smiles at you. If it's a tie or if either person never had an expression other than a smile, that's OK. See what happens! As a "warm-up" start practicing on those you come in contact with from now till Sunday!

Monday Mentinings: Being Christ's Church

Praise Him for the rain! I don't know how much we received, but anything is great! I am glad that it didn't dampen (all pun intended) our picnic plans yesterday! After the clearing it turned out to be a great afternoon.

As a "between series" sermon, yesterday we looked at some of the things it actually means to be a "church" "of" "Christ". As we didn't deal with traditions or what excludes us from others. Here are applications to yesterday's lesson...

1. What is one thing you can do to become less worldly and at the same time, blend in to the world. In other words, taking a stand for something you believe in is not being worldly, but not making it a big ordeal and not making yourself look "fanatical" is blending in. Pray that God gives you a clear area that shows you an area to apply this.
2. Think about what you can do (individually) to make this church feel more connected. Maybe using your talents to organize, greet, host, encourage, or any number of things to help us grow closer together.
3. Daring, caring, unbiased, unprejudiced, sacrificial, unselfish - which of these are your weakest? Jesus was each one of these - as we strive to be more like Christ, we much humble ourselves to understand what areas we are weakest in and pray about them. Praise God for those you are strongest in and ask that you remain strong in them.

Are you ready to "build a wall"? Each one us is going to be needed to create a "stronghold"! We are going to be looking at Nehemiah in a couple of weeks!

God bless you as you continue on in your week! May you be given ample opportunities to connect people closer to Jesus!

Monday Mentionings: Fishing for Your Attention - Exodus 3

It has been a long two weeks since I sent out the last Monday Mentionings! With going to Kansas and all the fun of "baby" stuff, seems like a lot has gone on in a short amount of time!

Saturday night was a meeting of our Vision Team...and man, was I pumped after that meeting. God is working in those team members! I am looking forward to the next time, already! I love to hear about others' ideas and how God is working in their lives. It totally inspires me to do more for God and His Kingdom! I was so full of "shazam" (that is the best "excitement" word) that it took me quite a while to fall asleep on Saturday. I was pumped for seeing everyone and teaching and preaching. And I was already ready for Monday to come, to start on specific things.

As yesterday was Father's Day, I hope that all the fathers were able to have a "catered" day! God calls men to be the spiritual leaders. That was one of the goals in the sermon yesterday...to step up to the challenge. Here are some additional applications to use...

1. Where is your environment in which you spend a lot of your time? God is asking you to serve Him there. He is putting before you ways in which you can serve Him. If your home is not perfect - which I would say that there isn't one - then you have a challenge there. If your workplace is not perfect, then you have a challenge there, too. The challenge to the challenge is to discern what the specific challenge is for you in the environment. Ask God to lead you in the wisdom to know how you are to be used by God in your environment. It could be somewhere else, even.
2. Watch out for the hook! God may hook you into doing something that you never thought you would be involved in! Maybe it will be through some friends or through a hobby that you have that may open doors for ways to use it.
3. God needs you! As it took some humility for Simon to accept help from the Lord, may you also be humble and accept/look for help from Him. What will God fill your "net" with???

Have a surprise-filled week!

Casting my net ~
Jarrod

E-mail Encouragement: A Positive Attitude

I hope your week has been amazing! Whether or not you see it that way, it has been. As a member of the Kingdom, you get to walk with God every day of your life! To have the Spirit as your guide in life is amazing! This is an amazing privilege! Not everyone gets to have that privilege. Take advantage of it...and praise God for it! What a "gift"!

This quote was an inspiration to me...

Our lives are not determined by what happens to us but by how we react to what happens, not by what life brings to us, but by the attitude we bring to life. A positive attitude causes a chain reaction of positive thoughts, events, and outcomes. It is a catalyst, a spark that creates extraordinary results.

I read an article recently that talked about how we don't have bad "days" but we have bad "moments". The bad moments cause us to choose whether or not we are going to have bad days. We can use those moments to learn from and make the best of the rest of the day or we can dwell on them. When you see that the "moment" was bad, it causes us to have a positive attitude toward the rest of the day, and looking at the day as a day of opportunity.

As we team up with God to bring people closer to His Son, may your positive attitude be the catalyst that sparks extraordinary results in your life!!!

Have an extraordinary day!

Monday Mentionings: Where Are You? - Genesis 3:8-10

What a great start to a week! Getting to go to my weekly "family reunion" followed up by spending more time with you in the early afternoon. Then, just taking some time to do stuff at home. I was excited to begin the week!

I am still going over that Romans 12:6 verse...that talks about the same God working through us all. As I was thinking about it later...maybe it isn't as fascinating when we're all in the same room together, but when you think about it today...when we're miles apart...WOW...it is fascinating! If we spread a net out as far as each family is at this very minute...think of all the "fish" we could catch!!!

So, "Where are You?" At this time, you have to be either reading this in front of a computer screen or you printed it out to read. If you heard yesterday, you know that the question is not about where you are physically, so much, but where you are in 'life', 'death', and 'in the family'. Try these applications on for the week...

1. Have you been able to be the real you today? Have you been able to show how your day is REALLY going? Have you been able to show what you are truly like to the person you had contact with today? Evaluate your day and see how you can let others see the real you. Maybe one area of "realness" would be to let others know how much you enjoy your victory in Christ. As a simple example, invite someone you know to one of our many events coming up...ice cream night, church picnic, baseball game, football game, etc.
2. Have you been hiding already today? Are you fearful of something? It could be something that happened long before yesterday. Something in your marriage, personal life, or relationship with God? What do you need to die to in order to enjoy life? Pray that God will help you with whatever you are needing to "die" to.
3. Where do you fit into the Body? Do you support - like back and torso? Do you protect - like ribs? Do you take us places - like legs and feet? Do you carry - like arms and hands? Do you pray, encourage, dream, etc.? Those are all positive, and I am not going to provide examples of the negative side of things. I hope you want to be one of those, or something like them, to allow the rest of the Body to flourish. The Kingdom needs doers, not "heel draggers". God is working through each one of us! What will He do through you?

I hope you have a "surprise-filled" week! Let me know what God is doing in your life!

E-mail Encouragement: What Can You Achieve?

Wasn't last night good!? I hope you had a good time singing, praying, hearing the Word, and hearing how God has been working in the lives of many people. God is Good! All the Time!

What can you achieve?...

My mother taught me very early to believe I could achieve any accomplishment I wanted to. The first was to walk without braces.
Wilma Rudolph, 1940-1994, Olympic Gold Medalist

God can definitely do some amazing things in people! We all seem to have moments of wearing braces on our spiritual legs. We may want to do big things for God, but we need to throw the braces to the side in order to do them. Unfortunately, about the time we are ready to take the braces off, we lose our confidence and put the braces right back on. What is it that you want to do with/for God? What is something you're afraid of doing that will impact the Kingdom, but afraid to take the braces off? If you have no answer, then you are definitely wearing braces and are "used" to them. If you said what you were wanting to do - then pray and ask that God remove those fears from you.

Praying we remove our "braces" and each do big things for God!

Have a week filled with (good) "surprises"!

Monday Mentionings: Remembering - Deuteronomy 8:2-3

Happy Memorial Day! I hope you all are having a great Memorial Day!

Yesterday, we focused on what Memorial Day is all about…remembering - from Deuteronomy 8:2-3. Remembering loved ones and those who’ve died in armed services, but not forgetting about what we have in Christ – the freedoms, the victories, the blessings, the forgiveness, etc. As you reflect back, think about these additional applications…

1. Egypt was the place of slavery to the Israelites. Sin is our place of slavery. When were you led out of sin? What did it feel like? After you have been out of that “land” of slavery, do you continue to praise Him for being out of that “land” or are you getting so used to it that you have forgotten what it was like to be there? As you read this, say a praise prayer to God for delivering you from your “Egypt”.
2. When was the last time that you were humbled? What was the method in which you were humbled? Humility helps us focus more on Him and not on us – as He is the one who provides. As you go through your week, look at life through eyes that see life as an opportunity to focus on Him and not on you. Try to keep to the forefront of your day that you are a “connector” – helping people be one “connection” closer to Jesus!
3. Testing reveals if we’ve grasped the concept. James challenges his readers by saying that if we have faith, there will be actions that reveal that. On the flipside, faith without actions is dead (James 2:14-16). Our faith is not limited to “staying with God” but it also includes having faith that He will be with us when we see someone who needs Jesus and talk to them about Him or praying to Him about something that may seem impossible to you but knowing that He could make it possible. I have talked about praying for “surprises” – do you have the faith that you are willing to pray that and see what God will do in your life? Try it…you might like it! I know I have loved being a part of God’s “game” and seeing what’s “around the corner”!

God brought an encouraging day to me today! Through a few people…that was what I reflected back on as a few of His “surprises” that He brought my way…What were yours???

Remembering…