Your email preview

NOW—hopefully everything is working for me again. We're 17 hours ahead of you so I wrote today's GMU and I'm sending it before I go to bed Friday night so you get it when you get up Friday morning!! Go figure!! Have a nice Thanksgiving break!

“How long will you defend the unjust?” Psalm 82:2

I little rebuke from David sometimes can be a little wake up call for where my focus and priorities might get distracted to. “How long will I find more joy in the ways of the world and by default forget that I am not called into this world to simply experience pleasure? I have been called to something greater! Pleasure is NOT bad; it just sometimes distracts me from that which is greater than pleasure—and that’s the joy of lifting someone else up.

David says instead of defending the world of injustice I am called to do 4 things:

“Defend the cause of the weak and fatherless
Maintain the rights of the poor and oppressed
Rescue the weak and needy
Deliver them from the hands of the wicked.” Vs 3-4

I can’t fix the world, but I can change my part of the world by being intentional about caring for whoever it might be that could use a word of encouragement, a prayer, a helping hand, or a voice FOR them to a world that might have written them off. I can get so absorbed in MY life that I forget about others. The call of Christianity, as I see it, is defined as “othercenteredness.” So what can I do today to defend, rescue, or deliver even one of God’s hurting children.

Thanksgiving vacation is here (AFTER your last class!) I wonder what would happen to my world if in thanksgiving I give someone else, who cannot pay me back, something to be thankful for? I wonder what would happen in your world if you did the same? I think I know, and I think you do too!

Have a great day AND a great break,

Pastor Rich

Quote for the day: Advice from An Old Farmer

Life is simpler when you plow around the stump.
A bumble bee is considerably faster than a John Deere tractor.
Words that soak into your ears are whispered… not yelled.
Forgive your enemies; it messes up their heads.
It don’t take a very big person to carry a grudge.
You cannot unsay a cruel word.
Every path has a few puddles.
When you wallow with pigs, expect to get dirty.
The best sermons are lived, not preached.
Most of the stuff people worry about ain’t never gonna happen anyway.
Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.
Live a good, honorable life… Then when you get older and think back, you’ll enjoy it a second time.
Timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a Rain dance.
If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop diggin’.
Good judgment comes from experience, and a lotta that comes from bad judgment.
Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply. Speak kindly. Leave the rest to God.
Most times, it just gets down to common sense.

PS Enjoy your break—AFTER your last class today!! See you in December!!

PPS No official Family Worship in the church but if you’re staying around why not get together in the dorm lobby and have a nice sing time!! Have a nice Sabbath. I’m preaching on Pohnpei today which for you is Friday but for me it’s already Sabbath!!