Phil Wickham

Phil Wickham is offering his first live album, Singalong, as a free download. It is only available on his website. Be sure to download the album and let me know what you think!

Thanks to Scott for posting this on his blog!

WeTheChurch.org Goes Live!

A couple of weekends ago Scott had me work on a small project for him and today it finally went live. The website is www.WeTheChurch.org and it’s a place for visitors to post prayer requests and praises.

Here are a couple of points about it:

• You don’t have to have an account to make a post
• The only information saved is your 140 character post and the date and time your post was submitted
• People can stay up to date on the posts by subscribing to the RSS feed or by following it on Twitter

The site is very simple and plain but I think it really becomes useful when people start using it with Twitter. If you haven’t heard about the Twitter service before it’s new fangled way to stay up to date with people. People can post 140 character messages and anyone following that person can be updated through text, IM, RSS feeds, or the website. So in WeTheChurch’s scenario, whenever someone posts a prayer request, everyone following the WeTheChurch Twitter account can have the prayer request instantly IM’ed to them, text messaged to them, or show up in their RSS reader. I think it’s really cool that people’s needs and praises can be known about so quickly and directly!

I also think think it’s good that it keeps you mindful of others and how you never know what they might be going through. At the same time it helps you stay mindful of God and everything that he’s working on in other people’s lives.

Visit the site a couple of times a day and take a few minutes to pray and rejoice with others. You get a real sense of the world calling out to God and a real sense of all the blessings that God is pouring out on people’s lives. Want to know something else? When we call out to God we’re not an anonymous request thrown into a pool of others, he knows us personally and can meet us right where we’re at.

Amazing Grace

I once was lost but now am found.

Some of you may not know this, but every Wednesday night I teach a group of Kindergarteners at AWANAs. There are many times when it feels more like babysitting, but there have definitely been some rewarding times. Last night, a couple of things happened that made it so worth it.

First, one of my little girls told me that whenever she has to write about a special friend in school, she always writes about me. I thought that was so sweet. Later when I saw the girl’s mom, she confirmed what her little girl had told me. I guess I never realized how much my kids really looked up to me. It just confirms how much I should be growing in my relationship with Christ so I can be a better example to them.

And now for the even better news (not that one of my kids looking up to me isn’t great)… One of my girls accepted Christ to be her Lord and Savior! YAY! What amazing news and what a time to rejoice in Him. She is actually new to AWANAs and came as a guest before. Then, she decided she l0ved it and wanted to come back. She has been a member of AWANAs for the past two or three weeks and has been thinking about being saved since she started. She is an amazing girl and I pray that she will continue to grow her relationship with the Lord. Her mom already informed me that all she talks about during the week is going to AWANAs. How wonderful is that!

Falling in Love with Jesus

I didn’t make any New Year’s resolutions, but I have decided to grow in my relationship with Christ. To do this, I have started doing 3 things on a daily basis.

1. I have started doing a daily devotional.
2. I have started a journal.
3. I have decided to read more God-centered books.

• Awhile ago, like a year or two ago, I got the Women of Faith Daily Devotional. I said I was going to do the devotional each day, it wouldn’t take much time. I never did it. The book has been sitting on the bookshelf for awhile now. I finally decided to pull it back out. I decided that it was time to focus on the Lord more. I don’t have any excuses left. Many times I am sitting at home bored, now I can use the time to be with God.

• Thanks to Morgan and her post about “Answered Prayer,” I have decided to start a journal. It was originally going to be a prayer journal, but I decided to simply make it a journal where I would not only write about my prayers, but I could also write down other thoughts I had that I wanted to share with the Lord and also be able to reflect back on. It is amazing how many prayers and praises I actually have. I know that using this journal will help me grow in my relationship with Christ because it will let me see how the Lord is working in my life.

• Finally, I have decided to read more God-centered books. The first one I am reading is called “Falling in Love with Jesus.” This book focuses on our Bride/Bridegroom relationship with Jesus. It is easy to relate to because it uses humor, contemporary love songs, real-life stories (as well as stories from movies), and solid Biblical teaching to help women discover a life-changing intimacy with Jesus. The book was written by two women, one who has been married for over 35 years and one who is still single even though she is in her mid-40’s; therefore, any woman should be able to read this book and get some value from it.

• PS- Did anyone notice the new header? The picture is one of our engagement pictures taken in St. Augustine.