Dear Brothers and Sisters,
• A short devotional reminder for news-aholics like me who follow Libya, tsunamis, and oil price fluctuations feverishly. By Scotty Smith—“At the end of that time, I, Nebuchadnezzar, raised my eyes toward heaven, and my sanity was restored. Then I praised the Most High; I honored and glorified him who lives forever. His dominion is an eternal dominion; his kingdom endures from generation to generation. All the peoples of the earth are regarded as nothing. He does as he pleases with the powers of heaven and the peoples of the earth. No one can hold back his hand or say to him: “What have you done?” Daniel 4:34-35 Almighty Father, I need to “bookmark” this passage and return to it often, for it doesn’t just tell the conversion story of a pagan King, it’s the ongoing story of my heart. We’re never more sane than when we raise our eyes towards heaven and focus our attention on you. Navel gazing, circumstance watching and daily-news fixating never serve us well. Father, help us to understand the glorious implications of your perpetual enthronement. Your dominion as the only eternal dominion. November elections and political insurrections; the world economy and temperature instability; earthquakes and oil leaks; multiplied conspiracies and conservative tea parties don’t affect your reign one micro-bit for one nanosecond. Keep us sane, Father, keep us gospel-sane.”
• Pray for Blair Commons – he’s headed to Japan tomorrow for two weeks to help coordinate our missionaries’ disaster response.
• Pray for one another – we have a lot of folks hurting. Dale McCollough has been part of SRPC since the beginning. He has served as an elder here and at our sister church Nature Coast in Homosassa. Dale has been diagnosed with MSA – Multiple System Atrophy – a progressive neurological disorder that impairs movement, disrupts balance and causes muscle rigidity. Dale and Debbie will need our love and prayer as they push back against this disorder. Lori Sutherland just joined SRPC and this week was diagnosed with cancer and is in surgery today. I love what she wrote, “I’m kind of surprised at how well I’m taking the news but I think part of that may be my new found faith & knowing I have SRPC for support if I need it. Funny how typing these words brings tears to my eyes but being told I had cancer did not.” Pray for Lori.
• Hunger Week approaches. Here is one family’s chronicle of reducing what they spend on themselves in order to give more away to others. On Saturday, April 2 – worship is at 5:00 p.m. and on Sunday, April 3 worship is at 10:00 a.m. Both services are celebrated with grocery shopping and dinner to follow!
• Does this little factoid surprise you? “A recent study of 400 drivers in a shopping mall found that drivers took longer to pull out of a space if someone was waiting than if nobody was waiting there to claim the space. This study discovered if nobody was waiting for the space, drivers took 32 seconds to open their door, get in and pull out of their spot. If they saw that someone was waiting for them, they took an average of nearly 10 more seconds to pull out. And if that waiting driver honked – they too another 5 seconds.”
• Staff changes abound. Helen Reid, Adam Jones’ uber-capable assistant, is moving with her husband Alex to the state of Washington (but not before we finish celebrating her birthday which is tomorrow). Taylor Swander’s fruitful internship with our student ministry is also concluding at the end of April. Helen and Taylor have been delightful members of our team. Long time staffer Robyn Shipes is rejoining our team to work in Adult Ministry and Pastoral Care. Everyone loves Robyn and we are thrilled to have her back!
• I’ll be preaching this week on James 5:1-6. If you’ve stopped reading Mark – why not start again with Mark 11 and follow our pastor’s as they blog. I’ll see you this weekend in worship!
Love,
Ray
