Category: Bible

Lion Chaser Manifesto

I have not read the book from which this comes, but a former college mate of mine posted this to his blog. I thought it was very good. To read the whole thing, surf on over to Nolan’s site and check out his blog.

Quit living as if the purpose of life is to arrive safely at death. Set God-sized goals. Pursue God-ordained passions. Go after a dream that is destined to fail without divine intervention. Keep asking questions. Keep making mistakes. Keep seeking God. Stop pointing out problems and become part of the solution. Stop repeating the past and start creating the future. Stop playing it safe and start taking risks. Expand your horizons. Accumulate experiences….

How God uses people

I read an article at esler.org today. It is a story of a blind two year old baby girl. She was blinded by her beggar parents so that she could bring in more money for the family. Shortly after they gouged out her eyes, they dumped her when the authorities learned of what the parents had done.

Mr. Esler’s point in his post is to show that God can use people to show His love to others.

God gave a perfect example of our relationship with Him. That example is the family. But sin has caused this example to break down. Our earthly fathers are not perfect. Therefore, we sometimes have a hard time understanding the role of our Heavenly Father. But God can, and does, use people to show His love to those who do not see this perfect example in their own families.

Parents, one of the goals you should have is to model God for your family. How are you doing?

Happy April Fool’s Day

This morning when I was preaching for the church service I mentioned that today is called Domingo de Ramos (Palm Sunday). Our son leaned over to my wife and asked her what that meant. She explained that it was called Palm Sunday because when Jesus entered into Jerusalem the people believed he was the Christ as fortold in the Old Testament. He had come to be their king. They laid out palm leaves for him to enter the city as a king.

Our son thought for a minute and then leaned back to my wife and asked, “Then how did it come to be known as April Fool’s day?”

How old are you?

This week we worked with a very pleasant man named Felipe. Felipe was one of our Spanish-Maya translators for the trip. He and I built a pretty good relationship through the week.

He has 5 children. The oldest studies in a seminary in the same town we live in, which is 2 hours from the village where he grew up. I think he said the oldest boy is around 25. The baby is in his early teens.

Felipe loves the Lord and dedicated this week to the work. I don’t know if he has been a part of this medical team in the past. He certainly jumped right in like he knew what he was doing.

Yesterday we were riding in the back of a truck headed back to the hotel for the last time to pick up our stuff and leave town. Felipe was with us. I asked him how old he was. His answer was classic.

“Something over 50, I think. Maybe 51 or 52.”

Day 3

I was hoping to get new pictures and a bit of a podcast out. That probably won’t happen until the weekend. I have been having too much fun with real people to spend time on the Internet playing with media.

Yesterday we saw 150 (or so) patients. We have seen between 500 and 600 patients in the 3 days so far. We have exact numbers, but I have not seen those numbers yet. We have also been able to share the message of salvation with almost all of them. There have been 88 who have accepted the Lord as their Savior via the main evangelist in the group. That does not count those who have come to the Lord by way of the doctors and med students. I know of 7, but there may be many more.

We still have today and a half day tomorrow.

I have had a blast running the last week. I have been able to run twice a day since I have been here. The people on the trip are either mid-20’s medical students or health conscious doctors. There are several runners. I have gotten to run with different ones through the week. Previous to this week I have run only 4 miles out of the 700+ miles I have logged while running with someone else. This has been fun.