Tornado's In California?

When I heard there were tornado's in California which touched down and caused a train to derail so close to home, It certainly caught my attention, especially so close to my in-laws home (about 15-20 miles away) off the I-215 close to March AFB. Earthquakes in California are a dime a dozen, tornado's not so much. What could possibly be next on the horizon?

Money Study - "It Just Makes Cents!"

Tonight was my 3rd week in leading a money study small group at my church. This study teaches GOD's principles about money. This experience has been wonderful thus far and the group is committed to the study. There has been excellent dialog and there have been some good questions and I hope I can guide them with the best options or guide them (as I identify) to the appropriate subject matter expert.

This evening we went over the curriculum and we provided a nice sheet of good advice which was provided to me <here> when I was going through training for this study. Here are a couple of some good take aways from this blog:

1. Save for retirement now
2. God blesses those who tithe
3. Live by a Budget
4. No spontaneous purchases

I look forward to next week with my small group.

The amazing Jesus

Here is a little comic relief for the day.

Conversational Prayer...Its my Kryptonite Part 2

I mentioned the other day how conversational prayer is my kryptonite. Well its interesting how this weekends message was speaking directly to me, and I happened to check out Ben Sigman's Blog (Eastlake's co-pastor) and person who taught the message over the weekend.

His message and his blog were quite helpful and answered my questions. I prayed for an answer, and received one, now I need to put this into practice.

Is the Bible True? Evolution vs Intelligent Design?

My small group has gone back to the basics and its wonderful. Our leaders have delved into the Eastlake Church archive for our small group discussion titled, "I Believe - A Foundation for Faith". For me this is a perfect timing to go through this because I have had an experiential experience in coming to Christ and being saved. Now I want to educate myself

I am getting questions from my children about dinosaurs etc and from others who are seeking Christ and ask, "Is the Bible true and accurate? How do we know we have the Real Bible? Frankly, I am not well equipped YET to answer these question. Its scary because my response to these questions are important. As one of the small group leaders says, "It's OK to say, I don't know". I have learned in this study its OK to question GOD. It one of the ways you solidify and continue to build the relationship with Our Father. Seek the answer.

I happened to be seeking answers to questions and ran across this trailer <Here>. It seems to be a perfect documentary to see as a group so I shared with my small group family. Perhaps we will all put the kids with sitters and we will all take a field trip to watch this together. It opened recently in April and It looked interesting.

I am excited as I continue to feed myself and grow as a Christian. We have a very strong small group and I only see our faith grow stronger as we all learn and share together. I feel blessed.

Here are some resources to check out if you have questions:

WEBSITES

1. http://www.drdino.com/
2. http://www.creation.com/
3. http://www.allaboutgod.com/
4. www.ibs.org/bibles/about/index.php

BOOKS

1. The Case for Faith - Strobel
2. The Case for Christ - Strobel
3. More Than a Carpenter - McDowell

Amen!

Today at lunch my oldest son wanted to share with the family he can recite the alphabet in Spanish. (He goes to Spanish immersion school - all curriculum is taught in Spanish). We were gathered around listening to him recite his alphabet proudly, at which point when he finished his younger brother said excitedly, "Amen!" and was about to dig in to his lunch (he is only 4). It was hilarious!

I am happy see he knows to pray before eating, but concerns me, cause i am sure he was only thinking of the delicious food in front of him.

I have some work to do. At least its a fun adventure for all of us.

Warning! Beware of Creamsicles!!

When I look at this picture now I see an excited young child ready to devour the delicious goodness of a creamsicle aka 50/50 bar....Little does he know he is in for a hurtin.

I accompanied my son to his friends 5th Birthday party, Yeah! It was his first birthday bowling bash! Upon leaving the party, my son saw the ice cream vending machine with the mechanical arm that retrieves your selection. I thought it would be cool to watch and also cause I was eyeing the 50/50 bar for myself. My son decided on the chocolate eclair, those are quite delicious as well, but my sights were on the hard orange Popsicle shell and vanilla inside. As I open his ice cream eclair and walked out in the scorching sun, I opened my ice cream bar ready to devour like that young boy in the picture above. Upon my first taste of the childhood favorite, my lips and tongue were stuck to the Popsicle!! (Think Dumb and Dumber - Tongue on ice cold pole scene). I attempted to pull the bar from my lips and tongue and they would stretch out stuck to the bar. Every time i would try to lick the areas which were stuck on my lips with my tongue, my tongue would keep getting stuck as well. Well in the moment, I panicked and started to twist the creamsicle to release my lips from the ice cream bar...it worked, however in the process I pulled chunks of skin from my lips!! Picture(s) attached.

This was definitely a teaching in patience and humility. I mean, I was walking out in broad daylight and had a creamsicle, "the childhood favorite" stuck and hanging from my lips and tongue, with blood running down by lips and the ice cream bar as I am twisting my lips from it and at least 20 - 25 people looking at me...yup I was embarrassed.

Conversational Prayer, its my Kryptonite....

I officially have lead my first small group (really not so small, there are about 18 in my group out of 80+) this evening. I rarely have no problems with public speaking, teaching, guiding in front of people. As a matter of fact once I get going its really hard to shut me up.

Although when it comes to starting or ending in prayer my heart starts to race, thoughts start to get cloudy...I FREEZE up. I hear the words "lets pray" or "we are going to do conversational prayer so please feel free to pray and participate", and I start to cringe like superman does when Kryptonite is near. In tonight's small group I felt like I barely got through the closing prayer. But I did it and I didn't feel 100%.

I also realized in my current couples small group I have not participated in opening or closing prayer. Is there something wrong with me? Does this make me a bad Christian follower? Do others have the same problem? I pray daily at home with the family and have no issues, why is this different when with others?

I know my heart wants to, but I feel like my brain is going to lock up, and all people will hear is either "crickets" or "umm, ahhh, hmmm.....", next thing I know the next person is already praying in the group. I am really starting question my praying ability in a group setting.

Lord, I pray for strength and wisdom. I am not looking to lead the perfect prayer and pluck the perfect verse from memory, I just want to say something and be authentic and share my heart to You and others.

I love witnessing and hearing GOD's work - Part 2

I was invited by a friend from my small group and a pastor at my church to accompany him to a different church in Santa Barbara CA. He was asked to guest speak and give the message.

Earlier that week I has been thinking of a high school friend cause my wife and I just bought our son his first drum set and was thinking how cool it would be for my friend (Ronnie Manaog) to teach my son.

On the way to Santa Barbara my friend asked me out of the blue if I have ever seen or heard of Saddleback church. I told him I have heard of it but never seen it. We decided to take a detour and check the campus out. Earlier that month I just got back from MinistryTECH 2008 in Oklahoma, so I saw this as another opportunity to see what this church does from a techs perspective.

We decided to sit in the main sanctuary and listen to worship. At the end of the set I noticed a person on the big screen and asked my friend of the person playing drums was Filipino. I told him I think that is my friend from High School. He responded with, "No Way, whats his name?" I told him Ronnie Manaog. We happened to be in the green room and I decided to ask what was the name of the drummer. The WL told me Ronnie, umm, and I said Manoag? He said yes thats him.

Ronnie is not a regular drummer at Saddleback he is a professional drummer on call. He was not suppose to be there, but was called last minute to play. I was not suppose to be there, I was suppose to be there, I was suppose to be on the road to Santa Barbara. This is definitely GOD's work. I wonder why He led me to Ronnie? I will keep you posted.