It's Monday!

Good Morning Team,
It crept up on me after the morning worship service yesterday. It was not very noticeable for most of the day, but by midnight it was here with all its vengance...a COLD! Dr. Coleen diagnosed it as a result of flying back from Orlando last week. I don't know about that, but its got me real good. I will do my best to not pass it on to anyone, but I'm still going to Karen's tonight for our rehearsal with Sweet Aroma.

Let's continue with our thoughts about being real with God. Last week, your staff from Owego Naz was in Orlando, FL with 25,000 other Nazarenes at our quadrennial General Assembly. We worshiped with people from all over this globe and we were one in the Spirit of God. Some people wore suits and dresses, some wore jeans and T-shirts. Some wore native dress of their country. Here's a video I took in the Exhibit Hall from one of the Missions booths...

It didn't matter what we looked like on the outside...we were united by the Spirit of God. That's what matters to God, not our outward appearance, but what is in our heart.

Matthew 6 teaches us that God is not interested in the flowery speech that we associate with great prayers. Rick Warren puts it like this:

Imagine I walked in the door one evening and my kids said: "O, almighty procreator of our family. How wonderful thou art, who sovereignly deposits our allowance to us. Oh, the majesty of thy wonderful self! We beseech thee to come eat dinner with us." I'd check their temperatures to see if they were sick! I don't want to hear that. I want them to say, "Hey! Dad's home. Good to see you, Pop!"

One of our focal points at Little Church has been on being authentic with our prayer time...not flowery speech, but simple sentence prayers in normal language. Now some are admittedly very "smooth" pray-ers. Again, God is not interested in how we are able to connect our thoughts and words together in a flowing manner...He wants to hear our hearts. So when you pray, don't think about the next line you are going to pray...just tell God whats on your mind...that's what He wants :)

If you haven't signed up or emailed me that you are going to attend our Christmas Brunch on Saturday, July 18 at 10am...do it now! This is for all choir members, band members and tech members. Basically, if you are reading this, you're invited. We need to have the number by this Sunday so please let me know. Gracias!

Have an awesome week!

Blessings,

Dave