Avoiding Evil

I left with Christopher to go to the Southern Baptist Convention this morning, not knowing that this would be a rough day. When we made it to the hotel, finally, they told us that they had accidently overbooked us and had to ship us somewhere else. After about 3 hours of getting to the new hotel, getting registered, and finding out where we were then we finally made it to the pastor’s conference to hear Johnny Hunt speak. Tomorrow the convention begins early in the morning. We had reservations at the Loews Vanderbilt hotel and they shipped us over to the Opry hotel. The Opry is not as nice as the Vanderbilt, but it works. I think they are giving us free rooms and free parking because of this mistake.

If you want to see the SBC Sessions for tomorrow you can watch a webcast at www.sbc.net. Each session will be archived for later viewing.

I have often wondered what strange, vile things we put into our bodies each day unknowingly. It seems that the city of Sullivan, MO has recently announced that its public water supply has been contaminated with a chemical called Trichloroethylene or TCE. Prolonged exposure to TCE causes severe damage to the liver, lungs, kidneys, and central nervous system, including nausea, unconsciousness, cancer, or even death. It also has the potential to reduce the property values in and around the Sullivan area due to the poor water supply. Seems that a local piston factory had dumped its waste years ago and it is seeping into the water supply. Yay.

It is hard to imagine how many different chemicals and contaminants that we get exposed to everyday. Especially if you eat at restaurants with other people preparing your food. I can’t imagine the amount of strange things that I have been exposed to… kinda scary.

It is official, my memory is getting worse. Today I was preparing to go fishing and in the process I placed my phone on the hood of my truck. Unfortunatly I forgot about it and drove off. With the wonderful luck I have the phone decided to ride on the truck for a long time. So long in fact that it didn’t slip off in my driveway, but instead slipped off on Hwy C into the other lane. While sitting peacfully on the road some vehicle came by and smashed it. I found it in several peices completely crushed.

Needless to say I am phoneless and I have lost all of my phone numbers. This is a bad deal because the I can’t remember any numbers, I have to have them programed into my phone, which was obliterated. If you were a person who had your phone number programmed into my phone I need you to e-mail me and let me know what your number is again. When I get my new phone tomorrow I will program them all back in.

To see a larger picture CLICK HERE!

{POSTED BY MY LOVELY WIFE}

My grandma has been pretty sick, lately, as she is getting older and so her immune system isn’t what it used to be, that’s for sure! Anyway, she was in the hospital recently and I went to visit her. She and my grandpa live here in town and I don’t get to see them as much as I should, unfortunately. Granny, as I call her, was in the hospital with a terrible case of pneumonia, for which they were filling her with fluid through an IV since she was dehydrated as well. I sat and visited with her for a while and, before I left, asked her if she needed anything. She told me that she would love to have her reading glasses from her house so she could read the Bible that was in her room. Mind you, my granny is an amazing woman of God and a prayer warrior like you would not believe. She devours chapters upon chapters of the Bible and loves to go to church. She is truly a servant and will have many jewels in her heavenly crown one day. All this to say, the glasses may seem like a minor thing, but to her, they were so important.

I was working that day, and when I went to visit her, it was on my lunch break. I was leaving that afternoon at 4, so I decided to just wait until I got off work. When I got to my grandparents’ house, my poppa was sitting out on the front porch and, as I informed him of why exactly I was there, he told me that he had just gotten off the phone with my grandma who told him she was coming home that evening. I asked Poppa if he thought I should take the glasses out to her and he said that it may be nice for her to have a visit from me, if only for a few minutes. I agreed and was on my merry way, when my Poppa called out, “You’re just too busy, you know that?!”

That very statement got me thinking. Am I too busy? Am I getting all the important things done in my life? It is very sad to think that some of the people who are most important in my life are the first to be pushed aside when life becomes a little chaotic. This is how we are with God, however. When we’re tired or busy, often we push aside our quiet time or our devotional to catch that tv show that we just can’t miss or to go see that movie at the theater. How terrible it is that we can make time for so many other, much less important things in our lives, but we can’t take time out for our Creator and Savior.

Don’t let your life become so busy that you push away those people who mean so much and are so important to you. Make time to visit with your family and friends. You’re not going to have those people in your life here on this earth forever, so make each day count. Give God the time He deserves and you will surely be blessed beyond what you can even comprehend. A quote: “Don’t count every moment, make every moment count.”

Kendall