Renewed Heart Ministries

Just wanted to share a really great website: Renewed Heart Ministries. Herb Montgomery is a pastor that gets it. I'll let his messages speak for themselves: http://www.renewedheartministries.com.

Growth

I love spring time. Despite it's dangers (pollen, poison ivy, and the allure of baby animals I don't have the time/room/money to care for), I truly enjoy seeing green, lush growth after the dreary brown, dormant scenery of winter.

Spring reminds me of the seasons of growth I'm continually going through as a person and as a child of God. All I can say is I'm glad God's not through with me yet. I've been struggling... more often than not... for as long as I can remember. God has granted me triumphs and given me great blessings that I don't deserve, and yet I still feel like I'm waging a continual uphill battle.

I've been trying to pair my worries with praises...to remind myself despite what I'm facing, God has always seen me through.

Frustrations at work. But thank God for work!

Worries about money. But thank God for work and for keeping me healthy so I don't miss work!

Unresolved pain and bitterness about my mom. But thank God for granting me understanding and hope in the future -- being reunited with mom in heaven, one day experiencing the fullness of motherhood myself.

Ugh-ness. Amen!

Haha. Still a work in progress, as you can see!

Sermon Video

This is a sermon I gave at my church (Canton Adventist Church) on 4/4/2009.

The audio is HIDEOUS at the beginning,
but it gets better once my dear hubby brings me a working microphone.

brainstorming...

I've started working on my sermon and I'm feeling a little better about it. I won't feel good about it until I've finalized it though...my mind can't rest knowing I've got something important coming up.

I've decided my sermon is going to be entitled "Bringing Heaven to Earth." I've got some really good quotes and some exciting concepts going through my head that I hope I can communicate clearly and effectively. Despite how much I hate seeing videos of myself, I'm going to have Drew run our video camera this weekend and I'll post the resulting video on here for those of you who wish you could be there but can't. :)

what was i thinking?

so...i'm scheduled to "preach" at my church next weekend...

i kind of have an idea of what i want to say...

but what was i thinking?

i'm 25. i have no theological training. i'm not a "good" christian. who would want to hear me speak? i don't feel qualified.

on the one hand, makes me really grateful to be a part of a church where everyone has value... including me.

on the other hand, they must be desperate for speakers.

i'm getting really nervous...

A Sermon I Heard from a "Heretic"

Despite the rather cheesy intro, the sermon is quite fantastic. Pastor Gary asks some really good questions that I would almost be afraid to ask in my own mind, let alone in front of a whole group of people. But I think they are valid questions. I could see how the questions he asks may make some people feel uncomfortable, but I think it's because they are hard questions that challenge the way we've always believed. But I think it is important to challenge and stretch what you believe in so that when it is really tested your faith will be as strong as can be. Check it out:

There is so much beauty in this world

There is so much beauty in this world...how much do you miss?

"Many a marketing survey has been conducted to gauge how presentation affects consumer perceptions of quality, and quite a few such surveys have found that people will frequently designate one of two identical items as being distinctly better than the other simply because it is packaged or presented more attractively. Might this same concept apply to fields outside of consumer products, such as the arts? Would, for example, people distinguish between a world-class instrumental virtuoso and an ordinary street musician if the only difference between them were the setting? These were questions tackled by Washington Post writer Gene Weingarten in 2007 when he enlisted renowned violinist Joshua Bell, a winner of the Avery Fisher Prize for outstanding achievement in classical music who regularly undertakes over 200 international engagements a year, to spend part of a morning playing incognito at the entrance to a Washington Metro station during a morning rush hour. Weingarten set up the event 'as an experiment in context, perception and priorities — as well as an unblinking assessment of public taste: In a banal setting at an inconvenient time, would beauty transcend?'

"So, on 12 January 2007, morning commuters passing through the L'Enfant Plaza Station of the subway line in Washington, D.C. were, without publicity, treated to a free mini-concert performed by violin virtuoso Joshua Bell, who played for approximately 45 minutes, performing six classical pieces during that span on his handcrafted 1713 Stradivarius violin (for which Bell reportedly paid $3.5 million). As Weingarten described the crux of the experiment:

Each passerby had a quick choice to make, one familiar to commuters in any urban area where the occasional street performer is part of the cityscape: Do you stop and listen? Do you hurry past with a blend of guilt and irritation, aware of your cupidity but annoyed by the unbidden demand on your time and your wallet? Do you throw in a buck, just to be polite? Does your decision change if he's really bad? What if he's really good? Do you have time for beauty? Shouldn't you? What's the moral mathematics of the moment?

"Three days earlier, Bell had played to a full house at Boston's Symphony Hall, where fairly good seats went for $100. But on this day he collected just $32.17 for his efforts, contributed by a mere 27 of 1,097 passing travelers. Only seven people stopped to listen, and just one of them recognized the performer.

"The Washington Post won a Pulitzer in the feature writing category for Gene Weingarten's April 2007 story about this experiment."

Read this story at Snopes.com: http://www.snopes.com/music/artists/bell.asp

To read Gene Weingarten's article, entitled Pearls Before Breakfast click here.