Many Thanks!

So much to be thankful for this season! Family, food (more than enough), home, the hope of Jesus to bring us ultimately to our eternal goal - heaven.

This year brings added "thanks". Few experiences in life equal the news and the ensuing arrival of a new baby. This year our new baby is "Mia"! (Even though she is already 19 months old).

Tim and Kristi and their boys have been preparing for this experience for over 2 years. They now have a face and they have their pre-approval. Which means that, except for a couple more documents and probably several more weeks of waiting, everything is in place for them to travel to China to bring Mia home.

I'm a grandfather again - for the ninth time! Call me Ken. Call me honey. Call me Dad. Call me son. Call me friend. Call me pastor. Call me Grampy and I'm ready to go!

So - when you see me - if it seems that my head is a little higher, that I seem a bit more 'giddy', it's just thankfulness oozing out of this 'grampy'. Just bring 'Mia' to me so I can hold her, play with her, spoil her - and, in time, I'll be okay! In the meantime, I'm thankful - very thankful!

Post Election Blues

Can you find a cure for it? Do they prescribe a medication for it? What to do for "post election blues"?

Here's the cure: Shout - out loud - three times - "Hallelujah, it's over!!!"

No matter your age or political persuasion - you and I are living in historic times:
**first black President
**most electoral votes since Bill Clinton
**most popular votes by a Democratic President in recent history, etc.

Can Barack Obama bring our troops in Iraq home sooner? I don't know.
Can Barack Obama bring an end to the economic slump we're in? I don't know.

If confidence and charisma alone are enough to make a great president - Barack Obama should be the greatest president the USA has ever had.

What I do know is this - our source for strength and wisdom and encouragement and help and hope and healing for our lives and for our land is "God" and "God alone"!

So - shake those "election blues" off. How? PRAY!

Pray for leadership.

1 Timothy 2.1,2 - "...I urge that prayers, intercessions, and thanksgiving be made for everyone - for kings and all those in authority that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all holiness and godliness."

Barack Obama, come January, will be your president. If you cast your ballot for him you need to pray for him.

If you did not vote for Barack Obama - you still must pray for him. For Bible believing Christians - you have a great responsibility to pray.

I'm convinced that my prayer should be for the Holy Spirit to guide the thinking processes of all the "thinking" and "talking" heads. Why? Because, prayer and the Holy Spirit can go where you and I cannot go! I believe that the Holy Spirit can cause godly and ungodly men and women to make decisions they would not have otherwise made when the Holy Spirit gets involved!

"People of the Spirit" - rise up! "People of the Spirit" don't quit! "People of the Spirit" don't back down! "People of the Spirit" - be led by the Spirit, walk in the Spirit, talk in the Spirit!!

I feel like singing!! What a mighty God we serve!!