Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Not only is it the middle of the week - but halfway through June - and very nearly halfway through 2010! My how this year is flying by! So today, let me encourage you to stop and take account of what you have been through thus far in 2010.

Me personally? Well, I started the year in New Orleans, LA with an eight month pregnant wife ... so things have changed quite a bit. Now I'm in Salisbury, MD with a nearly 5 month old daughter, a new job ... basically a new everything! It's been eventful. Often times very hard. But overwhelmingly amazing.

What's the reason for the look back through the year thus far? In staff Bible study we've been reading through the story of Abraham. Just this week we got to the part where Abraham sends his servant back South to find a proper wife for his son Isaac. I was and am very touched by the servant's reaction to every impossible thing that happens along his journey. He stops and worships. Every single time!

All too often when God answers a prayer, or brings something to pass from way out in left field, I have the tendency to shrug it off and press forward to the next great calamity. That, I believe, is just flat our wrong. I'm trying to practice what the servant in the story did - to stop and worship God when He does something (anything) and I'm there to witness it.

So this Wednesday - give thanks for the previous days, weeks, months - and search your heart to find what God has been doing, and worship Him for it!

ARTIST OF THE DAY: Jonny Diaz

"There's no crying in baseball!" - Tom Hanks A League of Their Own

A full-ride baseball scholarship to Florida State University. A family pedigree that includes two older brothers already in the Majors. Jonny Diaz had a legacy to live up to, but instead of hustling along through Spring Training, Diaz picked up a guitar and started writing songs that were pouring out like a flood!

Emotional, acoustic, semi-country songs about heart break, peer pressure, self-confidence and worship led Jonny away from a full ride at FSU and into full-time musical ministry. That's a leap of faith (and potential income). After putting out two indie albums and wrapping up college, Jonny headed to Nashville. He joined the INO team (MercyMe, Steven Curtis Chapman, etc) and before you know it, we were all singing "More Beautiful You."