get your sails up, get your sails up... c'mon party people, get your sails up...

you ever think you are doing awesome with your walk with the Lord and then it hits you, or is revealed to you that you may not be doing so well...

yes that is where i am at right now... God has totally empowered me lately since the alabama trip (or at least i am claiming the authority finally) but there has been an internal struggle for me as of late... while i feel that i have a great impact with the ministry here on Grand Manan, i have been wrestling with whether or not i am to take a church as a pastor... that desire has always been there, but i feel that God has wanted me here for a season and now i am facing that choice again...

while we were on our way to and from alabama a church that we stayed in really left it's mark with me and since being home i have found out that they are hiring a full time youth/young adults director... to say the least i am so intrigued that my stomach has been in knots and i struggle to get this posibility out of my mind...

yet here is what is holding me to GM... 1) my kids are in fredericton 2) i love my teens here 3) God has blessed me with an amazing group of friends 4)i love the ministry on the island and where things are going spiritually... yet, financially i have not yet found a fit that has been able to provide me with a full time income that allows me to be a father to my children... so i have been wrestling to say the least...

last night at a service that i went to the preacher spoke about the wind and how scripture often speaks about God being in the wind and how churches often react to the wind of the spirit moving... to make a long sermon not so long i realized that i have been sitting in my boat with my sails down because i am affraid of where that wind may take me... it seems that GM has become a comfort zone to me that i have become emotionally attached to... not a bad thing, but if it gets in the way of what God is doing then we have a problem...

so here is my prayer request... i have some potential options that range between GM and bama... i am going to be faithful to make some phone calls, but i need the
Spirit to lead or more importantly i want my sails up to recieve what the spirit says and then be obedient wherever, or whatever that means...

been a while... i may or may not be sorry...

so i guess i am due to add a new post here so that people do not think i am dead... actually i have been informed in that i am a selfish blogger... one of my teens who has jumped onto this fad has had her blog disappear and by me having one and not using it i guess makes me unthankful... actually she did not say that, but it does kind of make sense somehow...

so let's go way back:
our superbowl party went pretty well... the senior boys basketball team was away that weekend so that took away them, their friends and senior girls and despite all that we still had 85 or so teens there... now try to imagine 85 junior highers in one small building with lots of sugar in their system... oh yes, it was that insane... but it was good and the kids were given an alternative place to be where there were wonderful good influences like me all around... i am making this sound less and less inspiring aren't i???

after that things began to go downhill a bit and i guess i kind of let stuff get to me... there was a one week period where i had my water pipes in my house freeze and break, my transmission in my jeep seized up, i got the flu and was up all night puking and pooping (there is just no way to say that nicely), and i was laid off at the boys and girls club... this took quite the toll on my mind but as a look back it makes sense because i was about to lead a group of 42 individuals from grand manan to the gulf coast for some hurricane relief work... this was my 2nd trip and many peoples first time on a missions trip... satan really did a number on my mind and my confidence... it was hard to believe that i could do this and as a matter of fact there was a lot of time when i believed that i could not... yet this trip seemed to go by with minimal complications and i had to make tough decisions that i have never had to make before... i could feel God empowering me as people would wonder what we were doing next... once again i learned how big God is and how little i am... i could not lead this trip, yet God chose me and somehow we all made it back and have been changed through this experience...

and now i am back on grand manan kind of wondering what is next... to be honest i am hoping for some full time work, but that is up to God... i will search my options and see where He leads... i guess i am not really worried, but at the same time it would be nice to know... being that this is a big turn around time for the wesleyan church my mind has wondered about looking into taking a church somewhere, but i do not feel a peace about that... i am totally in love with my island teens and church right now and for whatever reason feel that i am not allowed to leave yet... so that being said i have to believe that God has something for me here... surviving leadership on this trip has built a new desire in me to speak to people for God... this goes beyond teens i guess... whoever, wherever, whenever... yikes... but once again this is bigger than me, but not the one who wants to speak through me...

so there... hope ya'll are caught up... more news at 11... or whenever the news happens... love ya'll... talk to me...