ATL to Florida

What a surprising trip. I traveled today from the ATL to Rosemary Beach, Florida. I’ll be down here all week serving with the Lighthouse Retreat. Lighthouse is an incredible outreach to families living through childhood cancer. This week a team of 100 adults and children will be serving a group of about seventy people all of who are living through a parents worst nightmare. There are a few things I have walked away from and felt like I can’t imagine life without. Marriage, parenting, North Point, Notre Dame Football, Braves baseball, Lighthouse to name a few. Anyway, I’m sure I’ll be giving you updates throughout the week about what goes on here. I say my trip was surprising because I brought about ten or eleven sermons on CD from North Point in case I got a bit drowsy on the drive. Turns out, I listened to about six of them on my six to seven hour drive. I don’t know of a whole lot of people who go back and listen to their pastor’s sermons for pleasure. Well, not a lot of people under the age of sixty-five. The sermons ranged from encouragement to get in a small group to being above reproach to fighting to repair family relationships. They left me feeling like I need to raise my standards, lead a small group, and call and tell my sister that I have been a terrible brother. (I did try to call her, and I have told her that before. Sorry Scarlett, you deserve better. Go get a tissue Mom; I’ll wait … better now? Let’s move on.) What a great privilege it is to have such a great teacher and communicator as my Pastor. In three years, I can’t believe I’m about to say this, I really have taken it for granite that I have a weekly opportunity to learn feel fed spiritually from my church. I’m not saying that this is where I’m supposed to get most of my feeding, but I am grateful that I’m still able to learn and feel inspired by my Pastor. Not a lot of church staff people can say that. If you haven’t listened to Andy or just feel like you need to be challenged, check out the sermon archive at North Point. Every sermon for the last four or five years is online in audio format, and quite a few are in video. Sorry for the commercial but I know that there are a lot of people (especially Student Pastors) that aren’t getting any consistent teaching. No you don’t have an excuse.