Saturday, March 31, 2007

Amazing Grace

  • Angela and I went to see the movie "Amazing Grace" last night. I give it a B+. It was the story of an English politician in the 18thCentury who fought for, and finally succeeded in getting the slave trade banned in England. His inspiration was his Pastor, an ex-slave trade ship captain who became a christian and gave up his job, to serve the Lord.
  • I wondered later, how many of us would do that? What if God convicted us that our job was getting in the way of serving him and led us to quit and go another direction with our life.
  • I know of 1 person would did that, my father-in-law, Billy Allen.
  • He was 40 years, a successful business man whom God called him into the ministry. He gave it all up and to do the Lord's work. From what Angela tells me, there was much financial sacrifice, but he never wavered. He went on to be a successful Pastor for 17 years, before God called him home. What a role model he was!
  • I think that is what separates people in life, the amount of passion and commitment they have for what they believe in. Way too many people in life, just want to coast through their job, their spiritual walk, and their relationship with others and their relationship with Christ. They really do not want to listen to what God is telling them to do, mostly out of fear of the unknown.
  • That is why people like Billy Allen and some long forgotten English politician, can change their part of the world and make the world a better place for all of us, still today.
  • What is stopping you or me from changing our little corner of the world?

Saturday, March 24, 2007

Friday, March 23, 2007

What a week

  • Well the Buckeyes pulled one out last night! We were down by 17 points at halftime but we chipped away and finally went ahead with a few minutes to go. We made a free throw with about 3 seconds left and UT had 1 last shot that our big guy blocked. The only problem was the game was not over until about 12:30 AM this morning!!!

  • Sorry to my UT friends, this was payback from the football bowl game where you cheated and beat us (you know what happened)

  • Starting to get quotes for fixing the house back up, may have to move out for a few days after they sand the floor to let the new coating dry. Angela is working on other options, that are more family friendly.

  • Brandon home this week on spring break. He finally bought a Nintendo Wii, and man it is fun!!! for those uninformed, it is a wireless system where you swing the controller based on the game you are playing. for example, when you are playing the bowling game, you swing it like you are throwing a really bowling ball. Great fun for the whole family. Even Angela and Tammy got into the act. Brandon goes back to school this Sunday, guess he will want to take it with him, maybe not.

  • Corey got a haircut!! Hasn't been this short in a long time, looks like he is 25 years old. He is going professional this summer with his mowing business, advertising and working for the same guy Brandon did last summer.

  • Have one of the new couples from church coming over tonight, trying to meet more of the people in the CONNECT group. One thing we all need to watch is that we don't always stay with the same people from church and form a clique. We need to reach out and make new people feel at home, meet new people, pay forward some of the blessings God had given to us.

  • I would like to challenge all of you to invite someone you know over to your house for some fun and conversation. If you think your house is not big or nice enough, be very careful, God has blessed each of us with what we have for a reason, His glory. We need to use what he has given us big or little. I really believe we have to show God we can handle what he has given us, before He will bless us with more. So pay it forward for His glory!

Thursday, March 15, 2007

It happened again!

I was traveling to my office so I decided to check voice mails on the way. I had 2 frantic messages from Angela saying there was water everywhere and she did not know how to turn it off!

The water supply line to the sink broke and water was pouring out from under the sink. She called Todd and Corey, both were close by. By the time they got it off it was about ankle deep in the kitchen.

So here we are again facing the replacement of the kitchen floor. The same thing happened before when the valve on the ice maker to the refrigerator busted and a much smaller amount of water was spilled.

This time we might have to replace the kitchen cabinet(s), the floor again, and a few things in the basement. Angela had just looked and it had been almost 1 year since it happened the 1st time.

And of course it could not happen at a worst time. We have some people from our CONNECT group coming over on Friday night and the Music Pastor search team over Saturday. Angela is really handling it well, all things considered.

Thursday, March 01, 2007

stuck again

Well it is 10:00 PM eastern time and I am stuck in an airport again! My boss Patti and I are in Chicago for 2 days of meetings. We left for the airport today about 4:00 PM for a 7:30 PM flight that is now delayed until 11:35 PM, if all goes well, will get in about 1:00 AM and then drive home get some sleep and have very important meeting with the VP of HR at 10:00 AM!!

I have been here so long that my laptop battery died and I had to switch batteries with Patti from her laptop.

And I am glad I did!

It seems that when my baby doll gets lonely she gets on eBay and looks around, well to my surprise she is bidding on 4 items, hair barrettes.

If you know Angela, you could guess that plain plastic $1 kind would not be for her. No she is bidding on items around $10 each! Who ever heard of antique hair barrettes? I am sure one of them was like that.

Leave it Angela to find "Hair Jewelry"! In addition she won a ring and is bidding on others. Guess I will have to change my password again.

I am starting to see a pattern with my family when I leave town. Either going out to dinner without me or EBay shopping or something. Oh well, it could be worse, at least when I get home I know they will be there and will genuinely welcome me home.

I now understand why they ask, "When are going out of town again?"

Jeff