Sunday, March 8, 2009

Sunday night mind purge

- Monday was an interesting day; I took a half day off since I didn't get the previous Friday off, and went into the office after lunch. I did lots of work at the office, working on some documents and stuff that I needed to finish, and ended up being at the office until about 6 pm. I went home quickly, freshened up, then went back to the East campus because we were hosting the El Paso Baptist Association's Executive Board meeting.

I think Walter and Craig and the DSC East campus volunteers did a great job with the music and videos and everything in setting the tone for it to be a Spirit-led meeting, not just another business meeting. We elected a new Director of Missions and I had the opportunity to meet several pastors out in the Northeast. It was a great, great meeting and even though there were only 2 of us there under 40 years old, it was great to be with my Baptist brothers and sisters.

- Tuesday was pretty down. I went out to the Northeast to check out Paseo Church's "the Hub" facility in the Northeast. Man, that place is a dump right now but they've got a great vision and that place is in the right hands with Greg and Steve and the Paseo family. After that I had a quick and encouraging lunch with Greg (Paseo's lead pastor), then rushed back to Del Sol's East campus for our staff meeting. Man, I just love our staff meetings and I love our staff. As a matter of fact, pretty soon I'm going to start writing posts about each of our staff members so you can get a deeper insight into them and what incredible people they are.

In the evening I met with Mark & Candi Pryor to catch up with them and talk about our trip back to Juarez this Wednesday.

- Wednesday I was at the office all morning and I was able to setup some appointments to talk with some principals at a couple of schools in the Northeast, among other things. I also got to meet with Jeremy, my accountability partner, and got some more work done at the office. And then Wednesday night was First Wednesday, our communion service, and the ladies that went to Ghana back in January talked about their experience and Walter talked about why we do good - that it's not just to feel good and pat ourselves on the back, but because of the Gospel.

Afterwards, I was invited to dinner by the Romo family, which was interesting because I had just met them on Sunday. They were so excited and eager to have dinner with me, and they were so encouraging. I really enjoyed the time with them and I think they're gonna be good friends of mine.

- Thursday was a hard day. Not only did I start getting sick on Thursday morning, but I had a somewhat discouraging meeting on Thursday afternoon. By about 4:30 in the afternoon, I was so tired and felt so sick that I had to just go home and take a nap before going to the Mix that evening.

It was kind of cool to be back at the Mix, since I hadn't been with the youth in awhile - and it was great to see so many youth there! There were over 50 people that night; we haven't seen that in awhile, and it definitely created a great ethos. And the band? Man, they were down the chain! After that was Village Inn night with Rick and Kristin, then I got home to my bed and crashed hard.

- I slept in late Friday, showered up and had a late lunch, then met Craig at the AT&T store to get my iPhone. Let me juat say that iPhones are AWESOME! I don't know how humanity survived before the iPhone. I'm still a PC though, not a Mac person. =)

I went back home and then wen to the Del Sol East campus for the kickoff of Celebrate Recovery that night. Man, I could feel the Holy Spirit there and I know God is going to do great things through CR.

- Saturday morning was bad. I felt so physically bad, and it took me about an hour to be able to get out of bed and cleaned up to go to lunch with my parents and my brother who was in town for the weekend. After lunch, I came back home and crashed again and then just laid around most of the night.

When I went to bed, I felt SO terrible and stayed up 'til about 1 am coughing like crazy. I finally took some of my dad's prescription cough medicine with codeine in it, and knocked out.

- This morning was weird. I slept in because I was so tired and went to the 11 am service. That was weird just waking up, going to the worship celebration service, and leaving. That's definitely not something I want to make a habit of. Then lunch, then I went and bought some more medicine and crashed again.

But oh my goodness, the Holy Spirit of God was there in such an incredible way. The band that was here this weekend was so honest and transparent, Walter's message was right on, and the cardboard testimonies and Gospel invitation at the end were so powerful.

I am SO pumped about what God is doing at Del Sol Church!

But He's also doing great things in other churches in El Paso, like Paseo and Abundant Living and Harvest and Life Church.

And God's also working in churches throughout the country like Cornerstone out in Chandler, near Phoenix, or LifeChurch.tv based out of Oklahoma, or Cross Point in Nashville, or NorthRidge Church near Detroit.

And He's working at churches all over this terrestrial ball!

Man, I'm so excited to see what He's up to and I'm so honored and feel privileged to be a small part of what He's doing at a place called Del Sol Church.

1 comment:

Mission Juarez Spring Break 2009 said...

Hi Ariel,

I was searching the internet trying to see if Mark and Candi had a blog and stumbled upon your blog. I'm part of a team from Boise, ID coming to work with IFM on a mission trip to Juarez on March 22. Anyway, just wanted to say "God bless you" brother. If you want to follow our missions trip, I started a blog that I'll try to update nightly: http://missionjuarez.blogspot.com/