Sunday, April 12, 2009

Sunday night mind purge

- Last weekend I was in Chicago with Rick and Kristin at NewThing Network's "Hitchhiker's Guide to Multi-Site" event, and since I didn't get a day off, I took a half day off on Monday. After volunteering at Wayside, I went down to The Bagel Shop's new Northeast location for opening day and spent a few hours there working because they have free wifi there! I think I'll be spending a lot more time there because of the good food and free wifi.

-
Corner Bakery Cafe also opened on Monday, so I went there for dinner. Yum! I will definitely be frequenting that place too. Now if only we could get a dang Panera Bread down here in El Paso!

- Tuesday was a super busy day! Pretty much the WHOLE day ('til 7 pm) was spent working at the office catching up on work from the weekend and from taking half of Monday off. And honestly, I don't even remember what I did that evening, but don't worry - I'm sure whatever it was, it was wholesome and clean. =)

- Wednesday was another long day at the church building; I went in at 10 am and didn't get home 'til nearly 9 pm because I had lots of work to do, a couple of daytime meetings, then I helped someone with a project afterhours, then had our NE Campus launch team meeting that night.

- Oh also on Wednesday, I had a GREAT lunch meeting with Pastor Tony Lara and his wife Charissa from
River's Edge Church. Man, those two are just awesome and so Kingdom minded. They gave me some GREAT feedback and great ideas about how we need to prepare and what we need to think through for the NE campus launch. I also got to share some ideas and names of vendors with them, so hopefully I was some help to them too.

- Thursday was pretty good. I met with Jeremy, my friend/accountability/encouragement partner at Bux and caught up on things and gave him some advice, received some advice from him, and we prayed for each other. Then I was at the office the rest of the day,

- Friday ...ahhh, my day off. I loved it. I slept in, had a nice, relaxed lunch at Peter Piper Pizza, then came home and watched some TV, read a little bit, then went to a Good Friday service at a very traditional, liturgical church in the Northeast. That was ...different. Afterwards, I drove around looking for somewhere to eat that wasn't fast food, and couldn't find anything, so I started driving.

Sometimes I drive and have no destination; it's just a drive. So I ended up in central somehow, and went up to Scenic drive (mental note: Friday nights at Scenic drive is not the best time to go - too many people, and most of them making out in public. Eww...). It's beautiful up there!

I was there for awhile and prayed over the city, prayed for the NE campus, and prayed for Juarez, then ended up Downtown in Kern Place. Have you ever been to Kern Place? If not, wow, you're missing out. That's one of the oldest and most beautiful neighborhoods in El Paso. Then I finally ended up eating at Jaime's Cafe, a little dive down on Alameda, then went home and went to bed. It was a good day.

- I was so mentally worn out from long nights and lots of deep thinking all week that I rested most of Saturday. I slept in again, went for a good long run, did some more reading, watched Slumdog Millionaire, and then went to Life Church for their Saturday night service at 7:30 pm. By the time it was over and I got home, all I had time to do was iron my shirt for Sunday, and then crawl into bed.

- I was incredibly restless on Saturday night; I just could not fall asleep for the longest time! It must not have been 1 or 2 am until I finally fell asleep, and then I had to be up at 6 am anyway this morning.

- So I was at the church just before 7:30 this morning, and served as an usher/welcomer in all 3 worship celebration services this morning. The 8:00 am service was pretty empty; I mean, REALLY empty. The 9:30 and 11:00 am services were packed, but the 11:00 am service especially. We ran out of seats at 11 and had to add about 20 or so chairs inside the worship center, and we had a bunch of people who didn't want us to accommodate them inside and just sat in the cafe watching. It was just a great time of worship.

- I saw a LOT of our regular Del Sol family park in the parking lot today instead of parking across the street. I even saw one car that was a DSC regular parked in a guest spot for all 3 services! Oh my goodness, was I upset! I don't know why people just don't seem to get it - if you are physically able, park across the street! It was SO heartbreaking to be out in the cafe and see several cars drive in, drive around a few times looking for a place to park, and then drive away because there were no spots. Rawr!!!!

- Jesus said in John 12 that when He is lifted up, He would draw all people to Himself, so I know that His Spirit was at work this morning in our church and in so many other churches in El Paso and in the country and in the world, and I believe He drew many to Himself this weekend.

- The GREATEST part of today, the part that made me SO proud to be a part of Del Sol Church, was at the 11:00 am service when us ushers were seating people well into the service, and a mom and her young son came up to me and said "our seats are over there; we're going to go sit outside so that you can give our seats to someone else." Wow. Wow. WOW!!! That woman and her son definitely knew what it meant when Jesus said He came to serve, not to be served, and when Philippians 2:5 said our attitude as believers must be the same as Christ Jesus.

- Wow. Thanks, lady and son. I'm SO excited to get to Heaven and see how God is going to reward you for that simple act of serving others and showing God's love in a practical way.

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