no words needed...

no words really needed for this picture.  i am the crazy uncle from missouri that teaches his nephew how to properly handle and shoot firearms!  he hit a bullseye on his first clip!  he's a natural!!!

love ya sis!  dont be mad at me...lol

visit is winding down...

well it seems impossible, but 2 weeks has almost come and gone! 

 this week we have: went shopping, went fishing, ate good chinese, went to silver dollar city, had a birthday party (tonight for andrea!!), me and julian are going to shoot guns tomorrow, rode 4-wheelers, and jumped hay bales...(see pic below)

this was one of my favorite memories growing up around a "farm".  hay bales lined up and my brother and i would race across the top of them!  well, like father like son i guess, this is eric's new favorite thing to do.  julian opted to take time and teach kinley how to drive the golf cart..such a good cousin!

some time tomorrow we are off to the branson landing.  eric's "grumps" (self-named g-pa) has landed eric a gig playing the street drums with some young men who are street performers at the landing.  these young men use anything from 5 gallon buckets to 55 gallon drums to make a drum beat on.  grumps works at the landing and got to know them and he asked if his grand-son could play along for one song with them...they said they would love to have some help.  eric is pretty good at drums, he got an electronic kit for his birthday that he can play pretty good for a 7 year old!  should be a lot of fun.

anyway, going to go and enjoy the last couple of days with the family!  

weekend thoughts...

i was reading eric cooper a story tonight at bed time.  his devotional was on repentance...that happened to be our topic at North Point this morning.  (btw, great music this morning!) really it was a great service...it has had me thinking most of the day on repentance and re-thinking what it means to repent.  tommy gave 4 "little r words" that make up the big R word.  re-structure, re-think, re-arrange and reality check.   different than feeling bad or guilty or sorry, or an emotional experience.  i think i agree mostly with this theory...too much to unpack in a short post.  but you can kind of fill in the blanks in the 4 points.  

eric's devo was out of psalm 51.  this psalm is written by david right after jonathan confronts him after the adultery w/ bathsheba.  my favorite part about david's view on repentance is the Lord restoring the joy of his salvation...

i think i got more out eric's devotional time than he did...somehow i think that is ok.  i love hearing him asking God, in prayer,  to help his cousin Bud to have a great time in heaven.  and praying for his aunt shelby to be ok now that she is going to be living by herself.  i KNOW the Lord heard that prayer!

my cousin Bud's funeral was saturday.  another cousin of ours, tony, officiated the service.  i dont know how long it has been since tony has done a funeral or preached a message...but it was obvious the the Lord had gave him words.  the question of the resting place of bud's soul was heavy on my heart and our small group had just got done looking at the story of the prodigal son.  tony referenced how the son came to his senses. he then told a story of an instance in the last month or so of bud's life.  he was living with his sister and had  attended church with her, later that day or week...he was walking around singing praise songs from church.  i dont have time, nor space to share with you how huge that was for bud to be singing praises.  essentially he had come to his senses.  he was confessing with his mouth that Jesus is Lord.

sorry so long and kind of winding around...lots of stuff going through the head!  but i think it all has something to do with repentance...

roller coaster week

ups first

• great time camping with my nieces and nephew
• a lot of fun riding a sea doo and pulling julian (watching him fall off)
• i am the champion of egyptian war!!  man i bet the girls got tired of me whipping them at that game...haha
• loved sleeping in the tent with eric and julian
• it is always relaxing and tiring being on the lake
• i absolutely love spending time with my kids and my family

downs

• really missing my wife
• my cousin Bud, who is quite a bit older than me, has had really a pretty rough life that even at 34, i do not know much about.  Bud was like all of us, he had some issues.  some of the ways that he chose to deal with them, led him down some very harmful paths.  harmful to himself and to those who loved him.  i do not know the condition of his soul...in english, i do not know where he will spend eternity.  
• this breaks my heart on so many different levels.  
• this post by vince antonucci says how i feel right now.

i never want to have to talk about feeling this way again...

oh yeah...baseball is over : (

thursday night, eric and his team lost their final game.  they just could not get anything going.  it was a fun season, we all learned a lot and , actually, we look forward to next season.

posts will be limited this week, due to a busy schedule of hanging out with kids... : )  ( i normally make a lot of fun of people who put those stupid little faces next to their sentences...guess i am "one of those" people now) 

digging into galatians 3:21-4:11 and luke 15.  good stuff, new small group study tonight.  looking forward to that!  

it is past my bed time...g'night.  

pedicures and 4-wheelers

my nieces and nephew made it in safely on saturday. below are a few pics of things they dont normally get to do in california!

where does the pedicure come into play? aunt kim had taken the girls for pedicures sunday morning after church...then uncle daniel took them riding 4-wheelers with sandals on!! prob not the best scenario for a new pedicure... : )

looking forward to a great couple of weeks with these guys!!

couple of quick hits...

BIG baseball game tonight! eric had an exciting come from behind win on tuesday night to advance them into this game tonight! i love seeing him improve and enjoy something that i never did. this team was terrible, and i am not even going to apologize for saying that, they were awful at the beginning of the season. but talk about improvement, they have won their last 5 games. so win or lose, they have done GREAT!

little crazy in the office today, anyone else know what it is like to get price increases monthly!! let me tell you...NOT GOOD!

had a great lunch with some really good friends today. it is good to hear that the Lord is working in people's lives in work environments.

2 days till the kids get here! SUPER excited about that!! 2 weeks with, honestly, the best behaved teens/pre-teens i have ever been around.

i could not fathom this post by perry noble, 50 K .

had a great/unique prayer service at JRA last night. i will post about it later...

have a good night!!