My Samaria

This past weekend, Harmony and I, along with some others from our church attended the Northern Plains District conference in Minot. The main speaker was Dr. Bill Hammel, President of the EFCA. He spoke about the need to minister to our Samarias, "the places you don't want to go but the people you need to reach." Just as Jesus could have avoided traveling through Samaria (as most during His day would have), He chose to enter Samaria because He had a divine appointment with a Samaritan woman at a well. I was challenged to consider who the "Samaritans" are in my community and to be willing to go to them instead of expecting them to "clean up their lives" and come to the church. I hope in the near future you will hear about me seeking to engage those who are often difficult to be around and easy to discard.

In addition, we voted on a new District Superintendent, Daryl Thompson, the pastor of Liberty Free Church in Williston. He has an unbelievable passion for evangelism, helping pastors and making sure our ministry fits our context. I really appreciated hearing his ideas and passions and am excited to get to know him better and have someone to go to for ideas and help. One of the convictions he shared that resonated with me is that "our Message and Mission must always stay the same but our Ministry must change to meet the need of our community."

In between events at the district conference I also had the district basketball tournament. The conference was in Minot (60 miles north of Underwood) and the tournament was in Garrison (20 miles north of Underwood), so on Friday night and then again Saturday afternoon, Harmony and I commuted between Minot and Garrison. We lost our opening round game to Wilton but the boys played tough and we encouraged them that if they continued to play that well we'd have a chance in the next couple games. On Saturday we played Sheridan County who we lost to by a couple points in the regular season. Utilizing a 2-man zone defense, we shut them down offensively and scored just enough oursevles to pull off the victory, 38-29. On monday night we met up with Washburn who we had just lost to a couple weeks ago. The boys played them really tough. We outscored them in two of the four quarters and were within a basket a couple times in the fourth quarter but just didn't have enough bounces go our way and lost 56-50. The one nice thing (beyond the season being finally over!) is that the assistant coach for Washburn and his son (who plays for them) attend our church. As I told my wife when she asked if she could root for Keir during our game, "No, but if they win you can root for him the whole rest of the season."

Sunday I preached on Ezra 8 and we saw that "God Helps those...who rely on Him." This was my longest sermon yet, so if you've got a spare forty minutes, check it out here. I also taught the second to last Sunday School lesson on the EFCA Statement of Faith "What We Believe & Why", which I believe has been a good series to take the church through, in spite of the fact that the statement will probably be changed at the upcoming national conference.

Please pray for me to work hard in the work God's given me to do and to pursue keeping my way pure by guarding it according to His Word (Ps 119:9). Please pray for Harmony to find someone to help out in the library as her working three evenings every week is taking its toll.

By God's Grace, Jeff

I'm too old for All-Nighters but not for Lockins

This Sunday the youth ministry at church had a lock-in that Harmony and I helped out with. This is similar to events that I organized while a youth pastor in Evanston but there I called them "All-Nighters". The main difference being that there's no expectation of staying up all night at a lock-in. We put on a movie at about 2am and pretty much everyone was out by the end of it (us included). It was a fun event and we had some kids there who don't normally attend the youth group. Please pray that we would continue to have wisdom about how to serve the church kids and reach out to kids from the community.

On Thursday evening I got a call from the basketball coach asking if I wanted to coach the JV team on Friday. The JV coach had a prior committment and this game opportunity came up last minute. So I did...and we won! We had to leave right after school got out to make it up to Max (30 minutes) for a 4pm game. We made it with eight minutes to spare! However, by the time the kids got dressed they only had a couple minutes to shoot around before tip-off. As a result we came out a bit sluggish. We trailed in each of the first three quarters before making a run in the fourth to win by double-digits. I was proud of how the kids battled...and it was nice to get my first JV win!

Our district tournament starts this weekend. The top four teams (out of six) advance to the regional tournament. We play a team in the first round who we lost to by five during the season, so if we play well we'll have a chance. Our girls won their first regional game but lost last night (only the top finisher in regionals moves on to the state tournament).

Harmony and I are going up to the Northern Plains District Conference in Minot this weekend. I think we're both looking forward to getting a chance to meet some other pastors in the district and just to get away for a couple days.

This week's sermon was on Ezra 7:11-28 enititled "God's Providence and Persian Politics." If you'd like to listen to it click here.

By God's Grace, Jeff

I left the car running

For the first time ever, last Saturday I left the car running while I was in the grocery store and at the bank because it was near double digits below zero. Before you label me crazy, let me fill you in that this is a common practice in town. No one is worried about having their cars stolen. They are much more concerned about not getting their cars to re-start in the severe cold. Having now participated in this small town rite of passage, you know that we are adjusting to our new lives in North Dakota. I'm lobbying to get a remote starter before next winter.

The other "exciting" happening of the week was having to deal with a clogged sewer line. In our basement we have a large utility room in which is our sewer drain. Since it was clogged, it did not properly drain but instead seaped into the utility room. We spent most of the day mopping up while we waited on the local plumbers to arrive. They were able to roto-rooter the drain and it is now functioning properly again. Now that we know the signs, I hope we never have to deal with that again. Ah, the joys of living in a home instead of an apartment!

We had basketball games Monday and Tuesday night. JV won both their games but varsity lost both of theirs (though they played much better in the second half last night). Varsity has one more game on Saturday before the district tournament begins next weekend. The top four finishers in the tournament move on to the regional tournament. Our girls team finished second in the district and will have their first round game in the regional on Monday. I have enjoyed working with the kids and getting to know more people from the community but I will be glad when the season is finally over and I get my afternoons, evenings and weekends back!

On Sunday we continued in our series through Ezra and looked at the beginning of chapter seven, learing that God accomplishes His will through His Word. Ezra is a great model of what it looks like to rightly value Scripture. He studied it, obeyed it and taught it. If you'd like to listen to the sermon click here.

Please pray that I would continue to develop a love for the church and community and for Harmony that she'd find someone to help her out in the library.

By God's Grace, Jeff

Poor Scheduling

I made a rookie pastor mistake this week. When the elder board scheduled our annual meeting, I didn't bother to check on other events occuring that day. It turns out that the evening of the first Sunday in February also happens to the Super Bowl! Fortunately the attendance at our annual meeting was not negatively affected. I'm sure at many churches you'd of had a hard time getting quorem...either that or the pastor would not have to worry about scheduling another annual meeting! So at about halftime of the big game, we were voting on church officers and budget. Now, before you leave sympathy comments, I did TIVO it and so was still able to watch the game (though I didn't fast-forward through the commericals).

By the way, as far as commercials go, my wife and I like the Doritos one with the giant mouse, the Bud Light one with fire breathing, the Budweiser one with the Rocky theme and the Pepsi one with Justin Timberlake, especially when he gets bonked on the head by the flat screen tv.

I am now 2-1 all time as a basketball coach (although I'm pretty sure even w/ this win I've lost ground to Coach K). Last night we played against Grant County and had four eighth graders playing with us. This gave us a deeper bench (I only had six guys in the previous tournament) as well as some funny moments. Needing an extra ball-handler, I told one of the junior highers he was going to start and he looked at me with big eyes and said, "who me?" Then during the first half one of the eighth graders asked me if we had any out-of-bounce plays. And although we have about six of them, because the junior highers don't practice with us I answered, "None that you know." But all-in-all they played really well and it bodes well for the future...the present on the other hand isn't going so well. Both JV and Varsity lost. We only have three games before the district tournament starts and we're currently not going in the right direction.

I think I've mentioned this before, but the best (only good) thing about the current state of most "Christian" bookstores is that you can find great deals on doctrinally solid books. Whenever my wife and I are in Bismarck and stop at the Christian bookstore there, I always go to the discount bin first. This time around I found "Living the Cross-Centered Life" by C.J. Mahaney for only $4.99! Great deal on a book that been on my list for quite awhile.

On Sunday I preached on Ezra 6 and we saw that "When God Acts, His People Rejoice." We also had our second week in the "EFCA: What We Believe and Why" Sunday School series. This week we took on the first two points in our statement of faith: Beliefs on Scripture and God. Click here to listen to the sermon.

Please pray that I would continue trusting and depending on the Lord in every aspect of my life including my leadership of Faith Evangelical Church, for the youth ministry to continue reaching out to the community and for Harmony as she gets adjusted to running the library.

By God's Grace, Jeff