West Cocoa Chat

Good morning family. Saturday’s game saw Steven complete “the Cycle” hitting a leadoff home-run to go with his single, double, and triple from the previous night. He ended up going 1 for 3 with a couple of hard shots to leftfield that were caught along with being hit once. Our pitching was off walking and hitting batters to the tune of a 10 to 15 loss to huge University High School from Orlando. Steven’s next game is tomorrow at our “Hardball Classic” that we host each year. My first game to announce is today at 4:30.

In a manner of speaking we also “finished the cycle” in our lifegroup yesterday. Don brought a powerful message from Proverbs 23 (“For as he thinks within himself, so he is.”):7. The hardest hitting part was some statistics from “Barna.” In a recent survey among Christians asking them if they had and by what principles / rules / laws they used to make decisions about life, less than 10% of adult Christians professed that they used Biblical standards to make decisions. The numbers for Christian teens was less than 3%! As Don said, the battle is for our minds where all evil deeds start according to James.

The discussion in our lifegroup was frank, introspective, and real when it came to how we were affected by outside circumstances and by how much we allowed Satan to steal our joy. It was about time for our circle prayer to end one of the best meetings we’ve had when the phone rang. God wasn’t done yet, the “cycle” was complete.

It was an old friend of mine who is in prison and won’t be out until 2010. He had tried to connect with us before but we were always out. As the discussion went on I walked out to our patio and took the call. Now when someone from prison actually gets someone to accept a “collect call from an inmate,” you’d think they would want to vent and ask for all kind of things. Not my friend, he asked if he could share the story of Joseph with me and another story concerning a missionary?

I figured the group would have the prayer without me and they would understand why I left to take this call. “John” shared his message from the Bible and his story. He wrapped it up by saying that although in prison, one of the worst ones (if there are good ones) in Florida, he knew that God was using him for good and for the cause of Christ, just as Joseph who being sold into slavery ended up saving his family. When I asked what I could do for him, “John” replied, “Just give me a hug when I get out in 2010.”

I walked back in and to my amazement the group was still seated in my living room. I asked if they had prayed yet and they said, “No.” I told them I need to share this call with you and they said a collective “we know already.” Seems my lovely wife told the group as the phone rang that she knew that was John and she intuitively knew how he would be the one encouraging the encourager.

The battle for our minds, a proverb, a sermon, a lifegroup discussion, and encouragement from Prison; seems the “Cycle” was completed in our home yesterday. May God bless you as you battle the world for your mind today.

// posted by cwinwc @ 3:12 AM