20 In a wealthy home some utensils are made of gold and silver, and some are made of wood and clay. The expensive utensils are used for special occasions, and the cheap ones are for everyday use. 21 If you keep yourself pure, you will be a special utensil for honorable use. Your life will be clean, and you will be ready for the Master to use you for every good work.
22 Run from anything that stimulates youthful lusts. Instead, pursue righteous living, faithfulness, love, and peace. Enjoy the companionship of those who call on the Lord with pure hearts.
Some folks think that a church never truly “arrives” until they have a church marquee sign. Click here to read my thoughts on Graystone having one of these. I guess I’m a LITTLE WEIRD, but I like to read what churches put on their marquee. Here is one of my recent favs:
I am so pumped about our new message series, The Heaven Series. To be honest with you, the study and preparation for this one has been wearing me out. I spent several hours Tuesday night (while the family was watching American Idol…I could not tell you the name of one contestant on that show.) in my basement office trying to figure out if pets go to Heaven. It is a little more complicated than I originally thought. Nonetheless, this Sunday, I will be answering the question, “Do pets go to Heaven?”.
Our main discussion for this Sunday is, “What will Heaven be like?”. Have you ever wondered what Heaven will look like? Well, I am going to tell you this Sunday.
Then, week 2 (March 21), we will discuss, “What will we do in Heaven?”. And I will answer the following questions:
What will our bodies look like (height, age, skin color, glowing?, etc.)?
Will we play sports? Work? Sing a bunch of worship songs?
Hey, if you are going to Heaven, you might want to find out a little more about the place that you will be living FOREVER and what it is that you will be doing for ALL eternity. It should be a great series, and I can promise you that the creative team will throw in a few surprises along the way. The next 5 weeks will be great Sundays to invite your friends and family to Graystone.
At the beginning of my message on Sunday, I shared with Graystone some personal things that our family has been going through with Jennifer’s melanoma skin cancer. Our family is so thankful to serve in a fellowship where we truly love our church family, and we know that our church family truly loves us. Thank you!
If you missed it on Sunday, here is what I had to say:
Just checking to see if anyone who reads the “To Live Is Christ” Blog is keeping up with B90X. Where are we supposed to be on our daily Bible reading? I’m in 2 Thessalonians. According to my calculations, we are more than two-thirds of the way through the New Testament, and we have less than one month until Easter Sunday (April 4). Where are you in your reading? What verse, passage or book of the Bible has been your favorite?
Let’s here it. How is B90X going for you? Let’s get a little accountability and finish strong. If you are behind, it’s no big deal. I’m applaud you for taking the challenge and getting into the word of God so the word can get into you.
9. Loved “Kyle and the Band’s” (not official name) version of the song, “Everything”.
8. A Tale of Two Services…the 9:15 was our worst service EV-VER from a technical standpoint (except for the Sunday in the warehouse when the power went out and we were all sitting in the dark…good times). Fortunately between services, someone through the power of Jesus’ name cast the demon out of the sound system and the 11:00 service was great!
7. “True happiness in life comes from marrying your best friend…of the opposite sex.“
6. “Jim’s Judea is Gwinnett Estates. Mine is Saint Simons Island.”
5. “When we tithe, we trust God that He can do more with 90% than we can do with 100%.”
4. I absolutely loved the video of Graystone members sharing why they give. You can watch is here.
3. Joelan leading worship with his guitar for the All Stars (elementary class). I could not be more proud of him.
2. Hundreds of people signing the stage committing to be “In It To Win It!”
1. Everyone showing Jennifer so much love and support.
It is an honor for the Howes family to serve in a church where we can truly love and be loved. Thank you for “being the church”!
Today was a very significant day at Graystone Church as several hundred people make commitments to be “In It To Win It!”. Those of us who made pledges to be “in the building to win the community for Jesus Christ” did so by signing our names on the front of the stage. Each time we enter the church, we will be reminded that Graystone is not about us. It is about God and our mission “to know Him and make Him known”.
I am so excited to be a part of a team of believers who are committed to doing whatever it takes (as long as it is Biblical, moral, and legal) to DOMINATE our community with the love of Jesus Christ. Let me encourage you to strap your seatbelt on and get ready for the ride of your life. Every Sunday in the next two message series, HEAVEN and UNCENSORED, will be great services to invite a friend.
Who are you going to invite?
Who are you praying for daily?
Whose life do you want to see changed for all eternity?
Jennifer and I spent the last 4-5 days by ourselves on Saint Simons Island. It was great time for us to relax and for Jennifer to heal from surgery. If you have not heard about Jennifer’s melanoma skin cancer, please read this previous post to get caught up: Jennifer’s cancer is gone!. I want to thank the Graystone Staff Team for contributing to my blog this week. I enjoyed reading/watching each of their posts.
The purpose of tonight’s post is to encourage to you to be a Graystone Church tomorrow morning. I know that the weather is nice outside, but if you are a part of the Graystone family, please make it a priority to be there. I have some personal stuff that I would like to share. Also, for those of you who are “In It To Win It!”, we will give you an opportunity to leave your mark on Graystone’s new building.
WOW…what an honor to be a guest blogger on the weblog of J.Howes! It is also an honor to wrap up the week before he returns to the blog world. My world is gettin crazy as my wife (Erin) and I continue to raise our two wonderful kids…Rylan and Emalyn. We are currently trying hard to find a house in the Grayson area, adding to the craziness. My life was impacted and influenced by one guy who kept an “open house”…just a way to “do life together.” We are praying for God to provide the right place for that to happen in our lives.
God is definitely moving and changing lives at GSM (graystone student ministry). We had our annual Disciple Now weekend in February, and it was awesome. We had tons of help from the entire church for this one, and it was incredible. We just finished a series on LOVE, that of course was initiated by Valentine’s Day. You can be praying for our students…but let’s just say…some have already committed to not dating and pursuing their relationship with Christ instead. WHAT!! That’s awesome! God is continuing to provide sharp leaders and a vision for growth and development for our students. Stay tuned…cause some big things are on the horizon.
Let me end with a couple of thoughts that I believe are transferable to any situation.
1. Start with the end in mind.
I want our students at GSM to think about their futures and to make decisions now that move them in the direction that has called them to. If you want to be a virgin when you get married, then it doesn’t make sense to put yourself in compromising situations. Especially in your teenage years. If you want to be debt free in the next few years…then it doesn’t make sense to buy a new hot rod and a crazy big house. If you don’t know where you are going, it’s pretty easy to get nowhere!
2. Who are you becoming?
My students were challenged with this thought: “If you want to marry a Godly spouse, then you need to be Godly yourself. If you want someone of great character, then you need to have great character as well. You need to become who you want to marry.” But I think the same is true for us who are pursuing Christ. Who are we becoming? What is coming out of our actions and speech. The more we hang out with Jesus…the more we BECOME like Him! John 10:10- you want to know the way to this “abundant life”?? Start becoming like Christ.
First off, I can’t tell you how amazing it is to be a guest blogger today. I’m so overwhelmed with emotion that I’m really not sure what to blog about. The band ‘Coldplay’ is awesome…Sorry, they just popped up on my iTunes playlist as I was typing. Chris Martin (lead singer of Coldplay) probably has one of the coolest voices out there. How can somebody sing in that high of a range and make it sound effortless? I wonder what Simon would say about him in an audition. Speaking of auditions, I will be holding auditions for ‘Kyle and the Band’ (not official name) on March 30th. So far I’ve had about 20 people sign up to audition. That’s gonna make for a long evening. Hopefully, they’ll be some phenomenal musicians and singers out there.
I think I’m going to tell you some quirky things about myself so you can get to know me better. I get made fun of all the time, but it doesn’t bother me. It takes quite a lot to get me frazzled. So here you go. Here’s some weird things about me:
I have never had a piece of pie in my life. (nor do I want to, so don’t cook me one)
I wear flip flops 95% of the time. (including winter months)
I am one of the palest people you’ll meet, but when we go to the beach I stay out for 8-9 hours a day. (I end up looking like a lobster)
I’m actually a pretty good athlete. (probably the best on staff)
I leave the car running while I pump my gas. (sorry to all of you in law enforcement)
I’m into hair products. I like to change up mousses every month. (right now I’m using “Tresemme’ Totally Twisted”)
As soon as I walk in the door to my house, I immediately take off the clothes I’m in and change into Pajama Pants or shorts. (depending on the weather)
I haven’t had a soft drink in over 5 years. (I still enjoy an occasional sweet tea)
Sometimes I’ll eat a ‘saltine sandwich’ (saltine crackers in between two pieces of bread)
I have once poured blue kool-aid in my toilet to make it look like one of those cleaning things. (wish I was kidding)
Chewed up gum makes me sick. (I can’t stand it when people take their gum out of their mouth and put it on their plate while they eat)
I don’t mind going to a restaurant and eating by myself. (this includes places like Chili’s, LongHorns, Japanese, anything really)
Well the list goes on and on, but I would be here all day if I tried to tell you all of them. I hope you enjoyed your brief tour of me and my weirdness. Hope to see you Sunday!
