At Shekinah Village, the pay lake turned campground:  Wayne Wray, his wife Connie(Newton Creek), and myself put rough-cut lumber siding on a pump house.  Wayne got stung by bees twice.  Gasoline does wonders.  Frank Cage, Homer Lamb, and Bob Rogers were roughing out the electrical in one of the lake cabins.  Greg Blalock and Donnie Beaman spent the day planing rough-cut cedar.  Larry and Kay Dowdy (Newton Creek), and Lela Blalock worked on finishing Drywall.

At the Ranch, Steve Adams helped Bill Warford(Newton Creek) trim hooves and shoe horses.

At the warehouse, Jay Kaneta, Chelsea Adams, Trina (Newton Creek), and Deanna Dillworth removed the tile floor from the entire warehouse.  Because the warehouse is in downtown Cumberland, they had the opportunity to do some witnessing to folks who came to receive furniture from the ministry.

At John 3:16, Harry Johnson’s home (Lonnie’s right hand man), Dewey Dillworth, Scott Record, and Joey Cowger assembled scaffolding and hung vinyl siding.

Lois Beaman, Mary Lamb, Mary Rogers, and Chestine Cage held down the fort at Solomon’s Porch and delivered our Lunches and prepared Meals.  For supper, we had pot roast, cream corn, mash potatoe’s and gravy, yeast rolls, pie, banana pudding and Chestine made some no-bake cookies that were awesome.  Bro. Harry Johnson and Lonnie Riley ate supper with us.  We are putting our minds together to come up with and ingenious way of delivering the pizzas from Solomon’s Porch on Friday night.  We’re psyched!!!!

God has a way of speaking to you.  This morning when dropping off the scaffolding for Dewey, we noticed Bro. Harry’s ministry traveling RV sitting in the driveway.  We were told that the starter was bad.  At that moment, I thought about volunteering to replace it (I always pack my mechanic’s tools in case of a breakdown), but I knew I already had an assignment, so I said nothing.  But I knew for some reason I was supposed to fix that RV.  Tonight, Harry pulled me aside and asked me if I had an auto mechanic in the group.  I asked him what he needed.  He told me about the RV.  I told him, “God has told me, that I’m supposed to do it.”  In the morning, I’m a grease monkey for the Lord, PRAISE GOD!!!!!

More to come….

Besides the breakdowns the trip to Lynch was a good day.  Lois kept us entertained.  I have one word to describe the bus when Lois and Chestine were both on it, “Rowdy”.  Lois quieted down after eating a cookie dough frostie at Wendy’s.  She happens to be Lactose-intolerant and Ice cream makes her sick.  Things were quiet for awhile.

It’s been a blessing to have a good relationship with Newton-Creek Baptist Church.  It ‘s a wonderful thing when two churches can come together as one to do God’s work.  Steve Adams has felt led to lead in our devotions for the week, he did a wonderful job last night.

So far as we know we will be working in Drywall, hanging cedar tongue and groove, roughing in electric, and vinyl siding today.  But we are all gearing up for the big Friday Pizza Bash in Benham.  We were told yesterday to expect the people to come out of the woodwork for this.  We’re excited!!

The spirit of the group is great.  With every little speed bump, we shout praises to God.  We see it as attacks from the Devil, because God has something big planned.  Be in prayer for Penny Adams and Shannon Vaughn.  They will be joining us on Wednesday.

God Bless, more to come

Bro. T from Lynch, Ky

A couple of weeks ago, I got a letter from the Kentucky Baptist Convention congratulating Spring Bayou for being one of the top 100 churches in the state of Kentucky in Baptisms.  Monday morning I sat in on a Pastoral luncheon where our church was given another recognition.  Spring Bayou was celebrated as having record VBS growth in the last five years.  As a matter of fact, with churches who have a Vacation Bible School attendance of 100 or more, Spring Bayou was among the top 100 churches in the entire Southern Baptist Convention.  They also recognized churches that had phenomenal growth in VBS with less than 100 in attendance.  Spring Bayou was only 1 of 13 Kentucky churches who had accomplished this.  Let’s take a moment to praise God BIG TIME!!!!  Remember anything that is good is because of HIM, we are nothing compared to his SOMETHING.  Can I get an Amen!!!

Sunday and Monday were filled with the events of the Pastor’s Conference.  It was a blessing for Leah and me.  This gives me a chance to get fed, instead of doing the feeding.  The Pastor’s conference is basically two full days of preaching and worship.  14 sermons in two days with singing in between, and you thought an hour and 15 minutes was long with me…lol.  

Before I forget, Sunday Afternoon before the evening messages, we were privileged to see an early screening of the movie “Fireproof”, coming in a few months.  It was awesome.  This is the next movie from Sherwood Baptist Church, you remember “Facing the Giants” and “Flywheel”.  Last year, I started a marriage enrichment ministry we nicknamed the “M.E.S.S.”.  We met for a few weeks then attendance fell off and I began going through my early back problems, which left me limping for a month.  This movie needs to be seen of every couple wanting to find renewed strength in their marriage.  This may be a good jump start on renewing couple’s ministry in our church.  Due to the lead character being a firefighter, I can think of a few guys who might want to see it, “Chuck”.I felt led to vote for Johnny Hunt for President of the SBC.  He won!!!  For those of you familiar with the history of Upward Basketball, you would know that Johnny Hunt gave an inspiring message that led Caz McCaslin to beginning this wonderful ministry that we now have.  On Tuesday, on behalf of our church, I was invited to a luncheon with Johnny Hunt, Caz, and other Upward churches.  I got to see Lance, our first Upward Representative.  He ran an upward ministry in Eddyville then became employed by them.  He stressed an increased need to reach Ballard County with Upward, where there are no churches offering it.

Wow, God has been at work!  A week ago Thursday is how long Eric has been in the hospital.  Seems as our days are starting to run together.  First let me say I send out a Great Big Thank You to each and everyone of our Spring Bayou family.  Eric and I have been members of Spring Bayou for approximately a year.  In this year God has shown us what it is like to really have a church family that prays for us, loves us and will be there in our time of need.  I have been in awe over the wonderful gestures we have received.  Whether it is prayers, visits, calls, basket of goodies, money and the home cooked meals we have been grateful for each and every one of them.  We have had so many God things in our life over the past week I do not know exactly where to start.  Let’s start with day one.  God directed Eric and me to the hospital because if it would have been up to me Eric would have just gotten over this “flu bug” by eating chicken noodle soup and drinking sprite.  The next day God put several doctors in charge of Eric that were believers of him.  I had more than one doctor tell me it was not all up to them but up to God in seeing Eric through this.  I had confidence in each of these doctors.  The third day was when I was told Eric might have had a blood clot due to the low heart rate etc.  But God seen us through that.  Praise the lord CAT scan was normal.  As the days went Eric has improved each and every day.  He is now up moving around, eating solid foods and has his sense of humor back.  We have faith that God will see to it that Eric’s kidneys do start functioning again on their own.  I can not wait to get back to church and just praise God for all the wonderful miracles he has shown us this past week.  And for all of you who just thought Eric got out of renewing our vows, WRONG.  God has worked so much in our lives over the past few months.  I am not one who likes to speak in large groups but I feel if God can work through us the way he has over the months then I can sure get up and share my testimony with each and everyone of my church family members.  Also to send a shout out to our Preacher.  Wow what a man of God.  When I needed a strong shoulder to lean on my preacher was there for me.  When I didn’t quit understand what the Doctor’s where saying or my brain just totally left me Brother Terry stepped up and seen me through that.  He was there on several occasions when the doctors came in and help translate to me what was going on.  I know if anyone was to ask Eric he would tell you the same thing Brother T has been a strong shoulder to lean, a pick me up when need be and a messenger of God.  One more shout out and I will close.  For all the women in the church that our not part of the Bayou Girls you ABSOLUTELY DO NOT KNOW what you are missing.  I can not think of any other group of Christian Women I would want praying for me.  In my time of need I knew that each and everyone of the “Bayou Girls” would be there for me.  I was stocked up with snacks, personnel needs so I did not have to leave Eric, reading material and those home cooked meals.  But the most important thing I was provided from them this week is their prayers, their shoulders to lean on when I was weak and the encouraging words.  If I need to come to each and everyone of the women in our church and invite you to join the “Bayou Girls” I am not scared I will do it.  You will truly receive a blessing from God and will be with women that Love our God and do not mind sharing it.  Shannon made us girls a journal with the words “God things” it was a journal to write the small or big things God has done for us in our life’s through out the week.  I look forward to sharing my journal with all of you.  God is Good!   I send my love, thanks and appreciation to each of you. 

Eric and Candy Lawrence 

Here’s the doctrine of Oprah in her own words:

God: “What I know is that God, nature, the Spirit, the universe, whatever title you wish to give
him—or her—is always trying to help each one of us to be the best and do the best that we can.”12
This quotation is particularly revealing, because it presents the universe and God as
interchangeable titles for the same reality. Winfrey often appeals to the universe in her meditations
and prayers (see next quotation).
“The universe is not interested in your struggles and your pain and your sorrow. It wants you
to be joyful… All that is God, my heart is open to you. My heart is open to find the flow, the flow, the
flow, the flow that is my life.”13 This is part of a guided meditation recommended by Winfrey.
“Because I am so connected to the bigger picture of what God is, I realize I’m just a particle in
the God chain. I see God as the ocean, and I’m a cup of water from the ocean.”14 This is a common
New Age illustration to explain how everyone is part of the oneness of all things.
“My prayer to God every morning on my knees is that the power in the universe should use my
life as a vessel or a vehicle for its work.”15
“I think you know what’s so important to me is that God isn’t a he or a she but is everything.”16
“I was raised a Baptist and we were too hung up on traditional ways. I was sitting in church
and heard that God is a jealous God. I asked ‘Why?’ Come on—let’s get over it!”17
“I believe in the FORCE—I call it God.”18
“You believe in love; then you believe in God.”19
Jesus: “If what we are taught in orthodox religion—I mean I was raised a Baptist—if, in fact
what we are taught when you go to church and you adore Jesus and praise Jesus … means Jesus
would have been the biggest egotist that ever lived, if that was his purpose in coming to the world to
have people adore him and worship him and carry on about him as people do.”20
“One of the most important books I have ever read is Eric Butterworth’s Discover the Power
Within You. In it he said, ‘Jesus did not come to teach us how divine he was, but to teach us that
there is divinity within us.”21 New Age enlightenment is realizing, like Jesus, that all is God.
Salvation: “One of the biggest mistakes humans make is to believe that there is only one way.
Actually, there are many diverse paths leading to what you call God… There couldn’t possibly be
only one way… Does God care about your heart or whether you called His Son Jesus?”22 This was
Winfrey’s reply to an audience member’s statement that Jesus is the only way.
The Bible: “As I read more of Shirley MacLaine—about the crystals—what you are saying in
The Aquarian Conspiracy—it seems to me to say what the Bible has said for years. It is just that
many of us were brought up with a more restricted, limited vision of what the Bible said.”23
Reincarnation: (including karma—belief that in the next life one will be rewarded for the good
and punished for the bad done in this life): “The first time I got a huge check I closed my office door,
lit a candle, and sat there with it. I prayed to the force that I call God, all that is goodness and light,
that my life might be an extension of the energy represented in that piece of paper, that it bring that
kind of value to myself and others.”24
“I believe that life is eternal. I believe that it takes on other forms. And I believe that there’s so
many different levels that the mind can’t even hold it all. So I believe that, yes, life will continue.”25
Channeling: Jonathan Demme, director of Beloved shared, “Oprah had explained to me…it was
her goal and intention to channel the spirit of Margaret Garner, the woman whose cataclysmic reallife
experience had first given birth to the idea of Beloved in the mind of Toni Morrison.”26 When
speaking of the actors in the film Beloved, Winfrey said “We were all channeling.”27
Winfrey might try to dismiss her views of channeling as simply calling upon the experiences of
others, but revealingly she wrote in her journal during the filming of Beloved: “I awakened early, and
did my daily prayer to the Ancestors.”28 A few days later she wrote: “I bring the force and grace of
history and pain with me, carrying the Ancestors in my heart, hoping, but also knowing, they too
carry me…I really believe I can call her up. Her and so many others. I’m counting on them.”
 

What blows you away is how many folks respect and follow her.  Let me hear your thoughts.
 

Bro.t

God Thing?  I think SO!  

Over the last several years, as long as I can remember, I have been challenged by depression.  Many times I would start on the positive uphill climb and something would happen in my life to cause me to stumble.  Well, the stumbles eventually became head-long plummets to the BOTTOM of the PIT.  During my adult life, I heard preachers speak of embracing all seasons of life.  I tried to embrace my “depression” season, but that’s a big one to embrace.  Lately, I’ve prayed for God to reveal how I can have a break-through and/or use my depression to minister to others.  I’m cautiously thinking I may have had a break-through, in that, God has shown me that I need to be conscious of my life, savor it and be aware of every part of it, not just go through it on auto-pilot, as many people do these days.  You’ll never guess how God presented this to me.  He did so through the TV show, “I Can Make You Thin”.  One of the 4 golden rules of the presenter’s plan is “Be conscious of what you’re eating”.  He described it this way, “Take a bite, put down your fork & knife, chew 20 times, SAVOR and ENJOY each bite.”  Nothing new, right?  Not rocket science either…no…in my case, a GOD THING!!!!  He gave me the ears to “hear” it and apply it, not only to my food consumption, but to LIFE CONSUMPTION!  During my Bible reading this morning, God impressed upon me how I have been consuming life just like most of us consume our food, without being conscious of it, without savoring it, and most of all, without ENJOYING it. I resolved TODAY that I will SAVOR this life, with all of its ups & downs.  I used to be a very organized person; I am not these days.  You see, BD (before depression), I had a great memory, so I didn’t cultivate the habit of relying on calendars, notes and lists.  I have FINALLY come to realize that I MUST depend on calendars, notes & lists.  By doing this, I can “unload” my mind, which keeps me from dwelling on things I need to accomplish.  Most of the times that I have dwelt on these tasks and chores, in my mind, they have become much larger and much more difficult, causing me to give up and give in to fear and failure.  (2 Timothy 1:7 KJV:  For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.)  Of course, calendars, notes and lists aren’t the answer to all of life’s riveting questions, and can’t be so rigid that there’s no room for me to let the Holy Spirit do His thing, but I am praying that this tactic, along with much prayer, counsel, and the love of my family, will one day soon set me FREE from this monster called depression. 

bro.t

 God Bless,  Bro. T.