we were craving some seafood so we went to this crab place called the fiddlers crab house on the river front. my wife and i ordered the seafood platter steamed…mussels, crab, oysters, clams, shrimp and crawfish. great place for seafood. there is a hole in the middle of the table where a bucket is conveniently dropped in so you can deposit the shells…nifty idea. great seafood if you are in savannah.
last night was a preview night at crave and we had a time. parents, friends and families came to watch our students in many different categories. in the end one of our worship teams threw it down and we closed the night out with prayer. you could feel God moving in the end of the service. the night was not the smoothest and never is due to technical issues for bands, singers, acoustic sets and human video..but all went well and it was a good night for students to practice in front of an audience before the festival. I am so proud of these kids…there are some extremely talented kids in our group and we are blessed! God is so good.
in the end of the service i spoke about what happened the night before at camp meeting…i could feel God all day long! tommy bates was praying for a young adult that use to be involved in crave and i squeezed through the crowd to get close. i wanted god to do something big in this kids life, well after he prayed for him he grabs me by the hand and speaks of change…for a moment i wanted to pull away because i was not ready for that word and he clarified that he was not sending me out! well, i have been praying for a definite change in this up and coming group of students and he spoke directly to what i have been praying for! God is truly about to do something in students lives and push the shy and timid to the foreground. tuesday night was a great moment for the portion of students that were their. last night i spoke to them about moving when God moves and told them of the change that was coming to crave.
God i truly desire for you to move in a powerful way in crave! i want more!
its time for a move of God in crave…
ok…i did not blog about last nights camp meeting. Tommy Barnett hit it out of the park with a message “the honor of wanting to quit” when you are near a person like tommy barnett you feel oh so insignificant. He is such an amazing man of God with faith and is doing so much. it makes you feel like you are not doing enough for Christ! wow what an amazing night! people that want to quit have something to quit! well it was truly a night of impartation. i got some great things last night. you left the building feeling better than when you came!
side note…parking crew (john, jeremy, mike, daniel, pedro and tony) it rained but you guys stayed with it and jammed the lot.
tonight tommy bates spoke and it was powerful. this was the first time i have heard him and if i could describe his preaching i would say it was a mixture of old time pentecostal powerful preaching mixed with relevance for today i.e…sound like yesterday but relevant for todays generation. in the end students were laid out on the stage speaking in other tongues. i got close to see him pray for a student that has been out for some time and he grabbed me and spoke over my life and pastor jon’s. powerful it felt like a blanket a heavy wet blanket was laid on me and i could not get up. God was big tonight. he said that there was change coming…not that i was leaving, but there was going to be a change in flow! i have been praying all week for God to speak to me about crave, life and the future…he spoke exactly what i have been praying for crave…God whatever it takes bring change to crave! i want the supernatural to be working, i want God to call students out of this group to do significant things, i want revival…i want all that God has for this place. I simply want God to be big.
I left tonight still carrying the effects of what God had done tonight…wow it was a powerful night. i am now looking with expectation for God to break out in crave! God is truly up to something big here…the harvest is coming!
july 28, 1990 
today we celebrate 18 happy years of marriage. God has been so good to us!
tonight kicked off campmeeting at calvary and the speaker was bishop andrew merrit. tonight he preached on faith extenders and told some pretty amazing stories about faith. mark 11:22 “Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. 23 “I tell you the truth, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him. 24 Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. tonight was a simple message with no deep theological truth. that’s what he said…well he anointed people and the power of God came and touched lives. we were picking people up off the floor everywhere. i watched as one of our staff pastors was ready to catch 2 at a time…i caught a few as well. others just fell out. God was rich today.
the most profound thing to me happened in the third service when he spoke on the widow from 2 kings 4 her son died and she laid him on the prophets bed then she went and found the prophet to tell him her son had died and he was a promise and she wanted him back. the prophet came back and laid on the boy and prayed. he came back to life…well things, die in all our lives and he had the whole service write down some things that are dead in their lives whether it was a business, relationships or finances…and the second our pastor laid on those things that died you could feel the anointing in the building! God was truly rich today!
great start to our summer campmeeting!
tomorrow night Tommy Barnett comes to town!
there are places you go and you can’t get anyone to help you and you wonder what in the world they do to stay in business, t hen there are places that you go to and you get the royal treatment. well not royal, but they know your name, know you like to order certain things and they even look out for your interests. you know the p[lace where you feel good about going to and glad you spent your lunch there.
now starbucks is one of those places that if you go often enough, then they will remember your drink and your name. I feel kinda weird when the guy behind the counter calls out my name and my drink. But there is a chic fila in our town where this lady passes out mints, and purell hand cleaner. she always brings over this huge pepper grinder knowing i like pepper on my fries and strips. she has a great smile and takes care of everyone. one time they place was so jammed there was nowhere to sit, i had the fam there and she grabbed one of my sons by the hand and ran him to the last table open to hold us a spot. i like this place! it’s chic-fila and it’s the service you truly don’t expect in fast food.
this brings me back to the church. customer service is all about the customer and when thousands of customers come through in a single day it can get kinda hectic. it’s really cool to look out for people that struggle getting in. there is this one lady that comes in every week and she use to never drive someone always brought her and she was real frail. well one sunday she came in driving and opened her window to say this it was the first time in years she had driven. working with a perking crew is not on the hit list for volunteers, but just helping customers out have the best possible experience is what the church should be all about. some don’t come in with a smile, but the what does a smile and a wave cost you anyway? hospitality is a gift, some people just don’t have it. so when you drive onto the church parking lot with all the cares of the world weighing you down, look for the guy smiling back at ya…his name is mike and he is always full of cheer!
