Barrage of Blessing

From Montrose we took the team to Sandy Cove for another Couple’s Conference … it was and will be the largest event we do … over 200 couples participated!

Kapp and Linda performed dead on dramas that added punch to each session … our guest artist was Mark Cable … who does some powerful family story music … and my wife Karen was in rare form helping me present the material.

Couples enjoy hearing from Karen … they like the other side of the story … we led the group through the 4 Laws of marriage as outlined in the book Marriage on the Rock.

Pray that the message of the weekend will continue to expand in the hearts of the couples who attended.

On that same weekend we launched our first radio feature (fancy name for a 5 minute spot) on WJTL 90.3 in Lancaster. The show is called Pebbles of Truth and we are excited about what it will do for the ministry. You can hear the program on our new website to support it … www.pebblesoftruth.com … leave us some feedback so we know that people are listening … although we have heard from folks already … they told me to stop reading and just be me … that will take practice … 4 minutes goes by too quickly for me not be a little scripted …

If that weren’t enough … we held our 4th annual Sweetheart Banquet this week. We had a fantastic evening … 112 couples came and emjoyed a great meal … some drama from Kapp and Linda … and a mini-concert by Gordy and Maire Barlow-Martin. It was a very positive evening for a lot of couples who shared how they appreciated a night to be together and to focus on themselves as a couple … that was the plan.

Busy February

Our ministry is in full swing … just back from Montrose Bible Conference where we did one of their couples’ weekends. It was fun to have Karen speaking in with me … this weekend we’re off to Sandy Cove for their Tandem Weekend … they have 175 couples registered … pray that the Lord moves in the hearts of couples … pray for all of the logistics … that things run smoothly … I will post here after the event … and finally … this Saturday is Valentine’s Day the day we celebrate love … be sure to do something special!! But it is a special day here at House on the Rock … we make our debut on a local Christian radio station … WJTL FM 90.3 … at 12:20 in the afternoon our radio feature Pebbles of Truth will hit the airways … you can listen to the broadcast live or go to our new website www.pebblesoftruth.com to hear it and pick up the family worksheet that goes with it! We’re excited to see what happens …

Thanks for checking in …

Summer

Things are always a little slower here (in terms of events) during the summer … but we are busy preparing for the fall.  Here’s some of the things you can pray for …

Family Ministry Conference … our second annual.  Kapp has done a great job in putting this together.  Click and check out the details …

Grand Opening of our Extension Office at the Family Center of Gap:  See prior post for the details … we are looking forward to the opportunities this space will offer us!

We are adding 2 New ”Part Time” Staffers over the next few weeks.  One will help me with the second most important thing we do here … raise the money we need to do the most important thing here … minister to families!  I’ll fill you in on the details when they get finalized.

Our second partner will be an Grad School intern from Lancaster Bible College and Graduate School … Scott will be helping us strike that delicate balance between becoming and organization while remaining an organism.  Our growth is forcing us to get more “organized” … institutionalization can be a death toll for organizations that fail to remain organisms as well …  pray for us as we seek to strike that critical balance.

Last but not least for this post … we have been asked to serve as the point organization to promote the new movie FIREPROOF … produced by the same church and production company that did Facing the Giants … we have the leadership premeire on July 22 and the launch September 26th!  Click on th elink to see a preview.

House on the Rock Receives Space in the New Family Center of Gap

We have been given a tremendous opportunity to expand our ministry.  This fall we will be part of

what will become the premiere family ministry center in Central Pennsylvania and maybe in the entire

Mid-Atlantic region.

 

Jonas and Anne Beiler, founders of Auntie Anne’s, have an intense passion for marriages and families! 

Back in 1987 Jonas had a dream to create a center that would provide family oriented services to their

home community of Gap.  His dream is being completed right before his eyes!  In September the Family Center of Gap will hold its Grand Opening; and House on the Rock Family Ministries is privileged to have

an office on the third floor!

 

We are thrilled to be a part of this regional family resource center!  The synergy of working with Jonas

and Anne and the other family organizations will be fantastic!  While checking on the progress of our

space, I was privileged to meet the International Director of Focus on the Family who was also inspecting

the facility and donating some library resources.  That is the caliber of folks involved in this project; and

why we are so excited to be a part of this ministry venture.

 

In another meeting with the Executive Director of FRCC we talked about how we can partner with them

to provide biblically based family life education to the churches and clients in their network.  We will have

a significant role in the family life educational program of this center!

 

We’ll keep you posted on the details for the Grand Opening.  They are expecting over 3000 visitors and

we would love to see you there!  So plan to come on down and see this beautiful new ministry center! 

Visit it online at:  www.gapfamilycenter.org

Powerful prayers for fathers …

Today I was part of the Lancaster National Day of Prayer Celebration.  50 of us met in a pristine 1870 vintage sanctuary in Mount Joy PA.  We had a number of folks from the community lead us in prayer for their assigned areas … the mayor was there to pray us through “government,” the president of the local Chamber of Commerce to pray for businesses … you get the picture.

 

Well in the middle of this litany … an ensemble of young ladies from the local middle school got up to sing two songs they had written.  They were great in both performance and power of lyric. 

 

When it was my turn to lead us in a time of prayer for families I presented several requests … one was to pray against fatherlessness … dads who were either physically or emotionally absent from their children.  I then broke the audience into small groups to pray through one of the family issues I had listed … asking each group to pick a topic and pray.

 

I met with the young ladies who sang.  They were sitting in the front pew!  Do you know what they wanted to pray for?  Yes … against fatherlessness … they each prayed that men would be loving husbands and involved fathers.  Each one of those beautiful girls was in a home with no daddy.  What a powerful moment that was for me.  What a demonstration that our Heavenly Father is indeed a “Father to the fatherless!”  Pray for fathers!

First floor — Our walk with God

Now that we understand the need for a firm foundation and have established it in the Word of God we are ready to unearth the rest of our pyramid of priorities.

The “step pyramid” of Djores was built one level on top of another … imagine building a big square one story warehouse … it is structurally complete and fully operational. Then, after a while you need more space and build another square warehouse, a little smaller than the first level on top of that one … and then another slightly smaller on top of that … up through six stories … that was how this particular monument was built.

The pyramid was built one level on top of the other … the previous level had to be complete and solid before the next level was added. Again another lesson for us … as we begin to unpack the pyramid of priorities the first level has to be well established in order to support the mounting levels to follow. (Remember all of this was built on a massive stone foundation!)

Our first level of priority is our walk with God … Paul says in Ephesians 4 that we are to walk in a manner worthy of the call that God has placed on our lives as Christians. Our walk with God, the first story or our ‘pyramid of priorities’ rests firmly on the Word of God our massive foundation of God’s truth. We learn all we need to know about God and how to walk with Him in the pages of His “How to have a relationship with Me Book.”

We see in Ephesians 4 that our walks with God are the practical ways we live our lives. The way we love each other, the way we do our work … all need to lived out so that people can see that we are God’s special children. Read those verses and see how you’re walking ….

The “Unseen” Difference

Archeologists tell us that thousands of pyramids were built throughout Egypt … yet only a fraction of them stand today.  Why do a few remain standing while others crumbled in the desert throughout the storms of time?  Those scientists say the difference was foundations.  The pyramids built on massive stone foundations are the ones that have stood tall for thousands of years.  This discovery was made because they excavated these historical sites. 

 

This archeological fact unearths another powerful lesson for us.  If our lives are not built on a solid, well laid foundation … they are destined to fall … they will crumble … our legacies will blow away in the desert winds.  That is why we call our ministry House on the Rock Family Ministries!  We want to help families build their lives and homes on the “Rock.”  So the first priority in our pyramid of priorities is foundational and vital. 

 

The pyramid of priorities was derived from the inspired progression of thoughts of Paul in the letter he wrote to the church in Ephesus.  The first part of the letter (chapters 1-3) deals with ‘who we are’ in Jesus Christ … the second half of the letter (chapters 4-6) unpacks the ‘so what … how should we live?’ 

 

The foundation to our “Pyramid of Priorities” is built upon the inspiration of these words and thoughts by God’s Holy Spirit … who inspired Paul to write them in an orderly progression.  I believe that the order in which God inspired these words and thoughts is extremely significant in that they are His list of priorities in how we should live our lives as Christians.  It is the building of our lives on God’s inspired (the unseen) Word (the seen) that will cause our lives and legacies to stand the storms of time.

 

The Words of God given through the Bible are the foundation upon which all of us as Christ followers need to build our lives to stand the storms of time.

The “point” of the pyramids

April 7^th …

 

Every culture is fascinated by pyramids … whether Egyptian or Mayan.  If they didn’t stand today in their own defense … we would deem them impossible for ancient engineers and contractors to design and build such massive structures thousands of years ago.  That’s why the Great Pyramid is one of the 7 Wonders of the World!

 

But I look at pyramids from a different angle.  Because they were built as eternal monuments to the persons they entombed, they were imagined, designed, and constructed while that individual was still living his or her life.  It took builders over 30 years to construct the larger pyramids … that was just about the lifespan of the future occupant.  That must have been just a little eerie … seeing your own tomb/monument being built before your very eyes! 

 

Yet the similarities are very sobering … we are building monuments too … our lives will leave a legacy for our children and their children’s children.  So … we need to be thinking and planning carefully as to how we’re building those legacies … those monuments pointing our ancestors heavenward.  It will take us a lifetime to build a lasting godly legacy.

 

That’s why I call my presentation on priorities the “Pyramid of Priorities” … because our legacies (positive or negative) are built on our choices … and our choices are made based on our priorities.  So developing a set of foundational priorities is extremely important.

 

But there is another reason I have chosen this title … each of the priorities … just like layers of the pyramids … are built one on top of the other.  If the foundational layer is not solid … the rest of the structure will crumble …

Gender Neutral Priorities

I spoke to a group of young wives and moms this week … that’s a little unusual for me in that I regularly speak to men’s groups and couples.  But I learned that males and females both struggle with priorities … not the choices between good and bad … although we all wrestle with those issues … they rarely tax our taxonomy of more difficult choices categorized as good, better and best.   So to get us thinking I presented them with a choice:  “Do you go shopping all day with a girl friend who needs to talk and be encouraged … or stay home and do the laundry so your family has something to wear tomorrow?”  Neither is a choice between good or evil … but there is an element of good, better, or best choice.

The ladies were chuckling and quickly assured me that they … unlike men … can multi task and that they could easily accomplish both these “good and better” tasks in the course of a day. 

So much for my feeble attempt at a moral dilemma <smile>.   You see my “blue brain” thinks like a man … we do one thing at a time!  Multi tasking is drinking my iced tea while I am driving and listening to a CD …  the real main task is driving … the tea and music simply enhances the experience! … anyway … I quickly added another ”choice” to my prioritizing scenario … “and prepare a nice meal for your family who has done fast food all week because of your kids’ hyperactive schedules.”  That threw in a little more challenge. 

After we discussed the factors and issues surrounding the choices … I presented what I like to call the “Pyramid of Priorities” … based on the ancient writings in the New Testament.  We’ll share more of that later …

 

 

Marriage mentoring is a growing ministry

I am going to try to do better with the blogging … not that anyone is reading … but at least we will have some sort of written history.  It is now April … and we have completed one of the busiest seasons ever … that’s great news in that the ministry is growing … it is bad news in that it severely taxes our infrastructure.

I am excited at the potential of marriage mentoring … we just finished training 8 couples who are chomping at the bit to get started … I’ll keep you posted on their progress. 

We’re training another group of eight couples this month at another church … this is a fantastic ministry for preventing marital issues as well as for enriching relationships.  If you are interested in learning how to be a marriage mentor … or if you are in the Lancaster area and want to be mentored … contact me.