CHANGE

Hello on this hot June day. Sunday is the Lord’s Day. God has blessed the Harding Street church of Christ with a nice beautiful comfortable cool building. He has blessed us with every good and perfect gift. As we sing and pray, listen to the lesson, give, and remember Jesus in the Lord’s Supper, may we be full of gratitude for His rich blessings.

CHANGE – Something we want and don’t want. Change can be frightening and at the same time interesting and exciting. Change is going on all around us, above us, and within us. Change – We may not accept it readily. We may love it or hate it, look forward to it or deny it, accept it or reject it, bless it or curse it, try to alter it or pretend it doesn’t matter, but either way change just keeps on keeping on. All we can do is adjust and move forward with it and in it. When we do, we’ll find that change can be a friend. Don’t believe what I’m saying is true? Look in the mirror.

I try to talk to my children about life and living and they say, “Dad, things today are not the same as they were when you were our age. Things have changed.” I know this is true. When I was a boy, my mother would send us outside this time of the year to play. You know, I rarely see children playing outside anymore. We had no cell phones, computers, or video game consoles. To get our friends in the neighborhood together we’d have to walk over to their house or ride our bike if we had one to see if they could play. And our friends were two miles away. We had no playground equipment other than trees to climb, barns to play in, and forests to explore. We had no swimming pools or splash pools. We did have streams, rivers, lakes, and ponds to swim in. No organized sports except for the ones we “organized” in the backyard between us, like “the goal line is the fence on my side and your shoes on the your side” or maybe setting up the bases for baseball; first base is a soda can, second is a trash bag, third a paint can lid, and home is piece of cardboard. And we didn’t always have a bat and a ball. Sometimes we had a stick and a rolled up wrapped up something held together with rubber bands.  Ever played Hide and Seek? How about Mother May I? No? Then you haven’t really lived! We did have an imagination, that’s for sure. I’m glad things have changed. And I’m sad things have changed.

God doesn’t change. He is the same, yesterday, today, and forever. God does change. He changes us, makes us better, stronger, wiser and readies us for all the changes that lie ahead. I’m excited about all that God has in store for us in the near and distant future. He knows.

This coming Sunday (July 2) our morning lesson is “God’s Call to Greatness.” We will take a look at Jesus calling the disciples to fish for men. On the evening we will look at FRIEND #4 – DETERMINATION. Enjoy your Sunday. God bless you. MB