MARCH 2011 EDITION

It is a nutty time of year! One day it is 35 degrees, the next it is 85 degrees. Who can figure out how to dress for the day? Also, It is also a time of year when we get violent storms. This causes sleepless nights for me. If we have a lot of rain and the power goes out, my sump pump in the sub-basement will not drain the incoming water. The result is that it would be flooded and ruin the furnace. I have taken some precaution. I bought a gasoline-powered generator that I can use in such an emergency. However, this necessitates my being aware of the power going out, hence the sleepless nights.

Then there is the pollen! If you don’t live in the south, particularly in the Atlanta area, you do not understand pollen. When national pollen counts are measured as extremely high at 200, we “enjoy” counts of 9000! Everything wears a coat of yellow powder for several weeks. Everyone suffers, spring allergy sufferers and non-allergy folks alike. A malaise sets in on each of us, as the air is thick with pine pollen. The good news is that there is no more beautiful place on earth in the spring than the Atlanta area when the dogwoods, wisteria, forsythia, and azaleas are in bloom. Spring green replaces winter gray and brown. The earth experiences a sort of resurrection.

Charles Haddon Spurgeon, a popular English preacher, speaks of another sort of resurrection, a daily resurrection. Let’s look at what he says.

“Every morning is a sort of resurrection. At night we lay us down to sleep, stripped of our garments, as our souls will be of our bodily array when we come to die; but the morning wakes us …even thus shall we be satisfied when we wake up in our Master’s likeness, no more to put on the soiled raiment of earth.

Now, as every morning brings to us, in fact, a resurrection from what might have been our tomb, and delivers us from the image of death which through the night we wore, it ought be saluted with thanksgiving. As the great resurrection morning will be awakened with the sound of the trumpets far-sounding music, so let every morning, as though it were a resurrection to us, awaken us with hymns of joy.”

Here follows Spurgeon’s challenge to us…

“Let us take care, while we are still fresh, to give the cream of the morning to God.

It is a good rule never to look into the face of a man in the morning until you have looked into the face of God; an equally good rule always to have business with Heaven before you have any business with earth. Oh, it is a sweet thing to bathe in the morning in the love of God.”

Do we attend to this? I am afraid we are in too much of a hurry, or we get up too late. Could we rise a little earlier? If we could steal even a few minutes from our beds, those few minutes would scatter their influence over the entire day.”

Ouch! As it is sometimes said, “Now he’s gone from preaching to meddling!” But it is good stuff, nonetheless!






MINISTRY NEWS

MEN’S RETREAT – DR. BOB MITCHELL LED A DISCUSSION BASED ON THE BOOK “RADICAL” BY DAVID PLATT – THERE WERE EIGHT MEN IN ATTENDANCE.

CRIME VICTIMS ADVOCACY COUNCIL HOTLINE RESPONDER POSITION – SPOKE WITH OVER EIGHTY INVIDUAL FAMILY MEMBERS WHO HAD LOST A RELATIVE WHO WAS A VICTIM OF MURDER.

UPCOMING GOLF TOURNAMENT CORPORATE SPONSORS –

DOUG HAYNIE – SILVER SPONSOR
ROB GARCIA – BRONZE SPONSOR
FIRST LANDMARK BANK – BRONZE SPONSOR
COURTMAKERS – BRONZE SPONSOR

UPCOMING GOLF TOURNAMENT COMPANY SPONSORS

BRUCE CHASTAIN CONTRACTING SERVICES
DYE AVIATION FACILITIES
ZACK BARFIELD – HEALTH PLAN DESIGN
WEST COBB DINER
MIKE AND KAMBRIA ROBERTSON – HOUSE OF HOPE – GUATEMALA
CLELL DEAVER – ATLANTIC CAPITAL BANK

UPCOMING GOLF TOURNAMENT FAMILY SPONSORS

JOHN AND JUDY MCMENNAMY
WARREN AND ELEANOR HERRON
MARSHALL AND CINDY DYE
PETER AND GAIL RE’

NEW NET WORK MINISTRIES E-MAIL ADDRESS – buckreese41@yahoo.com