Last week was harsh to me. I mean from an outside perspective it was a week like any other, but for those close to me they knew it was tough. Last Tuesday night I stood over the NICU bed of a two month old little boy who was brain dead. His precious, but lifeless, body lay still as machines kept him alive in the earthly sense. I watched as his mom and dad laid close to him, touched him, spoke to him, and held on to him. Wednesday morning I woke up to the bitter cold of the 17 degree wind and freeze of the night before. It was time to break out the winter coat, scarf, and gloves. Today was going to be another heavy day. I bundled up and headed to the funeral home to meet with another family who had lost their 78 year old grandfather, dad, husband, friend, and coworker. The family had chosen to do a graveside ceremony, but the kids wanted to have one last moment with their beloved before we made our way outside. They cried, shared stories, commented on how good he looked, and then we … [Read more...]

Yesterday I felt like trash. Woke up with a 101.5 fever and my throat was on fire. I was convinced that the swine flu had descended on my body at last. Impending death was immanent. Most of the day I stabled out around 100 degree fever and sandpaper ridden throat. Never before have I thought that I felt bad enough to need to send my sermon to someone else on staff to have them ready to preach. However, yesterday morning I found myself in that boat. This posed an issue for me on so many levels. I am STOKED about this series. I love being with our Roanoke people. We were prepping to baptize some people today. There are new people coming every week. You can see my dilemma. I spent the vast majority of my day in the same spot on the couch in and out of consciousness. I finally took some Benadryl and went to bed at 8:30pm. Minus some pretty jacked up dreams I slept hard until about 3:0oam. I woke up sweating, got up and got something to drink, checked my kids and went back to bed. Woke up … [Read more...]