Well, I’m off to College Station, Texas for the weekend. No, I’m not going to the Texas A&M game. I’m going to meet with a group of believers from the area that have been reading some of my stuff and wanted to talk with me. We’ve also got some folks from a wider region coming in as well. I’m really looking forward to it.
This all means I had to put up our latest podcast a bit early, since I will be traveling tomorrow. Oh well! It can’t be helped.
And let me leave you whit this wonderful uplifting letter. To be honest, I’ve been shocked at how broadly our little podcast has found its way around the world. I got an email the other day that was a real encouragement. If this is what people are getting out of our podcasts, then it is well worth the time and expense of doing it.
I just wanted to drop you both a line and tell you how much I enjoy your weekly podcasts. I am currently serving in the US Navy as an intel specialist and I can tell you that after a grueling week your podcasts lift me up with humor, honesty, and a freshness that I rarely receive in the bowels of the “dungeon” that we work in.
I have to also tell you that I have been feeling about the church what you and Brad discuss, for quite some time. and all this time I have been feeling a real sense of guilt that I haven’t wanted to attend church, or play their game of “you come, we manipulate you, you leave, you come back for repentance, we manipulate you”, and on and on and on. After I graduated from college and interned overseas at a church, I returned to the US feeling even more torn on the subject than ever, and even more torn seeing college and high school students struggling with the same inner turmoil. I had no answers for them, much less myself, and when I would go before the Lord on a daily basis I felt like I had to hide from Him these feelings of not wanting to attend church and play “the game”.
The church did a great job of making sure I felt that condemnation too, and I grew more and more resentful of them, all of them. however, now in my mid 20’s, and still madly in love with Jesus, I came to peace with it, and really took Jesus’ hand to walk my own journey and not that of what someone else told me was right. Thank you for getting the word out about this magnificent freedom. I deploy for iraq in a few months and I plan to still be listening to you both from the sand box, laughing along with Brad poking and smacking the bear. Have a great week, and thank you again.
You’re more than welcome. And our thoughts and prayers are always with the troops wherever they are stationed around the world. May God’s light shine through you to others around you in the simplicity and joy of just being his child in the earth.
My thoughts and prayers are with them also.
My thoughts and prayers are with them also.