Friday, September 14, 2007

A day in the life of John

Mindy wants me to put up a new post, so that our blog doesn't get stale. I guess I'll blog my day. MacBeth speaks of "a tale full of sound and fury; signifying nothing." Here is a record of my sound and fury today... (though because of God's grace our lives never signify nothing!)

I got up at 4:30 a.m. (and feat in itself for this late night man) and got to the church by 5 a.m. to look over my notes for my Friday morning men's discipleship group. We're talking about growing in emotional health this Fall. Specifically, today we talked about gaining the ability to name and identify our emotions, and then (through the Psalms) bring them to the Lord. We talked about how praying is always answering speech: God speaks first, then we answer Him. I opened up to the guys and talked about my own struggles with eating and weight and how much of my eating is often driven more by emotions than by hunger. Learning to identify the emotion in the moment and then redirect that emotion in a more godly, healthier way through the power of the Gospel is my goal. I think the 28 or so guys there really appreciated my candor. I got several emails afterwards. I know I appreciate their prayers and support.

I then grabbed a quick bite to eat and had a 10 am appointment, following by a lunch appointment that lasted for 2.5 hours at Blue Mesa Grill. Enjoyable, but intense conversation with a good friend in the church. After lunch, I finished up the final approval process for the Sunday order of worship and the Trinity This Week (~1 hour). Murphy's Law came roaring back today with the breakdown of the church copier, which prints, staples and folds our Sunday bulletins. So Kinkos will print our order of worship over the weekend. Bummer ($). Afterwards, I answered a slew of emails (~100?) rather quickly. Got home around 5:30. Took a quick 15 minute nap. Then we left to go to Small Group over at the Monroe's house.

Tonight in small group we studied Acts 12, where you see the power of Herod contrasted with the power of God through a praying church. Needless to say, Herod died and Peter was freed from prison. God's dealings with us are so hard to anticipate. But He is good (though not always safe) as Lewis says. We also celebrated the Parks triplet's 4th birthday together with cupcakes and candles. We had good time of prayer afterwards, though I could feel myself getting very tired.

We got home around 10:30, and did the quick routine to get Christopher and Sarah into bed. Mindy fed Hannah, I brushed my teeth, and now here we are in the bed at 11:10 at night. Mindy is reviewing her Scripture memory cards and John is blogging. We'll both be asleep very soon. My alarm is set for 7am.

Tomorrow is a big day. I'm moderating a church-wide meeting at 9:30 a.m. concerning a new strategy that would eliminate debt and open a door to new ministry growth for our church. After that we are off to a friend's birthday party. And I've GOT to get an hour on the treadmill and elliptical trainer in tomorrow, since I didn't get it in today and I'm behind this week on my goal of exercising 4 hours total this week.

I also met this week with a nutritionist that I really like and am very optimistic about the help that she is going to give me. Mindy is excited too. Over the past 6 months, I've explored the option of gastric-bypass surgery or lap-band surgery. After talking to numerous people, I've decided to put that on hold for six months and make a good faith effort with the proper support around me. I'm giving it the old college try, but more really wanting to trust the Lord to help me get through those days where a large pizza seems to be the answer to all sorts of uncomfortable emotions, like stress, anxiety, depression, boredom, anger, etc. So I'm optimistic and praying that this new venture with my nutritionist friend will be fruitful. So that's pretty much a normal day in the life of ministry for me, except I didn't get in very much study time or any exercise time today.

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