Good Morning Patiently Waiting Brothers and Sisters in Christ! Are you longing for more of Jesus or for God to intervene in some situation you are facing? Are you crying out for God to come and bring a prodigal to Jesus, heal something, bring His favor, change you or something? Are you trusting and choosing joy while you wait? BUT GOD! He is not slow, hasn't forgotten you or forsaken you--even in times of testing and stretching and pruning. PTL! He is working all things together and knows how many hairs you need on your head to accomplish His custom made plans for you. Think about that and check out the Charles Stanley Devo below speaking into how to wait on the Lord successfully. I think about all the Jewish people waiting for God to speak again and to send the Promised One in those long, dark, silent years before Jesus came. Think about Jesus starting His ministry and very few realizing God had already put on flesh and come down as a baby. God is at work, even when we don't see it, know it, or sense it. He is with us always and He is always at work. PTL! Look for Him and keep steadily plodding forward with His Spirit as your guide. Have faith like Mary the mother of Jesus who basically said, Lord, Whatever! Here I am! Have at it!

Check out Our Daily Bread about building up Goodwill. Peace on earth and goodwill to people...what's that mean? Goodwill is actually valuable if you own a business. The price of my business was affected by the goodwill I had built up before I sold it. Does our church have goodwill? Absolutely! But we are not selling it. We are continuing to invest in our goodwill as we bless many as we live sacrificially and love lavishly. We are pouring out ourselves and stewarding all God's blessings to build His Kingdom and goodwill. Can you see and sense the goodwill asset of St. Matts? I really like the story of the CEO in ODB. What truth we glean as we apply that to out church! Many people and churches have the tendency to circle the wagons and hold tight to resources instead of investing and sowing lavishly when times are hard. It's human nature and helps us have a little sense of security. But is it really wise and God's way of thinking? His Word reminds us to sow lavishly and reminds us that we reap what we sow. If we sow nothing, we reap nothing. God's ways are surely not our ways of thinking!

How people view us is our goodwill. People are seeing us as caring, compassionate servants of God. Thank you! And thank God as He blesses us, guides and prospers our sowing. Let us keep at it no matter what we face! Here's the reality, we can hoard our resources and hang on for 7-10 years before we run out of money or we can pour ourselves out for God's glory and invest in His Kingdom as we sow lavishly. There are two possible outcomes of this: We close our doors in 7-10 years with people knowing we ran our race well and loved lavishly like God; or, We start reaping and growing and producing many new disciples of Jesus and our legacy carries on for decades. (FYI: that has begun to blossom already! PTL!) Along the way, we need to constantly evaluate and adjust as God reveals the next steps, but either way we bring Him glory. There is one more options: circle the wagons and hoard our resources and hang on until "ICHABOD"--the Spirit has left us and we close our doors. It's kinda a Scrooge type of living. If you want to call that living.  Honestly, that could easily happen in five years or less if we aren't careful to keep trusting God, sowing lavishly in love and living sacrificially live Jesus. I see us more as the first two options kind of people--pouring ourselves out for God's glory. No matter what, trusting Him and doing what we can with what we got to keep building His Kingdom. As long as you will have me as your shepherd, we will continue to work on pouring ourselves out, living sacrificially and loving lavishly like Jesus. He has great plans for us and is working all things together for good as we humbly trust and follow Him. Peace to you all and His goodwill for all people who He sends our way! We are moving forward to become the dynamic movement of God that will bless many, attract them to God, meet needs and produce good and lasting fruit as we sow lavishly and love like Jesus. I can't wait to see what God will do next and where he will lead us next in our journey forward! PTL! And keep praying into it!

One last thought, we are family. God has brought us together for His custom made purposes for each of us and us as His body. We all have roles. Like any marriage, God seems to bring some opposites together and they flourish by learning how to balance life and goals. The church is full of all different sorts. Our priority is to meld together as one. That takes a lot of grace, love and even some hard work. We all have ways we think are best and even assume they are God's best. We need to constantly work at deciphering the times and God's plans for us and how He wants us to continue to invest and sow in ways that keep us unified and focused on following God together. He knew what He was doing when He brought us together. He knows best how we can all feel comfortable while being stretched as we follow Him. It take unity of the body and we need to keep working at that. Read through those Ephesian passages in ODB and ponder with God how to die to self, take up cross and follow Jesus for His benefit and for His Kingdom plans for us. We will all be stretched and have to move out of our comfort zones but we will be in it together and glorifying God! And I believe continue to be a healthy growing body of Christ that produces great fruit and many disciples for decades to come. PTL!

What's He saying to you right now? What measurable thing will you do about it? Who will you process with? Maybe we will talk about that tomorrow as we light the "Faith" candle and discuss having faith like jesus. he has faith in us! Do we have faith to follow Him?

Charles Stanley:

ODB: