When I was a sophomore in high school, the fall of my sophomore year, I did not have my license yet. I was playing football, and I was injured. Actually, I fell down on a rainy day and hurt my butt. I had to have an adjustment on my tailbone, of all things. My future wife, Kristi, who Id already been dating for a couple years, was three years older than me, so she offered to drive me to my chiropractors appointment. I thought this was really cool because when I would sit in the passengers side, I would reach over and get to steer. She decided to drop me off at the chiropractor clinic. We were running late, as most of you know the Powers family is always late. She dropped me off at the door and went and parked the car. I thought, even though Im late, this is a perfect time to scare my future wife. So I hid around the corner of the building and waited until I heard her footsteps. I heard her coming, and just as she rounded the building, I went Raaaahhh! Except…it wasnt my wife. It was a 75-year-old man who was coming to the chiropractor to get an adjustment. I probably had just adjusted it for him. I was mortified. I said, Im so sorry. I thought you were someone else. I just kept saying, Im so sorry. He looked at me with this fear and trembling, and he was like, Just stay away from me, man. He walked into the chiropractors office. What I probably did that day was breathe death into that mans life. What were going to talk about today is breathing life into other people. If you will open your Bibles to Genesis 2:7, page 2 [of NIV pew Bibles], it says, …the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. Wouldnt it have been so cool to be there in the Garden as God took the ground and formed it into a man? But, it was totally lifeless. Then God bent down into His creation and went wheww and just breathed life into the first human being. Thats what God has called us to do for each other. All of us know somebody that when you spend time with them, they are so negative. By the time you walk away, you feel worthless. You feel like you cant do anything; they have pounded you down into the ground, and you cant wait to get away from them. Then there are those rare people in our lives who when we are around them, we feel like we can accomplish anything. When we walk away, we are on Cloud 9. They have so built us up that we cant imagine not being able to anything in our lives. Thats what God has called us to be. If you turn in your Bibles to 2 Corinthians 3:2-3, which is page 1143. This is what the model is for our lives: You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everybody. You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. Did you know that if you have Jesus Christ living inside of you, you are a living letter-no matter you go? People are reading you like a book without your even saying a word. How you act and how you are around other people is your living letter to them. So wherever we go, we can breathe life into other people. Have you ever been at a toll booth and not only paid for yourself but paid for the person behind you? Now, dont try this at the automatic ones because it doesnt work, and youre just getting ripped off. But on the manual toll booths, just once in your life, pay for the car behind you whether you know them or not. Then, as you drive away, imagine the look on their face when they come up to the grumpy old toll booth person, and that person probably has to smile now and say, Youre already paid for. Go on through. Have you ever noticed toll booth people? We took a youth trip down to Chicago on a seminar. Every toll booth we went through, it was like this, Good morning! How are you? Arrgghhh! Blah, blah, blah! This one lady, I just wanted to reach down into the booth and go, Its okay if you smile. Finally, the last lady we had, her face lit up, and she said, Im doing great! How are you doing? I was like, Yes! I finally got to one! Or if you shovel snow, especially if you have a snow blower, and you go out to the six inches of snow, instead of just doing your sidewalk, you do your neighbors or the whole block. When that person gets up in the morning, and they know they have to go out and break their back doing that, they look out and the snow has been cleared. You have just breathed life into somebody without quoting a Bible verse, without saying anything about God. How about letting someone actually get in front of you when youre driving-or at the grocery store? This last week, I was at Woodmans, and I had a whole cartload of groceries. A person came up behind me, and he had just two or three items in his hands. I was like, Agghh! I know what I have to do. So I turned and looked at the man and said, You know, I have a whole cartload of groceries, and I notice you only have a couple of items. So I just want you to know Im probably going to be here for some time while theyre checking me out, so you have plenty of time to go get more stuff. No, I didnt say that, but let someone in front of you at the grocery store, and youll be amazed at the reaction youll get because the world does not do that. Remember peoples birthdays. When I used to work for the postal service, there was a lady there that always remembered my birthday. Its been almost four years since Ive quit there. Every year, she sends me a card or an email. I cannot tell you what that means to me. I found out that she does that for over 100 people that she works with, and she never, ever forgets one. Remember peoples birthdays. We took a trip to Guatemala a couple of years ago. It was a church missions trip. One of the things that we did was we went to a childrens hospital in Guatemala City. As we walked through there, our job was to play with the kids who arent so sick that they would be confined to their beds. So, a number of kids bailed out of that ward of the childrens hospital, and we started playing games. As we were walking by this room, we heard this terrible crying and wailing. And as we walked by, we saw this little boy-about three or four years old, and with the quick glance I got, I noticed some of his toes were missing. The toes that he had left were all black. I dont know what he had, but it was as if they were just rotting off, it was causing him intense pain. I saw in the room, there was not a single soul with him, not a mom, not a dad, not a grandpa or grandma, not a brother or sister, not even a doctor or nurse. I was thinking, This poor little boy. Two Godly women from our church, Lori Bower and Berti Baker, made their way down the hall and into that room. One of my jobs on that trip was to video tape, to make a video of the trip, so I snuck in behind them. They didnt even know I was there, and this is the video tape scene I have. Lori Bower was stroking his sweaty little head, and he continued to cry. Berti Baker just stroked his arm, and she started singing to him. Pretty soon, his wailing and his crying turned into just a little whimper. Pretty soon the whimper turned into silence. Then I saw little eyes start to flutter, and he fell asleep. It was such an amazing scene of how God used these two Godly women who live half a world away. By a sense of touch and singing words he didnt understand, they breathed life into this little boy. He felt the human touch and the comfort it brought to him was just enough so he could fall asleep probably for the first time in a long time. Then on our way home from that trip, we had always been warned, Dont drink the water. I did really well. I didnt drink any water I wasnt supposed to. Then on the last night of the trip, we went to a restaurant for the first time. I ordered a Coca-Cola, and the evil little ice cubes that were in the Coca-Cola snuck past me. It was the worst night of my entire life. I started timing how many times I would get up. I would sleep for about five minutes, and then I would wake up. Every twelve minutes, I had to go to the bathroom, either to throw up or use the facilities, as they say. We had to get up at 4 AM the next morning, and I probably got 20 minutes of sleep the whole night. I was just miserable. We got in this van, and they gave me a plastic bag, which was my friend. I held that plastic bag, and then I started throwing up. Its amazing how fast the van driver would pull over when he hears those noises coming from the back of the van. Rrrr Rrrr, as he pulled over to the side of the road. I stumbled out past the curb and onto the grass. If youve ever been to Guatemala City, there is trash and garbage and refuse everywhere. I kneeled down in other peoples trash, and two inches from my right knee was the nastiest, dirtiest diaper Ive ever seen in my life, and I could smell it. Not only was it the worst night of my life, now I am sitting here, throwing up my guts, kneeling down in refuse, and human waste is right next to me. It was the lowest point of my life. Then I felt a hand on my shoulder, and it was Jason Raddenbach, from our church. All he did was get out of the van and put his hand on my shoulder. You cannot believe the difference that made to me. He didnt say a word; he just let me know, Im here for you. I was like, Thank you, God. It was like God reached down from Heaven and, through his [Jasons] hand, touched me at one of the lowest points of my life. I know theres inappropriate touch, and Im not saying go up and kiss the first person you see and say, God loves you, but we have lost that. We need to hug people, and we need to put appropriate touch on people and let them know that you love them. Do you want to share Christ with others? Are you a Christian here today, and you want to share Christ with others? Do you know the first thing you can do? Keep your mouth closed. Dont say a word. Be a living letter, and show that by how you live and how you breathe life into them and let them know, because people dont care how much you know until they know how much you care. When I was a sophomore in high school, there was a senior student who was a special education student. Every day, I would come to school, and before the bell would ring for first hour, a number of kids would gather around him and make fun of him. They would say, Hey, be the Incredible Hulk! He would say, Rahh! and hed run through the halls thinking that they were his friends. They were just laughing at him, and it got worse and worse. I knew I had to do something, but there was a voice inside my head that kept saying, If you become friends with him, what are the other kids going to think? Finally, the whisper of God said, Dont you dare worry about what other people think! You need to worry about what I think about you. I got up enough courage one morning, and I looked at those kids and said, Knock it off. That is enough. I am sick and tired of you guys picking on him. Come on, man! Were just having fun. I said, Knock it off! They slowly dispersed. I would like to tell you from that day on, they never picked on him again, but that didnt happen. It did stop for a little while. What happened was this young man became my best buddy in the whole world. I started breathing life into him. Eventually, I invited him over to my house, and we would play Intellivision, and wed drink Tang. Hey, Im an 80s child. While we were doing that one day, he started asking me questions. He said, Mike, where do you go to church? I told him I would go to Peoples Church in Beloit. I was so competitive; I would keep playing because I was beating him. Then hed ask questions like, Hey, Mike, how come youre so different than the other kids at school? I knew it was time to talk to him. I said, Brian, lets go in my room. So we went into my room, and I pulled out my Bible, and I shared God with him. I told him exactly what God meant in my life, and I said, If you were the last person on Earth, Jesus Christ would still come down and die just for you! When I shared the Plan of Salvation with him, I said, Would you like to pray with me? He said, Yeah, and he prayed and accepted Christ into his heart. I looked at him and said, If you meant those words that you said, where is Jesus right now? He pointed to his heart, and he said, Right here. Then he did something I will never, ever forget. He grabbed my Bible, and he lay down on my bed, and he just hugged it, and he just started crying. Now, when I see Mufasa die in the Disney movies, I cry, and I cry loudly. But he didnt make a sound, and I had never seen this in another person. The tears just streamed down his face all over my Bible and all over his shirt, but he didnt even make so much as a whimper. Then he stopped crying, and he looked at me and said, Mike, did you know the love that God has for me must be like the love that a husband has for his wife. I was absolutely floored. Here was a student who could not grasp the little things in school and was having so much trouble, and he grasped one of lifes greatest truths. It wasnt until a couple weeks later that I really understood what had been going on in his life. You see, when he was five years old, he stood on his porch and saw his dad, who had a suitcase, and his dad looked him right in the eye and said, I cant stand having a son like you, and Im leaving and never coming back. So the last words that this five year old heard from his earthly dad were, I cannot stand having a son like you. Then is father drove out of his life, and he never saw him again. Now I understood why that meant so much to Brian when he asked Jesus Christ into his life. What hed been searching for his entire life was a fathers love. What he got was the unconditional love only a Heavenly Father could give him. Get your radar going in your life and seek out the people who are lonely, the people you dont normally take notice of, and breathe life into them. Kids become what you expect of them. If a kid is told everyday of his life, You will never amount to anything, do not be surprised when thats exactly what happens. When I was a freshman in high school, I was on the JV baseball team in Clinton. Our coach that I had couldnt have cared less about us. One day, he was sick, and we had a substitute coach; his name was Bill Greer. We loved Mr. Greer. He was our Phy. Ed teacher in junior high, and it was the first and only time I had him as a coach. By the time he stepped on that bus as we went to Beloit Turner to play baseball, he breathed life into us. He told us, You are the best team that has ever lived in the face of the earth, the best JV team ever! By the time we got off that bus, if he would have said, Mike, I want you to run through that brick wall, I would have banged my head against it 17 times before I realized its not humanly possible. We killed that team that day! Thats the only time we had him as a coach, and thats the only game we won the entire year! Its because he expected us to win, and we did. Theres a young lady named Sam Risseeuw, who has been on my basketball team for the past couple years. In our sophomore year, she came up to me before the season even started, and she said, Coach Powers, and the tears were just pouring down her face. She said, Coach Powers, I dont think Im good enough for basketball this year. I said, Why, Sam? She said, I dont think many kids on that team even like me, and I dont know if I can do that for a whole year. I put my arm around her, and I said, Sam, dont you dare not come out. Dont you let them dictate to you what youre going to do. If you want to play basketball, you come and play basketball. You let me worry about the rest! And Im not naïve enough to say that everything was peachy because I know things go on behind a coachs back, but she worked so hard; and by the time her junior year came around, she worked her way into the starting line-up. And shes nowhere near the most gifted athlete Ive ever had, but Ive never had someone work as hard as Sam. One day after practice, she came up to me and said, Coach, Im going to shoot free throws until I make five in a row, and then Im going to leave. I said, Sam, if you want to do that, Ill rebound for you. So, one hour later, she still had not made five free throws in a row. It was a Wednesday night, and I had youth group, small groups at our house that I had to go to, but I made a promise to Sam. I stayed, and I prayed, Please let her make the fifth free throw. And finally, she made the fifth one, and her face lit up, and she walked out of that gym with her head held high. Two weeks after that, we were playing Edgerton, and there were 10 seconds left in the game. We were down by one, and the other team got a technical foul. I had to pick somebody from my team to shoot two free throws. There was a girl named Abby Holcomb, who was on our team. She was probably one of the best free throw shooters Ive ever had, and I didnt even think twice about her. I said, Sam, youre my man. I said, You go shoot those free throws for me. She walked up to that line, and if you know anything about a technical free throw, everybody else is behind half court. Shes the only one there. She took three dribbles, bent her knees, and she shot. The ball spun perfectly, and then it clanked off the back of the rim. She looked over at me, Sam, piece of cake. I said, Sam, I know you can make this next one. She smiled and took the ball from the ref. She bent her knees, took three dribbles, and she shot again. I knew it was going in. I knew all those free throws were for that moment. She clanked it off the back of the rim. My heart just died. I was like, What have I done to this girl? I thought I had ruined her life. We still had a chance to win. We had 10 seconds left. We got the ball back. We had a really good shot, and we missed that shot too. The buzzer sounded, and we walked off the floor. When I first started coaching, I was so afraid of the power that you have as a coach. Just a smile or a smirk can change a kids life. I though I had ruined her life. I asked her later on, Sam, I have to ask you about this. How did you feel when I had you do that? She said, Coach, Im not going to lie to you. I felt terrible when I missed those free throws and let our team down. But you know what? I want to tell you this: it meant so much to me that those girls on that team knew you picked me when the game was on the line. She said, I will never forget that for as long as I live. See, sometimes you dont know how things are going to turn out. You just have to breathe life into them, the way that you think God is telling you to do, and let God work out the details. See, if we could only see with some kind of spiritual glasses and look to see what people are really like. Its like the prom queen that is so beautiful and looks like she has everything together. When she looks in the mirror, she sees this fat, unattractive, worthless person, but when she goes to school, you would never guess it. Or the shy girl who never opens up to anybody, and if you only knew that her step-father was visiting her room at night, and shes trying to get the courage up to tell her mom whats going on. Shes afraid to say anything because she doesnt think her mom is going to believe her. Or the jock athlete who looks like he has everything together, and almost every single night he goes home, and his father drinks until he gets drunk. Then he beats him and his mom, and he doesnt know how hes going to live and face each day. Or how about the mean person at work or the person you come across, and they are so mean! You hate being around them, but if you only knew that they have been beat down so many times in their lives. Theyve been hurt in their heart, and people have stuck knives in there and just twisted. Their only defense mechanism is to lash out and hurt you first before you get a chance to hurt them. We need to look the way Jesus would. Or how about that person that you really cant stand? Do you know that you only love Jesus as much as the person you love the least? You only love Jesus as much as the person you love the least. There are some people we dont think are deserving of that. Think of Peter and Jesus. At one of the lowest times of Jesus life on Earth, everybody deserted him. His three closest friends deserted him, and Peter was one of them. Not only did he deny Him, but the last time he said, I dont blank-edy-blank know the man! When Jesus came back from the dead, and He saw Peter again, he said, Peter, you are the rock upon which I will build My church. We would never have picked Peter to be that one, but God saw through that and saw the potential for that. When I was in 7th grade, there was a girl that had a crush on me, and she let me know that. Instead of letting her down easy and letting her know I did not like her, I started making fun of her. I started writing songs about her. She was going out for the student council, and I started campaigning against her-even though I wasnt even running for it. I would tell people, Dont vote for her! Id like to say that I wasnt a Christian at the time, but I was. I made her life miserable. One day as I was walking out of school, Mr. Greer said, Hey, Mike! You got a second? I said, Sure. He walked up to me, and he looked at me and said, Hey, I heard a rumor that you are going around picking on this girl. I was like (jaw drops). He said, You know what I told that person? I said, That cant possibly be true because the Michael Powers I know would never treat another human being like that, especially a young girl. Then he put his hand on my shoulder, and he said, I just thought you should know that. I was like double (jaw dropping). He walked away and didnt say another word. My face just burned with shame. He had this incredible gift of breathing life into you in such a way that nobody else would have thought of. I deserved a lot less than that. Have you ever judged people too quickly, when you dont know the circumstances? This last summer, I had finished up a wedding video for my video business, and I needed to ship it overnight to a customer. I went into FedEx with my two $20 bills because I wasnt sure how much it was going to cost. I had a pair of shorts on that had no pockets, so when I walked in to the store and up to the counter, he gave me the address label. I put the two $20 bills on the counter. As I turned this way to fill out the address label, and as he bent down behind the counter to get a package out for me to mail it in, somebody came in behind us, opened the door, put some pre-labeled packages on the counter and walked out. When Mr. FedEx said, How would you like to pay for this, cash or charge? I said, Cash. I went to grab my two $20 bills, only they were not there. Then we thought maybe when this person came in, the wind blew the $20 bills off the counter. So we looked all around the floor on this side of the counter and that side of the counter. For five minutes, we looked for the money and could not find it. Then Mr. FedEx looked at me, and I looked at him, and we both said at the same time, No way! When I had turned this way, and while he was down behind the counter getting the package, the person who dropped off the packages-in a 10-second span of time-swiped the two $20 bills, put them in his pocket, and walked out. I was so mad! I went home, got some more money, came back, shipped the package out, and then I looked at the man and said, Do you mind if I see the name on those packages that were dropped off? I walked over and got this guys name and address. I went out in my truck, took my cell phone, and I called the police. I knew there was probably nothing they would be able to do, but I wanted this guy to know he did not (the master thief that he was) get away with it. Then I called information, and I gave the name and address, and I asked for a phone number of the master thief. I called the number because I was going to let him know that he did not get away with what he thought he got away with. I got the answering machine. It was a ladys voice, and I thought this is his wife. I was going to say to her on the answering machine, Get out of the house now! Youre married to a crook! I lost my nerve, and before it beeped, I hung up the phone. The police came. They pretty much told me there was not much they could do about it, but they would pay this man a visit and put a little scare into him. I went home and told my wife what happened. I was fuming mad. As I walked down the stairs, I felt a little itch in the waistband of my shorts. I reached in, and I pulled out my two $20 bills. I got on the phone and called the police, and I said, Please stop! You dont want to ruin this mans life! Stop! They got a hold of them about five minutes before they pulled into this guys driveway. They turned around. I called Mr. FedEx, and I said, Please…I made a terrible mistake. Im so sorry. If this is a regular customer, do not think anything. I am the idiot. Then my wife looked at me and said, Michael! The next time you think someone has stolen $40 from you, strip down naked before you call the police! One of the segments of our society that I think does not have enough life breathed into it is the elderly. Im going to read you a poem, and its called Crabby Old Woman. There was an old woman who died in a geriatric ward in Scotland, and they didnt think she had a dime to her name. As they went through her meager possessions, they found a hand-written poem that she had penned. It went like this: What do you see, nurses? What do you see? What are you thinking when you're looking at me? A crabby old woman, not very wise, Uncertain of habit, with faraway eyes? Who dribbles her food and makes no reply When you say in a loud voice, "I do wish you'd try!" Who seems not to notice the things that you do, And forever is losing a stocking or shoe? Who, resisting or not, lets you do as you will, With bathing and feeding, the long day to fill? Is that what you're thinking? Is that what you see? Then open your eyes, nurse, you're not looking at me. I'll tell you who I am as I sit here so still, As I do at your bidding, as I eat at your will. I'm a small child of ten with a father and mother, Brothers and sisters, who love one another. A young girl of sixteen with wings on her feet Dreaming that soon now a husband she'll meet. A bride soon at twenty, my heart gives a leap, Remembering the vows that I promised to keep. At twenty-five now, I have young of my own, Who need me to guide and a secure happy home. A woman of thirty, my young now grown fast, Bound to each other with ties that should last. At forty, my young sons have grown and are gone, But my man's beside me to see I don't mourn. At fifty once more, babies play round my knee, Again we know children, my loved one and me. Dark days are upon me, my husband is dead, I look at the future, I shudder with dread. For my young are all rearing young of their own, And I think of the years and the love that I've known. I'm now an old woman and nature is cruel; 'Tis jest to make old age look like a fool. The body, it crumbles, grace and vigor depart, There is now a stone where I once had a heart. But inside this old carcass a young girl still dwells, And now and again, my battered heart swells. I remember the joys, I remember the pain, And I'm loving and living life over again. I think of the years, all too few, gone too fast, And accept the stark fact that nothing can last. So open your eyes, people, open and see, Not a crabby old woman; Look closer and see me. You do not know what is going on in a persons life that makes them do the things they do. We took our youth group to go visit some nursing home residents a while go. It stretched our youth because its hard to go outside of your boundaries and be stretched to do that. There was one lady in a wheelchair who had this little stuffed rabbit, and she held it on her lap and just rocked. She never talked. A couple of our braver kids went up and sat at her table and talked to her. She never said a word back, but she would smile at them. Then when we left, a young man in our youth group named Brock Messner, who was in 6th grade at the time, walked up to this lady, looked her in the eye, and said, Can I give you a hug? He reached down, she put the rabbit in her lap and reached up, and they hugged. They were standing sideways to me, and I could see them. As Brock was hugging her, all the sudden his eyes went like this (popped out of his head), and then he looked at me, and I looked. That old lady had slipped her hand down and grabbed his butt and squeezed it. When we walked out of there, there was no one with a bigger smile on her face than this lady. I thought, There are other ways to breathe life into people apparently. What do you do when you dont feel like life has been breathed into you? When my son, Caleb, was three or four, I walked by his room, and I heard him singing a song. The song went like this, I love my daddy. I love my daddy. I love my da-ddy! My heart started to swell. Then I heard the second verse, …but I dont know why. No, I dont know why. Then it was back to I love my daddy. It just took the wind right out of me. If youve ever felt like that, dont wait until someone breathes life into you. Go and breathe life into other people, and youll be amazed at how God breathes life into you through that simple act. I absolutely love my job as a youth pastor! Every single day, I get the chance to make a difference in a teenagers life. We have the most awesome youth leaders in our church that I can possible imagine having working with me. Do you know what the secret to youth ministry is? Its not what we say on Sunday nights; its not what we say on Wednesday nights; its going to a soccer game when its 40 degrees out, and youre shivering and shaking. Then a student looks up and sees that their youth leader or youth pastor is there. Its going to a school play. Its making a phone call. One of our youth leaders made a phone call to a young man in our church, and as he talked to him, all pretty much the young man said was ah ha. When he got off the phone, he thought, I dont know if that made any difference at all. Then, the mom called him and said, When he got off the phone, all he could talk about was that his youth leader called him at home and wanted to talk to him. You never know what youre going to do that is going to make a difference in someones life. After a basketball game last year, one of the parents of one of my players came up to me and started talking to me about church. He looked at me and said, So when are you going to move up to big church and be a real pastor? I knew that he didnt mean anything by it. I looked at him and said, How about never? I dont ever want to do that. Dont get me wrong, youre all cool and stuff, but God made me to reach teenagers, mostly because I act like one. Someday if God says thats what Im supposed to do, I will do it, but Ill probably do it kicking and screaming. But I love what I do. Im going to end with this: Ways that you can apply this to your life. I have an email list and a website called Heart Touchers. There are thousands and thousands of people all over the world who we send a weekly email to. A couple years ago, we challenged them to write a hero letter to somebody in their life who has made a difference. I have a number of people in my life who have mentored me and made a difference. I had a youth pastor that at the age of 17; he looked at me-even though I was only 17 years old-and he said, Michael I want you to be in charge of the whole junior high ministry at our church. He asked me to do something I never thought I could do, and he stretched me. That turned the corner in my life. I have a man named Dennis Roach, who is an older gentleman Ive known since I was a little boy. Everyday he sees me, he breathes life into me. He knows everything about me, everything about me, and he still loves me unconditionally. So we ask asked these people to write a letter to somebody, and Im going to read to you what I got back from one person. It says, Dearest Michael, I cannot thank you enough for encouraging us to write letters to our heroes. Yesterday, I got a letter back from my dad, to whom I had sent my hero letter, and I cant believe the timing. Hed become very depressed because he has a heart condition. Basically, the doctor said there was nothing more they could do for him. They also told him he needed to limit his driving, which affects his independence. I guess you can see where all this is going. The letter I received from him said, Thank you for sending me such a nice letter. The timing was perfect and literally kept me from doing something stupid. The girl went on and said, Thank God I sent that letter when I did, and thank you for suggesting it. The Lord truly does work in mysterious ways! If she had waited even a day to write that letter, her dad probably would have blown his brains out. Not every letter we got was this traumatic, but we got hundreds of letters that said, You would not believe how God used that in their lives at a time when they desperately needed some life breathed into them. Davids Staff: the thing that we are doing at our church, if people look at Christians, and we arent loving each other and encouraging each other, theres no way we are going to be an influence on someone whos not a Christian. Last night, I had a lady come up to me, and she said, You know what? I didnt think I could do that Davids Staff thing. I didnt think I had the gift for it. Now, I know I can write a letter or make a phone call. That is a tangible way that you can make a difference in someones life. Now, Im going to end with one poem. Most of you who know me know Im a girly man, so Im going to recite poetry-from memory hopefully. It says this: I would rather see a sermon than hear one any day. Id rather have you walk with me than merely point the way. The eye is a more ready pupil than ever was the ear, And good advice is often confusing, But example is always clear. Lets pray: Heavenly Father, we just thank You so much for sending Your Son to die in our place, Lord, and when You look down on us, You do not see the sin and the darkness that is in our lives. You look past that, and You see the righteousness of Your Son, Jesus Christ. Thank You, Lord, that we can be called Children of God, that You adopted us into Your family. As we look through the Bible, we see so many verses that show how You lavish Your love on us, and You love us unconditionally. Lord, I pray that with Jesus inside of us, He will come out of every word, every thought, every deed, and every smile that crosses our faces. As we walk by, we will be living letters of every person we come into contact with. I pray this in Your precious name, Amen.

04-24-05
Speaker: Youth Minister Michael Powers
Series: Spiritual Champions