a good day

i had a really cool experience tonight. my best friend growing up, who i haven't spoken to in almost a year called me out of the blue to share with me the news of their pregnancy. me and josh shared everything growing up, we were very much inseparable. but as you grow older relationships fade as life goes on. we still speak but rarely. it was more than a catching up conversation though. the last time i saw josh was at my ordination last year. i was very much the religionist then. tonight i shared with josh the joys of not only our new church but more importantly what the gospel was doing in my life and my desire for him to experience the same. we talked about traditional church, contemporary music, the work of christ and the need for humility in most churches. great conversation. he is like me and has grown up in traditional church and i pray that god would open his eyes and show him the magnitude of the gospel. it was a great conversation and i think he and his wife will join us at new city soon.

also had some anxiety today. we have a funeral to go to tomorrow for a good friend of my wife's family who was also somewhat of a "patriarch" at our last church. he was a wonderful godly man who from i could tell in the short time i knew him loved Jesus very much. with the funeral though comes being face to face with many of the reason's we left the last church. it's tough to be humble and love some people regardless of any feelings we have about them. Jesus said that the second greatest commandment is to love our neighbor as ourselves. who is our neighbor? these people would certainly qualify as mine. if the gospel is going to work through us we have to move past our issues with our neighbors. Jesus moved past our issues so we really have no choice but to look past theirs if we desire to be like christ. pray for me that god would cover me with humility and allow someone to see the gospel working through me.