Daryl Strickland

I am digging this song by Daniel Doss. It’s called Great God also check out God In Me.

I read this on Craig Groeschel’s blog and it’s resonates with me. Here is a link to the entire post

Jesus asked God to make all His disciples one (John 17:21). He prayed that we would be brought to complete unity (John 17:23). Paul told us to, “make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit…” (Eph. 4:3)

Unity doesn’t mean uniformity.

We shouldn’t be alike in style, philosophy, and personal preferences. We are strengthened in our diversity. We can be unified and diversified!

We don’t have to be alike or agree on minor issues to agree on the Lordship of Christ!

Here is a cool phone conversation with Steven Furtick and Perry Noble. If you are a pastor or staff member at a church this is a cool conversation to here these leaders hearts.

A couple of things that stood out to me in the conversation were:

• Church planters focus so hard on what others have that they miss what God has given them.
• We should be thankful for what God has given us and pray as to how we can go to the next level.
• You won’t be judged on what you did but rather on what you were called to do!!

Today absolutely rocked!! I can’t lie, my faith is tested every time there is a Sunday morning with bad weather. I always pray that people will brave the weather or that God will stop the rain long enough for people to go to church and today was no exception. At one point I was questioning God about the rainbow deal because it was a frog strangler. But and that is a BIG BUT, I was amazed. People showed up like crazy in the heaviest of the heavy rain and our parking team and greeting team paired up and shuttled umberella’s throughout the parking lot. It was insane. I don’t know who was more excited, the guest or the parking and greeting teams. The parking team actually had a rally up meeting in the driving rain between the first and second service ( you had to see it). One of our parking guys sat down for the service and after about five minutes there was about a gallon of water on the floor around him (I love that guy).

Thanks George for your leadership and thanks to everyone on the dream team today, you pointed people to life!!

I am going back through Developing the Leader Within You from John Maxwell and John is not only a leader but a huge encouragement. It is encouraging to know that most leadership traits are learned. This opens the door for all of us to become better leaders, to develop our skills, to learn as much as we can from everyone that we can.

Yes, there are natural born leaders and I cheer them on but for the rest of us, there is hope. We have great examples to follow and if you have the drive it takes to lead… lead diligently and grow your leadership daily!!!

I was reading my devotional tonight and this rang out loud and clear:

Psalm 127:1 Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it; unless the Lord guards the city, the watchman stays awake in vain.

Unless God remains at the center of your efforts, you labor in vain.

This is my biggest fear in life. I never want to be a part of something that God is not in (been there, done that) and I don’t want to lead anyone in a direction that God doesn’t want them to go.

So how in the world do you stay relentlessly centered of God? Read this post it’s a good start.

Sorry for the lack of blogging. Lot’s going on in the brain right now. I am sure at some point, it will work it’s way out to my notes.

The first question in our journals is what does this passage say, so in my journal I am paraphrasing the passage for the day.

Here is what Psalm 63 in the NLT looked like to me.

Psalm 63 (SV -Strick’s Version)

I am desperate for you God.

Your power and love astound me.

I love to worship You more than anything.

I can’t stop thinking about You.

I stand firm because You support me.

All my enemies will come to pass.

Those who put their trust in God will be full of praise.

We started a new series this week entitled 21 and I am pumped about this one. Here is why:

1. We gave out journals and book marks to everyone so that we are all reading the same scriptures for 21 days.
2. 21 days forms a habit.
3. The journals has three questions per day to answer. 1.) What does this passage say. 2.)Why is this in the Bible. 3.) What should I do about it. How cool is this? Listening, understanding, acting!!!!
4. More movement towards God.

I plan on posting some of my journal stuff from this journey so stay tunned.

Do you remember the Presidential Awards? My kids did their Presidential Test today and it was both fun and educational. I watched as they did sit-ups, push-ups, shuttle run, some flexibility test that I don’t remember and a long distance run. The fun part was watching them do the different exercises the educational part came on exercise 3 for my oldest child Noah. For 4 out of the 5 exercises he either got presidential or national level but on his third exercise (the V-sit or flexibility test) his score wasn’t even on the chart and I don’t mean that in the good way. He has no flexibility!

Here is what I learned from todays fitness test.

1. If you want to know where you stand then you need to be tested.
2. Accountability partners will let you know if you are off in certain areas. (sometimes way off)
3. You need a good baseline to shoot at.

If there were a presidential test for christians what do you think we should test? Here are some things that I would vote for.

1. Do you spend time with God daily? (through reading scripture and praying)
2. Are you applying what you read? (through serving and loving people)
3. What’s your baseline? (hopefully it’s Christ)
4. How do you handle a test? (do you view it as from God?)
5. Do you welcome feedback from trusted sources? (people who care about you more than themselves)