Weekend Update

Welcome to the update- I'm Carl Jones and you're not!  I thought I would take today to bring you up-to-date on a few of the things I talked about over the past few days. You will see, as usual, that 70% of the time I am wrong 100% of the time....  Here we go:

• I talked about my love and respect for my former youth leader Rob Mitchell.  I failed to mention that Rob has written a book about his life growing up in the orphanage system.  It's called Castaway Kid and you should visit the website and check it out.
• Marilyn, Will and I did see Men Who Stare At Goats on Saturday, and we all thought it was hysterical.  Will gave it 9 out of 10 stars, and Marilyn and I loved it as well.  It requires a bit if an odd sense of humor to appreciate, but Clooney was great and so was Jeff Bridges.  I am certain it will make it to our DVD collection someday!
• Worship at Van Dyke UMC was awesome on Sunday morning!  They stayed away from the patriotism that has marked previous years and simply recognized the veterans who were present.  It was very nice.  The music rocked, including the choir and praise band doing a song I didn't know called Revelation Song that was quite moving.  Matthew Hartsfield delivered a message based around Luke 7 and the sinful woman and the Pharisee.  Isn't is amazing that with so many people calling themselves Christians in our world that we have so little understanding of forgiveness?  When someone sins against us or our society, we often ask "How can I forgive that person?"  Matthew reminded us yesterday that Jesus would say to us "How can you NOT forgive that person, after all the sins God has forgiven you?"  Our churches are just packed full of Pharisees, even today.  It was an excellent message.  There was no mention, yet again, of the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church, but that just gives me something to work on for next year.
• The Tampa Bay Bucs wore the creamsicle jerseys and the Bucco Bruce helmets and beat the Green Bay Packers, their first win of the season.  I know I made fun of the throwbacks on Friday, but now I say we should wear them until we lose!  Seriously, congratulations to Coach Raheem Morris and the Bucs...maybe the rest of the season will be interesting after all.
• No one has yet to give me any good reasons why so many churches have quit doing youth group on Sunday evenings.  I did hear from one of my old youth, now a youth pastor herself, who still grinds it out on Sundays.  God bless you, Ashley!

That's it for now.  Tomorrow we will be back to the people and places of New England Yearly Meeting of Friends.  Until then, have a blessed day!

Because of Jesus,