Almost three days with no phone, no tv, and no internet. . . and I survived! Actually, I didn’t miss any of them. It was really good to get away for a couple of days and just kick back with the family. We had a fantastic time together. One of the (many) highlights for me was simply sitting around the fire together – coffee and conversation. . . what’s not to love!

The scenery along the Virginia Creeper trail was spectacular. After biking through one valley, I stopped and took four or five pictures of the landscape from left to right. I was able to merge them together in Photoshop for a single wide angle shot of the valley. On the way home yesterday, we stopped at Grayson Highlands State Park. We hiked the Twin Pinacles trail on Haw Orchard Mountain, a beautiful loop connecting the park’s two highest peaks – Little Pinnacle (5,089 feet) and Big Pinnacle (5,068 feet).

Here are some pictures and videos of our adventures.

I just finished cutting up some firewood to take camping next week. We’re going to take a couple of days and do some hiking in Grayson Highlands State Park. We’re also planning to bike the Virginia Creeper trail - 17 miles, almost entirely down hill. Our men’s group camped out and biked the trail last summer. We had an absolute blast! I’ve wanted to go back with the family ever since.

The only down side to our trip is that Emily isn’t going to be able to go with us. She’s still serving down at Snowbird Wilderness Outfitters, but she’s had an amazing summer! Sarah flew in this past Monday and it was the first time she had been home since Christmas. I’m really looking forward to being away for a couple of days, and sitting around the campfire with Laurie, Sarah and Robert. We’ll be back midweek for Robert and I to finish getting ready to head to Chester on the mission trip. The week after we get back, it will be time to take both girls back to school.

My Dad was a prophet. . . I can’t tell you the number of times, when the girls were little, that he used say, “Enjoy them, Buck, they grow up fast.” Yes indeed!

For my own part, I tend to find the doctrinal books often more helpful in devotion than the devotional books, and I rather suspect that the same experience may await others. I believe that many who find that 'nothing happens' when they sit down or kneel down to a book of devotion would find that the heart sings unbidden while they are working their way through a tough bit of theology with a pipe in their teeth and a pencil in their hand.
– C.S. Lewis

Many of you know my good friend Chris Rollins who is a pastor down in Charleston, SC. One of the many things we have in common is our addiction preference for the Mac and really, practically all things Apple. Guess what Chris is going to be doing this Saturday? Click the Apple icon to find out.

Wow, talking about getting the point, staying on the point, and nailing it. . . Ray Ortlund recently posted:

I believe in the sovereignty of God, the Five Points of Calvinism, the Solas of the Reformation, I believe that grace precedes faith in regeneration. Theologically, I am Reformed. Sociologically, I am simply a Christian – or at least I want to be. The tricky thing about our hearts is that they can turn even a good thing into an engine of oppression. It happens when our theological distinctives make us aloof from other Christians. That’s when, functionally, we relocate ourselves outside the gospel and inside Galatianism.

The Judaizers in Galatia did not see their distinctive – the rite of circumcision – as problematic. They could claim biblical authority for it in Genesis 17 and the Abrahamic covenant. But their distinctive functioned as an addition to the all-sufficiency of Jesus himself. Today the flash point is not circumcision. It can be Reformed theology. But no matter how well argued our position is biblically, if it functions in our hearts as an addition to Jesus, it ends up as a form of legalistic divisiveness.

My goodness, that’s good! And the point has a much broader application than just the question of whether or not you happen to be theologically Reformed. I have absolutely no problem with having theological convictions or distinctions (I have PLENTY), but the minute that I begin to look down my nose at another believer because he or she does not agree with me – Ortlund could not have said it better – I have relocated myself outside the gospel and inside Galatianism. Amen, amen, and amen!

“For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.”
(Galatians 5:6 emphasis mine)

As fond as I am of red hot dogs and the special tradition they have at our annual Hot-Doggin’ picnic and cookout, how do you think a BBQ would go over? But before I whet anybody’s appetite, the first thing we would have to do is decide on a STYLE. Here’s a little song that will give you a review of BBQ in the Southern United States. And, who knows, maybe we could even get Rhett & Link & the Homestead Pickers to play for our talent show!

Not familiar with the term retrosexual? Neither was I until I read this article. AMEN! “Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.” (I Corinthians 16:13 emphasis mine)

Shout out to “Coop” for sharing the link!

Pictures from last Sunday’s Hot-Doggin’ Talent Show and Picnic are now ONLINE.

I just had an interesting study break. One of the advantages of having a laptop is that I can work at home as well as in my office. I was in the middle of doing some study for Sunday’s message at home this afternoon when Robert came running in the house saying, “Dad! Come look! I just found the biggest black widow spider I’ve ever seen!” I grabbed the camera on the way out, and sure enough, she was a beauty! Click on either picture for a closer look. Better yet, check out this high resolution shot.

She’s on the decorative housing that holds our garden hose. Robert had been using the hose and the housing had gotten yanked out of place. He was just getting ready to grab it with both hands to move it back, when he spotted her. Wow! He said that his hand was less than a foot away from her and he just happened to see her move. Close call! Be sure to look closely at this second picture. While we were checking her out, we noticed what appeared to be a whole slew of little black widow babies fresh out of the egg sac. Neither mom nor offspring survived the nearly half-a-can of Raid we shared with them.

I just got off the phone with Bobbie Simpson, one of our judges from last night’s dessert competition among the men. She reiterated how difficult it was to pick a winner because of how delicious ALL the entries were! But here’s how everything stacked up:

• Best Looking went to Roger Wilson for his sweet potato turnover.
• Best Tasting went to Jason Hollingsworth for his oreo candies.
• Most Unique went to James Worth for his gummy worm surprise.
• Most Sinful went to Randy Dailey for his bread pudding with Rum Sauce.
• Most Decadent went to Buck Wardle for his chocolate decadence dessert.

Again - thanks to all the guys who participated! My apologies to Mike Allanson for not getting a picture of his chocolate eclair dessert. It was excellent, along with all the other entries! One other quick question. . . does anyone know who made the chocolate dessert that is pictured first in this post? If so, leave a comment or shoot me a quick email - I’d like to give him credit.

The World magazine editorial that I referenced in yesterday’s message, about it not being wrong to be a “single-issue” advocate, is available online.

We had a great time at our annual “Hot-Doggin” Talent Show and Cookout tonight! We appreciated everybody coming out in support our summer mission team. We had several people snapping pictures tonight, and when I get them all together, I’ll post them on our web gallery, so be sure to check back.

We also had a good turn out for the men’s dessert competition. I want to thank Chuck and Bobbie for serving as our tasters and judges. Unfortunately, I did not write down the results, so that will have to be another post. But I did get some pictures of our entries. If you’d like to see them, click to read more. . . Read More...

I’ve decided what I am bringing for the men’s dessert competition tomorrow. . . Come on, men... let’s pull out all the stops! Whose got game!

Chocolate Decadence Round Two
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Need a reason to smile? This cracked me up. 14 months in the making, 42 countries, and a cast of thousands... pretty cool...



Who is this guy?

With this Sunday being July 4th weekend, I’ve decided to preach a special message on why our country has been so blessed. While researching for the message, I ran across this prayer by President Abraham Lincoln. He had called for a National Day of Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer. Here is a portion of that prayer. We would indeed do well to give thoughtful consideration to it:

Whereas it is the duty of nations as well as of men, to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions, in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon; and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord. . .

We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown.

But we have forgotten God.

We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own.

Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us!... All this being done, in sincerity and truth, let us then rest humbly in the hope authorized by the Divine teachings, that the united cry of the Nation will be heard on high, and answered with blessings, no less than the pardon of our national sins, and the restoration of our now divided and suffering Country, to its former happy condition of unity and peace.

Abraham Lincoln, President
March 30, 1863

Two simple words. . . “I do.”

But oh how meaningful. Twenty four years ago today I said, “I do” to Laurie Michele Bryan and we became husband and wife. (This picture was actually taken about two years later when I was almost through puberty.)

I married my best friend. . . and she still is. I remember the first day we met as though it happened yesterday. It was on the campus of Atlanta Christian College. We were in a meeting together for those who would be serving on their summer ministry teams. You were sitting diagnonally across the large conference room table.

Ron Lewis had all of us introduce ourselves. And in the give and take of the meeting that followed, with everybody asking questions or providing their feedback, I saw your heart. It came out in your transparency. There was just something about your demeanor that separated you from the rest of the girls who were in the room that day. Even though our friendship would take time to develop, and we wouldn’t officially begin dating for quite some time, I was immediately impressed and drawn to you the very first day we met. . . I still am. Read More...

I just read the following question on somebody’s Facebook status:

• Did Jesus intend communion to be shared in an institutional church setting? Or in the context of relationships?

That’s one of those stir the pot questions that automatically makes me want to ask about forty other questions, the first one being, “What do you mean by the term ‘institutional’?” It’s also one of those ‘either/or’ questions which, unfortunately, end up pitting one thing against another, in this case, creating a dichotomy between the (institutional) church setting and relationships.

To be fair, I’ve been in some church settings that were more institutional than relational. But I don’t think the original ‘either/or’ question about communion fits the we way we “do communion” at Christ’s Church. I love it that we celebrate the Lord’s supper as a part of our weekly worship celebration, i.e. within the corporate church setting. I also love it that it is celebrated in an significantly relational context. Read More...