Haiti

I think all of you know that I am going to Haiti this Summer, but for those of you who don't I just wanted to let you know that I am. Ok, now that we have that out of the way let me get to what this post is about. Two weeks ago every one who is going on a missions trip (doesn't matter where) met together after church. Jesse Jarvis was heading up the meeting and he was basically just getting us all up to speed on what's going on, what has gone on, and what needs to go on. There was a lot of discussion on fund-raising and all that goes into it, Jesse gave us some details on the Daytona missions trip and how that is all working out, and then at the end he asked for some volunteers to share about where they are going for Mission X and why they wanted to go. When I say share I mean share with the WHOLE church. My first thought was "Ha, funny....I'll let someone else volunteer for this one", but almost as soon as I had finished thinking that thought God really convicted me for being such a coward, because that is exactly what I was being. I was letting my fear of public speaking get in the way of something that God wanted me to do. So, after fighting with myself for a few minutes I got the nerve to volunteer. I was supposed to share last Sunday, but it got postponed to next week. Anyway, throughout the last week I had some pretty mixed feelings about sharing. For the first 20 minutes after I volunteered I was like "yeah, this is great I can do this" then I was struck with the horrifying thought of "What if I mess up?!" For the rest of the week I was pretty nervous about the whole thing, even after I had gotten a whole little outline of what I was going to say written down. The entire thing is only going to be about 5 minutes or less, but I still found myself worrying about it. I even had the thought of calling Jesse and telling him I would not be able to do it, because something "totally unexpected" had come up. I continued being anxious and nervous until God led me to Matthew 6:25-31 where Jesus tells us "not to be anxious about our lives" and he asks "which one of you can add a single hour to his life by worrying?".  The truth of that passage sunk in almost immediately and I realized how stupid I was being by letting my anxieties get the best of me. As far as I know I am not the only one that has this "fear" of speaking in front of large groups (thank God I am not alone). So, I would like to pose the question to all of you who are reading: Why do YOU think that people have this "fear" or "uneasiness" with speaking in front of large groups of people? I sincerely would like to know what you all think, so just leave your answer in the comment area and let me know. I hope you enjoyed this post and for those of you who are like me and are prone to be nervous and anxious I hope that you will look into Matthew 6:25-29. Thanks for reading.

Roadkill + Paintball Gun + Turkey Buzzard = One Fun Time!

So, yesterday Daniel comes into the house and informs us that there "is something dead in the road" so naturally we go to investigate. We come to find out that that "something" is the possum that has been raiding our trash for the past several weeks. Needless to say there were no tears shed for the little creature and no, he did not get a christian burial, he was the cause of much joy and laughter though. Shortly after we found him we discovered that vultures are attracted to dead things on the road (go figure right?). Well, we didn't think it was right that the poor little rodent's body was being desecrated by those nasty vultures (even though he had turned the side of our house into a disaster area several times). So, we decided to act......violently. This video shows of how we kept those nasty vultures from picking that poor little possum to pieces.

Just in case you can't see, I do hit the one, the second shot misses though.

Straining Forward

As I am finding out, keeping up with fairly regular blog posts is harder than it seems. I have been thinking about what I could post about, but I have not been able to think of anything for days. That is until the other day when Daniel threw 5 innings (the whole game) against one of the best teams in the league and beat them. Now, for those of you who don't know when I say "threw" that means "pitched", and just to let you know Daniel is 10, and for a 10 year old to throw 5 innings is almost unheard of. I am a coach for his team so I was there when he got the last out and let me tell you, it was pandemonium at the ballpark. Now, let me also tell you something about what had to happen before he had the ability to throw 5 innings like he did.... Hours and hours of practice, physical conditioning, mechanical refinement, and repeatedly throwing the same way for hundreds of pitches. These are just a few of the physical things that any good baseball pitcher must do to be able to throw five innings at 10 years old. Here are a few of the mental things that Daniel had to have: commitment, hard work, desire, passion, mental toughness, and a "never give up" attitude are all needed to be able to perform like that. Daniel's performance was, in a word, amazing, but he knows that there are still areas where he needs work. The same holds true for Dewey, Owen, and myself. Even though we have good games and we perform well, we know that we can always get better and we must constantly be practicing to improve ourselves. All four of us play baseball with a passion, there is just something about us that just loves the game of baseball, and drives us to try and become the best ball players that we can be. Just FYI I did not write this post to brag us Nugent boys up. What I am writing this for is to show how playing COMPETITIVE sports is much like our walk with Christ. Our ultimate goal in life should be to glorify and honor God in all that we do and to treasure and grown in our love for Him throughout our lives. In baseball you compete against another team to win the game so that you can obtain the trophy, award, medal, or whatever is the prize for winning the game. Our walk with Christ is the same thing, Paul says in Philippians 3:14 "I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." Notice he says "press" like he is straining, it is sometimes like that in our christian walks. There are times when the trials of life seem to engulf us and we must "press on". The same thing holds true in baseball. There are times when it takes every bit of strength, determination, desire, and willpower to get through a game. We push ourselves through no matter what it takes, because we want what is waiting for us if we succeed. That object that we have been competing for. Well, we (as Christians) know what awaits us at the end of our race, we know what we are competing for. I just thought I would throw this out there as a little reminder/encouragement.