“Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. Instead, you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.'” (Jas 4:14-15)
Journal,
Sometime it is hard for me to wrap my mind around time itself. Has it been almost fifty years since I married this beautiful lady in my life? And has it been forty-eight years since I preached my first gospel message?
Wow, whatever happened to time?
Has it really been almost thirty-seven years since we held our first service at Christian Challenge? I was just thirty-five. Betty was thirty-three. Nathan 11, André 8, and Shana, 2 years old. In fact we held our first service on Shana’s second birthday.
Here I am, knocking on seventy-three.
Whatever happened to time?
I especially find it odd, that after having been a world traveler almost all my life, that I would end up in the very city where I took my first breath. (The truth be known, I wasn’t actually raised in Pineville, Louisiana. I was born here because of the Huey P. Long Charity Hospital.)
But, yes, I dearly love Pineville, Louisiana. Pineville is an awesome small city with its great city government and its law against the sell of liquor.
For my readers who would like to know a bit about Pineville, take time for this video. It was provided on ‘Today in America with Terry Brawshaw’.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBfVZdH5QjA[/youtube]This brings me to…
A Story in Time
When we relocated our ministry from Boyce, Louisiana, to Pineville, in 1978, I placed a special prayer before Lord God. I ask the Lord to please let Christian Challenge become a blessing to this city.
Have we become a blessing? I think so. I’ve had people tell me that Christian Challenge is a stabilizing influence in Pineville. Perhaps this is because we’ve made so many friends among the clergy here.
An example of this is that in 1988, a small group of we pastors began meeting each Wednesday morning at 
a restaurant in Pineville, for a time of fellowship.
These were simply friendship meetings. Nothing official. No agenda aside from getting to know one another. The meetings began to produce a friendship and a bonding among pastors that has lasted to this very day.
Oh yes, there have been changes such as when a pastor needs to relocate, or when one of the brothers is called home. But it seems that the Lord always brings a new pastor to the group.
And would you believe where these pastors come from? We’ve enjoyed our friendships with nondenominational, United Methodist, United Pentecostal, Assembly of God, Southern Baptist, Wesleyan, Charismatic, Church of Christ, Church of God, and others that slip my mind.
I think the community is well aware of this special group. The point being that when pastors love one another and are able to create friendship such as we have in our group, it sends a message to the churches and to the community at large.
Twenty-five years! Wow, whatever happened to time.
[One other thing I haven’t mention is that my oldest son, Nathan, has served on the city council for a several years. That goes with the prayer of, ‘Lord, let our ministry become a blessing to this city.]Speaking of time, I’d like to share another video. It goes back to the earlier days of Christian Challenge, reaching back to the thirty-seven years ago.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwA-cc-UxjM[/youtube]Well, did James say it well enough? Is time like a vapor that appears for a little time?
Something to think about.
Always in Christ,
Buddy
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