Bro. Lyndel's Football Team

I am writing some devotions for football players. Some of you who have known me for many years probably just fell over laughing. But I really am. I had several ideas for football player devotions last night and will be writing them over the next few days or weeks.

 How does a totally non-sports person write devotions for football players? And why write them anyway. It seems that someone who knows about sports and about football players and the things that they do to get themselves ready to play or how they exercise or something should be the person that would write such things.

 Hmmm. Well, perhaps I should begin with the story of how I ended up with my own football team.

 Last summer (2013) I took a group of High School handbell players to Porto, Portugal. While there, my friend, Andy, told me about how they are coaching football as a means of developing relationships with Portuguese men and how many of them are responding to the Gospel and coming to Bible studies and many are now followers of Jesus.

 Awesome!

 My dad was a big football fan. Back in the old days of the 70s families only had one TV. I know that sounds rather remarkable today, but that’s just how it was. Monday night football was a big deal in most homes, I suppose, and it was in our house as well. My dad and my brother would watch every game. It wasn’t a time that you talked about school or church or how the roses were growing in the backyard. It was just football. I usually spent Monday evenings upstairs in my room. I just didn’t care who was playing or who won or if their running back did a fancy whatever and got the ball down to a certain place and then someone kicked the thing and it got them points because the other guys wouldn’t let them run the ball all the way into the end zone……

I did watch some football in my H.S. days. I played the baritone horn in the marching band. Violins didn’t really fit with the whole marching thing. Perhaps the bows are too scary for the woodwinds – thinking you will poke their eyes out as you march by sawing away with your bow. There were actually two football games each week – one just before the band show and one just after the band show. Ha!

This would have been awesome!

I remember the name Bart Star, but I usually wonder if he is Ringo's brother. Oh, and I remember Joe Namath wearing pantyhose but I don't know why he did and I don't know who he played football for.

Please tell me those aren't Joe's legs!

Fast forward to 2013. My interest in football is about the same as it has always been. I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings, but I just don’t care…. I do watch a tiny bit of the Broncos because my son, Andrew, LOVES the Broncos. We lived in Denver during some important formative years apparently. So I like to know a little about the Broncos because they are important to my son. But to be honest with you, I don’t even know who their quarterback is. I know John Elway still has something to do with them as an owner or something. When I lived in Denver I had lunch with someone that played for the Broncos. I don’t remember his name. Seems like he was a defensive something-or-the-other. Andrew probably still remembers who it was.

If I haven’t lost you with this little trip through my football background, here’s how I ended up with my own football team. (I thought you needed the background to see how this is a God thing.)

Our church has a men’s supper/worship time/Bible study one Tuesday night a month. We call it “Man Church.” We kill our own food, sit around a campfire cooking our wild boar with our shirts off and beat on drums. Hahaha. OK. We have burgers and sit around tables at our Family Life Center (gym). At our August “Man Church” I noticed two twenty-something guys sitting by themselves at a table so I invited myself to sit with them. OK. You’ve read my football bio. Don’t really have one. And about the first thing I heard coming out of my mouth was “Do you guys play football? Or did you?” Seriously?! I’m going to start a football conversation with two people I don’t even know! What if they started talking about last night’s game? (Oh, I guess there might not have been one in August.) But if they had, what would I say? “Oh, sorry. Didn’t mean to bring up football since I’m a football idiot. You two just talk about the game and I’ll just nod my head.”

They said they did (or had played in HS or college) and I just kept going “Really? What position did you play?” and they said something about hiking and running and tackling… Then, without hardly skipping a beat I heard myself say, “Well, you know, while we were in Portugal we heard how football players from the States had gone there to do football things and share the Gospel and I’m thinking of taking some football players over there next year. Would you be interested in going?” Seriously?! I just said that?

I know God was at work that night because I had NOT thought of that before then. I would NOT plan a mission opportunity that included football. I have used vocal and instrumental music, art, ESL, Bible clubs and more, but football. HAhahaha!

The eyes of those two guys lit up. “You mean we could play football and tell people about Jesus? We could do that!” Then God grabbed my heart. I could just hear Him say, "Look at football missions through the eyes of these two." And long story short – they are the first two guys on my football team!

A few weeks later after our 9:45 service I walked over to the guy that sits right there on the second row every week and I heard myself say, “Can I ask you something? Did you football?” Boom! My third player.

I’m now up to 5 players – possibly 6 – and I haven’t even advertised for mission team members yet. If you’re at Hilldale this Sunday you’ll see this in the bulletin “Join Bro. Lyndel’s Football Team.” My dad would NEVER have believed this. I'm not sure either of my brothers will believe it either. They are both big football fans.

God is up to something with this. I can hardly wait to see what all will happen in the lives of these young men and in Portugal. He will have to do it because I keep slipping and saying “football rehearsals” and things like that.

Here's the end of the story for now.

I don’t really care much about football, but I care VERY much about missions and about investing in the lives of young men. If you care about missions and want to invest in the lives of some young men then God may lead you to help send them. Twenty-somethings don’t have money to send themselves on mission: they are at the beginning of their careers, they have young families, they have student loans... Call me and see how you can help.

Instruments on Mission - Getting a Second Life

Remember that clarinet that your daughter just had to have so she could play in the band and then decided one week into it that she really wanted to play the guitar instead?

Or maybe your child loved playing in band so much that the $200 trumpet wasn't good enough. No... you had to buy a $1200 trumpet. Now the $200 one is just sitting in your closet wishing someone would oil up the valves and make it useful again.

Whatever the story of the instrument in your closet that hasn't seen the light of day for years, we have an offer of a second chance - a second life - for that old flute. Some people turn old instruments into lamps and such.

Here's an option for an unused flute that will further the Kingdom.

Bro. Paul has a pastor friend in Venezuela that is reaching out to children in his community through music. He is teaching children to play the trumpet or clarinet or flute or other band instruments.

You can bring your instruments to church with you Sunday or if you don't attend Hilldale, you can mail them to me at 2001 Madison St., Clarksville, TN 37043

OK. Now you know how. Give your instruments a second chance at life, bring joy to a child's heart and give a pastor an opportunity to share the Gospel. It's a win-win-win proposition.

"Come Thou Fount, Come Thou King",

Gateway Worship, Song led by Thomas Miller

A wonderful "old" hymn with a new chorus added to it. We're singing it this Sunday at Hilldale in the 8:30 and 9:45 services.

The Language of Missions

Eu falo um pouco de Português.

 

No hablo español.

 

Ich spreche kein Deutsch entweder.

But I do speak a language that people all around the world speak – the language of music.

 

In September of 2011 I led an ESL team from our church, Hilldale in Clarksville, on a mission trip to Portugal. We didn’t need to know Portuguese, we were teaching English. It was a great way for churches in the Porto area to reach out to their communities by offering free English classes. (This trip would be another article in itself, but it leads into our most recent mission adventure.) While we were there with Andy and Michelle Milam (Tennesseans serving with the IMB) Andy mentioned that he would love to have a handbell choir come to Portugal. He knew of several ways and places that a handbell choir could partner with the Portuguese churches to reach out to their communities.

 

I love handbells, but my adult handbell choir had lost it’s rehearsal time (long story) and hadn’t met in some time. I wasn’t sure if I could get them going again. With their varying jobs and other issues it didn’t look possible. Then God gave me the idea of starting a new handbell choir with our youth. I didn’t have time to teach non-music readers how to read music, so in May and June of 2012 I talked to piano students and band students. “I’m taking a handbell choir to Portugal next summer and I want you to go with us!“

 

It worked! By the time our rehearsals started in the Fall of 2012 I had eight High School students, one young adult and myself to form a new handbell choir.

 

Fast forward... here are a few highlights of our preparation:

·         We came up with a new cool name – “Rezounding Praize“ and took some publicity shots.

·         We rehearsed and worked hard and learned how to ring well together!

·         We made a CD of handbell music to give away. A new believer in Portugal recorded the Roman Road for us and we inserted that on the CD in between our songs. We gave away close to 900 CDs. (We were able to make our CDs for about .55 each. E-mail me for info.)

·         We have a cool website www.rezoundingpraize.blogspot.com. Our free CD directs you there. On our website you can read about our songs and a little about us, but more importantly there are links that share the Gospel in Portuguese!

 

Here are some of the things we did in Porto, Portugal:

·         “Flash mob“ ringing in the streets to draw crowds. We gave away fliers to an evening concert and free CDs to all who came by.

·         Evening concerts to some of the biggest crowds one of the churches had seen in a long time (maybe ever) The highlight of our concerts was an arrangement of the national anthem of Portugal “A Portuguesa.“ They couldn’t believe that we would learn how to play their anthem on handbells. It was awesome! You can hear it here. We played several songs with one of the only handbell choirs in Portugal. Here we are in rehearsal together.

·         Ringing for a special 40th anniversary of a private school and making some great connections with the students there.

·         Ringing in a restaurant and giving away CDs to patrons and waiters and having a good conversation with the owner. In fact, we were able to share with several restaurant owners about our faith.

·         Ringing through the streets and in a street concert in the middle of a housing project of an outcast people group. (The doors for this outreach had been opened by other groups including the BCM group from Austin Peay University in March.) Several groups have now visited this housing complex and the Milams are hopeful that they can now bring in a group to do Backyard Bible Clubs there.

·         Shared CDs and smiles with the hotel staff which led to a great conversation about faith with some of the staff later in the week.



Our hotel

 There were other connections and opportunities to share in our week in Portugal – too many to mention here. We were able to follow through doors that had been opened by other groups (like an American football coach and players) and we opened new doors for groups that will come behind us.

 

Most of us didn’t speak any Portuguese – just a few words with a heavy Southern USA accent. But we did speak the language of music and more importantly, the language of God’s love. Jesus said that they would know we were His disciples by our love. His love crosses the barrier of spoken language.

 

What language do you speak? Sports? Drama? Art? Music? Add it to God’s language of love and you are on your way to a great mission experience (out of the country or at home).

One Generation - Giant Choir

Timothy was the Apostle Paul's "beloved son" (2 Timothy 1:2) in the faith, his partner in ministry, the one he left behind to pastor the church in Ephesus (according to most Bible scholars.)

Look at this great testimony of where Timothy was taught about faith found in the first chapter of 2 Timothy.

             5 For I am mindful of the sincere faith within you, which first dwelt in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am sure that it is in you as well.

This Sunday in worship (at 8:30 and 9:45) we are going to have a beautiful picture of one generation declaring their faith to another generation as we sing "One Generation" the title song from our new choir CD. We're going to have a GIANT Family Choir with all generations singing together. ♫ One Generation shall praise Your name to another. ♪ ♫ One Generation declares Your mighty works.♪ ♫

While we sing we will have a video playing made up of pictures from our church family. In these pictures you will see three, four and even five generations together. It's REALLY awesome!

Here's a picture of me and my mom and my daughter, Christy, and her son - my newest grandbaby, Malachi. (It will be in the video while we sing - of course.)

So that you and your children can learn "One Generation" and join us in our Giant Mother's Day Choir this Sunday, here is a recording of "One Generation" that you can listen to.

 

Of course EVERYONE needs to buy a copy of our CD (it's how I'm helping our HS handbell choir, ReZounding PraiZe, get to Portugal on a mission trip) and it's just nice to have some worship music to play in your car while you're traveling around town with your children. The CD is made of songs that we sing together in worship or that you have heard our choir sing.

Making May Memories

When I was a child we had a May Day tradition in our family. I still remember it (and I think - if I remember correctly - that I passed along this tradition to my daughter, Christy.)

On May 1st - May Day - we would make a basket and fill it with flowers. I guess people still do this because I found some pictures of May Day Baskets (yay, Google).

 

We made ours out of strawberry baskets. Remember these? Do they still come this way? I don't remember seeing them lately.

 

We would run ribbon in and out of the basket and add some ribbon for a handle. Then we would fill the basket up with fresh flowers cut from our yard.

The fun part was then going to one of our church's senior adult's house where we would leave the basket on the doorstep or hang it on the door handle. We would then ring the doorbell then run and hide behind the bushes to watch as the lady answered the door and was pleasantly surprised by an anonymous gift of flowers.

I suppose nowadays you'd get shot by some neighbors if they saw you hiding in the bushes. But that's a different post.

Making memories with your children is SO important. It connects you as family. It provides a fantastic opportunity to teach values - if you have good activities and talk about what you are doing. And it just makes life more fun! That's important!

Here's a memory you can make with your children that will be easy and fun. Take our choir CD (buy one tonight if you don't have one yet) and teach your child(ren) the song "One Generation" and then join us next Sunday morning for a giant family choir as we sing "One Generation" in our 8:30 and 9:45 services. How fun is that? Ask grandma to sing with us too and get all the generations together!

 

To summarize:
Today - make a May Day basket to fill with flowers and leave it on someone's door without getting shot.
This week - get a choir CD and teach "One Generation" to your kids and your mom.
Mother's Day, May 12 - sing with our giant choir for the 8:30 and/or 9:45 worship services at Hilldale.

Silent Auction - Art for Missions

Our Silent Auction for Missions goes through Friday, May 10. You can see the paintings and artwork in person at our Family Life Center on Old Farmers Road. (Side note - I've always wondered if the farmer is old or the road is old.)

Anyway, I'll let the art speak for itself. If you are interested, you can bid by calling the FLC at 931-368-0205 or stop by in person.