Yesterday we had the honor of having one of our very own, a son of our house, Josh Roberts, preach at Harvest Church. And did he preach?! Side note: I have the bad habit of saying, “Wow!” WAY too much. I just about had curbed the overuse of this word until…well, WOW! Yesterday blew me away. I must have said it a dozen times.

To think this guy who is only 4 years younger than me (in our forties now we seem almost the same age), ANYWAY, this guy was a teen in our church when we youth pastored here in the 90s where we now pastor. He was one of the pastor’s kids and we had the great privilege of getting close to him and his brothers and sister. Pardon this reminiscing for a moment : lots of pizza nights and Sunday Night Sensations as we called them which were times in the presence of God gathered around in a living room. There were late night knocks on the door back in those days and phone calls from a teen girl who just got her heart broken from some jerk my husband would be tempted to beat up but instead we aimed to be godly examples to these kids we came to think were part-ours to the best of our ability. There were things we knew about these kids and were torn. Do we tell their parents or just try to give them the best advise we had by the direction of the Holy Ghost? Help us Jesus, not sure what we are doing here. Oh how He did. So many of these teens are now do of amazing things all over the world for Jesus and we will never forget those awesome times we all had together!

This weekend as Josh ministered with such skill and anointing, our hearts were full. To think we had even a small part to play in loving him and nurturing his spiritual maturity as a younger guy. Ya know, sometimes it helps to be reminded that all that you do actually has lasting results. Isn’t that what brings all of us fulfillment in life? Knowing what we are spending our lives doing matters to someone and is making a difference so this life isn’t just all about us?! Yesterday, so many memories flooded my mind of all those years serving teenagers.

But the phrase that has rung in my mind over everything else yesterday was how Josh said one of their family values is that they are a family who lives by faith. And then he said, “we are bet the farm Kinda people.” There was a roar of faith inside of me when he said that. And I thought, oh my goodness. THAT is what I see missing in people’s lives who are all jacked up and in my own life when it gets a little or lot a messy. Why is that the case? Because it’s impossible to please God without faith!!!!

So I have a question for both you and me from yesterday’s message. What would look differently in our lives if we were really “bet the farm Kinda people”? What does that mean to you and what would have to change for that to be true? I don’t know about you but I’m making a list and going to make adjustments where needed because what I’m after in this life is pleasing Him and no one else. I’ve bet the farm before several times but what about lately? Let’s evaluate this in our lives today together! I’m excited for testimonies of people who decide to finally do what He’s been nudging you to do from this.

God’s the best bet we’ve got!

Happy Monday!