Smiles--Day 209/Day 7

I knew at least one thing I'd be blogging about today. As Carson (one of the 2nd graders at Awanas) sat up on the stairs waiting for everyone to get situated and ready for prayer, he looked at me and then gave me a kind of mischievous smile. Not the kind where he's about to do something mischievous, but just the sort of smile you might give another that jokes around with you a lot. I smiled back, then we prayed. I saw many more different kind of smiles throughout the day. I noticed Angela close her eyes as she listened to Scott up on stage. She held her microphone close as she usually does as he speaks, then she opened her eyes. She looked immediately at Scott and smiled. Scott has that effect on people as he speaks or prays before every song. If I think about it, I can think of so many other people smiling. Pastor Bob did when I saw him this morning. Sloan sat by herself as she was apparently waiting for the children's prayer. She looked up at me, waved, gave me a very genuine smile, and went about studying her gloves again. Many people smiled as I shook their hand before the sermon, and I smiled when Diane crossed the aisle to shake our hands. I smiled later on as I heard Diane speak a few times during the sermon. She would say an occasional "Amen" or other words of agreement. Colton smiled as he remembered last weeks singer. He could remember the song as well, but he particularly enjoyed when he sang separate from the rest of us as we sang the song.

I remember smiling as I watched TV later in the afternoon. There was a preacher from Detroit preaching to his congregation. When he got all excited, he would breath in hard and make an unusual noise into the microphone. It would've bothered me if I hadn't been enjoying what he was saying and enjoying the fervor he was causing for others. I believe he was talking about Ezekiel and how God's spirit pick him up and left him in a "valley of bones". He talked of how God will place us in situations that will humble us and to see what we do while we are in that place. The pastor believes that sometimes "only a shout will get you out" meaning one must still praise God no matter the situation. We need be overjoyed in our hearts because if God has placed us in a situation, then He is using us for a greater good. By the end of his sermon almost everyone was on their feet, some of them were jumping or rocking back and forth, many had their hands in the air and almost all were smiling. I thought of Diane and smiled. Although she is not loud, she is the loudest at our church, but her exclamations are nothing compared to this church I watched. As I've said before, it's great to see how other people praise our Lord. Some are quite loud, while others are quiet. That is one part I didn't really agree with the preacher about. He was sort of mocking the quiet ones. He acted as if then needed to continue to have an appearance of an intellectual or they needed to stay dignified or they didn't want to look foolish on camera. He said that some that seemed to act ridiculous during the sermon may be getting "ridiculously blessed". He told his congregation to "make some noise". People worship in all sorts of ways, and it was unnecessary of him to make note of the quieter ones. I think, though, that what he was trying to say was don't hold back. Don't hold back your praise and don't hold back your joy. He's right. We shouldn't.

The whole family smiled today as we wrestled around and even got Kim in on the act. We are fortunate Noah seems to very rarely hurt himself, but the flipside of that is that he seems to have no fear when we wrestle. He will fling his whole body and any and every part of your body. He's fun to play with, but you just have to keep a very close eye on him. I smiled as we prayed tonight. We are praying we learn lessons from this current situation, but we are very happy to have what we do. We are especially lucky to have a wonderful God be with us eternally. We are incredibly lucky to have found a wonderful church and we are blessed that He has given us each other. Thank you, Lord.