Another Day

I love Sunday's. I get up early and come to the office and pray and study while it is quite in the office. I have some wonderful times listening to the Lord and getting myself ready for service and Sunday school. It gives me time to fill up spiritually so that I am prepared to minister to folks.

This morning while coming down the stairs I got a spasm in my back. OH MY GOSH IT HURT!!!! I really had to work hard not to scream out. Now in a pentecostal / charismatic church that would be OK at times. Falling on the floor can be OK, at certain times. But the things I wanted to scream and the reason I would be falling out, would not be because i was "under the anointing" or "overcome by the power", I would be because I was in PAIN!!!! I could just see me crawling on the floor screaming and someone saying..."that's is pastor, shout the praises of God." God spared me from doing that though.

Tonight in church we are praying for Rwanda. I have recently finished a book entitled "The Bishop of Rwanda." It is about the Genocide in 1994. It details why the genocide happened and many stories of people who were killed. It also chronicles the reconciliation of the survivors. Many times while reading this book I wanted to just weep. It gives me a whole new picture of God's forgiveness. I have had to forgive for offenses against me. I have had to struggle at times forgiving. But they pale in comparison to the stories I read of the people of Rwanda being able to forgive. Once account tells of a pastor who watched his entire family butchered with machetes, his wife and daughter raped and tortured and he could do nothing. It tells of him meeting one of the men in prison years later while he was preaching. God was able to help him forgive that man. What excuse do I have when I have trouble forgiving.....