School Rush: Getting Ready for the Fall

The last couple of weeks our family has been preparing ourselves for the "school rush." You know how it goes. Getting the info for school to start, filling out forms, figuring out rides to school, sports, confirmation, etc. Whew.

One of the things that keeps us balanced is to fall back on God's grace and mercy. His forgiveness and the security of our salvation is secure. As much as we want to be on time, have things organized, try to be everywhere for our family, the fact is, we will mess up sometimes. Well, it helps to remember, these things are not necessary for salvation. What was necessary was the sacrifice of Christ, the Lamb who paid for all of our sins. He even paid for being late, not being able to be at all the kids events, forgetting the practice, etc.

Pr. Sell

God's Call to be a Dad

Having just spoke about Vocation at a youth gathering, a friend of mine directed me to this video. God calls you into your vocation. According to Romans 12:1-4, God calls each Christian into many vocations. The word vocation (vocatio Latin) means to call. Our many vocations, or calls, are our daily worship of God. One of those vocations is being a mom or dad. Here is a video that makes that point, called, "Dad Life." Yes, this is the one I showed in our Sunday morning bible class, in case anyone was wondering.

Pr. Sell

Pastor Sell Speaks at Youth Conference in Utah and TN

Summer Update

Other than the usual preaching and teaching at Immanuel and shut-ins for Trinity, Edwardsville, I've been involved in a few other things this summer. You might remember that I was scheduled to be the plenary speaker at a Higher Things (HT) youth gathering in Utah and then in TN. WOW! What a hoot. What makes HT attractive is the cost of the conference - about $325/youth - plus travel. They also have these every summer. Next summer, they will have 3 of them. One in IL, one at UNLV Las Vegas, and one in Atlanta.


Given 2010 Logan, Utah

The Utah gathering was a blast as I was able to relive some of my former experiences in Utah, aka, Mormon-land. It was high desert, so, it was a "dry" heat. As the plenary speaker, that meant that I spoke to all the kids at one time. Utah had well over 500 kids.

Sorry about the blurred pics...

I couldn't help but to get a dig in about the Red Wings.

The worship was awsome, the break out sessions were interesting and I was