It's time to get busy

Wooo hoooo!  I'm really excited, just made plans to go lead the music for a revival in New England at my brother's church.  I love going north even if they are under twenty-seven feet of snow at the moment.  Lots of exciting things coming up now that I think about it, Common Ground Saturday night (a worship service at Hill Crest), our love series in Merge (always draws a big crowd when we talk about sex), three DNow weekends in two months, Merge Unplugged, and the band is headed to one of my favorite churches for a night of worship in Ranburne.  God is really blessing with opportunity after opportunity for me to share his love through music over the next couple of months.  It's kind of overwhelming the more I think about it.  Just the fact that God continues to allow me to do ministry even though I'm a nasty sinner.  Grace is a great thing though and I just want to be faithful.  Hebrews 11:6 says it is impossible to please God without faith.

I've heard some great messages this week, one about staying in the boat and growing where you are planted.  Ironically to be followed by, "don't be afraid to get out of the boat. " Take courage, I Am, fear not! That scripture makes me want to punch the devil right in the face.  Then I got super convicted Tuesday night when I heard a message that really challenged me to get back to set quiet time and how powerful the Bible really is.  Simple but effective.  Who would have thought a message about how powerful the Bible is would have been effective. (sarcasm)

I got to do a little writing last weekend with one of my favorite drummers and we really came up with some pretty descent stuff.  I hope we can share a couple at Merge Unplugged. One specifically talks about God's unconditional love and how that there is nothing we have done that He won't forgive us for or restore us back to.  I think a lot of times we understand the forgiveness part but we don't understand the restoration part.  Restoration is huge.  If we live defeated lives then we can not be effective with the Gospel.  My prayer tonight is to be more effective with the sword that God has placed in my hand.  With that being said, it's time to get busy.


Andrew

Deep Thoughts by Hack Jandy

Ok, so it's Saturday morning and I'm just chilling watching dad snooze while HGTV is playing in the background.  These last few days have been a whirlwind for mom and myself.   The doctor decided while he was putting the second stent in that he would go ahead and do the third.  He said it was going a lot better than planned so he went ahead and did both.  Mom and I were both relieved.  He actually gave me the before and after pictures of the heart, which I thought was a little odd, but I gladly took them a placed them gently in my murse.  So to clarify, dad had three total stents done and seems to be doing fine at the moment.  If all goes well he may get to go home late Saturday evening or early Sunday morning.

We hear a lot about the peace of God, or having a peace that surpasses all understanding.  I'm not sure that I had ever experienced that first hand before Wednesday morning around 3:00AM.  When I saw my dad sitting in his chair obviously hurting and pale, I began to pray that God would take control of the situation and that what ever happened would be for His glory.  There was about an hour period there where I wasn't sure what the outcome was going to look like.  It was scary.  I remember getting in my car to follow the ambulance and it just seemed like everything was going to be ok.  You may say I under reacted but I honestly believed that he was going to be fine.  As I sat at dinner tonight it really hit me that I hadn't worried but one time over the past 36 hours.  Today after they transferred him to RMC his blood pressure wasn't stable and I begin over analyzing things.  God took care of it.

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! ⁵ Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. ⁶ Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. ⁷ And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.


This was it, this is what happened!  It's mind boggling even as I type this very blog.  I got to experience a peace that didn't make sense.  A peace that wasn't logical.  Often when I pray, I pray that God would allow unbelievers to understand the Gospel and that they would get to enjoy the peace that only God can offer.  I think I need to add to that prayer that the believer would also get to experience that same peace. The only way to explain it and it often sounds corny is that it was a "God thing."  


I'm beginning to doze off so I'm going to wrap this up with a huge thank you to friends and family for all of the visits and prayers.  Especially a few of you that have spent countless hours here with me and mom.  God has a reason for all of this and God is not finished with my dad.  To God be the glory for  his healing and recovery.  Please continue to pray for his recovery and for his up and coming diet/exercise change.


Andrew

Dad Update #2

Hey guys, just wanted to let you know that we just spoke with the doctor and they are going to try and get him a room tonight here at Stringfellow.  Tomorrow they are going to transfer him to RMC and they will do another stint around 6:00PM.  We did have some good news, my mom and I evidently were mistaken on the number of blockages, he actually only had a total of three and they stinted one yesterday so he has two left. The one they are going to stint tomorrow is 75-80% blocked and they will worry about the other one latter.  The doctor doesn't want to do both stints at the same time because of the possibility of complications.  Please continue to pray for healing and for everything to go well tomorrow.  Thank you for your prayers and visits.

Andrew

Update on dad

These last 30 hours have been pretty crazy.  Overwhelmed by the amount of prayers, visits, and concerns by friends and family.  I just wanted to give a quick update and recap of what has been happening over the last day.  Most of you know my dad had a heart attack early yesterday morning and was taken to Stringfellow Memorial Hospital for care.  They did a heart cath yesterday around lunch and found that he had four blockages.  One of which was on the right side of his heart and was about 95% blocked.  The other three are on the left side and are between 70-85% blocked.  They put a stent in the one one that was on the right side, aka the one that caused the heart attack.  I'm currently waiting with my mom on the doctor to come in and decide what will be our next move.  His nurse said that it looks like they will most likely keep him overnight and do the other three stents late tomorrow evening.  The reason they didn't do all four at one time was because of the dye that they use for the stents could cause kidney problems if they use too much.  All this is new to me so I'm merely repeating what I hear the doctor and nurses say.  We are waiting at the moment to see what the next move is.  They may move him into a different room just for tonight but we will know more when the doctor arrives.  I have been overwhelmed by the level of excellence that the staff at Stringfellow has shown over the last day or so.  Again, thank you guys for your prayers and visits it has made this process a lot easier.  Continue to pray for my mom, she has a tendency to 'freak out' easily and pray for me that I can continue to offset her with my nauseatingly positive attitude.

Andrew