here’s some video from the amazing work my bride melinda did the kitchen for new year’s eve.
so wish there was a way to share the aroma of the effort. although we rang in the new year with amazing food and the company of some good friends i pray you’ll give consideration to this list of resolutions Jonathan Edwards penned many years ago…ponder just this first one:
Resolved, That I will do whatsoever I think to be most to the glory of God, and my own good, profit, and pleasure, in the whole of my duration; without any consideration of the time, whether now, or never so many myriads of ages hence. Resolved, to do whatever I think to be my duty, and most for the good and advantage of mankind in general. Resolved, so to do, whatever difficulties I meet with, how many soever, and how great soever.
praying your new year’s eve was blessed and that many blessings come your way in 2012.
i love the folks that call new hope church home. so many amazing hearts willing to engage in so many good things. i mentioned on this past sunday during the service that many good things had come about in the prep for my participation in the Present:Hope Tour…training, fundraising, getting my own bike and even the trip home from the end of it all at Catalyst in Atlanta. One small piece was missing…getting to springfield, mo to leave (small point). and then immediately after the first service, Jim Gribble came up and said…”the stories you shared convinced me that I should be your ride to Springfield”. So fast forward to yesterday morning and at 5:59am est Jim knocks at our side door and we load up and off we go. here’s some video of our 12.5 hr drive west.
Once we got here we were able to meet up with another new hoper, Todd Morris (the world is really a small place) for an incredible meal together. Todd currently is a sales representative for a welding wire company and MO is part of his territory. Lots of great stories and it was fun to settle into the beginning of this adventure to leverage awareness for the rebuilding of Joplin and Tuscaloosa with folks from home.
I’m not sure how much posting i’ll get to do…i hope daily to journal our exploits, but a couple things you can be praying for beyond the Present:Hope Tour itself…as we got in last night, Jim got a phone call from his bride Jeannie saying that his brother had been admitted to the hospital for chest pains. Jim left early this morning for the 12.5 hr return trip and is concerned. I talk to my bride (of 32 years!) melinda and she and our emmah are home sick this morning.
had a short conversation with a mother and her son, here at the hotel from the UK after breakfast, the son is considering attending a local university…but in the conversation she mentioned…”life is really about the journey, is it not?” yep…heard that before.
i’m headed off here in about an hour to connect with the rest of the team. several are en route via airplanes and will be on the ground after lunch…then we start training. grateful for your following and investing more later.
had a interesting conversation today at lunch at the local rotary club with some community leaders. and the thread of dealing with the growing issue of broken families and its impact on a local community was in all of it.
it reminded me of this quote from a smart dude, robert george on marriage. it was part of an interview on national review online a few months ago. the whole interview entiled “sex and the empire state” is worth printing out and reflecting on along with the larger project from an article in the harvard journal of law that spurred the interview.
Marriage is a profound human and social good; its weakening and loss is a tragedy from which affluent people can be distracted (and protected) by their affluence for only so long. The institution of marriage has already been deeply wounded by divorce at nearly plague levels, widespread non-marital sexual cohabitation, and other damaging factors. To redefine it out of existence in law is to make it much more difficult to restore a sound understanding of marriage on which a healthy marriage culture can be rebuilt for the good of all. It is to sacrifice the needs of the poor, who are hurt the most when a sound public understanding of marriage and sexual morality collapses. It is to give up on the truth that children need both a father and mother, and benefit from the security of their love for each other.
—Interview with Robert George by Kathryn Jean Lopez, editor-at-large of National Review Online.
anita renfroe has done it again…brillant she is. so here…a tribute to our mom’s everywhere and especially my mom, alison and to melinda my bride and the mother of our children… yep…yep! turn it up…
a song written before the children from PS22 parents were born rocks the emotions even today. watch this video. see how the beauty of the passionate voices of children join with the tribute to the winners of the 2011 Oscar to leverage the value of community. So how can we create similar shared experience and culture in the church? so cool.
welcome to the blog of tom roepke. follower of Jesus. husband to melinda. father to sarah, jedidiah and emmah. pastor of student ministries at new hope community church. much like my friend, samwise, i am just trying to find my place in the Story.
