December 16 – “Follow Jesus Not Me”

We saw a great bumper sticker today on the way to Houston.  It was on the back of one of those really long trailers that only pickup trucks with high numbers like 350 or 450 after their names can pull.  It said, "Follow Jesus, Not Me."  I don't know if I would put it on my vehicle, but I liked it.    I went to the rheumatologist today.  In a nutshell, nothing new.  He seemed frustrated because the labwork is disgustingly normal, but there is obviously pain going on.  He added a medication.  An anti-inflammatory.  I'm supposed to take it at supper.  And if I forget then, I have to take it with food and sit upright for at least twenty minutes.  And sitting up reading in bed doesn't count.  He really said that.  We didn't have time to get the prescription filled today.  That was a good thing, because we didn't eat supper, either.  At least not yet.  Is ten p.m. too late to eat real food?   This morning I got started on the Christmas Eve service.  I got enough done that I could send Lanny a basic order of service.  Now he can plug in the songs and we'll be good to go.  I'm going to do a teaching involving six different film clips from five different Christmas movies.  Mike assured me he could make it happen.  That meant I had to find all the movies today and get them to him tonight.  He is going to be out of town this weekend, so he needs the time to work on it.  We used to have all the movies.  On VHS.  Now they are owned by Ike.  I was shocked that WalMart actually had all the ones I needed.  WalMart in Galveston.  They didn't have the one I wanted to use for this Sunday's teaching, though.   After the doctor's office we got a bite to eat and went to the Target at Baybrook.  That's as close to the Mall as I like to get.  We were able to find a lot of the gifts for our kids there.  We still have some more to go, though.  Down to the wire.  We actually went into a ToysRUs store.  I haven't been in one of those in years.  We remembered why as soon as we walked in.  It was a zoo.  We were looking for one thing in particular, and it took us forever to even find a salesperson to ask for help.  While we were stumbling around, I did run across the very DVD I couldn't find at WalMart this morning.  What are the chances?   Tonight was the youth Christmas Party at church.  We did a white elephant gift exchange.  We were very proud of the kids this year.  Their gifts were tasteful (except for one, but the youth pastor managed to go home with that one).  In fact mine was exceedingly tasteful.  I actually got a bag of Hershey kiss shaped Nestle's crunches.  Is that even legal?  I won't care when I'm eating them.  Tomorrow night is our home group party.  Another white elephant.  This group can be very creative.  I can't wait.   Jude 24-25 says, "To him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy— 25 to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen."   Father, I echo that praise.  It certainly says it well.  Amen.