I started the day with a class highlighting the Growing in Grace Curriculum from Terry Taylor and Paula Farrar. It was great. Very reminiscent of the old CMS materials - very music education based. I really liked this curriculum and think the preschool track may would be a good fit for us. I may even look at it for our older kids too. I had bought a little sampler pack from the bookstore and saw Terry and Paula in the cafeteria later and asked them a question. They are so nice and have a ministerial heart about what they do. They told me to go and get the companion CD for free from their room.
My second class of the day was with Slater Murphy called "Working from the Overflow." It ended up being more an hour commercial for planning center online, but that's okay, as I had wanted to learn about that anyway, although I'm not sure I'm sold on the value of a $50 per month music administrative software suite yet. People rave about it, but my system for worship planning seems to work for me, and the size church for which I'm at I don't think warrants that sort of software at this point.
Worship was great again today too. Jay dealt with the church's responsibility to "tell the story" and how we shouldn't assume folks already know it. Ginny has been old enough to be in worship with us this week, and part of the emphasis of the week has been generations worshipping together, and they actually changed the schedule so families could worship together this year. Not sure she got a lot out of the sermon today, though:
The highlight of the day, and maybe the whole conference so far, strangely, was the preview of the 2016 VBS music. This has never been done before, but it was really great. We got to meet and talk to the folks behind the VBS music (and many other things in LifeWay land) and listen to all of the main songs for VBS Submerged! Especially touching was getting to hear the God moments and sentimental stories behind the writing of some of the songs. We were "instructed" not to share any details, so I won't on this public blog, but nevertheless this was a special treat.
I had a free block of time in the afternoon, which I spent in the prayer garden. Despite the painful reality that it was uncertain when I would ever get to come back here, I had some nice moments with God, I spent some time in Psalm 80, where Asaph's song is pleading to God to restore Israel. He cited God's care for the nation in the past and lamented its current state of oppression from other nations. I can't help but to think of my nation with this prayer in mind as well. The Lord reminded me through this passage and a few others (like Proverbs 3) that the Lord disciplines those He loves. I think this does not apply only to the individual, but to groups, churches, and nations. Sometimes the righteous are collateral damage in the disciplining, but that does not excuse us from seeking to be righteous and reminding others about the statutes of God.
Oh, and this was my friend that stayed with me on the prayer bench that I was at :
The evening feature tonight was a screening of the new movie "War Room", but Sharon and I are going to meet up with Ginny in a bit and hang out together in the Nibble Nook instead tonight. We also got to see some good pictures of Nathan from CentriKid that were shared on Facebook, so we were glad to know he's doing well.
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