I love hanging out in God's Word.  My daily reading consist of 4 parts:
1.  Old Testament
2.  Psalms
3.  Proverbs
4.  New Testament

I just finished 1 Samuel.  What an incredible book.  Allow me to share with you what I took away from 1 Samuel.  Obedience matters.  In case you don't know the story let me give you a quick recap.  Saul has been named king.  Samuel is the prophet of the day and tells Saul exactly what God wants him to do.  His newest mission is to wipe out the Amalekites.

1 Samuel 15:3 
Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy everything that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.' "

Sounds pretty self explanatory.  Wipe them out.
But look what King Saul actually did.

1 Samuel 15:9 
But Saul and the army spared Agag and the best of the sheep and cattle, the fat calves and lambs--everything that was good. These they were unwilling to destroy completely, but everything that was despised and weak they totally destroyed.
 
To make a lengthy story short, Saul lost everything.  God took away his kingdom and life due to his disobedience. 

What can we learn form the mistakes of Saul?
1.  Saul tried to make excuses.
When confronted by Samuel Saul tried to explain that he only kept the best so he could offer them to God.
When we do mess up, when we are disobedient, just fess up to it.  Don't make lame excuses.  Let me let you in on a little secret.  God knows anyway.
2.  Understand that our choices have consequences. 
Every choice we make, good or bad will have some type of consequence.  Try and always make the right decisions.
3. Blind faith.
Even when we don't completely understand something God is asking us to do - do it anyway.  We might not know what God is up to but he does.

I love that God's Word is full of people that have messed up so we can learn from their mistakes.  Hate it for them but it's great for us.

I haven't given you any of my random thoughts lately, so here we go.
1. I don't want to complain, but sure do need some rain.  Have begun praying about it.
2. Football is here baby.  I get to do the devotions for the Liberty High School team.  I'm always excited about hanging out with the team and sharing some Biblical truths.  This week I'm using 3 clips from the movie, Friday Night Lights and discussing teamwork. 
3. I"ll be holding the down marker also.  If you're at the game Friday night and need to know what down it is, look on the away team side lines and I'll be there.
4. One of my best friends ever is the head coach of Liberty this year.  Curtis Middleton was one of the men that palyed a part in leading me to Christ.  Praying for you Curtis.  Praying for you to win football games and young men to Christ.
5. My 8 year old son has his first game Tuesday night.  He is pumped and ready to kick some butt.  They won the state championship next year.  Not feeling it this year.
6. Talking about pumped - baptized 15 last Saturday and have some more ready for baptism.
7. Our next baptism is September 30th.  It's a 5th Sunday and we're doing an evening service.  Baptism and Lords Supper.  It's gonna be good.
8.  I Screwed Up is almost here.  Expecting to see 800 people in attendance and 100 salvations.
9.  Training for triathlon went well this morning.  Swam 12 laps, rode 30 minutes on stationary bike and 5 minutes on liptical.  Then realized I was late and left very quickly.  Debbie wasn't happy.
10. Haven't sold boat so I'm taking her home and keeping her.
11. Excited about this Sunday morning.  We'll be doing some crazy stuff you'll never believe.
12. Just spent $650.00 for new tires and other repairs to my truck.  That one hurt.
13. Terry won't be singing this Sunday.  Gonna miss him on the stage.  He is helping with the retirement service of his previous worship leadr at Mt. Pisgah.  I'm sure they'll enjoy him as much as we'll miss him.  But as usual, Tim will do awesome.
14.  Our Wednesday nights are rocking.  Can see people getting hungry for God's Word.
15.  Gotta get back to work.