No Travel!!!

Sweet Baby Trey and myself!

I didn't travel this week!  It was nice to be in my home church and Sunday School last weekend.  Even though I didn't travel it was a busy week.

Monday - I worked on changing my talks to a new format.  This will be an ongoing project for quite a while.  We're changing to a wide format so we've got to go slide by slide through our talks and change them over.  That's good because it's making me go through and fix any little slips and update the talks completely.  Just takes time.  Monday afternoon there was a church from Arlington Heights, Illinois ask me to speak to their group.  I lived in Dundee which is their neighboring town for over 8 years.  The pastor of this church was brought to salvation under my old pastor!  Pretty cool!  We had a great time.

Tuesday - I worked on changing my talks over and helped my son move into his new school.  It's been a hard road for my boy.  Their school moved after the last school year to a new facility to find out that they couldn't meet there!!  Not Good!  To make a long story short they went through a very challenging period of trying to find a place they could meet.  Well, they finally were able to find a church that is working with them.  We spent a lot of time cleaning, moving etc.  While replacing ceiling tiles I shorted out one of the lights!!  Guess I'm not too much of a handyman!  I tried to help though.

Wednesday - My day off!  Mowed the lawn then had to go into work for a special meeting.  After that did radio with my buddy in Miami again, Steve James.  He and Frank are good guys and host a program called, "Sound Word Live".

Thursday - Worked on changing the talks over as well as other office stuff!

Friday - Spoke twice in the Creation Museum.  The responses were overwhelming.  I said on my Facebook page that I wish I could carry an audio recorder so you can hear the responses of folks and that's the truth.  Here are just few that I can remember.  After I speak I'm supposed to immediately go over to the book store to speak with people. 

Well, Friday before I even got out of the auditorium I had a pastor come up and ask me what he can practically do to keep from losing the children in his church.  We talked for a good 5 minutes before we had to get out of there so they could do the next show. 

As soon as I walked out of the auditorium I had 8 teenage young men standing there and talk.  Their comments were about how what was taught made sense.  These are the issues they're struggling with.  Their friends didn't trust the Bible and how can they reach them.  It was amazing. 

After I walked away from them I walked another 15 feet to the entrance of the book store and was met my 7 more teenage young men and women.  The one young lady had great questions.  She's a Christian and she's struggling with her classmates in the public school attacking her faith.  I was able to spend about 10 minutes with them and they left really encouraged!  I still haven't made it to the place I'm supposed to go after speaking and it's 20 minutes later! 

I finally got to the table and there was a line of folks wanting to talk.  One 17 year old young man and his grandfather had stood there for the 20 minutes waiting.  The young man was sooooo encouraging.  He told me how he was one of the teenagers I was talking about who was raised in the church, but was going to walk away when they get out of the house.  He shared how what he'd been taught had changed his mind and that he was excited about his faith.  He shared that he was the kind of young man that was attacking his Christian friends faith because they couldn't give any answers for why the believed what they say they believe.  He's going into the Navy very soon.  I gave this young man my card and asked that he stay in touch.  His name is Conner, please pray for him.  The grandfather was sooooo appreciative and shared with me how excited he is now about his faith.  I was blown out of the water. 

I had another young man ask me to sign a copy of his book and we talked for about 5 minutes.  After everything was done and I was walking back to the office the father of this young man came up to me and shared with me how much his son had been struggling with his faith and depression.  His dad was so touched to see his son get excited, want a copy of my book and wanted to speak with me.  The fact that I signed his book and encouraged him had this father close to tears.  I don't say that to brag.  I genuinely care about these young men and women.  It's not the same world that I grew up in, they are under attack.  Parents need encouragement, young folks need encouragement.  I just want to be obedient and share the truth to those the Lord allows me to speak with.  All in all Friday was amazing!

Saturday - Masami and I leave today to go to Kelley's Island.  There's a small family camp that meets up there that asked me to come and speak.  I met the camp director at another speaking event last year and he asked me if I'd come and speak to his folks.  I was happy to do it.  I'll have some picture from this next week.

Email of the week isn't really an email.  I was cleaning my office out and found a 'Thank You' card that someone sent to me a while ago.  It really touched me then and it touched me again when I read it this time.  Take me out of it, insert yourself in here.  This is a teenage young lady speaking to you.  Ready?

"Don't despise these small beginnings, for the Lord rejoices to see the work begin"  Zechariah 4:10a

"The things we do may feel like small, insignificant things, but to God they are building up to bigger things.  The world often applauds people who do something big, but God applauds those with a genuine heart - doing big or small deeds.  Today, don't worry about what people think about you, but rather what God thinks about you.  Whatever you do - with a true heart - God sees as important and will reward you one day."

Thank you Leanne!  Hope all of you're blessed.  Stay bold.

Carl Kerby