Winding Waters Brethren (Elkhart)

Last Friday Kris and I drove to Elkhart, IN to do a Jesus Creed conference and to preach at Winding Waters Brethren Church — whew, thankfully no home Notre Dame football game traffic to contend with.

Pastor Michael Thompson, who has a wonderful blog, is a friend and so it was great to be with him again, and to see Joy and their two little girls — Malena and Natalie — and to see Joy’s mom, Judy, a friend from near our home town, as well as Michael’s parents. And it was supercool to get to stay at Das Dutchman Essenhaus (and yes, we got to have a family dinner there Saturday evening). Yep, we got to see a few horse and buggies, too.

We got in Friday — and had a wonderful evening with three young vigorous thinkers (Ben and Jen and Rebecca) and bloggers (one of whose blogs is one of the longest fashion blogs going, and these two young women are into writing well) and Michael. Saturday involved a Jesus Creed “institute” from 9 to 3pm — it was a great time. In six or seven years that I have been doing Jesus Creed events my ideas and presentations have evolved and shifted, but I keep exploring how the Jesus Creed sheds light on the Christian life.

I preached Sunday morning on Love as a Great Idea … until you have to love your enemy! We worked both on Matthew 5:43-48 and the biblical understanding of love (more of that on a future post).

Michael is building a reading and thinking church, and I have to say I’ve never signed so many of my books in one setting. The encouraging remarks about the sessions and books are deeply appreciated.

I don’t publicize my speaking events much, though I do post the Speaking Schedule. But it is always a highlight to meet folks who are readers who heard about our event or just visitors who are interested — such as Joshua and Tana-Marie Olivas. So excited about their faith; full of questions; wonderful stories …

Kris and I never tire of experiencing salt of the earth local churches who are impacting their communities.