BASEBALL (OPENING SATURDAY)

Snippet

One of the beautiful things about baseball is that every once in a while you come into a situation where you want to, and where you have to, reach down and prove something. Nolan Ryan

Scripture

Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. 25 Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever I Corinthians 9:24,25 NIV

Song

HOME RUN BY GEOF MOORE

http://youtu.be/K3OqWydPZeM

Good afternoon Ladies and Gentlemen and welcome

to the Dan Brock Memorial Stadium

Are you ready for an afternoon of baseball?

I hope you are

Because it's Geoff Moore and The Distance,

Going up against the big guy,The Prince of Darkness(Darkness)

It's been quiet on evolution with Geoff Moore and The Distance

That's why it's brought them to the game today

So I want you to kick back and enjoy a funfilled afternoon of

Baseball(Baseball)

The teams are assembled

Are you ready?

PLAY BALL!!

The lights go on, another game day

I grabbed my bat, and headed for the plate

but the first pitch was a curve, and I was done!

(umpire) STRIKE ONE!

I stepped out of the box, looked the pitcher in the eye

you could read his lips, hey punk you're mine.

So I gave him a wink and said, "let's see what you can do"

(umpire) STRIKE TWO!

Gotta keep my eye on the ball, swing straight and true and follow through.

Don't be afraid, what-ever the call!

Because we're never alone, our coach is there to cheer us on.

well, it's the wind-up,

here comes that ball,

You gotta pray and swing, watch it till, it's goin, goin, it's gone!

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, we need a home run

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, we need a home run!

you know life can be like a baseball game,

We're on the same team, but were not all the same.

That's why we've got to learn to play together.

I didn't join this team to sit on the bench,

I'm goin deep, swingin for the fence.

I got some friends on base, I gotta get home!

Gotta keep your eye on the ball

swing straight and true, and follow through.

Don't be afraid, what-ever the call.

Because we're never alone,

Our coach is there to cheer us on.

Well it's the wind-up,

Here comes that ball,

You gotta pray and swing,

Watch it till it's goin goin, it's gone!

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, home run!

i want a home run

ho, ohho, ohh, oh,

ho, ohho, ohh, oh,

ho, ohho, i want a home run!

We are not the first to play this game,

or stand over this plate.

We are surrounded by the legacy.

I can see them in the stands,

I can see them wavin their hands.

sayin, "go, go all the way!"

(umpire) it's goin, it's going it's going,

Oh my!

it's outta here!

that baby is gone (gone)

Come on now,

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, home run

Hey it's gone,gone now

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, home run

Hey it's a homerun

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, oh,

oh, ohho, ohh, home run

Sentence Prayer

Baseball Players Prayer

God grant me wisdom,

to tell a strike from a ball,

to know where to throw

and never to fall.

Keep me always in the base line,

running straight and true

and I'll look for your sign,

to stretch one into two.

God give me vision,

to see every pitch,

so if a player needs help,

then I will see which.

Let me always hustle,

so I'll be at my best

and take pride in myself,

in sports and the rest.

God be my strength,

when I throw the ball

when I'm far from home plate,

or against a wall.

So I never miss a base,

please guide my feet,

bring me home safely,

so my job is complete.

When I help younger players,

let me always give praise,

so they'll see you in me,

in all of my ways.

God please guide our coach,

to be fair and smart,

to teach us to be good,

let it come from his heart.

Let me take a loss,

just as well as a win,

to do any less,

is surely a sin.

As long as I can play,

let me make my parents proud,

as proud as I am,

when they yell MY name out loud.

However my games end,

let me always have fun

and if Heaven has All Stars,

I want to be one.

When my games here are over

and my seasons are done,

let me play on your team.

just like your son.  Amen.

RAIN

Snippet

Suffering love is God’s strategy for overcoming evil.  His only strategy. God saves Through suffering.  Charles de Foucald said, “Not by his words or works, not even by miracles, but by his cross.” He overcame evil by surrendering to it in love and obedience.  (Brennan Manning Reflections for Ragamuffins pg 93)

Scripture

“Now I am coming to you. I told them many things while I was with them in this world so they would be filled with my joy. 14 I have given them your word. And the world hates them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. 15 I’m not asking you to take them out of the world, but to keep them safe from the evil one. 16 They do not belong to this world any more than I do. 17 Make them holy by your truth; teach them your word, which is truth. 18 Just as you sent me into the world, I am sending them into the world. 19 And I give myself as a holy sacrifice for them so they can be made holy by your truth.  John 17:13-19 NLT

Song

Blessings by Laura Story

http://youtu.be/1CSVqHcdhXQ

We pray for blessings, we pray for peace

Comfort for family, protection while we sleep

We pray for healing, for prosperity

We pray for Your mighty hand to ease our suffering

And all the while, You hear each spoken need

Yet love us way too much to give us lesser things

'Cause what if your blessings come through rain drops

What if Your healing comes through tears

What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know You're near

What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise

We pray for wisdom, Your voice to hear

We cry in anger when we cannot feel You near

We doubt your goodness, we doubt your love

As if every promise from Your word is not enough

And all the while, You hear each desperate plea

And long that we'd have faith to believe

'Cause what if your blessings come through rain drops

What if Your healing comes through tears

What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know You're near

What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise

When friends betray us

When darkness seems to win

We know that pain reminds this heart

That this is not,

This is not our home

It's not our home

'Cause what if your blessings come through rain drops

What if Your healing comes through tears

What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know You're near

What if my greatest disappointments or the aching of this life

Is the revealing of a greater thirst this world can't satisfy

What if trials of this life

The rain, the storms, the hardest nights

Are your mercies in disguise

Sentence Prayer

Father, bring on the rain and wash away the filth of evil.  Give me the courage to take up my cross this day, gladly bearing it with love and obedience.  Jesus, help us to see both the cross and the empty tomb as a reminder the rain will not last forever!  Help us look forward, by looking back at how your love has defeated every enemy that has opposed you.  Holy Spirit teach us how to dance in the rain, to drink up the challenges of this life. Holy Spirit protect us from the evil one.  Thank you for the rain.  Amen! R.M.

JOSEPH OF ARIMATHEA

Snippet

But there's much more to Joseph of Arimathea than is found in the gospels. A whole host of other stories have grown up around him...

He was the first person to bring Christianity to Britain, having been sent with other disciples by St Philip

He built Britain's first church (some say this was actually the first church in the world)

He was Mary's uncle, and thus Jesus' great-uncle

He was a merchant who visited England to buy Cornish tin

He took Jesus with him to England when Jesus was a teenager (local legends say that among the places they visited were St Just in Roseland and St Michael's Mount)

He brought to England two vials containing the blood and sweat of Jesus (or two vials containing the sweat of Jesus)

He brought the Holy Grail to England and hid it in a well at Glastonbury, now called the Chalice Well

(http://www.bbc.co.uk/thepassion/articles/joseph_of_arimathea.shtml)

Scripture

Afterward Joseph of Arimathea, who had been a secret disciple of Jesus (because he feared the Jewish leaders), asked Pilate for permission to take down Jesus’ body. When Pilate gave permission, Joseph came and took the body away. 39 With him came Nicodemus, the man who had come to Jesus at night. He brought about seventy-five pounds[k] of perfumed ointment made from myrrh and aloes. 40 Following Jewish burial custom, they wrapped Jesus’ body with the spices in long sheets of linen cloth. 41 The place of crucifixion was near a garden, where there was a new tomb, never used before. 42 And so, because it was the day of preparation for the Jewish Passover[l] and since the tomb was close at hand, they laid Jesus there. John 19:38-42 NLT

Song

The Flame Passes On

 by Whiteheart

http://youtu.be/LKttOeF2svs

Fire on the arena floor

The swords are drawn, hear the lions roar

The coliseum laughs and shouts and screams for more

They tried to crush this mutiny

In a crimson tide of history

But when people have seen the truth that sets them free

The flame passes on, the flame passes on

(Chorus)

From the heart of the people comes love for the people

Love that is burning strong

Oh from one to another

The dream of forever...

The flame passes on

Because of them we know his name

So let's lift the cross, and do the same

An unbroken line of believers building a human chain

And the flame passes on, the flame passes on

(Chorus)

From the heart of the people comes love for the people

Love that is burning strong

Oh from one to another

This dream of forever...

The flame passes on

Oh the light of ages illumines the pages

The words of an ancient song

Oh Faith is the fire that burns ever higher

And the flame passes on

Mothers to sons, fathers to daughters - everyone

Pass it on

(Repeat chorus)

Sentence Prayer

Risen Christ,

You have risen indeed, my faith can no longer be

kept secret.

Forgive me for giving into my fears.

Give me the courage to sail with you into

new lands, to proclaim the gospel.  Amen  R.M.

CHANGE

Snippet

The gospel is absurd and the life of Jesus is meaningless unless we believe that He lived, died, and rose again with but one purpose in mind: to make brand-new creation. Not to make people with better morals but to create a community of prophets and professional lovers, men and women who would surrender to the mystery of the fire of the Spirit that burns within, who would live in ever greater fidelity to the omnipresent Word of God, who would enter into the center of it all, the very heart and mystery of Christ, into the center of the flame that consumes, purifies, and sets everything aglow with peace, joy, boldness, and extravagant, furious love. This, my friend, is what it really means to be a Christian.” ― Brennan Manning, The Furious Longing of God

Scripture

What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with,[a] that we should no longer be slaves to sin— 7 because anyone who has died has been set free from sin. Romans 6:1-7 NIV

Song

I'm Not Who I Was

 by Brandon Heath

http://youtu.be/K1ZgtCRO-KY

I wish you could see me now

I wish I could show you how

I'm not who I was

I used to be mad at you

A little on the hurt side too

But I'm not who I was

I found my way around

To forgiving you some time ago

But I never got to tell you so...

I found us in a photograph

I saw me and I had to laugh

You know I'm not who I was

You were there, you were right above me

And I wondered if you ever loved me

Just for who I was

When the pain came back again

Like a bitter friend

It was all that I could do

To keep myself from blaming you

Thinkin' its a funny thing

Figured out I could sing

Now I'm not who I was

Write about love and such

Maybe cause I want it so much

I'm not who I was

I was thinkin' maybe I

Should let you know

That I am not the same

That I never did forget your name

Hello...

Oooo Nah nah nah nah nah

And the thing I find most amazing

In amazing grace

Is the chance to give it out

Maybe that's what love is all about

I wish you could see me now

I wish I could show you how

I'm not who I was...

Sentence Prayer

God, it wasn’t so long ago that we were mired in that old stagnant life of sin.  We let the world, which doesn’t know the first  thing about living, tell us how to live.  We filled our lungs with polluted unbelief, and then exhaled disobedience.  We all did it, all of us doing what we felt like doing, when we felt like doing it, all of us in the same boat.  It’s a wonder, God, that you didn’t lose your temper and do away with the whole lot of us.  Instead, immense in mercy and with an incredible love, you embraced us.  You took our sin-dead lives and made us alive in Christ.  You did all this on your own, with no help from us!  Then you picked us up and set us down in the highest heaven in company with Jesus, our Messiah.  Amen!

(Praying from Ephesians 2:1-10 Message Eugen Peterson Practice Resurrection Study Guide Pg 23)

CREED

Snippet

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.” ― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

Scripture

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!”

3 So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. 4 Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5 He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. 6 Then Simon Peter came along behind him and went straight into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, 7 as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus’ head. The cloth was still lying in its place, separate from the linen. 8 Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. John 20:1-8

Song

Creed by Rich Mullins

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LR2hFP1yb4

I believe in God the Father almighty

Maker of Heaven and Maker of Earth

And in Jesus Christ

His only begotten Son, our Lord

He was conceived by the Holy Spirit

Born of the virgin Mary

Suffered under Pontius Pilate

He was crucified and dead and buried

CHORUS:

And I believe what I believe

Is what makes me what I am

I did not make it, no it is making me

It is the very truth of God and not

The invention of any man

I believe that He who suffered

Was crucified, buried, and dead

He descended into hell and

On the third day, rose again

He ascended into Heaven where

He sits at God's mighty right hand

I believe that He's returning to

Judge the quick and the dead

Of the sons of men

CHORUS

I believe it, I believe it

I believe it

I believe it, I believe it

I believe in God the Father almighty

Maker of Heaven and Maker of Earth

And in Jesus Christ His only begotten Son,

Our Lord

I believe in the Holy Spirit

One Holy Church, the communion of Saints

The forgiveness of sin

I believe in the resurrection

I believe in a life that never ends

CHORUS

I believe it, I believe

I believe it, I believe

I believe it, I believe it

Sentence Prayer

Risen Christ,

We come with songs of joy and words of praise

For your powerful love and life-giving grace.

Like those first disciples

Who ran to your empty tomb,

Calm our hurried thoughts,

That we might hear the message

Of your resurrection.

Like the grieving Mary

Who searched in the garden,

Reveal yourself to us,

That we might know your presence

And heed your call.

Transform our doubts into faith,

That we might be a resurrection community,

Revealing your loving presence

For all the world to see.

(The Abingdon Worship Annual 2011 page 101) 

I BELIEVE IN GOD

SNIPPET

Random noise could never produce a Bach cantata.  Random letters floating in an ocean of alphabet soup will never spell out a chapter from Moby Dick.  When we hear the music, we know there was a composer.  When we read coherent writing, we know there was an author.  How much more does this principle apply to the detailed information contained in the DNA of every living creature?  John MacArthur The Battle for the Beginning, 2001, P. 137

SCRIPTURE

The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.”

They are corrupt, they have committed abominable deeds;

There is no one who does good.

The Lord has looked down from heaven upon the sons of men

To see if there are any who understand,

Who seek after God.

They have all turned aside, together they have become 

corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one.

 Psalms 14:1-3 NASB

SONG

I BELIEVE IN GOD

BY SCOTT WESLEY BROWN

http://youtu.be/Fa5xMa7XVWY

When I look upon the wonders of creation

And such intricate design in all there is

I know my faith is not a mere delusion

And I rejoice to know the Lord of All exists!

And I believe in God

I believe in God

I believe in God my maker

Blessed are the eyes of those who see him Those who walk by

faith and not by sight

For the fool says in his heart there is no god

But we have come from darkness into light

And I will praise him

Celebrate my God!

I believe in God the Father and in Jesus Christ his Son, 

and the Holy Spirit, Three in One

SENTENCE PRAYER

God Almighty, our Creator and Caretaker, our curer and coming King, you alone are our source, our salvation, and our future satisfaction!  Today we pray that our hearts will be full of praise and gratitude and kept far from greed and a sense of privilege.  As we go through this day, move us toward you and draw from us an offering of praise.

There is no plant in the ground but tells of you beauty, O Christ.

There is no creature on the sea but proclaims your goodness.

There is no bird on the wing, thee is no star in the sky, there is nothing beneath the sun but is full of your blessing.

Lighten our understanding of Your presence all around, O Chist.

Quicken our will to be caring for your creation, today and each day, we pray, for the sake of the mission, name and gloy of the one true God.  Amen!

(Dawn to Dark R. Douglas Jones House Studio Kansas City, Kansas pg 147,147)

BETTER THAN I DESERVE

Snippet

HOW ARE YOU?

BETTER THAN I DESERVE.

Scripture

The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, 

along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.  

Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: 

Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of 

whom I am the worst. But for that very reason I was 

shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, 

Christ Jesus might display his immense patience

as an example for those who would believe in him 

and receive eternal life. 1 Timothy 4:14-16

Song

PLUMB DON’T DESERVE YOU

http://youtu.be/j9Furrb3CI0

You're the first face that I see

And the last thing I think about

You're the reason that I'm alive

You're what I can't live without

You're what I can't live without

You never give up

When I'm falling apart

Your arms are always open wide

And you're quick to forgive

When I make a mistake

You love me in the blink of an eye

I don't deserve your love

But you give it to me anyway

Can't get enough

You're everything I need

And when I walk away

You take off running and come right after me

It's what you do

And I don't deserve you

You're the light inside my eyes

You give me a reason to keep trying

You give me more than I could dream

And you bring me to my knees

You bring me to my knees

Your heart is gold and how am I the one

That you've chosen to love

I still can't believe that you're right next to me

After all that I've done

I don't deserve your love

But you give it to me anyway

Can't get enough

You're everything I need

And when I walk away

You take off running and come right after me

It's what you do

And I don't deserve you

I don't deserve a chance like this

I don't deserve a love that gives me everything

You're everything I want

I don't deserve your love

But you give it to me anyway

Can't get enough

You're everything I need

And when I walk away

You take off running and come right after me

It's what you do

And I don't deserve you

And I don't deserve you

SENTENCE PRAYER

Father we thank you for the gospel of Jesus! Through t

he gospel, our sins were removed and forgotten by You.  

Through the gospel, our bodies will be raised from the

dead.  Our problems are solved, and you did it all for 

us and it’s free!  Thank You! Thank You! Amen

(Phil Duck Commander Devotional Howard Publishing New York New York pg 92)