Sometimes I just want to pack my bags, get in the car and start driving. 

I’d love to be able to do that, at least once in life.  I fantasize about driving into the mountains, stopping when I want just to drink in some beautiful vista then motoring on to some town whose problems (and people) I don’t know.  Maybe I’ll try a new restaurant every meal for a week running.  Anybody else share this fantasy? 

But I don’t live in Fantasyland…and neither do you.  We live in Spokane…around people who need us… surrounded by problems that don’t want to go away and sometimes just seem to get bigger.

This is where God has called us to do battle—fixing meals, doing laundry, meeting needs, getting tired doing one more act of kindness when our flesh would prefer to take a nap.

Heaven will have to wait because there are things this week…this month… that nobody in heaven is going to do. 

Only God’s people in Spokane, who love their own lives so little that they will leave their cozy homes on their day off, bundle up against the winter cold and step out into a wet Saturday morning in January, will take a walk in the park…for LIFE (Spokane Walk for Life @ Riverfront Park @ 10:00 a.m., this Saturday, January 20^th).  

Only saints in Spokane, not heaven, will show up to pray for an hour outside a brand new seven-million dollar building where confused moms by the hundreds will decide to end the little life God put inside them this coming year.  If our tax dollars and some local wealthy folks could find $7,000,000 to fund death in Spokane, certainly we can find 60 minutes to pray for life!  I’m proud that my own daughter and Mosaic mom, Joanna Hyatt, is heading up the local 40 Days for Life prayer initiative—people praying just 60 minutes during the 40 days of Lent on the sidewalk outside Planned Parenthood.  All you do is talk with our Father about moms, dads and children He loves in our city.  Rather than expecting God to send someone from heaven, let’s decide we’ll be the people He uses on earth to answer the prayer “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth, as it is in heaven.”  Go to 40daysforlife.com to sign up for a specific hour.

Finally, there is a Fatherhood Conference in Spokane this weekend at Valley Real Life from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.  If you’re passionate about turning around the scourge of fatherlessness afflicting our community, this will be worth your time and effort.  Go to www.spofi.org to register before 8:00 p.m. Thursday. 

Living in Realsville with you,

Pastor John