Hi Bruce, my name is David Wayne, I am the pastor of Grace Point Presbyterian Church in Severn, MD. I have one wife, three kids, one dog, and two cats. I have been at Grace Point for about 9 years now. I used to have more info here but I have basically shut this blog down. I am now blogging from time to time at a wordpress blog - jollyblogger.wordpress.com. Thanks for stopping by.

Thank you for illustrating David's point, and mine, George, and thanks Nancy for saying what I would have said in response. Many thanks to you EAJ for your prayers and your insight about food. I have been thinking a bit about that in relation to the Lord's Prayer. I don't know where I heard this but someone mentioned that the prayer for our daily bread is the one that, for those of us in the west, is always answered, we get our daily bread whether we pray for it or not. We pray to recognize that it came from God. I am sorry that you have had to watch your husband and mother struggle with this - I know I have had times where I didn't feel like eating and that has helped me to see what a blessing a simple meal is. Lesley - thanks for stopping by, I'm glad we have reconnected after all these years. I think your friend is basically right - the thing is that all have to confront death sooner or later. God hasn't promised us long life. I would rather prepare myself to die then give God thanks for every day I live than expect God to give me longer life. I can't see that it is God's plan for us not to suffer physical disease. Some of us may die suddenly in an accident or from a sudden heart attack or aneurysm or something like that, but that happens to very few. Most of us will live long enough that our death will come at the end of some kind of bout with disease. I am wondering if people who say we should not suffer physical disease ever say that to people in their 80's or in nursing homes. We understand it then, but not when disease strikes younger people. But that assumes that God owes us a long life. Christ didn't have a long life, why should any of us? Christ died from an excruciating physical experience, why am I immune. Paul's life was one physical ailment after the other. Does it make a difference that Paul was physically beat to a pulp many times, but he doesn't record any bouts with disease. Whether it comes from repeated beatings or a virus or a cancer, these are still physical ailments. Why should any of us be immune? But, I think the bottom line is that God doesn't owe any of us a long life. I read something awhile back by the puritan Richard Baxter where he spoke of the evils of expecting a long life. Those who expect to live a long time subject themselves to many worldly temptations. And to live is Christ to die is gain. And, amen to DMD's comment.

Matt - I have some stories to tell about planning and creating mission and vision statements and all of that. I know it works for a lot of folks, this is what seems to drive Rick Warren, Bill Hybels and there followers. For me and my church, the vision casting and mission planning hasn't worked and I have even come to think we have some problems because of it. Care to elaborate on this statement - The emphasis on "planning" is at the heart of all our late-modern pathologies - or have you written on that elsewhere?

Laird . . . sigh . . . yes . . . another sigh . . . It may not help anyone else, and it may not help us, but I did pick up a little pamphlet the other day for the folks in our church on listening diligently to the preached word.

PG - would love to hear your thoughts on it. I basically ended up copying and pasting the article from covenanter in to a word file and changed the font and increased it to be readable. It's pretty hopeless trying to read that thing on their site.

Thanks everyone for your encouragement. Terry - no doubt. Two thoughts on that. First, can we say something is a sin if there is no law or commandment on the matter. Still, you are right, grace would abound much more in "Bill's" life if he would be in the word and prayer more. But the second thought is this - Bill knows this and feels this deeply. In "Bill's" mind he is definitely sinning by not having a quiet time and has been living in sin for some time. Still, that feeling of sinning against God by not having a quiet time (for years now) has never been enough motivation to start having quiet times. So what's he to do?

Chris - thanks for stopping by. It's interesting - this online world is truly a world of it's own. I have made the mistake of getting so involved in the online world that I have forgotten that it is not the world that most of our folks inhabit. Though I do wish they would turn their attention to some of the Christian blogs we read. I know that a great many people are online or on the computer but most of them are on Facebook playing Farmville and Mafia Wars. I'd like to try to convince them that if they are going to spend time on the computer there is actually stuff out there that would edify them. But again, many just aren't online that much so it's a good reminder not to get too caught up in all of this blogging stuff. Rick - you always come through - thanks for the recommendations. I was looking recently through some of your stuff on Old Solar and I saw where you were wrestling with Walther. I'm only at the beginning of the book so I know I haven't gotten into some of the more precise stuff later. I take it that in working out his thoughts he sometimes gets a bit confusing, eh? I am trying my best to convince all of my PCA buddies that the law and gospel paradigm and the theology of the cross is the common property of the Christian church, it's not just a Lutheran thing, as we old fundamentalists would say, this stuff is just good bible. I will say though that you Lutheran guys have done the best job of working out the implications of this and I have greatly profited from it. I think I have told you that I would now put "The Hammer of God" at the top of my list of most influential books. And I am building a small section of my library around the writings of Luther and his exegetes, so thanks for the continued recommendations.

Paula and Kat - thanks, and yes Kat, feel free to share anything here with anyone you want.

Thanks everyone - Rob and Kat - thanks for mentioning your own and your families battles with cancer - I have prayed for you today. J. Eric - thank you for the prayer - I had read it before, but your posting today really hit the spot. Rick Ritchie - great to hear from you, we'll have to resume our email correspondence here soon!

Mark - thanks for the update I'll be sure and pray for you. Tara - I hope that didn't come across as a rebuke - I meant it more as an invitation. Thanks for all of your prayers.

Hey, let's set up a spam call sometime - I would love to talk to you. The question is, will your voice sound like I imagine it will . . . ?

Yep, we believe it the same way the overwhelming majority of the church has believed it throughout the overwhelming majority of church history.

Hi Becca - great to hear from you and I'm glad my sermons resonate with you. Will you be home this summer?

Yeah, Bobby and I have corresponded a bit. I didn't know about Mark, thanks for the heads up Michelle. Michelle, I'd be more than happy to chat with you and pray for you offline if you want to send me an e-mail. I agree about the initial shock.

Thanks a bunch Sheldon - I'll change that now so that future readers of this post will wonder what you are talking about ;-) I think I must have defaulted - there was a guy who ran for President a few years ago named Grietz or Gritez or something like that. I think even when I write this author's name I hear that guy's name.

Louise - I can't find it right now. I am guessing I may have gotten it from this article by Phillip Yancey. http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/november/19.128.html

Dwight - what in the world are you talking about and what does any of that have to do with this post?

George, wow, it's kind of funny, you ask a relatively simple question and as I sit here trying to answer, every time I try to answer I think of other issues and I could end up writing a tome on that. So, here's a couple of knee jerk thoughts on this. When it comes to the meaning of the word itself I would be happy with whatever popped up in the standard lexicons. This leads to the question of what significance, if any, we give to the Aramaic. I know it is commonly thought that Jesus spoke Aramaic but I have seen a couple of things that suggest that they spoke at least some Greek. In any case, since the NT manuscripts are in Greek and we ascribe inspiration to them then we would want to lean on the Greek. I know that scholars will often pay a good deal of attention to more ancient languages on which more current languages are built - hence I have seen OT scholars who study the whole family of semitic languages to gain a better understanding of Hebrew. But since Greek is not a semitic language I don't think the Aramaic fed into the meaning of the Greek. And if I may muddy the waters a bit more here . . . A friend of mine who is pretty familiar with languages mentioned to me this weekend that etymology is not meaning. In other words, even if we could trace the etymology of the word gospel back to some Aramaic or other linguistic root that wouldn't determine the meaning. I think it is John Frame (among others) who likes to say that meaning is use. The lexical definitions can help, but the best way to get at the meaning of the gospel is to look at entire passages that speak of the gospel. In that sense, I Corinthians 15:1ff is a great place to start, but I think it is useful to remember that we have four books that are called "gospels." I like to say that the gospel message is not a message of what you must do for God but of what God has done for you in Christ Jesus. In that sense the "gospels" do define the "gospel" for us as they are the story of all that God has done for us in Christ to secure our salvation. I think you are right on that we tend to narrow our focus though. I do think that hope is an important aspect of the gospel, especially in light of 1 Peter 1:3.

Hi Richard. I do have the book and it is in my to be read pile. I hope this means that you have battled or are battling cancer successfully??

Thanks Judy - sorry I haven't been better at keeping in touch - will try to do so - I hope you have a great holiday season.

Thanks Charles - I actually did read Pearcey's book and it is as good as you said - you can find my review here - http://jollyblogger.typepad.com/jollyblogger/2005/08/review_of_total.html

Jared - many apologies for that - I know very well who you are - I think I met you and the other Jared at the same time and sometimes have your names running together in my head. I fixed it, and again, many apologies.

Thanks Bob & Dan. Yep Dan you are right, it seemed like comparatively smooth sailing there for awhile but the last two and a half weeks especially have been pretty bad - mainly with fatigue, and along with the deep fatigue comes quite the emotional let down. The doc has me on ritalin now - I didn't realize it but they use this sometimes for deep fatigue. Today's my first day on it and I feel pretty good so we'll see how it goes.