This past weekend, I had the opportunity to go back to Camp Sumatanga (a place I have talked about before: see here). As I have said before, I can’t imagine a place on this Earth that is more bathed in prayer or has a more consistent and palpable presence of God.

This time, I had the great privilege of attending a once a lifetime experience called “Walk to Emmaus”. The walk is based on Luke 24:13-35 where Jesus appears to two disciples on the first Easter afternoon. First let me say this: I was a little freaked out by the idea of this experience. I mean, I know that everyone says it is a positive and wonderful experience. The thing is, no one will tell you much about it. I didn’t understand why, but now I know. To try to explain my experience would be meaningless to you. I can tell you some of the things I got from it, but if you went through the whole thing sitting next to me, you’re experience would be different. Of the men I talked to, no two people got the same message.

What I will say is this: My life will never be the same. I will never look at the world quite the same again. I know i’m going to fall, I know I’ll probably have days where I am cynical and the mountain top I’m on right now is bound to lead to a valley. Any journey must move forward and this one is no exception.

I learned about and experienced God’s Grace, love and his forgiveness in a way that I had never before felt. The whole weekend was full of new friends, new perspectives and a new appreciation for God’s call on my life.

For now, I will just say this: Christ is counting on you to be his hands and feet in this world. Go out there and share his love!

De Colores!

This was a really awesome Christmas. It seemed way too short, but it’s probably the best Christmas in my adult life.

Our family really didn’t focus on gifts and stuff this year. We cut way back on gifts and it honestly made things so much more fun because we weren’t stressed about making sure we had something equal for everyone. We did gifts for families and a small gift for the kids so they would have something to play with so the adults could talk. We’ve had such a strange year between all of us: I’ve changed jobs, my Sis doesn’t have the group home anymore (I think that was this year… either way it is a really great thing!) and my Brother has moved up in his job. This is Dad’s first full year as a full-time pastor, and possibly the most important to me: Micah is actually old enough to enjoy Christmas this year.

Last year, Micah was so small that he really didn’t get excited about his gifts . This year seeing him round the corner in his little pajamas and say “THAT’S COOL!” when he saw his car and his Mickey Mouse was one of the best things a Dad can have. He’s growing so fast and it’s just so awesome to see how much he has changed in one short year.

Being on-call for the first time at this job wasn’t so bad, even though it kinda sucked that it was during Christmas. It did have one benefit: We had Ann’s family out to our place for Christmas so that I could be close to my computer and closer to work should I need to go back in to fix something. It was nice to be able to show off our newly remodeled living room, and being able to sit in my recliner to open gifts, and to be able to relax afterward instead of having to worry about driving home.

Because I was on-call and because Micah wouldn’t be able to sit still long enough, we didn’t go to Midnight Mass with Ann’s mom. I’m not Catholic, and Ann isn’t anymore, but it is still one of the more beautiful church services you could ever attend.

Tonight we wrapped up Christmas by having some friends over to visit. Initially, we wanted to have them over for Christmas dinner because they thought they were not going to be able to go home and see their families. It worked out that they did get to make a trip home, but gladly we were still able to have them over and enjoy a great meal and some good fun.

All in all, it’s been a great Christmas, and a great year.

With my family Christmas stuff half over, I guess I am in as much of a “Christmas mood” as i’m going to get. It’s not that i’m NOT in a christmas mood, it’s just that it’s hard to do because I am spoiled.

That’s right. I’m spoiled rotten.

In all my previous jobs, I had a surplus of vacation by this time every year and I would often take off the Monday before Christmas and not come back until sometime in the first week of January. Well, this year with a new job that just isn’t possible. The result: I’m having a hard time feeling Christmas-y.

Yes, despite the family get-togethers, the week of rehearsals for a Christmas play, and the fact that I have a 7 foot tall lighted tree in my house, I just can’t seem to get it together.

This year I get 2 days off, and that comes out of my vacation time when I actually get it in 3 more months. Not that I am complaining about my job. So far, this is probably the best job I have had. It only narrowly beats out Little Rock by one factor: I’m close to home.

Either way,  don’t misinterpret my thoughts here. I have a great family, so much to be thankful for and I really love Christmas. Just hard to break that lazy, overeating, don’t-go-to-work-for-a-month mentality.

Now where were those Christmas goodies again?

It’s been a great year around the ol’ Plunkett Shack this year. We’ve had ups and downs, but it has been a blessed year all around.

I’m thankful for my beautiful and awesome wife who keeps me in line and makes sure I’m where I need to be, when I need to be there.

We are thankful for our smart, funny, silly little boy who is currently fascinated by the Macy’s parade and is standing in the middle of the floor in his dump truck footie pajamas.

I’m thankful for a job that I don’t hate, that is rewarding and despite some long hours doesn’t make me want to jump off a bridge.

I’m thankful that our family is close, that our love for one another outweighs how crazy we can make each other from time to time.

I’m thankful for the abundance of my life, even though I don’t regularly slow down to realize just how much I have.

Most of all, I’m thankful for a God who loves and watches over me and my family, who gave his son in my place to make it possible for all of these other things to fall into place.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Yep, it is amazing how productive I can be when there aren’t any games on that interest me (Well, Texas Tech v OU is an exception)

I got up at 5 this morning. Today is the opening day of deer season, so I was in my tree stand just after 6am. About 6:45 I saw some movement in the field, and drew up my gun to get ready for ol’ Buck Nelson to walk out in front of me. No such luck. Coyotes.

There is an open season on predators in Alabama, so I drew down on two of them and fired off a couple of rounds. I hit one, missed the other but I didn’t find either one when I got down to go look. A combination of the fact that A) there are coyotes in my field and B) I just made a LOT of noise and scent, there was virtually no chance that a deer would walk out this morning. I stayed in my tree stand until almost 9am before the reality that it was 19 degrees outside overcame my desire to kill the big one.
Ok, so that part of my day wasn’t all that productive.

After eating some breakfast at Mom and Dad’s, I came home and crawled under the house to run a new cable for my HF Radio (ham radio stuff). Ever since this guy came to my church to talk about how he was almost electrocuted underneath a house, getting under there has been really nerve racking for me. Sure, he saw Jesus, but I’m just not there yet ok?

Either way, I got that done and was inside soldering a connector on the cable when my brother called and invited us to go eat. I put the project on hold and went to meet them for a late lunch/early supper. We came home and gave the dog a bath (he’s a little sickly and despite my policy of no animals in the house, he really doesn’t need to be outside with it this cold.) I played with my radio stuff some more and watched Micah jump around like a crazy person for about 3 hours because the dog is in the house.

Now, I’m sitting here watching the end of the Texas Tech v OU game, and even though nothing I did today is of any real consequence, I feel like I have gotten a lot done because I managed to do one thing: relax and not worry about work.

One day at a time.