Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year!

I had quite an eventful time since the last time I posted. Heather's sister Destiny came and stayed with us for a while and since we live so close to Orlando there was only one thing to do... go to Disney World. I had never been to Disney with kids before, but let me tell you, it is a lot more fun when there is a little girl getting excited at It's a Small World. So that was a lot of fun.

That was Christmas Eve Eve. Then we had a good time with family and friends in Tampa the next two days. I was a good boy this year too, so Santa came to visit. Santa bought me a Nintendo Wii!!! It is a lot of fun to play and it is something that my wife and I can enjoy together. In fact, we are going to a Wii Party tonight. With grown adults :) I am very happy that I am not the only grown person addicted to playing the Wii. Anyhow, here is my picture of excitement after I found out what Santa brought.

It looks like my neck is broken. Anyway, Santa also came for my wife and brought her a new digital camera, so there should be a lot more photos in posts to come.

After Christmas we had the chance to just take it easy. I hope we are not the only ones that got to enjoy a relaxing Christmas break. We have been so used to traveling over the holidays from South Carolina to Tampa and back, that we had forgotten just how enjoyable the holidays could be. Now I only have a 45 minute drive to see my family instead of a 7 hour drive, which also means I get to sleep in my own bed. (and now it means also that I get to play my own Wii!)

We didn't do a lot to celebrate the New Year. We were invited over to our incredible Pastor's house and ate tacos (and played with their Nintendo Wii) but our party ended early and my wife and I went back home. I will give you two guesses what we did when we got back home... we played Nintendo Wii. We turned it off five minutes before the ball dropped (it is really sad to see Dick Clark these days) and said "Happy New Year!" and then went back to our game.

Since I have been accused of being a long-winded blogger, I will get to my main point. 2007 was a year of incredible highs and incredible lows for me and Heather. Our year started out terrible and just continued to get worse. Then came June. June was when I got voted in to be Student Pastor at the greatest church in the solar system. We had adjustment periods, we had rained out concerts, we even had a church fire... but in the last six months of 2007 I have been more happy and full of joy than I ever have been in my life... because I am at a place where God is moving!

I say all that to say this... turn the page... forget the past year... learn from the mistakes, give praise to God for the accomplishments and then... move on. Read these verses Phil. 3:13b-14 "...But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus."

To me this is the ultimate New Year's verse. Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead. There is no better time than January to do that. I am so excited about what God is going to do in 2008 that I can hardly stand it! It will be a year like no other, and it will be a year where I will press on toward the goal to win the prize. Won't you join me in that?