Prayer Chain

Sabbath Tip #0004: "Prayer Chain"
by A Sabbath Blog

There's nothing like finding out that there's someone out there praying for you, especially when like gets tough. Here's an idea:

Pray for someone you know that may be going through something difficult. You can ask God to be with them, and to give them the strength and peace they may need. Be sure to also pray that they may know that God loves them and is with them "through thick and thin."

Send them a nice card or ecard anonymously, telling them that they are on your mind and that you are praying for them. Make sure they don't know who sent it to them. :)

Tragic California Pathfinder Outing

Mark Darrough drowned last Sunday near a California beach, while trying to save a drowning girl. His daughter, Jessica, died last Tuesday morning after being on life support.

The Ceres Seventh-day Adventist Church Pathfinder club was on a field trip to visit the tide pools at Point Lobos State Reserve. Afterwards, they had stopped at Monastery Beach, which is part of Carmel River State Beach, because the kids wanted to "visit a beach with sand."

The group had just arrived at the beach and was rethinking whether it was safe to be there when a 13-year-old member of the group was swept into the water. Several people went into the water to try to rescue the girl, including the Darroughs. Noe Gomez was finally able to pull the 13-year old out of the water, but the Darroughs were "overwhelmed by the waves and undertow."

Jessica, 23, was pulled out of the water first. Mark, 47, was later pulled out; he was in the water for nearly 40 minutes.

Please keep their family and friends in your prayers.

Ceres Seventh-day Adventist Church
The Modesto Bee (newspaper article)

theFlow

A few months ago, we were seeing talks about the need for Adventist social networking websites. Well, Insight Magazine has just recently released it's own social networking website for youth. They're calling it, "theFlow, where people talk about the Water of Life." You can create your own page like on Facebook or MySpace and add videos, pictures, and blogs. You can join groups and jump into discussions in theFlow's forums.

Nick Bejarano is the marketing manager for Insight Magazine. When we asked what theFlow's purpose and missions were, this was his take:

"We wanted to connect with youth more on their level and interact with them in a way they feel comfortable with (social networking). Secondly we want to create a place where youth of all faiths can come and learn about ours. Our website receives a lot of traffic from non-SDA's, so this site is open to anyone looking for answers not just SDA youth. And thirdly, we're hoping to create relationships and not just network. Relationships is the key to discipleship and ministering to the most basic need for companionship and friendship."

The new site is hosted by Ning.com, a website that allows anyone to create their own "myspace-like" websites. To join theFlow, you need to create an account with Ning.com, which is easy since you can register without leaving theFlow's website.

Check 'em out: http://www.insightmagazine.ning.com/

The Wet Pants Parable

Circulating throughout the Internet, this story has a deep meaning.

A nine-year-old was kid sitting at his desk when suddenly there is a puddle between his feet and the front of his pants are wet. He thinks his heart is going to stop because he cannot possibly imagine how this has happened. It's never happened before, and he knows that when the boys find out he will never hear the end of it. When the girls find out, they'll never speak to him again as long as he lives.

The boy believes his heart is going to stop; he puts his head down and prays this prayer, "Dear God, this is an emergency! I need help now! Five minutes from now I'm dead meat"

He looks up from his prayer and here comes the teacher with a look in her eyes that says he has been discovered.

As the teacher is walking toward him, a classmate named Susie is carrying a goldfish bowl that is filled with water. Susie trips in front of the teacher and inexplicably dumps the bowl of water in the boy's lap. The boy pretends to be angry, but all the while is saying to himself, "Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!"

Now all of a sudden, instead of being the object of ridicule, the boy is the object of sympathy. The teacher rushes him downstairs and gives him gym short to put on while his pants dry out. All the other children are on their hands and knees cleaning up around his desk. The sympathy is wonderful. But as life would have it, the ridicule that should have been his has been transferred to someone else..... Susie.

She tries to help, but they tell her to get out. "You've done enough, you klutz!"

Finally, at the end of the day, as they are waiting for the bus, the boy walks over to Susie and whispers, "You did that on purpose, didn't you?"

Susie whispers back, "I wet my pants once too."

Baby Steps and God

A few weeks ago, I watched as a baby girl slowly took a small step. A few seconds later, she took another step. She would glance up at her mom, holding her own little hands in her mom's larger hands. As her mom slowly stepped backwards, the baby girl took another step forwards.

Thinking back, I start to realize it's the same with my heavenly father. He's not going to allow me to go through something that I can't handle. And even when I get myself into a tough situation, I know that I can trust my heavenly Dad to help me through.

That baby girl trusted her mom, she knew she wasn't going to drop her to do something else. Her mom was there for her baby. She helped her little girl to walk towards her. I believe the more we put our trust in God, the closer we are able to walk towards our heavenly Father.

1 Corinthians 10:13, Phillipians 4:13