What can happen in just one weekend in the populous metropolitan Chicago area?  Check this photo out:

As if that first picture didn’t say enough, the second picture shows that people are still filing down the ramp in the center!  What is this guy on you may ask?  Well, two weekends ago (yeah, I’m a lazy poster…) was the Harvest crusade at the Allstate arena.  Greg Laurie, the pastor from Harvest Christian Fellowship in California (not to be confused with Chicago’s Harvest Bible Chapel though the two pastors are good friends) came to our area with a message of hope for everyone.  I attended Sunday night, which hosted a standing-room only crowd!  If I am not being clear, I apologize and think of Greg Laurie as today’s Billy Graham, bringing the message of salvation via crusades in various cities when he is not firing up his own congregation in California.  I have to say- well never mind what I have to say except that it was an awesome experience.  Yes, only God is awesome but since this is His work after all…

Why forget what I have to say?  Because they posted videos of all three nights on their website!  And each night is different.  I actually attended on the night he talked about following Christ even through the pain of loss.  A couple of years ago he lost his own adult son due to a tragic car accident so I would say he is well qualified as a follower and as one who has experience.  Two of the musicians that night also suffered loss- Steven Curtis Chapman who lost a young daughter the very same year as pastor Laurie’s loss, and Jeremy Camp who lost a wife due to cancer several years ago.  Their pain is evident in their songs following the deaths, and they show their faithfulness in the face of it like pastor Laurie by continuing to follow Christ and spread His good news.

Each night is different, so just because you watched one in no way means you’ve seen it all!  Okay, I will have to put my money where my mouth is and watch the other two nights myself.  Saturday I believe was geared toward young adults and teens.  Friday I am not sure, but if you fall into neither category mentioned then Friday will probably be the best choice to watch if you only watch one.

So what does that number in the title represent?  Well, Allstate Arena (formerly Rosemont Horizon) seats well over that amount- in fact over 47,000 attended all weekend.  No, that number represents decisions for Christ made that weekend.  That was one big party in Heaven, as there is much rejoicing over just ONE soul saved.  Look at those pictures again.  The floor of the arena was mostly empty during the presentation and music.  In those photos people who accepted Christ that night came down to receive Bibles and followup information.  Okay, many of the people were follow-up workers (I could have been one since I went through the training beforehand, but I felt I wasn’t ready- next time!) but still- we were told around 2600 had accepted Christ over the last two nights, which means over 2000 were just on Sunday!

Time for me to shut up and let you click to the website.  To a certain blogger who lost his own wife- PLEASE WATCH SUNDAY’S PRESENTATION.  That is all.  And some videos below. [No, the songs I would link to are contained in the messages on the website, so I will not distract you from them].

https://www.harvest.org/crusades/2010/chicago/

As many go to bed tonight awaiting a certain jolly old gift-giver to pay them a visit when fast asleep, it pays to remember the gift given to us from above that bears no comparison to the trinkets we give each other.  Praise God for His gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, for lowering Himself to live as one of us and die an unjust death as atonement for the sins of all who put their faith in Him.

The rest of these are just for fun.  Watch them, search for more on Youtube, but most important of all please watch the above video before leaving this blog.

This is the post you were expecting today.  Happy Thanksgiving!  My mother, my grandmother, my uncle, and I got together on this fine day for our nonstandard (read: restaurant) meal, followed by pumpkin and apple pie at home.  My brother and nephew always spend this day with Alex’s relatives on his mom’s side, so they didn’t join us.  Not a big gathering as you can see, so there is not much to say unlike my fellow blogger Jamiahsh.  As such, I will just say thank you God for my family, my job, my friends, and my salvation through Jesus who died on the cross for my sin.  Now I will end with a couple of Thanksgiving videos I pulled from Godtube.  They are sort of related to the theme of my site too, as they involve kids.  Enjoy!

[godtube]https://www.godtube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=e7a4e540c5408f9820be[/godtube]

[godtube]https://www.godtube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=63b7e045fc2964c6ed23[/godtube]

Well, teaching in Sunday school that is.  Unlike last time I taught a month ago, I felt I did pretty well this time.  I was able to do 1½ lessons this weekend.  The ½ comes from last night, when I taught only half of the lesson.  Why?  Well, there was a shortage of leaders due to many taking the night off for this or that reason.  In fact, one who had off rearranged his schedule so he could be there after all.  Anyway, it was decided that we would spend most of the night with the younger kids (1st-3rd) as a result and not have small groups.  In the end, we did wind up with enough help from last-minute volunteers to do our normal thing, but the wheels were already in motion.  I really don’t think 4th/5th grades got much out of the younger lesson, but fortunately we had time at the end to do the intended lesson, well half of it anyway.  It was an important lesson so we had to fit it in.  I taught them the Romans Road to salvation.  This is a series of four key verses from the book of Romans.  Here’s where I get lazy now and cut-n-paste from another site.  You may notice that there are five verses here (6:23a and 6:23b are one), but Romans 10:13 is covered by 10:9-10 so as a “repeat” it doesn’t count:  😛