Ken Pierpont's Blog, page 72
February 21, 2018
What To Do With Girls
Classic Re-post for those of you who have not been reading my blog since 1999.
I read a lot of books. Some of them are devotional, some are theological, some are informational, a few are recreational. One of my favorite recent reads is practical. It was written by a fellow named Dan Bolin. This little treasure is packed full of creative, humorous ways to love your daughter(s). It is called: “How to Be Your Daughter’s Daddy.” and sub-titled: “365 Ways To Show Your Daughter You Care.” Since I have never been a little girl this is a most helpful book.
Here is a sample of some of Dan’s suggestions:
Together roast miniature marshmallows with toothpicks over the flame of a candle.
Ask her to help you put air in the tires of the car.
Compliment her character and skill three times more frequently than you compliment her on her appearance.
Be sure you take her to Sunday School and Church.
Take time to talk with her in her room before she goes to sleep at night.
Make eye contact when you talk to her.
Make mini pizzas, using English muffins topped with pizza sauce, cheese and slices of pepperoni.
Get her a special night light.
Pray with her at bedtime.
Sing in the car.
Tell her she has a beautiful smile.
Ask her questions she cannot answer “yes” and “no.”
(Here is one of my favorites), Kiss her mother in her presence.
Here are a couple I thought up:
Teach her to make coffee for you for when you need to taste-test her cookies.
Get her own library card and visit the library together at least once a month.
Have her roller-blade while you run. (some of you might want to roller blade while she runs).
It is hard to list these ideas and to think of the precious little girls the Lord has given me without tears of love and gratitude. When you have a little girl, every day is a treasure!
When I look at old pictures or videos of our three little daughters I always get a lump in my throat. They won’t live with me forever. Some day another man will enjoy their cookies and their smile. They will be grown and gone and I won’t be able to go with them up to their room at night and pray with them and tuck them in.
Maybe you wondered how Dan Bolin the author of “How to Be Your Daughter’s Daddy” came up with all those good ideas? Dan had a sense of urgency about spending as much time with his little daughter Catie as possible. His daughter was only four years old when they discovered that she had leukemia. When she was nine little Catie went to heaven. After they discovered her disease Dan had only had five more years to live his daughter.
I hope I can keep Dan’s book and use it with my daughter’s daughters, but we have no promise of tomorrow. Like Gloria Gather wrote: “We have this moment to hold in our hands and to touch as it slips through our fingers like sand. Yesterday’s gone and tomorrow may never come, but we have this moment today.”
Heavenly Father, Thank you for the precious little girls you have entrusted to me for a short time. Forgive me for my selfishness and help me make every moment count. And until Dan and Dan and Catie are together again in a place where death never separates, bless him for reminding us to love our daughters while we still can.
P.S. Its Saturday morning April 10th and if the ultrasound is right another little girl will join us any day.
P.P.S. God in His gracious providence, on Tuesday morning, April 20, 1999 at 5:27, sent into our lives a beautiful, healthy baby daughter. Mom and baby are both well. The Pine Street Parsonage has been filled with joy for the last week as friends and neighbors have come by to hold baby Hope and leave food and gifts. We are overwhelmed by the goodness of God and the kindness of his people and we are “…rejoicing in hope.” (Romans 12:12)
February 19, 2018
Growing A Family: Show Them (Sermon 1) Video
Growing A Family: Show Them
Bethel Church-Jackson, Michigan
February 18, 2018 AM
Pastor Ken Pierpont
The family pictured here is the family of Bob and Linda Dunbar. Bob and Linda raised six children who love the Lord. On February 1, 2015 Bob went to be with the Lord. His heritage lives on in his wife and children and all of us who admired and loved him.
Bittersweet Farm Journal (Number 3) The Boy Was Born With A Deformity
On Bittersweet Farm
Things are peaceful on Bittersweet Farm. It almost seems the deer in the fields around us are beginning to trust us. The creatures feed closer and closer to the house every week. While we are pushing snow off the drive we are planning our bird-feeders and thinking about our flower beds and what else we may try to grow when winter leaves and spring arrives.
Bethel Church has been flourishing of late. Yesterday we welcomed nine new members and received membership applications from a couple more. I’ve joined the choir. Saturday almost every seat in the church was filled for a memorial service for Linnea Strauss, the daughter of one of our elders and a young mother who died of cancer at 35. She had a dance studio and a number of her students paid tribute to her at the service dancing beautifully with tears streaming down their faces. Linnea is in the presence of the Lord, but she left behind many a young husband, children and hundreds who loved her and mourn her passing.
Saturday evening Lois and I drove over to a little berg south of Battle Creek and I spoke for a delightful Valentine event at North Adams Baptist Church. The pastor there Mark Bher is married to a young lady named Rachel who grew up in the church we pastored in Fremont. It was a pretty drive over and a delightful evening. There was a warm spirit in the church that night. Lois and I drove home in a light snow eager to be with our own people at Bethel in the morning.
If you can’t join us at Bethel my messages are archived at BethelJackson.org in audio and video. I hope they will be a blessing. My current series is called Growing a Family with a Life-Long Love for God. I’ll attach the video to this e-mail.
The Boy Was Born With a Deformity
Years ago a lad was born in Belfast, Ireland with a minor physical deformity. He was born with only one joint in his thumb. He would later tell others that he was extremely clumsy in sports because of the deformity.
A failure in sports can be a painful thing for a young person. I’m not sure how he felt about it. I do know this: Because of his inability to excel in sports he begin to write.
He died in 1964 and almost everything he ever wrote is still in print and selling very well today. They make movies out of his stories and he is admired around the world.
He may be the most popular Christian apologist of all time. But if he had not had a physical deformity he may never have published a word and the world would not recognize the name C. S. Lewis. We would never know the land of Narnia or the clear compelling logic of Mere Christianity or the wit of The Screwtape Letters.
What must have seemed a bitter providence for a few years has brought great sweetness to the world.
Lewis applied to study at Oxford in 1917. He would need to pass to “Responsions” an exam required for all students. There was a math portion and Lewis was strong in humanities but weak in math. Apparently he spent his time reading and writing and not ciphering. Lewis failed the exam because of the math section. He was not accepted to study at Oxford.
He volunteered to serve in WWI. He was wounded in battle on April 15, 1918. He lived, but would not return to the war. About that time Oxford, in a show of good-will toward veterans, suspended the Responsions exam for soldiers returning from war. Because of that he was able to study and eventually teach of Oxford.
He wasn’t good at sports. He wasn’t good at math, but his gifts continue to bless the world. Don’t mourn what you can’t do. Use the unique gifts God gave you to do what He put you on earth to and trust in his providential care even when things are dark or difficult or confusing. Sometimes what seems good is bad and what seems bad is good.
Ken Pierpont
Bittersweet Farm
Summit Township, Michigan
February 19, 2018
February 11, 2018
Bittersweet Farm Journal (Number 2) You Need a Plaid Couch
Bittersweet Farm Journal
(Number 2)
This weekend a hearty snow storm swept across the southern part of the state covering our part of Jackson County in nearly a foot of fresh snow. I was away speaking at a retreat up in the tip of the Mitten at Camp Barakel.
As always, it was delightful to be at Barakel even though I miscalculated the starting time of the last chapel and they had to come get me out of the shower to preach. Still, I was invited to return.
It’s been my privilege to speak at Barakel for 20 years. Since December my brother Kevin and his family have been serving on staff there. I was able to share some meals with them in their home on the camp property.
I arrived at Barakel after dark and stepped out of the cold and snow into the circle of warmth of a crackling wood fire in my brother’s home. It was sweet to think how kind God has been to give the Pierpont family so many opportunities to serve in such a blessed ministry.
It was my first Sunday away from Bethel. I missed being with the Bethel family and it’s good to be home. I returned early enough to enjoy the beauty of the snow storm, but late enough to miss it’s danger.
This weekend I spent some time working in the Conference Room at Barakel. This is a photo of Uncle Johnny and his Alumnus of the Year Recognition and chair given to him by Moody Bible Institute.
Lois did some decorating in the Farm House while I was gone.
You Need A Plaid Couch
In 1985 I was the Associate Pastor of Youth and Music at Loomis Park Baptist Church right here in Jackson. When we came to serve at Loomis Lois was pregnant with our third child, Chuk. The church provided a nice parsonage for us, and a full time salary including health benefits. They promised to cover the cost of our baby’s birth.
When the time of his birth approached we discovered a mistake had been made and there would be no insurance coverage. The good people of the church promised to take up an offering to cover our expenses. We were grateful.
One afternoon I went home for lunch and Lois was worried that our care would not be good because we would be coming in without insurance. We had met with the hospital administrator who promised that we would be treated well. We agreed to pay $200.00 ahead and the rest we could pay after the offering was taken.
I reminded Lois of our arrangement, She said; “I know honey, but we don’t have 200.00 dollars.”
As a young husband I wanted to comfort her and I wanted to be a man of faith, but I wasn’t very experienced in these things yet. The only thing I knew to do was pray.
“I said, let’s kneel down here and pray.”
We knelt there by our humble plaid couch and committed our worries to the Lord, then I returned to the church.
Within ten minutes of my return to work the faithful church custodians, a couple named Earl and Verlie Wedge, came in and stood at my desk. They said; “We know the church is going to be collecting money to pay the hospital bill but we thought you might be able to use a little before the baby is born.” They laid a check on my desk. I thanked them and prayed with them and they left.
The check was for $200.00.
Chuk was born healthy and he was paid for. He’s all grown up now with children of his own and he is a youth pastor about an hour from here. He and his wife Cecilia have another baby on the way soon.
I tell him, “God will take care of you, son. You can count on Him. You just need an old plaid couch where you can kneel and turn your burdens over to the Lord..”
February 7, 2018
A Treasure of Good Things (Sermon 6) Video
Series: A Treasure of Good Things
Sermon Six
Pastor Ken Pierpont
Bethel Church-Jackson, Michigan
February 4, 2018 AM
A Treasure of Good Things (Sermon 6) Audio
Series: A Treasure of Good Things
Sermon Six
Pastor Ken Pierpont
Bethel Church-Jackson, Michigan
February 4, 2018 AM
http://kenpierpont.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/2018-02-04AM-A-Treausre-of-Good-Things-Sermon-6.mp3
February 3, 2018
February 1, 2018
A Treasure of Good Things (Sermon 5) Video
Bethel Church–Jackson, Michigan
January 28, 2018 AM
Pastor Ken Pierpont
A Treasure of Good Things (Sermon 5)
January 31, 2018
A Treasure of Good Things (Sermon 5) Audio
Bethel Church–Jackson, Michigan
January 28, 2018 AM
Pastor Ken Pierpont
A Treasure of Good Things (Sermon 5)
http://kenpierpont.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/A-Treasure-of-Good-Things-Part-5.mp3
January 27, 2018
Discovered Light
One night last week we discovered another delightful feature of our little house on Bittersweet Farm. About eight in the evening I noticed a pattern of light on the upstairs bedroom floor just in front of my desk.
For the first time since we moved in the sky was clear. The moon was waxing toward full high up in the trees in the woods across the road. The upstairs bedroom windows and two of the three living room windows face south. The moonlight shone through the window making eight bright squares of light on the floor beside the bed.
To live in a place in the country where moonlight falls on the bedroom floor is good for the soul of the one who takes the time to see it.
The sunlight falls on my reading chair this time of year in the same endearing way. I try to pay attention to where the light falls into my life.
