From: Dr. Randy L. Rowland [rlrowland@comcast.net] Sent: Sunday, February 18, 2007 10:01 PM To: Dr. Randy L. Rowland Subject: weekly words from Randoon ... 2/18/2007 Weekly Words for the Week of 2/16/2007 Greetings to one and all! In this week’s words: News From Sanctuary Reflections Rowland Update NEWS FROM SANCTUARY – 2/11 Worship: 100 + A great sermon on Fear of Death by Ben Katt. 2/18 Worship: 75 + Yet another great sermon by Pete Armstrong on Financial Fears. Offering: $4,875.33 This has been an exciting season at Sanctuary. While we have suspended our breakfast service, our 10:oo am gathering is growing steadily. What is really wonderful is the increasing number of people who want to be ‘counted it’…desiring to lead, assist, serve, participate in whatever is going on. The same is true of the Green Bean Coffee House where a large contingent of volunteers is being trained A-Z (to open, close, clean, cook, make coffee drinks, run the cash register and most of all LOVE ON GREENWOOD!) We are planning our First Membership Class meeting this Spring on a Sunday immediately after church. Stand by for a date. Needed: folks who want to serve regularly at the local food bank, Boys and Girls Club, Young Life or the Senior Center. Contact rlrowland@comcast.net or bkatt@sanctuarycrc.org. REFLECTIONS – It was so great to have a couple of weeks to really think ahead on the LIVING BEYOND OUR FEARS series that we are in the midst of. It has been a challenge for me to name and to face my own fears….and to write and deliver messages in the hope that they will benefit others. I know Ben and Pete and Betsy Turnbull feel the same way. As I was away the last 8 days, what really struck me was how I tend to mask my fears and show defensiveness, anger, indifference or some other smoke screen. I excuse my fears and the actions they evoke all too easily. As I began thinking more and more about all of this, I caught myself taking some written notes. What really does scare me? When? Why? How? What do I tend to do? As I developed a personal narrative, I found the patterns helpful. I have categories of physical fears like heights, hornets, etc. I realize I also have fears regarding relationships and vocation. Those are even more powerful than the physical fears for me. I realize that I often use my psychological fears for crutches – as reasons to maintain the status quo and make my terrors look like power traits. Are you a BS’er like me in this way. If so, there’s hope. Take the time to write some of this stuff down and share it in a group of several people…or meet with one of our staff or elders at Sanctuary to get the stuff off your chest and into the “NOW” world of the Holy Spirit and prayer. When Plato said “the unobserved life is not worth living” and when Jesus said, “the person who seeks to save their life will lose it…” I wonder if both weren’t talking primarily about the fears we have regarding absolute, honest, personal awareness and a commitment to live beyond the ties of fear that have bound us lo these many years. I am looking forward to sharing again next week when the message is part of our THE FACES OF FEAR section of the series. This coming week the face of fear we will explore is FEAR OF REJECTION AND ABANDONMENT. Since these are probably my first and worst fears, hope you can join me both to encourage the Spirit to speak through me and to delight in watching me squirm. ROWLAND UPDATE – Nancy and I just returned today from 8 days off to the Dominican Republic. We had some great time of rest and reading. Lots of meals and chats with each other. Some nice walks. I scuba dove. Nancy took an eco-tour and we have fabulous day long trip from Punta Cana to Santo Domingo. We went through San Pedro, which has produced some of the greatest baseball players in history, including Sammy Sosa. That was cool! We also visited the original cathedral in Santo Domingo and neighboring Columbus Park. Our tour guide gave us 1,000 years of D.R. history during our 4 hours bus ride. We also visited the site where some of the remains of Columbus and his family are interred. The others remains were shipped to Spain in 1992. I was encouraged by how alive faith is in the D.R. The people are pretty devout and the nation seems to be moving toward prosperity through sugar cane and tourism. It’s a lovely place. While I was away, I was featured in “profile” article in the Seattle Weekly. Nina Shapiro did a good job of writing it and was accurate with the information she got, though not all of it was accurate. It described my time in radio, the rise and fall of Church at the Center and the Resurrection life in the CRC with Sanctuary and all the churches we are planting in the Seattle area in cooperation with other CRC churches. If you have any questions about the article, feel free to email of call me. My phone number is on the bottom of this email. Today is FEBRUARY 18th. This is the 4 year anniversary of my gastric bypass surgery which saved my life and took my weight from a couple cheeseburger’s shy of 400 pounds to today’s weight (as of 5pm) of 181. I thank God for this special anniversary and a reminder of the saving, resurrection power of God provided not just in heaven, but also in this world in these days through everything from medical miracles to flat-out works of the Spirit. In the 11 hours I was on the operating table followed by 2 days in intensive care after the surgery (complications: my new stomach leaked…and that can kill you) I got to know God in a new and deeper way. Surely, I was able to say that I belong to God “both in life and in death” as we say in the Heidelberg Confession….and I remember praying during one critical procedure in the ICU and remembering the words of Paul, “for me to live is Christ; to die is gain” and I knew that this was not only true for Paul, but also for me. Thanks be to God. So…..here’s to you…….and here’s to all of us living the Resurrection Life here and now, day by day. Much Love, Dr. Randy L. Rowland 2854 NW 59th Street Seattle, WA 98107 USA 206.953.0909 www.sanctuarycrc.org