Gilbert Thurston

Random Thoughts About Life, Ministry and Whatever Else Happens to be on my Mind

Random Thoughts on a Friday

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  • Haven’t done a random thoughts for awhile so let’s see where this goes…
  • Why oh why on my day off did I wake up at 6am wide-awake?
  • Couldn’t believe the news yesterday about Michael Jackson.
    • Thriller was the first album I ever bought.
    • Too bad he got really weird because he was an amazingly talented man.
    • However, no matter how talented you are, death is coming for all of us and it will sometimes come unexpectedly.
    • The moral…you’ve got to be prepared for eternity and the best way to do that is to begin a relationship with Jesus.
  • I’m getting back into the swing of things after vacation.
  • Working on two huge projects right now…1 is exciting…the other is overwhelming…both will be great when they’re completed.
  • Vacation highlights were:
    • Spening time with Lisa 24/7.
    • Celebrating our 14th anniversary.
    • Our dinner at Phillips Seafood in Atlantic City overlooking the beach and ocean.
    • Not checking e-mail the entire 2 weeks and truly being able to relax.
    • Walking with Lisa hand-in-hand up and down the boardwalk with no cares (ok dodging seagulls but other than that) or agenda.
    • Treating my parents to a couple days away in the Pocono’s with us.
    • Hiking to Bushkill Falls…beautiful!
    • Hacking around a par-3 approach course with my dad.
    • Celebrating my birthday.
    • Getting a sweet authentic Alexander Ovechkin Caps jersey from Andy and Gayle.
    • Getting to hang out with my friends.
  • We’ve got some pretty cool stuff coming up for July and August in the Experiences that we’re pretty excited about.
  • This week is the last week of the One Prayer series…Perry Noble…can’t wait!
  • Then I’m back preaching again…really excited about what God is going to do in the next series.

Random Friday Thoughts

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  • Enjoying my day off…just woke up from a nap.  :)
  • Last night’s practice for this weekend was awesome…I’m a combination of excited and nervous!
  • You’ll have to be there to see why.
  • This is about as edgy as I think we’ll ever be, but I truly believe that God has directed all of this to create an Experience that not only will you never forget, but will also get you truly re-thinking sex.
  • Speaking of excited, Andy and I got our tickets for Monday night’s Caps vs. Penguins play-off game. 
  • Alexander the Great vs. Cindy (oopps I mean Sidney) the Sissy   haha
  • Yesterday was Dianna Best, our children’s director’s, birthday.
  • The staff went out to a great liitle Italian place in downtown Chambersburg to celebrate.
  • For 44 days Dianna is a year older than me…ha!
  • In all seriousness, Dianna does an awesome job with “little people church”…please don’t forget to thank her for all she and her team does next time you see her.
  • Tonight CAYA is hanging out with a stop at Brusters in the mix.
  • If you’re in the 18-29 range stop by Brusters at 7PM to hang with them.
  • Going to try out Twitter for a week or so to see if I like it.
  • Got another busy week coming up where I’ll have to get 2 weeks worth of stuff done…definetely looking forward to vacation!
  • If you haven’t yet invited someone to United for this weekend…stop what your doing and do it now…you won’t regret it.

    • Random Wednesday Thoughts

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  • My talk went well yesterday…thanks for the prayers.
  • Had about 50 pastors and leaders attend and even though I had some tough things for them to hear, I think it was received well.
  • The AC wasn’t working in the room I was in so I was roasting by the time we were done.
  • It was great to have our own Adam Swisher there assisting me with the tech side of things for my presentation.
  • Adam and a few other of the guys from church are actually running all the tech for this conference and using alot of CFCOG’s equipment to do it.
  • This is the 3rd year I’ve been there and it’s by far the best it’s ever looked…not that I’m biased or anything.
  • Funniest thing was right before my breakout and lunch was a talk to the entire group from our keynote speaker, Craig Sider. 
  • Craig kept on giving the same quotes, scriptures and illustrations that I was planning on giving in my breakout…it was like we had the same notes.
  • To top it all off was when he showed a picture of himself skydiving from last year…well guess who else had in his presentation a picture of himself skydiving last year…yep that would be me for those of you playing along at home.
  • Eventually I realized that wait…maybe God is in this and some people that would be attending my breakout needed to hear these truths two times instead of one so I kept it all in.
  • When I got home I spent some QT with Lisa and then watched game 7 of the Caps vs. Rangers.
  • Didn’t have a good feeling all night about the game…they played terrible…but yet they pulled it out in the end.
  • Not only does this mean they advance to the next round, but it also means at least another week and a half of Andy growing his play-off beard.
  • I was supposed to be doing it as well, but one thing after another kept me from letting it grow so now I have to keep shaving because it would be unlucky now to start…not that I’m superstitious or anything.

    • Other Weekend Thoughts…and Beyond

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    First Baptist Orlando

  • Wow sorry I haven’t been able to blog as much this past week or so…things have been crazy.
  • Many of you were following me on Facebook last week, so you’re at least partially in the loop.
  • If you haven’t yet signed-up for a Facebook account it’s easy to do and an awesome way to keep up with all of your friends at United.
  • Had a great trip to Orlando for the Exponential Conference at the First Baptist Church of Orlando.
  • Got to spend time with a few other guys from our region, including Mike Schooley who started United back in 2005 before heading to New York to start his own church.
  • Mike and I roomed together and every night after we’d turn the lights out we’d talk and dream about church stuff for a long time.
  • I told him the last night I was going to miss our “Walton’s Family” chats.
  • The worst part of the trip was when my good friend Chuck Frank had to fly home early because his wife, Tammy, fell and broke her ankle.
  • Please keep them in prayer…it’s going to be a long recovery process and may still require more surgery.
  • I got a ton of great ideas at the conference and can’t wait to try some of them out.
  • The pic above is of their sanctuary.  To try to give you some perspective, there were 3000 people at the conference and almost everyone sat on the floor level.
  • Perhaps the highlight of week was the very last thing.  Not only did Francis Chan deliever a great talk, but the intro that was given for him left everyone…including Francis saying wow!
  • Got to meet Francis then at the airport that day and he was still talking about it.
  • Was finally able to get the interview with Satan video online from the “Finding the One” message.  To watch it, click here.
  • Satan will be making another appearance this week as a part of the message about sex called, “It’s Business Time”.
  • Seriously the entire Experience is something that is going to be talked about for a long time…
  • …we have things in store for you that you just simply will have to be there to believe.
  • For those that can’t make it, the number of downloads I’m sure is going to not just break but shatter every record we have.
  • Tomorrow (Tuesday) I’m speaking for our denomination on how to reach the 18-35 crowd.
  • Please say a quick prayer for me.
  • Night!

    • Other Weekend Thoughts…and Beyond

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  • Had a great Easter week.
  • Thursday night’s service was quite full and Aaron’s use of architectural projection on the sanctuary walls was quite impressive.
  • I had prepared the message for that evening earlier in the week and had run through it a few times but was going to have notes on stage with me.  About 1/2 hour beforehand, Aaron convinced me I should have it memorized…talk about a cram session, but I got it done with God’s help.
  • Friday I enjoyed my day off and just vegged while Lisa went to CAYA’s Good Friday service.  Heard it went very well.
  • Saturday I was up early to go in to help with the Easter Family Fun Fest.
  • The rain was a bit discouraging, but kids and their parents just kept flooding into the buidling.
  • I ended up floating around helping where needed…the football toss game will never be the same after Andy and I got a hold of it…but for the most part I hung out in my office answering the phone with “yes we’re still having the event..it’s just been moved indoors”.
  • Around 11:30am I was asked to run to the grocery store to buy 100 more hotdogs and rolls.
  • I had no longer gotten back and they asked me to go buy 200 more of each.
  • By the time it was all said and done, they had prepared for about 600 but ended up with over 1000 people altogether!
  • I got yelled at by the clerk at the grocery store for taking all of thier stock of hotdogs and rolls.
  • He kept telling me that we needed to pre-order such large amounts.  I kept explaining that we had prepared for 600 but now we needed to feed 1000, but for some reason that wasn’t computing for him.
  • As Andy said when I got back, “It’s not like you were stealing them…you still paid for them”.
  • With all those people on Saturday, I’m not sure why I’m still so shocked about the record crowds we had yesterday.
  • If I’m being really honest I thought United would have 450-470 and I was praying for 500.
  • So to have 550 was amazing.
  • The two sanctuary services combined for about 560 and the children had right about 200…amazing.
  • This week I’ll be planning a little further ahead than usual becuase I’ll be in Florida all of next week at a conference.
  • Please be praying that we can get everything done that needs to happen.
  • Also don’t forget that this Saturday at 3PM & 7PM in the multi-purpose room is a free community-wide date night where we’ll be showing the movie Fireproof.