Convention Blogging: Day Three and Back Home

We made it back after midnight last night. What a wonderful convention! If I hadn't had such a positive experience at the NACC last summer, I would swear off all other conventions except this one, the Preaching Teaching Convention at Ozark Christian College.

As day three came we started a little late but the first main session included two powerful sermons. Cam Huxford and Chris Seidman spoke discernment and forgiveness from the lives of Solomon and Joseph, respectively. After lunch we caught Reggie Epps speaking about leadership in the story of Nehemiah at that main session.

After the main session, we each caught a different workshop. Jay-rod went to a class on church websites which seemed to be really interesting and helpful. My workshop was good but it's so hard to sit in a warm room in the early afternoon – it's not conducive to concentration!

The main session Wednesday night was fantastic, as Bob Russell was the speaker. He spoke on endurance from the life of Job. What a fantastic message for church leaders to hear. My only concern is that the majority of the crowd was closer to the end of the race than the beginning of it. Ministers and church leaders in my age group needed to hear this too!

For those of you who are wondering the worship didn't improve much, though I think I got used to it (or better at tuning out the annoying parts). I'll be glad to return to our worship here at WCCC, which seems so much more genuine and less pretentious.

The last day of of the convention was especially sweet in that we met a lot of old friends and had several really good talks. It's funny, a few of our old acquaintances are actually starting to look old! How funny! But overall, we were still the youngsters in the crowd and talking to friends who are missionaries of and ministers and finding ways we might be able to work together in the future was a blessing beyond measure.

I was shocked at how many restaurants in Joplin have closed or changed hands. At lunch Wednesday our first two or three choices had been boarded up. I suppose that it's too much to expect things to remain exactly the same as 10 years earlier, but some of those places were really good. There is still an abundance of restaurants in the Joplin area, just not all the ones I was used to in my college years.