Second Stage Ministries

Every story has to start somewhere. About a month ago, a friend and I started a book called "The Story" written by Max Lucado and Ryan Frazee. In this book they zero in on the great story of God that runs through the Bible. It's a story of amazing love, forgiveness and grace.  In the first part of the story, we see the Earth as a formless void and the words: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.” – Genesis 1:1-2 (NIV) But as we read the first 25 verses of Genesis 1 we start to see a pattern in HOW God is creating the heavens and the Earth. Throughout those verses we see these three words… “….GOD SAID…” [1] So I picture God looking down or “hovering” over the Earth. Then God begins to speak. “Let there be light, sky, dry ground, seas and oceans, trees and plants. Let there be sun, moon and stars.” [2]...

As I was thinking about what to write for this post, I was reminded of this little story in Luke 10: “As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, 'Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!' 'Martha, Martha,' the Lord answered, 'you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.'" - Luke 10:38-42 NIV This was me this past week. I was focused on many things and was feeling a little stressed just like Martha. I needed to homework, work on a lesson for church, help the kids, work on things around the house, write a blog post or two and g...

There are some exciting changes coming. One of those changes is that I am going to be doing a short post for the videos that we also do through this ministry. If you didn’t know about the videos – check out the information at the end of this post. There are also NEW links at the top of this page. Last year at this time I posted my very first blog post here. At that time the blog was called “Breathe”. I had a lot of overflow from what God had been teaching me over the summer of 2016. God showed me a lot and I needed a place to put it all. So I sat down and started to unload my mind and the blog was born. I just wanted to give the people who read my blog and little breath of God to start, end or lift their day. This is still true today. I am sharing the different things that God has taught me, things I have discovered along my journey with God, and things I have learned through others. Over the last year, we have had many different posts on many different topics. We even went t...

The word masterpiece has taken on a new meaning to me over the last several months. I want to share this thought with you and I hope reading these words will give you the same a-ha moment that I had. This is the definition of "masterpiece" found in the dictionary: [1] "a work of outstanding artistry, skill, or workmanship. an artist's or craftsman's best piece of work." I would now like to draw your attention to a verse in the Bible and we are going to look at the verse in a few different translations. I believe that the different translations of the Bible are there to help us understand what God is trying to say to us. First we are going to look at the verse in the New King James Version: “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them." - Ephesians 2:10 NKJV In this version of the Bible we see the word workmanship - which is in the dictionary definiti...

I want to share something that came up this past weekend and I shared with the students at my church. This month we have been talking about respect and what that looks like for them. We have talked about the people they respect, respecting their parents/caregivers and respecting their leaders. We have built the month in this verse - "Show proper respect to everyone." - 1 Peter 2:17, NIV Everyone means everyone. But it's not that easy. Parents make a bad call or are a little unfair. Bosses aren't the easiest to respect. Friends can be disrespectful too. We all have someone that is a little hard to respect. But God wants us to respect them as best as we can. You don't have to look very far in this world to see the amount of disrespect people have for each other. People taking sides and if you aren't with them your against them. People protesting and yelling insults toward the fellow men and women. This is not the way it's supposed to be. ...

I had an interview yesterday for a position at a church in Ohio. The interview was for a Children's Ministry Director and I am passionate about children. After the interview was all said and done, I couldn't help but think what dream come true it would be to get that position. But I also thought about the other end of it - what if I don't get and it and it turns out like the few other interviews I've had. I was reminded of a verse. It's one of my favorite verses and is found in the book of Jeremiah: “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." - Jeremiah 29:11 NIV God knows what He has planned for me. That is good news! But wait, there's even better news - what He has planned for me is better than what I have planned for me. This church and the position they offer may be what God has planned for me in this season or I'm not yet ready and it's...

The lyrics and the message of the song below are so good and I just had to share it with. The lyrics speak for themselves and better than I could write. I hope this post provides a little bit of encouragement for you today or this week. God is a God a second chances. God gives us the opportunity to start over – to start new. _________________ "Start Over" (feat. NF) Everybody’s got a blank page A story they’re writing today A wall that they’re climbing You can carry the past on your shoulders Or you can start over Regrets, no matter what you've gone through Jesus, He gave it all to save you He carried the cross on His shoulders So you can start over Don’t let your heart be troubled Don’t be afraid To the broken-hearted that wished that they’d Never been born, never been torn, never sinned, never disobeyed I know you think there’s no hope, but that ain’t true, Jesus saves! I know you feelin’ regret (Like I) brought this all on my...