Glad to See Some Gamecocks with their Heads on Straight

The last 36 hours have been a nonstop whirlwind. It all started Wednesday midmorning when Elizabeth’s mother called saying that her grandfather, Daddy Bill, who she is extremely close with, took a sharp turn downward in health. In fact, the doctors did not think he would make it through the day.

We rushed to Charleston and throughout the day, 87-year-old Daddy Bill battled back, joking that he had to get out of the hospital to train for the bridge run. All the prayers from friends, church members, family and online buddies must have worked because by yesterday morning, Daddy Bill had rallied and surprised everyone. I think that as long as Daddy Bill is in good enough health to watch Fox News and yell at President Obama, he’s in pretty good spirits. Thank God for miracles.

We then rushed back to Columbia for a few meetings, conference calls, website launches and the recording of our new podcast Forward Slash with Alphonse from AlphonseFM. Forward Slash is a more serious podcast where I talk with local folks in the Internet business about how they are blowing it up. Alphonse is one such guy and you should be checking out his podcast every week at www.alphonsefm.com.

Somehow I was able to squeeze in day 5 of boxing. I’m committed to this and I refuse to skip appointments. For the second time I made it through the hour-long session. This one was a lot like yesterday’s workout, but we spent more time on the bags than we had the last four times, which I very much enjoy.

Last night was the REAL Men’s night of worship at First Baptist Church. The first two levels of the church were packed with men, kids and old men, black and white. New Brookland Church men’s ensemble led worship, and if you haven’t praised with a bunch of black people, you just haven’t praised. They know how to sing to the Lord. University of South Carolina football players Marcus Lattimore, Kenny Miles, Dylan Thompson and T.J. Johnson spoke about their faith on and off the field. Obviously Heisman contender Marcus Lattimore was the big draw of the night, but all four players were amazing. These four guys have their heads on right and are hot for Christ. I hope they start spending a little more time with Stephen Garcia. That dude needs some Jesus something fierce.

USC football chaplain Adrian Despres was the primary speaker for the evening. For nearly two hours, Despres gave an impassioned speech about the four chairs of faith. Chair one seats people hot for the Lord. Chair two, who he calls “the puke people” are those hypocrite Christians who say they are for the Lord, but don’t show it like they should. These are the harmful folks who turn away nonbelievers from the church. Chair three holds nonbelievers who have heard the gospel, but who have not made the commitment. Chair four seats those who are confused and know little about Christianity. By the end of the night, Despres brought over 200 people to Christ and sat them in seat one.

By the time I got home, Twitter was blowing up with word that the South Carolina congressional delegation left the House chamber to pray at a nearby chapel. Liberals across the web were blasting them and I suddenly found myself in a Twitter debate with a guy who said the actions were unconstitutional because our leaders were mixing faith and government. Have we really gotten to the point where even prayer is considered unconstitutional? Obviously these folks have not read the Free Exercise Clause with the Establishment Clause. They must also not have read some history and found that the Establishment Clause was created to protect the church from government, not to protect government from the church. If you do not believe our faith is under attack, I invite you to search through last night’s tweets. It scares the Hell out of me…. literally.

The day ended with a glass of merlot, an hour of Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations and a chapter of The Happiness Project by Grethen Ruben. As Ice Cube rapped “today was a good day.”