Hey everyone!

Full disclosure: I don't know about your family, but Sundays are FULL in the Bass family. After we get home from the morning service with our Antioch Dallas folk, we demolish a quick meal and get crackin on preparing for the week ahead. Since we have Discipleship school in the evenings, we often find ourselves finishing homework and memorizing bible verses along with the adult-necessities like paying bills and selling our car. At the moment Molly is working on finishing a book report for tonight, so I get a small window of time to be in our new-ish apartment in complete silence whilst eating Easter candy (an introvert's dream). Now I would love to say that I thought to myself, "James, what better way to spend the afternoon than blogging about y'all's life?", but sadly I cannot. My first thoughts have been to work on an Antioch Discipleship book reflection and that I still need to research more about fuel efficient small SUV's (more on that later). However, my beautiful wife reminded me about the blog, and that I haven't written in a long time, and that I do, in fact, enjoy writing. So here we are friends and fam!

Seeking First

To start off, I would like to set before you an excerpt out of Matthew 6 that has been a centering point for me in the past few weeks.

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious about itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. Matthew 6:33-34

At first glance, this can look like a pretty good equation for happiness. "Ok, so I just focus on volunteering at my local church and I won't have to worry about the bills or retirement, right? I don't have to make plans, I can just worry about today and only today. It's biblical, right?" WRONG (this is where all of the Type A planner people heave a huge sigh of relief).

Let's add some context, this whole chapter is jammed packed with Jesus talking about how we are to relate to God as our Father. We pray to God in secret, instead of only praying so others can hear us, because our Father values and rewards intimacy. We don't make a show of fasting, because it is something personal between us and our loving Father. Then Jesus goes on a long soliloquy about us worrying about our finances, pining after money, and wondering how we are going to make ends meet. If I'm honest, that's me. I can easily relate to that because I've been doing it everyday for a while. Maybe you can relate too.

But here is where it gets interesting: Jesus then spitfires a lot of questions about how we often let our fears distort our trust for our loving Father God. Does Father God give the birds food? (Yes, I think I saw something on Animal Planet about that) Are you more important to God than a bird? (I mean, yeah) Are you making your life any better by worrying? (No, I guess not) Doesn't your Father God even clothe non-communicative things like flowers with intricate beauty? (Yeah, and they smell good too) So why wouldn't your Father God clothe you even better? (Hmmmmm).

Jesus explains that we can't serve both God and money, you can only be devoted to one of them, not both. And then he delivers the final punch that our Father God actually sees and knows all of our needs before ending with "But seek first..."

Here's what I think Jesus is getting at: The primary thing is being in relationship with Father God and trusting Him to take care of you. Whether you had a great dad or an awful dad, we all need a Heavenly Father to remind us that we are His and we are deeply loved by Him. Being the beloved child of my Father God changes how I talk with Him, how I spend time with Him, how I interact with people, how I earn money, and how I think about the future. And when my anxiety flies through the roof, I'm learning to first bring my fears straight to my loving Father. Instead of letting my fears define Him, I'm letting Him remind me that I can trust Him completely.

SO TAKE THAT, ANXIETY.

A Dream Accomplished

I am a dreamer in training. What I mean to say is I'm getting better at dreaming up things that I want to do that make life into an adventure. Like say, learning how to box, for example. Anyway, earlier this year, Molly and I met for our Annual Dream Date and I wrote down that I wanted to go camping with my dad and brother. Some real manly outdoorsy stuff. This had been something we really enjoyed many years ago, but haven't gotten to do because I had been away from the states for so long. Honestly, when I was in Ireland and was missing my family, I often resolved that I would go camping again with them as soon as I could. So for me, writing this down was a big deal; it meant it was no longer an idea, but something I was going to try as hard as I could to make happen in 2017, no matter what.

So we talked about the idea for months, we chatted on Google hangout, created a group text, coordinated schedules, took off work, researched destinations, planned river routes, called Tom Ingram (the camping/fishing/canoeing guru), and prepped all of our gear. Even the night before we left I found myself wondering, " Is this for real? Are we actually going to do this?"

And guess what? WE ACTUALLY DID GO CAMPING AND KAYAKING. And oh, it was so grand.

New Building and Brussels Update

At Antioch Community Church in Dallas there are always new things happening to reach the local community, and the most recent undertaking is that we are moving into a new building! This has been such an incredible rallying point for the church members as we completely surpassed our funding goals for the new building, we took a Sunday to finish the final stages of the move together as a church, we have prayed over the new location together, and we even held Easter Sunday services on the lawn outside! Every thing is ready for us to start services at the new location, except Dallas has not given us our Certificate of Occupancy yet. So please be praying with us for God's favor to expedite this process!

All of that to say, it has been super encouraging to see our church grow even stronger together, without the need for a building. The Church is really a global gathering of people who are devoted to Jesus, not a building anyway, right? Even today, for the first time ever, we did "home churches", where we gathered in someone's home as lifegroups to worship, read the Bible, and pray together. How good it is to be reminded that God is not restrained by physical locations or building restrictions.

Also, Molly and I are now 19% fully funded to go on our short term missions trip to Brussels in June! Please be praying for God to provide completely for us to go on this trip, and if you feel God invite you to contribute to our mission, we would love for you to be apart of this with us!

Check out our link below:

Basses go to Brussels.

Prayer for a New Car

Lastly our dear car Beverly, the golden girl, broke down a few weeks ago. She was a 1999 Oldsmobile Eighty-Eight, living well past her prime, with a heart (and exterior) of bright gold. Beverly was a rescue, to be sure, but without her we could not have transitioned into our new apartment, and for that we will forever be thankful. Carry on.

That'll do Bev. That'll do.

So could y'all be praying with us that we find a buyer for Beverly as well as provision for a new DEPENDABLE car for Molly?

With that I will end this here blog. Thank for sticking with us friends, what an adventure it has been and will continue to be!