When Inside Voices Come Out

Create a Rhythm - When You Rise

2010-09-30T13:47:00.000-04:00

We have steadily walked our way through this verse this week and have attempted to discover the ONE THING that we could do at home to be more intentional about connecting our family with God. We have had great fun with 'Red Light Thankfulness' this week as our girls are getting into saying something they are thankful for when we stop at a red light. We have set a new rule with this one though, we have agreed that we need to be specific about the things that we are thankful for.

The final installment of this verse is "when you rise..." and today we will consider ONE THING that we can do in the morning time to encourage our family to connect with God and to connect with each other. I know that not everyone is a morning person, and that there are also a number of people living in our metropolitan area who leave home at an unearthly hour just to make it to the office in time. regardless of whether you have a crazy early morning or the opportunity to take some time, we can all use some encouragement to be focused. Our morning times are pretty intense - three mornings a week I am gone from the house before my wife and kids are up, and the other two days I have the great chance to work from home and so I can be a part of the routine.

There are lots of things that must be done before our school or workday begins and some of those things are not really the time to be trying to memorize bible verses. It takes enough energy to try to keep my 4 yr olds hair out of her cereal in the morning let alone trying to teach her some biblical truth. One thing that has to happen every morning is that our kids need to put their shoes on before they go out. So, Julie had the great idea that she would get six small photo frames from that famous Swedish furniture store and print out six attributes that our kids can read as they put their shoes on. So each morning there on the wall in front of them are these six pictures. When we get a chance we try to go over one or more of the verses or attributes and remind the girls of what they have read.

The other thing which Julie has implemented with our girls is that on the drive to their school they all take turns and pray for the day. This has become so much a part of the routine that one day last week when I drove the family to Cara's school, we didn't pray - I did not know the rhythm. Julie felt a little off after the short trip to Cara's school when she realized that we didn't pray. I had hindered the rhythm. The lesson we learned from that trip was that we both need to know the rhythm, even if we are not normally involved with a particular aspect of it. So now, if I take the girls to school we pray on the way there - its our rhythm.

So how are your ONE THINGs coming along?

Create a Rhythm - When You Lie Down

2010-09-29T13:05:00.000-04:00

So here we are on day four of our journey through this verse from Deuteronomy 6:7. We have been thinking about creating a rhythm in our families and today I want to challenge you to think about ONE THING that you can do at bedtime that will help you become more intentional about impressing on your children the laws of God.

Most households have a routine that they try to follow at bedtime. For us, we have a routine that typically takes about 30-40 minutes. That may sound like a lot for some of you, but that is our rhythm - you need to find your own. For us, our intentional impressing does not need to wait until we are tucked up in bed - we look at how we can use the time between dinner and bed time as a way to develop greater family connection. We do not try to do this every day, but most days we will ask the girls if they want to play a game or maybe do family movie night. The games we play range from Candyland, to card games to Break the Ice (last night). Family movie night is not as grand as it sounds, it is basically a 30 minute time block when we sit down as a family and watch a TV program together. For those who are on cable or FIOS then check out the Christian TV channels and especially some of the kids shows that are on between 6 and 7pm. The quality of production may not be what you want to see, but your kids will learn so much from the truth that is repeated on these shows.

After that it is upstairs for the typical teeth brushing and bathroom visits before we hop on one of the girl's beds to read a book or two. We spend some time in prayer for the things/people that we have interacted with earlier that day and thank God for whatever comes to mind. We spend a few moments praying with each of our kids before kissing them good night and heading downstairs to collapse on the sofa.

It has been interesting to me over the past few weeks as I have thought about this verse that it says 'as you lie down...' This has been especially interesting because recently our little one has asked either her mom or I to lie down beside her for a few moments as she settles for sleep. It is as if she just loves the proximity and safety that she feels with one of her parents lying beside her. We oblige, and there have even been occasions where an hour or so later we wake up from that position and go downstairs. How precious it is though that our daughter wants us to be close to her and to spend those moments with her. What greater expression of love is there than to just lay down and be there. TV shows can wait, new series premieres are nowhere near as important as those precious moments. Do not miss them.

For a long time our girls just wanted Julie to put them to bed. I sat downstairs, usually online, and wondered why it took her so long. I mean, how long does it take to read a story, kiss them on the forehead and walk out of the room? I realized one day that the investment that Julie was making in our girls was an invaluable one that would come back to bless her with many fold. As for me - I was too pre-occupied with my bowl of lentils (see Genesis 25:29-34) to see what I was missing. Last night, I lay down beside both of my princesses for a while. I want them to know that their daddy is right there, present, there for them. Always.

What ONE THING will you add or change about your bedtime routine to intentionally pour into your kids?

Create a Rhythm - When You Walk Along The Road

2010-09-28T11:42:00.000-04:00

Sorry for the delay in posting this but I met an old friend this morning as I was leaving my work-out who asked for a ride to the bus stop so he could wait for the next bus home. There was no way I was giving him a ride to the bus stop! I took him home instead. I didnt think you would mind waiting for today's installment.

So we talked yesterday about the ONE THING that we can do to enhance the time we spend with our families at bed time - or when we lie down. Today I want to turn our thoughts to the times when we walk along the road. The first time I read this part of the verse I was instantly struck with exactly how much time during the day this might have been for the children of Israel at that time. They were in the desert heading for the promised land and by the time that journey was completed it took 40 years. That was all done on foot - all done by walking. That is a lot of walking. Transport yourself to present day America and lets face it, if you see someone walking you pray that they get their job back so they can afford the payments on a car. No-one walks in this country - everyone drives. In fact, even walking from the parking lot to the store seems to be too much for most as they endlessly circle looking, nay waiting for the space closest to the door to open up - even though they actually could have parked and walked to the store by the time this actually happens.

Our walking along the road has been transformed to 'driving in the car'. What do you do when you are in the car? What music do you listen to? What songs do you sing? What do you talk about? What do your kids do, if you have any? Do your kids jump in the back seat and turn on the latest Disney movie on their in-car DVD player for the 5 minute ride to your next location? Do you think you are missing an opportunity here? do you think that somehow you could leverage these few precious moments and instead of your child learning the words to 'A whole new world...' that they might actually have the chance to hear God's truth sung?

What if you tried a little experiment for 2 weeks. Two weeks is not a long space of time in the life of a child, so come on, lets give this a try. What if for the next two weeks you listened to nothing but Christian music while you were driving. What if you switched off the DVD player and dropped a Christian storybook, or even a kids bible into their seats. What if every time you got in the car you thought to yourself - "What should we talk about?" or "Who should we pray for?" and then you lead the conversation or the prayers for those things.

Julie told me yesterday that she is going to try to make even the short car trips intentional by asking our girls to say something that they are thankful for every time they are stopped at a red light. You know how many chances there are to be thankful between our house and Gold's Gym in Crofton - 6! There are 4 chances between our house and the Town Center and 6 chances between our house and Grandma's house. One of two things will happen with this experiment:

1. My wife and I will run an awful lot of amber lights as we travel.

2. Our kids (and us) will gradually make thankfulness an everyday part of our lives.

I pray that the second of these options occurs more than the first.

So what is the ONE THING that you are going to do to be more intentional about leading yourself or leading your family into a deeper relationship with Jesus when you walk/drive along the road?

Lead Me - Video from yesterday's message

2010-09-27T22:19:00.000-04:00

I finished yesterday's message with the story of how Esau gave up his birthright for a bowl of stew. Esau gave his brother Jacob his entire future for nothing more than some cooked lentils. That is insane to me. So why do I do that very same thing - except not really the lentil part? Why do I give up my kid's future for nothing more than a few hours more in the office, or for nothing more than just one more check of my e-mail or just one more tweet? When will I realize that my wife and my kids are worth so much more than any hobby, than any work related demand, than any 'emergency' that demands my attention?

Last summer, after multiple efforts to try to help me see how I was putting everything else in front of my wife and family, Julie showed me that I need to chose to be intentional about putting them first. I needed to chose to give my family the best of my time, the best of my energy, the best of my passion - and not just give them whatever was left after I had spent everything I owned in my career, or my hobbies or my church. The words of this song really are what we walked through, and continue to walk through. Maybe you are in the same place with your wife and family. Maybe it is time for you to take your head out of the sand and begin to lead your family.

Create a Rhythm - When you Sit at Home

2010-09-27T07:53:00.000-04:00

My wife has often challenged me that my physical presence at home did not always equate to me actually 'being at home' with my family. What she meant by that was that even though I was physically in our house, I was mentally engaged in whatever the current issue was at church or at work. Being at home needs to become being at home - completely.

I have the luxury of an hour long drive home after work each day. Yes, I called it a luxury, because I have decided that this is the time that I re-live all of my office encounters. This is the time when I replay the conversations and choose the words were I win. My intention is that by the time I arrive at home that I can close the door to my truck and leave the office in there. When I open the door to greet my family I am trying hard to be present completely - physically, emotionally and spiritually. I am not always successful with this, but this is the ONE THING that I am intentionally doing to make our times when we sit at home more meaningful. If you talk to any craftsman they will tell you that preparation is the most important aspect of any job. So I prepare myself to engage my family.

What ONE THING are you planning to intentionally do with your family when you sit at home?

Last night we played checkers, we played cards, we read stories - we engaged and interacted. To be honest, I was tired and would have quite happily curled up on the sofa to sleep through the game like half the population. My kids wanted to play. I had to make a choice. In the interest of full disclosure, we did leave the game on in the background. Old habits die hard.

Share your ONE THING, or your sit at home experiences with your family.

Creating a Rhythm in Your Family

2010-09-26T20:59:00.000-04:00

This morning (Sunday Sept 26) Julie and I had the great privilege of sharing with our church some of our story of creating a rhythm in our family. When we discussed earlier this week, what we should teach during this session, we felt it was important that we were honest. We felt that it was important for people to know our story. Not that our story is the greatest story around, but our story is what we know, and what we can be real about. I thought I would share a little of our story here and then continue our discussion throughout the week.

Julie and I were married at Christmas time in 1995 having been engaged for 2 years and dated seriously for 3 years prior to that. We had known each other even before that. We were friends who fell in love. We took our time with our relationship. We took everything slowly. We thought we were on the right track.

Julie was an elementary teacher. I was a physical therapist who was in the final stages of completing his PhD, developing a career as a college professor and running a clinic at the same time. In fact, our clinic was developing a reputation that was fantastic and I was the therapist responsible for the Irish Ladies Field Hockey Association. Both Julie and I were what the world would describe as successful. We were creating a rhythm that we were comfortable with. The problem was that we were not creating the same rhythm, we were creating separate rhythms that occasionally synched up, but were often discordant.

In January of 2000 we had a life changing discussion. A painful discussion. A heartbreaking discussion that effectively changed the direction of our married life. Julie was dissatisfied with where we were going. She felt the discord, I didnt see it. She saw the different rhythms, I didnt. She was done unless there was change. I was not.

We decided that we had to change how we lived in order to save and salvage our marriage. Our plan was that if my squad failed to qualify for the Olympic Games that we would look at moving away from Belfast to start afresh. It was a big step, but it was a vitally important step. What was more important was that the decision to change was mine to make. Julie had already expressed her feelings on where we were at as a couple. If I wanted things to improve then I had to make the change. I had to accept that there was a problem, that I was the problem and that we needed to begin to move in a new direction. That was a hard decision to make, a very hard decision - because to me it felt like I was admitting defeat as a husband. It felt that by agreeing to make this change that I was accepting total responsibility for the issues we were facing. That is not an easy place to be in - but the truth of the matter was that as the husband, as the head of the household it was my position as appointed by God to lead my house. I had to change.

On April 1st 2000 I returned from the Qualifying tournament - we failed to qualify. I resigned my position, and we set about looking for a new place to restart our lives. In November 2000, we landed at Dulles Airport - Julie, Ollie (our dog) and all our worldly possessions. We were beginning a new era of our life together - we were attempting to create a joint rhythm.

Are you and your spouse creating one rhythm together or are you playing separate rhythms that only occasionally synchronize? Is it time for you to change your rhythm and begin afresh?

More to come tomorrow. Please join the discussion, and take courage to bear your heart.

How Compelling is the Story You Are Living?

2010-09-09T14:30:00.000-04:00

I just listened to a talk by Erwin McManus and was struck by one of the many great things he said. Essentially he asked the question from the title of this post. Erwin asked if the story I am currently living is compelling enough for the people who see this story to be drawn into following the things that I say or do, or am I just telling people things and expecting them to follow because I have said it?

This is a critical question. In my professional life I teach students. By my very position at the front of the class I am in a position where a group of 30+ people watch and listen to everything I say and what is worse they tend to write down pretty much every word uttered. Is my expectation that my students will just do as I say because of my position or is there a better way for me to go about my chosen profession? Maybe it would be better if I were to demonstrate the story of my experience to my students so they learn from my experience and knowledge because they are inspired to do so as opposed to being told to do so. How much more effective would my teaching be if I were to use my story to help compel them to learn our profession?

What about my life in the church? Do I lead in such a way that people see my story and are compelled in some way to do what I do or follow where I go? Do I just say things or even write things without living a compelling story and then expect people to do what I say? Where does this model of leadership come from? Where did we begin to think that people should do what we say when they are uninspired by the things they see us doing?

I think it is time to live a compelling story in all aspects of my life so that those who see it may be inspired to follow. Nowhere is this more important than with my family. How can I expect my kids to grow up and live their lives following Jesus if they do not see their daddy living his life for Him? Do my kids see me building my relationship with Jesus more than they see me on my computer or watching TV? What does my life story say to them? Time for a change. Time to live a story that is compelling, not a life that is struggling to even reach mediocrity.

Where is the Urgency?

2010-06-14T16:20:00.001-04:00

Are you in front of something? When you look behind you do you see a group of people who are looking straight at you and apparently waiting for your next move so they know what their next move is going to be? If you find yourself in that awesome position, then you have woken up to find yourself in a position of leadership.

Are you a positional leader? Are you by job description or title a leader? Does your position in your company or business necessitate that you are in from of people, but when you look around are you straining your eyes to see where all the followers are?

In the business world this lack of follower-ship can be problematic to your company's bottom line - if you are a pastor then this lack of follower-ship can mean eternal death for hundreds if not thousands of people. We live in a time when the population of the world is growing and the population in our churches is decreasing - Houston, we have a problem!

We do not have a lack of church locations, but yet we have a lack of growth of the Christian faith. How can this be the case? How can we in America have a surplus of churches and yet still have a deficit of Christianity? How have we missed the boat? Why are we in the position we are in? How are we going to get out of it?

Where is the urgency in the church? Where is the passion in the leadership of the church that compels us to give everything we have to reach those around us with the Good News? When did we swallow the lie that it is ok to be the church 'for us', but it is not ok for us to be the church for 'those people out there'? Why do we believe that 'those people out there' need to change to be more like us before they can join us? Do we seriously think that people are dying to flood into our churches and fill our pews all by themselves?

Houston, we really do have a problem - it just isnt going to happen.

We need to allow the Lord to change us and transform us to a people of URGENCY - a people who have heard the alarm bell ringing and understand that when the alarm goes off it means only one thing - FIRE!

We need to allow ourselves to accept change and new things readily and to not get stuck in the rut of 'this is how we have always done it'. We need to recognize that the cheesy-Left Behind series movies may not have all the Hollywood razzamataz, but they have one vital element - the TRUTH. Whether you enjoyed the cinematography of any of those end of the world type movies is not important - the truth that people have one life to live and if they die without knowing Christ then they are dead forever.

When will we wake up to the alarm that is ringing loudly at the minute and 'be strong and courageous' and simply invite our friends and neighbors to come to church?

When?

Please let it be soon.

Do you hear me Jason? The time is now!

GO!

My Little Pony - Its a Man Thing

2010-06-06T19:48:00.000-04:00

This week has been one of those weeks when it seemed like I was out every night, or working every night in preparation for what was a busy weekend. Friday daytime was spent putting the boat back together again followed by small group and a late night preparation time to get ready for Bowiefest on Saturday.

Saturday morning we were up and at em early and after picking up a few bits and pieces from the church at 8am I was off to Allen Pond to set up our booth for what promised to be a day of connecting with the great people of this city. Saturday was hot - from the moment I left my house it was hot. It was one of those days when being hot and sweaty was the common feeling of the day. I dont think that changed at any moment during the day to be honest. The band were due to play at 11:30am but that was never going to happen because the sound engineer who had all of the sound gear in his truck overslept and only arrived at Bowiefest at 11am. To say they were slow setting up their rig was an understatement, but by noon, JD and the gang were belting out worship tunes across the whole venue. It was awesome to walk through the vendors and stalls and see people tapping their feet to the music. I wonder if they really knew it was a worship set?

The rest of the afternoon was spent talking to people about StreetReach and what we were trying to achieve with our summer outreach. There were a number of great conversations and we will see what comes from the seeds that were planted.

Saturday night was spent enjoying the beauty of Justin and Jackie's wedding. It is always great to see friends fulfill their dream of getting married and to be a part of the beginning of their new journey together. Ending the evening with final preparation of this morning's message.

This morning went well, at least I felt it did, but it is always difficult to know how you are heard. The response seemed to be good. We will see what the week brings.

When I got home from gassing up my truck in preparation for the week, Emma was in the toy room yelling for her mom. I went in to see what the issue was that was evoking the screams. "Would you play with me daddy?" came with a little forlorn look. I was instantly met with my own message this morning - I had a choice to make. Was I going to make some selfish excuse about being tired and go sit down, or was I going to fight for my family and sit down on the floor to play with My Little Ponies. There wasn't really a choice to make. So little purple brush in hand I was designated as the head groom and had to brush all the ponies. Once the stable was completed we moved on to Barbies and the doll's house. For a little under an hour or so Emma and I played with her toys, doing the things that she wanted - and it felt fantastic. I need to keep making the right choices - regardless of how tired or busy I think I am.

Fight for your family, not with them.

Self-importance leads to self-impotence

2010-05-06T21:47:00.001-04:00

I sat in a meeting today in work, my university work, and read an e-mail informing us that one of our faculty colleagues lost her battle with cancer this week. We didnt stop our meeting, take a pause or even acknowledge the loss of a friend and co-worker. Those who read the e-mail made a few "That's sad" comments but little else. we returned to our business in an effort to complete our tasks and get finished for the day as early as possible.

I was struck by how self-absorbed this act truly was. It has set me to think today about the selfish things that we instinctively do and how so often we seem to think that somehow our selfish actions or desires are perfectly justified. we are full of our own self-importance. The refrain from the parody of that Christian song came to mind, "It's all about ME, really, and all this is for ME ...." (sung to the tune of Its all about You, Jesus). Why do we fail to look around us at the world we live in and fail to think of others above ourselves? Why is it always about us, about our desires, about our wants, about our needs?

As followers of the Way, we must have a different mindset. We must have the mind of Christ, who being in very nature God, who was made of the very same stuff that God is made of, who was equal to God the creator of the universe in every way, yet He humbled himself - ahh, there it is. He HUMBLED himself, He - the creator, the maker of all things He HUMBLED himself, He lowered himself, He wasn't lowered by someone else, He wasnt forced into it, He HUMBLED himself. And as He did that He took on the very nature of a man, the Creator became a created being. He became finite, the infinite was contained. He HUMBLED himself.

Could the simple truth be that easy? Could it really be a matter of us recognizing that regardless of our gifting or ability or position, for us to be like Christ then we must do as He did. We MUST HUMBLE ourselves. We must fight against the world as it attempts to elevate us, and we must fight against ourselves as we attempt to elevate ourselves. We must resist the urge to raise our heads above all others and we must take on the very nature of a servant. We must force ourselves to seek out a life of service, a life where we look to raise others up, a life where we spend all of our energy in exalting others and leading them to the Savior.

HUMBLE yourselves therefore, under God's mighty hand, that HE may lift you up, in due time.

YAY - BOO - how is your week going?

2010-05-03T20:54:00.000-04:00

Flying to Orange conference with Dione on Wednesday morning - YAY
Getting the call that Julie's granda had passed away - BOO

Getting inspired about reaching the family for Christ through Orange - YAY
Booking separate flights to Belfast for my wife and I to be with her family - BOO

Having local parents (Mine) who love to care for my kids - YAY
Being in Atlanta while my wife flies to Belfast - BOO

Being able to purchase a ticket to Belfast to support my wife's family - YAY
Having to wait until I could get my passport renewed to be able to fly - BOO

Having a very nice passport office worker get my passport in 5 hours - YAY
Condensing 5 days work into 5 hours to try to get everything done before leaving - BOO

Getting a call that my wife's car keys have been found after being lost for 1 week - YAY
Getting rear-ended by some guy not paying attention and crashing into... me - BOO

What's next? Tomorrow is another day

Has It Really Been A Month?

2010-04-29T19:26:00.000-04:00

Dear Blog,

Has it really been a month since I last spoke to you? Has it really been so long? I guess I have neglected you for 'the other woman' so to speak! I started my second blog with my 210 in 2010 Challenge and have put more emphasis into that site than this one.

As I write that I can't help but think about the message I just heard at the Orange Conference here in Atlanta. Doug Fields was on stage talking about how every day we have to make choices. Every day we only have 24 hours in which to accomplish all the things that we deem important. Every day we all have the same amount of time to fulfill our to-do list. What aspect of your life gets your priority? What part of your to-do list ALWAYS gets the best of your time, the pick of your energy, the quality of your day?

For many of us we struggle between a choice of giving the best of our time between one of two life arenas - our jobs and our families. So which one wins in your life? When push comes to shove and you have things left on your to-do list, do you go home only to still be at work? Do you grace your family with your physical presence only to rob them of your actual presence? When you switch off from the office, is the ride home little more than a moments respite from log-in sessions?

When you finally retire and they give you that gold watch - will your kids resent the career that stole their dad so much that they wont wish to share in the excitement of the presentation?

Let's change the scenario and swap work for CHURCH. Will you continue to argue that 'this is the Lord's work' and therefore is more important than your family? Will you weep when you sit all alone in your chair, abandoned by your kids who resent you and the 'mistress' that stole your time, 'their' time with you? How long will you neglect your family for some 'higher' calling? When will you realize that there is no higher calling than being the best dad you can be? When will you realize that the meetings will continue, even if you are not present, the discussions will go on without your input and the problems will be resolved without your assistance? When will you realize that your daughter will never dance at another 'first dance recital', that your daughter will never have another 'first soccer practice', that your daughter will never have another 5th birthday party?

Well Jason, how long will it take you to realize that the greatest call that there is on your life is to be dad. to those precious gifts that God has given you - Julie your wife, Cara and Emma your daughters.

Don't let it be long. Create habits today that will produce a family that is strong and secure. Set in place a pattern of living where you are HOME when you are home. Take time to switch off from work, to unplug from church and to focus every ounce of your being on pouring your heart and soul into your family.

That's God's call on your life.

Now go LIVE IT!!

Books of the Bible - Galloshans!

2010-03-24T15:09:00.001-04:00

This week is an important week for my precious 5 year old. This week is the week that she needs to remember the books of the bible so she can achieve her goal in AWANA and get an invite to the Achievement Party. It was suddenly my responsibility to make sure she had it all correct – at least that was what she told me.

So I sat with Cara and her AWANA book – “Matthew, Mark, Luke …” the first group rolled off the tongue relatively quickly, although she did seem to lose Romans a lot of the time. I thought, “There are a number times that I seem to forget Romans too, or at least some of the things it says in it.” We finished that first group and moved to the epistles – a little tricky for a 5 year old, but she is a smart kid and I am confident that she can do it. She steadied herself and began, “Galatians, Ephesians, Philipians, Galloshans…” I paused her for a moment and enquired what that last book was again – “Galloshans! Daddy.”

She was so close, and yet so far away from the truth. I must say that my first thought was that of Dora the Explorer's little buddy, Boots, and maybe he went to the church of Galloshans. Then I had mental images of what the Veggie Tales people would do with the concept of Paul writing a letter to the church of the Galloshans. When I snapped back to my seat at the kitchen table, I realized that the most amusing thing was that she was sure she was right – and she would today believe that Paul wrote to the Galloshans, had I not helped her see the little pen stroke that makes a C into a G wasn’t actually there.

How often do we do the very same things? How often do we believe something, and believe it strongly, only to find out that our understanding is not 100% accurate, and often it is only the smallest of pen strokes, or most innocuous of things that makes all the difference. As I reflected on this incident this morning in my commute, I was struck by how many times we draw a line in the sand and defend a position that is indefensible, if only we saw all of the facts as they were and not as we perceived them. We believe that we are right, yet we have missed one vital detail. There are even times when we have inserted a pen stroke where none existed, we have inserted information where there should not be any. We have taken our understanding of a subject and defend it as strongly as any proven truth. Yet, we are wrong.

What do you do in those times? Is saving face more important than acknowledging our error and our weakness?

What should we do at those times?

Why are those two things different?

Sticks And Stones May Break My Bones, Words Can Break My Spirit

2010-03-19T00:31:00.000-04:00

I know this is not how the famous little saying goes, but recently I have been wondering if the rhyme may be less than accurate. I have been considering the things that we say, and the way that we say them, and the power that is conveyed through our words.

The bible says in James 3:5-10,

“⁵Likewise the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. ⁶The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell. ⁷All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and creatures of the sea are being tamed and have been tamed by man, ⁸but no man can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. ⁹With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God's likeness. ¹⁰Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be.”

The tongue is a very powerful weapon, yet how often we choose to carelessly use it, and cause considerable harm in the process. There is a fine line between challenging and chastising. This became tremendously apparent last week when I was preparing dinner at home while Cara and Emma were sitting at the table. Julie had left some things on the table that the girls really didn’t need to be playing with, so I asked them to put them aside and not play with them. The first request went unheeded and so the same request was made a second time. It was at that point that my 5yr old (going on 40) said under her breath, “We were just looking at them”. This is a new phase for her – a new boundary she is learning, but this was one muttered piece of back-chat that pushed the wrong button. I turned on my heel, and using nothing but words reduced my beautiful sweet angel to tears. Through my tone, and my inflection I used the same tongue that earlier had conveyed love, to now chastise. She got the point, but I fear there may be more moments of correction before we are free of this boundary checking.

This incident set me to think that the bible is true (fancy that) and the way that we use our tongues is incredibly powerful. There are times when I stand before the congregation and try my best to issue a challenge, but after listening to the podcast later I question whether I brought more chastisement than challenge. Oh how I wish I had the wisdom to get that one right in real time. One thing I have learned though is that what may come across to one person as a challenge may be considered as chastisement by the person sitting beside them. It is a very fine line to tread.

So how do we learn to tame the only muscle in the human body with one end unattached? I think we can do no more than follow what the Lord has instructed us to do in His word. Psalm 34:13 says, “keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking lies” – we need to exercise control.

When it comes to bringing a challenge, we need to exercise control and only bring that challenge that comes from the Lord, not add our own ideas to what the Lord has given us. I think we step across the line into chastising when we don’t control our words. I pray that as we continue to grow as a body together that we will be patient with one another, holding each other up and being gracious to each other. I pray that as a family together we will use our tongues to edify and not to destroy. When we find ourselves feeling that we have been chastised, then maybe we can show grace and help the speaker understand how we feel, without making them feel the same way. When we feel that we have been challenged, then maybe we can take seriously the challenge that was made and not selectively pick out single words or phrases which we then use to disqualify ourselves from what was said.

I suppose when it comes to controlling the tongue we need to do everything that we can to keep our speech pure, and maybe we should learn to believe the best from the speaker and trust that even though their ‘challenge’ may have felt more like chastisement, it wasn’t intended to come across that way. Then we can show grace and mercy with our tongue, and edify.

I know I have a lot more to learn on this, and I hope that as we grow together you will graciously help me in that process.

Its about Prayer, not Beer

2010-03-17T15:51:00.000-04:00

Today is St Patrick’s day - a day when the whole world attempts to claim it’s Irish heritage by dressing in green, drinking beer and if you live in America, eating corned beef and cabbage. Sadly, none of these things were actually done or would even be condoned by the Irish saint (especially the corned beef and cabbage thing) whose day this is all in honor of. St Patrick brought the truth of Christianity to the people of Ireland, but only after he has been kidnapped, beaten and sold as a slave before he eventually escaped and following his call from God and traveled to the Emerald Isle with Good News.

The following prayer is attributed to St Patrick and this version is found in Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, Vol. 4, §14, critical note on St. Patrick. Schaff, notes that this Irish hymn is found in the Book of Armagh, and is "called S. Patricii Canticum Scotticum, which Patrick is said to have written when he was about to convert the chief monarch of the island (Laoghaire or Loegaire). The hymn is a prayer for the special aid of Almighty God for so important a work; it contains the principal doctrines of orthodox Christianity ... in a composition intended as a breast-plate or corselet against spiritual foes."

This St Patrick’s day why don’t you take some time to pray this prayer and find out what the real St Patrick was all about.

St Patrick’s Breastplate
I bind to myself today
The strong virtue of the Invocation of the Trinity:
I believe the Trinity in the Unity
The Creator of the Universe.

I bind to myself today
The virtue of the Incarnation of Christ with His Baptism,
The virtue of His crucifixion with His burial,
The virtue of His Resurrection with His Ascension,
The virtue of His coming on the Judgment Day.

I bind to myself today
The virtue of the love of seraphim,
In the obedience of angels,
In the hope of resurrection unto reward,
In prayers of Patriarchs,
In predictions of Prophets,
In preaching of Apostles,
In faith of Confessors,
In purity of holy Virgins,
In deeds of righteous men.

I bind to myself today
The power of Heaven,
The light of the sun,
The brightness of the moon,
The splendor of fire,
The flashing of lightning,
The swiftness of wind,
The depth of sea,
The stability of earth,
The compactness of rocks.
I bind to myself today
God's Power to guide me,
God's Might to uphold me,
God's Wisdom to teach me,
God's Eye to watch over me,
God's Ear to hear me,
God's Word to give me speech,
God's Hand to guide me,
God's Way to lie before me,
God's Shield to shelter me,
God's Host to secure me,
Against the snares of demons,
Against the seductions of vices,
Against the lusts of nature,
Against everyone who meditates injury to me,
Whether far or near,
Whether few or with many.

I invoke today all these virtues
Against every hostile merciless power
Which may assail my body and my soul,
Against the incantations of false prophets,
Against the black laws of heathenism,
Against the false laws of heresy,
Against the deceits of idolatry,
Against the spells of women, and smiths, and druids,
Against every knowledge that binds the soul of man.

Christ, protect me today
Against every poison, against burning,
Against drowning, against death-wound,
That I may receive abundant reward.

Christ with me, Christ before me,
Christ behind me, Christ within me,
Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ at my right, Christ at my left,
Christ in the fort, [i.e., at home]
Christ in the chariot seat, [i.e., traveling by land]
Christ in the poop. [i.e., traveling by water]

Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me,
Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks to me,
Christ in every eye that sees me,
Christ in every ear that hears me.

I bind to myself today
The strong virtue of an invocation of the Trinity,
I believe the Trinity in the Unity
The Creator of the Universe.

The River Looks Kinda Dirty

2010-03-07T21:48:00.000-05:00

My beautiful wife and I just returned from a fantastic short trip to see one of the 7 natural wonders - the Grand Canyon. We drove from Vegas to the South Rim of the canyon filled with anticipation of the sight that would greet us. We had seen photos and pictures, but there is usually no real comparison between the panavision and the real vision. We parked the car, and headed for the view. What a view it was! Breath taking, awesome, vast, OMG, are poor word choices which flooded my mind when I stood there on the edge of this great chasm.

As far as the eye could see to the left was a carved landscape of varying colors and eroded layers of time etched out of this barren landscape. Looking to the right provided a similarly stunning vista with the only difference being the direction the river had carved its path. One thing that was striking was the flatness of the top of the canyon that bounded this abyss. There were no mountain peaks to see, there were only sheer cliff-side drops that drew the eye eventually to the river below. When I say below, I mean way way way below. At the South Rim (where we were), it is a vertical mile (or 5,000 feet) from the rim to the river (7 miles if you walked the trail). The canyon is approximately 10 miles across from South to North rims and the canyon has a total length of some 270 miles.

I was stunned. What other emotion could one possess at that moment? What other thought could go through your head as you gazed upon this sight?

Just as I was contemplating the view I heard a voice from my right hand side. A husband and wife stood about 10 feet away from me looking at the same view I was awestruck by. The husband points to the canyon floor and says, "Look honey, there is the river." to which the most amazing statement was given in reply. The wife, with all seriousness, responds to her husband with these unforgettable words, "It looks kinda dirty, doesn't it?"

I'm sorry, what did you just say? You are looking at one of the 7 natural wonders of the world and your main concern is the fact that from over a mile away it appears as if the water in the river may not be crystal clear! I wanted to reach out the right hand of fellowship and slap the love of Jesus into that woman, but I refrained.

How can you look at a view like that and only see dirty water?

The simple answer is that this lady could make this statement because she is human - and us humans have the incredible ability to miss the obvious majesty and glory of a creator God and only notice the dirty water at the very bottom of the picture. How often do we stand in the presence of the creator of the grand canyon and instead of looking in amazement and wonder at His beauty, only comment on the dirt of the water in the river.

Lord help us.

Come Follow Me, Come Die for Me

2010-02-25T13:35:00.000-05:00

I was recently listening to a podcast featuring Rick Warren and he madethis statement which has been rolling around in my head ever since. For regular readers, things that roll around in my head for a while usually find their way out through my fingers into some sort of article. This statement is no different and has found its way to print.

When Jesus met the fishermen who would become his disciples he invited them simply to ‘Follow Him’. There was no great master plan given to them at the time. There was no discussion about salary, career path, stock options, pension plan, just a simple request – ‘Follow me’. You can read the whole story in Matthew chapter 4, but essentially Jesus sees these guys fishing, stops and talks with them and tells them to follow him and he will make them fishers of men. That’s it, that is all the information he gives. Would you have followed him? Do you follow him now?

It struck me that the same simple request that Jesus made to those first disciples is the same request that He makes to everyone today – Come, follow me. As I considered this it became apparent that when we first meet Jesus and first hear that call that we do not have a 5 year plan given to us as to what ‘following Him’ will look like, yet for many of us we took a step of faith and followed.

As you follow the lives of the disciples you see that the simple request to ‘follow me’ is quickly changed to ‘Come die for me’. In Matthew chapter 16, we see the disciples and Jesus who have been travelling through the land and spreading the Good News about the Messiah. They have seen Him feed thousands from little more than a bag lunch. They have seen countless people healed and set free from all manner of afflictions. They have seen miracle and they have seen heated discussions and attack from some of the religious leaders. However, in Matthew 16:24 they see that Jesus simple request to “Follow Me” actually has more to it. The act of following requires sacrifice – complete sacrifice. Matthew 16:24-26 says,

"Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?”

How many of us in our Christian walk have lost the eagerness to simply ‘Follow Me’ and now demand to know what is in store if we follow? How many of us have refused to ‘Follow Me’ because we think it unwise to do something that we don’t know the outcome of that activity? How many of us will only ‘Follow Me’ if we know the outcome, and will actually refuse if the outcome does not appear to be beneficial to us? How many of us count the cost first before accepting the call to ‘Follow Me’? How many of us justify our refusal to ‘Follow Me’ by saying that it would be unwise, or too expensive, or too difficult, or too painful or too whatever to simply ‘Follow Me’?

How many of us have not read Matthew 16?

We answered the call to ‘Follow Me’ and now we must answer the call to ‘Die For Me’. We need to set aside our own wants and desires, our own wisdom, or own way of doing things and get back to the child like faith where we said “YES!” when Jesus whispered ‘Follow Me’.

Following Jesus is not safe. Following Jesus is not comfortable. Following Jesus is painful. Following Jesus is difficult. Following Jesus brings rejection. Following Jesus brings separation of brother from brother, or from children to parents. Following Jesus costs – a lot.

Does this describe your Christian walk?

Are you really following?

Are you really dying?

Do You Hear That? - That is the sound of family time

2010-02-10T09:27:00.000-05:00

As we wake on another beautiful new day of snowfall, school closings, government shut downs, icy roads, treacherous travel conditions, what are you thinking? It struck me last night that the past five or six days have probably for many been the longest period of time that families have spent together, unable to go anywhere or really see anyone else. So how is that going for you? Are you ready to strangle someone? Or have you found that this gift of time with your family has been an opportunity to strengthen your family?

When you look back at the snow of 2009/10 what will your memories be? When your kids look back at the snow of 2009/10, what will their memories be? Will your kids eyes light up as they recall the day when daddy crawled through the snow with them to build that snow fort or snow man? Will their memories be of the fact that mom and dad were home with them for a long time and each day was a new adventure? How have you taken this enforced family time to build your family and strengthen your bonds with your kids?

If you are like me then you have probably had those times when you just wished the roads were open enough for you to slip slide your way to a store just for a break from the noise that kids can generate. Sadly, when I think of these types of thoughts my heart aches that I miss the opportunity to see the potential in giving my kids all of my time and attention and wish for 'peace and quiet'.

Today, I will do the work that I need to do when my kids are asleep, but when they are awake I am going to give them all of my time. I want my kids to look back at this snow fall as the time when daddy and mommy just hung out with them, played with them, did cut and stick projects and were a family.

Today, let's be family, let's create good memories, let's laugh with our kids, let's fill our family with love.

Ready, steady, love on your kids.

Out of the Mouths of Babes

2010-02-01T12:57:00.000-05:00

I am constantly amazed at my girls. Usually I am amazed at how much volume two little tykes can create, that and their ability to turn a perfectly organized and cleaned up play room or craft room into a scene from "Earthquake!". How can they not just take one toy out, play with it, then put it back where it came from? Is it really that difficult? Then I looked over at my home office desk and realized that this little trait was genetic and they had no hope of maintaining a neat and tidy play-room, but they would learn to clean it up every week.

Last night we reached a whole new level of amazement. This week, Julie and I have started a new venture with our kids - they get a nickel for helping out around the house with the daily necessities like making the bed, tidying the aforementioned play room. There is a sticker chart now adorning their bedroom wall and each night they recount the activities they have done to be good helpers. We are trying not to use the word 'chores' because it has such negative connotations and 'child labor' might get us arrested - so helping around the house it is.

Well, last night was payment night - we were late by a couple of days due to a lack of nickels - and Cara sat with three little jars in front of her. The first jar was for the Church, the second was for Savings and the third was for Spending. Our plan is that on 'pay-day' we will begin to teach them now how to handle their money so when they get to our age they might be better than we are at it.

$2.70 was placed in front of Cara in nickels (did I mention child labor?) and Julie began to explain that 10% immediately goes to the Church, 20% immediately goes to Savings and the rest does not go to Spending - it goes in a pile from which Cara can decide which of the three jars it goes to. Julie and I sat there as the wheels were turning in Cara's little mind and she reached out, grabbed a handful of her coins and poured them into the Church jar. Julie asked Cara if she realized that once the money went in the jar she couldn't take it back out again, and that if she took Emma to the store to spend some of her money and Cara could only spend what was in her 'Spending' jar. My little 5 year old never skipped a beat and looking at her mom said, "I want all this to go to Haiti. I dont need to buy anything this week. I have enough. Can I give it all to Haiti?"

My heart melted. My wife and I looked at each other across the kitchen table and were nearly overcome that here our little angel was old enough to realize that she is blessed and that there are children in the world who have nothing, and whatever she could give to help them out, she wanted to do.

Wow!

Moments later, our little one came into the kitchen, she had been in another room and hadn't been a part of the previous discussion with Cara. It was time to settle our account with her too. She had been equally as busy and had earned the grand total of $2.65. Once again, three jars were set out with Church, Savings and Spending on them. The pile of nickels was laid out in front of Emma and the same explanation given. Julie counted out 10% for Church, 20% for savings and the remaining pile was once again hers to decide over. She looked at the nickels in front of her and then looked at her mom. She reached out her hand, grabbed a handful of nickels and said, "I want to give this to the homeless people, where is the 'homeless people' jar?" Once again Julie explained that once she had given it away, she couldn't get it back and if we went to the store for Cara to spend her money then Emma would not have anything to spend. "That's ok mom, I want to give it all to the homeless people, which jar does it go in?"

My wife and I sat with 6 little glass jars in front of us, 3 for Cara and three for Emma. Two jars marked 'Savings' had approximately 50c in them, two jars marked 'Church' had approximately $2.20 in them and two jars marked 'Spending' were empty. My girls may not be good at cleaning up their rooms, but I will trade that for the rest of their days if they continue to live with generous spirits that see the need that others have as far superior to any need they may have.

I love my kids, and I love my wife for teaching and modeling these principles so well. After all, the girls had to learn this from somewhere.

Whats in a Name?

2010-01-27T16:33:00.000-05:00

I have the privilege of speaking at an upcoming winter retreat for Faith Community Church in Crofton in a couple of weeks. It is kind of weird but from the moment I was asked the passage that I have felt was right for the weekend was the passage in Matthew 16:13-20 where Jesus asks Peter who people say Jesus was. Jesus is not looking for the names that they called him, but more what they were saying about him. Were people calling Him the Son of God or a prophet, or simply just a carpenter? Jesus moves from the general to the specific really quickly in this passage and asks Peter who he says Jesus is.

What name does Peter have for Jesus? What description does Peter choose? These questions led me to consider how the answer Peter gave Jesus was a strange one. Peter doesnt respond by saying Jesus' name back to him, he uses words that describe what Jesus has done and who he is through demonstration and not description.

Peter says, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God..." He doesnt even mention Jesus' name - just His character. I wonder how many of us have become defined by our character as opposed to our given names, and how many of us have the character worthy of such a description. Or I wonder how many of us have given up the truth of our birth names with all of their meanings and have accepted the names that peers have given us, or that society has given us. How many of us have given up our names and accepted names like 'loser', 'dummy', 'idiot'. How many of us have accepted those names and have become defined by the names that we have been called? How many of us have been called stubborn and therefore remained inflexible? How many of us have been labeled as losers and believed that we will never amount to anything, and therefore we have given up and stopped trying?

I think God wants to change some names at this retreat. What about your name? Does it need changed too?

Mustard and Ketchup?

2010-01-20T23:56:00.000-05:00

There is an interesting group that has caught my eye, and my heart at present. This capture came about in a God designed whim when we attended a session at Catalyst 2009 that we were not planning on attending. The speaker at that session described the simplest of things which struck home with the magnitude of a lightning bolt.

He described how God had ordained two institutions in the scriptures - the church, and the family. Throughout the bible the Lord has a special place for these two groups. He repeatedly refers to them, declares His love for them and states His intention to rescue each of them. God loves families and God loves the church.

The simple question is, does the family love the church and the church love the family?

This seems like a simple question from the outset, however if we really consider what we do with these two institutions then we might be a little concerned over what we find. In church we are very pro-family. In fact, we are so pro-family that we have employed staff who's job it is to reach out to our children or our youth or our adults all with the purpose of connecting them to church. However, there is one missing link. We do a great job trying to reach and connect these three groups SEPARATELY, however we are not that intentional about reaching the whole family at the same time.

Is it even possible to do that? Is it possible to somehow do church together in such a way that we effectively reach the entire family at the same time - together? There are some great folks at a group called Orange - if the family were a color it would be red and the church would be yellow, mix those two and you get Orange - who believe that it is not only possible to blend the church and the family, it is essential. If we were somehow able to intentionally reach the whole family through church then we would have somehow been able to blend these two God ordained institutions. Wouldn't that be a good thing?

I think I will read some more of the Think Orange book and see what the Lord has to say. Why dont you check out the folks at Orange and see what God says to you. Post your comments and let me know if you get any insights.

How Can We Help?

2010-01-14T11:11:00.000-05:00

If you are like me then you will have sat in silence, dumbstruck at the events of the past few days in Haiti. For many we may not know much about this little country or its people. We may not even know where Haiti is, but the devastation that has occurred there must move us. I have a friend who works with the Community Coalition for Haiti (web site link is above) and he has traveled to Haiti for week long medical missions twice a year for a number of years. He has been busy working with INOVA Fairfax hospital in preparing to send three teams to Haiti this coming weekend.

While we may not be able to do much ourselves, we can support those who are helping. I want to encourage you to make a donation to CCH by following this link Give to Haiti Relief and please continue to pray for the people in Haiti and the rescue of those still trapped.

You can follow CCH on Twitter by going here

Be Still ...

2010-01-07T15:39:00.000-05:00

Today I am working on next Wednesday's theme for our week of prayer and fasting - BE STILL ...

If you have any bible knowledge then there are probably a couple of verses that jump to mind when you hear those two words. The first for me is the passage in the book of Psalms where we are commanded by the Lord to 'Be still, and know that I am God". The second passage that comes to mind is when Jesus was asleep in the back of a boat having preached all day and a storm blows up. Jesus is sleeping, the storm is raging and the disciples are panicking - hmm, a common occurrence in the bible I think. The disciples are so afraid that they are going to die that they wake Jesus up so He can save them. I always found it interesting that fishermen would wake a carpenter up in the midst of a sailing crisis, but I digress.

So we join the story with Jesus, just being woken by a bunch of scaredy-cat fishermen whining about the wind and the waves. Mark tells us that Jesus, 'got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, "Quiet! Be still!" Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.' Then he shared a few harsh words with the disciples about their lack of faith and presumably went back to sleep - the story doesn't tell us that part.

Be still - two simple words, spoken as commands in two places in the bible - once by the Father in Psalm 46:10 "Be still and know that I am God" and then by the Son in Mark 4:39. When Jesus spoke the words there was an immediate threat to the safety and welfare of the disciples, at least as they perceived it. Have you ever considered that the same two words spoken by the Father in Psalm 46 were spoken with the same authority and command as those spoken by Jesus to the wind and the waves. Have you ever considered that the command given in Psalm 46:10 should be responded to by us in the same way that the wind and the waves responded to Jesus.

Is it possible that when the Lord says, "Be still ..." that we are actually supposed to BE STILL? Is it beyond the realm of possibility that when we read the rest of Psalm 46 and the trouble that the author describes the children of Israel being in, that this command to BE STILL was the LORD telling the children of Israel to quieten down, to stop thrashing about and causing a commotion and to allow Him to be God? Could the same be true for us today?

Next Wednesday I want to encourage our church to obey the command of Psalm 46:10 and to BE STILL. I want to encourage myself and our whole congregation to stop trying to come up with the solution to our problems, to stop getting all agitated about situations around us, to stop, to BE STILL.

That will be an interesting day of surrender.

ONE THING

2010-01-06T14:33:00.000-05:00

During this week I have been preparing for next week’s prayer and fasting week and I have had a scripture rolling around in my head that I wasn’t really sure what to do with. The verse is in Isaiah 43:18-19. It reads, “¹⁸ "Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. ¹⁹ See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.”

There is a lot in this verse – let’s break it down. The rest of the chapter before these verses is the Lord telling the children of Israel who He is and how much He cares for them. God follows this declaration of who He is with this incredible statement – Forget the former things. In other words, what has happened in the past is in the past, it is time to leave it, move on and forget it.

What a powerful verse that is, and yet how incredibly difficult it is to achieve too. How many of us live with our minds on things that have happened to us in the past? How many of us ‘dwell’ on things that have happened to us in the past? How many of us hold on to our past hurts and fears like they are our favorite teddy bear – no-one can pry our fingers off of them? How many of us need to hear these words from the LORD? I believe that as we enter this season of fasting we need to hear these words – FORGET THE FORMER THINGS, DO NOT DWELL ON THE PAST.

As we begin our fast I want to challenge myself and all of us to forget the things that have happened to us in the past. I know that many of us have been hurt by the church, and by leaders and people in the church. I have walked on both sides of that line in my past – I have been hurt, and to my shame I have caused hurt. If you know of a situation where you have caused hurt or pain to a brother or sister then please take time to repent and seek forgiveness. If you are holding on to hurts from the past that have been inflicted on you, then I want to encourage you to take a step and LET THOSE HURTS GO. This does not excuse hurts from the past, but it releases us to move forward. We hold on to our pain and it not only stifles our walk with God but it also cripples our relationship with anyone we perceive to have hurt us in the past.

In this verse in Isaiah God says “FORGET THE FORMER THINGS”. The greatest news in this comes in verse 19. The reason we need to forget the former things is because God says this, “See, I am doing a new thing!” God wants to do a new thing in you and through you. God wants to do a new thing at Mt Oak. If you quickly mentally asked “why ?” , or internally said, “No He doesn’t” then I want you to seriously consider if you have forgotten the former things. This verse doesn’t command us to forget the bad former things, it commands us to forget all the former things, good and bad.

I am doing a new thing! Those must be among the most exciting words in the bible – a creator God, the Almighty declares “I am doing a new thing!” I believe that as we forget the former things and ask God to show us the “new thing” He is doing then we will be amazed at where the Lord wants to lead us personally and lead us collectively as Mt Oak.

What is the NEW THING you would like to see God do in your life? What is the NEW THING you would like to see God do in Mt Oak? In the New Testament, Jesus told a story of a rich young ruler – in Luke 18: 18-29 – and in this story the young man asks what he needs to do to get into heaven, especially since he had kept the law from a young age. Jesus answers him with these words, “You still lack one thing.” Jesus then goes on to highlight the area of the young man’s life where he had not let go – where he had not forgotten the things that were behind. The young man was rich, he had everything he needed, and he knew it. Jesus tells him that the ONE THING he lacks is complete trust on the Lord – he trusted in his stuff.

What is the ONE THING that Jesus would tell me if I were in that situation. I doubt it would be wealth, but I am sure there is ONE THING. What ONE THING would Jesus say that you lack? What ONE THING would Jesus say you are holding on to from the past? What ONE THING do you need to “FORGET” and move on from?

This week, maybe we need to just listen for ONE THING. Maybe we need to FORGET SOME FORMER THINGS.

Lord, show me the ONE THING that I lack, and the FORMER THINGS that I need to FORGET.

Maybe you are in a place where you do not lack ONE THING, but you need to hold on to ONE THING. The apostle Paul wrote in Philippians 3:13-14, “¹³Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But ONE THING I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, ¹⁴I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”

The apostle Paul takes these two ideas of forgetting what is behind and holding on to ONE THING. He sets the example for us to stop living in the past, stop comparing the present with the past, stop comparing people in our lives today with people who used to be in our lives, stop living in times gone by and forgetting what happened then, forgetting the good things and the bad things for ONE reason. The reason we forget the former things is so that we can fix our eyes on the GOAL – we can fix our eyes on the NEW THING the Lord is doing, we can focus everything within us to strain towards the GOAL to win the prize.

As we enter this week of fasting, let’s take this exhortation seriously.

Forget the things from the past

Desire the NEW THING God wants to do

Focus your life towards the GOAL to win the prize.

Let God be your ONE THING.

Seeking God's Face - Will You Surrender?

2010-01-05T22:39:00.000-05:00

It's Tuesday, only a few days before we embark on a special journey. Only a few days before we have the opportunity to put ourselves in a place where change can occur. A place where real change can come. But it takes just one thing. It takes our willingness to submit.This incoming week of prayer and fasting will be much more difficult for most of us than we think.

For many of us we have thought about the physical difficulties that we will face as we deny ourselves food, or certain foods, or technology or whatever it is we believe God is asking us to give up.

I wonder how many of us have considered the cost that next week will bring on who we are. I wonder how many of us have thought that next week might just be the time when we deconstruct our dysfunctional relationship with the Lord or with our friends, spouse, family, and then wait as He lovingly reconstructs us to e the person that God wants us to be.

I wonder if we think that we are just going to spend time telling God the things that we want or feel we need, or have we grasped the enormity of the possibility that we will simply put ourselves in the presence of the living almighty God of the universe, and He may wna to make some adjustments.

Will we be willing to change? Will we be willing to allow Him to break us? "But what will people think or me if they really find out what I am like?" "Will people still want to be in the same church or small group as me when they learn that I am not the person I portray myself to be?" "How can people follow me if they learn the sort of terrible things that I do when I don't think I can be seen or will get caught?"

I believe that this week is a critical point in the life of our church. It is a time when we can allow the Holy Spirit to sweep through his house and clean away long held positions and fears and replace them with passion and love. It is a time when the Holy Spirit can take a tired and weary people who have become tired in rebuilding the walls and strengthen their hands and reignite the fire in their hearts to continue the work that the Lord has set before us.

I believe that this incoming week could be a week that is looked back on as a 'red letter week' in the history of Mt Oak. This week could be a week when we truly humble ourselves and pray and seek His face and His righteousness. This week could be the beginning of something great.

Or it could be just another week, except one where our stomachs growl more frequently.

You decide.

Fasting is Fun

2010-01-04T11:03:00.001-05:00

As we get ready for the start of our fast I wanted to write what will hopefully be an encouragement to all who are considering joining us on our fast but yet have that hesitancy that is distracting them. Let's be honest, undertaking a week of denying yourself food, or any comfort for that matter will not be easy. I wonder who said life was going to be easy anyway? James said, "Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds ...". Now I know what you are thinking, but these trials are self inflicted. We could endure the trials of our faith being challenged by a co-worker, or the trials of being different in our family for Jesus' sake. But when we are inflicting the trials on ourselves it is a little different.

I read an article in the January edition of Charisma (click here) which was very encouraging. The article (if you didnt follow the link) was entitled 'Start the New Year with Extraordinary Prayer' and describes a 21 day fast that one church is undertaking, but the length of time of the fast doesn't matter - you don't get more brownie points in heaven the longer you go without food. The key thing is the attitude you take into the fast and the way you spend your time when you are on the fast.

The piece that struck me was the reason they gave as to why they fasted at the beginning of the year. They were three-fold:

You set the course for the rest of the year by how you start the year. If you begin the year with prayer and fasting then you set the rest of the year up to be successfully dedicated to the Lord. Just like praying at the beginning of the day often sets the rest of the day up and covers anything that may occur, so fasting at the beginning of the year sets up the whole year. Maybe we should carry that on into other areas of life - like giving God the first part of the day, giving God the first part of the week (Sunday), giving God the first part of our income (offerings and tithes), giving God the first consideration in every decision we make.
Blessings will occur because you set aside time at the start of the year to fast and pray.
Fasting at the beginning of the year sets us in line with Matthew 6:33, "Seek FIRST the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you." So if we seek Him FIRST then we should be expectant for ALL THESE THINGS to be added.

Wow! some simple truths that when we are reminded of them should change our attitude of a fast from something to be endured to something to be anticipated and enjoyed.

Let Your Kingdom come, and Your will be done O Lord.

I Can't Poo! and other unwanted physical reactions to fasting

2009-12-30T12:01:00.003-05:00

As we prepare our hearts for the upcoming time of fasting, we also need to prepare our bodies and understand that when we have an extended period without food then there are some common physical reactions that we can expect.

I think the first thing that must be stated is that fasting from food is not for everyone. There are certain medical issues where the regulation of blood sugar levels is critical and anyone who has an ongoing medical condition or a medical condition which requires regular medications is best advised to contact their doctor about whether or not fasting is appropriate for them, and if it is, how many meals per day should they miss.

For those of us who have no medical reason not to fast, the biggest obstacle is mental. We don't fast because we don't want to fast. We have never missed a meal without buckling over in two with pangs of hunger (slight exaggeration, but you get the picture). Well, there are some physical reactions that can be anticipated when we deprive our bodies of food and I thought I would give you some practical tips today.

Preparation not constipation - when your body takes food in, it passes through your digestive system visiting various interesting and fun places like the stomach, the duodenum, the colon and finally - well you know what comes next. When the input of food ceases there is nothing coming along the pipes to keep the flow going and motion stops - quite literally. With a prolonged fast there is a possibility that constipation can set in. To avoid this then a few days before the fast prepare your body by adding fruit to your diet, or roughage - salad, bran muffins etc. Preparation is the key. Don't panic if you get to day three and realize that your morning constitution has undergone some reforms with a filibuster in place. Once you begin to eat again, everything will get back on track.

For the caffeine addicts - when you start your fast and you drink your last cup of morning coffee, you will probably experience a headache at some point during the 1st or 2nd day. This is sadly a normal occurrence as your body is craving the caffeine you so regularly feed it. Rest assured that like the constipation, this too will pass.

Hunger pangs - as described in yesterday's blog, there will be hunger pangs and this is mostly because you have a habit of eating at certain times during the day. Your body doesn't necessarily need to have food, it is just programmed to have food. Most of us have plenty of fat reserves to last us through a lot more days of not eating than the 6 we will be undertaking. Some of us even have a little additional stored up from the winter - that's because some of us are smarter than the average bear! When you get hungry, drink a glass of water. When you get hungry, take time to pray. After a day or so the hunger pangs will decrease and even disappear altogether.

Unpleasant social issues - coldness, bad breath, more intense body odor, aches and pains (usually in longer fasts than ours) and changes in sleeping/dreaming patterns have all been identified as potential physical reactions to fasting. Some of these only occur with long term (21 day or 40 day) fasts but you may experience some of them in the 6 days of our fast.

More information is found on this Campus Crusade for Christ International site and you might want to check it out - http://www.ccci.org/growth/growing-closer-to-god/how-to-fast/10-expected-physical-effects.aspx

If You Liquidise a Happy Meal, Does It Still Count?

2009-12-29T23:30:00.005-05:00

So, yesterday we looked at an interesting piece of American history where the President actually decreed that there should be a National Day set aside for prayer and fasting - of course, the President was Abraham Lincoln, but who is he compared to the geniuses we have had in office recently? But no politics here, this post is about the practice of fasting - what do you actually do when you undertake a fast?

Essentially a fast is a relatively simple spiritual discipline which is not merely suggested in the bible but is expected. Jesus said in Matthew 6:16, "When you fast ..." and then he goes on to instruct us not to let our faces betray our internal hunger pains by running around looking pitiful because we haven't eaten breakfast.

The simplicity of fasting is this - we set aside a period of time in which we decide that we will deny our bodies the cravings that it has, in particular food, and focus our minds, souls and spirits on seeking the Lord. We have chosen to set aside 6 days for fasting - well, beginning after church on Sunday January 10th until after our special evenign celebration on Friday January 15th. So for that entire time, I want to encourage as many people in our church to decide that they will abstain from food and will only consume liquids.

I remember a number of years ago when my previous church was in the middle of a week long fast, there was a rumor going around that one of the guys had figured out that since we were fasting solid food and consuming water, a liquid, then maybe it would be ok if he put a steak in a blender and liquefied it. If you could get it up a straw then really, would it count against you in your fast?

Now please let common sense prevail, but I would encourage you to set your mind to only consuming liquids - primarily water, but other possibilities are fruit juices but really you should avoid any tea or coffee or any drink with caffeine in it.

But won't I be hungry? How will I cope in work without having something to eat all day? Well, the simple answer is, yes, you will be hungry, at least for the first two days, but not because you have to eat, but more because you are conditioned to eat - three squares a day. We most commonly eat not out of hunger, but out of habit. We eat lunch at the same time every day, even before we have any pains of hunger, we check our watch and determine it is time to eat. After a couple of days of ignoring those demands from your body, you will break the habit of eating and actually often begin to not feel hungry anymore. I know this is hard to believe, but it really does happen. The fasts that I have done that have been the least hunger driven were the ones where I only drank water and didn't drink anything else, no hot chocolate, or coffee or soup or broth - just water.

On another savory note, before you begin a fast, it is a good idea to eat a lot of fruit the day before so your morning constitution can clear the way so to speak. Once you begin your fast you will have nothing in your system to push along any digesting or completely digested food and there is a risk of constipation. The best way to cure this is to avoid it happening in the first place with a little preparation and planning of roughage and fruit the day before.

The most important thing about fasting is not the lack of food intake, but it is what you do with the time that you would normally have spent on preparation and even eating the meal. You have just instantly freed up a couple of hours in your day in which you can take some time to pray and seek God's face.

This can even be more difficult for some than going without food. For a fast to be an effective spiritual discipline we need to take time to seek the Lord. Most people can spend some time in prayer when they have a list of things that they can bring to God and ask Him to fix, heal, stop, start, whatever it is, it is always easier to pray when you have your list ready. But what about coming to God just to hang out with God? What about seeking Him just for the sake of seeking Him? That will be the subject of tomorrow's posting.

Posting about Fasting For a While

2009-12-28T09:35:00.003-05:00

We announced yesterday in church that we will be holding a week of prayer and fasting at Mt Oak from Sunday January 10th to Friday January 15th. I thought I would share some insights and thoughts into fasting over the next week or so.

I thought we would start with some history:

Proclamation Appointing a National Fast Day

Washington, D.C. March 30, 1863

Senator James Harlan of Iowa, whose daughter later married President Lincoln's son Robert, introduced this Resolution in the Senate on March 2, 1863. The Resolution asked President Lincoln to proclaim a national day of prayer and fasting. The Resolution was adopted on March 3, and signed by Lincoln on March 30, one month before the fast

day was observed.

By the President of the United States of America.

A Proclamation.

Whereas, the Senate of the United States, devoutly recognizing the Supreme Authority and just Government of Almighty God, in all the affairs of men and of nations, has, by a resolution, requested the President to designate and set apart a day for National prayer and humiliation.

And whereas it is the duty of nations as well as of men, to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions, in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon; and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord.

And, insomuch as we know that, by His divine law, nations like individuals are subjected to punishments and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war, which now desolates the land, may be but a punishment, inflicted upon us, for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole People? We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us!

It behooves us then, to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.

Now, therefore, in compliance with the request, and fully concurring in the views of the Senate, I do, by this my proclamation, designate and set apart Thursday, the 30th. day of April, 1863, as a day of national humiliation, fasting and prayer. And I do hereby request all the People to abstain, on that day, from their ordinary secular pursuits, and to unite, at their several places of public worship and their respective homes, in keeping the day holy to the Lord, and devoted to the humble discharge of the religious duties proper to that solemn occasion.

All this being done, in sincerity and truth, let us then rest humbly in the hope authorized by the Divine teachings, that the united cry of the Nation will be heard on high, and answered with blessings, no less than the pardon of our national sins, and the restoration of our now divided and suffering Country, to its former happy condition of unity and peace.

In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington, this thirtieth day of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty seventh.

By the President: Abraham Lincoln
William H. Seward, Secretary of State.

Is it Just Me or is Anyone Else Wrecked?

2009-12-15T19:52:00.003-05:00

Today marked the end of one very long and busy semester for me. Sixteen weeks ago I embarked on a journey with 31 gifted young students, all eager to learn everything they could about the subject I am supposed to be an expert in. I spent over 30 hours a week teaching this fine young group all the skills I could transfer. At the end of it all, they all successfully completed their examinations and wil progress to the next stage of their career preparation. They won, and I did as well.

At the same time, I continued to work in the clinic for some 12 hours a week or so putting my skills to the test and helping people regain their function back. There have been a number of wins during the past few months.

As if this wasn't enough to keep me busy, I continued to try to serve my church as best I could with every ounce of leadership that remained. We did some things that we have never done before - like starting and leading a small group, the brunch and the outreach at Applebees - epic wins, and we did a lot of things that we have always done, most of them wins.

With all of this potential chaos going on it was possible that my most favorite treasures could be left out - my girls, all three of them. While there were times when all the busy-ness of the previous activities took over, I tried my best to work hard to giving them as much of my best as I could. Sadly, I didn't always win, but I tried to win every week.

So now, it is Christmas break - and what do I want? Some rest, lots of time with my girls, a chance to re-charge my batteries, time to read my bible, time to read some new books and some more time with my girls.

Let the active rest begin.

I want Oceans of it!

2009-11-18T16:18:00.003-05:00

I sat in the movie theater in Bowie a few weeks ago with a number of good friends patiently awaiting the start of the ‘show’ for that evening. The lights dimmed, the screen darkened to black, the music began to play in that dramatic theatrical way and then it happened. My world was rocked. My world was challenged, by feelings were insulted, my senses were challenged and my mind was blown and my heart was issued the ultimate challenge.

You see, when we go to a movie theater we expect to be entertained, to have our conscience stroked, to have a place where the wounds of the day or week can be salved over with good feelings and the balm of laughter. We long for the escape that the movie theater often brings with its other worlds that delight and stimulate, its display of far off lands that offer intrigue and adventure. We salivate at the thought that one day, just one day, we might be able to trade places with the lead character, we might be the one that comes out on top, we might be the ones that get the girl, or the guy. We might be the ones who ride off into the setting sun with victory under our belt, love in our hearts and gold in our pockets. Just one day we might be the people on the big screen.

As I sat with my friends around me in that dimly lit shrine to the ‘possibility of what may be’ I was excited, I was eager to be an active part of what I was about to view. I was filled with anticipation of what was to come and the wonder of imagination as to how I might take the starring role in a similar production that would never reach the silver screen. I was ready.

Those feelings quickly changed. What happened in the next few moments stole all of those feelings away. The next few minutes of darkness, narration and written text did not fulfill my anticipation. The next few moments did not fill me with awe and wonder, they did not set my heart racing with the anticipation of what would follow or how I could see myself in the sequel.

The next few moments stripped my heart bare. The next few lines of prose reduced my anticipation to angst. The next few moments reduced me to a humbled position of reality. Reality of the world we live in and reality of how blessed I am with my version of this world we live in.

The narrator’s softly spoken voice conveyed a truth so un-mistakable that there was little else to do but allow the tear to form and slowly fall down my cheek. There was nothing else to do but listen to the words, to watch the images before. There was nothing else to do but to wonder what I could do.

As I listened my heart began to break, my world began to shake and my ideals were once again challenged with the reality of the world we live in. As I listened with my ears to the words of the narrator I was unable to close the ears of my heart to the deafening cry of my Savior. I couldn’t drown His voice out with soda or popcorn. I haven’t been able to drown His voice out for 2 weeks now. I pray I never will be able to.

My prayer is that these words of prose will grip me so deeply that I will never be the same again.

My prayer is that these words will disturb me so much that I can do nothing but answer His cry and change my life to reach out hands of justice. My prayer is that I will want what God wants – as deeply as He wants it.

“I can't stand your religious meetings.

I'm fed up with your conferences and conventions.
I want nothing to do with your religion projects,
your pretentious slogans and goals.

I'm sick of your fund-raising schemes,
your public relations and image making.

I've had all I can take of your noisy ego-music.
When was the last time you sang to me?

Do you know what I want?

I want justice—oceans of it.
I want fairness—rivers of it.

That's what I want.
That’s all I want.”

Amos 5:21-23 (The Message)

http://www.theiheartfilm.com/

Thoughts on Church - Membership

2009-11-01T20:05:00.004-05:00

Next week I will be preaching at our church and the subject matter, well at least part of it, concerns the church. I have spent some time over the past few weeks listening to podcasts, reading articles and of course, reading the bible in preparation for next week. This week Rev Ray posted an interesting article on his web site - http://raymcd.blogspot.com/ - which asked a couple of questions about church membership.

Church membership is one of the things that I have been considering recently - well, more so I have been wondering why we have it. Church membership is an interesting concept, because, unlike other memberships that one may have, there are actually few, if any, perks that come with church membership. There are no "Member's Only" sections in churches, at least I hope there aren't. No 'Member's Only' parking spots. There are no special rates for members - a tithe is still 10%, even for members. Your prayer requests don't get jumped to the head of the prayer list just because you are a member. So what is the point of membership? More importantly, is there a danger to having church membership? Could people feel excluded from our community if they are not identified as a member? Does the rhetoric we use set up invisible barriers to people belonging to our church?

As I have thought about why churches have membership lists I can only think that they do so to identify those who are 'with them'. I guess that churches have membership rolls so they can provide a list of all the people who have decided that this particular church is the body with whom they will work and serve to build the kingdom. But does that truly require membership - or does it simply require demonstration? Are there people on the membership roll of a church who have taken a class, signed a declaration, or made some specific statement that are not working alongside the church to further the kingdom? Are there even people on those lists who are actively working against the direction of the church due to some grievance or aggravation they perceive to have been foisted upon them? What about those 'members' who are inactive, or move away to another city or state? Their name is on a list, but their demonstration of alongside-ness has ceased.

If the idea behind membership of a church is to help to identify a group of core people who can be counted upon to work with the church to fulfill its mission then how tough should the joining process be? I once heard it said that a church should be hard to join and easy to leave. The harder the joining process involved then the greater opportunity for prospective members to prove that their actions will demonstrate that they will be active supporters of the mission of the church. If the joining process is too easy then is there a greater risk of people becoming members and then not fulfilling their membership duties? What if we made the membership process more stringent, where people took time to complete a series of steps. During this time they would be demonstrating that they are willing to give their time, energy and money to support the work of the church? I wonder how many 'members' we would have in our churches if this were the case? I also wonder if some of the issues we currently face would vanish too with those who should not stay connected to our bidy but should move on to find one where their gifts and talents could be better used.

I know that for some this discussion could be a difficult concept - but maybe it is time to look at the things that we have always done and ask ourselves a few questions:

Are these practices biblical?

Are these practices practical?

Are these practices hindering anyone from joining our community as they travel along their own spiritual journey?

What would really happen if we ceased these practices?

Just some thoughts on the church. Check back this week for more thoughts as I try to sift through the information in my head and hear the voice of the Lord for this week's message.

I covet your prayers this week and hope to see you in Mt Oak on Sunday morning. If you read this and dont live close enough to travel to our church this week then check out the podcast of the message next Monday morning when it is available.

What Would Jesus Google? - for Marty

2009-10-27T15:04:00.003-04:00

Ok, so I said I was going to write something and asked for ideas. The idea that was posted on my Facebook was this - 'how about Jesus using google'. So here goes.

Would Jesus use Google, and if so then what would He Google.

Well for some people they might get upset at this very question. After all, why would the God of the universe who was before all things were made, (even Google)have the need to look up anything on the internet. Why would I even consider such an insane notion.

Well, here is what I think. If Jesus were alive today, under the same circumstances that He was alive 2000+ years ago, then absolutely YES, JESUS WOULD USE GOOGLE.

THUD!! did I hear someone hit the floor? Why? Why would that surprise you? I guess that people would think that the Son of God would know everything, why would He have need of a computer or a search engine? well, here is why.

When Jesus came to the earth 2000 years ago, He did so under some specific conditions. According to Philipians 2:6-7 we read this:

"Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing,taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness."

When Jesus came to earth, He was fully God, but He set aside everything that was in Him that was God and became FULLY MAN. Jesus had no greater ability while here on earth than you or I do. He set aside everything that was divine in Him - he did not consider equality with God something to be grasped - He did not believe that having equal power with God was something He should hold on to. Jesus came to be just like us - how could He be just like us if He had all the power of the creator of the universe?

Jesus emptied Himself and took on human form.

So, if Jesus is just like you and me, and He was on earth today, where do you think He would go for His information? In His day He spent time with the scholars and teachers of the law - in the temple. There are not that many wise men hanging out in churches these days - probably get in trouble for that - but lets face it, there are a lot smarter people that we can learn from out there online.

I think that if Jesus were living on earth today and He had a question He would do two things - ask His Father in heaven, and use Google - and in that order.

Which order do you use?

Maybe the real question is not would Jesus use Google, but why dont we seek Jesus for answers.

See you in Mt Oak this Sunday - 10:30am - be there, Jesus will be, Google wont.

Naked and Unashamed - how church should be

2009-10-22T11:49:00.003-04:00

In Genesis Chapter 1 we read the story of how God created the world. We read how He made the sun and the moon, and the land and the sea, the birds of the air and the fish in the sea, and after every day of creation there was one comment that God made - it is good. Everything that He made was good. Now if we read in Gen 1:26 we see these words,Then God said, "Let us make man in our image..." Have you ever wondered who He was talking to? Well, He was talking to Himself really - He was talking to Jesus and the Holy Spirit. God is not separate, He is three persons in one. He is three persons living together in perfect harmony. He is three persons who exalt each other above themselves. The Father glorifies the Son, the Son glorifies the Father, the Holy Spirit glorifies the Son. They all raise each other up, they all glorify each other, there is no hierarchy, there is no selfishness, there is no me, there is only WE.

Read on a little further in Genesis 2 we see in verse 18 that God utters these words for the first time - "It is not good for the man to be alone..." Everything so far has been declared good by God, and now there is something that He declares is NOT GOOD. What is that thing? How can something which has been created in the image of God be 'NOT GOOD'? Well, the thing that was not a true reflection of the person of God was that man was alone. God was three persons in one, together, connected, in fellowship. He realized that the man He had created was alone, separate, isolated. That was NOT GOOD.

The story goes on that God causes man to fall asleep, takes a bone out of his side and creates a helper. God created woman - named because when Adam saw Eve for the first time he exclaimed, "Woah!! Man!!! Look at that!!!!" This was shortened to woman.

Man was now like God, man was in fellowship, man was together with someone, man was no longer isolated. Now here is the greatest verse in this story - Genesis 2:25 says this, "The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame."

What does this mean? Well, for the first time (and pretty much the last time) men and women were together with nothing between them. There was nothing separating them, they had nothing to hide behind - and they were not ashamed. This moment in time saw perfect relationship between men and women, there was no hierarchy, there was no shame. They were also for the first time naked before the Lord. There was nothing between men and God. There was only perfect communion. There was perfect relationship. This was VERY GOOD.

Sin entered the world - relationship was fractured, separation occurred.

Jesus entered the world, destroyed sin and made a way for us to enter into that perfect beautiful, unencumbered relationship with God again. We can once again approach Him naked to all the things in the world, we do not have to hide any part of our lives from the Father. Our relationship has been restored.

But what about our relationship with each other? What about our relationship with our brothers and sisters in Christ? Have we not been set free? Have we not been made whole? Have we not been restored once again? Isn't it time we were able to have relationships with each other where we prefer one another above ourselves? Isn't it time when we should stop putting each other down, or assuming the worst, or standing on top of each other? Isn't it time to lay down ALL of the hurt from the past and stop laying it on top of anyone we think owes us something? Isn't it time that we had relationships that were 'naked'? Isn't it time when we had relationships with our brothers and sisters in Christ and we would not be ashamed because, "If only they knew who I really was?" Isn't it time we were the church?

Well, maybe you need to put yourself in a group where you can develop authentic friendships, where you can take off some of the layers that you hide behind. Maybe it is time that you carved a portion of time out of your busy week and joined with other people to learn how to have authentic relationships together.

Maybe it is time to join a small group.

Just maybe.

Who is Church For?

2009-10-14T22:42:00.003-04:00

I was listening to a couple of podcasts on my way to/from work. It was a slow traffic day so I had plenty of time to flick though my selection and play podcast roulette. Two of the messages I listened to asked the same question - "Who is your church for?"

Is our church for church people? By that I mean, is our Sunday morning service designed for those who go to church, understand church and need little instruction as to what to do when in church? Or is our church service designed for people who dont go to church? Are we set up as a welcoming place where people who do not normally come to church will feel right at home? Do we have simple things like clear signage pointing to the tea/coffee or the bathrooms? Do we lead people through our service and announce what is going to happen as each thing takes place? If we don't then I suggest that we do not do that because we expect everyone present to know what is going on and why we do those things. If we think like this then we have answered the question posed above - and the answer is that our church is for church people.

If we have purposely taken the time to explain what we are doing at each point in our service - worship, offering, message, announcements - then maybe we are designing our worship services for non-church folks.

Maybe we should begin to change things up a little to ensure that we are truly making non-church people comfortable at our services. If it is possible then maybe it would behoove us to investigate how we can do it better.

Leading From Brokenness

2009-10-12T09:53:00.003-04:00

During the past couple of Sunday morning services, as we have been in worship or transitioning from worship to the message I have been broken by God as I have tried to lead the transitions. One week I was broken as we prayed for our family and friends who do not know Jesus. Then just yesterday as we moved from a new song written by AMPED Worship into the message I prayed and thanked God for His mercy. In the midst of that prayer I could see Jesus on the cross and things that I had done just that week, attitudes, actions, words, sins, were being placed on His shoulders and the weight of my sin was adding to the suffication that Jesus experienced on the cross. My sin was, in my vision, literally killing Jesus. His response was, "Father, forgive them ..."

As we sang this new song taken from Habakkuk 3:2 "... in wrath, remember mercy." I could see the pain that the Father felt as He placed sin upon sin on Jesus, then turned His back and separated Himself from His Son. My heart broke, my sin had caused that, but the gift that I received in return was freedom, life, the chance to be a new creation free from sin and death. God had remembered mercy.

I found myself in the midst of prayer, standing at the front of church, barely able to get the words out as the tears flowed down my face. I must confess that inside my head there was a voice that accused me of being 'unprofessional' or weak in front of so many people. A voice that said that the people do not want to see a grown man cry, and there are probably some who might even consider the tears were part of an act meant to manipulate their emotions.

In the midst of all of that internal turmoil I could still see see the image of Jesus on the cross carrying my sin, but the image changed. The crucified Savior was transformed into the risen Lord. Death could not hold Him, my sin did not bury Him. He was alive! He was risen! He was also reaching out His hand to me and raising me up from my death and setting me into His resurrection. His life was bringing me life! I am free, I am alive because of just one thing - Jesus loves me.

Through the tears came a deeper understanding that I am a child of a King, that I do not need to fear anything or anyone. I also realized that I was not alone. That my sin was not the only sin that was carried on that cross that day. The same event in history also transformed, or had the power to transform, everyone in the auditorium that day.

I realized that I need to allow God to break me wherever He wants to break me. I need to allow people to see God at work in my life whenever He wants to demonstrate His love for me. I hope that people can see that even those who are in a position of leadership do not have it all together. Those at the front do not always get it right, we make mistakes. I only pray that the biggest mistake we avoid making is one of portraying to people that we are ok. Let us lead with authenticity and when that requires brokenness, then Lord break us.

Getting Back to the Important Things

2009-10-08T23:48:00.004-04:00

Yesterday and today I have had the privilege of spending two days away from all of my jobs - paid and unpaid - and have been attending the Catalyst leaders conference in Atlanta, Georgia. It has been a very challenging two days and while there have been a number of very informative and challenging talks given, there has not been one session of one speaker that has really shaken me, but it seems that God is using a number of the sessions to drop in a couple of lines of the picture. I thought I would jot down where I was as of tonight.

Yesterday one line that was going over and over in my head was this - we have replaced the important with the urgent. A simple statement but a very indicting statement when you delve into it. Essentially what the speaker was saying through this statement was that we have some very important things to do and things that we should be giving our lives to. There are things that we are involved in that are so important that we should be setting them as priorities and yet we have not given these important things the place that we should. We have allowed ourselves to be distracted by the latest Twitter feed, or the latest Facebook status update, or the latest Facebook game, or the latest e-mail - these are the urgent things. Through our social networking and our drive to be on top of everything we have allowed ourselves to take our eyes off of the important things in life and move from one crisis e-mail to the next, from one Twitter post to the next and we spend all of our time on the urgent.

The result can be devastating. We take a normal work day and clutter it up with urgent work and we fail to give the important work any of our time. The important work will be the work that will last. This is the life changes that we see in people's lives - if we take the time to spend time with them. If we fill our day with urgent work then we squeeze out the important and we miss out on what God has for us.

As I thought about this line, another one came to mind - "We need to fight for our families". God has placed us in families and He does not expect us to be perfect, but He wants to write His story of grace and transformation on our family. God wants to take our broken families and write His story through them as He restores them, as He builds them, as He heals the dysfunction. We need to stop trying to write our own story for our family and create the perfect 2.2 children family picture and allow God to create His family picture using our families as the lead characters.

As I pondered these two statements I was struck by a very painful truth about our church and the latest discussions that I have been involved in. We are in the process of preparing our 2010 budget and there have been discussions on costs for this and costs for that. We have discussed air conditioning and grass cutting and fought to include or exclude such items from the budget (depending on your view point). What brought me to tears during this evening's sessions was that while we fight over air conditioning, I know of at least 4 families where the husband and wife partnership is in disarray and for some has become separation. We are fighting over air conditioning and we are not fighting for our families. We are fighting over how much money to spend on grass cutting and no-one is talking about how much we should be investing into our people to help heal their marriages. We are fighting for the urgent and we have failed to see that we have set aside the important.

God please forgive me for placing the urgent in front of the important. Please forgive me for fighting over air conditioning and not fighting for our families. Help me Lord to lean all of my leadership, all of my influence, all of my energy into fighting to restore families and not wasting time on the urgent.

What a month!!

2009-10-06T09:09:00.003-04:00

I cannot believe that it has been almost a month since I last posted a blog. Where has the time gone? Well, I know where it has gone to be honest - college started back up again, clinic takes up my other available mornings and today is the first time in a month when I have had a morning off of work/clinic/church/family to do my own thing, and guess where I am. Yup, that's right. I am sitting in my Bowie office enjoying some coffee, reconnecting with some of PG County's finest detectives, the mayor and some other church pastors who frequent 'my' office.

So this should be more of an update than a posting with an attempt at some in-depth meaning, I think. This past month has felt very hectic - only because I am teaching for 30 hours or so on three days and then treating patients for 10-12hours on two days and still trying to accomplish my tasks at church and my role as husband and dad. I have learned that trying to squeeze an extra 30+ hours a week into what was an already busy schedule doesn't really work too well. Something had to give - and the thing that gave for the first few weeks of this madness was actually sleep. For the first two weeks of college I survived (best word to describe it) on about 4hrs a night. Not too good, but just one of those things.

I have been trying very hard to not eat into family time, but I know I have sacrificed some of that too. Julie and I went out on our first date night in months two weeks ago. It was a beautiful evening and one that I would love to do every week, but at this season I dont see either of us making that regular a schedule. We just try to make the limited time we seem to have as effective as possible, knowing that Christmas is coming and a new semester with less pressure is lined up for the Spring.

Julie and I took on some additional responsibility this summer too - we are helping to coordinate our small group ministry in the church, really in the hope of setting up a good structure and format that can be taken on and run with by someone else. It seems that I have a ministry of short term fixes, ship-righting and passing the ball. Dont get me wrong, I love to start new ventures, but sometimes I wonder if we have started something that no-one else in the church wants to do. I'll talk about that in another post some day.

StreetReach continues to develop - some times in a positive way and then sometimes I wonder if we should just shut it down until next summer. The last Saturday we had arranged to go out and serve I had lined up three houses - not a large number by any stretch, and I expected about 12-15 people to show up. Pretty easy - 3 teams of 4-5 and these projects would be done pretty quickly. 5 people showed up. 5 people. Out of a church of some 200 adults and a youth ministry of some 60 teenagers - 5 people showed up. Disappointing to say the least. Having said that though, those 5 people served their hearts out and around 2pm that afternoon we completed the last of the three jobs and headed for home. So I need to be thankful that we served and reached out to three people in our community. There are three more people who know that they are loved by God. So we will focus on that instead of the paltry numbers in attendance.

Tonight we head to Catalyst 2009 - a leadership conference with some 12,000 other leaders gathering for 3 days in Atlanta for training and encouragement. I wonder what sort of challenges I will personally receive. I wonder what sort of challenges we as a church will receive. God bring it, and bring it full on!

I need it, we need it.

I'll write more later.

Well, Today You Are Five

2009-09-13T23:39:00.005-04:00

Do you remember the evenings when you couldn't sleep, and we walked the house together in the early morning hours. You were wrapped up tight, lying on your side being slowly rocked as we moved from room to room. Well, today you are five.

Do you remember the day you lay on the living room floor, playing with your soft snail toy, and you realized that with enough effort and a little assistance you could roll over on to your back? It took a while for you to learn how to roll over on to your tummy again, well, today you are five.

Do you remember the time when you first held a spoon and smeared mashed up sweet potato all over your face as you learned to feed yourself? Well, today you are five.

Do you remember the time when you first pulled yourself up to stand at the side of the sofa? You know you wanted to take off and run, but your unsteady legs would not permit you then, well, today you are five.

Do you remember the time we took you to see grandpa Eric and grandma Carol and you were so small that you slept in the basket of the luggage cart at the airport? Well, now you are five.

Do you remember the day when you stepped away from your mommy and began to walk, ever so wobbly, but once you were up, there was no stopping you. Well, now you are five.

Do you remember the time when you came to the hospital to visit mommy and you met your little sister for the first time? You were just 2 years old when Emma came, well, now you are five.

I have so many wonderful memories of you my sweet daughter. Each day you provide me with a new memory, a new story to tell, a new lesson to learn and each day you provide me with a new reason to fall to my knees and thank God for the beautiful blessing that He gave to us when He brought you into the world. I watched you today with your friends, as you played and laughed and ran around with them. There were times when it seemed like chaos, and then there were times when you saw that someone wasn't joining in, or wasn't happy for whatever reason and you lived up to your name - you my little 'friend' would talk to the unhappy guest, or find them another toy to play with. You truly are a good 'friend' to everyone you come into contact with.

Well, now you are five - you are not all grown up just yet, but you are becoming a beautiful young lady, with princess tendancies, as long as the princess is ready at a given moments notice to climb a tree or race across the monkey bars. You have a sweetness in your smile that comes from the purity of your heart that brings warmth and comfort to everyone you meet. You have a strong personality that we will do our best to teach you how to use for great good. Even this evening you realized that you can lead and teach as you and mommy talked and you remembered that you taught Emma how to pump her legs when she is on the swing. You have a great future ahead of you and that will all fall in place in God's timing. You will have great adventures that will make me proud. You will take the gospel to places that I could never go to and you will see God's kingdom come wherever you walk.

Well, that is to come for you, but today you are five. Today you are still my little princess who climbs up on my knee for cuddles, who says, 'carry me' at the end of a long day, who climbs into our bed when you cant sleep - which means that your mommy and me dont get much sleep, but at least you feel safe.

My continuing prayer for you is that God will keep you safe and keep you close to Him as you grow up. God has great plans for you, and I pray that we will see them come about together.

Cara, I love you dearly, and as I said to you when we were first introduced in the delivery suite, I'm your dad, and I love you with everything I have. Never forget that, and never believe that there is anything that can come between us. Sleep well little princess, because today you are five.

I love you.

Dad

Get On Your Knees and Fight Like a Man

2009-09-12T21:44:00.002-04:00

How many of you can date yourself and your music selection by knowing where that lyric came from? It is a simple line yet one filled with tremendous power and challenge. On first reading it appears to be a contradiction in terminology. If we are really going to fight then why would we do it from our knees? Why would we not position ourselves in the strongest stance or the place that would afford us the greatest advantage over our enemies? Well, the contradiction in terms is actually a truth that confounds and confuses, yet if followed releases tremendous power and opportunity.

“Get on your knees and fight like a man” could be translated as this – “if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.” (2 Chron 7:14) We fight for lots of things, we fight for our families, we fight for our rights, we fight for the things that we believe in. We fight in our own strength and our own power and we live in a world where the dominant win and the strong survive. However, we serve a Lord who does not follow those rules, we serve a God who is the strongest, who is the greatest, yet He does not use that force to accomplish His tasks. We serve a God who “…chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.” (1 Cor 1:27) We serve a God who asks us to rely on Him. We serve a God who asks us to offer ourselves as living sacrifices, we serve a God who asks us to humble ourselves and pray and seek His face. When the God of the universe asks us to do something as simple then shouldn’t we just do what He says?

So why don’t we?

The stumbling block in this statement from 2 Chronicles 7:14 is this – ‘humble themselves’. Have you ever wondered why that is in there? It must be in there for a reason, and the reason has to be because the people refused to humble themselves. They were a “proud and stiff-necked people”. Does this verse apply to us today? Are we a proud and stiff necked people who need to humble ourselves and pray? Are we a people who desperately want to see the Lord do a marvelous thing in our church and in our community yet refuse to bend our knee and lower our heads in submission and humility to the King of Kings? I don’t know if you have thought about this, but God has been challenging me about this recently. God has been challenging me on the things that I ask Him to do for our church and yet the lack of time I spend seeking Him with other people in the church. Recently Pastor Ray challenged us on our walk with the Lord and our personal prayer life. While mine is not perfect and could do with some help, I have been convicted over our corporate prayer life at Mt Oak, or at least my lack of personal involvement in our corporate prayer life.

We have a faithful and dedicated handful of saints who gather each Wednesday night in the sanctuary of our church and every week they pray for our leadership, they pray for our children, they pray for our ministry, they pray for our church, they pray for our city and they pray for our country. They pray faithfully because the truth of the statements above has gripped their hearts. Over the past few months I have been challenged to join with them, and that is what I intend to do. On Wednesday evenings after our church family dinner I have decided that it is time for me to humble myself, time for me to pray, time for me to turn from my wicked (and selfish) ways and time for me to seek His face. Is God asking you to do the same thing at your church? Is God asking you to humble yourself and pray and seek His face? Maybe it is time for more than just me to join with faithful prayer servants and spend time on our knees fighting like warriors – prayer warriors.

Do you think that corporate prayer should be a priority for a church? Do you think that corporate prayer should be a priority for you? Would you give up just 6 Wednesday evenings from 7-8.15pm to learn about prayer and spend time in prayer? We are planning to run a 6 week training series to teach us and encourage us to pray. Why don’t you come to our family dinner on Wednesday night, drop the kids off at Awana or youth small groups and come join me as I join our faithful prayer warriors and seek the Lord together. In the immortal words of Nike – Just do it!

Do the simple, ask the question.

2009-09-04T19:27:00.004-04:00

I have been thinking a lot recently about our recent summer mission trip, our upcoming Saturday StreetReach micro-missions, our pumpkin patch, our trunk or treat event, and a couple of other events that are in the planning stage and I cant get away from a recurring and nagging fear - "What if nobody else in the church gets what we are doing? What if nobody invites their friends? How can we be successful in reaching this city?"

Instead of getting depressed by these questions or focusing energy on events from the past that have really been disappointing I have been thinking about what the potential fundamental reason might be for a lack of excitement about church. I have come to think that this is really where we are at - there is no excitement about church. There is excitement about a lot of things that we are doing in our lives, but there does not seem to be much excitement about church. A quick trawl through Facebook status updates and you find all sorts of messages about the things that interest us, but rarely a simple message inviting people to join us for church. Now some folks may suggest that a Facebook status update is an ineffective way of inviting people to church - if so then why do people use their Facebook status update to invite people to the town center for coffee, or to the park to hang out?

Reaching people for Jesus involves one simple thing - inviting people to go where they will encounter Jesus - church. If I have friend visit me from Belfast and I ask if they would like to see some baseball, then the obvious place for me to take them is to the Baysox. If we want people to see Jesus then the obvious place to invite them is to church. Yet we do not do it.

I am convinced that the reason we have not reached this city with the love of Jesus is very simple - we haven't reached out. We have not asked the simple question like, "I know this may sound crazy, but would you be interested in coming to our church on Sunday morning?" Could it really be that easy? Could it really be as simple as asking a question? What about some great training in evangelism? What about bringing in a well known speaker? What about spending a lot of money of literature and posters?

What about just dropping a hook in the water and seeing what bites?

When we go to the lake (SML) on vacation I go to the dock with my girls to catch blue gill fish. A little piece of cheese, a small hook and a Barbie rod with flashing lights is all that is required to catch fish. No special training, no special equipment, no expense - just a willingness to put a hook in the water and wait.

It is time for the church to rise up in all of its humility and put some hooks in the water. It is time for us to ask our non-christian friends and neighbors a simple question - "Would you like to come to church with me this Sunday?"

What a difference a simple question can make.

The Scars of Being Up Front

2009-08-25T10:15:00.005-04:00

I started back to work this week, another semester of eager young minds to fill with as much knowledge as they can hold. As I sat on Sunday evening doing some final preparations, I checked my e-mail to look for any last minute schedule adjustments. In my inbox was one of those e-mails - you know, the ones where the author has some 'friendly advice' which is designed to make you a 'better person'. Yeah, that's right - someone had an issue with a presentation I gave to my work colleagues during a meeting on Wednesday morning and decided that they needed to correct my errant ways.

On Monday morning, when I had settled at my desk and sat awaiting my lecture to print, I once again checked my e-mail. There in my inbox was another e-mail of a similar vein. When an e-mail says "this is not meant to be offensive" then you can guess what will appear in the lines that follow. I wish though that with all of the means of communication available to us that we would learn how to confront or challenge without causing offense. Being up front in a large church and leading a faculty in a medium sized university inevitably paints a large target on your back. Every word that you say, every action that you do is under scrutiny and judgment by every member of the audience. And, if this weekend is anything to go by, people are not shy about helping me 'amend my ways'.

Now, please, don't get me wrong, I am open to correction and improvement but there has to be a way that we can write suggestions for correction that are not offensive.
The advent of e-mail and electronic communication appears to have empowered people to make suggestions to those whom they hear yet do not really know. Written communication has always been around however when one writes a letter there is always some re-reading before the letter is mailed out. There may also be a little time delay between the letter being penned and the letter being sent. Often, the gap brings additional clarity to the author and many times letters of 'correction' will not be sent. E-mail however has meant that corrective advice is documented and sent and of-times in the heat of frustration by whatever has been witnessed.

If you have a word of 'correction' for me from something you have seen me say or do then can I encourage you to sleep on your thoughts and write when you are not in a state of anger or frustration. Your good message is often lost if the tone is antagonistic.

Just saying, because believe it or not, words cut deep.

The Right to Urge or the Urge to Write?

2009-08-22T15:17:00.003-04:00

It is interesting how many people spend greater and greater portions of their life writing about what they are doing. There has been an explosion in the social networking scene with an insane notion that people might actually be interested in exactly what I am doing right at this very moment in time. The advent of programs like Twitter and facebook updates before them allowed people to communicate the most trivial of details about their lives and their real time existence however to what purpose? What do we really gain from 'telling people' how we feel at a certain moment in time - when often the people we inform can do nothing about our situation? Have we reduced our ability to communicate with other human beings in a meaningful way and to develop friendships that will stand the test of time to mere media style sound-bytes of what we consider to be relevant information?

Blogs sites like livejournal, xanga and blogspot have for a long time now been repositories of the words that ricochet around inside people's minds looking for a place to find a permanent home. When I was little those repositories were the infamous 'diary'. Teenagers everywhere (especially girls) had little notebooks where they would write their thoughts down each night before retiring to bed. These books would become like best friends and confidants who would be the only other thing that knew every deep dark secret of teenage angst. Those diaries would hold every inner thought and would consequently be placed amongst the most highly treasured and protected possessions. But can we honestly say that releasing these inner most thoughts from the closed pages of a diary equate to the world wide release through an internet blog site? Where did the secrecy go? Where did the intimacy of having a safe location where you could store your deepest dreams, hurts or fears? Have we allowed technology to create a society where there is no inner voice, no filter that sifts what is flowing out and attempts to determine whether what we produce actually shoudl be produced? Have we ultimately lost the thing that we all crave so much - have we lost our ability to cultivate and maintain friendships?

I fear that we have. I fear that we have lost the ability to pick up the phone and call another human being and to discuss the same issues that so easily appear on our Twits or FB updates. It is easier to leave a comment on a person 'wall' for them to read than it is to actually tell them in person - after all, what will they say? What if they don't like it? It seems that our insecurities have risen to such a pinnacle that we leave 'hit-and-run' messages with our 'friends' and think that we are truly developing the kinds of connections that matter.

So next time you get the urge to write, let me (ironically through my own writings) urge you to consider why you are writing. What are you trying to convey? Who are you trying to convey it to? Are you writing to encourage a friend? Then why don't you call them instead, write them a card and deliver it by hand. Engage in face to face dialogue, build your friendship - and make it last.

Meeting Together

2009-08-14T13:28:00.004-04:00

So we are in the beginning stages of launching a new small group ministry at Mt Oak. The question is, what makes it new? What is it that will distinguish this year's small group ministry from previous years? How will we overcome the issues that were faced in the past? How will we overcome any inertia in people that makes them resistant to meeting in a small group?

A while ago I wrote about the McDonaldization for church and how some pastors my try to reproduce exactly what another church does with their congregation - the problem with this is that God may not have called them to be that other church - they need to do what God has called them to do. How does this apply to small groups you may ask, well, we would like to create a model for small groups at Mt Oak that will be followed by all groups even though the subject matter that each group is discussing/studying may be different.

So what is the model? It is a simple one and consists of 4 things to do each week as well as an outward focus where the group reaches out to their friends or community.

Worship - each week every small group will have some form of worship. Worship is not just about singing, it is about taking time to focus on God and tell Him how much we love Him. Worship can accomplished with singing, with meditation, through art or painting (always fun to do in small group) or just reading a passage aloud. Whatever way each group does it, they must do worship - worship connects us to God. It is important.

Word - there should be some form of bible study or devotional study. Some groups may use a book they are corporately reading, some may study a book of the bible, others may do topical studies and prepare them each week. There are loads of resources available - DVD series, video podcasts that can be shown on the TV, access to teaching material is not a difficult. Let's make disciples by studying the Word.

Prayer - each group will be encouraged to keep a prayer journal and to record the things they pray for and also the ways in which God answers their prayers. How encouraging is it to hear that God has met a need or fixed a situation? Shouldnt we be celebrating those things? Small group is a place where personal prayer can easily occur and celebration of God's power can also be done.

Witness - each group should be looking for ways to grow - numerically and not just educationally. Personal invitation to a small group is a key way to bring people into a church and introduce them to Jesus. Each of our groups needs to develop an outward focus - and each focus can be different - as long as it forces us out into our community.

We can do this, we just need to stop saying stuff like, "We have never done it that way before" and "I dont know if I like that" and just get on with it and do it. It has been my experience that even though some people may not have used this model before, once they do try it they will find their groups come to life.

Let's make it happen

Who Influences You and Who Do You Influence?

2009-07-28T00:13:00.003-04:00

Influence is the measure of your ability to persuade others to take an action.

I read this line and started thinking about influence. Influence is one of those abstract concepts that affects every one of us each and every day however it is incredibly difficult to measure and quantify. Through reading a piece of written work such as this blog you yourself will be influenced - however each person that reads this may be influenced in a different way. Our ability to influence people is not just dependent on the things that we say and/or do, but it is also dependent on where those who we influence are in their lives at the time we come into contact with them.

Let's take a simple way that people can be influenced. Have you ever tried a recipe for a meal that you had at someone's house? Well, you were influenced. The meal you had was so good that you went out, bought the ingredients and attempted to recreate the meal yourself. If we can be influenced in simple things like sharing recipes then how can we influence people into the Kingdom?

Maybe it is easier than many of us think. I watch my kids and I see things that I do or that my wife does being mimicked by them. We have influenced them. I see them do things that their friends in pre-school do. They have been influenced. I wonder if by just living our lives we actually have the ability to influence people towards the Kingdom. Could it really be that simple? For many of us when we think about introducing people to a relationship with Jesus it seems so difficult. It seems to us that we need to know the right things to say and the right things to do all the time and to be ready for that special moment. I wonder if it isn't a lot simpler than that. I wonder if we just live our lives unashamedly will people see what we do and be influenced?

I heard a story this evening of how we have influenced people in another state. This week there is a group of young people camping at their church and going into their community to reach out to those in need in a StreetReach venture in Pennsylvania. Dione's brother in law is a youth pastor at his church and he was so influenced by what he heard that we had done here that he is in the middle of their first StreetReach Mission week.

That got me excited ... and to be honest a little frightened. If we can have such a strong influence for good then that is great. It scares me though that I may have had an equally strong negative influence on someone somewhere.

"The secret of my influence has always been that it remained secret."
Salvador Dali

How Young Do You Need to Be to Change a City?

2009-07-25T10:57:00.005-04:00

I haven't written in a couple of weeks. There are two reasons for this: last week was vacation. A vacation from the computer, from the internet, from the phone. A time to spend with my wonderful family - uninterrupted time.

The week before that was spent with a fabulous group of missionaries taking time each day to reach out to a hurting city through practical acts of kindness. On Sunday July 12th a group of 40 young people assembled together, set up camp and prepared for a week of service projects at homes in what to many could be considered as a wealthy, middle class city. What is not as readily apparent to most people is that behind the shiny veneer that many people put up, behind the front doors of many of the homes in this city are untold stories of pain, and heartache, and disease and death. This city did not take long to travel to for most of our team, in fact, for 95% of the team this city is where they call home. July 12th - 18th was our 2nd annual StreetReach mission week into our own city. We set up camp, real tents, organized work crews and for the entire week we served, served, served. we worked in 40 different homes during the week from small jobs like planting trees, to complete yard transformations and removal of fallen trees. Our team worked their hearts out. They smiled as they worked, they sang as they worked and they even prayed as they worked. Throughout the entire week they showed the people of our city that God loves them.

The whole point of StreetReach is to take the love of Jesus out to a hurting world and to show people through acts of kindness that they are special in the eyes of God and that He loves them.

I think that through the week I was most impressed with the attitude of our team. They just got up each day and set themselves to serving. They rarely grumbled, they rarely argued. There were an increasing number of water breaks taken as the week progressed, but they served their hearts out.

I think that the thing that caused me most concern through the week was that we still did not seem to engage the adult church much. Sure there were a large amount of youth that were engaged, but I was struck by the lack of adults who came out to serve for a even just one day. There were a few, but most days the adults could be counted on one hand. Maybe I just need to accept that people have limited vacation days and taking one to help out on StreetReach just is not a priority. Or maybe the adults don't know how much they are actually needed. This year we were very limited in terms of our adult (over 18 yrs) volunteers. We had 4 who were there every day. we even had to ask one of our adult youth leaders to sleep in the camp and then go to work each day because we needed an adult female to stay in the camp. We only had 3 people old enough to drive the vans we were donated, thankfully we only had three vans. It became very apparent to me that we need more adult help for next year. If we grow next year to the same extent that we did this year then we have to have more adults.

How do we engage people over the age of 25 to get involved? How do we get this demographic to join the youth and truly have the whole church actively involved in reaching our city with the love of Jesus? Over the next few weeks I need to consider how to reach the adults in our church to engage them to reach out with the youth.

Do You Want Fries With That?

2009-07-02T10:12:00.003-04:00

I dont know how much time you spend thinking about your church. I spend a lot of my thought time contemplating how we can continue to transform our church into an effective function body of believers who have a heart for the poor and the lost and who are willing to step outside of their comfort zones to reach their city. This can be a very disheartening endeavor but it can also be a very rewarding endeavor.

Recently I have had a few people write to me or contact me with suggestions as to how we can improve our Sunday morning services. Now dont get me wrong, I am open to hear people's opinions and ideas, but having weighed the suggestions that I receive from everyone with what I believe God would have us do on a Sunday morning I make decisions and set our services up. I dont pretend to get everything right all the time and I am very much aware of the responsibility that I carry and the judgment that awaits in heaven for those in leadership.

I think the thing that has recently frustrated me is the attitude of some to 'have it their way' with regards to our worship services. We have become a society that has everything our way and that is it. When Burger King was looking for a way to carve out a little more of the fast food burger market from McDonalds they decided to give their customer choice. Now you go to a fast food burger chain and get your burger without pickle and tomato. McDonalds kept making burgers the way they always did, and the customer had to remove the pickles and tomatoes themselves. In the church across America, and also to a degree here in Mt Oak, it seems that we are developing an attitude of 'Want it your way'.

When 300+ people gather together there are going to be differences in style and taste, especially in things like music, or message content or message length. Yet at what point do we trust our leadership? At what point do we trust that those whom God has placed in leadership might have a good sense of how our services should run? I dont think that the leadership should be left to their own devices and not be willing to hear suggestions, but I do think that when those decisions have been considered in light of all of the other factors that leaders hold in tension and decisions are made where some people dont get it their way then there should be some willingness of the people to trust and follow those in the lead.

Can you imagine how our Sunday services would look if we did everything that everyone wanted to do. If we became the Burger King of churches where everyone got their Sunday services how they wanted then I doubt we would be very effective. God has called us to be a body with Jesus as our head. can you imagine the confusion if your left arm wanted McDonalds, your right arm wanted Burger King, your left leg wanted Subway and your right leg wanted Chik-fil-a? YOu would end up paralyzed as each part pulled in its own direction. The same thing can happen to a church. We can be paralyzed as each group pulls in its own direction.

Is it time to follow the leaders and trust that they are doing their best to stay in step with the Lord?

I think so.

The Most Beautiful Girls In the World

2009-06-29T23:57:00.003-04:00

Last week I spent the entire week relaxing, playing, laughing, swimming, floating, fishing and having a great time with three of the most beautiful girls in the world. As the week progressed I found myself at different moments with each of my girls realizing that I have been blessed beyond belief with these three precious treasures.

It wasn't in the big things, it was the little things. It was the way Emma would look me straight in the eye, smile her wry little smile which just melted my heart with love for her. That look which for her may have meant something else, but for me I believe was just unconditional love of a daughter for her daddy.

There was the moment when a little hand just reached out for mine as we walked along and held on tight. There was no request from me, no need to hold hands for safety, but Cara just wanted to walk with her daddy and hold hands. As I looked down at this beautiful little girl I once again was reminded of the tremendous blessing that God has bestowed on me.

There was the moment when I looked across at my beautiful wife, Julie, who was sitting on the boat with Cara's head resting in her lap as we slowly headed towards the sunset after a perfect evening of fun and laughs.

Each day there was one moment after another. Nothing big or great, but each little thing which would melt my heart once more. Even the stuff that often can be frustrating would somehow become sweet. The sticky fingers and faces covered with melted marshmallows, or covered with chocolate ice cream or covered with ketchup. It didnt matter what the mess was, behind the mess there were looks of love, looks of acceptance, looks that reminded me once more how blessed I am.

As we returned home there were still more moments when Cara would say something silly or Emma would sing a worship song to herself, or Julie would challenge my thinking on something I had been reading. Again, no major life changing flash, but each moment enough to challenge me on how much I return the love to my beautiful girls. Each moment a challenge to be the head of the household in every aspect, and that means I need to give out more hugs, more kisses, more praise, more encouragement, more prayers, more support for each of my girls.

My prayer has become that God would give me the strength to be the dad that He has called me to be. That I would have the wisdom to be the husband that God expects me to be. That I would love more and be slow to anger. My prayer is that God would knit our family together with bonds of love that cannot be broken, regardless of what comes our way.

This week was supposed to be about relaxing and recharging as we/I prepare for a couple of busy weeks of church service.

This week was actually about me falling in love with my girls all over again. Don't get me wrong, I never fell out of love with them, but this week was a week when my love for them deepened and God showed me the specialness of each of my girls.

To Julie, Cara and Emma - I love you with everything that I have. You are my treasures, you are my inspiration, your are my loves. I pray that God would richly bless each of you in the calling on your lives and bless us as a family as we seek to do His will.

Choices

2009-06-18T01:02:00.005-04:00

This coming Saturday two very special people have the chance to make a choice that will change both of their lives forever. Sean and Janelle will be asked the most important questions of their lives and their choice is simple - "I do!"

We all have choices that we make every day. There are simple choices - like which radio station to listen to in the car on the way to work, and there are more difficult choices - like donut or muffin? Seriously though, we all make choices every day.

I would like to challenge us all to make some choices that will potentially have wide reaching effects. I would like to challenge us all to choose to get fully involved in the things that are going on at Mt Oak over the next few weeks. We have such an exciting opportunity to reach out to this city that we live in, but there is one thing that is holding us back - US. The biggest hindrance to the advancement of the Kingdom of God from the time of Jesus until now is not the Lord and His willingness to move, it is our choices and our decision to make ourselves available to be used by God or not.

As I write this I have a sense that this posting may cause some offense, and please hear me when I say that this is not my intention. I do not want to guilt anyone into action nor do I want to upset anyone, but I do want to bring the reality of the choices that we make and place it right in front of us for everyone to consider.

I know that for some, the idea of talking to people, or even walking and praying through a neighborhood is a scary thing. In fact, I am sure there are some of our congregation who have already chosen to attend another church on July 12th rather than take part in Amazing Sunday. I want to encourage you to reconsider that choice. I want to encourage you to choose to join with us as we reach out to a hurting city.

I want to encourage you by telling you that last Sunday we had all the kids up on the stage at the end doing actions to our closing worship song. Among those kids was one little boy who you probably did not recognize. Now dont feel bad that you dont know all the kids, because for this little boy the only person in the congregation who knew him was his mom. You see, this little boy who was up on stage trying to follow Babette as she led the kids in hand actions was a first time visitor. His mom met someone at the StreetReach booth at Bowiefest and she made a choice - she chose to come to church.

Last Saturday we had a small team walk through the P section dropping leaflets at doors. People who made a choice to come and serve. On Monday morning Milford received a call in the office from a resident on Pinelake Lane asking for help with some yardwork.

A simple choice to stand beside a booth and hand out information led to a new family visiting our Sunday service. A simple choice to walk through a neighborhood and hand out leaflets led to a connection with a new family and a chance to serve.

As you look at your schedule over the next few weeks what choices will you make? Will you choose to take your family out of town on Amazing Sunday weekend or will you choose to stay in town, come to Mt Oak and reach out to the city. During the VBS will you choose to stay at home in the evenings or will you choose to come and serve as a helper or will you choose to invite your neighbors along?

Its your choice.

Busy-ness is a bad business

2009-06-12T10:30:00.004-04:00

I got sick last week - and I am still sick. Here it is the middle of June and I have what feels like the flu, and it wont go away. The funny thing is that I know why I got sick. Without fail the main reason why I get the flu is that my body is screaming for a break. It is crying out for some rest and some time to just do nothing. I find that hard to do, but have done my best this week to have a 'quiet' week. What is strange to me is that in this, my 'quiet' week I have worked in the clinic two afternoons, presented a poster at a National Conference for PT's, had a meeting to discuss my research agenda for the next year and a half, talked with church staff about some significant changes, had two meetings at church and had a softball game canceled due to rain.

Aside from these few items on my to-do list this has been a quiet week. I have had 3 mornings at home and been able to do absolutely nothing - which I must admit feels a little odd.

When I say that I am doing nothing at home that is not really an accurate statement. With our Summer StreetReach mission only a few weeks away we are busy organizing and planning. This is a busy time, but it will all be worth it. One more week of busy-ness until we have a week away as a family - and that will truly be a week of down-time.

So here is to hard work, and here is to looking towards good rest.

N is for NOW

2009-05-31T23:59:00.000-04:00

“N” is for Now. I hope that even though this is the 6th daily message in this series that it will not be missed, because I think that it is the most important one. As we have looked at the subject of MISSION this week we have identified that our MISSION is Mandated by Jesus, that we would Intentionally reach out, empowered by the Spirit to Simply see Incredible things happen as we preach One Message of hope to a hurting and dying world. That is all well and good and will always potentially happen if we never get to today’s thoughts. The missing part of this week’s thoughts is the timeframe in which we can expect to see this happen. Today we answer that question by saying that the time to reach our neighbors in NOW.

In 2 Cor 6:2 we read, ‘I tell you, now is the time of God's favor, now is the day of salvation.’ This is the day that the Lord has made and we will rejoice and be glad in it. We need to not put off our intentional outreach but instead we need to make our mission a part of our life. I have found that often in our middle-class society that we have that ‘it won’t happen to me’ attitude where we think that nothing bad will happen to us or anyone we know and love. What is certain though is that no man knows the future. One of the hardest things I have had to do was to talk to a family member who lost a loved one who did not know Jesus. The pain of knowing that according to the bible only those who know Jesus as Lord and Savior will reign with him in glory is tough to bear. We need to be gripped once again with such compassion and love for the lost that we can do nothing but tell people about Jesus. We need a new sense of urgency. I often compare outreach and mission with the latest medical breakthrough. When a group of scientists or doctors identify a cure for a certain disease the one thing that that group is sure to do is to spread the good news about the cure they have found. They appear on TV and radio, there are internet postings and blogs written, the world knows all about it. Just think how quickly the word spread about the recent swine flu. Well, we have the cure to death itself. We have the keys to eternal life. We know the truth and the truth will set people free. What should we do about it? Should we just keep it to ourselves and share it only with those who come to us and ask? Should we wait until we can create the right event at our church that the lost will come to? Maybe we should follow the Mandate given by our commander-in-chief, Jesus – “Therefore, GO…”

Just something to think about as you go about your day today.

O is for One Message

2009-05-31T23:55:00.000-04:00

“O” is for One Message. I think that one of the most confusing things for non-Christians are the apparent contradictions in the message that is presented by the church. This is not a new phenomenon. The apostle Paul encountered this in 1 Cor 1:12 where he wrote, “What I mean is this: One of you says, "I follow Paul"; another, "I follow Apollos"; another, "I follow Cephas[a]"; still another, "I follow Christ." Even back then there were the makings of the divisions that we see so evident today. When Jesus returns He is coming for His bride – not brides. We are all part of one body and we need to have one message – the same message that Jesus spoke when He was on the earth.

Our main passage this week has been Matthew 28:18-20. We can see in the latter part of this passage that Jesus commands the disciples to teach everything that He taught them. His command was simple – go and make disciples – yet we seem to complicate this simple statement so much.

Have you ever thought about what the fundamental things are to someone becoming a fully devoted follower of Christ? What does it really mean? Is saying a prayer of repentance enough? Is there more to the conversion process? What about all of the different denominations? Does it matter if you gave your heart to Jesus in a Methodist church, or in a Baptist church, or in a Pentecostal church or in a Catholic church?

Romans 10:9-10 states, “That if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.” This almost seems too simple (remember the second ‘S’ from yesterday?) and we often want to make the salvation process so much more complicated. Jesus kept it simple – confession with your mouth, actually speaking it out, believing in your heart and the end result is that you will be saved.

The fundamental message is simple. Jesus is the Son of God who came to this earth to rescue a traitor race that rebelled against their creator. He is the way the truth and the life. You cannot connect with the Father, except through Jesus.

Just something to think about as you go about your day today.

I is for INCREDIBLE

2009-05-27T22:16:00.002-04:00

So far in our study of MISSION we have learned that M is for Mandate, I is for Intentional, S is for Spirit Empowered and S is for Simplicity.

“I” is for Incredible. There are a couple of places in the New Testament where Jesus sends his disciples out on what we would consider to be short term mission trips. What is quite different about these mission trips from those that many of us have been involved in is the direction that Jesus gives his disciples. In Matthew 10 (which is a great chapter to read if you have the chance) we see Jesus sending out the 12 disciples on there first trip. What is incredible in this passage is the instructions that Jesus gives them.

In Matthew 10:7-8 we read, “As you go, preach this message: 'The kingdom of heaven is near.' 8Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy,[b]drive out demons.” There are 5 things that the disciples are instructed to do on this trip:

1. Preach a simple message, the Kingdom of Heaven is near
2. Heal the sick
3. Raise the dead
4. Cleanse those who have leprosy, and
5. Drive out demons

I wonder what response we would get if we pulled the StreetReach team together on July 12th at our first meeting and told them that the next week we would be doing 5 things – the list above. I am sure that the sense of dread and panic would be intense, however, I can also imagine the celebration and rejoicing that would occur if our team returned back to Mt Oak having done just one of these things.

Here is the question, why do we not do these things on our mission trips? Prior to Jesus sending the 12 disciples out on this trip he gave them the authority to do all of these things, That same authority He has given to you and me. If you recall Matthew 28:18 we read there that ALL authority in heaven and on earth has been given to us, that is why we can go and see INCREDIBLE things happen when we take the truth out to those who need to hear about, and experience God’s love.

Just something to think about as you go about your day today.

S is for .....

2009-05-27T12:47:00.001-04:00

So far in our study of MISSION we have learned that M is for Mandate and I is for Intentional.

“S” is for Spirit Empowered. When it comes to mission and telling people about Jesus I think that most of us would follow the early disciples lead in the 49 days following Jesus death and resurrection. By all accounts they spent much of that time behind closed and locked doors trying to make sure that those on the outside didn’t know where they were. Have you felt like that? Have you gone to your office and prayed harder that people would not ask you anything to do with God than praying that they would? I have done that – I have been that undercover Christian who was more afraid of outreach than even non-believers were.

So how did the early disciples go from cowering in locked rooms to standing in the middle of a large crowd in Jerusalem proclaiming the truth about Jesus? The simple answer is the empowerment of the Holy Spirit. In Acts 2:1-4 we read that as the disciples were gathered together the Holy Spirit was poured out on them and they were filled with ‘power from the Holy Spirit’ as was described in Acts 1:8. Maybe it is time for us to seek empowerment from the Holy Spirit to give us courage, knowledge, wisdom, and passion to stand on a street corner and proclaim the truth. I would encourage you to ask God to pour His Spirit out on you in a fresh and a new way. I will speak more about this on Sunday morning.

‘S’ is also for simplicity. When the early disciples were empowered by the Holy Spirit they did spend time putting together a slick gospel presentation. There was no band, no powerpoint and no special effects. The stood up where the people were and spoke the truth. I am pretty sure that any one of us could do that – just tell people your story of how Jesus has touched and transformed your life. How many times do we make God more complicated than He really is? How many times do we place obstacles in front of people that even Jesus would not put there? How many times did Jesus just keep it simple and meet the needs of the peoples around Him? When people were sick, He healed them. When they were hungry, He fed them. When they were afraid, He brought peace. As we meet people each day maybe we should keep things simple and meet the needs we see and not over complicate the Good News. Mother Theresa said that Christians are called to be witnesses at all times, but they should only use words when absolutely necessary.

Just something to think about as you go about your day today.

I is for INTENTIONAL

2009-05-27T12:45:00.002-04:00

Yesterday we learned that M is for Mandate – telling people about Jesus is Mandated.

“I” is for INTENTIONAL. Today as we consider mission I would like to suggest that our mission should be intentional. I don’t know if you are like me, but I plan things out – at least in my head. It may not look like it sometimes but there is usually some intentionality in everything I do. Mission and reaching this city for Jesus should be no different. As we prepare for StreetReach we are intentionally targeting one location in Bowie – the Pointer Ridge Section. We are intentionally developing postcards and other ‘give-aways’ that have our message on them and we can give out at events. We have intentionally identified events that we can meet lots of people – the parade, Bowiefest, a table on the concourse at a Baysox home game, June 13th Saturday StreetReach prayer walk and leaflet distribution in the Pointer Ridge section of the city.

Jesus gave the disciples some intentionality in their mission – they were told in Matthew 28:18-20 to go into all the world to make disciples, to baptize people and to teach them everything they had learned from Him – all because Jesus had all the authority and was empowering them with that same authority. In Acts 1:8 they were told to start their mission in Jerusalem, then to move outwards until they reached the whole world.

Jesus wants you to be intentional about your mission field too. Do you have one colleague who is on your heart more than others? Have you been praying for a family member more frequently recently? Maybe that person is who God wants you to focus your effort on at this time – to be intentional about reaching out to. As a 15yr old kid I had a friend who lost his hair because of alopecia (stress over his parent’s divorce). At the age of 15 my friend was bald except for 3 strands of hair. I became intentional about reaching him. I started to pray every night, some time during February, and asked God that by December 31st he would have restored my friend’s hair. For weeks and months I prayed alone each night – the same thing, the same prayer. For that year, that was my mission. As weeks became months my determination to pray intensified. My mom even told him that I was praying for him – I must admit, that was a little embarrassing.

By January 1st guess what had happened?

Just something to think about as you go about your day today.

What is MISSION?

2009-05-25T09:39:00.002-04:00

With Rev Ray on vacation for part of this week, he has asked me to write the daily messages. As I was thinking about what to write I have been working on our upcoming mission week and so I thought I would write about MISSION.

M is for ‘Mandated’ – in the movie ‘Crimson Tide’, Gene Hackman plays the captain of a nuclear submarine which receives a message to launch a nuclear missile. Denzel Washington plays the First Officer who brings a partial transmission of a message which may or may not be an order to abort the launch. Hackman’s character is determined to go ahead with the launch because that was the last clear order he received.

In Matthew 28:19, Jesus gives his disciples a final order. Like the movie mentioned above, this final order has not been rescinded. It has not been over-turned by any subsequent order. Jesus’ final order stands as true today as the moment he spoke it. What was the order? To ‘go and make disciples of all nations…’ The final direction that Jesus gave to his disciples was what we know as the final commission. That commissioning remains our final instruction. We are called to go into all the world – and that begins within our own homes, extends to our neighbors, our work colleagues, our city, our nation and the whole world. We are MANDATED to go – that is our final order and until the Lord returns and rescinds that order or changes it we need to follow it.

For many of us though this order is the scariest thing in the world – “you mean we actually have to tell people about Jesus? Are you serious? Do you know what they will say?” Jesus never promised us a happy life. Jesus never promised us a quiet life. Jesus never promised us a long life. Jesus only promise to us was that he would never leave us or forsake us – and that includes those times when we take courage in both hands and speak out His truth.

As you consider the Mandate that Jesus made for us to reach this world maybe you could start by simply praying for those you are in contact with daily and asking God to provide opportunity for you to share the Good News – even if it is only through actions.

Just something to think about as you go about your day today.

The Scary Woman Behind the Desk - is Actually an Angel

2009-05-22T10:42:00.003-04:00

Yesterday I had one of those meetings that I dread. One of those meetings where I have never met the person I am meeting with, have no background information on them, don't know what they think or how they will react to me. I dislike these encounters. I would rather have to meet with someone that I know doesn't like me than to step into the unknown.

Here is a little background. This summer we are hosting a week long mission event into our own city. We call this StreetReach as we are trying to reach this city with the love of Jesus. As part of this week we host a number of evening activities that everyone is invited to and this year to close it all off we wanted to hold a Christian concert in the amphitheater at our local park. When I talked to the people in City Hall they told me that this facility was not typically available to the public during the summer. However, if the event were co-sponsored by a city run group then there would be no problem. Now the question before me was who in the City offices would co-sponsor the event.

I was put in touch, via e-mail, with a lady who heads up part of the youth and community services branch of City Hall. She was the scary lady behind the desk. I had a meeting scheduled for 1pm yesterday afternoon, which I dutifully attended.

So, fast forward to yesterday. Imagine the scene. I am sitting in an office inside City Hall about to ask a government employee if their government office would co-sponsor a Christian concert. The angle I was approaching it from was that we were trying to reach teenagers and she had an anti-drug campaign aimed at teenagers. It could match very well. However, all I could think about was the 'separation of church and state' people who might well jump all over this in a heartbeat.

We greeted each other, she smiled - all was good so far. Then came time for my pitch, or as I looked at it, my chance to cast the vision of what we are doing with StreetReach. I went for it. I laid the whole vision out, from Belfast to Bowie, from yard work to heart work. No holds barred, here we are, this is what we do. As I was talking I noticed that she wasn't frowning at the words, but her eyes were getting bigger and bigger and bigger. She was nodding along with what I was saying and she was even agreeing with what we were doing.

I could feel myself getting excited because I thought, if she gets this then we will get the amphitheater. I finished my vision-casting and awaited a response. What happened next blew me away. Our God is an awesome God and He has all the plans already laid out. The first words out of her mouth were these, 'You know, as a pastor's wife, this sort of stuff gets me excited!'

Yes, indeed. God had set me up to meet with a pastor's wife who not only wanted to co-sponsor, she also took some of our fliers with her to see if any of the young people in her church would want to come and join us. She contacted the lady who oversees the booking of the amphitheater and we confirmed the date of Friday July 17th with a rain date of Saturday July 18th.

WE GOT THE CO-SPONSORSHIP AND THE AMPHITHEATER AT ALLEN POND TO USE TO SPREAD THE GOOD NEWS ABOUT JESUS!!!!

Needless to say I was pretty excited.

God is good, and God is in control. I have more StreetReach praise reports to bring soon.

Those Controversial Gifts

2009-05-15T00:21:00.002-04:00

C. Peter Wagner defines a ‘spiritual gift’ as “a special attribute given by the Holy Spirit to every member of the body of Christ, according to God’s grace, for use within the context of the body.” As I read this definition I had a little uneasiness with the first aspect – the ‘special attribute’ part. I think the word ‘attribute’ has caused me some concern because it begs the question, “Who is it attributed to?” In other words, are spiritual gifts just an extension of our personality traits or are they separate stand alone tools that the Holy Spirit provides for each believer to use as they are needed? As I have been working on this series of teaching sessions for our college ministry, I have read a number of things that I have agreed with, many that I have not agreed with and a few that I am still making my mind up over.

I think that one of the things that I have read up on and have come down on the side of disagreeing with are the ‘Spiritual Gift’ tests or quizzes. I am sure you may have seen these and you may even believe in them. For me, I have found them somewhat lacking. Let me explain. As I have read through a number of these tests, answered the questions and even read the responses that I have achieved I have been impressed with their ability to identify my personality and my talents. They can even spot my weaknesses and deficiencies. The one thing that I struggle with though, is that there seems to be little difference between these types of tests and the personality tests I use in work with my students. The identification appears to be more about me and my personality than about the gifts that the Spirit has for me to use. When I look at those tests I wonder what some of my work colleagues would come out with as a result, even though they are Jewish, or have no faith at all. One thing I do know, unless you know the Holy Spirit you won’t know the gift He has for you, regardless of what the test says.

The bible does not tell us to take a test to find out our gifting, in fact it does not even say that you HAVE just one gift – to keep. Sometimes I think we believe that if we HAVE the gift of prophecy say, then it is like a little bottle of magic potion that we pull out of our pocket when we need it and pour a few drops on people. That is not how spiritual gifts operate, or how we should operate in our spiritual gifts.

I like this definition of spiritual gifts from AllaboutGod.com a little better, “Gifts of the Spirit are special abilities provided by the Holy Spirit to Christians for the purpose of building up the body of Christ.” The gift is provided by the Holy Spirit and it is an ‘ability’, requiring some form of ACTION, not just an attribute that can remain dormant. I have a number of great attributes, but if I do not put them into action then what use are they?

1 Corinthians 12:8-10 is the main passage used when discussing spiritual gifs. This list includes wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy, discerning of spirits, speaking in tongues, and interpretation of tongues. Other lists of gifts can be found in Ephesians 4:7-13 and Romans 12:3-8. Regardless of the location of the gifts the basic premise of the gifts of the Spirit are simply tools that the Holy Spirit gives out to enable believers to build up and edify the church. The gifts of the Spirit are given out freely, but only given out when they will be used to build up the church. You don’t walk around with your gift in your pocket next to your I-phone.

So, having said all that, the question remains, “How do I know which one I have?” The answer very simply is that you don’t HAVE any, but you have ACCESS to them all. The gifts are distributed by the Spirit as He sees fit (1 Cor 12:7-11). The reason for the gifts is to serve and build up the body. If there are sick people in the body then which gift do you think they require? Yup, healing. But if you “have” the gift of prophecy then how will the sick get healed? The gifts are tools, and every workman who carries a toolbox will tell you that if you have the right tool for the right job then it will be done easily. Each tool has a separate function, but under the operation of the craftsman they can accomplish a variety of tasks.

Can you imagine calling a plumber to fix your sink and 25 people show up carrying one tool each. They stand in line waiting to be called upon to loosen a bolt, then another to grip a fitting. Hopefully your plumber brings a toolbox with lots of tools and is able to use them all. So too with the gifts of the Spirit. (After all, when a sick person is healed who gets the gift of healing – the person who is praying or the one who is healed?) They are all available to each believer and are given out by the Spirit as they are needed. God has graciously allowed me to operate in the gift of healing when there were sick people to be prayed for. In the same meeting I have brought prophetic words to some, discerned different types of spirits with others and seen miracles occur. Do these gifts come up when I do a spiritual gift’s test? Do I carry these gifts around with me every day? Not at all. But I have access to them all at any time of any day. These are the tools of the Christian ‘trade’. The gifts are tools that allow us to be the difference that we can be in the world. The power of the Spirit is what enables the blind to see, the lame to walk and the deaf to hear. It is time that we took action and started to ask the Spirit to equip us to serve.

So you want to know what your Spiritual gifts are? Simple, do you see a need in the church? Then, do whatever you can to meet it. Is there a position in a ministry that is vacant and needs someone to step up? Ask God if He would have you fill it. If you seek God's will and obey His leading, He will always equip you with whatever gifts of the Spirit you need. If you are not serving the body, then why do you need a spiritual gift? As you serve, you will begin to meet things that require the Spirit’s gifting, that’s when you will begin to use your toolbox.

The Biggest Lie in the World

2009-05-14T09:35:00.003-04:00

I recently heard a pastor give a message on being who God has called us to be. During that message he said this, "There is one big lie that exists in the world today. You have heard it, you have probably even spoken it over your children or even your friends. Many of you do not even believe that this is a lie, but fundamentally, when you get down to the bottom line, this is the biggest lie ever."

As you can imagine, I was pretty hooked into this message at this point. As I drove through DC listening to these words I started to think of some pretty big lies - there is no God, Jesus was not the Son of God, there is no devil, and many more that I could think of. As the speaker progressed with his message he put me out of my misery by answering his own statement. Are you ready to hear what he said?

The biggest lie today is this, "You can be anything you want to be"

I will pause for a moment to wait for the internal reaction that just went off inside of you to settle down. I wonder if anyone thought that having heard this that I should be more selective of the speakers I listen to. Let me unpack this particular speakers rationale for this statement.

"You can be ANYTHING you want to be" - sounds good, sounds encouraging, sounds liberating, sounds unachievable, sounds unattainable, sounds false. You may have told your kids this as they were growing up. You may have high hopes and aspirations for them, but are these aspirations realistic? Do your dreams for your kids match God's gifting and calling for your kids? If you have a son who grows up to be 5'5" tall and appears to have two left hands when it comes to ball sports, then no matter how much he WANTS to be an NBA star, he is most likely not going to achieve that ambition. If you have a daughter who WANTS to become an astronaut but doesn't understand elementary physics and gets motion sick when you reverse the car out of the driveway, then this WANT will not be achieved. When we get down to the harsh reality, we cannot be anything we WANT to be.

If you have continued to read, then you are either depressed or upset or intrigued. So let me bring an upside to this otherwise depressing posting. If we were created by God, gifted and anointed by Him, and placed on this earth then there must be a reason for Him doing that. The biggest problem I see with the biggest lie is that we have removed God from the equation. We tell ourselves and our children that they can be anything that THEY want to be - what about being who GOD wanted them to be? When we see a goal or have a dream we will spend countless hours pursuing that goal and trying to achieve it. Many of us will be successful in our endeavors, and we often call it God's blessing. We see our success as a validation that what we are doing MUST be what God wants us to do - otherwise we would not succeed. Why would we think that? We hear stories of married men who leave their wives and move in with another woman because they have a better relationship with the 'mistress' - therefore it must be God's will that we be together!! - Have you got rocks in your head??

God's call and will for our lives is not a mystery. He wants to tell you and to teach you how to be the best YOU that He made you to be. So many people struggle with knowing what God has called them to do or to be because they followed the biggest lie. You may find yourself in a position right now where you have been asking God to bless you in your work yet you are not seeing that blessing. could it be that you have followed the path to become the ANYTHING you wanted to be but you have forsaken the THING that GOD created you to be?

I personally have wrestled with this for a number of years. I did not see myself as a college professor when I was growing up. In fact, while I was still in physical therapy school I applied for a vacant youth pastor position at a previous church. I was sure that I would be working in full time (PAID) ministry. When I graduated and started my PhD I began to teach. I loved teaching. It fired me up. I have spent the past 16 years teaching. So what about that full time ministry position? Well, I now have a job where I can do what I love, I interact with young minds every day and have the opportunity to affect those minds with words, actions and prayers. I have a mission field that comes to my office with their questions and concerns. I have some students who even read this blog - and have now realized that I am talking about them. I have a position where I only have to go to my office 4 days a week - boss' directive. I have a job where I get 2 weeks off at Christmas, 5 days off at Easter and 2 months off for the summer - all paid. My work pays for my ministry. This work schedule has allowed me to devote a lot of time to ministry - to the church. What a blessing!

If I had taken that youth pastor job back in the early 1990's I don't know where I would be, but I don't think it would be here. What are your wants? What ANYTHING do you want to be? Does your ANYTHING add up to the SOMETHING that God has called you to be? Don't settle for just ANYTHING. Ask God what He has created you for - what good works he has created for you to do? Eph 2:10 says, "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." Are you doing the good works that God has already prepared for you?

What Does the Holy Spirit Do?

2009-05-07T16:03:00.004-04:00

I began a short series last week looking at the person and work of the Holy Spirit. We started off by identifying that the Spirit of God was at work from the very beginning of time. As we read in genesis 1:2, “The spirit hovered over the waters..” Today, I want to continue our investigation by considering what the Holy Spirit does. Writing in articles such as this does not allow for a complete and sufficient discussion of this subject matter but hopefully you will take some time during the week to read the scripture passages mentioned and to allow the Spirit of God to be your teacher.

So What Does the Holy Spirit Do?
1. The Holy Spirit is involved in the new birth.
a. Jesus said, "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit…" (Jn. 3:5).
2. The Spirit lives inside believers
3. The Spirit sanctifies (I Pet. 1:2).
4. The Spirit convicts (Jn. 16:8, ASV)
5. The Spirit comforts (Acts 9:31)
6. The Spirit Counsels (Jn14:16)
7. Teaches (I Cor. 2:13)
8. Saves (Tit. 3:5)
9. Purifies (I Pet. 1:22)
10. The Spirit also exerts power (Rom. 15:13)
11. The Spirit brings truth (Jn14:17)
12. The Spirit empowers (Acts 1:8)
13. The Spirit gives gifts (1Cor 12:8).

Comforter/Counselor
In John 14:16-14:24 - Jesus makes a devastating announcement to his disciples – He is going to leave them again. He adds confusion to the devastation by saying that He HAS TO GO. He brings some comfort in that Jesus tells the disciples that even though He must leave He will send them another comforter, someone to come along side them. The Greek term used in the New Testament is ‘paraklete’ or ‘parakleton’. This word is translated as “advocate” in 1 John 2:1 and essentially it means “one called alongside” for protection or counsel. So the role of the Holy Spirit, as stated by Jesus, was that He would be one who would come along side to comfort and to counsel. Wouldn’t you just want that person with you every day, during every moment, assisting in every situation, counseling in every decision. In this passage Jesus also uses the word ‘another’. The word “another” used here is ‘allon’ (meaning ‘another of the same kind’) rather than ‘heteros’ (another of a different kind). Jesus was one comforter. The Holy Spirit was another comforter, but another of the same kind. Jesus is reassuring the disciples that the new comforter will be made of the same stuff Jesus was – to use an old expression, he would be cut from the same cloth. The Holy Spirit is our comforter, our counselor and He is just the same as Jesus – fully God.

An Indwelling Spirit
Jesus continues in this passage to tell the disciples that while He walked with the disciples, the Holy Spirit would dwell (live) inside of them. In verse 17 Jesus clearly tells them that the Spirit will live inside of them. Have you ever thought about that? The Spirit of God, who hovered over the waters at the creation of the world, lives inside of YOU! Everywhere you go, He goes, everything you do, He sees, everything you say, He hears. Now that probably doesn’t make you feel that good – especially if you have made some of the same mistakes I have made. Your body is the Holy Spirit’s address. Paul wrote in 1 Cor 3:16 that your body is a ‘temple of the Holy Spirit’. I think my temple is in a little need of repair – (time to drop some weight and take care of His house.) In John 20:22 Jesus appears in the Upper Room before the disciples, Thomas checks out the nail marks in his hands, and then Jesus tells them to ‘receive His Spirit’. This is what many authors consider the disciples conversion experience – they have seen Jesus crucified, risen from the dead and now have declared Him as Lord. After Thomas has had his questions asked Jesus fills them with the Holy Spirit. They are reborn. If you have accepted Jesus as Lord and savior of your life and have confessed Him as Lord then the same Holy Spirit has entered into your body too. You have been filled.

The Holy Spirit Insures Us and Assures Us
In Romans 6:16 we read that the Spirit of God ‘bears witness’ with our spirit that we are God’s children. The Holy Spirit is intricately involved in our salvation. While Jesus died on the cross and paid the punishment that should have been ours, He is now in heaven, sitting at the right hand of the Father, praying for you (comforting thought). Here on earth, the Holy Spirit is calling people by name, pointing them to Jesus, leading them to salvation. The Holy Spirit operates on a ‘spirit’ level and communicates with our spirit directly. Eph 1:13-14 tells us that when we heard the Gospel and believed that we were marked – with the Holy Spirit. You are a marked person – the Lord knows that mark, and the enemy knows that mark too. Those verses continue by telling us that the Holy Spirit is a deposit, securing our guarantee for a life with the King. What a beautiful image. Gordon Fee: wrote this, "The Spirit himself is the down payment...in our lives that guarantees our certain future...The gift of the Spirit is the first part of the redemption of the whole person". Now that really is ‘Blessed Assurance’. On the flip side, Romans 8:9 says this, ‘If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.’

Enables Us
John14:21 says, “Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him.”
1 John 3:24, “Those who obey his commands live in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us.”

John 14:23 “Jesus replied, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.”

It is clear here that the Holy Spirit lives in us and it is through His power that we can now live. Love is the only power that can draw a person to keep the Lord’s commands; they are too foreign to fallen human nature for it to be otherwise.

Provides Freedom
One of the things the Bible often associates the Holy Spirit with is freedom. The apostle Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 3:17, "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom." I want to look at four freedoms that the Holy Spirit produces in our lives. In 1 Corinthians 12:3 we read, “Therefore I tell you that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, "Jesus be cursed," and no one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the Holy Spirit. So we cannot even declare that Jesus is Lord without the Holy Spirit.

Empowers Us
Acts 1:8 – “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." Here we see one of the verses that we will discuss in a few weeks when we look at the difference between ‘in-filling’ and ‘out-pouring’. If you recall from earlier we discussed from John 20 how Jesus appeared to the disciples and they received the Holy Spirit – an in-filling. After that occurrence they were instructed by Jesus to stay in Jerusalem and to wait for empowering when the Spirit came ON them.

What sort of power are we talking about?

Well if we read the end of the verse from Acts 1:8 we see that the empowering is for us to be witnesses. We are not empowered so we can be better Christians, we are empowered so that we can be His witnesses. We are empowered so we can carry out the great commission.

The Holy Spirit Gives Gifts – that is for a brand new post – coming next week

We Must Go!

2009-05-05T08:45:00.003-04:00

Every now and then something comes up in my life that quickens this thought - "Am I going where God has called me to go?" From my teenage years I have had a focus on bringing the reality of the Kingdom of God to wherever I happen to be. Sometimes that has been more successful and diligent than others, but when I was a young man God planted that desire in my heart. It still burns strong today and I pray that that fire never goes out.

Recent events with Lindsay being at Invisible Children, with StreetReach looming large on the horizon, and with my cousin in Belfast launching a new charity to reach and rescue young children taken into prostitution have caused me to ask that question again.

"Am I going where God has called me to go?"

We are all called to "GO" - somewhere. At the end of Jesus time on earth, right before he ascended to the Father, he gave his disciples this command found in Matthew 28:19 'Therefore go and make disciples of all nations,' The final order from our commander-in-chief was to go and make disciples. There is more contained in these verses that I will unpack at a later date, but let's just hover over these few verses for a while today.

We were told to go - just like the disciples were told, we are also commanded to go and make disciples. As I have thought about this for the past week or so I have become acutely aware that we have taken this active word and turned it into a passive term. When Jesus told us to go He wanted us to, well, GO. We have an activity to do. We need to move from where we are to where He sends us. We have turned this around to mean that we will provide the best events, programs and/or services that we can so that the non-believers would be the ones who 'GO'. We somehow expect the non-churched to see some exciting piece of advertising that we produce and them to be so drawn that they would be the ones who perform the action of 'GOING' - right into our church. Why have we got this so backwards?

Jesus commands us to GO, so why do we sit? Jesus commands us to GO, so why do we open our doors and hope someone might stumble in? Jesus commands us to GO - why do we disobey by staying stationary?

We started StreetReach last year because of this very desire. Jesus commands us to GO - yet he has placed us here in this city. God has brought me to Bowie, for His purpose - and I am sure that His purpose will not be fully achieved unless I am GOING into the city to reach the lost. Through StreetReach we have an opportunity to do what our commander-in-chief has asked us to do - GO into our part of the world to make disciples.

We have tossed around the idea of taking the whole church out on a Sunday morning to reach out to this city. That would certainly be a start. And the best thing is that we need no special training. We do not need to be super Christians to walk through a neighborhood, to knock on a door and ask people if we can wash their car or cut their grass for them. We just need to be willing to GO.

Tim Hughes wrote a song with this chorus, "We must go, live to feed the hungry, stand beside the broken, we must go. Stepping forward, keep us from just singing, move us into action, we must go." This past week Pastor Charlie talked to us about worshiping with our whole bodies. What greater form of worship is there than to reach out to those in need, to follow the last command that Jesus gave.

We must go!

Who is the Holy Spirit?

2009-05-03T18:58:00.003-04:00

It is amazing to me that so many Christians have a fairly good understanding of who Jesus is, they have a reasonable understanding of who the Father is, but they have little to no understanding of who the Holy Spirit is. In fact, the Holy Spirit has almost become a taboo subject in many churches. It is as if there are believers who do not want anything to do with the Holy Spirit in case something weird happens. Why would we think like that? What is weird about the Holy Spirit? What are we really afraid of?

Over the next few weeks I would like us to begin to look at who the Holy Spirit is, what He does and how He impacts our lives. My intention is to lay the ground work for us to prepare ourselves for Pentecost Sunday and to help us as a body to get ready to allow the Holy Spirit to be poured out in a fresh way in our church so that we can receive ‘power from on high’ and go out and do the things that we are called to do.

So let’s take a quick overview of some passages in Scripture where the Holy Spirit is mentioned.

The Holy Spirit is an active part of the Trinity. The Holy Spirit has been with the Father and Jesus from the beginning of time. Genesis 1:2 says this, ‘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.’ So right in the very beginning when God the Father was about to open His mouth and speak forth all of creation, the Holy Spirit was there hovering over the waters of the formless earth.

During the time of Pharaoh the Holy Spirit was actively involved in people’s lives and this was a visible activity. In Genesis 41 we find Pharaoh in a little predicament. He has had a number of dreams and needed an interpretation. The person who came to assist him was Joseph. Because of the interpretation Joseph brought, he was put in charge of the land of Egypt. This is the criteria Pharaoh, a pagan king, used for Joseph’s selection – Pharaoh looked for a man like Joseph who the Spirit of God was inside of. Genesis 41:38 says, ‘So Pharaoh asked them, ‘Can we find anyone like this man, one in whom is the spirit of God?’

When we think of the Holy Spirit today we think of fruit of the Spirit or we think of the gifts of the Spirit. Somehow we think that the gifts are a New Testament thing – but that is not the case. In Exodus chapter 31 we see that the Spirit of God gifts men with skill and ability. Exodus 31:3 says, ‘and I have filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, ability and knowledge in all kinds of crafts…’ Again in Exodus 35:31 we read that the gifting of skill to be a craftsman was not something that was just attributed to a person, but it was attributed to being a gift from the Spirit of God. Moses said of the same man mention in Exodus 31:3, ‘and he has filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, ability and knowledge in all kinds of crafts’ Obviously this gentleman was very good at what he did – but why should we be surprised by that – his gift was not something he gave himself, but the Spirit of God gave it to him.

In Numbers 11:17 we read God say, ‘I will come down and speak with you there, and I will take of the Spirit that is on you and put the Spirit on them. They will help you carry the burden of the people so that you will not have to carry it alone.’ The Spirit of God rested on Moses and the Lord says here that the same Spirit that was upon Moses would be put on each of the 70 leaders who were to assemble with Moses. The Holy Spirit enables leadership. In verse 25 of this chapter there is an interesting exchange. Moses prays for each of the leaders and takes the Holy Spirit and puts him on each leader. Their response is audible – they prophesied. Interestingly at the end of this verse it says that these leaders never did this again. I wonder if they were ever in the position like this where the Holy Spirit was on them, or if they even asked Him to come on them again.

Numbers 11:29 indicates that the experience of the leaders and the elders must have been a good thing because Moses says that he wishes that all the people could have the Holy Spirit ‘put on them’. It appears that at this time, the Holy Spirit was restricted on whom He could fall. Contrast that to the day of Pentecost in Acts 2 and the prophecy from Joel that Peter quotes from on that day and we see that the Holy Spirit ‘will be poured out on ALL flesh’. It looks like Moses’ request came true – just a few hundred years after his outcry in Numbers 11:29.

In Numbers 24:2 we read that Balaam experienced the Spirit of God resting on him. It was written of Joshua son of Nun, that he was ‘a man whom in whom is the Spirit…’ in Numbers 27:18. Judges 3:10 states that the Spirit of God came upon Othniel so he could be Judge. The same thing happened to Gideon in Judges 6:34. In fact if you read through the book of Judges you will see time and time again when the Spirit of God came upon a Judge.

Even this very cursory look at the mentions of the Holy Spirit in the early books of the Bible shows us that the Spirit was active in the creation of the world, He was involved in interactions between the Father and Moses, He came upon the elders and leaders and enabled them to prophesy, He came upon the Judges and gave them wisdom, victory in battles and strength.

The same Holy Spirit that worked at the beginning of the Bible is the same Holy Spirit that was poured out on the day of Pentecost, and is the same Holy Spirit that will be poured out on you, if you want it.

I would encourage you to take some time over these next few weeks to consider the person and work of the Holy Spirit and to prepare your heart and spirit for Pentecost Sunday. If God is pouring out His Spirit and gifting men then wouldn’t you like to be in that line to receive His gifting?

Where is Your Calcutta?

2009-04-29T21:37:00.002-04:00

On Saturday afternoon a young lady boarded a metro car at New Carrolton bound for the National Mall. She was not alone as she traveled, however she had a different vision of what that day would bring. Her party arrived in DC and met together with an estimated 3000 other like-minded people who were all there for one purpose. Each of these individuals had ‘abducted’ themselves as an act of support in the fight to free the child soldiers being held by Joseph Kony in Northern Uganda. The demonstration was organized by the Invisible Children group (www.invisiblechildren.com).

The plan was simple – 100 cities across the US, and more in Australia, New Zealand, and Europe had gatherings similar to this one in DC where the participants had abducted themselves and were willing to wait at that location until a media mogul, politician or some other celebrity would ‘rescue’ them by showing up with some sort of media outlet and addressing the assembled gatherings.

Our young lady friend, joined by the rest of the DC abductees waited for rescue and after only a few short hours wait the DC camp was rescued by a local politician. Somewhere around 4pm on Saturday afternoon a senator arrived to release the group and allow these abductees to return home. For many people there, this was the end of the event known as ‘The Rescue’. Not so though for our young adventurer. As most people were headed home, our young adventurer (Lindsay Aiello) boarded a bus with a bunch of other ‘Rescue Riders’ and they headed to a nearby city to support those who had not been rescued there. This turned out to be Philadelphia. Once Philly was rescued the Riders were off again. As I write this, on Wednesday evening, Lindsay has been abducted for nearly 5 days – and she is now in the last remaining city to be rescued, Chicago Illinois.

Why did Lindsay drop everything in her life to fight for a cause that for many is completely unheard of? Why would someone give up themselves to fight for a cause that they cannot see? As I have been thinking about and praying for Lindsay this week I was reminded of another adventurous young lady. Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu felt called to ministry as a teenager. She did her ministerial training in Ireland and in India. Her story goes that she approached one of her superiors and said, “I have three pennies and a dream from God to build an orphanage.” Their response was simple, and probably what many of us would have said, “You can’t build an orphanage with three pennies. With three pennies you can’t do anything.” Agnes smiled and said, “I know. But with God and three pennies I can do anything.”

Agnes spent the next 50 years working amongst the world’s poorest people in the city of Calcutta, India. The little lady we know as Mother Theresa had not just built one orphanage, but had built a legacy of orphanages and outreach to the poor. Toward the end of her life she was asked by admirers how they could make a difference with their lives. Her response was simple, yet brilliant. She would always reply, “Find your own Calcutta”.

In the lead up to this weekend and her adventure as a Rescue Rider, Lindsay found her own Calcutta. She has found something that she is so passionate about that she is willing to set her life on hold to achieve a goal that many think is impossible. She has found her Calcutta. Lindsay’s passion should inspire us. Agnes’ passion should inspire us. Mother Theresa’s words should haunt us – “Find your own Calcutta.”

In Matthew 25:31 Jesus tells a story about two groups of people – the story is known as the Sheep and the Goats. Take a moment to read this story where the King is assigning people to his right or his left hand side. As the story progresses we see that these two groups are different – however the two groups are not clear as to what the difference is. On the King’s right hand side are those who saw Him in need and gave generously, those who saw Him hungry and provided food, those who saw Him without clothing and covered Him. Those on the left however are described as those who are cursed. Why were they cursed? What was the difference between these two groups? It simple – the difference was what they did and did not do.

Which group are you in? Has God shown you what your Calcutta is? Is your Calcutta the city that you live in right now? Are you on the King’s right or His left? Are you found among the righteous or the cursed? The way to know the answer is simple – what are you DOING? Not what are you thinking about, or what are you studying, or what had you hoped to do, but what are you DOING?

Are you reaching your Calcutta? The time has come for us to be a people who DO.

Waiting For My Kids

2009-04-24T20:31:00.004-04:00

My beautiful wife and two gorgeous daughters went to see her mum (their grandmum)for a couple of weeks over Easter. It sounded like a good idea when we booked the tickets back in November, but it wasn't long into the trip that I realized that I do not like being away from my family for that long. I missed them terribly.

Last Sunday they arrived home. I was excited to see them all again. As I waited at the arrivals area in the airport I paced nervously hoping for that first glimpse of my three girls. I check the various vantage points from our waiting area behind the thin black strap that was the demarcation line for those arriving and those waiting. I figured out the exact spot where I could look down the hallway and see the first glimpse of my family as soon as the double doors at the end would open.

It seemed like forever, but the doors opened one more time and there they were - looking as precious as ever. My wife and I saw each other first and I could see her telling the girls 'Look, there is daddy!'.

What happened next was priceless.

My oldest daughter, Cara, saw me first. Her response was beautiful. She dropped her little pull along bag right where she was and took off running right for me. She was only stopped in her tracks by her mother calling her back to bring her bag. Cara scooped up the handle of the bag and took off running again. She ignored the 'security' barrier, such as it was, and dropped the bag again as she ducked under the tape and hugged me as tightly as a 4 year old can.

My younger daughter having seen, and heard, her sister equally ran with all of her might and ignored all protocols of remaining behind the barrier and did everything she could to get to her daddy. I scooped them both up and was almost strangled by their loving embraces and smother with their kisses. It was a beautiful feeling.

This week in our church we started a new series on worship. Worship means to 'come towards to kiss' and is the thing that we are designed to do. As I thought about worship I replayed in my mind my experience at the airport and wondered if every Sunday morning is like that for God.

I imagined God coming to our church service early, pacing back and forward trying to get the best place where He can see us as soon as we walk into the building. I imagined the Father standing patiently waiting only for the doors to open and for us to come into His presence in worship. I wondered what our response would be. Would we be like my Cara and drop our baggage and start running towards the Father. When we come into worship on Sunday mornings are we more focused on the baggage we brought with us or are do we drop everything when we see His face and run with all of our might to our Daddy. Do we jump into His arms and throw our arms around His neck and tell him over and over again that we love Him?

Or is our approach to worship something else? Do we carry our baggage, and slow ourselves down? Do we walk into God's presence or do we run with total abandon? Do we jump into God's arms or do we hold back, quiet and reserved? I hope that this Sunday when we come into worship we hold nothing back. From the very first chord I hope that we run with full force, leaving all of our baggage behind and throw ourselves onto the King of Kings.

Wouldn't that be neat?

Where Does Your Worship Go?

2009-04-24T20:28:00.002-04:00

We are currently in a 3 week mini-series on Sunday mornings looking at the subject of being ‘Wired for Worship’. I don’t know if you have ever thought about that statement, but essentially we were created in the image of God, and our God is a God who loves worship. There is worship going on in heaven at every moment – not that there is really time as we understand it in heaven (but that is the subject of another article some time).

We were created to worship. Our chief aim in life was to worship God. However there is an interesting dynamic that occurred in the Garden of Eden during those few moments that we know as ‘The Fall’. God had instructed Adam and Eve that they could enjoy fruit from any tree in the except for one. We all know the story, there is a serpent who questions what God told them and leads them to that very tree and encourages them to eat from it. The serpent in this story is none other than the former lead worshiper from the ranks of the heavenly host – Lucifer himself.

His story is an interesting one.

Lucifer was the archangel in charge of leading the praise and worship of God the Father in heaven. As he was directing the heavenly host he began to desire some of the adoration they were lavishing on God for himself. He wanted to be worshiped instead of leading the angels to worship God. In Isaiah 14 we read about how Lucifer started to desire the worship that was only meant for God. He culminates this longing with this statement in Is 14:14, “I will ascend above the tops of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High." This angelic being was then hurled from heaven, along with 1/3 of the angelic host who followed him. We now know this character as Satan or the Devil.

Isn’t it interesting that the one thing that we were created to do – worship – is the very thing that God’s number one enemy tries to use to drive a wedge between us and our Savior? When we put things in the place where only God should be then we afford those things our worship, and we rob God of what is rightfully His. The Devil laughs because if we are not for God then we are against God, according to Matthew 12:30. So if we were created to worship, and we worship things other than God then where does that worship ultimately end up? When you worship your career, where does your praise end up? When you worship your money, where does your praise end up? When you worship anything that is not God who ultimately receives your adoration? Who are you really worshiping?

Kinda scary to think about really, isn’t it?

Living in 'Safe Mode'

2009-04-21T19:54:00.001-04:00

In this age of technology I am sure you have been sitting at your computer when suddenly the screen goes black, there is a cacophony of whirring and beeping from the machine and you then get this message telling you your system has recovered from a ‘fatal error’ and will be restarted in ‘Safe Mode’. Once the restart has occurred your computer is the same yet oddly different. All of your icons seem to be twice the size they once were, your machine seems to run slower than normal, all the information is there, but it just isn’t firing on all cylinders. You are in ‘Safe Mode’. Josef Mensah described ‘Safe Mode’ like this, “it's just so big and like... bulky. It's like having airbags on your computer imploded 24/7”.

I was thinking about this during the week and wondered if it were possible for us to live our lives in ‘Safe Mode’. Is it possible to be able to do all the same functions as we normally do but only a little more slowly, with a little less effectiveness. Is it possible to live life with airbags deployed 24/7? Are you living that life right now? Have you spent the past number of years trying to get into ‘Safe Mode’? It is interesting to think that so much of our society tries to “help” stay safe with so many devices designed to make our lives easier. Yet I wonder if all of these life enhancing gadgets are actually reducing our lives to little more than existence in vegetative states of passionless computer/television/game viewing.

Have we lost our desire to do the impossible?

Pastor Ray spoke about God being able to do the impossible but it struck me that even though God is capable, unless we are actually willing to allow Him to do the impossible – and to do it in His way – then we will never see it.

Recently Dione wrote in the AMPED blog page that the youth were restless and felt like their Christian life was too easy. They wanted a challenge. They were living in ‘Safe Mode’. Matthew 5:10 says “Blessed are those who are persecuted.” Matthew 10:23 says “When you are persecuted…”. John 15:20 says, “If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also..” According to Jesus there is no ‘Safe Mode’ for His followers - there is a life of persecution.

But who really wants that?

Surely if we just keep our thoughts and our beliefs to ourselves then we will stay off the world’s radar and have a quiet life. We really do not need to have all that controversy anyway do we? Wouldn’t it be better if we just had a few of those people who seem to enjoy being persecuted to take enough for the rest of us? Let’s just stay out of trouble and live our own lives, not interfering with anyone else and definitely not upsetting anyone.

If you honestly look at your life and the previous paragraph defines your goals in life then I would submit that you are living in ‘Safe Mode’. I find myself all too often drifting to this place where the persecution, the knowledge that people are talking about you (and usually not in a positive light), the hurt that comes from people becomes too much and I pull back the reigns and shut down and let the airbags deploy around me. I retreat into ‘Safe Mode’.

As comfortable a place as that can be, and as painful a place that persecution can be, I chose the latter. I chose today to restart and deselect ‘Safe Mode’ and to operate full on as God created and intended for me to live. There will be risk involved and there will be persecution and there will be pain, but the knowledge that God has created me and called me to serve with everything He has given me is motivation to endure whatever should come my way.

So what about you? Are you living in ‘Safe Mode’? Have you stepped back from the things that God has called you to because if hurt or pain caused by others, even those within the church? Have you shut down your creativity and your risk-taking ability to play it safe and make sure that you do not upset anyone with your relationship with Jesus? Have you changed your lifestyle such that church has become for you a Sunday morning only affair where you pop in and out without passion or zeal for the body you meet with? Are you so battered and bruised from the words of others that you find yourself forced to make leadership decisions and yet you only elect for the safe option, the one that will not upset anybody, but often the one that deep in your heart you know will be least effective? Does this very article upset you? Are you living in ‘Safe Mode’?

I believe it is time to break free from the chains that have bound us down. It is time to step out in faith and do the things that we believe God has called us to do – even when it looks risky. How many times have you read a story of some believer who made some crazy decision, stepped out in some impossible direction only to have the Lord fill in all the details and carry them to a tremendous victory? Do you wonder like me why that doesn’t happen to you? Do you then realize that you would never take the chance – so God would never have the opportunity to be God. I believe that God is setting before us a season of opportunity that will require us to step out of ‘Safe Mode’ and to take a risk, to lean on Him and not to trust in our own understanding. I believe that there are tremendous opportunities that God has in store for us, but like we saw in the video clip last Sunday – we need to take a step of faith into what appears to be a bottomless abyss. It is time to restart our systems and to de-select the ‘Safe Mode’ option.

Are you with me?

Wholly Weak

2009-04-10T09:31:00.001-04:00

Have you thought about this weekend? I am sure you have, but have you just sat down for a few moments of quiet contemplation and really considered what this weekend is all about? I have found myself caught in the tension of spending all my free time in preparation for this weekend and yet have not really sat down and spent enough time in contemplation of this weekend. This weekend we will run through a number of emotions as we spend Thursday remembering the Passover and the final meal that Jesus had with his disciples before he was arrested. On Friday we will, in some way, relive the sacrifice that He made when He submitted Himself to the authorities and allowed them to beat His body and ultimately, after an unfair trial, crucify Him on the cross. On Saturday, we have a chance to come together like the early disciples and to remember the things that God has done and how He said that on the third day He would rise again. Finally on Sunday morning we have the tremendous opportunity to worship together and to celebrate the truth that Jesus, who was dead, now lives.

How do you get your head around that? How do you not explode when you think that the creator of the universe, the God of heaven and earth, the God who spoke and light became, sent His most prized possession, His only Son, His boy, to come to the traitor race who had rejected Him and turned their backs on Him? How can do anything this week but fall flat on our faces in adoration and praise because we were once dead but Jesus, through His sacrifice, came to bring us life? This week is known as ‘Holy Week’ but I think that we should think of it as ‘Wholly Weak’ because that is what we are.

We are completely unable to rescue ourselves. We are completely unable to get ourselves out of the difficulties we find ourselves in. we are completely helpless.

We are WHOLLY WEAK and we need to accept that – quickly. I have found myself this week planning things for this weekend and not even going to the Lord in prayer with them – who do I think I am? When did I begin to think that I had a good idea? Even Jesus when He was on earth only said and did the things that He saw the father say and do. I wonder if He talked all the time – or if God the Father had moments when He was silent. I am sure that Jesus did not fill in the silences with His own words. I believe that He waited until further instructions. In my weakness though I know there are times when I fill in the blanks with what may be very good ideas or thoughts, but they are not always what God the Father is saying. I need to not be afraid of my weakness and not look upon my weakness as, well, a weakness.

Our culture has dictated that only the strong survive – it is the Darwin way! But yet it is not the Christian way. We are reminded in Matthew 5 that it is the poor, the meek, the merciful, the peacemakers who are blessed. Society dictates that the weak will not survive, only the strong will. God’s kingdom is not governed by our societies dictates though. Isaiah 40:29 says, ‘He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.’ Romans 8:26 says, ‘In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness.’ 1 Corinthians 1:27 reminds us that, ‘God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.’ God said in 2 Corinthians 12:9, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness."

We need to embrace our weakness and in fact we need to set aside our own strength, our own abilities, our own talents and gifting and take on only what the Father asks us to do. We need to become WHOLLY WEAK during this Holy Week.

Only Nuns Change Their Habits Overnight

2009-03-31T09:48:00.004-04:00

What an awesome title for a book - pity I didn't think of it or write it, I just borrowed it. My wife arrived home with a book with this title and instantly it started me thinking about change. Not the small coins that jangle annoyingly in your trousers pocket or fill up every small container in your car, but change - real change. Change of belief, change of knowledge, change of action, change of who we are to who God wants us to be. That sort of change.

I had an old youth leader who used to frustrate the life out of me and a number of my peers because he lived by his favorite saying - 'Constant change is here to stay'. Every September we would change how we did things in our youth group. We would change the small group we were in, everything would change. Peter was trying to teach us not to fear change, but to embrace it whenever we need it.

There is one fundamental flaw in this saying, and in trying to actually live it out with a church - PEOPLE DO NOT LIKE CHANGE!

I am learning that more and more each day. One thing that I am realizing is that people are much more willing to embrace change if it is the change they want to make. If there is an 'enforced' change then it seems that people just get out the shovels and dig the trenches a little deeper on those issues. Why is that? Why do we not like change? Why are we not willing to be led, even if that requires change?

I am unique, I know that. Well, actually everyone of us is unique. You are the only you that God created - He gets it right the first time. But few of us embrace our uniqueness and allow God to use that uniqueness for His glory. We gravitate towards a mid-line or a mean. We gravitate towards the lowest common denominator. We gravitate towards mediocrity. We need to CHANGE that!

We run the risk of being what every kid in school attempted to avoid - being average. Those average kids were always the 'ones in the middle of the pack' - they were always in a group. The ones on the upper edges or the lower edges were on their own. They were setting the pace - some in a good way and some in a bad way - but they were pace setters. It is interesting to me that even God has no time for mediocrity - in Revelation 3:15-16 "I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth."

Oh my goodness!

If we continue to be average, if we continue to accept mediocre as a way of living then we become vomit in the throat of God - ready to be expectorated. What a thought! Can you see yourself going to church this Sunday and shaking hands with Pastor and Mrs Vomit, Mr Hughey Upchuck or Ms Boak McPukely? If that is repulsive to you then why do we live our lives as if mediocrity is an achievement? Why do we accept our churches as average and celebrate that at least we are not struggling like some other places? Why do we feel we have made it when we treat our church more like a social club than the bride of Christ?

We need to CHANGE!

As the title suggests, "Only Nuns Change Their Habits Overnight". Well, then it is time for many of us to join the nunnery. It is time for us to stop avoiding change because of the pain it may cause or because of the unknown that it brings or because we just don't want to. We are on a spiritual journey as believers, we are being "transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit." according to 1 Corinthians 3:18 and again in Romans 12:2 we are told "Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind."

So what are we to do? Are we to remain as vomit or are we to take the changes being placed before us seriously? Do we believe that God is faithful and true? Do we believe that He loves us? Do we believe that He has a plan for us, a plan to prosper us and not to to harm us? Are we listening to his whispers? Or are we just playing it safe, taking the middle road, smoothing out the speed bumps, are we settlingn for mediocrity?

Dear God let the answer be "NO!!!!!"

We are called to be overcomers, we are called His children, we are called heirs to the throne, we are NOT AVERAGE! We need to lift our eyes to the throne room of the Father, we need to climb into His lap, and look in His eyes. We need to pour out the things that are weighing us down and we need to let go of them. We need to take on the burden that Jesus gives us -it is light and His yoke is easy.

Dear Lord why do we lose sight of the simple facts of what you have said to us?

It is time to rise up, to shake off the mediocrity that has besieged us and to do what we are called to do. To be the church that we are called to be. To change teh world with the love of Jesus, like He has called us to.

Can we change a habit overnight - ABSOLUTELY YES! Not only can we change a habit overnight, WE MUST. We need to stop whining when things get tough, we need to stop throwing dust on our heads and throwing our hands up in this 'woe is me' attitude and we need to put on the full armor of God that Eph 6 describes. We need to take our stand and when all else is done WE MUST STAND!!

We lift our shields of faith with which we can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. We need to take the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God and we need to start to wield it in all of its power and defeat the enemy. The word says that 'ALL authority in heaven and on earth" has been given to Christ Jesus, and He gives that authority to us. It is time to walk in the authority that we should be walking in.

Stop looking at the economy, it can no longer be your idol. Stop looking at your bank account, you cannot serve two Master - God and money! Stop looking at what once was and wishing that we could return to that place once more. That time is gone, the lessons from the past should be used to help us navigate the future. Successes of the past are not landmarks and monuments that we need to recreate, we remember what God did at that time and find out what He wants to do now. Then we do it!

Rise up O men of God, have done with lesser things, give heart and mind and soul and strength to serve the King of Kings!

Amen and Amen!

Picnicking in the valley

2009-03-25T16:09:00.004-04:00

If it already hasn't happened to you, sooner or later it will. At some point you will wake up and look around and realize that you are in the valley. For each of us as we journey through life there are times when we walk on the mountaintop. Those are the times when we feel like we are on top of the world where everything is going right for us. It is that place where every traffic light turns green as we approach, we always get a parking space right by the door, if it can go right it does go right. Then it happens, the lights are always red, the bills are piling up, the pressure is on and we realize that we are no longer on the mountaintop but we are in the valley.

Everyone has valley experiences at some point in their life. Everyone. There are some valleys that we find ourselves in that are not of our making. Being fired from our job puts us in a valley that we did not choose. There are those valleys that we find ourselves in because of something stupid we did. Overstretching our finances to get the bigger house that we never could really afford, making a bad business decision and watching it go south, saying something that is out of place and hurtful to other people. We look around and instead of being able to see above the clouds all we can see is the rain that is dropping from the clouds - we are in the valley.

When we find ourselves in the valley we have a couple of choices that we can make. We can sit down where we are and think about days gone by when we used to be able to see all that there was to see, we can take out a shovel and dig a little more so our valley becomes even bigger than it already is or we can follow Elijah's example. We can go back from where we came from.

In 1 Kings 18 and 19 we read the story of Elijah and his mountaintop experience (literally) with the prophets of Baal. Here is the man of God in a one-on-850 prophet contest. The prophets of Baal do there thing and nothing happens - Elijah calls on the name of the Lord and fire falls from the sky, and then the rains come ending a 3 year drought. Talk about a mountaintop experience. I can imagine Elijah retelling that story a few times. In the following verses of chapter 19 we read that Jezebel, Ahab's wife, tells this mighty man of God that she is going to kill him. So, fueled by the recent memory of this tremendous spiritual high, Elijah does what many of us do in times like that - he ran for his life. He didn't just run away and hide - he ran over 200 miles away to hide. He was so deep in the valley that he asked God if he could just die. This was a deep, deep valley.

You need to read the story for yourself, but after a number of interactions with God, God asks Elijah this question, "What are you doing here, Elijah?" This is not a philosophical question as to the meaning of life - God is asking Elijah why he is in this valley under a broom tree asking to die. How could this mighty man of God go from being in control of commanding fire from heaven and drought-ending rain and yet be asking to die? How did he go from the mountaintop to the valley?

"What are you doing here, Elijah?"

Are you in a valley at the minute? Are things in your life not going to the plan you had made? Are you struggling financially? Are you having difficulties in your marriage? Are your children driving you insane? Have you walked, no, have you run away from God and the things He has for you? Maybe today God is standing where you are and asking you the same question - "What are you doing here?"

The next interaction is incredible - God puts on a display of his strength and power for Elijah and reveals Himself not in the wind, not in the earthquake, but in the silence of a whisper. One more time God asks Elijah the same question - "What are you doing here?" God has demonstrated His power on the mountaintop with the prophets of Baal, He has reminded Elijah through a quick demonstration with some wind and an earthquake. God is screaming at Elijah - DO YOU NOT KNOW WHO I AM? DO YOU NOT KNOW HOW POWERFUL I AM? WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?

He doesn't literally scream it out - He brings his work in a whisper. God speaks to him in verse 15 and says this - "Go back the way you came...."

God tells Elijah to go back to where he was. Go back to doing the things that you were doing before you ended up in the valley. Go back and do the things that I HAVE CALLED YOU TO DO. God tells Elijah to go anoint a successor to King Ahab, and a successor to that King and a successor to himself. Elijah realizes that God not only has a plan but he has a successor to carry on his ministry, and a successor to the king - which means that the king's days must be numbered and Elijah will be safe. God has a plan - God had a plan the whole time, but Elijah couldn't see it because he was in the valley focused on his problems and not doing what God had called him to do.

Is this where you are? Are you in a valley because you have stopped doing the things God has called you to do? Are you in the valley because you stopped reading your bible and praying? Are you in a financial valley because you stopped giving God what was rightfully His off the top of your income and have subsequently lost the blessing He prescribes when we do that? Are you in a valley of your own making because things got hard and you bailed on your Christian walk and relationship and now don't know what to do about it?

"What are you doing here?"

Have you been sitting in the valley having a picnic and looking at the view? God's word to you is "Go back the way you came". Return to the things that God asked you to do. Return to putting Him first in your life, in your finances, in your thoughts. It is time to get up off the valley floor and do what God has called you to do.

remember this one thing - a valley sits between two mountains. If you were on a mountaintop and find yourself in a valley then keep on going because there is a new mountaintop to be reached right beside that valley you are in.

So are you going to sit where you are or are you going to stand up, remember the things that God has done in you and through you, and go back the way you came?

Its your call.

Money, Money, Money

2009-03-24T10:47:00.003-04:00

We are in an economic crisis! It is kind of like, 'the sky is falling, the sky is falling!'. Now I know that some people have sadly lost their jobs and that many more cannot just buy what they want anymore, but I have been thinking that there is an upside to this. Is it just me, or are we living in times where more and more people think that they are owed something? We live in a time when people feel entitled - entitled to do whatever they want, entitled to write whatever they want, entitled to have whatever they want. When did we think this was a good idea?

Is it just me or can anyone else remember when you had to make a choice between buying one expensive item or the other - as opposed to just buying the both now and paying for them later? Did anyone else buy the house they could afford at that time with the understanding that you had a responsibility to pay your loan back? When did we allow the greed of our eyes to dictate the decisions of our brains? As my mom would say when we put more food on our plate than we could actually eat - "Your eyes are bigger than your belly!" What I have learned over time with that one though is that with the right practice and training you can increase your belly :)

I have heard a lot of worry about the economy - and not worry because we cannot put food on our tables - but worry because we cannot put the food we want on our tables. There has been outcry because we cannot go to the restaurants we used to go to, or we actually have to cut our own grass instead of paying the lawn service to do it. When did we get to this sorry state of affairs?

Where has all the trust gone? Where has all the faith gone? Where did God go?

The simple answer I believe is that God didn't go anywhere - but many of us are learning the truth of Matthew 6:24 - You cannot serve both God and money. For some of us we fight against this, we declare that we have never served money - yet we live our lives glued to the markets and the financial reports. We worry about the cost of our houses more than we pray for revival in the nation. We justify our service of money as 'concern' or 'good stewardship' or 'being wise'.

We need to trust in God and His word - when He tells us to consider the birds of the air and how He takes care of them, then don't you think we should? God never said He would meet our wants, He said He would meet our needs.

Just a thought today - not sure where it came from.

The Graveyard of God's Precious Treasure

2009-03-18T14:54:00.003-04:00

I really need to stop reading books. It seems that each time I pick up a book to read there is a line in it that jumps out and smacks me in the face. This time it is from "The Principles and Power of Vision" by Dr Miles Munroe. I picked this one up at Borders for an evening read over a coffee and of course it came home with me - even though I only read a few pages.

Here is why.

As the title suggests, this book is all about vision - finding it, holding on to it, refining it and achieving it. Right up my alley. I never got past the first few pages because I read one of those pop-out boxes that said this - 'Too many of us bury our dreams in a lesser existence, making ourselves a graveyard of God's precious treasure.'

That was it for me. I could not get past that. You might wonder what the big deal is. Let me ask you this one question - are you doing right now what you dreamed you would do when you were younger?

When we are little kids we dream dreams about what we are going to be when we get older. We want to be firemen, or nurses, postmen or astronauts. Very often those dreams pass away and are nothing more than flights of fancy. Then we dream those formative year dreams where we see ourselves as the executive CEO of some major corporation, or we see ourselves as a professional athlete, or we see ourselves as a pastor or a church leader. whatever it is, there are those dreams that we had when we were younger, not simple flights of fancy, but real dreams where we would work out the details and imagine ourselves in situations that only existed in this dream life. These are the dreams that I am talking about. These are the dreams that directed our hobbies, that peaked out interest in subjects in school, that attracted us to join teams or clubs or organizations. These are the dreams that God placed in us at an early age. Very often we find that we have some gifting or skill associated with the dream we have. We can hit a baseball with ease and dream of breaking the home run record (steroid free of course). We can draw and create beautiful pieces of art and we imagine ourselves seeing our name on the sign outside of the City Hall announcing that we are the artist of the month. Big or small, it doesn't matter, these are the dreams and the gifts that are deep within us.

Now you know what I am talking about - now answer the question - are you doing right now what you dreamed you would be doing?

If you answered no, then you have become a graveyard of God's precious treasure. Ouch! that hurts! I don't mean to be rude, but I believe that God places gifts and talents inside of each one of us and along with those gifts and talents He places dreams. He give us those childhood visions of us serving sick people in hospital, or sitting around that board room meeting with a bunch of suits trying to make a decision as to how to avoid the next crisis. He gives us those dreams of putting out fires or rescuing stray cats from trees. he gives us those dreams of raising beautiful children or kicking a soccer ball even better than David Beckham can.

Have those dreams died inside of you? Has the treasure that the King was placing in you been buried under the mortgage, or the gas bill? Has the treasure been stolen from you from those who said, 'You want to do what? There is no money in that! Get a real job" Have you had your dream of teaching a small class of 4 year olds the truth of the simplest of bible stories because you "don't read so well"? As you look at your life and see the choices and sacrifices that have been made and how those dreams became another sacrifice, does something deep inside of you rise up when you think of what you wanted to become?

In 2 Timothy 1:6-7 Paul says these words to Timothy - "I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline." Timothy was just a young man at this point, and Paul is reminding him of the dreams that were in him, he is reminding him of the gifts that were in him - and he was exhorting Timothy to not be satisfied with the current intensity at which he was using those gifts - there was more. Timothy was instructed to fan into flame - a picture of a fire-tender taking out the bellows and blowing air into the very heart of the fire to inject combustible oxygen into the center of the flame and increasing the fuel, increasing the fire and increasing the heat.

I listened to a speaker on my way to work this morning that reminded me that I am unique - he wasn't just speaking to me, but I was the only one in the car so I reckon he had to be speaking to me. He reminded me that in 1 Peter 2:9 we are called a 'peculiar people' (King James Version). God created me peculiar. He created you peculiar too. Why do we try to conform to some middle ground where everything we do is normal. It is time to redefine normal. When we fan into flame the gifts that God has placed in us we will do just that - we will redefine normal.

I keep hearing people tell me that I am different, that I am unique, that no-one else thinks like me or acts like me. It used to bother me. it used to make me reflect on how I could change and become more 'normal'. It made me consider how I could become more acceptable and not be so different. Well, I believe that through the message this morning I need to fan into flame some gifts that God has put in me that have been on a low ebb for a while. It is time for me to not conform to 'normal' but to redefine normal. To define what is 'normal' for me - to be me, to be unique. You want to know something - don't do what I do - you are not me! God has created each of us to be unique, with unique gifts and talents but as we work together we compliment each other and our gifts blend until we corporately will build and edify the body of Christ. From now on it is unacceptable to consider someone weird just because they do things differently from me. Praise God for that difference and let's work together to see this city changed.

There is a passion and a desire inside of me to see the church in this city work together to see His kingdom come across this whole city. Only one church is big enough for that - THE Church of Jesus Christ collectively. There is a passion inside of me to see the college age generation so ignited with passion for the gospel that they become infectious everywhere they are and like the flu bug that has been going around i want to see our college age folks infect everyone they 'sneeze' on with the Good News about Jesus. I have a passion to see our Sunday morning services be the best opportunities they can be for us to come together to worship the King, to hear His word and to respond with open hearts and willing minds. I have a passion that I have laid down for a while, a passion that consumed my every thought a few years ago, a passion that defined my mission in life - and today I am resurrecting it from the graveyard. I have a passion that I will see God's kingdom come and see His will done right here in the City of Bowie, as it is in Heaven.

Let it come Lord, let it come. Today I am kicking tombstones over and monuments to dreams that have passed and were never thought to be possible. I am releasing my dreams back to God and asking Him to raise up again the things that He has called me to. Today I am shutting down the graveyard that I have created in my own life and having a personal resurrection service - right here in Panera Bread coffee shop. Let Your kingdom come, Lord! Let it come today, right now, right here!

What do you need to resurrect and fan into flame?

Today is your day. You choose.

St Patrick’s Breastplate

2009-03-16T12:36:00.003-04:00

Tomorrow is St Patrick’s day - a day when the whole world attempts to claim it’s Irish heritage by dressing in green, drinking beer and if you live in America, eating corned beef and cabbage. Sadly, none of these things were actually done or would even be condoned by the Irish saint (especially the corned beef and cabbage thing) whose day this is all in honor of. St Patrick brought the truth of Christianity to the people of Ireland, but only after he has been kidnapped, beaten and sold as a slave before he eventually escaped and following his call from God and traveled to the Emerald Isle with Good News.

The following prayer is attributed to St Patrick and this version is found in Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, Vol. 4, §14, critical note on St. Patrick. Schaff, notes that this Irish hymn is found in the Book of Armagh, and is "called S. Patricii Canticum Scotticum, which Patrick is said to have written when he was about to convert the chief monarch of the island (Laoghaire or Loegaire). The hymn is a prayer for the special aid of Almighty God for so important a work; it contains the principal doctrines of orthodox Christianity ... in a composition intended as a breast-plate or corselet against spiritual foes."

This St Patrick’s day why don’t you take some time to pray this prayer and find out what the real St Patrick was all about.

St Patrick’s Breastplate
I bind to myself today
The strong virtue of the Invocation of the Trinity:
I believe the Trinity in the Unity
The Creator of the Universe.

I bind to myself today
The virtue of the Incarnation of Christ with His Baptism,
The virtue of His crucifixion with His burial,
The virtue of His Resurrection with His Ascension,
The virtue of His coming on the Judgment Day.

I bind to myself today
The virtue of the love of seraphim,
In the obedience of angels,
In the hope of resurrection unto reward,
In prayers of Patriarchs,
In predictions of Prophets,
In preaching of Apostles,
In faith of Confessors,
In purity of holy Virgins,
In deeds of righteous men.

I bind to myself today
The power of Heaven,
The light of the sun,
The brightness of the moon,
The splendor of fire,
The flashing of lightning,
The swiftness of wind,
The depth of sea,
The stability of earth,
The compactness of rocks.
I bind to myself today
God's Power to guide me,
God's Might to uphold me,
God's Wisdom to teach me,
God's Eye to watch over me,
God's Ear to hear me,
God's Word to give me speech,
God's Hand to guide me,
God's Way to lie before me,
God's Shield to shelter me,
God's Host to secure me,
Against the snares of demons,
Against the seductions of vices,
Against the lusts of nature,
Against everyone who meditates injury to me,
Whether far or near,
Whether few or with many.

I invoke today all these virtues
Against every hostile merciless power
Which may assail my body and my soul,
Against the incantations of false prophets,
Against the black laws of heathenism,
Against the false laws of heresy,
Against the deceits of idolatry,
Against the spells of women, and smiths, and druids,
Against every knowledge that binds the soul of man.

Christ, protect me today
Against every poison, against burning,
Against drowning, against death-wound,
That I may receive abundant reward.

Christ with me, Christ before me,
Christ behind me, Christ within me,
Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ at my right, Christ at my left,
Christ in the fort, [i.e., at home]
Christ in the chariot seat, [i.e., traveling by land]
Christ in the poop. [i.e., traveling by water]

Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me,
Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks to me,
Christ in every eye that sees me,
Christ in every ear that hears me.

I bind to myself today
The strong virtue of an invocation of the Trinity,
I believe the Trinity in the Unity
The Creator of the Universe.

Never Beat The Sheep

2009-03-12T09:14:00.002-04:00

I have been wrestling with some thoughts this past week. It started with reading Exodus and the story of Moses and the children of Israel. As I thought about that story I could see things very clearly from Moses point of view - the reluctant leader, being asked to do something that he believes is beyond his talent or ability. I could see how the grumbling people became so much of a frustration to Moses that he even went to the Lord and said, "What am I to do with these people?" in Exodus 17:4. I could see how difficult it must have been for Moses to lead such a quarrelsome group who continued to want to return to the slavery they had been liberated from. A few verses after Moses complains to the Lord about the Israelites, he is instructed by God to strike a rock that the Lord allowed water to flow from to meet the latest grumbling need from the Hebrews. I imagine Moses hearing the instructions to strike the rock and rather that that one majestic strike the Charleton Heston did in the Cecil B DeMille movie, I can see Moses just hammering the living snot out of that rock with his staff, taking out his frustration with some 'exercise'.

So, hold that image in your mind and come with me as I transition to the other side of the coin. On Tuesday I was reading Bill Hybels "Axiom" book and a chapter entitled 'Never Beat The Sheep' leaped out at me. In the two and a half pages that this chapter consumes contained some of the most convicting words I have read in a long time. Hybels discussed how leaders can see what many others cannot see. They strive to the next thing, even when the people may not have finished the task at hand. This comes naturally to them, however to the people it can appear that the leader is never satisfied, doesn't stop and indeed doesn't even know how to slow down. This can produce incredible frustration for the people. Like the children of Israel in the desert - there was Moses out in front following the cloud and pillar and the people are behind wondering where they are headed to. I am sure that many of them were happy when they settled in one place for a little while, only to get aggravated that they have to up and move again, and for them this went on for 40 years.

When this frustration is not handled appropriately it becomes 'grumbling' from the people and can be even worse from the leadership - sheep beating. There are times when leaders can take their frustrations out on the people and instead of loving them, caring for them, protecting them, training and teaching them, they can often revert to beating the sheep for not doing what the leader believes the sheep should be doing.

So here is the eternal dilemma - leaders are called to lead, are gifted to lead, are anointed to lead and are appointed to lead. Sheep are followers, however they will follow pretty much anything that looks good - which sometimes goes against where the leader is going. However, with gentle correction most sheep will move back to the path that the leader is following. I fear that sometimes what the leader believes to be GENTLE correction is received by the sheep as a beating, at least, I can see this has been the case in the leadership that I have been involved in over the years.

I have been praying recently and asking God to forgive me for any times that I have beaten sheep. It has been a difficult couple of days to think back over the areas that I have been allowed to lead in and to realize that there were times when I struck the sheep with the staff and not the rock that God had designated. I wanted to apologize through this article to you if through things that I have written, said or done I have in some way beaten you down. It has not been my intention, but to be honest that is never an excuse. Bill Hybels is right, 'Never Beat The Sheep'. He concludes his chapter by instructing leaders that 'A word of loving admonition every once in a while might be appropriate, but put the stick away. Permanently.'

As I continue in the position of leadership that the Lord has put me in I will endeavor to follow this Axiom and please, if I say or write something that contradicts this then would you gently remind me that sheep beating season has passed? Lord, help me to put the stick down and never to reach for it again.

God bless

Let My People Go - Moses' Story

2009-03-10T19:39:00.003-04:00

Last week, Julie and I took the girls to the Lake for some family time. With no TV or internet to distract us in the evenings, time was spent talking, laughing and reading. I sat down and read the story of Moses and the exodus of the children of Israel from Egypt and the control and reign of Pharaoh and was struck by the similarity of this story and what seems to happen in a number of our churches these days.

I thought I would take some time to write this series on the church – paralleling it with this exodus story.

There are a number of areas where this story breaks naturally and if I were ever to teach a series like this these would likely be the titles:

1. The calling of Moses – the reluctant leader
2. The support of Aaron – good men are hard to find
3. The grip of captivity – how sin holds us, temporarily lets go only to recapture us
4. Our love for what we know – even if it means staying under bondage
5. God is in control – all the time
6. God’s plan is His plan – not subject to our whims
7. God’s anoints and works through anointed leadership
8. God fulfills His promises – in His time scale, not ours

I may post some notes to these talks as I write them - we'll see.

Have You Hugged Your Church Today?

2009-03-10T18:18:00.003-04:00

I don't write this blog for anyone in particular but more so I have a location where my jumbled thoughts can be gathered and maybe utilized better at a future day. Here is a thought I had today -

Have You Hugged Your Church Today?

I was reading from one of the books I currently have on the go and I was struck by the title of a chapter - Don't Beat Your Sheep! What a brave author to pen that as a title to a chapter. It certainly caught my attention. The chapter continued to talk about how church leaders can easily get frustrated by their 'sheep' when the latter do not appear to do what the leader is asking. After all, how can these 'sheep' not know that the leader has heard directly from God and therefore when he speaks a message he is communicating the heart of the Father. In a number of instances this is true, and the frustration can be too much. In some cases though the leader is really out of touch. The end result, can often be the same - some large 'spiritual truth' comes out in the form of a sermon or an e-mail or a blog detailing how the 'sheep' have missed the boat.

Now of course, no church leader would actually come out and say something as harsh as that to their congregation, at least not in words. How often do we as church leaders get frustrated when the people we are leading do not follow the plan.

Wasn't it clear when we communicated it?? Didn't they catch the vision from our flashy powerpoint and our witty message delivery? Can't they see? Are they blind? This initial frustration can lead to even greater internal criticism, which occasionally spills over. Why did God give me these people? Why did God put me here with this bunch? Do they even know the voice of God and His direction when they see it?

As the chapter continued, how often are the things that we get frustrated at our own making? How often does our bad planning or poor delivery lead to those things described above? All too often I fear, yet we seldom review our own internal systems, but more so we look for someone to attack?

There is an old saying that people will not care how much you know until they know how much you care? But dont they know? Don't they see the preparation I put into the messages I bring? Why cant they see that I care?

There is another old saying that goes - 'It is better felt, than tell't'

When it comes to feeling love, to knowing you are cared for, to see that you are accepted and part of the family it is one thing to be told that, it is something completely different to be shown that love and acceptance. Hence the question, Have You Hugged Your Church Today?

What love did you bestow on the whole congregation today? Who in your flock did you take some extra time with to help them catch the vision and decide to move with you? Did you put down the stick you have wielded once too often and stop beating your sheep?

Well, Jason, maybe when you come back and read this entry in a year or two you might sadly be walking in a situation like the book described earlier. Just remember -

Put the stick down and step away from the sheep!

Then hug your church and make sure they know that you love them dearly.

Vision: a function of the heart

2009-03-03T22:51:00.003-05:00

“Sight is a function of the eyes while vision is a function of the heart”

I read this statement recently and have been plagued with it, mulling it over in my mind for a couple of days now. How often we consider vision, and by vision I mean the direction or long-term objectives or direction of our lives, or our families or even the church we are in, and yet we use our eyes to try to look and see what will occur, we rarely use our hearts. We try to look with our eyes to see what will happen in the future. We look at the state of the current economy through our eyes and see the state of our 401k or dwindling stocks and shares. We look at the decisions being made by the current administration with our eyes and wonder what the future holds. We look at our lives with our eyes and wonder how we can fit in things that others deem to be important – like gym membership, a second job, completing college or even church stuff activities like tithing or joining a small group. When we view these things with our eyes we can see only so much. When we look with our hearts and look with vision then we can often see things very differently. Indeed, on those rare occasions when we actually use our hearts to try to discern direction and vision we can face a battery of questions on the validity or ‘do-ability’ of what we have conceived. When was the last time you went on a ‘flyer’ for Jesus and had a bunch of people questioning your wisdom or asking who was going to pay for it, or seriously doubting your sanity or even your calling to lead?

When we use our eyes to set our vision we will only ever reach as far as we can see – unfortunately many of us are spiritually myopic. When we use our ears to try to smell a flower we are unsuccessful, the same goes when we set our vision through organs intended for sight and not those designed for vision. Proverbs 29:18 tells us that those without vision will perish – quite simply those who live without direction, without revelation, without purpose will die.

Last week in our Young Adults group we were reminded of 1 Kings 18:41-45. IN this passage the prophet Elijah has just defeated the prophets of Baal in a “My God’s bigger than your God” contest and he falls to his knees to pray. He asks his servant to look out towards the sea and report what he sees. The report is that he sees nothing the first 6 times, but on the 7th he sees a cloud that was so far away it was the size of a man’s hand. Even his servant saw it and wasn’t that disturbed by it. That is because the servant saw with his eyes, Elijah saw with his heart. His eyes told him the size and dimensions of the cloud – the size of a man’s fist, but his heart told him of the potential of the cloud – a torrential rainstorm that would soon arrive. His sight said one thing, his heart (and vision) said another. What clouds do you see that are the size of a man’s hand right now? What does your heart tell you they may become?

So what about those who follow their hearts? What about those passionate people who seem to be dreaming more often than they are thinking rationally? What about those weird visionary type people? What about them? Find them, befriend them, love them, listen to their heart, help them teach you how to listen to your heart, include them in your discussions because without them you will not see very far.

Walk by faith, not by sight.

What Have I Got To Live For?

2009-02-24T09:28:00.004-05:00

The title track on the new AMPED Worship cd is called 'My Purpose' and I have been running it through my cd player continuously since its release. This track is one that some people might miss the meaning of as the melodic refrain repeatedly asks the question, "What have I got to live for?". To some this may sound like a depressing song, but the depth of that question demands exploration.

What have I got to live for?

Let's break it down word for word and see if we can come up with an answer to this apparently simple request.

"What" - the first word provides context as well as a definite article - what is the thing, the person, the activity, that sparks your passion. What is the thing that you will do before everything else. Identify it, name it, write it down. If you struggle to even identify the WHAT then you cannot even get beyond the first word, let alone attempt to answer the question completely.

"Have" - this is an interesting word - it denotes possession, it denotes ownership. This simple word denotes completion - something that has occurred already, not something future. So we in two words have identified a specific thing that we currently possess or own. Now what do we do with this thing?

"I" - this is me, personal, not general. Specific to my life, my experience, my skill set and gifting. So often we look around and see the things that other people can do and we want those things. We need to realize that God has given me an individual life, a life that no-one else has lived but me. He made me special, He has brought me to this point. He did not give me another life, He gave me this one. He did not give me another body, he gave me this one. He did not give me another set of circumstances, He gave me these ones.

"Got" - another possessive word. It is in the past tense too - so it has already been attained. This sentence is beginning to come together. It appears to be speaking of things that have occurred, of skill sets that have been attained, of accomplishments already achieved.

"To" - the reason, the point, the second part of the clause. Without a point there is no need for the first clause. One leads to the next. The fact that we have identified a thing that we possess is not sufficient, there needs to be a reason for us possessing it or for identifying it.

"Live" - ahh, it is now becoming clearer. This thing that we possess is not just a trophy, not just an ribbon or medal that we wear to remind us of past glory - no. This is a continuing possession, this is an ongoing accomplishment. This is an accomplishment that propels us forward into life. The very core of our existence, the very soul of our being is dependent upon this identified thing.

"For" - once more we are identifying ownership, but not ownership that we possess, but ownership of us. This is not something that we do to something else, it is what compels us, what owns us, what drives us, what directs us.

What have I got to live for? - not a statement of despair, but a question asking what is the identified thing/action/person/passion that you possess/own/embody which always compels/directs you to live in such a way that that thing becomes paramount in your thoughts, words and actions.

What have you got to live for?

Answers on a post-card please.

Who is Your Yoda?

2009-02-20T00:12:00.002-05:00

I took a break last week from my ‘Connections’ series but I wanted to come back to it this week with a simple question – Who is your Yoda? For those who may not know, although I really don’t know how this might be possible – Yoda is a 3 feet tall green Jedi Master from the Star Wars series of movies. He is a wise sage, a mentor, a teacher and trainer to many young Jedi hopefuls. Luke Skywalker was one of those young Jedi warriors who had to be taken aside, separated from the group and trained one on one by Yoda, by the master Jedi.

So again, my young padawans (Jedi apprentices), “Who is your Yoda?”

Who is it that you look up to for advice, for guidance, for encouragement, for correction, for mentorship? This does not need to be a formal thing, occasionally it is, it just needs to happen. We so often attempt to go through life on our own without looking for help or assistance because we fear appearing weak or unable to cope. I think we should just be honest with each other and admit that there are certain things in each of our lives that we are unable to cope with – it is in these areas that we need a Yoda. I would like to throw another myth out the window too today, our Yoda can be younger than us. Somewhere along the way we have bought into the idea that to be a mentor or a guide we must be old – and while age does bring experience and a certain degree of wisdom that youth lacks, it does not always qualify a person for being a Yoda. There are many younger people whom I can learn from and look to for advice, for direction and for mentorship. This doesn’t mean that I look to them in every aspect of my life – but I look for people who are wiser or more experienced than me in different areas of life and I try to learn from them. I search out Yoda’s wherever I can.

When I was growing up my mother will tell you that I never got into trouble for the same things my older brother got into trouble for. I learned that if it didn’t work for him then it probably wouldn’t work for me – so I never tried that. I found new things to get into trouble for, but from an early age I watched what other people did and tried to learn from them. Nothing has changed – except sometimes now I will try something that has been done before, I will just do it in a slightly different way.

As we look at the bible we see a number of different Yoda characters in the New Testament – namely the apostle Paul. Paul’s rise to this position did not just take place with his name change, no, he started his journey to mentor at an early age as he studied the scriptures to become a Pharisee. Through these early years of dedication Saul buried the truth in his heart that at a later date Jesus would unlock and use to build His kingdom. Saul didn’t completely forget his former life following his conversion, he used the things from his former life for God’s glory. You might be just like that. There may be things in your former (pre-Christ) life that you studied hard at, or learned and yet have set aside thinking that they would never be used for Him. Maybe it is time for some of us to use the knowledge and wisdom that God gave us before we met Him to build His kingdom and become a Yoda to someone else. Paul had many apprentices, from Timothy, Barnabas, John Mark, Onesimus – he was always pouring into someone’s life and passing on his knowledge. Maybe we should do that too.

For every Yoda, there has to be a Padawan (an apprentice). I think that we all instantly put ourselves in this category and rightly so. No one is perfect, not even one and no one person has all the answer (even though many think they do, myself included at times). But we all need to look for people who we can spend time with, who we can be honest with, whom we can learn from, who we can shadow and apprentice with. There are also a number of us who need to allow others to become apprentices to us. This sounds like a haughty statement, but there are many of us who could take on and develop a relationship with another member of the church that will love, nurture, care for and mentor that other person. Some of us Yoda’s need to step out of the shadows and share our experience, share our passions and share our lives with some eager students. I keep telling my college students that as long as I am 10 pages ahead of them in knowledge then I have something to teach them, and they have something to learn.

So, are you a Padawan to a Yoda or are you a Yoda to a Padawan? Or are you both?

What is 'Church'?

2009-02-17T21:17:00.003-05:00

I have been considering this simple question having read some friend's blogs and had some discussions with others. It seems that this simple question should have a simple answer, but that does not appear to be the case. The simplicity of the question almost generates inordinate complexity in response - and the reason I think for that is personal preference. Society today has become a very individualized system of relationships - not connections, but relationships. (Two buildings standing side by side are in relation to one another, but there is no connection between the two.) So to answer the question 'what is church?' - the answer would appear to be 'church is whatever I want church to be'.

Where did we get this notion from? Where did we get such a sense of entitlement where we believe that we can determine what church should be. When did we believe that those whom God has gifted, called and appointed to leadership should listen to those of us who are not called, gifted and appointed, but have an opinion nonetheless? When did we take Jesus out of the Captain's chair and set our own fat selves in that position? When did we determine what church should be?

There has been a lot of talk over the years about the Acts 2 church yet there does not seem to be that much activity to become the Acts 2 church. If you are wondering what the Acts 2 church is then read all of Acts 2 - not just the last few verses. The Acts 2 church was the beginning of the church - it started with an intense anointing and empowering by the Holy Spirit and ends with the disciples devoting themselves to their leader's teaching and to fellowship with each other. These people didn't just do Sunday services, check the box and live their life until the following week. No way! They did life together - every day.

Now I know what you are going to say - that is not practical. How can we meet every day? Wrong question. we should be asking How can we afford to not meet together each day?

The bottom line is that it comes down to priority. We face conflict in our lives each day and yet we only receive encouragement once a week. How can we adjust our lifestyle such that we place a higher priority in meeting together? How can we make sure that we are doing life together with the people that we meet with on Sundays? How can we be an Acts 2 church?

I think it comes down to a simple decision - like Nike proclaim to the world - JUST DO IT!!

We need to look at our day planners and schedules and not see where we can fit church in, but see where we can fit the other things that we give priority to into our fellowship and meeting with the body of Christ.

What would your week look like then? What would our church look like then? How would we impact our city if we met together with other believers every day? How much of a difference would our neighbors see in our lives? If we lived the way the Acts 2 church lived, do you think we would see the results they saw? Do you think we would see new converts added to the church EVERY DAY? Do you think we would see the sick healed EVERY DAY? Do you think we would see HIS KINGDOM COME like never before?

Wouldn't that be something. But I fear that we know best and the way we have decided to do church will continue and those results will be a thing of dreams and stories.

I Want To Be In A Church Plant

2009-02-12T00:11:00.003-05:00

Every now and then I feel like I want to be in a church plant. I don't know if you have ever been in a church plant, but the excitement that is felt by everyone involved is incredible. I have been involved in church planting before and there is nothing like that small group of pioneers who feel like they are stepping off a cliff into the great unknown, trying to follow where God leads and to allow Him to be the guide. Each tiny victory is celebrated as a huge success. Each time a bill gets paid on time there is a desire to hold a full-on worship event to celebrate God's faithfulness. The sense of connectedness is palpable, the love for the body and from the body is tremendous. Sometimes I want to be in a church plant.

But I'm not.

God has placed me in Mt Oak - and I believe for a reason, but that doesn't mean I don't sit some times and long for the passion that exists in a new venture. It doesn't mean that I don't miss the days when you just let people know that we are going to pray on such and such a night and everyone shows up - at least for a little while. It doesn't mean that I cant long again for the days when it felt like it was us against the world as we boldly stepped out on faith promises and whispers from God - and then rejoiced in amazement as we saw a miraculous God do miraculous things for sinful little us.

Sometimes I want to be in a church plant.

Everyone Needs a Barnabas - or Maybe You Are The Barnabas

2009-02-10T12:10:00.004-05:00

So you have had a while to figure out who your BTF (best true friend) is and hopefully haven't been too hard on those who didn't make that short list. This week I have been thinking about who encourages me - who is my Barnabas. In the book of Acts we read about one of Paul's helpers who is called Barnabas. Barnabas is an interesting figure because when he and Paul first connect it is Barnabas who is the mentor, caring for and leading Paul, or as he was at that point - Saul. As time passes, Saul becomes Paul and student becomes teacher, follower becomes leader. Now everyone knows Barnabas for being the encourager - but I want to think about this first part of his relationship with Paul for a moment.

Have you ever had a mentor or teacher who you have looked up to, who has taught you, nurtured you, cared for you? Have you ever reached that point with that individual where you moved from being the student to the position of taking the lead in the friendship? Have you ever moved from being mentee to being mentor?

This is a very difficult transition usually, and not for the mentee, but for the original mentor. There is something in us that seems to always remember each other as we first met each other. I will turn 40 this year and yet I have people who knew me when I was a teenager who still look at me and treat me like I was 13. They struggle with the idea that the young upstart who they taught memory verses to has grown into a young man who now teaches others. What I do for the Lord today is in part due to their diligence in the past, yet in their mind I will always be that 13 year old upstart.

How do we move past this? Well, the decision to move past this scenario lies with Barnabas. Barnabas was an encourager. He looked at the potential he saw in the life of Saul and was right there with him as he transitioned to become Paul and start out on his missionary journeys. Barnabas could have decided to stamp his feet and claim seniority, but he didn't. He recognised the gifting the Lord had put in Paul and he released and encouraged him to be all he could be.

When Barnabas got out of the way then Paul flourished and his ministry exploded. This does not mean that Barnabas checked his brain at the door - he had conflict with Paul, disagreement with Paul and even sided against him in one of the discussions, but he did it while he encouraged him.

Are you a mentor to someone today? Have you poured into that person and helped them become who they are today? Are there signs that you need to step aside and continue your encouragement - not from ahead, but now from behind?

My encouragement to you - don't be afraid, don't be insecure, don't see it as negative, see it as the next step in yours and their development - and then step aside. Stepping aside is not mean stepping away, it means that your encouragement comes in a new way, and the ministry opportunities might just explode - if Paul and Barnabas are anything to go by.

Withnesses We Need On Our Journey - Your BFF

2009-02-03T23:00:00.003-05:00

So who are you walking your journey with? Who are the people who are in your life every step of the way? Who can you rely upon and depend on when things are good and when things are bad? we all need to know there are people who will be with us each step - these are your withnesses.

Leonard Sweet describes a number of withnesses that he believes we need to have on our journey and I want to talk about one of those here. Who is your BFF - best friend forever? Who is your BTF - Best true friend?

The three letters BFF have become common vernacular for today's youth and as stated mean best friend forever - which I often wonder how a thirteen year old can be that prophetic - but that is for another blog. But is there a difference between being a best friend and a true friend?

While I believe that our best friends can and should be our true friends there is a difference. Do you have a true friend who loves you so much that they are willing to risk offending you to tell you the things you need to hear? Or do all of your friends tell you what they think you want to hear - even when they question your judgement or decision making?

It is easy to go through life with your best friend by your side and never know that your BFF is too afraid to lose your friendship that they will never say anything they think will offend or challenge. During those times you can find yourself getting into situations that later you regret, that require a lengthy resolution period and ultimately cause you more pain than any offense would have. If you begin to realise that your BFF's never challenge you or never contradict you then one of two things is happening - you have become perfect (not likely) or your friends are not being true.

True friends will say the things you need to hear, not just the things you want to hear. True friends will have your best interest in mind and will be willing to risk your offense or frustration to help you on your journey. True friends will be there, right beside you every step of the way. When times are tough true friends remain, when times are great true friends are where they always are - beside you.

True friendship is graphically displayed between two young men in the Old Testament - David and Jonathan. Right after David kills the giant Goliath, he befriends Jonathan and from that point on these two are inseparable. Even after Jonathan's dad attacks David and tries to kill him, Jonathan holds his true friendship with the young giant slayer.

Deut 13:6 says this "If your very own brother, or your son or daughter, or the wife you love, or your closest friend secretly entices you,..." this verse goes on to talk about resisting temptation and avoiding worshipping false gods - but that is not the piece I want to highlight. Look at the list of relationships here - very own brother, son or daughter, wife you love, closest friend. Is this list in some sort of hierarchical order of closeness of relationship? Can you really have a 'closest friend' who is closer than the 'wife you love'? I think that while physical intimacy with your wife/spouse is indeed a very high level of relationship, there are occasionally close friends who you may not connect with in some physical fashion but the emotional connection is equally as strong, if not stronger. It says in 1 Samuel that Jonathan loved David as himself - I think David found that close friend who was closer than even the wife he loved.

Who is your Jonathan?

Who is loyal even when you make it hard to be loyal
Who is the first to call in good or bad times
Who gives and gives but wants no payment
Who walks with you in all seasons of life - winter of discontent, summer of celebration
Who wont let you surrender to your own dark side
Who keeps you in check when you want what you cannot have
Who bestows grace to you when you take them for granted
Who defends your life's meaning when you believe your life has no meaning
Who sacrifices themselves for you

(adapted from L Sweet)

That is your Jonathan. That person who is willing to live a life of decreasing significance so you can become greater. That is your Jonathan.

Now a harder question -

Who considers you to be their Jonathan?

The Most Important Part of the Journey

2009-01-28T14:27:00.003-05:00

In our world today there are a number of different types of people who look at life in slightly different ways. There is a common acceptance that we are all on a journey, but there is huge differences in what the most important aspect of that journey may be. Let me explain and maybe you might be able to spot yourself in these ideas.

The Starting Point is the Main Thing - there is an ancient Chinese proverb which says 'A journey of 1000 miles begins with a single step' and then there is the old saying from Ireland when a young man lost on the back-roads of a the Irish countryside stops to ask a farmer for directions to Dublin. "Ah," says the farmer, "if you want to get to Dublin you don't want to be starting here!" Many people think that the most important thing about this journey of life is where we start from and they spend endless hours reading, searching, exercising, and planning in an attempt to begin their journey from what they believe is the optimum location. What they may have missed is that in the process of reaching the optimum starting point their journey has already begun and their efforts to that point may have only accomplished lateral motion and not forward momentum.

The Destination is the Main Thing - for every journey there is a starting point and there is a destination and this group of people are those who cannot wait to get the end. They are the ones most likely to ask, "Are we there yet?" countless times before the journey has effectively begun. For this group it is all about reaching the goal, attaining the prize, completing the task. There is little regard for the process that has been undertaken to achieve the goal, the bottom line is simple for them - the destination is the main thing, little else matters, as long as we get where we are going. The scrap-book for this group is full of things that happened once the destination was reached. There is very little of what happened along the way and if the destination is never reached then the sense of disappointment and dissatisfaction is intense.

The Journey Itself is the Main Thing - for this group of people the destination will arrive whenever it arrives, they are more interested in what the journey itself is like and what they will discover along the way as they travel the road they are on. They may have made a mental note of where they started however they are not that concerned about the start or the end - its the middle that captivates their attention. There is something special felt by this group who enjoy taking the time to absorb their surroundings, to meet new people along the way, to engage with others who have different life experiences than them, even if they are not heading in the same direction. The scrap-book for this group is filled with stories of what happened along the way - and if they don't reach their destination, they had fun along the way.

A lot of "Destination" people want to join the "Journey" group as they acknowledge the wisdom in taking note of things along the way and learning as they travel the road they are on, but they do so by making sure they have their 'E-Z-pass' in the window, their GPS with 'real-time traffic hazard' notification, and a full tank of gas to avoid those pesky delays like stopping for re-fuelling.

The final group are a small but ever increasing group. The final group are those for whom "The People You Journey With are the Main Thing". This group have realised that destinations are important, but they are changeable. They have realised that the experiences that occur along the way are important, but they have realised that without people to share those experiences with, the meaning decreases considerably. This group long for withnesses to walk through life with. They realise that they need to connect with others, to travel with others, to journey together, to share experiences, to carry each other's burdens, to be with people. This group has learned that the people who you do life with are more important than the places you go to or even the path you take to get there. Without people to share the experience with the journey itself becomes meaningless and the destination becomes hollow.

What group are you in?

Co-dependency - not with drugs but with people

2009-01-25T19:32:00.004-05:00

This coming Sunday I am bringing a message to our church on being co-dependent. Typically co-dependency is a term used to describe an individual's need or reliance on some sort of drug. As I have been thinking about connections over the past few weeks it has become more and more apparent that while many of us may think that we are completely self-sufficient and self-reliant, we need to break out of that lie and realize that from the beginning of time, we were created to work with others.

If we take a step back in time to the garden of Eden where God made the light and darkness, the air and the water, the sky and the land, the animals and man, it became apparent that God could not just create one man - even the Lord stated that it was not good for man to be alone. He created a helper - a mate - he created woman.

So why do we believe that we are better off alone?Why do we buy into the lie that says, 'I am an island' or 'I don't need anyone else'? I think the answer is simple - if God created us to be with someone - then the devil just wants to go against what God intended - he wants us to be alone, or even worse - he wants us to think that we will be ok if we are alone.

I have been reading Leonard Sweet's book, "11 Indispensable Relationships You Can't Be Without" and have been considering what Sweet calls 'Withnesses'. As Sweet puts it, these are the people who are 'with' you and 'witness' the things that you do or that God does through you.

Who are the people that you do life with? Who are your withnesses? Who do you know will be right beside you every step of your life journey? It should be an interesting week as I develop my thoughts and I will put them up here as a central depository.

So a few thoughts to begin the week - I am sure I will add more each day.

Can You Hear The Song In My Head?

2009-01-14T23:18:00.002-05:00

Last night I witnessed the sweetest thing I have seen in a long time - my 4 year old daughter leaned into my wife, placing her head up beside my wife's ear and asked, "can you hear the song in my head mommy?"

The song in my little angel's head was 'Blessed assurance" and with my wife unable to hear it, Cara proceeded to sing it and share the music. I was in awe of this exchange. The innocence of my daughter thinking that the music she could hear inside her head was loud enough for others to hear, and beside that, the song was an old hymn, albeit to a new tune.

What would it be like if we could actually hear the things in other people's heads? Maybe Bruce Almighty gave us a little insight to the clamor we would be subject to if we could actually hear what was in everyone's heads. I wonder if like me, you begin to think through a simple concept like this to its logical conclusion and get blown away at how many people there are with how many thoughts, and yet God is able to listen to them all - and He doesn't get things confused. I have two kids and I get their names mixed up.

It just shows you how great our God is.

Listening is an action

2009-01-14T00:14:00.002-05:00

As I prepare for Thursday night's college-age gathering I have been thinking about who we listen to, what we listen to, and how much influence those things have over us. I am becoming more and more convinced that we take what we hear to be the truth with minimal checking of the facts of what we heard.

Last week I came home to find a warning posted on my front door from the Animal Control department of our city. Apparently the new tenants in the rental behind us had called Animal Control because our dog was outside and it was cold and raining. So a very dutiful officer came to our house to 'investigate'. I had the girls at swimming lessons and Julie was delayed at an appointment - hence Ollie was running around the back garden in the rain - as he is want to do. Anyhoo, the officer takes a couple of photos and writes a warning stating that he was informed that we keep the dog out 24/7 and that this is not appropriate for the weather.

So the officer heard one report, didn't check any facts and jumped to some very serious conclusions. I went to Animal Control the next day to set the record straight but apparently my insistence that the facts be corrected to reflect the truth was determined to be 'nit-picking' by the officer and his supervisor.

So what is my point? Well, we are influenced by what we hear. The officer was apparently told that the dog was outside 24/7 and was outside in the rain at the time of the call. When he arrived at our house and found Ollie outside he assumed the information was correct - but his mindset was established from the initial call - we were bad owners because we kept our dog outside.

The simple truth was that the only time Ollie had been out that day was from 3:30-7:30pm - during which time the officer visited. He doesn't stay out 24/7. But the facts didn't matter. The initial hearing set the tone for how that officer views me and how I treat my dog.

What have you heard about someone that has set your mind thinking along one path about that person only for you to later learn more information which actually dismisses your original thoughts? Were you man enough to admit your mistake or did you just persevere with your misguided intention?

I think we need to consider how we respond to the things that we hear and the people who speak into our lives. Do we weigh up the information, check the facts and act with knowledge or do we jump in with both feet at the first thing we hear, only to regret it and have to spend time mending fences?

Who do you listen to?

2009-01-08T16:19:00.003-05:00

One of the charges often levelled against me is that I want to do things my own way. This is very often a very accurate assessment of the situation, however, what people who make the accusation often do not know is that I have spent some time discussing the situation with a number of people beforehand and that 'my way' is more of a conglomeration of my personal thoughts with the direction and suggestions of others. Hence when I make a decision or move on a subject I tend to come across as being set in my ways and wanting to see my thing accomplished.

Now I know that I could go about the things I want to see done with a little more grace and humility, but when it comes to trying to accomplish a task, once I have heard counsel from others and set a course I tend to not waver too much from that course.

Is this a good or a bad thing? Hmmmmm, I wonder.

Who do you listen to? Do you listen to anyone? Do you allow anyone to speak into your life? Does anyone have the 'last word' in discussions with you?

Questions, questions.

Connections

2009-01-06T10:59:00.000-05:00

For a week or so now I have been thinking about this past year and contemplating the upcoming year. The one thing that I am certain of is that I have few answers to all of the questions that are swirling in my mind. Late this evening as I was once again running things through my mind I had a thought, an idea, an inspiration even – or maybe it was just perspiration.

As I look back on 2008 I wonder if this past year was ‘the year of the head’.

Let me explain a little. As we relate to one another there are multiple connections that are made. Some are cerebral – head connections – which are more really based in communication of knowledge and education. There are connections of the heart – heart connections – which are more feeling based, emotional, and often deeper and longer lasting than head connections. There are also physical connections, where we stand beside one another and labor together at a given task. For these connections there is a definite end product – whatever we were working on together – but there do not need to be any heart or head connections. Physical connections appear to me to be the easiest to make but ultimately are the shallowest of connections. Don’t get me wrong, physical connections are vitally important in the life of a church, but unless they are physical connections made in close proximity with others and involve either heart or head connections they are rarely that deep. There were numerous physical connections made through the renovation of the Kingdom Kids facility and some of those may have developed further, but for those who spent a morning or even a day working beside others they made some connection, but rarely deep connections.

If we consider head connections next and continue to use the renovations as our illustration then maybe you were involved in some of the discussions and debates over paint color, or stage position or other such aspects of the design or implementation. Your connections moved from just being physical to being cerebral – you will have connected with others on two levels. The relationships will be stronger than those discussed earlier, but it is rare that lifetime accountability-partner type relationships will be formed based solely on these interactions.

For the deepest connections to occur there needs to be more than just working together, there needs to be more than even discussion and debate, there needs to be a connection of the heart. Connections of the heart are the strongest bonds between us. Connections of the heart will cause a mother to give no thought to sacrifice whatever is needed to help their child, or for one brother to drop everything and rush to the hospital to be with his sibling when accidents or calamity strikes. Connections of the heart will cause people to do the craziest things, will cause incredible self-sacrifice, will drive one person to walk through whatever pain or hardship is required to see their friend helped. This is the connection that David and Jonathon had in the Old Testament. David loved Jonathon like a brother and would do anything he could to help him, even at great risk to himself.

I think that in 2008 we spent a reasonable time in physical relationships with the renovations and activities like StreetReach. I think we spent a lot of time in head relationships as we studied things like the “Truth Project” and other such head-knowledge activities during our Sunday morning sermon series. Both of these activities were good and accomplished a lot of beneficial things, however I wonder if we were a little light on the third aspect of connections – heart connections. Maybe this is just for me, maybe no-one else feels this way.

I have a sense that the incoming year will be a tremendous opportunity for us to develop heart connections with one another, however, this will take considerable work and even risk as we make the deepest connections with others, but as we make those connections we need to realize that they will last a lifetime.

As I said at the beginning of this piece, I do not claim to have all the answers, but I wanted to share what was on my heart and see if it resonates with yours. Are you ready for the New Year? Do you feel that 2008 was a year when you made a lot of physical and head connections at Mt Oak but were missing something? As you have read this did something inside you say, “That is what I want, heart connections!”? Are you willing to make heart connections?

I am.

I am reminded of an old phrase which says, ‘People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.’ This entire message may be just personally for me, but I believe that I need to make heart connections this incoming year.

Are you willing to join me?