Jul

27

Creating Community

Post Category: Blog Posts, Church, Makes You Think 

Churches struggle to create community within the lives of the people who show up for weekend services that will hopefully bleed over to real, lasting friendships. Many churches call themselves communities. But how do you actually create authentic communities within your church? Can you actually create community or is it something that just happens? Does it happen intentionally or does it come as the natural byproduct of a healthy body of believers?

I love Dietrich Bonheffer’s perspective on community.

“The person who’s in love with their vision of community will destroy community. But the person who loves the people around them will create community everywhere they go.” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

I think we all desire to have healthy community and unity within our local church. We do all that we can to create environments that foster dialogue and craft programs and small groups that develop new relationships - all of which is very important. But ultimately we come back to the simplest but most profound challenge Jesus offered us - love God, love people (Luke 10:27). As a church our goal should not be to create community but to love people individually. And not just the people who show up on Sunday mornings - love everyone.

Love them completely.
Love them sacrificially.
Love them without expecting anything in return.
Love them even if they don’t love you back - especially if they don’t love you back.

Community is not a gathering of people on a Sunday morning or at small groups during the week. Community is something we take with us, something we create wherever we go.� Sure, we can create communities at our churches but we can also create communities on their turf. What about a community that forms at the Starbucks you have coffee at during the week? Why not create community with your friend at work who shares your love for science fiction books?

Community is, at it’s heart, not geographically driven - it’s relationally driven. Love God. Love people. Live in community.

Jul

25

Completely Uncalled For

Post Category: Blog Posts, Completely Crazy, Videos 

Barats & Beretta are absolutely hillarious. Here is one of my favorite videos.

Jul

25

Live for Others

Post Category: Blog Posts, Makes You Think, Social Justice 

“Don’t be selfish; don’t live to make a good impression on others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourself. Don’t think only about your own affairs, but be interested in others, too, and what they are doing.” (Philippians 2:3-4)

I read these verses in devotions today. It seems we have to constantly remind ourselves that this whole life thing isn’t about us! It’s so much bigger than what clothes we’re wearing, what we’re driving, and where we live. Those things seem so inconsequential when we take our eyes off of ourselves and look at how people live in the world around us. When thousands die each day because of lack of access to clean water, the fact that our cappuccino got messed up at Starbucks this morning seems kinda petty doesn’t it?

Jul

24

Seriously

Post Category: Blog Posts, Culture, Makes You Think 

OK, let me start out by admitting something - I’ve watched Grey’s Anatomy. Whew, I got that off my chest!

Before the negative comments and emails start flooding in let me add a disclaimer - I don’t endorse the lifestyles they promote on the show. With that being said I’ve found myself saying a word they use a lot on the show - “Seriously.” Anybody who has seen even one episode has undoubtedly heard that word several times. I don’t know why but the word just fits so many conversations. It can be an emphatic statement (Seriously!)�or an incredulous question (Seriously??).

As followers of Jesus (you knew I was going to bring this around, didn’t you?) we are faced with the challenge of living out our faith in a world that just doesn’t take us seriously. They’ve experienced too much hypocrisy and seen too many televangelists to respond otherwise.

So what do we do? The answer is simple -�get serious!

Seriously?

As hard as we might try we can’t solve our image problem through P.R. and trying to create slicker services. The answer is simply being serious and letting the world see us for who we are with all of our flaws and failures. Paul talks about this in 2 Corinthians 4:2 when he says, “We refuse to wear masks and play games…we keep everything we do and say out in the open, the whole truth on display.”

Our world has gotten pretty good at spotting posers and fakes. Get real in your relationship with God and live a life of open and honest transparency. Seriously.

“The greatest cause of atheism is Christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips, then walk out the door and deny him with their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable.” - Brennan Manning

Jul

23

New Poll

Post Category: Blog Posts 

Be sure to cast your vote in my latest poll. My weekly polls can be found in the column to the right or by going to the Poll Page. This latest poll really makes you think! :-)

Jul

23

Four Artists You Should Know

Post Category: Music Reviews 

I’ve been listening to some great new artists lately that I thought I would share with you. If you haven’t heard of them it’s worth a few minutes to check them out.

Architecture In HelsinkiArtist: Architecture in Helsinki
Album: In Case We Die

You’ve got to appreciate a band with a name like Architecture in Helsinki. What I like even more is that their music is as fun

Jul

18

Knowing who you’re not

Post Category: Blog Posts, Leadership, Makes You Think 

“The success of who you are as a leader is to know who you are not.” - Andy Stanley

I’ve been thinking about this quote by Andy Stanley. When we are asked what we do for a living it’s easy to rattle off a list of responsibilities and duties. Who am I? I’m a pastor, father, husband, friend. But our effectiveness as a leader is knowing who we’re not. We should be keenly aware of our weakness and limitations and recognize that we are most successful when we can delegate our weaknesses and build on our strengths.

Jul

16

Dream Center Videos

Post Category: Blog Posts, Videos 

We had a great time when we were at the Dream Center last month. If you missed my posts about the trip you can read them here. Below are a couple of videos we edited down from our trip.

Jul

14

Encourage the Future You Want

Post Category: Blog Posts, Family, Makes You Think 

If you’re like me you find that it’s easy to be crippled by the fear of what could be. I’m the father of two young girls who are going to grow up in a world that has far too much pain and hurt than I would like. I know that there is a very distinct possibility that they will have their hearts broken and their dreams shattered.

They will be the recipients of hurtful words and accusing glances.
They will be made fun of, laughed at and ridiculed.
Their peers will pressure them to do things that they know is wrong, and they will sometimes give in.
They will make wrong choices that I wish I could prevent.
They will see things that I wish I could erase from their memories.
They will hear things I wish they wouldn’t hear.

And yes, there is a chance that they will walk away from God and break my heart. I look into their sweet, innocent eyes right now and I know that we haven’t even come close to the most difficult challenges of being a parent.

But every day I pray that God gives me the grace to live, not from the fear of what could be, but from the hope that there is someone who loves them even more than I do and he has plans on their lives for greatness.

Call me naive if you like - my oldest is 6 and I�am after all in the stage where the worst arguments we have are over her bed time - but I hope that I can be the kind of parent that encourages the character traits I want to see in my kids rather than over-protecting and always living in fear of how they might turn out.

I’ve got a few years yet before my kids hit the teen years and my principles are put to the test so check back with me in 8-10 years to see how I’m doing. :-)

“We have to encourage the future we want rather than trying to prevent the future we fear.” - Bill Joy, Founder and Former Chief Scientist of Sun Microsystems

Jul

13

God-ordained Moments

Post Category: Blog Posts, Makes You Think 

I just read this great article at RelevantMagazine.com called “Considering Birds & Flowers” by Mark Roeda. I love the last paragraph:

“God�s will for your life is simple: Strive first for the kingdom. Everything else, don�t worry about it. In other words, take each moment in your life as an opportunity to work for kingdom stuff. Assume that is why God put you in any given situation. Assume that it�s God�s will for your life in that moment. And, then, don�t worry. Enjoy it.”

Imagine how much less stressful our lives would be if we could grasp this principle and apply it in our lives. It’s really a matter of perspective - if we view our every-day situations as God-ordained moments instead of chance encounters or experiences we will throw ourselves completely into the moment.

To live fully devoted to every moment is mark of someone who has grasped the potential of eternity in every action.

(Read the complete article here)

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