Archive for April, 2008

If you’re from LA (Lower Arkansas) and haven’t yet discovered the brown goodness brewing at the Coffee Bean, I want to urge you to make it a regular visit. Although a cup of the good stuff (like a flavored frappucino) will set back almost the same as a gallon of gas, you will enjoy spending your dollar the Coffee Bean far more than you will at the gas station.

The CB serves up a variety of gastro goodies, ranging from incredibly thick, delicious and uncommonly-flavored shakes to bagels, frozen hot chocolate, and lattes. It’s not just for cold-weather warm-ups. The CB offers just what you need to enjoy a freezing jolt for our intense summers.

Then there’s the owners. Richard and Vonda Russell are amazing people. Truly. Richard recently shared his testimony of God’s healing grace in his life at our church, and the atmosphere they’ve sought to carefully create at the CB is both faith and family-friendly. 

Throw in FREE WIFI, and you’ve got a coffee-lover’s and blogging junkie’s haven. I find myself “officing” at the CB 2-3 times a week and have met some wonderful friends through the CB that I would not have met if I hadn’t been “out and about.”

So, if you’re looking for the perfect cup of joe or a great cold treat, I recommend you put the Coffee Bean on your radar and make it a regular stop-off. 

I’ve been using this book for a while now in my personal devotional time, and I have to recommend it to anyone who is looking to “jump start” their Bible study. If you don’t have a plan or are in-between studies, this Following God Character Series is very good. I’ve done 2-3 in the series.

Life Principles for Following Christ is a 12-week interactive Bible study. There is material to read and respond to for five days in each of the chapters. The 12 chapters each take a deeper look at Christ’s roles in the following ways:

• The Last Adam
• The Seed
• The Angel of the Lord
•  Lawgiver and Judge
• The King
• The Prophet
• The High Priest
• The Son of Man
• Christ in Prayer
• The I AM
• Rabbi and Teacher
• Lamb of God

The one on the kings of the Old Testament was not only informative and helpful, but it also helped place into perspective a timeline of God’s dealings with the nation of Israel. Knowing the events of the Old Testament enables one to relish with gratitude God’s intervention through Christ in the New.

What Bible reading plan or study are you currently involved in?

One blogs. And sighs. And takes pictures with his MacBook.

Thank goodness for Ben at the ABSC who is coming to pick me up, eat lunch and drive me to Pine Bluff where wifey (in early stages of mental confusion) will meet me. She didn’t think I was arriving until 5:30. 

I went to Darrin Patrick’s seminar on leadership this morning, and I enjoyed how he related all his points back to scripture in 1-2 Timothy. Coincidentally, Darrin is pastor of “The Journey” in St. Louis.

He spoke about three areas of leadership:

1. Self-leadership
2. Leadership pitfalls
3. Leadership tensions

As far as self-leadership, he urged the room chock-full of church planters first of all to develop a Gospel identity. We must evaluate our motivations and ensure that they are directed and inspired by the Lord and not by selfish ideas of glory, notoriety, or simply to be “cool.” One sure way of doing this is to live a life of “gospel astonishment.” As long as we continue to submit ourselves to scripture and be astonished by the story of the Gospel, we will develop a Gospel identity. 

He also spoke strongly about laziness in the lives of church planters. He commented that the church is unfortunately a safe place for lazy, rebellious people to assume positions of leadership. 

In speaking of leadership pitfalls, he began by speaking about the important of developing new leaders. However, he said, “The problem with equipping new leaders is that you may be equipping your own assassin.” He spent several minutes urging us to develop eyes of discernment about potential “wolves” in our churches. He said Satan loves nothing more than to try to place problem people in leadership.

1. Don’t be “wow-ed” by a person’s gifting. Make sure there is testing and time to allow you to see if the person has the character required for leadership and the commitment to the vision of the existing leaders. “Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands…” (1 Timothy 5.22) 
2. Don’t give in to “age insecurity.” He used the passage in 1 Timothy 4.12, “Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity.” 
3. Don’t react because of pressure. Patrick said that under pressure, you rarely make good decisions. Stay true to your vision; be patient; pray and then respond.
4. Don’t mistake scaffolding for structure. Basically, he said that it’s tempting to try to build your church or ministry around some key people that come on board, but that we need to remember that some of these folks are short-timers, sent to the church for only a season before moving on. They are more like “scaffolding” – equipment used to help renovate, and not part of the actual long-term structure.

In speaking about leadership tensions, he listed three:

1. Change vs. stability. So much change happens in a church plant situation that you need to determine when you might even yourself, as the church planter, be resisting change just because you crave stability. He said it’s never easy to continue to plow ahead toward fulfilling the mission of why God called your church into being. However, he also urged us to always consider our church a “plant.” Stay a missionary force, he said. “You don’t want to become a ‘church’ but a movement.”
2. Solitude vs. people. He urged us to prioritize time away from people. If your life is filled with relationships all the time, you will be unable to continue to perceive the overall vision God has given you. Balance the two tensions well, and people will be blessed as the vision is followed. In this, he also urged us to diligently “protect your family from the church.” You don’t want your spouse or kids becoming jaded because of the unkindness and unthoughtfulness of those in a young church plant. Many times, they never know or understand or stop to consider the level of sacrifice that a church planter must make on a daily basis.
3. Shepherding vs. leadership. I think he was splitting hairs here, but he described “shepherding” as using ministry to get people “done” (or mature in Christ) and “leadership” as using people to get ministry done. I understood what he was saying but thought it was an unnecessary and unfair way to depict leadership. After all, leadership is described as a spiritual gift in Romans 12.8.

Overall, I found Patrick’s presentation to be imminently encouraging and rooted in the grind of daily church life as well in the soil of scripture.

Wednesday at Exponential was both affirming and exhausting. I ended up leaving the conference before the final speaker simply because I was on head and heart overload.

The day for me began in the main session with Alan Hirsch. Alan is an author and from Australia. I had the privilege of designing his website, and in many of our emails back and forth, he called me “mate.” I love that. I felt like the Skipper from Gilligan’s Island.

Alan is a profound observer of Christendom and an incredible kingdom contributor. I highly recommend both of his books to you which I’ve reference in another entry.

Alan urged us today to do the following things as we sought to recreate a movement of reproducing churches:

• Recover the centrality of Jesus in the life of the people of God.

It sounds almost like a no brainer, but he explained how easy it is for churches today to replace the simplicity of devotion to Jesus Christ with religion. He said the church is in danger of losing its identity, and its identity can only be found in Jesus. Our Christology should determine our Missiology which will determine our Ecclesiology. (Justin had a good entry on this a while back.)

In other words, our view of Jesus will define our mission as being His mission. Only when we properly understand and submit to Jesus’ mission will we be ready to create structures and churches (ecclesiology) that will be able to minister to our world and bring Christ glory.

Obviously, there are many who cling to their ecclesiology (how church is done) and have not considered for many moons how their Christology should redefine the way they “do church.”

He had an incredibly convicting series of points related to how we have domesticated Jesus, and he showed numerous images – all of them disconcertingly funny – of popular pictures of Jesus with captions that described what he was talking about. These included Buddy Jesus, Spooky Jesus, Bearded Lady Jesus, and others.

He quoted Voltaire, “God made us in His image and we returned the favor.”

Jesus is not up for our recreation! He is LORD. Creator. Sovereign. Head of the Church.

• Recover discipleship as the task of the church.

He said that we have flirted with consumerism for so long in the western church that it is killing us from within. Too many people look at the church and refuse to participate in it unless it “meets their needs” – or those of their children. It’s no longer about the mission of Jesus. It’s about joining a religious club for selfish benefits. Ouch.

Alan followed up on many of these thoughts in his seminar this morning as well. One wonderful concept that he shared was the importance of the Gospel of Jesus as being a “sneezable message.” It should be contagious! If a person has to study for seven years to lead another person to faith in Christ, then we’ve lost the simplicity of the Gospel as communicated by Jesus.

Every believer should be a church planter, Hirsch said. Our love for Christ as our Lord should continually compel every believer to bear fruit and become personally involved in the movement of God in their communities and our world.

I was incredibly encouraged today. That was after about 40 minutes of discouragement in the first plenary session of Exponential.

Ed Stetzer began the conference’s first main session, and his “presentation” consisted of statistics and research. Terrible way to begin a conference that should be inspirational and encouraging. In addition to that, everything he shared seemed targeted for the megachurch, in essence telling them that they need to be planting churches instead of growing monstrously large. (I agree with that but see no problem with them doing the latter if they’re diligently and sacrifically doing the former.)

In short, I give Stetzer’s presentation a D-. Seriously. The content was good, just inappropriate for the context. 

However, the second half of his presentation was a panel with different pastors of large churches who were modeling church planting. That was what was encouraging. To a “T,” all of them had wonderful words of encouragement and affirmation for the gathering of almost 3000.

Ron Sylvia, pastor of The Church at the Springs (very cool, Mac-like website) said some very deeply encouraging things to the group, as did the other panel members which included Neil Cole, author of Organic Church.

Then came Andy Stanley, pastor of Northpoint Community Church, and he hit a home run. Not only did he speak with humility and complete candor about everything from his dad’s divorce to his church plant/split, but he shared some profound insights about vision – mainly from his book Visioneering, which I am continuing to read and drink deeply of. I’ve read dozens of books in the past 18 years about vision, and it is hands-down the best. 

Throw in some wonderful one-on-one visits with Mark DeYmaz, pastor of Mosaic Church in Conway, Arkansas; Tim Smith, (former campus ministry buddy) executive pastor at Pinelak Church in Brandon, Mississippi and numerous conversations with others in the hallways and organizational booths, and it was a great day!

I spent the evening reading Visioneering by the pool in the gorgeous central Florida weather. 

I arrived in Orlando yesterday and had to rent a car. This was unplanned, but after discovering that a one-way trip from the airport was $55, I realized that I’d spend more on taxis than I would on car rental, so I’m styling in a Ford Edge. It is very nice, but it lacks get-up-and-go.

I drove to First Baptist Orlando where Exponential is being hosted and walked around, viewing the different ministry booths, picking up free pens, bags, and books. (Yippee!) I also had a chance to visit with several other church planters/new church pastors. The pre-conference intensives were very impressive, but the two that I wanted to attend were full. Bummer.

The full conference starts today, and I’m looking forward to hearing from Mark Batterson (I didn’t know he’d be here!) – he’s the pastor of National Community Church in Washington, D.C.

Here are some things I’m hoping to glean from the next few days;

Some new relationships with church leaders across the U.S.

• Fresh insight, encouragement, and wisdom related to our church
• Tools and resources for community development and impact
• Spiritual refreshment
• Personal conversations with some of the guys that I’ve followed for a while

I’ll be flying out for Orlando Monday morning to attend the Exponential Conference. I’ve been planning and hoping to get to go for over a year, and even though the money is not quite there, I made the decision a month ago to “just go.” It’s a gathering for new church leaders and features a dynamic lineup of humble and inspiring church planters who have “been there before.”

In particular, I’m looking forward to hearing from Andy Stanley, pastor of Northpoint Community Church; Alan Hirsch, author of The Shaping of Things to Come and The Forgotten Ways (I designed his latest website!); and Ed Stetzer, author of Breaking the Missional Code. This will mark the first time in five years that I’ve gotten to attend a conference designed especially for church planters and new church pastors.

I hope to receive some much-needed refreshment and wise counsel during some of the breakout sessions with other pastors and leaders. I’ll be trying to do some blogging from the event similar to what I did with the i2 Conference at Little Rock last year. 

This is my solitary place. Where is yours?

1. Matthew 14:13
   When Jesus heard what had happened, he withdrew by boat privately to a solitaryplace. Hearing of this, the crowds followed him on foot from the towns.
   Matthew 14:12-14  (in Context)
2. Mark 1:35
   Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed.
   Mark 1:34-36  (in Context)
3. Mark 6:32
   So they went away by themselves in a boat to a solitary place.
   Mark 6:31-33 (in Context) 
4. Luke 4:42
   At daybreak Jesus went out to a solitary place. 
   Luke 4:41-43 (in Context) 
5. Luke 5:16
   But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.
   Luke 5:15-17 (in Context)

Well… let me dust off my feminine side and respond to being tagged by Brittany and Mandy, all in the same day. Fortunately for me (and all of you who detest these memes), it was the same tag, so you won’t have to endure two different tags.

As an aside, tagging to me has always felt like an invention by someone who doesn’t get to talk enough. It’s kind of like they sit around, wondering why no one ever asks them, “What was your favorite childhood memory between the ages of 9-10 1/2 in which you were wearing a red sweatshirt?” They long to be able to share that kind of information with people, so they write up these lists of questions and answer them themselves and then claim they were “tagged.” A good way to find this out is to simply backtrack a tag. When you get to someone’s blog that doesn’t reference the person who tagged them, they are the originator and the culprit of your current tagging woes. 

I’d like to tag them… with a 2×4.

Sigh. End of rant. 

Since you’ve been eagerly waiting… without any further ado, here is the meme and the rules:

The Rules:

1. Link your tagger and list these rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Fact One: I dislike tagging, but occasionally I enjoy reading them. But I am going to be a spoil-sport and kill my part of this tag by not tagging anyone.

Fact Two: I’ve been tagged before (here, here, here, and here).

Fact Three: I’ve played tag before. (usually lose since I’m not the fastest kid on the block)

Fact Four: I taught a bunch of third graders at Monticello Intermediate School how to play Chinese Freeze Tag my first day as a WATCH DOG. That was also the day that one of those students broke his arm – on the monkey bars, not playing CFT. 

Fact Five: At Ouachita, I was voted junior and senior class president.

Fact Six: I haven’t been voted anything since.

Fact Seven: I am announcing my candidacy for President of the United States. I want to be a write-in. Start the campaign!

Blogging from jott. It’s a pretty cool feature to be able to call a toll free number, say a few words and have it neatly show up in your WordPress blog, I encourage everyone to swing by jott.com.
Have a great day everyone. listen

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I don’t know how many of you have discovered the delight of a coffee press. I’ve been through three now. Mainly because I broke one and had to reorder it. (No, it’s not a Donald coffee press… But that does make me wonder if I have an advanced case of break-ism.) I now have two coffee presses, one that’s a two-cupper, and the single cupper above in the picture.

If you’re unfamiliar with coffee presses, they’re wonderful inventions. Also known as the French press, it’s been around for a while. Basically, you put a scoop of fresh ground coffee (or if you’re lazy, Maxwell House) into the glass beaker, add hot water, stir and let steep for 2 minutes. Afterwards, you slowly “press” the plunger down, pushing the grounds to the bottom of the beaker. The result is a fresh, espresso-like cup of incredible goodness. There’s a good article here about how to achieve the best brew.

It’s become a part of my evening routine. It makes for a perfect evening, after the kids are in bed to press a cup or two of coffee, snatch up the book of the moment, climb into an easy chair and drink up the quietness of the evening. (Of course, the quietness is often interrupted by Caro’s favorite shows – Design on a Dime, Deal or No Deal, or Dancing with the Dorks.

So what’s your nightly routine look like? Post kids? Keep it clean, please! ;)

I have been taking a slow stroll through A.J. Jacob’s The Year of Living Biblically. Adelyn bought it for me for Christmas. She picked it out herself. There’s a picture of Jacobs on the front cover looking scarily like Charlton Heston in his Moses’ garb.

I didn’t know quite what to expect. The book is about Jacobs’ quest to live one year in literal obedience to the commands of scripture. He was not a follower of Christ at all as he began his quest, and I’m anxious to discover what the conclusion of his spiritual journey becomes. (If you’ve read the book or know it, please don’t ruin it for me.)

Jacobs says after his first week of biblically-attempted living:

“The learning curve remains crushingly steep. I continue to second-guess everything I say or do. I’ve noticed my speech has slowed down, as if I’m speaking English as a second language. This is because I mentally check every word before allowing myself to utter it. Is it a lie? Is it a boast? Is it a curse? Is it gossip? What about exaggeration? …

I’m poring over religious study books, desperately trying to get a handle on this topic and every other. My reading list grows exponentially. Every time I read a book, it’ll mention three other books I feel I have to read. It’s like a relentless series of pop-up ads.”

I’m particularly enthralled by Jacobs self-willed attempt at complete obedience. Most of us who have been Christians for a while will quickly recognize the futility of strict self-willed obedience. Scripture teaches us that a person simply can’t be perfectly obedient to the law.

In fact, the Bible teaches that only through faith in Christ’s perfect obedience will any of us ever be justified before God. Our attempts at self-created righteousness, no matter how sincere, are destined to fail. Sin is part of us. We need the deliverance offered by a Savior.

However, that’s what makes this particular journey a fascinating one. Other skeptics have investigated Christianity and the Bible with purposeful angst, only to emerge from their crusade dramatically transformed into faith-filled believers. Lee Strobel is one such. What will happen with Jacobs?

I find myself laughing hysterically one moment and pondering his profound insights in the next. One instance that drew some har-de-har-har’s was Jacobs’ description of his visit to an Amish community in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania:

“The trip takes four hours. Incidentally, I’m proud to say that I had absolutely no urge to make a double entendre when we passed Intercourse, Pennsylvania, which I see as a moral victory.

We pull into the driveway, and the first thing I lay eyes on is a woman in full Amish regalia – ankle-length blue dress and a white bonnet – wielding a gas-powered leaf blower. This isn’t an image I expected to see. She doesn’t have a video iPod, but still. It punctures my Amish stereotypes right up front.”

I’ll keep you posted on the book as I continue, but right away, I can recommend it. This Esquire magazine editor-at-large’s experience with a year of living biblically is immediately engaging.

For those of you who didn’t watch last night’s American Idol, you missed a profound shift in the cultural understanding of the power of faith in God.

Throughout its insanely dominating reign over the airwaves, AI has had contestants verbalize and demonstrate Christian faith. Ruben Studdard was overtly Christian, and his genre is Gospel music. Should-have-been AI from last year, Chris Daughtry, was the lead singer in a Christian band for a while and remains committed to his faith. Carrie Underwood’s song about a girl’s near-fatal car accident has been sung in churches across the country as a musical parable of surrendering one’s life to Jesus.

Hundreds of auditions and songs by contestants have been songs of faith. Yet last night raised the bar and turned the 2-hour special “American Idol Gives Back” into a near-worship concert as the remaining contestants closed the show with Darlene Zschech’s song “Shout to the Lord.”

What is the dynamic occurring with AI that seems to consistently lean it toward Christian faith? Have the producers “got Jesus?” I don’t know, but I did notice that although Dolly Parton sang freely about Jesus the week before, “the name above all names” was edited out of the first lines of “Shout to the Lord” last night. (Update: Even as I was writing this, Carolyn started watching our TiVo of tonight’s show, and they opened with “Shout to the Lord” again! This time, they left “Jesus” in the opening!! What is up?!)

It’s interesting that in a culture that preaches and rabidly enforces “tolerance,” there’s apparently little for that particular name being sung in a song (or mentioned by political candidates in this election year). It’s OK to default to an innocuous and occasional “God” or “Lord,” but Jesus’ name seems to be forbidden fruit.

Why? Simply because there’s “something about that name.”

Yet, the entire stage was filled last night with white-wearing, swaying singers, backed up by a choir, singing one of the most moving and popular Christian choruses of this decade.

Is it because when AI gives back, they discover a profound spirituality present when humanity shares? Jesus said, “Freely you have received, freely give.” Is this brush with holiness caused by the fact that rampant generosity short-circuits evil? That by giving, we release control and seek another’s good?

Another interesting observation is simply that it’s music that has provided the medium for TV’s largest viewing audience to once again experience the passion of love present in the person of God in Christ. There are varieties of music, of course, but it’s distinctly Christian music that resonates deeply with every human heart.

It’s one thing to sing about the gal who left you or the dog who got run over, or about killing a cop or rude sensuality. It’s another thing entirely touching to sing about themes that reverberate within the human soul – love, hope, peace, patience, kindness, joy, purpose, beauty. These themes in music lift the heart and mind above the temporary and base affections we’re so prone to and revive our souls.

Though the American infatuation with AI borders sometimes on true idolatry, last night’s show rose above the cultural noise to glorify the Author of Generosity, Love, and Music. Jesus took the wheel.

I’d heard so much over the past year about GTD this and GTD that. I had no idea what folks were talking about until Richard Poole began blogging about his desire for personal organization and how using the “Getting Things Done” principles found in David Allen’s book had helped him.

During his process, he also began reviewing several pieces of software that applied the GTD concepts. They included Thinking Rock, iGTD, and Omnifocus.

Since I am a fluid thinker and tortuous multi-tasker, I filed the book away mentally as something I’d like to get done… It wasn’t too long before a particularly overwhelming week hit that provoked me to finally order the copy of the book that had been sitting in my Amazon Wishlist.

I’ve been plowing through it for several weeks, and I must admit that it almost immediately began transforming my workspaces and habits. One of the primary points of Allen’s material is that our brains are profoundly able to retain information…. That’s not necessarily a good thing for many of us.

Every little to-do, project, honey-do, and urgent item that has ever crossed your mind is still buried in there somewhere. Over the course of time, you began to feel stressed and overwhelmed because you’re juggling so much mentally. Even things that carry relatively no weight – things that you just occasionally want to get to “someday” – occupy your mind with equal frequency as the need to finalize that big project.

So the first thing you do with GTD is simply to begin the collection process. Allen recommends setting aside an entire day for this. It’s a literal, physical collection process. Everything that lying around your house, office, in files on your computer, bulging email inbox, and floating around in your brain becomes part of this process. The goal is to simply empty it all into appropriate “collection buckets.” Whether file folders, trash cans or folders on your computer, Allen’s book guides you through this process.

As I’ve done this, I must admit that it’s mentally freeing to see accumulated piles of stuff – some things in them dating back a few years! – disappearing and being acted on, filed, or trashed.

The next step is “processing.” After collecting everything into one spot, now begins the time-consuming step of going through it all. He advocates a 2-minute rule in this step. If you come across something that you realize you could get done within 2 minutes, then stop and do it then. You’ll be surprised – I was – of how true that is. It’s also VERY encouraging to see things dwindling and getting done.

The next step is “organizing.” It’s this step that I’m still working on, but I’ve purchased a little file stand for my new filing system. Allen recommends the following broad categories: a “tickler” file (Someday/Maybe), Errands, Waiting (things that you’ve passed off to someone else but need to remind yourself of), Projects, and Reference (things you don’t need to act on but want to keep).

Obviously, you’ll also begin to create a more indepth filing system, but those are essential. Allen’s book is definitely not “pie-in-the-sky;” rather, it’s extremely practical and immediately useful.

After processing comes “reviewing.” You must carve into your weekly calendar a set time to sit down and review what you’ve filed. If you don’t, you’re in danger of simply getting things out of your mind and forgetting what you got them out of your mind for. You do the mind-dump in order to become more proficient and focused on what you begin to “do.”

And that’s the final step – “doing.” Start asking yourself about each project, task and floating idea, “What’s the next action step I could take on this that would advance it forward?” As you take that step, (and more like it as you then identify the next step after it), you’ll see even the largest, most daunting duties reducing in size and complexity.

I’m passing this book off to wifey, in the hopes she’ll digest it as well. It’s going on my yearly read/review list because I sense it’s one of those areas that in which I’ll need to be challenged again.

By the way, I finally bought Omnifocus after writing this review and using it for a while. It’s incredible. I especially like the ability to email myself and it automatically be put into my Omnifocus task or project lists. Another interesting new tool – with less features but a cleaner look – is Things.

Here’s the process: