Category Archives: Ministry

Ministry

It’s the G.R.E.

Well, I’m off to take the GRE today.

I’m not taking the Generic Routing Encapsulation which is a tunneling protocol designed for encapsulation. No, I will be taking the Graduate Record Examination so I can enroll in Grad School.

The train is a rollin’ for me to head back to school for my Master’s. I can’t wait to get that gold blazer! What… it’s not a gold blazer?

Wish me luck!

Update: Well, it’s over. The math beat me like a red-headed stepchild. Good thing I can already work the math I might encounter when studying theology. You know:

39+27=66
12-1+1=12
If God is X than X=3

Ethos, Leadership, Ministry, Remarkable

Remarkable

Seth Godin has made a living on encouraging businesses, churches, teams, and individuals to give people something truly Remarkable. You don’t attract new business by being as good as the other guy. You don’t make an impact on someone’s life by doing the ordinary. You can’t create a culture of winning by going through the motions. You can’t stand out by just getting by.

I believe in being Remarkable. I don’t like doing the same old same old and I tend to steer clear of organizations who do. My time and my efforts are precious commodities. If you want them you have to show me that you are at least willing to become Remarkable.

Example of the Remarkable:
There was a white box waiting for me in my office this morning. I noticed that the Catalyst logo was on one side and so I immediately tore the box wide open.

I have attended the Catalyst Conference for 4 out of the last 5 years. It has been one of the highlights of the year for me because each year it gets better and better. The conference delivers big time in content and character. I hear amazing speakers and see amazing things which in turn feeds my creativity so I can be a better leader. Since Catalyst always aims to surprise I wondered what would be in the box.

The Tube

What I found inside was a brightly colored metal canister. This year’s theme is Reverb. The art work featured noise lines and loud colors and the words “effect big.” One side of the drum had instructions on how to register and another side listed the featured speakers. I was already excited about this pacakage and I hadn’t even fully opened it yet!

A Whole Mess o' Catalyst

Inside I found a whole mess of Catalyst swag.

Window Stick-Ons and Reverb Magnets

There were window clings and those rattle magnets.

The World's Longest Event Poster

Inside I found atomic fire balls and 8 of the World’s Longest Event Brochures.

Catalyst Calendar

There was also a calendar poster so I can count down the days until Catalyst begins.

On top of all this there were also a couple of other little items and an event DVD.

They could of just sent a brochure and a registration card. Instead they sent a story.

Instead of sending me what was expected they sent me something Remarkable.

Discipleship, Leadership, Ministry, Sermons

Life in Transition

Sunday was our Graduation Sunday.

Next weekend each of these students will be graduating in ceremonies all over the area and in a few weeks each of them will be moving from their homes and onto college campuses. There has been a lot of preparation for this moment by their parents and families. Lots of apprehension and a little bit of anxiety as these students take the big leap and head out into the world.

Life is full of transitions. Graduation from high school is but one of the many stages of life that we pass through. While Seniors are leaving for college their parents are having to transition into a new stage of life as well. The only constant in life is that things change.

The message I delivered on Sunday was on the life of Hannah.

I think Hannah has a lot to say to us today. Hannah transitioned from a life without children to having a child to dedicating that child to a life of service in ministry.

Here are some of the highlights from my message on Hannah:

I believe the story of Hannah speaks to those you who are parents. I think is Hannah were here today she would ask each of you who have been blessed with a child,

“Have you given your children back to God.”

Right off, let me say that Hannah is not telling you to drop your kids off here at the church office for me to raise!!! If you did that I would respond like Eli and ask you if you’ve been drinking!!!

No, by asking you if you have given your children back to God she is asking you if you have fully invested in your child’s spiritual life. Are you making real sacrifices so that your children can know God?

Are you praying for and with your child? Are you living in such away that your children know, without a shadow of a doubt, that the love of your life is Jesus Christ? What are you teaching them about the importance of growing and maturing in their faith?

Do they know that their relationship with God is the most important thing or is it something that they can work on only after their school work, sports team, or other extra activities their are involved in?

Samuel had a relationship with God because his mother had the courage to do something radical. She showed him true faith looked like.

What does radical sacrifice look like in your life? What sacrifices might you have to make to ensure that your children know God and have a deep, rewarding relationship with Him?

  • Does it mean that you pull you child from one extra activity so that you can have a family devotional?
  • That they see you or your spouse reading the Bible more?
  • That you make a stand and keep a hedge of protection around Wed. and Sundays even if it means that they can’t participate in …. (you fill in the blank)?

I think I would have a hard time giving Hannah any excuses as to why I was letting the good things of the world get in the way of the greater things of God. Hannah shows us that faith and devotion often require radical sacrifices.

The story of Hannah doesn’t just speak to those who are parents.

Hannah speaks to everyone who’s life is in transition because she shows us what it means to grow up.

Growing up means…

  • Making Decisions


    • Hannah made the decision to lay her broken heart and her broken womb before the Lord. In times of transition are you more apt to try and work everything out on your own or are you willing to ask the Lord for help?

  • Making Sacrifices


    • Hannah made the ultimate sacrifice to make sure that the Lord was honored and that she followed through with her promise. Are you making any sacrifices to keep the promises that you’ve made to God?

  • Making Connections


    • Hannah made connections with the Lord (1 Samuel 2:1-10) and with her son Samuel (2:18-20). Are you connecting with God and with the people in your care?

Ministry, The Word, Theology

Pastoral Reminder

Hebrews 10:11-14 TNIV
Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, and since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool. For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

What an awesome reminder that it isn’t us who save people. Yes, we can introduce people to God. We can focus people on Jesus Christ. We point beyond this world and peer into the kingdom with the help of the Holy Spirit.

But make no mistake- Salvation belongs to our God. May we never forget that.

Discipleship, Hope, Leadership, Ministry, Religion, Resources, Youth Ministry

Robert Webber

Becoming a disciple, just like becoming a fully mature being, takes time, takes the involvement of committed people, and takes a process of growth and development that is intentional and well worked out. The problem that we are dealing with is not only the problem of individual Christians who don’t grow but the problem of local churches that don’t have a process for nurturing and growing new Christians into mature disciples.

I never got the chance to meet Dr. Robert Webber but he had a profound impact on my life and my ministry. His writing took my theological box where I stored my ministry paradigms, ideas, things I thought I knew, my church upbringing, and what I thought was my safe, little god and dumped it out on the floor for me to examine. When all was said and done I decided to do away with a box altogether and just make Christ my pursuit and my all consuming passion. When I first read the words quoted above I immediately knew that I had found my calling. I wasn’t just a minister. I am a disciple who makes disciples. As simple and profound and challenging as that. I promptly devoured everything by him I could get my hands on. I have even spent the year walking with him through the Christian calendar, something I would have never been able to experience without his prodding and help, by using his book Ancient-Future Time. I will be forever grateful.

Dr. Webber’s battle with cancer ended on Friday.

I also echo the prayer that was posted on the press release:

“Depart, O Christian soul, out of this world; in the name of God the Father Almighty who created you; in the name of Jesus Christ who redeemed you; in the name of the Holy Spirit who sanctifies you. May your rest be this day in peace, and your dwelling place in the Paradise of God. Into your hands, O merciful Savior, we commend your servant Bob. Acknowledge, we humbly beseech you, a sheep of your own fold, a lamb of your own flock, a sinner of your own redeeming. Receive him into the arms of your mercy, into the blessed rest of everlasting peace, and into the glorious company of the saints in light. Amen.”

Thank you Dr. Webber for your work and your life. I am indebted to you for insight and your relentless pursuit of Christ Jesus, our Lord. He is the Victor. May you rest in His arms tonight.

link

Books, Cinema, Ministry, Music, My Wife Rules, Stories

Quick Hits

Just a few thoughts for this morning:

Dating: Here is some free, unsolicited marital advice. One of my favorite things to do is to go out on dates with my wife. They never get old. Any couple can stay at home and watch a movie but there is no substitute for picking your spouse up at home, driving to dinner, and then catching a flick at the theatre… on a Tuesday. Don’t even wait for the weekend. These dates keep our love life fresh and exciting. It gives us time to sit together and talk about the day instead of frantically throwing a dinner together after a long day at work. Let someone else do the dishes while you connect. So where are yu and your spouse going to go tonight?

Busy and a Stiff Necked Guy: I hesitate to complain about how busy I’ve been because the summer is right around the corner. That is when I fear my reference point for being busy will be blown out of the water in a matter of weeks. However, I have been extremely tired and worn out. Today is the first day in two weeks that my right shoulder feels ok. A combination of sleeping wonky, working a tiller, sleeping on the ground for the Global Night Commute, and general use has left my right side stiff and unmanageable. Driving has been difficult because I have struggled to turn my head to the right or left in order to check my blind-spots. The pain has been frustrating. However today is good day.

Reading: When I get busy I miss out on my reading. I have updated the On My Desk page and On My iPod page to better reflect what I’m reading and listening to right now. Yancy’s Prayer and Wright’s Justice of God have been on the list since Jan. 1. I want to just finish them but I want to be very Berean about reading them. My goal will be to finish those two book by Dec. 31!

Long Distance Phone Call: While I was writing this post I got a very special international phone call from my friend in London, England. He and his family will be coming back to the states very soon. Austin City Limits here we come!!!

Beethoven’s 9th: Fantastic! I get teary and overjoyed every time I listen to it.

Creativity Should Never Go to Waste: before being called into ministry I had a great desire to become an animator. I loved to draw and I loved being creative in everything that I did. Thankfully I can still use my artistic eye and my flair for the creative in youth ministry. I spent the better part of yesterday working in Photoshop creating posters for different events and had a great time. Most of what I’ve learned in Photoshop has been trial and error. I’m not great at it but it feeds by need to create. Below is a poster for our Spider-man movie event. Our ministry name is Element523 so I tried to incorperate the logo and our name. Again, nothing ground breaking but I had fun. What do you think?

spiderman3_1024x768-1.jpg

Hope you all have a great day. It is beautiful here in the DFW area. Spring time rocks!

Peace.

Discipleship, Leadership, Ministry, The Word

Post 747

Psalm 130:2-7
Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to my cry for mercy. If you, LORD, kept a record of sins, Lord, who could stand? But with you there is forgiveness, so that we can, with reverence, serve you. I wait for the LORD, my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope. I wait for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning. Israel, put your hope in the LORD, for with the LORD is unfailing love and with him is full redemption.

As I read this passage this morning I was struck by a phrase I had never seen before.

“But with you there is forgiveness, so that we can, with reverence, serve you.”

It is only by God’s forgiveness that we can serve him fully. What a great reminder of the power of forgiveness.

Ministry, Tragedy

What to Say

John Piper has re-posted 21 Ways to Love and Comfort The Hurting in light of the shootings at VA Tech.

All 21 of these suggestions are great but you cannot go through them one after the other immediately following incidents like what happened yeserday. We forget that grief is a process and we would do well to live in numbers 1-4 for a good while before moving on to offering advice. the truth of “God’s sovereignty over all things” must not be taken lightly but in the face of a massive tragedy quickly offering it to those who are mourning takes the mystery of God and turns it into a weak platitude. That too is a great tragedy.

1. Pray. Ask God for his help for you and for those you want to minister to. Ask him for wisdom and compassion and strength and a word fitly chosen. Ask that those who are suffering would look to God as their help and hope and healing and strength. Ask that he would make your mouth a fountain of life.

2. Feel and express empathy with those most hurt by this great evil and loss; weep with those who weep.

3. Feel and express compassion because of the tragic circumstances of so many loved ones and friends who have lost more than they could ever estimate.

4. Take time and touch, if you can, and give tender care to the wounded in body and soul.

5. Hold out the promise that God will sustain and help those who cast themselves on him for mercy and trust in his grace. He will strengthen you for the impossible days ahead in spite of all darkness.

6. Affirm that Jesus Christ tasted hostility from men and knew what it was to be unjustly tortured and abandoned, and to endure overwhelming loss, and then be killed, so that he is now a sympathetic mediator for us with God.

7. Declare that this murder was a great evil, and that God’s wrath is greatly kindled by the wanton destruction of human life created in his image.

8. Acknowledge that God has permitted a great outbreak of sin against his revealed will, and that we do not know all the reasons why he would permit such a thing now, when it was in his power to stop it.

9. Express the truth that Satan is a massive reality in the universe that conspires with our own sin and flesh and the world to hurt people and to move people to hurt others, but stress that Satan is within and under the control of God.

10. Express that these terrorists rebelled against the revealed will of God and did not love God or trust him or find in God their refuge and strength and treasure, but scorned his ways and his Person.

11. Since rebellion against God was at the root of this act of murder, let us all fear such rebellion in our own hearts, and turn from it, and embrace the grace of God in Christ, and renounce the very impulses that caused this tragedy.

12. Point the living to the momentous issues of sin and repentance in our own hearts and the urgent need to get right with God through his merciful provision of forgiveness in Christ, so that a worse fate than death will not overtake us.

13. Remember that even those who trust in Christ may be cut down but that does not mean they have been abandoned by God or not loved by God even in those agonizing hours of suffering. God’s love conquers even through calamity.

14. Mingle heart-wrenching weeping with unbreakable confidence in the goodness and sovereignty of God who rules over and through the sin and the plans of rebellious people.

15. Trust God for his ability to do the humanly impossible, and bring you through this nightmare and, in some inscrutable way, bring good out of it.

16. Explain, when the time is right, and they have the wherewithal to think clearly that one of the mysteries of God’s greatness is that he ordains that some things come to pass which he forbids and disapproves of.

17. Express your personal cherishing of the sovereignty of God as the ground of all your hope as you face the human impossibilities of life. The very fulfillment of the New Covenant promises of our salvation and preservation hang on God’s sovereignty over rebellious human wills.

18. Count God your only lasting treasure, because he is the only sure and stable thing in the universe.

19. Remind everyone that to live is Christ and to die is gain.

20. Pray that God would incline their hearts to his word, open their eyes to his wonders, unite their hearts to fear him, and satisfy them with his love.

21. At the right time sound the trumpet that all this good news is meant by God to free us for radical, sacrificial service for the salvation of men and the glory of Christ. Help them see that one message of all this misery is to show us that life is short and fragile and followed by eternity, and small, man-centered ambitions are tragic.

link

Discipleship, Ethos, Leadership, Ministry, Popular Culture, Youth Ministry

I Am Insert Your Ministry Here

Ultimately, Starbucks can’t flourish and win customers’ hearts without the passionate devotion of our employees. In business, that passion comes from ownership, trust, and loyalty. If you undermine any of those, employees will veiw their work as just another job. Their passion and devotion is our number-one competitive advantage. Lose it, and we’ve lost the game.

Today we continue thinking about the latest Starbucks corporate initiative focusing on the unique talents that each partner brings to the coffee-table and what that could do for your ministry.

The I Am Starbucks campaign is truly inspired. Giving your employees stock options can make them feel like they share in the ownership of the company but highlight who they are as individuals and celebrate their strengths and you’ve got wildfire of loyalty, passion, and excitement that has the potential to sweep the entire organization.

When I read the words I Am Starbucks I immediately began thinking about my ministry. One of my non-negotiables is that I want and desire that every student that comes in contact with our ministry to feel that they are an important part of what’s going on. The ministry rises or falls on who they are as individuals and what they bring to the collective.

To clarify, I’m not talking about an individual’s worth being tied to what they contribute.

No, I simply mean that who they are is the contribution- their presence, involvement, ideas, passions, gifts. Who they are at their core means a great deal to our ministry.

For many teens this idea could be revolutionary. Teens have been conditioned feel as though adults only care about what they can do. They have a hard time believing that they could loved because of who they are.

I hear things like:

“My coach only cares if we win state.”
“My parents expect me to be perfect.”
“Every teacher thinks that their class is the most important and deserves the most of my time.”

I understand that this feeling is somewhat oversimplified but perception is the truest reality. Students need to be told that they are loved because of who the are and that our love isn’t a condition of what they can or cannot do.

So, starting an I Am insert your ministry here campaign begins with loving your people as individuals. If you jump into highlighting talents in an open forum your effort will reek of trying to profit off of their efforts. Students can see right through that and if we’re honest with ourselves so can most adults.

Long before Starbucks began this new campaign they built trust and loyalty with their partners by creating health plans, 401k, and Bean Stock in essence telling their people that they care about them personally above and beyond the corporate bottom line. The result is that this ad campaign has an air of authenticity behind it. That’s something many ministries struggle with.

You want to reach people outside your church walls? Start loving the people that are there now.

You want to highlight people’s gifts and talents in front of the entire body? Start highlighting people’s gifts and talents quietly on your own.

You want people to feel like they are responsible for the direction and success of your ministry? Make people more important than the specific ministry.

Start doing these things and pretty soon your people will begin proudly saying,

I AM Insert Ministry Here & YOU CAN BE TOO.

Coffee, Ethos, Leadership, Ministry, Popular Culture, Questions, Youth Ministry

Tapping the Talent

1 Comment

skinny.tiffSometimes I like it when things don’t go according to plan.

I had wanted to get into the office a little earlier than usual this morning but as I was trying to leave the house I couldn’t find my keys. I looked in the places where I usually leave my keys but after a few minutes I knew exactly where they were.

In my wife’s purse. At her job. 40 minutes away.

After calling her to confirm that they were indeed inside her purse I knew that my plans for the morning would have to change. While I do have a spare car key I do not have a spare to the building or to my office. I could leave my house but I had no where to go. Thankfully, I do have a spare Starbucks card for this very occasion.

When I got to Starbucks I ordered a tall mocha and I also purchased a copy of Off the Clock: Vol 1.

Off the Clock is collection of new music from “up and coming Starbucks artists.” Translation: The music is from actual Starbucks partners. You could have been served a drink made by someone featured on this album! How cool is that?

According to the liner notes:

For years Starbucks Entertainment has been asked by just about everyone who works here how to get their music heard. So we decided in 2006 to see what the partners had to offer by launching our first-ever Partner Music Contest. (Partners) were invited to submit solo or band recordings of original songs.

We ended up receiving more than 800 submissions.

Yes, these artists work at Starbucks, and they are also amazing musicians with great songs that deserve to be heard. We back their music wholeheartedly. While we strive to support our partners, ultimately it is our goal here to introduce you to astonishing music from exceptional artists.

Starbucks has always been known for standing behind their employees. The company consistantly ranks at or near the top of the world’s most respected companies and that is due largerly to the way that it treats its employees.

I think that highlighting the talents of the baristas around the country is a win-win for everyone. In a country that is focused on some guy named Sanjya with zero talent this album showcases 15 very talented singer/song writers or bands that sling joe in the morning and rock out at night.

The stores are also putting the spotlight on some baristas who are artists allowing them to create artwork for ceramic mugs, journals, and prints that are sold in store as well.

All of this falls under a new campaign titled, “I Am Starbucks.”

So, I’ve got a few questions that I want to discuss the rest of the week.

1) What could this kind of campaign do in our churches? How can we highlight what our people do “off the clock” (Monday-Saturday)?

2) What would this look like?