In The Dash- Live Different

One of the most impacting moments of my life was due to a series we did at church called Live Different.  The idea was to live our life with purpose.  It just so happened we were walking with the steps of a man who was dying of Lou Gehrig’s disease.

Emotional to say the least was his journey the last couple months of his life.  Powerful was his impact with his outlook on life and looking back with no regrets.

His funeral was a celebration of a life well invested with friends and family not a life spent with regrets.  His focus and determination challenged me and has forced me to live life different.

To live intentional, to live with a purpose, to invest into others, because death is not the end but only the beginning for those who have a relationship with Christ.

 

Action Step:

◊ Plan out funeral to be a celebration. 

In The Dash- Relational Witness

In college we had a program called “Friday Night Witnessing.”  Every Friday large amounts of students would take to the streets and tell people about Jesus.  One particular night I knocked on a door and my life was threatened, and needless to say my night ended early.

I eventually got a job working on Fridays.  Every Friday night I would get a rush of people in late and one night I asked why they were always there so late and their reply was, “So the witnessing kids from college won’t be out.”  It hit me; we were making an impact, just not a positive one.

For me building relationships with people and walking with them towards and through their journey of faith has been most effective.  It takes time, it’s uncomfortable but in the end relationships are not easy but are worth the work.

 

ACTION STEP:

◊  Share your faith with everyone you have a relationship with.  

Political Religion

There is a phrase that is used by many churches all over the world.  “It’s all about relationships and not religion.” I wonder what an unchurched person thinks when they hear that?  I wonder what those who have gone before us think about that statement?  I personally love the statement.  I love the meaning behind it because I know the meaning behind it.

It truly is all about a relationship with Jesus Christ and a relationship with others.  Building community between us and God and us and others.  It’s a very powerful and relevant statement.

It is not about religion, or is it?  I get what the statement is saying.  It’s not about the politics and the rules and the regulations.  It’s not about a list of do’s and dont’s.  It’s not about guilting people into a relationship with Christ.  However, for me I want to be careful that I just don’t throw out religion.

I work with people who are “religious” and they have questioned my thought process on this statement.  Many have shared a concern that when you say it is not about religion that you close doors to share about the relationship aspect of it.  Many are turned off when in one statement you marginalize potentially everything they have been taught to believe.  Perhaps they are right.

So many people, organizations and institutions have spilled blood, sweat and tears all in the name of religious freedom.  All of them have done that to give me the freedom to serve in a local church and share about a relationship with Jesus.  Christianity is a religion.  The church is a religious institution.  Christ died for everyone.  Christ died for those who would sit in a church and worship Him.  Christ died for those who would stand outside of a church and mock Him.  Christ died for everyone.

I think it is important to honor the past.  I think it is important to honor past spiritual giants. True some of the things in the past have hurt peoples perception of the church and Christ today.  However there is a negative past to almost every organization but does that mean you burn the history and forget where you came from?  Not saying anybody or any organization does that, it’s just a thought.

For me the statement goes like this in my head: It’s about relationships and not the politics of religion. For me it is about some aspects of religion.  The good parts of religion.  The parts that give me freedom not the parts that keep me in bondage of rules.  I’m not here to argue semantics, but it’s just a thought.

What’s your thoughts?

Do You Really Think That The Hope Of The World Is The Church?

I got asked recently by a co-worker who said, “Do you really think that the hope of the world is the church?”  My first response was silence as I thought about what they were really asking and then I said, “It should be”.  I have heard from various pastors over the years that the local church is the hope of the world and I love the way that sentence flows off of my tongue.  However by saying that sentence I feel like I pawn off the responsibility to a building to do all the work to reach people.  I leave all the effort to programs and procedures and systems.  Problem is, what happens if the people in local churches all over the world either don’t know they are the hope of the world or worse have no desire to offer that hope?

Jesus was a passionate individual here on earth who connected with those who were ultimately far from him.  Jesus took the time to hang out with sinners and the very men who walked with him were not the sort that any of us would have chosen to plant a church with or start a movement with.  He sought out the woman who had been married 5 times and was living with a guy who wasn’t her husband and he offered grace to the woman caught in adultery and he touched the lepers and spoke gently with tax collectors.  He healed those who were sick and broken and according to the world were disgusting and were better off dead.  He welcomed all those with questions and insults like they were his friends.

The question that person asked me was followed up with this…did God really create an institution where one day a week people could come to a building and fake the fact that they are really hurting and broken inside and begging for hope that doesn’t seem to be there?  Does God really care about my hurt and my pain and my life?  Truth is we all go through stretches in our lives where we do exactly that and pretend that we have it all figured out and that our life is perfect.  Smiles can only cover up so much.  Truth is we are not doing God or anybody else any favors by getting up early on Sunday and putting on our happy face to only go through motions and emotions.

Many a Sunday’s have gone by in my 10 years of ministry where it was easier to answer the cliche’ question of “How are you?” with “I’m fine”, rather than reveal my heart that was wicked and broken and desperately searching for God.  Now what I have gathered with those that I have talked to about this inside and outside the church world is that the world does not need to see perfect people NOT needing a savior, pretending to be something that they are not.  The world needs to see broken and messed up and fragmented people who have been honest and fallen broken before the cross and are changed and been made new.  I believe that is the church being the hope of the world.  What can the church offer that nobody else in the world can offer…hope.  Hold on to and grasp the hope that is in you today.  You are the church and through you and your story you can change the world.  Why?  Because I really do believe that the local church is the hope of the world.

15 Reasons We Don’t Lead Like Jesus

So I have been really digging into the life of Jesus and I have noticed how He related to His disciples.  I think understanding how He interacted with those men is crucial to understanding some key dynamics of leadership and how to lead a team.  Everyone wants to be known as a good leader but why are there so many bad leaders out there?  Why are there so many out there who don’t get the team dynamic or how to pour their life into a team?  I wish I had an answer because this would not just be a blog post but it would be a book.  Maybe I would see you at Barnes & Noble as I sign copies of your book, however I don’t have the answer and the reality is I would not consider myself a good leader…not yet.  So what did Jesus do that we could model in the teams that we lead?

1. He called them to be with Him and He called them with a purpose in mind.  He called them the way they were with all their faults and deficiencies.
2. He began to develop  them to reach their potential, even though they were far from being champions when He started with them.
3. He took them with Him on day to day activities.
4. He taught them.  At times he taught by simply asking them questions.
5. He game them ministry opportunities with clear assignments.  He gave them power.
6. He took the time to hear their reports and gave words of encouragement to them.  Told them to rest.
7. He answered their questions and their request for information.
8. He gave them assignments so He could do His ministry.
9. He let them get a close up view of who He was, letting them in on the inside.  Teams buy into the leader before the vision.
10. He intervened in their lives when He suspected problems.  He was close enough to them to know there was problems.
11. He corrected them when they were wrong.
12. He enjoyed fellowshiped with them.
13. He prayed for and with His disciples.
14. He dealt with their failures and restored them to service when the time was right.
15. He commissioned them and empower them to carry on the work He started.

When you look at who He had to work with it is amazing that the church exists today.

• Peter- impulsive, impatient and a denier.
• James and John- sons of thunder, judgmental, un-compassionate and inconsiderate.
• Thomas- was a doubter.
• Philip- was slow to understand and learn.
• Nathaniel- was questioning and cynical.
• Matthew- was a tax collector.
• Judas- was a schemer, betrayer and a thief.
• All of them were position conscious, not servants.  They were self-centered and thinking only of themselves, not ever of Jesus.  They did not know how to pray, did not know about the last days, did not understand the ministry of John the Baptist, did not know about the Holy Spirit, had little faith, were scripturally ignorant and were fearful and ran in the face of opposition.  As a group they fought with each other, they did not understand the big picture, they were afraid to ask questions, they argued whether Jesus would use an IPhone or a Blackberry, they bickered over the level of the sound system in the auditorium, who would get the biggest budget, who reserved the space first to do their program and who should be able to hire an assistant.

I think you get the point that the same arguments of then are the same arguments today of those we lead.  Maybe that is why we don’t lead like Jesus because all of that takes hard work.  Maybe we don’t lead like Jesus because we put so much hope in potential and when it doesn’t work out like we thought we just give up and stop leading and start doing.  Maybe we don’t lead like Jesus because we are not close enough to Him to know how to lead like that.  Maybe we don’t lead like Jesus because were not perfect.

Nobody will ever be the perfect leader, but just because we won’t be the perfect leader doesn’t mean we can’t work towards being a great leader.  Based on what I see in the scripture, Jesus was a great leader because He was personal and He got into the lives of those He led.  I don’t think it was the big numbers and miracles that drew the disciples to Jesus it was the fact that He called them, empowered them, walked with them and at the end of the day He called them friends.

Questions

I am learning to ask questions.  I am asking questions that will sharpen me as an individual and as a leader.  Questions that will make me a better husband and father.  I am learning that when you ask a question, everybody has an answer.  In fact many people are just waiting for you to ask a question so they can give you an answer.  I’ve been asking a lot of questions when it comes to my time with God.  So many times it feels wasted  and uneventful.  I am learning that I will only get out of it what I put into it and so for me to understand and apply God’s Word to my life I am asking more questions.

Here are nine good questions to ask.

1. Is there a WARNING to heed?
2. Is there a PROMISE to claim?
3. Is there a SIN to forsake?
4. Is there a COMMAND to obey?
5. Is there a LESSON to learn?
6. Is there a PRINCIPLE to apply?
7. Is there an EXAMPLE to follow?
8. Is there a BLESSING to expect?
9. Is there a SERVICE to perform?

How about you? What questions are you asking?  Have any others to add to this list?

Equally Perfect

I went to the Phillies/Nationals game on Friday night with a friend of mine.  It is a priceless trip that we do together each year and each year we try to get to the ballpark early just to soak in the environment and hot dogs.  This year I noticed something that I had seen before but never really took note of.  The grounds crew.  Have you ever watched them prep a field for a baseball game?  There are several people all working together knowing their roles and trying to accomplish one thing, get the field ready for that game.  Dozens and dozens and dozens of guys working together like clockwork to finish the field for the 7:05 first pitch.

One of the things I noticed is how well they prepared the field even for a Nationals game.  I don’t know if this is an MLB standard or if it is different for each team? Each guy took ownership and meticulously  fulfilled their role.  From how the batting cage is rolled away to how how the dirt is smoothed out, to how the lines on the grass are brushed to create a light and dark effect.  How the infield is watered, the lines are chalked to how members of the ground crew walk the field to make sure there is nothing on it.  They demand the best of themselves and for their team.  What intrigued me is they do this in all ballparks across the country.  Whether your team is in first place or last place you would never know based on the field and how it is prepped or how it looks at the end.

It made me think about the church.  Do we put in the same effort to share Jesus with people who will never step foot in our church?  The same effort that if we go out of our way to connect with them and invest with them and they go to the “other” church, was it a waste of time?  Would we put in the same effort if we knew that going into the relationship?  So many times we determine how we will live out our faith based on whether we will “win” or “lose” the hearts of those we are trying to connect with.  Maybe a lesson can be learned from grounds keepers at a baseball game.  The grounds keeper puts in the same effort to prep a field not based on the record of winning and losing but because they simply are connecting people to one of the greatest games…baseball.  It does not matter if they connect with you or your church because at the end of the day the goal is simply to connect them with Jesus.  Eventually we will learn that it is not about us.  There is a purpose and a goal much bigger than the individual.

Picket Lines & Boycotting

I honestly believe there is a time and place for everything.  With that being said I don’t know the exact specifics about this situation I’ve seen the last couple weeks but I have a couple questions.  Outside where I pull into my local Starbucks there is a group of men with picket signs and they are standing there at 7:30 every morning picketing a local business that is going in.  They apparently are boycotting because of what they call an unfair wage incentive. I have no idea how this works or how the Union works.  On one sign I saw .50 cents is .5o cents…pay up.  I would assume that they are upset that they are missing out on .50 cents an hour for working.  Now in a typical forty hour work week that adds up to $20 pre tax.  The business is still being built by other employees because this is not a full on strike.  These guys have lost three weeks pay since they have been out there all to earn another $20 a week?  To me that just doesn’t make sense.

What makes sense is the civil rights marches demanding equality.  Begging for equal rights to vote and for the simple right to live.  I’ve always laughed at boycotts and pickets.  I’m sure some are justified and really do work and get what they want or feel they need by pressing the hand of their employer.  Growing up I have seen some denominations boycott: Disney, Coke, Pepsi, Abortion, Foreign Cars, Legos, Chicken, Motor Companies, Styrofoam Cups and Beer Companies.  Ok, obviously I am kidding with that list, secretly nobody was really boycotting the beer companies, but several on that list were boycotted.  Even today there are some who are calling for the boycott of Glenn Beck.  I wonder, does it really matter?  Did Disney freak out when the local church boycotted them when they were still experiencing record sales?

My big question today is, do we sometimes waste our time majoring in the minors?  From our personal lives, professional lives, family lives and even our church lives, do we spend to much energy investing in minor things instead of focusing on what is really important?  I’m not saying those other things and what they may or may not have stood for are not important but is it worth our energy?

I would challenge you today to get passionate about the things that would make Jesus’ heart beat faster.  Get passionate about things that will make a long term difference and impact.  Just a thought.

Money Back Guarantee

I see commercials that say this all the time but does that really make you buy something?  By hearing that tag-line does that change everything for you and put you over the edge to make that purchase?  I hear that and think, yeah, but I will still have to ship it back and pay for that if I don’t want it, which I never will so your guarantee really does not mean a lot.  At the end of the sale all I have purchased is what you have marketed to me and it really may not be that good.  There is a scene in the movie Tommy Boy where they talk about guarantees.

Tommy: Let’s think about this for a sec, Ted. Why would somebody put a guarantee on a box? Hmmm, very interesting.
Ted Nelson, Customer: Go on, I’m listening.
Tommy: Here’s the way I see it, Ted. Guy puts a fancy guarantee on a box ’cause he wants you to feel all warm and toasty inside.
Ted Nelson, Customer: Yeah, makes a man feel good.
Tommy: ‘Course it does. Why shouldn’t it? Ya figure you put that little box under your pillow at night, the Guarantee Fairy might come by and leave a quarter, am I right, Ted?
[chuckles until he sees that Ted is not laughing]
Ted Nelson, Customer: [impatiently] What’s your point?
Tommy: The point is, how do you know the fairy isn’t a crazy glue sniffer? “Building model airplanes” says the little fairy; well, we’re not buying it. He sneaks into your house once, that’s all it takes. The next thing you know, there’s money missing off the dresser, and your daughter’s knocked up. I seen it a hundred times.
Ted Nelson, Customer: But why do they put a guarantee on the box?
Tommy: Because they know all they sold ya was a guaranteed piece of crap. That’s all it is, isn’t it? Hey, if you want me to take a dump in a box and mark it guaranteed, I will. I got spare time. But for now, for your customer’s sake, for your daughter’s sake, ya might wanna think about buying a quality product from me.
Ted Nelson, Customer: [pause] Okay, I’ll buy from you.
Tommy: Well, that’s…
Tommy, Richard Hayden: …What?

Here is what I know.  If something is what they say it is and it does what it says it’s going to do, it does not need a money back guarantee.  A relationship with Christ never says money back guarantee, because it is authentic and real and changes people from the inside out.  It does not market something that will not come to be or that is not true.

What about you and your life?  Does it accurately model and represent who Christ is or should your life’s example offer a money back guarantee?  Be authentic, be real, be transparent and show people the love of Christ by serving them unconditionally.

Mercedes & Bruce

What would you be willing to give up?  I mean if you clearly felt God say to you that it is time to give it up to move along, what would you be willing to give up?  How about give up your E-Class Mercedes for a conversion van named “Bruce”?  Sounds crazy right?  It did to me as well as I had a chance to drive that Mercedes this weekend.  People treat you different in a Mercedes.  People give you more respect and to be honest you feel differently driving it and getting out of it.

I have watched some friends of mine get messed up by God in a really good way over the last couple years.  They keep listening to God no matter how crazy it sounds and He keeps blessing them and increasing their influence.  I have watched them have little faith to incredible faith.  I have watched them go from materialistic to some of the most generous people I have ever met.  How did this happen?  They believe in this passionate crazy idea that God loves them and has a plan for their life and that everything they have is His. Let me type that again.  They believe in this passionate crazy idea that God loves them and has a plan for their life and that everything they have is His. That’s it.  No secret formula.  No recipe for success.  They simply are living to the best of their ability how Christ lived.  Serving everybody they can because at the end of the day its not about building the church but about building the kingdom.  It’s about seeing God take those who have and bless those who have not.  It’s about watching God do something extraordinary through the ordinary.  Its about being willing.

I pray for my friends as they continue to change their lifestyle from being about them to being about others and most importantly Him.  I pray for them as they turn in their Mercedes today to drive a van called “Bruce” so they can help those who do not have get to church and hear about Jesus and become those who truly have.  You can check out their ministry here to see how you can get involved in radical sacrifice.

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