Reflections of 2010 -- Part 1

My Christmas break is busy. I like it that way. I am trying to hang around and serve my wife as her arm/wrist heals from a nasty break that required surgery. But, while I am doing that, opportunities abound. I am meeting today with some leadership from a large church in Southwest Missouri that is seeking some direction in becoming Gospel-centered and missional. That is exciting! But, I have also spent hours wading through the initial draft of a book called MOVE by Greg Hawkins and Cally Parkinson (Willow Creek). They have asked me to read and make comments before the book's next editing. This is fun, but also very time consuming. Good to see the process because I know that there is a book to author someday about God's blessings on The Bridge.

This morning though, I was starkly reminded of a neat fact as I read through the book's content. I know it sounds ridiculously simple, but the more time that we spend in private with the Word of God, meditating and praying over the living and active Word of Truth, the closer we will get to the Risen Christ! Their surveying of over 250,000 church goers proved that out again. The reminder though came very personal though because I made a commitment last January to read through the Bible in a year with the folks from The Journey in St. Louis and it was one of the best things I did in 2010. There is a stat out there somewhere that about 82% of the Bible reading and meditating that most pastors do is in sermon prep. That is a huge mistake and it causes us to neglect the personal development time with Jesus. The reality of this is that people will rarely outgrow their influencers, so it is essential that I (and our other elders, staff, parents, and cell leaders) be in the Word of God and growing with Jesus.

I want to thank The Journey for putting a lot of time into the program that I did because I think it has been a big influence in a great year of Bible focus at The Bridge. If nothing else, I am closer to Jesus because of it. Reading through the Bible in a year should not replace closely meditating on a few verses for God to speak to us, but man has it been great.

I challenge you to consider this for 2011. It took me an average of about 25 minutes a day. Here is the program if you would like to consider it. http://journeyon.net/engage/scripture/reading

How can we make disciples if we are not disciplined ourselves?

Who Are You Day-to-Day Responsible For?

This coming Sunday is going to somewhat be about Judgment Day responsibility. We will give an account on the Day for those that we were RESPONSIBLE for their care and their spiritual well-being in the Gospel. You don't have to show this to anyone, but you might consider who God has put on your list and how well you are doing with that list. I have put mine into six groups because of my responsibility as a pastor, but you might only have three or four. You might want to share this at cell or just pray over it at home with your family, but this is worth your time. We can only day-to-day be responsible for about 30 people at most (15-20 is optimal). Here is my list as an example at a glance (don't be insulted if you are not on here because you probably are indirectly as my day-to-day care of some of these people trickles down to you). Notice that I do not have extended family on here. I am very close to my sister, but I am not going to be held RESPONSIBLE for these two areas with her (may be too hard-headed to let me influence her anyway -- haha -- we will see if she reads my blogs). The first 4 are day-to-day concern, prayer, and responsibility. Everyone should have their missional cell folks on here whether you lead the group or not, or you are probably not understanding the FAMILY identity of cell. Five and six for me are areas that I pray for and I am responsible for, but not day-to-day (would be impossible) Here we go:

1 -- Immediate Family
Kelley, Justin, Taylor, Mom, Juanita
2 -- Missional Cell Coaches
Ben, Lance, Stan Jackson
3 -- Mission Cell Leader Mentees (I coach this group)
Seth Durbin, Josh Massey, Bill Rawson, Brian Hurst, Stan Reiner, Jason Roney, Ken McIntyre
4 -- Board & Staff & Cell Family
Jerry Wallen, Roger Durbin, Tammy Durbin, Meg Reiner, Rob Pierce, Sarah Winch, Brad & Wendy Brown, Jeromy & Julie McDowell, Chris & Cheryl Guthrie, Bill & Amanda Simmons, Nathan & Melissa Bollinger, Paul Pinkston, Heather Jaco, Vickie Forsythe, Ronnie & Angie Buckingham (this group is fluid as some will leave to start cells and we will invite new folks in).

That is 36 people. And, I am failing miserably with some of these folks. I need to love them better. I need to more deeply engage their lives. I need to talk about Jesus more and encourage their Gospel-Centered lives. I need to be more intentional in going on God's mission with them. I need to love them better (yeah, I know that I repeated that one).

5 -- the entire Bridge community & not-yet Christian friends. I pray for and shepherd and love the entire church, but I must prepare and train others for the day-to-day care of this group. Also, I must rub shoulders with folks who do not know Jesus yet in a hope that He will reveal Himself to them.
6 -- the Body of Christ and my extended family. I love the church universal and want to see it grow and prosper. I mentor many leaders in the faith, but I do not care for them day-to-day. I love my family and want to see them in heaven.

Who is on your list? How are you doing with it?

Interesting, huh?

"NO" Can be a Holy Word

Just a note about God reorienting and resetting our priorities from last Sunday's sermon. To make the move to the Gospel centering all areas of our lives and building a close knit Gospel community in a home environment, saying 'no' to a lot more to things that look really important becomes a necessity -- sometimes even to charity work or church work. Mission and community are our new main priorities. NO almost becomes a holy word. If you did not see the last two weeks on Gospel-centered missional community, you can check it out at this link.

http://vimeo.com/channels/11022

Inflamed with Passion? Pursue Godly Marriage

Yesterday, I preached from 1 Corinthians 7 that God says that if we are inflamed with passion “that we should pursue Godly marriage.” I want to be clear about that pursuit. I hinted at it in the sermon, but never came right out and said it. We should not pursue Godly marriage by counting on dating websites, singles ministries, or definitely while HOWS (hanging out with sinners), or other worldly wisdom avenues. We pursue Godly marriage by devoting all of our time to PURSUING GOD. Singles, inflamed with passion, easily step into idolatry (the idea of being married) and make sinful mistakes in this pursuit. Once again, it boils down to the ultimate questions in life, “Is Jesus sufficient?” and “Do I trust Him, that if I spend time with Him - getting close to Him, that a Godly spouse will show up on the horizon.” My experience in watching people walking closely with God is that as they discover His glory, His majesty, His power, they discover that the passion (the urges, the hormones) did not own them quite as much as they thought it did. To pursue Godly marriage, first and foremost, PURSUE GOD -- LOVE AND SERVE GOD. Flee from sin, flee from sexual immorality, go to war with worldly wisdom, and pursue Him with time, service, prayer, fellowship, resources, EVERYTHING. Trust in Him; watch Him work in your life.

Note: I am not against singles ministries. My observation is that many times they are filled with people in idolatrous pursuit of companionship over Jesus. That is unhealthy. There are many healthy singles ministries and many healthy Christians that attend them.

Labor Day Musings -- #2

Had a car in front of me driving through town that had a big sticker that covered the whole back window that stated, "I will only be judged by God!!" In a sense, this is accurate and I am glad. We really don't want anybody except the perfect God Jehovah deciding who gets into heaven and who doesn't.

BUT, that is not really what the statement was getting at. This person was declaring to the whole human race, "Leave me alone; I will do what I want to do when I want to do it." The only problem with that is that it is not Biblical Christianity. The Bible designs the church to lovingly keep each other in check, and we Americans don't like it because that requires judgment. This person needs to study 1 Corinthians, chapter 5, and quite honestly the whole New Testament. Our wicked hearts are prone to wander without loving Spirit-filled hearts to bring them back into line with some judgment.

Labor Day Musings -- #1

Growing and bearing fruit in the Gospel (Col 1:6) brings with it enlightenment. We think differently. I am reading through the entire Bible with The Journey (Darrin Patrick’s church in St. Louis) this year and this morning, I bumped into a passage in Proverbs 11.
When a wicked man dies, his hope perishes;
all he expected from his power comes to nothing. Proverbs 11:7

And, I had an epiphany. Before God straightened out my theology, I really used to think that there were three groups of people. There were: 1) the wicked people, the really bad people who do evil things, 2) the sinners, people who were basically good, but did not know Jesus, and 3) the born again Christians. I now know two things. That there are only those whose hope perishes when they die (we all have a wicked and deceitful heart), and those that Jesus has come and rescued from this hopelessness. And, at one time I was among the perishing wicked. I was not just a sinner that was basically good. Proverbs 11:7 was about me. But, I was washed, I was sanctified, I was justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God (1 Cor. 6:11). So, hope rises this morning!

Finished

As I was cleaning at The Bridge today, I kept noticing some things around our new building that are not quite finished. Our church is spectacular, but there are a few places that need some paint, some trim, etc. The upstairs bathrooms are not complete, and on and on. This is not a criticism; we will never have everything done. It made me start thinking that anything put together by human hands just never quite gets perfectly done. There are always imperfections and just a little more refining to do.

I began to worship because Jesus completed His work on the cross of atoning for our sins. He completed His Bridge. When He said, "IT IS FINISHED," IT was finished. The act of remission of our rebellious sin was complete for those that He calls and respond by repenting and believing the Gospel. A perfect act by a perfect God. Praise Jesus!