So I say that I will post and then i don't - shame on me - would you please forgive me - seriously - how often do we get upset at others and then hold a grudge for a season until we feel that they have been sufficiently punished and then we forgive - nice that God doesn't treat us that way...
Sunday - what a tough day for me - appreciate all those that pray for me and my family -spent a lot of time last week struggling through the material to get it right on Sunday. It is a huge deal on a personal level to deliver the right message on a Sunday morning - the one that brings glory to God and sometimes you walk away wondering, but God is so good(could be a song) in that he takes our efforts and blesses them - anyway - we talked about creation on Sunday and the implication for each of us that God went to all this trouble to create this amazing universe to place us in it and then give each of us an opportunity to discover His purpose for our lives - what a great deal!
On another front - we had some snow and ice on Sunday - the kids were off school yesterday and had a 2 hour delay today - and i know that the roads can be dangerous but what do the people up north do - like in Buffalo, etc - do they shut down?
Finally, are you watching 24 this season - pretty cool so far - although i don't think it is cool to say cool anymore - another sign of my age
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
What Happened
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Tough Questions 1
What an amazing service - we had an awesome worship time and then a great response from the congregation as we taught about the importance of our worldview and the importance of what we believe. So that is the question - how is your worldview - it influences your decisions, your actions, your life goals and your priorities. We want to have a worldview that reflects God's will - a theistic worldview that believes that God is real and that I am created for His purposes - not a worldview that is materialistic, humanistic, pragmatic, or atheistic. Next week - we tackle where do we come from.
On another note - life is great but often weird. I love this time of year - the playoffs, goose hunting is in, ski trip around the corner - i'll fill you in on how that goes as my kids want me to do the snowboarding thing again - did it last year - was a blast but couldn't get the inside turn thing going - skiing is another thing though cause i love the black diamonds - do you sense my randomness? so back to weird life - went goose hunting on Monday - great day - but not for goose hunting - and i look forward to this season all year - btw - we eat whatever we kill - anyway - we only took one goose the whole day - depressing - but the bright spot is that I had a lot of reflection time - so life is great but often weird.
Friday, January 12, 2007
How God Speaks
I guess there are several ways that God speaks to us, but for me - sometimes He has to combine a few methods to get through. It really is cool to see how much God intervenes in our lives. God does answer prayer - like God help me to become a better person - improve my character; we prayer this recently at our Sunday morning service and boom things are set in motion.
So at Christmas dinner - my dad tells me about a book - Integrity by Cloud and then I start reading this book shortly after that prayer - I'm challenged and yet trying to determine if I buy in to the concepts being presented and then a conflict arises with a peer that challenges this part of my character that I believe the Lord wants to develop in my life and then of all things a friend of mine brings up this very issue in a regular conversation and then I'm reading the sports section and it is an article about Brian Billick the coach of the Ravens and how he dealt with some of these issues with his team and finally I get it - all of this put together is the Lord at work in my life. God - you are so good!
On another front - we kick off our Tough Questions series this weekend with "Why Does it matter what I believe"? - check back next week to see how it went...
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
Awesome Sunday
Well, Sunday was great. You know sometimes you just never know how stuff is going to be received. But that is the great thing about God, He takes our sincere efforts and blesses them and uses them for His purpose. I was a little nervous about presenting our vision to the church this year and updating folks about our construction process. But Thank God - it went great.
It was so cool to see the enthusiasm of God's people for our goals this year. Just in case your interested they are:
Break Ground: To see our land developed and the construction started on our worship facility that will allow us to be a greater light to the Stafford community.
Life Groups: To see our church participation increase from 50% to 70% and to have over 20 groups to promote fellowship and discipleship within our congregation.
Assimilation: To see an increase from 25% to 35% of visitors integrated and assimilated and to launch an assimilation team to deepen our care for those who visit.
Ministry Participation: To see 80% of our regular attendees involved in a ministry so that the body will continue to grow in a healthy manner.
Salvations: To see 80 salvations through our church’s collective ministries to fulfill the great commission.
Missions Trip: To see missions awareness increase as we expose our church to what God is doing around the world and also offer a foreign missions trip.
Multi Service: To see our church offer multiple services on Sunday to provide more opportunities for service and worship.
Our theme for this year is Evolve. I love it because that word is so emotionally charged. But like a lot of stuff these days - the world has stripped away a great concept from the church - evolve simply means to grow, to be transformed - and so we are all asking a question - where do i need to evolve in order to see God's purposes fulfilled.
Check back latter this week for more info on Vision Sunday and some more chatter from me...
Friday, January 5, 2007
Getting Jazzed
Life is on overdrive right now - just the way I like it. I am so jazzed to begin this year - can u still say that...
This weekend at Horizons we begin the year with Vision Sunday - our theme for this year is ? - you will have to listen to our messages on the church website - www.horizonschurch.com to find out 0r better yet - come to church on Sunday to find out.
And then the real fun begins. my buddy and co-pastor Jay and I will begin a 5 week message series on Tough Questions - you can check back here to find out my thoughts about the series and the state of our church throughout the year. From time to time there will even be other stuff...
Speaking of which - reading a great book right now "Integrity" by Henry Cloud - you may want to check it out and btw - can't get enough of Crowder at the moment - please put out another disc- and I wish Coldplay would put out a release soon...
