An annual report

Tom Peters encourages people to make an annual report of their lives in his business leadership book 'project:04'. I encouraged the church to do this last Sunday morning. The title, of the annual report I asked people to make was this: What Jesus did for me in 2004. Here is a slightly edited version of my report:

What Jesus did for me in 2004:

He built new friendships. (I don’t want to list the names here for fear of leaving some out).

He built stronger friendships. (I did not list names for the same reason as above). Blogging and the glccalumni board has allowed me to renew and strengthen several friendships.

He revitalized my relationship with my brother, Brandon.

He developed me further as a father and husband by teaching me more about how to love.

He increased my love and appreciation for my wife, Cindie and vice versa.

He blessed me with a new addition (soon to arrive).

He taught me more about the kingdom, and especially its manifestation within Christian fellowship.

He has developed more partners to carry the load of building the church.

He kept my whole family alive and in relatively good health. He delivered Hannah from her Mother’s Day sickness.

He has not only kept us financially afloat, but has increased our resources.

He taught me to wait on him by delaying our move and the baby’s arrival.

He challenged me with the writings of Rick Warren, John Ortberg, Bill Hybels, and Dallas Willard, and with films like The Passion, Signs, Bruce Almighty, Saved!, Bourne Supremacy, Miracle on 34th Street, and many others.

He kept my fire for church-work burning.

He opened my mind to the bigness of God by causing me to see a place within his kingdom for those I have considered to be liberal theologically.

He used me to comfort some who were dying, some who were losing loved ones, some who faced many other crises.

He used to me to challenge people to deeper, richer, riskier living for the cause of Christ.

He used me to help usher several individuals across the line into God’s good graces.

With my family about expand, and the church in motion, he has set me up for a wonderful and fruitful 2005.

An update

We were expecting to have a baby today. Cindie went in last night to be induced into labor, but the doctor decided not to do it after some tests came back reporting that the baby was not ready.

They have rescheduled us to go in Sunday January 2.

Your conintued prayers are appreciated.

3 baptisms, 1 funeral, and an ultra-sound

When the phone rang at 11:30 p.m. Sunday night, I knew who would be on the other end adn what the call would be about. "She's gone." It was the voice of a lady from our church. Her mother, whom she lived with, had been given only hours to live.

my heart really went out to her and her family. they are a tight bunch and will miss their mother.

Monday, cindie and I finished off our Christmas shopping list and visited the family who had lost their mother. I went back there a second time later that day to gather as much information on her life as possible.

Tuesday, I was busy with funeral prep and two visitation times. I'm not complaining about any of this. I actually love doing funerals. It's not a morbid thing. It's just that I want to be about meeting people's needs, and there is no more needed time than after the death of a loved one.

I arrived at the church Wednesday morning at 7 am. I had three baptisms scheduled for 9, but I had forgot to turn on the heater on the baptististry. The first thing I did when I got there was check on the water. While doing that, I dropped my Minister's Manual (book I use to plan weddings and funerals) in the baptistry. Knowing how badly I needed the book, I quickly went in after it, soaking my sockas and shoes.

Those being baptized were three generations of women from one family. A gal my age (mid-twenties), her mom, and grandmother. That was really cool. By the way, they started coming because of a funeral that was done at our church for the sister of the youngest. This is case in point why I love funerals.

To my surprise, they had invited family, who arrived in church clothes. And when I say church clothes, I mean the kind of thing I might wear if it were Christmas or Easter. I, conversely was wearing some sweats over my bathing suit, and was barefoot becasue my socks and shoes got soaked. I felt awkward, but other than that it was really cool. The whole church has been working with them for a long while.

After that I rushed home and showered and changed for the funeral. I have to say that it was one of the more tearful funerals that I have been to. She had a huge family (7 kids, 18 grandkids, 27 great-grandkids and one great-great-grandkid). And as I said earlier, they are tight bunch. I was glad to be there and really feel like God used me. with all of the functions it took from 11:00 am till about 6:00 pm, at which time I headed over to our Bible study. I mention this part only tosay, I was exhausted by the end of the day.

The next morning (this morning) Cindie, Hannah and I got up early to go the doctor's for an ultra-sound Cindie is 36 weeks pregnant (40 is full term). But our last child had to be induced early because she was getting so big. That is why we had this ultra-sound, to see if the same thing was happening. The baby is an estimated 8 lbs. right now, give or take a half pound. In the last four week babies grow on average two more pounds. That could put the bay at as heavy as 10.5 lbs. That's way too big for someone as petite as Cindie birth naturally. So it looks like the doctor is going to induce labor next Wednesday, 3 weeks early, and 3 days before Christmas You can imagine how paniced we are right now.

This has been a week of life and death. 3 baptisms, a funeral, an ultra-sound, and preparation for the celebration of the birth of Life himself. Big stuff. Today, after the doctor's visit, I finally got a chance to start my sermon for this Sunday. The theme that had already been chosen for this Sunday is "Making room for Christ's Peace." The text is Phil 4:4-7 which instructs us to anxious about nothing.

I guess I won't be short on illustrations.

Psalm 23, the prodigal sheep

In our Sunday School class, we are going through the book “Living by the Book” by Hendricks and Hendricks. The book teaches the basic skills necessary to read and understand the Bible. This week’s lesson encouraged us to try to read a passage as for the first time. It listed several very familiar passages and asked your to read it in four versions, and try to engage as it as for the first time.

The whole book has been really fun, but I especially enjoyed this exercise. I chose Psalm 23, perhaps the second most familiar passage in all of Scripture. I read it in The MESSAGE Paraphrase, Young’s Literal Translation, The Good News Translation, and The Holman Christian Standard Bible.

The challenge was to then set aside my preconceptions about this passage. I have read this passage a billion times, give or take a hundred million, so this was difficult. I had always read this Psalm as a comfort, reminder that God is taking care of things. This is, of course true, and a big reason it is by far the most-read passage at funerals.

But as I read this passage over and over again, a new theme rose from the page. I began to see them as the words of a believer who had returned from rebellion.

Yahweh is shepherd: the one who gathers me from wayward wonderings.
I don’t need (lack, want) a thing: perhaps a confession of someone who had gone searching from something more. (I think verse 2 just rewords the same concept).
He renews my strength leads me in righteous paths: the words of someone who had exhausted himself on the path of unrighteousness.
Even walking through the valley of Death’s Shadow: the road of repentance can be scary, and the road to repentance will doubtlessly run near temptation where death is so close you may feal like you are in the darkness of it’s shadow.
I’ll not fear for you are with me. Your rod and staff comfort me: I don’t need to fear further falling because Yahweh is there to yank and nudge me back on to the road.
You prepare a meal for me in the face of my enemies, revive me and make my once-dry cup overflow: this is an example of God’s unbelievable grace. His blessings for wanderer are multiplied on his return.
Your Beauty and Faithful Love chase after me without ceasing: good news for someone who wandered away. And this is the kind astounding realization someone might have if they have had their relationship with God restored.
I will live in the house of the Lord all the days of my life: I’m noit ever leaving again.

Now go back and compare this with the story of the prodigal son, which is the ultimate portrayal of a wayward returned to God. I think the parallels will become obvious. Let me know what you see.

In the name of Jesus Christ (Acts 3)

Luke has just given us a general picture of what the first church looked like (Acts 2:42-47). They met in the Temple. They committed themselves to prayer. They were filled with awe. Many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. They had the favor of the people, and so on. Luke follows this general description with a specific example.

Peter and John head to the Temple to pray, meat and heal a lame man, and use the attention it draws to testify about Jesus. If you had to identify one theme of this whole chapter, it would be the “name of Jesus”.

The man was healed, chapter 3 emphatically declares, by the name of Jesus (vs. 6, and 16). This we saw in verse six, and this is the central theme of Peter’s sermon.

The theme of “the name of Jesus” is further promoted by the large number of titles for Jesus found in chapter 3. Jesus Christ of Nazareth (6), His Servant Jesus (13), the Holy and Righteous One (14), the Author of Life (15), His [God’s] Christ (18), a prophet like Moses (22), and [Abraham’s] Offspring (25).

I’m not going to tell you what each of these mean right now (though, that would be a fruitful exercise). I just bring this up to show the emphasis on the theme “the name of Jesus”. You may be aware that when the Bible speaks of a name, there is deeper significance than what we typically infer. For instance, if someone donated money to a school in your name, that would simply mean that it was done on your behalf. In biblical language, though, it would mean much more. It would mean the money was donated by your power and in your character. It was rooted in you and reflected you.

So with the healing being done in the name of Jesus (Yeshua), the whole thing reflects and finds its beginnings in Jesus. These two men look at the crippled man, this comes from Christ’s character. Peter’s faith that is so courageous as to declare the lame man well comes from Jesus. His compassion to reach out and grab this lame man by the hand comes from the name (character) of Jesus. Peter and John’s willingness to have their prayer time interrupted to do God’s work, comes from Jesus. The power to heal a man, who had been lame his whole life, so completely that he is able to walk and jump without even being taught certainly came from Jesus. But the power of Jesus is not released without the character of Jesus.

A church which exists in the name of Christ have the compassionate character of Christ to identify a need, the humility of Christ to reach out to that need, and the faith in Jesus’ power to handle it.

Everything that I needed to know about prayer, I learned from my 2 year-old

If you didn’t know, I have a two year-old daughter named Hannah. She is the one pictured below on Santa’s lap. We have been letting her do the prayer before meals now and again, and it has proved to be quite cute. Let me share three examples:

1. Hannah began her prayer with pure gibberish. I don’t think she was “in the Spirit” or anything. This is just what she does when she wants to talk, but does not know which words to say. After doing that for about thirty to forty seconds, she closed her prayer with “Twinkle Star… A,B,C… Itsy Spider… Amen”

2. A second prayer came after a bad in potty training. She began with her normal lists of thank you’s for everyone she knows, and then unprompted said, “Sorry to Mommy and Daddy for potty in my pants.”

3. Recently she added a new item to her normal list of Thank you’s. She thanked God for the store. Unfortunately, she caught us giggling at that one. So, last night she said it seven times in a row until she got laugh she desired. “thank your for the store… the store… the store…” (I peak and see she is looking straight at me.) “the store…”

There might be lessons about prayer here. I’ll leave that to you to decide.

The ideal church (Acts 2:42-47)

This is one of my favorite passages in the whole Bible. It gives us just a brief glimpse of what church can look like when it clicks perfectly on all cylinders. Three thousand+ fired-up converts, all 1) devoted to apostle’s teaching 2) devoted to fellowship 3) devoted to the Eucharist 4) devoted to prayer 5) in awe of the Lord 6) sharing with each other 7) committed to meeting daily with each other 8) sharing meals 9) glad and sincere 10) praising God 11) appreciated by the community. So perfect that God was pleased to add converts daily to their number.

It was this potent church that was the seed for every church around the world. This church so completely portrayed what God’s Kingdom is like that people could not stay away. I think it is fair to say that the more ideal the church, the more likely it is to have this sort of far-flung, generational impact.

There is, however a danger to ideals. When we decide that only the ideal will do, we become incapable of having any involvement of in this fallen world. If we decide that an “Acts 2” type of church is the only church worth being a part of, then we put ourselves in a hard place. We must either be a part of no church, or close our eyes and deceive ourselves about the church we belong to. Both are absurd.

One of my professors at Bible college counseled me not to look for the perfect church. For the moment I joined it, he said, the whole thing would be ruined—no longer perfect.

As you will see, even this ideal church did not stay ideal for long. Or, more accurately, when this infantile, untested church hit some bumps in the road, she was shown more fully for what she was—an unfinished product. We’ll discuss this more when we get to Acts 5.

This brings me back to “Acts 29”. A lady at church was quick to point out, there is no Acts 29. I explained to her that there is not a written twenty-ninth chapter of Acts, but that we as the modern church are the unwritten twenty-ninth chapter. The church we belong to began on Pentacost with 3,000 fired-up converts, and continues today. We look back to the first-century church to learn more about being a twenty-first century church.