Bible, a book or a mystery?

The Bible is not a book. The Bible is not information. The Bible is not good moral behavior. In my mind the Bible has so much mystery in its existence. I don't think I read it as much as it reads me. As I read in the word, so many times it seems like the words jump of the pages and into my heart and began to tug me or draw me. Those words create spiritual hunger and thirst in me. I am thankful that God, the God of the universe, the huge majestic mysterious God, created a tangible piece of equipment called the Bible to communicate with me.

A scenic stop, a loving voice

This past week I stopped in to visit the ANHOP (All Nations House of Prayer) in Grand Prairie Texas. It is a model after the IHOP of Kansas City founded by Mike Bickle. I felt a dramatic peace as soon as I walked through the door. I was there for the Saturday morning prayer time. There is nothing quite like walking into a place and sensing the peace that can only come from God. The prayer chapel is a calming place. It has a large picture window on the west end that looks out into a garden setting.

While there in prayer I was encouraged to hear from God things such as "Would a loving father ever fail to give good gifts to His children?" "Or would a loving father send kids into a place and not take care of them there?" This was an affirmation for me on our step of faith to move to Dallas and plant a church. My family and I are attempting something that can not be a success, unless God Himself directs us and supplies what we need there. We continue on our transition wrestling with fear, yet going ahead in faith.

Open windows

Prayer, there is no life flow without prayer. How many times have I learned that when prayer (talking to God, listening to God, revering God) comes to a stop in my life then the journey gets much rougher. I truly think that in this generation God is speaking. But are we listening? Somehow prayer is like opening a window to heaven. When the window is open heavenly stuff falls through it and touches the earth and us and changes us and the world around us. If we can just take time to open the windows of heaven with prayer then life flows, the God of wonder and mystery invades our world and does life like only he can do. He does things like taking the ordinary (water) and turns into extraordinary (wine). He takes defeats and someone brings good out of them.

How can we not pray, when windows open?

Reloaded

A friend and I went to lunch today. We talked in anticipation about seeing the Matrix reloaded. He just turned thirty. I kidded him that if he didn't understand the movie that meant he was getting to be an old person.

The whole premise of the Matrix is such a great picture of the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God is the reality we all live in, yet so many times we don't see life through the reality of the Kingdom, we see it through the reality of this world and how this world looks and feels (The Matrix). Faith is so much not what we can taste, touch, feel, see, or hear in a natural sense, it is embracing something bigger than ourselves. Enough of that, I know books and thousands of interpretations have been written on the Matrix. Personally, I can't wait to see Hollywood's latest and greatest technology and to talk about the postmodern values of Reloaded with a circle of friends.

Morph

I began the first chapter of Ron Martoia's book Morph today.

Ron is the lead pastor at Westwinds Community Church (http://www.westwinds.org) . The book addresses the texture of leadership for tomorrow's church. One particular quote surprised me a bit. He said the audience for the final survivor (I'm guessing the first one) was larger than those who voted in the Bush/Gore presidential election. This points to the changing culture that puts more stock on craving experiences rather than representation. In my mind this could be a enormous opportunity for communities of faith to draw people to a Jesus who is not just a historical figure of influence, but a personal real relational God involved in our lives today.

The focus in this book is that today's leaders of faith will need to morph (transform, change) on a continual basis to have impact on an emerging world.

Failure

Do you ever feel like your a failure at being a GOOD Christian?


For some reason lately I've been wrestling with my "got it pretty easy American Christian life". It doesn't mean I don't struggle and just cruise through life. But I honestly wonder if we (the American church) are really living the life. I think my bottom line question is "What does God think of me as I live my life for Him?"


I found a bit of the answer I was looking for today in an e-mail reply from a friend. We were discussing a page written by Tony Campolo and I was telling my friend Shane about this issue. A portion of his reply said:


"Regarding Your comments about what i wrote, Yea - i agree that the main push of the article was about Jesus' integrity and character that was/is so like the Father's. Is there anything better than that besides the fact that He Loves us?


i totally agree about the U.S. and the living status of Christians here, too. We do have it good, but that to me is not anything bad. In my opinion, God never blames us for where He puts us. i do think, however, that He always holds us accountable for our stewardship of the positions, gifts, wealth, talents, status, influence, and health that He gives us. i am just now in my Life beginning to grasp how much i have been given and how much i am a steward of for God. Accordingly, i am just now beginning to learn how to humbly walk in His Mercy & Grace in order to be that good steward and good administrator of those things He has put in my trust. i am really blown away by that whole concept. So to me, the struggle i have is not so much the struggle of many Westerners about whether i deserve what i have or not or whether i should spend any time feeling guilty about my ____ level - my struggle is how to be a faithful steward of stuff of which i'm pretty convinced i don't deserve any. How can i be a good steward - which to me inherently includes the Jesus kind of selflessness."


That's all I needed for today, a little assurance that it is ok to live in American and try to walk the walk in the place I am in. I still want to pursue the life Christ is leading me to live and do just that, but there is peace that maybe He put me right where I am at to fulfill enlarging His kingdom as a "got it pretty easy American Christian".


Continue to lead us Father into your best. Its all about you.

Home base

blogger.com

Plant Wars

I was reading an article by Jim Griffith (a church planting consultant for Easum and Bandy http://www.easumbandy.com) this morning. He said something I had heard clearly from Tom Wymore Friday. Don't launch too quickly. Griffith calls it a premature launch. Wait until the team has formed and they are ready for launch. Another thing that I heard from both of these men is the importance of prayer. Tom told me as he was planting in Austin that each time he sent out a prayer sheet to his prayer folks life seemed to run a bit smoother for a time. In Griffiths "Ten Most Common Mistakes for Church Plants" #1 is taking spiritual warfare too lightly. I pray for not only Gods will in planting a new church but Gods wisdom for carrying it through.

Keep Unlearning

The Gallup strengthsfinder test identifies a persons top 5 strengths. The twenty something dollar book is worth getting. My top strength according to Gallup is learning. This is coming in handy in this process of church planting. There is a lot to learn. I have found that learning includes unlearning the incorrect learning we have. For all of us life is a journey of learning and unlearning. When we stop learning, we stop growing, and become stale and bored with life. It's very much like that as a Christ follower. To walk forward following Jesus is a life long learning and unlearning journey. When you stop learning and unlearning about Him you become bored and all the sudden earthly things become more appealing than heavenly things. I am trying now to learn and unlearn about planting a church.

I even hesitate to use the word church since that word is so worn out in our present society. So, I guess I'll be planting a community of Christ followers in North Dallas called Resonance.

This weekend, I was able to spend some time with Tom Wymore. Tom has helped write the Church Planting curriculum for the Foursquare Church. Tom pastors in Midland Texas and also heads up the Foursquare organization in West Texas. I enjoyed talking through different aspects of approaching the plant we will be doing in Carrollton. Not only has Tom written on church planting, He had been the lead pastor on a church plant in Austin Texas. Mentoring is important to me. Not so much formal mentoring but mentoring that comes relationally I find really rewarding.
.

A Big Step

We continue to prepare for a church planting venture in North Dallas. This is a real step of faith for a 42 year old with wife and kids. We are leaving all the equity of relationships and finances we have here in Lubbock, Texas to move to Carrollton Texas and pioneer an emerging church there. This past months I have been wrestling much with just what the DNA of this church will look like. Our mission will be reaching 25-45 year olds who are not plugged into or interested in a traditional church setting but has a spiritual hunger. The tag that has been on my mind for the DNA is decidedly non-traditional yet unapologetically spiritual.

Blogging, Bring It On!

On a whim, here I am. I read an article by Brain McClaren this week in Mars Hill Review. He gave some great examples in describing the differences of modernity with postmodernity. He also used the word intersubjectivity in describing postmodernity versus objectivity for modernity. I like that word intersubjectivity. It gives image to the interconnectivity of the world as postmodernity matures.