Daddy

Lately, I have had the pleasure of spending a lot of time with my two daughters.

During this season one of the things I love to watch is how my two year old strives for independence.  I have noticed that when she finds herself in struggle, like putting on her shoes, she often rejects my attempts to help her because of an internal drive to do it herself.  “No, no daddy I do!” 

However, if she has a minor fall or bump on the knee I have noticed the independent spirit disappear. 

In moments when she is frightened or hurt she will call for me.  The other morning she fell down and called for me to come pick her up.  She was crying and as I held her she was clinging to my neck and crying on my shoulder.  This carried on for a couple of seconds as I comforted her, but after the tears I noticed that she did not want to let go.  She just held on and was quiet. 

It was the best part of my day.  One of those moments that you wish could last forever as she just held on to her daddy.  I loved it.

I was thinking about that today and wondered: Does our heavenly father loves those moments as well?

Often in life, I want to do it on my own.  “No, No” I say to my Father.  “I can do it.” 

But there are those moments when I know I need Him.  Those moments when I am afraid, when I am hurt and I have nothing to say.  I think it is in these moments that God our father longs to hold us close.  Those tender moments when we are quiet and held by the love of our Father. 

It just may be the best part of His day as well.

Church Inc.

For the past 14 years I have spent my life working in the church. During this time I have had pleasure in serving in three large and generally corporate church settings. Although, I have often enjoyed the level of thought and strategic planning pop-business has brought to the church at times it has made me scratch my head and left unchecked can be very dangerous.

Once after addressing a moral issue with another church leader, this leader told that the community in question was “growing in attendance and giving and that the money does not lie.”

It made me ask: “What are we doing?” Is the church a money-making business? Is this the bottom line?

This week I attended The Willow Creek Leadership Summit, an annual event that I love to attend. During one of the sessions author and speaker Jim Collins spoke from his book How the Mighty Fall. In this talk Jim outlined how large and influential organizations have fallen over time. As I listened to this talk I thought: Now this is something the incorporated church need to learn.

5 Stages of Decline

1. Hubris Born of Success

a. Outrageous arrogance to believe that we have achieved success on our own.

b. Our decisions are good! This is because of our skill, not the work of God and great circumstances.

c. We have figured it out! We are the model of church today!

2. Undisciplined Pursuit of More!

a. Over reaching! Let’s get more! Let’s build a big room! Multi-site!

b. Don’t ask the question: “Do we have the right people on the right seats of the bus”

3. Denial of Risk and Peril

a. The team refuses to look at the risk involved.

b. Fails to put faith and fact together.

4. Grasping for Salvation

a. The game is up.

b. You start searching for the silver bullet.

5. Capitulation to Irrelevance of Death

a. It is over.

In conclusion, Jim shared that the mark of enduring organizations is the pursuit of some thing greater than success and money. As I listened to this I thought what a great reminder for the incorporated church today.

God of Money

I am currently reading Counterfeit Gods by Timothy Keller. It is a very profound read and here are a couple of thoughts I am wrestling with:

“Man must have an idol-The amassing of wealth is on of the worst species of idolatry. No idol more debasing that the worship of money. Whatever I engage in I must push inordinately therefore should I be careful to choose that life which will be the most elevating in character. To continue much longer overwhelmed by business care and with most of my thoughts wholly upon the way to make more money in the shortest time, must degrade me beyond hope of permanent recovery. I will resign business at thirty five, but during the ensuing two years, I wish to spend the afternoons securing instruction and in reading systematically.” Andrew Carnegie

• Money will be the primary God of Western Culture-Friedrich Nietzsche

• Greed is especially hard to see in our own lives.

• Have you ever thought: ”I spend too much on myself?”

• Jesus warns us more about greed than sex and almost no one thinks they are guilty of it.

• Nowhere is slavery more evident than in the blindness of greedy people to their own materialism. (Luke 16:13-15)

• Jesus, the God-Man, had infinite wealth, but if he had held on to it, we would have died in our spiritual poverty. (2 Cor 8:9)

• When you see Jesus dying to make you his treasure, that will make him yours. Money will cease to be the currency of your significance and security, and you will want to bless others with what you have.

• The God of money cannot be removed. It can only be replaced. It must be supplanted by the one who, though rich, became poor, so that we might truly be rich.

God of Success

I am currently reading Counterfeit Gods by Timothy Keller. It has been a very profound read so far and here are a couple of thoughts I am wrestling with:

“I have an iron will, and all of my will has been to conquer some horrible feeling of inadequacy. . . I push past one spell of it and discover myself as a special human being and then I get to another stage and think I’m mediocre and uninteresting. . . Again and again. My drive in life is from this horrible fear of being mediocre. And that’s always pushing me, pushing me. Because even through I’ve become Somebody, I still have to prove that I’m somebody. My struggle has never ended and it probably never will.” Madonna

• More than any other idol, personal success and achievement lead to a sense that we ourselves are god.

• One sign that you have made success and idol is the false sense of security it brings.

• Another sign that you have made achievement an idol is that it distorts your view of yourself.

• You cannot maintain your self-confidence in life unless you remain at the top.

• God’s Primary concern is not to help you achieve success.

• The God of Israel is not on a leash, he cannot be bought or appeased.

• God is not tame.

• God’s Grace puts everyone else in his debt. Not the other way around. We owe Him. He does not owe us success.

• When we forgive others it means that we absorb the loss and debt of that person. You bear it yourself. All forgiveness is costs.

Handing Off

This morning I started a personal reading plan of the book of John. It is often in times of transition that I find it comforting to get close to the words of Jesus. Today I was reading in John chapter 1 and noticed and interesting section of the text. I am going to call it: “the hand off.”

“The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look the Lamb of God!” When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus. (John 1:35-37)

As I read this passage this morning I wondered what it might have felt like to be John the Baptist. These men were his disciples, his students, his followers but in a moment they were gone. They were done following him and now following Jesus. In a moment a hand off had occurred.

As I pondered this passage it reminded me of life today. In reality we are always “handing off.” Currently I have two little girls under my roof. In many ways they are mine. They listen to me (sometimes), they love me, the follow me. But one day I will hand them off. It is my hope that when they go they choose to follow Jesus.

For the last 14 years I have worked in full-time ministry. It has been my life’s work to point people to Jesus. I have always deeply enjoyed and loved the people that I have had the honor to serve and care for but in the end I have always had to hand them off.

As I enter another season of life and I am excited to see what God will do next.

This life has been an incredible adventure and I know that God will bring my family and I to something better than we could imagine. But mixed into this season is the sadness of handing dear friends off. However, as I let go of those I have journeyed with over the past four years I know that I am not leaving them alone but rather I am handing them off to the master.

The King will Return

Last night my heart broke. I was sitting on my couch with my 6-year old daughter when Lebron told the world that he was leaving Cleveland to play for the Miami Heat.

It has been interesting to watch the reaction of those back in northeast Ohio as they took the news. Immediately the text messages and facebook posts began to make my phone buzz off the table as my friends started to voice their displeasure at “the decision.”

But for me, this was put into perspective just a moment before the announcement.

In the moments before Lebron spoke my daughter could see that her daddy was feeling a little uneasy. She grabbed a blanket, sat next to me on the couch, and asked what was bothering me. I looked over at her and said; “I think this man is going to break my heart tonight. “ To which she replied: “Do you know what would break my heart?” I said, “What?” Elena replied, “If you and Mommy were to break up. That would break my heart,”

Ah perspective.

For the remainder Lebron’s announcement I held my daughter between my wife and I as we took in the news. And it really didn’t matter.

For those back in Cleveland I share your pain. “the king” is gone. But just a reminder that one-day “The King” will return. (Rev 21) and this King will never leave. He will wipe every tear from your eyes, there will be no more morning or crying or pain.” I am praying today that his first stop on His return to this earth will be Cleveland.

Sharing Hope: Part 2

In his book Surprised by Hope, author and theologian NT Wright says that one of the purposes of the church is to live consciously between the resurrection of Jesus in the past and the making of God’s new world in the future.

As a church we must never give up the truth of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus while also constantly striving to restore a biblical since of fairness and justice in the world we live in today.

It is in doing this that we as a community will bring hope into our world. And conversely it is also in these moments that our hope in God or faith seems to grow the most.

In Hebrews chapter 6 scripture says: God is not unjust; he will not forget your work and the love you have shown him as you have helped his people and continue to help them. We want each of you to show this same diligence to the very end, in order to make your hope sure. We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised.

In this passage we see that it is often in the moments when we serve those who are less fortunate than ourselves that our faith seems to grow. It is in these moments that hope seems to become sure.

Maybe you have experienced one of these moments in life. A moment when you though you were serving someone else, maybe you were trying to make something right in this world but in the you walked away feeling like: maybe I gained more from this than anyone else.

Also take a few moments to read through this passage in Hebrews Chapter 6 and think about these questions.

· Read Hebrews Chapter 6:10-12

o When is the last time you have shown God Love by loving his people? Describe the experience.

o How did these experiences help build your faith or make your hope sure?

o Why don’t we actively pursue more of these serving opportunities in our life?