Today was a cool day! I did one of our blog interviews with Jonathan Sprang from Catalyst Church in Rowlett, TX. I am really excited about what God is doing down in Texas with this church. I will post as soon as we finish editing! I am doing two more tomorrow and hopefully a couple of more on Monday! Keep checking back for more updates.
Today is day 3 of GA and things are running smoothly. We will be doing some blog interviews with some interesting folks live from the GA Floor. I have seen so many people that I know. Check back soon!
Last night was the kickoff for One Heart, Many Hands! It is a service project in Orlando with over 2500 volunteers. We had a great service last night at First Baptist Orlando with Joel Hunter as our special speaker. Here are some pics from last night and today.
Here are the many hands!
Thousands of sandwiches being made for the volunteers in our Youth Activity Center
We are just 2 days from an important day in the life of dad's everywhere, Father's day! My kids are always the best on Father's Day, they manage to make it special every year. As I was thinking about this holiday I cocouldn't help to think about my own dad. Growing up I had a very difficult and tumultuous relationship with my father. I grew up in a split home, some of you probably know what I'm talking about. My mom was a Christian and my dad was not and that made life very interesting to say the least. There would be many nights that I was left wondering "where in the world is dad". I am sure some of you can relate. It took me many years to be able to forgive him of consistently letting me down. As I grew older our relationship began to get better and better.
Several years ago, my wife and kids went down to Chattanooga over the Christmas holiday. During our trip my dad and I were out in his garage and he was showing me a car that he was rebuilding. He was very intent to show me this piece of sheet metal that he was going to put on the car. I wanted to see this piece of sheet metal for myself so I grabbed it and when I did I sliced my hand wide open. Blood was streaming out of my hand and my dad quickly grabbed my hand and covered it with a towel. I was 26 or 27 at the time and he took me by the hand and walked me inside. I never remember him doing this even when I was a kid. His concern for me was so authentic and real. I remember him saying, "we have to get you inside and get you cleaned off". He took my hand and washed the blood off and bandaged me up. My boo boo was all better! It was a reminder of how far our relationship had come.
God does the same for us. We have all been let down by people in the past, we all have these deep wounds that live inside of us. God the Father wants to take us by the hand (no matter how old we are) wash us clean and heal us of all our impurities. No matter how deep the wound and how destroyed you feel the relationship is, he can heal it.
This father's day if you have been let down by your earthly father, keep in mind that you have a Heavenly Father that will never leave you, forsake you or let your down. Also remember there is still hope your earthly relationships as well. I am thankful for my dad and want to wish him a Happy Father's Dad!
7-10Because of the extravagance of those revelations, and so I wouldn't get a big head, I was given the gift of a handicap to keep me in constant touch with my limitations. Satan's angel did his best to get me down; what he in fact did was push me to my knees. No danger then of walking around high and mighty! At first I didn't think of it as a gift, and begged God to remove it. Three times I did that, and then he told me,
My grace is enough; it's all you need.
My strength comes into its own in your weakness.
Once I heard that, I was glad to let it happen. I quit focusing on the handicap and began appreciating the gift. It was a case of Christ's strength moving in on my weakness. Now I take limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size—abuse, accidents, opposition, bad breaks. I just let Christ take over! And so the weaker I get, the stronger I become.
2 Corinthians 12 takes us on a journey to humility and Grace. We should be thankful for the limitations and the shortcomings in our lives. When we face these times, then Christ is on display for all to see. So many times we are so self reliant that we are blinded to the fact that God desires for us to rest in him. Self reliance is such a smokescreen that wastes so much time. We have to come to the point in our life where we totally surrender to God and destroy self in the process. In the Message it even says that we should call this handicap of our weakness a gift from God. It goes on to say that we no longer have to live in the danger of walking around high and mighty. Through the grace of the almighty savior we are humbled to hand over our issues, limitations and weaknesses to Him. His Grace is enough for all of us. The weaker I get, the stronger I become due to Christ's strength and not my own! I am thankful for that today.
How are you letting self get in the way of the Grace that God desires to give you?
What area of your life needs to be cleared out and destroyed?
I had a great time this morning meeting with my accountability group. It is an honor to call those guys friends along this journey that we are all on. I woke up this morning with a word on my mind and that word was perspective. Do we have enough of it or how can we get it?
Last Tuesday Jared Skees was on his way home from working third shift at Disney when his car went off the road and struck a tree. By the time the ambulance got to him, he had substantial damage to head and neck. Jared was in a comatose state for about 6 days. He was on life support and yesterday the family had to make the decision to take him off of that support. Jared died shortly after that at the age of 38 years old. He left behind a wife and many friends and family. Jared and his wife were in our small group for a short time.
You hear about this story and you have to think to yourself, my life isn't that bad. Perspective is gathered when tragedy hits and it brings back down to earth to realize that God is good. He is good during the great landmark moments of our life and He is good during our darkest hours.
James 1 says that we will go through many trials, bad things will happen, but count it all joy. That is so hard to do when you are faced with tragic circumstances or our greatest fears. Sometimes we need time and space from the circumstance to gain proper perspective. We have rest in knowing that God is still in control, He knows our needs and in His time he is moving. We don't need to wait for a tragedy to have the right outlook in life.
So when you stump your toe tonight when you go to the bathroom or if someone is holding a grudge against you remember that life could be worse. Life is short, live today as if you have no tomorrow, do what is calling you to do! Carry out His purpose for your life. Don't wait and remember your life is better than you think! God is blessing all of us!
Last Sunday night in our small group, we were diving into James 2 and 3. We came up to the part in James where he describes that it only takes a spark to create a forest fire. James goes on to say that "a careless or wrongly placed word can create a forest fire."
We all need to be careful with our words, they are so powerful. We can lift someone up and we can destroy lives with our words. Words have a way of lingering in your mind and lingering in your heart. How many of you remember something someone said to you in high school? I do and it still sticks with me even today. It can make you a stronger person or you carry it around and mess with your mind.
In the Message, James says that "by our speech we can ruin the world and turn harmony into chaos." I am reminded of the Tina Fey penned movie, "Mean Girls". There is a part in the movie when the entire school is involved in a massive brawl. Every clique and social group were engaged in an all out maylay. The root of the problem was simple, it was words. Someone said something about a classmate that wasn't true. A misunderstanding caused mass chaos just because of words.
In verse 8, the Message describes our tongue as a "Wanton Killer". Have you ever thought of your speech as a not so silent assassin. Those are some tough words!
How can we hold each other accountable when it comes to holding our tongue.
Here is our three tips that might help.
1. If you don't have a dog in the hunt, don't speak.
2. If you have a problem with someone, go to that person and make it right.
3. It is better to say too little than to say too much.
Last Friday was a very interesting day and some of you have been asking about it, so I thought I would blog about it. What started out as a pretty normal day turned out to be pretty unique. We decided to go to Hollywood Studios for the day to celebrate the beginning of summer. When we were on the parking lot tram, Tiff said she wanted to go the new American Idol Experience. When got through the gate we decided to go check out the first show of AI Experience, they have 7 shows a day. We were standing in line and Tiff says, "you should try out for this, what are we doing in line?" I reluctantly said okay and we got out of line and walked to the audition spot. I went in the door and they give me this list of songs and said that I could take one person back with me, so I picked Jada. They took me into this room with a producer and he asked me to sing a 30 second song acapella. So I sang and he said that he liked it and sent me to the next round. I was met by a concierge and they took me to the Coca-Cola Lounge and they gave me an i-pod and wanted me to pick two songs. After about 10 minutes, I picked my two songs and they told me that I would be singing for the Executive Producer of the show there at Disney. I went in and he gave me a mic, chatted to me for a second and then I sang. After the first song, Ryan Secrest pops up on a screen and told me that I was in the show. I was going to be in the 2 pm show. I wasn't really sure what to expect but I certainly didn't expect to be singing in the show.
My call time was 12:50, I went to backstage entrance and was met by a production assistant and he took me in the door. From that point I was taken into the green room where I was told that was going to hair and makeup and vocal coaching. Then they let me rehearse my song on the Idol stage. You would not believe this stage, it was the exact replica of the real stage in Hollywood. I was also told that the auditorium has around 1000 seats and that the place would be packed. Luckily for me I had sang in front of a lot of people. That part didn't bother me.
The show began at 2 pm and it was crazy. There was a Ryan Secrest type host and three judges who resembled Randy, Paula and Simon. They were real music pros, pretty cool. I got to talk to them after the show. I was the last one to sing and then the audience voted. The judges were very kind to me (even the Simon knock off). After the audience voted they announced the winner and it was me! It was so weird and surprising. That meant that I was in the finale show at 7 pm. Crazy!
At the finale show, I went up against 6 other people who had won their respective shows throughout the day. I went up against a 16 yr old from Dallas who sang a Taylor Swift song, a 18 yr. girl from New York who did Aretha Franklin, an older guy from Texas who sang Bob Seger, the worship pastor Dan from Granger Community Church (we talked for a while, great guy). Dan sang Smooth by Santana and Rob Thomas. There was also a guy from Oklahoma who sang "What a Wonderful World" and a girl from Miami that sang Alone by Heart. Then there was little ole me, a white guy singing Stevie Wonder.
Fast forward to the end of the show, it came down to me and the girl from New York and they called my name and it was surreal. The confetti fell from the sky and the crowd gave me a standing o. It was nuts! My prize was a Magic Ticket. The ticket allows me to go to the front of the line or actually make an appointment with the producers of the real American Idol. Unfortunately for me, at the current rules I am too old, however they are thinking about raising the age to 32. Even then, not sure if I would ever take advantage of the ticket. I had a blast but I did it just for fun. It was certainly something I will never forget.
Every time I hear the phrase "Mad Church Disease", I can't help to think about the old SNL sketch with Will Ferrell as Harry Caray. His famous line in that sketch was "Would you rather have Mad Cow Disease or be the smartest person in your field? or "If you were a hot dog would you eat yourself?"
I just finished reading the book "Mad Church Disease" by uber blog star Anne Jackson. It is a must read, every leader in the church has to pick up this book. I have even go as far as encouraging our church to have a burnout prevention class based on this book. Everyone at some point will have to face and deal with the issue of Burnout. Let's be honest the church isn't always the easiest place to work. I am very fortunate that I work with a great staff and we have some great people here at our church but it is not like that everywhere.
One of our biggest downfalls as the Church is that we put people into the frontlines of leadership before they are ready. Sometimes folks are just not spiritually mature enough to lead and to experience the inner workings of how the church works.
Another downfall is that we spread people too thin and wear them down. Sister Suzie is great with kids so let's throw her in with the preschoolers. She is also a great singer so she has to be on the praise team. Suzie is also a great cook and before you know. Suzie is getting to church at the crack of dawn preparing breakfast for the whole church and attending praise team rehearsals and getting her classroom ready for those pesky preschoolers. Before you know it, Suzie is flat out exhausted and ready to quit everything. You just can't keep that pace and hope to sustain it.
Anne Jackson does a great job explaining what happens to the complete body when it is taken care of properly. When we get out of whack and do too much, our physical, spiritual and mental body breaks down. When that happens we are useless and sometimes it takes years to recover. More often than not we never recover and we forget our calling and our life spins out of control.
I can't stress enough if you are going through these issues, please, please pick up this book. It is not too late for you.
Are you currently burned out? Have you been burned in the past? How long did it take you to recover? Did you ever recover?
Get the book here!
