SUNDAY MORNING

It's Sunday morning, about 20 minutes into the first service and I am NOT at LifePoint. I am actually sitting in my camper on Tybee Island about to walk down to the beach for the day. Now this is not the first time I have been out on a Sunday but this time has had me doing a lot of thinking, reflecting and looking forward.

There was a time in my life when I would be going totally crazy if I missed a service. (Is everything going OK? Are they missing me? Can it survive without me?) These would be my thoughts. Hopefully I have moved past that.

This morning as I was thinking I realized that there are probably two things that have been the catalysts to my growth in this area:

1) I have an amazing staff. Having a team as incredible as the one we have at LifePoint makes it easy on me to just go and not worry. Knowing that they are there and that we won't miss a beat makes my life so much more peaceful than it could be. By the way, for those of you reading this, please tell them how much you appreciate them!

2) It's not about me! Now, I don't want this reason to take away from what I just said about the staff but this really is why I can relax when I'm gone. LifePoint is NOT about joe tessin or anybody else for that matter. I have had to realize that it is going to be OK and that this whole thing is about God and what He is up to in our world.

See, what I'm trying to say is that I have had to grow past my own insecurities about who I am and what I am part of. For LifePoint to be about me and my personality would paralyze it's ability to be bigger than me and if it isn't going to be bigger than me then it isn't going to be very big.

I'm asking God to give me years and years of leading the staff, teams and people of LifePoint but in that to help me stay focused on the reality that this is His vision and His doing. I have just been invited along for the ride. If I keep this in focus then I think I increase my capacity to be effective but when I loose sight on this my days may be numbered.

Papa is FOND of me

...on the water, there on the mighty sea You spoke of love deep as the ocean When You spoke of Your love for me I am loved by the Father I am loved by the Son It...
...heard you singing in the silence, a simple melody Words of love, O I can hear it My Father is very fond of me

These lyrics are from Chris Tomlin but I have to admit I love when this song is done by CHRIS HILDRETH at LifePoint. Chris H. is such an amazing friend but he is also so gifted at leading people into the presence of Papa. (If you haven't read "The Shack" by William Young stop reading and go buy the book, then you will hang out with Papa)
This past Sunday our band and Chris sang this song. Today it came alive for me.
As Carey and I sat on the beach in Tybee Island, GA we watched dolphins swim along the shoreline and sat and took in the beauty of all Papa has created.
As I have many times in my life, I came face to face with the reality that "My Father is VERY Fond of me".
It's one thing to live life and an entirely different thing to live it with the reality that God the Creator of it all is fond of me. I'm a bit overwhelmed right now!
By the way, My Father, is very fond of you as well. Bask in His goodness this day!

THE COST OF CERTAINTY

I'm reading one of the most challenging books right now, that I have read in a long time. "The Cost of Certainty" by Jeremy Young. While the book is totally resonating with me it is also totally rocking my world.
The culture of the church that I have grown up in is one that promotes certainty at all levels and costs. The goal is to be certain what truth is and to be certain that what we believe about God is absolutely correct. Can I just say that seems a bit arrogant to me!
I was in dialog recently, with a guy who God is using to really challenge me, about the idea of absolute truth. After a comment he made another guy in the group posed this question:
"So are you saying that you don't believe that there is absolute truth"
His response: "I'm not at all saying that I don't believe in absolute truth. As a matter of fact I am quite confident that there is absolute truth! However, what I am saying is that who do I think I am to say that I have discovered what absolute truth is"
wow! That was my response. Now I know that there will be those who read this and think that I have gone off the deep end. (Did you just now come to that conclusion?)
I will also say that most who have that feeling are those who have grown up in the same culture that I did that has caused us to think we have it all figured out and have held certainty up as the goal in life.
One of my greatest desires in life is to learn and grow. I've concluded that I can't do that if all I seek to expose myself to are things that further validate and embed what I already believe. Where's the learning in that?
So, while the book is a bit of a stretch I will press on and seek to know God more. In that process I think I may just have to settle on the reality that He (God) will become even more mysterious to me!

REAL LIFE!

This morning I had a thought that has been running through my mind for a while now, so I had to go do some study/research.
In John 10:10 Jesus said that He had come so that "we might have life..." and in Mathew 7:13-14 He said, "enter through the narrow gate.... the wide road leads to destruction.... but the small gate and the narrow road leads to life."
Jesus reaches into the Greek language both times for the meaning of this word life and He uses the same word in each verse. It means breath and vitality. In neither case is what Jesus talking about referring to an afterlife but He's talking about the kind of life He has created for us here and now.
Here's the hard part: In Matthew He says that "few will find it." Man, I want to be one of the few. Here's my thinking:
Most people walk a long way down a road seeking life, only to wake up and realize that they are on a road that leads to destruction. When we "wake up" we have a choice:
Do we keep walking because it has become easy and comfortable or do we enact and "emergency plan" to rescue ourselves and get back on the narrow road that leads to life?
One more thought that I will unpack later. Jesus said, "I am the life."
There is no life apart from Jesus, but does simply knowing about Jesus mean we have life?

Tuesday Morning Meditation

This morning as I sat outside and watched the birds and felt the breeze I was mediating on the goodness of God. I found myself reading Paul's words in Galatians. "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me." Galatians 2:20
Here's a few thoughts and questions I have:
What does it mean to "no longer live"?
What does it look like for "Christ to live in me"?
This is a big struggle I think for those of us who consider ourselves "followers of Christ". We spend much of our life trying to imitate Christ and quite frankly we ain't gonna get it done. (that's my GA slang coming out)
How can we imitate Christ? I've spent much of my life acting as if I was trying but I come up a bit short every day.
What I need in my life is less acting like Christ and more allowing Christ to live His life in me. The rest of this week I intend to ponder how I can stop doing and start being. Being one with Christ and allowing His life to take total control of what I think is my life.

Summer Slow Down

Summer is officially here! I guess it actually has been for a few weeks now, but we are well into the "summer slow down". I know that this means a lot of different things for all of us:
1) We don't have to get up as early to get the kids ready for school.
2) We may stay up later but our evenings are not filled with homework and projects to work on.
3) Vacation!
Summer is a unique time of year and we should take advantage of the gifts it brings to us. During the year we get so busy and focused that at times we loose sight of the things that matter most. As you vacation this summer take notice of the things you share as a family and identify ways you can implement some of those things throughout the rest of the year. Even after school starts back!
Take advantage of the opportunities you have to reconnect as a family and make a decision to not let it get so out of balance in the future.

STILL PROCESSING

After a week long trip through Illinois and Indiana I am still trying to land some of my thoughts. During my time hanging out with some other church leaders I was able to not only land some thoughts but also allow some other thoughts to take off.
It's good to find environments where we can think and not have it all figured out. Real growth in life comes, not when we look for our beliefs to be validated but when we have discussions from an open perspective.
So now I begin the journey of trying to process what is swirling around in my brain. For the next week or so I will be traveling on summer vacation with my family and this should afford me some still time and think time.
We will be camping in the North GA mountains. Nothing like a cool mountain stream or a big rock back in the woods to sit and ponder. For me that is some of the best places to connect with God.
I intend to journal my thoughts for about a week and then see where God takes me.
I am so glad that I don't have everything figured out! I am so glad that I don't have all the answers! I am so glad that I am part of a church that allows people to explore, grow, think and seek and that trusts God to lead people where only He can.
Wait! I hear the birds chirping and I see the sun coming up. Got to go!
Happy Camping!

Life Altering Experiences

We've all had those times in our lives when we knew that we had just experienced something that would alter the entire course of our lives. That is how I would describe the last 2 1/2 days for me. Almost four months ago I began a journey with a group of people through several texts that have really stretched my thinking. Each week we worked through a series of writings and lectures and spent time posting our comments to each other. It all came together this week as we met in Indiana for a few days of conversation and bringing our thoughts to some conclusion. At least that is what we had hoped to do. In reality what we have done is to just introduce ourselves to an entirely new set of questions. We didn't really answer anything but we started asking many more and new questions. I am learning more and more each day that who I become will be directly related to the questions I ask. We live in a culture, especially in the church, where people are more concerned with answering questions than asking them. If we are going to be who God wants us to be in the days ahead we have to be willing to ask different and better questions, even if there is no clear answer.

Jimmy John's

I just ate an amazing sandwich at a place called Jimmy John's in Michigan City, Indiana. What was even more amazing than the food was the service. From the time we walked in the door to the time a specialty sandwich was in my hands may have been 4 minutes, and that's because it took me
3 1/2 minutes to decide what I wanted. Here was my thought; "they get the service thing."
The service really blew me away. So here's my question to self;
Do I get the service thing?
Do I understand that my life is to be emptied out in service of others?
The truth of the matter is that most of my life I have looked to be served. I want others to serve me and meet my needs. I want the church to serve me and meet my needs.
Here's a question to consider;
How can I empty myself of my need to be served and live a life that focuses on others?

DECONSTRUCTION

Now that's an odd title for a post from me. My background, before I stepped in the world of church planting, was construction. (I can hear the thoughts, "how in the world did you make that leap?") We'll save that for another post. The major dialog, among the guys I'm hanging in Indiana with, today was about deconstruction within the church. For the last several months a group of us have worked through many books and one of them was John Caputo's, "What would Jesus Deconstruct?" Now there's a question for you to ponder. When I read the title a few months back my first thought was, "Everything we have constructed..." That may be a little bold or even hard but I wonder how much of what we do in our churches causes Jesus to scratch his head in wonder. We had some great conversation and I wouldn't even begin to try and unwrap very much of it here but two things I know for sure.
1) Deconstruction is HARD WORK!
2) We MUST do it anyway!
For those of you who are part of the family we call LifePoint you may not like some of the hard conversations we have in the days ahead but we have to begin to ask the questions.
Are we really who God has called us to be?
Are we really doing the things He has called us to do?
For those of you not a part of LifePoint, you may want to ask those questions in your world.
Tomorrow promises to be another challenging day as we continue our discussions here near "Touchdown Jesus" (that's South Bend Indiana) but I embrace the dialog and will post again after the day is over.

Indiana Bound

This week I'll be hanging with a group of friends in Indian! For the past three months a group of 15 church leaders from all over the country have been reading some books and having regular conversation about the things that God is doing in our worlds. After months of talking on the phone and posting thoughts on the internet we come together for 3 days. It should be a time of growth and learning for me. It gives me a chance to connect with other guys who are in similar roles as myself and allows me to be stretched and pick up some new ideas. I'll try and keep up my blog as we hang out. Have a great week!