Potty Training

Yes, today is the day that we decided to potty train our Rowan. She is currently running around the house naked. Her first attempt was to stand beside her little potty seat and let herself go...on the carpet. Doh! So close and yet so far.

These are those moments in a parents life where you go through so many emotions. You are frustrated that they just can't transfer what they normally do over to the potty. And yet you also realize that there is some sort of emotional attachment that your baby has to those velcro pants. And that leads me to patience. It's a big deal for her to change a habit that she has know her whole 2 year old life. It's easy to forget that.

As a dad I want to enjoy the milestones like this one, no matter how many messes it makes. I know these are incredible days that I will someday wish that I had back.

So bring on the towels and tears. I'm going to enjoy the journey.

Adoption Day Garage Sale

Part of what we call LifeWorks at Life Church is about caring for children, with an emphasis on orphans and others who are at-risk. Nate and Lisa Jarot have decided to adopt a baby from Vietnam. And we know first-hand, it is an expensive undertaking. So what started as a small idea of selling some items for the adoption, became...the Garage Sale to beat all other Garage Sales (Nate's phrase).

Nate did a nice job of directing people to the toy department, the sporting goods department, the clothing department etc. It was a fun three days and many people from the church either donated clothes or money. Kara Sims brought her "missions stand" that she made with her grandpa to raise money for the church's trip to Armenia. My daughter Raegan worked the goodie booth with Kara.

I love helping people to adopt. I feel it is a command (see James 1:27) that the church in general is beginning to wake up to. It's sad that many people are discouraged by finances. The church needs to get behind these couples who want to adopt.

m&m's back once again, call a friend...

In case you are wondering, yes, I am finally going to give in and consistently blog. I thought about it for a long time and even fought it for a while. And yes, I have read how Rob Bell thinks that blogging is as useless as rooting for the Cubs.

But I think that it fits with the way that I am wired and I hope that it gives a voice to some things that I care about.

So, thanks for reading, hope you enjoy the journey.

Fathers of the Faith

Stacey and I were invited to the Billy Graham retreat called The Cove by a friend (Dave Buehring) to view a taping of 6 "fathers of the faith" who were asked a series of questions about their lives. The six men were Loren Cunningham, John Perkins, Jack Hayford, Lloyd Ogilvie, Robert Shuler and Winkie Prattney.

The questions ranged from "what has been the most important spiritual discipline in your life?" to "how do you handle betrayal?". It was an incredible experience to get to peer into a conversation of these six men while the rest of us were watching their conversation in the other room. These men have lived their lives well and we had a chance to sit and learn from answers to questions that we would all love to ask.

Below is a link to the organization who is doing the taping. The DVD will be available later this year. I hope you get a copy, there were some great life lessons.


lionshare.org

Information or Transformation??

It is no secret that we live in an information world. The access to information is growing by leaps and bounds with every passing day. A survey released in December reports there are more than 74 million web sites online, while in 1993 only 130 web sites existed online. Millions of new web pages are created every day with more zeroes and ones proliferating the knowledge plane. But is more better?

Inputting information into a computer does nothing unless the information can be accessed or applied. The same is true for us. Information access is no longer a problem. Our knowledge cups runneth over. But how accessible is the good information? Is it stored in a safe place? And more importantly, can you apply it?

Information can lead to discoveries, but it takes transformation to change the world. And true transformation means being willing to think differently, to act differently and to relate to my world differently. NewSong's journey that we are embarking on has much less to do with information than transformation.This Sunday I am going to call our entire church to participate in a weeklong fast (more on this Sunday). I am asking everyone to begin to prepare their hearts for transformation.

James writes in chapter 1 "Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like."

We were created in his image. When we read Scripture, when we hear a message on Sunday applying Scripture to our lives, what do we do with this? Transformation is listening to the word, reading the word and then applying it to our lives. Then it becomes more than information and the image of who we are AND where we are going becomes that much clearer.

Breathing Easier

I was visiting my sister and brother-in-law (Bob and Debra Ferguson) a couple of weeks ago in San Antonio. While I was there, she handed me 2 cds on breathing. The content is about how breathing properly can help reduce stress etc. Ironically, it was while I was in San Antonio that my allergies hit me again.

But as I was practicing my allergy-affected breathing techniques, I was thinking about the phrase "breathing easier". A lot of time that is applied to pressure of some sort. "Wow, now that is over, I can breathe a bit easier". Stress is reduced and hope for a healthier tomorrow can be realized.

In many ways, this "breathing easier" is to be a way of life for Christians. Jesus tells us not to "worry" about the temporal things of this world. Paul tells us to "be anxious for nothing". Worry and anxiety are not fruits of a life in the spirit. They are more the result of bad fruit that can be traced back to some bad seeds that were planted in our thoughts and actions.

My hope for the journey that we are on as a church is that we can take aim at some of these bad seeds and plant some new ones. Right after Paul tells us to be anxious for nothing, he follows it up with some great seed for the seedbed of our minds...

"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you." Ahhhhh.

Now if we take these words to heart and begin filling our heads and ultimately our actions with these words, we should all be able to breathe a little easier.

It All Comes Down to This...

Christmas to me is about paradox. I love the fact that the hope of the world did not come through some expected source like a world power or a spectacular blast from heaven. It all came down to this- a teenage mother giving birth to a child in a less-than-perfect environment. Often times, God makes no sense to us. He does things in ways that we would not expect.

This gives me great hope. I am glad that I serve a God who doesn't do things the expected way. Do we still expect God to be unexpected? Has his unpredictability changed or has God suddenly gotten predictable? I'm betting that God doesn't change. And if we believe this, then in all likelihood, he is still doing the unpredictable- even in our lives! So when we start thinking and expecting that God is going to do things the way that we expect, maybe we should start looking for the unexpected.

There is a book with this idea in mind that I read a few years ago. It is by Roger Von Oech and it is titled Expect the Unexpected (or you won't find it). In it he gives an illustration from inventor
Thomas Edison- "who had a simple test he used to measure the 'unexpectedness quotient' of prospective employees. He would invite a candidate to lunch and serve a bowl of soup.He would then watch to see whether the person salted his or her soup before tasting it. If he did, he wouldn't be offered the job. Edison felt that people are more open to different possibilities if they don't salt their experience of life before tasting it.In what ways are you 'salting the experience' before tasting it?"

How about as it relates to God? Is it possible that God might just be doing the opposite of what you are expecting just to remind you that he is God and we are not?

Flip the switch

Met with a great group of leaders who are doing ministry among the emerging generation. They are eager and frustrated. Many of them said that they serve in churches that do not understand that a cultural shift has taken place. I had several thank me for validating them, another young women who said that she understands herself for the first time and a father who said that he now understands his 20 year old kids for the first time.

That is the funny thing about this. When you talk about the culture shift, you think that it is only about how this shift relates to ministry, but many find it almost therapeutic to hear that they are not crazy or just angry without no reason.

My favorite thing to do is to turn the lights on for people, whatever the topic. It brings clarity to them and that is...

priceless.

Experiential Storytelling

the book is going well. looks like it will be 175 pages and come out in february. reserve your copy today! ;-)

AG GC DC

going to dc for the general council of my denomination. there is supposed to be a "transformational" agenda. i'll keep you posted. i hope to make it to the holocaust museum on tuesday and bring my daughter raegan. they have an area for kids and i think it might be good to begin the dialog of this atrocity.

Out of Africa

just got back from uganda last week on a mission's trip. highlights- the beautiful country, the beautiful people, the trip to a small village church (man, can they pray!), a conversation on slavery, an opportunity to speak to 120 college students about reaching their "Jerusalem" and a safari (of course). it was a trip i will never forget. the testimonies (and everyone in africa loves to give a testimony) were unforgettable. many set free from their witchcraft backgrounds in their villages. others who came out of a muslim background. most of these young people feel a calling to go to the 10/40 window and spread the good news.

i hope to go back again. but i now know that God and His purposes are alive and well in uganda.

Book Cover

i just got the cover to my book emailed to me. my family had a great time watching the cover pop up on the screen. zondervan did a great job with it. this whole process has been grueling but very fun. i'm looking forward to the finished product.

heading off to hilton head island this week and looking forward to the break. i will be there for a week and then a week later leave for uganda for two and a half weeks. crazy busy.

NYC- anniversary

just got back from NYC. what a great town. we stayed in times square and the energy that place exhibits is amazing. it also was a little overwhelming. i found it particularly overwhelming to see such a glutonous and consumer culture that on one hand seems so amazing and on the other hand so empty and lost. i spent time praying for the people but also a lot of time being a tourist. we were there to have a great time and celebrate 12 incredible years of marriage. stacey is a woman of beauty, grace, wisdom and fun all rolled into one. and i am grateful to God for my gift.

lunch at central park, seeing a broadway show (thoroughly modern millie-i would highly recommend), eating out at a swing club, riding the subway, and a little stop into tiffany's- all fun. the world trade center is now reduded to a huge city block that looks like a construction team preparing a place to be built. the steel cross still stands (which surprised me). it was sobering to be there and more sobering when a plane flew over our heads. thougths immediately went back to that fateful day of september 11. a day which caught us off guard but i often remind myself that it was a day that God knew was coming. we are living HIS story, even today with President Bush taking a trip into the middle east. enough ramblings for now.

even with ramsay, i was able to watch the matrix reloaded last night with my friend. his wife volunteered to watch the little 'un. thoughts on the matrix- not as good as the first. serious philosophical blah blah blah throughout. i'm not sure what the wachowski brothers are trying to say if anything. they definitely did NOT in my opinion build on the first. i think they actually detracted from neo's character. also, there was some serious over the top cheese parts as well. and what was the orgy seen all about? is this what freedom looks like? a bunch of 20-30 year olds who are half naked bumpin' and grindin' in an underground city? explain that to me. but the action scenes alone make the movie worth seeing. they didn't take special effects to a new level in this one but they did add some nice tricks. even with the action, i dont' think i will be anticipating #3 quite as much now.

my wife and daughter are gone for the weekend. that leaves me all by my lonesome with my sweet 7 month old, ramsay. i have a newfound respect for my wife. i had forgotten just how much your life revolves 100% around the life of a baby when you are soley the one responsible for the child. i'm going to add another gift on top of my mother's day present. actually i already have. i am taking her to one of her favorite spots in the world nyc! it is our 12th anniversary and i thought it would be nice to get away for a change. and no, ramsay will not be with us. ;-)

my sister deb is in town from california. i love her. she is fun and the eccentric aunt that every child should have. my nine year old daughter thinks she hung the moon (my mom's expression). we have had a great time. a little rushed though as she only stayed for a day and a half.

just got back from our "denomination's" district council. it was a positive experience overall. a chance to connect with other ministers and find out what is happening within the assemblies of God movement.

it is also a frustrating experience as well. i try not to engage in too much of the political business at the councils. but. but. yes, that is two buts. when there is an issue that strikes at a principal that i believe in, it is hard for me to just bite my tongue. and so i didn't. the issue had to do with something seemingly insignificant- allowing associate pastors and not just senior pastors to be allowed to serve as the secretary of their section. the secretary does nothing more than take minutes (sometimes, although i have yet to see any in 10 years of ministry) and they send out postcards reminding everyone of when we are meeting. to me, this is a no-brainer and it allows younger ministers and those who might not have been called to be a senior pastor the opportunity to serve their section. but in the AG, there is a long history of a top-down mentality where you haven't arrived until you have become a senior pastor. it is a little bit of an old boys network and that sort of thing dies VERY hard (a la Augusta national). anyway, i spoke and was belittled for one of my statements. the resolution failed and the status quo won out.

i don't feel animosity but i do feel a sense of sadness. i am sad because times like these show you what you are made of. what i saw at this council was a segment of the council who desires to move forward and realizes that it will take a plurality of giftings for this to happen. many privately congratulated and say "keep the fight" and "change will come about, you are just the prophetic voice". but the majority still desires a return to the golden age when what the pastor says goes and where command and control is the choice of this generation. the problem is that the world has passed them by and any missional impact is lost on this romance of the past. but i wait, hopefully with patience for the day when we will not even debate such issues. when they will become the no-brainers that i believe God thinks that they are.

many of you will have no idea what this rant is about. that is ok. this was a rambling journal rant for me. and i needed to get it off my chest. thanks for reading.

well, i am heading to uganda this summer. our missions team consists of 7 men and 1 woman. we will be building a multi-purpose building and helping to lead a missions camp for students at the university. the missionaries we are partnering with are dave and jen carroll.

here are two sites from ugandan newspapers that you can check out. they are the monitor and newvision.

the seder we had last week was also cool. if you have never been to a seder, i would encourage you to try it out. it is the best example i can think of where your taste is part of the story. your actual sense of taste. the bitter foods are bitter for a reason. the sweet food is sweet for a reason. the flat bread is flat for a reason. this idea is beautiful and should be replicated to speak to our current context.

mark