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Fearless, Gideon-style

How cool is it that God wants to use people like you and me - normal, regular, slow-minded people - to do extraordinary things? Well, it's not just with you and me. It's a pattern He consistently uses all throughout history, Scriptures included.

Gideon is still on my mind here, after teaching about him last week. What an incredible story! Here's what's sticking around in my mind:

1 - "You are a mighty warrior". You might be thinking that's what Gideon said to God, right? Wrong. This is what GOD says to GIDEON! Gideon's knees are knocking, he's hiding out, and God says "you're a mighty warrior"! God sees in us what we can't see in ourselves.

2 - God wanted Gideon to overcome his fears. So he created a situation where Gideon had to choose - several times, actually - do I TRUST God or RUN? Trust or run. Those are the choices I'm convinced we face ALL THE TIME. Do I trust God with my future or run to the safe path? Do I trust God with my career or run? Do I trust God with the church or run? Do I listen to God and do what He says or run to the other voices?

3 - With God, the way forward is often the way backward. God kept taking his army away, making it smaller, smaller, smaller....until there were 300 left, to fight an estimated 250,000 person army! Then God said - "OK, that's about right." And proceeded to destroy the Midianites right in front of the 300 faithful.

What does God want to do in you right now - where is He calling you mighty warrior - that your knees are knocking about? What task is He putting in front of you that makes you want to RUN the opposite direction?

It's time to take a step forward. It's time to step into the fear. It's time to look it in the eye and go there anyway. It's time to stop running.

It's time to trust.

Pics from the UNC game friday

Hopefully I'll add a pre-season scouting report in the next day or so of my Tarheels. We saw them in action Friday night against Lenoir-Rhyne. I know, no competition, but let's just say they look really good this year....
here are a couple of pics of Bailey and Christopher enjoying the game. Their FIRST at the Smith Center! (and not their last I am sure)

Insight from a Leader

I got to spend some excellent time today with a leader of a great church in the Charlotte area, Southbrook Church, pastored by a great guy and terrific leader named Rob Singleton. This church is truly amazing, what God has done there. Check out their history page on their website to see what I mean. This guy is full of insight and laid it on me for the hour and a half we were together. I left our time feeling challenged, encouraged, all with a side of butt-kicking thrown in (which I desperately needed). Rob has a passion for church planters.

Southbrook has grown from 200 to 80 to 2500+ in about 10 years. Again, read their story to see what I mean. It's a great testimony to our awesome Father, and to a leader who wouldn't back down, realized it was time to persevere, and kept listening to God.

Click on the link above on Rob's name and check his blog out. I will be a frequent visitor from now on.

(An interesting side-note - I approached another leader of a church about half their size recently to sit down and pick his brain about planting, and was totally blown off. I know pastors are busy - I am one of them - but I appreciate Rob sitting down and taking the time. And I KNOW he's a busy guy. It makes me even more passionate about helping other planters however I can along the way and never allowing myself to be too busy. That other pastor, by the way, shall remain nameless.)

Prison Break....wow

Anyone watching Prison Break this year? I really didn't think it was going to be as good as it was last year. But after watching Monday night's episode (we DVRed it and watched last night), Susan and I both were saying "wow". 2 hours of nothing but intensity. That's some good stuff.

Dips and Cul de Sacs

Read a GREAT book recently called The Dip by a guy named Seth Godin. He's a business/leadership/marketplace writer, I don't believe he is a Christ-follower. But contrary to what a lot of church leaders believe, there is a lot to learn from our brothers and sisters in the corporate community.

In this little book, he says something pretty astounding - that the advice "Winners never quit, and quitters never win" is actually some of the worst advice anyone can ever get. He says that winners quit all the time - they learn how to quit the RIGHT THINGS.

How to know when to quit and when to press ahead and push through the tough stuff? It depends...are you in a "dip", or a "cul de sac"? If you're in a dip - then guess what? There is a great, amazing, fruitful place in your life/marriage/relationship/church/etc right around the corner. It's time to persevere, pray, dig down, and push through the Dip.

On the other hand, you may be hitting a cul de sac in your life. Just circling around and around, spinning your wheels, never getting anywhere. Godin's advice - get off of the cul de sac AS QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE. It's time to move on.

How do you tell the difference between a dip and cul de sac? That's info for another post.

The point (for today) is: if God has given you a vision for something in your life - your job, your purpose, your ministry, your relationships, your children...and you find you are on a cul de sac track that's not getting you there - it's TIME to get off and get to the place that will allow Him to accomplish what He wants to do through you.

iow it's OK to QUIT sometimes, people. Strategic quitting will allow you to pursue God's mission in this world freely and uninhibited.

Extended Letdown

That's a pretty ominous post title, huh? What I mean is - we have extended the Letdown series an additional week. Clark felt - and I agreed - that we needed one more week to talk through how exactly we get past the disappointments in our lives. Honestly, it felt a little like we glossed over it during week 1. So - we're digging in deep this Sunday to discover what it is that we actually need to DO when we are let down.

And that's going to be hard.

Because it starts and ends with one thing - one huge biblical concept that is really hard for us, but really important if we want to move on to a life of blessing, joy, and grace.

Think I'm going to tell you what that is HERE? Nah - just come on Sunday, it will become really clear really quickly.

Rattling the Cage

OK, so Sunday I rattled some cages a bit. We had a vision day type of Sunday, a pause from the series-focus we usually have, to give us a chance to tell some stories about what God is doing, and for me to share where we've been and where God is going. And also what the roadblocks are that would keep us from God's best.

With some of the stuff I said, I have no doubt that I ticked some people off.

I also am even more sure that there are some people that left Sunday more fired up than ever for reaching people in our community with the gospel.

I am learning along the way what it means to be a pastor. One of the realities is this - you can't always be pastor AND friend. There are going to be hard words at times that need to be said. Calling the church to commitment is hard. Being the body of Christ is hard. Not everyone who heard what even JESUS had to say followed Him! That is a wild thought.

Regardless of where you landed, I am convinced that God is crystallizing our vision and mission in our church, in people's hearts, and re-energizing us for the next leg of the journey.

I, for one, am re-doubling my commitment to seeing that vision become a reality. And no one is above it - not me, not anyone else in the church.

Once we get that, as ministry leaders, ministry partners, volunteers - THEN we start to roll. Because it's then that we realize that the vision we have is God-given - not man-made. And therefore contains power, fueled by the Holy Spirit.

I believe our best days are ahead - and it's going to be a wild ride.

Who?

I've been posed with the question recently - "WHO are we trying to reach?"

Our church claims a mission to connect disconnected people into a growing, dynamic relationship with Jesus Christ. But just saying "disconnected" is not enough. Who is it that we want to reach?

Let's start by saying who we are NOT trying to reach.....the already-convinced. There are plenty of churches around doing a fine job of that. We're not into re-shuffling the deck. We are not into "stealing sheep", as some pastors like to say.

(The 'already-convinced' people we want are the ones who GET the mission and want to impact the Kingdom and reach the disconnected....iow not pew-sitters)

So let me put some words around who I believe we are CALLED to reach:
-the bald-headed leather-wearing biker guy riding his Harley down the street
-the aimless twenty-something with no purpose, just looking for the next thrill in life
-the family man blindly climbing the corporate ladder aggressively, and not looking back
-the skeptic who doesn't believe, or give a rip about, God

As a church we HAVE TO work hard at capturing those people's attention. It's easier to attract the already-convinced.

It's harder to connect with the disconnected.

But we're NOT called to the easy, comfortable road. We're also not called to worry about who we're going to KEEP.

We're not going to focus on KEEPING people, we're going to focus on REACHING people. (by the way, if we do a good job of reaching people and connecting them, we'll also do a good job of retaining them)

Just felt the need to say that. I'll be saying that out loud this Sunday during our one-day vision day called "Stories".

We're GOING to be that kind of church. And we're not going to settle for less than that.

2 Things That Get In The Way

I got to take a mini-retreat last week, time to get away for prayer and connecting with God. It's something I try to do regularly, building in some deeper times in order to listen better and be more receptive to what the Lord is saying. It was great, I went to Crowder Mountain and hung out for a half-day, hiking, praying, journaling.

Two things that I came away with that I feel like will stop me in my tracks, and will stop the church in its tracks, if I am not careful:

1 - PRIDE
2 - FEAR

Pride - causes me to try to be someone that I am not; to try to be the church that we're not; to be competitive with other churches when I need to just be called

Fear - fear gets in the way of what God wants to do - fear of failure, of losing people, of not pleasing everyone, etc etc - I'm just like a lot of people, I can make decisions based on fear and not faith. But that wrecks any kind of power that God wants to show through my life.

These two things can wreck you personally and wreck your ministry to people.

So, church, how are we doing when it comes to pride? Are you more worried about what people will think of you than you are about following God's call on your life?

And what about fear? How are you making decisions these days? Are you playing it safe, because you're scared to take the risk, start the business, plant the church, have the conversation, etc? Or are you listening, and then stepping out in faith?

Great Sunday

What a great Sunday morning at Connection Church! A quick shout-out to the volunteers who make our church happen - you folks are incredible! Last Sunday was amazingly smooth, from setup to teardown. The lobby looks great, our volunteer teams that staff it are doing great work greeting guests and making people feel at home.

The service was great - our musicians did a phenomenal job on all the music- if you missed the BarlowGirl tune at the beginning, let me just say that I can't even describe how good it was. Just had to be there.

KidzConnection was rocking, as usual - Camp Connection has been phenomenal in the Theater, and kids have been engaged creatively and challenged on their level. Our little ones have been poured into with the love of Jesus and well-cared for. You folks that serve there amaze me every week. Way to go!

On a different note, if you're interested, check out this guys' blog. This is a brand new church in Burlington doing some great stuff for the Kingdom.

Tadd Grandstaff's blog