This book looks like one I want to get a hold of. The excerpt is pretty good stuff. I wonder, what would it mean to UnLearn church for my local congregation? Hmmm....I need to ponder this....
UnLearn Church
UnLearn Church
Socrates said, "An unexamined life is not worth living." This is my feeble attempt at examining my life.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Sunday, August 24, 2008
>We've moved!
>The Graceworks blog has moved to the Grace Chapel website.
Go to www.graceepc.org to read new blog entries, download podcasts of the Sunday messages, and to find out what's happening at Grace Chapel.
Join us for our fall kick off barbeque Wednesday, August 27 at 5:30pm.
Everyone is welcome!
Go to www.graceepc.org to read new blog entries, download podcasts of the Sunday messages, and to find out what's happening at Grace Chapel.
Join us for our fall kick off barbeque Wednesday, August 27 at 5:30pm.
Everyone is welcome!
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Blue Parakeet...
The next grand installment is coming to Church Remix. Zondervan was offering about 100 free copies of Scot McKnight's new book, Blue Parakeet, to bloggers. I am excited to announce that my copy is on its way and as soon as it does the posts will be rolling in.
I am also thinking that I will be posting thoughts, random or otherwise, from my Older Testament class this semester. I think that there might be some useful insights from those earlier incarnations of the people God. What do you think? Just maybe?
That's where things are headed.
I am also thinking that I will be posting thoughts, random or otherwise, from my Older Testament class this semester. I think that there might be some useful insights from those earlier incarnations of the people God. What do you think? Just maybe?
That's where things are headed.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
>This One's for the Ladies
>
Every word I believed in
till I felt it in my own heart
in the deepest part
the healing came -Sara Groves
Posted by Robin Schmidt on August 20th, 2008
There are women in our lives that intimidate us. We are awed by their beauty or their gifts or their strength or their popularity and we pull back. We are afraid to approach. We are afraid of rejection. "She doesn't want to talk to me," we think.
Last night I told my daughter the secret, a truth that we really need to get. I told her that every girl on her swim team, every girl she sees in high school, feels the same way she does. Every one of them is afraid of making a mistake, afraid they are not pretty enough, afraid that zit is neon, afraid they will be rejected. Every one of them doubts they are worthy to be loved.
And so do you. And so do I. But we need to believe the truth, in the deepest part of our hearts.
What is the truth? The truth is that you are beautiful. You. Right now.
Not that you once were, or you might be if you shed a few pounds, or you can be with a little effort. Right now, as you are, you are beautiful.
There's more.
You have a purpose. You come with a perspective and thoughts and gifts and talents that are needed.
But sometimes you actually believe that you were meant to live in comparison with others. You decide your worth, beauty, talent on a sliding scale, based on your assessments of the others around you.
You are wrong. So am I.
Yesterday I drove to work crying. Really crying. Not just tears, but 'cover your mouth because crying makes you look ugly' crying. I was drowning. There is a darkness that swirls around me and chokes me. Sometimes it has a name: grief, stress, hormones. Sometimes it doesn't. It doesn't really matter because drowning is drowning. And I was.
When was the last time you were drowning? I watched a battle recently, I couldn't actually hear the lies, but I saw them on the face of a woman who believed she wasn't useful, wasn't pulling her weight.
The lies can go very deep. They may have been planted by someone important to you, like your mom or dad, or a close friend, or an old boyfriend, or the kids in high school, or a teacher. And you trusted that person and you believed them. They said, you are ugly, worthless, fat, stupid, you can't sing, you can't...
And you have spent a lot of time and energy trying to change those things, trying to fight against the lies, trying to hide, because you want to be worthy of love.
But hear me women, hear me, this is the truth:
You are loved.
You.
Are loved.
You are special.
You.
Right now.
This is the truth. You must believe it, because it is the truth you are meant to take to other women. Other women who have been hurt, hampered, crippled by lies and doubts.
Next to you there is a woman who believes some lie about herself. You must believe the truth. You must believe it in the deepest part of your heart so the healing comes. And when it comes, share the healing.
Max Lucado wrote a very good book. It is called "You are Special". It is about this truth. And it is about believing this truth. The truth that the One who made you took special care to make you. He designed you with care and with purpose. And He has looked at His creation, He has looked at YOU and said, She is good.
I am not making this up.
You are beautiful. You can't create this beauty, it doesn't come from cosmetics. It doesn't come from diets.
You are loved. You can't earn this love. You are loved on your best day and on your worst.
This is the truth, because this is God.
You must believe it.
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Communion...now this is good...
My son and I were worshipping together on Sunday and being the first Sunday of the month we partook in Communion. As the elements came to us, he smiled at me and we had the following conversation:
Ethan: Do I get some of that?
Me: No son. We need to make sure that you truly follow Jesus by faith and that you believe that he is your Lord and that he has forgiven you.
Ethan: I do Dad.
Me: Well, you have to get up with Pastor Doug and tell everyone that you do.
Ethan: By myself?
Me: Yep.
Ethan: I'm not ready for that Dad, but I can't wait!
Amazing! This ties the whole thing together for me. We have confused the sacraments. For believing children communion is the place for the public proclamation of their faith. For the new convert it's baptism.
Can you imagine what that day will be like when he stands before the world and proclaims his faith in the risen Messiah and claims him as his own and then joins with the community through The Meal?
Infant baptism, communion, all tied together. This is the beautiful way. This is the covnenantal way of our promise keeping and ever faithful God!
Ethan: Do I get some of that?
Me: No son. We need to make sure that you truly follow Jesus by faith and that you believe that he is your Lord and that he has forgiven you.
Ethan: I do Dad.
Me: Well, you have to get up with Pastor Doug and tell everyone that you do.
Ethan: By myself?
Me: Yep.
Ethan: I'm not ready for that Dad, but I can't wait!
Amazing! This ties the whole thing together for me. We have confused the sacraments. For believing children communion is the place for the public proclamation of their faith. For the new convert it's baptism.
Can you imagine what that day will be like when he stands before the world and proclaims his faith in the risen Messiah and claims him as his own and then joins with the community through The Meal?
Infant baptism, communion, all tied together. This is the beautiful way. This is the covnenantal way of our promise keeping and ever faithful God!
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Baptism 2 - It's importance now...
Today's culture is adrfit. There is no longer an oppressive meta-narrative keeping everyone in check. Everything changes, and everything changes fast. If you have to wait more than a couple of minutes for your fast food you get upset. If the lines at the self-checkout are long you can't understand why they don't have more. People change their relationships almost as often as they do their underwear.
Yeah, it's a different world. The change that has taken place has left many disillusioned, frustrated, and wondering if there is anything left that matters, that will be what it says it will be.
Many of the college students that I work with are looking for stability. They are desirous that something will deliver. They can see through all the bull crap that's out there and so they are cynical. Who can blame them? Every week it sems that another "holy" man has turned out to be a pedophile or morally degenerate in some way. Every week sub concsiously they exclaim with the little boy, after the Black Sox trial, "Say it ain't so Joe!"
This is where infant baptism comes in. More than that this is where the covenant promises of the holy, triune God comes in. He brings about the things that he promises to bring about. He makes sure that they happen, because he can.
I had a conversation one time with a gal about baptism. She was baptised as an infant in a "liberal" "church" of some sort. She had been going to a church in town and they were pressuring her to be baptised now that she was walking with Jesus. They informed her that her "first" "baptism" meant nothing since she was a baby and didn't choose it and that her parents weren't even Christians. Yet, to me it is amazing that the day she was bapised her parents, the congregation, and the officiant promised to lead this girl to Jesus. They covenanted with God and he made good. The promise was on him to make happen and he did. As she reflected on that reality she was deeply moved and drew nearer to the God who had called her as a freshman in college.
As I think about my two kids and their baptisms I am amazed at how the Lord is making good already. Our pastor prayed during Ethan's baptism that he would be an evangelist and that he would take the gospel to the world. His first few weeks as a kindergartner, the first time he was ever around kids who weren't "churched" he began inviting his classmates to know about God. I didn't tell him to. He did it because "they need Jesus like me dad."
In a culture, a world where no one makes good on their promises. God does through this rite of passage into the covenantal community of believers. God shows his faithfulness over and over again to the child who is baptised in the triune name of God. It does not save them but it initiates them into the community.
I can hear the naysayers already, "it doesn't happen for everyone". I know. I don't know why, it's a mystery. It seems more often than not in my experience that these promises made in faith turn out.
The God of the Bible is a God who covenants with his people and includes the children in that covenant. He always has, always will. Why are we afraid to trust him for our children? Why act like he doesn't care, when he does? Why not show a cynical world the beauty of our promise keeping God as we remind our children, our friends, and those around us of their baptism and the promise that God is making good on?
Oh, for the world to see promises kept generation after generation.
Yeah, it's a different world. The change that has taken place has left many disillusioned, frustrated, and wondering if there is anything left that matters, that will be what it says it will be.
Many of the college students that I work with are looking for stability. They are desirous that something will deliver. They can see through all the bull crap that's out there and so they are cynical. Who can blame them? Every week it sems that another "holy" man has turned out to be a pedophile or morally degenerate in some way. Every week sub concsiously they exclaim with the little boy, after the Black Sox trial, "Say it ain't so Joe!"
This is where infant baptism comes in. More than that this is where the covenant promises of the holy, triune God comes in. He brings about the things that he promises to bring about. He makes sure that they happen, because he can.
I had a conversation one time with a gal about baptism. She was baptised as an infant in a "liberal" "church" of some sort. She had been going to a church in town and they were pressuring her to be baptised now that she was walking with Jesus. They informed her that her "first" "baptism" meant nothing since she was a baby and didn't choose it and that her parents weren't even Christians. Yet, to me it is amazing that the day she was bapised her parents, the congregation, and the officiant promised to lead this girl to Jesus. They covenanted with God and he made good. The promise was on him to make happen and he did. As she reflected on that reality she was deeply moved and drew nearer to the God who had called her as a freshman in college.
As I think about my two kids and their baptisms I am amazed at how the Lord is making good already. Our pastor prayed during Ethan's baptism that he would be an evangelist and that he would take the gospel to the world. His first few weeks as a kindergartner, the first time he was ever around kids who weren't "churched" he began inviting his classmates to know about God. I didn't tell him to. He did it because "they need Jesus like me dad."
In a culture, a world where no one makes good on their promises. God does through this rite of passage into the covenantal community of believers. God shows his faithfulness over and over again to the child who is baptised in the triune name of God. It does not save them but it initiates them into the community.
I can hear the naysayers already, "it doesn't happen for everyone". I know. I don't know why, it's a mystery. It seems more often than not in my experience that these promises made in faith turn out.
The God of the Bible is a God who covenants with his people and includes the children in that covenant. He always has, always will. Why are we afraid to trust him for our children? Why act like he doesn't care, when he does? Why not show a cynical world the beauty of our promise keeping God as we remind our children, our friends, and those around us of their baptism and the promise that God is making good on?
Oh, for the world to see promises kept generation after generation.