No More Six Year-Old Son

I just tucked in Karsten and prayed with him. I told him this would be the last time I ever tucked a six year-old boy in bed, because tomorrow night he would be seven. He seemed kind of sad about that. He prayed, thanking God for his mom & dad, for Karis & Darby, for Tybee & Melas. He asked God to send missionaries to people who don't know Jesus so they could know Him. I prayed and thanked God for how great it had been to have a six year-old son and prayed for Karsten to love God even more when he is seven and to be wise and courageous. I hugged and kissed him goodnight and I went downstairs in tears. I'm going to miss my son of six and I really don't want to waste a single day of seven.

The Five Stages of Workplace Tribes

This is a fascinating article from the Gallup Management Journal. The Five Stages of Workplace Tribes Anybody with experience in a medium to large company knows exactly what these researcers are talking about. I have a little more than an inkling as to how it looks in the church.

Satan's Double Lie

Here is what he, coming as an angel of light, may say to the church:
"The average human being is fairly slow, culturally encrusted. People like things that are palatable and light. So be palatable and light. And for goodness' sake, don't go into the primitive stuff - the blood of Christ or the realities of lostness throughout eternity."

Here's what he says to the uncoverted:
"You're too smart for the gospel. Look at how so many of its trappings are second-rate knockoffs of the real stuff you can find around you in theater, in deeply thought-through books, in higher education. Notice how much more of your mind is demanded even in your daily work than at church. You're ahead the way you are."

So between these two lies he goes about his business. The church buys into the simple-minded smoothed over approach; the world continues its assumption that there is, after all, a certain thinness to Christianity. In the middle of this gulf there stands the Savior, asking both the church and the world for entrance and holding out only one truth to each.

From Best, Unceasing Worship

Defining Worship

Here's how Harold Best defines worship, and why.

Worship is the continuous outpouring of all that I am, all that I do, and all that I can ever become in light of a chosen or choosing God.
Four observations:1. It involves the entire human race.
2. The words about a chosen or choosing god are meant not only to articulate two fundamentally contrasting theological positions taken within the body of Christ, but also to depict the confused condition of lostness itself.
3. The definition stresses the reality and foundational importance of continuousness. That is, worship does not stop and start, despite our notions to the contrary.
4. The term 'coninuous outpouring' particularly stands out. 'Continuous' implies relentlessness. It is the opposite of periodic or sporadic. 'Outpouring' is used to describe how one person relates to another. Many other words like serving, giving, befriending, revealing, sacrificing might have been used. Best chose 'outpouring' because it implies lavishness and generosity: when I pour something out I give it up; I let it go. God continually outpours within Himself and toward man made in His image. Man made in God's image is continually outpouring as well. Mankind was not just made 'to' worship or 'for' worship, but was made worshipping.

Nasty Evangelical Hijackers!

So who exactly was flying this particular plane when the evangelicals "hijacked" it? And who else actually has someone listening to them?
Prayer Day 'Hijacked' by Evangelicals, Critics Say - washingtonpost.com

I know who is chosen!

This morning in 2 Thessalonians 2:13-14 God told me who the elect are! "...from the beginning God chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth. He called you to this through our gospel."

There you go. There's no need to thank me or send a check. We know whom God has chosen because they are the ones who believe the gospel. I wonder, if we all proclaimed the gospel more would we find there are more chosen people than we thought there were?

Evidence of God's Good Judgment

Sometimes in the midst of trials I tend to question the goodness of God's intentions. In 2 Thessalonians 1:5 Paul writes to the church, "all this is evidence that God's judgment is right". He wrote this one verse after writing about the "persecutions and trials you are enduring". So what was it about being attacked by their enemies and going through major difficulties that showed them God knew what He was doing? In the midst of it all he could say of them, "your faith is growing more and more, and the love everyone of you has for each other is increasing."

The rightness of God's judment is not displayed through a lack of persecution and difficulty, but by our trust in Him and love for others in the midst of them. Our hearts are not consumed by the trials, but are instead turned outward to loving others and trusting that God is making us worthy of His kingdom and will one day set everything straight.

Finding it hard to love people?

"Now about brotherly love we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other." 1 Thessalonians 4:9

That's an amazing truth to make mine in prayer. May God Himself teach me to love. When I teach, may God Himself be the teacher. If He doesn't do the teaching, I will never really learn to love.

The Family on Mission

For about 24 years Ray & Marti Williams have been on the mission field, and Grace Bible Church has supported them for all of those years. They were at Grace yesterday and during the Sunday School hour they described a family on mission.

• The family must be on mission together. Dad is courageous in his leadership and sacrificial in his servanthood. Mom's attitude sets the tone of the home.
• Knowing the mission will not happen by accident, there is purpose and intentionality. Someone else will give the family an agenda if it's agenda is not clear.
• Dad & Mom live the mission and are verbal in their faith, so the kids see their example and hear the Biblical principles behind what they do.
• Hospitality is crucial to the mission.

Ray gave me some food for thought with this: "The church will evangelize as well as our families do."

A Ministry That Is Not a Failure

According to 1 Thessalonians 2:1-6, Paul's ministry to the church at Thessalonica was not a failure because he -

• ministered with God's help
• told God's gospel
• did it all for God's pleasure

It would have been a failure if he had -

• made his appeal based on error and impure motives
• flattered people as a mask for greed
• labored for man's pleasure