Impact

In the last week I've been exposed to both sides of the impact we have on the lives around us.
In visiting Roanoke I discovered the scope and depth I effected peoples lives there. I thought after a few months I was a forgotten face or a whisper of a memory. As I ran into person after person they shared about how much they've missed me and wished I would come back.

I have to admit, it was nice that no one said, "Man, am I glad you left!Things are so much better now that you're gone." If anyone thought it they didn't say it or come even close to expressing that. When I left Roanoke I knew I was moving away from some great friends. What I didn't realize was all the hearts I touched while I was there. It's amazing the positive impact we have on people just by being ourselves.

Conversely, I'm also growing to realize the impact of sorrow we can have on people around us. A teen in one of our local high schools recently hung himself and it's overwhelming how it effects even people who didn't know him. For some I think it serves as a reminder of finity of man. For others it's hard to believe some one was hurting so bad and we never knew.

He had no clue the impact his one momentary decision would create. He never imagined the tidal waves it would create through the halls of his school, where he felt so unnoticed. He was well know and liked by most of the students and the popularity was no comfort to him.
If he knew the impact he had on those around him would he have hung from the ceiling that night?

Super Friends

Last Night I had potenially the night of my year!!

A family who I got really close to during the 3 months I lived in Virginia flew me down for a week, which included taking in Winterjam here in Roanoke. At Winterjam Hawk Nelson, my favorite band, played. It blew me away. I not only got to meet them, but I also got to talk to them and found out they sometimes visit Moncton and Jason wants to move to PEI.

I'm beside myself at how the Hancocks would give me such a great gift. I've never rocked it out so hard at a concert before. Now that the concert is over we get to share this memory. I also ended up on the local news, and hopefully the words I spoke God will use to promopt a heart to go to church this Sunday. At the concert 126 people committed their lives to Christ.

When I got home form the concert my Super friend, Jackie, called. We seem to grow closer with every phone call. For thos who don't know I'm dating a girl I met on the internet. We meet on a christian singles forum. Neither of us was looking for a relationship, single people just seem to be more talkative. Anyways, we talked as friends and a mutual attraction developed. WE spent 2 months REALLY getting to know each other asking the hard questions and then decided to start a dating. Best decision I've made since I decided to come on staff at River Valley.

These are my Super Friends who make my life even better than before!

Death of Punishment

I've been thinking about punishment lately. A mentality I have had, and I think many others, is, "I better not sin or God will punish me". I know this isn't healthy, nor do I think it's true.
It may seem a little Calvinist, so brace yourself. Here's what I'm thinking...

The Law lays out for us what is required of us. Sin causes us to fall short of these requirements. The Law is Broken and therefore there must be punishment for the breaking of The Law. Punishment being the steps necessary to repay the wrong.

Here's a no brainer, Christ took the punishment for sin. So if Christ already paid the punishment for sin then should more punishment be dealt out?

I think with Christ's death and resurrection we saw the Death of Punishment. I think we have the GRACE of experiencing God's discipline and correction. Correction being, the quickening of the Holy Spirit as we lean towards sin, and the conviction which comes after sin. Then the discipline being the events God allows us to go through in order to develop the attributes and characteristics necessary to say "No" to Sin.

Understand we still experience the natural consequences of our actions. However, because of Christ and his grace, he makes available to us, we no longer need to make retribution or experience additional consequences in order to make right our wrong.

I would tend to think Paul in Romans, the writer of Hebrews, and James would agree with this approach.

What do you think?

Big Brotha

Growing up I became a self-appointed Big Brotha for a few girls in the youth group. My responsibilty, as their Big Brotha , was to essentially watch out for them, stick up for them, and give them guidance (some times this came soft and some times not). For 9 years I'd watch out for these girls, whether it be protecting them from guys, or giving permission for guys to date them. Each Sista had their own personality and therefore protection and guidance took on a different appearance for each.

Over the last few years I've had the honor of watching each of marry and begin a life with a new man. Signifying they no longer need me to protect them, or give them guidance. There's a new man, who's closer than any Big Brotha could be. Yesterday, the last of the girls took her husband's hand.

No more littla Sistas, so now what do I do?!

Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit

Today my mother asked me "What do you think blasphemy against the Holy Spirit...", at this point I had already begun to prepare my answer because I'm used to having this sentence end, "is".

Then my mom threw me for a loop when she said, "looks like".
Usually I would say, "It is when someone rejects God all the way to their grave, like Stalin who shoke his fist at God and die".

What does it look like though? This would suggest we could seal our eternal fate before death?.

What do you think?

And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven.
-Matthew 12: 31 (NIV)

I'll let you determine context. Unless you're being stupid, then I'll politely tell you, "You're being stupid"!

The How of Submission

A wise professor once told my Doctrine of Holiness class, "The difference between Initial Sanctification (Salvation) and Entire Sanctification (whatever denominational term you wanna insert) is an issue of position. If you know the prof I'm talking about, you also know he made this statement with a great deal of qualifying ones as well. With salvation we come to God as enemies and as a rebel soldier Surrender our arms. In Entire Sanctification we come as slaves and Submit our hearts/wills.

The surrender aspect of this happened 21 years ago for me, the submission aspect seems to be a continual thing. I wouldn't wanna claim I am Entirely Sanctified because God knows, along with many others, there are times my will isn't always submitted to him. Every time I think he has it ALL there's something new he shows me to give over or an area I need to give him more dominion.

Over the last few weeks God's been bringing to my awareness the need to be recognize his sovereignity, and to give him more rulership in my life. The big thing is, he hasn't exactly told me what area or HOW.

As a guy who thinks of things in comparments, to not have a compartment to look at is very challenging. I know what must happen, I just haven't been shown The How.

Sour Seattle Seahawks Supporters

Over the last few days, I've had to put up with some whining from those who were cheering for the Seahawks in the Super Bowl. The most common complaint I have heard, is the referees were favoring the Steelers. To be fair.....ok, I'm bias, so to prove a point I want to look at three of the most commonly referred to "questionable calls".

1. Touchdown called back

In the first quarter Hassleback connected with Jackson in the end zone, however a flag was thrown for offensive pass interference. Offensive pass interference was the right call.
The play occurred right in front of the ref and no matter how many times you watch it in instant replay you clearly see Jackson's hand touch Taylor's (Steeler) chest, pushing him away from the play. The contact was minimal, however the sheer presence of his hand would impede the defender from being able to make the play. This play will most likely serve as a textbook example of offensive pass interference in training videos for years to come. Anyone who feels the need to "let the players play", would also have to contest the Hassleback fumble that was over turned in the 4th quarter. Foote (Steelers) briefly touched Hassleback before he went down. Although Foote most likely didn't contribute to Hassleback's stumble and fumble, according to the rule book Hassleback was ruled down by contact. Therefore the initial ruling on the field was over turned. While the referees were picky they were equally picky on both sides.

2. The Roethlisberger Touchdown

Many people, including myself, thought Big Ben's dive into End Zone came up short, while the referees called it a touch down. If one is to do a instant replay and slow down the dive frame by frame, they will clearly see the tip of the ball, parallel to a piece of white line of the End Zone. The rule is, "if ANY piece of the ball, breaks the plain of the goal line(meaning the white line) it is a touchdown". All of the ball does not have to cross all of the line, this isn't hockey, all you need is a piece of the ball to be parallel to a piece of the goal line. At the Superbowl party we rewound and played it in slow motion, and on the second time everyone, including Seattle fans could see the right call was made.

3. Hassleback Illegal Block
This is the only play of the three I would call touchy. After being intercepted, Hassleback lowered his shoulder in front of a Steeler blocker as he went down to tackle Ike Taylor behind the blocker. I'm not positive Hassleback actually made contact with the Steeler blocker, and perhaps they should not have been given the 15 yard penalty. Of course Seattle didn't get called for their illegal block when Roethlisberger was intercepted. Roethlisberger was pursuing a caravan of Seahawks down the field and was cutting in to try to make a tackle, when a block was made on him, where the player clearly hit him in back as their hand was placed directly on the 7 of the back of his jersey. So if Hassleback didn't make contact these to balance out.

In the end Seattle simply didn't play to win! With their constant clock mis-management, missed field goals, dropped balls and the disappearance of Jackson and Alexander, they failed to seize the opportunities they had. The game was Seattle's to win or lose and they lost.

Champions are formed in adversity.

Bleacher Believers

In season with the upcoming Superbowl and perhaps as a result of a little Maxwell persuasion, I would like to rant about Bleacher Believers.

Every year millions of people tune into the Superbowl and most of them are at some sort of party. During this party we meet people who we can clump into 3 categories. The nomiees, the quasis, and the Crazies,

The nomiees are the nominals who are at the party because they're, it's a party they could really careless about the actual game, sure they ask occasionally what the score is, but that's the extent of their involvement. These people drive the Crazies crazy...........er.

The Quasis are the people who know a little about football, and have picked a team to cheer for, but they're really still there for the party. These people are easily influenced by the nomiees and the crazies.


Then there's the Crazies who would come close 2 selling their first born just 2 watch the game. I find myself in this category. If there was no party we'd still be watching the game. For us everything around us becomes inexistent as we are immersed in the game. There are times we can almost smell the grass and taste the turf (this maybe a little bit of an exaggeration, but you get the idea).

In Church life we seem to have these three catergories, as well. The nomiess, who come for the party. The quasis, who are kind of involved in things, but are still more interested in the party.However, with some guidance from some crazies could make the jump.The crazies are the ones who could careless about the party they just wanna be a part of what matters.

The big differences between a SuperBowl and the life of the Church is the Prize at the end for those of us who win, and the destiny of those who lose. The other difference is we are not to just become artificially immersed in the event, we are to be truly active and living out the experience. We are to get out of the bleachers and onto the field.

AN OT JC

This morning I was woken up out of a dead sleep at 5:45am. For those of you who have ever had the "pleasure" of sleeping in the same room as me you know this isn't the norm for me. It takes next to a natural disaster to get me WIDE awake and a whole lot of diligence to even budge me from my slumber otherwise.

I wasn't woken up by a natural disaster. I was woken up by God himself. When I woke up it wasn't a startled awake. It was a "I'm sleeping....I'm sleeping.....I'm awake. Absolutely no transition! So I did the logical thing, I went to the "lavatory" upon returning from my excursion, I laid down to go to sleep with, but to no avail.

After an hour of "discussion" I clued in God had woken me up for a reason. So I got up showered, grabbed a coffee and began to work on some youth things.

As it turns out if I had of gotten up as late as I was planning to I would have never been able to get every thing I wanted to have ready for our youth meeting that morning.


It reminded me of Samuel when he was laying in bed and the LORD kept calling him. While our relationship with God is dynamic, growing and changing as individuals and as his people, it's always cool when he reveals himself in some of the powerful ways of the Old Testament. Sure, I didn't hear an audible voice, but I do know who woke me up! Kinda throws a kink in those "that was Bible times, this is now" arguments.

Renewal

I have entered into the New Year with a great deal of joy. The Wesleyan Church is declaring this the year of the Bible and our church has begun working through the Bible. Now, me being the sly maverick, I have deviated from the reading plan and have begun my own. I'm reading books of the Bible I haven't given much attention to.

Historically, I've never really enjoyed reading the Bible, nothing against God, I just found it boring. I've prayed for my eyes to see what he has to say to me and I've prayed he would awaken me to his truth.

I've regularly read the Bible out of discipline, rather than enjoyment, then this year I began reading and I've begun enjoying it. I actually get excited about the Bible.
Being a Bible college graduate, I know that's suppose to happen instantously when I enroll, but I'm a little on the slow side, so give me a break.

This is the excitement of my New Year. What has everyone else's been like?

Our King

You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end."
-Luke 1:31-33 (NIV)

What a joy it is to know the Savior Mary once helded in her hands; rules all of creation with his.

Just in Time For Christmas

Canadians every where can hang their heads in shame over the Christmas holidays. Wednesday, Canada's Supreme Court handed down a ruling that makes Swinger Clubs legal in Canada.

Swinger Clubs are basically people married or single who meet at a club, and rather than the old key swap of the 70's. They pick who they want to have sex with. They may choose 1 or multiple individuals, as long as everyone is consenting. The Supreme Court ruled it is not a criminal act because "it poses no threat to society". Forget the moral fabric we've already shred.

This all came about because some clubs in Montreal got charged for operating a "bawdy house" or brothel. One owner's lawyer is quoted as saying, "It does not contaminate society. It does not hurt, it does not do any harm to society and to the public in general."

Come to Canada, where we have no morals.

Why would I be proud to be a Canadian?

Wrestling with the Holidays

http://www.visithoustontexas.com/fall-gallery/images/christmas%20Tree.jpg

The Christmas/Holiday Tree incident of Boston has sparked allot of discussion about the growing taboo of saying "Merry Christmas". The general attitude I get from most Christians is "It's our holiday and we're not gonna let you steal it from us".

What gets me is we stole the holiday from someone else. For those who haven't taken church History or who were sleeping during it, because of the persecution of the Church in the 1st few centuries AD Christians would use pagan holidays and celebrations as their times of celebration. For example Christmas was assigned the date of December 25 after the last Great persecution (c.330). Prior to this date the birth of Christ was celebrated at different dates each year (http://www.nisbett.com/holidays/christmas_date_and_origin_of.htm).


So really we have no rightful claim to December 25. Sure some people have argued this is the actual birth date of Christ, but we don't know for sure, and allot of other people were born on December 25th does this mean they're not allowed to celebrate their birthdays too?

In case you think I'm saying we need to start saying, "Happy Holidays", I'm not!! I am saying we need to get ride of this "It's our holiday" mentality and realize there are other religions using the date too. Still say "Merry Christmas" and if people get offended, we live in a land of religious freedom, it's about time Christians started having some.

If we really wanna make an impact, I say we stop celebrating on December 25th and move the date to some obscure time of the year, like May or something. Then sales rapidly decline because even "name only Christians" would follow suit. We would disturb the false god, "The almighty Dollar" and Then the TaD worshippers will quickly follow.

For Narnia!!

I recently watched Chronicles of Narnia and here are a few symbolic things to remember from the book to make your viewing more memborable.

Symbolism
Aslan = Christ
Aslan's breathe = Breath of life
Deep Magic = The Law
Lamp Post = beginning of spiritual journey
Stone Table = Temple Curtain
Turkish Delight = The lure of sin
Wardrobe = entrance into spiritual realm
Winter = Adamic Depravity/Reign of Sin
Witch = Satan
Witch's Staff = Death

I'm sure there is more symbolism that I missed so feel free to share with me others. I'm going to see it 2 more times so I'd love to have new stuff to think about as I watch it.


(http://www.canmag.com/images/front/lap/narnia.jpg)

Worshipping 2 Goo

By now we have all fallen in love with the Goo Goo Dolls new single, Better Days. I've found there are some pretty spiritual messages in the song. I'm not talking about God is in the trees type spirituality. I'm talking arugeably sound Christian doctrine The chorus goes like this:

So take these words
And sing out loud
Cuz everyone is forgiven now
Cuz tonight's the night the world begins again
And it's someplace simple where we could live
And something only you can give
And thats faith and trust and peace while we're alive
And the one poor child that saved this world
And there's 10 million more who probably could
If we all just stopped and said a prayer for them

Driving home from town tonight I let the Goo Goo Dolls lead me in worship as I praised God for the forgiveness he made possible through his son, the one poor child, who saved this world. I also praised him for allowing us to be a part of his plan for salvation, by carrying the message of salvation to others. During this worship session they reminded me I am the only one who can give my faith, trust, and peace. No one else can do these things for me. They are my responsibility to exercise.

Their song reaffirmed the truth I believe and challenged me to fulfill my role in God's plan.

How many worship services can we say do that?

Simple Things

(www.http://tsn.ca/cfl/)
I am currently celebrating the Edmonton Eskimos' Grey Cup Win!! For those of you who are anti-CFL... I'll pray for you!

I have been an Eskimos' fan since 1994, and many times I have watched them go to the Grey Cup and, in heart break, the same amount of times lose by a touchdown or less. The one time they won since I've been a fan, I was in Zambia and couldn't even watch a minute of it.

So this year, I made sure I was home to watch the game! They controlled the game early but some how with 2 minutes left they were down by 5. My heart raced, as thoughts of "NOT AGAIN!!" went through my head. Then they scored and went for 2 to go up by 3. The Alouettes, were able to tie it up and send it into Overtime. As I stood hunched over the TV, less 6 inches away, I watched the teams trade points on the first series of Overtime.
The Eskimos were stopped short of a Touchdown on the next series and had to settle for a fieldgoal, and the doubts of not again began to return. However. whne the Alouettes got the ball, the Eskimos' defense stopped the Alouettes cold and on their final down, 3rd and 31, the Alouettes Quartback ran and kicked in desparation, as they came up short. I jumped and quietly screamed (didn't wanna bother the rents).

So all this week, as simple as it may seem. I am going to be celebrating my Edmonton Eskimos' Grey Cup Win!

Motion

How long has it been since we've been passionate about the ministry God has called us to?

Thinking back to the first time I was hunting for a ministerial position. I wonder how much of my quest was fueled by a genuine desire to be in a place of ministry, which is within God's will and plan, verses a desire to just be in a church.

When I initionally had my denominational interview about becoming a pastor, something I shared about my calling into full-time ministry is "I couldn't imagine doing anything else and being happy". A few years older and perhaps a little bit wiser. I would say it's not enough to want be in full-time ministry. What is essential is to know our place in full-time ministry is within God's will. A will that could have a multitude of possibile places or simply 1 option.

Motions of Ministry
For us to serve in a church out of our own desire to be in ministry would be dangerously close to sin. A sin against God and his people, and ourselves. How can we consume a position of ministry we know is not within God's will for us, simply so we can be in ministry? Consider this, by maintaining a position of ministry, we know is not our place in God's will, is to go through the motions of ministry. In going through the motions we hinder and work against God's will. God has a better place for us in his divine plan and the place you currently hold belongs to another.

Ministry in Motion
Ministry in motion is to seek not only a place to minister but the place God has for us in his plan. Think of it as a train yard. There are hundreds of trains going different direction all for the same purpose, to get people where they need to go. Instead of jumping on a train and trying to make it go your direction, look at the direction God's already taking the train, then jump on board the train going in your direction.


The introspective question of the week: Are we going through the motions of ministry or are we ministry in motion?

Complacent Mediocrity

So I've been tearing up this book, The Youth Builder, by Mike DeVries & Jim Burns. Some of you would have had it for required reading or collateral reading in a youth course, if you went to Bethany. Well, I was not one of you, but was blessed to have it given to me. The book has allot of practical ideas and principles drawn from years of youth ministry experience. It's not the Bible of youth ministry or anything, just a very valuable resource. Kindof of like Maguyver's swiss army knife.

As I was reading today, I was deeply convicted about something. I was convicted about how we go about ministry half heartedly. As long as things are running smooth, what we're doing is good enough. We shouldn't live in a constant depression of inadequacey, but we should always have in our mind, "What needs to happen for us to go the next mile?"

This life of ministry we have isn't about achieving a certain standard. It's not about numbers. It's not about programs. It's not about being trendy.It's about impacting lives for Christ, the best way we know how.
.
Those of us who think our ministry is "good enough" are falling to fulfil our responsbility to God and those he has entrusted to us. If we are at this point we need to ask 3 things.

1) Is my heart right?
2) Am I in the right ministry?
3) Am I in the right place?

With a "good enough" ideology we are a parked cars in the middle of the freeway. So we'd better get our tires spinning or get off the freeway!

Consumer Christ

Like most youth leaders of the Atlantic District, I was at Booster this weekend, which in my opinion was the best Booster I've been too. The speaker was Matt LeRoy. At the last rally he talked about the Cost of following Christ. This got me thinking about how we've watered down the Gospel. We tell people about how easy it is to accept Christ and then once we get them committed we start telling them about what God requires of those who follow him.

Please understand I am not intending to preach salvation by works. I do believe God freely gave himself for us, and it is only through Christ we are saved.

We sell Christ to our teens and THEN start telling them, "Now that you've accepted Christ, he requires you to do this and that". We're the fine print people.
"For only one easy prayer you can have eternal life and your own Personal Saviour. Now that you have eternal life here's what's required of you by your new Lord & Savior".

We need to be more clear about what God requires of us in the long run from the beginning. I gotta question my integrity if I don't let people know upfront Christ requires our whole heart and not just a 5 minute prayer.

When I look at Scriptures like II Peter 2:21-23, telling us how it's better for those who accept Christ and turn away to have never known him and then passages like, "Whoever sets his face to the plough and looks back is not fit for service in the Kingdom of God". I gotta wonder what God's gonna say to us when we stand before him.

By presenting a Consumer Christ, we attributed to Consumer Christians, who sign up for their free trial, and then when it starts to cost, they give up.

From the other side of the Glass

Last Saturday, I went to an "Understanding Teens" seminar that was held up in Moncton, with one of my friends, who just happens to help with youth. The Seminar was geared toward parents, but I felt we could get some helpful insight by going.

As we sat there in the High School auditorium, something hit me, besides realizing we were almost the only 2 people there who weren't married and had a child. What hit me was how differently we look at things now that we are out in ministry.

Back at Bethany we were pretty well immersed in the hypothetical, with some practical. We went to class every day, most of us, and once a week helped out with or ran some sort of ministry. So our perspective of ministry was pretty much shaped by what we were told in textbooks.

The best way I can think to describe this comes from a junior high school memory. We used to have a class called Family Education, or something like that. In this class we'd spend time learning about the development of children and then after a few weeks we'd throw together a temporary day care. During these weeks there would be a time we would sit behind this one way mirror, you know the kind they have in jail, and watch the childrens' behavior. Then we'd paly Freud, Skinner, Piaget or some other psychologist and try to explain why they do certain things and how we should respond. This is pretty much what we did in our classes at Bethany

Now we find ourselves on the otherside of that glass. Now we're immersed in the practical and we dabble in the hypothetical. Other than the few seminars we hit or the books we read our perspectives are now being shaped by our experience.