I am constantly amazed with the way God seems to enrich my life.  I have played a small part recently in the development of a young adult fellowship in my church.  It was sorely needed so that relationships, growth, and  discipleship could be established among the few couples and singles that we have in attendance.  A few of them did not have a lot of opportunities for these things in church because of worldly interference such as work and children or mission interference such as working in the children’s departments and ministries.

The new group has a name and it is The Bridge.  This name was chosen because a bridge is something that connects.  A few people in my church have looked at this new group with concern, having let their minds go to thoughts such as division, separation or even revolution.  The Bridge has none of these things as an agenda.  The Bridge is a place for fellowship, for accountability, for biblical discussion amongst peers, and simply to celebrate our King in a way that is relevant to their age group.  As a bridge it is decidedly connective.  Connecting the individuals in this group to each other and the group to the lost in the community of like mind and interest and finally to the older generations in our church are the main goals we have in mind.  As one of the group, Wayne, put it; The Bridge is an addition and not a subtraction in our church.

Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another-and all the more as you see the Day approaching. Heb 10:25NIV

As some of you already know, I used to be a loner.  I was introverted and pretty much hated everyone.  Then I met Jesus and entered his Kingdom as a child and servant of God and started the process of change.  As all of us know, God sometimes makes supernatural changes in us in certain ways immediately but he seems to do this in various ways.  Some may be miraculously delivered from addictions to tobacco for instance while another may not.  One way I was not changed was in my attitude towards assemblies, groups, fellowships, and even church.

I immediately started going to church but only for the Word of God, not for the people.  I would be the first to my vehicle when church was over, waiting sometimes not very patiently for my wife to finally be ready to leave.  I did not need anyone but Jesus and that was fine with me.  The roles have now reversed.  My wife often is waiting on me.  Somewhere along the line in my concerted attempt to love everyone, a bridge was built.  I was connected to the rest of the Body.

As the verse in Hebrews states, we all need to be connected to each other and never stop meeting or assembling with each other.  Why is this so important?

The main reason is, of course, the mission.  We are not a bunch of spiritual Rambo’s, furtively making our way through the jungles of life attacking all the spiritual forces we find aligned against us.  We are instead part of a unit of elite, trusted soldiers that must train, fight, and rest together.  The enemy is out there and he likes nothing better than finding one of us cut off and alone.  We cannot make it alone, even if God is there with us, simply because God decided long ago to work through us.  And the work he does through us is for others, not ourselves.

Another reason is the thing that brought this post about.  We need each other for the joy it can bring.  The relationships between believers enrich us, fulfill us, and mature us.  I was pretty good at being alone at one time.  But most of you probably don’t need to be told, being alone is not very fun or fulfilling.  Some of you also know the terrible, depressing feelings that come from loneliness.  I no longer fight depression.

And love is simply amazing.  Not the emotion but the true attribute called agape.  Intentional love, as it grows from being something we make ourselves do, to something we want to do, and finally to that thing we just do, does so much good for each of us individually and for the Kingdom that it just naturally spills over and flows out.  It is contagious.  It is life changing.  It is life enhancing.  It is rewarding and enriches not only ourselves but others, and especially the Body of Christ.

We need each other and even more so as we see the Day approaching because the enemy’s activities are ramping up.  I believe the final onslaught is here.  For our adversary, it is all or nothing.  We must stand and even more, continue to advance the Kingdom and we cannot do it or make it alone.

Build a bridge.  Be a bridge.  Protect your bridge.

Blowing up bridges is one way all enemies seek to divide and conquer.

Love you all

Jesus began his ministry in prayer and ended it in prayer.  He prayed in the mornings and He prayed in the evenings.  He spent days in prayer, and He prayed at all the crucial points in His life and ministry; at his baptism, at his transfiguration, at his death.  Jesus wanted to maintain the relationship He had with His Father.  And He knew that while He was here, prayer was the only means for this.

Does prayer matter?

Jesus believed it did.  He prayed about everything and he prayed all the time.  The Romans of the time prayed and kept charms for good luck but they didn’t really expect their prayers to do anything.  The Greeks derided prayer, weaving crude, ridiculous and sometimes obscene prayers into plays and theater to bring out laughter in their audience. But those stubborn Jews believed that they followed the supreme and loving God and that He did hear and answer their prayers.  Prayer matters because we need that communion with God.  It matters because without it, God will ultimately not be able to bring about His will in our lives.  The Bible is the place we go to understand and get a glimpse of the mind of God.  But prayer is where we get to know His heart.

Jesus offers us no metaphysical proof of the effectiveness of prayer, but He not only prayed, He told the disciples on at least one occasion that they failed in their attempts to heal a boy because of a lack of prayer.  If we are going to believe Jesus then we must believe that prayer works and it matters.  Just not necessarily in the way we want at all times.  If we pray we may not get what we want, but oftentimes we get something we need.  Peter once prayed for food and got a lesson in racism, Paul asked for healing and received humility, we ask for relief and get patience.

Are prayers always answered?

No.  I know they are heard but that does not mean they are answered.  Jesus prayed that we would all be one as He and the Father were one yet we have over 34,000 distinct and identifiable denominations and sects of Christianity today.  Sometimes we ourselves hinder even the prayers that God would love to bring about. Unanswered prayer sometimes shows us a God that actually restrains himself due to the freedom he has granted us.  God respects our free will so much he allows things to play out naturally sometimes.  Even though when we are faced with some seriously dire situations we sometimes would like to give up that very freedom.

In God’s creation project, He built in this component that we call free will so that we could share in the maintenance and direction of the project.  He knew we could, and I think He knew we probably would; fail in our area of authority.  But He wanted free, loving relationships with us above all else.  And no matter how happy a five point Calvinist gets at the thought of God’s Omni-control, that just does not show us a loving God.  It shows us a puppet master instead.  God really wants relationships with real people not puppets.

Jesus taught us that prayer was necessary to maintain this relationship with our Father.  Prayer is ultimately only a method of communion with God and this is what Jesus modeled for us.  God desires a dynamic relationship with all of us and the only way that will occur is with consistent, persistent prayer. We pray to involve God in our lives.  Ministry, family, jobs, etc are all areas where we ask God to be there for us and to strengthen us.  But sometimes it has to be just about being with Him.  Our ministries are our calling but our callings came after the Fall.  Before that we had fellowship with God.  We were created for fellowship with God.  And since the Fall, prayer is the method of maintaining that fellowship.

Prayer involves an effort of will.  I must decide to do it and like anything else, doing it consistently will make it become a habit instead of a planned event, a joy instead of effort.  We must all pray and we must do it our way.  If I try to pray like Pastor or some of you I am only setting myself up for failure.  And while I believe it is good to start the day off and end the day talking to God it is not always that deep meaningful communion that I desire.  That has to happen when each of our hearts and our lifestyles dictate.

But it must happen.  Have you talked to your Father today?

Love you all

People come to church primarily for two reasons; for some kind of fellowship with people, or some kind of fellowship with God.  If they are coming seeking God, that is great, but it will not sustain them or keep them in “our” church because, whether they know it or not, they need people.  We all need fellowship.  And without it we ultimately move on.  A lot of people change churches for this very reason and may not even realize it.

If they are coming seeking to make relationships with people, that is actually better in a way.  If we reach out to them and include them then we can probably keep them coming for a while.  There are also potentially two problems with this also.  First, we never introduce them to Jesus, teach them about God, or feed the spiritual hunger in them and they, again, move on.  We can expect this because ultimately someone, maybe even me, will make them mad or hurt their feelings.  Second, we never introduce them to Jesus, teach them about God, or feed the spiritual hunger in them and they do stay, but never mature as Christ followers and may even be in danger of an eternal destination that does not include Him.  Neither of these situations help us grow a healthy church or bring people into the Kingdom.  The first won’t keep them and the second won’t save them.

What is our mission as a church?  It is simple.  It is to make disciples.  But what, exactly is a disciple?

A disciple is one who loves God, loves people, and serves them both.  It is that simple, but yet all too often we mess it all up.  So where are we messing up?  I believe we are dropping the ball right at the start.  We are not properly introducing our Father to them.  Sure, we have preaching, we have worship, we have programs, and we have fellowship; but are we teaching them about a Father in heaven that loved us so much that “He gave His only begotten son, that whoever believe in Him should not perish but have eternal life…” ( John 3:16)  When we speak out to others about our Father and all his love for us, we can help start them down a path of redemption that keeps going and growing.

But we must reach out to them first.  The same people who ask, “Why aren’t we keeping visitors,” are the very ones at fault all too often.  They either see the visitors and don’t care enough, or are too busy, to reach out to them.  We must not wait for the other person to go talk to that visitor.  If we don’t care enough, then we better get to work on our own spiritual health and if we are too busy, we better slow down.

Jesus told us that all we need to do is love God and love people.  The rest of the New Testament writers told us how to serve both.  The whole bible has this simple message at its core.  Yet we have made this whole business of church exactly that, a business.  One church growth program after another is put forward by some great church leader.  There are a wide variety of church marketing strategies that are pushed at any given time.  And they seem to be ever changing, just trying to keep up with perceived changes in seekers needs.  But seekers need only one thing; they need Jesus.  And we introduce them to Him by simply reaching out to them.

Have you welcomed and talked to that couple that has visited for the last month?

Did you truly rejoice and praise God for another brother added to the family when that guy got saved in church last week, or did you just praise God when the pastor quit talking about it so you could get out and miss the lines at a local restaurant?

Are you so busy that you do not even know about either the new couple or that guy getting saved?

All too often we are either too self centered or we have a wrong view of ministry, and we miss the simple fact that we are to reach out and embrace the other.  God created man for a relationship with us.  He sent His Son to show us the way back into that relationship after we abandoned Him.  And He lovingly showed us that we need each other, or we won’t make it.  We must realize that if we want to increase our church membership then we must reach out to people in love and stop trying to determine the best program or the newest strategy.  If we reach out in love, we not only may keep them in our church, we may bring them into the Kingdom and the family of God.

If we do not reach out, we won’t keep them in “our” church and worse, they may not ever be shown that God loves them and simply wants to start the adoption process.

Love you all

Today is the day that some of us celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ.  And today is the day that some just enjoy another holiday.  It is also a day which some try their best to ignore because they feel it is a pagan holiday or one for only those bigoted, intolerant people known as Christians.

Whatever your view, and I am sure there are some others, it is still Christmas day.  Whether you try to change it by refusing to say Merry Christmas or just ignore it, you simply cannot change the fact that a little over two thousand years ago, God took it on Himself to become one of us in the person of Jesus.  Submitting Himself to the indignity of being birthed the same bloody, nasty, helpless way that you and I were born.

If a king or a presidents or even a CEO’s son was being born today, they would be surrounded by the best of facilities and personnel, ready to attend to that special new baby.  A clean, sterile environment, cutting edge technology and only the finest doctors would be in order because of the VIP status of the newborn child.

But the King of Kings, the Lord of Glory, the Alpha and Omega, the very Creator of all came to us and was born in the cold of night, surrounded only by a stable of dirty, smelly stable animals.  Nothing clean and nothing warm except the loving arms of Mary were there for this baby who was God.

He came to be among us, to feel what we feel, to experience what we experience.  And it seems He decided to do all of this on the lowest, most common level.  Why?

He did this because He wanted to truly have a relationship with us.  He did all of this because He loves us and He wanted us back.  I am humbled just imagining it all.

I asked you what you enjoyed most of all about this holiday a couple of days ago.  There is no wrong answer to this because it is purely subjective.  And as some noted, it seems to change from year to year based on a number of things.  Family, age, level of spirituality, all of these must affect our answer.  I know for me it seems to change every year as I grow in Christ.

This year, I would have to say that the best part of Christmas is the fellowship opportunities.  As I have said a few times lately, I have a growing hunger for relationships and fellowship with those others in the Kingdom of God.  I believe it must be a sign of maturity in the faith and a necessary component of Kingdom advancement.  We do not spread the gospel or make disciples by being alone.

A lot of people, me included, have looked at Christmas in America and have knocked it and bemoaned the passing of the true celebration of Christ’s birth.  I still see all of the commercialization of this sacred holiday and am saddened by it.  But I must admit that I am not as upset as I have been in the past.  The Holy Spirit has directed me to some things that I want to share.

Christmas is becoming more and more commercial and secular.  But as I look around, I see something that I did not notice before.  That is that love is more evident at this time of year than any other.

People reach out to those in need.  Shoebox ministries to needy kids, the inevitable ringing bell and red kettle in front of Wal-Mart, families being bought food and gifts for the holiday, pleasant attitudes and well wishes in business establishments, and other small and large things that we can see going on around us, if we’ll take the time to notice.  Even the greeting of Happy Holidays, although upsetting to some, is better than the nothing we get all the rest of the year.

And all of this is being done by more than just Christians.  I have been wished a Merry Christmas by some that I can’t even imagine in a church.

I am naturally skeptical and probably a little pessimistic.  But this year, I have been awakened to the fact that there is still some good in this world; and some good people.  It just seems that after a full year of self-centered attitudes, most people let it go for a little while in December and are filled with at least some love for one another.

It has to be because of what the holiday really stands for.

As I said earlier, a little over two thousand years ago, the very epitome of true love stepped off the throne and entered into creation.  A baby named Jesus came to fulfill a rescue mission.

The wonder of it all still fills the air to this day.

I hope that you all have a really wonderful, very merry, Christmas!

Love you all