A Mike Foster quote for the ages…Story 09
“The enemy says be afraid of your pain, but God says let me leverage your pain.”
[singlepic id=26 w=320 h=240 float=left]Check out People of the Second Chance to learn a little bit more about Mike.
What can God leverage right now in your life?
For me, it’s the empty feeling of not having our three adopted children home yet, and seeing the movie Blindside didn’t help a bit. By the way, this is a movie you will want to own. Without a doubt it’ll start showing up in my blogs.
What about you? What pain can God leverage right now?
A Million Miles In A Thousand Years Review
I don’t really know who reads anything that I write, but for the few of you who do I cannot more highly recommend that you go to my Highly Recommended Books, click on the first book, and buy it from Amazon. The last time I checked they were selling it for a ridiculous discount. A Million Miles In A Thousand Years by Donald Miller is worth every penny and minute you’ll spend consuming it. Seriously!
I was first introduced to Donald Miller six years ago through his book Blue Like Jazz, which is now being made into a movie. I can honestly say that, except for a few writers who have only written one book, he is the only author of which I own every book he’s written. I say that I own every book he’s written because I haven’t actually read Searching For God Knows What yet, but it is sitting on my “To Read” shelf. I, with great enthusiasm, skipped right to this book.
Somehow I stumbled upon a sneak preview where I got to read the first three or four chapters and I was hooked. As soon as the book released I bought it with a store credit I had at Barnes and Noble. I was so enthusiastic about reading this book that I added it to my already weekly 150-200 page reading requirement for the class I am taking at Hope International. Reading this book was motivation for getting ahead in that class each week
This book is not only worth that additional commitment, but I will most likely re-read the book in one sitting before the end of the year. I may even take the book with me as we travel to Uganda to finalize our adoption as a reminder of what it is I am really doing as I renew old friendships and make some new ones. It was such a good book that I am tempted to book a flight to Portland, OR just to get him to sign my copy…seriously, this book is a must read for every high school senior, college student or graduate, every Christian, every American. I CANNOT STRESS this enough. Read this freaking book, and if you feel like I was completely misleading then I’ll buy it back…maybe.
If you buy one book this Christmas as a gift, other than the Bible, this is the one.
We need to be telling better stories!
How to know you are.
In my years as a Discipleship Pastor I went through a bit of a transformation as I struggled with how to best measure success. At first it was setting the audacious goal of having every member in a small group. When I couldn’t even get every elder in a small group it became abundantly clear that my goal was either unrealistic or just plain wrong. As I evaluated it also became abundantly clear that we really were not doing a good job as a church at tracking how we were doing. The two default metrics for every church to measure is attendance and money, and that is basically what we were doing.
After transitioning into my new role as Serve Pastor, aka Missions Pastor, I ran across Brennan Manning’s book shipped from Neue, aka Relevant, and it all became quite simple…
“How do your people love?”
How well…
How often…
Who…
Dave Gibbons, at the Story Conference, raised questions that really point back to,
“How does your leadership love?”
2 Peter 1:1-13 is a passage worth hanging on the wall of every Church Leader, Discipleship Pastor, and Church Guru. The end result in making Disciples is Christlikeness, and Christlikeness’s primary character trait is Love.
Verse 3 implies that our knowledge of Jesus should grow. Verse 5 implies that the promises of Jesus need to be applied for growth to take place. Verses 5-8 indicate that the end product of growing will be love for EVERYONE. In fact, growing in knowledge is synonymous with growing in love.
The Church is in trouble when partaking in Bible Study is more important than serving widows, orphans, and the poor. Studying the Bible is beneficial, but it should never be done in lieu of or instead of APPLYING it through acts of service to the unloved.
Here’s the rub…this is not easy, nor comfortable. This kind of love is a violent kind of love that reaches inside the hearts of people exposes their wicked and diseased hearts and offers the balm of the blood of Jesus Christ that will heal them. More on this later…