Guess What?!? We’re DIFFERENT!

I am amazed at how easily I forget how very different we are called to be as Christians.  I rode with a bicycle group here in town this week for the first time and there were about 35 riders.  I am a social & friendly guy and tried to start up a number of conversations only to be sized up and tolerated.  I was talking to my wife about it later and she had a similar experience at our son’s baseball game.  Idle polite conversation with a healthy heaping of tolerance.

Who in the world wants to just be tolerated?  We want to belong!  That feeling that you are a welcome addition to the team, an integral part of the community, that the organization is now ‘complete’ because you have arrived.  What kind of atmosphere are you creating around you when you are at church, in your neighborhood meetings, at the ball fields, in the community, but ESPECIALLY in your groups!  New, old, regular attenders… everyone in your group needs to experience the ’sense of belonging’ every week.  God has fully accepted us, removed all condemnation, and made us joint heirs with Christ.

Please don’t ‘tolerate’ your group members this week, help them BELONG.

The Mericiful Group

Most of you are very familiar with the parable of the prodigal son in Luke 15:11-32 and many have heard it renamed the parable of the ‘mericiful father’ since the storyline really is about the grace & forgiveness shown by the father to his 2 sons and not just about the lost boy that returned.

Our staff was challenged by Brooke Harrison, our Senior Exec Pastor over Children’s Ministry, with this passage during our chapel time this morning, and I couldn’t stop thinking about the application of this to your group.  Yes, I said YOUR group!  What would happen if YOUR group treated every prodigal the way a loving father would treat his son?

Does that mean your group picks up homeless people, or give $100 to a hungry high-schooler?  No.  There are definitely consequences to our actions and we are challenged to be good stewards of God’s money, BUT the twist in the story really was the ‘unreasonableness’ of father’s actions in welcoming his wayward son home.

Consider what ‘unresonable’ actions you and your group could take to welcome a prodigal home.  Using only first names, share about a prodigal or two that you know about, and discuss ways to unreasonably welcome him/her home.

Lastly – Brooke challenged all of us with this quotation, “You exist to be the church – not just come to church.”  Way to go pastors!  You rock.

Church Teams databasing

Hey Journey Leaders, just wanted to remind you that we need your help in fully testing out the trial run of the Church Teams website.  Please check out my emails from last week for the links, enter your group data, and respond to the email reminders.

This seems to be a fantastic system that will be a joint venture with our existing database, but replace all our excel tracking forms.  Plus it will give you tools to communicate with your groups easily, update group info at your convenience, AND give those looking for groups accurate info.

As we get everyone’s data entered I will be blogging on some of the features to give you more info…

Creative Marriage Conference

Just returned from a great marriage conference this weekend down in the DFW area, and just wanted to encourage each of you married folks out there to invest the time, energy, money, and effort into getting away to work ON instead of just IN your marriage. 

Ed Young talked about the importance of focusing on your Area of Influence, not the greater area of concern (that we may not be able to effect.)

Ed recommended finding a ’safe’ friend, professional marriage counselor, or other pastors to share with regularly and openly to help continue to strengthen your marriage.

Here are some highlights from Craig Groschel’s talk on the Vow of Pursuit…

In our marriages, we tend to judge our spouse by his or her actions, but ourselves by our intentions.

To close the gap between actions & intentions we can;

      If you think of something good, say it.

     If you think of something special, do it.

      If you want something different, be it.

The only different between a marriage that is united vs. untied is the placement of “I”.  If “I” is in the wrong place it has bad consequences.

For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife… Gen. 2:24

Lots of love honey, I love you because you read my blog!

Pure fun.

Okay, so if you’ve every been looking for a great alternative to watching Clark on podcast?  Try one of the Reverand D. Ray Montgomery’s Godcasts at http://www.revveduptv.com/.  I, nor Journey Church, nor Clark, endorse this guy, but our office was rolling today watching some of these…

Balance in my group…

I was challenged recently to describe what a healthy life group really looks like…you know, one that is doing everything they’re supposed to, growing upward, inward, & outward, etc…

What is ’successful group’…or as one of my coaches would refer to it, what does ’hitting it out of the park’ look like?

There are so many small group books out there, more models than groups it seems, but here’s the safest answer I’ve come up with so far…  it’s about BALANCE.  Groups with a core focus are great, but without a balanced approach to spiritual growth and community they often end up feeling lopsided to the members. 

Balance from Acts 2:42 is simply “devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching(Bible study) and to the fellowship (community building), to the breaking of bread (eating), and to prayer.”

So how is the ”balance” in your group these days?  What small step can you take this week to become more balanced?

-living the Blessed Life, Herschel

Encouraging words from Bill Hybels

So, I just listened to probably the very best small groups philosophy talk ever and it wasn’t even from a small groups guru, but from Bill Hybels…of course it was sent to me by the WCA groups guys but none the less…  Below are Bill’s TOP 5 THINGS YOU GET FROM GROUPS THAT YOU CAN’T GET FROM SUNDAY MORNING CHURCH;

1. Confession of sin…not in a weird way, but just to be real and admit you’re not perfect to others for them to encourage and support you through that process.

2. Application of Scripture to your life.  Critical to long term growth.

3. Accountability – not dogmatic, but helping others reach the goals they set for themselves.

4. Guidance for Decision Making – many counselors…always a good thing.

5. Encouragement, Affirmation, and ‘the love’ of church – I love that.

* These are great and definitely not available to the same degree on Sundays as they are during groups.  Preach on Brother Bill… (the talk was from early March 2008.)