This is something I’ve thought about quite a bit in regards to leading our church. What do we want our church to be like in 10 years? For the months of September and October, I met with our church leadership team and then our church body on a weekly basis to hammer through some of these things. As I’ve thought about this question, I keep coming back to the underground church. While so many churches are trying to become more like Willow Creek, or Saddleback, or North Point…I think the underground church even better exemplifies the kind of church Jesus desires. Why? I think the underground church relies more on the Holy Spirit, because it doesn’t have so many resources at its disposal like the American church has. Yet it seems like churches in the US are in a rat race to obtain more and more resources–bigger buildings, larger crowds, better giving. How is the underground church able to grow so exponentially w/out any buildings, paid staff, large crowds, or enormous giving? I think the underground church could care less about talent and cares more about spirituality. I keep seeing over and over how our churches in America crave talent. We want someone super-talented to work with kids or youth. Someone super-talented to lead worship. Someone super-talented to preach on Sundays. I think this is one of the worst trappings we find ourselves dealing with in America. First, it eliminates 98% of our congregations from leading ministries (and we wonder why so few are involved in our churches). Second, it infers that we rely on man’s abilities far more than God’s. Gone are the days of Paul, when he’d rather come in weakness, boast about his weaknesses, and ridicule riches, persuasive words, or talents. I think those who are involved in underground churches are more devoted to Christ than our congregations are. Because they follow Christ at the risk of their own lives, there is an authenticity to their faith. I am sure that when it’s praise and worship time, they press in (even though the music sucks or is completely absent). When it’s time to hear Scripture, they’re all ears (even if it’s the same passage over and...

This past month, our church has been meeting, among other times, at 6:18 am on Wednesday and Sunday mornings to study Scripture together and pray. My favorite part of this study is hearing the Holy Spirit speak through others at the study. My second favorite part is driving home on Highway 85, seeing the mountains on the right and watching the sun come up on the left. I can’t remember when was the last time I saw the sun come up before we started doing this. I guess in Alabama, it is so hilly, etc that you can’t really see the sun come up unless you’re on top of one of the hills at that time. A bigger obstacle, however, has been that I never get up in time to see it rise. 🙂 Come to think of it, when I had video jobs in Atlanta, I’d see the sun come up as I drove east on I-20, but once again, it wasn’t nearly as visible as here. In Ault/Nunn the ground is so flat, there are very little trees or buildings. On the way to the Bible study, everything is pitch black. On the way home, however, the sky is already lit–although the sun isn’t here yet. It usually arrives by the time I get home. Watching the sunrise got me thinking. This marvelous thing happens every single day, and very few of us enjoy the grandeur of it. If you want to see the “bigness” of God, get to a place where you can see the sunrise. One day, while waiting for the sun to rise, I imagined that the sun was the “Son.” Jesus said He was coming back one day, but He hasn’t returned yet. Even though the sun hadn’t arrived yet, the sky was bright. In fact, when I stepped out of the church and into my car that morning, I thought I’d missed the sunrise. As I started driving, however, I realized it wasn’t here yet. Isn’t that a great analogy for Christ? He hasn’t returned yet, but His light is shining everywhere through the rays of the Holy Spirit. We cannot doubt that He is right around the corner, about to appear....

If you’re on staff at a church, you know that every day leading up to Sunday becomes just a little more stressful. It seems like Sundays come around all too quickly. While everyone else complains about how slow the week goes, and how long it takes for the weekend to arrive, I have the opposite feeling. That’s how it felt when I was a youth pastor, and still feels the same way as a pastor. It’s as if there’s not enough days in the week to get everything done that I’d like to get done. On top of this, Sunday is the busiest and most stressful day of the week–the day of the week most people consider their Sabbath day of rest. For the staff person, this simply isn’t so. I’m more worn out that day than any other day of the week. So when Monday comes, I feel like just crashing. If I do this, however, that leaves only Tuesday through Friday to be in the office and get things done for Sunday. When you already feel like there aren’t enough days in the week to get things done, it presents a challenge to take one of those days off. For the past two weeks, I’ve decided to just take Mondays off anyway. When it comes down to it, how can I call myself a pastor if I refuse to follow one of the Ten Commandments? This past Monday, Audra gave me Sarah while she showered and got ready for the day. That turned into Sarah falling asleep on me and not waking up until 11 am. So I had no choice but to nap with her! That meant a whole half day of doing absolutely nothing but just lying there. Part of me wanted to say: You just wasted half a day. Another part of me wanted to say: You needed that rest, why feel guilty about taking a Sabbath? I think it will always be a struggle to take Mondays off. This week, there were emails to be sent, phone calls to be made, etc., but I resisted and waited until Tuesday to start any of it. It was hard to do that. For a good...

I read an article a few days ago questioning what young people long for in worship services. You can read it here. I have mixed feelings about such articles. I, too, long for the type of worship service he says young people are longing for. Yet, I wonder if young people at large really do want that kind of service. If so, why do they flock to the “hip” services? Why aren’t young people abandoning these hip services and starting their own, if they really long for them? I think this article generally reflects the frustration of a few, probably including the author. But as a whole, I don’t see it. However, as a church leader, I think my time is more well-spent investing in this minority. Where are these people who desire authenticity and knowing Christ in a real, deep way? Let’s come together and do something substantial for the kingdom of...

You know, some days are good, others are bad. Yesterday was a good day. Yet, even in good days, we can think about all the things we want to get accomplished but don’t have time to do. Or we consider things outside our control that we wish we had control over. Or our minds can race to a million different things that can consume our thoughts for hours, the whole day, or several days. But I’m reminded of our worship service last Sunday at church. At any point, we can turn off the noise, get away with God, and remember that He’s our Father. We can remember that everything in this life is temporary. We can be assured that one day, this will all be over, and we will be with God forever, and none of this stuff will matter any longer. Is that a great comfort to anyone else? The cool thing is that we don’t have to wait until then to get a taste of how this will be. In our time of communion with God, we can experience this reality right now. Granted, we don’t experience it in all its fullness, but it is enough. God gives us enough to continue on, and to rest in our relationship with Him. Be reminded today that this the only truly important thing in this life–your relationship with God. Protect it. Nourish it. Appreciate it. Don’t let it go to waste. And don’t let this life steal it away from you. What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, but lose his...

A few days ago, I was reflecting on the period of my life beginning when I knew I needed to step out in faith and resign at my former church and ending at the point where we moved to Colorado. And a thought came to me. Surprise, surprise… I felt like that was a very difficult, yet exciting period of my life. Yet, when I look at the circumstances, they weren’t really mind-blowingly difficult compared to what people face all the time in their lives. It was actually pretty mild, if you look at it objectively (although that’s hard for me to do, since I was the one who experienced it). That made me feel kind of bad. How would I have handled a much greater crisis? Something that could be genuinely labeled a crisis? But then I continued thinking about it. You know, it was like I had a taste of having to trust God during a relatively minor unsettling time. It was just a taste. Kinda like a vaccine. You know what I’m talking about. When they give you a vaccine, they give you a taste of the virus or whatever in order to trigger antibodies to build up in your body so that the full-blown virus won’t be able to overcome you if you come into contact with it later in life. And then it dawned on me…faith is the antibody. For some odd reason, my faith in God has intensified greatly over the past period of my life–disproportionately, I would add, to the circumstances. It’s like a little hardship came my way–and I reached down deep, and found God, and a whole bunch of faith was released. And so now I feel I have all these antibodies in my system disproportionate to the injection of the vaccine’s virus. That leads me to believe that there’s very good reason for all these antibodies. I’m going to need every single one of them. God knew that, and gave me a vaccine so that I would be prepared for what lies ahead. The task set before me right now–without the type of faith I have in God right now, I’d be turning to this or that to grow...

The past month, the leadership team at our church has been going through a time of praying and seeking God as to how He wants us to move forward as a church. It’s been exciting to see God working in all our lives. I see with eyes of faith what our church is capable of in the power of the Holy Spirit. In earthly terms, many people would probably dismiss us. We are small in number, and we don’t have anything “exceptional” or “noteworthy” going on. To put it plainly, if our churches explode in numerical growth in the next couple of years, there is nothing to put your finger on to say why it happened. It would have to be a move of God’s Spirit–like the stuff you read about in the Bible. And I guess that’s what I feel I’m being tested to believe can happen. I’m tired of standing around while people try to play the church game. I’m frustrated that so many church leaders can be simply concerned with church growth, and then put a spiritual spin on it, to make it look like it’s a “God thing.” Or that leaders can feel confident they can achieve a successful church by following this method or that one. I don’t want that to happen here. Yet, I’m tempted like everyone else. That’s when I need to go deep, and test if I’m for real or not. I know myself and I know my church. We aren’t anything special. I’m not a gifted preacher; we don’t pride in ourselves in being talented at anything. Of course, we really don’t know these things yet, as we’ve not explored them. But I’m also not so sure that trying to explore them is the way to go. Deep down inside, I want to set up an experiment. An experiment where a church puts their entire faith on God and Scripture–on the power of the Gospel and the Holy Spirit. And then prove that all this modern thinking about successful churches is bogus. And more importantly, prove that we can be, and must be faithful to God, and that He is a faithful God himself. I want us to return to...