We Have All Lost Our Minds

We are psycho at Elevation Church...

At Butler High School where I am the Campus Pastor, our parking team is crazy!

The greeters, they are neurotic!

Ushers, yep, they're "off their rocker"!

First Time Guest volunteers, First Impressions Team, Volunteer Headquarters people, Ekidz workers, Production Volunteers, Lobby Team members, Connectors, Volunteer Coordinators, group leaders and yes, even the staff have all lost their minds...

We are freaks! We actually believe that by waving, smiling, pointing people to their seats and/or parking spots we are making a difference in people's lives. Our volunteers work, sacrifice, show up early, stay late, and give everything they have every Sunday, because at the end of the day we're all clinical...we believe that it actually matters!

And you know what, it does! Today I had the amazing priviledge of leading someone to Christ in my office. The best part of the story is that she was only in my office because the volunteers at the Butler Campus were faithfully tending to the details this Sunday. As you were waving and pointing people to their spots, or greeting someone with a smile or directing that person to their seat, there was a woman coming to church for the first time. That same woman was so welcomed by you and so touched by the worship experience that you make possible that she found her way to my office today and accepted Christ.

Butler Volunteers - we've said it hundreds of times before - but the sermon starts in the parking lot. And when you show up to do what you do, people far from God pull into the parking lot, feel welcome, hear the powerful Gospel and respond...Don't miss it! You are part of this story!

Thanks for your sacrifice and dedication...for yet one more person you really are making a difference.

Halloween Traditions...

I come from a VERY competitive family!

Every year we would carve pumpkins, but we couldn't just carve them, we had to out do the other siblings in the room with a artistic masterpiece in gourd-ish medium. This conditioning has resulted in a very strange obsession in my life that flares up once a year around the end of October.

This year's pumpkin carving is titled: "ode to my neglected puppy..." (My dog, Oliver, has been very sad since Jeremiah was born 17 months ago so I have memorialized him in pumpkin flesh.) Enjoy!

And, just in case you can't tell what this image is...check out a real picture of Oliver to the right.

I can't post a blog without some kind of lesson, so here you go: Even a warty, lumpy pumpkin can be turned into something creative. If you feel like the world has handed you a gourd (work with me here...) you can always turn it into a jack-o-lantern!

Be blessed, and happy pumpkin carving...

Behind the Scenes with Pastor Furtick...

The other day I was part of a meeting that Pastor Furtick was leading. He took the principle from Seth Godin's book, The Dip, and described how the principle actually found it's origins in the Word of God.

You'll have to read Godin's book to understand what he meant by it because I will focus the rest of this blog on Pastor's interpretation of his principle.

Pastor suggested that there are two main reasons why we will go through spiritual dips in our life:

1) Disobedience - Sometimes we make stupid decisions and create our own problems for ourselves. We borrow more money then we can pay back and find ourselves in financial crisis. We neglect our kids by working too much and then suffer the consequences. He pointed to David and Bathsheba, Jonah, and Peter as Biblical examples of this idea.

2) Divine Dips - There are other times that God puts the pressure on us. We are doing all that we know how and we still find ourselves in times of struggle. At that point we have three steps to follow: 1 - Receive God's activity; 2 - Remember how he has walked with us in the past; 3 - Respond to God's direction.

Now, I know you probably had to be there to experience the weight of this teaching, but trust me, it was a VERY profound moment.

Here are a few quotes to consider:

"The teacher is always silent during the test..."

"God's past performance always predicates His future ability..."

"Is my integrity worth suffering for?"

To close out the talk Pastor highlighted Psalm 23. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil... In classic style Pastor highlighted that we are walking through the valley. We might be in the valley today, but God's intention is to take us through it.

If you're in a Dip today follow Pastor's advice. if it's because of sin or disobedience then repent. If not, then Receive, Remember and Respond and know that no matter how deep your dip is the same God that lead you into it has every intention of leading you through it and on the back side of any valley is always another mountain top!

Thank You Irekka

Last night my small group had the privilege of being introduced to a wonderful mom named Irekka. (Check out Tonia Bendickson's Blog on the story here.)

We found out about her because of our relationship with Communities in Schools - Safe Journey a program that helps teenage mothers graduate from high school and pursue their dreams in college.

Irekka's story is tragic - 19 with 2 kids, living in an apartment with a box spring to sleep on, a pot with a broken handle to warm up her kid's bottle, no money, no support, and seemingly no reason for having hope - yet, the characteristic that stood out most about her was her Joy.

Some of the ladies in our group treated Irekka to her first dinner at Olive Garden, we stayed behind and loaded furniture, dishes, clothes, and food into the apartment. When Irekka returned she walked into a fully furnished apartment. Her little girl Meiara was so excited she was literally bouncing off the walls. Irekka said, "I've been praying for 2 months that God would help and He did...I'm so happy!"

Irekka's joy and contentment was remarkable.

Thank you Irekka for reminding me just how blessed I am and for resetting my vision. Your best is yet to come. We're praying for you and more importantly, we're with you!

It IS my fault...

Pastor Furtick posted a blog recently titled "How IS it my fault". Check it out here.

As I'm sitting here looking at the index card he referenced I'm thinking about the frame of mind I was in when I made the comment.

In reading through Habit 1 of Steven Covey's book I was struck by this line: "Our behavior is a function of our decisions, not our conditions." (Covey, 71) - you should probably read that line again...

I wrote in an exercise that we did while studying this habit together that I need to spend less time in asking why something happened (i.e. assigning blame) and a lot more time using the "why" to answer the question, "how do we make it right next time."

One thing that has begun to sink in for me is that no matter who's fault it is and no matter what the solution is the problem is ultimately my responsibility. If it was a staff member that dropped the ball, for instance, I'm not off the hook. I need to ask, "How can I coach them better?", "What resources do they need to be effective?", "Was the way I communicated my expectations ineffective?", "Does this staff person have what it takes?", "Do I need to release them from the pressure of these decisions?" etc... It's a subtle shift but it is absolutely necessary. At the end of the day if my leadership does not have direction modifying influence on the people I lead I cease to be necessary as a leader!

So how IS it my fault? Well, if I'm really the leader it's all my fault. Now that we've got that out of the way, how can we fix it moving forward...

I'm So Far Behind!

I'm signing up for Facebook!

I am also considering twitter!

Someone asked everyone in the audience at the GroupLife conference at Willow Creek last week (side note: average age 48-52) whether they had a Facebook account...I was one of 7 people who did not raise their hand in a room of 1500 people. The other six...an Amish family!

I'm signing up for an account. If I deny you as a friend don't take it personally, I probably just don't know how to work the thing!

GroupLife Conference Takeaways

I don't have time to write about all of the things that I'm taking away from the GroupLife Conference at Willow so instead I'm going to give you the first three that come to my mind:

1) Being in connection with other great leaders is my #1 resource for advancing the work that God has placed in front of me.

2) Everything is an experiment (thanks Mark and Heather). Therefore, start trying stuff!!!

3) The model of ministry that is going to work best for us is the one that we are most excited about. So...we need to pick one and start!

and for a bonus:
4) What we have going on in Charlotte, NC is borderline miraculous! We are part of a very special move of God...I can't wait to get back.

Drummer's are Supposed to Keep The Beat

Let's imagine that I was at a conference at some point where there was a drummer on stage. In this hypothetical situation you could imagine that this drummer was actually a very talented young person who had a bright future as a drummer and you would not think that this blog was in any way a slam on said drummer...

But here is one thing I understand about drummers: the fundamental purpose of drummer is to keep the beat...agreed? Sure, they add a lot more then just the tempo, but there isn't anyone else in the band that will pick up the slack on the beat if the drummer decides to play without a click track.

So if you were at this hypothetical conference with me trying to sing a great song like Hosanna (for instance) you might be a little distracted if the drummer started at about 60 beats per minute and ended at about 100 beats per minute.

He might have had great fills, an incredible amount of passion, he might have been worshipping and carrying the weight of the musical experience, but when all was finished he would have neglected his central purpose as the drummer...he would have failed to keep the beat!

One thing I have learned as a leader in my short experience is that it is easy to get caught up in the passion of circumstances, pressures, or exciting moments in ministry and lose sight of my main purpose - to cast vision and lead people. I might develop great systems, or put together phenominal reports. I might extinguish fires, or pull off great announcements, but at the end of the day none of that matters if I fail to keep the beat.

Taking a lesson from the drummer, keep the primary purpose in focus and if you can't do it all make sure to at least keep the beat...the guitarist can alsways jump in with a cool solo, but no one else is watching the metronome!