Archive for 2011
Christmas fell on a Sunday again this year, and there were more and more churches who decided to “close up shop”. All of the pastors I know who decided not to gather as a Church on Sunday morning had a full complement of Christmas Eve (and even Christmas Eve-Eve) services […]
Read More...It’s Christmas Eve, 2011, and I’m enjoying watching my city kids play on Grandpa’s 2 acres in the country outside of Eugene. This is the first year in a long time that we took off for Christmas vacation and didn’t have church responsibilities to distribute before we left. This year […]
Read More...“I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you…” “On hearing it, many of His disciples said, ‘this is a hard teaching, who can accept it?’…From this time many of His disciples turned back […]
Read More...My wife and I have a Starbucks mug collection that’s very special to us. We built the collection over years as we have moved and traveled and ministered all over the country and the world. In each place we’ve lived, in many places we’ve served, and in select locations where […]
Read More...“…it’s easy to get a laugh making fun of somebody, but the Muppets never make jokes at other people’s expenses. It makes the writing a little bit harder, but it’s so much better.” Jason Segel, on co-writing The Muppets. In the original draft of the Muppets, apparently there were a couple of […]
Read More...Last week my family celebrated an epic day: 11.11.11 was my son’s birthday…his ELEVENTH birthday! On the day of his birth, we discovered this would be the case because the doctor told us we had a big birthday approaching in 11 short years. At the time it seemed like forever […]
Read More...When I was a teenager and twenty-something, I sang and played bass in a number of post-punk/rock bands. Triumphs of Faith, Dino’s Lucky Eggs, The New Resistance, Enclave, 45 North, and Average Joe are all names you probably haven’t heard, but they took up a whole lot of my creative energy […]
Read More...When I was in my late teens I worked on a couple of different janitorial crews. Those who worked these jobs had some things in common: We wore the same color shirts, we knew how to change a belt on a vacuum, we carried walkie-talkies (yes, before cell phones) and […]
Read More...While in Rome on a “footsteps of Paul” trip a few weeks ago, I had the privilege to tour the Coliseum. It was an amazing man-made structure that has stood for thousands of years. In the middle of the modern city stood something that is centuries older than anything that […]
Read More...I’ve had a number of people ask me when I’m going to start blogging again. Here’s the answer: Now. Tomorrow I’ll start to post a series of blogs that were conceived while I was following the footsteps of Paul in hgh vitamins Athens, Corinth, Ephesus, and Rome. Then, I’ll soon […]
Read More...“The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say thank you. In between, the leader is a servant.” Max De Pree Yesterday I said “thank you” to a great congregation I have been leading for a little over 5 years. As a leader and […]
Read More...Will you help me? I’ve started a new job, and it’s overwhelming! I don’t feel like i have time to breathe, much less to write. Tonight I went in to pray with my boys, and I just laid with them and talked and laughed with them for about an hour […]
Read More...In the story of David vs. Goliath (1 Samuel 17), David carefully picked 5 smooth stones from the creek; these were rocks he knew would hit their mark. But in the heat of battle, as David ran towards the giant, he couldn’t carefully decide which specific stone to put to […]
Read More...Recently my best friend John Fehlen used the following quote in a sermon he preached. Are we giving people God, or are we giving them our good ideas? Hint, our culture needs more than our “success” and redeemed strategies; they need the presence of Jesus! “Many Christian leaders are uncomfortable […]
Read More...In a classic story, a strong, young man was hired as a lumberjack. The first day he cut down ten trees; the second day he felled eight; but the third day he could finish-off only two. When he went to apologize for his unexplained loss of strength, his boss asked […]
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