Have you ever been somewhere when you heard the faint sound of the radio playing? Maybe in a public place and somewhere off in the distance you notice music. At first you don’t have any idea what song it is, you listen for the words but you can’t quite make them out. You try to hear the melody or the hook, but you can’t seem to find it. Then, suddenly, you recognize what song it is. You know the name of the song and the artist who sings it. And at that moment a funny thing happens. All of the sudden you can hear all of the words crystal clear. You can hear the melody and you find yourself singing the hook. I don’t know about you, but this happens to me all the time. And, it got me thinking, isn’t it often like that with God?

It seems like I often know that God is speaking, but I can’t quite understand. I know that He is leading, but I’m not exactly sure of the direction. I know that he has a plan for me, but for the life of me I can’t see even the first step. But then, when I finally get in sync with Him, it’s all clear. I can hear His voice, feel His leading and see at least a few steps down the road.

I think the key to hearing the music is the same as the key to hearing God, it’s an issue of familiarity. If you have never heard the song playing on that radio off in the distance you are unlikely to ever understand any of the words. But, if it’s your favorite song you will be tapping your toe in no time. In the same way, if you don’t know God, then you have no way of hearing His voice. But, the further you walk in relationship with Jesus, the more you will be able to hear and respond to His leading.

Its simple: Knowing God more = Hearing God more.

If you are a person that really wants to hear from God, then get to know him. Read scripture, pray, and learn to listen. Otherwise you will find yourself straining to hear words that you will never quite grasp.

Happy listening.

I have become completely convinced that unless we have a firm grasp of our Hebrew heritage and a comprehensive understanding of Jewish and Near East culture we will never have good theology. Our understanding of scripture must build upon the foundation that God laid out in the Torah, not in spite of it. Our understanding must grow out of our Hebrew roots, not sepeate from them. If we are to be wholeistic followers of Jesus (our Jewish Rabbi) then we must learn to be more like Him in our thinking; meaning we should think less like Westerners and more like someone from the ancient Near East.

Thoughts?

Have you ever found yourself asking the question, “why do young people seem to hate the church?” Its a valid question that has been kicked around a lot over the past few years. I think the reason that young people are shying away from the church is because their generation grew up in a church with a dualistic view of faith. The attitude seems to be that there are some “sacred” areas of life, like church and quiet times; and then there are “secular” areas of life, like work, and leisure time.

The problem with this dualistic view is that to people from my generation is seems fake and hypocritical. In my experience growing up in church you talked about God at church, but not at home. You studied the Bible either at church or during your “quiet time” but nowhere else. The problem is, that is not the type of faith that I want to give me life to, and I think most of my generation agrees with that sentiment.

Religion by it’s very nature is religious at certain times and certain places, but it rarely goes further than that. But, the younger generation doesn’t want religion that is stale, compartmentalized and ultimately unsatisfying. We want an encounter with the creator, a touch from the all power finger of God, a brush with infinity. To find this I think that the first step is recognizing that for a follower of Jesus nothing is secular, but everything is sacred. God created everything, and our daily lives are to be an act of worship for and to Him, so it would stand to reason that everything we do, we do for His honor and glory, making everything that we do sacred.

I’m still thinking this through, any thoughts?

When I open my Bible to Job 21 there is text in bold over the top of it, titling the chapter “Job Replies: The Wicked Do Prosper.” In the chapter Job talks about how the wicked often have a tendency to prosper with wealth, health and family.

As I read that chapter I got to thinking about what that means. Typically we look at someone that is healthy and wealthy and we have a tendency to say “well they are blessed.” But, it might be just as likely that they are wicked, because the wicked to prosper.

I think we make a profound mistake when we assume that God’s blessing has anything at all to do with material. Rather, it has to do with God giving more of Himself, more of His love, more of His mind. Sometimes His blessing comes in the form of a smile, sometimes in the form of an emotion, and even sometimes in the form of material. Ultimately, His blessing always points us back to Him and is designed to draw is nearer to His heart.

But, just a thought, maybe the material blessings that He gives are far fewer than the spiritual, emotional and mental blessings that he offers. We just tend to fixate on the material blessing because we can see that and we are all too often blind to His other, greater blessings. Which makes me wonder how many things God would bless me with if I would only open myself to receive even more of Him.

I’m just pontificating here, any thoughts? I would love a good conversation on this one

Have you ever been in a church when some authoritative looking dude says “let us pray”, you bow your head, concentrate on God, and then after the Amen you look up and notice that the stage has been entirely reset during that time? I have a problem with this.

Though I did this many times while on church staff (usually playing the role of the guy moving around and doing junk during the prayer) I have had a growing uneasiness about this practice within our churches for one simple reason; this reduces prayer to a prop that helps us to put on a seamless service.

The way I see it, doing this is basically using prayer as a tool of distraction to direct people’s attention away from the stage so that set changes (or whatever) can get done more quickly. But this degrades prayer. Instead, shouldn’t prayer be something that we enter into as a body? Shouldn’t that be a time when we are completely unified, where every individual part of the body is seeking after Jesus and making themselves subject to Him?

I find it a little bit odd that we claim that prayer has so much power and yet we treat it with such little respect.

So, I propose that rather than stripping prayer of it’s authority and using it as a staging tool, that churches genuinely get on their faces, united in prayer before the living God. I propose that prayer become an integral part of our times of gathering (large and small) rather than being a side item that we simply throw into the mix when it is convenient. I propose that we take prayer so seriously that every person in the room stops cold to seek after God with eagerness and conviction.

Imagine the power that lies in this type of prayer, one unified body seeking after it’s Creator. If we are a community, let’s pray as a united community.

Note: I know that churches that do this respect prayer and would never intentionally degrade it, but I think this practice has subtly emerged within church culture and that it is harmful to the church as a whole. If you disagree with me that’s cool, I would love to dialog with you in the comments…so please leave one.

When I first started working in ministry the whole “contemporary worship” thing was a big issue. I remember talking with a music minister that was in the middle of reading a book on contemporary worship; he explained to me that for a service to be contemporary there should be no down time; not more than 5 seconds of silence.

This is a sad idea.

The other day I stumbled upon Habakkuk 2:20 which says “But the LORD is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him.” This verse hit me in the face when I read it and has continued to beat on my consciousness ever since. I am struggling with questions like: what does it mean to “keep silence before Him”? Do I ever have silence in my life? Do I embrace silence or run from it? Is silence before God an integral part of my relationship with Him or something that I drown out with continuous noise? Why am I afraid of the silence?

It seems to me that silence is a necessity in our daily walk with Jesus, and yet, we avoid it like the plague. Silence allows for and encourages reflection, which is scary. When submerged into total silence we are left with only our thoughts and the Holy Spirit’s whisper, inevitably bringing us to some degree of conviction followed by God’s leading. Both of these make us uncomfortable and push us to change, which we tend to resist.

Think about it, we live in a world that embraces “self” over all other things. One of the keys to embracing “self” is to feel good about your own selfishness. The best way to do that is to drown out all opposing voices, like our conscience and the Holy Spirit. And so, since our world embraces “self” it also embraces noise because that helps to maintain selfish thinking.

By living in a constant state of noise we never have the time or ability to reflect on our lives, the good and the bad. We are never really able to asses where we are as individuals and determine how we can improve. We simply live our lives so narrowly focused on keeping forward motion, that we never realize the wheels we are riding on are wobbling around about to pop off. Then, we suddenly find ourselves bottomed out and asking why.

Maybe it’s time for some self assessment. Maybe it’s time for conviction, growth, and leading. Maybe it’s time for silence before a Holy God that not only deserves our reverent, silent respect, but also asks it of us.

Maybe it’s time for the Church to gather together to keep silence.

Please share your thoughts and ideas, this is a tough one…

Last Wednesday I took the first step, resigned from the safety of a full time position with a good salary at a loving church and stepped toward the realm of church planting. I’m pretty sure that planting a church is a lot like base jumping; you get training, you gear up, you step up to the cliff while people gawk at you and tell you that you’re nuts. Then, you jump and experience your greatest thrill and greatest fear simultaneously.

I haven’t gotten to the plunge phase yet, but I have started the ball rolling. And in doing so made this startling realization; I can’t go back. This somehow made me think of Newton’s first law and its spiritual application.

Newton’s first law states, “An object in motion will remain in motion unless acted upon by a force.”

I think following God often goes something like this. God has a plan for your life. He sets that plan in motion at which point you can resist (acting as a force against the plan) and hinder it, or you can hop on board (going with the motion) and let God take you wherever He wills.

The question is, are you acting as a force against what God wants to do in your life, or are you acting in cooperation with what He wants for you?

For me, God started the motion of church planting a while ago. For a time I held back and didn’t get on board, and that hindered the momentum in my relationship with Jesus. Now things are getting back up to speed, Jess and I are on board with where God is leading us and I can already feel the forward motion in my life. It’s a good place to be.