Earlier this week I was dialoguing with someone about something we both knew would need some future follow-up. At the end of our discussion they told me they’d follow-up with me next week. I told them I’d be on vacation with my family next week & would be unavailable.

They told me they’d just e-mail instead of calling.

I told them again that I would be unavailable.

THEM: No e-mail?

ME: No e-mail.

I am not a saint. I don’t have it all figured out but one thing I am certain of is that my family will always be more important than another e-mail, problem, phone call or text. We think it’s normal to stay connected & accessible 24/7 so most of us do but maybe we should ask if normal is really working? We live in a country where split families are almost the norm. Sadly, the numbers for those inside the church aren’t much better than those outside the church. Maybe this is because we talk more about putting our families first on Sunday than we spend time actually doing it the rest of the week.

As a pastor it’s easy for me to get so busy helping others create good marriages & families while I neglect my own.  I’ve been there. I’ve done it. I don’t like it. I had to decide early on in this journey that I wanted a family who loved me more than I wanted a church that would always have access to me. It might sound harsh to some but it’s absolutely true & I’m at peace with my decision.

It doesn’t matter what you do for a living because no matter what, I believe we all need to find ways to be intentionally unavailable to the outside world. We need to disconnect with them so we can reconnect with the people who truly need us the most. The pictures of Aubri & Owen at the top of this post are from a Disney trip we took last year. I keep them in my phone as a constant reminder of the memories that are made when I’m fully present with my family. May we all learn to disconnect  so that we can reconnect with our families. 

CV

The sad reality is that few people who have given their opinion on John will ever take the time to hear his story. This guy is a bum in their mind & nothing he could ever say is going to change that. He took their hard earned $2 & used it to buy a flat screen TV & shame on him for it they think! I can think of worse ways I’ve saved & spent my money, both the money I’ve earned & the money I’ve been given, but we have a harsher standard for others than we do for ourselves.

This post is not for those outside the church. This post is for those inside the church. Those who proclaim the love of Christ. Those who have been shown grace time & time again. Those who are reminded by Jesus Himself that we are NEVER to judge (Matthew 7). People on the outside aren’t held to the standard we are because people on the outside aren’t claiming to follow Jesus.

We might all have different opinions on whether or not to give a panhandler money. I have given John money & I will do it again because I’ve heard John’s story. The poor guy with the flatscreen TV deserves the same love & grace as the rich man with the flatscreen TV. We are all God’s children & I believe it’s time those of us who claim christ start treating our brother & sister accordingly. Our faith should cause us to see these types of situations differently.

CV

3-years later, as we prepare to end 2011, I realize things didn’t go quite as we expected over the last 36 months. We did have our first child (Aubri), and our second one (Owen), and recently found out we’re expecting our third (TBD). We did graduate from college, we did move back to Chillicothe  and we did plant a church (Centerpoint) but it did not grow quite as rapidly as we expected. I could tell you our growth has been steady but my honest translation of steady in this case would be slow.

More often than not, a good thing takes time to grow but this is not what we want to believe. We are drawn to the exceptions. We love the overnight sensations & the start-ups that defy the statistics. These stories happen but it doesn’t make the churches, start-ups & dreams that don’t go this way less significant. Even now, as Centerpoint has grown & faces another move into the last & biggest theatre in our building, I am reminded of what might have never been if I had just listened to the voices & given up. No life change. No hope. No Crazy Love. No future.

I believe God has placed a dream in each of us whether it be a church, a business a cause or a destination we are drawn to. Whatever it is, when God says go we must go & trust Him with the consequences. Those who truly love us will stick by us through thick & thin. They’ll be there when it’s bad & when it’s good. They’ll be there when we exceed our goals & when we fall below them. A good team is essential to fulfilling a big dream.

As we all look towards 2012 & all the promise it brings, I would like to offer a humble piece of advice: If you don’t want to do something great JUST GIVE UP but if you want to live the dream & follow God’s leading, keep going because persistence & faith will carry you out of the valley & up to the mountain. May your new year be blessed!

CV

Generosity is scarce, even in the church & we need to get it back. I believe the true story of Santa can help us put giving in perspective for our children & teach us a lot along the way about why we give. As Christians, we often run from things we believe might get “worldly”. I fear this is what we did with St. Nicholas & as a result, the true story has been lost because the wrong people are telling it.  

Kristyn & I have always sought balance in our home. We let our kids use their imagination & pretend but we also tell them true story of St. Nicholas right along side the story of Jesus & the manger. In our house, Santa & the manger go together. Many of us have no problem letting our young children believe in the reality of a Disney character &, although fine & good, those characters give us no real redeeming value. Why then, would many of us choose to avoid a character who actually has redeeming value & can enhance the true message of Christmas when presented correctly?

Christmas is about Jesus coming to earth to show us God’s love & it was because of that love St. Nicholas gave generously to others. At the end of the day, we can tell the stories but its up to us to live it & exemplify generosity to our children. I grew up with a generous family & those memories still impact me today. May we always tell the amazing story of our Savior who was born in a manager & may the love of that Savior compel us to reclaim the true story of Saint Nicholas who’s generosity is something we would all do well to model.

CV

UPDATE: Thanks to your generosity, we exceeded our goal by 30% rasing over $7K!!!!!

At Centerpoint, we have always felt compelled to do things that are bigger than our means. If it’s within our means than we could technically do it alone but if its outside our means, we know God has to show up. Our Christmas Project for 2011 was no exception to this.

The video tells the story for this years project so I hope you’ll watch it. Every year, we challenge everyone in our church to spend 10% less at Christmas so they can give 10% more. That 10% adds up to a lot we can do for others.

If you’re reading this, I’m asking you to consider giving generously & helping us give hope this Christmas season to some awesome people! To do something great it takes a group of people uniting with the same purpose. Regardless of your background or situation, let’s join together & change this world by showing God’s Crazy Love!

GIVE HOPE 

Centerpoint has been partnered with a local soup kitchen for over 2-years now. We thought it would be a simple, practical way to serve but it’s turned into so much more than that. The people we serve at this soup kitchen have become our friends. We talk with them, laugh them, & pray with them & it all starts by eating with them.

There’s something about food that opens hearts & there has never been more proof of this to me than Tuesday night during the Thanksgiving meal we served to our friends. One gentlemen started conversing with our Worship Leader Josh Strange. He shared his story & Josh listened. Before he left, Josh prayed with him as he made a decision to follow Jesus. Life change at a soup kitchen.

We complicate the Gospel but the Gospel is not complicated. Jesus summarized it pretty well in Matthew 22:36-40 when he reminded us that Loving God & Loving People was what really mattered. For us, feeding people is one of the ways we chose to love them & last Tuesday was proof that something as simple as food really can change lives.

CV

Give hope & Change lives with us as we provide Christmas for all 50 families that attend the soup kitchen!

When I say I “avoided this” I don’t mean I haven’t talked about Heaven & Hell from the stage because I have. Every pastor knows though that there’s a BIG difference between talking about something & teaching on something. I have avoided the teaching component because of the fear I would abuse my limited knowledge on the topic like so many others seem to have done.

Heaven & Hell both matter. They are both topics in Scripture & therefor should necessitate a response & discussion from those striving to live their lives in accordance with Scripture. That said, we can never know all the details of either topic because our human understanding is fallible even though God’s word is perfect. I have approached this topic with Isaiah 55:8 in my heart: “My thoughts are not your thoughts neither are your ways my ways declares the Lord.”

As I prepare to dive into this topic my prayer has been for humility. I am not God nor will I ever be God. I cannot know everything but I do know something & the something I know is that the Creator of the universe is madly in love with us & sent His son to prepare us now for what is to come later. Now matters & so does later.

CV

We live in a world where it’s hard to slow down.

We live in a world where we dream about  the THEN instead of living in the NOW.

We live in a world where noise is constant & silence is nearly impossible. 

We tweet on Twitter, while pondering our update for Facebook. We call him while texting her & we can’t even text her without thinking about the e-mail we meant to send to that person about that thing but didn’t. We are so focused on what’s next that we forget about the now. Once we recognize this as a problem, the question becomes what are we going to do about it?

I left this conference ready to make intentional changes in the way I live my life to ensure I am giving myself every opportunity to be present.  I don’t want to get so caught up in the nextseason of marriage, parenting, relating, pastoring that I fail to see what God has called me to now.  Kristyn & I will be taking 1 night off every week from technology. I am devoting 10min everyday to total silence. When I read Scripture & spend time with God, I’m going to do it with my heart in focus not the focus of Centerpoint & what next great series I can get out of a passage.

If we’re being honest with ourselves, I believe we all need to make changes in order to be fully present in the life we were called to live. Everyday has opportunities but we have to be present to seize them.

What about you? What distracts you from being present & how can you cut out the noise? 

CV

Early on in leading this church I now realize that many of our leaders were afraid to step on each others toes. We didn’t want to offend anyone, or have our ideas misunderstood. Instead of working through things we just let them go & we suffered some regrettable consequences as a result. Somewhere along the way, we started to become more comfortable in our own skin. We learned to trust & we learned not to take things personal. We learned how to move on even when we disagreed. Simply put, we learned to embrace the tension. 

Back to the conversation I referenced earlier: Instead of ignoring the issue like we might have previously done, we pushed each other & worked through it. We stood firm on our thoughts while staying open to different perspectives. Ultimately, it would seem the issue was resolved & instead of having regret we have peace because we said what we needed to say & embraced the tension.

Tension pushes us to think outside our box.

Tension helps us explore different angles.

Tension brings a fresh perspective.  

Learn to embrace the tension. You’ll be glad you did & so will everyone who sees the end result of what you struggled through.

CV

• How to guide the vision without controlling the vision. God called CP to fulfill a very unique vision. He gave me that vision & I carry the weight of being responsible for it. I’m afraid that sometimes, this causes me to control people & situations more than I should. I want to train & equip leaders not followers & that requires guidance not control.
• How to see everyone through the eyes of Christ. We have a messy church full of messy people. We admit it. We accept it. We love it. I believe everyone is worthy of a second chance & yet I sometimes I feel like I still pick & choose who gets that chance without meaning to do so. Some people are just harder to relate to than others but I never want anyone to sit on the sidelines simply because their different & we couldn’t find a way to connect them. If I see everyone through the eyes of Christ this will not happen.
• How to balance faith with common sense. In all actuality, faith almost always defies common sense so that would be my first problem. Truth be told, knowing this is not enough some days. I believe there have been times where common sense said NO while faith said GO & I chose to side with reason instead of trust in God. There have been plenty of times I went with faith but I pray daily for that margin to be shortened. For God to do extraordinary things I must have extraordinary faith.
• How not to let this vision consume my every thought. God has given me passion and for that I am thankful but there are many days when I have a hard time shutting my mind off of CP for a while. I believe this sometimes negatively impacts my ability to be present with family & friends. This vision weaves into every facet of my life & it’s the best worst thing in the world. I’ll be a healthier person when I learn to turn it off on a more consistent basis & be fully present in the moments I find myself in.
• How not to care about the outward stuff. I do care about numbers. I do care about image. I do care about perception. There are so many things I consume myself with that I really shouldn’t. I justify it but only for my own selfish sake. I want to care about the things God cares about yet I know much of what spins through my head everyday is in direct contrast to this.