I Once Was Blind, But Now I See

Ministry can be hard. Personalities don't mesh. Sin gets in the way. Personal feelings, goals, and vision divide teams, and can sometimes lead to church splits. Over the years, there are two times that leaving a position was very difficult for me. I shed some tears. I asked God "Why did this happen to me?" Honestly, I do not remember Him answering in any kind of timely manner (At least according to my time schedule).  Both of these times resulted in opportunities that I would not have even begun to look for if I had stayed put. No matter how much we love a situation, God may have something different He needs us to do. Our present ministry, New Creation Ministries , was a result of God pulling me away from something.  One truth we must realize is that God is not a reactionary God. At this point in time, I have cancer in my right eye. Why? I don't know. What I can put my hope in is that God has a plan. I love my ministry. I love being able to train and empower churches ...

Moses is a great example of waiting. He went from Egyptian royalty to spending 40 years as a shepherd before spending another 40 years of wondering around in the wilderness. God was trying to teach the Jewish nation to trust in Him. Galatians 5:22-23 "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,   gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law." Our culture has lost the art of waiting. Before telephones, you had to send a letter. To get a reply to your letter took days, weeks, or even months. Most meetings were done face to face, and relationships will be built through this. It wasn't about picking up a new client, it was about developing friendships. Replies to comments, letters, and invitations tended to be more thought out and intentional. In today's world, we reply to a text with an impersonal thumbs up or "K" (Okay is too hard). Why is waiting so important? Waiting forces us to halt our fee...

From time to time I have been asked "What is the big deal about theology? Why can't we just talk about Jesus?" In some ways they do have a point. Sometimes we can let nonessentials become essentials. I have seen churches split over nonessentials. I can see their point if this is what they mean when they ask this question.  However, more often than not, this is not what they mean.  This question opens a very serious issue, and it requires a very abbreviated history lesson in order to explain. Before the Reformation in 1517, the people did not have the Bible in their own language. This meant that the church could essentially teach whatever they wanted to teach, and claim that their monologue was part of God's Word. The common people could not contradict the church since they did not have the Bible to back up their claim.   The problem with our modern day churches is the fact that they are lazy. If we go to a book store or online; we can find hundreds of different Bible...

Prayer assumes the sovereignty of God. If God is not sovereign, we have no assurance that He is able to answer our prayers. Our prayers would become nothing more than wishes. But while God's sovereignty, along with his wisdom and love, is the foundation of our trust in Him, prayer is the expression of that trust. - Jerry Bridges This all starts on the Sunday before I go to UAB's Callahan Eye Hospital. Jeremy, a volunteer with New Creation Ministries, called me to tell me that 4 couples came up to him after church to tell him that they wanted to help with a motel in Carrollton. To give you a little background, we have been praying for God open up as many motel missions as possible within the Drug Triangle (Chattanooga, Birmingham, and Atlanta). We have praying for us to get into Carrollton for the better part of two years. We have actually been turned down by three other motels. Our model is to train churches to adopt a motel in their area. A person is more likely to visit a chu...

 It's Tuesday night, and Naomi and I are trying to attempt to go to sleep, but also discuss to ridiculous doctor's appointment from earlier in the day. We tossed around the idea of getting a second opinion. Now that seems like a logical decision, but we were both so numb. Due to so many family and friends being in the Birmingham, AL area, we decided on the Callahan Eye Hospital. Now we have a problem, "How could we just cold call a major eye hospital?" Naomi texted a friend who used to work there, and they recommended Dr. Mason. She immediately called that night (about 11 p.m.). The answering service said, "Mam, it is late. You will need to call back tomorrow." Naomi left for Birmingham first thing in the morning to sit with my dad, who is recovering from lymphoma cancer. Naomi called me while she was still traveling, and said she has me an appointment for tomorrow at 10:30.  At first, I thought she was kidding, because no one just cold calls the Callahan Ey...

 I am sorry that I have not blogged over the last few days. I didn't take my computer with me to visit the doctor at the Callaham Eye Hospital. So much has happened, and it will take several blogs to catch everyone up to date. On Tuesday, we sat in Dr. Debbie Downer's office. When she told me that there was a 20% chance, I was concerned about the things I would miss. More specifically, I didn't want to miss having the honor of walking my daughters down the aisle at their wedding. This really tore me up.  When we talked with Justus and Lydia, later that day, I looked across the room. All I saw was a young lady that I wanted to give her over to her future Godly husband. I began to tear up.  I never questioned God's goodness. With my humanity taking over, I wanted something that God never promises in His Word. I realize that I have mentioned before in a previous blog, but the first question in the Westminster Shorter Catechism is "What is the chief end of man? The chi...

More often than not, Americans call a successful person as having a good job, a home, a couple cars, and maybe some pets. The problem is that I can't find the "American Dream" in God's Word. If I can't find the American Dream in the Bible, then what should I strive for and expect? Yesterday was a little bit frustrating. It is kind of hard to explain how how it felt. I never doubted God's goodness, grace, mercy, and love. To be really raw and honest, I felt every emotion that I knew was possible. I experienced my humanity, while also experiencing God's peace and hope.  1 Peter 1:15-16 " but  as he who called you is holy, you also be holy  in all your conduct,  since it is written,  “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” This following quote by J.C. Ryle helps us understand what holiness is. " Holiness is the habit of being of one mind with God, according as we find His mind described in Scripture. It is the habit of agreeing in God's judgment, h...

This blog is a little different, because I am still processing and educating myself. In the meantime, this is where I am. I am reminded of how God used the death of Nate Saint and Jim Elliott to help open the eyes of the Auca tribe in Ecuador. God's plan is perfect. I am only called to serve with everything I have for as long as I can. Today, I found out that I have melanoma in my right eye (There is a specific name for it, but I don't feel like going upstairs to get the paper). There is treatment for it, but it seems really rough. There is also a 20% chance that it could show up somewhere else in my body over the next 5 years. We were told that there is no treatment if that happens. On the way home I told Naomi that this is really testing my faith. As a body Christ, we read books, read the Bible, go to church, and watch movies that help us in our Christian walk. Knowledge is simply knowledge until it is put into action. That is where I think I am. We know what we should do, bu...

Through the years, I would like to think that I have grown in my knowledge of the Bible and God. I grew up in a culture that focused a little more time on being moral. I am in no way implying that this culture was not a Christian culture. It was indeed. At least in my case, what I understood was that if I was good that meant that I was a Christian. If someone wasn't a believer, but they were a good moral person, then they had a ton of potential. Potential, that is a funny word. Growing up hearing from several different people that I was not smart or that I would never graduate from high school, the word potential came with a bitter flavor. Hearing different "Christian" people call me stupid and stuff made me hate God. The people that said those things were supposed to love and protect me. Why would I love something that should have been discarded? I hated everything about God, and everything that represented God. I was blind. I was God's enemy. There was nothing about...

Growing up, I remember having some family devotion time. It was usually sporadic. Sometimes, we would do it at night, and sometimes we would do it early in the morning before school. Often times, family devotion time was non-existent. I want to lay out three problem areas in the modern church culture that is negatively impacting our homes. First, our church culture has embraced a non-influential and wimpy savior. This modern day savior has come to keep us out of hell, but doesn't require us to change our lives to become more like him. With this mindset, church attendance becomes a morally good thing to do, but not necessarily a spiritually desirable thing to commit to. The repercussions of this spiritual segregation is dramatic. Essentially, our culture leaves most of the spiritual training to the church, not inside the home. I have heard so many people tell me this, "Yes, I know I need to get my kids in church. They need to hear about Jesus." The problem with this mindse...

 During this time of waiting on my doctor's appointment at Emory Hospital, I have had a ton of time to reflect what, why, and how's of life. Why do I do the things that I do? Why do I do those things? How do I put all of those things into action? During this part two of Insanity of Discipleship, I am going to take another look at family, but from another angle. It is easy to disciple your children if they love the same things that you do. It is easy to disciple a child in the fundamentals of soccer if you love soccer (which I do love soccer). It is easy to disciple a child in the truths of God's Word if they are an obedient child of God. They should be convicted of sin. They should want to read their Bible, and grow in their knowledge of Him. They should want to go to church, and grow alongside other believers. As most normal intelligent people would agree that it is much easier trying to raise a Christian family if your whole family has been saved by God's grace. But, ...

Often times as parents, we understand that we need to "train up a child." However, we may not really know what that looks like. Are we training them correctly, or too much? Should we just use the Bible, or use another resource? This may seem like hard questions to answer. God's Word never returns void. Using a devotional, Bible, etc. is better than choosing to not have family devotions at all. It can be tempting to use family devotion time to address specific things that are currently happening in your home. For example: a child may not be obeying when you tell them to clean their room. Therefore, we need to them what obedience is. You gather the family together to make an announcement. "Hear ye, hear ye, God has lead me to teach on obedience for the next month." Even though that child may need to study obedience, it will make them hate family devotion time. We can't force revival to occur in our family. The consistent teaching of the deep truths of the God...