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there was just something about showing up for our weekly “big show” that made me really happy yesterday…
years ago, i used to show up on sundays ready to run a program. now i show up excited to see friends.
i used to show up on sundays tired, empty, or anxious. i was afraid people would be disappointed in me. i felt guilty for not doing enough. i didn’t want to see people because i was sure i had let them down. now i can’t wait to be with people that are my family.
church is people. people gather together to worship…to study…to give…to serve…to sing…to pray…to be encouraged…to honor christ and affirm our common belief. but make no mistake…church is about sharing life together with the people we are living out our faith with.
i love showing up on sundays!
the bon voyage pictures were great.
the bon voyage cake was great.
have i ever told you that i think we ought to have donuts every sunday? i still believe that, but cake is a good second.
i actually shamed people in the first service into moving into the center section. and then more people showed up and sat in the seats they moved from. it didn’t go unnoticed.
if we sing a song that repeats the line, “we lift our holy hands up, we want to touch you”, and nobody lifts their hands, what should we do? just asking…
i can remember singing “i love you lord” back in the late 70’s. we owe an unlimited amount of gratitude to a church in costa mesa, california called calvary chapel, for taking amazing risks musically and even more risks of obedience to reach the hippies and street people of that era that the traditional church was afraid of and rejecting. here’s a book on the history of calvary chapel you ought to read. you’ll be inspired!
we could sing “the remedy” every week and i wouldn’t get tired of it.
can’t wait for next week, to hear how the band does “screen door”. they will do rich mullins proud!
i felt particularly bold in my preaching yesterday. i love preaching about the grace of god. i love preaching about righteousness being credited to us through the sustitutionary atonement of christ. i love preaching about our redemption from slavery to the law. but i really love preaching about how dead faith is without deeds!
i don’t think we preach about it enough.
i think we are afraid of coming across like we are a works-based, cultic kind of group. i think we’re afraid of teaching a works-based righteousness where we are guilty of trying to earn our own salvation.
baloney! i think it’s time we belly-up and start holding each other accountable to faith that works…faith that serves…faith that takes action…faith that rolls up it’s sleeves and gets dirty…and teaches people that any other kind of faith is dead. period.
props to nina for giving me such an awesome illustration of the clothing police at ciy.
man, i love what happens at the end of our services! i’m pretty sure if i didn’t kick people out, they wouldn’t leave.
it was a great father’s day! not sure there is a better place to celebrate the ultimate “man day” than rudy’s barbeque. like they say there: “i didn’t claw my way to the top of the food chain just to eat vegetables”. agreed.
here’s a video of rich mullins doing “screen door” with his band at one of his last concerts before he died. it was kind of signature thing that the band would do. rich is the one on the far right in the video. the guys that are singing with him are actually the band that stayed together after he died (they became “this train”) and did the rockabilly version of the song we heard at the beginning of my sermon.
watch this. it’s cool. and then watch a few of the other videos of rich on youtube. especially the ones from his concert in lufkin, texas. his preaching was as amazing as his singing.
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