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During our Urban Immersion time in a couple of weeks, we’ll be having a time of worship and prayer.   I wrote this prayer to help us prepare and I thought it might help others of you prepare for your own times of prayer.

Heavenly Father, you are gracious beyond our understanding.  Thank you for this time that we have to meditate on you, help us to see you clearly.  Lord, would you empty our minds of distraction?  Will you open our spiritual eyes and ears so that we may see and hear you clearly?  Will you calm our pride, our…

Jesus is an amazing figure if you believe Him to be fully God and fully man.  It’s a paradox and simply won’t be contained by the most eloquent of our dissertations or argumentations because it defies logic.

To get an idea of what he must have been like, we could look at someone like Peter who was with him a lot.  I can only imagine him in a state of panic when Jesus from his sleep awakens to terminate the storm on command and in Power.  How with His Power Peter was able to step out on the water, and the…

In my New Testament Survey class I have a few interactions with my “teaching fellow” that I must do.  Already they’ve been the subject of a couple of posts.  This last one was interesting, so I will reproduce it in its entirety.

“I’d like you to integrate this course (NT501) with your future ministry goals.  For example, is there anyone you look to in the NT as a role model for the kind of people-focused ministry you are interested in?  Or is there a particular passage that serves to guide your ministry desires?  Take this in any direction you wish,…

I was having a conversation about some kids at church singing songs to God.  Most likely, the kids had very little idea what they were singing, but boy, were they having a ball!   “How cute!  Even though they don’t really get it, they still enjoy it.”  We were both very glad.

Now at church, we saw a lot of people singing.  While they understood what they were saying, there was the feeling that they did not really enjoy it.  Or, that if they did, it was for the wrong reasons.  Perhaps they just like to hear their own voice and so on.

Are we…

As I was thinking about dreaming great dreams, a friend of mine asked what the difference was between health and wealth and great dreams.  I thought that was truly a great question.  While I believe on an emotional level the difference is clear, on a logical level they are indeed similar.  They both ask God with expectation, and wait for God to deliver.  Indeed, there have been a number of people I have counselled, who could not tell the difference between great dreams and a warped gospel.  This led to them being ever disappointed by God not pulling through when they were…

In my time with God I’ve been praying through Good to Great by Chip Ingram.  This isn’t the classic by Jim Collins, but a sort of Christian version of the same thing.  On a chapter I read recently Chip Ingram talks about having God sized dreams, not little me sized dreams, but the big ones.  The ones I dare not admit because they sound audacious and arrogant.  Why wouldn’t God be able to do those?

Well, he can!  I imagine being able to grow a ministry that is consumed with the Glory of God!  Where every believer is unconcerned about their own…

There is so much wrong with my body!

It should be obvious, but thanks to my own sin, and perhaps that of Adam as well… I’m dying. I don’t like it, and I wish it would go away. But there’s no denying that my life is limited and death will claim me. Luckily I know I’m going to heaven!

God promises…

However, God points out that someday I will be like Christ! I will have a new body. One that is not all messed up. I don’t think it will be perfect in my way of thinking… Christ still had the…

Satisfiers:
Achievement - We need to show people we recruit that we are making forward process. The assignments we give when we delegate must have a definitive end and must accomplish something tangible. To help people be satisfied with their job we must recognize everything that’s been accomplished regularly. This will help us move forward one job at a time, and help us feel like we are making tangible progress.
Recognition - When we recruit we should recognize those who are doing a good job by saying why we are proud of them, this will set a standard which we can recognize…