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Preaching the Real Jesus

Wow! I've really enjoyed preparing and speaking about the seven miraculous signs of Jesus that the apostle John recorded in his gospel. Our Sunday school image of Jesus always gets challenged by a fresh reading and study of Him in the gospels. He always seems so much more dangerous and controversial when we just read the text without watering it down as a "Bible story."

Something else I've noticed these past seven Sundays is how much more effective the gospel is at penetrating human hearts when we don't try to oversimplify it or explain away the difficult parts. One attender indicated that it was the understanding from the sign where Jesus walked on the water that really moved him.

The attender wrote, "That Jesus would send his disciples into a storm and then wait until the 4th watch to go out to them really spoke to me. I think this is a better explanation of reality than the stuff of Christianity lite usually being preached. This kind of faith isn't so self serving and syrupy. It requires more of me and I think now I must respond."

Several people have come to faith in Jesus during this series. Some of them self admitted atheists and agnostics. Others have found their faith challenged.

That's what the real Jesus does. He challenges our view of reality. He makes us choose.

I'm thankful that many chose to follow Him in these last seven weeks!

Thanks for the great evening C3!

It's great having ministry friends!

And Pastor Matt Fry, lead pastor at Cleveland Community Church (C3), is one of our friends. Last night he and his wife Martha, invited me and a small groups of lead pastors to a private dinner with the main speaker, Pastor Dino Rizzo, before their annual C3 Leadership Conference.

Pastor Dino is the lead pastor at Healing Place Church in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. His church was recently recognized by President Bush for its work among the hurricane Katrina victims. They have a great ministry built on serving others in their community. They have a huge ministry, but listening to Pastor Dino talk, they sound a lot like WCC in many ways.

Thanks Matt and C3 for the dinner and the great leadership conference! And thanks Dino for the great teaching!

Link to C3 Church

Link to Healing Place Church

I've always wanted to take Robin to Hawaii...

... But it always seemed too expensive on a church planter's salary.

But guess what? Robin and I are going to Hawaii in September!!!

God really takes care of us when we put Him first. Sometimes, He even provides the dreams that we don't consider all that important when we just stay focused on doing His work first. I think that's what happened this time.

This blessing really started a little over two years ago when I was nominated to be part of a program for senior pastors called SPE - Sustaining Pastoral Excellence. This is a three year program funded by a Lilly endowment grant to the Lake Hickory Learning Communities that is designed to take senior pastors who have demonstated excellence in ministry to higher levels of excellence. As a part of this opportunity I received a mini-grant that could be used for personal learning. I've used this grant to attend several great learning experiences.  And this September I'm using the last of the mini-grant to attend a Leadership Practicum with Pastor Wayne Cordeiro.

Dr. Wayne Cordeiro is Senior Pastor of New Hope Christian Fellowship O'ahu, a Foursquare church in Honolulu, Hawaii. New Hope began on September 10, 1995 and is one of the fastest growing churches in the nation. Over the last 12 years there have been 31,000 who have received Christ for the first time and the church has grown to over 12,000 weekend attendees. Eighty-three churches have been pioneered under New Hope's church-planting ministry outreach.

Outreach magazine has listed New Hope O'ahu as one of the top most 25 influential churches in America and one of the top ten most innovative.

I've been accepted to attend Pastor Wayne's week long leadership practicum on Team Building. This is a unique opportunity because Pastor Wayne only invites a few senior pastors each year and he uses a "shadowing" approach to teaching, where the conference attendees follow him on all of his regular duties.

Apparently, this includes being on the beach every morning at 6:00 A.M. for exercise and team  building activities. I even had to sign a health waiver and verify that I was a good swimmer before  being accepted. Pastor Wayne likes to use paddling outrigger canoes to develop team spirit.

Can you hear the "Hawaii Five 0" music playing in the background?

Link to SPE

Link to Pastor Wayne's Church