Here are my predictions:
The words “Tom Brady” will be spoken over 150 times.
Those words will be followed by “might be the greatest QB of all time” at least 10 times.
You will hear “undefeated” enough times to make your stomach turn.
You will hear “the greatest” enough times to make you seriously nauseous.
Terry Bradshaw will cause you to begin vomiting uncontrollably.
… and Eli will choke. Patriots 34 Giants 24
// Sunday, February 3, 2008 // 10:08 AM // Shocco Springs Retreat Center //
Sitting here again this morning in the retreat center, it’s really quiet with nobody in here. Which is an even more striking contrast to last night, where the place was going nuts. The students were jumping so hard it was bending the floor, which made me a little nervous. And more than a little bit nauseous. I felt like I was worshipping on a trampoline—made out of plywood and concrete. I definitely had visions in my head of us busting through the floor.
We’ve got one more session here and then we’re headed back home. This group is awesome though, and I think the biggest reason for it comes from their leadership. It’s just obvious that these people love their students and have a huge heart for seeing them worship Jesus. That’s so infectious, and so encouraging. I love seeing the people in the tech booth in the back going for it harder than anybody in the room, leading the way. All that to say, it’s been a great weekend.
And on the home front… We picked up our new dog “Miles” on Thursday, and returned him on Saturday. It’s a long story…
// Saturday, February 2nd // 10:35 AM // Shocco Springs Retreat Center //
Spending some time this weekend with the group from Auburn First United Methodist Church here in Alabama, and it’s been awesome so far. I was telling Steve, the guy that’s leading this retreat, that a lot of times you hear people tell you “Our students love to worship,” but it’s not true. This weekend, with these students, it’s definitely true.
The band’s showing up so I need to get back to rehearsing and getting ready for this morning, but I’m looking forward to it.
…We had skateboarders outside our room last night, kept us all up. I just found out that Ben put an end to it finally by dumping a trash can full of water on them. That makes me happy. They won’t do it again.
// Thursday, January 31, 2008 // 10:03 AM // Kitchen Table //
I don’t know what’s going to happen with the dog. We’ll see. We’re supposed to go look at him today, which probably means we’ll walk away with another dog. Good Lord, what are we doing?
…so back to what I was in the middle of yesterday…
Ok, so discipleship seems to be a function of the church that you can’t do on your own. It’s got to be modeled, and not necessarily programmed. I don’t think Timothy necessarily rolled up to the Corinthian church with a new discipleship “program” with a flashy logo and alliterated tag line. But that’s for another time.
Keep going in I Corinthians and he starts talking about instructions for worship, corporate worship in the church. First, instructions on corporate prayer, communion, the gifts and ministry of Holy Spirit, love (interesting that he takes a break to say that love is more important than all of these gifts we fight over so much… love it), the message of the gospel (what is the right gospel to preach/adhere to), and giving for the needs of others.
How many of these things can even the most spiritually mature believer do by him or herself? Corporate prayer—no. Communion—somewhat, but not as it was intended (I Cor 11:33 “when you come together”). Gifts/ministry of Holy Spirit—not really, it’s interesting but most of the gifts Paul mentions here are meant to be expressed to others. Love—you can definitely do this alone, but the collective love of the church is a powerful experience I’d hate to miss in life. The message of the gospel—yeah, ok, don’t know what to do with that one. Giving for the needs of others—absolutely, you can do this on your own, but again in this context Paul seems to be alluding to a corporate act combining the sacrifice of its individual members. If you’ve ever seen something like that in action, when we all give towards the needs of another as a church, you know it’s one of the most powerful things we can do and experience.
So I understand where Hybels is coming from. We need to develop spiritually mature Christians that can fend for themselves in the world. But at the same time, we need to provide in the church a place where those independently mature believers can get together and pray, worship, minister, love, and give. An atmosphere where that is happening regularly is what I long for. It’s what I’m praying for today.
So my wife is freaking out about a dog she found online last night. And it’s a pretty cool dog. We’ve been thinking about getting a new friend for Ella to play with. I don’t know if it’s smart, but he’s pretty dang cute. Check him out.
// Wednesday, January 30, 2008 // 10:37 AM // Kitchen Table //
My dog is doing laps around the couch now, it’s pretty awesome. And when she realizes I’m watching her, she slows down and just starts walking in circles, very nonchalant, like people do when you catch them singing in their car. My dog is awesome.
And I’m listening to some amazing music on myspace, I’ve listened to these songs about 100 times and still love them. Check it out… Savio
So yesterday I wrote a little about the research Bill Hybels has just released regarding the lack of effectiveness of Willow Creek at maintaining spiritual maturity in their members. First of all, I have to hand it to the guy, it takes some guts to stand up and say “we really screwed this up,” I can’t imagine how hard that is, especially when it’s something you’ve literally poured your whole life into. It’s those moments where a verse like I Corinthians 3:7 is really encouraging, talking about the church… “So neither he who plants or he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.” At the end of the day, the church is His, and as much as we may screw things up, He’s still somehow the one in control.
Last night, while I was walking my aforementioned dog, I had a thought about the Hybels talk. His response to the findings was something like, “At a certain point in people’s spiritual formation, we need to train them to feed themselves.” At first, that makes complete sense, it’s not that hard to understand. There’s always been something about the common church complaint “I’m just not getting fed” that bugs me. It seems dangerously commercial and selfish—this church exists to feed me, and it’s not doing that, so I’ll find one that does. I know that’s not what some people mean by it, believe me, I’ve said it several times myself.
But then, walking through the neighborhood, something hit me. Yes, we need to build self-sufficient Christians. But aren’t there some things that the church is mandated to do that we simply can’t do alone? We can read Scripture, and Holy Spirit will help us to interpret it correctly. We can evangelize on our own, even if we’re the only believer we know. We can worship and pray in secret, as we should. But there are some things we can’t do on our own.
The first that came to mind is corporate worship. Try as you might, you can’t equip believers to the point that they can experience corporate worship on their own. It’s a function of the church, and one of the most incredible privileges of the church. So that set me thinking—what else is out there that we can’t do on our own?
And then I Corinthians jumped up. This book is written specifically to a church who has already gotten things very wrong. People were drawn to Jesus, but from that point on things were going astray. So, instead of spending hours digging into the book (which I need to do), I just skimmed through it, looking for the main points that Paul is pointing out. What are they, and how do they relate to this idea?
First, after begging the church to maintain unity, Paul launches into a big discussion of what is moral and what is not. He addresses sexual immorality, greed/pride in the public sphere, God’s standard for marriage, what to do with food that has been sacrificed to idols. All of these seem to be somewhat clear cut, things we can learn on our own and hopefully adhere to as growing Christians. So what’s the reason behind I Corinthians 4:14-17?
“I am not writing this to shame you, but to warn you, as my dear children. Even though you have ten thousand guardians in Christ, you do not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. Therefore I urge you to imitate me. For this reason I am sending to you Timothy, my son whom I love, who is faithful in the Lord. He will remind you of my way of life in Christ Jesus, which agrees with what I teach everywhere in the church.”
So, even though his instructions were as clear as he could make them, he still needed to send them an example. Someone to live out faith and express for the entire church what to be striving for. So even Paul understood that he could instill rules into the church, but at some point people need discipleship. And you can’t be discipled by yourself. It’s a function of the church.
//I’ll continue this tomorrow, it’s gotten way too long. Sorry.//
So after a lot of hard work, the record is finally done. And we’re hosting a big party to celebrate. So put it on your calendar and come hang out with us… Andrews Upstairs, February 19th. All the details are below, and stay tuned here for more information.
To listen to some clips from the record, visit my myspace page. To purchase a copy of the record, you can do that here.
Hosted By: Eddie Kirkland
When: Tuesday Feb 19, 2008
at 8:00 PM
Where: Andrews Upstairs
56 East Andrews Drive
Atlanta, GA 30305
United States
Description:
Eddie Kirkland
I’ve been thinking a lot about the church lately, what it means to be a church and what God originally intended the church to be.
I think a lot of this stemmed from a conversation I had the other day with some friends regarding their church in another town. I’ve heard reports from this church before, but this time my wife and I were both really enthralled by what this church is doing. To tell the story very briefly, the church was started by very wealthy individuals, but when they decided the location to meet they specifically chose the City Rescue Mission, where the poorest and most downtrodden people of the city live and are being rehabilitated. Because of this, the church is filled with very rich influential believers sitting beside addicts and prostitutes. And everyone is accepted, regardless of race or economic status, in the same group of believers that minister together and cry out to God for each other in prayer. It was really encouraging to hear that a place like this exists and is going strong.
So it just got me thinking about what it really means to be a church. As best I can tell, it seems like the main purposes of the church are to Worship (ministry to God), to Disciple (ministry to believers), and to Love (ministry to the world/justice/evangelism/mercy). I know there are more books than I could even comprehend written on this subject, so this is definitely nothing new. But it definitely makes me wonder if there’s ever been a church that balances all three of these well. It seems like somehow because of our fallen-ness we can never quite get it all in balance for more than a brief period of time. But it’s worth trying…
No profound insight today… just some rambling thoughts going in my head.
And also, check this out if you get some time. I heard about this the other day and was really intrigued. It’s Bill Hybels, discussing the discouraging results he received from a large scale study of the spiritual maturity and growth of his church members. It’s really interesting, and again just points to the fact that as good as we’re doing, we’re still falling way short of the goal of bringing the Kingdom of God on earth.
This post won’t be nearly as long or boring as yesterday’s, I promise. My wife got home last night and I asked if she had read the blog post, she just responded that it was “really long.” I’ll take the hint…
So, today for some reason I started looking into some writing by Tim Keller, a prominent pastor in New York City. I’ve never really heard his name come up much, but lately I’ve heard it a lot. In fact, Jonathan Bostic was talking about him the other day and it made me want to look up some information on God and the city.
Evidently, Keller is a huge voice for this idea that God has a heart for the cities of the world, and that Christians should be involved in shaping culture by investing in these places. I thought that sounded interesting, so I started googling him and found a bunch of stuff. If you have time, read through this one, for instance:
A Biblical Theology Of The City
It’s really fascinating stuff, the idea that God created man in the Garden of Eden, and that since the fall He’s been moving us continually toward Revelation’s new city, the new Jerusalem. Interesting, and I still don’t think it’s totally sunk in for me. I need to spend some more time on that.
But the thought that really caught my eye was a passage in Jeremiah 29 that he referenced. Jeremiah 29:11 has always been a verse I know and love (I’m singing the song in my head now…), but I’ve never heard this part of the chapter or what it’s really about. When Voddie Baucham was at our church he talked about Jeremiah 29:11 being a “multi-generational” promise. When God said “I know the plans I have for you…” he was talking to a generation that would never see those plans really come to fruition (see verse 10… seventy years would pass until the promise came true). So the promise isn’t just for us, selfishly, it’s a promise of good and hope that we are to pass down to our children and the generations after us.
Then, Keller pointed to verse 7, and it really jumped out at me. “Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because it prospers, you too will prosper.” I’ve never really seen such a direct command to involve myself in the city where I live, it’s a pretty down-to-earth bit of theology.
So that’s it, that’s what I’m stewing on now. What does it mean to “seek the peace and prosperity” of the city in which I live? How can I help this city prosper, and how will that affect the world and the way it views Jesus?
Starting to blog?….
My wife has been telling me for a while that I should start blogging some of the things that are on my brain, the things God is teaching me through scripture and just through life in general. She says it might help people know me better, but I think she’s just tired of me brain dumping on her when she gets home from a long day at work. At least this way she can check the blog, read through what I’m thinking about, and brace herself for the long discussion that awaits her. There will definitely be rewards for her in heaven for listening to my ramblings, I know it’s tough to endure a discussion on the fascinating details of the Panama Canal or why this word is in the verse instead of another one. If you’re reading this honey, I love you, and I hope this will help prepare you for when you get home today!
All that to say, I’m not sure if anyone will listen to these ramblings, but it’s a good thing for me to write them down. It’s partly motivating for me, I love to write and it’s something I haven’t done in quite a while. I really enjoy exploring thoughts and seeing where they lead, then finding a way to express them on paper that is somewhat concise and understandable. Being concise isn’t my gift, though, I have to warn you. So, here goes nothing, guess you have to start somewhere.
Today, the thing I’m thinking about is a decision that I’ve got to make in the coming weeks and months. It’s one of the decisions that should be weighing on me constantly, but instead I kind of let it sit in the back of my mind and forget about it. This is typically how I deal with very important decisions, and it typically doesn’t bode very well for me in the end. I end up becoming extremely anxious and have trouble sleeping, all that stuff, because I’ve put off thinking about it. And I put off thinking about it because it’s uncomfortable to think about, it’s easier just to think that the decision will take care of itself and I’ll wake up one day saying, “Well God, thanks for making that decision for us, I don’t know that you could have made it any clearer which way you want us to go!” Sometimes, this does happen. Sometimes, God has changed the circumstances of life to the point where the decision is almost irrelevant, where I’d be an absolute fool not to see what the right answer is. But this definitely doesn’t happen every time, and when it doesn’t, it’s when I start to slip into the dangerous cycle of procrastination and anxiety.
So today, prompted by my wife (who would much rather tackle decisions early and be done with them), I decided to try and find a place in scripture where someone made a tough decision and see how the decision was made. Through snooping around on biblegateway, I came across Acts 20, where Paul was expressing his desire to move on to Jerusalem, despite the advice of others and the circumstances that he knew awaited him there. The phrase that jumped out to me was verse 22, where he said “compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem.” “Compelled” is an interesting word, not something I say every day. It caught my curiosity, so I started digging deeper into that word.
I know just enough Greek to be dangerous, so please correct me if my interpretation of this word is completely wrong. I wouldn’t be surprised. But as I started digging into this word, “dedemenos”, I realized that its true meaning is “I have been bound.” It is a passive participle, meaning that Paul is not the one doing the binding, but it is being done to him by the Spirit. And the verb “deo”, which this word comes from, literally means “to bind” as in the bindings used when Jesus was wrapped in “swaddling clothes.” It’s a somewhat literal image of being tied to something tightly.
At first, this made no sense to me. Well, it made sense, but it just didn’t really mean anything. So what? You’ve been bound to the Spirit, and you’ve got to make this decision. That seems somewhat like a copout, like the old “God told me to break up with you” excuse to dump your girlfriend. And that would be exactly the outcome of this expression if Paul was opting for the easy way out. But he’s not. Instead, he’s heading straight for his own death and destruction, “bound by the Holy Spirit.” Thinking of it that way, it seems a bit Sadistic, doesn’t it?
But then, there’s freedom hidden in this word as well. And it’s the fact that we’re not the ones that have to make the ultimate decision. Paul isn’t bound by his own intellect to go to Jerusalem. In fact, if he were left to his own devices to make the choice he might find himself putting off the decision until the last minute and then sweating out long nights praying desperately for God to help him understand what was best. But instead, it’s obviously the work of the Spirit making the decision, and in a way he’s just along for the ride. Sure, he has to consciously make the choice to follow the Spirit, which he does every day, but he’s not making the grueling decision to go to Jerusalem, he’s following the lead of the Spirit, which has done the hard work of the decision for him.
This seems really elementary because it is. It’s nothing profound, but it’s helping free me right now from anxiety, knowing that I can just rely on the Spirit to make the decision as long as I keep seeking Him and trying to discern what decision He’s making.
It also brings up two other questions, though, which I’ll need to explore more later…
1. How do I know this is a good thing? It seems somewhat imprisoning and like a loss of the will… how do I know this is what is best?
2. How in the world do I know what the Spirit is deciding? Once I’ve heard the Spirit, the following should come naturally, but how do I figure out what He’s saying?
So that’s what’s on my mind this morning. I’m sure there will be more to come…
