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If everywhere you go you have a problem with other people. Guess what: You are the problem. It’s called brokenness. God sends (or has sent) you people to love you, speak truth to you, fellowship with you, and help lead you towards wholeness. You’ve pushed them away. You’ve offended them. You’ve convinced yourself that you are right and they are wrong. You’ve believed the lie that you are unloved by them, by God. Anything but admitting that you might be flawed, that you might be broken.

The prideful selfish heart of man may be our greatest downfall. We all fight it. None are exempt (especially me!). It was a primary side effect of the Fall of Man way back in the beginning. The difference is that some revolt against it, want no part of it, and beg God to replace their prideful selfish hearts with loving hearts concerned more with others than themselves. It is only then that we have the capacity to become whole people, no longer leaving others hurt in our prideful wake.

Nothing breaks my heart more so than when I observe the effect of this type of hurt. Especially within the Church. No one wins. One person sinks deeper into depravity. Another person gets their heart and spirit wrecked by brokenness. The Church becomes less healthy, and thus less appealing to those who need her most. There has to be a better way…

Tonight marked the third straight Christmas season that we have taken the student ministry from Journey Church to what has become a very special place for myself, our adult volunteers, and our students. The place is Brookside Extended Care in Mason, Ohio. Brookside is an AMAZING long term care and learning center for the severely mentally and/or physically handicapped. Many of the residents at Brookside are teenagers or young children… all of them are wheelchair bound, and only a couple can audibly communicate.

For the third year in a row the group of teenagers that we brought to Brookside absolutely blew me away. Here are a bunch of cookie cutter suburban teenagers walking into a room full of kids, teens, and adults in wheelchairs, and unable to physically function at a high level… I can’t imagine the mindset of our teens walking into that moment. Each time we’ve gone, our students have stepped out of their comfort zone, and into the lives that they can hardly imagine. They color with (for) the residents, they make crafts to hang in their rooms and on their wheelchairs, they talk to them, they joke about cute boys and pretty girls, they talk about sports and TV shows, most of the time with the only response being a moan, or a stare from a drooped head. It’s sobering to witness and participate in.

Tonight when we left, on the drive back to the high school, I asked my car full of junior high boys what they thought of the experience, and if it reminded them of anything from Scripture. Here are some responses:

• It was really cool for us to visit them since they don’t get many visitors.
• It’s hard to believe that’s how/where they live their lives everyday.
• It’s tough to think about the fact that they are just teenagers like us.
• On Scripture: It reminded each of them about the stories they had heard about the lepers. Specifically how in our society, we often outcast the handicapped, and avoid them when we encounter them in public.

The most amazing thing about our trips to Brookside is how each time we intend on “blessing” those residents, and each time we leave feeling so much more “blessed” by them. (I put those words in quotes because I’m not even sure what that means… it’s a churchy way of saying that we feel fuzzy inside I think.) Our teams from Journey Church that go to Guatemala each year end up telling a similar story. We go to show love to those people, and end up feeling as much or even more love in return.

What’s up with that? I think the answer lies somewhere in Jesus’ words at the end of Matthew 25. When we serve the “least of these”… we are serving Jesus Himself. Jesus is pleased when we serve the downtrodden, the forgotten, the handicapped, the unloved, the ostracized, etc… When we do this, we make Jesus happy, and we make our own hearts happy… it “blesses” us. It makes me wonder whey we don’t do it more often…

I had a really engaging small group discussion with some of the high school students in Journey Church’s student ministry last night. We talked about a variety of subjects, and the conversation got pretty deep. Questions were asked by me that were over their heads, and questions were asked by them that were over my head! Good stuff! Probably one of the highlights of my year.

Ultimately the conversation centered around the question why. More specifically, how would we answer questions like these:

• Why do you love God?
• Why do you go to church?
• Why do you even do this “Christianity” thing?
• Essentially this: What’s the point of God/Church/Christianity?

I have a great fear that there are thousands of people sitting in Christian churches each Sunday, who have been in the pew for a long time, but have no clue how to answer these questions. I’m not suggesting that there is ONE right answer, but I think there are some key principles and ideas that people simply fail to understand, or lack the ability to communicate about.

So… how about you? Why?

Yep… I bought some new shoes. Ten pairs of shoes actually. I have no idea what they look like. I doubt they’d actually fit my feet. But that’s all okay… they aren’t for me. They are for a child somewhere that I will never meet. I bought 10 pairs of shoes for $25… quite a bargain if you ask me.

You too can buy some shoes. Here’s what you do. Just go over to the website for Souls4Soles and buy some shoes. It’s super easy to do, and instantly makes you a part of something bigger. If 720 more pairs of shoes are donated before December 14th, a donor will kick in an additional 500 shoes. Not to mention you can win all kinds of cool stuff like: an Amy Grant signed guitar (yea, not that cool, but come on…), a trip to Mexico (very cool), a keychain (spend $10), or some soothing foot cream (spend $25).

Go buy shoes! Oh, and if you need some motivation… watch this video… it’s the most motivational video ever created!

“Don’t Be That Couch” Closing Session

- Around the church, programming begins as an answer to a question, over time it becomes part of the organizations culture. The problem with this is that as culture changes, many of the questions remain the same, but the answers don’t. The tendency is to institutionalize our answers. If we institutionalize an answer, the day will come when it is no longer a valid answer.

- We must continue (or begin) to be more committed to our mission than to our programming or our model. Over time, sustaining the model can become the unrealized mission. Over time, the model can work against the mission.

- In the for-profit world, any product that does not have a significant market/buyers will be taken off the shelf in rapid fashion. Yet in the Church we have spent (and continue to spend) enormous amounts of time & money on programs & products that have no meaningful market.

- “If we got kicked out and the board brought in a new CEO, what would he/she do? Why shouldn’t we walk out the door, come back in, and do it ourselves?” – Andy Grove (Only the paranoid survive)

- We can not afford to fall in love with dirty old couches. The message & mission is too important to allow something to block it.

‘Creating Personal Spiritual Momentum’

- “The way I was doing the work of God was destroying the work of God in me.” – Bill Hybels (via Craig)

- The single greatest thing you can do to create momentum in your church or ministry is to bring about spiritual momentum in your personal life.

- I will do TODAY what I can do TODAY, to enable me to do TOMORROW what I can’t do TODAY!

- Four things to do today:
1) Do something to defeat your dark side (your sinful self).
2) Create artificial ministry deadlines.
3) Delegate what someone else can do.
4) Do something only you can do.

- (On delegation) You can have high control and low growth, OR you can have low control and high growth.

- Pastors who don’t take time off do so for two reasons: Pride & Poor Leadership.

- If you come to these events, and see these big churches, and think that all of this success comes from anything other that a deep burden born in the heart of a leader to see people enter into relationship with Jesus, then you are severly missing the point. (WOW)

*Craig knocked it out of the park on this talk. He closed by saying: “If you have put the success of the ministry above your relationship with God, and/or your family, then you need to repent today.”*

“Busting barriers with mindset changes.”

- The longer your ministry is stalled, the more dramatic & drastic the mindset change will need to be.

- “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” – Romans 12:2

- Think differently about these 5 things: Church culture, Programming, The Mission, People leaving the church, and Limitations.

- Think different about your church culture. What needs to change about your church culture?

- Your people will not go where they are not led.

- A church will always be a reflection of the key leader(s). Their character, heart, generosity, passions, dreams, goals, etc…

- The old school thought is that we have to do MORE to reach MORE. Maybe a better model is; We can reach more by doing LESS things, and doing them with excellence.

- “Do the thing(s) that you are uniquely called by God to do.”

- We can’t allow a good/nice/loving person to hold the church back from fulfilling the mission of the church. “You have to love the mission of your church enough to make the painful people decisions.”

- Go DO these things, and make these changes. It’s good to pray about them, and talk about them, but you MUST DO them.

Session 1 – Andy Stanley – Creating and Sustaining Momentum

- Three components of sustained momentum. New, Improved, Improving

- Negative circumstances are fertile soil for a burst of positive momentum.

- Organizational momentum is often triggered by one of three things: New Leadership, New Direction, New Product.

- If something new is not a significant improvement over the old thing, don’t impliment it. Make it significantly better, and then launch it. The bigger & better the improvement, the longer the shelf life of the momentum.

- *Side note* I am continually amazed by how Andy Stanley absolutely mesmerizes a room. It’s unbelievable. Jaws are dropped & inks pens and keyboards are flying.

- Staff & Leaders are the R&D department of the church… Evalute early and often. Unfiltered evaluation is required for improvement to happen.

- Manager types are critical & important, but there is the potential to over-manage, and thereby manage away creativity & leadership.

- “I’ll take a couple of things with momentum over several things that are decent anyday!”

- “Ask yourself; ‘What are the behaviors we like or dislike, and what are we doing systematically to either foster or eliminate those behaviors?’”.

*Awesome session… Can’t wait to take in more content. This event is a power packed 8 hours; no fluff and little break-time. I will be mentally exhausted at the end of the day.*

I am currently sitting at Granger Church near South Bend, Indiana. Tom and I are up here attending the Catalyst One Day conference. Go to www.gccwired.com and www.catalystconference.com to read more about both. I am going to do my best to do some microblogging from the WordPress iPhone application. I hope to capture some if they key principles from two of the greatest leaders (Andy Stanley & Craig Groeschel) in the church today, and pass them along to you. Enjoy, forgive the typos, and jump into the conversation in the comments.

I want to hear your thoughts on this video. What does it say to you? What does it stir inside of you? Tell me in the comments.