Today I had the immense privilege of opening our local Canada Day celebrations in prayer. If you missed it or are just plain curious, here it is:
Category: Ministry
Who Is Discipling You?
I read a tweet tonight that was a few days old. (I’ve been “offline” for a number of days and am trying to catch up.) The Tweeter asked, “Who are you discipling? Who is discipling you? Blogs and vids don’t count. Imagine if the Amer[ican] dream was to disciple and be discipled.” While I understand the writer’s point, I would argue that blogs, tweets and videos are actually huge influencers when it comes to discipleship in our lives.
Worship Followers
I watched a movie this afternoon about a small military unit trapped under enemy fire. When the officer in charge refused to follow the advice of a subordinate, she soon found herself in the middle of a mutiny. While she regained control of the unit, it wasn’t until after she was wounded, and her most trusted man joined ranks with the mutineers.
Afterwards I was going about my own business, getting ready for work, when my mind started to think about church and other matters floating through my head. (You don’t want to look in there, trust me.) I think that because I’ve been thinking about my next worship leading schedule, my thoughts were suddenly stuck on the worship track. This phrase came to mind, and I think it is something to think about for churches who have more than one worship leader on their teams.
Cheer `Em On
Isn’t it amazing how, regardless of the location, you rarely find empty seats in an Olympic venue? Here we are, a few days into the 2010 Games, and I can’t help but think of some implications the place we make for the Olympic Games versus some of the other elements of life.
Maybe it’s because football season is over, but do you take notice of the efforts spectators make to cheer on the representatives of their own countries? Thankfully we don’t see much of the shirtless, painted face variety that NFL stadiums attract. We do, however, see country colors, flags, and “official” Olympic gear. We hear chantings, screams of joy, and cow bells. We cheer on our favorite individuals and teams, and at times, we cheer on the other guys, too.
Because of “stuff” going on, I am reminded of a scene from a number of years ago. It holds a special place in my heart. It reminds us that sometimes the cheering of the “crowd” can motivate, encourage and breathe life into those in our church who often go unsung.
Searching for One’s Self – 4
This should be my last post on the topic of searching for one’s self. Of course, in relation to all of the self-help books, recordings, and seminars, and what seems to me as the obvious struggle to discover who we are and what we’re supposed to be doing, these posts are really just a drop in the bucket. (And you never know when it’ll resurface here.)
Think back to the post 2, where we talked about three traps that we fall into when it comes discovering and becoming who we are meant to be. We talked about how we get stuck by, (1) what we think we should be on account of the input we are constantly receiving, (3) what others think we should be, and (3) what we want others to think about us, true or not.
There’s one other perspective that we haven’t talked about yet that may have come to mind when you read this list. It’s the topic of this post, and you might be surprised by what gets unpacked here.
Searching for One’s Self – 3
I was convinced that just two posts would take care of the thoughts I had when it comes to searching for one’s self, but as I prepared to close that second post, a thought came to mind. Many of us have read in Scripture and heard from the pulpit that when we come to believe in Jesus, we live from that point forward “in Christ.”
There are many promises to the believer, being in Christ. I once taught a six-week study on some of them. But I think that we have to be careful when we talk about being in Christ. If we were to take the spiritual word picture literally, to where we would clothe ourselves in Jesus Christ, would it be a one-size-fits-all situation? Let’s take a moment and talk about that.
Chris MacKinnon 