Big Changes and an even BIGGER GOD!!

Sunday night, May 7, 2017, was a really challenging day ministry-wise.
Below is part of an email we mailed out to some of our church family after a very important church family meeting that night.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

This is a hard email to send.  Please prayerfully read through the entire email knowing that God is sovereign!

Here is the statement I read at tonight's IMPACT service (05/07/17)

On April 14, the following Kevin DeYoung quote I posted in 2011, popped up in facebook memories section.

We can stop pleading 
with God to show us the future 
and start living and obeying like we are 
confident that He holds the future.

This is what I wanted to do 

when my internship was coming to a close in 2011

and 

it is what I desire to do today.

I am so very thankful for Emmanuel Baptist Church.  I am thankful for your investment in my wife, my children and me over these 18+ years. 

That is why it is so very difficult to share with you that Krista and I have begun looking for a new ministry.  We have loved our time here and yet we know it is time for us to move on.

We are excited and nervous about what God has next for us. 

We are prayerfully looking forward to taking what we have learned here to another church.  I would greatly appreciate your prayer as I seek to lead or join a pastoral team that would provide this opportunity.

At the end of many of my emails, I usually put Acts 20:24.  I want to read this as a reminder for you and me. 

But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, 

if only I may finish my course 

and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus,

to testify to the Gospel of the grace of God.

Acts 20:24

I want to thank all of you and I especially want to thank God for his provisions.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Here is a brief explanation of what has led to this decision. 

In October Pastor Duke shared with the pastors about Emmanuel Baptist Church’s budget deficit and the need to reduce the pastoral staff. 

At tonight’s IMPACT service, http://www.emmanuelbaptist.com/podcast/impact-evening-service-walking-in-the-light-of-love-pt-4-important-emmanuel-family-talk/, Pastor Duke shared with the congregation a plan to help with these things.  After talking with me and the other pastors, Pastor Duke shared how he had asked Pastor Shane and me to begin looking for new ministries as he believes we both could lead a ministry.  In the meeting, Pastor Duke shared a lot of details and Pastor Shane also read a letter similar to mine.  
It would be very helpful to listen to the recording of the meeting.  The business meeting part begins at the 21-minute mark. 

At the end of June, my current responsibilities, along with Pastor Shane’s, will change.  Our new roles will be advisory/transitional as we are looking for new ministries.  Emmanuel has been very generous in continuing our salary and benefits through December. 

It is my prayer that with an end date of June 30, 2017, for our current ministry at Emmanuel and by sharing that with the church now, I and my family will be able to focus on searching and preparing for a new ministry.  This decision also helps the church move forward with the plans for the future, sooner rather than later.  

Once again, we are so thankful for you and the rest of our Emmanuel family!!
We would greatly appreciate your prayers as we work through the many details of transitioning our ministry.

Added on 5/17/17:  
HERE  is Pastor Duke's blog post on the church site.

Even If...

A song that has been an encouragement during this transitional time.

They say sometimes you win some
Sometimes you lose some
And right now, right now I'm losing bad
I've stood on this stage night after night
Reminding the broken it'll be alright
But right now, oh right now I just can't

It's easy to sing
When there's nothing to bring me down
But what will I say
When I'm held to the flame
Like I am right now

I know You're able and I know You can
Save through the fire with Your mighty hand
But even if You don't
My hope is You alone

They say it only takes a little faith
To move a mountain
Well good thing
A little faith is all I have, right now
But God, when You choose
To leave mountains unmovable
Oh give me the strength to be able to sing
It is well with my soul

I know You're able and I know You can
Save through the fire with Your mighty hand
But even if You don't
My hope is You alone
I know the sorrow, and I know the hurt
Would all go away if You'd just say the word
But even if You don't
My hope is You alone

You've been faithful, You've been good
All of my days
Jesus, I will cling to You
Come what may
‘Cause I know You're able
I know You can

I know You're able and I know You can
Save through the fire with Your mighty hand
But even if You don't
My hope is You alone
I know the sorrow, I know the hurt
Would all go away if You'd just say the word
But even if You don't
My hope is You alone

It is well with my soul
It is well, it is well with my soul

Songwriters: Bart Marshall Millard / Benjamin Glover / Crystal Lewis / David Arthur Garcia / Tim Timmons

Even If lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Music Services, Inc

Three Amazing Stories of Christian Service!!

People give many different reasons people give to not serve in children’s ministry.  You may have thought of and/or used many different reasons yourself

Over the last several weeks I have seen two VERY legitimate reasons to not serve.

One excuse is “I am in the hospital in Cleveland and may be for some time.”

The other is “I had brain surgery last week.”

A couple of weeks ago, Tammie Tetgmeier had brain surgery.  She had brain surgery on Friday, missed that Sunday and then taught the 4th and 5th grade 9:00 am class the next Sunday.  She let the class know that if her surgery was earlier in the week she might have been in class, but because her brain surgery was scheduled for Friday, she wasn’t able to be in class.

Desiree from the Cleveland Clinic getting ready to
Skype the 1st-3rd grade lesson 2 weeks ago.

Desiree Hillmon has been struggling with MS for some time now.  Recently she has been in a couple of different hospitals.  Yet she still teaches the 1st – 3rd grade 9:00 am class every other week through Skype.  She has powerpoint slides, songs for the kids to sing and so much more. 

Their dedication and examples of service in the midst of difficulties overwhelm me and make me very thankful.   I am thankful not only because I am the pastor of children and family ministry but because two of my children, Josiah and Jadyn, are learning how to live out a Christian life of love and service in the midst of challenges along with the Sunday School Bible lessons.

As I think about these ladies and their example, I am reminded of so many different people who have made a huge impact in my life.  One of these families is the Steffler family.  Melvin and Reida Steffler and their daughters Ann and Linda were, and still are, such a big part of my spiritual growth.  They taught classes, served in the music ministry and so much more at church.  But even more than that they invested in my family.  They showed us what hospitality was by hosting meals in their home.  They showed us how to pray by praying for us.  Melvin passed away many years ago and Reida’s health is failing, and yet the impact they made on me continues to grow. 

I am thankful for the lessons each of these individuals have taught in the church building.  I am even more thankful for the lessons they have taught and are teaching us as they live out the truth of God’s Word.

Backyard Bible Clubs

I want to share a couple of lessons I learned during the 4 week Bible study we did in our neighborhood.

• Backyard Bible Clubs need prayer.
• While we did have different people praying for our Bible, I wish I had found THIS BIBLE STUDY GUIDE before we started our study.
• Backyard Bible Clubs do NOT need to be in your backyard.  
• Three of the weeks we met in our family room. 
• Because of weather, we moved our fourth week egg hunt over to Emmanuel Baptist Church.
• The location is obviously dependent on the number of kids, the time of the year and the size of your home.
• Backyard Bible Clubs do need to include a Bible story.  
• Two Ways to Live from Matthias Media - www.matthiasmedia.com.au/2wtl/
• Children Desiring God curricula - blog.childrendesiringgod.org/fill-your-backyard-with-good-news-this-summer/
• Backyard Bible Clubs do NOT need to be life long clubs.
• We did our's for 4 weeks.  

What Might God Do in Your Backyard This Summer?  Click HERE for some possibilities.

God-centered Gospel

"God has placed children who do not know Him in your lives for a purpose.  Might that purpose be so that you can be salt and light to them and their families?"
Sally Michael

This Sunday night (04.26.17), I have the opportunity to share at Emmanuel Baptist Church's Sharing Your Faith Seminar.

One of the resources that has been very helpful is Children Desiring God's seminars on the Gospel.


Here are the introduction points to the "Presenting the Gospel to Children" seminar.

How do we present the gospel to children in a God-centered way?

First, we need to understand three encompassing themes in the gospel message:

1. GOD is the starting point of the gospel.
2. GOD is the vehicle of the gospel.
3. GOD is the goal of the gospel. 

Secondly, keep in mind the following four things:

1. Understand your role as a parent or teacher — you are to be a planter and waterer of the truth. (1 Corinthians 3:6) 
2. Have a long-term perspective. 
3. The hope is in the MESSAGE not the method. (Romans 10:17) 
4. Put the gospel message in its proper context: within the whole counsel of God. (2 Timothy 3:14-15)

Here is an electronic copy the 10 Essential Truths handout 

childrendesiringgod.org/documents/10_essential_truths.pdf

Last week was an awesome week

I just wanted to share a couple of things that made last week great.
Now each of these things were specific events/times on our calendar but looking back they were so much more than that.  
God really used each of these specific times to help me and my family see how God is working in our lives and in the lives of others.  
In the midst of some difficult circumstances, God has used these and many other truths and circumstances to encourage me.  
I share each of these things not to show some sort of "online utopia" in the Rodgers' house.  You know what I mean, that social media picture of perfection that many try to show online. 
I share this for the purpose of "glorifying God."  I am so very thankful that God shows us grace so many different ways - from little blessing throughout the week to the HUGE, life-changing blessing of Jesus Christ.
Our week was filled with blessings but it was not perfect.
It has been filled with struggles of all different kinds and sizes but in looking back I want to focus on God and his goodness and greatness in the midst of those challenges.

Tuesday:  Case for Christ:  Part 1

Joel, Josiah and I went to see The Case for Christ.  It was a great movie.  The boys and I had some great conversations after the movie.  I wrote about the movement at drodgersjr.blogspot.com/2017/04/case-for-christ-review.html

Wednesday:  Case for Christ:  Part 2

Krista went to see the Case for Christ with one of our neighbors.  I also was asked to share my review on the General Association of Regular Baptist Churches website, this is the assocation EBC is part of.  Here is the link where they posted my review - www.garbc.org/commentary/culture/movie-review-the-case-for-christ/

Thursday:  Kids' Bible Study

This Thursday was the last of our 4-week neighborhood Bible study with 13 kids in our neighborhood.  Krista clearly shared the Gospel with the kids.  Then we had an Easter egg hunt.  The other three weeks were at our house.  Because of weather, the last week's study and egg hunt were at the church. 







Friday:  Rogue One with the boys & Good Friday with the Family

From a facebook post on April 14:

We watched Rogue One today with a couple of boys. I told them I am very thankful that the Story of God's Glory is so much bigger and better than ANY story we can create. Showed them this video -http://www.rpmministries.org/2011/04/its-friday-but-sundays-coming/   and I told them about a book - Finding God in a Galaxy Far, Far Away. Each chapter ends with a "learn to live in awe..." section. 

For example chapter two ends with "Learn to live in awe by believing in a larger world than your eyes can see."


Here is a quote from the author "We have come from God ... [so] inevitably the myths woven by us, though they contain error, reflect a splintered fragment of the true light, the eternal truth that is with God. Myths may be misguided, but they steer however shakily toward the true harbor." http://www.timothypauljones.com/4522/

We had a good family devotional time at home.  We watched a couple of videos about Holy Week at www.crossway.org/blog/2014/04/the-final-days-of-jesus-sunday-march-29-ad-33/

Saturday:  Work Day

The boys and I had a great opportunity to work at the house of an Emmanuel family that needed some yard work done.

I was very thankful for the boys work and the McNeal's rewarding their hard work.






Sunday:  Resurrection Sunday
On Resurrection Sunday I had the opportunity to teach the 1st - 5th graders on Sunday morning.  Fifty-six kids heard that "God is the boss."  "People are sinners."  "Jesus is the only ONE who saves."  I used many of the things we had done in our neighborhood Bible study in order to provide a model for what families can do with their neighbors.

Over the last couple of days Facebook memory, a good friend, and Tim Challies have reminded me of a quote that I read 6 years ago.
This quote popped up on my facebook memory on Friday and then Tim Challies posted this on Saturday.
Thank you, God for great reminders.

Case for Christ - Review

"The Case for Christ" is solid apologetics shared through the heartfelt and compelling story of Lee and Leslie Strobel.  In reading this review keep in mind that I watched the movie with my 14-year-old and 11-year-old sons, thus guiding our post-film discussions toward a more youthful perspective.

VERY OBVIOUS SPOILER ALERT:  At the end of the movie Strobel’s life is changed by the truth of the Gospel and the life-changing testimony of his wife.

The movie begins with Lee receiving an award at his Chicago Tribune office.  The sign behind him summarizes the philosophy of Lee’s life and career: “If your mother says she loves you, CHECK IT OUT.”  Facts are what he pursues in his writing and to what he holds onto in his life.  His world is sent into a tailspin when his wife is saved through the testimony of a nurse.  From this point on in the movie, Lee decides to divide his time between his journalist job at the Tribune and finding proof that Christianity is nonsense so his wife will go back to being an atheist with him. After speaking with colleagues, he decides the way to destroy Christianity is to prove that Jesus didn’t literally rise from the dead.

The Case for Christ does a great job of telling Strobel’s life story while presenting apologetic evidence for the reliability of scripture, the death of Jesus and the appearance of Jesus after his resurrection.  These conversations with experts in archaeology, psychology, religion and other areas are interwoven throughout a heartfelt story of a couple’s pursuit of Jesus Christ. 

One of my favorite quotes that I believe summarizes the movie is when Lee says to his wife Leslie “It wasn’t just the evidence.  It was you.”  Strobel found the Truth about Jesus in the evidence he found.  He also witnessed his wife’s life changed radically by this same historical Jesus. 

I would not recommend you see this movie as mere entertainment.  I would highly recommend you see it with someone you want to see grow closer to the historical, life-giving, life-changing Jesus Christ.  There are many great talking points.

"What Are We Waiting For" by Matt Papa

"What Are We Waiting For" by Matt Papa 

He says Go, take the news to every nation

We say no, you know I just don't feel called

But oh the Lord of all the universe

Has called us all to go, so

What are we waiting for

A message in the sky

A miracle, a sign

From up above, is not His word enough?

What are we waiting for

He's given us a choice

He's given us a voice

And right now, if He is Lord

Then what are we waiting for

He says now give your life to serve the broken

We say how will this fit into my plans

But oh the Lord of all the universe

Has spilled His blood, His precious blood

Bridge:

If we love Him we will keep His word

keep His word

If we know Him we will tell the world

tell the world 

Successful Season

From our 7th/8th-grade basketball team celebration on 3/14/17

Last night we had our 7th/8th-grade basketball team celebration.  We won 2 games out of a whole lot more than that.  A losing record.  If I remember correctly, as a junior high and high school basketball player, I was always on a winning team.  So coaching a team that struggled was a challenge.

Going into our end of the season celebration, I wanted it to be a time of truthful encouragement.
There was a noticeable improvement from the beginning of the year to the end of the year, especially in relationship to our play versus the one team we played three times.
There also has been improvements in players in areas of confidence and self-control. 
BUT here is the biggest thing I shared with them last night and I tried to share throughout the season.
While we should want to play and practice well on the court and want to win, that is not the end goal.
While we should want to work hard and do well in the classroom, that is not the end goal.
“Whatever you do, do it well for the glory of God and do it somewhere strategic for the mission of God.”

Here is what I reminded parents of at the beginning of the season and I want to remind us of this same truth at the end of the season.  

Here is the New Morning Mercies devotional I shared with the team and families at the end of the season.  

FEBRUARY 25 

You’re going to hunger for some success in life. 

May you hunger for the complete success of the gospel in your heart. 

You and I don’t live by instinct. We are value-oriented, goal-oriented, purpose-oriented, and importance-oriented human beings. We are constantly rating everything in our lives. We all have things that are important to us and things that are not, things that mean a lot to us and things that mean very little. We willingly make sacrifices for one thing and refuse to sacrifice for another. We grieve the loss of one thing and celebrate the loss of another. We love what another person hates and we see as a treasure something that another person thinks is trash. We look at something and see beauty while the person next to us sees no beauty in it at all. Some things are so important to us that they shape the decisions that we make and the actions that we take. Some things command the allegiance of our hearts, while other things barely get our attention. 

In the center of this value system is our definition of success. No rational human being wants to be a failure. No one wants to think that he has wasted his life. No one wants to think that in the end she will look back and realize that she invested in things that just didn’t matter. Everyone wants to think that his or her life is or will be successful. But what is success? Is it judged by the size of your house, the prominence of your friends, the success of your career, the power of your position, the size of the pile of your possessions, the perfection of your physical beauty, the breadth of your knowledge, or the list of your achievements? The problem with all of these things is that they quickly pass away, and because they do, if you have lived for these things, you will eventually come up empty. 

Contrast that view of success with the success of God’s work in and through you. God offers you things of supreme value (his forgiveness, his presence, welcome into his kingdom, a clean conscience, and a pure heart). These things will never pass away. They are the eternally valuable gifts of divine grace. This leaves you with this question: “What do I really want in life: the success of God’s agenda of grace or the fulfillment of my catalog of desires?” At the end of the day, what do you long for: for God’s grace to do its work or for more of the stuff that this physical created world has to offer? Be honest. What kind of success are you hooking your heart to and how is it shaping the decisions you make and the actions you take? 

For further study and encouragement: 

Matthew 6: 25– 34

Tripp, Paul David. New Morning Mercies: A Daily Gospel Devotional (p. 56). Crossway. Kindle Edition.

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:
David Platt's sermon  "Sports and the Gospel" - www.radical.net/series/sports-and-the-gospel/

Gospel Saturated Prayer

This Gospel Saturated prayer is from Gaining by Losing and other Greear books.  He wrote about it HERE

The gospel prayer has four parts. The 1^st two parts lead us inward, helping us to renew our minds in God’s acceptance of us and the value of that acceptance to us: (1) “In Christ, there is nothing I can do that would make You love me more, and nothing I have done, or could do, that would make You love me less.” (2) “Your presence and approval are all I need today for everlasting joy.” Part 3 of the prayer has us consider what responding to the grace of the gospel looks like. Understanding God’s generosity toward us should lead us to radical generosity toward others. (3) “As You have been to me, so I will be to others.” Part 4 of the prayer helps us see our world through the lens of the gospel. If the cross really does reveal God’s compassion for sinners and His resurrection His power to save them, then our prayers on their behalf should be audacious and bold: (4) “As I pray, I’ll measure Your compassion by the cross and Your power the by the resurrection.” I’ve prayed this prayer every day now for the last few years. You know what? It’s finally starting to sink in. I hope you have some way, if not this, of saturating your mind in the revolutionary, turn-religion-upside-down, fight-the-latent-idolatry-and-works-righteousness-within-you truth of the gospel.

An Honest, Hard Evaluation of Soul Care

O.K. about a year and a half ago I read a bookGaining by Losing by J.D. Greear.  I posted about it a couple of times on our church blog.  You can read these posts at www.emmanuelbaptist.com/tag/gaining-by-losing/

This past week Pastor Duke let me know that he wanted to encourage the church to read this book especially because Missions Emphasis Month.  The subtitle of the book reflects a great Missions theme Why the Future Belongs to Churches That Send. So over the last two days I have been rereading sections of this book and getting knocked around by the Holy Spirit because of some things Greear wrote in this challenging book.   

Here is one specific thing I have been thinking/processing through....

An Honest, Hard Evaluation of EBC's Soul Care Ministry.
I want to share some incomplete thoughts with you to help us improve the disciple-making work of Emmanuel

One of the quotes that really challenged my thinking about Soul Care is

"Maybe the worst failure for a church is success in things that aren't producing reproducing disciples."  (139)  

Here is a specific question Greear asks in relationship to this quote.

"Are our small group ministries raising up new leaders to plant new groups?"

Now here comes the processing part for me.  Please read through to the end

In many ways, I feel like Soul Care has been successful.

• This year, I believe we have over 225 people in groups.
• Over the 5 +  years we have been doing Soul Care, attendance has either remained steady or slightly grown.  I have spoken with a couple of people who said they thought the small group ministry would lose enthusiasm or die after awhile.  
• Many people are connecting in a deeper way with others in the church.  I have seen this in my own groups. This includes deeper prayer requests and talking about real life personal problems

At the same time, I think of the Greear quote and question above and cannot help but think our Soul Care ministry has not been as fruitful as I would like (Note the use of the word fruitful not successful here).

• While it has maintained, it has not grown.
• I want to be very clear that I am not saying we need to have hundreds of people in groups.  I believe the FIRST and primary mark of a healthy small group is CHRIST-CENTEREDNESS.  However, the growth I am talking about is growth in the number of leaders and growth in the ways people engage with others outside of their current group. 
• We still have about the same number of groups.  In years when we have had growth, the average number of people in a group has grown.
• This addresses the first growth issue: the number of leaders.
• As I think about and evaluate the ministry I am not sure how well we are doing at "producing reproducing disciples."  
• This addresses the second growth issue:  the ways people engage with others outside of their current group.

This is not a "poor Pastor Dave" post, so please know 

I don't need encouragement, pats on the back and "You are doing a great job.  I wouldn't change anything" statements.

I do need your prayers, just like all of our pastors, and help in equipping disciples to be disciple makers.  This help could be in the form of suggestions and even more so in each and every one of us evaluating our own lives in light of the Great Commission.

One of the Plumb lines in the book is "Prayer Doesn't Fuel the Ministry.  Prayer is the Ministry."  You can read more about this Plumb line at www.jdgreear.com/my_weblog/2016/09/prayer-doesnt-prepare-for-ministry-prayer-is-the-ministry.html

I would appreciate your thoughts/responses to this post.  You can either comment below for everyone, which would be best, or email me at soulcare@emmanuelbaptist.com. 

Gaining By Losing

Transformation is this year's theme for EBC and our Missions Emphasis Month. Are you desiring to be transformed personally? Are we, as a church, desiring to be transformed as a church? J.D. Greear, who is the pastor you watched the first two weeks in the Gospel at Work class, has written a book entitled Gaining By Losing:  Why the Future Belongs to Churches That Send.  that will make you think about evangelism, the Great Commission, and the church. Here is the Amazon summary of the book.

When Jesus gave the Great Commission, he revealed that the key for reaching the world with the gospel is found in sending, not gathering. Many churches focus time and energy on attracting people and counting numbers–while the real mission of the church is about training up disciples and then sending them out. It’s about sending capacity, not seating capacity! In Gaining By Losing, J.D. Greear unpacks ten kingdom principles—plumb lines—that you can use to realign your church’s priorities around God’s mission to reach a lost world. To see ministry multiply, we must release the seeds God has placed in our hands. The good news is that you don’t need to choose between gathering or sending. Effective churches can, and must, do both

You can purchase a copy of this purchase at amazon.com or at Lifeway, who will match online prices.  Before you purchase the book check out these twenty quotes that will help you understand what the book is about.

1. Jesus did not say come and grow but come and die. (17)
2. We live by losing. We gain by giving away. What we achieve by building our personal platform will never be as great as what God achieves through what we give away in faith. (18)
3. Study after study shows that most Christians have never even shared their faith—most indicating that somewhere 90 percent of evangelicals have never shared their faith with anyone outside of their family. (22)
4. The church is now Jesus’ vehicle for the completion of his mission. Jesus finished the purchase of our salvation, paying the full price for our sin on the cross and shattering the powers of death in the resurrection, but the mission of salvation is not yet complete. (31)
5. Blessing the community might certainly include growing a big church, but it would also mean giving away some of our resources. (42)
6. A “sending” ministry always starts with a heart exam. Sending out people and giving away your resources, you see, will most often compete with your church’s “bottom line,” not benefit it. (44)
7. Ask yourself, “Are there mission fields in our backyards that could contribute to the global spread of the gospel that we have overlooked because they don’t enhance the bottom line of our church? (46)
8. The question is no longer if we are called, only where and how. The call to follow him is the call to be sent and to send. (49)
9. The cross of Christ provided Paul with the motive for sacrifice, a measure for his sacrifice, and a mission in his sacrifice (2 Cor. 5:14–21). Paul wanted to see others reconciled to God as he had been reconciled. (62)
10. This intensity to do comes only from being soaked in the message of what God has done. (63)
11. It is neither guilt over what you are not doing nor excitement over how God might bless you that produces true, lifelong generosity. It is deep gratitude for what Christ has already done for you. Remembering the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ does more to compel generosity than a hundred sermons that pummel you with guilt. (66)
12. Serving Jesus at work is about far more than giving a Christian theme to your business or staging awkward conversations about Jesus. It is about doing your work for the glory of God and the benefit of his creation and leveraging appropriate opportunities to make disciples as you go through life. (81)
13. Amazement led to attraction; attraction led to observation; observation led to confrontation and worship. (96)
14. Get this: Of the 40 miracles recorded in Acts, 39 happen outside the church walls. (105)
15. For those of us in the Western church, I think we are at a crucial decision point. I love seeing big audiences gathered to hear the gospel, but if we want to reach the next generation, we are going to have to equip our people to reach them outside the church. (107)
16. What Jesus did on earth for his thirty-three years was only what he began to do and teach. The book of Acts is about what he continued to do and teach—no longer through his incarnated body, but through his Spirit in the church. (116)
17. If you want to be a “sending” church, you have to develop a process for producing leaders. Without a process, it is unlikely you will move the leadership needle much in your church. As the old saying goes, insanity is doing the same things over and over again and expecting different results. (125)
18. God calls his leaders, not to a platform to build a great ministry for themselves, but to an altar where they die unto themselves. This means sending out our best with abandon. (131)
19. Let me be clear: The church’s primary objective is to preach the gospel, not to beautify the city, care for the poor, or renovate the ghettos. That’s because the gospel testifies to what God has done to save the world, not what we can do. The gospel is an announcement about Christ’s finished work. (138)
20. In the Bible, we find no gap between the call to follow Jesus and the call to engage in mission. (172)

Large Small Group and Crazy Hair.

Here is a recent attempt at intergenerational teaching
blog.childrendesiringgod.org/intergenerational-teaching-why-and-how/


Here are some pictures from our Soul Care group last night!   
We had 26 people there.
Let me explain why we had this many people and moved it to the church.

 Our Wednesday group has several families who have middle schoolers.  Well, last night the high winds knocked the electricity out at the school and our youth building.  So we had to think fast.

We moved our meeting place from our house to the church and planned an evening of brief sermon discussion, prayer, and family interaction.
Now here is where it gets fun.  Enjoy the following dress up pictures then read the explanation of what we did.

After reading the passage of scripture from this past week's message we played two games that connected with the Soul Care notes.

The first was a "put on and put off" game.  You saw the pictures above.  

Even one of the younger kids
got in on the fun.

The second activity was different mixed groups had to pick which one of six pictures they liked the most and liked the least.

After these two games, we discussed the "Put On and Put Off" passage and the Colossians 3:12 - 17 and talked about things we need to "put off" and "put on" especially as it relates to love.

We also talked about what we need to love more and love less.

Then we prayed. 
I asked one person to pray for George Collins, GAP (Global Access Partners) and the Akha Baptist Church.  
I asked another person to pray for our missionary family in general.
Then, I closed our prayer time.
We started at 6:45 ended around 7:50.
People stuck around, talked and played games until about 8:30.  It was a great night.

A Reminder for the Generations!

This morning I did staff devotions at Emmanuel Christian School and we started with this quiz.

What is the generation name for the following birth years?  (The answers are at the end of this post)

1. Born 1996 and later.
2. Born 1977 to 1995.
3. Born 1965 to 1976.
4. Born 1946 to 1964.
5. Born 1925 to 1945
6. Born 1910 - 1924

For the Bible devotional, I used this week's Fighter Verses

Psalm 103:15 - 17.

As for man, his days are like grasshe flourishes like a flower of the field;for the wind passes over it, and it is gone,and its place knows it no more.But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear himand his righteousness to children's children,

The reference to man's days being so short is is not merely to remind men how short life is 

EVEN MORE SO it meant to remind us of how AWESOME our God is!

You can see this clearer when you read Psalm 103:1-17.

Bless the Lord, O my soul,and all that is within me,bless his holy name!Bless the Lord, O my soul,and forget not all his benefits,who forgives all your iniquitywho heals all your diseases,who redeems your life from the pitwho crowns you with steadfast love and mercy,who satisfies you with goodso that your youth is renewed like the eagle's.The Lord works righteousnessand justice for all who are oppressed.He made known his ways to Moseshis acts to the people of Israel.The Lord is merciful and gracious,slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.He will not always chidennor will he keep his anger forever.He does not deal with us according to our sinsnor repay us according to our iniquities.For as high as the heavens are above the earthso great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him;as far as the east is from the west,so far does he remove our transgressions from us.As a father shows compassion to his children,so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him.For he knows our framehe remembers that we are dust.As for man, his days are like grasshe flourishes like a flower of the field;for the wind passes over it, and it is gone,and its place knows it no more.BUT the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear himand his righteousness to children's children,

God, who is to be blesssed,

forgives

heals

redeems

is loving and merciful

satisfies you with good

works righteousness and justice

He does all these things forever, from generation to generation.

God's steadfast is from everlasting to everlasting on every centennial who fears him!

God's steadfast is from everlasting on every millennial who fears him!

God's steadfast is from everlasting on every Baby Boomer who fears him!

God's steadfast is from everlasting on every person in the Silent Generation who fears him!

God's steadfast is from everlasting on every person of is part of the Greatest Generation who fears him!

Answers:

1. iGen, Gen Z or Centennials: Born 1996 and later.
2. Millennials or Gen Y: Born 1977 to 1995.
3. Generation X: Born 1965 to 1976.
4. Baby Boomers: Born 1946 to 1964.
5. Traditionalists or Silent Generation: Born 1925 to 1945
6. Greatest generations:  born 1910 - 1924