Relief

With 20,000 folks on their way to Houston I'm still not sure what to do to help. I keep hearing that money is the major thing which is needed. I'm sure it is but what else can be done? I imagine they need some volunteers down at the dome when folks start rolling in.

I was listening to the Astrodome announcement press conference today and heard them say it is meant to be a temporary place for them...days, maybe weeks. What then?

Maybe we should start some type of adopt-a-family program.

If your church or a church you are helping out needs help, feel free to post that information here.

Help Louisiana

If you haven't heard yet, they are planning to move all of the folks in the Superdome to Houston and keep them in the Astrodome. Go here for more.

I know there are already a good number of folks here from the area but this would be another 15,000 to 20,000 people. I know the Red Cross is in place to help, but I imagine they will need some help on this one.

I'm not sure where is a good starting place, but I think we should start looking for somewhere to serve.

If anyone has any ideas or is already serving and needs help, please let us know.

Bart

Emergent Worship, No Worms!

A friend of mine tells me good stories. Parables, really. And, to borrow his line, I like parables right up to the point I realize the are talking about me.

So one of his stories goes like this:


A little boy decides to set up an apple stand and sell apples. (Yeah, I know, apples. With a ton of lemonade stands already in existence, I guess he thought it was an untapped market.)


So the little boy, with the help of his parents, built a stand, acquired apples, and put up a big sign which read,

"Applz"

He soon discovered it was a great idea and business really took off. People came from miles around for his apples.

A neighbor kid thought to himself, "Who is he? I can do that and do it better!"

But how could he do it better? How could he get folks to come to his start-up apple stand?

The idea came to him in a blink of an eye.

The next day he set up his own apple stand, just down the street a bit from the other stand. He had his stand. He had his apples. And he had his clearly marked sign which read,

"Applz, No Wormz!"

Do we think of or present emergent worship as worship without worms?

Sometimes when we try and define what we are, we run the risk of being negative to what we are attempting to distinguish ourselves from.

Any thoughts?

Word Verification is On

I hate spam comments. Therefore, word verification is now activated. Sorry for the extra step, but it should be worth it.

Blink. Again.

If you haven't read the previous post (If you Blink...) yet, go there first.

Jeff got the answer. It was the mom. Did that come right away? Did you know immediately? What about everyone else?

I hate to say it, but it took me a bit to get it. I know plenty of women who are doctors. Women have been doctors for a long time. It isn't anything new. So why did I or anyone else who struggled with this, not think of it as soon as we read it? Are we prejudiced? Do we not think of women having the ability to be doctors? Our reason should say no, we just...well, what happened?

The example came from the book Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell. He is the same guy who wrote The Tipping Point.

Click over for a review on Blink, which is a great book, but let us continue on.

It is not enough to simply think good thoughts about people. I would be surprised if anyone said, "Well, a woman can't be a doctor!" If you did say that we would probably take you to a doctor!

No, we weren't negative, we(I) just didn't give it consideration. I didn't consider the possibility. I managed to ignore half of the human race. (I'm not proud of that statement.)

So, the question then becomes, who else have we done that to? Who else will we do that to?

Again, it is not so much that we are thinking of ourselves, it is just, we are not thinking of others.

It convicts me because this is a large group. It should be an easy one.

How much more do I ignore those on the fringe? I need to take this verse and carry it around with me and not just read it and think, oh, that's a great verse, but do it.

If You Blink, You Might Miss Something.

How fast do you make decisions?

Some of you may say it takes forever to make a decision. You may go days, weeks or longer in the process. Some of you would say, no, just the opposite, and you know right away. You might say,
"I know in a blink of any eye."

But what if you decided before you decided? (What?) No, I'm not about to talk about freewill. I'm thinking about prejudice, but probably not in the way you think I am. Or maybe you do know exactly where I am going with this.

Here...try and solve this.

A man and his son are in a serious car accident. The father is killed, and the son is rushed to the emergency room. Upon arrival, the attending doctor looks at the child and gasps, "This child is my son!" Who is the doctor?

This is an insight puzzle. It can't be figured out like a math or logic puzzle can simply by working it out on paper. The only way you can get the answer is if it comes to you suddenly in the blink of an eye.

Feel free to post your answer. If you have seen this already then don't give it away. If nobody gets it correct then I will eventually post the answer and then tell you where I am going with all of this.

Looking for Great Pix?

Are you looking for some great photos? If you don't mind spending some money try out Photos.com.

They have some great stuff. The pictures used on this blog are taken from there.


The great thing about them is you pay a one time fee and then download what you want from their site. A lot of places want to sell you a collection on CD and the cost per picture is high and you might not like or need all the pictures on it.

I believe a one year subscription is $599, but you can usually find a special offer. They usually advertise a promotional code in Communication Arts or Photoshop User. I've always seen the special at $399 for a one year subscription. Yeah I know, that is still $400, but I feel it is worth it. If you have a $1000+ projector then do it and your folks a favor and show something nice on it!

(FYI, Communication Arts is a great magazine for inspiration and ideas.)

Yes, you can always search Google Images for the free stuff.

God Sings

I've been listening a lot to Coldplay's, X&Y the last few days. Especially, A Message. I really like the lyrics. I'm not sure of the original intent of the song but I started relistening to it with the God frame around it.

Think of it with the, God is love, verse in mind. Think of it as God singing it to us...

My song is love
Love to the loveless, shown
And it goes up
You don't have to be alone

Your heavy heart
Is made of stone
And its so hard to see you clearly
You don't have to be on your own
You don't have to be on your own

And I'm not gonna take it back
Well I'm not gonna say I don't mean that
You're the target that I'm aiming at
And I get that message home

My song is love
My song is love, unknown
And I'm on fire for you, clearly
You don't have to be alone
You don't have to be on your own

And I'm not gonna take it back
And I'm not gonna say I don't mean that
You're the target that I'm aiming at
But I'm nothing on my own
Got to get that message home

And I'm not gonna stand and wait
Not gonna leave it until its much too late
On a platform I'm gonna stand and say
That I'm nothing on my own
And I love you, please come home

My song is love, is love unknown
And I've got to get that message home

The line...I'm nothing on my own...have you ever thought about God not making it on his own without us? Yeah, I know, only a hundred years ago I would have been tarred and feathered. Okay, maybe not even that long ago!

I know we can't make it on our own despite our continual efforts. But, what if God can't make it on his own without us? Maybe that is why we were created.

I mean, really, has anyone ever figured out why we were created. I'm not so bold as to say this is definitely it, but if God is love, then he needs to love. He created us to love. It is our freewill and the choice to love him back that makes it truly love. I don't say this in an arrogant way. Really, it is the opposite. It is humbling.

How much does God want to love us?

How badly does he want us to come back home?



I think I'm going to put a video together with this song for an upcoming gathering.

Video Resource

I hope to be fairly consistent in posting resource info. Some of this stuff you may already know about, but hopefully it will be of value to someone.

If you are looking for some videos to show during your gatherings, take a look at Nooma. They have been around a few years but are still pretty fresh.

Rob Bell, Jr (Mars Hill Bible Church) is a good storyteller and the videos can stand on their own. They are a good starting point for conversation and the price is reasonable.

Do I Call You, Mr. GOD?

What do you call God when you pray to him? I mean, what is he to ya?

Do you just call him God? Father? Heavenly Father? Big Guy?


I'm not a scholar by any means, let alone a Hebrew scholar.

I do know when I read LORD in the Old Testament it is similar to hearing the word 'love' in our language.

I love my wife. I love my G5. I love Pei Wei. Obviously, I don't relate the same to my three examples. If I'm not careful, I lose the impact of what I'm talking about. I need more words. At least better words.

It is the same with LORD.

Over and over I read about the LORD doing this or saying that or being referenced to and I just wonder, what are you talking about? Do you love your wife or do you love Pei Wei?

Fortunately I'm getting a little help with all of this.



Check out Ann Spangler's, Praying the Names of GOD..



She goes through the different names for GOD in the bible.

Now I know Elohim is the word for God that appears in the first sentence of the Bible.

Elohim - GOD, Mighty Creator.

You've probably heard the name Yahweh.

The name Yahweh occurs more than 6,800 times in the Old Testament...As the sacred, personal name of Israel's God, it was eventually spoken aloud only by priests worshiping in the Jerusalem temple. After the destruction of the temple in A.D. 70, the name was not pronounced.

Can you imagine?

Yes, they revered his name. It was holy and they were not. I see their point, but it makes it tough to have a close relationship when you won't even speak God's name.

Now, compare that with how Jesus taught his disciples to pray.

Jesus tells them to pray to their Father. Their Father.

The same father who knows what you need before you ask him. The one who knows all the hairs on your head. Who you were before you were. He, God, our Father is intimate with us. It is okay to be intimate with him. It's more than okay. He would love for us to.

I wonder how big it made God smile when Bono wrote Yahweh? Sing along with it, feel the words and I bet it will make the LORD (Elohim, El Roi, El Shadday, Yahweh, Adonay, Hashem, Abba, Patter) smile again.

Every time.

Heard Anything Encouraging?

I'm still amazed whenever I drive past Lakewood Church. I mean, the new Lakewood.

I'm from Houston so to me it is still the Summit, forget calling it the Compaq Center. All the events I've been to there are too numerous to mention. Concerts, the circus, you name it. One year we had season tickets to the Rockets.

Now it has been redone to house the largest church in the country. I haven't been there for a worship gathering but I would like to sometime.

This post isn't about bringing down Lakewood or any other megachurches. Just like any type of church there are strengths and weaknesses. I'm not here to talk about that.

What I am thinking of is, why do so many people go there? What are they finding? What makes them go there instead of any other of the thousands of churches in the area?

I am always interested in the different ways people worship God. Obviously they do it on a larger scale. I know many love to hear Joel Osteen. I've read his book and I've caught Lakewood on TV from time to time.

I think what is most appealing is that he is an encourager. He continually reinforces positive thinking. Some may be quick to write him off for this, but who wouldn't want someone like that in their life? I do.

I'm sure Paul did.

Paul had Barnabas. Remember Barnabas(son of encouragement)? I forgot how big a role Barnabas played in the emerging first century church. He probably was a huge encouragement to Paul and those around him. I wonder why we don't hear very many sermons on Barnabas?


-Bart

Behind the Door

Isn't it amazing when you find a door that opens up another world to you? Maybe you think to yourself, "Why didn't I know about this sooner?" or "How long has all of this been here?"

Maybe you are just now walking through that door. You are looking for a way in or way out. You are looking for something real and not fake. You are looking for God. You are not alone.

Who am I? Sean described me as a video producer. I more closely resemble the description in 1 Timothy:

...Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners - of whom I am the worst.

But I keep trying.

Of course, it is easier with the help of others. That's the idea of this blog, this community. It is a journey. It is a conversation.

I want to help start some of those conversations. Feel free to jump in. Feel free to start some. My qualifications are only this, I am a sinner and saved by Jesus.

-Bart