By His Grace

To be done or not to be done

Today is the half way mark in my summer intensive Hebrew Exegesis class. I’m tired and a bit over my head, but I’m pushing through because this in my last class for my Masters. Yeah! I am so looking forward to being done with school – it’s taken 10 years and 4 schools to make it happen. When I started I though I’d get through the 2 year program in about 5 years. Needless to say, it’s dragged on longer than I expected.

 

Last night as Randy and I were talking about it, I reflected on all the amazing things I’ve learned in my studies. It’s not just that I have a basic understanding of Greek and Hebrew or that my knowledge of church history is a little more full. Many of the teachers I had were/are in ministry. Along with the course of study, they offered such deep and useful insights into loving and leading a congregation. For those formal and informal lessons I will be forever grateful.

 

And it makes me think, though I’m so happy to be finishing the degree, I look forward to the day when I might be able to teach and pass on the wisdom I was given and the lessons from my ministry. Guess I’m not done with school after all!

Tons of Toys

Last Saturday morning I got up sort of early for a weekend, threw on some jeans and a hat, and headed to a grocery store parking lot in Norwalk. Randy and I had decided to join Christopher and the team in passing out toys to kids for Christmas.

After setting up in one spot and then discovering that the truck was right in the path of the McDonalds drive through, we headed over to the other side of the lot where we’d have more space for the kids. One small problem – this guy on a bike was eyeing us suspiciously. Turns out he and his buddies use the parking lot to make drug deals – an event we got to witness a number of times throughout the morning. I have to admit – I’ve never actually seen the deals go down before – guess I’m a little, well, sheltered.

Anyway, once we got underway, the line never stopped. I hung out in the back of the truck breaking down boxes as the toys were unpacked and passed out. By the end of 3 hours, the front of my hoodie and the cuffs of my shirt were black! I had to coat them in Spray-‘n-Wash just to get them clean. But the families were so happy. In fact there were some dads who looked overwhelmed and came back to personally thank Randy for the toys – I think it meant so much to see their kids’ faces light up.

The most fun was passing out the “Garden Tools.” Along with the sports themes toys, there was a set of 4 kid sized tools – a rake, 2 shovels, and a push broom. Most kids passed right over it, so we decided to make an impromptu game – every time a child chose the tools, we’d all start cheering. It would get the attention of some other kid in the back of the line who’d want to know what the cool toy was. It was so fun! I guess it goes to prove that it doesn’t take much to entertain me!

At the end of the morning, we headed home in a great mood, so glad to have had the chance to bless the kids. And so grateful for all the blessings God gives us, his kids.

Gifted for Leadership

I have an interesting web site for you to check out – especially all my female readers. My friend Shelley sent me the link, and I thought you might enjoy it.

www.giftedforleadership.com.

I especially enjoyed today’s BLOG (Dec. 4) by Carolyn Curtis James called “Born to Follow?” It so clearly articulates the necessity of following Jesus in order to be a leader – you must follow to lead. So true. Thanks for the reminder Carolyn!

Love your neighbor

A friend of mine named Pete is a principal at a new Charter school in LA. He’s been rushing around the past few months trying to get the details done, but they had a problem getting the lease signed and weren’t able to get into their building to paint, set up, etc. until last week. So I headed down yesterday to at least lend a hand, knowing the kids would be showing up today! I’m not sure what I expected, but I was thrilled at what I discovered.

Since it’s the first year, they are starting with only 6^th grade (7^th will be added next year, 8^th the following). With only one grade and 105 students, there were only 5 teachers! So instead of just lending my body, I was really able to lend my heart and mind as I got to know and encourage these new teachers. Only one has taught before; the other 4 are facing their very first year. And what a stressful way to start off as a teacher. When I left at 2:15 yesterday, they had just gotten to see the books they would be teaching from, they still couldn’t get into their classrooms because the painters were still working, and the desks had not yet been delivered. But there was no putting off the students who were arriving in less than 24 hours, so they had to make the best of it.

And yet, because I wasn’t stressed, I was able to be a calming, fun influence – a rare role for me. It was great! We really bonded as I got to listen and ask questions about their life and how they ended up teaching at this school. As I left, they made me promise to come back and see the school once everything was done. What a pleasure to be able to take 5 hours and just love, care for and support those 5 people who will be giving their lives to so many kids.

Ignite: Grow

This past Sunday I taught our first ever Ignite: Grow class designed to help people understand how to grow in spiritual maturity. It was such an amazing experience putting the material together because whenever you teach, you invariably learn more than you knew before.

First I spent time in Richard Foster’s book Celebration of Discipline learning about the tools Christians have used for almost 2000 years to grow in their faith. I was so convicted with just how lazy I am, especially because I live in this modern world with all these conveniences and distractions. Bottom line – I realized it is my choice. Do I want to know God deeply? Am I willing to really lay down my life for him each and every day in all the little things? It’s fine to say, “I am willing to do big things for God.” It’s another to say, “Each little thing I do every moment of the day is in submission to his will.”

Second, I drew on material I have been learning from a lecture series John Coe gave (he is the director of the Institute for Spiritual Formation at Talbot Seminary). In it he pulls from the ancient Christian writers (especially St. John of the Cross) who flushed out the spiritual journey we must take if we want to become spiritual adults. Lots of stuff that was new but fit right into my experience. A number of people remarked that seeing the Christian journey in print really helped explain some of their experiences as well.

Overall I got great feedback from the class members (including my need for a proofreader!). They seemed to get something from it, which always make the effort to create the class seem worth it. I’ll teach this again in the fall and I hope more people will be able to attend.

Life Group Leader Retreat

This past weekend, I hosted Revolution’s first ever Life Group Leader retreat at Mary and Joseph Retreat Center in Rancho Palos Verdes. maryjoseph.org The grounds are beautiful and the food was good. The only down side? Peacocks! Did you know they can fly? They were up in the trees all night making tons of noise and keeping some people awake. Next time I’ll tell everyone to bring ear plugs.

The weekend was titled Spiritual Conversations for Life Change and led by Tim and Shelley Batdorf, Masters Students at Talbot Seminary. We stared off Friday night with some fun – a game that didn’t go as expected (Bob Matulich!) and a finished with an inspiring message from David Trotter.

But Saturday was the really amazing part. At first, as Tim began to teach us how to respond when someone shares their heart, we all just wanted to “fix it” and just tell people what to do. Slowly, we struggled to figure out how to love another person right where they are without telling them what to do. Maybe because we were at a Catholic Retreat Center with crucifixes in every room, I got this picture of coming up to someone who is carrying a cross (see Mark 8:34 where Jesus’ followers are told they are called to carry a cross.) When we try to “fix it” we are communicating that we don’t think the person is capable of carrying their cross – that we could carry it better than they can. Instead we had to accept our role as one of compassion. We learned ways to express that compassion and then spent time after dinner being compassionate to each other. It was a beautiful picture of God’s call to love our brother.

I left totally exhausted, but incredibly encouraged: encouraged both personally in my relationship with God and encouraged to see the commitment of the Leaders to learn and grow. And I feel honored to work along side such amazing people as our Life Group Leaders.

Trust and Conflict

On Sunday I met with our University of Revolutionary Living (URL) teachers. It was an intense meeting where we wrestled through what God was calling us to accomplish with the classes. I left so excited to see people willing to passionately debate and challenge each other.

Patrick Lencioni in his book, The FIVE Dysfunctions of a Team, talks about two things necessary for an effective and healthy team: trust and conflict. I saw this at work with the URL teachers. Here’s an excerpt from the book:

Trust lies at the heart of a functioning, cohesive team. Without it, teamwork is all but impossible… In the context of building a team, trust is the confidence among team members that their peers’ intentions are good, and that there is no reason to be protective or careful around the group… By building trust, conflict is possible because team members do not hesitate to engage in passionate and sometimes emotional debate.

All great relationships, the ones that last over time, require productive conflict in order to grow. This is true in marriage, parenthood, friendship, and certainly business. Unfortunately, conflict is considered taboo in many situations, especially at work (and I would add at church!)…

It is important to distinguish productive ideological conflict from destructive fighting and interpersonal politics. Ideological conflict is limited to concepts and ideas, and avoids personality-focused, mean-spirited attacks.  However, it can have many of the same external qualities of interpersonal conflict - passion, emotion, and frustration - so much so that an outside observer might easily mistake it for unproductive discord. But teams that engage in productive conflict know that the only purpose is to produce the best possible solution in the shortest amount of time. They discuss and resolve issues more quickly and completely than others, and they emerge from heated debates with no residual feelings or collateral damage, but with an eagerness and readiness to take on the next important issue.

Ironically, teams that avoid ideological conflict often do so in order to avoid hurting team members’ feelings, and then end up encouraging dangerous tension… It is also ironic that so many people avoid conflict in the name of efficiency, because healthy conflict is actually a time saver. Contrary to the notion that teams waste time and energy arguing, those that avoid conflict actually doom themselves to revisiting issues again and again without resolution.

Our need as Christians isn’t to run from conflict with those you trust, but be willing to wrestle through challenges to find the best solutions. Spend some time thinking about that!

A New Kind of Christian

Got a quick book recommendation! It was assigned by one of my Fuller profs and I couldn’t put it down: A New Kind of Christian by Brian McLaren.

Here’s the description: “A New Kind if Christian’s conversation between a pastor and his daughter’s high school science teacher revels that wisdom for life’s most pressing spiritual questions can come from the unlikely sources. This stirring fable captures a new spirit of Christianity - where personal, daily interaction with God is more important than institutional church structures, where faith is more about a way of life than a system of belief, where being authentically good is more important than being doctrinally ‘right’, and where one’s direction is more important than one’s present location.”

It struck a chord with me because it gave language for things I had already felt but was not able to say. Theology books can be so boring, but with the setting and conversations of the friends, it makes the issues come alive in practical ways. I put the link on the side bar – check it out. It’s worth the read.

Easter!

Wow. I haven’t done this BLOG in awhile! Getting ready for Easter and the launch of our new campus has taken up every ounce of my energy. But it was well worth it. Here are some of my highlights from the weekend:

Last week I met with a woman who had been attending Revolution for about a year (she had accepted Jesus in Jr. High, but had not been part of a church since college.) Then during the Good Friday service she came over to me and wanted to recommit her life to God. We were both in tears as she said her prayer confessing that she wanted to follow God with her whole life. On Saturday, she told her husband and daughter who began asking lots of questions. By Sunday night they too were ready and both he and their daughter accepted Christ for the first time during the service! An entire family in one weekend! I can’t help crying with joy even now as I type this.

Sunday morning found me at Downey. I had told the greeters we didn’t need to pass out Bibles. Then on the DVD David said, “If you need a Bible raise your hand and an usher will bring one to you.” Oops! I started to panic when suddenly 5 members of the launch team (who aren’t all technically greeters) jumped out of their seats and rushed over to get the Bibles to pass out. The team work was simply amazing. And as a result, the entire morning was incredible. I was so proud to be part of the team.

On a personal note, I got to direct the drama teams for the two campuses. When David saw the dress rehearsal on Saturday, he came over to me and said, “They’re really good! You got so much out of them that it’s going to be powerful.” Needless to say that made me feel really good. I really love to direct, but felt a little rusty because I hadn’t really done it to that level in years. On Sunday, the drama brought tears to people’s eyes, even Christopher who had to get himself together so he could get up and speak afterwards. It was such a pleasure to see the talents of those actors used in such a powerful way and to know I got to play a part in touching people’s hearts.

Go God! We may do the activities, but you do the real work.