A Kingdom of connection

One of the biggest lessons that I have learned in my walk with the Lord is what it truly means to be “the church”. I struggled much in my youth with faith, mostly because I wrestled with the idea of becoming a part of what I called a goofy country club. I always thought church people were the strangest of people on the earth, I guess that’s because half my family is devout catholic and half are independent fundamental Baptist. This strange brew would cause any young man to struggle with their faith. For most of my life church was a place where myself and every member of my family dreaded going on Sunday morning, as a youth it appeared to me that no one actually enjoyed attending church, it was just something you were “supposed” to do. Our consumer Christian Americanized idea of church has led most church goers to feel apathetic about church. Most of us only go to hear the best music or the most entertaining speaker and we bounce from church to church to find it; we have lost in a sense the true meaning and value of being the “body”. I think this is why people in our country feel more lonely, depressed and disconnected than ever before. We are looking for entertainment not relation and community. I thank God that through struggling with my beliefs and faith as a young boy He has lead me to His word where I have began to discover what it means to be His church and as a young man I can honestly say I love Jesus and I love the church and I want as many people as God allows me to influence to experience the joy of this connected community we call the fellowship of believers or the church.
“I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God”- Exodus 6:7. Since creation God has been gathering for Himself a people set aside for His glory. He has called this people His bride, His body, His object of affection. What a awesome thought. God made us as communal creatures whose design was to be a lover of God and of others. While most people who walk upon the earth struggle to find identity in this world the Christian must understand who he/she is, a child of God, the bride of His son, and the dwelling place of the Spirit. Through the work of the cross in salvation in one’s life we become a new community, and this is where we find our identity. The church is who we are, it gives our lives definition and Christ like shape. This is something I have fallen in love with and my prayer is that you will too.
“The church is at the very center of the eternal purpose of God. It is not a divine afterthought. It is not an accident of history. On the contrary, the church is Gods new community. For His purpose, conceived in a past eternity, being worked out in history, and to be perfected in a future eternity, is not just to save isolated individuals and so perpetuate our loneliness, but rather to build His church, that is, to call out of the world a people for His own glory”. John Stott

Discovering yourself

Protect your identity

   My prayer and hope is for each of you to become true sojourners: each of us as Christians are called to be sojourners but most of us are doing a bad job of it because we do not understand who we are and what our mission is.

I.                    You will be a sojourner : 1Peter 2:11-12

1.      When you live a life defined by God: meaning you fear God more than you fear man.

·         Recap last week’s lesson(see yellow notes)

·         When you live a life defined by God many of the people around you will not be happy with you, you will become an exile, a sojourner(vs.11)

·         This is what the Christian walk is all about, being defined by something different, not accepting the cultural norms that define the people around us but pointing them to the reason for the difference in you. The cross

·         Jesus did not die so that we could fit in comfortably with the culture, He died so that we could bring the influence and truth of the gospel into that culture and win some people into the kingdom of God.

·         A sojourner lives in the culture that God places him/her in as a missionary both to speak the truth of the gospel and to live it out in their everyday lives. You are a living testament to the saving power of the cross.

·         People should look into your life and see something different and wonder what it is and find that the difference is the joy and peace of Jesus.

·         Will you say: I will be a sojourner, I will be defined by God not by the pressures and influence of this world. I am a citizen of heaven not of earth

2.      When “they speak evil against you”, not “if” and you stand.(I Peter 2:12)

·         Not for your own glory but for the glory of God.

·         As a sojourner people will try to speak evil against you and try to knock you down

·         Why? Because they want to see you fall, knock you down and steal your identity. They do not want you to live a countercultural life and be different, they want you to fall back in line and be ok with losing your soul.

·         Jesus asks us to stand in culture yet stand against its flow so that some who are caught up in its current may see your good deeds and glorify the Father. What an awesome calling and tremendous privilege.(have you ever stood in the ocean and tried to walk against a rip tide current or severe undertow?)

this is kind of cool. check it out

Jesus guy!

I have never quite understood why God chose me. I am a nobody, a dufus if you will. I go back to 1st Samuel 16 when we are introduced to David as a young boy when God calls him out to be His servant. His response goes like this..."who am I" as in , who am I that the creator God would choose me to do His work. This is exactly why God says that David is a man after his own heart because David even as a young boy recognized who God is and placed his entire identity in Him. If you asked David what defined him he would say it is my God. As much as I have rebelled against Him in my life it has always been my desire to be defined by God and not by man, after all God looks on the heart and man looks at the outward appearance. I want to be defined and refined by the work of Jesus, we call this the gospel. This is why I am a Jesus guy.

With any job or anything I have ever done in my life Jesus always challenges me to meet people and talk about the gospel . As a carpet cleaner people would open up and spill their guts while I was working in their home, I would talk about Jesus, As a cook people would say "your one of those Jesus guys right, what do you think about...." I would talk about Jesus.

Now as a pastor I get to talk about Jesus and bring the influence of the gospel everywhere and get paid to do it. I cant help it, I love Jesus, His church and lost people it is who I am because He is who He is.

Who am I? Just a Jesus guy...what about you?

For about 2 years, I worked as the Student Ministries Director at CrossPointe Church in Orlando. Here is a slide show of our time at CrossPointe with FUSION youth!


As hoped, I was able to get a Full time position on James Island SC in the spring of 2009.
http://www.jamesislandbaptist.com

So apparently, I don't get on here that often, since we moved out of our house in the last blog over 2 years ago! So much has changed since our last entry. I did get back into school & as of 2 weeks ago, I took my last undergrad course from Trinity College in Trinity Florida! Thank God!

Currently I'm working on a volunteer basis as Crosspointe Church's student ministry director. http://x.pointe.com
I'm hoping to soon be working full time with youth and have new counseling opportunities.

Just getting started...we've officially moved out of our home at 512 Habersham Lane in Easley, SC and are now living with Jess's mom while dad is in Kuwait. Life is changing rapidly around us, yet there is certainly a peace in the midst of all the change. It is as though we've been given a once in a lifetime chance to start over. DEBT FREE for the 1st time in our marriage...what a liberating event! The goal in selling the house was to get Brent back in school and hopefully finish his bachelors. However, the school thing is proving to be more challenging then we'd originally hoped. Please keep this matter in your prayers! The more longterm goal is to be moving to Asheville, NC by the end of fall this year. We will be helping plant a church there with a group from our church here, most of the people you'd probably know: Kurt & Shannon Hannah, Tim & Bonnie Blakeney, Scott & Amy Blakeney, John & Ariel Jones, Mike & Dianne Inks, and Michelle Labar...this is the group so far.
Exciting Stuff for 2006.