bob thoughts

worship

In the book, Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior by Ori and Rom Brafman there is an interesting observation. The book doesn't talk about worship but I think this quote helps clarify what we value or worship.

“When we encounter a new object, person, or situation, the value we assign to it shapes our further perception of it.”

Worship is what you and I value greatly and how that decision impacts our lives.

mark batterson

Mark Batterson has been giving small previews of his new book on his blog and I thought today's was exceptionally great and wanted to share it here.

The book bytes continue.  T-minus four days till Wild Goose Chase releases.

Can I share a personal conviction? I think vision is the cure for sin.  One reason many of us get entangled in sin is because we don't have enough God-ordained vision to keep us busy. The more vision you have, the less you will sin. And the less vision you have, the more you will sin. It is a vision that keeps us playing offense spiritually.

Too often we try to stop sinning by not sinning.  That is what psychologists call a double bind. It's sort of like saying, "Be spontaneous." You can't be spontaneous now that I've told you to be! The way to stop sinning is not by focusing on not sinning. The way to stop sinning is by getting a God-sized vision that consumes all your time and energy.

wild goose chase

In a few days Mark Batterson releases his new book called Wild Goose Chase. I'm really excited to check it.

Today on his blog he shared an excerpt and I thought it was an amazing analogy that I wanted you to see - here is what he said:

Thought I'd share some book bytes from Wild Goose Chase before it releases on August 19.    Think of it as a daily dose of Wild Goose.

I wonder if churches do to people what zoos do the animals. We try to tame them in the name of Christ. We remove the risk. We remove the danger. We remove the struggle. And what we end up with is a caged Christian.

Jesus didn't die on the cross to keep us safe. He died to make us dangerous. I would like to think that when I pronounce the benediction at th end of our church services, I am sending dangerous people back into their natural habitat to wreak havoc on the Enemy.

excerpt from Wild Goose Chase

reading

Those of you who know me well know that I am not a very good reader and I don't enjoy it. I force myself to do it because I know I need to. For the fist time in my life I have a reader - a good friend who loves to read and he is going to read several books for me this summer and give me a report on the book. How cool is that!

He just finished the first book, Pop Goes The Church by Tim Stevens. No real new things in the book for me but some great reminders.

Pop culture - not the church - is shaping the morals, faith, and values of our society.  In order to reach people and help them experience the life that Jesus can free them up to live, we have to get their attention by speaking in their language - the language of pop culture.  Most of them don’t speak the language of the church, and are turned off by those people who do.  But they do speak the language of Coldplay and Steven Spielberg, and we have to leverage that. 

My friend jotted down some key thoughts from the book for me and he said several times "Poop Goes The Church" showed up in his written report. It made me think how true that statement could be - I want to make sure that the church isn't POOP!

We need to work diligently to make sure the church is a place of excellence and not POOP.

Donald Miller

I am not a very good reader and I only read because I know I have to. The concept of reading for pleasure is something I just don't get. That being said, there is one author that I might have to say I almost enjoy reading - his name is Donald Miller. Here is a quick sample of his stuff. If you get a chance you should read some of his books.

Sometime I feel as though I were born in a circus, come out of my mother's womb like a man form a cannon, pitched toward the ceiling of the tent, all the doctors and nurses clapping in delight from the grandstands, the band going great guns in trombones and drums. I unfold and find flight hundreds of feet above the center ring, the smell of popcorn in the air, the clowns gather below, amazed at my grace, and all the people chanting my name as my arms come out like wings and I move swan-like toward the apex, where I draw my arms in, collapse my torso to my legs, roll over in perfection, then slowly give in to gravity. My body falls back toward earth, the ground coming up quick, the center ring growing enormous beneath my falling weight.

And this is precisely when it occurs to me that there is no net. And I wonder, What is the use of a circus? and Why should a man bother to be shot out of a cannon? and Why is the crowd's applause so fleeting? and ... Who is going to rescue me?

what would jesus buy

This Sunday we rap up our money matters series at LifePoint. I have heard about so many great conversations that people have had about budgets, debt and saving.

This morning on the Today Show they talked to this pastor about consumerism. Well, he wasn't really a pastor - just a performer preaching against buying things we don't really need. It was sadly funny and if you want you can watch the clip on the Today Show web site linked above.

He is also coming out with a new book What Would Jesus Buy

Though I may not agree with all of his tactics he is exactly correct in that we are a consumer driven society and if we don't work at it that consumerism finds it's way into the church as well.

Don't just be a spiritual consumer - don't just go to church, BE THE CHURCH.