A Gentle Rebuke

Missional Communities: A Journey

This is why I love Missional Communities!  If you are in Warner Robins and interested in getting to know Jesus or taking a look at what it means to live life in community - contact me!

Marriage & Men: A Conversation

Guys,

I hope you all have been enjoying the Marriage sermon series as much as Jennifer and I have.  We have been reading the book Real Marriage by the Driscoll's and enjoying Ryan’s sermons as well.  This has been a great time for us to reevaluate our personal practices in our own marriage.

Personally, I have had to confess some sins of neglect and have renewed the wooing of my wife – this has been a really sweet time!

As Jennifer and I talked we realized that there are many couples in our congregation that are entering times in their marriage that we have journeyed through in the past.  To be honest, we have walked through some incredibly painful times.  

In our 17 years of marriage we have walked through bitterness, anger, apathy, selfishness, sexual sin, job loss, personal attacks, months apart from one another, miscarriages, the loss of our 10 month old daughter, and much more.  We have found that our marriage has become stronger through those times as Jesus walked with us and we were brought to humble repentance.

Beginning this Saturday, I want to invite you men to a time of real, practical conversation about our marriages.  We will use the sermon series as a launching pad to talk as men about leading and loving our wives and families.  This time will not replace our MC conversations, but will hopefully enhance them as we, very honestly, evaluate how we are doing and talk about ways that we can be the husbands and fathers that God has called us to be.

Please RSVP to let me know who is coming.  If you are inviting a friend, either RSVP for them or have them contact me.  

In preparation for our time, be sure to listen to the sermons and bring some paper/pen to write any ideas down that you may want to remember.

Come join me!

Besides Daniel

I have posted up music by Besides Daniel in the past.  You can read his story here and watch some of his videos here.  Danny Brewer is at the center of the project and features a "rotating cast of musicians".  I love Besides Daniel because of the combination of rich storytelling and emotional music put to a decidedly folk sound.

He recently shared a new version of one of my favorite songs and I wanted to share it.  The first video is the new mix and the video below that is the first I had heard the song.  Both songs sound so differently and I love them both for different reasons - check them out.




This first version was recorded shortly after the event he is singing about and his emotion captures me every time.

Living in Community

Tonight was a great blessing.  For the past month or so we have been preparing a new Missional Community to launch at our church, New City Church Warner Robins.  Our leaders are more than capable leaders but they graciously agreed to allow me to shape the way our new MC's will operate.  They were a new pilot for us and things have been going very, very well.

What is a Missional Community you may ask?  In short, it's a small group of people who are committed to sharing the daily realities of Gospel centered living.  The beauty of a missional community is that we are invited to be open, honest and to freely share the brokenness and the beauty of life in this world.  None of us have it all figured out and in fact are learning much from each other.  Tonight was no exception.

The missional community leaders are Nick and Natalie Herr - they are two beautifully broken people who are quick with a smile and treat strangers like they are old friends.  They are not fake.  They do not pretend.  They are honest and real, and I love them for it.  Tonight they led a discussion about marriage in preparation for our new series at church, Real Marriage.  We enjoyed a meal together, shared some prayer requests and then spent most of the evening talking about 3 or 4 questions surrounding marriage.  What I love about this group is that our 'meeting' time is not a question & answer time - it is a free flowing conversation among friends who are just getting to know each other.  I never feel like I'm in a Bible study or in a lecture - it usually feels like friends walking down the road talking about life together.

At the center of who we are and what we do stands Jesus.  In many ways He is very mysterious to us.  Here is a man who died for people who hated Him and loved those who abandoned Him.  We are not like that.  I am not like that.  I get angry when someone cuts me off in traffic or is driving too slow.  As much as I like to think I am like Jesus...I am not much like Him at all.

So, at the center of our conversations is the reality that God has done something different in our lives.  We are different now.  We can look back on our lives and see that we have changed and are in fact still changing.  We are still exploring, investigating and thinking deeply about these unearthed truths.  It's real life, sometimes broken, sometimes beautiful.  So, sometimes our times together are confessional, sometimes there are tears.  And there are others filled with much laughter and food and drink.

This is authentic Gospel living.  This is a missional community at New City and you are invited to come join us.

Ok, I agree with most of his resolutions...

38. Resolved, never to speak anything that is ridiculous, sportive, or matter of laughter on the Lord’s day. Sabbath evening, Dec. 23, 1722. ~ Jonathan Edwards

John Piper: Bloodlines Documentary

John Piper: Bloodlines Trailer

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

- Robert Frost

New City Church downtown - Streaming Live

Join us this morning as we join New City Church downtown streaming live.

Video streaming by Ustream