Do you know how to make a cereal healthier? It's pretty simple: Change the name. Frosted Flakes were once Sugar Frosted Flakes. Sugar Smacks became Honey Smacks and then just Smacks. Corn Pops were once known as Sugar Pops. Are you noticing a trend? Rather than make the cereal more healthy, just change what it's called to a more healthy-sounding name. Then again, no one would buy Cheerios if they were called Fruit Loops Without All the Fun. The message of Ecclesiastes is to challenge the advertising of our culture; to compare it against God's truth. As Christ-followers, are call is to follow a first-century Savior who wants us to live his values in the 21st Century. That's our challenge: to effectively navigate consumerism and contentment. ********** What if cereal companies named their cereals acurately?

We have assembled a great staff at Mountainview. God has blessed us with talented, passionate men and women who are committed to him and his church. When you have a great team, it makes ministry all that much more enjoyable. Our staff meetings regularly includes times of devotion and study. When we worship and learn together, it helps us stay focused on the things that are truly important. At a staff meeting earlier this year, I took the opportunity to remind each person that they were seated at the table because we believed they were the best qualified person for the job. We have staff members who have served at larger churches, hold more degrees, and look better than their senior pastor. Even with all that talent, I told them this: We can do better. In fact, we must do better. This is not about perfection but effectiveness. It's about the continual…

"Mountainview exists to Glorify God, Grow in Jesus, and Go into the Word." In my last post, I explored what it means to be a church that glorifies God. In this post, I will tackle the second of the 3G's -- growing in Jesus. Both churches with and without a mission statement agree that spiritual growth is vital and necessary. And having a mission statement doesn't somehow make growth automatic. If it did, there ought to be more spiritually mature believers scattered across the country. When churches talk about reaching the world for Jesus, they often go the end of Matthew and what is referred to as the Great Commission: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them…

At our elder retreat last fall, we spent considerable time studying, discussing, and praying about our mission as a church. For many years we had a mission statement common to many churches of the Willow Creek era: "To help unchurched people become fully-devoted followers of Jesus." A mission statement does not have to be unique to be effective. At the end of the day, God will judge individuals and churches based on the outcome of their lives not on how many trademarks or copyrights they hold. As we wrestled with what the Bible described as the mission of the church and how that is to be lived out on the local level, we came up with the following statement. If you've been around Mountainview, then hopefully you already know it. "Mountainview exists to Glorify God, Grow in Jesus, and Go into the World." That's our mission statement, or as we…