I'm passing along the story I used this past weekend to illustrate how God uses his people to lead others to Him. How will the church be lighted? Several centuries ago in a mountain village in Europe, a wealthy nobleman wondered what legacy he should leave to his townspeople. He made a good decision. He decided to build them a church. No one was permitted to see the plans or the inside of the church until it was finished. At its grand opening, the people gathered and marveled at the beauty of the new church. Everything had been thought of and included. It was a masterpiece. But then someone said, "Wait a minute! Where are the lamps? It is really quite dark in here. How will the church be lighted?" The nobleman pointed to some brackets in the walls, and then he gave each family a lamp, which they were…
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The Lord's Prayer contains a curious word that has survived in most English translations from the King James (1611) to the New International Version (1980's). The word? Hallowed. Jesus teaches his disciples to pray, "Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name" (Matthew 6:9). But what does it mean? The basic meaning is this: "to make holy or sacred, to sanctify or consecrate, to venerate" (Source: Dictionary.com). Wikipedia also has a great article on the word itself and its usage. But why does it matter? It matters for this reason: What I believe about God will shape the way I live my life. If I believe God is a ... Slumbering Grandfather (I'll see what I can get away with) Harsh Judge (I’ll live in fear of him) Warm Fuzzy (Sin may not bother that much because he will love me anyway) To help illustrate this, we used a video…
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This weekend at Mountainview I taught on the first part of the Lord's Prayer: "Our Father ..." To help us understand the nature of our new relationship with God as Father, I turned to Ephesians 1:4-6: "Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure. So we praise God for the glorious grace he has poured out on us who belong to his dear Son (NLT)" We often describe our salvation experience as being "born again" and rightly so (cf., John 3:3, 1 Peter 1:23). Through faith in Jesus, we receive a new life -- a second chance. We speak of the old life…
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When it comes to living a life of purpose, filled with passion, and one that makes a difference ... it's important that we are asking ourselves the right questions. Ask the wrong questions, get the wrong answers. Ask no questions, get no answers. That all seems pretty simple but most of us realize how easy it is to drift aimlessly through life. With that in mind, here are three questions to start with: Who do you want to be remembered by? What do you hope they will remember about you? Who else and why? For great resources on continued personal growth and for a free life plan tool, visit Building Champions.
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