Any life worth living will have its share of fears. In our current teaching series at Mountainview, we're using the story of Benaiah (2 Samuel 23:20-23) to highlight what a life of passion looks like. In the course of one paragraph, Benaiah squares off against two Moabites, a 500-lb lion, and a huge Egyptian. Given that the invention of Prozac is still centuries away, it's likely Benaiah had a few fears. This is an important point: a life of passion is not one in which fears are absent. That sort of life would be mundane, not magnificent. A life of passion is one in which our largest, scariest fears are out-sized by our faith in God. As we headed into communion, I shared a story about Abraham Lincoln that Walt Whitman first wrote about in 1882: In the gloomiest period of the war, he had a call from a large…
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I read an interesting article about how to get over your glory days at the Art of Manliness Blog. Tip number one: create new firsts.
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At last, science creates something useful! Check out this article in Popular Science. It describes how you can convert a gasoline-powered car to run off coffee. It's called the Carpuccino (no, I'm not making that up). This Car Runs on Coffee
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"Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen" (Ephesians 3:20-21). Without bounds. Unable to be contained. Beyond our wildest expectations. Our God is able to do immeasurably more than all we can think to ask. He exceeds our most vivid imaginations. When we think we've exhausted every possible angle, conceived every possible solution ... God stands there and says, "You're just getting started." The Westminster Catachism explains the ultimate aim of every Christ-follower in this way: "Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever." The church was designed to bring glory to God. As we trust in God to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine --…
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I like reading Ed Stetzer. I first came across Ed's stuff when I was in the beginning stages of planting a church. My wife and I had just been hired by Stadia and were sent back home with a stack of books to read. One of those was a book on church planting by Ed Stetzer. Ever since then, I have tracked Ed via his blog and Twitter (@edstetzer). Here are excerpts of a recent post entitled, "Church Birth Control." Seems to be that churches must be on some powerful birth control. They are not reproducing. And I don't get why. It's natural. It's normal. It's essential. And we all know how to do it. But somewhere along the way, church reproduction and multiplication became unusual or strange in North America. And I am not happy about it. What's the most effective? Church multiplication movements. When churches plant lots of…
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