This entry is being posted from an "undisclosed" Starbucks location. I'll only say that it's somewhere in East County. I'm not sure if it's location, time of day, or just luck of the draw ... but I'm surrounded by some of the strangest collections of people ever gathered in one Starbucks. Even typing that doesn't seem very pastoral, but it's true. And if they knew I was a pastor ... they'd think I was the strangest one of all.

Sometimes the Christian life is portrayed as a dry and dull routine of staying within the boundaries of what is acceptable to God. It’s seen as a lifestyle that limits rather than expands opportunities. To those on the outside (and a few on the inside), the life of a Christ-follower is viewed to bland and boring.Nothing could be further from the truth!The life of a Christ-follower is an invitation to follow him into the risky parts of life ... to serve those who are disenfranchised, to battle injustice, to dream up creative ways of communicating truth.The life of a Christ-follower is to be marked by a sense of adventure. Where will God take me today? Who will I have the opportunity to influence for eternity? What does God have in store for the next chapter of my life? What dream is God forming in my heart that he has the…

Last Thursday, I was working out of the Starbucks on Navajo and Fletcher Parkway. This Starbucks -- like many Starbucks -- doesn't have enough electrical outlets for people to plug into. I find this to be highly annoying, especially since Starbucks is trying to court the laptop crowd. It is either a design flaw in their store roll-out plan or a deliberate attempt to limit the time people will spend in the store.At any rate, I digress. Just had to get that off my chest.I was sitting at a table, plugged into the closest electrical outlet -- which left one open. Two guys sit down at opposite ends of the table and begin to unpack. One guy hands me his power cord and asks if I'll plug him in. So, I take his cord and start to plug it in. At this point, the other fellow speaks up and says…

Opportunities, challenges, and consequences. These are the very things that faced Adam and Eve as they were given a place in the Garden of Eden.Just imagine being given the opportunity to name all the animals. Or being handed the chance to establish traditions that would impact the history of humankind. One of the statements that often grinds a vision to a halt is “But we’ve never done it that way before.” For Adam and Eve, that was especially true.Inherent with these same opportunities were great challenges. We often benefit from the experiences of others through mentoring relationships or by reading books. For Adam and Eve, there was no one else to set a precedent or provide an example.With opportunities and challenges come consequences. Not all the consequences were negative. They had moments of intimacy with God unlike any that others have experienced. Some of the consequences were earth-shattering. One poor…