Thousands of preschoolers, grade schoolers, junior highers, high schoolers, and college students have emerged to descend upon their schools. It’s an exciting new school year with great opportunities and lofty goals. Actually, September signals the very same phenomenon in the church world—the students come back in waves. We Are Ready We’ve spent the last few […]
Twenty years ago, John Wimber, founding pastor of the Vineyard Church Movement, drew up ten aspects of a healthy Vineyard Church. He called these ten character traits the “Vineyard Genetic Code.” We know that genetics determines much of what makes us what we are as living beings. We get our hair color, skin color, size, […]
How much time do you spend listening to, watching or reading the news? I would imagine that many of us log in hours each day keeping pace with the news of the day – locally, nationally, and internationally, even though most of the news is bad. I believe that in this glut of bad news, […]
How do we measure success in the church? How do we know if we are hitting the mark in terms of God’s call on our lives as a body of believers? There are churches that measure success using the b3 method. The measure of success in these churches are the number of “Bucks, Buildings and […]
Mission: Impossible was a TV series that chronicles the missions of a team of secret government agents known as the Impossible Missions Force (IMF). A hallmark of the series would show Agent Briggs or Agent Phelps receiving their instructions on a recording that then self-destructed in a puff of smoke, followed by the theme music that built the […]
Read More… from Mission: Impossible for the Sake of our Kids
One of my good friends in the ministry is Lloyd Rindels. Lloyd pastors a church in Kansas City and is in my opinion a great church leader and Bible teacher. Lloyd is being swept along (as I am) by what we are calling a “Gospel of Grace Revolution.” He gave me a powerful insight that […]
On April 10, 1972, I received the gift of salvation. This precious gift came to me after hearing a man deliver what he called “The Gospel.” It was to me good news. Jesus loved me so much that He laid His life down on the cross to pay the penalty for my sin. He had […]
This morning, I was reading Colossians 3. In verses 1-4 it says: Therefore, if you have been raised with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Keep thinking about things above, not things on the earth, 3 for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in […]
Experience: The disciples of the New Testament first had an experience with Jesus. They were invited to be close to Him. They saw Him do great signs and wonders. He proclaimed with great power the “year of God’s favor”. He opened blind eyes, healed the lepers, fed the multitudes, cast out demons. The twelve were […]
I like a plan. I like knowing the general direction the course of life is going to take. When I was a High School football coach, we never went into a game without a game plan. The game plan wasn’t rigid. Things could change along the way but our game plan offered us the basic […]
The source of my “addiction” to this crazy show can be traced to a friend of mine who attends and serves in our church, Randy Weeks. I went over to Independence to see Randy after he had “laid his motorcycle down” and severely broke his leg. We visited, I prayed for Randy and got ready […]
Kids are really awesome. Even though sometimes they press the patience of adults, they have qualities that unfortunately we adults have somehow outgrown. Adults can become so sophisticated that we resist full expressions of emotions such as joy, sadness, excitement and such. But kids are different. You know just how children feel and they say […]