Does your church fellowship and the community in which you live have a symbiotic relationship? Can it? And if so how? And would that mean that your fellowships existence would greatly depend upon that relationship?

Just thinking out loud…

What does it mean to serve? By definition to serve is the act of serving or rendering assistance or help. It can even mean a term (obligated time) of service, such as a tour of duty in the military. But do these definitions define what God meant when He told Abraham to “Serve me faithfully and live a blameless life.

So lets rethink the question, how does God define serving Him? He’s God, He needs nothing from us. He is “God Almighty”, as he states in Genesis 17:1, “I am El-Shaddai”. So what can we offer the “God Almighty”?

Lets look once again at the word serve. There is another meaning to the word that more…

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See what the supporters are saying about Larry in this news 3 report. (CLICK HERE)

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Alright, I’ll come clean. Neil Young is not on my radar for musical talent. But there is a significant point to my showing his video yesterday. I’m personally sick and tired of people (more specifically mature Christian’s) telling me that they don’t have the ability to share the gospel or that it is not their responsibility. Hmmmm! This is not only sad but entirely wrong (Acts 1:8, 22:15-16) . I’m not saying that we need to be bible thumping evangelist, but we are to be spokes people for God. This means we are to share with the world our unique testimony of how we came to a personal relationship with Christ Jesus. This is done not only with words but actions also.

So what does this have to do with Neil Young? Simple really, watch how we sings and carries himself. He cannot sing, he has no looks, and his dancing skills are a big zero, yet the crowds love him. Why? His passion is HUGE, he really believes in what he is doing and that is what people connect with. If you really believe let’em hear and feel you. Don’t be afraid to share your unique story, it’s yours and no one can say that your story is not true. They may not like or agree with you but they cannot call you a liar and discredit your feelings and personal experience.

Look at Acts 4:13, “The members of the council were amazed when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, for they could see that they were ordinary men with no special training in the Scriptures.” These common men spoke with boldness because the Holy Spirit was with them and they believed. Do you believe?

Not convinced, wrap your arms around Hebrews 6:1 So let us stop going over the basic teachings about Christ again and again. Let us go on instead and become mature in our understanding.

1 Corinthians 13:11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things.

May the Lord God revile in His perfect time His will for each of His new creations.

Tullian has an excellent blog post here, excerpted from the book he’s working on (Unfashionable). Here’s a part of his post:

There’s a major difference between having a tribal mindset and a missionary mindset. The highest value of a tribally minded person is self-protection. They ask questions like: Since I feel the safest around those who are just like me, how can I protect myself from those who are different than I am? So they intentionally surround themselves with people who think the way they think, like the things they like, and despise the things they despise. As a result, they live with a sense of superiority, looking down on those who are not like them (for half my life I was convinced that surfers like me were far cooler than anyone on the face of this earth).

In contrast to a tribal minded person, the highest value of a missionary minded person is not self-protection but self-sacrifice. A missionary minded person is a person that exists, not primarily for himself but for others. She is a person that is willing to set aside personal preferences in service to those whose preferences are different than hers. Missionaries are people who are willing to be inconvenienced, discomforted, and spent for the well-being of others. The Gospel of Jesus Christ demands that we be missionary minded, because the gospel is the story of God sacrificing himself for others.

More of Justin’s work click here

Do you know who this is?
Hint #1, He can’t really sing, play the guitar or dance, but he has passion.
Hint #2 more…

This is an interesting read from the New York Times…

Suppose you’re preparing to travel by air. Which of these precautions do you think is most likely to prevent your plane from crashing?

A) Sacrificing a gilt-horned bull on an altar.

B) Sacrificing two goats on the tarmac.

C) Buying flight insurance.

I’m guessing you didn’t go for the bull sacrifice. Although this preboarding procedure was practiced by ancient Greek travelers, as Homer reported in grisly detail, today there are serious doubts about its efficacy, if only because of the litany of tourist woes in “The Odyssey.”

The goat option was tested at Katmandu Airport in September to propitiate Akash Bhairab, the Hindu sky god. Officials of Nepal Airlines told Reuters that they had sacrificed two goats in front of a Boeing 757 whose mechanical problems had forced the airline to suspend some flights.

“The snag in the plane has now been fixed, and the aircraft has resumed its flights,” one airline official reported triumphantly. Nevertheless, it is probably premature to put much faith in a single experiment that so far, to my knowledge, has not been replicated.

We do, though, have abundant data regarding option C. Last year, tens of millions of people bought life insurance for scheduled flights of airlines in the United States. Not one of those insured passengers died in a crash — and this was not just a coincidence, at least not to many of the people who bought the insurance.

No, at some level they believed that their insurance helped keep the plane aloft, according to…. Click here for complete story

It’s the final paragraph that gets me “So when we think about passing up flight insurance, we conjure up disaster just as easily as ancient Greeks imagined a thunderbolt from Olympus, and we too figure we can avert it through the equivalent of a bull sacrifice. Intuitively, we haven’t made great strides since Homer’s day. But at least our gods take credit cards.”

“Religion is the Drug of the American People”

It numbs their pain!
It helps redirect their thoughts off their problems!
It is their temporary fix!

Far too many people are using religion for temporary comfort. Just think back to 911, the churches were full for just a few short weeks. Where did all the people go? Why did they not stay?

The Wilson’s were very proud of their family history. Their ancestors had come to America on the Mayflower. Their family included Governors, Senators, Pastors, War Heros & CEO’s.

They decided to compile a family history, a legacy for the children. They hired a well known author. Only one problem arose as they began to outline their history: HOW TO HANDLE THAT GREAT UNCLE GEORGE who was executed in the electric chair. But the author more…

Have you seen the movie? If not here you go. Warning, you may see this as disturbing as the videos roll on. Part 6 is well, hmmmmm, I’m scared.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9