Fuzzy Thinking

Last night I had the privilege of having dinner with a few friends. One of the couples is moving 1000 miles to minister to artists. They are artists, but for the past few years they have been Pastors of worship and arts at a mid-size church (700-900). What struck me was how comfortable they seemed with ‘emergent’ issues, even though they really haven’t studied or moved into the ‘emergent’ scene too much.

I told a different friend that I believe the Spirit of God moves and is moving. The question is whether we are open to hear it. My worship pastor friend definitely is. He is moving and doesn’t yet have a job or a place to live. He is leaving, because he heard the Spirit of God say “go.” As I struggle with the current issues within the church, I realize as we follow the Spirit of God, our lives will look different than those who don’t. I don’t want to be too judgmental here, but I will say it anyway, I wonder, in the traditional church, how much we have either stopped listening to God’s Spirit. Perhaps it isn’t that we have stopped listening, perhaps it is more of an unwillingness to allow our lives to be made uncomfortable or messy. After all, the church hasn’t done very well with the messy and we sure love to be comfortable. As I think along these lines, an Old Testament story comes to mind. What I wonder is how many of us are bowing down when the music plays, to what are we bowing down, and what penalty does standing involve?

I love the following stuff from theBlog blog. I wonder what will happen when the people of the Church stop seeing the ’sanctuary’ as where God is and is released to discover God where ever God might be. I wonder how a view of “God outside of the box” of our buildings would change the way we do what we do. I wonder what would happen if we stopped trying to get our church statistics up and started seeing ministry as “out there” rather than “in here.” What an interesting time we would live in…..

The postmodern, in social terms, is the end of secular space. It is the acknowledgement of the spiritual connectedness of all reality. Emerging Churches look to embody their way of life within postmodern, or holistic, or spiritual cultures. These postmodern missionaries accept the givenness of culture, look for the fingerprints of God there, and hopefully, on their best days, get behind and support the work of God in the unlikeliest places. The rallying cry of Emerging Churches is Psalm 24:1 (I heard this all over England), ‘the earth is the lords’. No bad people, no bad parts of town, and no bad times, just those areas waiting/groaning for redemption…to be transformed…to connect with God…

[TheBolgBlog]

A (re)blog post got me thinking…I’m realizing that my understanding of scripture is determined by the context of my life. How then, can I have a ‘fresh’ or ‘new’ reading of Scripture which is more in line with the original understanding of the text. In other words, how can I break free of my “rich, dominant, white, male American” context and be transformed by a truer reading of the text.

[the (re)blog]

I think the person who posted this is from the UK, but the analogy still fits (in my opinion). Anyway, the post is called “Emerging Church and All That.”

Emerging Church and All That

Sometimes I want off the ship…other times I want to help others find the lifeboats.

Wow, now I have a couple of tools that seem, at this time, to work well for me. I can now read my RSS feeds (Blogs and others) through a program called Omea (see below) . It looks good. It also has an option that I can hook it up to w.bloggar and can blog right from the reader (for the most part). If I want, I can save the post and upload it later. Cool.

In the February, 2005 issue of Home Computer Magazine (www.homecomputermagazine.com/),
Omea Reader was announced as their Five Star Pick for free RSS Readers. But you knew that already… isn't it nice
to be proven right? Check out page 34 of issue #4 for more details.

[Omea News]

I wonder how other people feel about doing “good works” but not “stamping” Jesus all over what we do. I’ve had some conversations with people at my church and many feel it is giving God glory to let people know the reason why we are doing what we are doing is because of what Jesus has done.

After a recent short term mission trip to Thailand to help with tsunami
relief on Koh Phi Phi Don Island, I asked myself is there another way to do
missions in an emergent context. What I came up with was Flash Mob Missions.
There are already several agencies doing work on this island, what they need is
people to come and be hands. These agencies are not "Christian" per
say, but they are doing the work of the church even if they don’t know it. So I
figured why create another organization, with a Christian banner, just to
justify the work? So what I have done is created a website with all the details
on how to go and serve the people of that Island. Wouldn’t it be a great representation
of the church if a couple of hundred Christians from all over just showed up on
the island to help? No fan fare, no press, and not "We need to stamp Jesus
all over what we do."

[open source theology - collaborative theology for the emerging church]

Jesus seemed to work “outside” of the religious establishment when He was on earth. What if He still is? My fear is that while I’m on the inside, I end up on the outside.

In my quest to catch up with my blog and rss feeds, and also be able to manage my own blog, I’ve discovered http://www.newzcrawler.com . It is pretty cool so far, although it isn’t free. I have 14 days to try it. This is basically a test post while I’m offline

NBC.com > The Apprentice 3

Ah…Kendra pulled it off. I’ve felt that she had a very good shot for about a month now. However, after I saw the way she pulled her team together for the final task I told my wife that she had it. After all, it comes down to how you treat people…even with the Donald.

The thing that caught me about the final task was it seemed like Kendra was being genuine about how she felt. Tana may have seemed behind her team when they were around, but when they weren’t she let the insults fly.

Causes me to wonder how I as a pastor feel and treat the people I am called to lead and serve.

the (re)blog: QUIET TIME

Here’s a good post on the Quiet Time. I’ve had my own issues in the past. Now, I feel comfortable with what I’m doing to connect with God. That is the point, after all, connecting with God. However, far too often the QT can become a type of merit badge and instead of us connecting with God it causes us to move farther away. The kicker is….we don’t even know it.

“O merciful Father! let me no longer reason about grace, but silently abandon myself to its operation” - from Spiritual Progress by Francois Fenelon

Ah..Numb3rs. I love the show…but I also seem to love numbers. Perhaps it is because I am, in real life, a computer guy. I dig math. However, God called me out of the computer matrix into the church.

What I find is I can still dig math, statistics, and numbers. Yet, I’m begining to sense a dark side to the whole numbers game.

Living in the United Methodist tribe, I find we love numbers. We have forms to fill out and get in on time so others can see our numbers. We have websites that track numbers. We even (for a while) had a catchy slogan; “We count people because people count”

Why do we keep track of our numbers? So we can know how we are doing….ah…there’s the rub. What I’m discovering is that when I become focused on the numbers, I’m focused on the wrong thing. What I’m finding is, when the folks in my congregation are focused on the numbers, they are focused on the wrong thing. Actually, as we focus on the numbers, we take our focus off the main thing. Bottom line: we get distracted.

Numbers do have their place I guess. But they also can generate a very real problem especially as we try to find new forms of ministry. Here’s an example:

In our community there are several “social networks” that meet on Sunday mornings. Perhaps they are Pop Warner players, flea market shoppers, model airplane flyers, or some other ’social network’ that people belong to.

If the social network meets on Sunday, guess what, that is the main time for worship in the area I serve. If I’m focused on the Numbers, I will have a great tempation to “convince” people to forgo their social network and come join the social network I’m a part of (Church).

If I’m focused on reaching social networks with the Good News, I might be more apt to convince folks to go ahead and be a part of their social network and to inflitrate it with the Good News (which could take quite a while). With the focus on reaching new social groups it means that the Sunday morning numbers will be down.

Also, if the congregation is more focused on social groups than numbers then it means we will ‘do’ church differently.

I am becoming more convinced that it is time to do away with our Number crunching. So far it has caused us (United Methodist Tribe at least) to be far to focus on things to get people into the church building so we can count them (because they do count after all). If we do away with the Numbers, perhaps the church will be free to focus on reaching new social groups and going out to them rather than bent on getting them into the building.

I’m sure I’ll have more later…..but this was quite a lot.

The Faithful Skeptic: Community

A wonderful post with some very good questions. Hopefully today I can post my thoughts on Numbers and the UMC. The issue I think that we must deal with is “Social Networks.”

When I post about “Numbers” this will be an important concept. There are “Social Networks” the church ignores. IF we decide to inflitrate these “Social Networks” will depend on how we view our Numbers and what they mean to us.

More later….

Pluck: Your Personal Web Information Center with RSS reader, bookmark manager, and publisher
Thursday May 12th 2005, 11:09 pm Edit This
Filed under: General, Computing

Pluck: Your Personal Web Information Center with RSS reader, bookmark manager, and publisher

Ah….the joys of rss and blogs and other stuff. Over the past few weeks I’ve realized that reading other people’s blogs may be an important thing to do. OTOH, sometimes I wonder if I’m not just wasting my time. What I’ve discovered is there are others voicing some of the things I’ve sensed for quite a while. It is a very interesting experience.

That being said, I’ve been in search of some good RSS readers. I use multiple computers and I am also forced to connect via dialup. I was hoping to find something that would dial in automatically, update the pages and give me the ability to read my feeds or is it, feed my reads. Anyway, Pluck doesn’t seem too bad. The downside is it only works with IE and I use Firefox. The nice thing is there is a web interface that may come in handy.

My point in this rambling is simply to say there is a conversation going on via blogs. Some of the stuff is fluff and I’m not sure it is worth the time to read all of it. However, there are some very important things being said. So, if you know of a great RSS reader, let me know.

Why Here? Why Now?
Monday May 09th 2005, 4:50 pm Edit This
Filed under: Church

I’m very interested in knowing the answer to the question, why am I here? Not on earth, rather in this place at this time… There is a lot of work to do here. I really don’t want to just do business as usual. However, I realize that there are many people that will have to literally “get on board” if we are going to move where God wants us to move. It is a new day and we cannot afford to do ministry _or even approach ministry_ the way we have for the past 20 - 50 years. I believe that reality is not just relevant here, but anywhere ministry is being done. People have moved on, so should we. People are asking different questions. So should we. People are at a different place. We should go to that place.

Label: Chistian
Monday May 09th 2005, 4:47 pm Edit This
Filed under: General, Church

What if Christians stopped seeing themselves as Christian? What if the label Christian lost its significance? What would happen if instead of answering the question, “Are you a Christian” affirmatively, we stepped back and found some other way to define who we are?

We are in a mass marketed, mass communication, mass information Culture where labels have been defined. The label “Christian” has a lot of baggage. Not all of the baggage is bad, but to many in our culture the label Christian means certain negative things. Some are trying to cast off the old label for a new focus on Jesus.

It was difficult for Coke to introduce “new” Coke. Perhaps we are having the same issue with a new flavor of “Christianity.” A flavor that is not focused on dogmas or what one believes, but rather if one is integrating the teachings of Jesus into one’s life.

It will be difficult for the church to discard the label Christian however. Not that “Christian” is bad, just the way the label has been defined. Many in our culture turn away when the label Christian is used. It has to much bad baggage.

Instead of Christian, perhaps we should focus on Spirituality with Jesus as the central figure. There are times when I’m not sure that Jesus is the central figure of the label Christianity. Jesus says feed the hungry, which I don’t do too well. He said clothe the naked, which I don’t do too well. He said to love your enemy…again…I don’t do too well. The problem is, I’m not alone in those who claim the label Christian.

When I claim the label Christian, I can feel good about myself. When I claim my spirituality is based on the person Jesus, then I don’t feel as good about myself because I don’t actively integrate His life and teachings into my life.

I still claim the label, yet now I struggle with the distance between what my life is and what Jesus teachings say. Progress is slow, but there is progress. My question is, how can we get more “Christians” to integrate Jesus?

Church Thang
Thursday May 05th 2005, 2:22 pm Edit This
Filed under: Church

God still calls out to all who will listen. SOmetimes I feel like, in the church, we have God all figured out. Sometimes I feel like we believe that if God is going to work he must and has to work through us.

Of course, this isn’t the first time people believed this. Jesus was traveling and his disciples said, “Jesus someone was healing in your name and we told him to stop.” They were probably waiting for Jesus to commend them and thank them for taking the situation in their own hands. Jesus however doesn’t. He didn’t seem to mind that someone outside of their group was doing things in his name.

We get upset when the church down the street does something. What would happen if God decided to work outside the church? What would happen if God decided to move away from our planned, packaged and marketed programs and went into the streets and started loving people? Would we freak out? Would we invite them to one of our programs? Would we be surprised if they said our programs lacked the reality of their meeting with God?

The real cool thing is that God is still moving. God is still calling. I get so hung up about my church and my programs and my ministry. God is moving. He is able to do far more than I ever give him credit for. He really doesn’t need my programs. In fact, perhaps the definition of grace is that at times he reaches through my human offerings to change a life.

What would happen if God stepped outside the church to do His work? What if He already has? What if, after getting the machine rolling, we are just keeping it oiled?

Jesus
Thursday May 05th 2005, 1:40 pm Edit This
Filed under: Church

I use to think of Jesus a certain way and I’m finding more ‘voice’ to my views through N. T. Wright and others in the postmodern genre. Jesus is the one who tries to teach His followers the best possible way to live. Following Jesus doesn’t mean that things will be wonderful in my life, or that everything will work out. Following Jesus doesn’t mean I have to hold on to a set of beliefs and/or dogma. Following Jesus means living life the way He lived it. When I don’t, basically, I am swimming upstream from how life really is and operates. When I choose to live some other way, then I am trying to live a lie. Jesus _is_ the truth. He _is_ the Life. Any other way basically says, I don’t believe that Jesus knew the best way to live. What he calls me to is substandard to another way to live.

This has huge implications to how I live and how I lead. It effects my view of sin and why sin is so destructive. Sin becomes trying to live by swimming against the flow of how life really is. Sin is denying the reality of life and living. Sin is trying to find a “new” way to discover abundant life. It just doesn’t work.

…more later….

Post-modernism
Wednesday May 04th 2005, 9:33 pm Edit This
Filed under: Church

I think the thing about the whole post-modern movement is the feeling that some are making it into some program. It seems like if there is anything that effects the church, we are able to turn it into a program and try to market it. For me, post-modernism is not a program, it is simply the way things are. For a while I was turning away from all the post modern books and such, but what I found is that I felt most comfortable when thinking about the issues post-modernism resources address.

I am beginning to have some clarity about where I am in the mix of all this. I have stopped seeing life, and reality as some type of machine to be manipulated. Instead I see it more organically. This has huge implications for me as I serve a church. I’ve long ago tossed aside the programs that the Christian subculture keeps telling me I need to embrace to “save” my church, or have a “successful” church. Instead, I’m seeing this job as much more difficult than knowing the ‘right’ programs to implement. If this church was a machine, then having the right parts might be helpful. It ain’t no machine….I am finding more art to this gig than science. Although, perhaps science might be more art than science too.

The Church Why Bother? - Christianity Today Magazine
Saturday January 08th 2005, 3:30 pm Edit This
Filed under: Church

The Church Why Bother? - Christianity Today Magazine

A pretty good read and it reminds me of the fact that there is more going on with the church than what I believe. I get so concerned with all the ‘trappings’ of the organization when in reality there is something more important. My growth in Christ. God wants me to be mature in my faith and for this to happen I need to be with people whether I like it or not. It is as I interact with people, the good and the bad of people, that I become more Christlike.

A New Year…again
Tuesday December 28th 2004, 11:06 pm Edit This
Filed under: General

I was wondering what my “Focus” was going to be for the new year. Then it kind of hit me. Perhaps this year I can stop trying as hard and simply start trusting.

One of the areas I’ve been trying to work on is having true joy in my life. I know that through Jesus Christ my sins are forgiven and that does bring me joy, yet, my life doesn’t always show it. For some reason, I’ve been making a connection between joy (or the lack of joy) and feeling like I need to be trying. So, I’m going to try to allow myself to trust God rather than feeling like it all falls on me.

Dave.

My Day At the Convent
Sunday December 12th 2004, 11:38 pm Edit This
Filed under: General

As we got out of the car I felt different. For the past couple of months my soul had been aching. I had been longing for something that was missing. For the past several years I felt I was groping in the dark. It was easy to hide this groping because those around me were groping to. We don’t always talk about it, in fact, it is rarely that we even acknowledge it. Like two people passing one asking “How are you doing”, the other answering “just find thanks” we simply continue on our way without thinking about the answer, or the question.

So, we fill our lives and our souls with projects, programs, and possessions that help us take our mind off the real issues within our spirits. We turn, or rather run, away from John Wesley’s question, “How goes it with your soul.”

It could be that we don’t understand the question. It sounds like a different language to us. It might be that we don’t know how to respond to the question. We have become so good at allowing the noise of life to crowd us that we are no longer comfortable with the silence it takes to answer such a question.

All around us sounds abound. Of course there are times we take to get away, to leave the noise to others, to find a place to think and reflect, but those times are rare. We have been unable to cultivate a sense of silence and wonder into our everyday life.

So, as we pulled up to the convent things ‘felt’ different. I can’t explain it. It was as if a puzzle piece was moved and finally everything fit. The flurry (activity, not ice cream) of my life was replaced with a familiar, yet far away friend.

Sister Magdalene showed us around the facilities. There were rooms with beds and showers. There were meeting rooms. There was a library and even a bookstore. Perhaps the most impressive item there was silence.

The rooms looked a lot like hotel rooms. Yet, there was one vital difference. There was not a TV or a Telephone in any of the rooms. The difference between these rooms and those in a hotel was simply that silence was expected. People were there not to get away from life, rather, people came there enter into life.

It isn’t the silence that takes us away from our lives, it is the silence that helps us to enter into our lives. Our true lives.

As we got out of the car, even though I had left home, I was in fact coming back home. Home to where my Father was waiting. Home to the Open Arms. Home to the robe of acceptance and the ring of belonging. The noise was gone. In the silence I heard the Father of Life. In the silence of letting go of the noise, I discovered the one thing, the only thing that I needed.

Letting Go
Wednesday December 08th 2004, 11:22 pm Edit This
Filed under: General

There are times when you simply have to let go. Although letting go is seldom a simple thing.

For the past several weeks I’ve been evaluating my spiritual life especially in the area of prayer. I’m finding, that in order to discover a greater sense of God’s grace I simply have to let go of other things.

For me, the most precious item in my life is time. Yet, this is the one thing that gets chipped away little by litte. Before I know it, my time has been spent and I can’t get it back.

In order for me to deepen my relationship with God, I’m finding that I must spend time with God. Even though I’ve been a Christian for over 20 years and have been a pastor for over around 15 years I always tried to ’speed’ up my relationship with God by trying to spend ‘quality’ rather than ‘quanity’ time with God. Now, I’m discovering that the only quality time is quantitative time.

For our culture it is difficult to let go of things. It is difficult to free up ourselves. We want to squeeze everything we can out of life. When we do we are making a statment and a choice. I’m finding that in order to grab onto God, I must let go. Letting go is a difficult thing.

Finally….
Tuesday December 07th 2004, 9:41 pm Edit This
Filed under: General

The joys of dialup are simply amazing. I guess once you have a cable modem you really never want to go back. Now that I only can get dialup I find that statement is true.

Actually, I have a pretty good setup. I have my computer set to automatically dialup and get my email. The problem is, I’m unable to respond to my email unless I fire up my laptop, dial into the internet, start MS Outlook, download and finally answer my email. Usually I decide not to mess with it. The downside is that I’m finding I’m not answering my email, my email box keeps filling up and when I’m not online I don’t post to my blog.

Well, tonight I decided to bite the bullet, get online, answer my email and post to my blog.

So…there you have it…what my life has become

Church Marketing Sucks: No Need to Impress
Tuesday October 26th 2004, 7:33 pm Edit This
Filed under: Church

Church Marketing Sucks: No Need to Impress

An interesting website that I plan on mining some more. Living in our current culture, I find I keep osolating between living in, accepting and “doing life” like the culture suggests and living ‘against’ the culture. One good thing, I believe, is being free and brave enough to question the culture in which we live. Too often we simply accept the ‘wisdom of the age’ or the ‘thoughts of the culture.’ Most of the time this might now be a very big deal. However, when the subject is the church, then we must ask questions of our culture and place our agendas before God.

It seems as if this website is questioning some of the ‘common sense’ of our culture. This is a good thing.

My Time with Leonard Sweet
Monday October 25th 2004, 11:03 pm Edit This
Filed under: General, Preaching, Church

Well, I did it! I sent my registration in for a workshop with Leonard Sweet. After reading his books and website I finally am taking an opportunity to see him live and in person! The workshop includes three sessions, worship and dinner.

It sounds odd (even to me), but I am having difficulty decided whether or not to stick around for the final session. If I do stick around it means I will miss the first couple of hours of The Indianapolis Colts on Monday Night Football.

Even if I don’t stick around, I know the time spent will be well worth it.

One little tidbit was the brochure mentioned that Sweet is working on a book on preaching. After being a part of preachingplus.com I’m sure that will be quite an interesting book.

Dave.

Pursuing God
Sunday October 24th 2004, 10:07 pm Edit This
Filed under: Church

I started re-reading “The Pursuit of God” by A. W. Tozer a few days ago. I originally bought the book in the late 80’s for 99 cents. That was an excellent price. In fact, for this book it was better than an excellent deal. If you ever haven’t had the chance of reading this book, I would encourage you to.

As I reflect on the church and its state, I realize that I am a reflection of the church. The church’s problems are reflect in me. Because of the issues within me, the church reflects those same issues. We often talk about the church being “the people” yet, it is easy for us to forget that any ‘problems’ we see in the church are only there because we are there.

One of the area’s I’ve been struggling with is simply connection with God. I’m not sure I always see a strong connection between God and God’s people. It seems we tend to get sidetracked and do all kinds of things, but we forget to be connected with God.

A. W. Tozer writes, “The stiff and wooden quality about our religious lives is a result of our lack of holy desire. Complacency is a deadly foe of all spiritual growth. Acute desire must be present or there will be no manifestation of Christ to His people. He waits to be wanted. Too bad that with many of us He waits so long, so very long, in vain.”

I find that it is much easier to ‘do’ than to ‘wait.’ However, there are times that I find holy desire only comes in the waiting. We live life at such a frantic pace that we allow holy desire to dry up and blow away. God is waiting, yet my heart moves so fast that I pass God by.

The one thing I want is the One. I wonder if that is why my heart is so restless. I want to know God. I am tired of my apathy. I am tired of my complexity. I want to simply bow before God and allow him to speak. I want to know him who loves me beyond belief. I feel that is the only thing that will satisfy my soul.

Postmodernism and me
Friday October 08th 2004, 11:19 am Edit This
Filed under: General, Church

Reading some books on postmodernism, the church and such issues. I have to wonder where I fit into all this. Some of the leanings of postmodernism I have. However, there is still much that I’m not comfortable with yet.

Dave Tomlisin in his book “The Post-Evangelical” lists many things that resonate within me. Yet, there were some things in the book that I cringed at. Perhaps it is the nature of postmodernism, the now and not yet.

I realize that culture is changing, and I am, for better or worse, a product of my culture. Yet, I want my culture to be changed and transformed by Jesus.

I guess the one thing that I’m rejecting from the more ‘traditional’ church or the ‘traditional way of doing church’ is that there doesn’t always seem to be a focus upon Jesus and his call on our lives. It seems like church (or christianity for that matter) becomes more of a business and that is how we end up structuring things.

At times I wonder if I’ll make it though all the cultural shifts and changes…

Africa Challenge
Monday October 04th 2004, 11:05 am Edit This
Filed under: Church

Well, if you want to be challenged, here’s a link to go to It is from SansBlogue and has a quote from Bono (U2 fame) dealing with how the west has basically forgotten (or chooses not to acknowledge) the issues in Africa.

I’m not really current on the issues, but I do know one of our conference missionaries has also said that he feels the west has given up on Africa.

Free Culture and the Church
Friday October 01st 2004, 11:54 pm Edit This
Filed under: General, Church

Just posted on UMSource a bit about Leonard Sweet’s new book. I was lamenting the fact that we in the church have not picked up on the the Free Culture movement. I didn’t say too much on UMSource, but since no one has found this site yet, I thought I’d post a bit more.

I understand the need for someone to make a living, but it seems like those of us in the church are doing quite well for ourselves. We talk a good game about doing things for God, yet, we have no problem in getting compensated for those things that we credit to God. For example: A pastor may say God inspired him/her or God led her/him to a certain idea, sermon, program, etc. Yet, no one has a problem with that same person marketing that idea/sermon/program and making a lot of money.

Now, I’m not against making a lot of money. The problem is by not participating in a ‘free culture’ or allowing ‘free access’ there are barriers to creativity and extension of ideas. By copyrighting that which we believe God ahs given us, the ability for someone to build upon the thing copyrighted is limited.

My hope is that in the church there would be a free culture movement. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if those who are considered “top notch” move outside the mainstream and risk profit and future to allow God to use their work to enhance others (churches included).

Well, it is late and I’ve rambled a bit, but hopefully someone will be able to build upon these ideas.

Dave.

Sims 2
Thursday September 23rd 2004, 10:31 pm Edit This
Filed under: Computing

One of the Youth Group kids told me they just got the Sims 2. Man. I’m still on Sims 1. I don’t play it very much because I tend to loose track of time. Perhaps at times that is a good thing. I can fall into a ‘driven’ state and Sims might be a good deversion. However, I have trouble limiting my time on the Sims. Plus, I’m always thinking of other more important things I could be doing.

I guess the trick is to somehow get my kids involved That way, playing the Sims could also be spending time with my kids. Or, better yet, perhaps I could pretend I’m a Sim and instead of play the game I’d live my life

Simple Simplicity
Thursday September 23rd 2004, 10:25 pm Edit This
Filed under: General, Church

Just some ramblings ruminating around my mind. I’ve read various books about the church and how to “do” it so it is “successful.” There are people (and some churches) that are making quite a bit of money trying to convince me (and to some extent my church) that if we attend their conference or purchase their material, we too can have ’success.’

What if we are making church just too complex? Is it possible that we believe the complexity of how to “do” church gives us a sense of importance?

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