5 Things I keep in mind while praying

This week a co-worker told me, "you pray the longest prayers."

I've been a Christ-follower for 18 years but I've been praying my whole life.

I remember before I surrendered my life to Jesus and received his leadership in my life, I would lay in bed and pray for help. I vividly remember praying one night as a ten year old asking God to keep us safe. You see I was living in Germany at the time and President Reagan had ordered the bombing of Libya. I was convinced by others we would be the prime location for a counter attack.

Since then, I've prayed many prayers in the shower, on the road, with the church, in hospital rooms, on the ball field, in bed with my wife, with & for the kids, in meetings, etc. Yet even with all the praying I've done, I'll admit it's a bit of a mystery.

I wrestle with the words and emotions I express in my prayers. I have wondered if I'm just talking to myself. I even question what right I have to ask God for the things I do. In spite of all of that I still pray.

One of the challenges of prayer is seeing them answered. After all, if we risk praying and what we pray for doesn't happen, what does that mean? Is it better to just skip the prayer, in case you ask for something stupid and God gets angry?

Even still, I keep praying.

Here are somethings I keep in mind when I'm praying.

1. I start with a sense of who I'm speaking with.

It's important to keep in mind that you and I are not merely telling God things, but rather prayer is a conversation with God. That means just as I need to share what has happened in my day or what's going on, I also need to make time to listen to him. After all, he is the creator, redeemer, restorer of all I see and know.

2. I practice thanksgiving.

A key element in my time of prayer is offering thanks. I express my thanks to God for his provision in life. It is easy to fall into the trap of thinking I make things happen, but I need to remember God is at work.

3. I talk about what and who I see.

That means sometimes, actually a lot of the time, I pray with my eyes open. This can be distracting at times and even take away from the formality and mysticism of prayer, but I find it really helps the "nowness" of prayer.

4. I seek to bless God and others.

This is harder to explain without it sounding like I'm praying for the appeal of those listening, but I consider those I'm in the presence of when I'm praying aloud. I want God to be blessed and I want to offer blessings to others.

5. I remember that "amen" means "so be it!"

It is not uncommon for us to pray and say "amen" to close out the prayer in a way we might hang up the phone at the end of a conversation. Instead I see it more like the athletic team preparing to take the field. They've huddled up, placed their hands on top of one another, spoken words of inspiration and challenge, cry out really loud, and then take the field. Amen is an announcement of let it happen, let's do it, make it so! (Thank Jean-Luc).

There is much more to prayer than what I've got here, but maybe this will help you in your prayer life. My co-worker who I mentioned at the top, she not only expressed how long my prayers were, but she added, "I don't know how you just talk like that." Maybe this helps!?

GP: A Small Church Doing BIG Things

I want to take a moment to brag on Grace Point Church in Odessa, Texas! I'll be honest, I'm partial to them as I have the extreme privilege of serving as the lead minister for this group, but they are a awesome bunch! The past twelve months have been huge for Grace Point and I want the world to know what God has done in our midst as we've made ourselves available to him.

Over the course of 2011 we have had more than 250 people attend Grace Point in one or

more of our worship gatherings. Some of these guests were family and friends while others were searching to become a part of a church. Of those searching, we have had nine new households become a part of the “regulars” at Grace Point! We were blessed

to baptize eight this year.

We also stepped out on a limb this year by trying a Saturday night worship gathering. With help from guest worship leaders like Skip Birtman, Bill Yuhasz, and Andre Furtado, these were great experiences. Though the gathering time seemed like a good idea to many of us to start with, we discovered in the process that Saturday nights work for some congregations, but it just wasn’t the right time for us. So in September, we returned to gathering on Sundays!

Another bold step we took was to partner with Faith Temple Fellowship and their efforts to assist men transitioning out of homelessness through the Jesus House and Soup Kitchen. Beginning in May, a team of GPers spent one Sunday a month preparing meals for the Jesus House Soup Kitchen. More than 30 people participated in this throughout the year, including some 10 kids. This effort to care for others is a great example of how we live a missionary life in our own community.

Speaking of missionaries, we had seven people affiliated with GP attend a mission trip this year. Mother and daughter duo, Channon and Elizabeth Gregg went to Haiti in April. The Greggs served alongside others from Texas in helping in some of the rebuilding following the earthquake of 2010. Christy Tyree joined Project Partner for Christ to teach English for two weeks in China. In late September, I joined Matthew Gregg and Dale Arnold and her son Bryce Harper on a trip to Berlin to witness the efforts of XZBerlin.

If you add the numbers, that means nearly 40 people from Grace Point experienced some level of missionary service in 2011! That’s pretty awesome for a church that averages 55 in attendance.

I’ve not mentioned our efforts for the Spring Fest where more than 200 people showed up for our egg race or the 300 backpacks we gave away to students at Jordan Elementary. We did all this and more through your partnership and an income stream of less than $65,000. What a mighty God we serve!

As we prepare for 2012, join me in believing God is up to something BIG for the year ahead. He is moving in your life; in my life; in our lives. He is at work not only for our benefit but also for the benefit of our neighborhoods, city, state, nation, and world. We should count it a great joy that he has chosen to use us as part of his plan to bring heaven to earth!

Thanks for sharing in the stories of Grace Point and for allowing me to brag on what God is up to in our midst as we make ourselves available to him.

Discipleship: Come out and be separate

I'm a pastor, church planter, and a voice in the lives of others seeking to follow Christ. I'm also a guy who wrestles with what it means to be a disciple of Christ and how to help others in their path of discipleship.

In my previous posts I've wrestled with the time it takes for discipleship and my particular formation as a follower of Christ. As I look back on my journey I'm grateful for my experiences, particularly for the experiences that pulled me away and pushed me to grow.

The more I wrestle with what it means to be a disciple of Jesus, the more I think we need times where we separate ourselves for our own development.

The challenge with becoming proficient in something is that it requires a dedication and devotion that is uncommon. In Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers (mentioned in my

previous post), he shares about a study at the Berlin Academy of Music (read the story) and the discoveries concerning top level violinist and pianist. Each group of the best had put in the 10,000 hours or more of dedication to the craft. If you think about it, practicing violin and/or piano for 10k hours sounds excruciating, but it is the difference.

I transferred this 10k hour rule of mastery to discipleship and I've asked how can one achieve the 10k hours. This is where I think opportunities like youth camps, Bible College, Seminary, etc come into play in our discipleship formation.

It is well accepted that to grow in your faith you need to attend church regularly. Some may argue this point, but the majority have come to recognize the role of the Christian community (typically expressed as the church) is vital to our growth. Yet, there is more to our faith development than merely going to church. And if going to church is our only act of discipleship it will take a really long time to achieve our 10k hours.

Alan Hirsch in his book The Forgotten Ways borrows the idea of communitas from anthropologist Victor Turner as a way of helping us see a vital element of our faith development. Essentially, communitas is when a community forms through a shared experience of trial or hardship and carries an intense kinship with it that bonds those from the experience together. I see communitas as being a critical component of achieving our 10k hours of discipleship formation.

For many Christians, their first exposure to communitas is a youth camp. Certainly, these are not life threatening experiences but the separation from the normal into an abnormal place, routine, and relationships creates an experience that shapes and bonds the participants. This is part of the reason so many campers will make decisions of faith during the week and long to return to the experience year after year (regardless of the quality of the camp). This time of separation allows a camper to accelerate the hours they spend in their faith development. For instance in that week they increase from 1-3 hours to 80-100 hours depending on the programming.

The most influential time of communitas is probably college. This time of separation from one's family, support system, and likely home town begins to shape a person in immense ways. The new environment with its academic and social challenges (not to mention financial) begins to test the student in a huge way. They form bonds with others going through the experience. Many of these bonds are brother or sisterhoods (fraternity or sorority) that endure through the years. This is also the time when a person devotes a great number of hours into their development. For instance, it is possible a college student could spend up to 5,000 hours focusing on a field of development. That's half of the hours needed to reach the "expert" status mentioned by Gladwell and others. This is why choosing the right college is critical. Bible and Christian colleges along with seminaries stand in a tremendous position to help form disciples.

Rather than focusing on one discipline of discipleship formation, it is critical our Bible and Christian college along with seminaries seize this opportunity to develop disciples across the disciplines. Todd Hiestand has done a great job of outlining the areas of discipline or formation.

The five different puzzle pieces as I see them are:

• Liturgical Formation - The community gathered for worship is where we are re-oriented together to the story of God through the scriptures worship, prayer and communion.
• Personal Formation - This emphasizes our need to relate to God intimately through spiritual disciplines.
• Servant Formation - We are called to love and serve others and when you care for others, you cannot help but be changed.
• Relational Formation - We are not called to follow Jesus alone. We intentionally seek relationships that were encouraging one another on towards Christ-likeness.
• Educational Formation - We seek truth together and seek a knowledge that leads to faith. This “renewing of the mind” is a vital part of our formation.

As I see it, the preferred track to achieving our 10k hours must involve the above formation pieces in association with communitas which is only possible when we step into a level of devotion that includes separation for development. Trying to frame this into a 21st century North American society is becoming increasingly difficult.

While reading Dietrich Bonhoeffer's book Discipleship, I stumbled across this:

Following Christ means taking certain steps. The first step, which responds to the call, separates the followers form their previous existence.

I added this thought: the call of separation is likely the hardest step because we are so comfortable in our surroundings.

I feel like I'm on to something, but I have as many questions now as I do thoughts. How can we experience communitas in a world where we can rarely separate ourselves from the 24/7 noise? How can we devote the time needed to faith development when we are faced with the demands of work, family, etc? How can we separate from life for a season of development without creating tremendous earthquakes in our lives - or is that the point?

Discipleship: It's not sexy

I'm a pastor, church planter, and a voice in the lives of others seeking to follow Christ. I'm also a guy who wrestles with what it means to be a disciple of Christ and how to help others in their path of discipleship.

In my last post, I shared about my faith journey to this point. If you've not read it, please take a moment to do so, because it sets the stage for this post.

I've been following Christ for 18 years now and I think I'm just starting to get a picture of what discipleship looks like, and it's not sexy!

I think the biggest obstacle to discipleship (whether it's being one, or making them) is the fact that it takes TIME. Our culture is constantly running and we have this distorted understanding of time. We want everything to happen immediately. I remember my first computer and modem back in the around 1991-92. It was a 1200bps modem! I thought this was so fast. I was able to access my message boards at blazing speed. I think the computer had something like 8mb of ram. Today, my iPhone 3G (no, I've not upgraded yet) blows the doors of that. Technology is the easiest area in our lives to see our perception of time. We have this crazy notion that faster is sexier!

Yet, the Kingdom of God doesn't seem to be concerned with speed. Consider this, the Bible covers some 5,000 years of history (give or take a millennium). In those stories, there is not a rush on God's part to fix everything right away. Sure, he wipes out humanity with Noah, which is only 4 chapters after Adam & Eve mess it all up, but it was more than a 1,000 years between the stories (if you trust the Bible's record of ages). Then we find the Hebrews live in Egypt for 400 years, plus 40 years of roaming around in the wilderness before experiencing the promised land. From then it moves through hundreds of years of the chosen people messing it up, followed by 70 years in captivity, and another couple hundred in a mixed up time of "free" and "occupied". Then Jesus comes onto the scene to fix everything, nearly 1,000 years after the righteous King David. Since Jesus, we've had nearly 2,000 years of life and we still don't have it right. Clearly, the Kingdom of God does not seem to be concerned about speed or efficiency (major values in the US).

As a matter of fact, much of creation (nature) seems to fly in the face of speed & efficiency.

For the past four years or more, Christy and I have planted tomato plants in the backyard, hoping for some fresh grown tomatoes for salsa, sandwiches, salads, and more. Each year, we seem to be pretty focused on caring for them for the first two weeks to a month. Then our attention begins to wane as we have a hard time holding out for the time when the plant is mature enough to produce fruit. By the time our plants produce fruit, we've failed to nurture them properly, and so the fruit that is produced is small and sporadic. But we love when someone else brings homegrown tomatoes by! We see a healthy vine of tomatoes and begin to fantasize about what it would be like to have our own full bush. So we go home and try again, but we don't stick with it, because it doesn't happen fast enough. You see we want the sexiness of homegrown tomatoes but we don't want to put in the work required because that takes time.

Discipleship is the same way. It takes time! Disciple formation sounds sexy when someone else is doing it. We long for the same things in our lives, but we won't invest the time.

Best-selling author and columnist Malcolm Gladwell (he's got a great first name and some awesome hair), identifies a powerful rule of development in his book Outliers. In looking at the Beatles, hockey players, computer programers, and more, he uncovers what is known as the 10,000 hour rule. Simply put, this rule states that it takes 10,000 hours devoted to working in a field in order to become an expert. If you've not read the book, go, do so immediately!

Gladwell's premise of 10,000 hours got me thinking about my vocation (preaching/public speaking). A few years ago, a fellow pastor and friend and I wondered when preachers reach their prime? NFL Quarterbacks seem to reach their prime around 30. So what was the range for pastors. We figured 45. Do the math and add up how many hours a preacher would have preached by 45 if he preached "every" week beginning around 27.

Since then, I've wondered how long until we reach "expert" as a follow of Christ? I use the term "expert" loosely. But how long does it take for a person to be, in the words of many church mission statements, a fully-devoted follower of Christ? If Gladwell is right and it's 10,000 hours, how long is that?

Is it possible in one year's time? 168x52= 8,732 Close but not quite. This also requires us to be devoted to the formation 24hours a day, seven days a week, without sleep.

So let's remove the time we sleep... 5,824 hours in a year. So it would take just short of two years, if we did nothing else.

Let's say we took one day a week (16 hours, if you take out 8 hours to sleep), how long would that take? 12 years

Let's propose we spend an average of 3 hours a week completely focused on our faith. At that rate, if my math is correct (3x52= 156 then 10,000/156) it would take 64 years!
64 years to be a fully devoted follower? I guess so, I mean if you made a decision to follow Christ in your early teens, as most do, and you gave yourself 3 hours a week to follow Christ, and you did so for 64 years, you would have spent your whole life following Christ, right? Is that what we mean by fully-devoted followers of Christ?

Certainly there's a better way! Isn't there something sexier and more efficient?

Using Gladwell's 10,000 hour rule as a metric for discipleship formation I believe there is a path we can develop, but it won't be sexy, nor will it be fast.

In my next post, I'll share my thoughts on a formation track and how church, devotional time, and even Christian Colleges and seminaries can play a role.

What stands out to you? How long has it taken you to develop? What are the obstacles to developing faith in your own life or in the lives of your disciples have you noticed?

My Discipleship Journey: Was It Wrong? Was It Right?

I'm a pastor, church planter, and a voice in the lives of others seeking to follow Christ. I'm also a guy who wrestles with what it means to be a disciple of Christ and how to help others in their path of discipleship.

My faith journey is not unlike many others' in America. I grew up in a typical American family that experienced divorce, remarriage, and other set backs. I was not raised going to church. I began actively attending church in High School at the invitation of my best friend. A few months before graduation, I surrendered my life to Christ. The church I attended was around 200 in attendance and the pastor's messages could always be boiled down to two central themes: salvation and sanctification.

After I made my decision to follow Christ, I began to volunteer in simple ways for my church. It started with mowing the lawn. From there I was changing the marque sign, inserting such token phrases as: "there won't be a u-hal behind your hearse." Yes, I did misspell "u-haul" when it was on the sign. I eventually became the teacher for the youth meetings on Wednesday, the Sunday School teacher for the college-age, and the director for the children's church. Did I mention that I also helped in getting our bus ministry going and the men's fellowship. I was all in!

After those three years of faith development and volunteering, our new senior pastor encouraged me to go to Bible college, so I did. I had failed in my previous attempt(s) at college, but this time I seemed to have a purpose for attending. I devoted myself to my classes, especially my Bible classes, learning the inductive Bible study method as well as the challenges of different learning styles and personalities. I graduated in 3 1/2 years and then went on staff at the college working in campus ministries. A short two years later, I became a senior pastor for a 65 year old congregation.

After 3 years of pastoring this congregation, tensions where high. I was a young and idealistic kid (27 when I assumed the role) and they were a seasoned group who had seen their glory days pass them by (they had decreased by more than 100 people in the three years prior to my coming). It didn't end well. I was asked to step down, and I did.

Some six months after stepping down, my wife and I dove into starting a new congregation, in the pastor-circles we call it church planting. Over the past five years I've committed myself to this effort and helping others learn from my successes and failures.

As I look back on my faith journey, I am grateful for my home church in Clarksville, Tennessee. They laid the foundations of my beliefs. Bro. Lanham was a godly man whose messages of salvation and holy living have guided me through the years. I am also grateful for my time in Bible college. There my beliefs were challenged and expanded thanks to the instruction of Dr. Greg Robertson and Dr. Cliff Sanders (BTW 21 hrs with one prof is too many for anyone!). As hard as it was to accept the end to my first pastorate, I am grateful for the experience I had there too. It helped to mature me. And the last five years leading Grace Point Church has allowed me to grow and mature in ways that shape every relationship and conversation I have these days.

As I look back I often wonder if I've missed something in my 18 years of following Christ. In the books and blogs I read these days there is a sense of critique against the church for her failure to really disciple believers. I can't say that I entered into a formal discipleship outside of my time at Bible college. But not everyone will attend Bible college. I can't say I experienced a form of discipleship that is easily reproduced. What I can say is my discipleship has consisted of listening, observing, and practicing.

Now after 18 years I can say I am seeing others who are directly influenced by me. I am discipling them (mostly inadvertently or accidentally). A few months ago, I was listening to a young man and his wife who have walked with me for 9 years. They were sharing about an experience they had at a conference and were telling me what they had observed. I realized they had evaluated it in a way I would have. Did this make them my disciples?

Since then, I've been really wrestling with what it means to be a disciple and how to make disciples.

In my next post, I'll share about some correlations I'm observing with regards to discipleship. In the mean time I'd love to hear about your discipleship journey and what you think of mine. Is yours vastly different? Is yours remotely the same?

I look forward to hearing from you and sharing some of my other observations.

Returning to Sunday: What we learned from Saturday Gatherings

Last winter, the leadership of Grace Point began to ask again a question we had pondered in the summer of 2010 - what if we had church on Saturday night? This time we took it a bit more seriously and elected to bite the bullet and make a go at it. That's right, we took our main worship gathering time and switched from Sundays at 10AM to Saturdays at 5PM.

As we prepared for the switch, the anticipation was high. We believed it would be more convenient for people to participate in our gatherings if we eliminated the "it's my only day off" or "it's my only morning to sleep in" excuse. We also thought it would be great to really help us experience a true day off on Sunday. What we found was different than we expected.

After making the switch to Saturdays following Easter Sunday, we had a great turn out. The truth is we saw our highest attendances for the year during the first month of Saturdays. Surely this was a sign! Then June, July, and August came. As vacations, getaways, camps, reunions, and the like filled family calendars attendance quickly plummeted. By the time the summer was over we averaged 30% less in attendance than we did on Sundays before the switch.

Here's what we found: church on Saturday night sounds great, on Sunday morning!

The shift to Saturdays was exciting at first because it was new, but as life continued, the newness wore off. Changing one's rhythm is very difficult and we found our new Sundays were enjoyable, but Saturdays weren't working. Our families hadn't abandoned the gatherings, but they were unable to participate as they once had.

Some might ask, "why cut it before the fall? Surely, more people would be able to participate in the fall, wouldn't they?" Maybe. But our experience has taught us that Saturday night church is a great OPTION but it's not a person's first choice. There is a historical value to Sunday morning church. Regardless of the validity of gathering for worship on Sundays versus any other day, Sunday has the first place in our historical memories. Additionally, unchurched people aren't any more excited about going to church on Saturday as they are on Sunday.

Ultimately, it comes down to this: if we are trying to make church attendance/participation convenient, we've already lost!

Being a part of Christ's body, the church, is not convenient. It should cost us something! And I mean more than just our time and money. Being the part of the church should cost us our comforts, attitudes, and predispositions. We've fallen into the trap of believing this following Christ-stuff is easy, and it's not! As my college professor Cliff Sanders reminded me over and over again: "It's impossible to follow Christ! By our own efforts." The cost of discipleship is great and it doesn't matter how we try, it is never convenient to follow Christ or to be a part of his body.

So, here we go, back to Sunday mornings because it's our story! Grace made it's grand entrance into the lives of humanity on a Sunday morning as Jesus conquered death and made life available to you and me. We are returning to Sunday gatherings because it's not convenient to set aside the beginning of a day or week to gather with others for worship. We are returning to Sunday mornings because our neighbors expect to see us leaving our homes and assembling during this time. We are returning to Sundays because it seems old fashioned and maybe that's what is missing in our culture.

We are returning to Sundays, but that doesn't mean we won't try out of the box ideas to reach our neighbors with the kingdom of God. Who knows, some of efforts may crash and burn, but some may be glorious!

Why is Grace Point Switching to Saturday Nights?

Grace Point continues asking how can we expand our reach in the community to encourage others in their faith journey? As a part of that we’ve questioned whether Sundays at 10am is the best time to reach our neighbors, friends, and coworkers. Overwhelmingly, we’re seeing more and more individuals and families facing issues related to work and activity schedules that rule Sunday mornings out as the time to gather with the church. Sundays are no longer viewed as set a part for church.

When we extend invitations we hear comments like “I’ve got to work on Sundays” or “Sundays are the only time I get to spend resting” even “My kids play soccer on Sundays.” We also have had a number of our members get “called out” for work on a Sunday morning. Increasingly, Sundays are filled with competing activities. We can always question the “validity” of such activities, but rather than fight this trend and limit the number of people we are hoping to encourage, we’re making an adjustment in our approach.

In surveying the community, outside of Catholic Mass, it appears Sunday mornings are the only option for families in Odessa to gather for worship with the church. Certainly there are a few churches that offer Sunday and Wednesday evening gatherings, but these are not seen as “main” worship gathering times.

We understand the historical nature of gathering as the church on Sunday mornings. We have valued this through our own heritage and history, but rather than focus on what we “like” or are used to, we’re committed to reaching those who are disconnected from Christ and his church. Rather than continue to lament about how “no one makes church a priority” we are making people a priority by offering a legitimate option for gathering for worship with the church.

We believe there are plenty of great churches in Odessa gathering for worship on Sunday mornings and there are thousands of people unable to participate in Sunday worship for a number of reasons. We are not satisfied with this, so we’re providing an option on Saturdays!

Some may ask, why not do both Saturday and Sunday? Logistically, we cannot. Our current size limits us into choosing. We do not have the budget nor the facility to meet on both days, today. So we’ve drawn a line in the sand and we’re taking a stand to reach those who are disconnected from Christ and his church, who need to be encouraged in their journey of faith.

We believe individuals and families across Odessa are looking for a church that gathers with it’s neighbors, friends, and families in mind. We’re striving to be that kind of church.

Take a step of faith and be a part of the gatherings on Saturday nights at 5:05PM at Jordan Elementary School, 9400 Rainbow Dr.

Remember, if you need something to change in your life, chances are you need to make a change.