I’m about tired of syncing!  It’s hard work!

Today Pete talked about “Syncing Through Perseverance”.

Scriptures:

James 1:2-4

Genesis 22:1-11

Isaiah 40:29-31

Psalm 147:3

Important takeaways:

• He made the important distinction between perseverance and suffering.  Suffering is what happens to you, perseverance is how you choose to respond to it.
• Suffering reminds me that I’m not in control of my life.
• You don’t have to choose suffering.  Life will arrange that for you.  You choose how you will respond to it.
• The cross reminds us that God doesn’t stand apart from our suffering.  The cross is also a reminder that God doesn’t always step in or answer our prayers the way we want them answered.  But it’s also a reminder He redeems.
• Suffering alone doesn’t create perseverance.  Suffering lived out with faith is perseverance.

We finished the service with the amazing song “Healer”, challenging us to acknowledge God as our healer – the healer of whatever we are facing in our life – the healer of our hearts, the healer of our hurts, the healer of our sickness…

Thanks Brewster for introducing this one to us!

This is the performance of the song by the original artist – powerful!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4xsWldmqAo&eurl=http://thebrewster.wordpress.com/2008/06/26/healer-part-200000000/]

A few weeks ago I asked you all what woman from the Bible you would like to know more about.  One of the leading responses was Deborah, so I’ve done so more reading about her and wanted to share some of my thoughts and observations with you.

1) I am amazed at Deborah’s influence. Deborah was a prophetess and judge of Israel at a time when it was highly unusual for a woman to serve in such positions of leadership.  It makes me think she must have had some significant influence to have been appointed to these positions to begin with.  (If anyone knows how prophets were appointed during this part of Israel’s history, please let us know.)  It also seems as if Deborah had respect beyond just the positional power of her role.  For example when Deborah gives the directive to Barak to go battle Sisera, Barak insists that Deborah go with him.  Now maybe he was thinking “If this stupid woman is going to send me to my death, she’s at least going with me”, however I get the impression that Barak respected Deborah and felt like her presence would be valuable.

2) She displayed incredible strength. I can’t imagine living in the times that she lived in.  Not only were living conditions tough, Israel was weak, defenseless and far from God.  I suspect moral was low and hope was barely a flicker.  But Deborah had hope and a vision from God and out of this she summoned the strength to still the voices of doubt and timidity, and as one author describes, “called the people to battle, leading them out of idolatry and restoring their dignity as God’s chosen ones”.

3) Deborah was humble. Rather than describe herself as prophetess or judge which were incredibly influential positions, she describes herself as “a mother in Israel” (Judges 5:7).

4) She was close to God. God gave her the directive for the battle with Sisera and she didn’t lose sight of this even in the heat of it.  Judges 4:14 says “Then Deborah said to Barak, ‘Up! For this is the day in which the Lord has delivered Sisera into your hand.  Has not the Lord gone out before you?’”  After the battle was finished she and Barak sang a victory song in which they repeatedly thank God.

5) Deborah had style. Judges 4:5 says she would sit under a palm tree in the mountains and the children of Israel came to her for judgment.  Seems to me the best office space in Israel would be under a palm tree in the mountains.  It’s funny to me that the Bible would give the specifics of where she operated as judge… doesn’t seem that consequential to the story, but it made me smile.  As strong of a woman and leader she was, she was still a ‘girl’ – environment was important to her.

Read Judges 4 & 5 and share some of your observations of Deborah with us too!

We continued the Sync series today with Pastor Tom speaking on “Syncing Through Confession”.

Scripture:

• Matthew 18:15-17
• 1 John 1:8-9
• James 5:16
• Luke 15:11-24

Pastor Tom challenged us to not think:

Confession = ‘gottcha’ - people pointing figures at you calling out your mistakes

but to think:

Confession = a huddle; a group of people with whom you can be honest and accountable

Other key points:

• The purpose of confession is not exposure, it’s restoration
• Confession begins with ‘I’m sorry’
• Confession begins in safety and ends in freedom
• Realize that God is in the business of transforming lives not condemning them

So, is there anything you need to confess today?

The Sync series continues this week. George Stull, our interim student pastor, spoke today at Cross Point Nashville on “Syncing Through Joy” and it was a good one.

I’m embarrassed to admit (although I’m sure it’s no big surprise to many of you that know me well) that I have trouble with choosing joy. And that was George’s point today, we have to CHOOSE joy.

I’m always amazed by how people have great joy even in difficult circumstances – the people who have just lost someone dear to them, people facing life-threatening illnesses, people who have lost a child, etc. How embarrassing it is to acknowledge that (fortunately) I don’t have any grave tragedy in my life and yet I have trouble finding joy.

I was challenged today!

Here are some key points and scriptures from George’s message today:

• John 15:9-11 Joy goes hand in hand with how we love others
• 2 Corinthians 6:4-10
• We lose joy when we covet or envy others. Are we really loving people when we’re envious of what they have?
• Joy can transcend circumstances.
• What would your life be like if you were dialed into the things that can’t be taken away?
• Joy is a posture of the heart.

How can we live in more complete joy?

1. See Joy more clearly as a choice.
2. Wear Joy no matter what – allow joy to permeate the way you see the whole world. Psalm 30:11
3. Sing for Joy because sometimes we just have to. Psalm 71:23, 100:1-5

Here’s a great quote from Henri Nouwen to leave you with:

“Joy is what makes life worth living, but for many joy seems hard to find. They complain that their lives are sorrowful and depressing. What then brings the joy we so much desire? Are some people just lucky, while others have run out of luck? Strange as it may sound, we can choose joy. Two people can be part of the same event, but one may choose to live it quite differently than the other. One may choose to trust that what happened, painful as it may be, holds a promise. The other may choose despair and be destroyed by it. What makes us human is precisely this freedom of choice.”

I hope you’ll choose Joy this week!

The Cross Point Nashville Picnic was today. I hope you were able to make it… lots of fun for all… a little hot, but still great!

Cross Point Dickson, your summer picnic is July 13th – make sure it’s on your calendar!

Pete continued the SYNC series today with “Syncing Through Scripture”

Here are the highlights:

• Matthew 12:33-35
• Most of us have grown up in environments that focused on external behaviors, on what you do. But in reality, transformation happens from the inside out.
• Jesus message was NOT about behavior modification
• In regard to my spiritual transformation, my job is to abide in Christ
• Spiritual transformation is not about behavior modification. Rather, it’s about internal renovation.
• We’re not just talking about your actions, we’re talking about your thoughts.
• Romans 12:2, 1 Corinthians 2:16, Philippians 2:5, 2 Corinthians 10:5, 2 Timothy 3:16-17, Psalm 119:105, Lamentations 3:21
• There is a big difference from going through the Bible and letting the Bible go through you.
• The overwhelming majority of us don’t immerse ourselves in scripture.
• The Bible is an amazing text message – it is instant, relevant, personal information
• Don’t think about scripture in a ‘homework’ kind of way!
• If you want authentic transformation in your life, it’s not going to happen sitting around watching T.V.
• The Bible is NOT a book about laws and limitations, it’s a book about life.

How can I pray for you this week as you SYNC with God?

This is the phrase that is haunting me as we start the ‘Sync’ series.

Nearly a year ago a devotion I was reading posed this question:

“Do you spend enough time listening to God?”

My response:

The answer is an emphatic “NO!” This is likely my greatest challenge and hindrance as a leader. It’s almost as if I feel guilty for taking time to be still. Finding time alone, without distractions, is hard enough as it is but then I feel obligated to do all the things that are undone. I’m afraid I’m going to get in trouble if I’m not productive with my time. The irony is that time with God would be the most productive time I could spend! It’s a paradigm shift that I’m having trouble making.

Sadly, nearly a year since I wrote that I don’t feel like I’ve made any progress. Time to get serious!

So let me ask you:

“Do you spend enough time listening to God?”

Just read THIS!

Tonight in small group we talked about The Mystery of the Holy Spirit from the study Canvas: Mystery. (If you click on this link it will take you to the product page of this study. If you click the preview video it is the video about the Holy Spirit that we watched in our group.)

I needed this discussion tonight. The questions centered around how we allow all the other voices in our lives to drown out the Holy Spirit. I don’t know how to be still and to purposefully listen.

How do you turn off the noise in your life to hear God’s voice?

“As for me, I will see Your face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied when I awake in Your likeness.”  Psalm 17:15

I discovered this verse in high school and it quickly became my life verse.  To me it speaks to that constant pursuit of being Christ-like – refusing to be satisfied until I awake in His likeness.

I think what I connected with in this verse is that idea of a constant pursuit, a striving, a desire to achieve.  Unfortunately I don’t always apply that relentless striving to the right things.  I wrote this in my journal last year:

I have this overwhelming, insatiable need for validation/to be acknowledged/to be right/to be taken seriously/to be valued.  So much so that I never lighten up/relax/let my guard down.  I always feel the need to prove myself.  It doesn’t matter what it is… work… house cleaning… exercise… decorating, etc.  Important or trivial I always have this underlying drive to prove myself.

Marcus Buckingham describes this as the striving talent of “achiever”.  In his book First, Break All The Rules he says this of achievers: “They may not have to win, but they do feel a burning need to achieve something tangible every single day.  And these kind of people mean ‘every single day.’  For them, everday – workday, weekend, vacation – every day starts at zero.  They have to rack up some numbers by the end of the day in order to feel good about themselves.  This burning flame may dwindle as evening comes, but the next morning it rekindles itself, spurring its host to look for new items to cross off his list.  These people are the fabled ‘self-starters.’”

I wish that I applied my “achiever” nature as much to the pursuit of being Christ-like as I do to all the other things in my life.  It’s kind of humbling that I seemed to have more clarity on this back in high school than I do now as an adult. 

How about you?  What about your personality, taken to the extreme, creates imbalance in your life?  

My good friend Kat Davis has been doing this thing called The Daily Verse for years now.  We were just punk kids working at ForeFront when she started emailing her friends a verse for the day with her commentary.  Well, her list grew and now has over 2000 subscribers through www.thedailyverse.com.  Here is today’s verse.  I encourage you to check it out and subscribe!

…for we walk by faith, not by sight.
2 Corinthians 5:7

If we responded to what we see with our own two eyes, there are time where we’d probably consider our fate grim. However, we have the ability to look through the eyes of faith – see the hope, the intricate plans and the intentional work of our Father in our lives and those around us. intentionally look at what’s in front of you today with your own two eyes; then do the same thing, but look at everything through the eyes of faith. Stay there. Walk using that vision.