Jonathan Herron

Staff Trip to OakPointe Church

Our team recently took a recon mission to OakPointe Church in Novi, MI, noted as the 36th-fastest-growing-church in America by Outreach Magazine in 2007.

Back in the day Amber and I both served on staff (hence our strong passion for Zambia) and were greatly shaped by senior pastor Bob Shirock.

Anyhoo, Jack Janigian generously shared a few hours of his time with our team, giving us a tour of their new facilities and helping create contacts between our staff teams.

One of the big takeaways we plan on implementing was a dedicated space by the Worship Center for strategic, purposeful prayer during each worship service.

The idea behind traveling off-site like this is simple:
When we stop learning, we stop leading. 

We are always seeking to stretch ourselves through the wisdom of church leaders further ahead of where we are.

I had a ton of tweets yesterday from OakPointe - here a few facility pix I snapped:

Avoid Beaver Traps

Picking up on my train of thoughts from the MAGGOTS post
(BTW - thanks Perry for the link love):

Ephesians 4:26-27 says:

"Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil."

This verse reminds me of beavers.
I hate beavers. 
Always plugging up happy water streams.
The Tale of the Beaver is a prerequisite for this post.

Animal traps, however, are heavenly.
A small plate in the middle of the trap contains bait to catch small animals.
Once the furry codger takes the bait - SLAM! - the trap imprisons him.

Greek for the small plate of bait is scandalon.  Its where we get our word for scandal.  When we take the bait, we are trapped. 

Now chew on 2 Timothy 2:24-26: 

"And the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone...
and they (must) come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will."

The Enemy sets traps for us.

Now think back to Ephesians 4.
When we are offended or bitter about something, we take the bait of the trap set for us!  This is why Paul implores us to keep short accounts!

Not keeping short accounts leads to growing anger (maggots!) which distorts your view of reality which then births bitterness.

Ready to really blow your mind?
Hebrews 12:15 says:

"See to it...  that no root of bitterness springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled."

Bitterness in Greek = pikros = to prick.
Defile in Greek = miano = to stain or dye.

God is saying don't let the poison of bitterness infect you!

Bitterness is like grabbing a bottle of poison, chugging it, and then expecting the other person to die.

Holding onto a past offense is a trap of the Enemy.
The Devil's playground is the Christian's battleground - shut the door on past hurts!

Radically forgive.
Pursue grace.
Don't be a beaver.

I feel sad for church-world critics

In the Book of Nehemiah, we see a man courageously following God's grand vision while enduring great personal criticism and friendly fire.  Every pastor and church planter in America walks in Nehemiah's shoes.

I can honestly say that now when I read Nehemiah's story, I'm starting to feel sad for Sanballat and Tobiah.  They completely miss out on the miracle. 

Sanballat and Tobiah mock & jeer, but ache on the inside.  After all, only hurting people hurt people. 

Jesus said our words and behaviors are simply the overflow of what's already going on in our hearts.  If we're at war on the inside, of course we'll be at war on the outside.

Bitterness is the fuel of criticism.  John Courson once said:

"This is what bitterness does.  It's like taking a bottle of poison, swallowing it, and then waiting for the other person to die."

Sanballat and Tobiah are drinking poison and I genuinely find that sad.  It's impossible to build something beautiful with your life when you're swinging a sledgehammer.  They need the Gospel; a renewed explosion of God's grace in their lives.

Nehemiah is our godly model in not firing back; he simply remains Gospel-centered and trusts that God will take care of the church-world critics.  He remains faithful to the mission entrusted to him.

And so we pray for those who wish us harm.
We out-love, out-serve, and out-bless our critics. 
We trust God as our Guard when we're misunderstood.
And we press into these words from Charles Spurgeon:

"Somebody has said a very nasty thing about us.
Well, well; we will answer him when we have got through the work we have at hand, namely, praising God continually. At present we have a great work to do, and cannot come down to wrangle.  Self-love and its natural irritations die in the blaze of praise."

Amazing Words: "These early Christians were on fire..."

“The great difference between present-day Christianity and that of which we read in these letters is that to us it is primarily a performance, to them it was a real experience. We are apt to reduce the Christian religion to a code, or at best a rule of heart and life. To these men it is quite plainly the invasion of their lives by a new quality of life altogether. They do not hesitate to describe this as Christ ‘living in’ them.

“There were no churches, no Sundays, no books about the Faith. Slavery, sexual immorality, cruelty, callousness to human suffering, and a low standard of public opinion, were universal; traveling and communications were chancy and perilous; most people were illiterate. Many Christians today talk about the ‘difficulties of our times’ as though we should have to wait for better ones before the Christian religion can take root. It is heartening to remember that this faith took root and flourished amazingly in conditions that would have killed anything less vital in a matter of weeks.

"These early Christians were on fire with the conviction that they had become, through Christ, literally sons of God; they were pioneers of a new humanity, founders of a new Kingdom. They still speak to us across the centuries. Perhaps if we believed what they believed, we might achieve what they achieved.”   

- J.B. Phillips, Letters to Young Churches, 1947.

MAGGOTS in my Garage

Clasping my piping hot coffee and whisking toward the car parked gingerly in the garage, my senses failed the first tell-tale sign that something was askew: the sound of rustling.  In the garage.

As I approached my car, my eye caught movement on the ground.  Was that rice wiggling around?

My groggy mind caught up with my senses: MAGGOTS! 

Something odorous in the flimsy plastic trash can had attracted, retained, and birthed maggots.  All because I had missed the trash pick-up two Mondays in a row.

Scratch that.  "Missed" isn't the correct term. 
I hadn't wanted to deal with taking out the trash.
Apathy.  Laziness.  Call it what you want.

But I've proven that you reap what you sow.

My failure to deal with the trash (true story!) resulted in writhing maggots, jiggling their pulsating little blobby-bodies like something out of Star Trek.

Paul wrote that failing to deal with little pieces of trash in our everyday lives attracts, retains, and births larger spiritual maggots.  In Ephesians 4, we wrestle with these words:

"Do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil."

In other words, keep short accounts with people in your life.  If something - anything - is rubbing you the wrong way, deal with it immediately. 
That day. 
Before the sun goes down. 

Otherwise that small bit of trash will attract, retain, and birth larger maggots that will jade your perception of reality and eat away at you. 

Small things quickly become big things if we don't take out the trash right away.

Motivational Speaker Matt Foley

Teaser for Amplify Series from Colwood Church on Vimeo.

Save the date!

Mega-props to our videographer, Josh Phillips, for his behind-the-scenes magic.

And kudos to our Executive Pastor, Dan Thorp, for... well... mastering the impersonation. 

And for only partially breaking the table.