Filed under: Church, Connections, Personal | Tags: C3 Church, Connecting the Community with Christ, Discovering C3
All I can say is that I am totally blown away by how God is blessing C3 Church. This weekend we have 42 44 people that have signed up to go through our behind the scenes look at C3 Church and their “next step” as they join with us in the vision that is C3 Church. It is hard to believe that we have only been in the theaters since January and God is blessing with so many new people and growing our congregation more than we could have imagined. Every Sunday I see the hundreds of volunteers united to reach people and I get a rush and a realization that this is what church is supposed to be like. I am so pumped to meet everyone at Discovering C3 this week and to be amazed once again. Every week it is a great new journey. I am truly “discovering” C3 every week. If you haven’t signed on to the vision that is C3 all I have to say is what are you waiting for? Connecting the Community with Christ is what it’s all about!
Filed under: Church, Personal | Tags: Bishop TD Jakes, C3 Conference, Dallas TX, Fellowship Church
Our flight landed at Orlando International on Saturday around 12:20pm. They did not find my luggage until 2:15pm. How can you lose luggage on a direct flight? Well, Robbie Robison’s was lost on the way to Texas and he had a direct flight so I guess it stands to reason that it could happen too me and it did. The airline that will remain nameless told me that they were sorry but eight flights all landed within ten minutes of each other and in the mountain of luggage mine just happen to get mixed up. Oh well, the only thing I wanted to do was to get home because I was tired but that is life and you have to take it as it comes. I guess Saturday was a mini breaking session for me.
That leads me to discuss some pretty insightful stuff I picked up from the Creative Church Conference in Dallas, TX. I know my wife has blogged about TD Jakes’ messages along with Angie and Pastor Byron but for me it was the most impactful time of the conference. Bishop TD Jakes is a gifted communicator of God’s truth from the Bible. Obviously the man is anointed by God to preach His Word. His message, particularly on Friday morning was straight from the heart of God too me. Bishop Jakes spoke on how God uses betrayal in our lives to accomplish His will for us. Bishop Jakes talked about how the disciples did not recognize Jesus after He rose from the dead until He sat down to eat with them and did something that they had seen Jesus do many times before. Jesus TOOK the bread, He BLESSED the bread, He BROKE the bread and then He GAVE it out. Bishop Jakes spoke on how Jesus did this with the five loaves and two fishes. The disciples saw Him do the same thing at the passover feast. Then Bishop Jakes made the analogy of the many men in the Bible that God used that were TAKEN, BLESSED, BROKEN then GIVEN such as Joseph and ultimately Jesus Christ Himself. Bishop said that you might be in any stage of this process but God has a purpose in mind as we go through this process. I never saw how betrayal was a work of being broken so clearly as when Bishop Jakes spoke on Friday.
Needless to say I was bawling my eyes out. The tears were flowing and I could not stop them. I know, I know I am too emotional but God was literally speaking too my heart on Friday. It’s amazing how God can use His word and the servant that preaches it to touch people. Sometimes I can forget in our busyness and our constant evaluation to do our best for the Lord that it is truly a work of His Holy Spirit that touches lives and changes them. Even if you have a relationship with the Lord it is great to be touched by the power, that is the Word of God, just like it was the first time you heard about Christ and the overwhelming feeling that imparted to your life.
So I learned a lot at the conference but everything is just not as powerful as that moment when Bishop Jakes was speaking directly too me. Don’t get me wrong the rest of the speakers and messages were fantastic and very insightful but I believe God wanted me to hear about being TAKEN, BLESSED, BROKEN and GIVEN so I can have renewed hope that the work that He started in me is not complete and the betrayals and everything that I have gone through is not the end but only the beginning of the work He has for me to do.
Filed under: Personal | Tags: C3 Conference, Dallas TX, Fellowship Church
I am here in Texas and it’s cold. I think the high today is 40 degrees. It might be cold outside but the C3 Conference (Creative Church Conference) is smokin’ inside. We just heard 4 great sessions today by Ed Young Jr., Mac Richard, Perry Noble and Brian Houston. All very challenging and encouraging. God is really speaking to my heart here in COLD Texas. I’ll blog more about it later when I return to warm sunny skies in O Town. So long from Dallas, TX.
Filed under: Andrea, Family, LOVE, Personal | Tags: Andrea Loper, LOVE, Valentine's Day
Several years ago my wife on Valentine’s day wrote out on poster board all the reasons for loving me. This year we agreed on keeping Valentine’s Day simple with no exchange of presents since we are treating each other to a cruise at the end of March. Even with that being the case I wanted to express just how much I love my beautiful wife.
Andrea,
I wake up in the morning looking forward to seeing you. I love just looking at you. I love the way you look. I love your smile and the way you occasionally crinkle your nose. I love the way you take care of me. I love the way you love my mom. I love the way you love your family. I love the way you do make up. I love the way you lead the kids in worship in Powerhouse. I love your sense of style. I love the way that you eat ice cream sandwiches. I love how clumsy you are. I love that you are just as messy as me. I also love the way you clean the house after I make it such a mess. I love the way you don’t complain about all of the things I don’t do that you wish I did.
Things I love about Andrea cont.: I love your OCD. I love the way you constantly check your blog to see how many hits you have gotten. I love that you have to blog everyday even if you have nothing to say. I love how you will make a great momma to our future children. I love how you surf the net constantly while in the car on your iPhone. I love how you always encourage me no matter what. I love how you love it when I call you my honey bun. I love how you let me drive the nicest vehicle in the family. I love how you say that you will never drive a mini van. I love how you answer the home phone waiting for telemarketers so you can tell them off because you know I won’t. I love how you are an example of Christ to everyone you meet. I love how you have invited more friends than anyone I know to come visit C3. I love how you are the most patient Pastor’s wife ever especially with people that are rude and mean. I love how get excited about things you read and then insist that I read them right away. I love how you don’t get mad at me if I don’t read stuff right away. Most of all I just love you for you.
I could go on and on but most of you would not read it if I went on too much longer.
Andrea, happy Valentine’s Day. You are the one person in the world I love the most!
Andrea I LOVE YOU!
Alright, I just deleted the blog I was writing and now I am starting over. It was actually making me depressed as I was reading it so I just thought I would chuck it and start over. My wife and my mom are sick in their beds so I am taking care of them (nurse Darrell). I am just going to share what is rolling around in my little head this morning. I am going to talk about trust.
I have said it many times and I have heard it many times but I am going to share it none the less. Trust is a choice, and it does not come naturally. You seriously have to make a choice to trust because I just think we are products of our environments. People are flawed, none of us are perfect therefore trusting anyone, even the people closest to us is hard. That is why I think that we have such a problem trusting God because all we have to go on is experiential data from people we have interacted with, in our lives. We then equate the way God will treat us with how people have treated us. Therefore trusting God is hard. That means that trusting God is a choice.
It’s hard to make the choice because we don’t want to be hurt or let down. But God tells us in His Word that “He is a friend that sticks closer than a brother.” He also tells us that, “He will never leave or forsake us.” We also know that God is the one constant in the universe. God never changes and His Word, the Bible, is true. This makes choosing to trust Him the only logical choice to make. He never changes. His love for us never changes. His promises for us never change. In a world where nothing stays the same, He does. Because of this I choose to trust.
So in my life when I have doubts whether people love me or if they have confidence in me or if I am worthless to them I only have to look to God to know He loves me and has confidence in me and considers me worth something. Something else I know is that He understands my weaknesses and loves me in spite of it. He understands my insecurities and still loves me. He knows when I worry and believes in me even through my doubts. This sounds like someone I can trust.
Because of this, I make the choice. Trust is a choice, a conscious decision to believe in someone with the expectation that they will be there when you need them. I think God fits that definition. God, I trust you!
Filed under: Church, Family, Friends, Pop Culture, Sports | Tags: C3 Church, Giants, Sunday, Superbow.
I can remember when on Superbowl Sundays one would be made to feel guilty for wanting to watch the Superbowl in lieu of attending church on a Sunday evening. A person’s relationship with God or spiritual walk or lack thereof was equated with whether you attended church on the night of the Superbowl. In fact I can remember so many of those Superbowl Sunday nights at church going longer than a normal Sunday evening service just to prove to whoever might be looking at our church (it wasn’t the unchurched) that we were the spiritual giants (no pun intended 🙂 ) and were better than most people in the world. I can remember big choir songs and big planned services scheduled on this night and then jabs at all of “those” people that stayed home to watch the game from the pulpit. I can remember statements like, “God is bigger than any game” or “Why don’t people cheer or get as excited about God as they do a football game” or many or any statements dealing with how “we” are better than “they” because we came to church on the biggest Sunday night of the year. Isn’t that just like religion? To place a man made rule on people to make them feel closer to God.
Yesterday morning we had another great message on religion by Pastor Byron, where he talked about how religion likes to place rules and regulations on people which in turn determines how close or how much favor you find with God. We talked about how religious people many times look nothing like Christ and Pastor Byron shared a powerful example of such people that he had encountered just on Saturday. I then started thinking about this Sunday, Superbowl Sunday.
I am thankful that C3 Church does not espouse or teach legalism. Legalism is a churchy kind of word. To put it in layman’s terms, it just means a bunch of rules and regulations to live your Christian life by. In years past the religious thing would be to go to some long church service on a Superbowl Sunday night instead of watching the game. I thank God that I no longer equate my spiritual health by my attendance to church on Superbowl Sunday night. I enjoy spending time with family and friends and even building relationships with new friends watching a football game. I am glad that God doesn’t put the same qualifications to be His child on us as some people do. It’s not about religion it’s about a relationship.
So, of Sundays and Superbowls. We had great services on Sunday morning and we had a great game on Sunday night. To the Giants and all of your fans, congrats on winning and to all of my C3’ers, what a great day of worship and congrats on our freedom from religion!
loveworshiplovelife 