This past week I was sharing a meal with our newest staff member, Jason, when he posed a question I had never heard before: "What are the rules here?" I was intrigued and really engaged not only in trying to get him a suitable answer that was honest and true [...]
Yesterday I sat with a fellow church planter in a restaurant in Southern California discussing the best ways to lead the various people that come in and out of our new churches. My colleague's frustration with the state of people's pursuits in church was obvious and while I know him [...]
Recently I sat with a friend and local pastor who often helps me out by speaking when I have to be away from Disciples on a Sunday. We were discussing his last preaching assignment at our church and planning for his next that was soon approaching. In the course of [...]
Financial struggles in churches all over the U.S. is a well documented saga over the past year and Disciples has been no different. Add to that mix the loss of a few influential staff members partnered with the summer slump and you have a pretty depressing landscape for fostering health [...]
There was a time in my life when I considered myself somewhat of a poker player. My experience amounted to a weekly game in the garage with guys from the neighborhood where we would swap quarters or the occasional "monster pot" with enough to buy dinner for two at the [...]
It's Olympics season and so chances are good no matter how much of a sports fanatic you are or are not, you have been tuned in some. Some of the sports defy physics. I mean people who can jump 27 feet across a sand pit not only amaze me, but [...]
Yesterday on my way home from the office I stopped off at Ted's house (Ted is our worship leader) to sit on his patio and talk for a bit. Not only do these talks feed my soul but they tend to be a welcomed and unpredictable mix of topical discussion [...]
For years I have prided myself on my ability, at least perceived that way, to package up a bad day or bad meeting and head into the next with the lingering thoughts and feelings of the last neatly wrapped up in some place out of view of the rest of [...]
Amidst the rock n roll revolution of the free-love sixties was a dream, pushed forward by Martin Luther King Jr. A few years later the seventies greeted world leaders with public threats of nuclear war set against the back drop of a simple and very hopeful message to millions through [...]
Let me paint for you a picture. It’s one that I live in real time on a somewhat regular basis, it’s something I, from here on out will, refer to as Church Planter’s Groundhog Day: It’s Wednesday afternoon, 4p. I am sitting in a local pub (Starbucks was so [...]
