Happy New Year! This past year I made the goal of reading 36 books (I only got to 35, and that with binge reading the week between Christmas and New Year’s!) I stepped it down from 2016’s 60-book count because I had a hard time recalling many of the books that I had read. I …
Happy Thanksgiving to all my friends and family. As you prepare to travel, cook, host, visit, etc. I hope that your weekend will be filled with more than just football on TV and polite dinner conversation (or hostile conversations). In an age where technology is causing us to lose the ability to engage meaningfully, I …
Dear Church, We woke up this morning to learn about the deadliest shooting in U.S. History. This time it was in Las Vegas. A man opened fire on unsuspecting concert-goers from the 32nd floor of his hotel. As I read about the tragedy, I couldn’t help but think, “not again.” I experienced a weird mixture of …
With the encouragement of a friend and in response to a fantastic workshop on reading for preaching (thanks to the Center for Excellence in Preaching), I accomplished my goal to read 60 books last year. Before you think I accomplished some super-human feat, the 60-book total consisted of everything from children’s books to multi-volume trilogy novels. Some books were …
As a church, we have been experiencing the Christmas story in our Face to Face series. We’ve looked at a variety of ways God meets us through the Incarnation. That Jesus came as a baby reminds us that God came to meet our brokenness, our shame, and even our fear. I’d like to highlight two …
We are continuing our Side By Side series through the book of Philippians. Paul gives us a way forward as we press on to know Christ: forgetting what is behind and straining towards what is ahead. As I preached on Phil 3 this past weekend, I didn’t have the time and space to talk about …
This past weekend, our church celebrated a MISSION weekend. That’s “Mission” as opposed to “missions”. What’s the difference?
Have you ever heard of Brian Regan (not the comedian, but the would-be spy)? Back in 2003, Regan was a former analyst for the United States Air Force. Regan made headlines when he sent an email (of all things) to the Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi with the subject line, “I am willing to commit espionage …
The Weeklong Sermon – What Story Are You Living? Read More »
This past weekend we wrapped a two-part vision calling Grace Community Church to be Side By Side this year. The basis of this call was the fact that we are needy and we are needed. Everyone in our church has needs, and therefore everyone is needed. It’s actually one of those counterintuitive truths about life. (Kind of …
Installation is such a funny word to describe what happened to me this past weekend. Maybe that’s why people used every word imaginable: coronation, inauguration, commemoration, ordination, indignation… (just kidding about the last one). Though I have been functioning in the lead pastor role for a few months now, there was something so powerful and …
