They Like Jesus but Not the Church

18Jun08

I feel like Christians are messed-up, we’re getting it wrong, I think part of the solution is rethinking how we’re doing church. Not everyone agrees with me on this – it seems like people think we’re doing okay. Here’s a video from Scott Hodge that may change their minds.

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The Christian Brand – with 30% More JESUS!

14Jun08

We think of brands as products. But the idea of branding is actually useful in many areas of study. The science of Branding is based on Psychology and how our brains work. It turns out that we associate feelings and words with specific things in our brains – this affects our image of a brand, and our interest in buying it.

Starbucks does a great job of branding. Their stores are SUPER COOL! Their logo is cool, their menu looks

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The Missionary Position

13Jun08

Growing up, I wanted to be a missionary. I read the AWESOME, amazing miracle stories about what God did overseas and I wanted in on that action. Plus, I wanted to be a top notch Christian. Growing up, it seemed like to be the best you had to be a pastor or missionary. So I wanted to do that, or be a youth pastor.

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My Landlord poured Comet all over

12Jun08

the bathroom.

My landlord is a clean freak. Super clean freak. Like, I have to use a special place mat on top of the place mat on the table, to eat. And I have to keep my room clean. (to be fair, he’s trying to sell the house), but I have to keep it clean every day and make my bed – AND NO ONE EVEN COMES to see the house!

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Examples of us not being good Christians

11Jun08

In my last post I assumed we’re not very good Christians, and asked for reasons why you think that came to be. I realize many may disagree with my premise! I’ll try to state some of my argument for that belief below:

When I was in the Horizon School of Evangelism, in San Diego (I miss you), we would do street evangelism (crazy, I know). And we would go up to people and try to share God’s love for them. I realized quickly that

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Why do you think we’re not good Christians?

09Jun08

My Passion is for the Church. I feel that we’ve gotten way off track. Blue Like Jazz, UnChristian (Lyons and Kinnaman), They Like Jesus but Not the Church (Dan Kimball), and many other books have convinced me of this – not to mention my own experience.

 The off-trackness is: we’re nothing like Jesus. At least I’m not. I don’t love people, I don’t have the fruits of the Spirit. I’m lonely, I’m selfish, I have no power, I have little love – and I don’t see much of that in my fellow Christians.

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Living in a Van Soon

07Jun08

So I just bought a new van. Well, new to me. It’s a 1994 dodge caravan (a picture would be nice, jesse). 128K miles (pretty good!) good tranny, small oil leak, good AC, it’s good. Also it’s bright red and a little small.

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The Discipleship Strategy

01Jun08

In 2005, I completed a year long program called The Horizon School of Evangelism. The director there was big on discipleship (we did a weekly study in Mark on discipleship that took all year). He believes that we should be making disciples b/c that’s what Jesus did, that’s what the Great Commission explicitly tells us to do (“make disciples of all nations”), and, practically, that’s what will win the day.

I think I agree with him. The MOST INTERESTING PART to me, is the numbers. Did you know that if the original 12 disciples (or 11 or whatever), had done what Jesus did – get 12 disciples, spend 3 years teaching, training, doing life with them – and their disciples did this as well, after 24 years (or 8 generations of disciplemaking) over 5 Billion disciples would’ve been made. – and that’s if all they did their whole Christian life was spend 3 super intense years, then slacked-off the rest of their Christian life.

The whole freaking world could’ve gotten saved a long freaking time ago!

If each one of us would just make 1 disciple every year (and kept doing that every year) - spending a whole year with them, meeting with them very often (every day?) teaching them, etc then 1 > 2 > 4 > 8 > … after 32 years … > OVER 8 BILLION DISCIPLES! THE WHOLE WORLD … in 32 YEARS! The power of exponential growth is exciting!

Now, obviously, this would be pretty difficult to do. Not all of us are gifted disciplers. I doubt I could, in 1 year, train someone to make disciples. Ok, how about 1 person every 4 years. After 128 years, again, 8 BILLION DISCIPLES (approximately).

Ok, not all of us are gifted to do this – we use our gifts in other ways to help the body. In a more complex model, a discipler spends 3 years with a group of 10 people – only 3 of whom go on to become disciplers themselves (the rest either fall away or use other gifts to facilitate the process). After 30 years (10 iterations) a discipler retires from making disciples. Here’s how it would look:
year 0: 1 Discipler, 1 Reached
year 3: 1 + 1×3 = 4×1 = 4 disciplers, 1 + 1×10  = 11 Reached
year 6: 4 + 4×3 = 4×4 = 16 D, 11 + 4×10 = 51 Reached
year 9: 4×16 = 64 D, 51 + 160 = 211 R
year 12: 64×4 = 256 D, 211 + 640 = 851 R
…
year 54: 17.1 Billion Reached.

We can play with the equation and ratio of diciplers, but it seems to me that if we focused our efforts on making disciples and disciplers, we could potentially reach the whole world by the end of the century. I’m not foolish enough to think this will actually ever happen, HOWEVER, I’m compelled by the numbers to believe that if we at least tried to do something like this, we’d have a greater measure of success than we’re currently having.

This is part of the reason I question our current system.

What do you think of these numbers/this system? Does this light a fire under you? Are you moved but unconvinced? Are you unmoved? Please share your opinions!

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Thank yous…

30May08

I’m not thankful enough. Here’s a Jesse update as thank list:

Thank you Jesus for Friday

Thank you Jesus for Marie Calendar’s frozen meals (for $2.58 at WalMart!)

Thank you Jesus for this article I’m reading from Sally Morgenthaler that validates some of my own thoughts

Thank you, Lord, that you love me, and provide my needs.

Thank you that Mack Kitchel gave me some design work and thinks I’m valuable! That I designed a flyer for him and possibly a shirt – possibly more. Thank you!

Thank you, Jesus, that Kevin Sterner is letting me do some side work for him, watching videos and finding good quotes! Thank you, JESUS!

Thank you, Father, that I’m feeling good about going on a road trip on the US, and that Nathan Pauley wants to come, and that I might get funding from some source, somewhere. Thank you that I’ve found a Ford Aerostar for $800.

Thank you for my Economic Stimulus Check!!

Thank you, God, that you’re so good. Thank you that ROOV.com is coming up soon, and that Chris Capehart called me. Thank you that my sister dropped that Dan guy, and that she seems happyish. Thank you that Lara is fun to hang-out with.

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The Homosexual Challenge

27May08

What do you think about the gay marriage ruling? Would you perform a gay wedding?

No, this is not a contest. There’s no prize. I’m referring to the challenge facing the Church of how to respond to Homosexuality and Gay Marriage.

The recent ruling legalizing gay marriage is very interesting for the Church. It brings up several questions. I think the most important one is this: assuming homosexuality is sin, would Jesus perform a gay marriage?

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