A Stone's Throw

Mark Batterson has a new book coming out later this year called “Primal: A Quest for the Lost Soul of Christianity.” His book “In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day” was an extremely influential book in my personal leadership and spiritual pilgrimage. I read it all the way through in the middle of the night…I couldn’t put the book down.  It came at a time in my life when I was extremely open to the concepts and I really did take some risks that I felt God was calling me to do.

I am currently reading through his second book, “Wild Goose Chase” on my Kindle 2.  Really enjoying his book on the Holy Spirit along with a companion book, “Forgotten God: Reversing Our Tragic Neglect of the Holy Spirit” by Francis Chan.  I have been studying and learning about the doctrine of the Holy Spirit lately.

The publisher, Waterbrook-Multnomah is giving away 500 copies of Primal to bloggers who would review the book.  I would hardly call myself a blogger of any significance. However, I love books…and Mark Batterson books…and Batterson lived in SGF for a while in college…and I lived in SGF for a long time–and college too!  Anyway, a guy can hope for a free book, can’t he?

Amazon.com: Primal: A Quest for the Lost Soul of Christianity (9781601421319): Mark Batterson: Books.

I came across this post from the Lifechurch.tv/Swerve folks and it made a lot of sense in regards to my recent post, and particularly John’s comment.

Interesting post.  I have had the same statements from people…especially when they are “checking us out.”  You can always tell when people have left their old church and are reluctantly looking for another place to worship–not necessarily a place to serve and sink their heart into for the long haul.  They have a lot of expressions like, “well at our old church, we did X…you ought to do that…that might be a good idea for you to do.”  I believe it was Rick Warren who said at a church planting conference I attended, “just respond back to those people, ‘Why don’t you just go back to your old church, be reconciled with them, and we will all be better for it.’” That takes courage to actually say that, but it is true.

Much like in a counseling setting; if you are not willing to work on it and put some of the things into practice, you are wasting the counselor’s and your time both!

I love this statement in the post:

I’m asking God to empower me to move people from “going to church” to “being the church.” When they stop going and start being, the church goes from yours to mine.

Lord, let that be our prayer as well!

Making It “Their” Church – LifeChurch.tv : swerve.

A buddy of mine said today, “You know a true friend when they help you move.”  My thoughts exactly!!  We had some of our dear friends and family help us move the “easy” stuff of boxes.  There was nothing “easy” about unloading our storage unit and filling the biggest Penske truck we could get with stuff–lots of it should have been let go of years ago, but you know how hard it is for pack rats to give up their stuff.  It is amazing how much stuff you seem to accumulate over the years.  We had a step smaller Ryder truck when we moved from seminary to Ozark–packed yes, but we made it in one load.  We probably won’t have a totally full truck tomorrow, but full enough to think about cutting out some things.

My friend, Eric Barb wrote a little about this need to have way too much stuff in his “Barb Wire” in the CFC Current. He is a really good writer. I miss the guys.  The were always a lot of fun.

Better get to sleep . . . huge day tomorrow.  Still can’t believe this is our last night in our house.  Tomorrow we will officially be home in Carthage!  WOW.