We are in Northern India this week, working with the ministries that we have partnered with over the past 5-8 years. God is doing great things here and it is amazing to see the perseverence and faithfulness of the Indian Christians in a very difficult place for the gospel. We have spent time with Dr. Rajesh in a Christian hospital in the mountains, with a ministry that cares for children and sends church planters deep into the Himalayas, at the residential children's school in Dehradun that we work with, and with a ministry that does development work and gospel ministry in rural villages outside of Dehradun. And, we have only really been here for 3 days. Today, we head to Rishikesh to connect with another ministry that operates a Christian school and does village development work, while praying through and engaging in gospel conversations in this holy city for the Hindus on the Ganges. Prayers are always appreciated.
This past weekend, Erika and I took a little trip with some friends to New Orleans. I was recently given a new camera and I thought I'd try it out. Here are a few photos that I took in various places in New Orleans, my favorite city.
We just finished an amazing weekend of worship, reflection on the Death, Burial, and Resurrection of Christ, spending time with family, and looking toward the future. We look backward at what Christ has done so that we can more clearly see our present and so that we can look ahead to the hope that He has for us in Him. Jesus is risen and that means something significant for us today and for our future as well.
On Friday night, our church set aside time to reflect on the sufferings of Christ. We often skip over the suffering so that we can get to the victory, but unless we go to the cross, I don't think that we will be able to really understand the resurrection. We took time to sit in silent prayer and meditation on the Lord and Scripture before the worship started. We did this for about an hour. Then, we sang, prayed, had some Bible study, and took Communion together. One of the songs that particularly touched me was the modern hymn, "How Deep the Father's Love for Us." There is a verse that says,
It was my sin that held him there / Until it was accomplished / His dying breath has brought me life / I know that it is finished.
My sin is what put Jesus on the Cross. He took it from me so that I would be forgiven, be restored to God, be justified, and so that He could bear God's wrath instead of me. He conquered Satan, death, hell, and He fulfilled the Law, nailing it to the Cross - the debt was paid in full. He disarmed the powers and authorities making a public spectacle of them by the Cross. He rescued me from the dominion of darkness and brought me into His Kingdom. Because of what Jesus has done, I can now approach God with freedom and confidence. I can worship by the Spirit of God freely. Through Christ, God is reconciling the world to Himself, making all things new. What a glorious Savior!
Dwayne O'Riley, a man in our church, painted a painting for us during the two and a half hour worship/prayer service of the face of Jesus. He worked on it some more on Saturday and displayed it during the service this morning. Here is a picture from Friday night right before a tornado knocked out the power!
On Saturday, in the spirit of new life and God making all things new, I planted a small garden with the kids. We planted 7 tomato plants and a basil plant. I have tried this a couple of times before and something always went wrong. One year, I placed the plants too close together and they did not bear much fruit. Another year, we had too much rain and the plants grew huge but I didn't get any tomatoes out of them. I love fresh tomatoes. They taste totally different than the store bought variety. Anyway, it was a neat teaching time for the kids too. I don't try and make every little thing that we do have a spiritual application (even though all of life points back to God), but this just seemed to make sense and be very obvious. While we were digging up the ground, we talked about how we needed to have a soft heart toward God and how we needed to be humble before Him. We also talked about being good soil and the parable of the sower and the seed. They were really engaged and could understand a lot better with their hands in the dirt working to prepare the ground for planting. It was great to work with them too. They worked hard and, even though it is a little garden, tending it will be a rich experience this Spring. Here are some pics (Erika took them - I was filthy):
Yes, I know. A VERY small garden. But, it will be fun. If we do it well this year, next year, we're taking half the yard!
Worship on Sunday was great and we had a lot of visitors, although a lot of regulars were gone. Easter is not usually one of our larger services because we have so many young people and young families and they often travel to spend Easter with away with other family. But, we also have a lot of relatives come visit, so it is a different mix than usual. We started the day with a Sunrise Service and then about 25 of us went to eat breakfast together at a local restaurant. Our family made this an Easter tradition about 3 years ago and we just invite people to join us. We had a great time. After this, we went to church and continued to reflect on the great salvation that Christ secured for us. I preached about God's grace and mercy, but also about His justice and wrath. Jesus fully took God's wrath for us and brought us to God. My Mom in Mississippi will likely read this along with other family members, so I'll put up the picture that was taken of the family after worship. What a blessing my wife and children are to me.
Since I'm posting pictures, the following are from last weekend when Erika and I took the kids to some Greek gardens near Montgomery and then went to feed the ducks at a nearby park. There were some ducklings swimming in the pond that made for some amazing pictures, I thought. Enjoy and have a great week knowing and believing that because Christ is risen, He makes all things new!
I hope that you also had a great celebration of the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ! God is so good and I see Him at work all around me is so many amazing ways.
Last night, I couldn't get to sleep. My mind was racing. Finally, I drifted off, but not before I ran through a dozen different subjects. I've been told by friends that I have adult ADD. Maybe so. It would explain a lot. Normally, I write essays for this blog because it is really rewarding for me to lock in on one topic and explore it and I use it as a teaching platform for my church. Today, I'll take you on a random tour of what I'm thinking about in classic, stream-of-consciousness form. Each of these thoughts could be a blogpost all their own and they have been building up in my head. So, I think I'll clean out my brain a little so that I can think more clearly and start over.
I'm going back to India at the end of next month. Around midnight last night, I called Thom Wolf in India and talked with him for awhile. It was almost noon there. He was my professor and intellectual mentor in school back when I lived in San Francisco and he lives in New Delhi. We will go north to the Himalayas and do our normal thing with the ministries there, and then possibly travel with him for a couple of days to the south of India to meet some people doing very interesting things.
I am working through Paul's letter to the Philippians right now in my Bible study and my preaching. I am also writing essays to go along with each topic. Philippians is a great letter to address the "God as a means to an end" syndrome that plagues contemporary Christianity. I am thinking of releasing the essays after I am through with this. It has been really interesting. Today, I am working on one called "Chains" about how Paul volunteered to put himself in less than ideal situations so that the gospel would be spread to others through his life and suffering. Check out Philippians 1:7-14. Am I willing to do the same?
"According to some estimates, Christians in developed Western countries now represent only 37 percent of believers worldwide. As I travel and also read chruch history, I have observed a pattern, a strange historical phenomenon of God 'moving' geographically from place to place: from the Middle East to Europe to North America to the developing world. My theory is this: God goes where He's wanted." ~ Philip Yancey, Finding God in Unexpected Places.
I ran across a fascinating article today on urban development in post-Katrina New Orleans on Newgeography.com by Andres Duany. Duany, of Cuban descent, says that "New Orleans is not among the most haphazard, poorest or misgoverned American cities, but rather the most organized, wealthiest, cleanest, and competently governed of the Caribbean cities." He says that New Orleans is not really an American city at all. Rather, it is a Caribbean city. Jimmy Buffett, after Katrina hit, said that the northern Gulf of Mexico is actually the northern part of the Caribbean, not the Southern part of the U.S. I agree. Being from there, it is different that the rest of the country, and I love it. Totally different way of thinking, worldview, and lifestyle. Maybe this is why Baptists have had so much trouble reaching the Gulf Coast? Hmmm.
My two favorite songs on my ipod right now are "Rocket Man" by Angie Aparo and "A Change is Gonna Come" by Ben Sollee. They are both cover songs, but the music and vocals are really intriguing. If you haven't heard either of these guys, check them out. Here's a live version of "Rocket Man." I think about this when I am travelling too much.
And, Ben Sollee on the cello. Yes, the cello. This is amazing.
This week marks the 3 year anniversary of us finding a lump on Caelan's chest that was a cancerous tumor. It has been a hard three years, but I praise God everyday for His faithfulness. Last night, Erika told me that the little 3 year old girl that my family has been praying for since we saw her at Caelan's last scans died last week. Her name was Cassie. My heart was broken over that. Maybe that is why I keep singing "A Change is Gonna Come." Ben Sollee, covering Sam Cooke, says he doesn't know what's beyond the sky. I do, and more and more each day I pray that God's Kingdom come.
"As heretical as it sounds today, it is probably worth telling Americans that you don't need Jesus to have better families, finances, health, or even morality. Coming to the cross means repentance - not adding Jesus as a supporting character for an otherwise decent script but throwing away the script in order to be written into God's drama. It is death and resurrection, not coaching and makovers." Michael Horton, Christless Christianity.
Baseball season is about to start. I really don't like baseball. Too slow for my taste. During the dead of summer, it is almost like there are no sports going on. I'm just waiting for football. Although, our church has formed THREE softball teams with about 50 players and they'll be playing mostly on Monday nights, so I am glad for the fact that a lot of people from our church will be hanging out together and building relationships. Being blind in my right eye caused me to never play baseball because I have no depth perception, so maybe that is why I don't like it. I do plan to play summer league basketball, though.
The groundbreaking for our church's new building is April 5, right before we have a huge neighborhood Easter Egg Hunt. We've been reaching a lot of teenagers in our community lately, and God really moved in their lives at a youth retreat that we had this past weekend. Several came to Christ and many more opened their hearts to Jesus. We have also started tutoring, GED classes, and are helping with job placement. God is doing some amazing things. The building is just a tool to help us with this, and it should be finished by October. I'll be very happy.
I keep watching Jon & Kate plus Eight. I don't know why. Erika keeps asking why I stop there when we are watching TV and I have the remote and I told her that I really can't believe how mean Kate is to Jon and I can't fathom how they manage eight kids like that. Wow. It's like a car wreck. I have four kids of my own. Do I really need to watch someone else's stress? Strangely, I'm drawn to it. That, and Clean House, which is about people who live in an unfathomable mess. I guess that it is cathartic to see other people's stress and mess instead of my own. Normally, these shows come on right after we put the kids to bed. Hmmm.
I turned in my taxes yesterday and I'm trying to get some insurance stuff taken care of. It's a pain and seems to be taking forever. Car tags have to be paid on Monday and I'm doing a TV interview tomorrow for a local religious broadcasting station about our work in India. I lump all of that together because it all feels about the same to me - stuff I have to do that I don't like doing. I'm not just trying to be humble about the TV thing either. I HATE stuff like that. Communication should be two-way and interactive with feedback, not captured on a television for people to pick over and misinterpret as they wish. Maybe I'm just insecure.
Books I'm reading right now (they happen to all be "Christian" books, which is not good - I need to vary things up a bit and learn from some other disciplines):
Finding God in Unexpected Places by Philip Yancey - picked it up in the airport last week. Yancey writes essays about where he sees God working in the world. Excellent.
Christless Christianity by Michael Horton - states that the American church has given itself over to an alternative gospel that he calls, therapuetic moralistic deism.
No Place for Truth - Or Whatever Happened to Evangelical Theology by David Wells. This came out about 15 years ago, but it was recommended to me by a friend of mine. It is pretty dense, but a good read. Makes some of the same claims as Horton, but from a historical perspective.
My church is always heavy on my mind and my heart. I graduated from seminary over 9 years ago. I've been the lead pastor of our church for 3 1/2 years. I'm realizing more and more each day that I am not smart enough, talented enough, entertaining enough, or gifted enough to do what needs to be done, no matter how many books I read. God has to work through me. I need Him. I carry the weight of people's struggles pretty intensely. I greatly desire for people to walk with the Lord and to glorify Him and I want our church to hunger after Christ with their whole lives and to reach people who do not know Jesus. But, I am really having to pray about this and release it to the Lord. I can't make anyone do anything. I am completely powerless to make anything happen. God has to do it. I have always known that intellectually. I am learning that emotionally and spiritually and it isn't easy, believe it or not.
Ashtyn has started soccer.
I have great kids and an amazing wife who listens to me go on and on about everything that I am thinking about. She is really patient and she always gives me great feedback. I do not deserve her, and I'm not just saying that because it is what I am expected to say. She's really something. She texted me two days ago and said that we should go on the mission trip with the youth group this summer. I told her that I agreed. Not many mother's of four kids would do that.
My city, Montgomery, just elected a new mayor in a special election a couple of weeks ago. In his election night interview, he said that he hoped that he would "rule" well. Rule #1 in American politics: Never tell the people that you plan to "rule" them. It doesn't sit well in a democracy. Then, he said that he was pushing the inauguration back a week because he was taking his family to the beach. Rule #2: When we are in a severe recession, don't tell the people that just elected you that you would begin to rule, er, serve them, but first, you have to go to the beach. Go to the beach in a few months AFTER you have worked for them for a little while. Wow.
Look, a BUTTERFLY!!!! Sorry, had to get that out. Does anyone ever feel that way? Random as can be.
I've lost 10 pounds in the past two weeks and I don't know how. I guess that I haven't been eating as much. Duh. Stress? Busyness? I don't know, but I'll take it. I could stand to lose a lot more.
Well, that's about it. Not really, but I figure that no one is still reading at this point, so I might as well stop. Believe it or not, engaging in an exercise in complete randomness actually made me feel better. So, I leave you with a picture of my kids that I really love.
God is good, by the way. And, He's always working in every thing. Big, little, important, mundane. God is always at work.
Last fall, our family went exploring through the countryside of central Alabama on a Saturday looking for fun stuff to do. I took these pics and meant to post them a long time ago, but forgot. So, here we are at a farm that was holding some type of fall festival. Enjoy. It was a really great day.
When we were in Delhi on the last day of our trip to India in October, I was snapping pictures as we were driving to the airport. I looked up and saw the reflection of our driver in his rear view mirror.
This is a photo that I took this past weekend in the mountains of Eastern Alabama. I thought that it was pretty cool. It was a rainy, foggy night and when we woke up in the morning, the mist was everywhere. As the sun came up, it started breaking through the fog and the trees in a quite mystical way.
I haven't put up photos in a while. These are two from our last trip to India that I particularly like. Young and Old in the first one. The second one was taken inside a hut in a Nepali village in the Himalayas of Northern India. This reminds me what we are supposed to be focusing on.
There is an open door that is emerging for the gospel to penetrate Northern India. Indigenous Christians are being faithful to carry the message of Christ deep into the mountains, at great peril to themselves. They do not have very much, but whatever they have they use for God's glory. God is at work there in amazing ways.
In this valley, Nepali farmers have come to Christ. From the dirt floor of this mud hut, we heard stories of how God healed the man's daughter and the whole family came to the Lord and was baptized. They are being discipled and are learning to live for Jesus. They have only been Christians for about 6 months, but they are already undergoing persecution from their neighbors who are stealing their seed and trampling their crops. Still, they are being faithful to the Lord.
Here is a picture of this family of new believers. Pray for them tonight. Let's not forget.
I've been thinking a lot about the decline in the SBC this past week. It was talked about at our quarterly associational meeting today. As I heard multiple plans for outreach and church growth, the thought ran through my head: We don't have any idea what we are doing. I don't know that I've ever thought that before. I guess that I always thought that someone, somewhere knew what they were doing in regard to church leadership, evangelism, and cultural engagement. But, recently I've realized that all of the experts have been passed by. All of their plans, strategies, books, and conferences are no longer working. Everyone is groping around trying to figure this out. Even the megachurches are struggling to figure out how to not be left behind in this new environment of a post-Christian, post-modern, multicultural America. So, here is a picture that I took in India that I think fully captures where we are right now in relation to a rapidly changing culture:
Obviously, we are the boy on the left. Fortunately, we are indwelt by the Holy Spirit and we can pray. Has it come to that, you ask? Prayer? Dependence on God? The most pertinent words spoken at our associational meeting today were by the youngest pastor there. He gave the devotion and he called us to preach nothing but Jesus Christ and Him crucified (2 Cor. 2:1-5). He called us back to dependence on Christ and an application of the Cross in our lives. The true gospel of Jesus Christ has power and can still speak to a spiritually dead people. Can these dry bones live? Only by the power of the Holy Spirit. But, we have to stop believing that we can bring revival through our religious acts, devotion, and morality, and become serious about really repenting of our self sufficiency and pride. God opposes the proud, you know.
I just returned from our trip to Northern India where we participated in helping lead a conference with an emerging indigenous ministry network that we helped initiate last year. It was amazing! We also travelled into the mountains to facilitate further development of the clean water project that we have begun with a local Christian hospital. Our travels took us all over the north of India, from the Ganges River to the Himalayas. We even ended up on a safari and saw a herd of wild elephant one morning! The Father worked in powerful ways and we were able to meet many people who have recently come to Him through the work of these holistic ministries. ALL of them have a story of some type of miracle that took place that caused them to change their direction. Something is happening in this region as people are coming to faith much more rapidly than they have in the past. Our relationships with the indigenous believers have grown exponentially and we have seen amazing things. We hope to go back again in the fall, or possibly next year and I wish that I could take everyone I knew with me.
Over the past week, we met with development workers, teachers and leaders, economic developers, medical personnel, and educators - all using their skills to better the lives of people and bring the Kingdom. We are helping the organizations of this emerging network with micro loan programs, clean water projects, church planting, and school start ups and development in unreached areas. I could not be more amazed at what we have stumbled into. We drove along mountain roads, tromped all over God's green earth, sat in huts along river banks and ate over open fires with Nepali farmers who had just recently had a change of heart. We gathered in a house on the side of a mountain at around 7,000 feet sharing our really great news with over 20 Hindu tribal people in a village where we had just placed a water tank and sat at the feet of the giants of the faith who first brought the message to these mountains. People are opening up in amazing ways as the seeds that have been planted are beginning to bear fruit. I am privileged to be a part of it and to serve the Indian believers as they take responsibility for their own calling.
I have learned some pretty incredible lessons about what we are doing well and what the American Church is doing very poorly when it comes to this type of work and I will be sharing some over the next week or two. Since I just got home today, jet lag is taking its toll, so I'll just stop by sharing a heap of pictures - every one has a story behind it. The first is me on my favorite motorcycle, the Royal Enfield, which is made in India (if anyone wants to get me one, I'll be eternally grateful! - Kidding. I don't think that would be a good idea just yet!). The rest of the pictures are more focused on the purpose of the trip. Enjoy, and please pray for Northern India. God is on the move!
It's been a while since I posted any pictures here. I'll have a lot more pretty soon, but I went back through my files and pulled out some that I liked.
I haven't posted any pictures lately, but I found myself in the mood to put a few up tonight. This is a wide variety of pictures from a beach trip, to Christmas presents, New Year's fireworks, and even a Southern Snowfall. Photography has been a really good outlet for me, especially when I get to see my kids through the lens. It is almost like I am seeing them for the first time, or capturing something timeless. It really makes me appreciate all that God has blessed me with.
On Saturday, November 17, the Convoy of Hope rolled into town. This is a ministry that provides food, health care, social services, love, and fun to the needy in communities all across America and the world. It came to our city 5 years ago, and the return was a greater success than anyone anticipated. You can read the newspaper article HERE. Altogether, we had over 9,400 guests visit the event to receive physical as well as spiritual ministry. We had almost 1,300 volunteers from 124 churches and 24 different denominations in our city! It is truly unbelievable what can happen when God's people work together instead of against one another. On this day, there were no Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, or Pentecostals. Instead, it was just the Church of Montgomery working together as the hands and feet of Jesus. It was an amazing event that richly blessed our city. There was a great deal of spiritual ministry that took place as well as almost 500 people made professions of faith. I worked in the prayer/counseling area and it was amazing to encounter so many deep needs in the lives of the people of our community. We had over 30 from our church volunteer, so this morning, many of them shared in the service about how God used them and ministered to them through the lives of others. What an incredible blessing it was! If this ministry ever comes to your city, I highly encourage you to particpate! A few pics:
Here are some recent pictures of the family during some recent fun days at the park, our church's Fall Festival, and by just hanging out. I like them - hope you enjoy.
When we were in Northern India, we stopped by a church in the city of Mussoorie and walked into a Union Church that was basically a protestant church that allowed many different denominations to come together and worship Jesus. The pastor was from a baptist background, but they tried to lift up the name of Jesus over denominational differences. I couldn't help but think of the situation back here in the States. I really liked this picture, by the way.
I returned from India on Saturday evening and have been incredibly busy ever since. The trip was incredible and all of our goals were accomplished. I'll briefly share what happened and elaborate more later:
In conjunction with a Christian hospital high in the mountains of Northern India, we established the beginnings of the Himalayan Clean Water Project. We are financing the building of water tanks and toilet systems in three villages along with a plan for implementing the systems. We are looking at this from a development perspective and there will be a community group established to discuss the uses of clean water and a study conducted to find out how their water supply has been used in the past. A local pastor connected to a ministry that we are working with will work alongside the project as a basis for building relationships and sharing the gospel. We are praying that this becomes a platform for evangelism and church planting, as well as to help the people with clean water.
We met with the leaders of 6 indigenous ministries that are combining evangelism, church planting, schools for orphans and mistreated children, and development projects to talk with them about working together. We met with them in March on our previous trip and we had a follow up meeting to discuss the topics of spiritual transformation, the power of unity, and the economic affect of the gospel on the poor. They were very receptive and are interested in forming a coalition/network of ministries that are impacting their state in both word and deed to bring the gospel into the unreached mountain regions of Northern India. Here is the teaching that we shared with them: Working Together to Bring Spiritual, Social, and Economic Transformation
We explored and moved forward on several microfinancing projects. We are wanting to infuse capital into the hands of believers who are entrepenurial in both a financial and Kingdom perspective. These leaders are starting businesses to provide income for people that they are leading to Christ to improve their standard of living and also to give them a broader platform for ministry. Basically, they are stepping forward in the concept of business as mission and we are helping them to do that by providing low interest loans instead of handouts. In some cases, we are just giving to ministries, but in others, we are trying to set up a system where they can become sustainable themselves. We worked with another non-profit in this called Isaiah's Legacy, led by Bill Hurley, who went with myself and another minister named Carmen Falcione on the trip.
At the end of the trip, we went back to Delhi and attended the semi-annual meeting of the workers connected with Truthseekers International, a ministry that is working amongst the politicians and educators of India to bring a Christian worldview to the nation. This ministry is also made up of indigenous Indians and is led by Sunil Sardar. We heard the testimony of what God is doing through this ministry in India, heard from several Indian MP's (ministers of parliament) who had become believers, and also heard about the great church planting effort that is going on. I met one man who has helped plant hundreds of churches and has the gift of healing. He has seen many people healed and even saw a girl raised from the dead. This was attested to by many in the meeting as an established fact. He gave all the credit to God. Actually, the meeting lasted 7 hours and we sat on the floor the whole time!
We connected with ministries who were impacting lostness in Northern India and were penetrating unreached people groups for the first time. Some of the areas were seeing the first Christian converts ever. We met a woman who went into a village near Hardiwar, the second most holy city for the Hindus, and led 31 people to the Lord, many were her family members. A church was quickly planted and a day care was established to minister to the children through an afterschool program. The church planter assigned to that area is using the day care as a platform to minister to the families of the children who are coming. All of this is being organized and led by Indians who are devoted to Christ.
We have learned many things through our travels to India. We are working in an area that is the seat of Hinduism, boasting the most holy cities for the Hindus on the Ganges River and many mountain shrines and temples. If Northern India comes to Christ, the whole nation will follow. We are working with indigenous Indians who are doing incredible work and are far outpacing the Westerners that are there. Did you know that an Indian church planter only needs $1500 per year to live and do ministry? Western missionaries need tens of thousands of dollars to do the same work, although they are hampered by language and cultural barriers. There is a growing church in India that is serious about taking responsibility for the evangelization of their own nation. Of the 1.3 billion in India, only 2% are Christian, but many are mobilized and are working diligently to see the Kingdom come. We are going to help them directly.
Here are a few more pictures from the trip. I'll be writing more on this over the next few weeks.
"Beautiful Feet" - This is a picture of the shoes of little children left outside a church on Sunday morning as they go inside to worship. I could not help but think of the verse in Romans that says, "How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news."
Over Labor Day Weekend, my family and I travelled to North Carolina to see my wife's sister and her husband. We had a great time visiting the North Carolina Apple Festival, camping in a cabin by a lake, seeing Asheville, hiking in the mountains just a little, and driving up the Blue Ridge Parkway. The kids did great and it was a beautiful trip. Here are a load of pictures because . . . well, just because. The first picture is of Caelan and me. I don't normally put pictures of myself up, but this one makes me look like I'm doing something productive, so I thought I'd treat everyone.
