3 Encouraging Things

Vision Campaign: OCC 2012: Changing the World by Degrees: Be the Degree

Pastor Mike has been focused lately.
I’ve been consumed with this Vision Campaign for the last 6 months, maybe more. I’ve shared with good friends that it’s been a difficult road for me. I feel that the assault has been massive: fear, stress, anxiety, discouragement, depression, temptation, fatigue, exhaustion, feeling alone, developing an eye twitch…these are just a few of the weapons that I feel have been leveled against me. I think it’s like that whenever followers of Jesus attempt to do something powerful for His name’s sake.

As we wrap towards completing the public arm of this thing (the next TWO weeks are going to be powerful!), it was fun to have 3 encouraging things happen.

One, we had a full membership (changing the name to MISSION-ship) class last night…where we had to just keep adding chairs for all the folks streaming in. Energy, excitement, and passion for Jesus were profoundly encouraging to me.

Two, we received a $1000 check towards our vision campaign. From a family that lives in California. They have only been to OCC a handful of times, but as they track with us online, they heard about OCC 2012 and wanted to be a part of God’s amazing work through this campaign.

Three, a college student sent me an email. I won’t steal his reward by mentioning his name. But the short story is that he had been addicted to porn for years. He found the grace of Jesus at OCC, and now he’s porn free, in accountability, and amazed at Jesus. He said that he knows he used to look at women from Thailand…maybe even some of the slaves that we are seeking to set free. So God expanded his heart. This full-time student on a part-time salary committed $100 a month for the next 3 years, so that he could set slaves from the sex-industry free.

Passion. Selflessness. Freedom. 3 encouraging things.

Be encouraged today!

Don't Miss your Moment

I want to show you a moment.

This moment is a glimpse. If you play your cards right, if you trust Jesus and take a RISK every now and again for HIM, then this moment is certainly one that you can look forward to.

But if you think it’s about you. If you choose to turn inward. If you never take a RISK for Jesus, then you’ll miss it.



Don’t miss your moment.

Akeelah and the Bee, and a Church on Fire

I watched Akeelah and the Bee last Friday night with my family. It was a warm movie about an inner city middle school girl, who competes, and wins the National Spelling Bee. Lawrence Fishburne plays her coach. The uplifting story line contained elements of overcoming, of rising above, of stepping through fear, of daring to be great.

I’m honored to be a part of a church that is a part of a similar kind of uplifting story. Overlake is truly pursuing God’s call. It is a selfless story of overcoming. Of rising above. Of stepping through fear. Of daring to be great. I’m not overstating this.

OCC is called to be a church of 10,000 lives living free in Jesus, impacting 100,000 lives around the world. In a season of economic uncertainty, we seek to invest $3million in each of our 3 purposes: Love God, Love People, and Serve the World.

The Love God initiatives will focus on local Bringvitation, sharing Christ’s love with our community. The Love People initiatives will focus on Transformation, growing more and more like Jesus. And the Serve the World initiatives focus on Multiplication, caring and sharing around the globe. Which, practically speaking, means this: 1000 slaves set free. 2000 orphans placed in homes. 50 HIV/AIDS clinics opened. 1000 churches planted. Lives will be saved. Eternities will be changed. Hope will be offered.

I’d love to invite you to be a part of this journey too.

In Akeelah and the Bee, there is a quote from Nelson Mandela (at least it is credited to him; perhaps he just quoted it as well). It goes like this:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world.”

Overlake, you are not a church that plays small. Let us Love God, Love People, and Serve the World, together.

Mobilizing towards Vision

In light of an incredible Vision Campaign, called OCC 2012, (details at occ.org) my buddy Chris sent me these thoughts as an encouragement. Please be encouraged by them as well! Thank you, Chris, and thank you friends, for being on the journey, praying and joining us in Changing the World by Degrees!!!! Chris’s email follows:

“The word kosmokrateros (“rulers of the darkness of this world”) is a military term that has to do with discipline, organization, and commitment. The devil is so serious about doing damage to humanity that he deals with demon spirits as though they are troops! He puts them in rank and file and organizes them to the hilt. Meanwhile, the average Spirit-filled believer often doesn’t stay in one church for more than one year at a time!

“Yes, we do have more authority than the devil has; we do have more power than the devil has; and we do have the Greater One living in us. The Church of Jesus Christ is loaded with heaps and heaps of raw power. But at this particular time, that power is disconnected and disjointed by a Body that lacks discipline, organization, and commitment!

“As Christians, we have no power shortage, nor are we short of God-given authority. We simply have a great lack of discipline, organization, and commitment. In order to change this, we must buckle down in the local church and begin to view ourselves as the troops of the Lord! Once we match the discipline, organization, and commitment that the enemy possesses in his camp, we will begin to move into the awesome demonstration of God’s power!” -From the book “Dressed to Kill” by Rick Renner, p. 238

This section jumped out at me as it related to the OCC 2012 Vision campaign. What this vision is providing is direction, organization and calling us to a commitment as a church to bring all our individual focus together as ONE body and directing it towards a God honoring set of initiatives. As we succeed at this, I am super excited to see what God is going to do through it.

I appreciate the leadership that you, the elders and staff are bringing to this campaign and to our church. Continue to mobilize our “army” at OCC to come against the devil’s schemes and we WILL prevail!

CRAVE Adventure

I think it’s at the center of the human experience. Adventure. God has planted deep within our hearts a longing for FULL life, for experiencing His Abundance, for stepping through our fear and taking a RISK with HIM…this is partially what we refer to when we use the word FAITH. Now, I know that there is another aspect of the human experience that wars with this one: the side that longs for comfort, for ease, for peace. That hobbit-ish side of each of us that thinks adventures are nasty little things that make one late for dinner.

Here’s the road that I’m walking NOW: I have heard God’s call, and we’re walking the road of RISK at Overlake Christian Church (www.occ.org). However, as we’ve taken the first few steps, I’m being buffetted by fear. Discouragement is roaring, loudly. Temptation whispers in the wings, and on top of it all is the stress of attempting something that is without question more significant than anything I’ve ever attempted in 19 years of ministry. The hobbit-ish side mentions something like maybe the status quo isn’t so bad after all.

And then it hits me: Of course.
This vision IS more important than anything I’ve ever pursued in my whole life. It has HUGE consequences: hundreds, thousands, and even hundreds of thousands of souls will be impacted for eternity. People who are far from HOPE will find it in Jesus. Slaves will be set free. Street children will be adopted into homes. Churches will be planted.

We have an enemy. He’s been taking shots at me. But not for my own sake, not because I’m important. He’s trying to take me out because this kind of thing SCARES him. Churches waking up. Hearts set ablaze. Love practically impacting lives. He hates it. So let’s pour it on.

Encouragement came this morning while reading a book by John Eldredge, called Walking with God. In a chapter called Assault. He describes what I’ve been walking through with crystal clarity. Antidote: Draw close to God, and continue to RISK for Him. After all, he’s planted adventure deep within our hearts…

Sex and GRACE

This week we’re wrapping up our Series on LOVE by talking about Grace, and how the Gospel, the good news of God’s love made known through Jesus, is the key to life, to freedom, and to change. His grace and forgiveness are transformative.

I’m excited to unpack this more at Overlake, but for now I’d love to share some insight from Tim Keller, from a paper he wrote called Gospel: The Key to Change.

Tim Keller writes:

Paul says to Christians, ‘your life is hid with Christ in God’ (Col 3:3), and in numerous places he says that we are now ‘in Him.’ This means, on the one hand, that the Father accepts us in Christ and treats us as if we had done all that Jesus has done (cf. Col 3:2a). But this is also means Christ’s life comes into us by the Spirit and shapes us into a new kind of person. The gospel is not just a truth about us that we affirm with our minds, it is also a reality we must experience in our hearts and souls.

He goes on to say:

Paul does the same thing in Ephesians 5:25ff, where he urges husbands to be faithful to their wives. What is the point? What makes you a sexually faithful spouse, a generous-not avaricious-person, a good parent and/or child is not just redoubled effort to follow the example of Christ. Rather, it is deepening your understanding of the salvation of Christ and living out of the changes that understanding makes in your heart—the seat of your mind, will, and emotions. Faith in the gospel re-structures our motivations, our self-understanding and identity, and our view of the world. Behavioral compliance to rules without heart-change will be superficial and fleeting. The gospel changes your heart…. The gospel is the dynamic for all heart-change, life-change, and social-change. Change won’t happen through 'trying harder' but only through encountering with the radical grace of God.

On the topic of repentance, Keller writes:

It is important to consider how the gospel affects and transforms the act of repentance. In ‘religion’ the purpose of repentance is basically to keep God happy so he will continue to bless you and answer your prayers. This means that ‘religious repentance’ is a) selfish, b) self-righteous, c) and bitter all the way to the bottom. But in the gospel the purpose of repentance is to repeatedly tap into the joy of our union with Christ in order to weaken our need to do anything contrary to God’s heart….

In the gospel our hope is in Christ’s righteousness, not our own – so it is not so traumatic to admit our weaknesses and lapses…. the more accepted and loved in the gospel we feel, the more and more often we will be repenting. And though of course there is always some bitterness in any repentance, in the gospel there is ultimately sweetness. This creates a radical new dynamic for personal growth. The more you see your own flaws and sins, the more precious, electrifying, and amazing God’s grace appears to you. But on the other hand, the more aware you are of God’s grace and acceptance in Christ, the more able you are to drop your denials and self-defenses and admit the true dimensions of your sin. The sin under all other sins is a lack of joy in Christ.

SEX: What I couldn't say at Church

Last Sunday we talked about SEX at church. (Hit occ.org/media to watch the message). There’s always more to cover. After the first service, an elderly couple was exiting, and talking. The wife asked the husband, “What do you want to do today, hon? Do you want to get breakfast, or do you want to watch the Seahawks game?” And he looked at his bride with a twinkle in his eye…”You KNOW what I want to do!” And they laughed together.

Heard one story (from the principle parties) of a man many years ago who asked his crush out on a First date. For some reason they decided to go to church. They were listening to the message when he opens up to Song of Solomon, begins to read, and nod, and says “Amen, Amen.” She’s curious. She cranes her head over to see what he is reading, and he shows her the verse that says your breasts are like clusters of fruit (SOS 7:7,8)…there is a moment of silence as their eyes lock, and she starts laughing at his quirky sense of humor. They celebrated 40 years of marriage last year. Friends, don’t try this today. Today this doesn’t lead to the altar of marriage, as quickly as it leads to a lawsuit.

Song of Songs, or Song of Solomon is a book in the bible that is so explicit, young Jewish boys were not allowed to read it until they were determined to be of a certain responsible age. It not only wows with it’s poetic imagery and it’s erotic setting, but it captures a love that is rapturous, as God desires monogamy in marriage to be. Finally, it is a metaphor of the kind of intimacy in prayer that is desired by the Lord for His people, and a precursor to the union of Jesus the bridegroom with His Bride, the church.

Several of the questions that I’ve received through the years have to do with the sexual activity that the Bible refers to. So I read through the Bible’s most metaphorical and explicit book on sexuality, and I have no doubt that after reading it, you’ll discard ANY notion that sex within marriage is designed to be dull or boring. Here’s how another pastor puts it:

The Song of Songs gives great liberty to sexual freedom and the full use of all five senses.
1. kissing (SOS 1:2)
2. oral/fellatio – her initiative (SOS 2:3)
3. manual stimulation – her invitation (SOS 2:6)
4. petting – his initiative (SOS 4:5)
5. oral/cunnilingus – his initiative (SOS 4:12-5:1)
6. striptease – (SOS 6:13b-7:9)
7. new places, positions, etc. including outdoors – her initiative (SOS 7:11-13)

As long as both participants in the marriage bed are feeling comfortable and honored, then there is great freedom and enjoyment planned by the Lord there.

Is it hot in here? I’ll say: the last time I taught this material my Father in Law was in the front row! I had to tell him, “Randy, after 13 years of marriage and 2 kids, you need to know…I’ve been sleeping with your daughter!” It just felt good to get that off my chest.

Remember, there are three types of sex for married couples:
1. Practice. Talking, communicating, discovering what sorts of things that both of you enjoy together.
2. Maintenance. This is due to high levels of exhaustion, and it’s sort of the minimum requirement necessary. Many couples live here, and it’s one of the reasons why the spark isn’t sparking like it used to.
3. Feasting. This is when you prioritize date nights, weekends away, and even vacations together without the kiddos. Again, for a Biblical example of feasting, read through Song of Solomon together, by yourselves, listening to your favorite romantic tunes with the fire roaring and the kids at grandma’s house for the night.

I know the world messes with sex all sorts of ways. But God really did give it as an incredible gift…Cherish your spouse, and honor your marriage bed…