Chase the Setting Sun...

Every Wednesday I have a group of students that come over to the church after school to hang out and play video games. Most of the time they play Madden 2010 or Halo.

I am not your typical youth pastor. I almost never play video games. Seems that most youth ministries have a huge focus on video games; having multiple game consoles and TVs to play them on. I'm just not that interested.

I've been thinking about different Holiday traditions as Christmas quickly approaches. I decided to put up a list of my top 10 favorite holiday traditions (in no particular order)

1. Peanut Butter Balls

• Those of you from Ohio might call these "Buckeyes". We were always forbidden to call them that because most of my family attended Indiana University for college. They are basically a mix of peanut butter, butter, and powdered sugar rolled into a ball and covered in chocolate. Pretty phenomenal!

2. Christmas Vacation

• This is by far the greatest Christmas Movie of all time! No matter how many times I watch it I think I pull a muscle laughing every time. Just watched it last night with my parents and Grandmother for the second time this season (their first time ever!) and it was amazing. After the movie my 89 yr old grandmother said "Well Joe, I think that is the first movie I've seen since Hoosiers. (in the theater)". At that rate, unless she lives to be 120 it might be the last movie she sees. What a great last movie! (I'm not sure she'd agree with that statement).
  

3. Edward Scissorhands on Thanksgiving Day with Courtney

• This tradition started our first Thanksgiving together when we were dating. The movie was on TV and I was (still am) a huge Johnny Depp fan so we watched it. We've seen it most Thanksgivings since (although we missed the last couple years until this year).

4. Christmas Morning Cinnamon Rolls

• Every year since I can remember we have had Pillsbury cinnamon rolls on Christmas morning. We would awake to the smell of garlic and onions sauteing (Mom preparing her famous stuffing for Christmas dinner), open presents, then stuff our faces with cinnamon rolls. Courtney and I continue this tradition.

5. Putting up the Christmas Tree (Mexican Style)

• Every year growing up it was always fun to put up the Christmas Tree. When I was growing up that usually occurred either the 1st of December or sometime after Thanksgiving and before Dec 1st. Now, although Courtney likes to try and get me to put up the tree sometime closer to HALLOWEEN, it is still a lot of fun. We make queso dip with mexican seasoned ground turkey (a tradition her family started...I think without the meat though) and play Christmas music while decorating. Definitely more fun this year now that we have a house and don't have to move half of our furniture into another room to fit the tree.

6. Dinner Rolls

• See previous post "On a Roll...a Holiday Tradition"

7. Starbucks Peppermint Mochas

• Most of the year I can restrain from too many Starbucks runs...Christmas season kills me though with the Peppermint Mochas. I'm addicted (and drinking one as I write this).
  

8. Christmas Eve Service

• Last year I participated in the 6pm Contemporary service on Christmas Eve at Castleton United Methodist Church. This year, now that I work at the church, I was responsible for picking music and organizing the service. As much work as it is to organize a Christmas Eve service, it really is a lot of fun and I am looking forward to the actual service. I'm also looking forward to next year, hopefully I'll be able to take the service to the next level. This year I stuck closer to what is expected from the past as my first Christmas Eve.

9. Phao Student Ministries Family Christmas Dinner

• This year was our first annual Phao Student Ministries Family Christmas Dinner. Last Sunday we had about 100 people show up to Fellowship Hall in a snow storm to join us to celebrate the Christmas season and our ministry. We gave out thank you gifts to some of our great volunteer leaders, had a white elephant gift exchange with the students and gave out information for summer mission trips. Props to Steph for the idea and everyone that helped decorate and pull it together!

10. Snow!

• I've been loving the snow this year. I think having a house really adds to the enjoyment of the snow. I don't really even mind shoveling the snow. It's been a lot of fun watching it snow while in my living room drinking coffee and enjoying the warmth of our fireplace (even if I have already burnt through most of the wood we have).

Anyway, I am enjoying this time of year more and more as I get older I think. What are your favorite foods, movies or traditions during this Holiday Season?

**Our Contemporary Christmas Eve service this year will be at 6pm in the Castleton United Methodist Church Sanctuary of of 71st Street and Shadeland Avenue, Indianapolis. Join us!

Right now my Young Adult Discussion Group is reading through "Messy Spirituality" by Mike Yaconelli. This week we are on chapter 5, "Odd Discipleship."

Mike is talking in a part of this chapter about the church he pastors and how it is an odd group of people and how their service is "growing".

"I pastor the slowest growing church in America. We started twelve years ago with ninety members and have ungrown to thirty. We are about as far as you can get from a user-friendly church--not because our congregation is unfriendly but because our services are unpredictable, unpolished, and inconsistent. We are an "odd friendly" church, attracting unique and different followers of Christ who make every service a surprise."

We often try to justify what makes a good service by the quality of the "product" we produce, the quality of the music/sermon, the number of people in attendance, the amount (or lack) of awkward moments, blunders and other oddities.

Maybe what makes a good worship service are those oddities, blunders, awkward moments. Maybe it's as few as ten or fifteen weirdos coming together as the Body of Christ and worshiping together and enjoying fellowship with each other.

As we continue Renovate, our Saturday evening contemporary service, my thought on what makes a good worship service is changed and molded weekly. It is so easy for me to worry about the quality of the band, the sermon, the numbers in attendance...when really all that matters is that a few people that might not attend a church anywhere else are coming together and interacting with Jesus in some way, even if just for a few minutes.

It's that time of the year again. The holidays are here. The Christmas tree is up (and has been for a couple weeks...haha). There is an eternal flame in the fire place these days. Thanksgiving is a few days away and you know what that means...time to bake some dinner rolls.

Since my Grandpa Garrison died a few years ago I have taken over the task of making the traditional holiday dinner rolls for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Grandpa made rolls for decades up until the last couple of years of his life. They were always a tie for my favorite holiday food tradition, right along with Mom's stuffing. For a lot of years I think I barely ate anything else at Thanksgiving dinner. I bite of turkey, a plate of stuffing, and about ten dinner rolls.

I always get a few messages each year from family asking how many rolls I'm making, usually with a hint of "If you don't make enough you're dead" in their voices. It really is a honor to make them. I think at this point making the rolls is my strongest connection with my Grandpa. They are always good for bringing a couple of my cousins to tears with that first roll of the season. It seems that biting into them brings back all the memories of "helping" Grandpa bake bread when we were little.

Along with the honor of making them is a little bit of fear. I'm kind of a perfectionist when it comes to these rolls. I'm always worried they are going to be bad, or even just not quite as good as Grandpa's were. What if no one likes them this year?

So far so good. I've only tanked them a couple times. The first two times I made them and only Courtney and I had those.

Hopefully this year goes as well as other years and I can keep those memories flowing with Grandpa's dinner rolls. Tomorrow, once again I will try and channel some of Grandpa's bread baking expertise and whip up two or three batches of rolls, about one hundred rolls in total.

I'll have a long day of work ahead of me, but I always enjoy the house smelling like fresh baked rolls, the Christmas tree lit, and the eternal flame burning in the fireplace.

What are your family holiday traditions?

I have now been doing full time ministry for about three and a half months. November 1st marked the end of my third month here at Castleton UMC. There have been a lot of fun and exciting things going on here in Phao Student Ministries along with the Contemporary worship ministries here at Castleton.

Along with some amazing things that have been going on in ministry it has been a time of figuring out how to balance full time ministry with marriage.

As probably anyone in ministry will tell you, it takes up an incredible amount of your time and energy. The passion God has given those of us in ministry, for those we minister to, often occupies our minds long after we leave the doors of the church. Ministry is not a 9-5, 40 hour per week kind of job. It tends to be a "whatever it takes to do it well" kind of job.

I have run into the struggle of not only dealing with full time ministry's time commitment, but being involved in two (or three) totally different types of ministries presents maybe a greater struggle to balance ministry with being home with my wife. I am supposed to spend half (or maybe a little less than half) of my time working on contemporary worship for our two worship services, and the rest of my time ministering to teenagers.

As perfect of a job as that may sound, it is difficult because handling music, musicians, and organization of two separate services and bands tends to be more than a 15-20 hour a week job. Student ministry, even though I work alongside a great full time Director of Student Ministries, tends to also take more than 20 hours a week. Add on leading a Tuesday night discussion group for young adults every week and the weeks tend to get pretty long.

As much as I absolutely love my job, the struggle has been finding time to be home. Not just finding time to be home though; finding time to be home when my wife, Courtney, is home. My schedule tends to make it so it is easier to be home in the mornings while she is at work because ministry often extends into the evenings, when she is home.

I am constantly trying to find ways to be home more but I'll admit, it's pretty hard. I'm thankful that everyone I work for, and with, are supportive of helping me find ways to get more time at home with Courtney.

I'm sure this is a struggle that I'll be working on forever, or at least as long as God is using me in full time ministry. Every pastor, youth worker, church staffer, deals with this kind of thing. It's nothing new. It's not specific to me.

I'd be curious to hear from those of you that are doing this, or have done this before and are (or were) married. How do you, or have you, balanced ministry with home life and family? What are the secrets I haven't come up with yet? Thanks.

P.S. Courtney has been a rock star throughout these last few months, as hard as it's been, she has been more than supportive and willing to adapt her life to meet the demands of being a "youth pastor's wife." Thank you.

Well, I've only been at work since like 3pm today. It's 5:40pm. I officially can't concentrate and I still have two hours left. It's not like it's a long day of work or anything.

I got to work at 3pm, put together worship books and slides for worship for the Sunday morning contemporary band and then came over to the sanctuary to set up the stage for rehearsal. All the while having The Ride with JMV playing on the PA system so I could hear up to the minute Colts coverage.

Three hours to go then the Colts rock Monday Night Football against the Houston Texans for the lead in the AFC South division. Having a few friends over for Chili and football. Doesn't get much better than that!

So for the next two hours I will try to gain my composure and think about something other than the Colts...maybe.

As much as I love Monday night football, it would be better for me if the Colts didn't play on a workday ever. So here's lookin forward to Thursday Night Football in December and a productive day that day as well!!

Go Colts!

Over the last five or so months I have been helping to launch a Saturday Evening Contemporary Service called "Renovate". We started off to a strong reception right off the bat. Over the first few months we were averaging between 60 and 70 attendees with little to no advertising at all. We have consistently had at least one new person to the church attend this service each week. That alone has been impressive with no outside advertising being done.

The past month or so attendance has really dropped and we have realized that we aren't retaining many of these new people. So the obvious question is...WHY?

I have been going over that in my head again and again. Is it the music (for which I have control over)? Is it the sermon? Is it the time and day? Is it the environment? So many questions and variables as to why things have slowed down.

So in the last couple of weeks we have begun our advertising campaign. We began by doing some facebook "pay per click" advertisements that have reached thousands of people, we have erected two large yard banners on 71st street and Shadeland avenue. We will be plastering posters all over local college campuses and different locations around the immediate area. We will also be doing some targeted mailings.

As we begin to do all of this advertising we also want to hear from you all. What draws you to a contemporary worship service? What things do you expect out of a contemporary worship service? Are there new things you'd love to see done at a service like this?

If you have attended Renovate go to our Facebook page (link on the right hand side of my blog) and click on the "Feedback" tab at the top. There you will find a few questions you can answer to help us improve on the service and get some new ideas.

Leave comments here or feel free to go over to the facebook page and post on the wall or on the feedback tab. Thanks!

For the last month now I have been teaching a group of high school students in our Phao Student Ministries the book of Proverbs as part of our semester long series "WISE UP! Study of Proverbs" on Wednesday nights. If you've ever read Proverbs you know that the book is focused on searching for and gaining wisdom and knowledge of God.

I consistently have been hitting on how discipline in studying scripture and a focus on searching for wisdom and knowledge in many different areas of life can bring us closer to God. The writer of Proverbs is clear, wisdom can be found in many different places, not just church and Scripture, although Scripture should be our main focus.

As I am teaching the book of Proverbs to the high school students I am also leading a discussion with some young adults once a week on the book of Colossians. In Colossians, Paul is specifically writing to combat the Gnostics who believe that the only way to God is through knowledge. The body and flesh and anything created (actually including the incarnation of Jesus) is sinful and bad.

It's kind of a weird spot that I'm in. On one night I'm pounding home the need for wisdom and knowledge and a desire to study not only Scripture but study in school as well. On another night we are hearing about Paul's battle against the Gnostics in Colossae and their over emphasis on knowledge.

Obviously there has to be a middle ground or balance, right? So what do you think that is? Where is the balance between our desire to gain knowledge of God, and the wisdom of God, while not putting too much of an emphasis on those things, and still having a faith that goes beyond knowledge and isn't based on our limited ability to understand God?

Just something I'm thinking about. I would love to hear your thoughts!

I am now one month into my new job at Castleton UMC. It's been a fun and crazy month. Here's what's been going on for those of you that care.

Last night at our '20 Somethings' discussion group we discussed 1 Timothy chapter 2. In this chapter Paul gives Timothy his thoughts and instructions on worship. Paul discusses the importance of prayer for all people, kings and all those in authority in the first half of the chapter. The second half Paul deals with women in worship and teaching positions. Here's what he says,

I also want women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or expensive clothes, but with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God.

A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. But women will be saved through childbearing--if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.

~1 Timothy 2:9-15

Obviously there is a lot in this passage that could easily anger a lot of people in our society and culture, both women and men. Here are a few thoughts that I have gathered in preparation to lead our discussion last night. I'll break this up into a few parts because there is a lot of information here.

1. Culture

That was a different culture that Paul was speaking to in this passage. At that time men were the heads of the household, government, and churches. Women, in Jewish culture, were uneducated and not allowed to be educated. Therefore, it wouldn't make sense for an uneducated woman to be teaching anyone, let alone educated men.

Being that a man was the head of the household it would have limited his ability to lead his home if he was led by a woman in a ministry setting. Paul says in chapter three of 1 Timothy that a man must be able to lead his home first to be able to lead well in the Church. The two were interconnected. If a man couldn't lead one well, he wouldn't be able to lead the other well.

Also, if a man had been led by a woman at the church he would have been ineffective in his ability to be a role model to other non-Christian men outside the church and therefore not been able to lead them to Christ effectively.

Many women in Ephesus were likely very wealthy. They would have had money to buy fancy clothing and jewelry. They would attract attention to themselves (just like today) by wearing attractive clothing and jewelry that would draw attention to their bodies and sex appeal. Paul obviously thought this was out of place for the Church. A Christian woman's focus should be on Christ not on her own looks and body. This isn't to say Paul thought that a Christian woman should let herself go, but rather not dress in a way that distracts others and themselves from worship of the Lord.

2. Effective Ministry

As you read Paul's letters you easily can see that he felt an undeniable urgency for the Gospel. He knew that the clock was ticking and he needed to get the Gospel out to everyone he could while he still could. So, in line with that, the effectiveness of ministry would have been very important to him. If his ministry wasn't effective he would have been wasting valuable time.

At that time, because of a woman's place in society it would not have been the most effective way to present the Gospel if a woman was teaching it. Most would not have respected a woman's opinion on such matters and likely rejected her teaching. Also, if women were being a distraction in worship either by their dress, or speaking out of turn, that also would create an ineffective ministry.

Paul taught that women should learn in quietness and full submission. This did not mean they should shut up at all times and follow blindly. Paul consistently taught that all should be conscious of what is being taught to be sure that no one is adhering to false doctrines. The fact that Paul called them to learn at all showed a shift in thought from traditional Jewish culture. Women would just be a distraction if they had spoken up in worship due to the culture of that time.

3. Paul Had Great Respect for Women

While Paul was clear that woman should not be an elder, overseer, or deacon, he did believe that women had an important role in ministry and life. Here is a few examples...

I have been reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also. ~2 Timothy 1:5

Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much whine, but to teach what is good. Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God. ~Titus 2:3-5

Wives, in the same way be submissive to your husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. ~1 Peter 3:1-2

Obviously Paul had great respect for women and their role in teaching those around them. He gave great respect to the women that raised Timothy. He gave great responsibility to older women in the Church to teach the younger women. Along with that he showed women that the way they live could be transformational for their husbands and the men around them.

While women weren't allowed to teach, they had great responsibility in the advancement of the Gospel in their families and communities.

4. Final Thought

Obviously this is not an exhaustive scriptural study of women in ministry. This is just some thoughts and information I encountered in preparing for our short discussion last night. However, I think it does show that Paul not only respected women, he saw a great need for them in the advancement of the Gospel.

At the same time he had very certain thoughts on women in teaching and leadership roles within the Church. We can debate all day long whether we think these thoughts apply to our culture today or not. I would encourage you (as well as myself) to continue studying scripture, no matter what you believe. You may be right, you may be wrong.

We all have strong beliefs about certain things in our lives. What we need to do is be sure our beliefs are rooted firmly in scripture, not just in our own biases. Just because our culture has led us to believe something doesn't mean that it is Biblical.

I would also be curious to hear, as we're on the subject of women in ministry. What women in your life have had a positive effect on you and/or led a great ministry from a pastoral or teaching role? Leave a comment

My last post was on the Fear of God and what that might look like. Whether that be a simple reverence and respect for God or an actual fear, or terror, when in the presence of God. It is important to understand the fear of God. I'd like to talk about that a little more as I study through Proverbs for our Student Ministries WISE UP! study of Proverbs. There is a decision we have to make before we can be led into wisdom and an understanding of the fear of God.

"My son, if you accept my words and store up my commands within you, turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding, and if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding, and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God." ~Proverbs 2:1-5

This passage clearly presents a specific choice that each of us has to make in life to determine whether we go the way of the wisdom of God and on to a relationship with Jesus Christ, or if we turn away from wisdom and lose our salvation and life completely.

This is where the Church comes in. When I say "Church" I mean the people of the Body of Christ and not just the individual churches in our community (though they are obviously a huge part of this). The Church has the responsibility to present all people, but specifically young people, with this decision.

The book of Proverbs is clear that ignorance is not an excuse for not making this decision. It says that "Wisdom calls aloud in the street, she raises her voice in the public squares; at the head of the noisy streets she cries out, in the gateways of the city she makes her speech." Wisdom is out there and in our face, screaming in our faces.

The Church is where Wisdom screams it's loudest (or should be). We are the mouthpiece, or bullhorn, for Wisdom. We are the ones that should be screaming wisdom into the streets and to all that we come in contact with.

If we fail to do this, specifically for young people before they have a chance to turn the wrong direction, we fail and they do not understand that they have a decision to make. We need to make this appeal to our young people so that there is no confusion about the choice they need to make; to follow the way of Wisdom to Jesus Christ, or as Proverbs basically puts it, dig their own grave. "For the waywardness of the simple will kill them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them."

Granted, a lot of you might point out that I am still really a young person at the ripe age of 25. However, I feel this call strongest of all being one of the Student Ministries Directors here at Castleton UMC.

I love Proverbs, always lights a fire under me!

We've all heard a sermon in our lifetime that centered on, or at least passed by, the idea of the fear of God. A lot of times we hear the pastor say something like "Now, understand this is not fear in the sense of 'terror' but more like 'reverence' or respect."

Right now I'm reading through the Old Testament book of Proverbs in preparation for a study with our high schoolers this fall. Right off the bat I came across 1:7, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline."

That line had me thinking about a passage I read from Revelation a couple weeks ago for our Tuesday night '20 Somethings' discussion group. Revelation 1:9-17 has John explaining his vision of Christ in heaven, ending with his reaction to that sight. What did John do? He fell on his face as though DEAD.

That sounds more like a terrifying drop dead kind of fear than a reverence kind of fear. John wasn't just like "Whoa! God, I respect you!"

Isaiah 6 also comes to mind when I think of the fear of God. Isaiah is explaining his vision of God seated on the throne. He sees God on the throne and seraphs flying above him singing "Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord Almighty. The whole earth is full of His glory." I think it's important to note that they are covering their faces with two of their six wings as to not directly see the face of God.

Isaiah however, does see the face of God seated on His throne. Immediately at the sight, Isaiah says, "Woe to me! I am ruined!" Isaiah sees God and immediately recognizes his own sin and determines that he is dead. God is going to kill him for the sinful life he lives.

That sounds like honestly terrifying fear. Again, Isaiah wasn't just like, "Wow, I respect that dude." He feared for his very life!

Looking at these passages I have to believe that the fear of God is more than just respect or reverence, but an honest and terrifying kind of fear. God wants us to honestly fear him. It is only at that point that we can begin to gain his wisdom. It is through that fear that we can receive the wisdom and knowledge of God.

This week was my first week working full time in the office at Castleton UMC. It has been pretty busy. The first day was chuck full of meetings to get myself and Steph, the Director of Student Ministries, oriented to our new jobs.

So far we have done some planning and set some dates for events and programming for this coming fall for the youth and are pretty excited about it. I have had a chance to do a little organizing of some of my contemporary worship things and get that in order, which was long over due.

It's been a pretty good week. I'm looking forward to next week hoping things will really start to settle in and get into a routine.

A conversation recently got me thinking about my (and our) response as a Christian to potentially offensive actions, words, lifestyles etc. Are we too easily offended by the things people say or do around us? Do we jump to quickly to judge others on their words and actions?


First of all, I think as Christians we should be offended by sin. Sin is offensive. We all have it in our lives and should be repulsed by it. However, when dealing with other Christians and non-Christians I don't think we should show offense to almost anything at first glance.


If you know me, you know I tend to say what is on my mind. I rarely shy away from voicing my opinion in most situations. I can remember many times while at Taylor University that I would voice and opinion or say something that would obviously offend someone else. Sometimes the offense was merited, sometimes it was not. Occasionally I would say something off color or out of place that might be deserving of the reaction I got. Sometimes though, my words were just me working through something in my faith and talking about it.


All people are at different stages of their faith journey. Some are deep into their relationship with Christ, some are just beginning, and some are far from the start of it. I believe as a Christian I should be offended by sin and sinful language, but at the same time be slow to show offense. Rather I should be quick to show love and understanding of someone who is visibly showing sin in their life.


When we immediately get an offended look on our face when someone swears, or does something overtly sinful, or offensive, we immediately turn that person off to a possible relationship that could benefit them and the kingdom.


Just a quick thought. What do you think?

On Tuesday nights at 7pm each week I attend, and occasionally lead, a discussion group for young adults in their 20's at the Claddagh Irish Pub on 96th Street here in Indianapolis. Last night was my turn to lead the discussion. I thought I'd post some thoughts here as to what we talked about.


Last night I brought up the popular A.W. Tozer quote, "What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us."


While this might be a pretty general topic to discuss, I think it has some important implications.


I think that most times we do not pay attention specifically to what comes into our minds when we think about God. We think about Jesus, we think about scripture, faith as it relates to our life...but not often do we acknowledge our true perception of God Himself.


I feel that if we paid attention to what our honest perception of God is, we might really have a better understanding of where our faith stands.


If we look at our perception of God and realize that we view God as a distant, impersonal, and small figure; we probably also have a distant, impersonal, small faith. If we view God as this larger than life figure that is all powerful and can do all things, yet loves us individually; we probably have a stronger faith and are able to lean on God at all times in our life.


I like this description of Jesus in heaven from John out of Revelation. It may seem like something crazy out of Harry Potter or something but I think it really illustrates how incredible and HUGE God truly is.

I turned around to see the voice that was speaking to me. And when I turned I saw seven golden lamp stands, and among the lamp stands was someone "like a son of man," dressed in a robe reaching down to his feet and with a golden sash around his chest. His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, and out of his mouth came a sharp double-edged sword. His face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance. When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. Then he placed his right hand on me and said: "Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last. I am the Living One; I was dead, and behold I am alive for ever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades. ~ Revelation 1:12-18

As crazy as this might sound, I think this shows how huge God really is. Just try to picture someone big enough to hold seven stars and with a face that was as bright as the sun. Someone so Holy that you fall on your face as though you were dead in fear. That is a big God.


Do you think your image of God, or perception of God, can have an effect on your faith? What do you think about when you think about God?



If you would like to join us on Tuesday nights CLICK HERE for more information.

I have noticed something over the last year or so. As I look through places like Facebook and Twitter I see a lot of people putting up posts about things going on in their life, some of them not so good things. Often they will get comments of encouragement from friends and family.


As I look through these comments I have noticed an overall trend of people saying something like "Sending good thoughts your way!" or "Sending positive energy." Now this typically wouldn't bother me and I wouldn't normally notice, but I have noticed that some of these people call themselves "Christians."


It seems wierd to me that a Christian wouldn't just say "I'm praying for you." Isn't that what we do as Christians...pray for each other? To me it just seems like these people are just afraid to just be transparently Christian and just straight up say they are praying for someone.


For some reason the phrase, "Sending positive energy" just sounds cultish to me. We're Christians, we pray.


Now, I'm not saying that telling someone that you are thinking about them is bad. That is a good thing, letting someone know you care. To me, if I am a Christian, I can be thinking about someone and praying for them. There is a difference to me, if only in how we are witnessing to the world (even if just the Social Media world), in saying "I am praying for you," vs. "I am sending positive energy/thoughts your way."


Non-Christians; continue sending "Positive energy/thoughts" to your friends and family in need. I think in some way you are praying at a basic level, whether you intend to or not.


Christians; let's be willing to let the world know that we are Christians and that we believe in the power of prayer. That's nothing to be ashamed of.


"I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone" ~ 1 Timothy 2:1


"And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well: the Lord will raise him up." ~James 5:15


"The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective" ~James 5:16b

I'm sure there will be many posts to come covering my adventures in music and ministry.

Last night was Rally #3 for Castleton United Methodist Church's capital campaign. Courtney and I were asked to share our stewardship witness with the attendees of the rally. Here is basically what we said (although in the moment a couple sentences I think got left out of the actual talk).
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We agreed to speak tonight because we’ve heard recently about what our sacrificial giving today can mean for tomorrow, and about how today’s sacrifices are tomorrow’s blessings. We truly feel that we’ve been able to reap the benefits of the giving of those that have come before us so we wanted share what sacrificial giving means to us.


I’m going to start by reading a quick quote from C.S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity that basically sums up how we feel God is calling us to live.

I'm afraid the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare. In other words,if our expenditure on comforts, luxuries, amusements etc., is up to the standard common among those with the same income as our own, we are probably giving away way too little. If our charities do not at all pinch or hamper us, I should say they are too small. There ought to be things we should like to do and cannot do because our charities expenditure excludes them ~ C.S. Lewis - Mere Christianity

Two years ago, this coming Monday actually, Courtney and I got married right up there. It was the high point in 23 years of us, and our families, being blessed, by God, through this church. Castleton UMC over the years had given us each other, most of our closest friends, and most importantly; showed us the blessing of Jesus Christ crucified for us.


That C.S. Lewis quote I just read kind of sums up how we feel about giving, and how we feel God calling us to give. A passage from Malachi 3, that has been shared already during our worship services recently kind of sums up why living this way is worth it to us.

Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this," says the LORD Almighty, "and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it. ~ Malachi 3:10

Over the last 25 years, God has already poured out so much blessing on us, through this church, that we already don’t have room enough for it. Imagine what would happen if we acknowledged that and stepped up to God’s challenge to somehow, in some small way, repay this church just a little bit, by contributing and giving a little extra to this capital campaign. If we are already blessed beyond what we can hold, I can’t imagine what might be in store for us next. Not only for us, but the Castleton UMC as a whole.


It is because of this that we have decided to be a part of this campaign and contribute in any way possible. Honestly, right now we don’t have much to give in the first place and our current 10% tithe seems pretty huge. At the end of the month I will be switching jobs, which is one of those blessings that God has poured down on us that we have been praying for, for a long time. That blessing however does come with slightly less money than I was making before as I go from a full time and a part time job, to just one full time.


A couple months ago we put down a number that, at the time was sacrificial for us. It wasn’t much, but to us it was a sacrifice. Even though we will have slightly less income we have decided to go ahead and honor that original commitment and find a way to make it work. We will make that work without loading up our credit cards or incurring any more debt than we already have in student loans, my car and our house. Right now, that number is almost certainly out of our means, but we will find ways to cut back and put it within our means.


We do this because Jesus has already loved us and blessed us so much that out of the overflow of that blessing we find joy in giving back to God and His church.

Yesterday morning I was listening to a sermon podcast from Francis Chan as I was driving to work. During his sermon he started talking about a sermon a student of his, from his preaching class, gave recently for that class.

This girl, before giving her sermon, was talking about how nervous she was and how she kept repeating to God over and over, "God please show up, God you have to show up!" As she was repeating this to herself she realized God was telling her, "I am already here, this is MY party and I invited YOU!" I love that!

So many times we wonder, "Is God going to show up?" or "Is God going to be present in this situation?" What we keep forgetting is that God is already there. He has been there from the start and never left. At some point along the way He called us to that situation, not the other way around.

We talk about how we should expect God to show up. I think it is even beyond that. God is already there, we don't have to expect him to show up, we just have to worry about getting ourselves there and God will be waiting to be there with us.

How often do you pray that God just "show up" in a certain situation in life? Do you expect Him to be there?

This is a song by Matthew West called "The Motions" that is truly inspiring to me. It is not the newest or hippest worship song out there right now, but it is a great one purely on message and emotion. Here are the lyrics and video

Verse 1:
This might hurt, It’s not safe
But I know that I’ve gotta make a change
I don’t care if I break,
At least I’ll be feeling something
Cause just okay is not enough,
Help me fight through the nothingness of life

Chorus:
I don’t wanna go through the motions
I don’t wanna go one more day
Without Your all consuming passion inside of me
I don’t wanna spend my whole life asking
What if I had given everything?
Instead of going through the motions.

Verse 2:
No regrets, not this time,
I’m gonna let my heart defeat my mind
Let Your love make me whole,
I think I’m finally feeling something
Cause just okay is not enough
Help me fight through the nothingness of this life

Take me all the way

I've been listening to this song for about a year now. I hadn't really heard it until late last summer. Once I came across it though I instantly was inspired by it. This song is just obviously a prayer from the depths of the writer's heart. He's talking about how painful it can be to just follow Christ, to go all the way, to quit going through the motions.

The motions...that's what a lot of us "Christians" are so insanely talented at. From the outside we look like Christians, but from the inside, we are little better than anyone else. This song asks God to help us in our times alone, when no one is there to see us or know what we are thinking. This song is a prayer to help us when no one on earth would know if we did something that wasn't quite Christian.

What would happen if we quit "going through the motions"? What would happen if we truly had Christ's "all consuming passion" inside of us? What if we went "all the way"?

I love this song because it inspires me to live a life that is of Christ at all times. Not just when I'm at church leading the worship team, or in a public setting. It calls me to truly live a life that is Christian at all times. It is when the deepest, darkest, depths of who we are become Christ that we are truly transformed.

It has been a crazy spring season so far. It seems that life has hit light speed and shows no signs of stopping. As difficult and crazy as that makes it, I have to say I am loving it.


Some background...


In January of this year I took over the reigns for Castleton United Methodist's contemporary/blended service on Sunday mornings at 11:00am (in addition to my fulltime job at Garrison Law Firm). My charge was to turn it from a "blended" service into a full blown "contemporary" service in terms of music. At the beginning of March my wife (@courtgarr) and I closed on our first house. We began looking for a home in early January and found a great house in Fishers. Soon after that our church began a capital campaign to retire the debt associated with building our current sanctuary. On the same day that was started, Matt Lipan (@mattlipan) and I were given the green light to start a brand new Saturday Night Contemporary service on our Castleton campus. Immediately we went to work on advertising for musicians, interviewing worship leaders and developing the service. All the while participating in hours of meetings regarding the capital campaign and all of the tasks involved in making that a successful venture for our church.


On May 14th Court and I took possession (finally) of our house. Immediately began the work of packing to move along with preparing our new home for our arrival. We spent the following week painting, cleaning, replacing things, adding new things until the house was ready for us to move in this last weekend.


On top of all that we started a new discussion group on Tuesday night at George's Neighborhood Grill for the '20 somethings' group in our area.


With all the craziness that has gone along with all of the things I've been involved in and doing lately I have to say that I haven't had this much fun in a long time. It has been a blast searching for, buying, and moving into a new home with my wife. Starting this new service (even though it technically hasn't started) has been a great experience and a lot of fun as I've put together a completely new band with new faces and talents. Even the capital campaign, as boring as that may sound, has had it's moments.


I am completely looking forward to the following months and years as I continue to lead some great bands and services and get to finally live in our new home and experience life as a home owner.


Although at times I may complain...It has been a great few months and promises to only get better.

This weekend we began packing to move...again. Since my wife and I entered college it has become an almost annual tradition to pack up and move in May. In college we packed up our dorm rooms at Butler and Taylor in May and moved home, only to pack up and go back to school in August. After we got married I moved out to Oxford, OH in July, only to pack up an move the following May back to Indianapolis, IN.

Tonight I spent three heavenly hours in a meeting for leaders of our church's capital campaign. Ok, maybe all three hours weren't heavenly. Nonetheless, it was beneficial in some ways. Just some background. A few years ago our church built a new sanctuary. It was long overdue and completely necessary in my opinion. Of course there are only two ways to pay for a new building like this 1) pay in cash and 2) go into debt. It is now our task to pay off the debt.


A phrase that our campaign coordinator brought up a lot was "sacrificial giving." His challenge to everyone in our meeting, as well as the church as a whole, was to "give sacrificially." I got to thinking, what does it mean to give sacrificially? Is it different for everyone, or does it mean the same thing? C.S. Lewis came to mind...


In Chapter 3 of his book Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis says this,

"I'm afraid the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare. In other words, if our expenditure on comforts, luxuries, amusements etc., is up to the standard common among those with the same income as our own, we are probably giving away way too little. If our charities do not at all pinch or hamper us, I should say they are too small. There ought to be things we should like to do and cannot do because our charities expenditure excludes them."

This to me is what it means to give sacrificially. As human beings we are particularly driven by our own status in society. What car do we drive? How big is our house? What kind of clothes do we wear? How many followers do we have on Twitter? We want to at least match if not exceed those in our income bracket in our possessions.


C.S. Lewis says that we should take a look at what everyone else in our income bracket has and make sure that we have less. He doesn't say that we should give away 90% of our income, but we should see how others are living comfortably (or more than comfortably) and give a little more. Our giving should make us a little uncomfortable.


The church talks a lot about tithing. Personally, my wife and I do tithe our 10% each month. However, I'm not sure that formula works for everyone. For some people, 10% is outrageous and would bankrupt them to just all of the sudden start forking over 10% of their income. For others, 10% is a drop in the bucket and they would have to go up to maybe 20-30% before they feel the impact.


I think giving sacrificially means the same thing for a person making $20,000/yr and someone making $1,000,000/yr. It is the specific numbers that are different. Give until it makes us a little uncomfortable.


So I am challenged to try take another look at our finances over the next couple of months before the giving phase of the campaign starts and see if we can sacrifice a little more. To be honest the 10% we do give right now feels like it hurts enough, but maybe God can help us find a way to squeeze out a few more percent to try and pay down some debt.


How is God challenging you to give sacrificially?

I was reading Romans 3 this morning and came across this line in verse 4, "Let God be true, and every man a liar."


As I was thinking about that verse it made me think of the argument so many non-Christians have against Christians. We always here them say, "Well I've seen all of these 'Christians' doing this, that, or the other. Doesn't that contradict what your 'God' would say/do?"


What I want to say is, "What does that have to do with God?" We can't put mans' sins on God. We have nothing to do with God, God has everything to do with us. What we do, does not affect who God is in ANY way. We cannot change or manipulate God by our actions or words. I think a lot of non-Christians believe that God is just the sum of those who follow him. Sometimes maybe even Christians think the same thing.


On the contrary, God has everything to do with us. Who God is affects us on a daily basis. Now, that does not mean that we somehow become perfect. We are human beings, we are going to mess up. The fact that God doesn't change based on our actions or words means that we always have that rock solid example to come back to.


A lot of times our response to these questions is to defend Christians. In all honesty, it might work better to show that no matter how dumb, stupid or ridiculous Christians may act on this earth, God never changes. He remains the same God he was yesterday, last week, and a million years ago. Maybe we should start throwing ourselves "under the bus" for the sake of Christ. When someone asks us these questions maybe we should just say, "You know what, you are right, I/we do a lot of dumb stuff, but who I am doesn't change who God is and will be."


Let God be true and EVERY man a liar.

This is a video of me and some boys from Taylor doing Blue Man Group's Drum Bone. It was a good time. I'm on drums.

I have been thinking about this since our meeting on Tuesday. We discussed what Christian community looks like and refferred to Acts 2:42-47. Verse 44 says, "All believers were together and had everything in common."


If you look at this with a quick glance it kind of sounds like a clique you would experience in high school. Just a bunch of people exactly alike huddling around each other talking about how cool their "sameness" is.


So is it ok for Christians to have "cliques," or groups of people gathered with "everything in common"? I think it is unavoidable and designed that way by God. God designed each of us with different interests, passions, talents and abilities. He did this so we would each be able to accomplish something different for his kingdom. We, as humans, naturally gravitate towards those people that are similar to ourselves.


Here is the difference...


In high school we gravitated to those that were similar to ourselves, but we purposely excluded those that were different and chose not to accept them. As Christians this should look different. While we naturally gravitate to those people with similar interests and passions as us, we have learned to LOVE and accept those that are different than us. We do not turn away "outsiders" and we learn to accept each person for who they are in Christ.


We will always naturally gravitate to people like us, that isn't going to change. I'm not sure we are made to be "best friends" with every single person on earth. Where we become the Body of Christ is when my community unites with your different community and becomes one big community. It is ok to have a smaller group of friends that are like you. Where being a Christian come in is when we take our little community and engage with someone elses little community to form the Body of Christ.


Think about the United States of America for example. As Indiana we do our thing, Florida does theirs, Nebraska theirs and California theres. We are all cool and unique in our own state communities. However, we are stronger and become a "super power" when we combine ourselves to be the UNITED States of America. Christianity is no different.


What we have to remember is; even though we may have nothing of this world in common with that other person's community, we all have Christ in common. As strong as we may feel in our tight knit small communities, we have the strength of the Body of Christ when we unite all of our communities together and nothing can beat that.

The Colts selected Jerry Hughes, a Defensive End from TCU with the 31st pick in the NFL draft. Here is a highlight reel of him. He's definitely got potential. As I watch highlight reels it doesn't seem like he gets to the quarterback as much as I'd like to see, but with Freeney and Mathis showing him the ropes I'm sure he'll be sweet. Never a reason to doubt Bill Polian. What do you think?

Here is a video of Myles Kennedy of Alter Bridge playing Hallelujah. Great song, great voice. Thought I'd share. Enjoy...

Tonight we had our young adult discussion group at George's Neighborhood Grille off of 71st and Binford Boulevard. We were discussing Acts 2:42-47. While we were discussing that passage, I looked over to Acts 4:13 and saw an underlined passage in my Bible. Acts 4:13 is the passage where Luke describes how Peter and John were preaching the Word and performing miracles, and jailed because of it. When asked who's authority they do these things by Peter says,

"...It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom YOU crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed. He is 'the stone YOU builders rejected which has become the capstone.' Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved." Acts 4:12

When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus. Acts 4:13

Peter completely and directly calls out the Sanhedrin for crucifying and rejecting Christ. They were, of course, incredibly astonished by Peter's directness, boldness and courage. They couldn't believe an uneducated ORDINARY man could have the courage to say this to such high standing, educated members of society like themselves.

This has always been an empowering verse for me. I am someone that never did all that well in school, I was never the smartest or brightest in my class. This shows me that Jesus does not require book smarts or legal smarts to use someone. All Jesus requires is a heart and passion for Him and His people. If you honestly love Christ and love others, he will empower you, and use you, in ways you could never be used if you were just a 'smart' guy/girl.

I don't know who all is reading my blog these days but I would be interested in hearing about times when God used you in ways that you didn't expect him to, because maybe you didn't live up to the world's standards for "smart" or "successful."

As you have probably noticed thus far; I have been going over what makes a worship service good, in particular, the worship music. This seems to be one of those things that, depending on how you look at it, is either really simple or really difficult. Much of the time it's insanely difficult for me, I think, because I am always over analyzing it based on my knowledge of music.

Take today for example. We played some older songs during our worship set. Not to us by Chris Tomlin, We Fall Down, How Great is our God, and Mighty to Save by Laura Story. Pretty basic worship songs. The beginning of our opening set my amp malfunctioned and Matt, our pastor for today, had to vamp for a few minutes while I figured out what was going on.

We finally got everything together and played through the first song ok. The second song the slides were wrong and we lost our place and ended the song incredibly awkwardly all at different times. The next two songs towards the end went fine.

Being who I am (a music nazi) I was ripping myself apart the rest of the day because the beginning of the service went bad. Talking to people after the service though, and my wife later, apparently no one really noticed the apparent train wreck I felt was occurring and thought we did a great job. So either I'm completely nuts or everyone was lying to me.

Now I'm sure it wasn't quite as bad as I imagine, I always am ridiculously hard on myself about these things. I know that God can break through our crap and still show Himself through technical difficulties and missed song endings. I shouldn't worry about that. The problem is, and maybe it's not really a problem, I take my job so seriously that every little mistake I take upon myself for not rehearsing the band well enough or not preparing well enough myself. I mean, I'm the leader, if something goes wrong it's my fault, even if someone else is the one that forgets something or makes a mistake. It has to be my fault for not rehearsing them well enough.

Anyway, from what I was told after, the music went fairly well. So does it really matter all that much in a worship service if the music is stellar or we play the coolest, hippest, new worship songs? I guess not. All that matters is that we are true to the reason we are there, to worship God. If we hang on to that God will break through our mistakes and show Himself to those worshiping with us.

Maybe someday I'll get over it and stop killing myself for minor mistakes and details...ok probably not, but at least after letting off some steam I can realize that God is a Bizillion times bigger than me and nothing I do can get in His way.

Ok, so I heard from my wife on Thursday this week that the Library of Congress will be archiving all tweets retroactively to March 2006. That includes everything from "I just ralphed at this crazy party" to late breaking news, to anything else under the sun. That's roughly 55 MILLION tweets PER DAY.

Now there are obviously good things and bad things about this. We can all see that bad side. Drunken ridiculous tweets are going to be immortalized in the Library of Congress Archives where people a few hundred years from now are going to be seeing them and thinking we were insane. There's definitely that going against it.

I think this is a pretty cool idea. If you think about it, since the Library started archiving it has mostly been distinguished authors, journalists, newspapers, magazines, whatever. Which of course give a pretty good representation of culture. With Twitter being in the archives now it gives people hundreds of years from now a minute by minute timeline of our culture. It shows what topics were trending on any given minute of any day or month; everything from Justin Beiber, to American Idol to the President and politics. They will be able to hear from the mouths (or fingers) of individual American's what it was like living through a big recession, or what it was like having family members in the armed forces. Even things as simple as what it was like when their favorite celebrity won a dance show.

It's about time we started archiving exactly who we really are. Of course, this is going to downgrade us in the eyes of many in the years to come. At the same time though, it might be one of the easiest way to document history. We will be able to go back and say at any moment in history what was happening in different cities, states, and countries. We will be able to see what the scores were of sporting events, what the emotion was in the stadium as a team came from behind to take the victory in the biggest game of the year.

I think, as crazy as this might sound, this is a very good step in the right direction. Of course, there are plenty of downsides to it but over all I think it is a pretty cool idea.

As I pray over the opportunity to go into youth ministry this verse comes to mind as what it means to be a youth pastor.

By the GRACE God has given me, I laid the foundation as an expert builder and someone else is building on it. 1 Corinthians 3:10

In this chapter of 1 Corinthians, Paul is calling out the Corinthians for being prideful about who they are following, who they are a disciples of. Paul condemns this thought noting that no one, not himself nor Apollo are anything apart from Christ. They each have different jobs to do in building the kingdom and ministering to God's people. One may lay the foundation, but the other will build on it.

Paul makes it a point to say that there is no foundation other than Christ. He can only lay the foundation that Christ already laid in Himself. It is by God's grace that He allows Paul to lay the foundation of Christ in the lives of the people he encounters in his ministry.

This is what I see myself doing in ministry, especially in regard to youth ministry. Many of these kids will not have a solid foundational faith built when they enter into a youth group setting. It is my job and privilege, by the grace of God, to lay the foundation of Christ in their lives. They will only be with me for a short period of time. Once they leave the youth program and head to college they will have to rely on someone else to build on their foundation. By Christ working in me, and through me, I can have the chance to lay that solid foundation in them that they will always have the rest of their lives. I can help them come to Christ and show them what it means to have Christ as the foundation and center of their lives. Only through Christ can I be used as an "expert builder." Apart from Him I have no expertise.

I pray that I always acknowledge that it is Christ building the foundation, and Christ that is the foundation. It is nothing that I can do apart from Christ. I pray that I am always able to be an example of what it means to have Christ as the foundation and center of life.

(Reuters)

On March 5, 2010 in the wee hours of the morning a woman called the police and accused two time Super Bowl quarterback Ben Roethlisberger of sexually assaulting her at the Capital City night club in Milledgeville, GA. Roethlisberger and his alleged victim were apparently very drunk and as she stumbled down to the restroom he followed her in. At that point no one knows what happened. The video tapes showing everything leading up to that point were "accidentally" recorded over and the victim has decided not to press charges and has urged the Milledgeville district attorney not to press charges either

A lot has happened recently that has caused me to question where I am in my life and my relationship with Christ. Here's a little background

Most things in life follow the path of least resistance. We all prefer to do the easiest thing in most situations. We would like to think that the path the Holy Spirit is leading us on is the path of least resistance. Chances are....its not.

This is a blog post I wrote for Ramblings of a Rebellion about a year ago. I thought it still would apply to most that might read this blog.