Running on purpose?

I know that this is going to shock some of you but for the past several months Todd and I have been running every day. Well - sorta. We started out doing a lot more walking than running but now we can knock out a few miles and it's not that big of a deal. Because we are tired of running on a treadmill and not going anywhere we decided to sign up for the Memphis Firecracker 5K run to benefit St. Jude Children's Research Hospital on July 3rd. It should be pretty hilarious. We are going to be running with several thousand people who no doubt will be wearing the most ridiculous clothes on the planet. After it's over there is a huge concert, pool party, and barbecue. I am expecting it to be very interesting. Some people have asked if they should pray for me during the race - I don't know what to think about that question by the way - but if you are serious, then just pray that we don't get hit by anything with tires and an engine.

What do u think?

I have been in the middle of some great conversation this week about the future of student ministry. There are a ton of opinions out there about where we are headed, but I want to hear from you. Here is our thought process.... What does student ministry look like in the context of the cutting edge/contemporary type church next year and/or 5 years from now? There was a day when everyone wanted to go to the student ministry because they thought that Sunday church was so boring. It was pretty easy to funnel people into the student ministry when that was the case, but now things are a little bit different. What happens when Sunday church is just as innovative and exciting as Wednesday nights? What do you do when Sunday morning worship incorporates all of the incredible sound/lighting/etc., that used to only be common in student ministry? Keep in mind this is not the case in 99% of all churches; however, we are thinking about a scenario that doesn't yet exist in most places in order to stay ahead of the curve. What does the future look like? What do you think?

Buddy Passes and ignorant people

It's official. When it comes to flying - I hate buddy passes. Yesterday I was supposed to have had a meeting with a guy named Perry Noble in Anderson, SC. He is the pastor of Newspring Community Church that was started 6 years ago and they are already running over 4,000 people. I have not looked forward to a meeting as much as this one in a very, very long time. To make a long story much shorter - here is what happened. Every flight on Thursday morning was booked solid. Not only were they booked - they were oversold and there were about 13 standby passengers trying to get on each of the planes that I needed to be on. Needless to say - I got bumped from both flights that I needed in order to get to Anderson on time. I hate buddy passes... I am convinced that Delta makes it as hard as possible to travel with buddy passes. If you ever get the opportunity to use them - don't.

The other day I heard a guy say that "if teenagers are the church of tomorrow - than our churches are in major trouble". He then went on a rant about how teenagers are ashamed of God and no matter what the church does we will no longer be able to reach them. Let me just rant a little bit about those comments.
1. Teenagers are not the church of tomorrow - they are the church of today. The person who accepts Christ at any age is just as much a part of the church as the person who has been saved for the past 50 years. There is no favoritism in the Kingdom of God. Let's stop acting like there is.
2. Teenagers are NOT ashamed of God. They are ashamed of their church. If we give our people (whether they are teenagers or not) something they can be proud of - then we will not have to beg our people to be in church on Sunday mornings or Wednesday nights. Rather than investing so much energy into putting a guilt trip on people in order to get them in church - we should simply invest in doing everything that we do in church with excellence. We don't settle for second best in any arena of our life; however, we have come to expect that in our churches.
3. We can reach them! They are looking for something - we just have to build relationships with them and point them in the right direction. The bottom line is that most churches won't (not can't) reach them because they expect lost teenagers to clean themselves up before they are welcome in our churches. Just a thought - lost teenagers don't have a drinking problem, smoking problem, whatever problem - they have a Jesus problem...and until that get's taken care of - than everything else is irrelevant. We can reach teenagers! We have seen over 360 saved and baptized in the past 30 months at Crosspointe...They can be reached. Will you be the one to reach them?

More Random Stuff

Apparantly the birds that I wrote about in my last post must have a computer and access to this blog. As a result, they have taken their nest and moved to a safer place. I know all the Tree hugging, PETA loving people out there are excited about this horrifying news; however, I am quite disturbed as a result of the fact that the score still remains Birds - 1 and J.R. - 0.

Last week 9 of our interns and 2 of our band members traveled with Devin, Todd, and I to Atlanta to attend 722 (www.722.org) . It was absolutely amazing! Everything was done with excellence and the worship atmosphere was second to none. Louie Giglio hit a home run in front of a packed out house filled with over 3,000 college/young singles.

We had a great debriefing meeting after 722 was over and we were able to capture several ideas that we can implement in our own ministry here at H2O. It has been great the past several weeks to travel around and see what God is doing. He is definately up to something.

Randomness

At some friends of ours house (Regans' for anyone in Millington) there are some birds that built a nest in one of the columns on thier front porch. This wouldn't be a problem except for the fact that everytime you walk anywhere near their yard - the two birds divebomb your face. As of last night I have had enough. As a result, my baseball bat and I walked across the street with one mission - annhilate one or both of those stupid birds. Long story short - I stood in thier front yard for 10 minutes trying to kill that bird but to no avail. No worries - their day is coming, but as for now, Birds 1 - J.R. 0

This past month I have had the privilege of attending two incredible churches, Newspring Community Church in Anderson, SC and Fellowship Church in Grapevine, TX. Both of these churches are doing an incredible job of reaching people in creative and innovative ways. The pastors of these churches, Perry Noble (www.perrynoble.com) and Ed Young, Jr., are doing an excellent job of penetrating this culture with the message of Jesus Christ. Keep it up guys! God is using you...

Who can you trust?

Blogging on a computer for the whole world to see (or the 3 people who will read this) seems very strange to me. Trying to put into words what is going on inside your mind in such a way that it makes sense to other people will probably prove to be more stress than I want to add to my already stressful life. With that in mind - I am not going to try extremely hard to sound articulate or to attempt to shed some new light on some age old question. Rather, I am simply going to write about whatever I am thinking about at that particular time. Sometimes that will be serious - sometimes it will be funny - sometimes it will be completely random - and it is probably at that moment that you will discover a little bit about my mind. That being said - welcome to my world...

On a serious note....have you ever noticed how often we try to sabotage ourselves? Good intentioned people always tell us when we are making a decision to "follow our heart." The sad reality about that advice is that the Bible tells us in Jeremiah 17:9 that "our heart is deceitfully wicked - who can know it?" I don't know about you but following my heart has gotten me in quite a bit of trouble over the years. Even worse, there is constantly a battle going on in my mind as I try to decipher who I trust more - my heart or my God. Don't get me wrong; I know the right answer to that question - but sometimes living out the truth is easier said than done. I don't have it all together. The good news is - God and I are working on my problems together. He is not only encouraging me - He is helping me as well.