Resolutionary Failure

I ran across a great blog from an acquaintance I met in Louisville who leads a church network in California. His blog was titled, “How To Write a Life Plan for 2014” by Brian Howard. I highly suggest taking the time to look through it. I've already completed most of mine. 

New Year’s Resolutions! For many, like me, that’s just another thing I can feel guilty about failing at—and the guilt may start as early as March. There are some people who use the start of the new year to make great resolutions and they really stick to them. I’m jealous of those people. To be honest, by April or May, I may not be able to even tell you what my resolution was back in January. Maybe it’s the season of life we’re in. Maybe that’s just an excuse. Maybe I’m just not as disciplined as I should be on those type of things. 

• I do like to use the new year to evaluate where we’re at in life. I like to ask how I (and we as a family) am doing and assess any changes that need to be made. I probably like that approach better than having 1 or 2 huge resolutions. It may be that I need the goals to be very applicable and broken down into very concrete, practical steps that can be seen on a daily and weekly schedule. 

• As stated earlier, I think people who stick to resolutions are very disciplined, but for me, it helps to have a main area or category of life that I want to see growth in (spiritual life, marriage, parenting, serving others, relationships, health, finances, etc) and then have specific, concrete steps in order to implement change. (Brian also has a good tool for assessing and evaluating the past and upcoming year here.)

As Brian stated in his Life Plan guide, instead of “Lose Weight,” which is general and broad, I need to have specific targets that fit into my weekly schedule like “Exercise for 45 minutes on 4-5 days each week.” 

Instead of “Great Marriage,” which is merely pie-in-the-sky thinking without the diligence and hard work to better our marriage, I need specifics like, “I will have a date night each week or at least every other week,” and “I will pray with Jamie 4-5 nights each week.” I need to first take the time to evaluate areas that need growth and then implement specific steps to move towards that growth. 

• I know I am probably different from most people on the area of Vision and Purpose statements, but I like to have them and align my daily and weekly schedules to meet those statements. Brian suggests having a Vision Statement for each area of growth you are working on. Both Jamie and I are using this tool this week. I am going to watch the boys for a couple of hours to let her get away somewhere to specifically work out her Life Plan for 2014. I’ve already completed almost all of mine. 
• Below I included my Vision Statement for the area of Marriage from my Life Plan. You can see that I enjoy Vision Statements. Vision Statements are supposed to be short and succinct, but I wanted to have specific statements that are very important to me. There were a few Scriptures that guide me in loving Jamie and I wanted those to be included. I was even purposefully anti-grammatical (and…and…and…and) in order to separate specific goals. 

MARRIAGE

Vision Statement:

“I am a husband who is loving and leading my wife. My marriage and my wife is the #1 priority in human relationships. My wife will know and feel and experience and share and enjoy the oneness in being my first priority after Christ. Jamie, desiring deep quality time, will not feel competition from my time with work, my education goals, my hobbies/entertainment, or even with my time for our children. Jamie will see and experience, alongside of me, a passionate pursuit of Christ where we grow together in loving God and loving others while living our lives seeking to make disciples. I will, by the enablement of the Holy Spirit, be “loving her as Christ loved the church” (Eph. 5:25), loving her as defined by 1 Cor. 13, and try to “do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count {her} as more significant than myself…looking not only to my own interests, but to her interests as well” (Phil. 2:3-4 emphasis mine), and provide security, stability, and enjoyment in life." 

{Create 3-5 concrete action steps in order to implement the plan.}

{Disclaimer: Some people may feel that being this intentional and purposeful (whether in life plans, spiritual parenting or setting goals for the mission of the church) is a form of legalism. For some people, that may be the case, but you have to know for yourself whether you’re a person who leans more towards legalism or more towards freedom. These are not rules, but tools to help. And for me, all of this flows out of being a faithful steward of captivating grace.)

Sankie P. Lynch

Pastor of Families

nbchurch.info

nbfamilies.info

sankie@nbchurch.info

Maybe Next Year

Another Christmas season has come and gone, and another year has passed the same. Funny how time operates, isn’t it? Sometimes it seems a day will never get here soon enough. Other times it feels an hour may never end. Sooner or later it gets here, it concludes, and it is quickly forgotten as we are faced with a new day of fresh challenges.

As we open our new calendars and look forward, we have to wonder, how will we fill the days ahead? Or perhaps more accurately, how will we spend our thoughts of filling the upcoming months? Sometimes we plan and plan; only to have our schedule constantly adjusted. Aside from that annual check-up, you probably didn’t plan on those other trips to the hospital this past year. I can promise you that my wife and I didn’t plan on visiting the tire shop this morning, especially not during the holiday break. I guess we should have expected it, anticipated it, but we didn’t.

Much of life is this way. We have hopes, great intentions, and solid schedules, but must often audible just to meet the most pressing need, the crisis of the hour, the obstacle of the day. When I think back on 2013, I realize that there was much I didn’t get to. There were many endeavors I didn’t complete. Numerous other goals I forgot about. Last week was a sort of microcosm of the previous year. We tried to find balance and prioritize our time but still didn’t get it all completed. As we sat on our couch last night, we asked, “where did the time go?”

Sure we did a lot of fun stuff last week. We watched a couple Christmas movies, made cookies together, saw lots of extended family, started some new traditions and continued some others we began Christmases before, but we didn’t get to everything on our list. We didn’t have as much chill time as we would have liked. We didn’t watch all the Christmas classics like we had intended. We didn’t quite get to our scenic thousand-piece puzzle…but we did our best to make the most of our time together. And sometimes, that has to be enough.

I wish I had something profound to say. I’d love to write a phrase that would motivate you to accomplish a perfectly prioritized to-do-list in 2014, but I just don’t think that’s very realistic. What I desire to offer us is hope. Maybe we can all give ourselves a break. Perhaps we can find relief in releasing ourselves from the pressure of completing all the things we think we should be doing – the things we feel we must achieve. Maybe we can get a reprieve from the demands we sense from others and from our own critical voice, and hear from the God who holds time in His hands. Listen to how scripture describes time for the One who created it…

“Dear friends, don’t let this one thing escape you: With the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day (2 Peter 3:8)”

Through one of David’s psalms, God also reminds us that each of our days is foreknown to Him before we’ve even walked in one of them (Psalm 139:16). The truth is that we have all the time that we’re going have. While we are not privy to the exact number of days that will be, we can rest in knowing we are loved by the Sovereign King of the universe that knows fully and is in complete control. This should be a warm blanket of comfort to the soul. For while we are unaware of all that might be headed our way in the coming year, God is not. He will not be surprised, nor will He be unable to strengthen us and carry us through. Before I wrap this up, consider a rather convicting few verses from the Epistle of James.

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will travel to such and such a city and spend a year there and do business and make a profit.” You don’t even know what tomorrow will bring—what your life will be! For you are like smoke that appears for a little while, then vanishes. Instead, you should say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that (James 4:13-15).”

We should steward our time and resources well. It would be foolish to have no plans whatsoever, but we should be careful to not allow anything, even our meticulous well-intended planning, to master us. In fact, as James reminds us, there is a way of pushing our agenda so forcefully that we fail to acknowledge God’s providential care and our own temporal nature. Honestly, I’m quite familiar with that kind of tension. I pray I may continue to learn how to hold things more loosely and strive for the things that are Kingdom-focused and not so me-centered. May we wisely make plans and diligently work toward the goals the Lord has placed before us, but may we do so in complete submission, resting entirely in the One that brings all things to be in their good season (Ecclesiastes 3:11). I wasn’t so great at doing this in 2013, but with the Lord’s help, maybe next year. 

matt@nbchurch.info     Twitter: @FattMowler     Facebook: TheFattMowler

Especially Fathers

Josh Sallee's Performance

I'm writing today's blog the night before at one of my son's performances. Tonight he is performing for 150-200 people in downtown Tulsa. He travels and performs several times a month. He is very talented and loves what he does. His music has taken his mother and I to places we would have never experienced without him. We support him and his dream. I'm proud that he is unique from so many other performers in his genre.

Josh has worked very hard, for a long time to achieve his dream. I'm not surprised to see the seemingly fearless courage and determination that he has mustered. He has always had a strong mind and will. Fathering this strength hasn't always been simple, but without it he would have never pursued his dream, nor would he have stayed so determined for this long.

I have always seen great potential with Josh. He has always been one of the best at whatever he has set his mind to do (golf, basketball, college GPA, and now music). I also see so much potential for Josh to use his musical platform to address social concerns and other pertinent messages to a crowd that is largely not listening to the message from the traditional church.

I will also admit that, like every father, I wish for him to have much success but am also concerned about the potential pitfalls that are lurking to take him down. Every career choice, every decision, every relationship has potential pitfalls. The music business has a long and sordid history with artists who have fallen due to a variety of public pitfalls.

I trust my son. He has a deep faith in ways that impress me. My prayer for Josh remains the same as it has always been since he was a little boy – That God would use him to do great things for His glory.

In our NBMen’s ministry we fathers have challenged one another to bless our children with the following two statements:

1. Tell your children that you love them. I have always told my kids I love them. It is rare that I hang up the phone with out having told each of my kids that I love them. I haven’t been the perfect father, not by a long shot. But I am confident that my kids know that their dad love them.
2. Tell your kids that you are proud of them and specifically explain why you are proud. I am proud of Josh for many reasons. I am specifically proud of his focus. His motivation and concentration on building his music career has been typical of his fearless courage and determination.

Sunday I am preaching a true story of a father who loses control of his son and faces a bottomless regret that will not subside. As I prepared the sermon, I was reminded how much I love and am proud of my own son. Keep it up Josh. God is going to use you for His glory!

• Ephesians 6:4
• Colossians 3:21
• Psalm 103:13
• Proverbs 3:11-12
• Malachi 4:6

The Day After

So it's the day after Christmas. The anticipation and excitement have now passed. All of the presents have been handed out and unwrapped. We have eaten our family dinners, snacked on all of the goodies, spent time with family, stressed out or not stressed at out. We have sang and listened to Christmas music.We have celebrated and rejoiced about the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Now what? Time to relax, right? Time to take a break. All of the gift buying, cooking, baking, cleaning up is over and now all we have to do is to turn our thoughts to, "when are those decorations coming down?". But we can give that a few days or a week or more.

It's time to breath a sigh of relief, relax, the work is done.Ahhhhhhhhhhhh.

Luke 2: 16-20  ¹⁶ They(the shepherds) hurried off and found both Mary and Joseph, and the baby who was lying in the feeding trough. ¹⁷ After seeing them, they reported the message they were told about this child, ¹⁸ and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. ¹⁹ But Mary was treasuring up all these things in her heart and meditating on them. ²⁰ The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God  for all they had seen and heard, just as they had been told."


How can we continue to show and tell our families and friends, by "glorifying and praising God for all that we have seen and heard."? Our work is not yet done.:)




Terry Langenberg
Twitter: TheLangenberg
Facebook: TheLangenberg



 

Merry "Hump-Day" Christmas!!

Before someone get's mad... This is a biblical concept!!  There's a camel in the nativity (Just in case you don't have a nativity at your house, I attached a pic below)

Since it's actually Christmas Day, I'm betting no one reads this post (or shouldn't... GO BE WITH YOUR FAMILY), I thought I would just give you a fun post of my family's favorite Christmas Movies (some of you probably didn't know that I and my family are avid movie watchers... Thus, believe that this list is very good)!!   If you were needing a more spiritual post this morning... See: 'Our Need for the Nativity' or 'Eternal life in Christmas'

Jeff's Family's Favorite Christmas Movies (No particular order):

Now that you know which are the best, grab one tonight and follow up with a Faith Talk!!

*Disclaimer read ratings... Or like me, check Plugged In for overviews & discussion ideas 

May God bless your time with your family... May you put the phone down and just enjoy your time together... May you see the blessing in every moment... May His glory be present in your time together... May we love others because you first loved us!!

The Bergs

**Follow Jeff (Family Pastor of High School), also known as "surgeberg" on: Facebook, Twitter & Instagram

Eternal Life In Christmas

Since the first time I heard the song, "All I Have Is Christ," by Jordan Kauflin, I knew it would be a lifelong favorite. The song is on the "Looked Upon" CD from Sovereign Grace Music. Here's Jordan leading worship with this song:

I've mentioned it at several funerals and usually post it on Facebook when I feel it's fitting. I'm like the guy who orders the same thing every time at the restaurant. I know it's so good, so I keep going back to it. It's gospel fluency and pointed focus on Christ is beautiful. 

As some of you now know, our first son cried out to God for forgiveness, reconciliation, salvation, and hope just a couple of nights ago. This song has been one of his favorites for the last couple of years, but he had never made a profession in following Jesus. 
There have been times he has expressed guilt and sadness over his sin. There have been a few times he has even cried when talking about his sin or need for forgiveness. But guilt and sadness do not necessarily mean salvation is present. 

• 2 Cor. 7 speaks of two type of sorrow. There is a "Godly sorrow" that produces repentance which leads to salvation. And there is "worldly sorrow" that leads only to remaining in spiritual death. 

In times when he came with tears and true sorrow before, we remained patient to see if there was a lasting desire for removal of sins and lasting, earnest sorrow for sin. On one hand , how much sorrow is understood and explained by a seven year-old? On the other hand, how many times do we as parents, desiring salvation for our kids, jump at the first opportunity to a "sinner's prayer?"  

The other night, he was reading Matt. 1:21 "and you shall call His name Jesus, because He will save His people from their sins." Those words became crushing to a seven year-olds heart. He needed relief from the weight of his sin. And there was nothing he could do to remove himself from it's grief. There was one Man standing between him and God who had taken his place and as the song says, "suffered in my place." That Person, Jesus Christ, became captivating! 

Simply put, I love the repetitive lines, "Hallelujah, All I have is Christ...Hallelujah, Jesus is my life." I hope he begins to plumb the depths of what life could mean if the main thing that matters is Christ and life is found in Him. 

His two favorite songs to this point (leaving out the secular "Big Green Tractor" by Jason Aldean) is "All I Have Is Christ," and "Just Like You" by Lecrae. Here's why I let you know that: Because my son hasn't understood how bad life can hurt nor seen sin for all that it is to the depth that adults should see it. Nor has he been involved in drug dealing and drunkenness in urban settings where that's the norm. But God makes Jesus so beautiful and captivating that even young children can understand the glory of His worth. 



Here are the lyrics:

I once was lost in darkest night
Yet thought I knew the way.
The sin that promised joy and life
Had led me to the grave.
I had no hope that You would own
A rebel to Your will.
And if You had not loved me first
I would refuse You still.

But as I ran my hell-bound race
Indifferent to the cost
You looked upon my helpless state
And led me to the cross.
And I beheld God’s love displayed
You suffered in my place
You bore the wrath reserved for me
Now all I know is grace.

Hallelujah! All I have is Christ
Hallelujah! Jesus is my life
Now, Lord, I would be Yours alone
And live so all might see
The strength to follow Your commands
Could never come from me.
Oh Father, use my ransomed life
In any way You choose.
And let my song forever be
My only boast is You.

Hallelujah! All I have is Christ 

Hallelujah! Jesus is my life

© 2008 Sovereign Grace Praise (BMI), by Jordan Kauflin

We're amazed by God's grace poured out on our undeserving son. There's no equation to spiritual parenting, faith mission, faith walks, and faith talks. God doesn't grant salvation based off of our attempts at parenting our children towards Godliness. It is by grace alone in Christ alone where justification takes place. God grants salvation because His beautiful and glorious Son left the holiness of heaven to be ripped apart and killed on a cross so that seven year-old boys could be free from His justified wrath and instead love Him and enjoy His worth for all of eternity!

Sankie P. Lynch
nbchurch.info
nbfamilies.info
sankie@nbchurch.info

Our Need for the Nativity

A couple of weeks ago, this tweet by Burk Parsons appeared on my timeline and caught my attention.

“Satan would be quite pleased if we kept all our attention on a baby in a quaint manger scene and forgot the baby grown up bloody on a cross.”

As I’ve considered this in the time since, I agree that this type of thing is exactly what the enemy would want. Unfortunately we often miss the point of the manger, the cross, and the fact that our Savior has risen. However, I’m not sure we fully understand the purpose of the Nativity. Doesn’t it seem a bit odd and gratuitous that God would send His Son as a babe? In his article entitled Evil, Suffering, and Calvary, Peter Kreeft shares a portion from C.S. Lewis’ Miracles that well summarizes the peculiarity of this.

“It was unthinkable, “the absolute paradox” (as Kierkegaard calls it) that the eternal God should have a beginning in time, that the maker of Mary’s womb should be made in Mary’s womb; that the first should become second, the independent one became dependent as a little baby, dependent for his very earthly existence…”

Could God have sent us a 30-year-old Jesus – one that was fully-grown and ready to begin His ministry? Well, yeah, but that’s the beauty of the Incarnation. Christ was sent as an infant so that He would grow and mature and fully experience humanity. Because He lived as one of us, Jesus knows what it is like to be sore and tired. He is familiar with loneliness, grief, and trouble. As the author of Hebrews reminds us in Hebrews 2:17, Christ had to become human in every way, so that He might serve as our great high priest and make a sacrifice on our behalf, to satisfy the wrath of God.

While Jesus was indeed tempted, He was without sin. That’s why His offering on the cross was sufficient and once for all (Hebrews 10:10). But here is a central component in understanding the gospel: Christ not only came for an eternal hope in glory, but also to offer a very real hope in our desperate need of 'right now'. Because Jesus is familiar with our hurts and our pains, He can come to our aid as One who truly knows. Allow your soul to soak-up the following scriptures…

“For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tested in every way as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us at the proper time. (Hebrews 4:15-16)”

“For since He Himself was tested and has suffered, He is able to help those who are tested. (Hebrews 2:18)”

The Nativity is not some superfluous sidebar in the story of our Savior, but is rather an essential scene in God’s salvation story. God’s love, His nature and character, is seen and understood through Jesus. For “He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature (Hebrews 1:3).” In Christ, we see God’s grace to give us One who understands. Through Jesus, we have an ever-present help in times of trouble. In Him, we have hope, restoration and forgiveness. Because of the cross, we may now approach the throne of grace with our deepest needs and in our darkest hours. Remember though, the redemptive offer of the Easter narrative is a fulfillment of the Father's thoughtful Christmas plan.

“She will give birth to a son, and you are to name Him Jesus, because He will save His people from their sins. (Matthew 1:21)”

May we view the manger scene in the shadow of the cross and experience the fullness of Emmanuel, God with us.

Merry Christmas!! May we all make much of Him this season…

matt@nbchurch.info     Twitter: @FattMowler     Facebook: TheFattMowler