the formula
there you have it… proof my honey’s spiritual gift is chit chat. and adam’s, apparently, is pointing out people who need God’s love by hitting them with frisbees. [ kidding - - about adam 
]
i have an idea…. why don’t we all pair up and go to the park to engage in frisbee hitting and chit chat? we can win the world for God. i really think this will work. once we perfect our methods we can write a study course on how people can implement the program in their cities. we can win thousands. we just need to know exactly how adam and ernie pulled it off.
ok, i’m now nervous about lightning bolts… so, let me make my point here.
professional church people (that would include me) spend a lot of time looking for the next new thing. what’s working? how can we do our jobs better? we have a great community. we learn from each other, we share, we really work hard to grow and learn together, and i think we have the best intentions. we spend a lot of time looking forward, but what can we learn from our past? this is what carlos asked of his creative coaching kids. study the methods of churches long gone and take a good hard look at what they did right. what was working for them? what can we learn?
i discovered there were a lot of what we would deem “successful” churches before the days of all of our advanced technology and clever marketing ideas. people got saved, healed and delivered by the thousands long before direct mail, social media and online campuses. but i didn’t notice the greatest impact coming from the utilization of new technologies, implementation of new methods, or even by using illustrations derived from pop-culture. i’m sure they used these methods, but their use wasn’t so noteworthy that the history books (ahem… wiki’s) attributed a single mention of such as means to their success. but, i did find a common thread. the great revivals i read about all seem to have started much the same way. with a human, or group of humans, who sacrificed their own ideas, comforts and desires, devoured His Word, got on their faces and sought after Him….. and you know what? God showed up.
denominations were born out of some of these great revivals. denominations (arguably, divisions) for the most part, seem to have been formed when a group of these same humans, who after experiencing a legitimate move of God, over-analyzed it, argued over it, tweaked it, organized a church split and tried to do it better…. when maybe they just should have gotten back on their faces for God’s next big idea.
God never said we had to become an experts on how to change lives…
He already is….
He never asked us to figure everything out then go tell others…
He’s already got that….
He never suggested we come up with new ways, new methods, new technologies to get people to feel loved…
He already loves them…
He said… ask.
He said… seek.
He said… knock.
He said He’d do it. So, why do we try so hard to figure it all out while we ignore Him?
i’m throwing around the pronoun we very presumptuously. i mean, me, myself, i, yo, me…. yep, guilty right here. but yeah – - i think you guys can pretty much agree we’re all in this humanity thing together. and lest you forget, or just don’t know me, all the stuff i just presumed to dismiss is the stuff i do for a living. i’m not at all suggesting our methods are bad, or our technology useless. in fact, i still think we have the greatest potential for world change in the history of humanity. i have no doubt… mostly because God said it’s going to happen. the formula for success though, and i think there really is one, is this…
God’s creativity is limitless and so is our access to it. it’s so imperative we learn from our past, get on our faces, seek God’s face until our make-up is running and our eyes are all puffy, make some real sacrifices and start exerting some persistence to hear from Him….
….then lets get up and push some buttons.
i’m so thrilled for my new sister
and the 3 others who met Christ today.
this is what it’s all about.
& i’m quite happy God has me in the wood shed over this issue…
…it means He’s still with me somewhere.