GOD-SIZE YOUR DREAM

At what age do you become a “grown-up”?

What does it mean to be a grown-up”?

Does it mean – no more school, no more studying, tests, homework?

I do a lot of reading in all kinds of areas or disciplines. It is my homework for growth. I’ve never wondered, “When does it all stop?”

I’m amused when I hear people in college state, “I can’t wait to get out of school and not have to study anymore.”

I don’t ever plan on stopping reading, learning, studying and growing.

Why is it that we come to a point in our lives when we think we don’t have any more growing to do?

The tense of the term "grown-up" implies that we have stopped growing. When you stop growing, it gets worse. You resist growth and change.

Children dream (daydream) They have an incredible ability to imagine the future. That’s the way God has wired us. The Bible says without a vision, people perish. (Proverbs 29:18)

Now grab hold of this. Without a vision, people perish; become stagnant… your life journey is severely limited.

I can’t believe the people who live without passion.

What would it take for you to have some "fire" in your life?

What would you do different if you were told that you were in the last stages of an illness and only had months to live?

What would be on your “Bucket List?”

When facing death your values change.

All of a sudden, people want to know God’s purpose. Business will wait. Life values change in the face of death.

Here’s the most important thing you can do with your life today. Don’t waste another moment. You need to articulate your life purpose.

We are so busy doing good things that we miss GOD things. Good is always the enemy of best.

By articulating your life purpose, you sharpen your focus.

Who Stole My Church

Just finished reading Gordon MacDonald's book, Who Stole My Church.
I highly recommend it.
Brilliantly written.
Love the narrative style.
Points presented so well.

MacDonald presents powerfully how people take up an ownership attitude of THEIR church. That often means, I want to be COMFORTABLE and "Its' about ME! And people outside of my comfortable group, well, they can just go... someplace else."

Now, you may feel that is an overstatement, but MacDonald makes the point so strongly and clearly.
Jesus said, "For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost." (Luke 19:10)

How must the man who hung naked on a cruel cross feel about so-called "followers" that ignore, scorn, reject and overlook those He died for.

MacDonald has a beautiful section where he addresses what he labels as the Shelf Life of a Church. He asks, "how do churches and organizations and marriages and even friendships sometimes start out with such freshness and then, later on, go stale?"
He goes on to explain that all human relationships and organizations have a similar beginning that is based on the discovery of a need or opportunity.
Need and opportunity, when defined correctly, lead to vision.
Vision represents the moment someone articulates, "this is what we should do about the need."
It is important to periodically revisit both the original need and the corresponding vision to see if they still form the basis of the church's present existence.

A lot of churches have lost their "first love." All you have to do is read in Revelation 2 to see what Jesus feels about that.

Need or opportunity leads to vision.
Vision leads to initiative and after awhile programs are developed.
Churches are bundles of programs. As long as they continue to meet the need and fulfill the vision they are fine.

Here is the problem... society and cultures change. Needs change.
But by this time the "bundle of programs" have built a following and the programs morph to institutions.

MacDonald defines, "An institution is essentially a bundle of programs that have worked reasonably well over a long period of time. The leaders devise strategies and policies to keep the programs going. They recruit space and staff, because they are the core of what makes an institution.

Here is where the problems can begin to grow. If we are not careful, institutions breed a kind of politics and internal conflict. And if leaders are not alert, people become more interested in running the institution than getting the results defined by the need and the vision.

You can have a church with a million programs, none of which are doing anything but keeping people busy.

Tradition is a stage of shelf life where people do certain things over and over, but have no idea why.
This is the stage, the moment, when the INSIDERS see themselves as more important than the people outside the church that they are supposed to be reaching.

Every church must determine whether or not it prefers tradition and their own comfortable style of music and preaching to the work Jesus said we are supposed to be doing.

Get the book. Read it.