Monday, September 25, 2006

I couldn't help but share this cartoon with you today. I can remember as though it were yesterday sitting at the dinner table and not being allowed to excuse myself until all the spinach on my plate was eaten. Somewhere, kids are celebrating the fact that spinach has been banned due to the recent E. Coli outbreak.

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Wednesday marks the kickoff for the annual Spiritual Growth Workshop at Woodward Park. I am so excited about being a part of my first-ever workshop and sitting at the feet of some great speakers who will feed us from Paul's letter to the Colossians.

As a newbie to the workshop, what can I expect? You folks from Woodward Park that are veterans to the workshop, tell me what you like most about the workshop.

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Thanks to the internet and phone calls to my good friend Jamie Saveall, I have been able to keep close tabs on the Jessieville Lions football season. The Lions are rolling, ranked #3 in the state in the most recent Hootens poll. My old pal, Lonnell Fort is having a superb season and the Lions seem to have an offense that is unstoppable.

Friday, the Lions have a big matchup at rival Mount Ida. In two weeks, in advance of my speaking trip to the Sojourners National Conference in Marshall, Texas, I will be back for the game with Bigelow.

Keep it rollin', Lions!

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Finally, chew on this bit of insight today from one of my writers, Dallas Willard.

"Generally, what I find is that the ordinary people who come to church are basically running their lives on their own, utilizing 'the arm of the flesh'—their natural abilities—to negotiate their way. They believe there is a God and they need to check in with him, but they don't have any sense that he is an active agent in their lives. As a result, they don't become disciples of Jesus. They consume his merits and the services of the church. Discipleship is no essential part of Christianity today."

"We don't preach life in the kingdom of God through faith in Jesus as an existential reality that leads to discipleship and then character transformation. When you don't have character transformation in a large number of your people, then when something happens, everything flies apart and you have people acting in the most ungodly ways imaginable"
(From Christianity Today, September 2006, Vol. 50, No. 9, p. 45).