On Preaching In Faith

This quote is from one of my most treasured books "Correspondence With A Cripple From Tarsus - Romans In Dialogue With the 20th Century" by H. Beecher Hicks Jr. Of all the commentaries I have on that great book from Paul's hand and God's heart, none rise to the level this one does when I consider how that book would have been written today. It is well worn, my copy, but fresh every time I come back to it.

Hicks is in dialogue with Paul who writes:

"Beecher, you know this, but I must remind you that God reserves the right to be God. Mysterious. Awesome. There is none like Him. Not one.

Moreover, God makes hard statements. God makes stern demands. God asks hard questions. What makes you think hard questions will have answers? What makes you think that we need to know all the answers? or that if we knew the answers we would understand what they mean? Abraham discovered that God will do right. Is that enough for you?"

Yes it is. It is enough for me.

Can You Reach Seekers and Be Missional?

One of the great concerns as I lead our folks out from the mother ship and into those strange new worlds of our neighborhoods, the offices, and the places we live is whether or not the emphasis on pushing the main thing away from the Sunday morning gathering and into everyday life will decrease our effectiveness at reaching seekers.

Yes, I do lose sleep over things like this.

My however many years I have left mission is to reach people for Christ. If I'm not seeing our church being more effective in that, no matter how many disciples we have becoming more mature, we've missed the point.

So I look for people who are successfully pulling off both and shamelessly steal from their ideas. Here, Bob Roberts Jr. gives great insight into pulling it off. Read the article. Print it out and give it to your leadership. Put his ideas into practice along with your own.

Then write me and tell me what they are so I can steal them too.