It’s been a couple of weeks now since the conclusion of our very special “What’s Your Story” campaign, and yet I continue to hear and receive comments about how meaningful it was to so many of you. I can honestly say that I have never been a part of a series that was so genuine and real in its impact. God always moves in powerful ways when we talk about things like dealing with trials or the importance of forgiveness. There are just some topics that will always evoke a lot of emotion. But this series was different. This series seemed to touch everyone on some level. Whether it was taking the time to think about and share your story or listening to the courageous testimonies that were given each week or taking a closer look at the lives that Jesus touched in the gospels, or watching people that you worship with every week stand up on the platform and show how Jesus has changed the story of their life, this series found a way to touch everyone.

One of the biggest challenges that those of us in full-time ministry face is the fact that as soon as one weekend (one sermon or one series) is over, there is a new one just days away. That doesn’t afford us much opportunity to think about the past. I’m currently involved in preparing for a new four-week series called, “The Wise Family” that will look at what the book of Proverbs has to say about family life and living. But I’ll be honest; I really needed a couple of weekends out of the pulpit to recover from where we have been. That might sound odd but “What’s Your Story” just took a lot out of me. But beyond that, I’m glad I’ve had a couple of weeks to simply reflect on everything that happened—everything that God did. I can’t seem to stop thinking about it. Just this morning I watched the cardboard testimonies one more time. And here’s something that I know for sure. While our “What’s Your Story” campaign may be over, the fact that everyone has a story is still true. And I know that God can work both in and through your story to do great things in your life and the lives of the people you know and love.

So, here’s my encouragement. Embrace your story no matter what it is, give it to God, and just watch what He will do. Perhaps the best thing that came from this entire campaign is we all learned that we’re not alone; we’re not the only one with struggles; we’re not the only one with a past; we’re not the only one with ________. I’m praying that God will use that realization to build a stronger church than we’ve ever known before. You can help that happen if you’re willing to answer this one simple question, “What’s your story?”

Jesus cares,

Pastor Chris

Next Steps

This past week Sandy and I traveled to Savannah, Georgia, to visit my brother and his family. My brother moved to Savannah about six months ago to serve in their global and local outreach ministry. But after being there for just a brief time, they gave him a new position, and he is now the pastor of what they call their east campus (Savannah Christian Church is one of the largest Christian Churches in the country with a main campus and three different satellite campuses). He’s very excited about this new opportunity. Not only am I excited for him, but I’m very proud of him.

Normally everything at the satellite campus is “live” except for the message which is a video from the main campus. But this last weekend my brother brought the message. He preached from Psalm 51 and talked about how important it is, if we’re ever going to changed into the person God wants us to be, to be honest about our sin.

I’m eight years older than my brother. He and my younger sister were still at home when my parents divorced, and life for them got pretty difficult. Everyone deals with difficulty in different ways, and, for a time, my brother made some really bad choices. But one day when he realized things needed to change, he called me. We talked for a little while, and then I said, “I want you to come and go with me to church camp.” I was scheduled to be the dean of a senior high week at Tanglewood Christian Camp in Lexington, TX. So he went. While he was there, God dealt with his heart, and he made a commitment to turn away from his sin (the Bible calls that repentance). He also made a commitment to enroll at Dallas Christian College (he had already been to two different colleges where he spent most of his time…well he doesn’t really remember much about that time). So my brother enrolled in and graduated from Dallas Christian College. While he was there he met his wife Jolene, and they have been serving the local church together now for almost twenty years. And it all started with a moment of recognition followed by a phone call.

I imagine there are many moments of recognition in all of our lives. The problem is we don’t always take that next step. For my brother Kenneth, it was a phone call to someone he could trust…someone he knew loved him. What would it be for you? One of the great examples of that next step is found in the parable of the prodigal son in Luke 15. After this son had demanded an early inheritance from his father and wasted it all on wine, women, and song (loose translation), he found himself with nothing but a job feeding pigs. Luke 15:17 says, When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men.’ (NIV) You know how the story ends. The father was actually waiting for him to come home. And when he did, the celebration was incredible.

Is there some next step you need to take? Is there something you need to do? Don’t let anything stand in your way. Somewhere there’s a celebration waiting to happen.

Jesus cares,

Pastor Chris

P.S. The weather in Savannah and Hilton Head was perfect every single day. I ate a lot of Blue Bell ice cream and played a lot of golf. How cool is that!

The Evolution of a Blog (one pastor’s experience)

Monday, October 12, 2009 (10:15 a.m.)

Wow! That’s all I can say about this past weekend’s worship experience. I could feel the power of the Holy Spirit in each service, and I know that everyone who was present was blessed and challenged. But I have to be honest and tell you that I was really disappointed (It has always been hard for me to hide my disappointment) in the number of empty chairs…especially at our 9:00 service. Several months ago when I first began to imagine this series, I actually checked the Colts schedule and the school calendar so that I could schedule this particular weekend at a time when there were no obvious conflicts. That’s because I knew how powerful it would be. That’s why I took the time to encourage everyone a couple of weeks ago to make sure they didn’t miss the last two weeks of this series. The end result was our lowest “What’s Your Story” weekend attendance…almost 500 fewer people than previous weeks. Someone told me they believed the low attendance was due to the temporary seating in the Worship Center. I suppose that could be a possibility, but I just can’t bring myself to believe that something like that would really keep someone out of church, not unless they had some genuine physical disability. Someone might read this and think that I’m overly concerned with numbers. That’s really not the case. I just know how much time and effort went into last week’s service, as well as how important the message was. (Whoa. There’s no way I can publish this. It’s way too negative/honest. I should know better than to try and write a blog on a Monday.)

Tuesday, October 13, 2009 (8:45 a.m.)

Wow! That’s all I can say about this past weekend’s worship experience. I could feel the power of the Holy Spirit in each service, and I know that everyone who was present was blessed and challenged. But I have to be honest and tell you that I was really disappointed (It has always been hard for me to hide my disappointment) in the number of empty chairs…especially at our 9:00 service. Several months ago when I first bean to imagine this series, I actually checked the Colts schedule and the school calendar so that I could schedule this particular weekend at a time when there were no obvious conflicts. That’s because I knew how powerful it would be. That’s why I took the time to encourage everyone a couple of weeks ago to make sure they didn’t miss the last two weeks of this series. The end result was our lowest “What’s Your Story” weekend attendance…almost 500 fewer people than previous weeks. (Apparently Tuesdays are not much better)

Wednesday, October 14, 2009 (2:37 p.m.)

(Nope)

Thursday, October 15, 2009 (5:14 p.m.)

This weekend marks the conclusion of our special “What’s Your Story” campaign. I hope you’ve been blessed by what God has done each and every week. I have been particularly thankful to those who have had the courage to share their story whether it’s been in the main service, on our web site, or in a small group setting. One of my main goals for this series was to try and communicate that we are not a church filled with “stained-glass saints” but real people with real lives in real need of God’s grace. We have a very special element planned for this final weekend that I believe is something we will all remember for the rest of our lives. I hope that you are planning to be present at one of our four services so that you can be a part of what God is going to do. I have to tell you that we will once again be sitting in temporary chairs. It’s painful for me to have to write that. We tried to synchronize our re-model schedule to only have to do this for a couple of weeks, and this will be the sixth straight week with the folding chairs. It’s not our fault. The only thing we’ve been guilty of is believing the people who sold us the new seats when they gave us our delivery date(s). I apologize for that. Please don’t let it keep you from worship this weekend. Thanks for your patience.

Jesus cares,

Pastor Chris

My brother, who recently moved to Savannah, Georgia, to work on the staff at the Savannah Christian Church, called me recently to ask me about some details related to the spiritual heritage of our family. He’s writing a sermon about “change” and wanted to tell the story of my grandmother’s conversion. Because he’s eight years younger than I am, he doesn’t know or remember the story as well as I do.

I’ve told you before about my grandparents who owned a bar on the west side of Tulsa, Oklahoma. That was the life they lived for several years. That was the life that my mother was raised in and influenced by. That was the life that led her to make some of the choices she made as a young woman. But a little over fifty years ago, my grandmother was in a serious car wreck that crushed her pelvis. She ended up in a hospital, flat on her back with a long recovery ahead of her. It was during that hospital stay that some men from the Osage Hills Christian Church visited her and told her that God loved her and explained to her how she could have her sin forgiven and receive the gift of eternal life. That visit was the beginning of an incredible transformation. Once she was out of the hospital, she had to wear heavy metal and leather braces. But she was so anxious to obey the command to be baptized that she wouldn’t wait until she was free of the braces. So she went to church, answered the invitation, made a confession of faith, and two men carried her into the baptistery on a metal folding chair and baptized her into Christ. Not long after that, my grandparents sold their bar, and my grandmother became the secretary at Osage Hills. She spent the next sixteen years of her life in that position until she was diagnosed with breast cancer. One weekend they had a special service where the people were asked to bring or wear a pair of shoes that had a significant meaning for their spiritual life (I know this because the preacher told this story at my grandmother’s funeral). My grandmother brought those leg braces. I can still remember, as a boy, seeing them hanging on a nail in her garage. I’m sure that every time she looked at them she was reminded ofhow God stepped in and re-wrote the story of her life.

But God didn’t just re-write the story of my grandmother’s life that day in that hospital room…that Sunday in that baptistery. He re-wrote the story of my mother’s life and my uncle’s life. He re-wrote the story of all of their children’s life, including me. And he re-wrote the story of my children’s lives. And the story goes on and on and on.

That’s one of the things that makes this What’s Your Story campaign so special, and one of the reasons why it’s important for all of us to take the time to recognize and tell our story. My life has not been perfect. I’ve made and make a lot of mistakes. But because of the faithfulness of ordinary men who were making a hospital call on a woman they had never met, my story is covered by grace. And if I were ever asked to wear or bring a pair of shoes that had a significant meaning for my spiritual life, I’d have to find those braces.
What’s your story?

Pastor Chris

I’m very pleased with the way our What’s Your Story campaign has begun. The past two weeks we have had great services, great crowds, and great responses from many of you. Thank you for being willing to look past a worship center in the midst of a massive “face-lift” and focus on what the Holy Spirit is doing as He moves in us and among us.

This past week we talked about Nicodemus and the dangers of legalism. While researching that message I ran across the following story:

One afternoon a man named John, dressed in blue jeans, walked into a bank to finalize a business transaction. The teller told him that the officer he needed to see wasn’t in, and he would have to come back the next day. John said that would be fine and asked the teller to validate his parking ticket. The teller informed him that, according to bank policy, she couldn’t validate his parking ticket because he had not completed a financial transaction. John asked for an exception, since he had come to the bank intending to do business, but was unable to because the appropriate officer wasn’t in. The teller didn’t budge. She said, “I’m sorry, that’s our policy. Rules are rules.”

So John decided to make a business transaction. He decided to close his account. John’s last name was Akers. He was the chairman of IBM, and the account he closed had a balance of one-and-a-half million dollars. This qualified as a financial transaction, and the teller was required to validate the parking ticket.

One of the signs of legalism is when rules and regulations become more important than people. Now I’m not saying that there’s no place for rules and regulations because that would be foolish. But one of the things Jesus taught us with the example of his life is that people come first…people are a priority. My prayer is that we would always be a church that models the ministry strategy that people come first!

On another note, our new video venue has gotten off the ground. On Sunday, September 13, we began a new video simulcast service in the Student Ministries Center at 10:45am. Each week there is a Host Pastor, Worship Team, Greeters, and Guest Gathering folks to make you feel welcome and to help with the overall worship experience. The worship, special, and message, along with any special elements, are seen from a live feed to the Worship Center while the decision time as well as the communion and offering are handled live by the Host Pastor. During the service the SMC is set up with tables and chairs and those attending are able to enjoy some morning refreshments as they worship. Our hope and prayer for this service is two-fold. First, that we might reach some folks who would feel more comfortable in a setting like this. And, second, that this would help free up some space in the main service. If you’ve ever attended our 10:45 service, then you know that it can sometimes get pretty crowded.

So pray for this new service. Pray for God’s blessing on all of the technical details. And pray that God might use it to reach even more folks in our community and on the south side of Indianapolis. You might even want to give it a try. Who knows, you might like it.
Jesus cares,

Pastor Chris

This weekend begins a very special new sermon series called, “What’s Your Story.” I can honestly say I am more excited about this sermon series than any other I have preached in the past. Over the course of the next six weeks, we will look at six people who had personal encounters with Jesus (A Samaritan woman – Nicodemus – A blind man – A paralytic – John the Baptist – Peter), and we’ll see how Jesus changed their lives/stories in powerful and dramatic ways. At the same time, we’ll be hearing from some very special people in our church family who have stories that are very similar to each of these characters. I can’t tell you how much respect and appreciation I have for these people who have been willing to open up their lives in ways that are rarely seen in church. Along with all of this, we will be experiencing Spirit-led worship, heart-stirring specials, and a very powerful element on the final week that you will remember for the rest of your life. I hope you won’t miss a single week and that you will be inviting your family, friends, co-workers, and neighbors to come and experience church the way it’s supposed to be…honest and real.

While I’m on the subject of church, I read a very thought-provoking article in the Christian Standard written by a man named Paul Williams. He wrote about a recent evening when he was flipping through the television channels and happened upon five comedians (O’ Brien, David Letterman, Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, and Craig Ferguson) all with one thing in common – every one of them was wearing a suit and tie. He went on to say that the next week he traveled to Louisville to attend the North American Christian Convention. While he was there, he attended five of the main sessions where the speakers/preachers all wore polo shirts or, as he called them, “hide the fat Hawaiian shirts.” Williams went on to talk about the progression he’s experienced in his own ministry of shifting from preaching in a suit and tie to blue jeans. Then he wrote these words:

Some day archeologists will discover evidence dating back to the early 21st century. They will gather behind closed doors and puzzle together about the early days of the third millennium. What fascinating conclusions will they reach? I can see the headline: “Clothing Unlocks Secrets – Ancient Civilization Worshiped Comedy – Laughed at Religion.”I am not a curmudgeon. Really. I’m not. You can ask my kids. I am pretty sure there is no right or wrong here. But you have to admit, it is fascinating. How did we get here? How did David Letterman end up doing his monologue in a suit, while I quote Scripture in a pair of Levi’s?

It’s something to think about.

Finally, this weekend when you come to church, you’ll find the Worship Center in the midst of a pretty extensive facelift. That means for about three weeks we’ll have to sit on folding chairs and deal with floors in various stages of stain and carpet as well as walls that are going through their own transformations. I hope it won’t be a distraction to you and that you’ll remember to focus on the end result. I guarantee it will be well worth the inconvenience. But in the meantime, you might want to bring your own seat and/or back cushion if you think folding chairs will be difficult to endure. Please join with me in praying that the setting will in no way detract from what God is doing in the service.


Jesus cares,

Pastor Chris

Boomer Sooner

This past week while Sandy and I were vacationing in Boca Raton, my cell phone rang just as we were getting ready to head to the first tee. The caller on the other line didn’t know I was on vacation and wanted to talk to me about how Mount Pleasant could be involved in the local arrangements for next year’s North American Christian Convention when it returns to Indianapolis. He did know that I have always been a big Oklahoma Sooner fan so he asked me if I was ready for another season of college football. I wasn’t quite sure how to answer.

As a boy growing up in Oklahoma, I loved sports—all sports. I have a brother who is seventeen months older than I am, and he was a natural athlete who was always bigger and faster and stronger than everyone else. I was not. So for many years, I lived in the shadow of his touchdowns, his rebounds, his homeruns, etc. But I had one thing my older brother didn’t have and that was desire. Since everything came easy to him, he really never worked at it. He just showed up. It wasn’t that way for me. But by the time I was a sophomore in high school, things had changed. He was still a football star who had opportunities to play in college, but I wasn’t in his shadow any longer. In fact, when it was all said and done, I achieved more success than he did even though my family forced me to move from Oklahoma to Texas, and I didn’t play any sports as a senior. NOTE: Just so you know I’m talking about achieving a small measure of success in a 2A school with about five hundred students—not really that big a deal when you look at the big picture.

I spent a lot of my growing up days playing, practicing, and loving sports. I passed that on to my own son who played both basketball and baseball as a boy and settled on baseball in high school. I have a lot of great memories that revolve around sports. But to be completely honest with you, for the first time in my life, I feel a genuine sense of disinterest in sports. See, I believe that sports have gotten out of control in America. And I’m talking about every level, from youth sports to professional sports. When my son played t-ball for the first time back in the spring of 1990, the baseball league we played in had rules concerning the number of practices you could have in a week and how long they could last. By the time he was playing what we called “competitive” ball in Oklahoma, there were teams that played well over a hundred games a year. I’m talking about teams of nine-year old and ten-year old boys. And it just kept getting worse the older they got. When my son played American Legion ball the summer before his sophomore year in high school, I remember being at a game where some of the parents began to talk about how their boys had decided not to go to church camps and church mission trips so they wouldn’t miss any games and jeopardize their place on the team. That same summer Andrew went to a Christ In Youth Conference in Colorado and missed two games. Now all the boys on that team were good baseball players, but by the time they were seniors, there were only two of them who were on the varsity and only one of them ended up playing college baseball at a Division III school, but it was so important that it took precedent over church and church activities.

And what about professional sports? When I moved to Indianapolis, I decided to become a Colts fan. But I’ve got to tell you that it’s really disappointing to me when some people can’t make it to a Saturday night or Sunday morning church service because the Colts have a home game.

So, am I looking forward to another season of college football? The answer, honestly, is I don’t really care. I’ll still pull for the Sooners, and they’ll still be my favorite team, but, honestly, I don’t really care. Even the team that I have loved since I was a boy represents in one way or another everything that’s gone wrong with sports today.

On a more positive note, I do care about the sports and recreation ministry we have at Mount Pleasant because it’s built on and around Christ. And I love the fact that we give families in our community the opportunity to participate in sports without it taking over their lives. I understand that recreational sports simply don’t meet the needs of every child or family and that there needs to be a place for higher levels of competition and achievement. I wouldn’t have been satisfied with recreational sports when I was young. But here’s my question. At what cost? In America we have a history of being a people who dive headlong into opportunity without taking the time to examine the cost—without asking any questions about the long term results (Anyone remember subprime mortgages?).

In Ephesians 5:15-17, Paul writes, Be very careful, then, how you live – not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is. (NIV) Just what is the Lord’s will for you and your family when it comes to sports? That’s a great question. Your answer or conclusion might not be the same as mine and that’s okay (I’m not writing this to offend anyone.). But what’s really important is that you at least take the time to ask the question. What is the Lord’s will for you and your family when it comes to sports?

No doubt we’ve all heard the story of Eric Liddell (Remember the movie Chariots of Fire.) who refused to run in the 100-meter race at the 1924 summer Olympic games in Paris because it was scheduled on Sunday. Instead he ran in the 400-meter race where he not only won a gold medal but also broke the world record. Just before the race, an American masseur slipped a note into Liddell’s hand with a portion of I Samuel 2:30, Those who honor me, I will honor. Following the Olympics, Liddell became a missionary to China where he died in 1945 as a prisoner in a Chinese Internment camp. In 2008 in a poll taken by The Scotsman newspaper, Eric Liddell was voted the most popular athlete Scotland has ever produced. And that, friends, is a big deal when you look at the big picture.

Jesus cares,

Pastor Chris