Author: Robert

we did the labyrinth on campus tonight. consider the fact that we are an unknown church within the community and that i purposely didn’t advertise in CHRISTian places (so as to avoid people who are just looking for their next spiritual “fix) i think things went very well. the launch team was great. i’m worn out and going to bed after i finish unloading all the junk out of pam’s van.

thanks to everyone who helped and participated within the labyrinth.

one of my favorite sayings regarding parenting is that it’s like being pecked to death by ducks. it makes me laugh every time i think about it. owning two basset hounds is one step worse than this. owning basset hounds is like being pecked to death by ducks who try to make you feel guilty the entire time they are killing you.

genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus handicapped.

Elbert Hubbard

we have our tickets to nicaragua so i can introduce my new friends to all that GOD is doing there. this is very important. our first steps as a church body will go a long in shaping who we will become. that’s one of the reasons that i am so excited about this year’s trip down there. the other main reason is that for quite some time pam and i have wanted to introduce out kids to al that is going on down there. that’s going to happen this year. woohoo!!!

my run for the day
distance – 4.0 miles
time – 42:42
pace – 10/40/mile
weather – 48º

as a former youth minister (boy is that hard to say) i know a ton of college students and young adults who are going off on mission trips. that’s great, of course it also means that i get contacted by many of them concerning support. sometimes that’s a good thing and some times its not. recently i received to such requests. one request from a kid that only contacts me when it comes time to ask for support. i don’t hear from this kid at all otherwise. the other request came from a kid that i don’t talk with all the time but i do hear form every now and then. this kid responds to my questions and makes contact every now and then.

i’m excited about helping one of these kids. you can probably guess which one.

the reminder here for me is i have to do some of the same things. i have to remember that people are going to respond to my requests the same way. maintaining contact is a majorly important thing. caring for somebody is much more important that caring for their pocket book.

every time i talk to one of my friends who is not in wisconsin i get asked the same question in various forms, “so how are things going with starting the church?” before i talk about my confusion on how to answer that question i want to point out that i’m very thankful that friends are asking it. every time i hear from a friend i am very grateful for it. this is especially true in regards to friends from baton rouge because it’s nice to know that i haven’t been completely forgotten down in the swamps. okay i’ll talk about my confusion now.

i don’t know how to answer my friends because i don’t have anything to compare this experience to and i’m not real sure how to define the success of tapestry. i think we’re doing well. when we started meeting as a leadership team in january we were composed of 5 people committed to the launch and one guest. this past week when we met there were 8 people committed to the launch and one guest. more people seem to be connecting with what we’re thinking about the church and that’s great. yet, like i said i don’t really have anything to compare it too.

the other problem in answering the question is that i don’t know how to define success for tapestry. ultimately tapestry is a success if we bring glory to GOD. that’s the goal but that’s a very hard goal to quantify (as it should be). it would be nice to have something that could be a semi-guiding goal that was quantifiable enough that i could see how we are doing based upon it. i can’t use the launch (september 14th) because it’s kind of lame to have as your goal just to start. launching the church worship services is not even close to the finish line so i can’t aim towards that. i can’t use having a certain number of people attend a worship service because that’s not even just kind of lame, it’s amazingly lame. that’s about as far away from who we are as you can get.

so i’m going to ask a question that i’m not sure is easily answerable. what quantifiable things do you think a young church can and should look at for judging how it’s doing? i would love to hear your thoughts.

right now these are the things that that i think we will be looking at:

• CHANGED LIVES – if we really believe that the gates of hell will not prevail over CHRIST’s church then we should see visible manifestations of evil being defeated within people’s lives.
• SACRIFICES THAT CAN ONLY BE EXPLAINED BY GOD – irrational sacrifice seems very much in line with the way of JESUS. why is it that the early church was know for its sacrifice and the modern church is know for political influence?
• REACHING OUT TO THE REJECTED – the church should be like JESUS and connect with those who are rejected by the powerful.
• SENT LIVES – when our people start feeling like they have been called to all the “corners” of the world to be a part of sharing and living the love of JESUS that will be most excellent.
• NEW DISTINCT CHURCHES – as a church we should be involved in planting new embassies of the kingdom of GOD (i.e. churches) that are their own representations of CHRISTian community rather than franchises of us. to some extent this will be the most visible sign for me. when we plant a “daughter” church i’m going to feel like we are doing what we are supposed to do.

any thoughts?

SIDE NOTE – my parents should be very happy. they always complain if i don’t post something regularly (they are the only ones who do). in the past two days i’ve 6 times. while will admit that some of them are quite short (the random quotes post) or administrative (the tapestry monthly prayer post) they’re still posts and therefore count. i’m giving my parents a reason to surf the net.
😉

my google startup page has a quotes of the day application on it. these are the quotes from this morning.

i take my wife everywhere, but she keeps finding her way back.
– henny youngman
The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools.
– herbert spencer
It was beautiful and simple, as truly great swindles are.
– o. henry

i just thought they were funny.

here the may version of the prayer email i send out for tapestry each month. if you are not presently receiving these from me each month and would like to just email me at my name at gmail.com.

thanks for all the prayers guys & girls.

this story is so cool.

western oregon and central washington are playing the game that will determine who has the lead in their ncaa division ii conference (which is important for the tournament). senior sara tucholsky hits the only homerun of her college career and as she is running the bases misses first base. she turns around to go back at touch the base and her knee suddenly goes out. while she lays on the ground the team and officials realize that if anyone from her own team touches her then she is out. their only option appears to be for a pitch runner to come in for her on first base and thus her homerun would be erased (again the only one of her college career). this is when a senior on the other team comes up and asks to carry her around the bases. this is amazing sports*woman*ship.

grant posted concerning a post on tom peter’s blog concerning his thoughts for leaders. it’s good stuff.

i think my favorite is …

6. make sure that you spend your time on the things you say are your priorities.
if you say you love GOD, spend time with HIM. if you say you love people, spend time with them.

SIDE NOTE – i finished the nomadic church: growing your congregation withou owning a building and it was excellent. obviously, i’m not an expert on this because we haven’t started services at tapestry (of course, i still won’t be an expert after we start services). it has such great advice in it while still covering theology & theory concerning why you would want a nomaid church. if i were making a list of “must reads” for church planters this book would definitely be on that list.