Player-Coach: Economics

I view my role at The Bridge Community to mainly be that of a player-coach. My main function is to "equip the saints for the work of ministry." I do this by giving instruction while being in the heat of the battle myself. I am not standing on the sidelines shouting out, I'm literally bleeding in the same battle every other minister/missionary (child of God at the Bridge Community) is.

A part of my "equipping" ministry is to lay a firm foundation which is Jesus Christ and God's word. At the Bridge, we are constantly providing avenues for disciples of Christ to be grown. I as well try to be very incarnational and model a life that is based on Christ's firm foundation. We believe in the sufficiency of Jesus Christ and the Bible. A second part of my "equipping" ministry is to prepare/train others. We provide avenues for everyone to discover and find their gifting, provide specialized training, and use cell families/gap for mobilization. We view our Sunday celebration as a time to prepare our community to be missionaries in their neighborhoods engaging culture with the gospel.

I would be wrong to neglect that a part of my player-coach role deals with mending and restoring. This week I will focus on equipping our community to be priests to one another in this aspect individually and through cell. But now to be frank, a lot of disciples need to fix what is broken in their finances.

Remember, I am in this same battle. At The Bridge we use Crown Biblical Financial Training as a tool to equip and mend/restore financial situations. Please check out their website here. http://www.crown.org/ . We offer the Crown Biblical Financial study once a year - but we will offer it more often if we must. It is time to reduce debt, and free up God's resources to be used for God's kingdom. Too many disciples have not heeded Biblical financial principles and have now become servants to a lender just as Proverbs 22:7 has warned.

Here is where I stand as a player-coach in this battle. I currently have two mortgages. We moved into a nicer home for an exceptional price. We viewed this as our long-range family home, but we did not sale our other house. We instead began renting it and now we wish that we would have sold it. We have a choice to make. We can rent it out again or sit on it until it sales. We are seeking God's face and committing to him to reduce debt and to help other disciples reduce debt as well. Why? Debt hampers a disciple's ability to bring the Kingdom of God to their surroundings. It imprisons, entraps, and destroys.

Will you commit to reducing debt? With the debt that you now have, what could the same amount of resources have done for God's kingdom in your own neighborhood for the glory of God?

Prayers

Please keep our family in prayer for the next 40 days. I have a killer schedule that depresses me to look at. This month outside of preaching and leading cells and cell leaders, we are constructing a sprung for our permanent location as The Bridge. I as well have the Catalyst and Reveal conferences. Throw in concerts at Chester, Windemere, and Waterloo and I'm toast. I'm praying that my family doesn't just toast me. Start praying as well for November. Becky and I are traveling to Honduras for a few days to help with the Global Leadership Summit and see the work of Compassion International. Finally, we have a house that we need to sale or rent-to-own.

I don't often ask for prayer.. but now is a good time for it.

This is a very exciting time. I can't wait to see/experience all that God has in store. It is also a time that I need to be extra careful to spend time with Becky, Brylee, and Halle.

Complete Awesomeness

Crowder and UBC covering "Jesus is a Friend of Mine" on YouTube.

Elephant Rocks

GAP focus area

We announced the focus area of The Great Adventure Project this morning at Church.

Check out the new http://www.greatadventureproject.com website and video below!


GAP-CSC

You don't want any of this

In case you missed the news, you should read the news here.

And I'll say it one more time. You don't want any of this beast.

Majesty

In April, 2006, a retroactive computerization from one telescopic discovery was released on the media airways that brought NASA to its knees.

"From the moment of inception, the cosmos expanded billions of light years in the first trillionth of a second."

Defying all laws of physics and far exceeding every natural explanation , our 100 billion galaxy cosmos went from "a mathematical point" (absolute zero) to a six million, million, billion mile wide expanse in a fraction of the twinkling of an eye.

Majesty.

So great was the realization of NASA's scientific research lab's director, Dr. Robert Jastrow explained, "Now we know with absolute certainty that supernatural forces were at work in the creation of the universe."

--- This note was taken from Won 2 One by Joe White. It is a 24 week discipleship curriculum that I have been going through with two men from our church. I look forward to our meetings every week!

Doesn't this make your day???

glumbert - Jesus Is My Friend

This video changed my life. :-)

Max Lucado has some words of wisdom....AGAIN

Our cell family has been reading and discussing the book Facing Your Giants by Max Lucado. God always has a way of reminding us His promises at the most opportune times. I just thought I'd share this paragraph for anyone who needs to read it as much as me.

David saw Goliath as a chance for God to show off!.......What if you saw your giant in the same manner? Rather than begrudge him, welcome him. Your cancer is God's chance to flex his healing muscles. Your sin is God's opportunity to showcase grace. Your struggling marriage can billboard God's power. See your struggle as God's canvas. On it he will paint his multicolored supremacy. Announce God's name and then reach for...

Just want you all to keep watching for God to show off. I know he will, he always does. He shows up and provides everything we need...and sometimes abundantly more.

FYI- I love my husband who is a wonderful daddy! I'm so thankful for him. He's investing in Brylee today while me and Halle bond at home.

Third World Diet

It is estimated that 50-60% of the world's population lives on rice and beans alone. I can't remember the last time that I even considered eating rice and beans. Can you?

Yesterday, we challenged The Bridge Community to spend five to seven days straight eating nothing but rice and beans. Why? We want our community to get a sense of what it is like to live on a Third World Diet.

We are once again participating in the Advent Conspiracy. You can read more about our church's involvement here. I won't be doing the rice and beans diet this week, but I will blog about my experience when I begin. So stay tuned! Also, I challenge you all to try the third world diet and to consider how you can become a part of the Advent Conspiracy this Christmas season.

Busy Week:
This week is packed.

• Tuesday - one on one discipleship meetings and work on the Great Adventure Project
• Wednesday - flying to Willow Creek for the REVEAL conference planning meeting. Dinner at Willow and work session following.
• Thursday -Reveal Conference planning work sessions (keep up on twitter).
  
• Friday - back in MO. I'm going to watch ROY walk. Are you?
• Saturday - traveling to Decatur, IL to play a concert with Parallax View.
• Sunday - We are announcing THE great adventure project at The Bridge.