Advent Expectations

I grew up in a suburban Southern Baptist home where we celebrated Christmas like most other evangelicals; you indulged in all the craziness of shopping and tinsel and Santa, but you went to church on Christmas Eve and reminded yourself that this was really all about Jesus. We never observed Advent. I didn't even know what it was until I was grown up. This is the first year that my family and I took the time to observe Advent. At the prompting of our lead pastor, Steve Whipple, We bought an amazing book by a Messianic Jewish writer Arnold Ytreeide called Jotham's Journey. It is an exciting and well-written adventure of a small boy who becomes separated from his family and winds up in Bethlehem the night of Jesus' birth. It has been a wonderful experience and I highly recommend Ytreeide's books.

Advent is all about expectation. It's the preparing oneself for the arrival of Jesus. When Jesus shows up, everything changes! It's not only about the arrival of Jesus' birth, but for Christians, it's also the looking forward to His second coming. But there is another aspect of advent I discovered.

While looking for music for our Christmas Eve services at Church at the Ridge, I discovered an Advent hymn by Charles Wesley, "Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus." The version I heard was by the musicians at Red Mountain Church in Birmingham, AL. I was captivated by the beautiful melody and the hopeful, longing spirit of the song. Needless to say you will be hearing it this Friday night!

My thought was this: We expect too little of Christmas, because if we're being honest we expect too little of Christ. Deliverer? Redeemer? Shepherd? Savior? Healer? We sing these things but we don't really expect Him to come through for us. Christmas Eve we will see our largest crowd of the year at Church at the Ridge. I can't help but think there will be people, some of them our regular folks, who will sit and sing and go through the motions but not really expect "God with us." They long for Him, without even realizing that it's Him they long for. Their heart cries, "Come, Thous long-expected Jesus! I've been waiting for you all my life!" My prayer is that they will experience the presence of God made flesh this Christmas Eve.

Read the words to this hymn and make them your prayer this Advent season. I ask our people to pray these words over our service on Christmas Eve.:

Come, thou long-expected Jesus,
Born to set thy people free;
From our fears and sins release us;
Let us find our rest in thee.
Israel's strength and consolation,
Hope of all the earth thou art;
Dear Desire of ev'ry nation,
Joy of every longing heart.

Joy to those who long to see Thee
Day spring from on high appear
Come, Thou promised rod of Jesse,
Of Thy birth we long to hear
O’er the hills the angels singing news,
Glad tidings of a birth,
“Go to Him, your praises bringing;
Christ the Lord has come to earth.”

Come to earth to taste our sadness
He whose glories knew no end;
By His life He brings us gladness,
Our Redeemer, Shepherd, Friend.
Leaving riches without number,
Born within a cattle stall;
This the everlasting wonder,
Christ was born the Lord of all.

Born thy people to deliver,
Born a child, and yet a King,
Born to reign in us for ever,
Now thy gracious kingdom bring.
By thine own eternal Spirit
Rule in all our hearts alone;
By thine all-sufficient merit
Raise us to thy glorious throne.

Words by Charles Wesley, additional verses by Mark Hunt
Music by Rowland Pritchard

Staying Married on Purpose Alumni writes

Got this encouraging letter from a couple who took our marriage class in Vegas and wanted to share it. Not because we think we are all that, but because it shows that when you obey God and just speak His truth into peoples' lives, He does great things... and you get to be in on it! Also, we want to challenge those who have taken the class to pass on what you learn there. It may be the very reason God had you there!

Hey guys. Hope all is well with you and your family. Wanted to drop you a note to tell a short story & to let you know I thank the Lord for you two everyday. This is how great our God is...I'd been talking with an old dear friend of mine since junior high who now lives in Philadelphia. Well...she'd been having problems in her marriage. It isn't her first time marrying but I could tell by the sound of her voice that things were going south with the relationship. Just like the 1st time. I felt so terrible. Apparently she caught her husband cheating and as in her previous marriage she was ready to call it quits right away. She was devasted. She said her husband & her had been separated for almost a year but they both knew they really wanted to make things work but didn't even know how or where to start. She finds it hard to trust her partner when it's comes to adultery. I reached out to her. Sent her one of our copies of "the Love Dare" that we won at your cool Fireproof movie viewing @ HOPE. I told her about how we went through the Fireproof Your Marriage series and took your SMOP class at HOPE. I went into a little bit of what Josh & I learned (yep, we kept all our notes) and told her that if they start looking at marriage in a biblical perspective, things will surely change for the better. I just planted the seed and we left it at that. This was all sometime this last summer. She e-mailed me with the greatest news yesterday morning. She & her husband are back together & working things out. They did the Fireproof Your Marriage series & are going to classes at there local church in Philadelphia. I cried tears of joy because way back when..I would've did the normal(worldly) thing and told her to dump him & move on. Instead I shared the tools that were given to me, with her & with God's grace...Wah-lah!! I am so so so happy for them. I'm not too familiar with her husband but says he deeply appreciates the suggestion made to them. They thanked me & so now I'm thanking you. WOW...what a great feeling it is & we are so greatful for you two. God had put ya'll in our lives when we needed the guidance the most and since then there has been an overflow of blessings in our marriage & in relationships around us. 10 years ago I woulda never thought our marriage could be such a great example to others. This is all because of the HIS light that you pointed us to. Jerry & Cheryl, God is definitely working through ya'll. He picked the perfect couple for the marriage ministry. You're work has helped & is in the process of helping people you dont even know. Isn't that awesome?? Thank you Thank you Thank you....God Bless guys! YOU ROCK!! Merry Christmas & Happy New year to you and yours! We send our love..............- Lore

Thanks Josh and Lori for sharing your story!

Undercover Ross

We had a blast doing this spoof on the CBS show Undercover Boss. This is Undercover Ross, where we sent one of our workers in our children's ministry at church to see where we could improve our environments. Check it out!

A Social Network Christmas

Found this very clever mini movie from Igniter Media. What if the greatest story ever told took place in the age of Facebook?

In Sync with God

The other morning, I had the rare opportunity to drive my 15-year-old daughter, Whitney, to school. It was great to be able to spend a little time with her one on one without distractions or interruptions, just to find out what was going on in her life.

I knew she had been doing the student version of Experiencing God in her youth Bible study at church. So i asked her what she thought God was saying to her. I expected her to kind of think for a bit but to my surprise she answered right away: "I think God wants me to trust Him and not get stressed out so much in my life." Wow, I thought, my little girl is all growed up and hearing from God!

We talked for a while about what causes stress and I gave her my theory about why we stress out. I think I covered it here in an earlier post but the Cliff Notes version is basically this: We wake up every day with a set of expectations for the day -- things we expect to accomplish, the way we expect our day to go, how we expect things to work, etc. Stress happens when our day doesn't happen the way we expected. There is a tension between what we expect and what God actually gives us and that tension is called stress.

The way to avoid it, I told Whitney, would be to wake up and the very first thing you do would be to take all your expectations for the day and hand them over to God in prayer. Phillipians 4:6-7 says, "Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus." NLT

We began to talk about prayer, about what it is and what it is not. So many people treat prayer like it's a way to get what they want from God. They see it as a way to get God on their agenda, to meet their expectations. Rather, I told her, prayer is how we get on God's agenda, how we catch His heart and make it ours. It's how we sync our lives to God, I said. And that's when it hit me.

Suddenly in my mind's eye, I saw an iPod attached to a computer by that little cable. "Whitney," I said, "think about syncing your iPod to the computer. Let's say the computer represents God and the iPod is you. You want everything on the computer's library to be on your iPod, until it mirrors exactly what is stored on the computer. Now that little cable that connects the iPod to the computer is prayer. It is through that connection that you will be synced to God, He will download Himself into you, until you mirror Him exactly. Then as you go through your day, you are taking everything God is around inside you."

I don't know which one of us got more out of that illustration but she seemed to like it. Since that morning, though, that image of syncing my life to God's heart through prayer has been stuck in my head. Have you "synced" yourself to God today?

Mary Margaret: Story teller for a new generation

This kid is an amazing story teller. Check her out...

What's in your hand?

"Withhold not good from them to whom it is due, when it is in the power of thine hand to do it ." - Prov. 3:27, KJV

This past week our lead pastor, Steve Whipple, was preaching on Giving Like God from John 3:16. Near the end he asked this question: What is in your hand? In light of this scripture from Proverbs, that is a very good question.

What do I hold in my hand that someone around me needs? Has God brought someone across my radar with a need that it is in my power to meet? Am I withholding some good from someone to whom it is due?

As I thought and prayed on this over the weekend one word kept coming to my mind: encouragement. Think about it. What is one thing everyone needs and everyone can give? Encouragement! It's something all of us can afford to be generous with and none of us can afford to live without. But how often do we withhold it from each other!

The word encourage literally means "to put courage into another person." We all face challenges every day. Even Jesus said that each day held enough trouble of its own (Matt. 6:34). His answer was that we should continuously set our eyes on God and the kingdom He was establishing, and the righteous life that would be the defining characteristic of that kingdom. But that takes courage.

Encouragement is so vital because it is much rarer than dis-couragement. Interesting thing about the prefix dis-: it is from the same Latin root that means twice or to divide. It literally indicates a separating or parting from something. So when we say we are discouraged, we are saying that we have been separated from our courage. It has been taken from us. So when the challenges come, when the trouble of the day rears its ugly head and threatens to overwhelm us, we have no courage left to deal with it. So we retreat, withdraw, hide, or, more often than not, simply do nothing and let life just happen to us. We take no part in it. We become disenchanted, disheartened, and disengaged. In short, we are a dis-couraged people.

Why? Because we refuse to see the significance of en-couraging each other, of putting courage back into someone who has been separated from theirs. Hebrews 10:23-24 says, "... let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near (emphasis mine)." It's not optional. You can't say, "I'm just not that kind of person." Are you a human? Are you a Jesus Follower? Then you are that kind of person!

It's true that for some it comes easily. Some have a gift of encouragement. But everyone everywhere who names the name of Jesus is required to encourage. Especially, the writer of Hebrews says, as the Day of His return draws nearer and nearer. Paul writes to the Thessalonian church about the return of Christ and then commands them to "encourage one another with these words." (1 Thessalonians 4:18, ESV)

Hope gives us courage. Paul told the Corinthian believers, "Since we have such a hope, we are very bold." (2 Corinthinas 3:12, ESV) Paul was encouraged to speak plainly and openly and fearlessly about Jesus because he constantly reminded himself that Jesus was returning. And with His return would come a new heaven and a new earth. Death, Hell, Sin, and Satan would be no more. Now that's encouraging, isn't it?

So my wife and I have decided that as often as we can, we will be lavishly generous with our encouragement. We want to leverage whatever influence God has given us to put the courage to follow Jesus into everyone God brings into our path. What does that look like? Here are just a few practical ways we have thought of:

Use your Facebook to encourage. Put up a scripture that comforts or encourages. Send someone an encouraging message. Write on their wall what their friendship means to you. Brag on them on your wall.

Spend time with someone who needs encouragement. Take them to lunch. Invite them for coffee. Have them over for dinner. Invest your self into someone else personally.

Write them an encouraging note or card. end them an email just to tell them how much you appreciate them, especially if they sacrifice their time and energy serving in kingdom work. This is not just pastors or church staff (but God knows they desperately need encouragement!), but for volunteers and lay leaders as well.

Meet a real need for them. Lavishly and generously. One woman in our church is spending the holidays alone with three children while her husband serves our country in Iraq. It has been awesome to watch members of our church deliver firewood, offer to babysit, invite her family over for lunch, and just serve her in the name of Jesus. Nobody told them to. The love of God compelled them to. It is not only an encouragement to her, but to the rest of the church as we witness the love of Jesus in action, right in our midst!

So... what's in your hand? Who needs it desperately? Will you withhold it? Or will you allow God to love them through you, so that everyone around you can see Who He is and how He loves?