the bigger the vision

In an effort to start each week out on the right foot, I will be sharing the thoughts of others who are much more intelligent and insightful than I, with the hope that their words encourage and challenge you as much as they have me.
This week I want to share a thought from Andy Stanley's book Visioneering which I have referenced in some of my prior posts:

"The bigger the vision, the more important it is that your faith be grounded in His ability, not yours. The bigger the vision, the more pressure you will feel to take credit for your success. Before God can entrust you with the rewards that accompany success, you must be dependant. He brings you to that place by stretching and even straining your faith. But as the capacity of your faith increases, so too your potential to pass along to Him the glory He deserves.

So be encouraged. The agony you are experiencing is normal. The loneliness you are feeling is to be expected. The sleepless nights when you stare up at the ceiling and think, "What have I gotten myself into?" are part of the process. All of those experiences will ultimately lead you to the conclusion, "God, if you don’t come through, I’m sunk!" And that is exactly where he wants you to be-and stay. For this reason, men and women of vision are men and women of faith. And through their faith, God is honored. "

so what?

As you reflect back over your week,what during your week seemed so important that it took time and resources, that now when you look back does not pass the "SO WHAT" test?

my dependence

Let me start by saying that I had well intended plans to post something completely different than what I am about to lay out but God always seems to get what He wants, so here IT BE.

I continued my journey through the book of Judges this morning and found myself saddled up in the midst of Samson’s systematic destruction of the Philistines. Side Bar: To be perfectly honest the whole story of Samson is perplexing to me. Yes it is another great story of God’s deliverance of His people from bondage through the life of a man but the whole sex, murder, and scandal aspect, although intriguing, simply mystifies me. I mean the men God had used up and till Samson were the likes of Gideon and Jephthah. Mighty warriors yes, but also obedient and from what I can gather righteous men of God. And then we have Samson. I mean dude was a mess. Kinda like that friend who seems to have the cunning ability to always make stupid decisions, like always falling for the wrong person. How exactly does that work? Uh, maybe it’s that God will even use our sinful human weakness to accomplish His will and bring glory to His name. And aren’t I thankful for that.

So where was I? Oh ya: saddled up in the midst of Samson’s systematic destruction of the Philistines. And again “The Spirit of the Lord came upon him in power.”

O.K. STOP!! Can you honestly imagine what that must be like? How would you know? Is it possible that in our own lives, “the Spirit of the Lord has come upon us in power” and we missed it? Is it even possible to miss it? Or perhaps we must just simply claim it? (Matt. 16:19) At any rate, “it came upon” Sampson and he made a blood bath of 1000 Philistines with the jawbone of a donkey and followed it up with some heavy SMACK TALKIN: "With a donkey's jawbone I have made donkeys of them. With a donkey's jawbone I have killed a thousand men." (Judges 15:16) But in the midst of Sampson’s victory we very quickly see his humanity appear when he “cried out to the LORD, You have given your servant this great victory. Must I now die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?" (Judges 15:18) And God, as He did for His people in the desert provided Sampson with water from the ground.

My point is this; as Andy Stanley put it in his book Visioneering “Success has a way of weaning us off our dependence on God. In the throes of success it is easy to take responsibility for maintaining our success.” I think in that moment of thirst God was saying, “uh, excuse me my servant Samson, it was my Spirit which fell upon you, it was my power that led to the destruction of the 1000 Philistines, you are merely man and your dependence upon me is required in even the little things like this drink of water.”

Man did I ever need that punch in the face this morning.

a redirect

O.K. so it has been just over a month since we officially launched this blog, and much to my surprise we have had a good amount of traffic. We have a steady flow of people visiting the blog on a daily bases. Although still in its infancy, I want to in a sense re-route the direction of the blog as to align its purpose more closely to the vision God has given me for Man of Honor and to communicate those things that I am truly passionate about. The truth is God has laid a heavy burden on my heart for the souls of men and their role in the home, church, and community.

I am disgusted by the cultural shift from a God fearing nation to one that embraces a socialistic, secularist agenda and frankly believe it is high time that men answer the call of leadership and in a unified voice of believers proclaim the truth of Gods word boldly and unashamedly. Thus Man of Honor, a catalyst ministry of Men that commit to Honor God Mind, Body, and Spirit.

A little over two years ago God began the process of laying the foundation for a ministry that brought men together breaking denomination lines to answer the call to action. As we held our first MOH conference we saw 250 men from twelve different churches come together as one battalion in God’s army. What an awesome sight. Without question there is a stirring among the Men of our nation to take their place in something that thwarts the boundaries of career and success, that is bigger than themselves and that punctures the membrane of mediocrity and isolation.

Without question there are great ministries focused on the needs of men that offer excellent tools and resources for equipping and educating. But where is the edginess, the blood bath of battle on behalf of my family, my church, and my country? Where is the tactical and strategic battle plan that can stand toe to toe with the highly complex and coordinate secularist movement that seeks to spit in the face of God and re-define the Family? Where are the men who’s “faces are marred by sweet and blood” from the arena of this fight? This is my heart that seeks the what, but it is God who holds the HOW. And so in this time of waiting on the how, I will not waist time doing nothing but rather will pray and plan using this blog as a pivotal step of action

So, expect to see some edge. We will address issues in a way that perhaps might catch you off guard or just might leave you screaming out loud “YES!” We will have fun with this blog while seeking to speak truth and challenging the hearts of those who visit. We will take on pop culture and Hollywood and speak to it as our Savior spoke to the Pharisees calling them “a brood of vipers”. We will deal with the daily battle over a man’s Mind, Body, and Spirit, in an effort to claim victory in our Lord’s name. It starts now.

No more nice guys, it’s time to bring it, and bring it we will! Let your voices be heard. It is an open forum for comment. It is all our fight. It must be waged together.

I Corinthians 16:13 "Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be men of courage; be strong."

a crisis of belief

As a follow up to my last post, I found it to be very timely and applicable to our recent journey into the “Believing God” study put out by Beth Moore. Coming to know Christ as my savior at the ripe age of five, I have found myself on many occasion during my journey asking whether I truly believe God is who I say He is. Truth be told, rarely did my actions exemplify what I would have proclaimed my belief to be. To know and understand God’s holiness is one thing, but the personal application and or belief, well, that is whole other ball game. Frankly speaking, I believe that within the refuge of Christianity and church, we as men have a crisis of belief that is lived out in our actions or lack thereof and decision on a daily basis. But then is it fair to assume that our belief should be measured by our actions? I am afraid so.

Why is it that we are seeing a rising trend in middle aged men 30-40 enlisting in the military to fight the war in Iraq? It no doubt has everything to do with that stirring spirit of expectation, the expectation of being apart of something bigger than ourselves. It is that call of significance and of a life of meaning that is desired, but it must first start with belief a belief in the liberties and freedom that are granted to us as Americans. It is a transcendent belief that leads one to lay down his life in sacrifice for what he believes in.

So I ask you “Do you have that kind of belief in God”?

Reality says that belief is derived from knowledge or knowing. And so we find ourselves in a virtual paradox of balancing knowledge and faith in determining our belief. In a recent study of Nehemiah, it was said “we should know the personality of God so well that anytime anything is said in reference to Him it should resonate with us as to whether that is characteristic of who God is through scripture”. For me to truly believe God is who I say He is I must know Him like that.

To this I will submit the following: Knowledge and experience foster our belief, our belief will reveal our love, and our love requires action. Translated: For one to believe in God he must know who and what He is through His word and His moving in our lives. Within that knowledge and experience a deep and intimate love can be fostered for our Savior, and it is that commitment of love that will require daily action for which we will not hesitate, because we truly believe.

When we believe we speak truth. When we believe we obey. When we believe we protect. When we believe we love. When we believe we fight for truth. When we believe we are intolerant of our God being profaned. When we believe we ACT.

Let your action be the yard stick for your belief.

Credits: Beth Moore - Building new Walls

raising the bar

I Peter 1:16 “Be holy because I am Holy”

For past several months I have been enthralled in capturing God’s vision for our men’s ministry and laying the foundational ground work for His process us to get there. As a growing church with great vision God has set us on a transcendent course to impact our community like no other time in the History of our church. It is no secret that Satan has become agitated and increasingly threatened by the number of lives that have been changed through the grace of God and the ministry of our church as satan has waged war on the men of our church and their families.

Without question we have within our Brotherhood a stronghold of Godly men who are leaders in ministry, home, and the work place. Yet the numbers are few and the need is great. So I find myself asking the timeless question “where are the men”?

You see, the Vision God has set before our men is one of “Personal Holiness”. PERSONAL HOLLINESS. It is within the heart of those two words that the answer lies to the timeless questions of “where are the men”? As unfortunate as it may be, I believe the bar on personal holiness has fallen and now rests on the rung of “Christian Nice Guy” when it was God who called us to “Be holy because I am holy”. It is the very few that first, fundamentally understand God’s holiness and second impart it’s importance on their lives.

It is the bar of Holiness that must be elevated and captivated within the lives of our men if we truly strive to be Godly Men. To be holy is to be set apart, to be completely separated from sin. God’s holiness is complete moral perfection; His eyes can not even look on evil with any kind favor. Moses couldn’t so much as wear sandals in the Lords presence in Exodus 3:5 “for the place where you stand is holy ground.” I know, I know, “wow is that a high bar”, but it’s God’s bar and it is within His context of holiness that we then can build a foundation upon His call in Leviticus 11:44 “I am the LORD your God; consecrate yourselves and be holy, because I am holy.” For how can we consecrate ourselves as men we have not embraced the true Holiness of God.

We have to guard ourselves from gauging our bar of Personal Holiness against what seems holy compared to the world we live in. God’s standards of holiness are eternal and do not rise and fall on interpretation, trends, or morality.

It is with true personal holiness that we must start. As leaders once God’s standard has been set and the vision captured, we can then lay the framework for guiding our men to that place of Consecration.

I hope to share with you over the next few months the framework that the Lord has laid out for the men of our church in our pursuit of Personal Holiness.

God is our Mighty Warrior!

Credit: Al Houck - Inspiration

wrestling with god

“Then Jacob was left alone; and a Man wrestled with him until the breaking of day.” Genesis 32:24

Have you ever wrestled with God? I mean in the deepest part of your soul, just latched on and grappled for all you are worth?

I can recall as a young boy some of my fondest memories were wrestling with my father. I suppose in one since that rugged and tough essence of boyhood sought to test my strength and how I measured up. Yet in the midst of testing my strength I drew great comfort and security from the power of my fathers arms when in the end he over powered me.

Now I sit in the place of fatherhood, and experience great joy when my son, full of testosterone, in his most fierce growling voice, exclaims “daddy let’s westle”. So, like my father did with me, I lay low for a time letting him ruff me up.

See, it is during that time of struggle that I am teaching him to be strong, to persevere, to survive, and to trust, TRUST in my strength which is greater than his. It is during that time of struggle that we grow closer together.

So, there I sat one late Saturday afternoon, waiting in line to wash my truck. Finances had been increasingly tight and my last pay check had to stretch over two months worth of bills. With the prospect of writing a tithe check the next morning the match was on. Right there in my pickup God and I went at. I maid very clear to Him all the details He was quite obviously not aware of and His only response was “OBEY”! So being a salesman I dropped a little Sandler selling technique on Him and His response was again “OBEY”! In a last ditch effort I tried bargaining with Him, but this time He responded with “TRUST ME”. “TRUST ME”. And so it was with that utterance that I relinquished control and took great comfort in His strength and assurance all the while recalling the story of Jacob, and asking God to then bless me.

Then the man said, "Let me go, for it is daybreak." But Jacob replied, "I will not let you go unless you bless me." Genesis 32:26

My hope is that you have truly wrestled with God. That in the deepest part of your soul you have grappled with your Heavenly father. Because it is there in that place of vulnerability that we find security and comfort in the strength of His all powerful arms.