BLeach

Lunch With Ed

I had the privilege of eating lunch with Ed Stetzer today.  Very likeable guy.  And definitely very sarcastic!

The conversation confirmed my suspicions from watching him speak and reading his books.  The guy's a genius.  He rattled off stats, church history, and global trends like he was reading from an Encyclopedia.  Incredible retention.

My favorite quote from the day: Bad places make good soil.  As many aspiring church planters look to relocate to the fastest growing cities in America, our city sometimes feels like it's the fastest shrinking.  So cool though to see Jesus call missionaries to serve unique places.

I did ask Ed to link to me from his blog, but he quickly pointed out that I'm not doing anything cool enough yet.  Maybe someday:)

Championship City

For as long as I can remember, I've loved Detroit sports.  That's why this spring is starting to feel special.

The Pistons own the closest spot to my heart.  And during the last week they finally hit their stride against the Sixers.  Next up, the Orlando Magic in Round Two of the NBA Playoffs.  And if Sheed can take care of Dwight Howard we may see the Celitcs for the Eastern Conference Championship.  Just like the eighties:)  Can't wait for some revived visions of The Bad Boys vs. Larry Bird.

The Red Wings are cruising.  After cleaning up their sweep of the Colorado Halves Avs, a matchup with the Pittsburgh Penguins in the Stanley Cup Finals becomes more of a possibility.  And since Leah's a die hard Pittsburgh fan, that will add some flavor to our dinner discussions:)

The Tigers just swept the Yankees.  They're finally playing like the Playoff team that most of us thought they'd be.  They're scoring a ton of runs.  And if we can pick up a pitcher or two before the trade deadline I feel real good about our chances.

There's just one more Detroit team that I love, but since this post is about winning, victory, and potential championships, we'll keep them out of this post:)

It's raining jump-shots in Hockeytown where the Tigers are starting to roar!

Mythbusters: Going to Church

Each week we send an email newsletter to our church.  (You can subscribe on the home page of our website).  I usually write a personal note to the church to include with the e-letter.  Just thought I'd include this week's message on the blog:

Do you ever catch yourself using certain words or phrases that don't exactly mean what you're trying to say?  I do!  In fact, here's one of the popular phrases that I'm doing my best to unlearn.

I'm going to church.

Just take a minute to think about that phrase.  It assumes something about the nature of the church.  Doesn't it?

It assumes that church is a place I occasionally visit.  It assumes that church is a place where events take place.  It assumes that church is one isolated, compartment of my life: sometimes I'm at church, and sometimes I'm not.

But don't you see the problem?  The church isn't like that at all.  It's not a place that I can drive to or leave.  That's the building that our church owns.  That's the address where we gather each week.  But that's not the church.

We are the church.  You and me, and every other disciple of Jesus Christ; we are His Church.  We are His Church on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and on Sunday.  We represent Jesus to the world twenty-four hours a day.  We live to serve the mission of God seven days a week.  And then those of us who have made a commitment to this local church, Church of the King, gather together.  But here's the beauty of it.

We don't gather at the church.

We gather as the church.

I will probably still continue to use the wrong phrase from time to time.  For me it's even more challenging because I work "at the church." Ha!  But I'm going to work harder at dropping this phrase from my vocabulary.  And here's why.

If Church of the King is only about what happens on Sunday, we will be known mostly for our advertising.  But if our church is mainly about what happens Monday through Saturday in Metro Detroit, we'll be known for our action.

Our mission is to Connect our City to Christ.  That only begins when we gather.

It climaxes when we're sent.