Joshua’s Men

I recently received an email that had the above headline as the signature of the email.  It got me thinking about how we interact with God.  Through His Grace we are saved. What an awesome gift. A gift of life and eternal salvation. Not because we deserve it but because God wants to have a relationship with us. He knows we aren’t perfect so he’s given us a way to heaven.

Colossians 1:3-6
3We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, 4because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints— 5the faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven and that you have already heard about in the word of truth, the gospel 6that has come to you. All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and understood God’s grace in all its truth…..New International Version (NIV)

What does he want in return? Faith….faith that He is God, faith that you can’t do it alone and that you need to accept Him into your life…faith that you can turn your life over to him…faith that He can provide forgiveness.

Pretty simple, right? Easy…well, no. We struggle with this. We think we’re not worthy, we think we’ve done too many bad things, we think how could anyone love me.

God loves us all and through his Grace we can have a great and fulfilling relationship with Him. He chose us and He holds us blameless.

Ephesians 1:4
4For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight.

Ephesians 2:10
10For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

2 Thessalonians 2:13
13But we ought always to thank God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because from the beginning God chose you[a] to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth

I recently went on a mission trip to Ixtapa, Mexico.  As we were getting off the plane, my pastor leaned over to me and asked me to present a devotional to our mission group two days later.  This was my first mission trip, and I didn’t know what to expect and being asked to do a devotional took me by surprise.   I had no idea what I was going to say.

We spent the first day at a church plant in the mountains just outside of the city.  The area was extremely poor; no running water, no heat with clapboard houses of squatters.  The church was an awesome place.  It was a carport with plastic chairs with old sheets hung up to block the sun.  Although these people had no material possessions, they certainly had the love of God.

Our mission trip was planned for us to preach the Gospel and to do a vacation bible school, medical assistance and for us to help with painting and electrical wiring that needed to be done at a local seminary.  The more I thought and prayed about what I was going to say during the devotional, the more I was struck by the fact that we were there for a purpose and that we were actually an answer to someone’s prayers.

Imagine that; an answer to someone’s prayers.  How do you prepare for something like that?  What an awesome responsibility.  Would I say the right things when I witnessed?  Would I do the right things?  I decided that God put me here in this place, at this time for a reason and that he would provide what I needed.  So, I went to the Bible and here is what I discovered.

Acts 1:8
[Jesus said,] “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere — in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

1 Corinthians 2: 4
My speech and my proclamation were not with persuasive words of wisdom, but with a demonstration of the Spirit and power.

Ephesians 6:18-20
And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people. Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should.

As I read this scripture, I came to realize that God’s purpose is for us to grow our relationship with him and to spread His word. He gives us the tools and the confidence to do exactly that.

I now had the confidence to know that I would say the right thing because God was with me on every step. I had what I needed for our devotional time and I also had what I needed to witness on the mission trip.

We will be reading “The Next Generation Leader” by Andy Stanley for our November meeting.

Preparation for the meeting will take some planning.

Conduct an interview with someone you consider to be a good leader:

For the interview questions, draw from the five major segments of The Next Generation Leader.  Create a couple of questions from each category (Competence, Courage, Clarity, Coaching and Character).

If you would like to transcribe the interview that would be great, but it is not required.  Please be ready to share with the group what you learned about leading from the interview.

Our next meeting is Tuesday, November 17th at 6:00

We will be covering the book, “Becoming a Contagious Christian” by Bill Hybels. Our next meeting is Tuesday, October 20th at 6:00

Click here to download the application guide.

Click here to download the project guide.

You’ll need to use the application guide prior to the meeting in order to share with the group your evangelism outreach.  You’ll also need to spend some time in order to cleary communicate your testimony.

Our September meeting will be held on September 15th.  We will be reading, “Spitirual Leadership by J. Oswald Sanders”.

There are also a number of things to do prior to the meeting.  First, make sure to read the entire book.  Fill out the  application guide.  You can download it just by clicking the link.  In addition, your task is “intentional acts of service.” Do several clearly servant-oriented things before the next meeting. The key is that these intentional acts of service must not be part of your regular routine.”  There is a bit more on this and you can download the instructions, here.

See you all on the 15th.

Communicating For A Change

The project documents for month 5 can be downloaded from the links below.  Just click the links to download the information.  We are reading   The Pursuit of Holiness by Gerald Bridges.  See you at the May meeting on Tuesday, May 19th.

Month 5

Month 5 Project

I was recently in Clearwater, Florida where I had the opportunity to attend Sunday services at Lakeside Community Chapel.  The service was great and afterwards, I attended an awesome Bible study hosted by Bruce Mills.

Bruce has a blog at:  http://invertedplanet.blogspot.com

“Men who have turned the world upside down have come here… saying that there is another king, Jesus.” Acts 17:6-7 (ESV)

Inverted Planet

I highly recommended Bruce’s blog.

April is a big month for our group.  The application guide is not so much a reading guide as a set of questions for you to work through during the month. Working through these questions before hand will make all the difference in how meaningful the session is for you in April.  Find a way to work through this packet before we meet again.  The lesson guide is what we will be teaching on at the April session.  Start early as you cannot complete the pre-meeting guide in 20 minutes.  It will take you some time to consider the questions.  The more time you take preparing, the more you will get out of our meeting.

The book we will be reading is called Visioneering by Andy Stanley and is a fairly easy read. (Amazon link to Visioneering)  Our next meeting is April 21st. Be sure to connect with your prayer partner this month.

Documents you will need are linked below.  Just click on the link to download.

Month 4 Project

Month 4 Application Guide

Here are the files you will need for the study guide and meeting discussions for our 3rd month. The book to read for March is: Be a People Person by John Maxwell.
Discussion Guide
Lesson Guide
Project Guide