Against The Flow

A few “Working Together” quotes to start off the week.

‘Did you ever see an unhappy horse? Did you ever see a bird that has the blues? One reason why birds and horses are not unhappy is because they are not trying to impress other birds and horses.’ — Dale Carnegie

‘Make no judgments where you have no compassion.’ — Anne McCaffrey

‘If you want to move people it has to be toward a vision that’s positive for them, that taps important values, that gets them something they desire, and it has to be presented in a compelling way that they feel inspired to follow.’ — Martin Luther King, Jr.

‘Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them become what they are capable of being.’ — Goethe

‘Clothe yourself with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against each other.’ — Paul of Tarsus

The list below is By tony morgan on Inside GCC

If you aren’t receiving the WiredChurches.com weekly newsletter, you may not have heard about Mark Beeson’s unique messages from New Year’s weekend at Granger. Mark shared several examples of irritating things about Christians–five of them in each of the five services. Here’s a sample of the topics that he covered:

* Christians who think everyone else should be just like them.
* Christians who are lousy tippers.
* Christians who don’t move their faith one measly foot.
* Christians who major on the minors.
* Christians who think everything can be explained with a trite phrase or
a simple slogan.
* Christians who use “God told me” as a silver bullet.
* Christians who explain God by saying of God what God never said of Himself.

Amen! Any that you would like to add? Do so in comments

The following is from Pastor Scott Hodge on leadership. An issue that all church leaders need to address.

“What would you do if money and resources wasn’t an issue?”

I’ve heard that question before and have even been challenged by others to ask it of myself. It’s always sounded like a nice cliché or a real positive way to think. But lately I’ve begun realizing that this type of thinking is so much more than a clever cliché or an Anthony Robbins sounding quote.

In fact, I’m realizing that if we are really going to do something incredible in our community and beyond, this type of thinking is ESSENTIAL to me and to the organization that I lead. Absolutely essential!

Yet, if I’m totally honest with myself, I can see how there have been times that I’ve actually pushed away ideas and dreams because of where we’re at NOW or due to a lack of resources or talent on the team. In a way, I’ve said to myself, “Don’t dream about that now Scott… wait until we’re in a better place financially or wait until we have this team player or wait until such and such…â€?

What I’m realizing is that when it all comes down to it, vision/dreams/ideas almost ALWAYS precede resources – not the other way around.

Read that again.

THE “WHAT� FIRST. THE “HOW� SECOND.

Good funny from Team Swap

1. Most Christians will continue to complain about their suffering for God far more then they actual suffer for God
2. Church attendance will stay steady
3. Church participation will decline
4. The Goliaths that face most Christians will never be challenged, even though God has already defeated them
5. Mega churches will begin to discuss having their own sports leagues to compete against each other – suddenly Ex Pro athletes will join churches nationwide
6. Joel O will be banned from Aspen forever
7. Sunday school attendance will swell when the Baptist announces the new series – “Paris Hillton’s Bible Studyâ€? – the Paris Hillton of this series will be the daughter of a South Carolina pastor though – thus the different spelling of the last name.
8. Methodists will continue to have open minds
9. New seeker friendly pews will recline, Baptist deacons will vote for immediate installation
10. The KJV only crowd will finally read the front of their own translation and see that the KJV translator’s expected their to be updates and new translations due to better tools and new scripts, this of course will not matter as they will still sing – “If it was good enough for Jesus and John The Baptist it is good enough for me�
11. New text will show that the Da Vinci code was a complete fraud, but that will not make the news and many will still believe it to be true
12. The Chronicles of Narnia book sells will spike and C.S. Lewis will get banned from public schools, though Harry Potter will still be Ok
13. Leisure Christianity will be the title of the next big Christian movement in the US
14. Young Married classes world wide will swell when church youth departments start offering Friday night child care for “date nights�
15. Choir days will flop

Any you’d like to add to the list?

One of 63 quotes to be seen on Starbucks Coffee cups in 2006:

“You are not an accident….you were made by God and for God, and until you understand that, life will never make sense. Only in God do we discover our orgin, our identity, our meaning, our purpose, our significance and our destiny.” – Rick Warren, from his book the Purpose Driven Life

Truly a message to be shared.