Coach’s Corner

Yesterday (2/12), I drove down to St Louis to attend a quarterly meeting of the Acts 29 Network of churches. It was a really good investment of time and I’ll share more on that later. But this morning, I want to describe to you some interesting insights I gained on the drive down.

CAN’T SEE A DANG THING!

I left early in the morning to head down. This was my first trip with a GPS in the car. It’s a really neat gadget, but I’m still partial to maps. (Is that just a guy thing?). Anyway, I fully intended to bring my map as a back-up, but somehow in my rush to get out the door, I forgot it. About 20 minutes into the trip I realized I didn’t have it. So now, I actually have to depend on the GPS. Throughout the 3-hour drive, there was a very light freezing mist falling. No big deal, but it would come up off the road when a truck was in front of you and mess up the windshield. For some reason, my window washers weren’t squirting, and I couldn’t clean the windshield off. Every now and then,I would get enough moisture on the windshield that it would clean up pretty good with just the wipers, but all-in-all, nothing too bad.

But the closer I got to St Louis, the heavier the traffic got. And the more traffic, the worse the windshield got. Finally, twenty miles outside of St Louis, I stopped at a station to clean the windshield. Guess what? The squeegees were frozen in the buckets. I had to drive the last 30 miles to my destination with almost no visibility out of my windshield.

LESSONS LEARNED

Most of this will relate to the GPS system. It may not mean much to you as you read it, but I can promise you, it meant much to me yesterday. It also reminds me that God can use almost any situation in life to teach us.

1. Total Trust- Without my map yesterday, I was left with no choice but to completely rely on the GPS system. I must tell you that was very unsettling for me. I have always prided myself on being able to find anything with a map. I’m comfortable with a map. GPS? Well, it’s cool in theory, but I have very little experience with it, so I’m trusting something I have very little track record with.

2. Noise - It was incredibly windy yesterday and the noise was pretty significant. With all the road and wind noise, I could barely hear the GPS telling me what to do. I had to turn off the radio and reduce the noise around me to the bare minimum in order to hear.

3. Can’t See - Because of my windshield, I was virtually driving blind. I could not read road signs until the last minute. I could no longer rely on my own senses to get me where I needed to go. I had to trust what the GPS was telling me about where I am and where I was going.

4. It’s the Small Turns That Confuse Us- I realized yesterday that I could cover lots of miles without the help of the GPS. While I was on the interstate, I knew exactly where I was and how much further I had to go. It’s when you get off the interstate, onto the side roads where there are lots of turns to navigate where we get lost. I could have gotten from here to St Louis yesterday easily without the GPS, but I would have never made it to my destination without it.

YOUR TURN (That’s the GPS talking)

Now, I could further elaborate and unfold all the spiritual principles in the four points above, but I’d rather you do that. What speaks to you from this list? What have you experienced that you can share here?

Yesterday (2/12), I drove down to St Louis to attend a quarterly meeting of the Acts 29 Network of churches. It was a really good investment of time and I’ll share more on that later. But this morning, I want to describe to you some interesting insights I gained on the drive down.
CAN’T SEE A [...]

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Yesterday (2/12), I drove down to St Louis to attend a quarterly meeting of the Acts 29 Network of churches. It was a really good investment of time and I’ll share more on that later. But this morning, I want to describe to you some interesting insights I gained on the drive down.
CAN’T SEE A [...]

Start uga_filter:

Some thoughts on today’s service:

Goofs - We started the morning with our worship guides in the trash can because they had the wrong date on them (my fault). They were ultimately rescued, but we looked a little foolish. I am glad though that we worship at a church that allows some mistakes. That makes us real. As the leader, I’m always striving to do the best I possibly can. But I’m pretty sure I never make it through a day without a mistake or two..(heck, I’m not sure I make it out of the first hour most days). We never want to be sloppy and accept mediocre, but perfection at the sake of heart and passion is cold and sterile. I’ll take a few goofs along the way.

Spirit - I’m not sure exactly what it is, but man, our response has been great during our music services all year long. There is power and energy and joy. I love hearing people SING! What’s really cool is how the spirit in the body encourages the musicians on the platform. It’s kind of like a crowd cheering on the team. They feed on each other. And in a spiritual setting, it raises the spiritual temperature in great ways.

Heat - The truth is that our building is really cool…in more ways than one. It’s been hard to heat. But this morning, the temp was really comfortable. Which is remarkable since it was in single digits outside (that has to be the result of sin). We owe that to the hard work of Jeff H. who crawled through ducts for over an hour looking for ways to redirect the air flow. I never cease to be amazed at the hard work that so many of you do behind the scenes.

Children’s Area - Totally dug the sign that Tim & Brooke made for traffic flow. It was inspired by similar signs at Starbucks. How can you argue with that as a source of inspiration?

Quote - Coach Greer did a great job with the message this morning as we broke into a new series - “In the Fire”. It’s a great follow-up to the last series of pursuing “something more and going B.I.G.”. I particularly liked the quote that he shared this morning:

• “Many an opportunity is lost because a man is out looking for four-leaf clovers.”

Wow, what a great insight. It reminds of another quote that says the “opportunity often comes disguised as hard work”. While we are often waiting and hoping for good things to fall in our laps, we fail to see the real opportunities to step out in faith and go B.I.G. because it looks a little too challenging. But God gives us opportunities, not ease. So here’s to a week of bad hunting for clovers, and great fortune at finding opportunities.

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Some thoughts on today’s service:

Goofs - We started the morning with our worship guides in the trash can because they had the wrong date on them (my fault). They were ultimately rescued, but we looked a little foolish. I am glad though that we worship at a church that allows some mistakes. That makes us real. As the leader, I’m always striving to do the best I possibly can. But I’m pretty sure I never make it through a day without a mistake or two..(heck, I’m not sure I make it out of the first hour most days). We never want to be sloppy and accept mediocre, but perfection at the sake of heart and passion is cold and sterile. I’ll take a few goofs along the way.

Spirit - I’m not sure exactly what it is, but man, our response has been great during our music services all year long. There is power and energy and joy. I love hearing people SING! What’s really cool is how the spirit in the body encourages the musicians on the platform. It’s kind of like a crowd cheering on the team. They feed on each other. And in a spiritual setting, it raises the spiritual temperature in great ways.

Heat - The truth is that our building is really cool…in more ways than one. It’s been hard to heat. But this morning, the temp was really comfortable. Which is remarkable since it was in single digits outside (that has to be the result of sin). We owe that to the hard work of Jeff H. who crawled through ducts for over an hour looking for ways to redirect the air flow. I never cease to be amazed at the hard work that so many of you do behind the scenes.

Children’s Area - Totally dug the sign that Tim & Brooke made for traffic flow. It was inspired by similar signs at Starbucks. How can you argue with that as a source of inspiration?

Quote - Coach Greer did a great job with the message this morning as we broke into a new series - “In the Fire”. It’s a great follow-up to the last series of pursuing “something more and going B.I.G.”. I particularly liked the quote that he shared this morning:

• “Many an opportunity is lost because a man is out looking for four-leaf clovers.”

Wow, what a great insight. It reminds of another quote that says the “opportunity often comes disguised as hard work”. While we are often waiting and hoping for good things to fall in our laps, we fail to see the real opportunities to step out in faith and go B.I.G. because it looks a little too challenging. But God gives us opportunities, not ease. So here’s to a week of bad hunting for clovers, and great fortune at finding opportunities.

Start uga_filter:

Some thoughts on today’s service:
Goofs - We started the morning with our worship guides in the trash can because they had the wrong date on them (my fault). They were ultimately rescued, but we looked a little foolish. I am glad though that we worship at a church that allows some mistakes. [...]

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Some thoughts on today’s service:
Goofs - We started the morning with our worship guides in the trash can because they had the wrong date on them (my fault). They were ultimately rescued, but we looked a little foolish. I am glad though that we worship at a church that allows some mistakes. [...]

Start uga_filter:

OK, you may think you’re on overload now, but I am finding so much helpful information that directly relates to our desire for “something more”, that I just have to share it. It won’t all apply to you, but if you discover one or two nuggets out of all of it that find a lodging place in your heart and soul, then I have served my purpose. I came across this over at Tony Morgan’s blog. The following are his thoughts (But I agree!):

The 4-Hour Workweek

I recently wrapped up The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss. This one was a stretch for me. The ultimate goal of the book is to help you become part of what Ferriss describes as “The New Rich.” That involves a combination of financial freedom and freedom from time constraints to be mobile–not tied to the responsibilities of your career. I, on the other hand, was more interested in the truths that might help me be more effective in my family and ministry roles.

Though I lost interest in chunks of the book, I pressed through and found some great insights that challenged me to revisit my priorities and how I invest my time. The book also provided a helpful reminder of how empty life can be when it’s void of the purposes God places on our lives.

That aside, here are some highlights from the book:

• “Finding a market before designing a product is smarter than the reverse.”
• “I can’t give you a surefire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time.” –Herbert Bayard Swope, first recipient of the Pulitzer Prize
• “‘Someday’ is a disease that will take your dreams to the grave with you.”
• “Measure the cost of inaction, realize the unlikelihood and repairability of most missteps, and develop the most important habit of those who excel and enjoy doing so: action.”
• “Being busy is most often used as a guise for avoiding the few critically important but uncomfortable actions.”
• “Problems, as a rule, solve themselves or disappear if you remove yourself as an information bottleneck and empower others.”
• “The vision is really about empowering workers, giving them all the information about what’s going on so they can do a lot more than they’ve done in the past.” –Bill Gates
• “People can dislike you–and you often sell more by offending some–but they should never misunderstand you.”
• “The more options you offer the customer, the more indecision you create and the fewer orders you receive–it is a disservice all around. Furthermore, the more options you offer the customer, the more manufacturing and customer service burden you create for yourself.”
• “People say that what we are seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think this is what we’re really seeking. I think what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive.” (which is another way of saying we are looking for “something more”)–Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth
• “Lacking an external focus, the mind turns inward on itself and creates problems to solve, even if the problems are undefined or unimportant. If you find a focus, an ambitious goal that seems impossible and forces you to grow, these doubts disappear.”
• “If you don’t make mistakes, you’re not working on hard enough problems. And that’s a big mistake.” –Frank Wilczek, Nobel Prize winner in physics

My prayer for Grovers (our affectionate term for people attending The Grove Church) and others alike is that 2008 will be the year that it all begins to click. I will keep supplying as much ammunition as I can, but you will have to pull the trigger…with God’s help.

I’ve highlighted the two bullet points that particularly speak to me. How about YOU? What smacks YOU between the eyes? Which ones do YOU see as nuggets of gold?

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