2:47b

Acts 2:42-47 [42] And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. [43] And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. [44] And all who believed were together and had all things in common. [45] And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. [46] And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, [47] praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

Every church has its strengths and its weakness (um - opportunities for improvement).

Journey has so many strengths, many of which are found in Acts 2:42-47

·         We are serious about knowing and obeying the Word of God.

·         We regularly see the power of God expressed among us.

·         We are generous with each other.

·         We have a good name in our community.

·         We...

But Journey has never been GREAT at seeing people in our community come to faith because of our witness and then grow in their faith as they join us as a faith family.  Oh, we see people come to faith from time to time and there a lot of Journeyers who actively share the gospel with others, but I long to see Acts 2:47b be something that is true of Journey - "And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved."

I take full responsibility for not leading us well enough in this area. A significant focus for me these days is to do a 180 in this area and lead us toward being a church that Acts 2:47b is true of.

My challenge to those of you who call Journey your home is to take up your responsibility to make this true of us as a church. Start to pray for 2:47b to be true of us, and take advantage of future training toward a 2:47b reality.

Will you join me in hungering and praying and working for GREAT?  GREAT is possible because we have a GREAT God who has made this promise: Acts 1:8 “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth (and Greece NY).”

                                                         

(And a bonus challenge for those of you heard my sermon on Sunday.  Question - "So, what are you called to do?"  Answer - "I'm called to raise my sail.")

Correct, Clear, and Compelling (powerful stuff)

There are a number of things that I want to accomplish with this blog.  One of those things is to expose you to various speakers and authors that would be healthy for you to hear and read.  Personally, I love being introduced to a new author or speaker who God uses to impact my life.  I find that these people have 3 things in common.  

·         They are Correct regarding truth.   

·         They are Clear in the communication of the truth.  

·         And they are Compelling as they relate the truth.

Francis Chan is a speaker and author who does all 3 very well.  I commend him to you and offer you the following video as a taste.

3:21

Video Announcements (really?)

Announcements.  They’re a part of almost every church worship gathering in every church and they really have very little (well, really nothing) to do with worship.  So, why do we do them? Well, we need to communicate (but we do have the website, and the bulletin, and the church mailboxes, and tables in the foyer, and mailings, etc.…you get the picture).  It seems that there are some things that we just want to highlight on a Sunday morning - for our faith family and for guests. So, it seems that there is place for Sunday morning announcements.  The question is, how do we do them, and if you are a regular at Journey, you have seen the shift to video announcement.  Now change can be hard and I want to help you along in this transition time. So I have listed below the reasons for our shift. 

1 - Sticky – Our first reason for video announcements is that they are sticky.  You may debate that, but it is my opinion that tight video announcements accompanied by well thought-out words do stick well. (They’re memorable.)

2 – Time Efficient – Our second reason is the efficient use of time.  We want to use our 75-miuntes of worship time for worship.  The video announcements take 2 – 3 minutes.  We are happy with that.

3 – Multigenerational – Our third reason is multigenerational involvement.  The video format enables us to use everyone from children to senior citizens for announcements. (I was thrilled to see two of our junior high gals doing the announcements several Sundays go.) (Let me also point out that the number of people we can use for announcements increases as we bypass the fear of getting up in front of a large number of people.)

There is it – the rationale behind the move.  You may still not be convinced, but I hope you understand that this was not a move without thought.  And I hope you will come to enjoy this new announcement format.  (Hey, if you want to do the video announcements some Sunday, just let me know and I’ll hook you up.)

I have been resisting writing a blog for several years now.  People kept telling me that it would be a good thing for me to do, and I kept thinking that it would be another thing that I needed to do. My “To Do” list is already long enough.  (When a “To Do” list is a document that involves stapled pages, it has reached “too long”.)  So why am I starting a blog now? Well, as I laid in bed the other night thinking about things I would like to share with our faith family, it occurred to me that a blog would be a great outlet for this, and all of a sudden I heard myself saying, “Steve, you should write a blog”.  So, here’s the deal.

I plan to post at least twice a week.


I plan to post about what is going on at Journey, what’s going on with me personally, and things that I would just like to pass along (other articles, videos, etc.).

I hope that this will be helpful to us as a faith family.


And I wish my high school English teacher could see this post.  He would be shocked that I finally learned to write.


And the title of the blog – “…taking every thought captive…” comes from II  Corinthians10:5.  It is my hope that the words I share will be helpful for us to bring our thinking in line line with the mind of Christ.