Here is a link to a web site my wife came across the other day. CAUTION! Don’t got there yet… let me prep you as you may not want to go there. Trust me!

My wife met someone recently who is a volunteer photographer for a foundation called "Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep." I had no idea anything like this existed and it’s simply powerful. Perhaps there are photographers at your church who’d be willing to volunteer for something like this. I can think of few things more touching that this.

Here’s the deal. Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep is a network of volunteer photographers who go to hospitals and homes to take pictures of children who have passed away shortly after birth or are are going to die due to a complication or illness. Most of these parents will only enjoy holding their child in their arms for minutes to days and these photographers provide beautiful memories that the parents can cherish forever. These aren’t morbid or disturbing photos, but beautiful and touching scenes.

I’ll caution you though, viewing these photos will absolutely rip your heart out. If you’re up to it, I do encourage you to visit the link, view the pictures and read the stories from these parents who lost their children. I’m not an overly emotional man, but I was fighting back the tears. Sara and I lost babies at 8 and 10 weeks. When we got pregnant with Titus, we were on pins and needles at every doctor visit. On the day of delivery, I was holding my breath. I really knew he was going to be healthy and strong, but true joy and relief came when I saw him suck in air and let out that beautiful little cry! How precious is life? Isn’t it a miracle? I think I’m going to go grab my little boy out of bed and give him a hugs and kisses!

We’ve got a very big promotion coming up at Gateway Church. Very Big. Actually it’s so big that we’re going to host four parent meetings to explain all that is happening. To be honest, we don’t really need the parent meetings, but its another opportunity for me to speak vision to our parents, so we’re going to anyway.

• Currently we have four nursery rooms that are almost at capacity every weekend.
• Our preschool is overflowing. We have 20-25 kids in our Clubhouse (large group teaching area) and over 40 four and five year olds in our Cottage room.
• We have Kindergarten-5th grade split between two rooms.
• We offer Middle School only during our 12:30 service.

Our 9:30 and 11:00 services see similar sized crowds, but our 12:30 service has a fraction of the participants.

So, on August 24th, were making some big changes.

• We’re bringing in two portable buildings (yeah, they’re trailers) which will give us 4 more rooms.
• The kids in the clubhouse will move out to the portables
• The 40 kids in the cottage (who would be promoting kindergarten) will move to the portables.
• We’re launching a significant small group component to our 1st-5th grade rooms.
• We’ll be offering middle school during all the services (we’re giving them the cottage room)

It’s big changes for us, but we’re really excited. We’ve got a lot of fresh faces to recruit. It isn’t really any more kids (well, maybe some), it’s just more rooms and opportunities to serve. I’ll be keeping this blog up to date on our promotion efforts.

I think this is about the quietest I’ve been on the CMO blog since I came back in March. Sorry. I’ve got a whole bunch of posts swimming around in my head, I’m just saving them up! Actually, it’s been a pretty crazy 10 days.

• I got back from camp last week, on my little boy’s first birthday.
• We moved into our new house right before camp, so we’ve been unpacking a few boxes at a time… this is taking forever.
• Three groups with three different assignments. I’m in a small group with some men on staff. We’re reading a book of the Bible each week. This week is John. I’m in a spiritual development group with some guys I just met that’s been a lot of fun. We have some exercises to do every week along with some scripture memorization. As a staff we’re reading a few chapters every week from "Transforming Discipleship." So, I’m in a lot of meetings right now.
• Over the weekend my brother came in town and we hung out a lot. On Monday I took the day off and went to a huge Texas water park (haven’t you heard, everything is bigger in Texas) with my family.
• On Sunday I made the announcements, introduced myself and shared some vision for the CM at all three of our services.
• Last Friday I had an intern arrive. He’s staying at my house this summer.

Last week I wrote a post entitled two truths and a lie. It was fun to see what you guys thought was the lie. Well, here goes. Since each of them have a bit of a story behind them, I’ll tell that too. I’m sure you’re not going to let me get way with not telling you about the cobra or the staple.

Okay, truth number 1: When I was 17 years old I was on a mission trip in India. I was there for two months. After the first month, the 7 or 8 of us that were there for the full summer took a quick little vacation to Madras (no longer called Madras I think). One day while there, we rented mopeds. It was near the end of the day and I was bringing the moped back into town. We had just finished watching a Cobra and mongoose fight and it was starting to get dark. As I was driving down the road, I saw a squiggly line in the road. I got a little nervous as to what it might be. As I got closer, my fear was confirmed, it was a snake. Since I had a girl riding on the back of my bike, I was afraid to run over it… I just didn’t want to get that close to a potentially deadly snake. So I swerved. By swerving, I wrecked the bike and we tumbled off right toward the snake. As I got my bearings, I found the snake. It was a few feet away from me. It’s head popped up and the signature hood flared out… yes it was a cobra. I had been told earlier that if bitten by a cobra, fatality within minutes is almost certain. Just at that moment, a friend pulled up to help us (he didn’t know “why” we wrecked). Unknowingly he pulled up right next to the cobra and the snake began climbing up the wheel of his bike and up the handle bars. We shouted at him to get off the bike just in time. Several locals who observed this whole thing came to the rescue. They grabbed the snake from behind the head, killed it and set it on fire. I was a little shocked and a little bloodied from wrecking only wearing sandals, shorts and a tank top. But, I was alive. I have a really gross story about later that night that involved my wound, bedbugs and a shower, but I’ll save that for when we meet in person.

Truth number 2: A few years later I was in college. I went to a Christian college and no drinking was involved, I promise. It was late at night and a bunch of guys were in the dorm just joking around. Then I thought of something funny to liven the mood even more. I had seen someone do something really fun with a staple gun. You know how when you pull the trigger on a staple gun, it makes the loud pop even if it is not loaded. I watched these guys take pieces of paper and “fake staple” them to their foreheads. They took paper, put a staple in it and put some sticky tape on the back. They would stick the paper (sticky side to their head) and staple (with no staple in the gun) it to their head. With the staple sound, it was really funny. I ran to my dorm room, grabbed an index card, a stapler (I didn’t have a staple gun) and some tape. I did this little trick for my friends and they thought it was pretty funny. They wanted me to do it for another friend who was in his room studying. However, they also noticed that it wasn’t very believable as after I “stapled” the card to my head, there wasn’t a staple ” in” the card. So, before I did my stunt for my other friend, I ran back to my room, loaded the stapler and put a staple in the card so at least it would look like I had stapled it to my head. I quickly ran to my friends room and said, “Hey, I gotta show you something.” I then proceeded to “staple” the card to my forehead (mind you, I wasn’t gentle either since it was a trick.) It didn’t take me very long to notice the error in my plan. When I put the staple in the card, I had forgotten to take the staples out of the stapler. Yup, I put an actual staple in my head. It didn’t really hurt that bad and the ends didn’t close in on itself, so I didn’t have to work to hard to remove it. I did have two little marks on my head for the next few days. My pride was hurt more than my head.

My Lie: This past December I was at Disney. The shuttle was set to take off while we were there. We found a good place to sit and wait. But it never happened. There was an issue, so it didn’t take off.

Well,that’s it. Thanks everyone for playing!

I took one class at college in hermeneutics. I actually really enjoyed the class. I knew that it wasn’t likely that I’d be using my new hermeneutical skills on a regular basis when preparing preschool lessons, but I saw great application for my own personal knowledge and development. One of the key skills taught in hermeneutics is studying the verse in context. When looking at a particular passage, we would have to outline in detail the entire chapter in addition to a less detailed outline of the entire book. The context of the book, the chapter and surrounding verses can have a profound impact on the passage being studied.

Like I said yesterday, we’ve been looking at The Great Commission in our staff meetings. Usually people quote this passage using only verse 19 or sometimes 19 and 20. It also isn’t’ unusual for people to begin their quote starting with verse 18.

However, keeping the rules of hermeneutics in play, the passage of “The Great Commission” actually begins in verse 16. I’ve read the book of Matthew at least dozens of times, but two weeks ago I noticed something I’ve never noticed before. It’s in verse 17. I’ll quote both 16 and 17.

16 Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted.

Do you see it? What the heck? Who doubted? Was it Thomas again? There must have been someone else as well if it says that “some doubted.”

It amazes me. These 11 men saw miracles performed by this man. These 11 performed miracles in his name. They witnessed his brutal crucifixion. Then they witnessed his resurrection. And here we are several weeks later and some doubted??? I don’t get it.

I seem to recall that this isn’t a first time occurrence. How often did the Israelites complain against God after they saw him smite (I love using that word) the mighty nation of Egypt. Moses went up the mountain for a little while and his people turned toward worshiping idols in his absence. How does this happen?

Here’s what I’m coming to realize. We’re a stiff-necked people! If I had been one of the 11, I might have been a doubter. Maybe you would too. Don’t deny it, look what happened to Peter when he denied similar accusations. I’ve encountered grace so amazing and have experience the power and love of the God who created the universe, yet why don’t I love him more? Why do I find it so difficult to spend time with him? Why don’t I love others more? Does this put me in the same camp as the doubters? Maybe.

Just something to chew on today…

Technorati Tags: Great Commission, Doubt

A few months ago I helped my wife set up her own blog. Once it was up, she immediately wrote four or five posts. She added her website to her facebook profile and within hours the traffic started coming.

After a day or two, she came to me with a scowl on her face. She asked, “why are all these people visiting my site (I set her up with analytics), but no one is leaving any comments?”

I smiled and said, “join the club! Everyone who blogs wants more comments on their posts.”

It’s kinda just the way it is. Lots of people read, few respond. My question is simple. Why? Why is the percentage of readers who comment so small?

Here are the reasons I came up with:

• Readers don’t connect with the content. I’ve been known to skim over a paragraph or two. I guess that is why short posts are highly encouraged (something I’m working on).
• Readers don’t want to comment. I’ve been on many sites with the attitude, “I’m just looking.” I guess that’s fine. If I had to comment on everything I read online every day, I’d be spending a lot of time commenting.
• Readers don’t feel they have anything worth adding. Been there too. I’ve read some great posts but just didn’t feel like I had anything worthwhile to add. What’s the point?

My response? If you don’t connect, then I see no reason to comment… unless you’re a very honest reader and you want to let the blogger know that their post just put you to sleep. Harsh maybe, but honest. If you’re just looking for info and don’t have time to comment, then I understand that as well. However, if you don’t feel like you have anything to add, you’re completely wrong. I’d encourage you to at the very least post a comment like “I agree or here’s how I experienced that.”

Most bloggers expect/like comments. It’s the only good feedback we get. We can tell when a post generates a lot of traffic, but we don’t know if it’s becasue the post was inspiring or it was so dumb, readers are sending their friends to it for a good laugh. Even a simple, one liner is better than nothing. As a reader, it’s the least we can do.

Anyone agree? Dissagree?

So, the challenge I’m throwing out. Comment more! If you’re not a blogger, comments are you’re way of geting your thoughts and ideas out there.. without having a blog of your own. If you are a blogger, it’s a little of the “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

So, I’m challenging myself to be mindful of the blogs I’m reading, to post a comment where initially I didn’t give it a thought. If everyone did a little more commenting, we’d have significanlty more information out ther for the benifit of everyone!

Lately I’ve been a crazy reading man!

I just updated the ‘Books I’m Reading" and Books I’ve Read" widget on the right. Unfortunately I’ve been reading Bringing Up Boys for over a year now (I need to either just wrap that one up or take it off my list). I’m about three chapters away from finishing "Wild at Heart: Discovering the Secret of a Man’s Soul." I’ve got some blogs coming out in the next few weeks addressing this book. It’s been hitting me on so many different levels, both personally and vocationally. In the last two weeks I devoured Patrick Lencioni’s books "The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable" and "Death by Meeting: A Leadership Fable…About Solving the Most Painful Problem in Business." I have upcoming posts on both of these books as well. As a staff at Gateway, we’re reading "Transforming Discipleship: Making Disciples a Few at a Time." It’s a major focus for us, so I’m sure I’ll have many posts interacting with this one. Next week, however; I plant to dive into Covey’s "The SPEED of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything." After that, I’ll still have two more books that Nancy Ortberg told me to read while at Orange (I just haven’t listed them on the widget yet… I have too many "Books I’m Reading" there already). Last of all, I’ve still got the book "In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day: How to Survive and Thrive When Opportunity Roars" that I’ve only read one chapter of. So, I’ve got a lot of reading to do….

So, if you’re interested in reading any of these books, I’ll let you know what I think in the coming weeks. If you’ve read some of them, I’ll look forward to your comments!

Sorry it’s been kind of quite on the blog lately. As most of you know, I started my new job as Next Generation Pastor at Gateway Community Church last week. It was a great first week. Really, of the first weeks I’ve had with new jobs, it definitely ranks at the very top.

On my first day in the office, I came with a suitcase. Yeah, the first time I’ve done that. We left that day for a Texas Large Church forum in Dallas, TX. The forum was pretty good, but I had a lot of time to get to know fellow staff members who I’ll be working with. I roomed with the new Student Pastor (he’s a trip) and got some good hangout time with everyone. Even got out one night to see Iron Man with Chad (the student pastor) and both of the people I report to. Fun!

Thursday was my only day in the office last week, and it was a busy one! I’ll write more this week about some great things I’m learning from my new church, from my new job, and from some great books I’m reading right now.

Since I left Orange a few days ago, I’ve been traveling from Atlanta to Austin. Now my wife, my 11 month old boy and 70 pound chocolate lab are settled in an Extended Stay in Austin as I’m now up in Dallas, TX. Yesterday was my first official day as the Next Generation Pastor at Gateway Community Church in Austin, TX. I spent the Sunday morning at both the South and North Campuses just checking things out and getting a feel of what is going on. After church, we drove around for several hours looking at neighborhoods (we really don’t want to make our Extended Stay visit extended). Lastly, we wrapped up the day with a leadership community meeting at the church with the Children’s Ministry volunteers.

This morning I took off for a two day gathering in Dallas, Texas. Eleven or so churches are gathering for the Texas Larch Church Forum where other large, like-minded churches will discuss issues, successes and strategies in a variety of ministries and departments. So, it should be a great time to get to know members from my team as well as connect with others in my area of ministry.

I should have some time to catch up on a couple of posts I’ve been meaning to write. I posted like crazy during Orange and I’d like to write some closing thoughts about Orange. Good stuff!

Okay, probably one of the most embarrassing things happened tonight. I’ve been hanging out at Orange with an old friend… a youth pastor I served with several years ago. Like many youth pastors, he’s a little crazy and not afraid to make a little noise.

Well, for the first two sessions we sat up high and in the back. For the third session I sat with my youth pastor friend and some others in the front on the far left-hand side of the stage. So, were were pretty close to those on the stage. They were good seats.

Well, Reggie was making some general announcements and then he threw a t-shirt out to the crowd directly in front of him. At that very moment, the YP friend sitting right next to me yelled as loud as he could “Hey Reggie!” He was trying to get his attention to get a freebie thrown in his direction. Since we were so close, he heard, turned to us and said “Yes?” I don’t think he immediately understood. At that moment, the band started playing the old batman theme. Reggie turned around to the band and signaled for them to stop… it wasn’t time for that.

Yeah. My friend yelling at Reggie and him responding confused the band into thinking it was their signal to start the song for a segment that wasn’t supposed to happen for another 10 minutes or so. I think I turned 10 shades of red and shrunk down in my seat.

So, on behalf of my friend, I’m so sorry. Next time my friend has a urge to yell at the person on stage, I’ll knock him in the back of the head!