Thursday, April 26, 2007

My Transition

In about four weeks I will be heading back to Indiana. There have been a lot of interesting developments that have led to this transition. I just want to take this time to thank the Lord for my time in NC and I can't wait to see how God is going to work in me and through me next.

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

My Winning Streak pt.1

In baseball or in any sport for that matter we have winning streaks, where a team will win two or more games. Now if you're a Cubs fan you're used to the losing streak but we're not talking about that today. What I really want to talk about is how can you judge a team's success? You judge mostly by the points produced but you also judge on the team chemistry. You could site team after team with players who take away from the team chemistry and make the show all about them and that team struggles. That person might be the best at their position but when the team does not perform the best because they are concerned with other things the chances of a Win or even a Winning streak are greatly diminished.

So what about the Church? Can the Church have a Winning streak? I guess first, to quote Andy Stanley's book 7 Practices of Effective Ministry, "you need to determine what your win is."
So here is my question for this beginning discussion is what is your Win in ministry?

I'll tell you what I view as a win for me. Ultimately it's someone coming to Christ. If they can come to saving knowledge of Jesus then I've done what I needed to do (along with help from the Holy Spirit) to get the win. Another win for me is to see a kid "get it". If you've ever taught teenagers something and they understood what you were saying and put it into action, essentially getting the concept you taught, there is not much of a better feeling. Third, when a parent thanks you for your investment. How great it is when you hear from someone so close to a kid that you're making a difference. So those are my Wins...if I can see those in ministry I see a win...so what about you?

Preview: Next time pt. 2 of My winning streak: Team Chemistry and it's role in the Win
pt. 3 Is it fair to judge a church like you judge a team?

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

My Theological Worldview

So this morning I found a little quiz that you can take to discover or I guess better understand your theological stance. The Quiz is titled What is your theological world view? Maybe it is that I was raised in the Wesleyan Church after my conversion or maybe it was going to a Wesleyan school but it turns out my theological world view is Wesleyan/Evangelical Holiness. Now whether or not that means I'm sticking close to the "big T" tradition of the church (Thanks Dr. Bounds) remains to be seen from this quiz. I guess I was really surprised by what finished second on my quiz. Emergent/Postmodern. Now I feel a leaning toward that mindset but I just thought it was because my friends were but when I read these questions and answered them honestly turns out I have some of that POMO or Emergent in me!!! Just so everyone knows I'm more Catholic than I am Reformed, and it looks like I might now ever really be a Fundamentalist.

To be honest I knew that I believed the Wesleyan theological world view more than others but it was fun to answer the questions with my theology professor's voice in the back of my head saying "Micah make sure you stay within the big T tradition of the Church." And I know that not all theological perspectives aren't available but it is quiz to take some time away from the boring office hours. So What is your theological world view? Anything surprise you?