C2 Challenge???

Well for lack of anything really really profound to say today, I have decided to issue the following challenge to all of the bloggers in our growing community:

If you choose to accept this mission!

The challenge is simply this. We need to reach out in our sphere of influence, along with some good detective work and track down some of our brothers and sisters who came through what used to be known as Campus Connection and get them blogging. Couple of examples of folks I am looking for.

1. Robert "Dwayne" McDonald
2. Steve Motsinger
3. Micheal Croce
4. Bryan Hall
5. Amy and Bryant Knowles
6. Tara Estes ( even though I believe she is married now)
7. Reed and Tab Thomas- Sorry Reed but only posting comments does not count :)
8. Adam Carr- Caroline this is your project because you are better at giving instructions than me.
9. Scott and Andrea Hix

etc.

You get the idea. Find those folks and lets reconnect with some of these great people who were a part of all our lives for a brief period of time on that mountain.

check'em out now: New Life Campus Ministry

Long Look Back!!!

When I think about the people in our ever growing blogging community, I am amazed how God fit us together in such a unique way. I feel as if I have known many of you all my life to the point I can't remember how we met. I recall meeting Waxy at Cubbie's house and not liking her at ALL. But then God did something super natural and He formed a covenant friendship between Waxy, Cubbie and myself. We would sit in Cubbie's room for hours and just pray and intercede. Those two people won't believe it but it was those times that they taught me through their example of how to press into God's presence. They were the ones who helped lead me into receiving the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Thanks.

Rodney and Kim, I met through C2 and grew to love them even more on our Missions trip to Mexico. You guys were our partners in crime all over that country. APASCO RULES!!!
Kim even had the spiritual maturity to bring correction in my life and do it with love. Now all you know I received that word.... Right! NOT!!! And she was still gracious enough to accept my apology and year(or so) later. You got a good one Rodney!

RJ- A warrior in the natural and in the spirit. The perfect help mate to C and she is to you as well. Looking forward to going to war beside you my friend.

My Bride- What can I say that has not already been said. You are more beautiful to me now than when we first were married. You have spoken into my life more than I care to count. You love me with all my many faults. YOU are more precious to me than gold. Truly this man can call himself blessed because God gave you to me. LOVE YOU!

To all you numerous others friends who happened to wonder through Appalachian State ( 2 time National Champs) and intersect at a Church called Watauga Christian Center and be a part of Campus Connection, I say that I am blessed to know that God set me in the middle of a group of people who loved the Lord and desired to find His will for your lives. You blessed me then and you bless me now because I can look back, those many years ago and know that I am a better man because of those times/people in my life.

Spinning out of control

This whole blogging thing has taken on a life of its own for me. I am talking to people I haven't seen since college. I would have never thought that it would have grown like this. Funny how things work out...

Saint or Sinner

Donnie McClurkin has a song that he remade from another Christian artist whose name escapes me right now. The song is titled "We fall down". The chorus states "that a saint is just a sinner who fell down and got up".

I had a dream the other night that was quite strange and I did not realize the spiritual significance till later that morning. In the dream I was fighting these people/zombies with a sword. Some of my adversaries I was able to kill with one fatal blow. At times during the dream I was fighting multiple enemies, dividing my attention between them all but the result was the same. Defeat for my enemy. During those fights it became apparent that in some cases it required multiple strikes for me to defeat them. I don't recall ever receiving any injuries during my battles, but my final enemy during that battle did not come at me with an aggressive stance, but with beauty and cunning. I understood that this foe still needed to be defeated. I struck it multiple times in the neck expecting as before for its head to fall off. Unfortunately it did not. I had inflicted what could considered fatal blows but this foe was still alive. Holy Spirit revealed to me at this point that even though I have made progress in this area of my life, I have not yet cut off the head of the oppressor. I believe it serves as a warning and encouragement to me to not let my guard down for one moment.

So whether I fall or stand, run or walk, I will be the saint who was just a sinner that fell down and got up. Hope this makes sense. It is not often that the Lord speaks to me in dreams, but I felt it was significant enough to share.

There is a Friend...

Yes I know 2 posts in one night. Lots on my mind today. Need a place to express them. I am part of a writer guild at our church and I was looking over some of the things we did in a free write and this jumped out at me. My brother RJ is talking about going into warrior mode so this should fit quite nicely... I hope.

There is safety in numbers, never travel alone. A 3 fold cord is not easily broken. It is good to have friends because if they are true, they will walk through hell and back for you. We ask, how can I endure or how can I push on? If you want victory then you must take all other options off the table. Refuse to fail, refuse to be defeated. Find out what you are made of when your breaking point is exposed... Then go past it, exceed it and overcome it. Place me where the fight is the hottest and most difficult. I want the land where the giants walked... Bear down and break out for the through the dessert is the promised land and the weak will not get there unless they are willing to be transformed through the fire.

That is the kind of Warrior I want to be. I am not there yet. But I am headed in that direction.

Perfection

How do you define it? How do you achieve it? To whom do you ascribe this standard? I am in awe of how much I don't know about the Lord. My preconceived notions of what I thought was gospel and what actually is, has been blown apart. Which brings me to the title of this post. I can define perfection as being mistake free, without error or blemish. In my humanity I have sometimes placed that label of perfection on people I respected in the church. In my flawed thinking, if I could just be more "spiritual" like them then all my problems would be solved. Truth is, that was unfair of me to place such high and unattainable expectations on those people, because at the moment they failed to measure up, I was setting them and myself up a huge disappointment. It is my belief that we(I know I'm not the only one) have place these standards of perfection on our pastors and leaders in the church. And when they let us down it gives us the excuse to cut and run because we got our feelings hurt.

What makes me think that if I can't achieve perfection in this body that anyone else could. As church folk we have been real good at shooting our wounded. It is no wonder that the world doesn't want to be a part of the body. Why would anyone in their right mind want to be a part of something that is loving and encouraging one minute and shooting each other in the back the next. I admit it, I am guilty of doing the exact thing, which qualifies me to speak with authority on the matter.

So I have decided that as long as you and I can agree on Christ's death and resurrection and what that blood did for us, then the rest is not that important. I see through a glass darkly and I only know part of the story. There is power in my words and I choose to use them to speak life. God has convinced me that He knows what He is doing and that while He appreciates the advice :) He can handle it just fine. I am done making the gospel complex and unappealing. I am looking to the author, creator and finisher of my faith to perfect in me what I could not and would not do on my own. I hope this makes sense, I hope it brings comfort to all who read it. I've just made up my mind that it is time to start destroying the enemy and not those who labor beside me.

To be continued....

...And again I say rejoice!

Rejoice in the Lord always.... What does that mean? It has been a long week and I must say, 5:00 can't get here fast enough. Should I rejoice in that? Should I rejoice when we receive an unexpected financial blessing? Should I rejoice when someone gets healed or set free? To all those things the answer is a hardy YES! But what about the flip side? How about when there is no money to put food on the table or gas in the car? What about when a loved one is still lost in their sin. Or how about in the wake of the tragedy at VT? We, as Christians are commanded to rejoice in the Lord at all times and in every situation. The word rejoice means to take delight in, be glad or to be joyful. It also means to spin about. In other words when times are difficult we need to stand to our feet and rejoice( spin about ) praise Him with our bodies and make war in the heavenly realm. I have always been one who when things did not go my way, I would get into a serious funk and I would be difficult to be around. I am learning that at all times and in each challenge of life to rejoice and praise.

Sometimes God delivers us from the storm and sometimes He delivers us out of the storm. So we had better be prepared for both possibilities. Either way deliverance is coming.
Psalms 24:7-8

7 Lift up your heads, O you gates!
And be lifted up, you everlasting doors!
And the King of glory shall come in.
8 Who is this King of glory?
The LORD strong and mighty,
The LORD mighty in battle.