Buried Treasure

Posted October 26, 2008 by Chris
Categories: Belief, Context, Creativity, Life, Message Series

I’m sitting in my office after leading worship in the last of the three services for today and I am incredibly excited about the future of Lifepoint and the plans that lay ahead. The main song for this series is “God of the City”. I love the fact that the song describes that “greater things are yet to come and greater things are still to be done in this city”.

As each one of us listens to our own hearts and then follows the plans and ideas that we hear, greater things will be done. God doesn’t lead people to a life of mediocrity. Instead, He leads people to live a life full of greatness. Few decide to follow His lead, but those who do enjoy more than just the immediate benefits of being a part of something new, fresh and good.

The greatest benefit is in knowing yourself and following yourself – win or lose, gain or fail. The willingness to take a step of faith into an unknown arena is the willingness it takes to really live a life worth living. In fact, I wouldn’t want to have it any other way!

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UGA and LSU

Posted October 25, 2008 by Chris
Categories: Georgia Bulldogs, Life, Me

OK, had to post about this great game between UGA and LSU. Both are great teams; both are great SEC teams; and both really wanted to win this game. By far, the most memorable moment was right after one of the commentators proclaimed that Matthew Stafford could not give the ballto Knowshon Moreno. If Stafford did give the ball to Moreneo, LSU’s defense would stop him. The words had no more left his mouth than Matthew gave the ball to Knowshon and Moreno ran through LSU’s defense down the field.

The score was high on both sides. Georgia scored more that they had ever scored in a game at LSU. To be fair, LSU’s red-shirt freshman quarterback Lee did a good job in keeping momentum when he was playing as quarterback. This was a great game to watch. I particularly liked watching Matthew Stafford. He showed just how good he can be. Incredible arm, aim and focus. In spite of the fact that a good number of LSU fans were in the parking lot on the way home, the game ended with just as much enthusiasm from both teams players as it had begun with.

All said and done, another great Saturday of college football in Georgia!

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Tribes

Posted October 24, 2008 by Chris
Categories: Books I'm Reading, Context, Goals, Influence, Leadership, Life, Starting, Vision

I just finished a new book by Seth Godin. Seth is one of my favorite authors. In just about every case, every book of his that I have purchased has been outstanding. Tribes takes the cake. This is one book you simply must at least give a glance over – I’m certain that you’ll buy it if you glance at it! You would think, at first, that the book would be about Tribes, or a “fable” about a tribe (fables are all the rage now in business writing). You may even think that perhaps Seth is interested in setting up his own tribe. You would be wrong.

Tribes is about you. Tribes is about your inner struggle to become “you”. The book incessantly makes you look at yourself and ask “Why are you not doing what you know you want to do?” Then, before you have a chance to bring up a reason, he’s already told you why the excuse you’re about to give isn’t good enough to warrant inaction.

I’ve begun reading it again and will probably read it several more times. I found myself reading a paragraph or page and then closing the book to think. Then I would read a little bit more and think some more. To say that this was a book whose timing was perfectly matched to my own individual circumstances would be an understatement. The great dividend of this book is that I would bet that I’m not the only person to have those thoughts.

If you have an idea in your mind and have found reasons not to pursue it, read Tribes and then go do it!

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Paradoxes in Life

Posted October 23, 2008 by Chris
Categories: Awareness, Creativity, Life, Rhythm
Tags: , ,

One of the blogs I look at frequently is the Happiness Project, in one post the discussion of the paradoxes that keep coming up in life was particularly insightful. The opposite of a great truth is also true. I try to embrace these contradictions:
1.Accept yourself, but expect more of yourself.
2.Keep an empty shelf, and keep a junk drawer.
3.Take yourself less seriously—and take yourself more seriously.
4.Use your time efficiently, yet make time to play, to wander, to read at whim, to fail.
5.Think about yourself so you can forget yourself.
6.The days are long, but the years are short.
Often, the search for happiness means understanding both sides of the contradiction.
Take, for example, Item #1 above. W. H. Auden articulates beautifully this tension: “Between the ages of twenty and forty we are engaged in the process of discovering who we are, which involves learning the difference between accidental limitations which it is our duty to outgrow and the necessary limitations of our nature beyond which we cannot trespass with impunity.”

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Opportunity of a Lifetime

Posted October 22, 2008 by Chris
Categories: Awareness, Belief, giving, Influence, Lifepoint, Vision
Tags: , , ,

There is so much excitement in my heart as I begin to think about this coming Sunday. I’ve talked to several people who call Lifepoint their home, and they are excited as well. This past Sunday a large vision was cast for a more interactive and integrated 2009. More work with the community; more work with the disenfranchised; more work with the less fortunate and more work to make the community of Middle Georgia a better place to live and make a difference.

The most glaring challenge was to come together and give $75,000 over and above the regular giving, to begin to fund the incredible endeavors of next year. So much is going on in the world and in the church that we need to be more aware than ever before of opportunities to make a difference.

More incredible than anything else is the great knowing that I have of the true impact of our actions – as we give we become a part of the fulfillment of the commandment of Jesus that we “love one another as ourselves”. In the days and months to come, the “change” we’ve heard so much about from both candidates can only truly be realized as each of us look into our heart and see where our “treasure” should be. Then we can and will see palpable change!

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What Is Poverty?

Posted October 20, 2008 by Chris
Categories: Awareness, Belief, Context, Creativity, giving, Influence, Kingdom of God, Life, Lifepoint, People, Uncategorized, Vision
Tags: , ,

Sunday night is a time that a group of people from Lifepoint go out to a place in Macon on Cherry Street and 3rd called the Fountain. There is obviously a Fountain there – although it doesn’t work – and it is a time and place for a meal to be given to those who otherwise would likely go to bed hungry. The most incredible thing is that the relationships that have developed are little miracles happening throughout the week.

Previously I posted about Kamara, who is a part of the gathering at the Fountain. This Sunday I was unable to make it to the Fountain and, because he’s my friend, sent word to let Kamara know why I wasn’t there and that I was thinking about him. This kind of consideration is something that I take for granted, but it had a great impact on Kamara. He was blown away that I would be concerned about what he thought and me not showing up on Sunday night. Poverty is living without friendship. When Scripture says for us to love our neighbor as ourselves, it is giving us the opportunity to enrich those around us with the gift of friendship.

This need for friendship is why sites such as Facebook and MySpace are so popular. The currency of friendship never loses value and will withstand any economic crisis. Watch this video and understand that the gift of friendship is the most valuable commodity on the planet.

[this is a repost – the video had problems]

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It Begins – Hunting Season 08-09

Posted October 19, 2008 by Chris
Categories: Me, Rhythm
Tags: ,

yes, this is me last season

Hunting season has begun, and I am happy. I could stop typing and let those words say it all, but I won’t. Hunting season is a time for me to take a moment and integrate a little more space into an already full life. One of the best things about hunting season is that it comes for a few months and then it is gone. The short time given to hunting deer in Georgia, also gives the hunter time to let the desire to hunt build in the early fall.

Yes there will be ungodly early mornings and bitter cold and rain, but there will also be so much more. There is nothing like seeing the sun rise perched up in a tree alongside all the other forest animals, nor is there anything like watching the last rays of that same sun fall below the horizon and hear the forest settle down for the evening. The smells are inescapable and the sight of creatures in their element is testimony to the greatness and creativity of the God we serve.

I can’t wait to see what this season holds, and what new and amazing thing will happen to me. People have many opinions about hunting, but the one thing that we all have to agree on is that nature in it’s wildness and beauty is as unexpected as the lives we all so desperately seek to live.

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Bulldogs and Vandy

Posted October 18, 2008 by Chris
Categories: Belief, Georgia Bulldogs, Leadership, Life, Me, Sports
Tags: , ,

Well, well, well. I had to digest and recuperate a little before I posted this. As you know, I am a fan of the SEC’s most scrutinized and hardened team – the Georgia Bulldogs. Some may have their opinions, but mine is firm “Glory, glory to Old Georgia!”. In a quirk of heavenly fate, I was allowed the esteemed pleasure of actually attending this game in person. It happened to be Homecoming, so it was even better.

This was my seat:

                       

As for scrutiny of the game itself, the Dawgs could have played better, Stafford wasn’t on his A game, but that didn’t matter – Georgia shut the “Dore'” on Vandy and won. The other fact was that this was my first “live” Georgia game, so I was a little preoccupied looking…I mean gawking at everything. I truly felt like Moses at the Red Sea. The only difference was that I didn’t want it to part open for me, I just let it swallow me up.

                       

There is something pristine and “right” about college football. Many have tried to define it and have left their readers poor for lack of words to explain the unexplainable. For me it has to go back to the essence of sport. These guys are competing for glory, not money. They are going out in the field to execute the plans and strategies of others. Mark Richt doesn’t play football, neither do the Defensive or Offensive Coordinators or their staff. It is the players themselves who go and put their all on the line, fighting for ten more yards.

In life, as leaders, we have to always understand that strategies and vision are great, but it is the people we lead who go out and seek to execute. Execution is the only way to win. On the field and in life, whatever stage of life, we must “Finish the Drill!”

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Eli Stone

Posted October 14, 2008 by Chris
Categories: Awareness, Belief, Context, Creativity, Cultural Ideas, Life

Got to see the premier of the show, Eli Stone, tonight. I was floored. The preface of the story is that a lawyer has had an aneurysm that has given him hallucinations -but they have been truthful premonitions. He had the aneurysm removed and the erratic behavior stopped.

The great point for me was that the head of the firm, in remembering the “old” Eli, said that he had done all he could to make the firm a machine that worked like clockwork. Along came Eli and brought chaos to his previously ordered life. The strange thing was that the head of the firm, along with other co-workers, missed the “old” Eli and his behavior. Somehow, the chaos had given them all a sense of purpose. With the “new” Eli free of aneurysm and hallucination, life suddenly was dull and pointless.

So often in church we try to constrain the spiritual to the explainable and the expected. Too often in fact we find that our souls long for the unexpected and uncontrollable direction of the spirit. Our lives desire to live on the cusp of chaos. We all know it and yet we all try to find a feigned shelter in a predictable life. Throw off the desire to know what the ext moment holds and embrace the chaos of a life lives with no knowledge of the next moment. That is what faith is all about!

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Columbus Day

Posted October 13, 2008 by Chris
Categories: Belief, Context, Life, Me, People
Tags: , , , , ,

Columbus Day is an important day because without it, the Spanish would have never found the Americas. This is somewhat funny paradoxically as many experts say that within the decade more people will speak predominately Spanish than English in the United States. Columbus was always important to me – we share a first name.

The holiday is celebrated as Day of the Cultures in Costa Rica (a place I hope to retire to). I like that. We should have a Day of the Cultures in the United States. After all, we are an amalgamation of cultures from around the globe – we should celebrate it.

I celebrated with a time being home with family – both blood family and those who I have had the privilege of calling family because we “do life together”. We talked about the future and what we wanted for our children and then we ate (because you can’t have a family gathering without food!) Life is good – not because of the stock market or the bond market or because of my paycheck. Life is good because I do not have to live it alone! Be it so for you and yours. Live life, but live it in relationship. It is the messiest, most chaotic and most wonderful way to exist on this planet we call Earth!

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