Carey Nieuwhof

Line of the Week

A lot of great comments on the blog.  This one caught my eye though. It's from someone who simply calls herself K who posted on Heaven, Hell, Who Cares?  Here's what she wrote:

"I have enjoyed all your topics in the 4-5 months that my husband has been bringing me."

Let me tell you why I chose it.  I promise you it's not because she likes the messages.  It's the "4-5 months that my husband has been bringing me" part that made say "yes" deep inside.

One of the most exciting things for me personally in the life of Connexus so far is the number of people who have been inviting their friends and family.  I don't believe I have met K's husband (or K.), but it's so good to see a man investing in his marriage and in his wife's heart in this way.  It's been fantastic to see so many people bring their friends and family (talked to even more people brought by friends again yesterday).  That's just kind of how it went down in the Bible - no mass marketing, just people telling people that there's something about Jesus they need to explore.

K. - I'm looking forward to the series this summer.  Thanks for being open to exploring Jesus together with us.  K's husband - thanks for spiritually investing in the most important relationship in your life.

Have You Seen This?

I was reading my bible this morning (I'm a One Year Bible guy) and ran across yet another verse I'm sure I've missed all these years.

So much ministry energy is wasted trying to figure out why people die. You hear everything from "it must be God's will" to the ridiculous "they must have needed her more in heaven than we did on earth."  I always find those conversations frustrating, disappointing and heartbreaking all at once.  Because I'm not sure the image of God reflected in them bears much semblance to reality.

Enter Psalm 116.15:  "The Lord's loved ones are precious to him. It grieves him when they die". 

That's about a five year old New Living Translation rendition, but I love how it reads.  I think that summarizes the heart of God so well.  And I think if people could understand that the sin that entered the world and pains us so badly also pains the heart of God, our relationship with Him would run so much deeper and be filled with much more mutual love.   

Introducing the Line of the Week

Okay...so here's a new weekend feature I'm calling line of the week (It's a really lame name, so if you can do better, post a suggestion baby.)  You posts lots comments most week and usually, there's a line that someone wrote that I think everyone should see that could get lost in the shuffle.  This will help reverse that.

Here's my pick for this week from M.W. Smith who commented on Preaching Cramp....Help Please:

"I doubt that we are courageous enough to love one another in a way that wakes others from their numbness."

When I read that it hit me so deeply.  How many of us are numb from lack of love?  What might happen if we really loved?  I could spend more than a morning camped out on that thought.

Hope this brings some life and depth into your weekend.

Twitter Twit

A new feature on the blog today...I added Twitter to the sidebar.

Twitter basically keeps you up to date with what people are up to...if anyone actually cares.  If you care, you can sign up, and then you can let your friends know what you're up to or thinking or anything.  Some of the Twitter posts are quite funny.  Some of them aren't.  Mine will be a mixture of both, and more, and less, I'm sure.

Going to watch tv now and see if anything grabs me because i'm not tired because i'm too well rested....

The Deals We Make

We all fall into habits. 

When something new enters my life, I usually have a period of a few days where I establish some learnings on how to use it. And within those first 48 to 72 hours, I form patterns that soon become indicative of how I'll interact with whatever I'm using.  For example, I bought this laptop back in August, and it is my first Mac.  Initially, everything seemed new.  But for the most part, I figured out how to use it in the first 72 hours.  It was like I made little deals on what keystroke shortcuts I'd use, what features I'd open, and what I'd never bother to figure out.

In those first few days, I didn't explore every feature or probably even 90% of what this baby can do.  I just figured out how to use it for what I needed it to do, explored a few bells and whistles, and left it alone.  And what I did in those first few days set the pattern for my use of this thing since then.  Even though I totally love my Mac (I'm a raving fan!), I've explored two raindrops worth of ocean so far.

The same is true of how I'd explore a new cell phone...set patterns in new relationships....even how I'm approaching the new patterns of how to preach at Connexus with video and very steeply raked seating...in the first few days of using something new, I set a pattern that I pretty much follow without much deviation from thereon in.

Think about your own patterns.  Do you see a trend like that?

The pattern may be natural, but what it leaves me with is probably using a small percentage of the power of whatever I'm dealing with, like this laptop.  I think the same thing is true of so much in life, including my spiritual life.  Have I fallen into a place where I'm discovering .1% of God, only because my approach to God was set years ago and hasn't varied much?  What would I do differently if I really explored Him, really got to know Him differently and fully?

What about your relationship with God?  Have you fallen into patterns that you know limit you to exploring a fraction of God?  Just asking.  But I think I'd like to chew on that personally for a few days.

By the way, later this week, I'm going to sit down with a fellow staffer and she's going to teach me how to use some software I've always ignored over all these years of computing.  That should be fun.

And maybe...maybe...I'll even talk to God about exploring Him far more creatively and fully too.