Random Thoughts
-Third week of “BC” series was incredible! If you didn’t come to service Sunday, you missed an incredible Word! You can go to www.journeychurchnow.com and there is a link for the podcast.
-Powerful staff meeting last Thursday. God is still messing me up from it. In a good way of course!
-It was crazy windy here Saturday. Took the kids to the park to fly kites. Thought the kites were going to get ripped apart!
-Went to Connor’s flag football game. It’s a joke when:
1) You don’t check a kid’s age to make sure they are eligible to play. Some boys look a lot bigger and older than they claim to be.
2) They let kids that all play on a tackle team together, stay together and play against kids that don’t and you end up with an undefeated team at the end of the year cause they just pound the mess out off the little guys.
3) No checks and balances to make it more competitve. This allows 15 year olds that look like they are on steroids play against 12 year olds who are half their height.
All right, I’m done ranting about it. For now.
-Refuge had a night of playing manhunt and pizza. Wished I would have stayed and played too! Kids had a great time!
-Having a meeting with all of our Guest Services volunteers after second service Sunday. Praying that God moves in a powerful way in our team.
-Don’t forget to pray for your pastors, leaders, your local church, and the global church.
-We are going to have a powerful Source Group meeting Fridaynight at 7PM. You won’t want to miss it!
-I am so thankful for Jesus Christ and His irresistable grace and His unfathomable mercy!
God Bless
Kevin
Thursday Thoughts
My wife and I were talking the other day. We were using the words “common sense” and “common courtesy”. In the end of our conversation, we came to the conclusion that sense and courtesy has become less common these days. It seems like this is getting worse. Paul warned Timothy and he warns us:
2: 1) But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. 2) For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3) heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, 4) treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5) having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power.
Does this not fit our society to a tee? Of course I know that every generation previously thought that the society they lived in fit into this scripture. The farther we move away from the fall of Adam and Eve, we can see men’s tendency to do that which is evil in His eyes has grown greater and greater. Men have shown almost brazen courage in their rebellion towards God. Mankind laughs in the face of God and dares Him to do something. The scriptures explain why man becomes more and more evil:
Romans 1:28)And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. 29) They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, 30)slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, 31)foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32)Though they know God’s decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.
While things get worse in this world, I praise God that there are those who are predestined: to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— 6to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. 7In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace 8that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding. 9And he[d] made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, 10to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment—to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ. (Ephesians 1:5-10)
Thank the Holy Spirit who is drawing those who are His by His irresistable grace and mercy! I am thankful that He shows us our totally depravity, but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)
I am thankful for the hope these scriptures bring me . How about you?
Kevin
Rightly Handling the Word of Truth IV
2 Timothy 2:15) Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.
I said I would have the most important question today. I only have one, but it is the most important So let’s get into them without further delay.
5) What is your motivation ? What drives you to share the Word of God? Do you do it cause your daddy was a preacher? Do you do it for the strokes you get from those that listen to you after you preach? Lot’s of people do it for this reason. Do you do it cause someone told you should do it? Is it truly your heart? There are lots of people who do things because they feel like they have to. Sharing the Living, Breathing Word of God should not be one of them! Our number one reason for communicating, and rightly handling the Word of Truth should be love!
1 Corinthians 13
1) If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2)And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3) If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
4) Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5)or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6)it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7) Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
If we love, we won’t have to manipulate people with the scriptures. If we love, we will respect God’s Word cause we would never want to mishandle or misinterpret what His Word says. If we love, we will search the scriptures diligently to be sure that WE are walking upright before Him! If we love, we will temper our frustrations with mercy before we speak. If we love, God will draw those to you that need to hear what you have to say. If you love, you won’t need any special gimmicks to get people to listen and understand you.
The Word of God is alive and powerful! When communicated by a person full of love and conviction, it can pierce the hardest heart, heal the deepest hurt, it can bring life where there is death! It can bring hope to the hopeless, grace to the fallen, and strength to the weary! It can convict of sin, reveal God’s desire for relationship with us, and show us our purpose in life! Why would we share God’s Word for any other reason?
Kevin
Rightly Handling the Word of Truth III
2 Timothy 2:15) Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.
We are continuing with our Rightly Handling the Word of Truth series. I have a couple more questions for you communicators today.
3) Are you communicating accurate numbers for your financials and attendance?You may say “what does that have to do with this topic?” It speaks your character. If you are willing to twist hard numbers to make a situation sound better, or get a more favorable response, than you will not handle His Word rightly. I’m not talking about “we had one hundred people at a meeting and we tell them we thought we had 110″. I’m talking about the magic of multiplication. “There were a hundred and we tell them there was 200″. We had 2 people get saved and it turns into a dozen!You don’t think it happens? Oh, it definitely happens more than you would think. There are a myriad of excuses when those leaders are confronted. Growing up in church, I saw this go on regularly. I also saw those churches disintegrate because of the character of the leaders of that church. It is dishonest. If you will lie about numbers, you do not deserve the trust of those listening. Those of you who sit under such leaders should run from these people as fast as you can!
4) Before you use a scripture in your communication, do you make sure you are using it in the proper context? It’s been said many times but it bears repeating: you can make the Bible say anything you want it to if you use the right scriptures. There are many scriptures that are taken out of context and if they were read in their proper context, they would say something very different. Let me give an example. Revelation 3.20, “Listen! I am standing at the door, knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to you and eat with you, and you with me.” This scripture has been used on countless tracts and sermons for to reach those who are not Christ’s followers. The actual context of this scripture is that Jesus is speaking to one of the 7 churches at that time and not to unbelievers. Here’s another one: Philippians 4:13 ” I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”There are many factors that go into being able to do “all” things. The context of his “all things” is that despite the poor circumstances he was in, he can do everything that God wanted him to do in the strength that God supplies. Not anything he wants to do. When scripture is taken out of it’s context, you are leaving yourself wide-open for extremely broad interpretations of scripture and even heresy if not careful.
I have a couple more questions. I saved the most important for last. Stay tuned.
Kevin
Rightly Handling the Word of Truth II
1) Do you use the Bible every time you are communicating biblical principles? If you don’t, then why not?
The amount you use of God’s Word in your communication will determine how much the people who hear you value it. This is powerful! Read that again! People will not value the Word if you do not use it as the foundation on which you build everything you communicate. When you do not use the Word as your foundation, you can be easily deceived and you have no basis for anything you say. The scripture we have been breaking down says to”present yourself to God as one approved”. How can you present biblical principles without the Bible? Psalms 119:105 states:Your word is a lamp to my feet
and a light to my path. Joshua 1:8 states: This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.
I rest my case on this point.
2) When you prophesy, or when you hear a prophesy, does the prophesy line up with scripture?
For an example, you are told by God that you should prophesy over this person that they should start an orphanage. Then you think you hear from God that everyone in the room should cluck and peck the ground like chickens and God will perform a miracle. Ok, we have two words. One is from God, one is not. Would God call someone to start an orphanage? Sure He would! James 1:27 says: Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. As long as the person who is called bears witness(or is in agreement) with what you are saying and the person called to start an orphanage isn’t a child molester, we can be pretty sure that this is a Word from God. However, besides the health issues and embarrassment factor of pecking the ground and clucking, which are enough to bring the word into question, there is no biblical precedent for anyone in the bible being told to act like animals in order for God to heal someone. Second of all, according to scripture, if someone is sick: James 5:14)Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. 15)And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. There is no biblical precedent for clucking and pecking, but for the anointing of oil and prayer, so we can both from a physical and biblical standpoint judge that that word was not from the Lord.
I have a couple more questions for you next post.
Kevin
Rightly Handling the Word of Truth
2 Timothy 2:15) Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.
I have been greatly impressed by God as of late about this topic. This scripture has been resonating in my soul over and over. I have not felt more passionate and strongly about a topic in a while. That is the topic of rightly handling the Word of Truth. I must say that there are some things that have come up in recent days that has only stressed the urgent need for this to be taught in the church.
We are living at a point in history where there is a strong effort by those who truly do not know Christ to blend different religions into one train of thought, that there are many ways to know “god”, whichever one that may be. If we truly believe in Christ, we know that He is the only way to have a relationship with the one and only true God. If we solidly believe that, we are not going to fall into the New Age Oprah gospel that is going around.
While this is very disturbing, I am addressing something that is even more pressing. There are different levels of truth. For example, the divinity of Jesus is without question. Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection are without question. They are absolute truths.
The problem is when we are talking about other things in the Word that may not be so “In Your Face”. There is yet another level of truth. There are ordinances, giftings, and teachings that we learn about after we have come to know and put our trust in Christ. Things we need to know and practice to deepen our relationship with God. They also help us to become witnesses of Christ so that we may share the gospel with those who do not know Him. This is the area that those who share these truths have to be extremely careful to rightly handle the Word of Truth.
I know in this fast-food society it is easy to pick up a book on a topic, read it, and preach a sermon on the topic. It is easy to give a prophetic word when it is full of wonderfully positive things and the people are eating it up. If a well known preacher, teacher evangelist says something on TV it has to be right. Right? There is no way that they could be wrong! Right? If you have to ask that question, then you are walking on some very shaky, dangerous ground. I am going to ask some questions and share some principles to help those who communicate the Word, and give those of you that are hearing some simple tools and benchmarks to judge whether or not what you are hearing is truth.
Stay Tuned!
Kevin
Another Loss
I was shocked to hear about the Pastor in Maryville Illinois being gunned down standing in his pulpit yesterday. I am greatly greived for my brothers and sisters that have lost their Pastor, and the family that has lost a husband and father. My thoughts and prayers go out to you.
I know there are a lot of questions that are floating around. I’m sure many will be answered to some degree soon. The thing that amazes me is the lack of the fear of God that exists in this country that one would walk up to a man of God and would murder him. Not only gun down a man of God, but a man of God in the place of his authority, doing what he was called to do by God! Noone would dare do such a thing less than 20 years ago! This is the by-product of a society that has devalued the validity of God, the Bible, and Biblical authority both in our country, our family, and our homes!
This is not the first man of God to die for the sake of Christ in our “Christian” nation, and will not be the last. As Guest Services director, I am wrestling with a lot of things as a result of these type of incidents happening more and more often. How do we keep our volunteer staff alert to various dangers that can occur? How do we not lose the edge? How do we keep our pastor safe from those that they may want to harm him, but not hamper ability to freely move about and mingle. How do we keep our children safe from people that would bring them harm? I’m sure that First Baptist had some procedures and protocols in place but something, somewhere didn’t happen the way those protocols dictated.
We must pray for our Pastors and leaders. We must pray for His divine protection over those that would protect us. We must not grow complacent in thinking that what happened in Maryville “wouldn’t happen to us.” We must be “sober and vigilant for our enemy the devil is like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8)
Kevin
Where are the Dads?
I am at Connor’s game right now watching him and his team get ready to play. Something I noticed is that with the exception of the coaches, there aren’t a whole lot of men out watching their kids play. There are mothers galore, but not a lot of fathers.
It makes it easy to see why the influence of a father is important. While kids are at games, fathers are out fishing, or at their own softball or football games. Fathers have exchanged their influence for their own pleasures. This how they will prioritize the relationship with their own children when they are older and the cycle will continue. This should not be.
I know it is hard for men to check out when it comes to spending time with their kids. It is a continuous thing that I have to check myself about. I want my son to be a better father than I am. If I want or expect that to happen, I have to step up to the plate and be that example. Just thinking out loud.
Kevin
Are You Born Again?
I got this statistic from the Barna Group website. They are a Christian research company .They have done some pretty extensive studies. Check this out:
Where do I begin? This one bothered me the most out of all the ones I read. You might ask why. I had someone ask me about a year ago a similar question. I was asked if I thought that Christianity is the only path to salvation. I told them that believing in Jesus Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection and turning away from their sin is the only way to heaven. They were shocked!
I am amazed at how biblical truth has been so distorted in this day and age where we have people, even believers in Christ, that believe that there could be another way to get to heaven! Peeling back another layer, there are those who believe in Christ that don’t believe that the Bible is our ultimate authority as a believer! So not only do we have to convince the unbeliever that they need Christ, we have to convince people who think they are going to heaven that they are not!!
Maybe I have stirred some folks out there. I hope I did. I hope I make you think. Have you asked forgiveness of your sin? Have you professed your faith in Christ? Do you believe that His blood cleanses you from your sin? Do you believe Christ was born of a virgin? Do you believe that He died, rose again, and is seated at the Father’s right hand? If you answered no to any of these questions, then you do not know Christ and you are most likely, not born again (unless maybe you are on your deathbed and there is no time to explain their importance) . These truths are so intertwined that the absence of one negates the others.
The Bible never says that if you are a good person, you will go to heaven. I hate to break it to you. The Bible says that there are those who do great things in Christ’s name that He will say to them ” I never knew you.”
I hope you don’t see a judgemental Christian talking here. I hope you don’t see someone judging. I do hope you see someone who wants to see you in heaven. I hope you see a person that doesn’t want you to gamble away your eternal destiny based on a personal belief rather than a belief in the Word of God says. Please take some time to ask yourself: “Am I Really Born Again?”
Kevin
New Duties
Just a note for those of you that are a part of the Guest Services team at Journey. I have been asked to take over as Guest Services director. I have worked in Guest Services for over 2 years helping usher and greet so it’s exciting to have the opportunity to cast vision and help find new and inventive ways to make our first-time guests and church family feel loved and welcome! Journey’s Guest Servivces team has been outstanding at this, and we will continue to work even harder at making Journey that last place you need to look for when searching for a church home!
We have had a desperate need for a drummer and Mark has volunteered to help the Worship team. Mark will be be a great asset to the worship team as they lead our worship into a (yes I’m going to say it) WHOLE NUTHA LEVEL!! I can’t wait to see what God is going to do!
If you have not been to Journey Church, we would love to have you. If you need any info in regards to the church, or if you go to Journey and your interested in being a part of the Guest Services team, please send me an email at: kevinbarthelette@journeychurchnow.com
Kevin
