Bay West Church Blog - a church in Palm Bay

God can use a lot of things in ways you don't realize

2012-01-12T10:44:00.001-05:00

Got an email today from Dolly, (MC student ministry assistant/FBC Web Manager) and it was a prayer request that came in online through our online prayer request page on our website (here's the link)... It was from Serbia. We'll gladly be praying for them and for what God is doing, but it got me to thinking about the impact of just a small campus worldwide...just 100 people or so, could we make a difference?

The answer is yes, God can use anyone to make a difference if we are willing. I'll share two brief things.

This last year, we sold the Bay West T-shirts and helped the village of Las Lajas get clean water for the first time ever. The project has just recently finished...a project that should have taken 3 weeks, due to calamity and bad weather has taken over 3 months to complete. Still, God used that time. In having to spend the extra time with the people of Las Lajas, the workers were able to plug into the lives of the people of the village even deeper, spending more time with them. In the process of doing that, 74 people came to know Christ and not just "say" they know him, but as our project manager said, to FOLLOW Him with their whole lives. They will be planting a physical church, the first church, in Las Lajas and just through that, God has used us to transform a village.

Our Video Podcasts, since we started putting them up on Facebook 1.5 years ago, have been watched in over 56 countries. People have allowed little Bay West into their lives through the Internet. Here's a map...the blue are the countries that have watched our services online.

The lesson is this. Obedience is what you do and the only success you will ever have to worry about. After the "not a fan" movie last week, I imagine some of you may be re-evaluating your life situation and what reallly matters in a way that maybe you haven't before. Sometimes, simple obedience doesn't seem to have the dramatic effect that we think should be present from the sacrifices in life, but we must remember, that true followers of Christ are focused on the following and trusting God for the results of obedience. Consider this, as you look at your life and wonder how the results are working for you, think of this map and the shirts and wonder, "where is God using me in ways that I don't see?" Just like an older chorus used to say "He works in ways we cannot see...", trust that.

Christmas thoughts: What you are

2011-12-25T22:28:00.001-05:00

¹³ “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.
Matthew 6:13 (NIV)

Christ follower...don't lose what it is that God made you to be to serve the world in the way only you can. If you do, then you lose your sense of purpose and you lose you momentum, and it's likely that you'll get trampled by those that don't get it. Don't just quit being what God has called you to be and "lay down" waiting for it to happen.

How do you lose it? By taking your eyes off Christ daily...by putting your judgment ahead of God's...by listening to those naysayers who are rarely party to the conversations that you and God had.

Stand up...be what God called you to be...let Him worry about that results of that. It says later to "let your light shine before men"...that's YOUR light. Not someone else's light that seems to have it more together or to have it figured out, it's YOUR light, the light that God placed in you, the gift that God gave you...the light that is fueled by hanging around the true Light of the world, Jesus. Light it up!

A closer explanation of the translation of John 1:1 issue re: "the Word was A god" vs. "the Word was God"

2011-12-12T11:34:00.006-05:00

In John 1:1, is one of the strongest declarations that Jesus is God. Here is what it says:
¹ In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Some religions who use the Bible as part of their basis have translated that verse incorrectly from the Greek to say this:
¹ In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a God.

It's a simple change, but is it a big deal? Yes. As I alluded to yesterday at Bay West, it opens the door, that we will all be Gods, like Jesus one day, to which many concurrent beliefs have been built on in some of these religions. That premise has been superimposed on other expressions of Jesus in the Bible and you can see where that leads. Conflicts with God as the one true God... conflicts with the unique nature of Jesus (Him being the ONLY Son of God in the nature that He is Son)... introducing a polytheistic essence to the monotheistic faith of Christianity (not one god, but many)...loads of issues.

You can see that this interpretation doesn't synthesize John 1:1 with other Scripture, such as Deut. 6:4 (God is one) and the loads of other similar passages throughout the Bible, but instead it tries to elevate this mistranslation above other verses, by using it to "trump" them so to speak, not to understand what Scripture, as a whole, together says.

I wanted to provide a more complete explanation than what I was able to get into yesterday, so that you can understand it. Here is a good, concise one below. It isn't too technical, so if you aren't a Greek scholar, you can understand it and get the point. All you really have to have is an understanding of that boring subject that we all had to take in school...grammar, subject, verb, predicate (or predicate nominative, as I was taught in English grammar), etc. Bet you thought all that would be useless, didn't ya? :D

Here is a good concise explanation from Nelson's New Illustrated Bible Commentary. I could reword it. but he did a great job here in explaining the Greek translation issue

This confused position falls on at least two grounds. Such a view is polytheistic, the belief in more than one god. Second, it betrays a misunderstanding of Greek grammar. Verse 1 of the first chapter of John reads, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” The last portion of 1:1 is the major point of contention. It reads in the Greek theos en ho logos, or literally, “the Word was God.” God, or theos, occurs in this verse without the Greek article ho, so that some have contended that the lack of the article in the Greek text should cause the statement to be translated “the Word was a god.” The best understanding for the translation, however, as recognized by Greek scholars, is that since theos is a predicate and precedes the noun logos and a verb, it is natural for it to occur here without the article. Greek scholars are agreed that the verse should be translated as it regularly is in modern and ancient translations, clearly affirming that Jesus is indeed God.

Radmacher, E. D., Allen, R. B., & House, H. W. (1999). Nelson's new illustrated Bible commentary (Jn 1:1). Nashville: T. Nelson Publishers.

Christmas STUFF coming on us at FBC & Bay West

2011-11-30T10:20:00.001-05:00

Christmas is here and it's crazy, because another year has just flown by. When we look back at this year, we've been
- "radical" in new ways, serving in ways we've never served before.
- started new directions in our lives, studied God's Word differently, expecting a difference in our lives.
- started a partnership in another country to reach an unreached people group, and help support the building of a clean water system in Nicaragua that has been instrumental in leading over 30 people to Christ.

So far, good year, but it's not over...and there are lots of Christmas things to benefit us this year.

Our Christmas Schedule at Bay West will be as follows.

We'll meet at Heritage High School on Sunday, Dec. 4, 11, 18 and then on the 25th and January 1st, we'll meet in combined services at the Melbourne Campus...returning to Heritage the next week on January 8th with a GREAT new series, so be ready.

For the "Who is Jesus" series at Bay West, we have some interesting and impacting services planned, so do not miss them. If you have someone who battles with Who Jesus is, this is a good series to invite them to come...we'll tackle that question.

On December 10-11, we have the Adult Christmas Concert at the Melbourne Campus...it's a great FREE Christmas offering of music and fun. You will need a ticket and they are GOING fast. There are only a few left and they are at Bay West this Sunday. After that, it's overflow and hope someone doesn't show up. These are tickets, not just invite cards, so only take them for your immediate family and someone that you've already invited and know they are coming.

On December 18, we'll be having the Children's Choirs Christmas Concert at the Melbourne Campus. Our little ones are always cute and talented and it's a fun time for all...I'm there with the video camera to watch mine!

As you know, Christmas Day falls on a Sunday this year, so we get to celebrate Christ's birth at church this year! As awesome as this is, we realize that it does present challenges for those with large family traditions, and we are trying to be sensitive to that. God ordained that His name be praised always, but each church picks the times under His guidance and we feel we've done so this year as well. We will be offering two services this weekend at our Melbourne Campus...a Christmas Eve service at 5pm and a Christmas Day service at 11am. Both services will be identical in construction, so you can choose to come to one or both, whatever God leads you to do...no guilt from us. :) Childcare is preschool only.

New Year's Day will be a very special time with our two campuses. Randy and I will be working with Scott on leading the service time... It will be a special time, very laid back and a time for people to share what God's doing in their lives. It's called a "Catacomb service" at FBC. We put the chairs "in the round" on the floor and we lead worship and speak from the floor. It's really interesting and a special time.

Looking forward to what's going on at Bay West and FBC Melbourne.

Please continue to pray for us as we attempt to be a Jesus- following church in Palm Bay, Florida as a the Bay West Campus of FBC Melbourne.

Holy Radical T-shirts, Batman! Pray for the work of the Water Project in Nicaragua!

2011-11-10T11:00:00.001-05:00

When last we left our caped crusader...sorry, couldn't resist that, but seriously, wanted to pass along an update from Daniel Richeson at Viera Water Network on the work on getting a clean water system to Las Lajas, a village in the mountains in Nicaragua. If you remember, we are helping to sponsor this project with the sales of our Bay West T-shirts.

Daniel emailed me and sent some pictures and I'm going to copy the email report from Maynor Curtis, who works with us in Nicaragua as a translator when we go. Maynor is heading up the project onsite with the Mennonite Church that is working with the villagers to build the water system AND sharing Christ with them as they work on the project side by side. GREAT NEWS and GREAT needs of prayer for the people and for Maynor personally. You can read it below.

"Hello Brother Daniel! I return to Grenada on Thursday afternoon and Friday at 4:00 am, I was taken to hospital because I had high fever, cough, body aches and my blood pressure was down, 90/70. I was in the hospital until Sunday afternoon. I am serving as his interpreter, but with some difficulty, because I still coughing. For the last 5 weeks we could not work on the water project, but we had advanced a little, and the reason is the heavy rains in Nicaragua.

The rivers have plenty of water and we have to stay in Panama for 37 days, without returning to our homes because we could not cross the river that is on route to Los Panama and the Caribe.

On October 18 collapsed part of the hill, where we were and the water entered into the house at night, when we were sleeping, but thank God, we suffer losses of 20 bag of cement. The Mennonite church, going to buy others 20 bag of cement, (100 pound per bag); but the owner of the house, he lost some rabbits and some chickens. Next week, I returned to finish the work of the water tanks and then I will send the full report.

In Christ,

Maynor Curtis

The unprofitable bondservant of our Lord Jesus Christ"

Our job is not through with the sending of the money to Nicaruagua...we need to PRAY!

Here is specifically what I am charging you personally to pray with every day.

1) For Maynor's health as he continues to try to run the project at far less than 100%

2) For the weather to be conducive to finishing the project

3) Praise God for the many who have accepted Christ in working on the project (over 23 at last count)

4) Praise God the loss due to the damage of the hill collapsing was minor, but also pray for the owner who had losses, that God will bless him for helping with this project.

4 things...pray every day...this is part of our Radical Experiment and it's not done yet!

Pictures from the "T-shirts for Nicaragua" project with Viera Water Network!

The truth about wolves and Proverbs 18

2011-10-26T21:32:00.001-04:00

¹⁵ “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. ¹⁶ By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? ¹⁷ Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. ¹⁸ A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. ¹⁹ Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. ²⁰ Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.
Matthew 7

You know...this is a well-quoted verse in Scripture, but misused by many people...Christians and non-Christians alike.

For so many, they believe that this verse is pointing at people who are in their limited estimation "bad" pastors or tele-evangelists or someone like that, but that's a very limited scope of what this verse is about...it speaks to just about anyone who would choose to speak in God's name.

In the Old Testament, it was easy to find the true prophet...if a prophet ran his mouth saying "thus sayeth the Lord" (because we know they didn't speak Hebrew, they spoke King James English - :) ) and his prophecy didn't come true, the people just stoned him to death and no more prophet. Pretty simple.

Well, today, most people don't agree on prophecy as something that just tells the future, but prophecy is one who takes the Word of the Lord and expounds it with application and expediency to the people in a specific situation. Basically, you take something from the Bible and speak "for" God into someone else's life and tell them what that means for them. The problem is that without a fortune telling element, how do you know who to stone and are you really even supposed to do that?

That's why God put this together in Matthew 7...he said "by their fruit, you will recognize them." In other words, they'll be true to the entirety of the character of God as expressed in the whole of Scripture. Their message won't hold water or they will be exposed when they deliver it by their life not matching with what Scripture says. For example, when someone brings the "truth", but spouts in in an unloving way or in violation of Scriptures such as Matthew 18...they are a false prophet at that moment. Don't listen to them.

Or if, for example, out of fear and cowardice they hide in the bushes or scream their message from afar in a cowardly manner, you'll know they are false because Joshua 1:8 tells us that when God speaks through us it isn't through a spirit of fear, but of power and of love.

Or if, they do it in an ugly and disrespectful manner, obviously not trying to bring someone in sin to resolution with God, then they are violating Galatians 6, in which is clearly defines the proper way to approach someone who is caught in a sin...the proper way to view that person, not as an enemy, but a fellow co-laborer in Christ who needs help. Maybe they violated Ephesians 4 by not being humble or gentle or patient or valuing unity with their fellow believers, feeling that somehow their message has given them leave to violate the rest of the Scripture...Then, well, you see by the fruit that you don't listen to them.

There are loads of examples here, but the truth is when someone delivers a message in an unChristlike manner, then you just heard all you needed to know about that person and what they had to say, because they just denounced their "prophetic message" with the way they lived out the "Gospel" in front of you.

"But Jim, what if they quote Scripture (or part of one) or say a couple of things that sound good...shouldn't we listen to them then...what if only PART of what they say is wrong?" That's cool, but there's more to it.

Here's why you don't want to listen to them...

Proverbs 18 puts it a little more bluntly about those who aren't following God in their speaking "for" God. In the Bible, fools are characterized as those who don't follow Christ, because as Psalms 111:10 (or Proverbs 9:10) says "the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom"...but Proverbs 18:2 lays it pretty clear here..."Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions." One, the person not following Christ isn't interested in the truth, it's just their opinion...their fruit tells you so.

Proverbs 18:7 takes it further and tells you more..."The mouths of fools are their undoing, and their lips are a snare to their very lives." First, their own words and message will cannibalize itself eventually. Even further, their mouths and lips will be their OWN undoing and it will be a snare to their lives and if you participate in that, you'll be snared by the same things that ensnare them...because as you allow them access and influence over you, their snares, just like their words, will become yours as well.

Beware the wolf in sheep's clothing...they look like they know what they are doing, but pay close attention to them...."so we can STONE THEM, right, Jim?"

No, we don't stone them. We see them as people who are caught in sin just like anyone else. It's not our job to take vengeance on anyone doing wrong (Romans 12:19), we leave that to God. He's a much more strict, harsh and effective disciplinarian than we could ever be any way. We are to be God's agents of mercy, grace and love (even love that says the hard truth, but never done without love or we violate Scripture again). Doesn't mean we sacrifice the "truth" to love people, any more than we commit the sin of sacrificing "love" as our motivation of truth....and people know.

Sometimes, it's hard to see them as what they are, because usually, to reference Proverbs 18, "fools" who just love to air their own opinions just annoy the daylights out of you...usually it's their self-aggrandizing arrogance that is really hard to love and that's only natural. While that's natural, it's not God-controlled and we must always attempt to follow Christ, even more closely in the moments where we are in the presence of someone who is sin-controlled. Not for our sakes, but for theirs and my interaction with them is about helping them, not pumping up myself (Phil 2:3). It's not to down them or judge them or in some false humility moment insinuate how much better we are than them...not at all, because that's not remotely what Christ wants us to be...if we succumb to that, we become them, not help them. No, we must pray for them, care for them and use the strength that Christ gives us to endure what they have to say, however misguided, in hopes that some day, we can "restore them gently" to full fellowship with Christ.

So love the wolves, pray for the wolves, but just don't listen to them or get caught up in their mess.

Thought about brides

2011-10-25T00:00:00.001-04:00

Just a thought... If you say you are all in with me as a person, but you keep ragging on my wife, keep acting like you are too cool for someone like her (not that you ever would) and aren't sold on her having a pretty immovable place in our circle...we're gonna have issues, because she's my #1...they'll be some weirdness.

I was just thinking...Jesus called the church "His bride"...how you think that flies with Him if a) you keep ragging on her, b) think you are "above" hanging out with her and c) aren't really sold on her having a pretty immovable place in your circle....well? You think that's gonna fly any better with Him?

Just sayin'...you might find out that you and Jesus have some weirdness there. Might be a good idea to clear that up.

Unity is pursued...not fallen into

2011-10-09T18:36:00.000-04:00

In this series "ONE", we are talking about some basic foundational concepts and as we talked about on October 2, UNITY was something that Jesus prayed specifically for YOU, as a Christ follower to have.

That means two things...one, it is important enough to pray for you to God about and two, it's something that needs God's help to achieve.

It's important because at the foundational identity of a Christian is a love that unifies the body of Christ...we won't be who we are or accomplish what we should accomplish OR be identified with Jesus without unity among the body of Christ.

Two, we need God's help to achieve it because it's not achieved by accident. You have to be purposeful in achieving it. When it is threatened, you have to put on your "big boy pants" and protect it...even if it puts you at risk of being made fun of or insulted or being hurt again or whatever, because Jesus never prayed that you'd never be made fun of or that you'd never be insulted or that life would never be hard...in fact, He told you all those things would happen and those things won't damage the church, but broken relationships and disunity will. The reason we hang ourselves out on a limb to protect it is because it's THAT important to maintain.

If you, yes you, don't pursue it, it's not going to happen. Matthew 18 gives us steps to deal with conflict that threatens the unity of the body and in the KJV, it says if your brother has wronged you...take care of it, in private. I believe it says that so no one else will be tainted or tempted to take sides or be effected by the disunity...it's that important.

In Matthew 5, it says that if you bring your tithe to the altar and remember that your brother has a problem with you...as in there's problems between you two, and it's your fault...then go immediately and take care of it. It even says just leave your tithe and take care of that broken relationship immediately...why? Because it's THAT important.

What these two verses show you is that it doesn't matter who's at fault...all that matters is whoever knows it exists, hurt-ER or hurt-EE...they should be leading the charge to eat their pride and get it taken care of. We should be falling all over ourselves to make it right...

Church in the Park was cancelled today due to weather, so we all worshipped at Melbourne Campus today and a quote from the sermon stuck out...

"Every broken relationship is a crack in the foundation of the body of Christ."

Think about that... Do you KNOW about a broken relationship between you and someone in the body of Christ that you aren't actively pursuing resolution to? Then you are watching a crack in the foundation of the church grow wider each minute and Jesus says, "drop what you are doing and take care of it....NOW." Why? Because you HAVE to be willing to chase it and sacrifice for it and grasp it...and that doesn't mean that, even if someone has wronged YOU, it means "wait until they wise up and figure it out"...no. It says it's important enough to drop all that you are doing, even if it's the worship of God and go chase unity down until you catch it...swallow your worthless pride and humble yourself to do it...it's that important...pursue it.

The Story of "The House That God Provides"

2011-09-16T11:36:00.003-04:00

The story: A wonderful story of God’s faithfulness in

Panama

rests in the “House that God Provides”.  As you know, we have a young couple from our church that felt called to full-time missions in Panama when we went there earlier this year.  They made an incredible step of faith to quit their jobs, and put their house on the market. Without knowing where God’s provision for this calling was coming from, they stepped out in faith and began moving where God wanted them to be.  God has provided every step of the way, but one way that God has provided for them, for our church and for the mission of reaching the Chinese in Panama is through the “House that God Provides”.

During this time, a married couple in our church (who have asked for their names to be withheld) was moved by God to make a bold step as well…to buy a house in Panama.  The plan was to buy the house, let the couple (the Ervins) live in it rent free, and then it would be used to house the mission teams that come down to work with the Chinese.  The problem was…how to find a house that’s big enough to do that?  The couple gave the Ervins a number to shoot for and then they began looking for a house.  They looked at many houses, but many were too expensive.  They found one that would be perfect…it was newer than the more expensive ones, it was bigger than many of them and the design of it would lend itself perfectly to housing our teams when they came down…unfortunately, it was over the figure given.

While praying in Melbourne, the couple buying the house felt a calling of God to increase the number and God gave them one.  Mind you, they had no knowledge of the house the Ervins had found at all.  They called the Ervins and gave them the new number and yes, this is a God story, so it was the asking price of the house.  In addition to a place for the Ervins to live, allowing them to put more time into reaching the Hakka Chinese, this makes the cost of the Panama trip more economical for the teams that come by only adding a fraction of the normal housing cost for a Mission Team to stay in Panama (to upkeep the house).  While that is incredible, that’s not all, because this house also opens up a place to house teams from colleges and other churches that would join us in this effort.  Amazing, huh?  I’m not done.

The house itself came with a story.  The owners of the house go to El Dorado Baptist Church, one of our primary partners in ministering to the Chinese in Panama.  The husband had just become a Christian recently in the last year or so.  Upon becoming a Christian, he lost his job.  Nalo had been resistant to accept Christ, but when he did, he went at it for real.  His job required him to be untruthful periodically about certain figures about his company and after becoming a Christian, he would no longer lie about the production, so he lost his job.  Nalo, Marta and their two children remained true to God, even in the face of this seeming disaster. Not being able to find more work, the lack of income was forcing them to lose their house. Imagine finally accepting Christ and integrity to that decision leading to the loss of your job, and now you couldn’t keep your house …but they remained true to God.  They had been searching for someone to buy the house before they would lose it, but, not just anyone, they had been praying for something special.  They have a heart to reach the Chinese of Panama and they had been praying for a Christian couple with the same heart to buy the house.  They were one month from losing the house completely when God led the Ervins to the house through the Pastor of El Dorado Church’s son, Richey, who is a lawyer in Panama. They trusted God and He was there.

It doesn’t end there.  Now the Ervins had to find a way to stay in Panama legally.  The previous most-economical way to stay in Panama would have been to apply for a Missionary Visa which would cost the Ervins between $5000 and $10,000.  The Missionary Visa would last for a few years and then they would have to pay it all over again to renew it.  Richey informed them that with the price of the house, if the house was put in the Ervins’ name for a time that they could then apply for a permanent visa under a little used statute in Panamanian…for free.  This provision would also allow them to gain citizenship in just a few years.  It’s all perfectly legal. That’s God.

So, God provides…but understand this…
…if the Ervins had not been faithful to just go with no concrete support for the future, just a promise from God…
…if the couple in Melbourne had not been faithful to what God said about the crazy notion of buying a house in Panama…
…if Nalo had not been faithful in his integrity to God in the face of unemployment…
…if Nalo and Marta had not been faithful to God to pray and wait for God’s timing…the mission to reach the Chinese in Panama wouldn’t have received this incredible confirmation/blessing/tool, and they wouldn’t have seen God’s provision in their lives in this amazing way.

The lesson: (DON'T miss this)

Faithfulness to God is a chain reaction and if I am unfaithful because I don’t see the resources in my hand, I refuse the hand of God and His provision in my life. That’s my choice…that’s your choice...that’s our choice as a church as well…it’s the choice of being unfaithful or faithful and we make it every day. We choose to reject the hand of God when we don’t tithe, when we don’t give our time, when we don’t risk our reputation to share …at each decision big AND small, we refuse the blessings that God has pre-arranged for us and for others and we choose destitution over blessing again and again.

While we were in

Panama

, the paperwork for the house was processed and the business done. Part of that
business was the making of a plaque that would be affixed on the outside of the house. In Chinese, Spanish and English, a sign exists to be a testament to the God that is faithful…it reads “The House that God Provides”.

Nalo, Marta and their two children

Saturday recap - Panama, mostly a rest day, but finishing strong

2011-09-12T13:34:00.000-04:00

We started Saturday by taking the morning off and going on a boat trip to Monkey Island. We rode a boat through a lake into the Canal on the way to some islands to observe the wildlife. The lake was manmade out of a valley....it took 4 years to flood. Under the lake were 23 former towns and a railroad. At one of the islands a few monkeys jumped on our boat and tried to steal Pastor Larry's food (that he wasn't supposed to have out -- lol), but it was great. Saw a lot of good wildlife.

That afternoon Jenny met for over 2 hours with El Dorado church's children's workers and leaders and that could have gone on forever. She was able to give a lot of feedback and wisdom to their children's area.

When she was through Larry taught for 3 hours on discipleship that evening. There were 150-200 people that showed up for the conference and it ended with about 80% of them walking forward to commit to disciple someone one-on-one to Christ...It will be interesting to see how that goes.

We were really tired when we got in...but it was a profitable day.

Friday Recap part 2

2011-09-12T13:23:00.000-04:00

Picking up at lunch...I won't be as long winded here.

We went to El Dorado Baptist Church's Christian radio station "La Voz del Istmo" (I'll be meeting with a secular Chinese radio station during the week here). Apparently, their AM station has been operating for 60 years and the FM station has been operating for 40 years.

We met a couple from the church that works at the radio station, Gunther and Frida and several other folks from the station. Larry and I were interviewed on the radio station about the mission in Panama and for our speaking this weekend.

We left here and went back to get ready for the evening service at El Dorado. Ben and Caitlin sang and so did Katye and I and I preached. After the services we were pretty tired, but God had a productive Friday for us.

Friday recap - Panama

2011-09-12T01:20:00.000-04:00

Friday started early...Katye, Caitlin and their translator, Anna, had to be at Sun Yat Sen (a very large and influential Chinese school - not the Christian one we've worked with before) at 8am to meet about having an Music and Arts Camp in January. They are not a Christian school, but are very connected and influential among Chinese society here in Panama City. They left about 30 minutes before the rest of us left, and after their appointment, we all were going prayer walking in a Mall and surrounding businesses in the "new" China town in Panama City.

Katye, Caitlin and Anna met us at the church with very good news. Pastor Ricardo also went with them and they had great success. They were able to meet with the Head Principal, not just an assistant, and she was very open to the Music & Arts Camp. The college group from FBC Melbourne that came in July that did the basketball camp had done a good job with their end of things and had left us a great opening and reputation with them. Pastor Ricardo and the principal hit it off and she actually said that they have "summer school" (December - January is their "summer" time) going on and they would like to incorporate our camp into their existing program in the morning. That worked out very well and it was a slamdunk to really start the trip.

We met at the church...heard the great report and left to go prayer walking. Instead of going to the Mall in "new" Chinatown, Pastor Ricardo and Anna, our translator, took us to "Avenue B", the old Chinatown. Apparently, it is a dangerous place. We found out that Anna had only been there for the first time a couple of days ago and in 25 years of living in Panama City, Pastor Ricardo had never been. He said this was "no tourism" and believe you me, there were no other white people around here...definitely no tourists.

We prayer walked each side of the street, split into two groups, Larry and Pastor Ricardo headed the group and Ben Norton and I guarded the rear of the group as we walked. We had to take off our electronics and most jewelry and leave them in the van (another great praise story, btw...the van or busito, I mean) because the place was known for thieves that would snatch and run to steal things apparently. We stopped in a shop and Pastor Ricardo struck up a conversation with a shop owner about the location of a Buddhist Temple that was supposed to be near there. Pastor Ricardo walked off, telling our group to "aqui" (stay here) while the guy he was talking to showed him directions down the street. As we were standing there, a policeman in bulletproof gear and a few guns came up and starting asking us questions in Spanish. I was reaching to pull out my copy of my passport, but Katye understood that he was asking us if we wanted to go see the Buddhist temple. When Pastor Ricardo came back, he talked to the policeman and he said that he would guide us to it. We called the other group and headed out.

We started going down alleyways and side streets and then came to a door that led up some narrow stairs. If people would lag, our translators would call out for us to catch up and stay close...Some of us really didn't think things were too scary, but then others of us noticed that another policeman had circled in and was bringing up the rear of our party. We went upstairs and saw the Buddhist Temple, praying for the people as we went. it was a beautiful place, but honestly, for me, it really hit me how hard this was going to be...for an ornate place to be built in this tough area and to be kept so well...other religions really had a stronghold on the people here.

The policeman led us down the stairs and out into the street and told us he and the other policeman would take us down another street (Pastor had told them what we were doing and I don't know if they were believers or not, but they were very helpful). The policeman said that the name of the street meant "Leave if you can" (that's comforting)...it was extremely narrow and was filled with little shops a continuous row of huts with tin roofs in the middle of the street...there was only enough room for one person to walk between the buildings on the street and the shops in the middle of the street. We continued to pray and the policemen led us out on the other side and back down the streets to the market when were had parked the van a few streets away. The policeman said never come down there on Sunday, because Sunday is the day there are no police in the area...but we were safe. We really believe that God has big plans for that area and we are confident that He's already working in Panama.

Right now, it's late, and this blog entry is really long, so I'll stop here and I'll get back to you later on the next set of recaps...there's plenty more...good night.

Thursday recap - Panama

2011-09-12T00:55:00.000-04:00

I've been kind of limited in my WiFi down here this time, so I haven't blogged like I meant to, so I'll try to catch up tonight a little and keep it going tomorrow.

Thursday was a LOOOONG day. We have to be at the church at 5:30am to go to Orlando to fly to Panama...not bad, 1 layover in Miami and out of the country. It was a smooth trip.

When we got to Panama and cleared customs we met with Chris, Pastor Ricardo and his son Richey and they got us back to PVQ (where we are staying). We got to hear about the awesome way that God has been working already to piece things together. The Mission House story is another crazy one...that's huge. A story for another day.

We went to eat and then right back to PVQ to meet with an IMB missionary, Kavin Cawfin (sp?), who is actually from Enterprise, AL (30 minutes from where I grew up) and knows a lot of my relatives in the Enterprise area very well. He talked to us about the work in Panama and after a LOOONNG meeting, we finally got to bed...good day, but a long day...and we had to be ready for Friday.

Misunderstood passages in the Bible, a little study never hurts

2011-08-24T10:47:00.002-04:00

"Where there is no vision, the people perish..." Proverbs 29:18 (KJV)

For a long time, I jumped on this verse...sounds AWESOME doesn't it and it is. I heard it preached and used in bible studies and it was presented with something like a building program or a future plan for a church and it just works. Where there is no vision, the people perish. It's a great verse to inspire people to a cause...and I'm sure there's an element of that interpretation that is true, but after looking at it and studying the Bible around it, I'm not sure that's what the verse is talking about here. If we take the verse simply as that, there are some weird shoots that can spring off the plant and give us some trouble down the road.

Funny, but a lot of people who would quote this verse might balk if someone said "I just had a vision". "Vision" has become a term for an ability to see where things must go, such as what an project, organization or movement could be when it hasn't even started yet and then making it happen. Is that what the Bible is saying here? If you can see where things are supposed to go, then you have a vision and if you don't, those involved will perish?

It makes sense...I've seen lots of aimless people with no plan just wander around and waste their lives away, so there's some wisdom in that area...but you have to come back to this. Is that what the WORD is saying there? If you are going to quote something, even if the principle you pull seems wise, the passage you quote needs to say what you are attributing to it...good or bad. I think of it like "showing your work" in math. I was GREAT at coming up with the right answer early on in Math...hated showing my work, but sometimes, my "processes" only worked for the problem I was on and if I had not been made to show HOW I was coming up with something, so the teacher could correct my logic, then I would have not solved many other problems. The point is, life is not about just getting the right answer all the time and neither is studying the Bible. What is the WORD saying here?

If I say, "Look out! It's a dog!", that means LOTS of things from "hey, take a picture" to "run for the hills", depends on the context. Let's look at the context of the verse...a lot of the time, you sharpen the point of a verse when you understand the rest of the "conversation". I usually choose things before and after. Here is the same passage in the NIV...

¹⁵The rod and reproof give wisdom: but a child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame.

¹⁶When the wicked are multiplied, transgression increaseth: but the righteous shall see their fall.

¹⁷Correct thy son, and he shall give thee rest; yea, he shall give delight unto thy soul.

¹⁸Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.

¹⁹A servant will not be corrected by words: for though he understand he will not answer.

So we've got "correction" for a child, how the "wicked" thrive in going against God and breaking His law (sin)...how "discipline" is good for your son to give him peace...and then we have "no vision" and "people perish", but the end of the verse doesn't really talk about a plan does it? It says "he that keepeth the law, happy is he." Then it's about correcting again...

Let's look at another translation of the Bible...NLT...here is what it says...

¹⁸ Where there is no revelation, people cast off restraint;

but blessed is the one who heeds wisdom’s instruction.

Or the NIV...

¹⁸ Where there is no revelation, the people cast off restraint;

but blessed is he who keeps the law.

That sounds a little different, none are contradictory, but together explanatory. "Revelation" doesn't carry the same weight as "vision" does in our contemporary society, but it still fits, right? "Cast off restraint"...that's a very different connotation to "perish"...same thing and both fit together, because of the word choice, so what is the deeper meaning here?

Before we go on, you might ask: Why another translation? That's because as you translate something, a lot of the time, there's not a "one word" in the other language that carries the EXACT same meaning. Sometimes a concept in one language is communicated in another language by a series of words...so let's take a look at another one...one of my favorites. When you look up a Hebrew word or a Greek word (the languages the Bible was written in), you find several words (like our dictionary) to give the full nuance of what is trying to be communicated. Because of grammar or context or because it's a recognized colloquial phrase or some construction/textual clue, you choose the meaning. The Amplified Bible (AMP) is a bible that tries to throw all those words in...sometimes, it can be confusing, but most of the time, it helps focus us in on "what the writer is trying to say"...let's read this verse here.

¹⁸Where there is no vision [no redemptive revelation of God], the people perish; but he who keeps the law [of God, which includes that of man]--blessed (happy, fortunate, and enviable) is he.

Without the revelation of God to people of who He is, His law that shows the need for mercy and grace and Jesus, people will cast off all restraint...and ultimately, that way will lead to death and they will perish....that's what the writer is trying to say. It's the validity of following God, not the microcosm of having a grand plan for something.

Now hear me out here...STUDY the bible
1) Yes, purpose is good for people and an unfocused people DO not fare well in life...but we have a purpose and that purpose is folded into the fact that we are looking emulate and honor Christ in everything we do (1 Peter 2:21-24), we are to make disciples as we go through our lives (never off mission - Matthew 28:19-20)...that's our purpose. We should not need to supplement that with a building program. Remember the micro is the brush with which God paints the macro picture.
2) It's not bad to have a plan. God gives plans and "visions" all the time...all I'm saying is to use this as the proof-text for any plan you state is wrong, because that's not what it says. We see life prove out God's plan all the time....God is a planner, he planned all my days before I was born (Psalm 139) and God has had a plan for the world since before He ever created a thing (John 1, 1 Corinthians 2:7 - all over the Word)...good grief, plans are fine.

What I am saying is that when you handle the Word, handle it with care... strive to understand it, when you read it, read it again and again, then in another translation that is GOOD (some aren't), read about the historical context in which the passage was set and above all, do this...read the Bible as a WORK...one Work...it doesn't contradict itself, it expands upon itself, it helps explain itself...sola Scriptura is a Latin term that means "the whole of Scripture" and that is where you see the conversation with God grow...don't miss it. Show your work...read the context...talk to other believers you trust and most of all, listen to God as you read...have a conversation.

I hope this little Bible Study helped. Please pray for us as we continue to try to be a church in Palm Bay that shows Jesus to all around us.

The "last" weekend of an era

2011-08-12T13:07:00.002-04:00

This weekend, we'll take another step in the changing of an era...we'll say "goodbye" to FBC's Senior Pastor Dr. Larry Bazer and his lovely wife, Gayle, in their role as "first couple" (so to speak, you know what I man) of FBC Melbourne.

For 25 years (he became the pastor here the year I graduated from high school and honestly before a lot of folks who'll read this were even born), Larry has been the leader of FBC Melbourne. He has baptized, counseled, married, buried, effected, launched into vocational ministry, taught, visited and cared for a boatload of people in his time here.

God has blessed and multiplied Larry & Gayle's influence to reach over county lines, church lines, state lines, country lines, denominational lines, philosophical lines and governmental lines in this area. Many of the churches in the area have been either started or guided or directly effected by his desire to teach, mentor and make disciples...which is shown by his reassignment to continue doing that fulltime in the US and the rest of the world by devoting himself fully to training/mentoring pastors from Melbourne to Ecuador to Panama to Romania and beyond.

We should be especially thankful for Larry's determination in following what God has set before him in Palm Bay. After many short-lived works in church planting, the Bay West Campus began in 2009, under his direct influence and work and we will hit 2 years next month....two months of being a church in Palm Bay, Florida. That's two years of continuous steady growth, leaving us poised to continue the growth of God's kingdom in a historically tough place to grow.

I think that as we celebrate the God who Larry follows with a different spin this weekend, we shouldn't ever forget that MANY churches have been started in Palm Bay (many in conjunction with FBC Melbourne during Larry's tenure), that have not made it as long as Bay West has. A lot of these churches struggled, but all of them were collectively part of God's work to get us to where we are now...just as Bay West is another link in the chain of God's work in Palm Bay, along with 63 or so more churches in Palm Bay currently trying to reaching 103,000 people approx.

Bay West is truly blessed and a lot of that has come from Larry's faithfulness in the midst of what the world would mistakenly call "failure". The truth is that we are as ill-qualified to pronounce the judgment of "failure" on something as we are ill-qualified to definitively say that all scientific discovery is over or that we have measured the Universe to the inch. God works and plans far beyond the scope of our analysis....so what does that mean for us personally?

Here is what it means. Do what you know honors God with every decision...no matter how small or how great, then let God judge the failure or success. Live this consistency in belief and in 25 years, maybe you'll look back at your journey and be pleasantly surprised at the trail that God has left in the wake of one God-honoring decision at a time...just like we are doing at the end of this era with Larry & Gayle, as they move on to a new thing in God's journey for them. Thanks, guys.

Response to the "Urgent Prayer Need" yesterday

2011-08-09T16:27:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, I posted an email sent to one of our LifeGroup members, sent from a missionary couple that they support in Papa New Guinea, asking you to pray for a dire need in their lives. Here was the response and the result of that situation. I hope you'll be encouraged.

My God sent his angel to shut the lions’ mouths so that they would not hurt me, for I have been found innocent in his sight. Dan 6:22

This is exactly what the Lord did again today! He protected us and saved us from the lions! Literally, the accusations made against us were like a lion’s roar but the roar was worse than bite. We are very safe and all is good, know it’s better!

This morning after a not so good night sleep I looked outside and saw men walking around our houses to protect us. I couldn’t see all the angels that were fighting for us J Then the plane came in with the leaders and left to go get the police men. We all met together and prayed and reminded each other to respond as Christ would respond.

The police arrived at the same time as the delegation. So we gave to floor to the religious leaders and they accused us of all kinds of falsehood and that they said we had to leave and gave us a 2 month deadline to get out. The police men then gave us (around 120 people) the floor and they listened to testimony after testimony of how God has changed their lives and that Jesus is the only way to God. I literally cried as a listened to them give God all the glory. The police man had to stop people as hand after hand went up wanting to give testimony! It was AMAZING!

After these men heard the testimonies one man proposed that we can stay until we finish the translation and all of a sudden the lions turned into kittens. They literally changed their demand and said, “We never said they had to leave.” Can you believe it – listen to the purr! The testimony of God’s working in the lives of these people silenced them! 1 Cor 4:20 says that the kingdom of God is living by God’s power and God’s Kingdom is here!

So they even apologized to us and we shook hands and left. Our houses are still standing and we are safe, but more importantly our faith is stronger! This served to unify the church here in an awesome way.

We are exhausted but exhilarated. Our mission leaders said they’ve never seen a heavy like that get settled so peacefully. They too give all the credit to God.

To God be the Glory!

Thank you again for fighting with us. We love you all so much.

Gary for all us Smith’s and the Dinangat Church.

Please continue to pray for Bay West Church as we continue to try to be a church in Palm Bay that shows Christ to all around us.

URGENT Prayer Request for today (Monday, August 8th)

2011-08-08T14:02:00.004-04:00

Gary Holland, one of the members of our Osterholm LifeGroup at Bay West, sent this email in asking for prayer for some missionaries that they help support in Papa New Guinea.

"We just got an email from the missionaries that we support in Papua New Guinea. I will try to make it short but it is urgent. The denominational leaders of their area are coming in to question them and challenge them in the areas of church practice. They are treatening to remove them from here if they do not comply with their demands. That was the email from yesterday. Now we just got one saying that they were in another village yesterday and their tempers boiled over. One of the believers from there (Gary's village) was with them and came back with the report that they are going to burn their houses down and force them to leave.

When this villager was telling this there were about 100 listening and said that they would stand around them and not let anyone touch them. One old man shouted that he now knows the truth and you can not get rid of these missionaries, they are God's work men!

They contacted there leadership and they are flying in with the police early this morning. This should all take place around 6pm EST. They are rejoicing with the verse from Acts 5:
Thanks so much,

Gary and Beverly Holland"

As a part of our Radical Experiment commitment for this year, we've been praying for the World and here is a personal request that is tied directly to people at Bay West that we need to pray for today.

Continue to pray for us as we continue to try to be a church in Palm Bay, attempting to honor Jesus at Bay West Church.

GUEST BLOGGER today: Rebekah Lorenzo

2011-07-30T10:46:00.001-04:00

Rebekah Lorenzo is one of our students that participated in one area of the Radical Experiment (click here for info on that) this summer by stepping out of her comfort zone and going to West Virginia to show Christ's love to the people up there. I asked her to blog a little about her experience and here is what she wrote. Enjoy how God is speaking to and through our students...you might learn something. I did.

In Luke 9:23, Jesus tells the disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” I’ve almost always felt something like guilt or anxiety when I’ve come across this verse, although I’ve never completely understood it. What did Christ mean by “come after” and “take up his cross daily”? I never realized how much of this verse’s message I had just been glossing over before until we started to read the book Not a Fan by Kyle Idleman on our way to West Virginia. The book was basically about what it means to be follower of Jesus rather than just a fan of Jesus, and Idleman explains that this is what He’s telling us about in Luke 9:23. Idleman also explains that the Greek term that was translated to “come after” really means to pursue, almost as a boy would pursue a girl. So what Jesus is saying is that if we want to pursue a relationship with Him, we need to deny ourselves and take up our crosses daily and follow Him. I also learned that “denying myself” and “taking up my cross daily” means denying my own needs and any other selfish causes so that every day I can “take up” God’s cause, instead.

Another thing addressed in the book that stood out to me that week was that one way people sometimes “cheer” for Jesus as fans would instead of following Him as real disciples should is by putting on masks and hiding behind rituals and boundaries so that others can’t see their weaknesses. I felt really convicted about holding back from my friends in that way, especially the ones who weren’t Christians. My group at the camp spent a few days visiting a birthing center for female prisoners, which was basically a place where women came from prisons all over the country when they were six months pregnant and stayed until their children were old enough to go up for adoption. On the first day there, I met a mother who told us that she had spent a lot of time in prison, and that some of the best and most interesting people she had ever met, she had met there. She said that this was because, when someone is incarcerated, they can’t be identified anymore by money or status or even their old friends. We heard similar ideas when we went to visit a men’s prison, and heard testimonies from some violent offenders who had formed a support group. Prisoners in a way are stripped of their resources so that all that remains is their character and the memory of what they’ve done to get where they are, and so their character is what defines them. I think now that this is what Christ wants from us as followers. He wants us to be totally open and genuine, and not to worry about people holding our faults against us, because really only He can know and judge us, and His forgiveness is all the justification we need. If we just let go of the past and focus on God, we’ll stumble less often and we’ll be able to find peace and satisfaction.

Thanks for sharing your experience, Rebekah...nice job.

Generosity and Water skiing

2011-07-26T23:47:00.002-04:00

I've really been thinking about generosity and I just have been thinking of the imagery of water skiing...follow me.

If you've ever waterski'ed, you know that in getting up on the skis for the first time, it's a bit of fight and trust. There's a tension of being pulled, and straining yourself to keep your body straight enough to get pulled up. I'm not an expert or anything, but you'd see people just get pulled over, or bent over, sunk in the water just taking a lot of water in the face. That's exactly where a lot of Christians are in being generous, in both tithing and giving to others. They can't trust that if they keep a little stiff against the philosophies of the world that you will actually "pop" up on top of the water.

Then when you get up, you've got to trust that what you are ski'ing on is right. I remember getting up the first time, but falling after a few minutes because I thought that the tension and effort I was putting forth wasn't right, so I pulled to the place of no tension without thinking and found myself falling face first, getting yanked out of my skis and cutting my heal. Some Christians try it, but when it requires some push and strength from them, they feel they are doing it wrong and reach back for the comfort of not trusting God to provide and they fall...hard. I was lucky enough to get back up and get rolling again...but some Christians never do.

Then there's the bliss when you trust the gliding across the top of the water...you get it, you are doing it and it's AMAZING. you are flying and you can turn and pick up speed and it's extremely fun. That's when you have finally trusted God...turned your back on the failed philosophies of the world as far as finances and resources and sharing goes. You look back at when you were being drug around by the boat taking the water in the face and you think "that's nuts". Others that are getting dragged around or those afraid to give it a shot, think you are amazing and they wish they could do that...when they CAN...you know that, but they won't believe it.

There are those who never try and let go, never enjoy the bliss of just absolutely gliding across the top of this world, being pulled along by the Father. They think they have to generate all the motion and they sink in the waves. The great part of ski'ing is that I don't generate the motion or the energy...not my job, that's the boat...I don't have to decipher the direction...that's the boat driver. I'm just supposed to hold my ground and trust the boat...same as with Christians.

I really hope that we, as a campus, can grasp these principles of generosity in our lives. I feel that it is ABSOLUTELY crucial for all of us here. This is a watershed moment for most of us and it will mean the difference between being stuck in the drudgery of water in the face or the excitement of water under your feet. Whether anyone of us stays at Bay West for the next 10 years or the next 10 days, that WHEREVER any of us goes, my prayer is that we can just fly and just tear this life up...that's God's plan for us, for you. Please don't miss it.

Generosity all over the place.

2011-07-20T08:26:00.001-04:00

The famous King Solomon of the Old Testament was widely known because he was the wisest man alive at his time...ever wonder how he got His wisdom? The story goes in 2 Chronicles that He became King and took a "firm control" over his lands because God was with him and he got his leaders together and went to worship at a temple. After burning a 1000 burnt offerings to God, that night, God appeared to him and told him to ask for anything...ANY thing...he wanted and he would have it. He basically asked for the wisdom to lead God's people properly....and this was God's response.

¹¹ God said to Solomon, “Because your greatest desire is to help your people, and you did not ask for wealth, riches, fame, or even the death of your enemies or a long life, but rather you asked for wisdom and knowledge to properly govern my people—¹² I will certainly give you the wisdom and knowledge you requested. But I will also give you wealth, riches, and fame such as no other king has had before you or will ever have in the future!”

It was said after that time that silver and gold were as common in Jersualem as stone...

Learning about Radical Generosity

2011-07-17T15:30:00.000-04:00

- Generosity begins and ends with God...it is FOR God.

- Generosity is not about the needs that we meet, and all about the God we serve. It's not even as much about the lives we touch, as it is about the honor we deflect to God.

- One of the things that's apparent in this series on Radical Generosity is that generosity is utterly imperative for the Christ follower, so much, that if someone is truly following Christ, it is impossible for them to remain not generous.

Christ is the most generous person to ever live.
God is the most generous being that has ever existed.

If those are your examples and you really follow them, it is IMPOSSIBLE to do that without being generous, first to God and then even more to God by giving to others.

- It's also apparent to me that for the church not to talk about money is almost criminal from a spiritual standpoint.

- What if we met challenges in our life with the predisposition to GIVE and not the predisposition to hold on to what we have? In other words, rather than talk myself INTO being generous, then we should talk ourselves OUT of being generous.

- What if we first budgeted what God gets, then what others should get and then we lived on the rest, rather than doing exactly the opposite?

- I've never seen anywhere in Scripture that we have been given the blanket right to dictate the use of what God has asked us to give...not to others and not to God...yet, we still feel the need to dictate that, yet call ourselves generous. If a purpose is dictated, it is dictated by God.

Before we can be truly generous, we have to understand something.
Generosity is not merely about the relinquishing of possession, but also about the relinquishing of control.

Integrity and Insanity

2011-07-10T22:04:00.003-04:00

Here's a little idea that I've been toying with some lately.

I shared a quote that I heard this last week in a sermon by Francis Chan, pastor of Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, Califiornia. He had heard it from a missionary couple that they were "commissioning" to the ministry field, and they'd heard it from a guy that spoke at Cornerstone who was on staff (sorry, I can't remember his name.)..but anyway, the quote is this:

"We should live a life that DEMANDS an explanation."

I'd been thinking on these lines for my article, but expressing it in another way. I think that there are two characteristics that should mark every Christian leader...and every Christ follower for that matter....Integrity and insanity (to the world at least).

First, we all should have the highest integrity to the Word of God and His direction. That should mark EVERYTHING that we do. Due to the nature of the Bible, if you read it fresh, looking at the chances that people took...they really believed what they did. It was life-altering, it was common sense-overriding, and it was baffling to those around them....always to the world, sometimes to other Christians. When you follow a God who has thrown the truth out in Luke 9 that if we want to save our life, we must lose it, that just doesn't track if you don't have a trust in or a framework of understanding for an Almighty God...just the facts there.

Second, that integrity to following a God who has more info than everyone, who engineers an endless stream of "once in a lifetime's" and knows the exact schedule of when they happen within the course of His plan, will take you to a place where your next move can only look like "insanity" to the world. If the world looks at what you do all the time and goes, "well, exactly, that's exactly what I would do", then you've got a problem...a big one.

Why? Because if you possess the integrity to God's Word, that integrity to an uncompromising following of Christ will absolutely lead you to a place of "insanity" to those around you at some point. The greater the task, the greater the risk, the more pronounced the insanity to those around you. You won't actually BE insane, but people around you will question your sanity because the thought "that will never work" or "why would you ever do that" will be all over their minds...and rightly so, because without an Almighty God personally directing what you are about to do, it's going to be an EPIC fail.

Check the Word...check the leaders written about in the Word...you'll find the majority of them, minus a framework of a God who runs it all, looked absolutely insane...and they had too much integrity not to look that way.

Please continue to pray for us at Bay West Church as we attempt to be a church in Palm Bay sharing Christ with those on the folks in West Palm Bay and beyond.

Bay West Church is a satellite campus of First Baptist Church of Melbourne, a Southern Baptist Church, meeting in the West part of Palm Bay, Florida.

Facebook and affairs? What's the real problem here?

2011-05-22T21:52:00.003-04:00

For some time, Facebook has become more popular as a communication and social media tool. With the rise of that popularity and usage, the concerns of Facebook increased. Addictive games, addictive info supply, and massive time wasted leading to lack of productivity are among the list.
While these seem more controllable and harmless, more dangerous games are "played" like marital affairs. John connects with Jennifer from high school and driven by strong early emotions and a lot of rose-colored glasses about the past, John and Jennifer begin a relationship online that leads them to connect emotionally again...one problem, John and Jennifer are married and not to each other...and they end up leaving their previous soulmates to be together in some sort of "we found our real soulmate...no, REALLY...not like the other soulmates, but the real only one for me" moment.

There's a growing trend to outlaw Facebook in business and religious circles, and, from ministers to counselors, to "demonize" it. So is Facebook a marriage killer? I don't think so. The pattern of online affairs usually seems to follow the same pattern as any affair...connection, emotional attachment, improper contact, secretive continuance, adultery and ultimately, announcing that you've found "the one" to "the one" you've already found. Facebook isn't the problem, it's an opportunity for connection and at ANY opportunity for connection people can stumble. Without discipline and transparency and honesty, anyone can sin. I think the Bible shows us how sin happens in James 1...

14 but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed.

15 Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death. 16 Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters.

This passage is talking about the subject of whether or not God tempts us to sin and while the answer is "no", this passage gives us the pattern by which sin...ALL sin...happens. There is a desire that tempts us, we linger with that desire and hang around with it...then it takes hold of us and we act on it (gives birth to sin) and then that sin leads to death. Sounds a lot like the process of an affair...online or otherwise.

I've thought rather than demonize Facebook, maybe we should look at the real problem which is ourselves and put our guards there. There's no denying that Facebook gives more occasion for connection, that's why it's popular, but just like any other area of connection, it shouldn't give us some "free pass" to throw off all safeguards and just act however...that's where the real problem comes.

In real life, I don't ride in a car by myself with a member of the opposite sex that isn't family, if I can help it...I don't tell things to members of the opposite sex that I haven't told my wife. I don't have personal conversations with members of the opposite sex, but if a conversation turns that way, I talk about it with Katye. She is privy to all parts of my life...and loads of that are things that I tell NO ONE but her and vice versa with her.

I don't violate those things on Facebook either... and then there's other guards as well, if I don't know you, I'm probably not going to accept your friend request. I stay off private chat, if I can help it...if I do get on and talk with someone, I'll let Katye know what we said. That's transparency...that's a big part of safety. If I'd feel weird telling Katye about an interaction, then it's a safe bet, I don't need to take that connection opportunity...that's a good safeguard for me.

The truth is that affairs start at ANY connection point...too many affairs start at work, so should we stop working? or make work segregated sexaully? No. Work isn't the problem...and neither is Facebook. The problem is the lack of discipline of the people who use it...and to an experience, that's exactly how sin works...regardless of the medium.

Last day recap - leaving for the airport in 5 hours

2011-05-06T19:02:00.000-04:00

Well, the last day was whirlwind to say the least. We began by heading out to the church to meet with Pastor Ricardo of Iglesia Bautista El Dorado. We talked through a lot of the things that we had learned so far and bounced ideas off of him and his team. It was very encouraging and very promising.

First, this is a MOMUMENTAL job...300k of Panamanian Chinese, very few believers. The language that most speak, Hakka (pronounced "Ha-KA'"), no one does ministry in because of the stigma attached to the language. The preferred language is Mandarin, the more respected language...why would anyone speak Hakka, even if we do, we won't own up to it and why would you attempt to communicate in it, even though that is the most communicative language to the 1st generation Chinese? See what I mean...a barrier. The other barrier is their work schedule...they are all workaholics. They rarely leave their shops, even for kids programs at school. School is the job of their children and working at their shop is their job. A 14-16 hour day is not unheard of and to keep that up for 7 days a week is normal. Big task.

We are looking at sending teams of people at least 4 times a year, possibly more...the opportunities are endless...literally. We have a lot of good ideas and have learned a lot, but this is just the beginning...and it is a beginning. Here's the thing...FBC Melbourne has NEVER done anything to this extent before.

Let this sink in...

We have adopted 300,000 people that don't know Jesus...let that sink in...300,000 people. We aren't part of teams that go to Romania or Nicaragua or Haiti...not part of other churches that help. In large part, as far as outside mission resource and support, we, as ONE CHURCH, are IT. Only us. That is a monumental responsibility and focus. We have NEVER done that before.

We have plans...we will need YOU. (don't look around, I'm talking about you...)

WE met an immediate outreach need by buying 2 ping pong tables to use in the activity outreaches to the Chinese students. Pastor Ricardo, Rick Furtney and I went to buy the tables...Pastor Ricardo doesn't speak much English...me and Rick, almost no Spanish. We took the time to "practice" on each other. I learned a lot...I habla mucho es Spaniol than the Po Quito me habla earlier....okay that's it. They were very appreciative, both Tomas and Ricardo.

While we were gone, the students from the school came over for an awards ceremony. This was special because there were actually parents that came...this is unusual. We made some good contacts and got some good info. We spent some time with the administration of the school and made some plans for next January.

We left there to meet the Tim Louderback (IMB missionaries), Audrey Tucker (IMB to college students) and Tina (another missionary with the ISC). They are mainly focused on Panamanian people, not Chinese, but it was a good lunch.

From there we went to the Crossroads Christian School to meet with Frank and Kelly Lee, who have some considerable experience with the Hakka and worked with John Mark, the previous missionary that did a lot of work here...his research has helped us a lot. It was VERY informative, but also troubling, because while we uncovered some opportunities, we also had some difficulties reinforced...it's not impossible by any means, but it will not be easy...so it must be God.

We are all reeling from the week...so much information...so much need...so much we need and CAN and SHOULD do as a church. It's all wonderful to "say" you adopted an unreached people group and to get a certificate, but now you actually have to take on the heavy burden for reaching them. This will be a LARGE change for our church, philosophically and resourcewise, in my opinion...but, we signed on, we got the paper and they are our responsibility.

Recap for Thursday, Day 3, from Panama

2011-05-05T16:47:00.001-04:00

Well...I'm just sitting down to blog, after a really good day. Not a long one, but a good one.

Most of the rest of the team is checking out the rain forests, but I decided to stay behind and have some much needed, quiet and alone time...I'm a hermit by trade, so what can I say. The Panamanian Rain Forests...or...time completely alone...yeah, I choose alone. :) Awesome team, nothing like that...I'm just a hermit at heart who needs him time of quiet to energize.

This morning, (after another Mavs win over the Lakers last night), we struck out early to share our testimonies with some 6th-8th graders. I shared with the first group of 7th and 8th graders at 7:45...I broke out the tennis balls and juggled a bit to help tell my story (tried it once last year and then it had been a while). It was "faith juggling", no practice just go and God was faithful...it worked. Jenni Irvin and Darren Wolfe shared their stories (I enjoyed hearing them) and then Larry gave an invitation.

Jenny, Kevin and Larry shared with the 6th graders in another class and had to use an interpreter in Spanish. About half way through Jenny Goodson's presentation, the principal came in and stopped the presentation. Apparently, he recognized that some of the students only knew Chinese and knew neither Spanish nor English...at that point he asked Sharon Chaio on our team to translate for this group and the rest of the time, our team would speak, the teacher would translate in Spanish and then Sharon would translate in Mandarin for the other students. That was interesting.

We went back to our apartment and then we talked for about 2-3 hours putting together all that we'd seen and heard. We will have to plan at least 1 other trip this year besides the trip we have coming in June.
Tomorrow...SPECIAL opportunity...it's nearly impossible to get to Chinese adults, they work 7 days a week and many for 12-14 hours, but tomorrow morning there is an awards ceremony at the Panama Christian School and many parents will come to see their child. We'll get to share with them tomorrow about Christ...big moment.

After that we'll be meeting with some IMB missionaries that work with Panamanians and a couple who focuses on college students in Panama...hopefullly we'll also catch up with a church planter in the area who is looking to reach the Chinese as well...that will be about EVERYONE who is working specifically with the people in this region. Part of our team will also be talking with someone who plans medical missions into the jungles of Panama. They have yet to go to the Chinese, but we'll look for them as a long term contact for our trips. Some of those will be gone next year...it's a good time for us to be here and to take up the work.

We had a good dinner last night with the Joberts (the IMB missionaries being reassigned to Costa Rica) and with Tomis (and his wife, Melissa) and Cliede Cooper, a great resource person for us here in Panama.

This endeavor will be unlike any other partnership that FBC has taken on with Romania or Nicaruagua or Haiti...this is a new level of commitment for our church. Not only will we need more people to come to Panama, but we will need people to lead and coordinate the effort, because this effort alone will be massive. We have a lot of ideas of how we can help short-term, mid-term and long-term. Of course, we'll be dialoguing continuously with the contacts that we've made here to see what we can do and what will fit in with, undergird and multiply their efforts currently. We'll be sharing a lot of our findings when we get back, but here's my challenge to you (yes you, not him...not her either, you):
1) Get your passport
2) Shots for Panama (TDap, Hep A, Hep B, Typhoid, etc...) - look on the Brevard Department of Health website...
3) Start saving to come.

Here's the Radical Experiment right here...you gonna do it or not?

Wednesday recap - Day 2

2011-05-04T19:14:00.001-04:00

Well, we started early. Most of the team took an early trek to the top of a hill where you can see the whole city, but not yours truly...I slept in. Felt a little like a slack, but I got to fire off the blog, spend some extra time in prayer and QT and still be comfotably ready and waiting when Steven, Lao and Tomis got here to pick us up.

Interesting personal note: When I was a child in rural Alabama, a missionary from Paraguay named Ken Watkins came to my church...I was 3. He took a liking to me and I latched onto him and called him "My Missionary". Ma has a picture to this day of Ken and I. I never kept up with him after that much (had Ma write a letter, I think). Steven mentioned being in Panama and I casually mentioned Ken and Steven knew him and his family had stayed in his house. He said Ken pioneered much of the mission work today in Paraguay and shared a story about how one time Ken was preaching and men rode up on horse back, horse whipped Ken and broke all his equipment...but he stayed. "My Missionary" is the bomb... Steven also knew a friend of mine that went to school with him and his wife at the University of North Alabama and again at Mid-American Seminary in Memphis...small world.

We went to Iglesia Bautista El Dorado today and met with Tomis and Lao and a few others who work with the Panamanian Chinese students out of El Dorado (I remember some of their names, but not all...Claudia, Mauricio, and a few others).

From there we went to Panama Christian School, which was a very short walk across a parking lot from El Dorado. There we met Willy, a chaplain at the school and Eduardo, a school official...they are working hard using the school as a very efficient tool to share Jesus to Chinese students. It's a private school and it's been here for 10 years (adding a grade each year -- they have retained 10 students from the original 1st grade class of 27). The school has garnered such a great reputation so far, that all types of Chinese want to come to their school...some travel 2 hours one way. They pay tuition to come and 75-80% of the students ARE NOT Christian. The school requires them all to take mandatory Bible class and they all have to memorize Scripture for a grade...parents get to hear them practicing...pretty cool, huh? The school has a serious mission and have a great vision to reach parents.
Larry, Jeff and Sharon got to speak to an assembly of 9th-10th graders...good times. They speak English, Spanish and Chinese. The school administrator believes that Central America will be the sending ground for the next major force that will TRULY reach the whole world. The main 3 languages here are English, Spanish and Chinese and those will carry you throughout most of the world. They don't have the stigma that Americans do across the world...so we'll see.

We went to eat at a hole in the wall Chinese restaurant and it was great and we talked a LONG time how we could get plugged in to ministry here in with them. LOTS of ideas, lots of brainstorming and some concrete short-term projects, long-term projects that are possibilities...now we have to put them in gear...GET READY.

We prayer walked (but honestly, mostly continued brainstorming with Tomis, Lao, Claudia, Mauricio and others) about how we could help them or be a resource or whatever.

Good productive day...we leave in 20 minutes to meet the Joberts, Cliede Cooper (a local church planter and HEAVY resource for us), Tomis, Lao and others for supper (or whatever they call it down here). Thanks for praying...don't quit.

*** We need to have at least one more trip this year...we have a college aged trip coming in July, but we need to probably look at another trip in later in the early Fall...FULFILL YOUR RADICAL COMMITMENT HERE. Get ready.

Quick one from Panama - Tuesday's recap

2011-05-04T09:18:00.000-04:00

Wow...fast first day. We met with our missionary, Steven and his family and learned a little about the Panamanian culture. We went to the Canal and saw that big thing and Larry and Jeff got to share Christ with a guy who worked there.

Today, we meet with the church at El Dorado ("Gayly bedite, a gallant knight, in sunshine and shadow"....Google it) and we'll look at what we're doing for the next couple of days. We've got many possible leads on people that we can hook up with to support and send teams to, and today, we'll be meeting many of these folks and hoping that the "possible" turns to "positive". We also are meeting at a Chinese-Panamanian school (high schoolers, I think...found that out on the bus ride down and a little more detail yesterday...we're scrambling to come up with stuff to do a bit, because they have us scheduled to meet with them for a program for like 2 hours...we're trying to adjust that, especially since this trip was more exploratory, i.e. we didn't know to plan a 2 hour program for high schoolers, yikes!...but God is in control).

There is some church planting going on, but I'm also seeing do to restructuring, the IMB is pulling out a lot of teams that work with the Panamanian culture here over the next two years, so it's a good time for us to be getting here, before they leave (that's Panamanian people, not working with our people group, the Chinese here)...so the missionary effort in this area will be decreasing all over...sad, but God...still in control..

Talk to you more tomorrow...got to go.

P.S. Also heard the Mavs beat the Lakers on Monday...Go Mavs! ;)

Bay West T-shirts - a RADICAL piece of clothing to own

2011-04-28T12:37:00.002-04:00

This Sunday, we'll start selling the Bay West T-shirts that I've been putting on Facebook and Twitter and that Randy and I wore to Church in the Park on Palm Sunday. These T-shirts won't just be a normal buy and be a walking ad for Bay West, they have a larger purpose.

We are in the process of working with Viera Water Network, a year old ministry based up in Viera, that goes to under-resourced countries to build safe water pumps and safe water systems for people. Over 1.4 billion children die each year from preventable diseases caused by unsafe drinking water...that works out to 4,000 deaths per day or 1 every two seconds...that's two children alone that have died from a preventable disease due to drinking unsafe water since you began reading this blogpost.

FBC is forming a partnership with VWN and we will be sending a team to community that we have partnered with in Nicaragua in July. We hope to be able to see VWN repair two water supply areas there in the community and my hope for these T-shirts is that the sale of them will pay for at least 1 of the repairs. I hope to be having Daniel from Viera Water Network in to Bay West to give us a better picture of what they are doing and the ministry they are a part of.

We will be selling the T-shirts for a minimum price of $15 per shirt...we have made a decision NOT to recoup the cost of the T-shirts and send ALL money given to the shirts to this project. Due to our commitment to the Radical Experiment, we'll make adjustments in our campus budget to make up for the production costs of the T-shirts and any future T-shirt orders for this project, so we can give ALL of the $15 price to the project in Nicaragua.

Why minimum price? We chose this term because we know that some of you will probably want to give more to this project, so anything above $15 given to each shirt will go to the project as well.

Why $15? We have 100 shirts and the average cost of a well repair is $1500...our hope is to pay for one at least and possibly pay for another or have money to put toward another.

We have regular T-shirts, soft cloth (blue, tan, black) and some "Junior Cut Ladies" Tees (Pink/black writing & black/white writing) as well.

Time

2011-03-23T10:16:00.000-04:00

“Time, why you punish me?” That’s the beginning line to an old song by Hootie and the Blowfish (some people will hate me for saying "old song", but it’s been 15 years people…that’s broaching oldie). Even though it’s been 15 years (ouch again), I can still identify with that line…though probably not in the way it was intended. Sometimes, it feels as though time is flying at you and just punishing you. I remember hearing a story told by a comedian about how a man tried tying himself to a post on a seashore once to prove he was fit enough to withstand the force of the wind…the comedian calmly pointed out that it wasn’t the force of the wind that got you, it was what the winds blew at you. His words were “When you get hit by a Volvo, it doesn’t really matter how many sit-ups you did that morning.” Clever and true.

Time is like that as well. It sweeps in and through, going seemingly faster as you age, and then you think it’s punishing you, but it’s not time, it’s the things that time blows at you…the tragedies, the changes, the harsh realities, the seasons of life that pass and the seasons that never seem to end. It is like this for EVERY person on the planet…we are not alone.

It’s at times like these that I am most comforted to be a follower of Christ. Jesus tells me in John 15:5 that He is the vine and we are the branches and promises help for us as we remain in Him and He remains in us. He supports us from without protecting us from what comes…and then bolsters us from the inside helping us to withstand tremendous collision. He tells us in 1 Corinthians that He controls the things He lets get to us and provides for help even in the toughest of situations. In Romans 10, Paul writes that “all things work to the good of those who love and serve the Lord”, showing us that even the most seemingly cruel situations, God controls and turns them to good in our lives and the lives of others as we continue to love and serve Him.

It’s times like these, when I read the word and see the massive amounts of gigantic debris that time has thrown at those who have followed the Lord throughout the ages that I understand one truth for sure…

God is bigger than time, and time, at times, may “punish me”, but God will sustain me and bless me, if I refuse to be the servant of time, and remain the servant of Christ.

Gaps and holes

2011-03-08T20:07:00.001-05:00

We talked a few weeks ago about why it's important to study all of God's Word...to read it all for yourself.

One of the primary reasons we talked about this danger was because failing to do so can leave "gaps" and "holes" in your understanding of God's Word. The natural tendency when you don't have information is to try to fill those "gaps" and "holes" with your own logic or wishes or from your sense of justice or mercy...and most of the time, our personal thoughts are not God's thoughts.

I ran across this verse that made me think about this in my reading today...in Jude 1

¹⁸ They said to you, “In the last times there will be scoffers who will follow their own ungodly desires.”
¹⁹ These are the people who divide you, who follow mere natural instincts and do not have the Spirit.

What the Bible points out here is the dangers of following merely your own natural instincts. It's hard to remember that sin corrupts even our best logic and helps us completely rationalize the most illogical thing we can do...not following God...that's what sin did to us. It made it seem like the "smart" and "logical" thing to do was something other than God's plan. That's why the Word is so important and why we should strive to know it as well as we can. Our earthly intelligence...at its best, will always have a part of it that will try to pull us away from God, because, through sin, it is flawed. We need God...we need His Word.

So take advantage of the gift that God gave you....and get rid of the "gaps" and "holes".

Radical AND the Power Team

2011-02-28T13:23:00.001-05:00

The Power Team had a GREAT time last week and God really moved in the lives of some people, but, NOW, the real work begins for us as a church. "Do you mean that setting the stage and all that stuff wasn't work?" No, it was...but it's just the beginning.

Last week, 181 people made decisions for Christ for the first time, & 59 people who are returning to Christ in rededication. That's almost 200 new people in God's kingdom...We just finished a series on our theme for the year, Radical....time to step up, people of God.

In Radical, it walks about multiplying yourselves and being a part of a multiplying community, here's where the rubber meets the road for that...it's not just seeing decisions for Christ, it's deciding to step in and take people who've made decisions and helping them grow in Christ...taking responsibility for the spiritual "babies" (if anyone who accepted Christ for the first time is reading this, I'm not trying to slam you, but to make a point to existing Christians...you are new, and you need some help to know where to go from here - that's all.)

Don't bring me any weak stuff like "I don't know enough"...every person who's been a Christian knows SOMETHING to pass on to the next one.

Here's where the RADICAL challenge/experiment meets the road now...what are YOU going to do about those spiritual babies? Not me...not Larry...not Dennis or Doug or David or Jenny or Tom or Scott or Randy or Nate or Bevan or the deacons or whatever group you can categorize... but YOU...What are you gonna do?

Here's my suggestion:

If you know ANYONE personally who made a decision, then YOU take the personal responsibility to be PROACTIVE in offering yourself as a resource and mentor through this time for them. I'm not talking about just once, but to call them and then check up on them...ask them to lunch (guys with guys, girls with girls...please)...talk to them about their decision...encourage them once a week for the next two months...help them get to church by inviting them, offering them a ride...be availble, but not just that, be proactive in contacting them. Point them to where you read...not reading the Word? START NOW...you don't have time to waste, them read it with them.

There shouldn't be ANY young Christian that has to wait to ask for help...that's the job of ALL Christians in our churches.

Time to step up people...God dropped 200 spiritual children on your door, church...rubber is meeting the road as you read this...what you gonna do?

Look what's going on in the schools in Brevard County

2011-02-21T13:12:00.000-05:00

I got an update from Loretta Dozier, the founder of Dove Bible Club, that we had in services a few months ago. Loretta and her husband, Anthony, are doing some great work in the schools in Brevard County. She started Dove Bible Clubs in 2008 in 4 schools...here's her latest update below, including the first DBC started out of the state of Florida in Houston, TX...

"We just started school #14. We are in all 11 Brevard County elementary schools in Palm Bay and 2 Middle schools (Southwest Middle-Palm Bay and Wells Middle - Houston Texas). We are now moving northward in the Melbourne schools. We started Meadowlane Intermediate in January, with a total of 55 students. We will start school number #15 next month at Meadowlane Primary.

For the month of January, we shared the gospel with 381 students.

The print cartridges are coming in very handy. It is nice to have them on hand, as I need them. I have already used 1 black cartridge and started my second one yesterday. God bless you and BayWest Church for your gift of ink cartridges!"

Loretta and Anthony really need our prayers for energy, strength and wisdom to continue doing the work God has for them in our schools. For more information on Dove Bible Clubs, including how you can help in your area, check out dovebibleclub.org .

Sugar and air

2011-02-02T15:00:00.002-05:00

Every year, we make our way around to that time when we all are bombarded with signs of love everywhere. Hearts, flowers and balloons mark the stores, advertisements and commercials on TV. Usually our mental paintings of love consist of romantic fancy and that's certainly a part of the equation. Still, for me, I see this extreme over-emphasis on this small part of love, as more of a detriment in some ways than a help. Don't lynch me...hear me out.

I fear that in focusing exclusively on the emotional part of love in our relationships, we walk away with the wrong definition of what we sign up for. Love is not about that rush of feeling you get, that's not the substance of love, that's like the icing on a cake. Icing on a cake is pretty much sugar and air. In every relationship, there comes a time, where the strength of love is tested. If your version of "love" is just sugar and air, then you are in trouble, because there no substance to it. Icing never stands by itself, it needs a solid substance by which to cling.

The substance of real love is based in commitment and sacrifice. The Bible says that there's no greater love that a man can have than to lay down his life for his friends. The most extreme picture of this definition was when God's Son, Jesus, gave His life for every one of us without a "pre-nuptial" promise beforehand. That's unconditional...freely given regardless of whether it's returned or not.

Everyone longs to be loved in this manner because it's real. The problem is that we all want it, but we don't want to do the work to give it. It's the son that wants his mom to just "accept him", but doesn't embrace her lack of acceptance. It's the wife, that thinks its all her husband's fault, and if he'd just "love" her like he is supposed to, then everything would be fine or the husband who does the same...we all want to have the perfect partner to love, but much like Jesus, who has no choice but imperfection from which to choose to love, it isn't happening. That's part of what Jesus modeled for us, because the strength of love is never in the getting, but in the giving of it. Here's another truth of it...if you aren't willing to give it, you will never get it, it will never come to you by demanding it. You'll just be shouting at the rain. It's a commitment freely given, with risk of it never returning anything. That's hard, but true.

So when you "get" the flowers or the golf clubs or the card, and over a candlelight dinner you gaze into the eyes of someone, don't forget that the feeling of the moment has to have some hard choosing, unglamorous, pride-swallowing sacrifice at its foundation if it's going to last. If not, it'll wash away at some point, either in light rain or hurricane, because ultimately, it was just sugar and air to begin with.

Safety redefined

2011-01-22T09:21:00.005-05:00

I'm reading this book called The Barbarian Way by Erwin McManus and he deals with the "domestication" of Christianity. One of the principles that he discredits is the Americanized version of the safest place to be is in the center of God's will. We've somehow taken this to mean that God will keep us physically safe. That's not necessarily true. I believe, in the eternal sense, that the safest place to be is in the center of God's will, but there's a lot of Biblical argument that God will sacrifice physical safety for spiritual gain.

Ran across another deal this morning...Joseph, son of Jacob, was sold into slavery by his brothers and those same loving brothers told their father that he was dead. They even attempted to manufacture evidence by taking the coat they'd stolen from him and dipping it in animal's blood, to throw Jack McCoy off the track.

After all of this, Joseph goes on this amazing journey where he's sold into slavery, falsely accused for rape and imprisoned for at least 2 years or more. Person after person that Joseph helped or served faithfully in his state betrayed him or forgot about him or lied to have him imprisoned. Then, of course, he interprets a dream for Pharaoh and Pharaoh ends up making him second in command of the country of Egypt...a pretty normal occurrence for all us, wouldn't you say?

Here's the point...most folks read that story and think God jumped in while Joseph was in prison and "took over" to bring him to the exalted position of 2nd in command in the country...but that is not what the Bible says. Here's the commentary straight from Joseph's mouth in Genesis 45.
5 But don’t be upset, and don’t be angry with yourselves for selling me to this place. It was God who sent me here ahead of you to preserve your lives. 6 This famine that has ravaged the land for two years will last five more years, and there will be neither plowing nor harvesting.

No matter how you read it..."It was God" sticks out. So was God not in control while he was attacked by his brothers, imprisoned by them, sold & resold as a slave, falsely accused & imprisoned for rape, forgotten and betrayed by people sworn to help, but then he was "in God's will" when God stepped in to make him 2nd in command in Egypt...or was it, as Joseph seems to understand, all a part of God's will to begin with... Kind of blows that "I'm safe in the arms of God" thing. I really like the old song "Sheltered in the Arms of God"...it talks of safety, but the chorus states the truth "so let the storms rage high, the dark clouds rise, they won't worry me". Our physical blessing or safety is not the priority...of course, God doesn't want you to live in a stressed out state, but that's because He wants you to trust Him so much, that you accept what He has for you, NOT that there is always piles of money in the bank or the job is safe or the 401k is rolling on up. We will see death and struggle, but that's not because "Satan" snuck into the control tower and God is breaking down the door to get things back in order...doesn't work that way.

The "Bay" Way

2011-01-13T10:57:00.001-05:00

I confess...that's flippin' corny. No doubt about it...I'm going to own that, but as I told my girls about commercials on TV, they aren't written to be the best song or the best acting, they are written to be the most memorable and that's what Bay is all about.

Hence, the Bay Way. I've gone to church a lot in my life and I can navigate the culture pretty much, but if you haven't been in church all your life, you may not get the memo of what's "normal" in being a part of a group of believers. So here's what we are...our core values are explained here. Those are called "the 6" and are they are statements that guide what we are trying to do at BW to keep us on track as an organization.

But past that, for the individual, if you wonder what's the norm for involvement in church, here it is for us...and it's BAY.

Be here. A primary purpose is for us is to help people love God more. Our worship services are designed to help you learn about God and process through various parts of who He is through speaking, singing, and creative experiences.

Among friends. Another primary purpose is to learn to love others more, from a God perspective. Our small groups are designed to develop community and relationship. People learning from God by being a part of each other's lives and learning to care/love each other from a God perspective. These Bible studies meet in homes weekly or bi-weekly.

Your part. Another primary purpose is to learn to serve the world around us. We expect everyone to find a place that is their responsibility within the workings of Bay West. That's usually on Sunday mornings taking a turn on our FIT (First Impressions Team), KidZone, Setup crews, Worship Team or something like that. Everyone needs to be a part. This practice reinforces the truth that we don't come to Bay West for ourselves. It teaches us to give to serve others inside the church and hopefully, that habit translates outside the church. It's important in the church because doing it in the context of "worship" helps us understand that worshipping God isn't a passive activity and we learn more by doing.

There it is, in a nutshell....Be here, Among friends, Your part..."BAY" Way.

So, how are you finishing off 2010?

2010-12-30T18:23:00.001-05:00

So, how are you finishing off 2010? If you are like me, it's possibly like running 300 miles an hour and then slamming on the breaks, hitting a wall, somewhere around Dec. 26-Jan. 2. A lot of people I talk to seem to be like that. There’s a lot of stress in the season these days. One really has to wonder how it came to that, because “stress” was about the last thing that God really wanted for us to associate with the birth of His Son. It was quite the opposite actually.

In the Bible, the prophecies that talk about Jesus’ coming tell us things like “God is right here with us”, describing His power and might and endless capability to handle situations and this world…and then it wraps all that up in words like “Everlasting Father”, denoting how this magnificent God views us all. One of the most interesting themes that is thrown out the Old Testament is the theme of “comfort” in Isaiah 40. Prophecy in the Bible usually has an effect for the people of that time, an alluding aspect to a future event and an over-arching principle for all of mankind. In Isaiah 40, the Israelites are just getting back in God’s good graces, so to speak, because they are being delivered from a country’s oppression that has been due to their lack of respect and obedience to God. Isaiah 40 starts off with “comfort, comfort my people” and then it goes on to link this prophecy with the life of Christ in the New Testament. We begin to understand that one of the big things about Jesus’ coming is that we are comforted in knowing that the Master Planner of the Universe is actively working over us with the care of a Father and has sent His valuable Son to rescue us. In a lot of ways, Jesus’ coming was meant to reduce the amount of stress in our lives, limiting us to one main concern, a relationship with Jesus as the source of our comfort.

God’s gift of Christ was supposed to streamline our cares in this world to our relationship with Him. We were supposed to see that God would provide, care for, protect and direct us by giving us access to limitless wisdom and knowledge that is found in the relationship with Jesus.

You see, What we’ve created is far from a simple gathering of a few shepherds with the family. This event was meant to take the pressure off and relax us…but somehow, we’ve found a way to turn it into one of the most stressful times of the year. Sometimes, I have to wonder if somewhere, when Christmas starts again, God just looks at our overstated plans and just, figuratively, shakes His head…and maybe chuckles a little.

Everybody makes mistakes :)

2010-12-05T15:06:00.001-05:00

I've got to fess up to a slight mistake I made in the Biblical history of this morning's message.

In my time alone in the Word this morning before I left for Bay West, I was reading in Hosea 1. I was thinking how that was a lot like Isaiah in that God used the names that Hosea was to name his children in delivering his message to His people.

Here's the problem...when I was talking this morning about how God used the names of Isaiah's children to show his prophecies, off the cuff, I decided to give an example...bad idea. Unfortunately, instead of giving you a name of Isaiah's child's name, I gave an example of one of the children's names in Hosea [Lo-Ruhamah (which means “not loved”)] that I read about this morning before church.

Sorry about that. Just wanted to clear that up.

P.S. Thanks to Katye for pointing that out to me later.

The invisibility of repentance Part 1

2010-10-01T20:40:00.001-04:00

Today's blog is not a solution...it's a beginning to a thought process. Think of it as a jumping off point....you may not agree. You may not find resolution...it's not sewed up and finished. That's fine....Here we go...
This thought's just been running through my head and I'm a little concerned for the church of America today and it has to do with God's grace and forgiveness.
I believe somehow in our society, we've gotten the impression that "admitting" or "confessing" your sin is enough for God's forgiveness and grace. It's become accepted, almost, to some, for us to feel that if we own up to a sinful behavior, but tack on the end, "God will just have to forgive me", then somehow, someway, we feel that's enough to settle accounts with God. Sadly, it's not. I wish I could tell you that only giving the "head nod" and the "yeah, you're right" was good enough for God's forgiveness and grace, but it's just not. What then finishes off that forgiveness for God? REPENTANCE.
Repentance means that you turn around from the direction that you are heading, do a 180 and do it God's way. That's what it is. That's all it is. There is no substitute for that. In other words, if I'm not being kind to someone, then my repentance is to start treating them with kindness. That's what it is. If God has told me to do something, then my repentance is to do what God says, that's the only way that relationship with God is maintained. Here's a thought for you to chew on...I'm not done with this, so really chew on this.

The grace of God is a magnificent thing, but it is designed to cover us until we come in line with God's Word...NOT instead of us coming in line with God's Word.

What do you think?

Next time....we'll start here.

"If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left."
Hebrews 10:26

The definition of God

2010-09-22T14:51:00.003-04:00

You know...I don't think we take enough time to think through what being "God" means. It's impossible to fully grasp. God is unique and has a set of rules that apply only to Him. Just wanted to throw out some random thoughts on the subject.

God is perfect...He lacks NOTHING. In other words, He does not need you or I. You and I must act on the basis of need. We need food. We need relationship. We need rest. God is in a total state of perfection...in other words, at every moment, He has NO need. In turn, He never acts out of want or need...He acts ONLY out of free choice. We cannot understand that, because every decision we make, every action we attempt, is, at it's most free, a coerced choice or a "forced choice". At some level, every choice we make is effected by "need". In fact, our entire life is colored by need.

God owns everything. That's me, that's you, that's your Mom, your house, your stuff...it's all His. In the faux ownership thing that we live everyday, really just minding HIS stuff, we don't like anyone telling us what to do with our (HIS) stuff...well, neither does God, and even more, because it is His stuff...and it really is. He's not caught in the fake state of ownership like we are, attempting to "own" everything, including our own bodies. He really owns it all. Unlike us, He's not just holding it until the real owner decides to take it back.

God is not moral. Before you lynch me, follow me a little. I'm not saying that God is immoral. When we say that something is "moral", we are saying that here is a "moral standard" and this thing/act/person conforms to that standard, therefore they are moral. God conforms to no standard...He is the standard. It would be more correct to say "Moral is God." The standard by which we determine something being right or moral or just is what God is. That's the only requirement. In this sense, God is not just...Just is God.

Whatever God decides to do in the moment is right. He is not bound as we are, by a standard that is out there that depicts justice or righteousness that we try to model.

For example, if God decided to completely flip the rules of life tomorrow (which He would never do, because He is unchanging and consistent to His character, but for sake of argument)...if He did...say...make murdering people right and correct. That's just crazy, but I'm just picking something "nuts" to make a point. If he made that switch in morality, then that would be the right and moral thing to do, because He is the standard of right...there is no other.

For us, we can easily fall into a very American mentality of thinking that the authority needs to meet our approval. God cannot be judged or evaluated. There would never be an evaluation that comes back but "that's the most perfect action to be taken". Why? Because whatever God does, by definition of "being God", is absolutely right. The misconception that we all fall into at times is that there is a standard set that we are supposed to judge God by, that He should meet to determine if He deserves our allegiance. That is completely wrong and it makes terribly misguided conceptions of God. It lacks an understanding of what it means to be God. Think about these questions...

What if whatever you decided to do was instantly a law of the Universe?
What if gravity was your decision?
What if what you felt defined reality?
What if the concept of perfection was based on what you are?
What if the way you are determined the way the world worked?
What if physics was based on you and not the other way around?

Getting the picture...to question God is not to understand who or what He is and to demonstrate an ignorance of life itself.

There is no effort required to be perfect or all-powerful or all-knowing...it's just who He is. It's more natural to Him to be all of those things than it is for us to attempt to breathe. Easy and hard are irrelevant terms to God when "nothing is impossible" for you. As I said, the normal rules and assessment techniques don't apply when it comes to God and when we attempt to say things like "God didn't do that right" or "God is wrong" or "I think it would have been better to have done", we just spout ignorance of the reality of the situation, not some sort of evaluative wisdom that God didn't understand somewhere.

And the glorious thing is, in the middle of this situation, that He is aware of our almost insulting ignorance and He's quite willing to walk patiently with us through the complicated and impossible process of understanding...why? Because He loves us that much...and because, nothing is impossible for Him...another by-product of being God.

Please continue to pray for us at Bay West Church as we try to be the church of Jesus to west Palm Bay Florida.

A little reminder about relationships

2010-09-20T11:52:00.002-04:00

I know we talked about why we have them yesterday, how important they are and that they are one of God's primary learning tools for us and a top-level revelation process about Himself to us...but really take this with you today.

We can, in an almost obliviously selfish way, go into autopilot thinking that our relationships are for us. I challenge you not to live that way today. Give it a shot and just try it. The first time that you have that moment today where you think "What the devil are you thinking?" whoever your "you" is...stop it a minute...take a breath and ask yourself this question..."What is the goal of my next response?"

A few reminders...
"...to spur others on toward love and good (God) deeds..." Hebrew 10
"...gently restore" someone from a sin Galatians 6
"...to seek and to save that which was lost" Luke 19

Take a breath...accomplish your purpose, which, btw, isn't to prop your rep? Some people may look at what you do and think you are just taking junk...they might even call you a "doormat".

A huge secret/key to cultivating relationships with God's purposes in mind is to find your self-worth in pleasing Christ and not finding it in living up to the expectations of those around you. It's not easy...but it's the key and it's the way you are going have to do it to succeed in living a life that follows Christ. It's just the way it is.

Please continue to pray for us at Bay West Church as we continue to try to be the church of Jesus to the people of west Palm Bay Florida.

So what is the heart?

2010-09-15T09:55:00.000-04:00

Reading this morning...Proverbs 4:23 "Guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life." It's funny, but I've read that many times, but some days the Word hits you differently than others.

It's really true. Picture a flowing spring of water...picture a hole that it comes from, as it runs along the ground making the stream. If you go to the source and pour in green food coloring, think about what would happen. It would turn the stream green or at least, greenish. Hopefully, it would run out or clear out, but it would effect it for a while. Imagine setting up an I.V. of green food coloring that dripped at a steady pace into the wellspring or the source...it would effect the spring, turning it greenish or green consistently...whether that's good or bad, depends on your perspective on green and food coloring.

Apply that to our heart, the source, and our life, the stream. We should be careful what we allow to dump into or to drip into our life, because it can turn it green or whatever...and as I said, the good or bad is dependent on your view of green, because what we allow into that wellspring of life can do either. Carelessly allowing a temporary thing or even an ongoing habit/activity to "drip" can drastically effect many areas of your life.

For many of us, the stream of life takes a turn around a tree, out of sight of the source of the stream, and looking at life there, we honestly can't tell why the life is effected in the way it is. Nothing is poured into the stream at that point...nothing is in the immediate vicinity, but the life is effected negatively or positively anyway. If it's negative and you are trying to solve it, it can be maddening...there is no cause, seemingly...nothing related to the direct issue...how do you fix it? You just can't find the cause at that location...the problem is that it was what was dropped in at the wellspring, the heart, seemingly having nothing to do with it, and the effects show up far from the site of the problem. It's just how it goes, and like it says in vs 19 of the same chapter, it can put you on a path of wickedness, that is darkness, and they "do not know what makes them stumble."

I picture standing determined guard over this spot of my life, making sure that whatever gets here, as best as I can make it happen, is Jim-tested and Jim-approved...better still, that Jim's test standards come from the Word of God. Because what gets there will color my life...there is no way to avoid it. Protect it.

Proverbs 4 is all about wisdom and it's got several cool deep nuggets that can shape your activity/thinking for the better in it...some of the verses I'm committing to memory right now are from here (incidentally, I just changed my Scripture memory process...awesome Android app called "Remember me"...free app, it will even speak the verse to you if you need it...try it out.)

Try it out...Proverbs 4, I mean...the Android app is optional. iPhone users are on their own. :)

Keep praying for all of us on the leadership team at Bay West Church, as we try to be the church of Jesus in Palm Bay.

Interesting deal about "SMALL is big" from Last Sunday

2010-08-17T21:51:00.000-04:00

Last Sunday, in the intro talk to our message series "Focus", we talked about the parable of the talents from Matthew 25. We talked about how Jesus was teaching about the kingdom of Heaven, but the real issue that He was teaching everyone about was how to live and maintain in uncertain times...in situations where there is limited info and visibility is hampered.

In that parable, we learned that that zeroing in on the small things...the moment by moment decisions and honoring God with each one, keeps us in focus (which, is all about zeroing in on the small things and that's why they are so big.)

In that context, we talked about the guy with the 5 talents, 2 talents and the 1 talent...interesting bit of knowledge on those guys that I forgot to bring out. A talent was the largest single unit of money back then in Jerusalem. It was equal to 10,000 denari. Interestingly enough, a denari was basically looked upon as one days wage....or 10,000 days of work. If you worked somewhere for around 40 years, you'd probably hit 10,000 days of work or somewhere thereabouts...which in our culture is basically your working lifespan as an adult, give or take a few years. In a sense, the talent was a life or a life's work.

When you begin to look at the parable of the talents as basically a "life" producing other "lives" and multiplying themselves in the Christian context...you begin to see the picture even more clear, as the layers of this teaching story really play out. It spoke to me as in "what am I doing to multiply life with the life that I've been given?" Or in other words, with this life-giving gospel that God has charged us all to take to masses and masses of spiritually dead people...am I hiding it in a hole in the ground or am I working smartly to allow God to use me to increase what He has?

Please pray for us at Bay West Church as we attempt to be the Church of Jesus to the people in West Palm Bay, Florida.

The way...

2010-08-09T21:20:00.000-04:00

1   “Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me.
2   There is more than enough room in my Father’s home. If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?
3   When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am.
4   And you know the way to where I am going.”
5 “No, we don’t know, Lord,” Thomas said. “We have no idea where you are going, so how can we know the way?”
6   Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me.”
John 14:1-6 (NLT)

These verses are pretty familiar to those around church...but in these verses, we zoom by wisdom every day. I think that all of us that follow Christ, at one time or another, have felt Thomas' pain..."God, I have no idea where you are going with this." We've all sought direction. We fall into a trap of thought that paralyzes us. It says "If I can't picture the end result or know the exact end destination, then how can I know which way to go today?" We all feel as though we need to see the end result to know how to proceed., but that's just not true.

We treat life like Google maps. We have to know the ending address and we want to plug that in to let our personal Google app generate the map...then we want to choose the options of the roads we want to take to get to the end destination. One problem is that God doesn't work that way.

He's already generated the map...and He's not giving it to us to manage. He's in full possession of that. If He handed it to us, the complexity of the plan would probably blow our minds and we'd be filled with thoughts of "no way THAT'S going to work." So what He does is give us, not the whole enchilada, but one decision at a time. He calls out the instruction and we move. That's the point of this Scripture.

Jesus said "I am the way"...I will be your momentary guide. Don't look for the end, look for Me..just go where I go and do what I do.
"I am the truth"...I will never steer you wrong.
"I am the life"...do not look for life's fulfillment and purpose outside of me. Anything you find to fulfill those roles will break like plastic when you lean on them...only I can handle them.
"No man comes to the Father but through Me." I'm all you need to know.

That's about it. It's really about that simple. Need direction? Make the next decision you make be the most God-honoring one you can. One after one, one breath at a time...from the little to the big...

One old adage debunked...

2010-08-02T13:09:00.000-04:00

"You can tell how popular the pastor is by how many people show up on Sunday morning.
You can tell how popular the church is by how many people show up on Sunday night.
You can tell how popular Jesus is by how many people show up at prayer meeting."

This is an old adage from church leadership from a while back. Someone should be due this quote and usually it holds true...BUT...not at Bay West last Sunday. Why? Because we experienced our largest total in the worship service for 2010, but there was one thing missing...the campus pastor, ME!

Some guys might be a little sad and while I guess I was disappointed that I couldn't experience it with you, the first thing for me was to let out a "YES!"...on the inside, because Matt texted me the total while I was in church in Arlington, TX. (and yes, I checked the text message...couldn't wait so I did it during the "welcome" time at the Church on Rush Creek, where Katye and I attended on Sunday). That's exactly what I want to see in our campus and church, a body that comes because of a love for Christ and not a love for a particular leader or anything.

Some accepted thoughts that I've enjoyed seeing fall so far as well...
"You can't grow a church in Palm Bay, for some reason." - God's proving that wrong.
"You can't grow a church without the cherry location." - While we love our school, we are out on the outskirts of east buddha..as we say in Bama)
"You need a lot of experience to get it done." campus pastor - 1st timer, worship leader - 1st timer, children's leader - 1st timer and MANY of our leaders are taking on their first shot at both their responsibilities AND being a portable church. God has brought the wisdom.
"People over a certain age won't attend a portable church..." - WRONG
"People over a certain age won't attend if you don't ________ {insert church tradition here}" - God proves that wrong every Sunday.
What I've enjoyed seeing is that our services at Bay West are LARGELY ageless...one of the most diverse churches generationally I've been around.

Some popular stereotypes about church I'd like to continue to see broken...
"Americans are too lazy and self-absorbed to give and serve sacrificially."
"Churches only care more about what goes on inside their walls than what goes on outside their walls."

Please don't see this as "pride", because our people only go as far as our God moves us and sustains us and guides us. If we give in to God and His leading, all these things and many more restrictions can be broken because God is limitless...He does whatever He wishes.

That's the lesson here...if you submit to God, the limits that you thought were there, probably won't be and you'll live a life that is bound only by the limits that God, not man, puts on it.

Please pray for us as we continue to try to submit to God's leading and be the church in Palm Bay for Christ that He wants at Bay West Church.

So what's the deal with baptism?

2010-07-28T11:59:00.000-04:00

On August 8th, we'll be taking advantage of becoming a Christ follower by having baptism on the beach. We'll be having a cookout/baptism at Howard Futch Pavillion over on the beach from 4-7pm.

I get questions about baptism and what we believe and who should be and all that jazz. Does it do any good to baptize infants? Does that help? Where did it come from?

This Sunday, we'll clear a lot of this stuff up. You won't want to miss it.

Things to remember:
August 8th - John James, former lead singer of the Grammy award winning band "Newsboys", will be speaking in our worship service. John has a great testimony as God led Him, even in the midst of being submersed in Christian culture, to the REAL important things in His life.
That afternoon - Beach Baptism

August 15th - VISION begins...don't miss it!

Please continue to pray for us at Bay West Church as we continue to try to bring Christ to the people of Palm Bay by being a church in palm bay.

One thing I forgot today about what is and isn't good...

2010-07-11T23:55:00.000-04:00

One more thing that I forgot to say today about what makes a "good" life.

For most of the planet, "good life" means that you do most things right, and everything thinks you are a great person...but as I said today at church, a "good life" has very little to do with what people think of me and everything to do with what people think of God.

What that means is that even in my failures, I can live a "good life". As I live my life attempting to be honorable to God, I'm probably going to make some mistakes and fall. If I'm living the world's definition of a "good" life, then I'm done pretty much...game over. But if my life is truly about focusing everything I can to bring glory to Christ, I can still be living a "good life". I can take advantage of God's grace and bring glory to Him by showing others that God's grace is amazing.

When I ask for God's forgiveness, accept His grace and point to His healing, I can bring glory and praise to God's great love, grace and healing power....doesn't make me look too swift. I look flawed and imperfect...this is the place where people usually hide their failures, so they won't look bad. That's not God's plan. When we fail, we should not be reluctant to testify of where we failed and God showed up.

Like I said, that won't make us look too good, but that's not really the point is it. It's all about "what people think of God" after witnessing my life, not about how great they think I am...think about it.

Please continue to pray for us as we try to be the church of Jesus to the people of Palm Bay, Florida at Bay West Church.

For the city...

2010-07-06T19:38:00.000-04:00

When we began to consider taking the Campus Pastor role for Bay West Church, going on 2 years ago, God really began to speak to me about some things. I became very disinterested in just being "another church" in a city. That's not a problem really, because every church needs to be who they are and what they are and collectively, the Lord works through His body (or bodies, if you think local churches). I'm cool with that, but for some reason, I became disinterested in it. Through the time, I felt that we at least needed to think on a little bit larger scale.

I shared with our Community Impact Team my vision for us in Palm Bay. How can we effect the city? What goodness can we bring to it? I believe that we've got to think a little larger than the boundaries of our meeting place. Then, as we discover this, how do we make unapologetically clear, without bragging or arrogance, that Christ is the reason for whatever the goodness is. Because He loves us, in gratitude to Him, we try to make Palm Bay a better place...securing more opportunities to point to His greatness.

I began to think...does this mean that we partner with civic organizations? Does this mean that we randomly give out kindness in small acts? Does this mean that we tackle a need and see if we can make a dent in it? Do we try to join with those who are looking to unite the church of God in a more citywide sense and really try to take on some of the problems in Palm Bay? Do we invest in other churches and church/campus starts? I believe the answer may be "yes" to all of them...but we must approach our opportunities with wisdom. I personally believe that if we lift up the name of Christ, He will draw all men to Him...in doing so, I don't think we'll have to "do a sales job", per se at all. It's also NOT about Bay West. We could flourish or fade, but our focus must remain constant. Our existence in not paramount, but our obedience is.

I heard a quote from Charles Stanley once that was particularly thought provoking. He was in a particular situation and was asked if he thought he'd "win". His response was something like this: If I win, I win. If I lose, I win. I'm just supposed to trust God to follow Him with my actions and trust Him for the outcome. As we look ahead, I'm trying to be as open to the Lord about what we need to do...I am very sensitive about saying things like "surely the Lord wouldn't have us..." because those statements are often made to find a reason to escape doing something that is too hard.

Personally, I believe in the power of Christ to change a heart, a city, a county, a state, a country and a world... I'd like to be a part of that...starting here in Palm Bay.

Please pray for our leadership here that as we look to find what God would have us do to follow Him. Whether we last 3 years or 30 years or 300 years, the direction that I feel the Lord leading is toward one that will make a lasting difference. Those directions usually lead to the necessary places, but the sobering part is found in realizing that the necessary places are not always the most risk-free places or the easiest or the most well-travelled ones. be ready.

Family Fun Night a success!

2010-06-28T00:18:00.000-04:00

Wow...it's done. Thanks to all who helped setup. Nice job Randy and Bevan...great to have good folks you can depend on on staff at Bay West.

All Things New...thanks for the use of the PA, a top-notch show as well, great spirit, and zero ego...nice. Bay West Band and Christian's band were stellar...

To all the guys who worked double over-time Friday, Saturday and Sunday on the stage....way to go...good thing that won't have to be built again.

To all the bounce house foremen, superhuman hotdog cookers, balloon-wielding magic men, info table jockeys, bunch wrappers, tiny tot entertainment brokers and Bearbonez Productions...way to go! Great job! Hard work is rewarding...

To all the neighborhood folks who showed, it's our sincerest desire that you had fun and if there's any thanks to be had, point it Jesus, it was his party.

500 hotdogs....
boatload promotional bottled water...
3 bounce houses...
1 stage and 3 bands...
over 500 people...

Awesome outreach to meet more folks in the neighborhood...great times.

Load it up...."Jesus to the City" starts next week!

Jesus to the City

2010-06-23T20:53:00.002-04:00

Just what are you here for...seriously.

When I was in Seminary, many times I would meet students who were there and when you asked them what they were involved in doing for the kingdom, they would say "I'm going to Seminary". Usually this was followed by how "one day" when they were out of Seminary, God would give them a place to serve and then they would be "serving God".

I always had a problem with that type of philosophy. I don't think there "comes a day when we will" serve Christ...I believe that day is right now.
Sometimes, I feel like many of us act as those guys in Seminary..."some day" "one day, when ______ _____, then I'll ________ for God". It might be couched in the sweetest and most innocent "I'm not ready" verbiage, but it's the same ol' thing.

At every place we are, we have something that God has for us in service to Him. God is not a big wasteful guy...truthfully, He's the most efficient leader I know.
God made you and you breathe...that fact alone is enough for you to know that You have something important to be about for Him. Some where, some how, God chose for that miraculous power that's called "life" to been spilled on you...so you've got no excuse. You have all the tools at this very moment to do/be/accomplish everything that God intends for you to do/be/accomplish at this very moment...what are you waiting for?

Stop "waiting" for the moment that just passed you by while you were reading this sentence, reach up and grab the next one that will be gone by the time you click off this page.

Jesus to the City...July 4th...see what it's about.

This church is NOT...

2010-06-13T22:20:00.000-04:00

Just being straight up. Sometimes, we get the wrong idea about church. Don't get me wrong, church is a great thing, no doubt, but there needs to be some clear boundaries, as to what church is for. Church is a body of believers that do life together and encourage/help each other live/love/honor God. God uses the church to speak to, to minister to, to help, to reclaim, to restore, to challenge and to aid in the growth of someone. It's a wonderful thing to be a part of and to be about...there's no telling what my life would be without being a part of the church. You can't love Jesus and not get the importance of church. Kind of hard to be real close to me and not like my wife and the same is true of Jesus. There may be some things about her you wish were different, but just as Katye and I are tied together, so are Jesus and the church, described in Scripture as "His bride" (that's a toughie for guys to reconcile, but it's okay...weirdness sometimes makes us look closer at a concept and end up understanding it more.).

But in learning about and being the church, there are a few things the church is NOT designed to do.
Here's one...the church is NOT designed to feed you. A popular thing I like to point out is that in God's world, His creation points to evidence of Him. That's not simply limited to a mountain being evidence of the majesty of God...it's all over the place. My son is 1 and Katye and I do a lot for him. We prepare his food, but even at the age of 1, he's expected to do things to feed himself. We chop up food and put it on his plate, and he's expected to pick it up, put it in his mouth and digest it. His body is expected/designed to integrate the food into his life. If it doesn't, then we take him to a doctor/hospital or something and pray and seek help to heal him, because something is wrong.

That's the way it is in our spiritual life as well. We may start out as baby Christians, but with maturity comes the skill to feed ourselves, in varying degrees. I love me some good preaching, but let's be honest, as adults are meant to be able to feed themselves, so are the children of God as they mature. We are all expected, like physical children, to be able to feed ourselves in the Word. That's important here at Bay West and at every church.

I think if Braden just continued to eat and not digest his food, just ate and ate and ate and never integrated his food into his body to sustain it, Katye and I would see him be bloated and unhealthy. I believe that this is a condition in the church as well. We see people who take in the Word of God in enormous amounts, yet they continue to wonder why they feel unfulfilled. Their natural reaction is that they "aren't getting fed" enough, so they find another Bible study or another service or another radio program or podcast to fill their spiritual bellies again. It can become an endless cycle, when the problem is not one of feeding, but of digestion. They've never integrated what they've heard into their spiritual body to sustain it and they are wondering why they feel so spiritually anemic.

God's message is not a message of quantity. Most of the time, we feel like the more we can get in the better we will be...and that's fine. But more than quantity of our intake, we must observe the "quality" of our digestion. If we refuse to listen to God's Word or integrate what God tells us into our lives, just endlessly searching for a better verse or a more palatable principle or a loophole to counteract the parts of the Scripture that we don't really want to hear...we will be spiritually anemic.

Naturally, for some, we go back to the church or the pastor and say, "I'm not getting fed" and in chasing the solution to the wrong problem, we never really get anywhere. As a staff member in other churches, I've had this subject come up and the point that I try to make is that when someone says they aren't getting "fed", it's an indictment on their own spiritual life, not the pastor's teaching or the Sunday School teacher's teaching or the Worship Leader. I have sat under some pretty anemic preaching in my lifetime...endured some music that has scarred my musician's ear for life, BUT, the only time that I have not been fed in my lifetime was due to one and only one reason...the lacking of my own relationship with Christ, because regardless of the theology or the Greek study or the historical emphasis or the amount of Scripture, God does the feeding and if I'm not getting fed, it's because there's a problem between Him and me...and it's not because He's not supplying things, it's because I'm refusing to eat what He has for me. I'm not picking it up off the tray...I don't want to hear it...I'm taking it in, but I'm refusing to ingest it...or I'm just not allowing myself to daily sit at the table and eat, because I think I can survive on the 30 minutes of teaching that I get on Sunday.

Be careful, friends, and don't fall into this trap. Never let your plate get empty...never allow sin to gum up the process and never retreat from your daily time with God's Word. Listen to what He says and live His direction...I promise you, if you do that, you will never go "unfed".

Continue to pray for us at Bay West Church as we continue to try to be a church in west Palm Bay, Florida.

Urgent patience...

2010-05-18T16:00:00.001-04:00

I was reading in John 9 the other night about where Jesus heals a man born blind. The disciples asked Jesus why this man was born blind, was it his sin or his parents? Jesus told them it was neither, but he was this way so the power of God could be seen in him. Then there was this verse....

4 We must quickly carry out the tasks assigned us by the one who sent us. The night is coming, and then no one can work.

A couple of things... God will sacrifice physical comfort for spiritual gain. We aren't too keen on that and somewhere in our psyche, we have programmed into us, just like the disciples, that everything that isn't comfortable is a punishment or a persecution...when actually, there's no guarantee that it is either one. It could just be a sacrifice of praise to your God. Are you okay with that? To quote the great theologian Ben Stiller from the end of "Meet the Parents"...CAN YOU DEAL WITH THAT?

That's a tough concept to assimilate....God creating you to go through a hardship so He can show His power. This blind man had lived to manhood, completely blind, and it wasn't anyone's fault or a punishment, but was simply so God could show His power. That's not the particularly lollipops and giggles God that everyone seems to try to sell, but the sovereign Lord that we are all forced to come to grips with if we follow Him long enough. Of course, God loves us, but we forget that His purpose doesn't begin and end with this act of love. Though valuable enough for Him to voluntarily die for, we are not more valuable than Him.

None of us really have any problem with God showing His power, in fact, we welcome that moment...it's the stuff before it that we have the biggest problem with. It's also that God doesn't send us a postcard letting us know when this process begins that it's going to end up with Him showing His power. Many times, we are in the dark until the moment that it happens, much like the blind man.

Truthfully, the blind man was fortunate. I'm reminded of a story I heard Monday night in my LifeGroup of the an Eastern European cleric who attempted to take down Communism by defending the truth and overcoming evil with love. When the troops came into the streets, he handed them cookies. He finally was killed, finished off by being drowned to death, after being tortured within an inch of his life. The people to which he preached revolted by the thousands, but they were true to his message as they marched through the streets shouting "We forgive".

He never saw that moment in the story...he never saw the massive result of his life on Earth. The truth is that many of us will never see the culmination of what God has for our lives...regardless of our lives, the ripple lasts longer. The fortunate really get a moment of exhale, when they know it was really worth it...but it never compares to the moment when we see Christ face to face and really get it.

The thing we must remember...is the final statement. The night is coming and at some point, your chance to make a difference will be no more....when no one can work. There is an urgency...but we must not run ahead...but delayed obedience is still disobedience. There must be a balance of tension and patience in life, where you are always ready, but never rushing. It's the obedience zone...it's the balance on the waterskis between pulling and being pulled (one gets you a face of water)...because we all have tasks and we must "quickly carry" them out when the moment comes, not hesitating, but surging forward in urgent patience.

Look for it. Don't miss it.

Please continue to pray for us as we try to be the Jesus' church in west Palm Bay Florida at Bay West Church.

A wonderful PROBLEM

2010-05-17T11:43:00.000-04:00

Hey folks, in the aftermath of our message on the Family and why it matters in our "Family Matters" series, we are looking to start some new Life Groups.

The wonderful problem is that the ones we have are starting to get FULL! What we need is for some of you to pray about hosting one in your home and others to pray about actually facilitating the study.

This may mean that you are currently in a LifeGroup and God is leading you to step up in leadership and fill one or both of these roles (our goal is host and leader to be separate, but it works in some situations). This may mean that you aren't involved in a LifeGroup currently, but would like to be in on the start of one of our new groups. Please pray about this.

If you are interested and would like to know more, please email Dennis Smith (Minister of Education) at dennis@fbcmel.org or Jim Campbell (Campus Pastor - Bay West) at jim@fbcmel.org . Thanks.

Please pray for us as we continue to be the church for the West Palm Bay, Florida at Bay West Church.

Habakkuk...the ultimate 'SAY WHAT????"

2010-05-10T23:08:00.000-04:00

I was thinking about a friend tonight who's had a really rough time recently and isn't out of the woods yet. What do you say? When things have been so tough, just what religious platitude do you throw out there? "Keep on keeping on"...yep, I'D hit me if I said that. When "trust in the Lord" is what my friend is doing and it's just going to be a process...a long one, perhaps, what do you say? Guess I'll just pray. It's especially hard when you've lain out for the very Lord that seems to have been the very One who left you almost stranded in the tough spot you are in. What's encouraging? Maybe a little company, possibly?
When I prayed for my friend, I prayed for the faith of Habakkuk. Here's the story (if you don't know it). Here's Habakkuk, trying to be out there being God's guy, standing up against evil, and he goes to God completely indignant against the nasty Babylonians. He's all like just laying down how it is to God, completely expecting God to totally agree with him...Habakkuk is completely convinced that God is right there with him, and of course, who wouldn't be? But God completely throws him an uber-curve. "God, how can you let their evil continue?", and God replies "no, no, I'm raising the Babylonians up to do something you wouldn't believe..."

After God laid out the plan, I don't know if there was a long pause before Habakkuk's second complaint, but there should have been. My picture is a cartoony extra long Looney Tunes face on a guy just standing there with his scroll unconsciously slipping from his fingers...."Say WHAT????....bu-bu-but you sa......"
This moment was a cataclysmic theological change for Habakkuk. He was COMPLETELY bought in to one particular line of thought and it got just blown out of the water..."raising up" the people who were tormenting/violating/damaging him and his people and doing evil all over the place...God??? How??? He's in a tough spot, and it's almost like God just booted him from the chariot he road here in and sped off in it down the long dusty road out of sight.
Still, through the book, you see the faith that is beyond "belief" or theological theory in Habakkuk...a belief that is simply in the amazing God that He has served all His life...and at the end of the book in chapter 3 are these words, from the guy who's just been driven somewhere and left...

16 I heard and my heart pounded, my lips quivered at the sound; decay crept into my bones, and my legs trembled. Yet I will wait patiently for the day of calamity to come on the nation invading us.

17 Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls,

18 yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will be joyful in God my Savior.

Wow...that's stout. Throw me a curve, God and I'm with you. Completely destroy my pre-conceived understanding that I've spent years building of You and I will still rejoice in You and be joyful as well.

Hang in there, buddy.
Please pray for us as Bay West Church continues to try to be the church to the people of west Palm Bay, Florida.

The Invisible Woman - overtime

2010-05-09T22:44:00.000-04:00

Here's a pretty good video by Nicole Johnson called "The Invisible Woman" and it has an expanded view on the message last Sunday from our "Family Matters" series. Larry played it at the Melbourne Campus.

Remember that the "invisible creates the visible" and that is your character...the character of the Proverbs 31 woman. It's interesting to see Nicole's take on not getting caught up in the resume and how she illustrates another point...not only does character connect and communicate...it rarely gets the credit it deserves...also, it's contribution isn't made for the benefit of the contributor or those close to the contributor here on Earth.

Watch it...it's pretty good and I doubt you'll be disappointed.

Please continue to pray for Bay West Church as we continue to try to be the church of Jesus Christ in the West end of Palm Bay, Florida

NEW MESSAGE series: Family Matters

2010-05-04T10:00:00.011-04:00

Family matters...that's just a fact. No matter what composes your family, whether it's traditional, blended, multiple combined or you and your friends...families are important. God created the family and His Word has a lot to say about what He can do in our lives through our families and in His world.

Please join us for this 6 week discovery of some of the things that God has in His word for mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, cousins, friends and all of God's believers...all in the context of our family.

Please continue to pray for us at Bay West Church as we continue to try to be the church of Jesus in West Palm Bay Florida.

Within Reach outreach event was a success!

2010-05-03T12:25:00.001-04:00

Here's a message from Jeff & Tracey Gwinn, Within Reach founders and coordinators. They are a real testament to what you can do, if you just listen to God and follow His leadership. You can make a difference in your community and in your world. Jeff is just a guy who listened to God's leadership in vision-casting, dreaming and stepping out in faith to organize this ministry event last Saturday that Bay West worked in partnership with.

Here is the link to the Within Reach Facebook page.

I hope everyone is rested up from the long weekend. If you were at the Within Reach event on Saturday I would like to hear from you on what you thought of our first event and if you might of seen God move in different ways or would like to testify of God's goodness then email me back or post it on our WIthin Reach FB page. I want to once again thank everyone you came out and was a part, we could not have done it with out all of your support,

Thank you and God Bless,
Jeff and Tracy Gwinn
Within Reach

Please continue to pray for us at Bay West Church as we try to be the church of Jesus in west Palm Bay, Florida.

Cool verses...

2010-04-27T21:30:00.008-04:00

Proverbs 14:5-6
⁵ An honest witness does not lie;
a false witness breathes lies.
⁶ A mocker seeks wisdom and never finds it,
but knowledge comes easily to those with understanding.

This is such a true statement...it has to be from the Word of God.

"Go with the strength you have..."

2010-04-26T08:33:00.003-04:00

11 Then the angel of the Lord came and sat beneath the great tree at Ophrah, which belonged to Joash of the clan of Abiezer. Gideon son of Joash was threshing wheat at the bottom of a winepress to hide the grain from the Midianites.
12 The angel of the Lord appeared to him and said, “Mighty hero, the Lord is with you!”
13 “Sir,” Gideon replied, “if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? And where are all the miracles our ancestors told us about? Didn’t they say, ‘The Lord brought us up out of Egypt’? But now the Lord has abandoned us and handed us over to the Midianites.”
14 Then the Lord turned to him and said, “Go with the strength you have, and rescue Israel from the Midianites. I am sending you!”
15 “But Lord,” Gideon replied, “how can I rescue Israel? My clan is the weakest in the whole tribe of Manasseh, and I am the least in my entire family!”
16 The Lord said to him, “I will be with you. And you will destroy the Midianites as if you were fighting against one man.”

Judges 6:11-16

When God called Gideon, he wasn't even sure if it was real, and it looked as though he was a little miffed about all the stuff that had gone on in the country. God had already decreed that what was happening had happened because of Israel's specific disobedience, but they didn't really respond to correct that. So, God called this one guy, Gideon, who was just threshing wheat, to do what was necessary.

Gideon had a list of things that disqualified him and made it "impossible" for him to win, but God knew better. He told him in vs. 14 to "go with the strength you have..." I guess that's what all of us need to do. We need to stop complaining about what "we" don't have/get/like/agree with and go with the strength we have when God presents something unavoidable in our path, and the Midianites, if you read the backstory on this, were pretty much that...unavoidable.

Really, life comes down to one thing...are you going to be with the Lord and be obedient, or are you just going to keep coming up with excuses...urrr...."reasons" why you won't submit to what is obviously before you? Gideon figured it out...and he went with the strength he was given.

Lesson from the story: If God puts it in the path of your life, do it. "Go with the strength you have..." and you'll see that God will take care of everything that is beyond what He gives you...just like he did for Gideon...read the story.

P.S. Serving God isn't about what you are doing. Serving God is about Who you are willing to do anything for.

Please pray for us as we attempt to be a church in west Palm Bay for Jesus at Bay West Church.

Addendum to "Value influence" from today

2010-04-25T16:05:00.002-04:00

We talked about the gift of "influence" that gives us in the way of relationships in our lives today at Bay West...and these are not just "saved" people. We all have lost friends and the question always comes up if we should distance ourselves from our lost friends.

A couple of caveats and a stressing of a point I made today:
1) People under the authority of others - Teenagers, especially. Until you are on your own, you are under the wisdom of your parents. Because of the mandate that God has given them, they need to have a say in who you choose for your tight circle of friends. Listen to their wisdom, because God has them in your life.

2) Jesus modeled influence management in several ways, but here's two. 1) He met with the Father regularly and often, and He studied the Word and knew it by heart. As we know in God's Word, this is prime way to keep yourself from trouble. 2) Jesus had a tight network of support through the believers around him...that helps for us to make us able to maintain our relationships out in the world in a healthy, God-honoring way.

A stressed point: the only way that ANY of this works is keeping the relationship with Christ as the trump for EVERYTHING. If you begin to value the approval of others above that, whether they are saved, lost, or Klingon...whatever...the structure crumbles when you look to others for things God is meant to provide or to place them at a higher priority level than Jesus.

Just wanted to stress that stuff. Please pray for us as we continue to try to be church in west Palm Bay at Bay West Church.

On the clock...retirement is not recognized

2010-04-16T10:58:00.004-04:00

Just ran across this verse this morning in Quiet time.

Joshua 13:1 When Joshua was an old man, the Lord said to him, “You are growing old, and much land remains to be conquered.

For the folks who want to throw out they're too old...sorry, God doesn't recognize that. If you're breathing, you've got a role to play. The Lord said "you are growing old, you've got a lot left to do" and laid out the list for Joshua...not the retirement plan. And if you think, God was saying "you are growing old, so one day you can't", thinking of his one day Earthly retirement, nope. That's not true...the Scriptures say Joshua was ALREADY an "old man"...God seemed to be saying, "you've got this to do, before you die"...as long as you are here, God has a plan. Retirement is just a man thing. For God, there's only one place to retire to...that's Heaven, the rest of the time, you may change roles, you may do something different, but you are on the clock, man. Act like it.

BTW...if you aren't reading the Word, you're missing something that God had for you that you needed today.

Please continue to pray for Bay West Church, as we continue to try to be a church in west palm bay that honors Christ with all we do. We meet Sundays at 10am ...

Losing your life...

2010-04-13T01:09:00.000-04:00

I was reading in Luke 17 and happened upon an interesting verse.

32 Remember what happened to Lot's wife.
33 People who try to save their lives will lose them, and those who lose their lives will save them.

It's interesting that Jesus references Lot's wife here. If you know the story of Lot, he was the kinsman of Abraham and he travelled from his home with Abe. They chose to pick places to settle when they reached their destination and Lot chose to settle in an easier place...a lush valley. Abraham chose the worse of the two, but God prospered him.

Well, Lot prospered as well...you know the place he lived. It was in the region of Sodom and Gomorrah. A place of wickedness it became and God got a little tired of the nastiness. He decided to destroy the place and all in it. Abraham pleaded for the place, mainly because Lot and his family lived there and God understood. He warned Lot to leave and Lot did. He left the easy life he'd created for himself and took his family with him. The story goes that as they left, Lot's wife chose to look back and she turned into a pillar of salt.

No one really knows what was up with Lot's wife or why she did what she did, but in Luke, the reference to "remember what happened to Lot's wife" gives us some insight into a possible reason. "People who try to save their lives will lose them, and those who lose their lives will save them." It is obvious that some affinity for what she was leaving drew Lot's wife back to look. It may have been a great place for her. She might have been away from the nastiness of the place and may have carved out a nice existence for herself. Doesn't mean she was evil or anything...just means she enjoyed what she had.

I think we all can get into that mode. We have a place of existence in which we are comfortable and it's natural to be drawn to that, to want to stay there. Sometimes, like Lot's wife, God directs us to a new "place"...emotionally, physically, careerwise, maturity-wise etc... Every time that God directs you to a new place, you don't automatically want to go. It might make perfect sense to you to stay, because things seem fine...but there's a danger...the danger of Lot's wife.

When we become a follower of Christ, we begin to recieve our direction from Him and not from our desires. And like Lot's wife, if we chose to hold onto the desires of the old life, we can become a pillar of salt. Salt is used in both the positive and negative in the Scriptures...because we can all be both. We are to be the salt to the Earth, in a positive way for Christ, but salt can also be harsh and distasteful. I don't think Lot's wife turned into the positive kind and neither do we when we kick against the will for God in our lives. We can become bitter and "salty"...insert adjective here...you know what I mean. It can carry over into our existence, because when salt hits the plate in abundance, it seems to get on everything...even things that we never intended it to get on...it can bitter up our whole life for us, even things that are seemingly unrelated.

The problem is that when we think we can clamp onto the thing that God doesn't have for us anymore, it ends up like the bar of soap. We end up losing our grip on it. It's like staying at the party too long after the person (God), who was the reason you enjoyed it so much, has gone.

The only way to save our life is to do the same thing we did when we became a follower of Christ...we lay it down at the feet of Christ and entrust it to Him. It's difficult to do and there's nothing easy about it, but it's the solution...or we can choose the pillar of salt. Lot's wife chose the latter and she lost it all...she never regained the life before, she lost the life she had at present, and she lost the better life that God had prepared for her that was ahead....by looking back.

Just because He hasn't lately, doesn't mean He won't now

2010-04-07T13:33:00.002-04:00

I was reading in Deuteronomy this morning and happened upon the "changing of the guard" from Moses, who was "retiring", to Joshua...the new guy. Here's the account...take a minute and read it.

Deuteronomy 31
1 When Moses had finished giving these instructions[a] to all the people of Israel,
2 he said, “I am now 120 years old, and I am no longer able to lead you. The Lord has told me, ‘You will not cross the Jordan River.’
3 But the Lord your God himself will cross over ahead of you. He will destroy the nations living there, and you will take possession of their land. Joshua will lead you across the river, just as the Lord promised.
4 “The Lord will destroy the nations living in the land, just as he destroyed Sihon and Og, the kings of the Amorites.
5 The Lord will hand over to you the people who live there, and you must deal with them as I have commanded you.
6 So be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid and do not panic before them. For the Lord your God will personally go ahead of you. He will neither fail you nor abandon you.”

What was interesting about this is that this changeover comes after 40 years of Israel wandering around in the wilderness. The land that God was going to give to them was the land He'd promised years and years before. He rescued them from Egypt and in "the great Exodus" they travelled toward this land, fighting battles, enduring strange stuff, being provided for in weird ways, on this incredible journey to what God had promised.

When they got to the cusp of what they had been promised, a group of spies were sent into the land and all but 2 came back saying "no way...the people are giants and we are not enough." The people as a whole revolted (a striking note to the inmates ruling the prison) and said we aren't going. God told them they'd wander about for 40 years...basically, in effect, letting the untrusting adults and leaders die off and God would bring the next generation into the Promised Land...they basically forfeited their prize and took on a bunch of grief and hardship for them and their children...kind of like...no, I won't say it. :D

Fast forward in time...So here...after all that, they are about to enter into the land and what does Moses tell them..."The Lord has told me...But the Lord your God himself will cross over ahead of you. He will destroy the nations living there, and you will take possession of their land." So basically, they didn't have to life a weapon...God was taking care of it all. So, after all the mess about them being not big enough to take on the people of the land 40 years earlier...God did it himself and didn't even employ people.

That's a lesson for us, because if God puts a task before you, He may not even need you to do it, just to go along with it, because He might be going to cover it himself...without your "help"...just your participation.

A life not wasted...

2010-03-30T10:03:00.001-04:00

Was reading in Psalm 71 this morning...

6 Yes, you have been with me from birth; from my mother’s womb you have cared for me. No wonder I am always praising you!

It's always easy to read the Bible from a too artistic sense, if you aren't careful. You can pass by things and say "well, it just appeared to that guy that way" or "he was under a lot of duress" or you can say that "that writer was just caught up in emotion and being drama", but there's a catch there. Once God allowed it to continue as a part of His book, it became holy writing...it became sacred and without error. It's not just an opinion like this blog. I can mis-step...I represent God, I don't transcribe for Him. The Bible is without error in tone or emphasis or anything. It communicates exactly what God is trying to say. Remember...this book is all about us learning what God expects from us and what we can expect from God.

This verse is always eye-opening, especially in the days of pro-choice and pro-life...sometimes, you just need to look for what God places priority on and recognize. If God chooses to begin His care inside the Mother's womb, then we should too...just sayin'. From one abortion survivor to another...

Please continue to pray for us as we attempt to be the church of Jesus Christ in Palm Bay, Florida at Bay West Church.

Disaster Relief Team assembling NOW to go to Haiti at end of April!

2010-03-15T11:34:00.001-04:00

Hey guys,

Larry mentioned a Disaster Relief Team being put together by the Bay West and Melbourne Campuses of FBC yesterday in the service. Here is a link to the info on when the team is going and how YOU can be a part of this amazing relief effort firsthand As Larry told us, over 40,000 people have come to know Christ in Haiti since the tragedy.

Click here for info and who to contact if you feel God leading you to step out and "be Jesus" to the people of Haiti. Pray earnestly about whether God would have you to go and sign up quick, because there are only 8 spots and they will fill up quick.

Thanks for being the church of Jesus in Palm Bay and around the world at Bay West Church.

In Christ,
Jim

Time change this week! Spring forward!

2010-03-11T10:00:00.001-05:00

Don't forget this! This weekend, March 14th is time change Sunday!

Seeing isn't believing, it's only the setup for the payoff

2010-03-09T12:15:00.003-05:00

Numbers 13
17 Moses gave the men these instructions as he sent them out to explore the land: “Go north through the Negev into the hill country.
18 See what the land is like, and find out whether the people living there are strong or weak, few or many. 19 See what kind of land they live in. Is it good or bad? Do their towns have walls, or are they unprotected like open camps?
20 Is the soil fertile or poor? Are there many trees? Do your best to bring back samples of the crops you see.” (It happened to be the season for harvesting the first ripe grapes.)

These verses are the instructions that Moses gave his folks when they were supposed to "scout out" the land that God was about to give to Israel. What ended up happening is that after 40 days of scouting the land, the team came back and about 80% of them were COMPLETELY opposed to trying to take the land...they were scared out of their mind... Even though, their nation had gone through a LONG journey, all the while, dreaming and relying on God through ENORMOUS struggles and hardship to get them right where they were...to this land. It was their goal! It was a motivation...and right at the edge of it, they were scared to death and said "no".

My thought was "why even have them scout it, God? I mean, You had decided on the destination...they had given up LOADS of stuff and followed You across treacherous ground to get there. What was the point of evaluating now?" Was this a bad leadership decision? Of course not...it was a misunderstood command.

I think God does this to us...He asks us to really take a look at what's about to happen. In His plan, He wants to us realize the immensity of the task He's about to accomplish. It's not about deciding on an action, it's about setting up the praise for God and His power. If we don't take in the huge task He's doing, our praise doesn't fill out, because without some sort of realization of how difficult and impossible the task is, we don't burst forth with how great God is through it.

Here's our problem...we think that when God calls us to "check it out", that somehow that's God saying "I don't know about this, what do you think?" and for a lot of us, we take that as our chance to get out of the scary thing in front of us...we run like scalded dogs. We don't realize that God is just saying "Check this out...see how scary impossible the task is...got it...now WATCH THIS!" Sadly for a lot of us, we have turned tail and are running at "see how scary it is" and we never get to the "WATCH THIS!" or even the incredible move of God that happens next that inspires us and challenges us and makes a statement to the entire world around how incredibly unbelievable God's ability and power is... We miss the "I'm the master of it all" statement...sad.

Stick in there and realize that if God told you to do it...and you KNOW that for a fact... wait for the win, because it's coming.

Continue to pray for us at Bay West Church, as we try to be a church in Palm Bay and communicate Christ to west Palm Bay, Florida.

Psalm 50...what God is after

2010-03-07T07:17:00.008-05:00

If you've ever wondered if God needed your money or stuff, here God talks about it in Psalm 50...

Psalm 50 (New Living Translation)
7 “O my people, listen as I speak. Here are my charges against you, O Israel: I am God, your God!
8 I have no complaint about your sacrifices or the burnt offerings you constantly offer.
9 But I do not need the bulls from your barns or the goats from your pens.
10 For all the animals of the forest are mine, and I own the cattle on a thousand hills.
11 I know every bird on the mountains, and all the animals of the field are mine.
12 If I were hungry, I would not tell you, for all the world is mine and everything in it.
13 Do I eat the meat of bulls? Do I drink the blood of goats?

Our sacrifices and offerings aren't about His greed, it's about controlling ours and honoring Him.

Here's the scenario that God is looking for with His people...
14 Make thankfulness your sacrifice to God, and keep the vows you made to the Most High.
15 Then call on me when you are in trouble, and I will rescue you, and you will give me glory.”

There you go...that's the deal in a nutshell. Why don't you read the rest of Psalm 50? There's more good stuff in there as well.

Some jewels from Psalm 49

2010-03-06T12:53:00.005-05:00

5 Why should I fear when trouble comes,
when enemies surround me?
6 They trust in their wealth
and boast of great riches.
7 Yet they cannot redeem themselves from death
by paying a ransom to God.
8 Redemption does not come so easily,
for no one can ever pay enough
9 to live forever
and never see the grave.

So where's the hope, since you can't make enough to save you?

15 But as for me, God will redeem my life....

Yeah, I want to be THAT guy.

And one verse for all the artists and poets and songwriters out there, one of which David was...

4 I listen carefully to many proverbs and solve riddles with inspiration from a harp.

That's a good mission statement for artists...take solid wisdom and express it artistically for all to remember.

Please continue to pray for us as we try to be a church in Palm Bay in West Palm Bay, Florida at Bay West Church.

Just a point...

2010-03-03T17:53:00.004-05:00

Read this today...if you've ever had to address the "being a Christian is fun, TOO" thing and wondered if it's Biblical or just sensible... Answer: absolutely Biblical.

Proverbs 10:23 (NLT)
23 Doing wrong is fun for a fool, but living wisely brings pleasure to the sensible.

I also like how the Amplified Bible puts it...
23 It is as sport to a [self-confident] fool to do wickedness, but to have skillful and godly Wisdom is pleasure and relaxation to a man of understanding.

So...make sure what you do brings you some "pleasure"...have a great day!

Please continue to pray for us as we attempt to be a church in Palm Bay that honors God here at Bay West Church.

ALL Request Sunday is Feb. 28th

2010-02-18T10:00:00.003-05:00

What's that special song that helps you connect with God the best? Expresses your heart? Inspires you to realize God's power? Faithfulness? Love? We want to know.

Over the first 6 months at Bay West, we've done about 40 different worship songs to help connect our people to speak out as a body to God on Sundays and continue singing throughout the week. On FEBRUARY 28, in our morning worship, we are going to put the worship sets together with songs from the list that you say hit you the best. Choose one or two songs from the list only and click here to send an email to us.

If you are a facebook person, there is also a place on our Facebook fan page to add your responses.

The deadline to have your submissions in are Tuesday, February 23rd.
We will only take songs from the list below.

In order to have an orderly and excellent service, we will ONLY take submissions here, before the deadline...NOT on Sunday morning.

**If you don't know the song by the title (we all do that), then just google the title or go to youtube and search the exact title...there's probably a music video that someone has done with it that could help job your memory.

Let The Praises Ring
Mighty To Save
Beautiful One
Blessed Be Your Name
Forever
Here Is Our King
Marvelous Light
Your Grace Is Enough
Awesome Is The Lord Most High
From The Inside Out
I Am Free
Sing To The King
Enough
God Of This City
How Great Is Our God
How He Loves
Jesus Paid It All
Mystery
O Praise Him
Angels We Have Heard On High
Come Ye Sinners Poor And Needy
Desert Song
Devoted
Here I Am To Worship
How Great Thou Art
Open The Eyes Of My Heart
Revelation Song
Sing Sing Sing
Today Is The Day
Your Love Oh Lord
Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone)
Be Thou My Vision
Emmanuel (Hallowed Manger Ground)
Great Is Thy Faithfulness
Hark The Herald Angels Sing
In Wonder
Jesus Messiah
Joy To The World
O Come All Ye Faithful
Salvation Is Here

Please continue to pray for us as we attempt to be the church in palm bay at Bay West Church.

A solution is a solution...

2010-02-15T17:18:00.003-05:00

Mark 1
23 Suddenly, a man in the synagogue who was possessed by an evil spirit began shouting,
24 “Why are you interfering with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One sent from God!”

25 Jesus cut him short. “Be quiet! Come out of the man,” he ordered.
26 At that, the evil spirit screamed, threw the man into a convulsion, and then came out of him.

Was blowing through this story today and thought a couple of things.
1) Bet that convulsion wasn't so pleasant...but it had to be done. Couldn't Jesus have thrown out a "no convulsions clause" or something? Then I thought...a solution is a solution and sometimes, we don't get shed of unwanted and harmful stuff without a bit of a fight or some unpleasantness... Maybe it's still the same today...anyone....anyone...Buehler?
2) How long did that thing last? Doesn't really say and you'd probably think it was only a minute or two...but it could have been longer. I guess if you think about it and consider that it might not have been instantaneous, it gives you a different view on solutions from God. I don't know why Jesus chose to let it go down like that, but he definitely had a reason for it to be that way.
Could it be a teaching tool for the guy to stop a behavior that left him vulnerable for the attack? Bet he'd remember that...
Could it be that others around needed to know how bad this type of thing was, so they needed a little bit of a scary show? I don't know and the Bible certainly doesn't really tell us here, but...it all happened under the sovereignty of God... Something to think about.

I wonder if this guy was ready to give up or thought the whole situation just had gotten worse in about second number 2 of that convulsion?
I wonder if he wondered if Jesus really did know what He was doing for a minute?
Could the possessed man have thought that the spirit was more powerful than Christ because he didn't like the violent nature of his present state in the midst of the convulsion?

Anyway...it made me think that some of God's needed and "welcomed" solutions aren't without price/turmoil/conflict...that, in the middle of them, it might not really seem as He knows what He's doing if you only trust in the present and what you see. And, sometimes, they might take longer to complete than we'd want them to...

Please continue to pray for us as we try to be the church in Palm Bay at Bay West Church.

Another cool verse

2010-02-14T06:48:00.002-05:00

Psalm 34
11 Come, my children, and listen to me,
and I will teach you to fear the Lord.
12 Does anyone want to live a life
that is long and prosperous?
13 Then keep your tongue from speaking evil
and your lips from telling lies!
14 Turn away from evil and do good.
Search for peace, and work to maintain it.

That's about as straightforward an instruction as you can find in the Scriptures.

Another nugget from Jim's QT

2010-02-10T16:51:00.004-05:00

Proverbs 32
8 The Lord says, “I will guide you along the best pathway for your life.
I will advise you and watch over you.
9 Do not be like a senseless horse or mule
that needs a bit and bridle to keep it under control.”

In other words...I (the Lord) got this, stop fighting me on it. Good gravy, man! If you don't know and need to, I'll tell you. If I don't tell you, you don't need to know. If you are in danger, I am aware and will handle it. (If I say "duck!", then "duck!".)

Apply your God-given sense to reconcile these statements "Almighty God" and "I will guide you...best pathway for your life...I will advise you...watch over you."

If you do, you will see that just going along with what God advises is the best course of action. The only thing you can do to mess it up is to choose to disregard where He leads you and what He tells you.

Keep praying for Bay West Church as we continue to try to be the church in west Palm Bay Florida.

From the QT of Jim...

2010-02-09T17:31:00.005-05:00

Here's what the writer in Proverbs had to say in my QT this morning...thought it was cool.

Proverbs 8
22 “The Lord formed me from the beginning, before he created anything else.
23 I was appointed in ages past, at the very first, before the earth began.
24 I was born before the oceans were created, before the springs bubbled forth their waters.
25 Before the mountains were formed, before the hills, I was born—
26 before he had made the earth and fields and the first handfuls of soil.

That's a message for us all, but especially all of us who think we just kind of happened along. What exactly does that say about your life?

Pray for us as we continue to be the church in Palm Bay Florida at Bay West Church

What do YOU think: An Interesting Verse from Jim's QT this morning

2010-02-08T11:10:00.004-05:00

Proverbs 8:12-13
12 “I, Wisdom, live together with good judgment. I know where to discover knowledge and discernment.

13 All who fear the Lord will hate evil. Therefore, I hate pride and arrogance, corruption and perverse speech.

Couple of questions to mull over
(I'm not going to answer them)

What things does the writer seem to imply are evil? (easy one)

Why do those who fear the Lord hate evil? (the 64 million dollar question - it's answered in the verses)

Happy thinking.

Shades...

2010-02-01T23:23:00.008-05:00

In the PULSE series, we are taking a read on our "spiritual pulse" by looking at different pulse points in our lives as seen in Proverbs 4. Last Sunday, we were looking at the Eyes as our installment of our sermon series pulse. We looked at Proverbs 4:25 and talked about how, even though that verse tells us to look straight ahead, a massive point of the verse centers around how we look, as much as what we look at or where we look. It's like looking at the world through red colored sunglasses...

When you look through the sunglasses, everything looks differently that it did without them. Everything would have a red tint to it...colors look different...things that were pretty look a little weird. You begin to notice different things about objects that you look at because the red sunglasses cause different things to be highlighted. Because of the way that some things look, tinted really red, you are drawn to some things and repulsed by others. Has the reality of the world changed? No...but how you look at it has.

In our case, it's like someone gave us Truth-colored sunglasses and for the first time, when we signed up for this thing with Jesus, we put them on and see the world as it really is for the first time. It's life-altering....things look different...things that were attractive now seem a little less of a deal. We notice different things about objects and different attributes that we didn't notice before are highlighted about objects we see. Because of the way things look now, you are drawn to some things and possibly repulsed by other things....Has the reality of the world changed? No...but you now begin to see it how it really is...because you are looking at it through different eyes, in a different way.

Decisions are now looked on differently. The reasons that we do what we do are different.

Please continue to pray for Bay West Church as we try to be a church in Palm Bay Florida.

Why the HEART is the key...

2010-01-26T09:49:00.004-05:00

We talked about the PULSE point of the heart a couple of weeks ago. We talked about how it was the "seat of all of our motives". To illustrate, we had two treasure chests. In the one, we had different pictures or objects to show the different motives that we could live our life for and we talked about how most of us struggle with several motives, that at times compete against each other for dominance in our decisions. In the second chest, we had an envelope with the word "Christ" on it and we talked about how desiring a pure heart is a heart with only one motive in the chest...so to speak. We talked about all the "good" motives, such as family or being a good steward of what we have, things God has commanded us in His Word to handle responsibly and take care of. How are those taken care of if I only have one motive? The answer is that Christ takes care of all those things. Ecclesiastes 8:5 tells us the wise heart knows the proper time and the proper procedure for every delight and as we know from Psalm 9:10, wisdom begins when your #1 priority is set...that priority being God.

This battle for the heart is KEY to our lives here on earth. Why? Check out this verse below.

Mark 7
20 And then he added, “It is what comes from inside that defiles you.
21 For from within, out of a person’s heart, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder,
22 adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, lustful desires, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness.
23 All these vile things come from within; they are what defile you.”

From our hearts, we sink or swim. When our hearts are pure, or basically have the one motive of Christ, we just follow them, sometimes with the opposition of our other senses. Still, we must always check ourselves and make sure our motive is not compromised in our decisions and actions, because that's where the problems begin.

Please continue to pray for us as we keep trying to be the church in Palm Bay at Bay West Church. Please pray that our hearts as individuals that make up the church can be centered on His purpose...only one motive in the chest.

A cool verse that goes along with our first PULSE point, our ears...

2010-01-20T11:18:00.002-05:00

This message from PULSE was a couple of Sundays ago, but in my Quiet Time Tuesday morning, I ran across this verse, so I thought I'd share.

At Bay West Church, we're in this series PULSE and the idea is to check our spiritual pulse by reading 5 pulse points: ears, heart, mouth, eyes, and the feet. We get these from Proverbs 4:20-27.

The first week we talked about our ears and how we should be listening to the Word of God. A lot of people hear God's Word, but they never really listen to it. Psalm 1:2 tells us to "meditate on it day and night" and we talked about how that doesn't mean to sit in a corner with crossed knees and just think all day and night...that would violate other places in Scripture. What it meant was that God's Word should always be in your field of vision when you make any decision...it should always be the first consult and the last decision maker. Everything goes through that lens...when you do this, you really begin to see how it applies to every situation and you really listen to it. This is the point that most of us fail.

I was reading on www.oneyearbibleonline.com (which is where I try to read every day for my quiet time) and I came across this verse in Matthew. The disciples asked Jesus why he used parables to teach the people. Parables are stories that illustrate what Jesus is talking about in real life or in an artisitic way that sheds further understanding on the principle Jesus is explaining. Anyway, Jesus answered them this way...

13 That is why I use these parables, For they look, but they don’t really see.
They hear, but they don’t really listen or understand.
Matthew 13:13

You see...the reason He taught how He did was to make us not just hear something that sounds nice, but to have to use our brains to think about it, thereby understanding the concept more fully. It was to give examples of how to integrate it in our lives or to make us dissect the concept intellectually or to peak our understanding by engaging our brain in something that drew us in, but expected us to put a little effort into understanding. In other words, to make us listen.

Just thought it was cool and figured I'd share. Please continue to pray for us as we try to be a church in Palm Bay, Florida.

FYI on the FL Bapt. Convention's Haiti Disaster Relief efforts

2010-01-19T16:48:00.005-05:00

Just wanted to keep you guys up to date on what our offerings are going toward right now and how God is working through this crisis. Between our two campuses, we took up over 23,000 dollars for the relief effort last Sunday and we are still set up to take donations through our online giving on the website, baywestchurch.org . Everything we take up goes directly to purchases for the people of Haiti, as described below.

Got this email a few minutes ago. I'm c-n-p'ing the text. Dr. Sullivan is the Executive Director for the Florida Baptist Convention.

Haiti Update, January 19, 2010 - From Dr. John Sullivan
Subject: The Miracle of Multiplication

The Biblical miracle of the fishes and loaves had a modern day twist for the Florida Baptist Convention when it made an initial purchase of 21 tons of rice for use in Haiti relief efforts. An Arkansas Baptist church's matching gift of rice has multiplied the initial commitment into a total 84 tons of rice being earmarked for Haiti.

This miracle of multiplication started on Friday, January 15, when Executive Director John Sullivan negotiated to purchase 42,000 pounds of rice from a grain distributor in Stuttgart, Arkansas. Sullivan negotiated for a low price of $20 per hundred pound bag. With the deal confirmed, the Convention arranged to send one of its disaster relief semi-trailer units to Stuttgart to take delivery of the rice. On Monday, January 18, a second order was placed for another 21 tons of rice for delivery at the end of February.

On Tuesday, January 19, Sullivan received a call from Pastor Sam Roberts of the First Baptist Church, Stuttgart, Arkansas, who had learned of the Convention's purchase and planned use of the rice. He told of the church's mission committee authorization to purchase 42 tons of rice to supplement the Convention's commitment to feed Haitians. The combined purchase and donation brings the total commitment to 84 tons or 168,000 pounds of rice which will be distributed in Haiti as soon as possible.

Sullivan noted that the average Haitian subsists on a quarter cup of rice each day. He went on to observe that every Baptist can be a part of the Haiti relief effort by sending $20 to buy a one hundred pound bag of rice. "That one bag of rice will feed a family of four for a long time in Haiti," he explained.

Once the grain is delivered in Haiti, distribution of the rice will occur from the many Haitian Baptist churches in and around Port au Prince. Florida Baptists' 15 years of partnership and assistance provided to Haitian Baptists has resulted in a model effort to distribute food and clothing without the chaos experienced at government-controlled food distribution points.

On another developing front in the effort to aid Haitians, the U. S. government is preparing to airlift orphans and other Haitian refugees from Port au Prince to Miami. According to the Miami Herald, federal agencies are gearing up under an existing crisis plan called "Operation Vigilant Sentry," drawn up in 2003 to help prepare for any mass migration from the Caribbean. Miami-Dade officials are looking at housing the refugees in the currently closed Krome Detention Center in West Miami-Dade and the old Baptist hospital facility in Kendall.

The influx of refugees will present a unique ministry opportunity for Florida Baptists in South Florida. As a result, the Convention has directed its Church and Community Ministries personnel, led by Marc Johnston, to begin developing action plans to assist in receiving, processing and re-settlement of these Haitian refugees.

Details are few given that the situation is very fluid. However, additional information on the Convention's response will be posted on the Convention's website www.flbaptist.org.

The devastation is immense in Haiti, but this is just one religious organization of one state...there are loads of other relief efforts, secular and religious, that are responding to the disaster in Haiti.

Just thought I'd keep you up to date with what's going on with the relief efforts and this is just one of the things that are going on. I'll post some updates from time to time as I get info.

Just a little mop up on your Heart from PULSE

2010-01-18T10:21:00.005-05:00

I kind of zipped through a couple of things yesterday on PULSE at Bay West Church, so I thought I'd slow it down and emphasize something about the whole heart thing.

A key verse that we talked about yesterday is found in 1 Chronicles 28:9 where David is giving Solomon some of the last instructions that Solomon will get from his father before David's death...important words, in other words. There's a lot in this verse, but I want to hit one particular thing.

9 "And you, my son Solomon, acknowledge the God of your father, and serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the LORD searches every heart and understands every motive behind the thoughts. If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will reject you forever.

There's a key point in here. Obviously, David tells Solomon that he needs to serve God with a wholehearted devotion...as we talked about yesterday, that's living your life with only one motive in your chest...honoring God. We can all be divided in our heart by trying to live with many motives that drive what we do...our career path, our kids, our health, our entertainment, our goals...but a "wholehearted devotion" to God puts all these things to the side and lives every decision answering one question "What will honor God the most here?"

What trips most of us up in this pursuit is when our brain gets in the way. I play music, sometimes by ear, and I was telling a friend that the biggest problem to doing that is when I let my "brain get in the way". I'm playing along and my fingers are just going to what's the next deal...almost like there's a connection from the ear to my fingers and there you are. Then all of a sudden, for some reason, I think "hey this is too easy" and there's a hiccup in the process when I try to "think" about the next chord I'm going to play...and that's usually when I make the mistake and blow it. I don't trust the process, because I don't understand it fully.

For us it's the same way in life. When God's Word tells us to do something or outlines this plan for a situation in life, when we balk is when our "brain gets in the way". We don't trust the process, because we don't understand it fully...we can't see how THAT would work. This verse in 1 Chronicles gives us some wisdom on that subject. David tells Solomon to serve God with a "wholehearted devotion" (only one motive...for God) and with a "willing mind". In other words, have a mind that is open to what God tells you...it's not an "understanding mind" or a "comprehending mind" or a "mind that sees the whole plan and can connect all the dots to why it will work, allowing you to trust in that"...nope...just being open to doing what God tells you to do. You just have to trust "God". Don't let your brain get in the way.

We've had to do that as we've tried to be a church in Palm Bay. A lot of people, even in FBC Melbourne, haven't fully grasped what we are trying to do here..."aren't you starting a church?" "satellite campus?". I get people all the time, when I'm back at the Melbourne Campus for dinner that say, "Hey, so sorry you left us to start a new church" and I say "I never left, just think about it as if I go to a different service than you...we are all FBC." Many things that we've done to this point are things that if we let our brains get in the way of what God was telling us to do, we'd have missed the great opportunity to see the end of God's plan, because we wanted the explanation of how it was coming first.

Interesting side note on PULSE the series

2010-01-12T09:28:00.004-05:00

We've started this new series, PULSE, at Bay West Church in Palm Bay, Florida and it's proving interesting in the study. The whole idea for the series comes from Proverbs 4:20-27 and the title framework for the series comes from the practice of taking your pulse after a run or some exertion. We do that by pressing our finger against a pulse point to check our heart rate. This practice allows us to check the signs of our body and to see that our body is functioning properly.

It doesn't have to stop there. We can do this spiritually and hence the series PULSE. In Proverbs 4, we identify 5 spiritual pulse points...the ears, the heart, the mouth, the eyes, and the feet.

An interesting aspect that we find out in searching the Scriptures how all these points are linked together Scripturally. As in Proverbs 4:20-27, these areas seem to be mentioned in tandem at least two or three at a time and it's hard to find places where only one is alluded to. That's because, like the body, all these areas of our spiritual lives are linked. When one isn't working correctly, others are effected, because the health of one increases or helps the health of the other.

It's the same way in our families or our marriages or any of our relationships, we are the body of Christ and when one person is failing, it effects us all. This principle of the body carries over into many aspects of our lives so that we see that the Creator has a theme. It's interesting to see His handprint all over things.

Please pray for us as we continue to be a church in palm bay and bring Christ to west Palm Bay.

A good name for a church

2009-12-03T16:45:00.006-05:00

I was talking to one of our leaders in our Children's area and she was sharing about her son's friend that they'd invited to church at Bay West. They had tried to work out picking him up to come last weekend, but with holidays and stuff, it didn't work out. So, our leader was talking to the mother about arranging a time for the son to come and she said that actually she was going to try a new church in Palm Bay this next weekend in the area.

Our leader asked her which one and she said that it was called "Come as you are" and it met at Heritage High School. She showed our leader a mailer that she got in the mail that had prompted them to go.

That's a picture of it above...and it's actually a mailer that Bay West sent out (minus the "CHURCH" that Photoshop and I added to the picture above) and that's the church they are trying out this weekend. Funny, huh, how God works that out? And that just sealed the deal for them to come, because now they know someone already.

Don't forget to invite your neighbors and your friends, because you never know how God is already working.

We've got some INVITE CARDS that will be on the information table as you come in and go out...pick up a few and give out to friends. They have a map, our website, what's going on the next few weeks in X-Factor, and some special Christmas opportunities that FBC as a whole is doing throughout December.

FYI...we will be having a combined service on Sunday, December 27th at the Melbourne Campus @ 10:30am. It will be a chance for all of FBC Melbourne to get together in one place. CONSEQUENTLY, there will be no services at Heritage High School on December 27th...the rest of the time, we are on the ball as usual.

A good way to cap off Incomplete

2009-10-20T16:16:00.000-04:00

We just finished our first series entitled "Incomplete", a series on the 6 things that God has lead us to focus on here at the Bay West Campus.

The tough thing about a series like that, as I've expressed, is moving away from the sort of "checklist" mentality in dealing with Christ. If I do these things, then I'm good. The problem is that's already been done, it's called the Law, that God gave, and it was created, not for us to find righteousness in it, but to highlight the fact and make it easier for us to see that we CAN'T keep it, thereby making it easier for us to turn to God...still, when you say, "Hey, look at these 6 things!", people tend to look at this as the definitive list...but it isn't...hence the name of the series "Incomplete", because just any compilation existing of only our efforts to save ourselves from the punishment that sin brings would be just that....Incomplete.

Throughout the series, we've said, time and time again, that Jesus is the thing that connects everything. Our relationship with Christ and the faith in Him is what leads us to salvation, because He is the only source of that saving.

Katye sent me an email the other day about a verse she found in her reading that really kind of capped off the sentiment from this series on "The 6"...

James 2:22- "You see, his faith and his actions worked together. His actions made his faith COMPLETE." (NLT)

Pretty cool, huh? See you Sunday, when we examine a perspective on something that we all do every day...

It's all in who you know

2009-09-30T13:56:00.005-04:00

For years, I've heard this phrase and it's made me bristle. It implies that you can't get ahead in this world on your own merit, it's always about the person in power that you know that can get you to the right place.

I HATE that... I want to make it on my own merit on things, that's why I hate it... That, and I'm one of those guys who have never really known anyone to hook me up. :-) Just kidding.

This week, we'll be talking about the next one of "The 6" here at Bay West Church which states that one of our values at Bay West is that we lead people to cultivate relationships with God's purposes in mind. When I was studying for this talk, I began to see that the statement I hate may be more a part of my life than I ever suspected...and that may be okay. Oh yeah, it's easy for the preacher to take the high road, capitalize the "Who" and say the "Who" is God, but that's too obvious...and while that would be the greatest value statement I could make, it would hardly be the end of this subject in the life of a Christ follower.

Hopefully, I can shed some light in the immensity of this one of the 6 that just really gets lumped into eating meetings and parties...but it's much, much more than this. If you are in West Palm Bay, or you just want to drive a little bit, feel free to stop on by. See you Sunday, 10am, Heritage High School.

Are you working it or missing it?

2009-09-21T09:50:00.006-04:00

Worship is something that most of us have on a calendar of some sorts, either in the habitual brain side set for Sundays at "x:xx" or the family on the wall calendar or the online, computer-based variety. Our schedule consists of getting up on time, taking the shower (hopefully), busting out the smell good (DO, ToothP and the like), breakfast (optional), getting the kids ready (if you have them), checking the news/internet or whatever is your morning routine... I'd love to say Quite Time with God and His Word, but I know that some people take the "well, I'm going to church already" road, sadly enough, so I know for some, that's in the optional category with breakfast.

Then, you've got to hit adequate drive time and if you are at Bay West, you've got to get there early enough to fulfill your opportunity to serve the weeks you are on...which so far has totalled "2".

Most of us, if we can hit our little mile markers and hit the service before I start to speak, we stamp goal accomplished...good job.

But is that enough? While this would probably be the picture of a successful Sunday for most and if people were asked what they had to do to prepare for the worship service on Sunday, it would be a similar list...is that enough?

Sadly, no, it's not. This Sunday, we'll be talking about #3 on the 6 in our series entitled "Incomplete". Hopefully, we can all come away with a broader perspective and some winning strategies to get the most out of Sundays. If your worship has been sort of boring lately, I've got some answers for that. If you're just not "feeling it", got that covered... No problem...

See you Sunday!

Sooooo....love it is or is it?

2009-09-16T21:55:00.006-04:00

One thing I noticed as I prepared for the love component of the Incomplete series at Bay West Church is what secularly we associate with love and exactly how it changes the focus of love. I'm not really talking love and lust, but just in the foundational aspects that make you really understand what's involved in the endeavor...I'm going to spend some time on that on Sunday...

When you think about it...everywhere you look, love's all wrong, as far as the definitions go...people say the right things, then send you on a wild goose chase, philosophically...what you look for, what you think you're in for...no wonder people seem to fail at love so much, when everything around us at times works to re-focus in another direction...

The dichotomy is really interesting...

Dangerous series...incomplete

2009-09-13T22:39:00.010-04:00

We started off at Bay West Church in West Palm Bay with our series "Incomplete" last Sunday. It had an interesting germination. In the development of the vision of Bay West, we wanted to identify some things that we would like to be core values to our campus. In meeting and praying with some of the couples on the launch team, we came up with what we call, "The Big 6". It's a list of 6 habits, characteristics, behaviors that we'd like to be known for at Bay West. In developing this list, I really felt God's leading to begin Bay West by preaching on these foundations of Bay West...hence the six-week series we are starting out with.

I was at Sun Shoppe in Melbourne, meeting with Elliott Davis, one of our worship leaders about a month or two ago. I shared what the first series was and he said "Hey, that would be a good thing to call this series, Incomplete" Of course, I was like...wha???? He went on to explain his thinking that 7 was the perfect number and this was one short, leaving it incomplete. Of course, we went to the same place....that the 7th and complete picture was Jesus that made it all relevant. Great! Incomplete was complete.

You know when you preach a series like this...that lists some good things to focus on in your life...there's always a danger. It's called the "holy checklist syndrome". The danger is that someone might think that if they do these 6 things, the "holy checklist", they'll be fine.

Nothing could be further from the truth....and it's part of the reason that the name of the series, "Incomplete", fits so well.

In the Bible, Matthew 7 says...
22 On judgment day many will say to me, ‘Lord! Lord! We prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name and performed many miracles in your name.’
23 But I [Jesus] will reply, ‘I never knew you....

Hence the danger...there are loads of people, all across the planet, that think if they just can "do" enough stuff and put Jesus' name on it...even in a well-meaning, honest, trying-my-best, in-church-ever-Sunday sort of way, that this will be enough...but not so much.

Christ, right there in Matthew, puts it in black and white. The biggest thing, the foundation of our judgment, before all the "you did WHAT????? You mean I have to forgive THAT???" starts (just kidding - :-) ), the requirement will be if He knew you or not...did you have a relationship with Christ? Did you spend time with Him? Did you follow Him daily? Did you get to know Him in the ways He left for you to? It won't be because you did a bunch of stuff that impressed Him enough to make Him think you deserved it...just the opposite. We CAN'T accomplish that at all...impossible.

The Big 6 aren't your salvation...they are just good things that can help you understand, live, grasp, emulate what already exists in your heart...a relationship with Christ. So let's not get the cart before the horse, the ".com" before the "http:" so to speak...remember the foundational non-negotiable here...that's you...Jesus...healthy relationship...the rest will work itself out.

GREAT Day!

2009-09-13T14:24:00.006-04:00

We had a great day at Bay West Church this morning. The training took WAAAAAAY longer than expected on Saturday, so needless to say, even though God's been extremely faithful the whole way, we all found a way to lose a little sleep last night. Of course everyone was so keyed up to get it done, we had the guts of the Worship Center done at 8:15-8:20am...lol.

The service was great, even though we had some minor technical snafu's and PCI/us will have to get those worked out (got to mention the Tech stuff...I am still a techy guy at heart.)

All in all, though it was great...talk to you next time...what? You want numbers...we didn't count...just kidding, here are the vital stats.

Bay West Church first Sunday
1 hour and 20 minute setup and sound check
45 minute takedown and store away
Service was 1:05 (and yes, Jim went over, got out at 11:10, but we started late on purpose - just this week- :-) )
108 or so in the Worship Center (some people came in late - don't know if they got counted also)
43 kids
17 workers (including Jenny and Bevan, Children's Minister and leader)
34 people filled out guest cards (even though we didn't have any pens or anything to fill them out)

Lot of people we didn't know...

That's 170 on Campus for the first Sunday (not counting Roberto, the best head custodian in the business in Brevard county, or Larry, since he couldn't stay the whole time).

Praise to God...let's get ready for next week!

God can do a lot of things...

2009-09-13T06:52:00.005-04:00

I found out a new one yesterday and it bears repeating and it happened in our journey of starting our new satellite campus, Bay West Church in west Palm Bay, Florida. Heritage High School, 10am...

On Thursday, the AP at Heritage High let us know that he'd been able to clear out "most" of the room that we'd been scheduled to use for storage there at the school, but still had a shelving unit...and he didn't know where we'd put the overflow.

That was troubling since our diagram of the room and how our cases fit in there from PCI showed that we'd have the room jam packed and have 3 large cases that wouldn't fit in the room and would have to be stored elsewhere...now there was no elsewhere.

Honestly, I was a little bit ashamed (that's dumb right?) to go to God with what I had...all I really knew to ask for at that point was "can you just make the room larger, please?"

We got there yesterday and our equipment was delivered by PCI. When we started loading the cases into the room, ALL the cases fit in the room...with the shelving unit in there!

I've always felt that God could do anything that He wanted to do, but I'd never thought about Him being able to enlarge a room and I guess I never thought I'd be lucky enough to see it...but He did.

God can do a lot of things...thanks, God. Bay West Church starts today.

Spiritual Warfare never really stops...

2009-09-10T08:23:00.005-04:00

...it just ebbs and flows. If you don't know, Bay West Church has experienced our share this week of the launch, so keep praying.

Larry, our SP, had to go to the emergency room on Sunday right after the service. He probably should have gone before the service, but he wanted to be a part of commissioning everyone who was going to Bay West. I've been sick for about 2-3 weeks or so, nothing nearly as serious as Larry's by far, but just had the accelerator to the floor for 6 months or so and this is just the result. Finally had to break down and go to the doctor myself, and get a shot, take a day off and go short days on work for a couple of days (which means keep working, but just try to be calm about it).

Last night, I got a call from one of our Launch Team guys. Tuesday night, he & his son had put out about 20 signs on Malabar in West Palm Bay about the Launch on Sunday...you know, those political signs that stay up for weeks. Well, someone had gone down Malabar and taken all 20 down. I'm not sure if someone just knocked them all down or actually took them away, but they aren't standing.

We also have not received all the final confirmation on the storage space we'll need...computer software issues have taken extra time this week...we've had some extra miscommunication as far as staff at FBC that's taken some re-communication and backtracking and clarification on stuff...nothing major...if you shoot a BB at something, it's not so bad. If they come one at a time, not that big of a deal, but if you shoot 100 at the same time, that's a shotgun shell...bigger deal.

Most of the time, spiritual warfare is always around, so it never really stops, it just goes in waves when you are attempting to accomplish something for the Lord. Personally, I don't think it will destroy the work or anything like that, because God is still in control. Most of the time, sw really just attempts to steal the joy of those involved. It's a good reminder that you are probably doing the right thing, if it upsets the enemy so much, but it's all good.

All I ask, is that all of you pray extra hard this week...we don't want to pull up short and that we don't get thrown off by the inevitable little things that get thrown our way.

More pub for launch...

2009-09-09T13:00:00.005-04:00

Is it big enough to call it "pub", I think so. Billie Williams at the FBC Weekday Preschool, had her parents orientation meeting today (has another one tomorrow), gave out our info, talked about it and let Katye speak to the parents in attendance about Bay West. She had a signup sheet for anyone who wanted more info and one lady even said she'd heard about it and said that her family was going to go this weekend.

The FBC Weekday Preschool has become a pretty good entity with a good rep (according to Ann Marie's Kindergarten teacher at West Melbourne School For Science) and lots of people send their kids there, regardless of their religious affiliation or the church thing at all. In Susanna's class, there's only one kid besides Susanna that goes to FBC. There are also several families from Palm Bay whose children attend. Anyway, the point is that everyone that goes there aren't Christians necessarily...not a requirement to go or anything. It's just another way that we can reach into the community to help build a bridge from Bay West Church to the community of people in West Palm Bay.

One more testimony of stuff...

2009-09-08T22:40:00.003-04:00

Stan Berry called me in my weakened condition to tell me some encouraging tidbits from his day.

1) He ran into someone at Publix and in talking with them, was able to share about Bay West and they seemed to be interested in coming.

2) He also ran into someone else later that had gotten our mailer and their kid had already been nagging her to take him there on Sunday.

Things are working as God continues to move to bring Bay West Church to Palm Bay...don't miss your part in this, okay?

Family Fun Night went great...not wet

2009-09-06T21:12:00.003-04:00

Last night, I was a little worried about the rain and thunderstorms, whether it would even go off. This morning, I thought about calling it early...but, we figured we'd just deal with it, suck it up and just go for it....good thing too!

At Bay West Church's first official community event, there were a lot of people there...a LOT. We cooked 500 hotdogs and they were ALL gone...while I know some people might have gotten two, there were also those that didn't eat any. Lots of kids as well...The Community Center opened up for open gym, and we rented it out for 2 of the 3 hours and it was PACKED (thanks, Dudley, you are simply the man...know you hate that I said your name, but you are).

The GREAT thing was that there were A LOT of community people that I'd never seen or met before...lots of people that got the mailout, saw a sign, looked on the web, were invited by friends or just people they ran across...I was really pleased, but boy, am I tired...as are a lot of really great servants who will sleep well when they go to bed tonight.

GREAT JOB! I don't know how many will come, but there were a lot of people who said they were planning on it...we'll see. Here's our first real attempt to reach out and serve the folks of Palm Bay, Florida...West Palm Bay...and it seems to have worked. I would totally love to name EVERYONE who worked there, but I'd forget someone and that would stink...so I won't...I'll just say I know that God is pleased with your sacrifice and that's why you were there.

Signs are up in Palm Bay about Sunday night

2009-09-04T15:57:00.004-04:00

Signs for the Family Fun Celebration are up in Palm Bay...some really great people put them out and some really weird looking guy in an Alabama hat just had to take his picture by one today...

We'll see if the weather cooperates...we've got about 60% chance of Thunderstorms on Sunday afternoon at present...the chances have been getting worse...we'll see what God has in mind.

And things keep coming...

2009-09-04T10:53:00.005-04:00

Katye, my wife, was wearing her Launch T-shirt at Nicole Cote's School of Dance, which is where our girls take dance. Someone stopped her and started talking about Bay West Church, and said that she'd heard about us and was planning to come.

Little words here and there...don't forget to invite your friends...Launch is in 9 days at Heritage High School in West Palm Bay.

Don't forget the Family Fun Celebration on Sunday night!

Another really cool email in a timely fashion...

2009-09-03T11:27:00.005-04:00

I got home from our Launch Team meeting last night, felt REALLY tired...long day...

The day started well with a great Worship planning session, then a meeting with a guy who agreed to be our drummer for a while...but as the day wore on the issues came in...isn't that just the way it is?

Lots of issues to deal with...all of them level "5"...allegedly...then some good stuff, but you know how it is...the challenging seems to take more out of you, even when the good is there, too.

To end the day, I had a standoff with my 5 year old daughter and we both ended up crying and pledging to be better (okay, I'm a sap, sue me...she's got me, can't help it.)...I'm getting really sick and it won't quit, but I don't have time to quit so it will. So, all in all, it's a pretty not so great ending... I'm lucky I have people that are praying for me or I simply wouldn't be making it (I know they are, they email me that they just did, facebook me right after they do, text messages, v-mails, so that's AWESOME...it's not always necessary to pray for storms to stop, but better to pray for strength to withstand them, to learn what you need to learn through them, and grow closer to God in the process...because that's what it's for....but I digress.)

Back to the story... I'm feeling pretty much lower than a worm's belly button and I decide to check my email...yeah, when you're low you might as well go in for the kill, because usually email can be that...but I got a really cool email from someone who'd seen our flyer and was really glad we were coming to the area. That's great! Made my day!

The other side of things was that this email was PARTICULARLY important because one of the things we've had to deal with was some well-meaning person calling the church to complain about the separation of church and state and how we shouldn't be meeting in a school...didn't matter if we pay BIG money for rent just like anyone else could...because we are a church, we should be penalized for that. I also found out that a few well-meaning people had been pestering the principal, John Tuttle, at the school as well. Our Worship Minister ended up on the call with the well-meaning person and made a really good point..."sir, you make a good point, but isn't it funny that we vote at every election that's had in churches all over the country?"...guy didn't know what to do with that one...kind of took the wind out of his sail...

Anyway...you can see how God sets up stuff to keep you going and give you energy and encourage you, because this was a big email. I hope the person who sent it didn't mind, but I copied-n-pasted a really nicely put portion (minus their names and stuff) and forwarded it to John over at the school. He only gets the junk calls and emails and he needs to know as well how many people appreciate our being in the school. He's a good guy trying to do a hard, yet very important job.

And this type of thing happens all the time...so there's my "just another cool email" story...hope it helps you to. Here's to bringing Bay West Church to West Palm Bay and doing our part in obedience to join with all the other GREAT Palm Bay churches there to reach Palm Bay, Florida for Christ.

P.S. And if that wasn't encouraging enough, the next article I read was that Mark Ingram and Julio Jones (two big starters for the University of Alabama football team) were cleared to play against Va Tech on Saturday night and our starting DE, Brandon Deaderick, who was shot during an attempted mugging on Tuesday, miraculously, only sustained a flesh wound in the arm, so he won't miss his entire senior season or anything...good news all around...every little bit helps...God knows that.

Things are working...

2009-08-31T21:44:00.003-04:00

Someone was talking with someone this last week and upon mentioning Bay West and FBC, they responded with "hey thanks for the water"...pretty cool, huh? They had gotten some of the free water we've been handing out.

Keep praying for this weekend...please, please invite friends in Palm Bay, especially if they have kids...The Family Fun Night at Palm Bay Regional Park...4-7pm will be fun!

Bay West Church is just 12 days away from launching in West Palm Bay! It's an exciting and busy time. There are a lot of people picking up the slack and I'm reminded every day of two things....1) There is a LOT of things to do 2) God really is on top of things.

Look for our first service to possibly be on the Bay West Church YouTube channel...NO GUARANTEES...but definitely possible.

Just more evidence...

2009-08-27T18:52:00.006-04:00

God sure has been in our corner throughout this process..so many things that I've missed and He's caught and fixed without my help...one more thing. For those who were at prayer last night...the whole water thing...God has now opened the door for someone to donate 20 cases of promotional water (and pay for the shipping) for us...God is truly good.

So, LAUNCH TEAM, be ready to get to work to bring Bay West Church to West Palm Bay.

A few things:
1) Sept. 6th...BOTH morning services will be praying over us and commissioning the ENTIRE team in the morning services. If you are in town, please plan to be in both services for the commissioning if you can.
2) Sept. 6th...EVENING...Family Fun Celebration. We'll be on hand to get things done at Palm Bay Regional Park that evening...do not miss it and bring all your friends from Palm Bay. You will be getting some phone calls about helping at various things, but the primary thing is for you to attend and make sure you mill around and meet people in the area.
3) This next Wednesday, Sept.2 and next Wed. Sept. 9th - BE THERE, be there, be there... There will be training for the KIDZONE teams both nights with Jenny Goodson, who'll be doing the training and there will be some things such as putting toys together and other things (First Impressions, Media Team, etc...) that have to happen.

Also, our leaders of teams will be recruiting, so if they call you, so stay receptive and open and we can do the work that God has for us in Palm Bay, Florida,

another Thursday night...

2009-08-13T23:20:00.004-04:00

There's some great things going on for Bay West Church...

We have us a Children's Leader...Bevan Brennan, a Melbournite and her husband Jason will be joining us in this endeavor. Katye and I had a great dinner with them tonight and feel very positive about them being part of the team.

They've been married 3 years, and they'll be coming around so look for them and get to know them...good folks. Jenny, David and I have met with them to interview them and it's a good deal. You might remember Bevan, because she was a music intern here a few years ago.

Keep praying, because I meet with a prospective Worship Leader tomorrow night AND I had an awesome lunch with a guy today who I've asked to be a part of our worship planning team...GREAT creative mind, we freakin' click....

Feeling good about stuff...met the Community Center Coordinator for the Ted Whitlock Community Center at Palm Bay Regional Park the other day...Rob Medina...GREAT guy, great guy! Talked with him about distributing some promotional water, if we donated it for his different classes and stuff and he was all for it...he's a believer and sincerely loves Jesus. Great contact....btw, thanks again to Larry and Doug for maintaining such a great rep in this area, that definitely helped out the cause here!

Another story of how God just works stuff out here...Jeff Cooke, one of the guys on the Launch Team, was at the prayer time Wednesday night (DON'T MISS THAT) and I was talking about taking water down to the Community Center next week...then I remembered...I'm in Fort Myers all next week at this mandatory training from the FBC (pray for my attitude about that, I don't like being made to go somewhere when I feel I've go so much work to do here), so I can't deliver the water when it comes on Thursday...Jeff pipes up and he's a Landscape Tech with the county in Palm Bay, lives right near the Park, has a truck and says "no prob", he knows Rob, so, done deal...water is right on schedule to be delivered. See how God works...solving problems I didn't previously even know were problems.

There's loads of stuff like this that makes me hopeful...I can't plan this stuff, it just happens. There's big stories and small stories (like just meeting up with Cliff the other day, the guy who runs the Cricket Club down at the Park and then Rob setting me up with a contact for a future community service project...HUGE! to Truth Advertising finding a string to pull to get our mailer out with a short turnaround - thanks Geoff) You just can't buy this stuff...not to mention the money that's been raised in THIS economy to make this happen....you just can't deny that God has something planned. I'm not sure what it is...maybe three of us sitting in that big school in learning about Jesus...but we'll see.

Anyway, here's to more successes in faith as we follow God to try to help bring Jesus to West Palm Bay...adding to the Palm Bay Churches.

woo hoo

2009-08-05T12:37:00.003-04:00

LOTS TO DO! Bay West Church is on the move!

Just a few quick hits
- just recorded some spots to start airing on some cumulus radio stations in the area
- look for Facebook ads to hit soon (I'm paying per click, so if you already know about the church, doooooon't click it)
- We've got a HUUGE potluck for the Launch Team coming up on August 23rd (Sunday night) in the Fellowship Hall..EVERYONE on the Launch team needs to be there...BIG TIME.
- September 6 - Sunday night - We are having a family night at Palm Bay Regional Park to gear up for the Launch the next day...tell ALL your friends in Palm Bay. We'll have bounce houses, refreshments, (possibly) live music and it will be from 4-6pm...and it's FREE!
- I've just decided on the first series two, possibly three series that we are doing at Bay West and this should take us through the end of the year... You know me, so it's INTENSE, so be ready for it...
- we are still looking and praying about the children's leader and worship leader...we are close, but I'll let you know as soon as we do.

Things are really looking up and I'm getting the second wind to pull this thing off...so hang in there. We are really serious about being a Palm Bay Church and doing what we can to bring Christ to West Palm Bay