Here’s some more on our Christmas celebration at the Maryland State Fair. The Cow Palace, where we’ll be, is huge. So big, in fact, we actually only use half of it. Half is seating, 3800 seats, and the other half is used as a backstage area for ministers and musicians. Besides the regular seating, there […]
Everyone who knows me knows I am all about Christmas. I love Christmas. And I get to be pastor of THE Christmas Church. I mean, to begin with, we’re named after Christmas. And we have the biggest Christmas celebration of all (OK, St. Peter’s is bigger, and so is Rick Warren’s Church, and probably Cardinal […]
Ever since we started the miracle series, people have been stopping me, and seeking me out and e-mailing me (a minor miracle in itself, since I am somewhat inaccessible via e-mail). And they’re telling me about miracles…miracles they’re seeing or experiencing just because they’re on the look out for them this season. Apparently there are […]
As I was saying (see previous post), many of the people we meet in the Christmas story (see Matthew chapters 1 & 2 and Luke 1 & 2) are expecting miracles and God keeps sending them. And maybe those two things are not unrelated (ps: they are related). On the other hand, others in the […]
I will be honest with you. I am not one of those jaded, post-consumer minded anti-holiday bah-humbugs when it comes to Christmas. I love Christmas, hands down my favorite time of the year. Love it all: the lights, the music, the holiday movies and specials, the gifts, the parties and dinners. Yep, it’s all just […]
Don’t know exactly where I came across the expression, maybe I thought of it myself (unlikely, but possible). Anyway, I say it all the time, so much so that people around me have taken to saying it too. It goes like this: unexpressed gratitude is ingratitude. Ingratitude is a big problem because what we do […]
This weekend we are celebrating Stewardship Sunday all weekend long. It is the one time of the year when we reflect on the financial stewardship of Church of the Nativity. We have been increasingly disciplined about this in recent years, eliminating fundraisers and other distractions from the giving God wants. We talk about giving that […]
This is a different kind of post: a brief look at my week. Why, you ask? Well, I was thinking, it’s already November. Where does the time go? Here’s where mine went this week. Saturday We successfully hosted our second ever church conference; as noted about 150 people, including our own ministry leaders and others […]
This weekend was our second ever, and hopefully annual, conference. Because of our forthcoming book, Rebuilt, we organized the conference’s main and break out sessions, on the book’s chapters. The main morning session, which I gave, was all about articulating the basic problem when it comes to churchworld these days. What is going on, what’s […]
The English idiom, “don’t judge a book by its cover” is a kind of moral admonition advising us not to prejudge the worth or value of anything (or anyone) based on appearances alone. Nice idea…except everybody does it, we all do it. We’re constantly doing it. Especially when it comes to books. Anyway, the process […]
