4,000th comment

Thanks for a great community you guys have created.  As of this entry, there have been 4,012 comments chalked full of insight, foolishness, and friendship…with the occasional barb/buffoonery!  ;)  Thanks mucho!

Write a Story with Me One Line at a Time

I’m 80 comments away from my 4,000th comment.  Care to take me over the edge by writing an interactive story?  It’ll help your creative juices flow.  I’ll start it out with a Twitter/text message length sentence or partial sentence (no more than 140 characters).  Then, the next commenter picks up where I left off.

Ready?!  Here we go.

“There once was a man with a wooden leg and an eye patch who…”

Opportunity of a Lifetime!

Amazing facility isn’t it? Check this out: It is 32,000 sq. feet of prime retail space in Austin, TX and it has been rented by The Parks Church, a new church plant of about 50 people led by Devlin Watson. The price tag on the space? Only $5,000 per month. At $1.87 per square foot, I can say that this is ridiculous. This is $30-50,000 per month space at a minimum. I’ve honestly never heard of anything remotely like this before.

Well, they can make their $5,000 per month payment. But, they don’t have much left over. This is one of those situations that you just don’t pass up. You just go for it. They’ve done that. Now, we have an opportunity to come along beside them and take the same kind of faith leap. Here’s the opportunity:

You get a chance of a lifetime to pray and/or give finances to help them leverage this moment. This is such an unusual situation that I had to share it and invite you to be an investor. Your financial gift would go directly to helping them launch this location.

You can give here. Email Devlin if you’d like to find out more about what they’re doing and how you can participate. Let me know of any creative things you might be doing to help. I’m game for anything.

Community as Vehicle to Christ

There is only one way to God the Father (1 John 2:1) and that is through Jesus Christ (1 Timothy 2:5).  There is only one way to Jesus and that is through the power of the Holy Spirit (John 16:5-11).  I would offer a practical and Scriptural suggestion (John 4:28-29) that I’ve noticed over and over.  Friends position people to be in close proximity to an omnipresent God.

Community/relationship is almost always the front door to the drawing, convicting power of the Holy Spirit.  People often buy into me before they buy into Christ.  If I fail to open my life to others- to extend myself on behalf of Christ, the door to Jesus may be more difficult to access.  I bring people into close proximity with Jesus by simply being in open, enjoyable relationship with them.  By living in community with others and sharing Jesus who is in community with me.

Sharing Jesus outside of the parameters of authentic community is commanded (Luke 14:12-24).  Without neglecting the call to reach to the marginalized, we are called to function in community with those in close relational proximity.  Without a doubt, the greatest responsiveness to Jesus is on the heels of strong or developing relationship.

PATH TO GOD

You (in community) -> Holy Spirit (in compelling conviction) -> Jesus (in salvation) -> God the Father
(in righteous judgment)

• What are the barriers to authentic community?

• What are the barriers to sharing Jesus in community?

• What are the barriers to the expression of God’s power in your existing relational networks?

Your Most Embarrassing Moment?

I was on crutches, a freshman in college, going home through the Chattanooga airport.  Standing in the front of the line atop two flights of stairs, I took my first step.  My no slip crutch pad and the no slip step locked in battle.  It was like falling over with your hands in your pocket.  I could see the crash coming but I couldn’t do anything about it.  Yes.  I was the loser tumbling to the bottom of the stairs.

After landing, I flexed my muscles to see if anything was broken…no pain.  Relieved, I looked up just in time to catch a glimpse of one of my crutches coming at my end over end, crashing into my noggin’.  Dang!  After that, I had to fly with the entire audience to my crash…don’t know what was worse.

Care to sit down in the therapist’s chair and share yours?

Treating Leaders Like They’re Remedial

Todd shares a great post quoting General Patton saying, “Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.”

I love it.  Understand when you need to apply situational leadership and help people along on a more basic level.  But, a lot of time, people don’t grow because they haven’t gone through the trauma of figuring it out for themselves.  So, quit talking to people like they’re remedial and start expecting them to step up as leaders.

Sunday Wrap-up

• Again, Chris, Ritz, and PJ beat me to their version of Sunday Wrap-up. Check ‘em out.
• I got up at 4:30 and hit the office…love that space. It’s totally stripped down and clean. It was the perfect place to re-write my notes and have some quiet time.
• At 8:15, I hit the theater.
• When I arrived, a two piece jazz band was playing in the lobby and chocolate fountains for dipping marshmallows, strawberries, and a ton of other little snacks were on tap just for our ladies.
• I immediately had a ton of explaining to do because I was wearing a suit and I have proof.
• Jesse was in Chicago. The Messengers (Bill Finch, Terry Brown, Rick Swintek, and Michael Betancourt) stepped right in…great stuff.
• During the message, I asked, “Whose side is God on anyway?” in week 2 of Fortune Cookie (Romans 8:31-34). The notes are below.
• Now, here is the cool thing: There is no way we could pull off what we do every week without the amazing women of Life Pointe. The list is long. Their commitment to Jesus was illustrated throughout the day. I cannot stress how honored I am to serve alongside them.
• We headed out from the theater to meet up with my family for lunch at my house. My mom was late getting there. Proving what I was just saying about our women, she was late because she drove back to the theater to take gifts to all of the women working at Flagship Cinemas. Awesome.

worship guide notes

FORTUNE COOKIE – week 2
“Whose Side Is God on Anyway?”
1. God is not on your side.
2. God is on your side.
Romans 8:31-34, John 3:16-18
3. God + you = a majority
Philippians 4:13
4. God – you = a majority – you
Mark 8:38, Daniel 4:34-37
5. A broken you + a perfect God= a revolutionary force
2 Corinthians 12:6-10

Momma, ooooh ooooh ooooh ooooh

My mom used to sing “I’d Rather Have Jesus” at bedtime.  That song remains the most soothing song in the world to me.  And, she imparted a value in me for the things of God through her voice.  My mom works hard, lives grace, and loves me, my wife, and kids beyond belief.

Kelly was my friend, then my girlfriend, then my wife.  Now she is the mother of my three children while excelling in the aforementioned relational attachments to me successfully negotiating me into watching chick flicks on Friday nights instead of Iron Man. She develops our kids to be self sufficient, bright, adventurous, and to have an inquisitive heart for who Jesus is.

Happy Mother’s day to the two amazing moms in my life.  I’m blessed to have a terrific mom.  I’m even more blessed to have married a hot lil’ mama that keeps my life interesting and who loves me so much.

Burn Bridges

This is a leadership lesson Sun Tsu’s Art of War style:

Sometimes you just have to break things and burn things down to get people where they need to go.

Have you ever had someone tell you that you shouldn’t burn bridges?  Me too.  It is good advice…sometimes.  In the case of mission, sometimes you just have to grow a backbone and leave yourself with no exit plan.  When you’re backed into a corner, you have to fight because there is only one way out.

Tactically, you shouldn’t position an army between your enemy and a body of water (river, lake, or ocean).  In the event of a retreat, you’re in mega trouble. But, sometimes there are more important things than survival.

Counter-intuitive lesson to be learned?  Provide no way of retreat and people must move forward.

500,000 dead?

Pray.

More Leadership Lessons from Moving

While we’ve made the move from our old offices to our new offices successfully, there are still a ton of things to do to bring order to our world.  I’ve also got a few leadership lessons learned in my back pocket.  They are:

• Throw stuff out. Quit hauling non-essential things.  If you don’t use it, lose it.  Focus.  Spend your energy working the essentials.  Stop consuming your life space with non-essential, negative side stuff, activities,  and (shock) people.  Every person is valuable.  But, some people work hard at destroying the value in others.  Leader beware.  Know who is essential and work like the devil to protect and develop those people.
• Consolidate. Every leader should be required to wait tables.  I first learned consolidation in that arena.  I relearned it this week.  Don’t make 5 trips.  Consolidate and make 1 or 2.  Think through your process.  It is hard work.  But, it honors people, time, and makes you more productive in the long run.  Of course, if working unnecessarily hard assuages your guilt, then by all means, continue not thinking through your processes in advance.
• Take a break to have fun in the middle of the hard work. Work hard.  Play hard.  When you’ve led people hard, take a great break and have a blast. Wednesday night after the move, all the guys and gals hit this awesome taco shop downtown called “La Cruzada Taqueria.”  I went home and collapsed.  The last thing I remember though were the jokes, stories, and flaming sauces we were daring each other to eat.  Looking back, this has been on of the longest weeks of the year…also the funnest.
• Compete. If you want to be productive, compete.  Tell a young kid that you can load 3 boxes to his 1.  You’ll load the truck faster.  Double your productivity by telling everyone working that they’re a bunch of girls.  Quadruple your productivity by pointing out the workhorse.
• Hire people to do it for you. If you cannot afford the time interruption or do not value the team building aspects of doing it yourself or if you do not have the expertise to do it yourself, hire someone to do it for you.  There is a lot of upside to outsourcing as you will soon see with our new website (soon…I promise).  However, expect things to be broken at a great rate because hired hands don’t appreciate how you’ve had to sweat, bleed, and skimp for your stuff.  At the same time, you can demand excellence.  If they don’t perform, you can cut them free and withhold money while severing a short term, low investment relationship.  You cannot do that so easily with close, high-investment, personal relationships.
• Don’t hire people to do it for you. Outsourcing may maximize your time and productivity.  But, it may not foster relationship, learning, team, or growth.  If you can afford the downtime associated with learning and interruption, go for it.  You’ll bond to people, create loyalty, ownership, cast vision, and get to know people on a level you wouldn’t otherwise.  You’ll also impart and gain knowledge that you wouldn’t have been able to otherwise.  The key is to know when to do it yourself and when not to.  If you don’t have and can’t muster the expertise internally, don’t even think about it.

A woman’s place is in the…

Leadership Bottlenecks

This week, we’ve been renovating new space and moving our offices.  Pulling off projects requires effective marshaling of people and resources.  If you are out ahead of the project, you’ll encounter bottlenecks which eat up time, resources, and frustrate people, who are ultimately your greatest resource.

When we first began doing setup in the theater, we would have 10 guys show up at 6:30 AM to setup.  It was a major league drag when the trailer would show up at 6:45 AM.  Ultimately, the 15 minute bottleneck had a price of 2.5 man hours in addition to 10 high-output volunteers now becoming 10 frustrated guys who will think twice about being on time next time.  

In leadership as your organization grows or as you encounter activity spikes, the bottlenecks that have always been around get exposed.  In response, a good leader will:

• root out bottlenecks, 
• challenge the people who cause them, 
• rework systems that cause individuals to be the bottleneck, and ultimately
• examine the skill sets of the guy in charge (in the case of Life Pointe, me)

Who Needs Sleep?

This weekend was crazy busy, crazy fun. Kelly and Luci tell a bit about it. Summed up? Chili’s with our life group (last gig of the Spring Semester), Guitar Hero with James and Mark, paint the offices, locked out of car, 2 services, IKEA, a little bit of sleep.

Sunday Wrap-up

• Chris, Phil, and Ritz have the scoop on Sunday.
• Ritz also has the scoop on his first real life girlfriend!
• Sunday was one of the most enjoyable days at Life Pointe for me.
• We receive communion weekly towards the end of our song set using a common cup.
• During the first song, we open the table for prayer. During the 10:30, people basically continued to come forward for prayer at one of the four tables throughout the worship set. Beautiful. Not only do we have a God that knows about our troubles, who is moved by our troubles, but He also intervenes on behalf of our troubles!
• The curtain has been killed in the 10:30…should have been gone a few weeks ago.
• The 9 AM vibe was unreal. A ton of people made the move from the 10:30 to the 9…perfect.
• I met a guest in the 9 am and asked her how she found out about Life Pointe? 3 invites at three different places in one day.
• Second time guests were seriously high. I love it when people come to church for the first. BUT, when people come back, I’m jazzed.
• We asked the question, “Do We make our own fortunes and call them fate?” (Romans 8:28-30). Worship Guide fill-in-the-blanks below.
• Listen here.
• After church, we jetted to IKEA where we got some stuff for our new digs.
• We’ll now have as many empty desks as we currently have occupied. As we add staff we’ll need them. More importantly, our volunteers have some great workspaces…no longer have to drag out folding tables.

Eight Belles is Dead: a Bad Sign for Hillary Clinton?

Yesterday, Hillary Clinton was sporting Kentucky Derby hats. A journalist asked, “Which horse of going to win the derby?” She said, put your money on the only filly in the race, Eight Belles. Bad news. The only female horse in the race came in second but also broke both her ankles and had was killed right there on the track! The Winner? Big Brown! I’m not making this stuff up!

I’m not into fate, fortune cookies, or omens. But, it does make you pause and go, “hmmmmm.” I bet she wishes she wouldn’t have put her money on Belle. I bet Belle’s owners wish she hadn’t either.  Barrack has to be smiling.  Does anyone else find this completely bizarre?

Painting Day @ Our New Offices

Put your signature on the new Life Pointe offices this Saturday @ 9 AM.  We’re painting at 50 NW 15th St Unit 101.  Are you in?

The sixth sense of a leader

I had lunch with a friend today, Kevin Fisher, lead pastor at Miami Vineyard. We were talking about leadership, church, discipleship, and rhythms resident in each church.

In tracking rhythms in the life of an organization, the first move is to look at trends (people in groups, # of people serving, # of leaders, attendance, giving levels, # of guests, etc…). Kevin pointed out that God puts something in a leader akin to a sixth sense or a gut-level awareness of the movement of the organism. It made for a great conversation where natural and supernatural co-exist, contradict, and compliment.

Fortune Cookie Starts This Sunday

Our new website is about to be released…maybe today. Until then, we do not have current content at moviechurch.info relating to our new message series, Fortune Cookie which starts this Sunday. For the next four weeks, we’ll be studying Romans 8 and looking at Fate, Destiny, Freewill, and Fortune. Enjoy a little glimpse of what’s inside the cookie. Invite as many friends as you can for the kickoff this Sunday.

Saturn Project on South Beach Tonight

Jesse and Alex Santoyo, Brent Maloney, and their bass player in The Saturn Project are playing on South Beach tonight late. If you want to head out with a couple of us to catch their show, drop me a note. I’ll be online for a bit. I’m not positive I’m going yet. But, I know my brother Phil is.

Keys to a New Office in Hand!

We’ve gone through a ton of flux over office space. That’s a big deal when our move out day is May 7th.

First, we lost a deal for prime office space because our representation didn’t close a done deal.  Then, we got a verbal agreement which was also sent to us via email on a downtown venue only to have them decide that they wanted to renegotiate an already agreed to price at contracting.  That pretty much hammered our concert venue.

Finally, we got our new offices today.  The space is exceptional and the key is in hand!  We’ll be rolling out a sign-up for painters, people who are handy to help assemble equipment, hang TVs, and move in soon.  It’ll be a big bash where all the knuckleheads come out and create a ruckus.

DSL in the Theater

Cool news.  We just got our own DSL installed in the theater.  Among other things, it means in the near future, we’ll be live streaming our services on Sunday mornings from beginning to end.

Are there masses of people banging on the door to watch our services on line?  I doubt it.  But, we do have some really wonderful people that because of health and work issues cannot be in church on Sunday morning.  But, they can be in front of their computer.  Love it.

Virtual Stalkers and Oil Painted Boobies

I have a lovable, fluffy, warm hearted, pseudo-anonymous virtual stalker who has known me since I was 13 that’s taken umbrage with my use of Cold Play’s new album cover which is in actuality “Liberty Leading the People” by Eugene Delacroix.  What’s his beef?  Well, aside from the multitudinous links to “Rick Warren is the Anti-Christ” blogs and websites, the issue is summed up that he’s offended by oil painted boobies and a “foreign country’s flag.”

There are other issues he has with me apparently that is fueling the banter.  Perhaps, he’s generally dissatisfied in life and is only happy when others are miserable…not sure.  But, for his sake, would you mind giving a vote on whether I should ditch what he feels is anti-American pornography or go with the improved American flag waving, more modest version of artwork as seen here?  What say you?

Cold Play - Violet Hill (free download)

Check it out. Cold Play just released a new single, “Violet Hill” as a spiff to you, a freebie. Its a great tune. If you’re in London or NYC, there’s a free concert.

Linkfest

• 7 Signs You’re Not a Leader by David Foster
• Jeff Kaputska shares a video on why Twitter. (sign up and follow me)
• Jesse got a pedicure.
• Craig Groeschel gives pastors advice on message preparation.
• Chris Elrod shares his thoughts on Exponential Conference.
• Kent Schaffer shares a bit about church technology trends.
• Leonce asks why we’re focused on cultural relevance and not cultural shaping.

Website Unvelied

The new church website will be unveiled this week.  I’m excited.  It will be a central hub.  It will have a great warm feeling…can’t wait for you to see it.

Sunday Wrap-up: speed edition

I’m sitting here waiting for staff meeting to start.  So, this is quick:

• We ended our series, “Simply Jesus.”  I really enjoyed this focus a lot.  I feel like we gained some depth.
• Chris and Phil have some good insights into yesterday.
• We’re asking more people to move from the 10:30 to the 9 AM.  We really need the help freeing up some seats.  There were about 5 available seats in the upper section.
• That means some families don’t get to sit together and it can be awkward for guests on their first visit.
• Dan Bard made the mother of all storage boxes.  Our hospitality gear is rollin’ in luxury.
• After sharing about a family in our church who had a significant need, tons of people responded with offers to help.  Thank you for being the church.
• The fill in the blank notes from Sunday are:

Seattle through My Lense

Panoramic view of Seattle, WA from atop the Space Needle. I’ve got to get a better camera…still a great perspective.

Tim Keller Intro Songs at Exponential Conference

The introduction songs for each of the auditorium speakers were hilarious. I’m going to see if I can track down the lyrics to More Than a Feeling” Tim Keller/Eric Bramlett style. It was a sick, twisted piece played out to introduce one heck of an stodgy, intellectual, Manhattanite Presbyterian pastor. Enjoy.

(thanks to Elrod for the vid)

Crowd Status

Over the past couple weeks, I’ve really started messing around with Twitter.  I dig it.  Along with Twitter, I also dig my blog.  They collide on my Crowd Status.  Check out what some of my Twitter friends that also participate on my blog are doing all at the same time on my Crowd Status.

Are you missing from the crowd?  Let me know and I’ll add you.