• St. Patrick’s Day Prayer for Missionaries

    st-patrickEach year I’m shocked that few Christians latch onto Saint Patrick‘s Day as a holiday to celebrate international missions. I think it comes from few people knowing Patrick’s story. They have heard the lore that he scared the snakes out of Ireland but forget the facts. Patrick (of Wales) was trafficked as a boy to Ireland to work for a rich person. Later, he left Ireland and returned home. Through a series of events Patrick became convinced that his life’s mission was to return to the place of his captivity and set spiritual captives free. For the rest of his life he worked tirelessly to establish Christianity on the island. Through some inginuity and fancy friends Patrick was eventually able to help start 500 churches across the once resistant land. As time would tell, Ireland would become the place which “protected” Christianity during the Dark Ages. Luck of the Irish or providence of God? I chose providence!

    While drunks everywhere salute St. Patrick as the god of Guinness I celebrate him as the example of all believers to chase wildly the call of following Christ wherever you are lead.

    With that in mind, here are the missionaries I’ve been lifting up in prayer today. These are the heroes in my life who willingly accept the crazy challenge of changing the world.

    – Dan & Barb Evans. My former youth pastor and his wife run a hospitality house for military personnel in Alaska.

    – Eric & Michelle Stapleton. Kristen and I have been friends with them since college. They spend their days translating the Bible in a remote area of the island nation of Vanuatu.

    Of course, the staff of our church are all missionaries. (They raise support as they plant this church.) Today I’m praying for Stephen & Bradford Phelan, Edgardo & Elizabeth Avila, Christine Brinn, Chris and Anastasia Brewster, and the whole team at World Impact who have joined forces with Harbor.

  • Powered by the Letter “I”

    Two things dominated our Saturday. Ikea and iPhones.

    Actually, on the way to this epic fun we had lunch at In & Out Burger. I’m not a cult-fan of the burger joint but it was quick, easy, and not McDonald’s.

    ikeaIkea: There’s a pretty strong irony in our trip yesterday. When we moved across country in August we sold nearly all of our furniture. We had a rule of thumb that if it had been to California and back in 2002 & 2003 it wasn’t going in 2008. Then when we set up the house in August we made a massive trip to Ikea. We packed 4 of those big flatbeds to the gills and crawled our way to the checkout. They even had to break our receipt in half so that their strict delivery rules when get it all delivered.

    When we moved into the bigger place a few weeks ago we immediately recognized that the bedrooms all needed more stuff. Both kids bedrooms are huge and all they had was a dresser and a loft bed. So back to Ikea we went! We didn’t manage to get everything they needed yesterday. But we did add to each kids room a lamp, desk, and chair. Mom and dad also picked up some end tables, a TV stand for our bedroom, and a patio table for the backyard. It doesn’t look like Ikea has everything we need… so we’ll have to look at our second favorite furniture store, Target.

    apple-logoiPhones: Kristen and I have bounced back and forth on this forever. We didn’t upgrade when 3G released because one of our phones was still under contract. Then I really wrestled with the whole Blackberry vs. iPhone thing, then I decided in December I wanted an iPhone but I didn’t want to make a decision before I saw if Apple was going to release a new version. When Apple released a new Mac Mini, iMac, and Shuffle last week that was my signal that they weren’t rushing anything to production.

    With that, we headed to Fashion Valley Mall‘s Apple store to make our purchase. Though the store was slammed we were able to find a person who was perfectly happy to help us out. While the in-store activation thing is a bit annoying I can imagine this is the way to go on the macro level for Apple/AT&T. I wrapped things up in the Apple store while Kristen shopped at Crate & Barrel for a new blender. (Thank you community group for the gift card!) I’ll do a full review later for the iPhone 3G, but I will say my initial expectations were exceeded. Before I got to the car I had already synched my phone with my gmail account and installed a Facebook and Twitter app. The hardest part about the set-up was getting my contacts synched between gmail and Address Book on my Macbook. But now I have all of that taken care of and all of my contacts sorted into tidy groups. Next up is getting Kristen’s contacts and my contacts to synch… wouldn’t that be cool? If only it talked to our Highrise account…

    We spent most of the evening putting things together from Ikea. Twist, twist, twist, screw gun, screw gun, screw gun. All fairly simply and everyone is happier. We still have a long way to go until everything is put away from this last move but it is progressing nicely and we’ll be hosting a housewarming BBQ some time after Easter.

  • Saturday Tunes

    Saturday TunesThis was an incredibly fast week. A week of big ups and downs. I’m actually thrilled to get to the weekend and start relaxing. Today we have some fun planned. The kids have been begging us to take them bowling… and since I’m not a fan of the game I’ve put it off for a long, long time. From there we plan on doing some furniture shopping. When we left Romeo we were going from 2000 square feet to about 1000. The new place is more like 1500… which means the kids rooms are virtually empty. So we’re off to find them desks and bookshelves and things like that. Then mom and dad get to have some fun. The contracts on our phones are finally open, so we’re going to head to the Apple store and finally jump on the iPhone 3G bandwagon. I had gone back and forth with the Blackberry vs. iPhone… in the end, the App store takes it over the edge.

    This morning is quiet. Coffee brewing, birds chirping, music playing. Here are the next 10 songs playing on my (for sale) iPod. As always, completely random and my ratings are included.

    #1 My Hope by David Crowder Band ****

    #2 Sitting, Waiting, Wishing by Jack Johnson ****

    #3 Everytime You Go Away by Paul Young ****

    #4 A Woman’s Worth by Alicia Keys ****

    #5 Walkin’ Blues by Eric Clapton ****

    #6 Hallelujah, I Love Her So by Ray Charles ****

    #7 Becoming by Three63 ****

    #8 World by Five for Fighting ****

    #9 Green Eyes by Coldplay ****

    #10 So What by P!nk *****

  • A Dare for Pastors

    lunch

    I am daring you and your staff to take this challenge. I promise you it isn’t as dangerous as it sounds. In fact, I think it may just fundamentally change the way you interact with the people in your ministry.

    Here’s the dare.

    Lock every staff person out of your church building for a work week. From the senior pastor to the part time guy to the janitor. Instead of going to the office and doing your normal thing for 7 work days I am daring you to put all that “work” aside for a work week and a couple of days to spend that time getting to know 10 people who go to your church in their native environment.

    Here’s how it works.

    1. Instead of getting up and going to the office, split your day in half. In the morning you’ll spend a half-day with a first shift office worker and in either the afternoon or evening you’ll pull a half shift with a blue collar worker. Trust me, you’ll find a bunch of volunteers. It’ll be fun for everyone. Repeat this for 5 days so each staff member gets to see 10 of your church attendees in their work environment for half a day.

    2. Run your ministries that week in the most stripped down way possible. Just wing it for a week… you’re professionals, you know you can wing a week. Tell the pastor to talk about his week or something. The preacher absolutely doesn’t get special treatment in this. Heck, download a free sermon from open.lifechurch.tv and tell the band to play last weeks songs on Sunday. This dare will make your ministry better, I promise.

    3. When that week is over schedule an off-site meeting with your entire church staff for Monday and Tuesday. It’ll take 2 days to debrief this.

    3a. Spend the entire first day (with a lunch paid for by the boss) sharing your experiences. What did you do? What was unexpected? What went crazy? Who works their butt off? Who has the easy job? Why do people do what they do? Who is the most servant hearted? You get the idea.

    3b. Spend the entire second day (bring a bag lunch) determining how getting to know people in their native environments changes how you minister to people, families, children, and students.

    4. Send thank you notes to every single person you visited. Let them know how much you appreciated the time with them, how much you learned, etc.

    Money back guarantee! Since this project isn’t costing you anything I promise to refund you fully if you take this dare and learn absolutely nothing.

    Go ahead, spend time with your people at work. I double dog dare you!

    For those taking the dare. Let me know if your staff is doing it. I’d love to pray for you all. Also, let me know how it went. Leave a comment here or drop me an email, mclanea@gmail.com.

  • Andrew Marin goes to Washington

    I probably seem like a total fanboy for Andrew Marin. Thing is, I think he’s one of those few prophetic voices within Evangelicalism. Here’s a message he presented as part of the Inauguration Weekend in Washington, DC.

    I’m really digging his book, Love is an Orientation. It comes out soon, you can get yours today at Amazon.

  • Why Church Hopping is Bad

    By Scott Kinmartin via Flickr
    By Scott Kinmartin via Flickr

    The second fastest way to make a church leader roll their eyes is to ask, “How do you minister to homeschool kids?” The fastest way to make a church leader roll their eyes is to ask, “Do you have any church hoppers?”

    Let me give you 5 reasons why church hopping stinks!

    1. It’s turning church programming into a commodity. Church hoppers bring their families to church like they would a trip to McDonald’s. Pastors can spot these folks coming a mile away. They are checking everything out, looking for the best kids program, the best worship band, etc. There is a difference between an earnest shopper and a professional hopper… ask them how long they’ve been looking!

    2. It’s turning preaching into a commodity. No pastor wants you to come to their church because you think they are a good preacher. There’s a little devil on the shoulder that says, “You want them, they love you.” But people who are coming to hear a good sermon are only there for the show. Make them buy tickets!

    3. It’s turning your community into a commodity. I’m always amazed to find people driving 20-30 minutes to a church. It’s as if they were in complete denial that a good church would turn them loose in their own town? (Even if the churches are lame in their opinion.) If God put you in that community, go to a church in that community, make it unlame.

    4. It’s turning the people of the church into a commodity. It’s funny when you talk to a church hopper about “their old church.” They are quick to point out what they don’t like there and they do like here. I’ve noticed these folks are happy bystanders. Ask them to join a small group and see what happens. It’s a trip.

    5. It’s treating churches like a commodity. A little repetitive, eh? It can’t be said more clearly. The problem with hopping from church to church is that it tends to value “church” by the elements that make it up instead of jumping in with two feet. No staff member wants to be judged by numbers, no church deserves to be judged by the programs they offer. And it’s ultimately a sign of shallow spiritual growth when you fail to commit to a local church for the long haul. Yep, it’s messy. Why? Because it’s full of people just like you!

    What advice do I recommend to church leaders when they encounter church hoppers? Call them out. (Privately) Invite them to shop but not hop. Speak truth into their life. Don’t placatte them and their silly requests. “We’d stay if you had a cry room with a video feed.” “We’d stay if you had a better college ministry.” My advice is for church leaders to be comfortable enough with who they are and their churches vision to kindly invite hoppers to keep on hopping!

    Catering to the saved is a distraction from reaching the lost.

  • Forest Gump in a Minute

  • Fast Tuesday update

    Two weeks into lent, fasting is going great.

    The first week was great. I felt fantastic. It was a time to slow down and walk with God through Scripture and stuff. Plus, I didn’t feel like ending the fast after 24 hours so I kept it going until late afternoon. It was awesome!

    Week two was almost the opposite. I never felt good. My mind was very cloudy all day. The day felt like it spun out of control. And I was hungry all day long. I’m not a “fasting expert,” but I’ve done plenty of one-day fasts and yesterday was my most bizarre. Yesterday was pure discipline. No joy in it at all.

    Two weeks and two different experiences. I suppose that is to be expected. Thinking of Jesus’ 40 days of fasting in the desert… I’m sure there were days that were good and bad as well.

    I’m looking forward to next weeks fast.

  • Grammar Police!

  • Rock that Quirky Church

    dsc_0211I think some of my harsh criticisms of the evangelical church come from a love of our church. The mission of Harbor Mid-City is one that is quirky by design.

    We have a hyper-qualified staff brought together despite significant theological difference who lean into that tension for the sake of the Gospel in the neighborhood. For my theologically savvy readers (aka Kristen) we have staff people from PCA, Salvation Army, Baptist, pentecostal, emergent-types, traditional evangelical and hard core liturgical backgrounds. In most communities these folks wouldn’t even get together to pray for one another… much less chose to work at the same church!

    Toss on top of that theological stuff the language issues we experierience every week and you will start to see the quirks pop out. We offer the same service in both English and Spanish, meaning there are painfully long times of translation. But this is San Diego and people are used to hearing both languages on the radio and TV… so that’s no big deal. We also have a population of people who speak Korean, Vietnamese, and Swahili. Sometimes our worship music is in those languages. In fact, there tend to be as many non-English songs as English ones.

    Ready for this? It gets more quirky as the design of the church allows minority cultures to have equal voice in our services. What that means is that we’re more worried about celebrating our worship service in a way that lifts up Latin American, Mexican, African American, Southeast Asian, and African cultures above the dominant white evangelical culture.

    OK, one more quirk. There is a huge hodgepodge of socio-economic situations in our church as well. You have working class poor next to college kids from San Diego State. And you have immigrants next to upper-middle class folks who live just north of the church.

    Is it perfect? No. Do I agree with every last bit of the theology? Absolutely not! Are there things about the church I really dislike? Yes! Am I comfortable in the service? Rarely. Are the messages challenging and encouraging to where I am at in my walk with Jesus? Not often. Do they offer all of the things I need for my family? No, children’s ministry is just getting organized. Youth ministry is in a pre-formational stage.

    So why do we go? We go because we believe at the core of our being that there is tremendous strength in that diversity. I am not arrogant enough to believe that my evangelical expression of theology and worship is superior. I love to worship in a place that agrees on the essentials while allows gray areas to be interpreted through the lens of culture.

    Don’t get me wrong. This place is solid theologically. In fact, I’m convinced that Harbor expresses in their worship many best practices of things believed across Christianity. This hodgepodge isn’t just the brain child of idealists. It is the brainchild of idealists who are stupid enough to think that it will work, have the training and experience to make it happen, and have a core of people at the church who are dreaming the same dream.

    In these quirks I see tremendous hope for the Gospel across our country. Lives are changed as they are surrendered to Jesus. And as I think about it, much of what I rebel against here on the blog about evangelicalism is because I see Harbor doing something right while most of evangelicalism is doing it wrong.