I’m in New York hanging out with my brother, and some good friends of mine. I’m wore out, but wanted to share some images from the first day! Enjoy!
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The Nicene – Constantinopolitan Creed of A.D. 381
Want to win a FREE, Autographed copy of Reggie Joiner’s new book – “Think Orange” ?
Here’s the deal – I have a signed copy of Reggie Joiner’s {from The ReThink Group} new book – Think Orange, and I’m giving it away on my blog! FOR FREE!
{Reggie gave me the book at The Orange Conference 09 – check out the pictures!}
Watch the video below to find out how you can win this book – FOR FREE!
(and it’s easy to win – you just have to “think” a little bit!- -pun intended!)
Contest ends Friday June 5th at five pm!
Good luck!
{update : Only words that are listed in Webster’s will be allowed.}
American Idol Winner Kris Allen Sings God of this City – Does it matter?
A few days ago I posted a video of American Idol winner, Kris Allen, performing “God of This City” at New Life Church. To my surprise it has caused quite a bit of discussion on the comment section of that post, and on Twitter. It seems to boil down to this questions :
“Is a person’s faith a deciding factor on who you vote for (if you vote) on American Idol?”
In other words does the person you vote for (or would vote for) have to be of the same faith as you in order to get your vote? Is that something that is important to you? Do you google every contestant to find out what their faith views are before you vote?
I’m sure many of my Christian friends will quickly proclaim “YES – it does indeed matter to me!”
To which I ask “Why?” (or “Why not?” – if your answer is no)
I’m not saying there is a “right” or “wrong” way to look at this – I’m just curious to hear your thoughts on the matter.
Also – I’d like to take it a step further. How does the faith of another person affect your decision to interact with them? Does it matter?
For instance; The dentist who cleans your teeth – does his faith determine if you’ll use his services or not?
If there was two dentists next door to each other – one who had really bad service – but was a believer, the other, the best dentist in your city – but he hated God – which dentist would you choose? Why? (and it just so happens that these are the only two dentists in the whole world, the other ones all retired – sorry – you have to choose!)
What about your boss? If you are a person of faith, could you work for a person who hated God?
What about the products you buy? If Steve Jobs hated God would you still use your iPhone?
{SIDENOTE – Did you know that Jews for Jesus has attempted to share the Gospel with Steve Jobs? In fact they even made a tract just for him – take a look}
I Just wanted to throw those thoughts out to get you thinking. Please leave a comment, I’d be very interested to hear what you have to say in regards to this topic!
(by the way – here is the link to the post with Kris Allen’s video of God of this City in case you want to watch it again, or read the comments.)
-Rick
No Six Packs at Fry’s
I’ll let this photo I took at Fry’s today speak for itself.
{disclaimer: I’m a HUGE Fry’s fan, but you would think they would have more creative ‘signage writers’ on staff – #fail.}
Well done Mr. Piper
I’m a big fan of everything that God creates – especially people! (then again I am a bit byist since I am one!) That’s why I can’t even believe that in our country we debate things like this. I mean really, the killing of a person, we really debate if that is right or wrong? Seems like Romans 1 to me, but I digress.
I came across this link a few days ago on desiring God – and I thought it was really good. I’ll be honest, I’m not one of those John Piper weird – o’s (you know the ones – the ones that almost worship him, the ones who treat all of his books like Scripture, the ones who quote John Piper more then they quote Scripture – we all know people like that – that’s not me!) But I think think this content of this video was legit. Well done Mr. Piper.
I definitely married up
This girl is awesome!
I am so thankful for my awesome wife. There are so many adjectives that I could use to describe her, and how God really hooked me up with this whole marrying a super, crazy, awesome women thing, but I don’t have the space to type them all out! Even though we will be married two years, this year – I wanted to share some images from our wedding day with you!
It was a such a great day, and if you know me in real life, ask me to tell you about how I had to leave a preaching engagement right before I was supposed to walk on stage to speak, because I got a call a few days before our wedding to meet my wife, and in-laws at the hospital because she had a SUPER BAD, LIKE HAVING A BABY SORT OF PAIN, kidney stone. (and how we almost didn’t go on our honeymoon!) Ahhhh…God has an awesome sense of humor!
{By the way – our images wedding images were taken by Studio563 – Check ‘em out!}
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- This girl is awesome!
Does your church have Momentum ?
{MOMENTUM} – Forward motion fueled by a series of wins.
I’m at Catalyst One Day today, and Andy Stanley just knocked it out of the park with his first session. He talked about momentum. I like momentum. allot.
He had much to say about this topic, but one thing he talked about is how the consumer product companies really have this figured out. Look at the picture above – “new and improved toothpaste” – really? New? Improved? How? How do you “improve” toothpaste? I mean really? (He also showed some toilet paper that was “new and improved” – I mean really….)
The fact is, these companies know that when you give people something that is “new” and “improved” that creates momentum. People REALLY do like “new” things. (Next time you are at the store try to count how many products say “new” or “improved” on the box. Starting to get the picture?)
What is your church doing that is new? How is your ministry creating (and sustaining) momentum? Let’s hear it!
If you don’t know, now you know – Amena Brown
I was reintroduced to Amena Brown a few weeks ago while searching for a video to supplement a Good Friday message I was giving. {Turns out the first time was at passion event years ago.}
Simply put – she is awesome! Check out the video below, and you’ll see why!
(by the way – you can buy many of her videos for an incredibly cheap price from BlueFish!) – {enjoy}
thank you Ambassador {and The Cross Movement}
If you’ve never heard the music of William Branch, aka – The Ambassador – you’re missing out! Him, and his group, The Cross Movement, have ministered to me for almost ten years! (Wow, ten years is a long time!)
William went to the same graduate school that I attend, and is now a pastor in Philly. (Check out this video my school put together.) His music is simply incredible. The lyrics. The content. The “deepness.” The way it honors our Triune God. I can’t tell you how many times I have worshipped (and even been brought to tears) as I have reflected on the content of some of his songs. (here are a few of my favorite song lyrics – When It’s On In The Whirlwind – It Was Love – Oh Wretched Men – The Fall – Off The Hook – What Do You See? – This is only a start – I could list many more!)
Here is a video off one of his newest cd’s. Enjoy.
{p.s. – do yourself a favor and pick up some of their tracks off of itunes today!}
Truth.
We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, the maker of heaven and earth, of things visible and invisible.
And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the begotten of God the Father, the Only-begotten, that is of the essence of the Father.
God of God, Light of Light, true God of true God, begotten and not made; of the very same nature of the Father, by Whom all things came into being, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible.
Who for us humanity and for our salvation came down from heaven, was incarnate, was made human, was born perfectly of the holy virgin Mary by the Holy Spirit.
By whom He took body, soul, and mind, and everything that is in man, truly and not in semblance.
He suffered, was crucified, was buried, rose again on the third day, ascended into heaven with the same body, [and] sat at the right hand of the Father.
He is to come with the same body and with the glory of the Father, to judge the living and the dead; of His kingdom there is no end.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, in the uncreated and the perfect; Who spoke through the Law, prophets, and Gospels; Who came down upon the Jordan, preached through the apostles, and lived in the saints.
We believe also in only One, Universal, Apostolic, and [Holy] Church; in one baptism in repentance, for the remission, and forgiveness of sins; and in the resurrection of the dead, in the everlasting judgement of souls and bodies, and the Kingdom of Heaven and in the everlasting life.
Orange Conference {day 3}.
After a nice few days hanging out in Atlanta, I’m back home in good, ‘ol Dallas, Tx. I had a GREAT time meeting so many awesome people – I only wish I had time to mention them all! {by the way – I broke a “cool rule” this week – I actually asked a few folks I meet if I could snap a few pictures – that’s a no-no when your sitting backstage at an event like this – talk about looking lame! – oh well!}
I must say, Reggie, and his team, know how to do things right! The entire conference was done with such excellence! (you wouldn’t believe how well they treated all the people who were apart of it – I had LOTS of great food!) I was very excited (and honored) they asked me to be a part of The Orange Conference. I am POSITIVE that I learned WAY more then I was able to “teach” anyone. I have much to say about all I learned the last few days – but not now! This week is going to be spent finishing up the last week of my many seminary projects, exams, readings, etc – not a very fun week I might add!
I have added some pictures from the third day at Orange ’09 – hope you enjoy!
{P.S. – I am going to be giving away a SINGED copy of Reggie Joiner’s new book – Think Orange : Imagine The Impact When Church and Family Collide – so be sure to check by soon for details on how this could be yours! – FOR FREE!}
{oh, and “one more thing” – I just wanted to add that I”m really digging the design of Reggie’s new book! Ok, maybe I’m a little biased since the designer of my website, and my good friend, Jared – did the artwork for the book! – check out the credits in the front of the book! – Jared is the man!}
Orange Conference {day 2}.
Wow – what a great day! Things are in full swing here at The Orange Conference! I Had a great day connecting with so many awesome people talking about creative ways to use social media to connect with the students we minster to – among many other things!
Since I am about to fall asleep on my laptop, and I’m not sure drool is covered under my warranty; I’m going to keep this post rather short. However, I did want to share one thing I heard today that really today that really impacted me.
It was from Francis Chan’s (who is a CRAZY cool guy, by the way – and author of the book “Crazy Love” ) talk this morning. In his talk he said the book of Acts was his least favorite book of the Bible because he “never reads it, and says ‘Wow – that looks allot like my church!” He went on to talk about how we act like the things in the Book of Acts were just “for back then.” How we act like God doesn’t move like that today; or that we shouldn’t expect God, or The Holy Spirit, to work like He did in Acts. I’m going to talk about this in more detail later in a video post because it really got me thinking – so stay tuned!
Question : Do we REALLY trust God to move like they did in Acts? Do we REALLY believe He can move in such powerful ways TODAY? Do we REALLY believe in the power, and work, of The Holy Spirit?
And one last question – Do we REALLY preach as BODLY as we see the people in Acts preaching? (If your answer is no – why don’t we?)
That’s it for now – but I have much more to say. Soon, very soon. But in the mean time take a look at a few images from today!
Orange Conference {day 1}.
I wanted to share some pictures from the first night of Orange ’09.
I also wanted to share a little bit of what Reggie Joiner from ReThink talked about as well. He spoke on how as student ministers we must equip parents to “do” ministry with their kids.
His entire talk was great – but one fact that really stood out to me was this. We get to spend an average of 40 hours a year ministering to one student. That’s it. Each student will be around the ministry around 40 hours. However they will be with their parents around 3000 hours a year! What we have to do is find ways to equip parents to use that 3000 hours well!
Also - there are no picture perfect families. (The Cosby show was scripted by the way – it was NOT a real family.) We need to let families know that there are no PERFECT family. It’s OK to be NOT perfect. God is not interested in PERFECT families – He is interested in life change. He is interested in His story. His story in the life of that family. This is huge!
Anyway, there is more to come – and that is just 1/100 of what Reggie shared, but think on that. How can we equip parents to “do” ministry “with” their student? Ideas? Thoughts? How are you doing this?
{and enjoy the pictures!}
Orange Conference – It’s time..
Well here it is – Orange Conference 09. I made it. I’m here. Are you? I am upstairs in we are calling the “bloggers lounge.”
Do I know you? Do you know me? Do you want to be friends? Come visit me (and other neat people) upstairs….and as the saying goes…”I’ll be here all week…”
Here is a little video I shot when I got here. (Due to the schedule being so tight, all the videos will be raw footage – but you can call it “indie” if it sounds cooler! {enjoy}. – {Rick}.
orange leader forum {dallas, tx}
I will be heading over to this forum in a few weeks. I really do hope to see you all there. The folks from the Rethink Group are awesome, and this sounds like a very unique opportunity to connect with some great Christian leaders!
By the way be sure to check out The Orange Conference and Cup Cakes For a a Cause!
Below you will find a copy of the info emailed to me by a friend at the ReThink Group! Hope to see you there!
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The Orange Leaders Forum
Date & Time:
Monday, March 2nd, 10am-2pm
Location
Bent Tree Bible Fellowship
FX Live Theater
4141 International Parkway
Carrollton, TX 75007
Topic:
Reggie will lead a discussion on Family Ministry and how church staff can best connect with each other, volunteers, parents, the community, and other like-minded churches. Lunch and networking time to follow.
About Reggie Joiner:
Reggie Joiner is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of The reThink Group, Inc., a non-profit organization providing resources and training for churches to maximize their influence on the spiritual growth of the next generation.
Reggie is one of the founders of North Point Community Church in Alpharetta, Georgia. In his role as Executive Director of Family Ministry, Reggie developed a new concept of relevant ministry for preschool, children, students and married adults over the course of his ten years with the church. Additionally, during his time with North Point Ministries, Reggie created KidStuf, an environment where kids bring their parents to learn about God, as well as Grow Up, an international conference to encourage and equip churches to create relevant, effective environments for children, families and teenagers.
We’d really love to have you and any of your ministry team join us for this event! If you have any questions, or would like to RSVP, please let Kristi know no later than February 20th and email her at eerickson@rethinkgroup.org
*No registration fee, just a $10 suggested donation for lunch.
