Monthly Archives: April 2008

Some waddup

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There’s a lot going on these days…

  • I’m working on getting Walls Down Church established as a 501(c)3. We are working on Bylaws and articles of incorporation. I really miss this guy…

  • Tomorrow at 3:30 we will be closing the sale on our house in New York! I barely know how to act!
  • This weekend we (Sherri and I) will be going to our fifth Re-Think Money seminar hosted by Casey Graham! Sherri serves as a Table Leader at this seminar. This guy has really helped us to “rethink money.” If you are a pastor you should definitely check him out! He has some great ideas and resources to offer you and the people of your church. You can contact him at  graham_ibs@bellsouth.net.
  • Next Monday I’ll be flying down to Orlando with a team from Mountain Lake Church to attend/participate in the Exponential Conference. This year’s speaking lineup is incredible! Rick Warren, Andy Stanley, Tim Keller, etc. will be presenting! I can’t wait!
  • Next Tuesday I’m going to make a call to the lady who can say “yes” or “no” to a church in the Showcase Cinema. I’d love your prayer as we move forward on this!
  • Today… right now, I’ve gotta go get my stupid van fixed! The ignition switch thing has locked up. GRRRR…

A good night

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Just got back from MERGE where Shawn cast some compelling vision and highlighted some amazing things that God is doing through Mountain Lake Church.

Now I’m watching Senators Clinton and Obama go at it in the Democratic Presidential Debate.

Next I’m going to watch The Ultimate Fighter: Team Rampage vs. Team Forrest.

This is how how I keep my testosterone level high in a house with five ladies and a female dog.

Cincinnati – Day Six

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We landed back in Georgia at 5 a.m. on Monday! After traveling all night in the back country of the Georgia hills I’m sure glad to be home. Tired, but glad.

Day Six

  • We went to Northbridge’s launch. It was exciting. They had 240 people on their first day. As we sat there, I realized, again, why God has called us to this area. We are different. We will have a different kind of church. The guys at Northbridge were very helpful and gracious to us as they shared their excitement with us! It was a good morning.
  • We spent the afternoon cruising around the Landen area. This is really quite an exciting area packed with young families. We are looking at this area for housing and schooling. Because it is five minutes or less from Maineville and even considered a part of Maineville at points we are also considering this area as a launch point.
  • We packed up and headed home with the assistance of Starbucks and Skyline!

Any final reflections Mr. Peterson?

Sure.

  • Ten of us and an English Mastiff spent a week in a three bedroom apartment. It was an apartment over a couple’s house so we did have access to their kitchen, laundry, and TV room, but we still packed ten people (4 little girls, three teenage boys, and three adults) and a dog into a three room apartment! We did it and we still love each other! Weird smells, walking over sleeping boys and babies, sharing one shower, eating around a table that seated five… This is commitment! ;-)
  • I’m so confident in what God is going to do through Walls Down church that it humbles and scares me.
  • I’m pretty sure we’re not going to meet in a high school. We are going to be calling some movie theaters this week.
  • Yesterday a friend of mine, JR, called me and left a message of encouragement. Now here’s the story about JR: a few years ago in Pennsylvania I was his pastor. To make a long story short, his marriage had fallen apart. Through a series of miraculous events, I had the privilege of re-marrying he and his bride! Sherri and I regularly look back at that event as illustrative of what we want to spend the rest of our lives doing. When he called me yesterday and left his message of encouragement, it occurred to me that a man that I once ministered to is now ministering to me. It has come full circle! And then Sherri said it, “God is using JR to remind us of what he wants to do through Walls Down church.” He wants to regularly bring reconciliation to broken relationships; hope to despair; forgiveness and peace to guilt-burdened hearts; meaning to apathetic and bored people, and on and on and on. God is going to use Walls Down to be a point of change in innumerable lives. Am I being arrogant? No. Just confident in the vision that God has given us and His ability to carry it out through humble, obedient servants.

This was a great trip that we will make several more times before moving to the area in July.

Three ways you can pray:

  1. Pray for the people of this area. The broken, disappointed, bored, and disillusioned people. Pray that God will use Walls Down Church to help them find the life Jesus promised.
  2. Pray that we will find the location that God has carved out for us to meet in.
  3. Pray that Rindy sells her house and that we both find housing.

Cincinnati – Day Five

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Day Five

  • We ate lunch with some of our good friends here in this area. We ate at McDonalds so our kids could play. Man, I’ve gotta tell you… I’m hating eating any place but Skyline or Goldstar these days. ;-) It was awesome spending time with friends. We’re looking forward to getting up here!
  • I had to get an emergency spark plug change on the van. While it was being done I was able to spend some time with another close friend in the area. As I listened to the story of the last several years of his life, I was so pleased at how God can take a wrecked life and make something worthwhile out of it! We did eat some Skyline while we waited on my van. That makes for a happy man.
  • Sherri and Rindy spent some time looking at some neighborhoods and spotted some possible meeting places! We’ll be checking them out tomorrow before we leave to go back to Georgia.
  • I missed my date with “The Ladies.” I’m not so happy about that. It’s been a really busy week filled with lots of travel and meetings. When we weren’t traveling or meeting we were looking at maps, making phone calls, or studying local demographics on the internet. I’m going to think of something special to make it up to them.

Tomorrow we’re going to visit Northbridge church’s first service! And then we’re going to “leaving on that midnight train for Georgia.”

Cincinnati – Day Four

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Day Four

  • It’s hard finding a school to meet in here. They want you to have a plan to build your own building within a year… and a contract on the land you’re going to build on. That’s a problem. Why? Because I don’t care if we ever own our own building. We’re not starting a church so that we can build a building. We are starting a church so that we can help people find the life Jesus promised. Honestly, renting a facility is a heck of a lot cheaper anyway. So, I’d love your prayers on this one.
  • Another issue that we’re running into is that schools will rent out their gyms or cafeterias, but not their classrooms. That creates a problem for our children’s ministry.

Hmmmm… all these problems seem like a good place for a miracle! Miracle anyone?

  • In spite of the above comments, I did make some good connections today. I met the lady who schedules the facilities for the Little Miami School district, and was put in touch with the man who does the same for the Kings Mills schools. (Kings Mills Schools don’t look like they’re going to work. It’s hard to share a gym with a basketball group while you’re trying to “do” church. It’s also hard to have church in the summer when the district shuts down the elementary schools for the summer.) Maybe it’s time for a breakthrough here! It’s time for some “Possibility thinking.”
  • We were able to eat lunch with some friends from Northgate church. It’s good to have friends from the church we used to pastor. I feel bad for pastors who leave churches with no friends. It happens.
  • We ate supper with some friends who live in the area. We went to college with these guys and they’re talking about coming to Walls Down! I like the thought of that!

So how are you feeling Mr. Peterson?

  • We need to find where we’re going to meet as a church BEFORE we locate where we’re going to live. Why? Because we want to live in the community where we minister. Please help us pray about the right  location!
  • I’m tired.
  • I want some more Gold Star. Gold Star anyone? Joni?

Jesus should be my hero

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Reading from Vintage Jesus this morning. This book, by Mark Driscoll and Gary Breshear, gives a fresh presentation of a historical, fundamental set of beliefs regarding our Leader, Jesus. I recommend it.

Anyhow, the authors threw out a line that grabbed me, and is worth sharing.

“As religious people often do, they read the Bible looking for ways to be the hero of their own life rather than reading it to see themselves as villains and Jesus as their hero.”

Gosh! That’s dead on! A typical reading of Scripture ends with, “What can I do to make myself better?” which is exactly NOT the point of Scripture!

Check out these verses from St. Paul:

Christ has really set us free. Now make sure that you stay free, and don’t get tied up again in slavery to the law. Listen! I, Paul, tell you this: If you are counting on [keeping the law] to make you right with God, then Christ cannot help you. I’ll say it again. If you are trying to find favor with God by [keeping the law], you must obey all of the regulations in the whole law of Moses.  For if you are trying to make yourselves right with God by keeping the law, you have been cut off from Christ! You have fallen away from God’s grace. (Galatians 5:1-4 NLT)

Basically Paul says that if I’m trying to do it, Christ can’t help. Maybe I should stop trying so much and start trusting more!

Maybe the next time I read Scripture I need to embrace Driscoll and Breshear’s counsel and look to Jesus as the hero and savior of my life rather than my villainous self!

Cincinnati – Day Three

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Day Three

  • Rindy and I met with Tom Planck and Luke Dooley. Tom is the lead pastor and Luke is the students pastor of Journey Church. These guys were gracious and very insightful. I’m loving the community of church planters in the Ohio region.
  • I met with the principle of Little Miami High School. He was friendly and connected me to the lady who schedules the Little Miami School district facilities. Now that’s a good connection, eh? I asked him how a church plant could best add value to a school. He gave some great pointers, but by far, the best one was, “Create opportunities for the students to get involved in community service.”
  • Ate some Gold Star Chili and felt the warm glow of divine pleasure! Ahhhhh… What you’re looking at in this picture is a coney and a 5-way bowl of chili. A 5-way is: spaghetti, meat, beans, onions, and cheese! Add a Pepsi to that and you know why Cincinnati is so great!

By the way, some who read this blog, have made disparaging remarks about Gold Star on this blog. That is unacceptable. Completely unacceptable. In fact, I have threatened to ban Joni from this blog if she continues this buffoonery. ;-)

  • BONUS MATERIAL: It doesn’t matter if you are in Atlanta or Cincinnati… where there is coffee and free wireless internet there will be pastors. By the way, have you noticed that all pastors are starting to look alike? What am I doing? I’m sitting in a coffee shop with free wireless internet looking like the two pastors seated behind me. Good grief! I’m gonna grow a mullet and sit in Gold Star.
  • Spent some time sipping coffee with Rindy and Ray Brock, a church planter in Goshen, Ohio. One of the best parts of this internship is learning how to start a new church from guys who have already done it.

Cincinnati – Day Two

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Day Two

We spent several hours driving around Warren county looking for buildings for Walls Down to meet in. It’s amazing how economically diverse this area is! From rags to riches… literally.

We are focusing on the Maineville area. We feel a draw to this area. However, if there are no available buildings, we will simply move over a town.

The cool thing about this whole journey is that we know we will be a multi-site church AND that we will have a church-planting emphasis, so even if we don’t start out in Maineville, at some point we will either have a site here OR we will partner with another church or churches in the area OR we will plant a church here.

Again, we like the Maineville area, but in order to “set up house” we need a building. Keep praying with us on this one.

Last night we went to a college worship service where we worshiped and heard some good teaching! It’s exciting to worship with college students. They are refreshingly authentic and idealistic! They really believe we can change the city! I do too, and I pray to God that we never lose this informed, optimistic attitude!

“Even though”

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I can think of a lot of reasons why God shouldn’t use me. Quite frankly, I can think of more than a few reasons why it would seem He couldn’t use me! I’ll bet you can think of a few too (not about me… about you!)

Reading this morning in the Bible, I ran into a couple of people who had the same “God can’t use me” issue, Abraham and Sarah. This couple had some BIG reasons why God couldn’t/shouldn’t use them and yet they discovered the secret becoming “usable.”

It was by faith that Sarah together with Abraham was able to have a child, even though they were too old and Sarah was barren. Abraham believed that God would keep his promise. And so a whole nation came from this one man, Abraham, who was too old to have any children — a nation with so many people that, like the stars of the sky and the sand on the seashore, there is no way to count them. (Hebrews 11:11-12 NLT)

There’s one line in here that sticks out to me – “Even though.”

You and me, we’ve got plenty of “Even though’s” in our lives! There are a ton of reasons that God “could not” or “should not” use you or me, but the crazy thing is that when we trust Him, He trumps those “even though’s” and uses common people to do uncommon things!

What are your “Even though’s”? What are the reasons you think that God cannot or should not use you to do anything of significance for Him?

How about if today we stop focusing on the “even though’s” and begin believing and seeking to live out these words from St. Paul,

“We are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so that we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.” (Ephesians 2:10 NLT)

Cincinnati – Day One

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Someday, after Walls Down is started, we’ll look back on these blog posts and say, “Ahhhh… I remember that!”

Day One

  • We were late for every meeting! I’m not sure how this worked, but it was pretty frustrating!
  • Before we were in the area 24 hours, we have already eaten @ Skyline Chili! I can’t wait until this is a regular part of my diet! ;-)
  • We had lunch with a great couple… Ben Stroup and his lovely wife-to-be… Amy!
  • I met with a pastor/church-planter, over some Starbucks, to discuss church planting and a potential partnership between our two churches.
  • We ate dinner with another great couple and their family of three girls! In case you’re wondering, that would be an evening spent with nine ladies and two dudes!
  • Here’s a BONUS: we’re staying with a wonderful couple and the husband is Dave Ping. Dave is an author and an out-of-the-box thinker! The highlight of my evening was listening to him talk about writing books, finding your passion, re-thinking evangelism, and ton of other valuable insights. This man is the king of one-liners!
  • Rindy and her guys pulled in last night! We’re going to be looking for houses, schools, meeting places, etc. It’s gonna be fun and busy!

And that’s the wrap up for day one.