arguing on how to tell the truth to Muslims

I decided to add my voice to a theological discussion under way that involves several members of Frontiers--with whom John Piper has taken exception to. My friend, Dr. Rick Love, the former International Director of Frontiers, is one of the main persons in dialogue with Piper. A discussion began at this website, too, and I encourage you to check out this link and add your own voice. This link leads you right to the commentary, where I wrote today as JRL, but you should look at Justin's original article as well.

The Time is Fulfilled

Reading in the Gospel of Mark, I see that Jesus went to be baptized by John, and then the Father speaks, "This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased." What an introduction to ministry! As adopted sons of our Heavenly Father, we may also long for that kind of affirmation. Certainly, we long to hear "I am well pleased" from our earthly fathers. With the help of this spoken blessing, we may feel empowered to represent him/Him as we walk out into the wilderness, among people who don't like us, and to gather others around us (some of whom, like James and John, may need to leave their father behind along with the family business). Jesus didn't begin his real work without this public affirmation from His Father. I wonder how many of the people I am trying to encourage, who have a desire to start ministry overseas, are still waiting for some find of affirmation--if it's not forthcoming from their real father, could it come from someone else who's older in the faith and believes in them?

Wednesday

This afternoon, my team is headed to ASU's Hayden Lawn, and we hope to interact with students at a prayer tent--where people pray 24-7 for weeks. We want to help people pray for people groups that have not yet heard about Jesus.

After hosting a big conference like Take My Life, one of the last things my body wants to do is follow-up work with attendees, but it's a critical component. I need God's grace to help me complete what has been started.

Yesterday, I sat down with three members of the Development team to discuss the next issue of Frontlines, and there were some good ideas flying around the room as we talked about integrating the issue better with its online version. I would really like to complete this issue on time for a change and not grow weary in well-doing.

I have a beautiful and talented wife, an adorable daughter, and a church that loves the work I do. Plus, a workplace environment that's flexible and willing to allow new ideas to be tried (even if they fail)--a good thing once in a while despite what I wrote yesterday. For these things and, most of all, my Lord who wants to be known and already knows me intimately--I have so much wealth for which to be thankful. May the Lord be praised today as I listen for His voice and seek to walk into the good works He has planned in advance for me.

Renewal

I think that blogging won't get done unless I carve out 15 minutes to do it and it alone. For me, that time is 8:15am-8:45am. I want to share two stories:

1) I labored and was planning for several weeks, leading up to the Take My Life Conference (www.takemylife.org), about a large prayer tent my org was going to set up in order to help people at the conference pray for 24 hours straight. I knew that rain would prevent us from putting the tent up, and I checked the weather reports--clear skies predicted. The morning that we were set to erect the tent, clouds came and the rain poured down, so we had to scrap the tent and ask people to pray in a small enclosed prayer chapel instead. I'm not sure how many people did go there to pray, and the announcment was never made that people could pray all night. I thought about the verse in Proverbs 16--"A man plans his way, but the Lord directs His steps." The following week after the conference, I learned that our special guests, who are part of the 24-7 Prayer Movement and were helping to lead the conference...they had asked God to bring rain, as they see rain as a sign of His favor. Interesting.

2) Yesterday, I received some surprising news from a co-worker: a 2-week trip to Central Asia that he had been planning with 3 other couples has now been put on hold because the three couples said they weren't aware of the April departure time, and they weren't sure if the goals of the trip truly aligned with their own. I found this very curious just one month before the proposed trip was going to launch. My co-worker said, --"A man plans his way, but the Lord directs His steps." This time, though, in the way he applied the verse, it had the ring of an excuse for poor planning. Not that he was at fault--but someone somewhere (need to find ouut who) had failed to communicate clearly with the three couples, who we were hoping would emerge as future leaders overseas. Or else they blocked out the word "April" when they heard it and panicked when they realized February was coming to an end.

In the ministry I'm involved with, we pray a lot. We make a lot of plans. We dream. But when things go badly we may default to our ethos of being "grace-oriented" and fail to hold people responsible for what they have (or, more often, have not) done. Because God has been gracious to us, we give ourselves a lot of (too much?) leeway to continue in a failing pattern. I see it in my own life--figuratively shooting the arrow and then drawing the bullseye marking around wherever it hits. There are times when plans fail, though, and we need to show ourselves and others grace. But there are other times when we must lovingly rebuke brothers and sisters for being poor stewards and exhort them to see the areas where they can and should improve to avoid similar results later.

I'm learning a lot in my Project Management class about how to overcome the many pitfalls that come along with working alongside complex human beings (especially engineers) on projects. More on that tomorrow...