Lamp Lit Learnings

When you dream and you dream big it takes a lot of courage.   When we went to Discovery Lab (April 2010), and then to Strategy Lab (September 2011) with the Kairos Church Planting Network it was with two goals in mind.  First, my husband and I believe in Church planting and we want to be a part of supporting it in a big way.  Second, we want our home church to be a church planting church.  We dreamed big partly because we had the backing of a relationship built over 14 years of ministry with this church.  We thought that together we could do great things for God's Kingdom.  Not once in our years of dreaming did we ever picture heading out on this adventure of church planting without our home church.  So when the recent turn of events changed our foundation we were left with half of a dream and a lot of questions.  Primarily " Where do we go from here?" Half of a dream is not much of a dream at all... or so it seems. While on one hand ...

I'm not naive, at least not in the sense that church planting is going to be difficult.   I know it will be one of the hardest things I've ever done in my life.  I just didn't expect the hard part to be up front. I've been at a church for 11 years, living, loving and sharing in fellowship with this church body.  For me it seems a natural conclusion then that when we decided to go plant a new church, that this family here would send us out.  And not just support us financially, but rather send us out with shouts of joy and blessing over our new work.  As we converse with the leadership it seems that may not be the case and that pains me.  It causes anxiety like I've never known.  It is effecting me physically and emotionally.  You see when I think about church planting I fully expect heartache when those who don't know Christ decide to reject truth.  I didn't expect heartache when those who have known Christ their entire adult lives dec...

I'm a very emotional person. To me there's nothing like a good cry.  When my husband and I took a systematic theology class together the first day was overwhelming.  It was so much information to process with ideas I'd never considered before. When we were done with that day of class I just wanted to cry.  It's how I deal with a lot of things.  If I'm happy, I cry.  If I'm sad, I cry.  If I'm frustrated, I cry.  If I'm overwhelmed, overjoyed, or over the moon, I cry!  It's who I am and who God created me to be. All my life I've attended church and it's the one place where my emotion seems "out of place".  This morning as I was doing the dishes choking back tears as I sang along to a worship song on the speakers, I pondered why we shut the emotion out of Church. There are times that I sit in Church completely overwhelmed by the consuming love of my Savior.  Tears burn  my eyes when I allow myself to grasp at understanding His lo...