On January 2nd Lighthouse will be launching a new channel with Vimeo, a video hosting company.  This is the result of hours of work in advancing our online presence.  I’ve partnered with some volunteers in the church, including Marty Robey who has put in countless time and resources, to expand our reach into the virtual world.  But why?  Why is Lighthouse spending time, energy, and money on an internet ministry?

When Jesus invented the church, He told its founding members to go where the people were and to share the Gospel.  Today, people are online.  The internet is where people go to connect, study, work, shop, be entertained, and learn.  Social media is now ubiquitous from twelve year olds to retirees.  Phone books have gone the way of eight tracks, vinyl, and VCRs.   If current trends continue, in less than five years more people will connect to the internet with their phone or other portable device (anyone want to get me an IPad for Christmas?) than with a traditional computer.  People are online, and people need to meet Jesus and grow closer to Him, so Lighthouse is online.

Lighthouse already has an active Facebook page, website, and blog.  We have experimented with streaming our 9:00 service live.  In January, we will add an easy to use video archive of past sermons and we will have weekly, quality live streaming.  This is the next step in our web development, and it is a big one.  Members of our church will be able to catch up on sermons they missed, or watch them again.  They will be able to share those videos through email, facebook, and a number of other ways.  People who are checking out our church online will be able to see a service live, or peruse old sermon series.  In the future look for us to add a Twitter feed, and the ability to chat online with other people watching the live streaming service.  As we develop this ministry it is our goal to put the Gospel where the people are, and that is why we are growing our online ministry.

-Mike

P.S. To get a ‘sneak peak’ of the video archive we are developing, go to http://vimeo.com/channels/lighthouse

Thoughts from my Souled Out Group:

Sunday night we talked about sin.  Yeah… not the best topic in the world.  But the good part about talking about sin is that we get to talk about grace.  God saved us from sin.  We deserved Hell, He stepped in, and if we accept that free gift we are saved.  Simple.   Wonderful.  Incredible.

During our discussion a question came up that has had me thinking for a few days, so I thought I would share my thoughts with my small group and my other readers (if I have any left, my blog has been neglected and left to starve to death.  Sorry!)  Here is the question: Do we really believe that all sins equally deserve Hell?

My Fundamental theological gut grunts “Yes!”  My (overly) sensitive heart says “Can’t be.”

I try to operate on the principle that my heart, which is a liar (see Jeremiah 17), is not my spiritual authority.  Instead I try to live and believe according to what the Bible says, it is the boss, whether I like what it says or not.  So what does Scripture say about sin and its punishment?

Any Pastor worth his salt would immediately refer to Romans 6:23: “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  This verse boils down to a simple truth: sin = death.  “Death” is referring to the second death, namely, Hell.  So sin = Hell.  Clear?  I thought so, but…

What is meant by “sin” here?  Paul, the guy that wrote the letter, is in the middle of an argument about the ‘sinful nature’ of man.  He’s talking about the fact that men are born sinners, selfishly seeking their own gain instead of the ultimate purpose of creation: to glorify God.  So when he says that the punishment for sin is death he is NOT talking about stealing a cookie from the cookie jar or annihilating a race of people… He’s not saying that Little Suzie’s sin is just as bad as Mr. Hitler’s.  He’s saying that our sinful nature is a disease inside all of us, and it is terminal, and that Jesus is the one and only cure.

That being said, Little Suzie and Mr. Hitler have the same problemo… they have the same ‘sinful nature disease’.   And the end result of that disease is not pretty and not different: they will both go to Hell if they do not find the ‘Jesus cure’.  They are not going to Hell for cookie stealing and/or mass murder, however.  They are going to Hell because of a sinful nature; the individual sins are ‘symptoms’ of the disease.  So when Little Suzie steals the last cookie, her willful offense is not the deed worthy of Hell, it is not the disease, it is a symptom of the disease.  And, equally, Mr. Hitler’s disgusting plot is also a symptom, though a worse one, of the same disease.  Therefore the individual commissions of sins are not equal, but the inner nature that rebels against God is.  In other words, the symptoms are not the same, but the disease is identical.

Why does this matter?

1. It makes me sleep better at night knowing that my heart isn’t as far off the mark about justice as I thought it was.  I think Suzie deserves a time-out and Mr. Hitler deserves a prison cell on death row, shared with a large man named Chris who goes by Chrissy.  The Old Testament shows that God doesn’t treat all commissions of sin the same, either.

2. It makes me sleep worse at night, knowing that even though individual sins are not considered by God to be equal, individual sinners are only placed in two categories: Saved and Not Saved.  Those who are Saved did and do deserve Hell, but they will live by the sacrifice of Jesus.  Those of the Not Saved group will be permitted to carry their sinful lifestyle straight to the eternal death… Little Suzie and Mr. Hitler both, lest either one of them accepts the cure.  The majority of people think that if they are good enough, they will get into Heaven, but controlling the symptoms does not eradicate the disease itself… they are wrong, hence my deprivation of sleep.

3. When Christians like me realize that they truly deserve Hell, it changes their life.

-Mike

Next week we kick off our summer ministry!  Our fifth graders will move up to Junior High youth group, which will meet on Wednesdays from 6:00-8:00.  Our eighth graders will begin their "Golden Summer", meaning they can attend all Junior High and all Senior High events all summer long.  And our summer theme, "On Fire", will begin.  This year I wrote a daily devotional for our students.  Each day they will have a page to read about a Bible verse that fits with our theme and introduces our teaching for that week.  Here is the letter I wrote our students, it's from the first page of the book, I hope it will help you understand the thinking behind the theme:

Dear Student,

There is nothing more important in the world than your relationship with God.  God loves you, and He wants to do incredible things through your life; that means you were born with a purpose, you have a reason to be here!  In fact, God loves you so much that He is willing to give you a choice: you can follow Him if you want to, but He won’t make you.  If you follow Him you get to go to Heaven, and that is sweet, but that is not the only benefit of following Jesus.  If you put Jesus in the driver’s seat of your life, incredible things happen!  Your life will have meaning, you will have a reason to get up in the morning, you get to be a part of something that really matters, you get to make a difference in this world, you have a chance to do things that will matter for all of eternity!  There is no feeling in the world like the feeling of knowing that God is working through you.  When that happens a fire is lit within your heart, and your entire life is all about making that fire grow bigger and hotter and letting it spread to other people.  That is what our summer is all about: being On Fire for Jesus.  This book is part of that theme.  In this book you will read about some of the verses in the Bible that have the word “fire” in them.  My hope is that you will learn to love God better, to know God deeper, to follow God closer, and to shine for God brighter.  My hope is that by the end of this summer we will all learn to be “on fire” for Jesus!

I’m looking forward to a great summer with you!

-Pastor Mike

Our church has purchased a new IMac computer.  It is fast, outperforming any of our other office computers by a long shot.  Its purpose: to edit pictures and video, manage the website, and live stream our worship services in order to better serve our church.  Already I’ve edited a video on it that would have crashed my PC at least half a dozen times.  I’m the biggest fan of our new IMac; I love the idea of our church advancing its message by being sufficient in its use of media and the web, but this new computer has got me thinking.

Our church can be the coolest organization on the planet, but still miss out on God’s best.  We can have the sweetest website, the most up-to-date Facebook, and media that is funny and relevant, but still miss what God wants most from us… kind of like Martha.

In the book of Luke there is a story about two women.  One was named Martha, and she was all about pleasing Jesus.  When Jesus came to visit her and Mary, the other woman, Martha went nuts!  She worked so hard, cleaning up, preparing food, making sure everyone was comfortable… I think she really wanted to do her best for Jesus.  But Mary didn’t help out at all; instead, she spent time with Jesus.  Mary knew she only had a limited amount of time to be face-to-face with the Savior, so she didn’t spend it working on making everything great around her, she spent her time worshipping.  When Martha got upset about this, Jesus said to her, “You are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed .” (Luke 10:41–42 , italics mine) So what was the one thing He was talking about?  Ben Patterson, in his book ‘Deepening Your Conversation With God’, says it better than I can:  “The one absolutely essential, nonnegotiable thing is to be with Jesus as Mary was. The church grows when its people attend to the one thing needed, not when it is preoccupied with the many things not needed.”

May we be preoccupied with Jesus, and not with the ‘stuff’.  Our new IMac is pretty sweet, but I pray that we will use it to support the one thing that is most important: being with Jesus.

-Mike

I just finished a three hour lunch with my Student Leadership Team.  It seems that every time we meet I walk away encouraged as a youth pastor.  God is really doing some things through our ministry.  2009 was a great year, but as I look to 2010 I am thrilled at the possibilities!  The Student Leadership Team isn’t perfect; we have a long way to go in our training and team development, but today six students took three hours out of their Christmas break to continue preparations for a major outreach Super Bowl party that they are planning.  They could have done anything today, they are on Christmas break, but they chose to use their time for ministry, God is good!

Last night the Senior High Youth Group had a great discussion on the death of Jesus (Matthew 27).  When Jesus died the world went black, the temple curtain was torn, graves were opened and righteous men who had died were resurrected and showed themselves to many witnesses in Jerusalem, the earth shook, the presence of God was felt.

Did you read that?!  The earth went dark and shook and dead men came alive?!?  What?!  This isn’t your average Sunday School Jesus death scene.  Where were the zombies when I went to VBS?  Did they just leave that part out?  And the earthquake?  What about that?  Why do we picture this scene of Scripture as a dramatic and wrongful but otherwise uneventful death?  That’s not what the Bible says!

I have been on a mission as of late to bring a fresh perspective to my students, to help them see the stories of Scripture as if for the first time.  I want my students to ask questions, to see beyond the surface of the story, to have a sense of wonder when they think about who Jesus is and what He is.  In short, I want my students to be in awe of God.

The Senior High ministry has started a Student Leadership Team.  The team is made up of six students who have committed themselves to two goals: introducing students to Jesus, and helping students who know Jesus to get to know Him better.  Our team’s first project was to create a group covenant, a team contract with a list of expectations that we will hold one another accountable to.  The students made the list, and it has things on it like reading the Bible six days a week, church attendance, and setting an example of godliness.