Matthew 19:1-12

So Jesus is saying that divorce for any reason is against the way that God intended it and that divorce for marital unfaithfulness was just put in there by Moses to make life easier. What's crazy is that in verse 10 the disciples say that if that's the only reason that you can legitimately get a divorce, then it is better not to marry. That's really sad.
I can't imagine life without my wife. I know you can't miss what you've never had, but I just think that I would be really lonely and unfulfilled without my wife.
I've always said that if I was ever cheated on, then I would look at the marriage as irreconcilable. I would really have to think about that now, though. Jesus is basically saying that the only reason that's in there was to make our lives easier. Interesting. JM

Most The Movie

This movie looks awesome. Somebody took the modern day parable about the drawbridge operator who sacrifices his son to save the people on the train, and put the idea into a short film. I showed the clip to our senior pastor the other day, and I think he wants to use it, it's just a question of when. It's 31 minutes long, so it would fit in well within our regular service. Plus that reinforces the simple church idea of using special events within your regular programming. JM

Matthew 18:21-35

When you put things in perspective, we should be extremely motivated to forgive people. We don't like to do it, though. We feel just when we don't forgive. We've been so wronged. We like to hold it over them. Man, I bet that makes God mad. I mean, he forgave us of so much, and yet we feel like we can hold little stuff over people's heads. Pretty sad. JM

Band In A Bubble

So MTV is doing this Band In A Bubble thing. Evidently they did it in Australia and Uk as well. But I just saw this bubble thing when we were in NYC two weeks ago. It's kind of a dumb concept, lock a band in a big room for 4 weeks, make them record an album, and webcast the whole thing. I haven't heard a lot of buzz about it yet, so it might be a bust. We'll see. JM

Matthew 18:15-19

I love that God gives us a simple plan for handling conflict and yet everybody seems to ignore it. We complain and whine about the person with whom we're in conflict until we finally reach such a level of frustration that we then go approach the person. By that time we're either so upset and feel that we are so right that the conversation is not handled well by us, or we feel so ready to be over it, that we don't even care if the person gets the point of what we're trying to say. JM

Responsibility

One of the big things we push on students during the crucible is responsibility. We define it as accountability for my actions. One of the things that we go over is the idea that if we disagree with something we are responsible for, the time to debate that is when it is assigned, not whne it is due or when we are in trouble by saying that rules are unfair. It always amazes me how many adults use the excuse that the rules aren't fair when something is due. It's extremely frustrating for me. I always picture the person as a little baby whining about something. Ugggh. JM

New York

My wife and I loved NYC. I'll post later about our trip, but we loved the city so much that we want to move there. The only problem is we can't afford to live in the city. I'm looking for jobs, but I've only found a couple and they are on Long Island. I would love to get connected with a church that is actually in Manhattan and somehow become a teaching pastor with them. There are basically like a handful of churches that are effectively reaching the city, so it's ripe with potential. I think I would fit in well with my style of ministry because I would like to help people discover their spiritual selves. Show them that the reason they appreciate art and music is because at the core of it they are tapping in to creative expression meant to glorify their creator. I'm going to apply to any openings I see, but one of the things I'm going to do is apply to journey church's leadership experience. It's an internship program to work with journey church new york, which is one of the fastest growing churches in the US. The only problem is that you have to raise your support, which for my family would probably be about $80,000 for the year. That's a lot of money, and I doubt there are people that like us that much. I would do anything to get there, though. I loved it. My wife loved it. I would feel like I am on mission for God. I'm going to pray earnestly for this. JM

WOW

Man, what an awesome time my wife and I had. We went to New York City, and absolutely loved it. She wants to move there now. I would love to move there, too, but I wonder if she would like it in the middle of winter or in the dead of summer. It's so amazingly connected with mass transit. I love the idea of walking everywhere or taking the train.
Sunday also went well. It was great to see people respond, even though it didn't feel like a normal mother's day message.
I'll post more about our trip and about Sunday tomorrow. JM

New York

My wife and I leave tomorrow for our anniversary trip. We're going to New York for 3 days. We've never left the kids before for longer than just during the day when we're gone just for fun (we went to a conference for 3 days a couple of years ago). We're both really excited. It will be nice to experience NYC with my wife. Neither of us has been before, so I'm sure we'll look like wide-eyed tourists the whole time.
We get back on Saturday night and then the next day I get to preach. I'm really excited about that, too, it's just going to be kind of rushed making sure that I'm ready for it. JM

Great

I'm supposed to preach this coming Sunday, and I'm going on vacation with my wife from Thursday to Saturday, and I'm getting sick. It's just a cold, but I have like a sore throat and some body aches and crap. I'm sure I'll be better by the time we leave, but this takes away from my prep time because I'm so stinking tired. JM