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Over the past year, I have read numerous places about the importance of reading the bible cover-to-cover.  It’s a daunting undertaking I know, but as I mentioned in my most recent post, it’s one I am going to challenge myself to follow through on.

There are many ways some one could go about this, as there is virtually hundreds of ways in which you could divide up the chapters and go through it.   If you are an tech-geek like me, then YouVersion (www.yourversion.com) might interest you.   YouVersion offers an online version of the bible in almost all major translations as well as 31-different reading plans that you could choose from (some just cover pieces of scripture, like the Gospels, others plans offer a guide through the whole thing).  It provides a way to check off each day’s reading, tag, journal, and bookmark them.     

If everyday reading seems like it could be too much, then you might check out the new plan released by Journey Church in Denver, called Engage.   This plan offers the reader every 4th day off, which might be very appealing to some.   They also are offering some videos to supplement the readings as well.

For me, this is not the first time I’ve started down this road.  I’ve tried this a few times in the past, but I can tell there exists a new passion to know the Word, especially the Old Testament, inside of me.   So I am putting it out there for anyone to keep my accountable here.

And if publically blogging about it enough, I read the following  quote in the book Primal, that I just finished a few weeks ago from a present-day theologian:

“Any Christian worth his salt ought to read the Bible from cover-to-cover every year.” – J.I. Packer

I enjoy new beginnings, even when they are a simple as a change in the date.  The start of a new period of life - whether it’s a new year, a new day, or a new job - brings a renewed hope for change and growth to come.  It’s a chance to look back and reflect, as well as chance to prepare and pray for what’s ahead.

2010 came in quietly.   I spent a quiet evening at home with the wife, doing what we do most every evening.   Our ability to venture out to parties has decreased with Logan, and that’s fine with me.   It challenges us to slow down a bit which is a good thing.   We spent the evening reflecting back on 2009, but also the past decade.   One thing is for sure: life looks really different then it did in 2000.

New beginnings doesn’t always mean our concerns and problems go away.  Sometimes we wish they would, but we still have to deal with the hard stuff that was challenging us before.   And sometimes, new beginnings bring new challenges.   I look forward to how these things will continue to help us grow.

I haven’t set many resolutions for 2010.   I’m a goal-oriented person, but haven’t sensed the need for a list of goals like I had for 2009.   The one goal I have set, and started already, has been to read the whole Bible this year.   I think that could be the most important things for me to do, so to have goals beyond that one, seem like they could be more distracting than beneficial.

I did decide to start 2010 with a new design for my blog.   If you are a subscriber in Google Reader or another RSS reader, click over to check it out.   I still have some clean-up to do, but I’m happy with what I’ve come up.   I hope to write more in 2010, so I felt there were some things I wanted to change before I could do that.

I hope all of my readers had a wonderful 2009, but even more, I pray you have a great 2010.

In today’s fast-pace, always on-the-go culture, the search for something more simplistic in life is appealing. Life is busy. If I could find an extra hour to squeeze out of each day, I would love to know how. And it’s in that busyness of life, that if I’m not careful, the one thing that becomes sacrificed is my daily pursuit of God.

Pastor Mark Batterson, of National Community Church in Washington DC, addresses the way we pursue and spend time with the Lord in his latest book, Primal. Primal is a call to return to the basics of Christianity; for us to seek to be great at the Great Commandment. Batterson believes that many have fallen into the trap where they look at their relationship with God through logic alone, which leads to a limited view of God based on their understanding. Instead he challenges us to forget trying to figure God out and to “return to the things we did at first” (Revelation 2:5).

Primal breaks the Great Commandment down into four parts: compassion, wonder, curiosity, and power. If we are going to “Love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength,” as Jesus tells us to, we need to stop putting God in the boxes we create and begin living in a way that allows us to love God through his understanding of love, not ours.

This book is an easy read, however very thought provoking. It addresses a multitude of topics regarding life and how we live it, including a number of real-life stories. Batterson lays out his thoughts about living primal in a manner that allows you to grasp his ideas.

As the year comes to a close, this book is timely. I know there are questions and pieces of it that I still need to process, but I look forward to seeing what possible ways I can begin to apply this book’s ideas to challenge me as 2010 begins. For anyone looking for a good book to remind you about loving God in the daily grind, Primal is definitely worth your time.

I’ve been meaning to write this post for weeks addressing the issue of spyware & malware.  In my job at work, we continue to see a growing number of computers that have become infected with these viruses, to the point where we have been asking the user’s to walk through a 12-step manual to clean it up themselves.   I’ll post some links below, but this is not about cleaning up spyware necessarily, but rather preventing it in the first place.

Now before I get too far, my Mac Reader(s) is probably already mounting his response regarding the fact that this isn’t a problem on the Mac.   While yes, for the most part I’d agree with them, I do agree with caution.   Recently, Adobe Flash, announced vulnerabilities that weren’t specific to PC installations of Flash, but Mac as well.   Mac’s aren’t Fort Knox, so proceed with caution.

I am going to go out on a limb here, and suggest that the following two steps could prevent 98% of spyware/virus infections.  I don’t say that flippantly, but I do believe that spyware/malware infections say more about the security mindset of the user than it does about the computer.   Here they are:

1. Browse safely and with a purpose 

Spyware doesn’t infect you by searching for content on Google, rather most often Spyware gets installed when we get off the beaten path and start clicking links and ads outside of what we opened up our browser for in the first place.    Being wise with our clicks is the number one way to prevent spyware.     If the ad really seems so outrageous that you can’t believe it, then don’t click it to find out more unbelievable details.

One of the common instances of this I’ve been seeing is the “High School Video” on Facebook.     No, your long lost friend doesn’t have a video of you from high school, so don’t go try to watch – it’s a trap.   That’s how spyware works.   It’s get’s your attention, and then it infects your computer.

While not recommended, the truth is that in between various operating system installations, there are times when I don’t run any sort of anti-virus/anti-spyware package at all.   I believe that because I follow this principle, I can be just as safe I am with security software installed.

2. Know your security software’s warnings

Any computer should only have one (maybe two in some cases) type of security programs installed, and those programs will have their own set of warnings that it shows the user, whether it be for virus alerts, or program updates.    You should know what these warnings and notifications look like.  

A common way of getting innocent users to install spyware is to show them a generic pop-up saying “Warning, you have a Trojan Virus.   Click here to remove it.”   And because they aren’t aware of what these alerts should look like from the security software they do have installed, they click to remove it and that’s when the virus installs.     You must know the difference between your software and a pop-up.

so what do I do now?

1)  Make sure you have security software installed.   Anti-Virus is essential on PC, and one with anti-spyware is nice too.    And there’s enough of these free, that I never recommend paying for one unless a user just is to stubborn to follow the rules above.    I recommend Avast or Microsoft’s new Security Essentials.

2)  If you think you have spyware, then run a scan right a way.   I really like Malwarebytes Anti-Malware.   It seems to do a very through job of scanning a cleaning up this stuff.

Hopefully this information will help keep you and your computer protected!

A little over a month ago, the church where I attend held an Organic Weekend, led by Neil Cole and the Church Multiplication Associates team.   As a church, we have embraced and been doing house churches (a.k.a. simple church, organic church, etc) for going on four years, and a lot of our foundations were based upon shared truths we discovered and found in Neil’s book the Organic Church.

For me, this training was timed nicely with a shift going on in our family’s journey with house churches, as the one we were attending had grown to fill one house, so we heard from the Lord and were preparing for multiplication into two churches, with myself helping to co-facilitate the new one.   We are currently meeting in our home, and have been this whole month.

At the training, much of what was talked wasn’t new to me, but it was great to hear from some folks that have been doing it longer than our church had and gain some new insights.   As I sat there the two days, this quote below was probably one of the key pieces of information I left with mulling over:

The Gospel is like a seed, and you have to sow it. When you sow the seed of the Gospel in Israel, a plant that can be called Jewish Christianity grows. When you sow it in Rome, a plant of Roman Christianity grows. You sow the Gospel in Great Britain and you get British Christianity. The seed of the Gospel is later brought to America, and a plant grows of American Christianity. Now, when missionaries come to our lands they brought not only the seed of the Gospel, but their own plant of Christianity, flower pot included! So, what we have to do is to break the flowerpot, take out the seed of the Gospel, sow it in our own cultural soil, and let our own version of Christianity grow.–Dr. D.T. Niles of Sri Lanka

Now, I realize that two people can read something and be impacted two completely different ways, but honestly, this is big stuff to me.   A few things jump out to me: 

1)  “The Gospel is like a seed, and you have to sow it.”   This is an area where I feel like God is teaching me a lot.   The house church model we currently follow has three parts:  Dynamic Truth, Nurturing Relationships, and Apostolic Mission (DNA).  All three pieces of the DNA work together, largely at the same time, to perform the functions of the church as God has called it (I have a post coming soon about the scriptural foundations of the DNA), and none of them can be separated from the other two.    Being a disciple means we are doing all three, together.

2)  “but they bring their own plant of Christianity, flower pot included!”  If you question this, then look at how America plants democracy.   It’s true.   As a nation, we tend to pass along not just our beliefs, but our interpretation of those beliefs as well.   And while I don’t know that is always a bad thing, I don’t know if it’s always a good thing.    The seed of the Gospel has the ability to grow anywhere it is planted, as long as God as prepared the soil.   If we try to bring our own soil with the seed, it is likely just adding layers on top of what God has prepared, causing it to take longer to take root as part of the culture, not just apart from it.

As we began preparing to facilitate a house church, this has been a big prayer of mine.    That I would let the seeds of the Gospel be planted and not worry about what the flower pot (our structure for house church time wise) looked like, but just that we are seeing the seed watered and taken care as we watched the DNA being lived out.   This new house church can look completely different from the last and still be planting those seeds.

Friends & Family:

I wanted to say thanks for your generous support of me as I paddled in Kayak for a Cure (KFAC) to raise money for cancer research. With your help, we surpassed our goal of $300. THANK YOU!

It was an amazing day in Vancouver. In total, KFAC had 75 paddlers and countless volunteers raise $37,000+ for the Canadian Cancer Society. Of the four years of the event, this year was a record-setting day in Vancouver. We heard some amazing stories of paddlers who were currently fighting cancer, in remission, and had friends and loved ones who lost their lives to the disease.

One that stands out is the story here: www.fatherandotter.com. The mother and daughter paddled a hand-made kayak with us that weekend. It was started by the father/husband who passed away to cancer in the middle of building it. The mother and daughter finished it in time to be part of the event. Amazing!

Kayak For A Cure is growing, with similar events in Columbus, OH; San Francisco, CA; Victoria, BC and Mississiauga, Ontario – and more cities are signing on for 2010. It’s my friend’s dream to have a KFAC event in every state to “Make Cancer History.”

Best Wishes,

Andy

I was sent this video the other day, and some of the statistics it showed were astounding.    Whether you agree with the term “social media” or not, the people-driven content that is being created and consumed is powerful stuff.   We have little choice but to recognize the trend and give it the credit it’s due.   

A few months ago I blogged about the name Logan James and where it came from.  Well on July 31st, we actually were able to take Logan to camp and share the story with him.   Here's some video from our first trip to camp:

“Real Church”. What is it? How is it defined? Is it possible? Can we find it?

In the opening pages of author Larry Crabb’s latest book, Real Church, he describes a real church as one which does the following:

“…will teach spiritual theology, that stirs a hunger for spiritual formation that surfaces the need for spiritual community that then marshals its resources for spiritual mission.”

This description seems like a very solid premise to build a church on, therefore I was excited about diving into this book. I, myself, am seeking guidance from God as I prepare to embark on a new journey in church-planting, so the title interested me to see more of what Crabb was speaking about.

Truthfully, I found the first half of the book to be a bit slow, as Crabb spent a lot of time outlining his experiences in how churches have been failing to live out the vision that he describes above. His assessments seemed legit – most of which stems from our addictions to ourselves; he clearly points out why there are so many churches struggling in our culture.

However, half way through the book Crabb picks up the pace as he begins to discuss the marks of a “real church.” I found myself consistently agreeing with him as he presents his ideas. The church Crabb describes is one that realizes we’re all sinners, dealing with addictions to something who need Christ, and gathers to seek God’s Truth through intimate community. It feels as if sometimes we tackle that goal from the wrong direction – we seek community first, and then realize we are sinners last, limiting the power and grace that God gives and wants to use within His body, the church.

Real Church is worth the read by those who are struggling with the idea of getting up every weekend for church. This book will challenge you to first look inward to see if barriers are preventing you from experiencing church, as well as help you identify marks to look for in churches who are practicing Real Church.