Love Your God More, Not Your Country Less
When you love something or someone, you are tempted to love that thing or person more than God. Because we are prone to idolatry, we can easily take good things—blessings in our lives—and give those blessings our worship. I can do this with Kaye, my daughters, my role, and so many things. C.S. Lewis wrote […]
6 Thoughts for Worship Leaders on Theology and Our Weekend Gatherings
Our Lead Worship Pastor, DK (Daniel Kim), asked me to speak to all our worship leaders from all our congregations about some theological convictions that I hope inform our weekend worship gatherings. This is not an exhaustive list. Nor do I think it is an inerrant list! But I do love serving alongside others who […]
4 Upside-Down Actions as You Gather at Church this Easter Weekend
In our Resurrected King’s Kingdom, the values are often opposite of this world. We have been included in what many refer to as an upside-down Kingdom where the weak are strong, the first are last, and the servants are the greatest among us. As we celebrate our King’s defeat of death this Easter weekend at […]
What to Do With Christmas Trees, Halloween, Meat Offered to Idols, and New Year’s Celebrations
We recently held a Lunar New Year party after one of our worship services on a Saturday night. The Lunar New Year is a big deal in Asian cultures and our context is highly Asian — which I love. Someone sent a message that we should not celebrate Lunar New Year because the celebration’s origins […]
5 Thoughts from Gathering in the Middle of a Pandemic
The church I serve gathered again last weekend for large gatherings – outside with chairs set up in a physically distanced format. It has been a progression for us. In June we began gathering in homes. In July we launched smaller gatherings in neighborhoods throughout Orange County. In August we started using our largest campus […]
Choosing the Time of Your Next Worship Service
For years churches have moved to multiple worship services instead of building bigger buildings, which is a wise use of the facility the Lord has provided to the church. When adding a second service, the choice is fairly simple. While the times may vary from context to context, two services “back to back” make it […]
3 Places the Word Must Be Central in Your Church
There is one spiritual discipline that increases engagement in every other spiritual discipline. In the research behind Transformational Discipleship, we discovered that when someone is engaged in studying the Bible, participation in every other spiritual discipline is positively impacted. While the other spiritual disciplines are important, engagement in one of these (from a research vantage point) […]
How Leaders Can Cultivate Godliness
The following is a guest post by Dr. Nathan Finn. Nathan serves as director of the Center for Spiritual Formation and Evangelical Spirituality at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, where he teaches courses in church history and historical theology. He also serves as one of the pastors at First Baptist Church of Durham, North Carolina. For this reason […]
4 Ministry Reminders from Backyard Bible Club
A few weeks ago, we hosted a Backyard Bible Club at our house. About 35 kids, mostly from our neighborhood, came to our house from 9:30-11:30 each morning for three days. Kaye recruited friends, neighborhood moms, and teenagers to help. It was great. Our kids loved it. The neighborhood kids loved it. And it was […]
Gospel and Worship
Worship is the most appropriate response to the gospel. When challenging people to worship, both corporately and personally, churches that view discipleship through the gospel lens articulate that attitude. When God gave the Ten Commandments to His people, He first reminded them of the freedom He graciously gave them. I am the Lord your God, […]