This past weekend Tracy and I were able to join some friends in San Diego for Game 1 of the Second Round of the World Baseball Classic! I was tremendously excited to see Japan vs. Cuba, a rematch of the 2006 Championship Game! A couple of months ago when I realized the WBC would be just down the coast I looked into ticket prices but was blown away at how much it was going to cost to attend a couple of games, however purchasing single-game tickets the day of the event proved to be a much more cost-effective routine!

We were already in San Diego for the weekend when we decided to make our trip to the ballpark, and little did we know we’d get to see two great teams take the field. Dice-K was the starting pitcher for Japan and he was absolutely lights-out… Ichiro didn’t disappoint either… but Fukadome, was a terrible disappointment (and doesn’t really bode well for the Cubs upcoming season!) Even though it was great to watch a baseball game in the middle of March in a sort of playoff type atmosphere, my favorite part was the fans. Drums and cowbells could be heard all over the stadium during Cuba’s at-bats, and the Japanese fans were unbelievably in sync with their thunder sticks producing complicated rhythms and beats. It was exciting to be in the midst of the madness and hopes riding on each team.

Ultimately Japan prevailed, and they looked remarkable in the process. I’m looking forward to watching more of these games on TV, just as long as ESPN quits televising them solely on ESPN Desportes… a station we don’t readily get.

I’ve been traveling an abnormal amount the past couple of months speaking at churches in Boston, NYC, Chicago, etc, about the new church plant in San Francisco. All of this travel has offered me an opportunity to get to know a few “single-serving friends” (a reference from Fight Club) and this past weekends flight to San Diego was no different.

Enter Ted.

Before the plane even made it to the tarmac, Ted introduced himself and asked what my occupation was (the million dollar question where the answer would surely put an end to any ensuing conversation) to which I responded, “I’m a pastor”. Immediately Ted shifted in his seat a bit, almost uncomfortably, but then something changed in his demeanor and he turned to me and began to ask questions about our congregation in San Francisco and what exactly a church plant is/looks like. I answered his questions one at a time before he began an onslaught of questions from all sorts of different angles, “What is truth, what’s your stance on homosexuality, how can you trust the Bible, how do you understand the Trinity, what’s your training, why are there so many denominations if Truth is unified, isn’t seminary pointless, etc, etc, etc.” Let me say up front that I’ve never experienced such a wide-range of questions in such a short amount of time and it literally caught me off guard leaving me a little off kilter and discombobulated.

Ted asked permission to tell his story, and so I listened as he started with the line, “I have a lot of Christian friends who don’t consider me to be a Christian… I grew up in a Buddhist home before joining the church.” Ted continued his testimony all the while utilizing some of my answers to the onslaught of questions he asked earlier to make his points and solidify the position of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (read: Mormonism). For the majority of our flight (1 hour, 8 minutes) I was being evangelized by a Mormon and had no clue. Ted, presented himself as a person seeking understanding and answers to some of life’s hardest questions before spinning on a dime and presenting Mormon Doctrine and belief, asking me to read the introduction of the Book of Mormon and following the instructions to believe in the One True Church.

Ted, was more than likely in his mid to late 40′s, over twenty-five years removed from his Missionary Journey as a 19 year old and yet still sought opportunities as a missionary to share his faith. I must say, that I was very impressed with his boldness, with his willingness to engage with me on a 9:50p flight to San Diego and his friendliness.

I realized, in retrospect, the formula that the Mormon Church uses for evangelism:

• Upset the equilibrium of your opponent by questioning their belief system as a seeker of truth. By raising questions to which they are unable to answer provide you with a platform down the road to speak your truth into the situation, thus pointing them in a new direction
• Share your personal story and point out the inconsistencies and questions of your previous way of thinking by inserting your “opponents” thoughts into the mix as well. This will give you common ground and begin to create agreement.
• Point to the Book of Mormon an ask the listener (no longer an “opponent”) to read the Introduction on their own time and follow the instructions, praying for guidance and a “burning in the bosom.”
• Hope the person doesn’t ask any questions outside of your presentation because you’re not really prepared to go “off-script”

This presentation is wildly effective, hence the growth being experienced by the Mormon Church, however taking the conversation off-script reveals a great lack of depth behind the scenes.

I look at my conversation with Ted and I wonder why the church isn’t more effective in presenting the Gospel, in pointing towards the Kingdom of God and specifically Jesus… especially if we truly believe it is the hope of the world! How did we lose our way in this? What has been the greatest source of our undoing in this respect? Have we lost our boldness? Do we no longer rely on the Spirit? Or are we simply just unprepared?

Ted taught me a great deal about the importance of story and how we as the Church miss the boat on pointing towards Jesus and the Kingdom of God…

Have you thought that maybe God is calling you to something new? Do you have an entrepreneurial spirit that is begging to be unleashed to impact God’s kingdom? Maybe you aren’t sure exactly what your dream is, or you have an idea, but haven’t defined it. If so, NewThing’s Discover the Dream is an experience that will help you discover how to make God’s dream for you become a reality. In almost all cases when I talk with someone who is currently living out their dream, I find a motivated, overly raving and passionate person. And I quickly learn that, at some point in their life, they encountered the power of discovering the dream that God put within them.

Join the staff of Community Christian Church and NewThing on April 20, 2009 in Orlando and learn how you can be a part of the reproducing church movement. We want this to be a personal experience for you so space is limited to the first 80 people who sign up. For more information or to register, click here. I would LOVE to see every person encounter the power of discovering and living out the dream that God has placed in them!

Back by popular demand, here’s your Friday Playlist. I haven’t really been keeping track of my listening for a while, but these three artists are consistently in my top rotation. Big fan of Portland group Blind Pilot, Jacksonville, Illinois singer/songwriter William Fitzsimmons, Greg Laswell and Emilliana Torrini. Check ‘em out and give them a good listen… they’re soothing to the soul.

I grew up hearing on the news, hearing in church, hearing in school and conversations around me that “The United States of America is the greatest nation in the world.” Never before have I really questioned this notion instead blindly accepting it as truth. But recently I’ve stumbled across several statements that offer a different perspective on the “greatness” of this country and have me wondering how do we really measure greatness? Is greatness measured by our educational system? Is greatness measured by the quality of life in both longevity and care? Or perhaps greatness is measured by our freedoms?

I decided to take a look into our “measurables” to see just how great of a nation we truly are by the numbers. This is what I found:

» Health Care
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), of all the countries in the world we rank a paltry thirty-seventh (37th) behind countries like Morocco, United Arab Emirates, Colombia, Iceland, Malta and France. (France is the top country in the world for health care). In regards to life expectancy we fare slightly better ranking twenty-fourth (24th). However, as a country our overall health performance plummets to seventy-second (72nd). This quote from The Guardian helps to sum up the state of our health care system:

“Despite spending $230million an hour on healthcare, Americans live shorter lives than citizens of almost every other developed country.”

Not quite the statement you’d expect about the “greatest” nation in the world.

» Education:
As a product of our educational system, it’s not hard to believe that we don’t rank at the top, but what surprised me more than anything is we (the United States) don’t even crack the Top 25 in Reading, Math or Science. Canada, our neighbor to the north, ranks in the top 5 in Reading and Science and the top 10 in Math.

Not quite the statistics you’d expect about the “greatest” nation in the world.

» Freedom:
So, if education and health care don’t make you the greatest nation then it must be our freedoms, right? As the purveyor and champion of freedom in the world, it would stand to reason that we experience the greatest amount of freedom in the world. However, according to Freedom House (who provides the US with the benefit of the doubt) we tie for 21st in Freedom of the Press behind a slew of countries like Finland and Denmark, Iceland and Germany. Or take this stat for instance: The United States of America “enjoys” the greatest rate of incarceration of any country in the world at 5.6 million, or 1 in 37 adults… which doesn’t include many white-collar criminals like Bernie Madoff. (Sidenote: Why do we have so much crime in this country compared to all the others?)

We are, however quite free according to Freedom House, but not the most free. We simply reside in the upper tier with 50 other countries like France, Germany, the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Poland, Malta, Slovenia, Micronesia, etc. So, then if we are the “greatest” nation in the world and freedom, education, and health aren’t a part of the equation then what is it that makes us so great?

In a word: Military. We are the undisputed (undisputable) #1 country in military strength/might/power. Our defense budget is a whopping $515 billion dollars, or more than 10 times higher than Russia—the #2 country on the list.

Is this really why we’re the “greatest” country in the world? (“Agree with us or we’ll blow you up?”) Perhaps its time for us to stop saying we’re the “greatest” country in the world and start living like we are… start shifting some of that massive defense budget towards investments like health care and education—could you imagine a $200 billion infusion into our educational system?! It wouldn’t hurt our military standing in the world but it’d certainly revolutionize our children’s education!—and instead of “protecting our freedom” actually create systems and structures that promote freedom within our borders instead of working to incarcerate 1 in 37 adults.

When is enough firepower enough? Is it when we continue to stockpile it to the detriment of our children’s education? Is it when we continue to add more and more weapons of mass destruction to our arsenal to the detriment of our own health and well-being? Or is it enough when we’ve incarcerated more of our citizens than any other country?

I suppose more than anything our “defense” (offense) spending shows where our true priorities sit… and it’s certainly not an attempt to make this nation great… but rather to protect our mediocrity.

Saturday morning (3.7.09) rolled around and our very first Launch Community* was upon us. I didn’t really know what to expect, whether those who had RSVP’d or said, “Hey I’ll be there,” would actually show up or if we’d be left standing there at square-one needing to seriously retool our entire approach towards planting this new church. Fortunately, my greatest fears and the worst case scenario didn’t play out before my very eyes!

As we prepared and envisioned what our first Launch Community would look like I said time and again, “If we have 10 people there that’d be great! If we have 15 that’d blow my mind!” Well, neither of those classifications fit. For our very first Launch Community, 17 people showed up to participate in this new thing taking shape in the city! I could hardly believe it, but it left me realizing two things that morning : 1) There is a real need in this city for a new church; 2) God is up to something BIG! and this is just the beginning!

We spent the morning introducing ourselves to each other, eating a fantastic brunch and dreaming together of what this new church could look like to truly make a difference in the city of San Francisco. We talked about how we can impact the community for good—to literally be an integral part of hepling this city succeed—to how we could serve the city and the important aspects of who we truly want to be at our very core. It was a fun morning, an exciting morning, and the anticipation for what’s next was palpable! I can’t wait till next month… April 4th at 10:30a when we get to do it again and take another BIG step forward towards launching this new church. I’m looking forward to seeing who’ll join us next, who’ll step up to the plate and how God will continue to bring together the right people for this time to create something that will long outlive all of us!

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*Launch Community is a gathering of people who are interested in joining with us in launching this new church in the city of San Francisco.

Seven years.

It’s hard to believe that seven years ago today, Tracy and I were married and began this journey of life together hand-in-hand. It’s hard to believe that we’ve moved as many times as years we’ve been married and it’s hard to believe how many and how big the challenges were that we’ve had to overcome in such a short amount of time. It’s hard to believe that we’ve made it as far as we have, and yet at the same time it’s hard to believe that the past seven years have been so easy.

It’s not hard to believe that each and every day I love her more, that I stand amazed that she ever said “I do”, and that her patience and her grace make this life so much easier to walk through. It’s not hard to believe that she’s a gift, one that I’m learning to appreciate more and more. And it’s not hard to believe that she’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me.

Seven years… what a ride… and to think there’s so much more to come!