His Word will not return void

It started in August 2004 and now, three plus years later, it's continuing. In my bi-weekly meeting with Pastor Scott this week, we found ourselves once again reflecting on all that God is doing in our midst and the way the Holy Spirit is prompting people to respond to God's Word. It's incredible in and of itself. That it has continued at a sustained rate, if not an increasing rate, is unbelievable. Though our combined ministry experience of several decades isn't even a hash mark on God's timeline, I can't tell you the number of times we've remarked to each other about how we've never seen believers respond in the way the people of Grace have been responding.


Each exegetical study has produced fruit. Each of us examines our lives and strives, going to great lengths, to apply the lesson(s) to allow the Holy Spirit to mold us closer into the image of Christ. All fulfilling God's promise that His Word will not return void. I've just never experienced it to the extent we've seen.

COMING UP NEXT: How God has been working amongst the Elders

C3 Notes

If you want to catch the highlights of most of the speakers from last week's conference, Tony Morgan was one of several who blogged throughout the sessions. In case you're interested...



Ed Young, Jr's session 1



Ed Young, Jr's session 2



Mac Richard - something was up with this session as it started 45 minutes late, but we never heard what went down. My behind the scenes logistics curiosity would love to know.



Perry Noble



Brian Huston



Tommy Barnett



Bishop T.D. Jakes



For me, the most powerful lesson came out of one of Bishop Jake's messages. Using the account of the Last Supper, he applied it to each of our lives... how like the bread, God took us, blessed us, broke us and gave us. The light bulb went on (you could literally hear people connect the dots across the room like a wave) as Bishop walked us through the stories of Jesus, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and several other Biblical characters we all know so well and illuminated how in each instance, God took them, blessed them, broke them and gave them - with specific emphasis on how God wasn't able to fully utilize each character until they'd become completely broken.

Deployments

With close to three hours to burn once we arrived at DFW for our return flight to Harrisburg, I found myself at one of my favorite places with a lot of time on my hands. Since I was but a few years old, I've enjoyed watching airplanes. In fact, I have a memory of going to the Princeton Airport one afternoon when I was two or three. So spent the three hours I had at DFW walking the concourses and riding the SkyLink. All in all, I walked from gate B6 to B33 and then from B6 to gate D12 and rode the SkyLink close to three times around the entire DFW terminal. I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

In addition to helping a couple of foreigners figure out the slightly confusing SkyLink system, I also watched a US Army unit head out for deployment. I'd never seen a unit head out on a commercial flight, so the sight of the concourse crowded with about 100 personnel in desert fatigues was impressive.

If I have my data right, two individuals connected with Grace deploy today: Larry and Barnaby. Regardless of your stance on the political side of things, be praying for all of our military personnel as they serve our country.

Please join with us in prayer

Pray with us and for us. God has and continues to apparently equip us for something we've yet to identify. Trusting that He's always at work around us and that He'll eventually lead us to a point that requires faith and action; please pray with us that God would open our eyes to where He is working and how He wants us to join Him and use us in what He's doing.

It's both an exciting and frightening position in which we find ourselves. So, continually pray!

Visions of air travel and worship juxtaposed

Hoards and hoards of people travelling thousands of thousands of miles a day.
Craft travelling at hundreds of miles an hour.
Lines and lines of travellers waiting to board airplanes and before that, waiting half dressed and barefoot to go through security check points.

As we experienced all the joys of domestic travel last week, I turned to Scott saying, "This is exactly what the Wright brothers envisioned during their 30-second glide on the beach." And yet, there are church movements today that are equally foreign when compared to that first church in Acts.

Growing up I attended churches that employed a traditional style of worship. Of course, spending several years in another culture, I was exposed to other styles and means of worship which broadened my perspective and appreciation for the universal church. And as new songs have been used in worship, I've come to appreciate the new styles that have come with them. But, the multi-sensory, experiential worship style makes me feel very old. I'm just not comfortable with it yet.

If the Wright's had known that their innovation would eventually restrict everyone to carrying only three ounces of liquids they may have scrapped their endeavors all together.

The thing is, in His omniscience, God knew His church would be where it is today and He knows where it will be tomorrow and He knew where it was over 2,000 years ago. And for some reason, God decided that where things were 2,000 years ago was the right timing for sending His Savior. Recollecting my Bible readings, I can't think of a reason why the years of silence between Malachi and Matthew had to be 400 years as opposed to 2,000 years of silence. Though it won't matter in eternity, I wonder why He chose to rebuke the religious peoples of that time period as opposed to sending His Son today or sending Him for the yet to be fulfilled second time.

Theme song and another lesson

I realize this evening that two items of note had gotten lost in, as Scott has proclaimed, my Elephant brain. Though chronologically out of order, I couldn't resist leaving these undocumented...

I was the last of our group through the enjoyable encounter every air traveler today experiences with the wonderful people at the Transportation Security Agency. And after frantically retying my shoes, shoving the laptop back in it's case, putting my baggy of liquids and gels back into my luggage, I was able to catch up with the rest of my group. The facial expression on Matt's face, a combination of embarassment and discust, conveyed that my rush was unnecessary. See, two of the nine in our group are fans of Walker Texas Ranger re-runs and all week at various times, they'll break into singing the theme song from the show. The disdain of the rest of us and their fervor where diametrically amplified when we learned that Walker himself attended one of the ministries we've crossed paths with while on this trip. So "when you're in Texas look behind you..."

Secondly, as an addendum to my last post, another lesson I picked up this week, is having the paint in the facility touched up weekly. One of the ministries we visited employees two full time staff who's sole responsibility is to go around the facility each week touching up the paint on the walls. Hadn't thought of that before.

What I learned today: Hallways and Handwashing

Twenty some years ago, I would've denied any enjoyment in learning. Grade school and undergrad were a chore for me, but now that I've had the opportunity to focus on specific areas and see the direct applicability of lessons learned, I've found learning to be very enjoyable.

Though I didn't know it at the time, much of my philosophy of learning, was crystalized in middle school when I decided that I wanted to pursue a Bible degree first to give myself a solid foundation upon which I'd build/add any other specialties. Today, I like to push myself to look for lessons to learn from a diverse range, taking those observations and lessons and passing them through the filter of my Biblical foundation and applying the dregs that remain in the filter.

Though I saw a lot of interesting things at Prestonwood today, two small details caught my eye related to our Early Childhood ministry: hallways and bathrooms.

I am adimant that the size of hallways cannot be underestimated in any facility project. They have to be designed to move a maximum amount of people in an efficient manner; the wider the better. I've seen too many churches from the 1970's era that present significant traffic flow issues because of narrow hallways. In addition to large hallways, making the children's area hallways vibrant with color creates an atmosphere of comfortable enthusiasm that's attractive. The off-white Early Childhood hallway of Grace, with some paint, can easily be transformed into a whole different atmosphere.

If you walk the daycare halls during the day, at various times you'll pass entire classes lined up by the restrooms for potty breaks. By law, employees must always have their eye on the children, with exceptions made only when their relieving themselves. Traditional bathrooms with both sinks and commodes behind closed doors present a challenge to this. The employees are required to monitor the kids when they're washing their hands at the same time watching the line of kids waiting in the hallway. At Prestonwood I saw an interesting solution to this conundrum; public handwashing stations. Only the commodes were behind closed doors for privacy. The children's sinks were outside the restroom in a small alcove off of the hallway, arranged as a shared, communal washing area. I found it to be an outside the box approach to allowing employees maximum visibility for keeping track of the children in their care.

I enjoy learning.

Take off flashbacks and psychoanalysis

As we sat in line for take off my mind flashed back to an earlier time when I plane I was riding was sitting in a similar position.

The year, 1976.
The occasion, my families' first missionary journey to the Philippines.

We'd just said our farewells to both sets of grandparents and an uncle/aunt or two, family members we wouldn't see for another four years. As we sat on the plane waiting for our turn to take off that morning, I was disturbed that unlike when leaving in a vehicle, I couldn't see my grandparents standing in the airport or that they couldn't see me.

As I shared this deja vu moment with Scott, who was seated next to me, he recalled his earliest memory. Then it came to us... there's a good chance that first farewell for me is why goodbyes are so important and emotional to me. And for him, well let's just say we may have uncovered the origin of his OCD.

Our conclusion, we're all messed up in some way shape or form.

Adventures with Pastor Scott…

As transparent as he is (see earwax illustration, shower obsession blog post, among others), I recognize that I have the privilege, or sentence, as the case may be, of seeing Scott up close and in unique situations; most recently, on our trip to Dallas.

From day one we've had to adjust to Scott's energy. Sometime we should put him up against the Energizer Bunny. One, to see Scott in a pink bunny suit would be worth it, but I'm guessing he'd outlast that furry little generator. Well, when you have to awake somewhere during the 4AM hour for a half-day long trip, you do so hoping to have a quiet two-hour ride to the airport; right? Not gonna happen with Distler along. And in those rare opportunities to catch some shut-eye in between conversation topics, you don't dare slip off into unconsciousness for fear that your name be mentioned in a less-than admirable light, and your comotose state rendering you unable to defend your honor.



During the flight once the conversation fire had dwindled to but a few embers the thought occurred to me to share one of my earphone buds with him so he could enjoy the DVD I was watching, but recalling his earwax issues I thought better of it.



I won't break too many of his confidences, but for those planning to go on the next Israel trip, I can report that Scott is beta testing the team's uniforms. He's swearing by it, economical, stylish by his standards and by his account, extremely comfortable.



Pastor's directional issues have also been well documented. Thus far we haven't gotten lost, mind you we've circled and circled our exact destination multiple times without reaching it, but we've known exactly where we were and where we wanted to be; how to get there just kept changing.



Maybe there will be more from Dallas as the week progresses, maybe not.

All in a day's work - actually only 1 hr's worth

I'll get to some of our contingency plans, but first these messages...

It's often hard to explain what all is involved in church ministry, but the last hour is an interesting snapshot of what a day can entail. In just 1 hour...

I've talked with Meredith Jorgensen of WGAL on details of how Grace Church has helped Melissa Leisey and Laura Spotts.

I've helped put up a bulletin board in the main lobby.

I've communicated to our front desk personnel how to handle inquiries from people wanting to help Melissa and Laura out.

I've coordianted what account will be used and how we'll track the funds that will come in.


Meanwhile...

Jay and a whole wedding party are getting the Auditorium ready for a wedding tomorrow.

The weekly volunteer team is in stuffing Sunday's bulletin.

Classes continue at Lititz Christian as usual.

Daycare continues at MorningStar like any other day.



And I've only been in the office for an hour.

Crisis Management

Knowing that the students are safe an no lives have been lost, I took some time this evening to learn a little bit about Union University. I was intrigued by their use of the web for information flow as they navigate the crisis.

1. I hope that I would be equally open in disseminating information in my responsibilities.

2. It's a good reminder that multiple avenues for communication need to be available. Mobile phone towers, landlines, internet connections, etc. can be destroyed. For that matter, even if they weren't, if someone's mobile phone charger was left in their now destroyed room, their mobile phone's battery is eventually going to run out rendering that avenue ineffective.

3. A coordinated response with strong leadership is critical.


While I'll never believe our contingency planning is complete (there will always be another contingency we haven't considered), we do have some general contingency plans in place at Grace which I'll share next time.