The Prophet Like Moses = Jesus

This was a pretty cool happening.  In my bible reading this morning I read Deuteronomy 18 which talks about the Prophet like Moses, and Mark 13, where Jesus is speaking as a prophet in the temple.  Pretty awesome “coincidence.”  Thanks Biblegateway.com

A New Prophet like Moses

15 “The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers—it is to him you shall listen— 16just as you desired of the LORD your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly, when you said, ‘Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.’ 17And the LORD said to me, ‘They are right in what they have spoken. 18 I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. 19 And whoever will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I myself will require it of him. 20 But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die.’ 21And if you say in your heart, ‘How may we know the word that the LORD has not spoken?’— 22 when a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the LORD has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him.

Mark 13

Jesus Foretells Destruction of the Temple

1 And as he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher, what wonderful stones and what wonderful buildings!” 2And Jesus said to him, “Do you see these great buildings? There will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.”

Signs of the Close of the Age

3And as he sat on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter and James and John and Andrew asked him privately, 4“Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign when all these things are about to be accomplished?” 5And Jesus began to say to them, “See that no one leads you astray. 6 Many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray. 7And when you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. This must take place, but the end is not yet. 8For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines. These are but the beginning of the birth pains.

9 “But be on your guard. For they will deliver you over to councils, and you will be beaten in synagogues, and you will stand before governors and kings for my sake, to bear witness before them. 10And the gospel must first be proclaimed to all nations. 11And when they bring you to trial and deliver you over, do not be anxious beforehand what you are to say, but say whatever is given you in that hour, for it is not you who speak, but the Holy Spirit. 12 And brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death. 13 And you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.

The Abomination of Desolation

14“But when you see the abomination of desolation standing where he ought not to be ( let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. 15 Let the one who is on the housetop not go down, nor enter his house, to take anything out, 16and let the one who is in the field not turn back to take his cloak. 17And alas for women who are pregnant and for those who are nursing infants in those days! 18Pray that it may not happen in winter. 19For in those days there will be such tribulation as has not been from the beginning of the creation that God created until now, and never will be. 20And if the Lord had not cut short the days, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect, whom he chose, he shortened the days.

Forgiveness

Today I was reading from Mark and this verse struck me.

Mark 11:25 – “And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.”

Whenever you pray, forgive.  Who do you need to forgive?  I think we all have things that tweek us throughout our day, week, month, and when we let those things build up we can create a grudge.  But I love this little verse because we need to be the first to forgive.  We should not wait for people to apologize.  I know I needed this verse today.

Great Presenters

Great post from Seth Godin on what makes a great presenter.

Bottom line if you don’t love your audience, you’ll never be great.  When it comes to preaching, if you don’t love the people you are speaking with then they won’t care.

Perry Noble, Mark Driscoll, Rob Bell, Erwin McManus, Rick Warren . . . all of these guys are great preachers, and you know that in their heart there is a great amount of love for the people who are receiving their message.  They preach because they love.

Too many sermons are preached because it’s sunday, or because they think the preacher thinks they are really smart.  But if you don’t love your audience you will be found out.

“As the talk (pitch/presentation/interview) begins, don’t focus your energy or concern on yourself. It’s not about you. It’s about them. The presenter who loves his audience the most, wins.”

Thanks Seth.

Killing Cockroaches – Review

I just finished Killing Cockroaches: And Other Scattered Musings on Leadership by Tony Morgan.  Let me just come out with it, I would recommend this book to all pastors.  I think Tony has some great insights on leadership and the church.   I don’t agree with all of Tony’s assumptions about church or about what would make a successful church, but it’s still a good read.

Reading Killing Cockroaches felt like reading a Seth Godin book.  Quick sections, funny, precise, and honest.  All of that helped reading the book go really quickly.  So I commend that.

It did feel like the way Newspring does church is the way to do church, and that get’s annoying as we do church very different, but the heart to reach the lost is the same.  And I think for churches context is key, once you learn the context your church ministers in you can develop methodology. But the most valuable thing in this book is probably overriding metaphor of Killing Cockroaches, which is really doing something you should not be doing, get a professional to do that.  And in church there is a ton of stuff that I know that I should not be doing, it’s not the best use of my time, and there are others who would be way better at it than me.  It’s a good reminder that I need to carefully guard what I say yes to, and what can I help others to do.  That sentence was a bit rough, but I think you get my point.

Anyway, get Killing Cockroaches, you’ll enjoy it.

My Son Is Famous

I listen to a radio show podcast – TBTL, which is short for Too Beautiful To Live.  Great show!  Last monday Judah and I were bored and we were playing with Garage Band which was awesome.  I had Judah says, “boom roasted”, “RAWR”, “Come On”, and “Awesome”.  All of which are regular audio drops on TBTL. On a whim I emailed the recording to the TBTL host, Luke Burbank.

Like I said I listen to the TBTL on podcast so I’m a little behind.  Today i was listening to last monday’s show and what do you know, I heard them playing our recording.  How fun.

If you are not listening to TBTL, I would recommend it, it’s a great, fairly random podcast on 97.3 KIRO, weeknights from 7-10. or you can get the podcast on mynorthwest.com/tbtl.  If you want to download the specific episode where Judah was “featured” you can download that here.  You should listen to the whole thing, but you can hear Judah around the 23 minute mark.  Enjoy.

U2 and organizational greatness

U2 released No Line On The Horizon, which is growing on me.  It’s quite a departure from How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, which I loved.  I was reading an interview with the band on CNN.com, and I was struck by the last statement from drummer Larry Mullen, Jr.:

We were always labeled “big” — you know, “U2’s a big band.” And you want to be a great band, and I think that’s one of the reasons we stick at it. There’s still work to be done.

Wow.  Some people might read this and think pretension.  I thought just the opposite.  For a guy who has spent most of his life in the biggest band in the world, he realized that big and great are not the same thing.  You can be big and suck as a musician (I could name some examples, but that would be mean).  Or you can strive to be great and your audience will find you.

Organizationally the desire to be big is a killer, for churches, business start-ups, whatever.  If your desire is to be big you are simply a balloon, Balloon’s pop when they get to big.  If your desire is to great, then you start with substance instead of air.

For the church, it is so easy to just want to grow, but I’ve been in enough big churches that were just that, big, they weren’t great.  And I’ve been in some small churches that were really great.  The small church knows that there is work to do.  Sometimes it’s harder see where you can grow when your desire is just to be big.

To stretch the metaphor a little more, look at the human body.  It’s easy to get big, just consume, consume, consume, and don’t strain yourself.  You’ll get big.  It’s a lot harder to get strong.  You have to consume, and exercise, and you have to monitor your body, and make sure that you are on track.  You set goals, and you work towards them.  You can be big and strong, or you can be big and flabby.

If your goal is big, that’s easy.  If your goal is strong (great) you’ve got a lot of work ahead of you.  And it’s totally worth it.

The Bible

The Bible is way more powerful than we realize.  Sometime it takes an outsider to show us just how strong the Word of God is:

“You Christians look after a document containing enough dynamite to blow all civilization to pieces, turn the world upside down, and bring peace to a battle-torn planet. But you treat it as though it is nothing more than a piece of good literature.”

-Gandhi
thanks bob.