Facial Hair, Cool Glasses, Coffee Breath and MacBooks

One of the requirements, I think, for being a church planter is that you have to own a Mac laptop, drink a lot of coffee, have Rob Bell glasses, and shave irregularly. I've been at an Acts 29 Church Planting Conference in St. Louis for the past day and a half as a requirement for a class I'm taking this semester at Urbana Theological Seminary. The conference is great, other than the fact that I own an HP laptop, don't like coffee, have the wrong glasses, and can't grow legit sideburns. After half a dozen speakers and another half a dozen conversations, I've spewed plenty of ink on my conference notebook so I thought I'd jot down a thought or two on the ol' blog from the conference.

The first morning a guy named Darrin Patrick from the Journey Church in St. Louis told us to never forget James 3:16 if we are doing ministry. The verse says "For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice." How quickly those of us in the ministry chase selfish ambition! I hope I don't forget that verse.

In Bryan Chapell's message from yesterday afternoon he mentioned "The expulsive power of a new affection", which is a phrase coined by Thomas Chalmers. The point is that the real power over sin is not simply to suck it up and try harder but rather to fall more in love with Jesus so that the desire to obey Christ, our new affection, expels the sin from our life which is the antithesis to the new affection.

Lord do not let my affection grow cold. Help me to love you more than my sin. Remind me that I am not sanctified by works of law or by simply trying harder, but only by your grace. Kindle within me and within your Church a greater affection for your glory!