BOLD Part 3 - 3D Living

June 3, 2013

BOLD is back! Yesterday's message was a very powerful one, but also practical one.

We talked about 3 simple steps that every single one of us can take to start living a life of evangelism: Develop friendships, Discover stories, Discern next steps. This is a must listen for anyone who's ever said "I know God wants me to do evangelism, but I don't know what to do" or "I want to be a witness but I don't know what to do or say."

If you've ever said that, then check out the video above and hopefully it'll help answer your questions.

Why “Loving One Another” is the Key to God’s Heart

May 29, 2013

“Do you think we should leave the kids or not? Will they be ok without us? Or should we just take them with us and forget about the waterpark?”

That was the conversation that I had with my wife just three days ago as we were debating whether or not to leave our children – ages 8 and 6 – at a waterpark during our church’s weekend getaway to a local resort. They wouldn’t be alone there. They’d be with several other members of the STSA family – about 100 or so – but they would be without us.

As you can imagine, everyone was super excited to go to the waterpark on Saturday afternoon (remember it was Memorial Day weekend). But Marianne and I had to return home for a wedding that evening. So we had to decide what to do with our kids. They were excited to go to the waterpark, but we were worried.

BOLD Part 2 - Just Sowing Seeds

May 20, 2013

Part 2 in the latest series, BOLD: All Things to All Men. Yesterday's message was focused on the key to "success" as an evangelist. It isn't training or knowledge or any special skills. It's your willingness to just do one thing....

What is it? Check out the message to find out.

Seeing Christ through His Brethren

May 17, 2013

The day was finally here – the day we’ve been preparing for and praying about for weeks! It was the day of our medical/spiritual outreach event in an impoverished Atlanta community.

The goal was to serve a shelter for abused and homeless teenage mothers and their children – both medically and spiritually. We had volunteers ranging from elementary school kids – ready to sing their hearts out – all the way up to our competent medical team. We prepared a program for the adults, and another one for the kids. We planned various lectures on health nutrition and even dental hygiene. In addition, we had a lecture on how the message of Christ was relevant to us today.

With over 60 volunteers from all ages from a variety of churches involved, we were ready for this day...

...until two unexpected events took place.

BOLD Part 1 - The Call to Evangelism

May 13, 2013

I'M BACK! I know I've been offline for a couple of weeks now, but I am back now and more on fire than ever. God has really really been speaking loudly and clearly to me and I can't wait to get back on schedule (now that house is sold, Pascha week is over and week in Florida is done) and share all the good things God is doing.

So if you thought you got rid of me....YOU WERE WRONG!

And the first thing I want to share with you today is the first message in a brand new series that I started yesterday. It's called BOLD: All Things to All Men. Can you guess the topic? It's all about "evangelism" - the word that means different things to different people - and what our role is with regards to evangelism. Trust me, it's not what you think.

Being an evangelist isn't what you might think it is. It is something much simpler and in this message I answer the "who, what, where, when, why and how" questions with regards to evangelism. You can check it out below. And tomorrow, I'll resume my regularly scheduled blog posts as before.

IT'S GOOD TO BE BACK!

Pascha Week is Here

April 29, 2013

Just wanted to let my faithful readers know that I won’t be blogging at all this week because this is the week that we in the Orthodox church celebrate Pascha Week (aka Holy Week).

And during Pascha week we have pretty intense schedule of services so therefore I’ll be offline till next week. However, I wanted to share a message which I delivered last night (the first night of Pascha week) over at St. Mark’s church. Something important to keep in mind throughout this week…

A Spirit of Forgiveness

April 26, 2013

At the start of this year's Lenten journey, Fr. Anthony reminded us that it is a journey of forgiveness -- God's forgiving nature towards us and our forgiveness of others. Whenever I think of forgiveness, I imagine a big dramatic scene like the prodigal son running into his father's arms or friends who haven't spoken for decades finally apologizing to each other in their gray years. It's easy to imagine myself being so magnanimous as to take back an errant child or wayward friend. I'm just arrogant enough to picture my dignified acceptance of his or her apology.

But I don't think that's what Christ meant when He asked us to forgive our brothers 490+ times (70 x 7, see Matthew 18:21-22). Scripture warns us not to judge and that the plank is our eye is much larger than the speck in our brothers' eye (see Luke 6:42).

We are so forgiving of our plank. We are so good at finding rational excuses for our sins. When we snap at a coworker, we excuse ourselves because we were tired. When we cross four lanes of traffic to get to our exit, we excuse ourselves because something distracted us. Do we extend the same courtesy when we are snapped at, when someone cuts us off?

It’s Time to Launch Out into the Deep

April 25, 2013

“Launch out into the deep.” Those were the words that the Lord Jesus spoke to Peter after a long night of work (see Luke 5), during which Peter labored and toiled to catch fish but had come up empty. After that night of frustration, Jesus commands Peter to go back out into the deep waters and let down his nets and try one more time to find what he was looking for.

You probably know how the story ends [Peter catches more fish than he knows what to do with], that isn’t the point of the story.

Are You Ready to See the Judge?

April 23, 2013

When I was a child, I used to love getting asked the question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I loved it because the answer to that question was never the same. Like most kids, I was constantly changing my mind about what I wanted to be one day (and believe me, I still haven’t figured it out what I’m going to be when all is said and done).

But I remember that there was a long period where I really wanted to be a lawyer. That was my dream. Coincidentally, this happened to be right around the time of A FEW GOOD MEN – the Hollywood hit starring Tom Cruise, Demi Moore and Jack Nicholson. Man I loved that movie!

(even more coincidental was the fact that I also wanted to be an Navy pilot after seeing TOP GUN – the original Tom Cruise classic – where Maverick and Goose stole all of our hearts. “I feel the need…for speed. Whoa!” What can I say. We all have our little quirks. Mine is Tom Cruise movies. Judge not, lest ye be judged.)

Preparing for Holy Week (sermon video)

April 22, 2013

I'm back online! Sorry for being out of touch all last week. We were getting our house ready to be put on the market for sale - so I was wrapped up with that all day, every day, last week.

But now, thanks be to God, we're done and I am back and more pumped than ever! Lots of stuff I can't wait to share with everyone out there in the blogosphere so stay tuned... But for today, I wanted to share the video of the message that I delivered yesterday: PREPARING FOR HOLY WEEK.

NOTE: if you're not Orthodox and you're wondering why we're preparing for Holy Week now, it's because we are on a different calendar than you. You celebrated Easter a few weeks ago; but we don't get to it till May. So you can look at it as we are a month behind the rest of the Christian world, or as I prefer to see it, we are about 11 months ahead. :)

Either way, check out the video and hopefully this helps get you in the right frame of mind - regardless of when you celebrate the Resurrection of the Lord.

Why I’m Not Blogging Today

April 16, 2013

No blog post today. Two reasons: First of all, this entire week is dedicated to me packing up my house and preparing it to go on the market (we’re moving to a new home in May….YEAH!!!!). I painted an entire room for the first time ever yesterday.

Many spiritual lessons there which I’m sure I’ll blog about at some point – like for example, the importance of not having the color blind guy (aka, ME) insist that the color is correct when everyone is saying otherwise. We painted half of the room until I finally was willing to admit that “ok maybe it won’t look different when it dries. Maybe it’s the wrong color.”

Second reason is this: because I was tucked away painting and packing all day yesterday, I just heard about the tragedy in Boston this morning. Don’t really know what to say. My heart goes out to everyone involved.

Crazymakers Part 6 - CONCLUSION

April 15, 2013

We wrapped up the Crazymakers series yesterday and this final message might have been the most powerful. In it, we talked about 6 commitments that we need to make in order to keep the crazymakers from making us crazy. 6 commitments. That's it. If you can do your best with these 6 commitments, I promise you, you'll find a new level of peace in your life - one that you never knew was even possible.

“When a man’s ways please the Lord, he makes even his enemies to be at peace with him.” Proverbs 16:7

Check it out and leave a comment to let me know what you think.

Did You Remember to Take Your Medicine?

April 12, 2013

Being sick is the worst! I should know because my immune system is like that of a toddler, and being in arctic Minnesota doesn’t really help. It’s so frustrating and annoying to always be tired. It affects everything you do! Always nauseous, and short of breath – at school, at work, even just hanging out with friends.

So what is the solution? You go to the doctor, get prescribed a medication and get on that ASAP so you can quickly heal and get back to what you’ve been missing out on.

But we don’t always do that, do we? We know we should, but we instead think we can do it on our own. We can defeat the sickness without the meds. Or maybe we start taking the medicine, but then discontinue its use after a few days because we have deemed ourselves to be all better now.

In arrogance/ignorance, we think to ourselves, “The doctor doesn’t know what he’s talking about. I don’t need to take this medicine for two weeks. It’s been two days and I feel just fine.”

Can you relate?

Faithful Stewardship

April 11, 2013

“Moreover it is required in stewards that one be found faithful.” 1 Corinthians 4:2

I always wondered why the Bible says that. Why is faithfulness the one thing that is explicitly listed as a requirement for “servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God” (1 Corinthians 4:1). Why not love? Or patience? Or kindness? Why not the ability to recite all the books of the Bible in order or memorize the most verses? WHY FAITHFUL???

The key to this passage is understanding what a steward is – someone who was given something and asked to take care of it. If you read the rest of the chapter, St. Paul makes it clear that he doesn’t think highly of himself or what he has accomplished. He says that we are just stewards – not people who accomplished a lot, but people who received a lot. In other words, all of us are just like little orphan Annie – we got lucky and hit the jackpot when God adopted us into His family.

But as a member of His family, there are certain expectations. And those expectations center around faithfulness. What must I do to remain in good standing in the house of our heavenly Big Daddy Warbucks? I must do whatever I am asked to do.

Who Switched All the Price Tags?

April 9, 2013

“For what is highly esteemed among men is an abomination in the sight of God.” Luke 16:15

Imagine that you went into a store one day and all the price tags were switched around. Someone came in during the middle of the night and pulled the price tags off of expensive items and put them on the cheap ones. And vice versa, they put all the cheap price tags on the expensive items.

So items that should cost $100 were being sold for a $1 and items that aren’t worth more than $1 were being sold for $100. What would happen? What would the scene look like?

Crazymakers Part 5 - THE SNARE OF APPROVAL ADDICTION

April 8, 2013

Are you a people pleaser? Do you care too much about the approval of others? Is there any area of life where you are making decisions based on what other people will think about you?

“Nevertheless even among the rulers many believed in Him, but because of the Pharisees they did not confess Him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue; for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.” John 12:42-43

Check out Part 5 in the Crazymakers series: "The Snare of Approval Addiction."

Crazymakers Part 4 - BOUNDARIES AND RELATIONSHIPS

April 1, 2013

Part 4 in the Crazymakers series. This week is all about BOUNDARIES - what is my responsibility and what isn't? Should I help every person in need? Should I help no one in need? Where do I draw the line? The answer to these questions might surprise you. One of the things that I said in the message is that our goal is NOT to aim for equality - the goal isn't to treat everyone the same way. That wasn't what Jesus did surprisingly enough.

So what should we be aiming for? You'll have to listen to find out!

On Selective Compassion

March 29, 2013

I recently saw a documentary called “Life in a Day.” It’s a film that compiled thousands of hours of footage from people around the globe going through one particular day. The film had some light-hearted moments – like when a young boy asked his dad why he was filming him and nervously veered his head out from the camera frame – but mostly, it was sobering.

It showed destitute people in Nepal, a helpless family in a hut in Egypt, a young boy carrying his wooden stand through streets till he arrived at his designated corner for his shoe shine operation. The juxtaposition of those images with a man giddily driving his Lamborghini, a teenage girl obsessing over her iPhone or a man in a restaurant watching sushi pass him by on a conveyor belt were naturally jarring. The idea that some people have so little while others (us) have a lot is a subject of which we are aware. And to see such images is heartbreaking.

Jesus in Weakness (sermon video)

March 26, 2013

I’ve been a priest for close to 12 years now. And in those 12 years, I’ve probably preached more than 1,000 sermons. But very few of them have ever touched me in the same way as the one below.

This is the video of a sermon I gave two years ago during this same time of year – the second week of Lent. It is based on the passage from Matthew 4:1-11, the temptation of Christ in the wilderness.

I just watched it this morning and could still feel the chills in my spine as I remembered the picture of Jesus during those 40 days in the desert. The picture is not a pleasant one at all – it’s not the strong Jesus that we love to picture, or the Almighty Jesus or the Eternal Jesus. Instead we see a picture of a weak Jesus. A hungry Jesus. A Jesus in need of help from the angels. And that picture breaks my heart.

Crazymakers Part 3 - RESOLVING CONFLICT

March 25, 2013

It's one of the most important things to learn in life - yet it's something that's very rarely ever taught. HOW TO RESOLVE CONFLICT - that was the topic of yesterday's message in the Crazymakers series. In it, we looked at both the strategy (mindset) and the steps (what to do) to resolve the inevitable conflicts of life.

Such an important message for everyone. Unresolved conflict hurts everyone and just sucks the life right out of life. As I said in this message, we need to figure out a way to walk hand in hand, even when we don't see eye to eye.

Hope you enjoy!