Catalyst West Coast. As I write this, I am in a hotel room in Irvine for the conference that, I truly believe, is going to rock my world. After my love for Jesus and my family, my passion lie in (no particular order) my church, my business and becoming a better leader for both of those things. This conference promises to expand on all of these things, with music by Hillsong United thrown in to really make it a party.

There have been times in my life that I have felt were turning points for me. Times where I knew God was getting me ready for some big things. I don’t want to overstate it, but I believe this is one of those times. With the things that I have been working on, in business and church, I feel that the groundwork has been laid and these two days are going to kick into overdrive. There is a passage in Exodus where God sends Moses to the promised land:

The Lord said to Moses, “Depart; go up from here, you and the people whom you have brought up out of Egypt, to the land of which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, ‘To your offspring I will give it.’ Exodus 33:1 (ESV)

Today, as I sit here writing, I feel like that. Not comparing myself to Moses, but that clear voice saying, “Alright man, this is where the fun really starts!”

So, like Greg mentioned tonight, my prayer is that God just open me up in the next two day to take in all that I will experience, soak it all in and let Him lead me to where he wants me to be. This is so awesome. Stay tuned for the reports!

I describe this because in the last few months, many in this industry have been laid off, punctuated by the firing of 1,850 or some people from a major radio company in the last couple of days. They are great people who worked on their craft in a very specialized field, considering the number of radio stations in each city.

I have been through similar situations in the past, some very recent, and I was struck with this verse when I read it on the day that those that I know are hurting were laid off:

5 But don’t be upset, and don’t be angry with yourselves for selling me to this place. It was God who sent me here ahead of you to preserve your lives. Genesis 45:5 (NLT)

In this case, Jacob had been thrown in a pit by his brothers, sold into slavery by them and taken to Egypt. But from that, he had worked his way out of all this, been thrown in jail in the meantime, and still found his way to be the number 2 guy in Egypt, despite being Hebrew. 

But most of all, he forgives his brothers for letting him go. We are meant to do what God wants us to. If radio is it, you will find your way back, but a layoff will not stand in your way. It may be the change that you need. I know it has been for me. I am excited because I believe that I am going to be able to help those in need, in all media  industries and more. Bring it on!

Over the past couple of weeks, I have been sick, worked a special event, prepared a message for this weekend’s service and had some issues with work. But, the upside to all of this is when I go underground on the blogging scene, it means that God is growing me. I have been wrestling with things and it is pretty great. Now, I don’t want my hip popped out like Jacob (nor am I wrestling with God, just sayin’}, but there are those times and I know that it is going to be even better than before.

I guess my point is this: when you are into God’s Word, sometimes he is going to make you put it into action. And, it may make you busy. I believe it is alright if you are putting His Word into action you can catch up. I still don’t like not blogging about the Bible. It bums me out…

Fortunately, as I am reminded in the read today, Jesus gives a great lesson on praying:

9 And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.11 What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; 12 or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” Luke 11:9-13 ESV

The irony in this is that sometimes when we pray, we are really asking for the scorpion or the serpent. Yet, God always provides us with the fish or the egg. I know that many times I have prayed for something and then another thing happens in its place. But guess what, it ends up being better than what I thought was right. It usually ends up being somewhat trying, but at the end of the day when I look back on it all, I end up seeing how great it really was.

I love talking with God. In fact, I was doing that way before I was reading the Bible. It is an amazing thing and I hope that you might enjoy it as well. The funny thing about prayer is that we have been programmed to think that it only counts when we do it like in church. I believe that switch is always on. I think I will go have a chat right now. Thanks Jesus for the tips.

We crave attention and approval. It’s how we are wired. We want to be loved by our parents. We want the approval of our bosses. We want to be accepted. But, even in this text that is over 2000 years old, Jesus lets us know that this is not always going to be popular with others around us and we should not let that detour us. When addressing the religious leaders of the day (man, they didn’t even know what they were up against), he says:

33 For John the Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’ 34 The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ 35 Yet wisdom is justified by all her children.” Luke 7:33-35 ESV

I love this! What he is saying is, “Luke is totally pure and virtuous and you call him a demon. I hang out with people you don’t like and you call me a drunk. You are like a bunch of name calling kids.” Don’t we all face that everyday. Who cares what they think! We should be listening to what Jesus is saying to us. Not ever easy, but the way to go.

On to Luke 8, Jesus’ mother and brothers come to see him. His response:

19 Then his mother and his brothers came to him, but they could not reach him because of the crowd. 20 And he was told, “Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, desiring to see you.” 21 But he answered them, “My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.” Luke 8:19-21 ESV

Ouch! That one is rough. Being a mentor in student ministries, this one hits hard. For teenagers, despite all that is going on in with them, they crave acceptance. But, this is so great because the ultimate example of what we do should come from Jesus and those that are doing the Word of God. We need to do what is right, even if it something that parents aren’t into. Harsh? Yes. True? Absolutely! Parents not into your walk with Christ? Try to get them on board, but don’t let them detour you. Keep it up!

There is saying that says something to the effect that nothing comes easy and the things that are of worth to us come from hard work. How true that is of our walk with Christ. It is probably one of the most difficult things that we will do, but the kingdom awaits. I pray that you can keep on it and hope that you will do the same for me. I mean, it’s defying our human nature! We need all the help we can get.

So I mentioned that I have mentioned that I have worked for the Cardinals. For those of you who might happen upon this site that don’t know me (and even those that do), one of my jobs is engineering radio broadcasts for sports teams. What this means is I go to the arena three hours early, set up the audio equipment, connect a special phone line to the radio station and control the volume during the broadcast. Most of the time I work with the visiting hockey and basketball teams who hires me to work for them in Arizona, but there have been a few times that I have had the privilege to work with the Cardinals, home and away. I could write for days about my experiences with the Cardinals and the other teams that I have worked with, but that is not the point here.

You might ask, what is the point here? Isn’t this listed in the Church category? Bear with me. I have waited a long time for the Cardinals to win and Moses waited over 400 years to get his people to the promised land. You can keep reading for a few more paragraphs to get to the point! This is something we like to call in the broadcasting business as a “scene setter”.

It was December 31, 2006 and I went with the Cardinals to Indianapolis for a game on New Year’s Day. It is rare that this happens, but there I was on New Year’s Day working on a Sunday. I have spent most of my adult life working on New Year’s Eve, so this was not much different. What happened the next day I will never forget.

At this time, the Indianapolis Colts played in the old RCA Dome. It was old and antiquated. Yet, they sold out their games and it was a sea of blue in the stands. It was a circus! Two hour pre-game shows on TV, people everywhere. The Colts were on their way to the playoffs and the only thing on the line this day was for the Colts to secure a home playoff run. The Cardinals weren’t bad and they were playing for pride, to go .500 and the fans of this town wanted to make sure that didn’t happen. It was electric.

I was working with the Spanish broadcast team and we were positioned in the stands near the fans. It was off to the side, but still within the seats. I don’t know why I remember this, but I was with Gabriel Trujillo and Luis Zendejas of the spanish broadcast team and Luis looked out and said, “Can you imagine when we are in the new stadium and seeing a sea of red like we are seeing blue today?” This was the last game of the season that Cardinals has played at ASU Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe and the team was getting ready to move into University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale. The new stadium is state of the art and comfortable. While Sun Devil Stadium is great for college football at night, it was a little uncomfortable during the day at the end of an Arizona summer on Sundays. Plus, they weren’t a great football team. All that added up, the new stadium was going to help this team and our community. It has been all that and more, win or lose.

Now, on to the point of this point in the Church category. Like my friend Luis imagined on that New Year’s Day in Indy, I dream of the day when 60,000+ people can gather in a stadium and just worship God. If there can be that many that wear the team colors and worship a bunch of big, sweaty guys who try to kill each other, why can’t there be a day when we come together and just worship what really matters? That would be AWESOME! I think it could happen because:

4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. 5 Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; 6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:4-7 ESV

We will rejoice and come together like this. Just like a football or other sporting event, I know we will see the day when this kind of worship will happen. That will be cool. Don’t think it can happen? If the Cardinals can make it to the NFC Championship game, anything is possible!

Read more about Kurt Warner’s faith by clicking here.

Another champion, Tim Tebow’s faith is outlined here. Thanks to Dave Ferguson for the link on this one.

Alright, enough about the NFL. Get to church!

There are so many examples of this in the Bible, but none better than Abram. In Genesis 15, God speaks to Abram:

After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision: “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” Genesis 15:1 ESV

Abram had just turned down a great reward from the king of Sodom. How hard must it have been to turn that down? But here, God is telling him that there is even greater reward! Then God let’s him know that his offspring will outnumber the stars, as the guy is in his 90’s. If you have been trying to have children for that long, it’s pretty easy to see that you would think that it is not going to happen. Yet, with faith, anything is possible. We see here that we are rewarded for our faithfulness:

 6 And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness. Genesis 15:6 ESV

How cool is that? Personally, from my reads, I know that God has something cooking for me. I don’t know what it is yet, but by faith I know that it is going to happen. It’s probably something that nobody, even myself, would think possible from me. But, I have faith that it will happen and I am fired up! How exciting is that? I’ll keep you posted…

15 But now even more the report about him went abroad, and great crowds gathered to hear him and to be healed of their infirmities. 16 But he would withdraw to desolate places and pray. Luke 5:15-16 ESV

None of us are healing people and having concert sized crowds looking for us, but don’t we all have things that are demanding our attention? For me, even though many times I am alone, there are things that are clamoring for my attention. My laptop is the biggest culprit. The mobile phone is a close second. Beyond that I have work, my kids, my wife, my house (which is cleaner than ever, by the way), church and the list goes on.

Tonight it was this blog. I was going through code and it was frustrating me. If you use a computer at work, feel for the IT guys. It is part of what I do. There are hundreds of lines of code and we need to find the problem. It consumed me and I got frustrated. I finally put it aside and read.

There is the solution. Get away. No computer, no kids, no mobile phone, no nothing. Just me and God. I need to get away. Not far, just away from the things that are calling for my attention. God, thanks for giving me this Book to let me know what is up. Amen.

If you are coming here from myBibleJournal.com, thanks for checking it out. I am excited about the new look and some of the new technology that comes with the new theme. I am excited about the plans for the old site and I hope that it can be a tool to help you as well.

There is a lot going on and I am fired up about where it all is leading. As always, thanks for coming along for the ride and for your patience as we build this up.

42 And when it was day, he departed and went into a desolate place. And the people sought him and came to him, and would have kept him from leaving them,43 but he said to them, “I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns as well; for I was sent for this purpose.” Luke 4:42-43 ESV

This verse really spoke to me. In this, Jesus had done some great stuff in Capernaum, but he had to move on. I am at that point right now where a lot of great stuff has happened in my life and career, but I am getting the feeling today that I really need to narrow the focus and hit it hard. Don’t get me wrong, this is not about moving or making changes in my family. It is really about my time and what I use it for. Really, it’s such a God-thing, I am having a hard time putting it into words. But trust me, it’s nothing too drastic in my life in terms of everyday life. A more focused approach really…

It’s funny how this Bible read thing goes. It just starts speaking to you. Get ready for the fun. Stay tuned…