Healthy Small Groups

Joylene has a helpful post on her blog Therapy.

She outlines what she feels are some of the helpful components for healthy small groups. I'm guessing we should all listen up as this comes from a Marriage and Family Therapist that runs groups for a living. :)

Among some of her insights I like:

• 3. Commitment- Being regular to a group and providing accountability to those that are MIA
• 5. Journey/Stages- Recognizing that many are in different "places" in the faith.

You can read the entire post here.

Intimacy Part 2

This Tuesday in Downtown Dalton we will get real with What Culture is Selling Us? We will discuss the issue of False Intimacy and how these illegitimate ways of meeting out legitimate needs so often seems the quick easy fix but inevitably leaves us feeling empty and often ashamed.

Join us and bring a friend!

MyScandaLust.com

Mountain Lake Community Church near Atlanta has started a blog for their up coming series. You can check it out here.... not for the faint of heart.

Among other things the church is planning to bring in former porn star, Shelley Lubben, who will be at Mountain Lake Church to share her story of escaping the sex industry and becoming a Christ-Follower!


I'm so impressed by this church! I applaud Shawn Lovejoy and his staff for tackling such an important and difficult issue.

You must jet over to the link above and read some of the stuff people are blogging about! Powerful.

Joylene's Blog: Therapy

Joylene has entered the blogging world and I hope that many of you will venture over to her site as she has a lot of powerful insights. The link is joylenegreen.blogspot.com.

For those that don't know Joylene is my wife, a Marriage and Family Therapist, a Bible-Theology Graduate, and a Christ Follower. I know very few people that have the insight and have experienced the emotional growth and freedom that Joylene has over the last 10 years. If you are someone looking for authenticity and insight head over to her blog as I'm sure she will do a top job-- she only knows one way to do things... well.

Intimacy? part 2

September 4th @ 7:15pm in down town Dalton we will begin part 2 of our Intimacy? series titled "What's Culture Selling Us?" Be there and bring a friend.

Become Action Oriented

There's a great post over at Pick the Brain's blog titled 7 ways to grow the action habit and it's a must read for anyone trying to get things done. I think all of us dreamers and thinkers could use a bit of action minded living... yea it's true isn't it.

Here are a few from the list that stood out at me:

• 3. Remember that ideas alone don’t bring success
• 4. Use action to cure fear
• 6. Think in terms of now

I especially liked number 4. If you read a post I had a week or so ago titled Death by Risk Aversion you'll understand why... essentially it's that space between the idea and the fruition of it where we "freeze" and are filled with fear. Thus as Pick the Brain states let's use action to cure fear. I've certainly found that helpful in my own life.

Here's the graphic I refer to in Death by Risk Aversion


By the way here's the link to the origin post.

Intimacy Issues Recap

Tonight we took off the mask and got real with each other. There were awkward moments. There was a restless tight feeling across those gathered. There was silence and a stillness as we closed in worship. I believe the spirit moved in peoples lives tonight as we hit intimacy head on dealing with sex, porn, and the like.

Here's a recap:

• Intimacy Issues we all have them.
• Intimacy Issues are common to us all.
• I told a story about a guy and a girl. About intimacy and intimacy lost.
• We looked at Genesis 2 and 3 where Adam and Eve fall illustrating and ushering in intimacy issues for us all. We noted a pattern in Genesis: naked and unashamed, tempted, giving in to temptation, naked and ashamed, hiding from God.
• What is Intimacy? Relationship, Connectedness, Authenticity, Openness, Trust, Safety, and Being fully Known
• We will never be fully known in this life. Period.
• Only God, who already fully knows us, can usher in true intimacy. In fact, since Genesis 2 and 3 God has been orchestrating the renewal and reconnection of intimacy with humanity.
• We ended looking at John 3:16 and 17.

Simple Fool rocked the house tonight and we had a lot of new people checking us out!

SEPTEMBER 4th we will jump into Intimacy pt 2: What's Culture Selling Us?

Church Architecture

No I'm not speaking about the whole shabang of church architecture but I ran across an post on Think Christian that linked to some amazing church architecture in Uragua. You must check this out!

Here's the Link

According to Andy at Think Christian this was the product of a Catholic Church contest... maybe churches should have more contests?

Here's the post I stumbled upon at TC.

Matthew's Table Values: Part 3 of 3

This is our final part where we discuss Matthew's Table Values... part 3...

5. Balance/Wisdom: We believe that maturity involves growing in the balance, simplicity, humility, and practicality of wisdom, not endless complexity, pride, controversy, and abstraction. As a result, we focus with wholehearted commitment on "core Christianity," those essential truths and practices, made clear in the Bible, which Christians across the ages have held in common, and which most effectively nourish spiritual vibrancy. In addition, wisdom should guides us towards integrated, holistic, systems thinking, encouraging synergy instead of competition within community.

6. Spiritual Vibrancy/Mystery: We recognize that this world, life and God are all too profound and complex to be reduced to simplistic formulas or to be neatly packed and cataloged in boxes. We embrace the wonder and mystery of all of creation and of the Creator, and seek to celebrate, enjoy, and experience the goodness of God, that far surpasses our understanding. We value spiritual disciplines to help us grow in spiritual vibrancy, including the study of Scripture, prayer, worship, fasting, feasting, fellowship, journaling, silence, and service. In light of the awesome mysteries of our faith, and strengthened through spiritual disciplines, we seek to live "life to the full" in Christ.

How do you think we are doing?

Part 1

Part 2

If you enjoyed this series why not check out the posts titled Service: Why isn't the Church Going?

Matthew's Table Values: Part 2 of 3

Our Values continued ... part 2...

3. Acceptance/Diversity: We believe that without a conscious pursuit of diversity we will tend to fall back into our "looks like me" comfort zone. We reach out to a wide variety of people and encourage them to explore their questions and progress in their spiritual journey at their own pace. We welcome them with their unique blends of experiences, gifts, challenges, and insights, believing that we will be enriched as a group by the contributions of each individual.

4. Innovation/Creativity: We serve a creative God! The splendor and span of God´s creativity call us to creative innovation. This quality keeps us moving forward as individuals and as a group. We do not wish to fall into the status quo of ministry. We value the spontaneity of the Spirit and will not allow ourselves to speak that tragic phrase, “we’ve never done it like that before”. Jesus said only new, flexible wine skins could hold the new wine of the Spirit, so we are committed to remaining flexible, teachable, not change-averse. It´s not enough for us believers to be contemporary; we need to be anticipatory, leaning forward, riding the crest of the wave, being part of the exciting "new things" that God is doing — things that we are privileged to be part of as they emerge.

How do you think we are doing?

Part 1

Part 3

Matthew's Table Values: Part 1 of 3

If you have ever wondered what Matthew's Table holds as our guiding values... Part 1 of 3

1. Authenticity/Integrity: We want to be real, honest, and genuine, in our personal and professional life. We want more than slick productions and nice appearances; we want to encourage people to be authentic with God and one another. This value means we don´t hide our rough edges and struggles. We know that we all stumble every day in many ways — and so we seek to encourage brothers and sisters in Christ to "fall in the light" — to readily admit our mistakes, not to hide or try to cover them up. Sometimes, a sense of humor helps us to avoid taking our mistakes and ourselves so seriously — so we can take the amazing grace of God more seriously. Along with authenticity, we seek to pursue integrity — morally, financially, relationally. We want the genuine quality and integrity of our lives to honor Christ and make a difference in the world.

2. Connection/Community: We are not just a disconnected crowd of people who attend public programs together. Our ideal is a dynamic balance that we call "mission through community," believing that mission is essential to community, and community to mission. This balance takes time, effort and vulnerability. But how can people experience the rich life God intends for them unless they are connected with others: serving and being served, challenging and being challenged, giving and receiving forgiveness, teaching and being taught, giving and receiving, failing and being encouraged and offering encouragement to fellow strugglers? How can people experience the "life to the full" offered by Christ if they never laugh and cry and work and communicate and forgive and experiment and rest and work together, connected to God and one another in a dynamic community of faith?

How do you think we are doing?

Read part 2

Read part 3

Jim and Casper go to Church

I stumbled upon this book review on http://www.simplyjosh.com - the blog of Joshua Griffin who is the manager of Purpose Driven Youth Ministry, a venue pastor at Saddleback Church and dabbles in community with Simply Youth Ministry.

Basically the book states that an atheist and former pastor visit churches across America on any random Sunday and review the church. Josh seems to express mixed feelings regarding the book as he writes,

Let me also caution you that the book is somewhat unfair - they visited churches on a random Sunday morning and only went to the large group meeting. No small groups, no seeking rest of what the church has to offer as a whole. But I guess that's the point, as hundreds of people like them visit church each week unannounced - and probably attend just the big church experience. Maybe it's more fair than I care to admit.

I can't wait to grab this one. Anyone else read it?

Little Annoying Struggles

Well the last few days have been very difficult. I'm not talking the world falling apart here, rather I'm referring to the continuous flow of irritating little things. Examples: locating air pots for coffee has taken a ton our time, Nursery workers went undone, our Connection team lead is stuck in Jamaica and so is her back up. I guess you send out a mailer to 4800 people etc etc... you push back on the powers that be and well you get some push back yourself.

It could be just life. :)

I really think tonight is going to ROCK! I believe God is going to really transform some lives tonight! I pray that the place is packed and the spirit comes and does his work in spite of us.

Myspace Link and Bulletin

Visiting Rock Bridge Community Church

Joylene and I will be visiting with Rock Bridge Community Church in Dalton, GA this morning. I've visited twice before but Joylene has never had a chance to see Matt Evans, Aaron Gable, and crew in action. They are in the midst of a series called "Is it in You".

Rock Bridge is one of the premier church plants in Northwest Georgia... at age 5 they now have ~1250 on Sundays in a county of 130000. Their worship service is modeled after a North Point or New Spring and the life of the church or small groups are modeled after Mountain Lake in Cumming GA.

This is the first in a series of visits to local churches as well as churches in the area... we plan to visit and thus learn from Rock Bridge, Oak Leaf, Mountain Lake, North Point, New Spring, Rock Point, Revolution Church, Cross Point in Decatur Alabama, and a few others.

It should be an interesting morning.

Intimacy? Thoughts in Process

I must say I've found our up coming series exciting yet difficult from a preparation perspective. It may be something known as spiritual warfare, as I've been experiencing waves of doubt, insecurity, and condemning accusations that I'm the last person that should talk about Intimacy. Those feelings are accurate in many respects. I have a past that is long and ugly. However, the condemnation is not of God. In fact I believe God is going to use my personal experience (past) and do some amazing things in the life of our community.

I'm excited about sharing this Tuesday about something that's common to us all... Intimacy Issues!

Check it out in downtown Dalton this Tuesday at 7:15 pm.

New Webstie Up and Running for MT

Matthew's Table website received an upgrade this past week moving from dreary html templates to flash. Things still aren't completely updated and we need to add a few links and additional pages, however I'm very happy with the look and feel of the site. Let us know if you experience problems with the Simple Fool track because we have had a terrible time updating it.

Check it out!

www.matthewstable.com

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Dalton State College

I was over at the college today while the BCM was feeding students hot dogs and such! I was overwhelmed by the number of students on this first day of classes. I love our relationship with Bill Grissett from the BCM and I love his and its heart for reaching students on campus!

Drive over to DSC sometime and just check out the campus! You will be amazed by the growth and number of students.

On the other hand I feel more and more certain we MUST place a club or ministry on campus sometime during this school year. We've run into a brick wall on several occasions so if anyone has some connections please let me know.

10 EASY WAYS TO GET THE MOST OUT OF YOUR DAY

I love this type of post.

A few of my favorites were:

2. Start off great.

5. Avoid interruptions.

7. Have a time for calls and meetings.


It's the little stuff that can really wreck your day... remember people are what we in ministry do so if you aren't making time for people why not sell widgets?

Head over to Freelance Switch Blog and check this out.

Hitting the Pavement

Myself and several others (thanks to each of you) were able to put up almost all of the posters for our Intimacy? series that starts next week. I've been amazed at what a great job Liberty Press did with the posters! They look very sharp. We placed all but about 20 around Dalton and Chatsworth. I plan to take the other 20 over to Dalton State College and see if the BCM can get some up for us.

The work was hard in 100 degree temps, but rewarding!

One kid remarked after I put a sign up, "Damn two people in bed for a church thing, that's too much!" I loved the response. Although not as thoughtful as I might have liked I really believe the logo will draw people into the posters, mini-invites, and direct mailing and give us an additional second and third look.

Intimacy? T minus 8 days

Intimacy?

• Intimacy Issues? August 21
• What's the Culture Selling Us? September 4th
• Real Intimacy. September 18th
• Intimacy: you, me, and them. October 2nd

The Three S's of Delegation

I ran across the following on Church Relevance blog.

Kevin Moore a youth pastor from Tulsa OK says,

1. Speak it- nothing surpasses one on one info from a knower to a learner
2. Spell it-it's tedious but writing it out (vision, goal, objectives) is key to success. We often skip this step feeling it is far to anal and such... it's not, rather it's clear communication on which you will live or die.
3. Slowly Release-this is the part where the learner watches the knower do the task. We often skip this step believing we have been clear enough... no show them.

You can read Kevin's take on this here titled Learn to Delegate, Not Dump.

Death by Risk Aversion

I saw this over on Creating Passionate Users blog... looks like he/she/they might be hanging up the blogging thing for a while if not forever.



I wonder what this says about where we are in the growth process. Don't miss read me here I'm talking about we as a ministry and we as individuals. Are we paralyzed between vision and actual accomplishment of that vision in such a way that we never arrive or we abort?

There's a thin line between following God and vision and being rigidly stubborn. Here's to hoping we find that healthy balance!

Reminder: One August 21st

Our series on Intimacy? begins August 21st @ 7:15pm in downtown Dalton.

Longer Lasting Volunteers?

Everyone in church or para-church ministry understands the importance of a strong volunteer base so I was excited to run across the following helpful post today from Church Relevance blog. It's titled "6 Keys to a Longer Lasting Church Volunteer"!

Here's a few that hit me:

• 2. Be a burden-bearer, not a burden-maker.
• 3. Look for learners, not experts.
• 6. Offer a variety of responsibilities and terms of service.

Head over to Church Relevance and check them out it's a great blog.

The Cycle of a Fan

I stumbled upon a great post on Church of the Customer blog about developing contacts within your organization into "fans". It's called the Cycle of a Fan.

I did not create this nifty visual neither did Church of the Customer blogger Jackie rather it was Geno from Brains on Fire Blog... props must be given to where they are due.

As was noted on both of the aforementioned blogs, go read them and you will see, participation is the key to moving people from mere "visitors" toward "fans". We need to create more "fans" of Matthew's Table. This has been dreadfully apparent over the last few weeks as we have really stepped up the heat as far as our One connection point goes. Our leadership core has finds our collective self over worked and without help.

To do: get people involved. Allow them to participate on some level early in the process. At this point it appears we are merely introducing people, which is true to our model of Connection through One however this practice will not get us over the dip we find ourselves struggling to climb out of... nope. We must focus on ways to get people involved ... participate should be our mantra this Fall.

Lovejoy's Top 10 Ways to Invite Someone to Church

This is good stuff. I especially liked the following:

4. Have a BBQ and invite some co-workers or friends over to eat. Here's the only criteria for the INVITATION list: They can't go to church anywhere.

8. Just say: "Hey, man, what would I have to do to talk you into giving God and the church one more shot this week?"

10. Say: "You would not believe what my church is going to be doing this next weekend..."

You can find the entire list here.

John Lull and Rome, GA

I had a great time with John last night in Rome. John will be a senior at Berry College and he and I go way back. For those of you that do not know John went to Visible School 5 years ago or so where he taught and studied music (worship particularly), he then did a stint at Rhodes College before transferring to Berry a few years back.

We ate at this sweet sports bar called Jefferson's in downtown Rome! You must check it out if you are ever in the area. On the down side we must have watched Barry Bonds home run shot 500 thousand times on the TVs in the place :( (I have not beef with Bonds but come on you know).

After having some bodacious wings, a huge mammoth burger, and some beer battered onion rings we were off to Starbucks for some caffeination and yea that's my own word. We sat around and of course I talked a lot about church theory and such.... I have this love hate relationship with the current evangelical church growth model (a la North Point, Granger, etc etc), but that's another post. We were all over the map really. We headed to John's bachelor pad after a bit to play some Nintendo Wii and pray together. It was so sweet to reconnect and pray with a strong brother. There's nothing like laying your heart open and bare for all to see.

It was nice to reconnect with a very good friend!

Intimacy? Only two weeks!!!

We are only two weeks away from what will be an exciting time of growth for the ministry. As we move into our bi-monthly schedule and seek to do some formal marketing I think things will heat up in this Fall.

For those living under a rock... We kick off a four part series on August 21st at 7:15pm in downtown Dalton titled Intimacy. In part one we will be discussing Intimacy Issues. This is a don't miss message as it will hit home for many of us.

I got so pumped and excited when I received the 2500 mini-invites in the mail this week! I've already disseminated around 500. As Dalton State College kicks off the Fall semester in a few weeks a crew will be saturating the campus with these mini-invites. We are looking to hand out between 750-1000 on the first 4 days of class. We also need a crew to place/put up 100 signs in Dalton and Chatsworth over the weekend. Further, another crew will be needed to place road/yard signs around town (100 to be exact). If you are itching to get involved here's your chance.

Intimacy?

• Intimacy Issues? August 21
• What's the Culture Selling Us? September 4th
• Real Intimacy. September 18th
• Intimacy: you, me, and them. October 2nd

Ricky Harrod @ Starbucks

I had the chance to hang out with Ricky Harrod, the lead singer of Dead Men Walking, on Tuesday afternoon for about an hour or so. I can honestly say that I haven't been around a lot of guys with the energy and shear passion (zeal?) for Christ in a long time. Ricky is one of those guys that gets the gospel in it's largest and purest form. For Ricky the gospel has no territory or boundaries, rather the gospel is to be a wave of community togetherness, which in the end will (ought?) to form a quilt type blanket of sorts. Ricky is excited about now. Ricky is excited about tomorrow. Ricky wants to work together with others that are likewise community minded. Ricky is a disciple.

By the way Ricky is following God in putting together an event called the Great Uprising on October 6th (Saturday). Bands. Free Food. Speakers. I'll let you know more about this one as it gets closer. Dead Men Walking are playing at this Friday as headliners in Dalton, GA. Email me for more info about either event.

I enjoyed it man.

Tuesday Night Prayer

A group of us will be getting together tonight around 7:00pm to pray for the community at large, Dalton State College, Matthew's Table, Community Groups, and One.

Join us at the Book Nook in downtown Dalton or pray where you are.

Grant Writing Seminar in Cartersville GA

I'll be heading down to Cartersville on Wednesday for a Grant Writing Seminar that has specific talks on Faith Based Orgs. Here's a few of the sessions I plan to join:

Federal Grant Writing Basics
Grant Opportunities from the White House Office of Faith Based Organizations

The event is being held at the Georgia Highlands Bartow County campus and is free.

I'll be heading over to Rome after the even to hang with John Lull on Wednesday Night.  It will be nice to get out away from things for a day and do some thinking and learning in a different environment.

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Need Prayer?

I'm setting aside some time over the next few days to pray for a specific things and to hear from God. In the process I would be glad to pray for you about whatever needs you have etc. Just email me at info@matthewstable.com.

Intimacy? Resources

Here's a where we got stuff for the fall series:

• The series logo was photographed and edited by Jeremy Owens in full. Thus we did the logo in house from start to finish. The bed in the picture is mine and Joylene's bed, the feet are not ours, however they are Jeremy and Greta's with me holding a baby off camera and Jared snapping photos.
• Direct Mail piece design was also done by Jeremy Owens prior to munching down on some burgers compliments of Aaron Simpson.
• Liberty Press is doing the direct mail. They do the printing, the bar coding/addressing, and take the mailers to the press. Thanks to Oakleaf's Behind the Leaf for the tip on these guys.
• PSprint provided the direct mailing list with demographical breakdown for us.
  
• Liberty is also doing our 13x18 posters.
• Netprint is doing our mini-invites that are nothing more than full color business cards posing as invites (front and back).
• Our yard signs were done by these guys. Easy to use and quick.
• We are using some lifechurch.tv resources for our intimacy series videos and a few others from bluefish.

Connie the Judgemental Cow

The first one has made me laugh for weeks. I found it on Paul Joseph's blog. You can read his blog here or if you are less lazy just type in http://criesoftheheart.com/

The second one was on his lovely blog today!

Paul is a great guy and his blog is well worth the read.

Going Away Party: Jansen

For those of you that found your way here below is the info for Jansen's going away party. If you don't know Jansen is headed to the Navy in a few weeks. I have nothing to do with this party...other than supporting Jansen.

Sunday September 2nd 5-8pm @ the North Summit Club House

Please RSVP if you are coming call Lisa @ 706-217-8144.
For more info call Macaela @ 770-548-1199.


directions are as follows:

North on Cleveland Hwy (from Dalton)
Take North Oak Drive (Prima Care and the Chevron)
Turn Right on North Summit
Turn Left on Summit House Dr
The club is the last on right

Leadership, Vision, Fund Raising, and Jesus 101

I had the privilege to spend an hour or so of the morning over breakfast with Dave Grusnick of FCA. I love receiving instruction/advice from those that know more about a subject than I do... Dave definitely fits that bill! We chatted about ministry and "getting organized" as Dave puts it. When you talk to Dave you can always expect passion, excitement, and a healthy dose of Jesus! I came away from the time feeling energized and focused.

If you haven't caught the learning fever or the finding a coach/mentor fever you should. I believe we each need someone to coach us and someone to coach in our lives!

Thanks for your time Dave.


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