A few testimonies shown at our Easter Service this year at Community Gospel Church.
Jacobs Story.
Brandi’s Story.
Mike’s Story.
“I may be weak, but Your Spirit’s strong in me!”
God is alive!
How was your Easter?
-jordan
Posts Tagged 'leadership'
Easter Testimonies
Published April 25, 2011 Uncategorized Leave a CommentTags: Bible, Christian, Christianity, church, devotional, devotions, discipleship, Easter, Emmanuel, encouragement, Evangelism, Faith, God, grace, Jesus, leadership, leadership principles, ministry, music, pastor, people, prayer, Religion, testimony, Worship, youth, youth ministry, youth ministry tools
Discipline Implementation (Prayer)
Published February 28, 2011 Uncategorized Leave a CommentTags: church, discipleship, how to pray, leadership, leadership principles, ministry, Paul, prayer, prayer requests, youth, youth ministry
Pastor Mike Fanning’s gave our youth a message tonight at Velocity on Paul’s prayer requests and how to pray. Will you/Can you pray this way with us this week?
- PRAY: God help me to understand your Word, the Bible (Eph. 1:16-17).
- PRAY: God I need your strength through the Holy Spirit (Eph. 3:16-19).
- PRAY: God help me to know your love and experience it at a deeper level (Eph. 3:16-19).
- PRAY: God help me to pray for others (Eph. 6:18-20).
- PRAY: God give me the words to say to declare the Gospel of Jesus Christ (Eph. 6:18-20).
- PRAY: God help me to love others more and more (Phil. 1:9)
- PRAY: God show me your will for my life (Col. 1:9-12).
Discipline yourself.
I dare you!
-jordan
A Discipline Story
Published February 21, 2011 Uncategorized 2 CommentsTags: Bible, church, discipline, Jordan, leadership, leadership principles, meditation, ministry, Muck, prayer, spiritual, study, youth, youth ministry, youth ministry tools
The following is a video we played for our teenagers demonstrating what spiritual discipline looks like in my life and how I implement it. It was a powerful illustration that the teens really latched onto.
How are you spiritually disciplining yourself?
-jordan
2010 Reading List
Published January 3, 2011 Uncategorized Leave a CommentTags: Andy Stanley, Bible, Bill Hybels, books, C.S. Lewis, Christianity, church, david platt, donald miller, Forgotten God, Francis Chan, harley, James Dobson, leadership, Mark Cahill, ministry, reading, reading list, Steven Furtick, tim keller
Books I read in 2010:
A Grief Observed: C.S. Lewis
His Needs Her Needs for Parents: Willard Harley
*To Own a Dragon: Donald Miller
Bringing Up Girls: James Dobson [DNF (did not finish)]
^BodyMinder: Workout and Exercise Journal: F.E. Wilkins
*Too Busy Not to Pray: Bill Hybels
*In Constant Prayer: Robert Benson
*Forgotten God: Francis Chan
*Sun Stand Still: Steven Furtick
The Christian Atheist: Craig Groeschel
Radical: David Platt
**Prodigal God: Tim Keller
The Fine Line: Kary Oberbrunner
**Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard: Chip and Dan Heath
**Leadership and Self Deception: The Arbinger Institute
Stuff Christians Like: Jonathan Acuff
*A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: Donald Miller
*7 Practices of Effective Ministry: Andy Stanly
The One Thing You Can’t Do in Heaven: Mark Cahill
^One Heartbeat Away: Mark Cahill
^Honor Few, Fear None: Rubean Gavazos
House: Ted Dekker and Frank Peretti
* – Would recommend
** – Would highly recommend
^- Would not recommend
Bold – This years favorite
What did you read last year?
-jordan
From Better to Best
Published January 1, 2011 Uncategorized Leave a CommentTags: bible change, biblical leadership, book excerpt, Christ-based leadership, christian change, churches, layleader, leaders, leadership, minister, ministry, pastors, what does the bible say about change
Change bothers me. That’s probably a head scratcher to some people but regardless, it’s true. Change is change and change my friend, is hard. I’ve told and been told, “You need to deal with it”. While that’s true, it doesn’t make it easier to handle. Personally, change from bad to good is easy to handle. However, changing from good to better to even better to best is when it gets hard.
Explanation?
Sure.
When we go from bad to good we’re satisfied. Life is getting better, things are progressing, and the change is accepted. However, when we move from good to better or better to best, we often have to give up control of something, somewhere in ourselves. That is difficult no matter who you are.
I can recall recording our first record. All the people involved had to give up control to let the who were specialists in their area do what they do best. If it were in a single persons hands, the record would have turned out a flop. In the end the disc turned out better than anyone could have imagined because we all let the people involved do what was needed to accomplish the goal. While a lot of us wanted to do things that we outside of our giftedness, we knew it would be detrimental to the disc.
Know this.
The further down the road you get in ministry, the more you will have to come to the realization that if you want to grow then you have to change. That change might be easy at the start as you go from bad to good but it will be more and more difficult when you go from good to better and better to best. You will lose control something, somewhere, every time. As the ministry and impact grows, so does control. What you have been used to doing in the past, you might not get a chance to do in the future.
That’s not a bad thing.
So in change, may you utilize the time in going from good to better and better to best by continuing to hone your individual skill that God has gifted you to do. Focus in on becoming a specialist at what you know God has gifted you to do best. As you give up control and let others impact those around them by their gifting from God, may you impact other the way God has gifted you. This is the beauty of the kingdom of God. When all the saints are humble and active in utilizing their gifts, God is glorified in the change. From bad to good, good to better, and better to best.
Stil processing it myself.
-jordan
Listen Up
Published December 13, 2010 Uncategorized Leave a CommentTags: Bible, James, leadership, leading, Peter, principles
Jesus’ brother James declares, “Know This! Let every person be quick to listen.” Not to brag but I’m good at listening. I do it often (not going to lie, I like to talk too). I love listening to peoples opinions, their stories, and hearing what’s on their heart. Outside of the context of people, I love listening to God’s message even more. I love sermons, reading the Bible, and even listening to scripture audibly. However, in the daily grind of listening, I often get lost in putting into action what I have previously heard.
To James, listening wasn’t in itself enough. The act of gaining knowledge was useless if it did not accompany action. Look at his letter, “Anyone who hears the Word and does not do what it says will deceives themselves.“
I don’t want to deceive myself. So I strive to put into action what Christ calls me to become. Through Peter I gain the knowledge of who I am Christ. I’m holy, royal, and chosen through faith in Christ. Therefore, the life I live must accompany the knowledge that I have received. The pursuit must always be separation from self gratification to the identification of who I am contained in the Word of God.
Dear Christian, don’t forget who you are in Christ. “Become,” or “keep on becoming”, a doer of the Word and not just a hearer. Put the truth presented in the written Word into action in your everyday life.
Apply your knowledge.
-jordan
Velocity: New Series (VIDEO)
Published November 10, 2010 Uncategorized Leave a CommentTags: Christianity, church, discipleship, encouragement, imove, Jordan Muck, leadership, ministry, movie, trailor, Worship, youth, youth ministry, youth ministry tools
We utilized iMovie trailers for this upcoming series on James. Looks pretty sweet! Can’t wait to roll it out and get our teenagers into the Word of God.
What are you studying?
-jordan
AND CONFERENCE: Matt Carter (Breakout)
Published November 5, 2010 Uncategorized Leave a CommentTags: AND, Chris Tomlin, Christianity, church, conference, encouragement, GCC, God, granger, Granger Community Church, leadership, leadership principles, Matt Carter, Metropolitan Tabernacle Church, ministry, people, Pop goes the church, the austin stone
About Matt: Alongside worship leader Chris Tomlin, Matt is the Senior Pastor of The Austin Stone Community Church in Austin, TX, one of the 100 fastest growing churches in Amercia. Matt has been the featured speaker at Houston Metro and various camps and conferences nationwide. He currently lives in Austin with his wife Jennifer and his three children, John Daniel, Annie and Samuel. Check Matt out on Twitter.
My Notes/Thoughts:
- Matt’s plan for his church was off of Charles Spurgeon and the Metropolitan Tabernacle Church. That is awesome.
- There has to be a time when you don’t run from the city because of its problems but embrace the city for its restoration and renewal for the gospel.
- Matt says his job is to exhaust the name of Jesus Christ period. Is that yours as a pastor? As a disciple? As a Saint?
- The Tabernacle engaged the city but building low income housing residences, built homes for the elderly, built a school and a home for the orphans, took care of single moms, began a school that educated poor pastors, started a ministry to train business men to do missions as men in their workplace, etc. etc. etc. Our churches aren’t doing jack compared to this model. We need to raise the bar and the standard on what we are trying to accomplish and the people we are ministering to.
- Would the city grieve if your church closed its doors tomorrow?
- When a gospels doing a good work in your church the gospels will do a good work through your church.
- Matt opened his bible and spoke from it. This is he first I have seen in this conference (sad?). There are also few people in his breakout session… What happened to our hunger for expository preaching of the Word and relating it to the culture? Oh wait, I’m at a church conference, never mind.
- Are you for your city?
Seriously, go and be challenge by Matt. Our technology today gives us the ability to sit in so many churches via podcast and the Austin Stone is one that you need to attend weekly. You can access their material here.
AND CONFERENCE: Jason Miller
Published November 5, 2010 Uncategorized Leave a CommentTags: AND, Christianity, church, conference, encouragement, enter mission, GCC, God, granger, Granger Community Church, Jason Miller, leadership, leadership principles, ministry, Notre Dame, people, Theology
About Jason: Jason has been a part of the ministry at Granger for 7 years, leading worship and teaching in our environments for students, the midweek core, and weekend guests over that time. Now as Pastor of Arts and Teaching, he leads the team of creative and technical artists and volunteers who are responsible for the live experiences that implement Granger’s strategy for outreach. While driving the week-to-week creative process that results in weekend services, he also finds time to hit the books as he pursues his graduate degree in Theology from the University of Notre Dame. You can find his blog here.
My Notes/Thoughts:
- Your ministry might not get left out but it might get transformed.
- Story telling is how God get’s his message out to the world.
- Missional thinking says that there has to be a better way to what we are doing and worshipping God in His presence in every place on the earth. This is an interesting concept if you view the church as a “sacred space”.
- Loving people means that you love people the way that God loves them and understand that their view of love is jaded and outside of what God’s love is like.
- If people can’t see what you’re doing, they can’t be apart of it.
- Do something beautiful and let people see God manifested.
- There is a difference between beauty and style. Style doesn’t transform anything. Beauty however has a residence in the heart of God. We need to go where things resinate with the heart of God instead of just trying to look cool.
- “The church is God’s imagination for the world.”
- “Where you invest you love, you invest your life.”
I’m not going to lie, I was pretty wiped out during this session. When you listen to one speaker after another after another your brain starts to hurt. He did however have an awesome illustration using going to the bathroom and getting the light turned out on your. It was a sweet illustration. I’m stealing it.
Your the man Jason. Keep preaching it for Jesus brother!
-jordan
AND CONFERENCE: Tim Stevens (Main Session)
Published November 5, 2010 Uncategorized Leave a CommentTags: AND, Christianity, church, conference, encouragement, enter mission, GCC, God, granger, Granger Community Church, leadership, leadership principles, leading smart, ministry, people, Pop goes the church, Tim Stevens
About Tim: For over 15 years, Tim’s leadership has helped Granger connect with people who think church is irrelevant. He has done this through the creative blending of architecture, strategy and technology. He’s acutely tuned in to popular culture and is instrumental in balancing operations, building creative teams and inspiring artists to brand each message series and sharpen the weekend experience. He’s co-authored the Simply Strategic book series using humor and practical principles to equip churches and ministry leaders, and in 2008 published Pop Goes the Church to challenge leaders to leverage the culture to reach their communities. You can read more on Tim at Leading Smart.
My Notes/Thoughts:
Tim used a couple of youtube videos that you can see here:
- Missional Schmissoinal (There is no way that is spelled wrong… it was on the screen that way so it must be a word)
- Attractional Schmactional (Seriously… what’s going on. You should be here and it would make more sense.)
- Tim talked a lot about getting worn out or burned out on missional and attractional thinking. I love how he talked about the “Sunday’s Coming” concept (that you have to come up with something every Sunday). It is a wearing process on those in the church but I love how it all comes back to Christ and being like him. Some things will land and some won’t. That’s just the way it is but you have to keep going and serving the kingdom of God.
- “A growing number of Americans are recognizing a need to develop their inner life… but many don’t know where to begin.” -USA Today
- All churches can be described in America as “Come to us”.
Tim closed with three main points:
- There are things we can do to reach the 60% of the unchurched. We have to strive to figure that out.
- We need to focus on those 40% who come to the church. We cannot lose focus on our people and their spiritual needs.
- We must help the 40% of the churched reach their 60% of the unchurched that they know.
Man, I lean so much when Tim talks. I love the fact that he talked about the church being in the heart of the community. That the church (building) is the place to go for all the needs of the people. What an amazing concept that would take a massive amount of faith.
Good stuff.
-jordan
