Community at Watermark

As a dad I can identify with the craziness that the holidays bring.

It all starts with great intentions.  The idealistic part of us desires to create memories, give to those in need, sit by the fire with loved ones contemplating our thankfulness and the eternal gift of Jesus our Savior. 

It quickly turns into a commercialized induced spending spree, trying to satisfy and keep peace with all family members and leaves little or no peace on earth.  

What happens?  These less than ideal memories can resemble something more out of Christmas Vacation.

This is where I realize that I need to notch down the idealistic expecatation but know that I can still create great meaning and memories for my family around Christmas.

With some planning and intentionality, a Dad Ready Christmas can truly reflect the spirit of the season and make memories for a life time.

Take a look at this site for a list of things to get your Dad Ready Christmas off to a great start;

http://blog.marshillchurch.org/2009/12/07/16-daddy-christmas-tips/

God, help me to get along with my in-laws this week.  Lord, allow me to give up control of the remote this year.  Lord, if only they would do the smoked ham that I love rather than the sweet, pineapple ham that I hate.

Well, some of these are worthy prayers and I do like a good smoked ham over a sweet, honey ham, but this is not the peace producing prayer that we are talking about here.

In Stories for the Heart, Alice Gray writes the following:

“Matthew Henry is a well known Bible commentator.  One day he was robbed and that evening made the following entry in his diary:  Let me be thanful- first because I was never robbed before; second, because althought they took my wallet they did not take my life; third, because although they took my all, it was not much; and fourth, because it was I who was robbed, not I who robbed.”

It is this simple diary entry that helps us to understand the magnitude of how we should pray with a thankful heart to our worthy God who gives abuntantly and gives us opportunities to seek his goodness dispite the circumstances.  “That I was never robbed before”…Praying for the times that God protects us or saves us from harm that we never see. “Becuase it was I who was robbed, not I who robbed”…Praying that outside of grace in my life, that I could be the one taking from others as a means to fullfill my own needs.   And that He would show me that when I do seek to fulfill my own needs that He would quickly bring me to my knees (James 5:16).

What is your honest prayer of thankgiving that can produce peace where you are spending Thanksgiving or any other place that may need it?

At our conference, we announced the roll out of this blog for you, the people, the leader, and the community group.  Now almost three weeks later, we finally have most of the conference material uploaded and ready to open up for the benefit of your community.   We are not techies, so forgive us for the delay, but we are passionate about you and your community finding ultimate satisfaction in Christ in all aspects of life and committing yourself towards living life with others.   I hope the resources on  this site pushes you towards these two Goals ( loving God and loving others).

The further I move down the path with my own community group and now being an official “community guy” at Watermark, I’ve realized that everything in life comes down to commitment.  I am caring less and less about someones maturity (don’t get me wrong, the Lord cares about us being mature in our faith, see 1 Cor. 3), but more and more to one’s commitment.  So, give me a guy that has been in a relationship with Jesus for one day, who is “all in”, and committed verses the guy who Has known Jesus for 20 years, but won’t commit to do the hard things Jesus asks of us or commit to messy people (all of us).  Make sense?  More on Commitment in another blog, but I wanted to post one of the videos from the conference on Commitment.  Brent and Heather Bailey lead this group, which met for the first time at group link.  No one in the group knew each other, but they were committed to each other and doing the spiritual life together.  As a result, I have been blessed by watching crazy Christ honoring fruit (Jn. 15) come out of this group.  What’s funny, is that there are 8 couples in this group and i have suggested a time or two that they should divide or conquer because four couples seems way more manageable than eight, but they won’t have any of it.  I’m glad they have chosen to trust in God’s unlimited capacity, and i chose to trust in a formula.  Hope you enjoy this…

I’ve been meaning to blog since the completion of the Community Leader Conference, which was Saturday at 1pm.  My fired up (!!!) meter has been through the roof and here’s the main reason:  YOU.  Community is all about the celebration of reconciled relationship in light of the ultimate celebrated reconciled relationship between believers and Yahweh.  The face to face conversations were the most exciting part of the entire 19 hours together, yes even more than all of the laughs, stare downs, water gun skits, and “fake gifts” Friday night.

Here’s the reason, life together while pursuing Christ.

Two weeks ago, 3 couples from my community group were eating together after our “group time”.  We began talking about Christ and Scripture memory, and I was totally encouraged by who we will refer to as “the Gertz”.  This year she has memorized the entire book of Colossians and is currently working on 1^st John.  We asked her why she would memorize Colossians 4, which is where Paul mentions all of the people in the body of Christ who he has done life together.  “The Gertz” mentioned that chapter 4 gave her life, because apart from the individuals there is no Church of Colossae, and no letter to the church.  The chapter reminds her that the body of Christ is everything (forgive me Gertz if I butchered your explanation).

So, in light of Colossians 4, we are the body of Christ. What’s more fun that hanging with 700 people who are all pursuing Christ and committed to the local body of Christ that you serve with?  I though through all of the one-on-one conversations, and realized that these are the people that I love and who love me, not just in word or tongue, but in action and deed.  Thanks for taking time out of your busy schedule with yourself, family, and friends and risking your time to come and hang with us.  The conference was a taste of the great ingathering when We will all love each other perfectly and worship together Yahweh, who eternally exists as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Be excited today that we are one day closer today to our hope…

Out of all of the elements that are the makeup of authentic biblical community, confession is the value and action that carries the most weight with me.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not disagreeing with Jesus in Matthew 22 when He says that the two greatest commandments are loving God and loving others, I simply believe confession is an action that kills two birds with one stone.  My life has changed dramatically as I have meditated on James 5:16, “therefore, confess your sins to each other and pray for each other, so that you may be healed.”  Let me briefly flush out the “stone of confession” as seen in community.  Now, I get upset stomach thinking about confessing to my wife and my guys group that I got stuck watching 5 minutes of Spike TV, where women were not fully clothed, but there is healing there.

We have a God that has not only saved us eternally, but wants to redeem, deliver, and save us out of something right now.  Just for fun, watch how Jesus always wants to pull people out of their current situation and have them find life in Him.  So, confession is the act of communicating two truths to God and others:  1) the sin that I have run to and  2) I am trusting the Lord to save me out of this sin.  The act of trusting God is the action of loving God, and it is loving others enough to let people know, “the true you.”   John Cox always says, “Facts are your friends,” which is a statement that I love but the reality of the facts are hard to swallow.  Communicating to people around you, “the facts” about who you are allows them to participate and watch a transforming and saving God work in your life.  Leaders are people who lead out and set the culture around them.  How are you leading out in the area of confession?  What sin do you need to confess to those in your community, so that you can be known and that they can know what God is saving you out of?

By: Rob Barry

What’s the purpose of community?  What bulls-eye are we all shooting for?  The Proverb says, “Without vision the nation parishes.”  Do you and your group have a clear vision of what you’re aiming for?  It’s been my passion over the last couple of years to remind others of the target, aim, and bull’s-eye.  Paint it really big, so no one forgets and so everyone in the group aims at the same target.  Some will hit the bull’s-eye, some will land in the red or white ring others will miss the target completely, and yes some won’t even shoot.  In the dynamics of doing life with others, some are more excited about following Jesus trading in their old life for “life to the full” (John 10:10).  So, the target I’ve always painted is TRANSFORMATION (see Galatians 4:19; 2 Corinthians 3:18; Romans 12:2) into the image of His Son, Jesus, or the image of God.

I’ve realized that this target might be inadequate; it is only the means and not the end.  Thanks John Piper for your gift of teaching and the wonderful world of podcasts to remind me of something so simple.  The end, goal, target, aim, bull’s-eye, etc. is worship and praise of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  See Ephesians 1:3,6,14.  Transformation is the process that brings Our Lord more glory, honor, and praise.  Transformation and praise go hand in hand, so how do we move towards framing community questions more around worship?  For example, what areas in your life are not worshipful to Christ?  What areas have you grown in worship?  What areas in your marriage/relationships, purity, finances, speech, discipline, humility, mercy, etc. look more like Christ than a year ago?  How is your capacity and desire to worship the living God growing?  What is an area that your heart desires to worship yourself?

By: Rob Barry

I’ve been reminded of something lately that I’m not proud of, namely,  I’m not frequently going before the Lord and praying for the people in my community.  I had a great conversation with a friend a few weeks ago who mentioned that his friends were not asking about how his struggles were going.  Unfortunately, I saw a lot of his friends in myself.  We spend a good deal of time on the community team talking about he “one another’s” and specifically two that i have been convicted about over the last two weeks have been:

Bear one another’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the Law of Christ -Gal. 6:2

Confess you sins to one another, and pray for one another, and you will be healed. – James 5:16.

Here’s what’s hard to stomach for me, I haven’t been faithful in living out these verses with the 5 men in my group and let alone the 6 wives.    I think it’s a great place to start the 2010 year is to work towards being faithful and obedient to these two verses.  If I can take ground by applying these verses as a follower of Christ, then it will be a successful year.  There is much to process about the “why” behind my actions.

So let me make a connection that may be true for you, and is true for me.  That I best follow up with people that I pray for.  The contrary would be, if I am not actively talking this person before the lord, I rarely follow up with them.  Personally, I know that it feels amazing when someone cares enough about me to follow up with me, even if they really don’t care, it communicates to me that they care.

How well are you living out these two verses with the 5-10 people you call your community and you provision from God?

If you were to ask everyone in your group about the two areas that you would like them “taking to the Lord,” what would they say?