New Year, New You – Covenant Prayer

Begin this new year with a renewed pact with God. Post this Wesleyan prayer as a way to humble yourself for God’s service.

The Wesley Covenant Prayer

I am no longer my own, but thine.
Put me to what thou wilt, rank me with whom thou wilt.
Put me to doing, put me to suffering.
Let me be employed for thee or laid aside for thee,
exalted for thee or brought low for thee.
Let me be full, let me be empty.
Let me have all things, let me have nothing.
I freely and heartily yield all things to thy pleasure and disposal.
And now, O glorious and blessed God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
thou art mine, and I am thine.
So be it.
And the covenant which I have made on earth,
let it be ratified in heaven.
Amen.

—as used in the Book of Offices of the British Methodist Church, 1936.

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New Year, New You – Engaging Scripture

One of my favorite Bible tools is Youversion.com. The tech team at Lifechurch.tv created Youversion in an effort to put the Bible in people’s hand via computer, phone, tablet, or mobile device. They also created a catalog of reading plans whereas you can subscribe to a plan to guide you through the scriptures.

This new year, logon to Youversion.comdownload an app for your mobile device if you have one – select a reading plan and get reading the Word of God!

YouVersion Reading Plans

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New Year, New You – Henderson Dispatch

My article “New Year, New You” was published in the January 1, 2011, Henderson Daily Dispatch, Faith Section. Here’s the clipping…

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The Beautifully Imperfect Connectional Community

The title is a mouthful. The words best fit the church in which I serve – The United Methodist Church. Our church is a community of local churches in crossroads, villages, suburbs, ghettos, and urban centers are scattered all over the world. We are uniquely design and commonly grounded. We are young and older. We are recently birthed and as old as the communites they reside.

We are also imperfect. Continue reading

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Handling Criticism

If you are leading then somewhere along the way you are going to meet resistance. God was resisted by Satan. Moses was resisted by the back to Egypt movement. Jesus was resisted by the Pharisees. Continue reading

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The Next Christians

I am currently reading Gabe LyonsThe Next Christians. Gabe spoke at Catalyst this year and I previously read his co-authored book unChristian several years ago. The conversation is extremely interesting as a young adult pastor leading a congregation whose median age is likely 20 years my senior.

Gabe recently contributed to CNN/Headline News this article and video. He also appeared on FoxNews; yet, I have not found the links for sharing.

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Praying for Haiti

Today I sit in the cozy warmth of my Henderson parsonage watching the devastation Tomas is wreaking upon an already broken country. Haiti is suffering it second major natural disaster in a year. People are only getting accustomed to living in tents as a Hurricane Tomas crosses the island. Continue reading

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Living Memories

Happy Halloween fellow readers! While children 0-100 will dress up this weekend as ghosts and ghouls, superheroes and characters of another world, we need to recall the history of the day. Moreover, I hope we recall All Hallow’s Eve leads us to the church’s celebration of ALL the saints remembering the lives and witness of the great cloud of witnesses who completed the race of faith before us. Continue reading

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Pastoral Entrepreneurship

While pastoring a church seems to be a group gig, it also entrepreneurial qualities. No, not lone ranger qulaities, entrepreneurial qualities of leadership that strive to create community and product.

Catalyst team leader Brad Lomenick shares tips for the entrepreneurial free agents that are applicable for pastoral entrepreneurs as well: A few tips for all the Free Agents and Consultants.

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Using an iPad PRODUCTIVELY

I wrote a post entitled “Using an iPad PRODUCTIVELY” on the NCCUMC Faith and Tech blog.

http://faithandtech.nccumc.net/?p=166

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