A Few Resource Links

Yesterday was an amazing God-filled day at NLC! In the morning, we were challenged to FORGIVE others in our lives. I am already hearing the stories of how God used that time. At the end of service, Pastor Scott mentioned a book for those who want to continue the journey of forgiveness of others. Here’s a link:

Total Forgiveness by R.T. Kendall

Last night was Night of Worship at the Warehouse and it was incredible! We spent an hour just enjoying the presence of God and soaking Him up! It was awesome. If you want to keep worshipping in your personal life, the music our worship teams are doing comes from the following cd’s. You can download it on the iTunes website, I’m sure.

Northpoint: Louder than Creation

God of the City

Hope that helps you connect with God this week,

Pastor Matt

What I’m Listening To Right Now!

Worship Music is one of the greatest tools of encouragement in my life. There are so many times when worship songs say exactly what I’m feeling in my life. As a leader and influencer in many of your lives I wanted to give you a run down of what I’m listening to right now.

I think it’s all available in iTunes & I highly recommend downloading as much of this as you can and then integrating it into your daily life somewhere. (In the car, during your workout, etc.)

Yesterday’s Worship Set @ NLC:

• Faithful – Steve Fee
• Your Name – Ross Parsley
• Jesus Paid it All – Kristian Stanfill
• Oh Praise Him – David Crowder

My Personal Top 6 Worship Songs Right Now:

• Mighty to Save – Kristian Stanill
• God of this City – Chris Tomlin
• Happy Day – Kristian Stanfill
• Let Me Sing – Todd Fields
• Beautiful Jesus – Kristian Stanfill
• We Shine – Steve Fee

If You Only Buy 1 Worship CD this Year Buy:

Northpoint Live: Louder Than Creation

It’s got everyone of those songs on it except for Your Name which is a Ross Parsley one.

A Few Other Notables that Are Ministering to My Heart Right Now:

• Healer - Planetshakers
• Here in Your Presence – Ross Parsley
• You are the Light – Steve Fee

Seriously, download these songs… it could be the best thing you do for your spiritual life all week! You’ll drop 4 bucks on a coffee, download 4 songs instead and feed your spirit.

Just a Worshipful Bloggish Thought,

Matt

Wow, what a Week!!!

Hey everyone, I’m so excited to be back in SW FL.  Sarah and I just finished an amazing / whirlwind week of ministry consulting, downtime, edification, and networking!  The last 8 days have been incredible!  It’s amazing to see how God is using all that we are learning through Next Level Church to impact so many!  AND… we just keep learning more!  Here’s the last week in a nutshell:

• Friday, Feb. 8th – Flew to Orange County, CA.  Made it to Dallas.  Then flight cancelled.  Rerouted to Las Vegas.  Ran to catch the plane.  Realized we were on Pacific time, not Mountain time.  Actually had an extra hour.  Felt like Idiots.  Caught our breath.  Arrived in OC, CA @ 7 pm PST (10 pm EST).  Had dinner with Church Planters.  Told our story.  Went to bed at 2 am EST.
• Saturday, Feb. 9th – Had breakfast at the hotel.  Ate too much.  Slept for 2 hours.  Met up with Scott & Mary Turner, incredible church planters in Irvine, CA.  Shopped.  Ate at PF Changs.  Heard their story.  Went back to their house.  Talked til 10 pm PST (1 am EST).  Slept at hotel. 
• Sunday, Feb. 10th – Arrived at theSummit Church which at 8:30 PST (Do I need to keep doing the EST reference?) Watched set up.  Took notes.  Preached at 11 am PST.  Grabbed a sandwich.  Debriefed at their house for 3 hours.  At 6 pm, a dozen of their leaders arrived.  Taught Church planting leadership & philosophy til 9:30 pm.  Drove to our new hotel on Laguna Beach, CA at 10:30 pm (1:30 am EST).  Slept.
• Monday, Feb. 11th – Had 9 am PST Video Conference Call with Pastor Scott and Quigs about the upcoming week at NLC.  (I love iChat by the way…) Drove to Saddleback Church, founded by Rick Warren.  Toured Saddleback.  Was blown away.  Had lunch.  Did some Geocaching. (Ask me later).  Back to hotel.  Slept.  Went to a movie.  Had Pizza at BJ’s Italian Restaurant on Laguna Beach at 10:30 PST (1:30 am EST).  
• Tuesday, Feb. 12th –  Had breakfast overlooking the Pacific Ocean.  Walked on the beach.  Slept. Listen to a couple of LifeChurch.tv podcasts.  Read by the pool.  Ate Mexican.  Saw another movie.  Slept.
• Wednesday, Feb. 13th – Woke up at 8 am PST.  Drove to Scott & Mary Turner’s house to return their car.  (Thanks by the way…)  Drove to Airport.  Talked with Scott for another hour.  Flew to Dallas.  Flew to Ft. Myers, FL.  Arrived home at 9:30 pm EST (6:30 pm PST).  Did some laundry. (Okay, Sarah did.)  Watch American Idol.  Still on West Coast time.  Bed by midnight.
• Thursday, Feb. 14th – Valentine’s Day.  Woke up 6:30 am.  Checked e-mail, (1st time all week.)  Repacked.  9 am drove to Fort Lauderdale.  Arrived 11:30 am.  Got Starbucks.  Checked into hotel.  Attended lunch at the Book of Hope Missions Roundtable Event.  (Talk about a great ministry… oh my goodness, they’re incredible.  More on that later too.)  Last afternoon session at 4:30 pm.  Took a cat nap.  Dinner at 6 pm.   Watched the sunset over Fort Lauderdale skyline with my wife. (Come on Somebody!!!)  Attended night session.  9:30 pm had dessert at Cheesecake Factory with Peter and Carolyn Haas (Substance Church in Minneapolis, MN).  Incredible couple that we totally hit it off with.  Back to hotel at  12:30 am.  Asleep by 1 am.
• Friday, Feb. 15th – Woke up at 8:30 am.  Went to the Red Door Spa at The Galleria in Fort Lauderdale.  (yeah, I did.  So what???  It was awesome!)  10:30 am – watched SportsCenter in the Men’s Dressing Room. (Hey I wasn’t about to go out there with a bunch of women and pretend I was actually comfortable!!!  I do have boundaries, you know.)  11 am – 80 minute hot rock massage.  1 pm – Lunch with my wife.  2 – 5 pm – shopping at the Galleria with Peter and Carolyn Haas.  Back to hotel.  Cat nap.  6 pm – Dinner with RoundTable Pastors.  9:30 pm – Last Session ends.  10 pm – Dessert at the Cheesecake Factory with Chris and Jan Beard, Pastors in DownTown Cincinnati.  Incredible story. 1:30 am – back to hotel.  2 am – sleep.
• Saturday – Feb. 16th – 8 am – Wake up.  Check out of hotel.  Get boys a present.  Get Starbucks.  Get Krispy Kremes. (yeah, I did!)  Drive across Alligator Alley.  Home at 12:15 pm.  2 pm Birthday Party at Gator Lanes for Will’s friend.  5:30 pm ate something. (I can’t remember)  8 pm – Boys in bed.  8:10 pm – practice message for tomorrow.  8:57 pm – finish writing this blog.  9:05 pm – Probably will pass out.

Man, what an amazing & refreshing time we had.  It was just great to relax and do nothing, you know???Seriously, we love that!  It’s God’s calling for us, and there’s nothing we’d rather do together! Can’t wait for God to move tomorrow at NLC! Pastor Matt 

“Hey Daddy, we have a Surprise for you!”

… were the words I heard when I walked in the door tonight. But I had to play the “Hot and Cold,” game to find it. It was so cute watching my 2 boys in their “I don’t do Mistletoe” pajamas leading me around our house all the while saying, “You’re gettin’ warmer…” or “You’re gettin’ colder…”

After a few minutes of downstairs rabbit trail chasing, they finally led me upstairs and into the laundry room. I opened the washer (to which Drew looked in and acted surprised to find a load of laundry). Then as I started to open the dryer door, both boys broke out in spontaneous shouting: “You’re burnin’ up!!!” (which I found ironic, since I was at the dryer…)

As I opened the door, I seriously had no idea what I was about to find… That’s when I reached in to discover a brand new GPS! Perfect for my new found hobby… Geocaching!

I was so blown away. Apparently they had been planning all week to surprise me, and man they sure pulled it off.

I’m most excited to make some great memories with the boys in the days ahead. They’ll love treasure hunting and I’ll love being with them.

Thanks guys for my GPS. May the Geocaching begin!

Just a GPS bloggish thought,

Matt

My Geocaching Adventure!

So a pastor friend of mine from Ohio, Mike Cole, and his wife Trinda have been down visiting this weekend. Escaping the cold up north etc.

So yesterday, (Sunday) afternoon, Mike tells me that he wanted a GPS device for Christmas. To which I’m thinking, “Are you serious? Why? All is does is give you directions to places right?” But then, he whips it out and starts showing me all the stuff it can do. Oh… my … gosh… that thing is SO cool!

So then he starts telling about this thing called Geocaching. (www.Geocaching.com) Basically you go to the geocaching website and put in the address of wherever you are (in the world), and it will tell you where all of these “Hidden Treasures” are near you! It gives you the exact GPS coordinates. It’s a Global Treasure Hunt! So there are like millions of these Hidden Treasures all over the world now, and you use a GPS to go and find them.

Enter Scott Drummond. So we go over to Pastor Scott and Kirsten’s last night for dinner and when we get there Mike starts telling Scott about Geocaching. To which Scott whips out his computer and we put in his address… What happened next feels more surreal then actual, but it’s true I tell you. True.

After we successfully had broken the code (like Tom Hanks in the Da Vinci Code movie) we had what we needed for our Adventure.

Before we know it, we’re running to my car like Bank Robbers! The GPS (who we named Suzi) is giving us directions to a Hidden Treasure in Scott’s neighborhood! It was like the coolest thing! We get within a hundred feet of the Treasure and then we had to search and destroy on foot. MIke is holding the GPS unit and telling us the coordinates as we walk through this woods. With every step, the intensity was rising! I swear there was a mote with a dragon and an alligator in it as I crossed this rickety log bridge!

After 15 minutes of searching in the woods, Scott yells out, “Hey, hey guys right there!” Sure enough, he dives in to this clump of trees and pulls out a camoflage ammo box. We open it up and there are all kinds of Treasures in there! (Stuffed animals, golf balls, key chains, etc.) Every person who finds it leaves something behind and can take something with them as well if they want. There was a log book, so we signed our names. (All the while I was totally watching for the cops and stuff!) (I was going to leave a Next Level Church card, but Scott convinced me that would be lame.)

After a few minutes of enjoying our Global Treasure Hunt, we stood, made our way out of the forest (it was a big clump of trees) and returned to our All Terrain Vehicle (my car) victorious! The other guys only suffered a couple of wounds (read, burrs stuck to their flip flops) and I escaped without a trace on my crocs. (I could have simply washed them off had their been any mud on them).

A few minutes later we were back in the safety of Scott’s house, surrounded by our wives who would never know or even hope to understand the danger we had been in, how we had risked our lives, and the adventure that would probably bond our friendship for a lifetime! We didn’t even try to explain it to them.

So I think I found a new hobby… Geocaching. Talk about something that doesn’t look anything like my life! Dragons, and gators, and forests and adventures and firey motes. It was all real. Not a bad way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

I gotta run, I’m pricing out GPS units online…

Matt

My ADD has been bad lately

I don’t know if it’s the holidays or the stress I’ve been feeling with my
wife all “laid up” with her foot surgery or what, but seriously, my ADD has
been through the roof lately.

I walked into Sam’s Club the other morning and had to buy 3 things. My wife
had made me a list and everything, and the minute I walked in, it was like,
“Wowlookatallthetvsandwheredidthemoviesgothatusedtobeintheentranceandthispla
ceisawesome,waitwhatwasIsupposedtocomeinhereforagain?whyareallthosepeoplejus
tstandingaroundandwaitIknowI’mhereforsomethingwhatwasitshesaidIneededtogetag
ain?howcomethegrinderforthecoffeeisonlynexttothecoffeeIliketobuy?whataboutth
epeoplewhodrinkotherkindsofcoffeearetheylessworthytohaveagrindernexttothemth
anIam?maybeI’mmakingtoomuchofthis.whyamIhereagain?

Seriously, that’s what it feels like right now! Dead serious. If you have
ADD then you totally know what I’m talking about but there’s also no way
you’ve been able to concentrate long enough to get to the end of this, so I
know you’re not reading this.

It was a good day when I actually embraced this whole ADD thing. For a long
time I didn’t want to use it as an “excuse” but now I realize that It’s got
good sides and bad sides. The bad sides are, that occasionally a trip to
Sam’s Club can feel like a bag of scrabble letters. The good side is, When
I’m in the zone, I can get a lot done. It’s finding the zone and not
letting things knock you out of it, that’s the challenge. Thank God my
wife, Sarah, my assistant, Susan, and my staff that know this about me.

Occasionally, it’s like, “Just leave him alone, he’s in the zone.” When
that happens I can write like 3 messages in 3 hours kind of thing. It’s
crazy like that.

Anyway,

Keller

I Love Christmas!!!

I can’t believe there’s only 8 days until Christmas! This truly is the
most wonderful time of the year! I’m serious. I love Christmas. I’m not
sure if it’s like the mandated “time off” or what, but somehow all the world
goes right for me around the holidays.

I think there are those few surreal times in the calendar when the world (
and by world I mean church world) is permitted to stop, which is a good
thing. Christmas day is one. Thanksgiving day is another. I wish there
were more in preacher land, but there’s not.

See, my day off is Friday, and everyone else is working, so at times it can
feel strange to be “chillin’” while everyone else is still workin’.
Although I work on Sundays and I know that makes up for it somehow, but…

Anyway, 8 days til Christmas and I intend to party like it’s 1999. May the
days be Merry and Bright! Yeah I went there.

Just an ADHD Bloggish christmas thought.

Matt

All The Things I’m Learning (Part 6) The final installment

By part 6, my ADD has set in now, & honestly, I have no idea what number were on any more. So we’ll just start with 16, sound good?

16. I’m learning about Long Term Grace in my life. I can’t even tell you
how spot on Mike Ash’s message was in week 4 of our Fuel for Life Series
last month. He talked about God’s purpose for Suffering and absolutely just
opened my eyes to a whole new perspective of what it means to “have a thorn
in the flesh” as Paul writes about in the New Testament. The idea that it’s
possible that God actually leaves “stuff” in our life that keeps us postured
toward dependence on Him, lest we be tempted to think, “our strength is
sufficient.” I love what Paul says about “His strength being made perfect
in our weakness.” Man, that’s so true. You know, Paul had some really
amazing insights.

17. I’m learning that my creativity is a unique gifting from God. I’m so
thankful for the people in my life that keep me focused and organized and
own all the details of my life so that I can be who God has uniquely created
me to be … Which is creative. The team around me makes so many of my
ideas look way better than they could ever be if I had to try and execute it
alone. I love working with my team. They make me a better pastor,
communicator, speaker, & writer.

I’m just really thankful for the people I get to do life and ministry with.

Just a bloggish thought,

matt

All the Things (Part 5)

Today’s installment is just one thing I’m learning with clarity about myself. I challenge you to pray for clarity about your “calling” as well.

I’m learning I’m called to do 3 things:

1. Write (Messages & Books). Writing fuels me like nothing else can. The
entire process of learning and reading and studying and praying and
developing a thought and seeing new things in Scripture just make me feel
strong like nothing else can. I struggled with this calling for several years, because, quite honestly, I never felt like I would have anything to say. (At least that other people would want to read, anyway.)

It feels good to be stepping into that calling now. Wow.
2. Speak. Speaking comes easy for me. That’s the part of my job that I
enjoy. It’s probably the part I get most nervous about as well though. I
feel such a Holy Responsibility for what I’m about to say to so many people
every week, it’s crazy. I also have a Holy Nervousness that God will show
up and change hearts. I’m so aware that, my talent alone, doesn’t have the
power to change anybody. Only with the Holy Spirit convicting and changing
hearts does anything good have the potential of happening. That’s serious
business for me.

3) Coaching other Leaders. My heart beats to teach others what we have
learned and are continuing to learn about leadership, church planting,
ministry, creativity, & doing church in our cultural context. Nothing fires
me up more than a phone call with a church planter or a meeting with a young
leader.
What “fires you up?” What fills your tank? If you don’t know, start having conversations with others about it. Because the sooner you find out, the sooner you’ll start moving boldly in the direction of your calling.

Just a bloggish challenge,

Matt

All the Things I’m Learning (Part 4)

Here’s my hypothesis: Each of us are capable of making a list of what we’re learning in our lives as well. I just happen to write them down and publish them to the World Wide Web for all to see. Feel free to comment back and let us know what you’re learning in your world as well. I’d love to hear it and learn along with you…

12. I’m learning what it means to Trust… Really trust. Dr. Richard
Powell, who is the pastor of MacGregor Baptist Church here in Fort Myers, FL
(& an amazing leader, pastor & guy) told me recently over lunch that, “I
would have to learn to completely turn my back on entire areas of NLC. That
would be when I could know that I’ve completely given away ministry to
others.” I have definitely adopted that phrase, “turn my back” recently.
That takes trust. And man, it’s hard sometimes.

13. I’m learning Jealousy can hit you quick. I’m amazed at how quickly I
can drift toward jealousy or comparison in my life. I see another guy’s
book, or hear of something another guy is doing in a church somewhere, and I
immediately rush to judgment. I hate that about myself. That’s the kind of
stuff you have to crucify on the cross ya know.

15. I’m learning about sins of Commission & sins of Omission. This isn’t
new information for me, but I was recently refreshed to the categories.
Sins of Commission are those things we do that don’t please God. Sins of
Ommission are those things we DON’T do, that consequently cause us to miss
out on God’s best for our lives.
Where are we guilty of a sin of “Omission” in our life? Where are we hesitating to take a step of faith, instead of pushing through and just trusting God.

Just a bloggish thought,

Matt