sometimes books pull me away from stagnation...

i've been trying to force myself to take time off. this isn't an easy thing for me. Lauren's been helping me though. yesterday morning i didn't work; not turning the computer on helped greatly. i spent a few hours reading "The Doctrine of Reconciliation" by Karl Barth. reading Barth makes my head hurt. i think i'm going to set a new years resolution to start this book over, and finish it in 2007. i like setting new years resolutions. i usually complete them. i'm also thinking of starting to work on a book.

as i was reading Barth i was reminded of a few other books that i'd been wanting to read, so off to Barns and Noble. thirty minutes later i was heading home with 1984 by George Orwell, The Secret Message of Jesus: Uncovering the Truth that Could Change Everything by Brian McLaren, and Organic Church by Neil Cole. i haven't bought any books lately, so my splurge seemed justified in my mind. i started reading Organic Church yesterday. in one of my classes at TIU one of my professors used the term "organic ministry." when this bas ook came out last year it made it's way to my "should eventually buy" list. i made it through a chapter and a half during my walk to work. i had to stop reading a few times to think. i had two thoughts that i want to work through. feel free to give some thoughts.

1. in thinking about ministry with Satellite: i wonder if Satellite should be in the ministry of planting home churches rather than small groups? as i was thinking through this and this first thing that popped into my head was the announcements that Gabe gave on Sunday. most of the announcements were for things going on hosted at the Ninja Den. why cant the Ninja Den be a church? granted the biggest reason for this not to happen is that people might not like the idea of home churches. but my guess is that the thoughts they have about them are just preconceived ideas because i don't really know anyone who has been a part of a home church.

i'm really intrigued by this idea. the more i try to understand my calling i think that planting churches might be part of it. which is becoming increasingly ironic because of the growing frustrations i have with the North American church. which is even more ironic because of my job.

2. i want to be able to put all of my time into ministry. it's hard for me to have a job that takes my time away from ministry. i've been questioning the thought of raising support. this scares me a lot. the fear of raising support is what kept me from going on staff with Young Life. I've been thinking about this possibility quite a bit lately, but as i was reading Organic Church yesterday i had a new thought along the lines of raising support. what if the support i raised wasn't to do ministry for the church, but for some other element of ministry? maybe i would be raising support as a missionary. i've got to think this through some more to develop what it is that i could be doing.

well, there you go.
enjoy.