Now, that sounds all well and good on a conceptual level, but how does that play out in the gospel assembly?

In my IT career, I have had to learn how to wear several different hats at one time to handle the complexity of the tasks at hand.  When you wear multiple hats, you can easily become distracted from your primary role.

To become the CLO we first have to take off any other hats that we may have grabbed on to, like CEO, COO, or CFO. What do those hats look like in the church?

The CEO pastor learns to value vision over loving people extravagantly. The COO pastor values operational excellence over loving people extravagantly. The CFO looks to resources instead of loving people extravagantly. All of those hats are fine in and of themselves as long as they are secondary roles subject to the CLO.

There are going to be times that people “get in the way” of vision, excellence and resources. Our response to those situations will tell us very clearly how we, those who have received extravagant love from Christ, really feel about love for the brethren. Just as the Father does not value us for what we can do or bring to the table, we as pastors cannot either.

We are to model the scandal of the gospel by loving extravagantly.

Pastors, are you the CLO of your church?

Our old group had developed routines and patterns that developed into a group cultural expectation. When we moved the new group to a new locale, those routines were changed. The group dynamic that kept us together even when we sometimes did not feel like attending was removed. In essence, we had permission to stop.

It has been 6 months since that change and I feel that the new group is just now hitting its stride. It makes me wonder if the concept of changing groups every year (as some practitioners suggest) is such a good idea.

Small group update just for grins…I’ve outsourced my group! We are no longer hosting or facilitating our group. We had someone want to start a group and tried (in vain) to recruit a group for them. When this did not work out, I suggested we move some of my group to his group and let the other pastor in my group start another group. It’s been nice to attend a lifegroup and not have to scrub the house and have an extensive lesson prepared. We get to enjoy the people!

We’re working through the Parental Guidance Required curriculum from Andy Stanley, and reading the Gospel of John together through the week as our homage to Neil Cole’s LTGs…

We start with a 10 minute devotional with parents and children, followed by prayer time together. We’re trying to model (and do) family worship in our small group to encourage each family to make this a practice.

While we listen to Andy Stanley, the kids watch a Nest video with activities. We now have about 15 kids (2 – 13 yr olds, 3 – 12 yr olds), so we’re going to have to ramp up the curriculum for kids during the adult
time. We’re wanting to leverage the 12 and 13 year olds as leaders.
Sounds like I need to do some research!

Besides that disclaimer, I’m really enjoying the Gospel of Matthew!

I should have mentioned that I have a specific methodology to my reading. I use the ESV Literary Study Bible my wonderful wife got me for Christmas to read Scripture. This helps me to approach the text without relying on study notes, as well as my own highlighting/comments, that seem to draw me down the exact same path of determining how God is speaking to me. I also like the organization of this bible, in that it puts notes about the literary style of the specific text in a block before the text. I usually read a couple of chapters, then close my eyes to picture the text. This always seems to help me meditate on the narrative.

The most important thing I’ve found is that “just doing it” always cause me to “just do it” more.

Ain’t discipline a great thing?

Perhaps I should start with the concept of 1 post per week. Since I’m writing primarily for myself, this should help me develop a “discipline’ of blogging.

Anyway, back to Matthew.

It’s always exciting to have God’s word come alive from a text you’ve read many times. I’ve found it best for me to read a small unified section of scripture many times to let it “stew”. The Holy Spirit has been faithful to show me new application every time I read.

I think the most surprising section(so far) was Matthew 1:1-17, the genealogy of Christ. Yes, you read the section and you see that several “lowly” people were included, showing that God can use anyone for his purposes. What surprised me was that the list included many enemies of God. Sure, on some level I know and believe that what God purposes always comes to pass, but I thought it interesting to see that he doesn’t <b>always</b> use humble, obedient and righteous folk for his purposes.

Well, I’m in Matthew 8 now. I finished the Sermon on the Mount very slowly, as I was afraid I would blow past it without meditating on what Christ himself had to say.

I’ll come back to Matthew 5-7 at a later date…

I studied Mark and John in the fall, so I think it’s time to get back into Matthew.

After I work my way through Matthew, I’d like to go back to one of the prophets. It’s very easy to neglect both the major and minor prophets in devotional study. I want to train my mind to see the gospel in the Old Testament.

But first…Matthew 1:1-17

“It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step into the Road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there is no knowing where you may be swept off to.”

Here’s to the journey!