Good day all,
I hope this finds you well, warm, and not needing to travel much. If so, I pray Psalm 119:105 for you, "Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path. I am currently reading a book called, "The Unstoppable Force", by Erwin McManus. He writes...
"Many leaders make the mistake of beginning with what rather than why, so the what is quickly rejected. Sometimes the reason we as leaders do this is because we've thought about the why so much that we think it's obvious to everyone...And so we begin the conversation with what needs to happen rather than with what has led us to this place. Once the why is clearly understood and embraced, the what can be received well..."
After reading this I felt led to again give you some insight to what is going on in my heart, mind, and soul when it comes to 2 Coats...
So Why 2 Coats? Because I like/love/adore Jesus, and I want to become like Him...1 John 2:6 says, Anyone who claims to be intimate with God ought to live the same kind of life Jesus lived.
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Here's where you come in...McManus continues...
"We need to lead God's people to that place where the why is weighty and in their hearts--hearts that would cry out with the question, 'what then should we do?'...One the dominating question becomes how, creative juices begin to flow..."
The Spirit gave me these goals about a year and a half ago...this is the what
- to bridge the gap between those who have and those who need.
- to share the wealth, gifts, fruit and blessings God has put into our lives.
- to compassionately engage individuals towards God, one another, and their personal dreams.
It is important to understand, to know, to believe in your heart that these goals and ideas are not "what has led us to this place but what needs to happen."
When we begin to live like Jesus and carry out these ideas, we are going to find ourselves in many different places as we "put our life into the book (the Bible)". We are going to be uncomfortable, looked upon as radical, what we do may not make sense to us in this world, but then again many things that Jesus did, that he asked his disciples to do, DID NOT MAKE SENSE.
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The what of 2 Coats is more than going to church on a Sunday. We are putting legs to the theology here. Your Mondays and Tuesdays and Wednesdays and Thursdays and...........they are going to look different.
As we "bridge the gaps" we are going to enter houses with several kids being warmed by the opening of the stove because their LP tank is empty because they don't have the money to fill it. We are going to travel to different communities and even countries, exploring the lives of the hurt, the lost, and the broken totally recreating our comfort zones to look more like that of Jesus and his disciples. We are going to step into the lives of single moms with newborns who are scared and lonely and afraid...
As we share our gifts, talents, time, resources, passions and experiences we are going to enter people's lives who don't know Jesus, His Father, or the power of the Spirit. What will you say to them when you look into their eyes and feel their brokenness and begin to share about yours and what God has done in your life?
What does it feel like.....to give 20%.....to allow someone to use your washer and dryer because theirs has broken.....to be embraced by a mom who didn't have anything to make lunch until you showed up at their door with a bag of groceries.....to sit with an elderly shut-in for twenty minutes and make their week?
When we compassionately engage others we are going to lay hands on them, pray in tongues, see healing happen in front of our eyes. Please know that we are Plan A here...we are the energy carriers...
An energy carrier is a person who refuses to allow apathy to take their life over... who refuses to live in mediocrity, who will not allow the average, mundane, the common and the ordinary to define or limit their life...and there is a world out there who desperately needs you to live at your highest level, who needs you to get up in the morning realizing that there is a God who created you and he longs to energize you to pour his love and power into his life so that you can become a conduit of his life to the world around you ...
~Erwin McManus
So, if you are here...that's a lot...but I hope I have clearly defined our reason for existing in Grundy Center and beyond.
In closing, I give this to you, with one question...
How can we engage this community and begin to bridge the gaps?
I am eagerly awaiting your response...
Steve Hinderhofer
