Water Bottle Labels

I'm trying to decide which one... what do you think?

or...

#1 or #2? Leave your answer in the comments.

Amazing Sand Painting

Take 8 minutes and watch this all the way through. Art is powerful. I believe art is at it's best when it speaks to real feelings and when it engages more than one of the senses. This is simply amazing!

Pharisees and other thoughts

Wow... I thought my alma mater was strict. I was poking around on the website of a local Bible college and in the FAQs I find this rule:

What are the music standards?
Music should glorify God and be a direct reflection of the life of a Spirit-filled believer. Songs or styles which are strongly identified with unbiblical movements or worldly practices are not allowed (Romans 12:1-2). Such music includes rock, rap, country, new age, jazz, and any "Christian" music that borrows these styles (I John 2:15 ). We do not wish to lead students toward music which is questionable or which might violate believers' consciences.

Seriously? How far can I carry a cup of water on the Sabbath, oh Bearded Ones?


In other news...

• Here's a shout out to some people who really stepped up this week: Nicole H, Trevor T, & Mark S... you guys rock, literally! I arrived at rehearsal Sunday am only to quickly realize I could not sing a note. Nicol stepped up to lead and Mark did a fantastic job changing keys at the last minute. Trevor smiled and rolled with the whole thing. Thanks, team... you're the best!

• GREAT time in Granger, IN last week attending the First Impressions and Lasting Impressions workshops, both led by Mark Waltz. He has written books by the same names. READ THEM if you serve a church and think that people matter!! Much love to my traveling buddy (and driver) Chad W.

• Looking forward to the Bob Castelline band leading worship at Crossroads on Dec 6. I'm not going to preach or speak or anything... just going to worship and enjoy!

• November 29th we begin the Advent Conspiracy. So cool! We're not just "remembering the reason for the season." We're remembering the reason we exist... Worship Fully, Spend Less, Give More and Love All. Hope you'll join me!

Peace.

Factual or Inspirational

This story comes from Kem Meyer:

A blind boy sat on the steps of a building with a hat by his feet. He held up a sign which said: "I am blind, please help." There were only a few coins in the hat.

A man was walking by. He took a few coins from his pocket and dropped them into the hat. He then took the sign, turned it around, and wrote some words. He put the sign back so that everyone who walked by would see the new words.

Soon the hat began to fill up. A lot more people were giving money to the blind boy. That afternoon the man who had changed the sign came to see how things were. The boy recognized his footsteps and asked, "Were you the one who changed my sign this morning? What did you write?"

The man said, "I only wrote the truth. I said what you said but in a different way." I wrote: "Today is a beautiful day but I cannot see it."

Both signs told people that the boy was blind. But the first sign simply said the boy was blind. The second sign told people that they were so blessed that they were not blind. Should we be surprised that the second sign was more effective?

We can choose to give just the facts or we can choose creativity. We can relay information or we can inspire. As we write, draw or speak, we can simply show what is, or we can invest ourselves to take people to a different level... a different understanding of what's already plain to them.

Be inspirational!

Cultivate'09 & Story Chicago -Making Up For Lost Time

It seems like forever since I've attended a ministry/leadership conference. I may just go to two next week. I've been kind of eyeballing Story Chicago for a while now, wondering if I could get away for it. Today I finally did some checking into Cultivate '09 and it sounds like a perfect compliment to Story. Add in the fact that one is Tuesday and the other is Wednesday/Thursday and both within 45 minutes of each other... I smell a road trip!

I also smell a need to hit up some relative/friend in the Chicagoland area and avoid the cost of a hotel room... not that Crossroads wouldn't pay for a hotel room, but that's money that could be spent on ministry.

So who wants me? Honestly the closer to Aurora/Chicago the better as I'd rather spend my time catching up with friends than driving an hour home.

If you're within a decent drive of Chicago, and care about communication in or around church, check these two out. They both look amazing in their own rights. It takes a lot for me to want to be away from my family for three days, but this might just be the ticket.

Thinking like a guest

I read a great post by Dawn Nicole Baldwin over at the Connect blog. Dawn writes about "seeing through new eyes [again]." It has really bothered me, and so I've been trying to think about what would most add value to the experience of a guest at our weekend service. Don't get me wrong... the most important thing that can happen is for a person to be confronted with the furious love of Jesus and to find out that the Gospel story is his or her story.

But while that may be our intent on every weekend, how often do our methods become barriers to that event occurring?

So I've tried to put myself in the place of a guest... a guest unfamiliar with typical church environments, and I've made a list of what I believe would most impact a guest on a typical weekend at Crossroads, or any other church for that matter. Here's the list:

1. Quality signage at entrance to parking lot.
2. Close parking spots clearly marked as reserved for visitors.
3. Helpful, friendly greeter opening door; offering help.
4. Second layer of reception coupled with helpful lobby signage.
5. Helpful, friendly, confidence inspiring helpers registering children for class. Someone offering tours of children's ministry rooms.
6. Friendly, helpful usher prepared to confidently help find the right seat.
7. Seating that helps a guest feel close to others (not isolated on a row) but not too close (no one really likes someone they don't know in the adjacent seat).
8. Activity in the auditorium that is easy to understand and capable of keeping an outsider's interest. (like the trivia questions at a cinema before the feature)
9. A service that is engaging, easily followed by a novice, and not full of elements that are too cryptic or understandable only to insiders.
10. Not too long... leave them wanting more, not dreaming of the door.
11. Give them a reason to leave slowly... Encourage conversation and connection following the service.
    
12. Friendly, knowledgeable greeters thanking them for coming and ready to answer questions or inform about possible next steps.
13. Let them leave with something in their hands that they appreciate and that reminds them of Crossroads.
14. Polite, respectful, warm follow-up, giving them a reason to want to come back.

What do you think of my list. What did I leave out? What is off-base? I'd love to have your feedback in the comments section of this post.

Book Review: Find Your Strongest Life by Marcus Buckingham

Bottom Line: I liked it and my wife liked it.

Important footnote to be placed somewhere above the bottom line: It may not be the revolutionary solution to all your problems as a wife and mother.

A few years back I picked up a copy of Marcus Buckingham's Now, Discover Your Strengths. Loved it. Took the Strenth Finders Online test and got a pretty good look at the themes in my life that are potential strengths.

So when Thomas Nelson contacted me about reviewing Find Your Strongest Life, I was definitely interested. I got the book in the mail and an odd thing happened. My wife Tricia picked up the book before I got a chance to, and read the intro and the first few chapters. She brought it to me, impressed by the info she gleaned just from those first few pages.

Buckingham's basic tenet is that women can draw enough strength from life to feel fulfilled, loved, successful, and in control. He states that the SIGNs of a strong life (mind the acrostic) are:

1. Successful
2. Instinctively looking forward to tomorrow
3. Growing and learning
4. Needs fulfilled

Here is Marcus Buckingham talking about the book:

Overall, Buckingham echoes the lesson learned in his previous books which is: Focus on your strengths -- the things you do well, easily and that make you glad you did them -- and you'll be happier and more successful. This makes an incredible amount of sense when we're talking about a work environment. I'm just not sure that it can always be that simple when speaking to the non-negotiable requirements of motherhood.

Still the principles are solid and will benefit the working wife and mother who can put them into play in her life. This book is definitely for the woman who is frustrated by her attempts to juggle career, family, marriage, and her other relationships and responsibilities. For the older CEO-type whose kids are already out of the nest... skip this and go read Now, Discover Your Strengths.

From a Movement to a Museum

So how does a movement avoid becoming a museum? Unfortunately that's the general progression. At some point, the focus on "where we're going" becomes a focus on "where we've been," or even worse, "what we used to do."

From the Protestant Reformation to the Great Awakening, there is a history of Movements in Christendom, mass + velocity + direction, to steal an idea from Dave Ferguson. But benchmarks are reached, goals are achieved and what was once an all out striving to do what is unthinkable, becomes a satisfied glance backward at the already accomplished.

And we start saying things like, "That's too risky..." "That could bring the whole thing crashing down..." or "We have too much to lose."

And then we start naming buildings after people.

Very Cool Art Piece

This isn't the post I've been threatening--that's still to come--but this was too cool not to share. I have friend (What up JS?) at the Savannah College of Art and Design and while looking him up, I came across this Senior Project by a different SCAD student. Enjoy!

Hotter than ever?

This is Scott Hodge, the pastor of the church Tricia and I attended before moving to Iowa and joining with Crossroads. I'm so proud... ;-) Oh and that's Mike Jones in orange, sporting the massive goatee...

Scott Hodge Live! from The Orchard on Vimeo.

Intentional fitness planning

Well, it wasn't intentional, but with the transition and all, my exercise habits have deteriorated considerably and I'm not as lithe and energetic as I like to be, so...

It's time to get healthy. I'm going to have to trim some of the treats out of the diet for a while, but mainly I need an exercise plan. I've thought a little about P90X but after a lot of research, I think I'm going this route... Thanks, Los for the tip.

Job update plus links for catching up

I'm letting people know about some news going on in our lives and of course it becomes obvious that many people have no idea where we are right now! =) So if you have any interest in what's going on for the Reeves family right now, try reading these 3 posts... they should bring you up to speed.

1. First mention
2. Big News
3. Early Update

Beyond that, we got some great news today... Tricia applied for the one and only job opening in the Norwalk school system--a 6-12 Gifted position. She interviewed for it this morning and we found out this afternoon that she got the job. AWESOME!! We are very excited!

I wish I could say that I'm surprised, but if you know Tricia, you know that she is not only one of the best teachers you'll ever meet, but she's the person you want on your team. She adds value to every thing she's a part of, and I'm very blessed to be her husband!

When I asked for prayers on Twitter this morning, many of you prayed and I humbly thank you. There were so many reasons why she might not get picked for this position, and yet she was anyway and we believe that it's our God making a way for us and confirming his calling of our family to Norwalk/Des Moines and to Crossroads Church.

It's definitely bittersweet to leave behind Illinois, (just as it was hard to leave Birmingham and Lanett/West Point) but we know that we still have awesome family all over the U.S. and are now able to add to that. So excited about serving at Crossroads. So excited that God is blessing my family. So excited to serve alongside PG and the rest of Crossroads' awesome staff.

Can't wait to see what the future holds!

Redeeming culture... all of it

This Sunday (4/19) we're using a great U2 song as we talk about our relational need for each other--the need we have for unity. "One" illustrates that very well, I believe. Plus it's a great song, and its going to be fun to play (and I hope fun to listen to).

U2 is in a special category because while they are far from being a "christian band," many of their songs delve deeply into spiritual and Christian themes. So they kinda get a pass in some church circles.

AC/DC, however does not get a pass! No one would ever mistake their lyrics for christian. But here is a great church in South Carolina taking a shot at redeeming a very un-Christian anthem. What do you think?


HIGHWAY2HELL_JUSTIN from Jiggle Snort on Vimeo.

This freakin' rocks!!

props to Terrace Crawford for sharing and to Calvary Chapel for ROCKIN my friday!

Since You've Been Gone...

Well, I'm officially in the once-a-month club when it comes to blogging. Sorry about that. If you don't follow me on Facebook or Twitter, I'll try to fill you in a bit.

For the past two weekends I've traveled to Crossroads Church in Des Moines, IA, where I'm serving as the Pastor of Congregational Development. Currently, what that looks like is me focusing upon and leading the Arts teams (Band, Vox, Tech, etc) and as we move forward, I'll be helping in the areas of leadership development and first impressions, as well as small groups.

Crossroads is a great church full of talented, dedicated people who are ready to move to the next level organizationally to reach their community, Norwalk and Des Moines, for Jesus Christ. They are an evangelistic congregation in a denomination not generally known for evangelism. Under the leadership of our Lead Pastor, Glen Blumer, Crossroads is in many ways setting the bar for RCA churches when it comes to strategy and mission.

Something you might not know about the RCA is that it has a very high Dutch population. What this means practically is that I'm (at 6'3") one of the shortest men there. I'm hoping we can start a church league basketball team... I wouldn't be able to get off the bench, but we could dominate in the paint!

I'm hoping to get back to a more consistent level of posting here at Intentionality. Thanks for sticking around, and get off your duff and check out Twitter and Facebook. Much more interaction for sure. And if you haven't yet, definitely get a blog reader... I use Google Reader.

Okay, that's it.

A Prayer for Our Church...

It's been a while since I've posted. As my friend Mike Jones was saying, Facebook and Twitter seem to be the enemy of blogs. Another of the pastors at the Orchard, Larry Boatright posted this which he attributed to John Piper... it's amazing and it's my prayer for my churches (the Orchard AND Crossroads) and even more so, the Church universal.

A Prayer for our Church

Oh, Lord, by the truth of Your Word, and the power of your Spirit and the ministry of your body, build men and women at (name of your church here)…

Who don’t love the world more than God,

who don’t care if they make much money,

who don’t care if they own a house,

who don’t care if they have a new car or two cars,

who don’t need recent styles,

who don’t care if they get famous,

who don’t miss steak or fancy fare,

who don’t expect that life should be comfortable and easy,

who don’t feed their minds on TV each night,

who don’t measure truth with their finger in the wind,

who don’t get paralyzed by others’ disapproval,

who don’t return evil for evil,

who don’t hold grudges,

who don’t gossip,

who don’t twist the truth,

who don’t brag or boast,

who don’t whine or use body language to get pity,

who don’t criticize more than praise,

who don’t hang out in cliques,

who don’t eat too much or exercise too little;

BUT

who are ablaze for God,

who are utterly God-besotted,

who are filled with the Holy Spirit,

who strive to know the height and depth of Christ’s love,

who are crucified to the world and dad to sin,

who are purified by the Word and addicted to righteousness,

who are mighty in memorizing and using the Scriptures,

who keep the Lord’s Day holy and refreshing,

who are broken by the consciousness of sin,

who are thrilled by the wonder of free grace,

who are stunned into humble silence by the riches of God’s glory,

who are persevering constantly in prayer,

who are ruthless in self-denial,

who are fearless in public witness to Christ’s lordship,

who are able to unmask error and blow away doctrinal haze,

who are tough in standing for the truth,

who are tender in touching hurting people,

who are passionate about reaching the peoples who have no church,

who are pro-life for the sake of babies and moms and dads and the glory of God,

who are keepers of all their promises, including marriage vows,

who are content with what they have and trusting the promises of God,

who are patient and kind and meek when life is hard.

That is a mouthful... That is challenging!

Big News for the Reeves family

For those of you that have been praying for me and my family since July, I can never say thank you enough. God has been faithful and has shown us our next step. On March 2nd, I will become the Pastor of Congregational Development for Crossroads Church in Norwalk, Iowa (Norwalk is a suburb of Des Moines). I've believed this was going to be the case for quite a while, but my friend, Pastor Glen Blumer and I were determined to insure that this was God's will... not just a fun thing for us. So we've taken baby steps and trusted the decision to the leadership of this three-year old congregation, and it has been one confirmation after another.

There's just a good vibe at this place and I'm excited to jump in and serve with my new family.

The road to Des Moines still has a few obstacles... our house in Morris has not sold and this seems to be just about the worst time in my lifetime to sell a house. We're trusting that God's got it under control, though. Plus, Tricia and I want to let the kids finish out the school year if at all possible. So beginning in March, I'll be commuting to Norwalk on Thursdays, staying the weekend and coming back to Morris on Sunday afternoon. Our family will all move to Norwalk in June.

The next few months may seem like a hard time for our family, but the truth is, I'll see my family more than I do now. And the 9 hour roundtrip commute every week... it's shorter than my current 10 hours a week drive to and from work in Lemont.

Leaving Morris will be bitter sweet; most of our best friends are here. Leaving Timberline Knolls will also be a somewhat sad day, as I've grown to love the young ladies that we're helping get their lives back on track.

But to be right in the middle of God's will and see the awesome things that he's going to do... that I can't wait to see. I hope we can go there together, even. I'll try to keep you all in the loop via my blog, so if you talk to someone and they ask what we're up to, be sure and send them to corbettreeves.com.

Thanks! Peace,
Corbett

What does your marketing tell about you?

I don't really want to get into the argument about whether or not churches should be involved in marketing. For the purpose of this post, understand that I believe marketing is anything you do to affect the way others perceive you or your organization. For example, I don't want my neighbors to think I'm a lazy, bad person to live by, so I cut my grass, conduct general upkeep on the outside of the house and keep trash and toys picked up out of the yard. I don't want our friends to think we generally live in a pig sty, so I straighten the living room and close all other doors before someone comes over. It's all marketing -- affecting the way others perceive us.

So what it your organization communicating to others?

• If you're are a church, do you claim to be focused on impacting your community, but program exclusively for those who come through your doors?
  
• If you're a business, do you claim to be focused on customer service, but reward your employees for profit and not for how satisfied customers are?

By the way, I'm trying to sell my house...
Maybe you're like me and it's time to revisit what your marketing is really saying?

5 Reasons Why Consensus Sucks

I read this today from Tony Morgan's blog and thought it was definitely worthy of passing on. Enjoy!

I’m growing more and more convinced that the worst thing an organization can do is try to reach a consenus about something. Think government. Think church committee meetings. Think declining big business.

On the surface, reaching a consensus seems like a positive thing because it means people have agreed to move in the same direction. That’s a good thing isn’t it?

Actually, I’m not convinced that’s the case. For example, here are:

5 Reasons Why Consensus Sucks

1. It embraces the status quo. Change, whether positive or not, is not human nature. We would prefer for things to remain the way they are today. So, when people get together to discuss the possibility of doing something a little different in the future, it’s normal for the majority to avoid making changes.
2. It gives the malcontents an equal voice in your decision. Reaching consensus gives everyone a voice at the table. When that happens, even the negative, bitter folks that don’t really embrace the vision have the opportunity to pull the rest of the group away from what could really be the most desirable outcome.
3. It short circuits the radical ideas that lead to the biggest breakthroughs. The big, bold ideas won’t see the light of day. Yet those are the ideas that could potentially lead to the best innovations. Consensus brings people back to the middle where the majority approves but mediocrity reigns.
4. It leaves unresolved conflict on the table. At the opposite ends of a decision are distinct opinions which, if left unresolved, could potentially lead to division. Consensus prevents tough conversations from happening. It gives people the freedom to jump to compromise without engaging a healthy debate.
5. It discourages people from dreaming big dreams. Want to neuter the creative-thinkers and entrepreneurs and visionaries in your organization? Force them to reach consensus with the rest of the crowd. These are the people that make you uncomfortable. They can drive you crazy. That’s OK. They’ll just go work someplace else if you keep forcing them to compromise their dreams.

What do you think? Do you agree? Or, have you actually seen consensus work? What would you add or delete from the list?

Let’s try to reach a consensus on whether or not consensus sucks.

Again, that was from tonymorganlive.com. If you don't subscribe to his blog, you probably should.

Peace,
Corbett

Facebook and iPhones

So for my wife's birthday I got an iPhone. (don't ask how that
happened...I don't understand it either but I'm not asking silly
questions.)

Toward the end of December, my wife talked me into a Facebook
account. I can't really say I jumped at the idea but it's been fun
catching up with some old peeps.

Between the two, I've never been more aware of how small the world
is. I am now reaquainted with friends from every stage of my life
thus far. And it is all literally at my fingertips, 24/7. I'm
feeling quite the technophile.

Don't get me wrong... I'm not ready to start Twittering just yet, but
who knows?

Peace,
Corbett

Sent from my iPhone