Category: College Football (Page 11 of 12)

Heaven On Earth

August 19, 2008 / Allan / 6 Comments

David Hunter’s wife, Denise, died Sunday. The funeral is Thursday morning in Robinson. Our Father tells us through his prophet Isaiah, “I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you” (46:4). May our God carry David and his two children through this dark, dark valley. May he grant them his peace and comfort. And may he use his people—us—to reach out to them with his love and mercies.

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Further reflections on this past Sunday at Legacy — There was so much anticipation, so much build up, so much expectation going in to that first assembly in the new building, it wouldn’t have mattered what happened in there, most everybody was going to come out feeling great. Everything was going to be positive. Everything was going to be fabulous. It would have been impossible to mess it up, even if we had been trying. Everybody’s expectations were that it was going to be great. Everybody had already decided it was going to be wonderful, months before it ever happened.

And it was. It was wonderful. Microphones were off when they should have been on and they were left on when they should have been off. Communion servers missed rows. The baptistry water was freezing cold. The PowerPoint slides weren’t all up at the times they should have been. I was so totally disoriented, I’m not sure what I said or how I said it. Yet, it was fantastic. It was amazing. And I can’t help but think a ton of that has to do with our mindsets going in. It was going to be wonderful no matter what happened. We had already made up our minds.

Bingo.

Can’t we all, everyone of us, go into this coming Sunday, and the next Sunday, and the Sunday after that, and even the Sundays to come next month and next year and five years from now with the exact same level of anticipation and enthusiasm? Shouldn’t we? Next Sunday there will be more visitors to meet. Next Sunday there will be more Legacy members to greet. Next Sunday our God is going to work in and through our assembly to bless us and shape us into the image of his Son. So why wouldn’t we go into next Sunday the same way we went into this one? No matter what happens during the service, I’m convinced even before it begins that it’s going to be wonderful and I’m going to be blessed by gathering in the presence of God and one another. Why wouldn’t that be the attitude every single week?

Sunday, we looked at how our Christian assemblies transcend time and space. We’re not in this room, we’re not in the worship center. When we’re together, we’re at Mt. Zion, gathered around the throne of our God with all the saints for all time, those who’ve gone before and those who are coming after. We’re in the future. We see the future. We experience the future when we’re together like this. It really is heaven on earth. The singing really is that good.

On Sunday, we joined the future. When we assemble together, we see the future, we experience the future. And we’re strengthened to live in the present because we’ve experienced the future. And we live and act in the present as if the future’s already come. Because for us, it has.

We don’t have to wait for the sweet by and by to experience the transforming presence of God. In the hallowed here and now we enter his throne room together along with all the saints of every age.

May God’s people assemble in our new building in spirit and truth for generations to come. And may our understanding of our assemblies always be shaped by the realities of the eternal Kingdom of our God.

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I was so disoriented Sunday. I never knew whether I was coming or going. The whole thing was so strange. Nothing normal about any of it. And it was much more than just being in a new building. I’ve certainly preached before in strange new settings. What made it weird was that it was all the people I know and love, but nobody was where they belonged. I’ve become very used to looking in certain places and seeing certain people. I know where to look to find the people who are always paying attention and nodding encouragement to me. And I know where to find the people who are just nodding. I know where my good friends are and where the people are I don’t know that well. I know where each of our elders can be found. I know where Carrie-Anne and the girls are. For 14 months now I’ve been accustomed to knowing where everybody is. Until Sunday. Nobody was where they were supposed to be. Everybody was with different people. In different places. This was my church family. But it was like the room had been turned upside down. Very strange. I never got my bearings. I hope it’s a little different this next Sunday.

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I’m humbled by all this. I’ve thought it many times before, it was running through my head all day Saturday, and the thought was overwhelming me Sunday morning: what in the world am I doing here? This church has really messed up by ordaining me as their preacher. They have no clue how far in over my head I am. If they only knew how terrified I am by all this. I don’t belong here. It’s too big. It’s too important. I’m too weak. I’m too small. This doesn’t fit. I’ll be exposed any day now for the fraud I really am. And those thoughts drive me to the floor on my knees. God, if you don’t show up, I’m not showing up. Ever. I can’t do this. You have to do this. It’s all on you, Lord; every bit of it.

And he’s there every time. Every single time. He’s never missed. And it never ceases to blow me away.

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Here it is! Here’s the official logo for The Kingdom, The Kids, & The Cowboys Top 20 College Football Poll. We received a grand total of 6 votes. One vote for David Watson’s “Football Pole” design. Of course, that vote shouldn’t really count because the one casting that vote didn’t even get the joke. Brittany Bankhead-Kendall’s entry received no votes. Sorry, girl. I’m not sure why. I appreciate your effort, though, because it seemed to really get the ball rolling. The other five votes went to Scott Beard’s inspirational design. Scott’s imaginative scheme combines the rich imagery of a football player preparing mentally for the physical battle that faces him in the heart of the trenches—where, as we know, all football games are won or lost—with bold lines and striking attention to detail that paint a complete portrait of the paradox of the game: artistic brutality; violent ballet; a symphony of collisions with all the drama of a month’s worth of soap opera Fridays. So, here it is.

Congratulations to Scott Beard!

The KK&C Top 20 Preseason Poll will be released first thing tomorrow morning.

Peace,

Allan

Building Faith

August 12, 2008 / Allan / 4 Comments

Lance and Kipi and I are in the middle of our three-day Faith Builders Day Camp with our 5th, 6th, and 7th graders here at Legacy. And I’m exhausted. From 9:00 to 11:30 am, we’re teaching these kids — 44 of them — the fundamentals of our faith in God through Christ Jesus. Yesterday the theme was “Sin: The Problem.” Today it was “Jesus: The Solution.” And tomorrow we wrap it all up with “Faith: The Response.” We play games together from 11:30 to 12:00 noon. And then Lance and Kipi take the kids in vans to NRH2O today, Main Event yesterday, and a movie tomorrow.

It’s crazy. So much energy in here. 44 of those 10-12 year-olds. Non-stop. Constant. Loud. Interactive. Responsive. Hilarious. And soaking everything up like a bunch of little sponges. It’s funny that we can be talking about what it really means to be made in the image of God and wind up in a riveting discussion about dinosaurs. We can be deeply involved in Jesus as the perfect lamb for our redemption and 30-seconds later arguing about whether our pets are going to be in heaven. But through it all, they’re getting it. When we talk about Jesus radically changing the life of the demon-possessed man in Luke 8, taking Peter back at that beach-side breakfast in John 21, dying for us while we were still sinners, they get it. I love watching all the little lightbulbs go off. I love the interaction with the kids during lunch or inbetween sessions.

They’re all doing 30-minutes of Faith Builders homework each night with their parents. The conversations are happening. The Bibles are being read. God is reaching out to his children. And the faith is being passed on from generation to generation.

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I can’t imagine a week much busier than this one. Ever. And it’s only Tuesday afternoon. I wish it were Tuesday last week. I’m running out of time.

Faith Builders Day Camp through tomorrow afternoon. Oasis tomorrow evening and then a dry-run in our new worship center. Thursday morning at 6:45 we’re going to hold a ceremony outside while construction workers place the giant metal cross on the exterior of our building facing west on Mid Cities Boulevard. At 7:00 that morning the Legacy Bible Reading will begin. Our whole church family — men, women, and children — will read from Genesis through Revelation in 15-minute shifts. The reading will be carried on video and audio monitors all over our campus here. It’ll be streamed live on our church website. And it’ll conclude at 8:45 Sunday morning with a congregational reading of Revelation 22:12-21. After that, Jim teaches our combined adult class at 9:00. Our first worship assembly begins at 10:00. And that’s followed by a catered all-church lunch, a Tarrant-County-wide singing at 2:00, and an Open House at 3:00.

And then we go home and crash on the couch.

What an amazing week. What an inspirational week. Passing the faith on to our kids together. Reading God’s Word together. Worshiping together. Eating together. Singing together.

For well over a year now we’ve been calling things that are not as though they were.

Now they are.

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Thanks so much to Scott Beard, Brittany Bankhead-Kendall, and David Watson for submitting logo designs for “The Kingdom, The Kids, & The Cowboys Top 20 College Football Poll.” Here are the three logos. Now I need a vote. It’ll be one of these three. Vote now as a comment on this post. Or email me at astanglin@legacychurchofchrist.org Winner will be announced Friday.

Peace,

Allan

I Need A Logo!

August 8, 2008 / Allan / 3 Comments

Someone said I should be more assertive. Here goes:

Allright, readers. I give and I give and I give. Day after day I slave over this keyboard doing everything in my power to encourage you, to provoke you to meaningful thought, to entertain you, to make you laugh, to build you up as we walk together in the footsteps of our Savior. I give and I give and I give. And what do I ask in return? Have I ever asked for anything from you?

I need a logo.

You think I’m kidding. I’m not.

Design a logo for The Kingdom, The Kids, And The Cowboys College Football Top 20 Poll this weekend. Get it to me before Monday.

I mean it.

Click on the green “KK&C Top 20” tab at the top of this page for more info.

Dude, I’m serious.

Allan

The Church Is The Building, Too

August 4, 2008 / Allan / 8 Comments

They’re in the middle of the impressive task of installing the pews in our new worship center. And in just two weeks we’ll be assembling together in this beautiful building to worship our God and spur one another on in our lives of faith.

We say all the time that the Church is not the building, it’s the people.

OK. I’ll buy that. I believe that. Up to a point.

We shouldn’t carry that statement or that position so far that it discounts or nullifies the sacred nature of the actual place where God’s children meet him in sacred assembly.

The building is important. It’s OK to feel that way. There’s nothing wrong with feeling the way you do when you walk into our new worship center or into the old church building in Arkansas where you were baptized or into the church buildings in Tulsa or Abilene where you meet and worship with dear friends once a year.

Our church buildings are vital to our faith. Our buildings collect stories and develop associations that give great depth and breadth to our experience of following Jesus together. It’s in our new worship center where our two younger daughters will put on their Lord in baptism. A couple of them may wind up getting married in there. We’ll sing and pray together in there during the funeral of some very dear sweet person reading (or writing!) this article right now. We’ll send off missionaries together in there. We’ll laugh and we’ll cry together in there. We’ll experience birth and death and everything in between together in there. We’ll hear the Word of our Lord together in there. We’ll share the communion meal together in there. We’ll be convicted and moved, we’ll confess and repent, we’ll chase little kids around the aisles together in there.

And we’ll do all those things together in the presence of each other and in the presence of our Holy God.

Your grandmother’s house is full of stories. Your childhood home is full of memories. Your current space of residence serves as the comforting and stabilizing center of your family’s hectic schedule. Our church buildings serve the same important function of reminding us of who and what has gone before and pointing ahead to who and what is to come, all in the presence of and by the power of our eternal God.

Yes, the Church is the people. But the building represents the people and the stories and the memories and the provision and care of the God we serve.

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Our 20 pollsters for the inaugural The Kingdom, The Kids, & The Cowboys Top 20 College Football Poll are all in. 19 Texas residents and one from California. Eighteen men and two women whose formative years were spent in places as widely varied as Chicago and Broken Arrow and Mississippi and Ohio. Judging from our pollsters’ list of favorite teams, it looks like we have the Big XII, Big 10, SEC, C-USA, Mountain West, WAC, and Pac-10 Conferences completely covered. It should be a totally comprehensive poll. And legitimate. Until the first time ACU or Harding or UTA receives votes. Then it’s over.

I still need a logo for this thing. Submit your entries now. Design a logo for the KK&C Top 20 and email it to me at astanglin@legacychurchofchrist.org

Thanks for jumping in. Much more later.

Peace,

Allan

ONE More Slot!

August 2, 2008 / Allan / 0 Comments

There is only one more opening for weekly voters in the inaugural “The Kingdom, The Kids, and The Cowboys College Football Top 20 Poll,” or as it’s commonly known, “The KK&C Top 20.” Click on the green “KK&C Top 20” tab in the upper right corner of this page for more info. Nineteen are in. One to go. I’ll get all of you much more information once we nail down the last one.

Have a great weekend,

Allan

Sovereign Lord

July 30, 2008 / Allan / 0 Comments

“Sovereign Lord, you made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and everything in them.” ~Acts 4:24

The Scriptures point clearly to the fact that our God uses governments and wars and elections and political manuverings and the rising and falling of empires to work his will in our world. Whatever the powers of this earth decide or do, our Father uses for the purposes of his eternal Kingdom. Those early Jerusalem Christians in Acts 4 understood this principle. After they’d been ordered to stop teaching and speaking about the resurrected Christ, they appealed to their Sovereign Lord to “stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” They pointed back to Psalm 2 in this prayer to acknowledge that the powers and authorities of this world are always opposed to God and his mission but that God uses those very powers and authorities to do his will.

Maybe they didn’t even realize how true their prayer was.

Shortly after the unified wording of this prayer, the powers of the world carried out the execution of Steven and scattered the new Church with persecution. And God used it to spread the Gospel and expand the borders of his eternal Kingdom. And our Father is doing the same thing today.

This coming Sunday, for the first time ever, our brothers and sisters in Christ will assemble in a public building in the capital city of the people’s republic of China. This Sunday, the legally sanctioned Beijing Church of Christ will meet to worship our Sovereign Lord.

God uses the Olympics.

There are over 15-million people in Beijing. There are over a billion people in China. And starting Sunday our own brother Aubrey Johnson from the Peachtree City Church of Christ outside Atlanta is going to be teaching and preaching salvation from God in Christ Jesus for seven straight weeks! In Beijing, China! Under government sanction! Under government protection! Bible class at 9:30! Worship at 10:30! Are you kidding me?!?

Prove our God is sovereign? He just did!

Again!

David and Olivia Nelson tell me Christians are fleeing Moscow by the hundreds because of new government restrictions there. God is going to use that. Manuel Calderon baptized eleven people into Jesus last week in Venezuela. He’s using that. Our teenagers here delivered over 700 lightbulbs last week to families in an apartment complex near our church. God’s using that. Dan Miller and Bruce Archer have established two congregations of new Christians at two apartment complexes in Mesquite. And God’s using that.

That smile you gave the clerk at the post office. That kind word you delivered to your waiter. The check you wrote. The cake you baked. The hours you volunteered. The child you helped. The senior you assisted. The big stuff and the little stuff. Our God is sovereign over all. All of it. And he’s using it for his purposes and his Kingdom.

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I have 17 spots available for college football pollsters to participate in The Kingdom, The Kids, & The Cowboys Top 20 College Football Poll. You can be a pollster. You only have to be a college football fan and commit to emailing me your Top 20 every Monday through the football season. Please see yesterday’s post or click the “KKC Top 20” tab at the upper right corner of this page for more information.

Happy Milestone-Birthday, Ro! Are you tired? Are you involved? Is that why you’re so tired? I love you.

Peace,

Allan

Category: College Football (Page 11 of 12)

Heaven On Earth

Building Faith

I Need A Logo!

The Church Is The Building, Too

ONE More Slot!

Sovereign Lord

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