The Tough Way is Still the Best Way...

the past week has again been filled with numerous tough conversations...

i am the type of person that would just rather avoid confrontation. i feel like God has blessed me with the ability to be an incredibly positive person, but part of the problem with that is i often want to spin things in such a positive way that it leaves me skipping out on confrontation that needs to happen.

so, this past week, i have managed to not allow myself to be talked out of confrontation...and i had a couple of really tough conversations. but they were conversations where the Spirit was very obviously present...and that have brought great things in their aftermath.

i have thought much these past couple of weeks about the words of james 1:2-4 where it says...

"consider it pure joy my brothers when you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything."

i have to confess...i am far from enjoying, liking, wanting, being comfortable with confrontation...but i am realizing more and more that there are times where it is simply the best way...and i pray that i can continue to rely on the Spirit to know when that is the case.

A Great Night of Reflection...

last wednesday we finished up our series on the sermon on the mount...called ascend.

we spent 11 weeks in all looking at matthew 5,6 and 7. it was the longest expository teaching series that we have done in probably 2 and a half years. it was a great series...people really seemed to get into digging so deeply and entering into the story of God in the way that we did.

so, to come to the final week brought mixed emotions. half of the emotions were really about not wanting the series to be over...to continue to dig and study in new ways. but the other half of the emotions were all about the excitement of hearing what people had learned and what stuck out to people along the journey.

we took some time during the night and asked people to share about what stuck out to them the most, what their favorite moments were, and what they felt the most challenged by. and the sharing was really phenomenal!

there were probably 20 people that shared...and it was such a great picture to hear all of the different things that people remembered and that stuck out to people. many of which i barely remembered teaching! it is so good to be reminded that God works in so many more ways than we know or realize. really just awesome stuff!!

as we move into second semester, we will be moving to some slightly more topical series...but it leaves me incredibly excited to again dig into a section of scripture over a rather lengthy amount of time.