As of today, I have been soda free for 8 days. I know that doesn’t sound like a big deal to some of you, but for me, it is the first time in my life I have not consumed soda for a week.

The reason I tell you this story is not so that you will pat me on the back and tell me that I am doing a good job. No, I write this because of the dynamics behind this change.

Back in January, I visited the doctor for the first time in 18 years. I did all of the standard tests, and he told me that I have high cholesterol. This puts me at a greater risk of a heart attack. If you combine that with my dad having a heart attack and a series of strokes, my chances are also significantly increased. Then two weeks ago I read a new scientific study that showed people who consume two diet sodas a day are almost 75% more likely to have a heart attack. Immediately a light went on for me. I can’t control my genetics, and the doctor can prescribe medication to help with the cholesterol, but I can 100% control the liquids going into my body. In that very moment, I decided that I was done with diet soda forever.

The process of change has always fascinated me. So I began to dissect this event in my life. My wife has tried to convince me to drop the diet Mt. Dew for years. She has almost begged me and I would not do it. I have read other articles about the evils of soda and ignored them. This time it was a perfect storm of my stage in life, a doctor’s report, and a timely article that changed my mind. Everything came together, and all I needed to do was act.

I tell you all of this for two reasons. First, some of you have experienced God working on and in your life. Maybe it is time to follow him. I pray God will bring everything together that you might step forward in faith.

Second, some of you have been working with people you love, and they are resistant to ever changing. Don’t give up. With prayer and the power of God, one day everything may come together. You never know when that day will come so keep persevering in your effort to help.

I never dreamed I would give up my diet soda, but here I am. Who knows what God will do in your life and the lives of the people you love.

After reading a line by another writer, I took his thoughts and crafted my own sentence. I scribbled in my notebook, “You choose not only who you want to be but also how you want to be as that person.”

I firmly believe that God created us with free will. He is so powerful that he can limit his sovereignty over our choices, thus allowing us to love out of our own hearts. We can choose to follow him or reject him. We can walk the way of Jesus or the way of sin.

Once we step out in faith and become a disciple of the Lord Jesus, then we have a secondary choice. How are we going to live as a believer? Are we going to be an overachiever always pushing for greater success? Are we going to be passive and do very little for the kingdom of God?

One line that has adjusted my thinking is in Paul’s letter to the Church at Thessalonica. There he says,

Paul’s instructions for the believers in that city and all believers are elemental. Work hard. Earn your keep and don’t depend on other people to pay your bills. Then, when you are done working. Mind your own business and take care of your needs at home. Do what he calls “leading a quiet life.”

You do not have to be busy all the time. You do not have to work non-stop. You do not have to fill every minute of your life with noise and distractions. It is enough to work hard and take care of your own family. A life like that is so rare that people will see it outside of faith and they will respect you.

Your life is the result of the choices you make. You chose not only who you want to be but also how you want to be that person. Chose wisely.

Almost daily one of my news feeds shares a story of something negative that some individual or group did who call themselves Christians. Lately, they have ranged from sexual abuse to adultery to a misuse of power. Whenever I hear these stories, these are the five words that go through my mind.

1. Sadness. It breaks my heart to every time I hear that a Christian has tarnished the name of Jesus by some sin. It doesn’t surprise me, evil is real and seeks to devour us. Humanity is sinful, and we chose to break God’s law repeatedly. Still – it makes me sad every single time.

2. Thankfulness. I am thankful for God’s grace and mercy in my life. I mean this in two ways. First, except for the grace of God, there go I. Honestly, I am one bad choice away from messing up my life and leadership. Two, I am thankful am forgiven. The sins I have committed are covered by the blood of Jesus.

3. Suspicion. When I hear stories of failure by Christians, I always check out the source. Frequently, they come from very non-Christian places from people who are trying to hurt the name of Jesus intentionally. The reason these stories spread like wildfire is that they damage the Church. It reminds me to be careful with what I share.

4. Reality. I have heard of three stories of different types of moral failure lately. All are terrible. Three ugly stories of sin doing damage. Honestly, that is three too many, but it is only three. When you consider there are over 300,000 Churches in the US alone. Those Churches represent millions of people, and that is just in this one country. The truth is that the vast majority of believers are living with grace and only a few bad apples make the news.

5. Goodness. For all the bad stories that make it to social media, there are thousands of positive stories that go unreported. One of the sinful situations I read about recently was perpetuated by two men in a foreign mission. It was disgusting. What the story did not tell you was all the good this organization did with its numerous volunteers besides those two evil men. Unfortunately, a group of Godly people feed, cloth, and educate thousands of people and we only hear of these two sinful men. There is far more good happening in the name of Jesus than evil.

I hate sin. I hate it in my life. I hate it in other people when it damages the cause of Christ. As long as men have free will, evil will exist. People will sin, and negative stories will circulate. I hope you will pray for Christian leaders so that they do not fall and also for the people who have sinned. I hope you will view these stories in the proper perspective. Otherwise, we will grow cold and cynical instead of reflecting the joy of the Lord into our dark world.

One of the preachers I heard speak when I was a boy used to say something like, “I know I am preaching to the choir.” At first, I had no idea what he meant, but over time I learned that he was saying something we already believed and with which we agreed.

Throughout my ministry, I have tried to avoid sermons that were just preaching to the choir. I wanted to say things that challenged our thinking or forced us to question our assumptions. Occasionally, despite my best efforts, I end up doing exactly what I have been trying to avoid. Last Sunday was one of those times.

Let me give you the whole story, so you understand what happened. I am in a series of sermons from the gospel according to Luke. The second sermon in the series focused on the calling of one of Jesus twelve disciples named Levi. My goal was to explain the text while trying to invite people who feel like outsiders to follow Jesus. Well, the sermon was prepped and ready when we had to cancel worship on account of ice. I held onto the message and planned on preaching it the following Sunday. Little did I know that the next week we would also have snow and ice. We decided to meet, knowing that many people would not be able to attend. Finally, when I stood up to preach, I looked out at about a hundred people who I knew was mostly committed Christians. That was not entirely unexpected, only a person with a strong commitment to Jesus would get out to worship on such a lousy day.

There I stood with one thought running through my mind, “Today I am just preaching to the choir.” These people already know and believe everything I am going to say. My next thought was to change or adjust everything at the moment to make it more challenging to those in attendance. I did add and adapt a little of the information, but the basic message remained the same.

After I was done preaching several people commented that the sermon was good, inspiring, and enjoyable. At the precise moment, God spoke into my soul and reminded me that we all need to hear about the call of Christ to sinners over and over. The followers of Jesus must be continually reminded of their sins and the grace found in him. Even the choir should hear about the mercy and compassion found in Jesus repeatedly.

Perhaps today you would call yourself a believer who is trying to follow Jesus, and you need to be reminded of grace. You need to hear that Jesus loves you in spite of what you have done. These words that are so familiar to you can still touch your soul in the place you most need it. Sometimes the message we need to hear the most is the one with which we already agree and have merely forgotten.

Yesterday I attended a conference workshop designed for smaller Churches at my alma mater. It was an inspiring day filled with great information from some gifted speakers. One of the men addressed how our Churches are called to make disciples, a topic I have been discussing with our Church leadership for the past two months.

During a question and answer time near the end of the day, one person asked this speaker a great question. They wanted to know, “What are the characteristics of a disciple?”

I appreciate the question as I have been researching and teaching on that exact topic. I usually point to Matthew 28:18-20 or what is referred to as The Great Commission. There Jesus tells his followers that they are to make disciples, baptize them and teach them to obey everything he commanded. I then emphasize that a true disciple follows Jesus, is baptized, obeys Jesus and then goes to make more disciples. It is a solid biblical answer that is still very helpful.

The speaker took the idea and went a different direction with it that I have never heard or noticed. He went to Matthew 4:19, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” (New American Standard). He then explained that there are three characteristics of a disciple.

1. They follow Jesus. Jesus calls, “follow me.”

2. They are being transformed. He focused on the phrase, “and I will make you.” Jesus is making us into his image.

3. They are fishers of men. A disciple cares about other people’s salvation and growth.

These are the marks of a true disciple of Jesus.

I think that is a great response. It pushes me to grow in my faith while demonstrating it with my life.

If these are the characteristics of a disciple, then I must ask myself if I am a disciple or just a Church attendee.

It was one of the most interesting criticisms I have ever received. A man brought his small house church to join the new church I was leading. We had been meeting for about four years at the time, and things were starting to go well.

One day this man contacted me and said he wanted to talk. We met, and he told me that one of my recent blogs was troubling him. I inquired as to what was bothering him so much. He proceeded to show me a blog post and said something like, “read through this and see how many times you write ‘my church.’”

Unsure of what point he was trying to make I read through the article and answered his question. Then he said, “That is the problem, you think this is your church.”

I paused in shock and then questioned him more specifically. He said something like, “This is not your church, it is the Lord’s church.” I responded, “Okay.” He then proceeded to question my leadership and my pride as a leader.

Honestly, this was the first and only time I have ever heard someone complain that I thought it was “my church.” I responded in two ways to home. First, I explained that I had moved my family to Iowa to start the church, raised the money to make it happen and spent countless hours making things grow from my family to over 100 people meeting each week. As a result, I did feel a sense of ownership. I apologized if that came off as arrogance, but this was my baby, and I was happy with what God had done through me.

Second, I offered a sense of personal reflection. This is my church. Not in the sense that I own or control, rather, in the way that the woman I married and the kids she bore are my family. I do not possess them, but I am connected to them in a deep and meaningful way. My heart is given to them, and they are family to me. So, I said emphatically, “It is ‘my church,’ and I am proud to be a part of it. I hope you would come to consider it as your church too.”

One of my goals in ministry is to see people find a place to call home with people they see as family. The church is not just a place of which you are a part or attend worship regularly. It is a collection of people united in Christ and committed to one another. These are my people, and I hope they are yours too.

Here are some of the best articles and posts I have read over the past few weeks. Enjoy

Putting the Basket in the Water: Trusting God in the Next Phase of Your Child’s Life

Four Words that Describe Today’s Pre-Teen Girls

3 Reasons Why We Need Godly Men Serving in Children’s Ministry

Why You Should Try Assigning Seats at a Fellowship Meal

5 Common Mental Errors That Sway You From Making Good Decisions – I found this fascinating.

Today is February 14 or better known as Valentines Day. It is a day here in America when we celebrate love, particularly the love between a man and a woman.

When I sat down to write a post for this day I thought, “I should write something about love.” Several thoughts went through my head from personal stories of love to poetic writing to inspire. Finally, I decided to write something about what real love looks like for people to understand it. Then I realized that has already been written. You have probably heard it read at a wedding, but here it is from The Message paraphrase:

Happy Valentines Day

You are probably familiar with the saying, “One bad apple spoils the whole bunch.” I would even guess that you have used the expression a time or two. It is the idea that one bad person affects everyone they are close to through their rotten behavior. I would say that this is a concept of which you need to be keenly aware in Christian circles.

I was reminded of this truth today as I went on the internet. A few months ago, I became a part of a small Church pastors’ group on Facebook. The rules of the group are very clear. It exists to support people, answer questions and not debate theology. For me, the group has been helpful with questions about benevolence and canceling Church because of the weather. It has been useful to know other Churches policies and procedures. All total those who have joined number over 3400 pastors from across the country and the world. Every day I am blessed by at least one post to this forum.

Two types of people consistently try to ruin it. The first is the righteous zealot. They make it a personal aim to break the rules and argue theology. They are right, and they know they are right, so they decide to debate and argue with everyone. A few minutes of reading these posts and comments make me want to quit the group for such mean statements from another pastor.

The second group that makes communication complex with the community is the self-absorbed. They continually post pictures of their Church work, their sermons, their blogs, and everything they are doing. They do not ask for other people’s advice because they are there to give instruction, not receive it. These people seem to be clueless as to the needs of others and turn every discussion toward their holy behavior.

As I read through the posts, I recognize three things:

1. Every Christian group has these one or two bad apples. Wherever Christians gather there will be someone who wants to argue and someone who is self-absorbed. I really wish this were not true, but experience tells me otherwise.

2. One spiritual gift could be self-awareness. I believe it would do us all some good to go before God and ask him to reveal our weaknesses, including our failures in dealing with people. One area of faith is dealing with our sin against God, and another is learning to deal with other people in a Christlike way. We need to be honest about our behavior and ask God to make us self-aware. Don’t be that bad apple.

3. Know that it is only one or two. My group is 3400 people, and only a handful are the issue. The Church I lead has about 250 people involved, and all problems come from a handful of people. Be careful about labeling any group based on the actions of one or two.

I know this information is nothing new to you any more than it is new to me. Yet, I need to remind myself of these things every day. Today I almost gave up on a bunch of well-intentioned pastors because two guys have issues. I will not let their behavior define me or my actions.

After twenty-five years, it still stands as some of the best leadership instruction I have ever received. It came as I was talking to a pastor at another Church about some of the struggles I was having with the people I lead. After listening to me for several minutes, he responded by saying, “Remember, what you win them with, is what you win them to.”

I understood what he was saying, and the conversation went on to other topics, but his comment lodged in my brain, and I have thought about it repeatedly since that day. What he was expressing was a profound truth about how people connect to a Church.

If people attend a Church because they like the preacher, then they will always want a preacher that they like the same way.

If people attend the Church because they like the music, then they will always want the same style of music.

If people attend a Church because they like the visits and care of someone, then they will always want that same level of care.

If people attend a Church because of relationships, then they will always want to have the same type of close relationships.

What you win them with, is what you win them to.

The essential part of this truth is that as a pastor I want you to connect most to Jesus. I want you to come to this Church because Jesus is proclaimed, taught and glorified at that place. Any other answer is a little skewed.

Then comes the problematic side that I had experienced when I had my original conversation years ago. When the Church changes anything from the pastor to the music to the design of the building, there will be a group of people leave.

Let me ask you a pointed question: When you think about the Church you attend, what is the primary thing you like about it? If that aspect were to change would your feelings change too?

The way you answer this question will let me know whether you are connected here for the long-term or just for a season.