Category Archives: Revolution Church

The least, the lost, and the lonely

*Disclaimer! This definitely falls under the category of church planting. If you read my blog for pithy comments, insightful devotions, or my family’s journey – well, this may bore you completely. You’ve been warned.

The Call

Church planting is hard. I read a post from a fellow church planter recently who said church planting was easy – pastoring was hard. I understand the sentiment, but the issue is that the two are inseparable.

Unlike the difference between the wedding and the marriage, church planting has no definitive end in sight. I’m not sure when you are done “planting”.

The Challenge

The primary reason for this is that the most common challenge church planters face is the need for additional leaders. In the majority of cases, every leader involved in a new work is responsible for 3 or 4 areas – and none of them may be their area of gifting! There always seems to be more work to be done than there are people to do it.

Many church planters (myself included at times) often cry out, ‘if I only had more leaders, I could _________!’

Wake Up Call

The truth is, you probably couldn’t _________. That’s because leaders aren’t born. They’re grown!

I was reminded today that Jesus had a peculiar way of doing ministry and equipping leaders. There’s an old saying: God doesn’t call the qualified, He qualifies the called. Repeatedly in Scripture we see examples of God taking the most unlikely candidates and using them for His glory and purpose.

True Discipleship

I sat in a meeting this morning where I heard David Putman from PlantingTheGospel.com share this: ‘When Jesus sees the least, the lost, and the lonely, he sees people beaming with potential.’

In other words, rather than focusing on your situation and the lack of resources, why not take the approach of Jesus and focus on the people God has placed in your care and the potential that lies within?

Discipleship isn’t about taking a full grown plant from one garden and transplanting it to yours. It’s more about taking a freshly planted seed, planted in new & fertile soil, and making sure it grows into the healthy plant it should be.

Healthy things grow.

As leaders, we don’t have to manufacture something that doesn’t exist. We don’t have that power. We are only to harness the God-given power already at work within the disciple and steer that in the direction God intends for it to go.

It’s slower than your plug and play leadership team idea.

It’s messier than the neatness of titles and job descriptions.

It hurts more because you fail more and learn as you go.

It’s harder to help people move from where they are to where God wants them to be.

But that’s the job.

That’s discipleship.

And it’s our sole mission.

*Question: I have not arrived in this area and am still learning this principle. How about you? What has your experience been with developing leaders from within?


James: Faith That Works

We started a new 12 week series at Revolution Church called ‘James: Faith That Works‘.

The book of James is often misunderstood and many see James’ strong call to discipleship as standing in stark contrast to Paul’s writings and emphasis on grace. That is a common distortion of what’s going on.

Just like my wife and I have one dynamic of our relationship as best friends and lovers, we also have a facet of our relationship as parents. One looks one way and the second looks another. Yet it is the same relationship.

So it is with the contrast with Paul and James. Paul focuses on the relationship between sinner and Savior. James focuses on the relationship between servant and Lord. Perhaps more than any New Testament writing, this is a message to followers of Christ.

Just like with my wife and me, Paul and James describe different aspects of the same relationship – both rooted in grace. One is our desperate need for grace alone and the other is the effect grace has as it manifests itself in the life of the believer.

I invite you to walk through this journey with us and follow along.

Here is the opening message to the series – James: An Introduction.


Revolution Church is Moving!!! Woohoo!!!

It’s official! Revolution Church is moving to Camelot Cinemas on September 25, 2011!

This is our 4th move in 2 years! I remember Rick Warren writing about the number of times Saddleback moved in their first 10 years and saying something like ‘The joke was, if you could find us, you could come!’

We don’t want to be confusing, but we do want to be clear: the Church is the people of God meeting for the purpose of God to worship the person of God. It’s not a building.

This is a great move for Revolution! It gives us the space to grow and top notch facilities to do it in. I am more excited about this location than any other venue we have utilized for Revolution!

Here are the details:

Revolution Church (at Camelot Cinemas)
48 East Antrim Drive – Greenville, SC
Service time: 10:30 am
Full adult and children’s worship

We would love to have you join us for a service where our guests are made to feel like family and the atmosphere is casual and engaging. Please visit the website for more details: www.revolutiononline.cc


Message Highlights – The Return of Christ: A Biblical Perspective

The following is a 4 minute highlight video from a message I preached at Revolution Church in part due to questions and conversations I’ve had as a result of Harold Camping and the media attention from his May 21 prediction about the rapture or end of the world.

The full message is available on the website.


Acts: The Church Unleashed Messages

The last several messages from Revolution Church’s series Acts: The Church Unleashed are now online here.

Also, all messages are now available for free as a podcast subscription in the iTunes store. Try this link to open in iTunes or paste this in your browser:

http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/revolution-church-podcast/id405501782


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