Ladies, I was so thrilled to share our latest event with Christine Caine this August.  Thank you to all the ladies who served to make the night unforgettable and for raising awareness for The A21 Campaign.

Here’s a quick rewind video of the event.  Hope you enjoy!

Celebration Women Presents Christine Caine

Monday, August 2nd, 7 pm
Georgetown Campus

Pre-register: $12 or $15 at the door
Childcare is available.

Girls, I can hardly wait for us to get together this August with Christine Caine.  Be sure to pre-register now and invite the girls!

For two years, I’ve been processing a message that I shared yesterday on Friendship. Being the perfectionist that I am, I thought maybe I had to get everything right (i.e. had to be the perfect friend) before I could share any profound revelations. Well, I finally realized that that would never happen, so I just decided to share on this topic that’s very dear to me straight from my heart. If you weren’t there, I encourage you to get a copy of the CD. God is already using this message to change mindsets and set people free. I had no idea that so many women were struggling with this issue! Here’s a very small excerpt – I may end up writing a series of them out of my 10 pages of message notes!

Enjoy, my friend!

Finding Foundation in Friendship

Friendship is the highest form of relationship! You may think it’s marriage or family, but what are they without the foundation of friendship?

Friendship, loyalty and longevity of relationships are oxygen to me. There was a time in my life (and probably in yours) that friend time was easy. Ring a doorbell of a neighbor, and then spend the next several hours playing Barbie dolls or Hide and Seek! Now, it’s tweeting, texting, Facebooking and scheduling an occasional lunch months out. But true friends, once together, can pick up right where they left off – even if you meet once or twice a year – there’s nothing sweeter!

Jesus had the best friendship model for leaders. It was the “Follow Me and Let’s Change the World Together!” Model. Along the way to healing and restoring people, they had lunch, they had dinner, they fished, they prayed, they walked, they talked . . .

The greatest friends you’ll ever have can be found in church. Our vision for Celebration Church is to connect people in friendship with a God who stepped out of the comforts of Heaven in order to lay down His life for friendship with each of us – He is the ultimate friend.

Celebration Women Give Big

John 15:12 – This is my commandment that you love one another as I have love you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made know to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you. These things I command you, that you love one another.

Secondly, our desire is it is to join people together in friendship – generations, experiences and callings to partner for a cause that Christ gave his life for – the Church. There are no greater friendships than those formed in faith, with a common and divine cause.

Here are 5 questions to ask yourself about your friendships (from Pastor Brian Houston):

1. Is it hurting my relationship with God?
2. Is it distracting me from my call or purpose?
3. Is it destructive to the work of the Lord?
4. Is it helpful to my marriage or family?
5. Is it going to take away from the network of relationships God has given me?

God designed each of us for a purpose and he gave us friends to encourage us in that purpose. Who are you surrounding yourself with?

Surround yourself with people who are more interested in you becoming what God wants you to be than they are with their personal desires for your time and their plans for your friendship. I want to be the right kind of friend to the relationships God has given me. I want everyone I touch to be challenged to serve God and His House with greater love and passion – to be the World-changers God designed them to be!

I can hardly wait!  Download the complete gift registry and register for the luncheon or the dinner at CelebrationChurchTx.com/women

So I just had a frustrating thing happen! In a rare moment, I was motivated to go for a power-walk and, this time, I actually did more than put on my running shoes! In fact, with the weather warming up (I hibernate in sub-70 temperatures) I thought, “I’m going to download a pedometer app on my iPhone to start measuring my steps and walking a little more each day!” So, off I went to the corner of my street and turned around, only to find that my pedometer had shut itself off – stuck at 655 steps. I think I should just add a zero to the end and we’ll call it even!

It made me think of my spiritual walk. We don’t have to earn our salvation.  His grace is unmerited, unearned, undeserved and freely given! Thank you, Jesus! Yet, at the same time, Ephesians 4 challenges me, beginning with the first verse, “I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called . . . ” What a powerful verse and chapter and book! It is a selfish Christianity (BTW, “selfish Christianity” is an oxymoron!) that says, “I was bought with a price.  My eternity is secure.  Now I will rest easy!” One may as well say, “I’m safe and everyone else can ‘go to Hell!’” Our walk counts for eternity!

At last night’s Celebration Serve Team event, Joe shared about Jesus leaving the multitude to go to the other side, where he encountered the “one” – one person, who needed an experience with Jesus. Our multitude meetings (a.k.a. church services) should always lead us to “go to the other side and reach one!”  At one point, we heard a great example that illustrated this. Joe called a woman named Maribeth to the stage to share how her neighbors and her granddaughter’s swim coach relentlessly invited her to Celebration. She was un-churched, and although she’d been raised in a Catholic home, time and events happened that left her empty of a relationship with Christ. She changed her plans to visit her mom on Easter, just so she could try Celebration and her life and her family have been radically changed as a result.  Hundreds of Celebration leaders were brought to tears and challenged by her testimony. She said, “I needed this (hope of Jesus Christ) years ago!”  She’s now serving faithfully, never misses a service and is “walking worthy of the calling,” by using her very new story of her relationship with Christ to lead others to Him.

I loved Rick Warren’s tweet directed to Pastors this week that said, “If you count the offering and don’t count the church attendance, it shows you care more about money than people!”  Ouch!  People count and I want every bit of my walk to raise the number of people who experience the love of Christ and secure an eternity in Heaven.

People desperately need the Lord. How many Maribeth’s do I walk by daily? I want my walk, my walking each and every day, to count! I not only want it to count, but I want to be able to count the lives that have been affected by how I live, invest and invite people to Him.  Walking on!

While driving to San Antonio for a quick Mother’s Day family getaway, Mason, my 18 year old, was in the backseat signing up via iPhone to take his ACT test. “Mom, is there a good church in Tuscaloosa, AL?” “Yes, Pastor Chris Hodges has a campus there,” I replied. He said, “How about Oxford, MS?” then, “How about Norman, OK . . .Gainesville, FL?” Frustrated with the constant interruptions, I said, “Why are you asking me about the churches in all of these areas?” My frustration turned to complete joy when he told me that he had to list six universities that his test scores would be sent to and that he would NOT list a university that didn’t have a good church for him. Of course, I didn’t make a big sappy deal of it, because he would not have thought that was cool, but inside I was shouting, “YES! ALL THE TRAINING, THE MOTHERING – HE GETS IT!” What a great revelation on Mother’s Day weekend!

Right priorities don’t just happen. They are modeled.  In all of Mason’s 18 years, we’ve missed church maybe five times. Even when we vacation, we go to church. It’s not because we’re pastors. We’re pastors because we wanted to give our lives to a cause that Christ died for and that has been used in our own lives for salvation, healing, comfort and freedom – the Church. The conversation with Mason was reminiscent of one I had with my parents in 1986 as a senior in high school trying to find God’s will for my education. Thinking that I’d go to ORU (a Christian university), my dad called a pastor friend from Baton Rouge who was on the ORU Board of Regents to get a recommendation.  The pastor said, “You should send Lori to LSU. We can plug her in at my church.” My dad was sold once he found out that I’d have a healthy church where I’d continue to grow spiritually at such a critical time in my life – a time when most of life’s crucial decisions are made.  I didn’t have a car my freshman year, but I secured a ride to church every week, sometimes riding with people I didn’t even know. To me it was non-negotiable – even during finals, after late nights, and when, for whatever reason, it wasn’t convenient or desirable.

I don’t know where I’d be without the local church. There was a time I was so distraught about my father’s untimely death, that I honestly did not feel God.  I felt like my prayers hit the ceiling and when reading the Bible, it may as well have been the newspaper – nothing! I told my roommates, “The only thing that I know is that ‘Help comes from the sanctuary (Ps. 20:2)’, and I’m going to keep showing up, and worshipping like I did when I FELT GOD.” One day, six months into my “showing up,” God totally met me. The songs, the message, the man who prayed with me, the whole service was all orchestrated so that God could reach into my 19-year-old, devastated life, set me free from grief and restore my joy. What a difference a day in God’s House can make! It’s honestly what I think about every time I plan a service or lead a song – “Today, someone is going to walk into a service like I did 22 years ago, and their life will be forever changed!”

Proverbs 22:6 - Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.

This Mother’s Day, I’m most thankful for my parents, grandparents and great-grandparents who put a taste in my mouth for the House of God, for His presence and for His family. It’s like a honing device in me, that if I’m not with my Celebration family, I feel like I’m missing out, and that’s how it should be. We are a Church, not a crowd, a body that needs all of its parts together in order to function effectively. The greatest gift for me this Mother’s Day is knowing that this honing device is in my kids, too!

Happy Mother’s Day to all of you who pray and sacrifice with a commitment to seeing the ways of God ingrained in the lives of your children.

Galatians 6:9 – Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

Much love & blessings,

Lori

My friends know that although I am out of breath in the first few minutes of walking on a treadmill, a few years ago I successfully and energetically climbed the Sydney Bridge as soon as I de-boarded the flight from USA to Australia (22 hours in airports and planes). To the complete and admitted surprise of Joe, I had no problem keeping up with him and our athletic friends who accompanied me on this great adventure.  What’s the difference?  Well, on a treadmill, I walk alone. I’m bored. The view doesn’t change. I’m inside my house! God has called us to walk with others and – I know for me – it challenges me to keep up, plus I’m very competitive! Face it:  God’s called us to walk outside of our four walls and enjoy the journey and view!

Joe and I were on a treadmill for the first year and a half of our church plant – walking, running, working, sweating! Things got exciting in April 2002 when we left after Wednesday night service tear-down (we were a mobile church then) and headed to Memphis to learn more about a new organization that long-time friends/ministry acquaintances were launching – the Association of Related Churches (ARC). We were so poor that we could not stop for a hotel on the way and made arrangements to stay with our pastor’s daughter’s family in Memphis.

Twenty-two people sat in the room (21 men and me) and we listened to story after story of church-plants that had hundreds at their first service and continued to have outrageous growth. At 18 months old, our church had barely topped the 100 people mark. We could’ve left there depressed, but they weren’t there to brag about their numbers, they offered tangible concepts, creative ideas and encouragement. The encouragement is what we needed most!

We were ALL-IN, and immediately began sowing 2% of Celebration’s income to church-planting through ARC and tithing to global and local missions! We made tweaks in our services, refocusing people on reaching the lost. The results were absolutely supernatural! Over the next few months, our church attendance and income more than tripled, even in the summer. I cannot point to any one huge thing that we did to see the turn-around, other than PARTNERSHIP with the right people – people who challenged us to do more than sweat the treadmill, but to climb higher, just like we did the Sydney Bridge!

So, last week’s ARC All Access 2010 Conference was huge for me.  First of all, ARC has grown from 22 (when Joe and I joined) to almost 2000 of us in the room.  I looked around at wide-eyed church-planters, who need exactly what I needed 8 years ago – ideas, proven concepts and people to climb with! Secondly, I still (and will always) need the people (now some of our best friends) who have climbed with us for the last eight years. No matter how big or successful your church is, the encouragement is still what we all need most! Every time we’re together, I’m challenged to continue to improve our ministry so that we can continue to see thousands of people come to know Jesus! Who would’ve ever thought that the difficult trip to Memphis would forever change our lives!?

I am supposed to be studying to share a word with OneHope board member wives next week, but ever since this morning when Jackson announced the return of the armadillo (who invaded our flower beds nightly last year), I can’t stop singing “Armadillo by Morning” to the tune of George Straight’s “Amarillo by Morning”! I’m laughing to myself that although I’m totally aggravated that this critter has navigated his way back to my unwelcoming home, that I admittedly DO take after my grandmother, Ruth Hunt, who is a human juke box! She breaks into random songs at any (or many) given times during a conversation, when triggered by a word or phrase. At 86, she has quite an extensive and interesting repertoire!

My armadillo encounter reminds me of Song of Solomon 2:15, “Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes.” If there was a Texas version of the Bible, “Little foxes” would definitely translate, “armadillos”! The passage is referring to the little sneaky things/issues that make their way into our relationship with the Lord. They are usually nocturnal, operate in darkness rather than light, and without tending to them, they can stunt or kill the fruitfulness in our lives.

What then, are these little foxes, which can spoil the relationship between us and the Lord?

In my experience, it usually begins as innocent distractions, comforts of the world or even business pursuits that impede our ability to hear God’s voice and lure us away from time with Him and our commitment to His House. No one wakes up and says, “Today, I want to derail God’s plan for my life.” It’s subtle choices, it’s “taking a break” from ministry responsibility that lasts too long, it’s seeds of disappointment and resentment that become roots of bitterness, it’s lack of Godly counsel . . . and before you know it, the Awe of God and for His presence is lost, and effects can not only be deadly but also generational.

In Psalm 51:11-12, David said, “Do not cast me away from Your presence. And do not take Your Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the Joy of Your salvation, and uphold me by Your generous Spirit.”

When I feel dry and weary (Yes, you can become both IN FULL-TIME MINISTRY!), I speak this over my life. I start thinking about what God did to Save me, how He picked me to lead in His church, how he healed me when I thought I was dying, how he’s blessed me with friendships and provision, how He gave me an incredible family to steward for His purpose, how I get to be a part of His awesome plan. . . Gratefulness for His generous sacrifice begins to stir up the Joy, the Awe, the Energy to re-prioritize my life again, to get over my selfishness and make Him the center of my existence again.

Get rid of the Armadillos in your life, and start “Flourishing” in the life of God and His House again (Ps 92:13). There is no better life, and He is Worthy of us, 100%!

P.S. – If you know how to get rid of armadillos, literally, please do share!

I don’t like to cry, I’m not a cry-er, but when I do cry, it’s the ugly cry!!! So, here goes. . . April 23, 1992, a burst of joy in the midst of my own personal health crisis, entered our world! I wanted to be surprised. Would it be Kaitlyn Michelle or Joseph Mason (following the Southern tradition of naming the firstborn boy after Dad’s first name, and Mom’s maiden name)? Mason (we called him by the middle name to be sure to confuse everyone at the beginning of every school year) was a month early, induced one week after I was diagnosed with cancer, so that I could get on with treatment. To the medical team, his birth seemed to be more about me than about him. But to Joe and me, getting to meet our 6 lb. 7 oz. beautiful, olive-complexioned (Joe prayed he’d tan and he does!), brown haired boy early was the only good part of what we were experiencing. In fact, you’d never know that our future was being threatened by a potentially life-taking illness. We were thrilled, giddy and had a room full of happy, loud people celebrating his birth the whole time we were in the hospital!

It’s so true that kids grow up quickly – like most young moms, I smiled and sloughed that off. It seemed like it would take forever just to get him to sleep through the night, then to walk (he was 15 ½ mos. old), then to potty-train… But he was early to speak, and he argued even before his words were clear! At 4 years old, on the day Connor was born, he learned to ride a two-wheeler. I think he was trying to run away, as he wasn’t a fan of giving up the only child status! He still jokes that he was a great kid before he had to share with two brothers!

Every mom thinks their kids are special, but he’s never been normal. He was kind of part-child/part-adult his whole life, and he’s so very logical, cautious and mature. What 16-year-old declines his parent’s suggestion of getting a license because he doesn’t think he’s mature enough, and thinks he looks too young to drive, which would result in the police pulling him over? What does he want for his birthday? Money to start a business! He’s just finished reading “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” to learn to invest, and last week he attended a Tea Party! When he said, “I’m going to be a little late, because I’m at a Tea Party”, I thought he was on a date – we had Tea parties in my college sorority. But he came home fired up about politics!

But my favorite part of Mason is his loyalty to his friends (when Mason is your friend, he calls you “family”) and his commitment to Christ. You never have to wonder where Mason stands on issues he’s passionate about – LSU football, hunting, politics, JESUS! He loves Jesus and he loves our church! It’s so rewarding to invest our lives in building a Church and to be rewarded with children who never want to miss a service, whose deepest friendships are there and who appreciate and want to spend time with the amazing mentors who come alongside us in training them in God’s ways! So today, I celebrate my firstborn. Thank you, Jesus, for his life! He was born and embodies a Champion! I’m so proud of Mason, and look forward (though not in a hurry!) to seeing him change the world!

Father Knows Best . . . In most cases!

So, I’m joining the world of blogging! Every time I read someone else’s blog or think to myself, “Twitter doesn’t have enough characters”, I think about the time when I called my dad and told him I was changing my major to Journalism/Advertising. He said, “Lori, you’ll never be able to use that in ministry!” Being the brilliant (in my own eyes), strong-willed, 18-year-old that I was, I quickly responded “Well, that’s just fine, since I’ll NEVER be in ministry!” My Dad used to say that I’d “argue with a fence-post!” He loved to provoke me, and then he would affectionately laugh that I’d taken the bait again. Dad was right that I had a call to ministry upon my life, and although he didn’t foresee the vastly different, connected, computerized communication world in which we’d live in the 21st century (this was pre- fax machines!), I must admit, HE KNEW BEST about my future and my calling! And, I was apparently outsmarted by God in my education path. God knew I wouldn’t be what I’d aspired to be – an attorney, a politician or a campaign manager, but He knew I’d use what I learned! I guess you can say I was double-teamed by both my heavenly and earthly Fathers!

Our Heavenly Father KNOWS BEST in All Cases!

Jeremiah 29:11 (NIV) “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

I love my life and my calling. I thought I would sacrifice my career dreams to serve God’s purpose, but His purpose has exceeded my every imagination and expectation! I’m obviously not 18 anymore, but I’m more passionate and some may say more idealistic than ever about my future! It’s a future that is invested, full-on, in the Purpose of God, His Church, His People! His plans for me and for all of us are that we absolutely change the world, whether it’s through raising up the next generation of leaders in our own homes, by spreading the Good News or by imparting experience and wisdom to church leaders.

I hope to inspire and challenge you through my sometimes chaotic, never glamorous, but fully-committed-to-God- life that He Knows and has the Best future for your life, and that as you surrender your life to Him and His Church, that He will do more in and through you than you could ever imagine!

XXXOOO
Lori