Mental Post-Its

Thoughts, Notes, and General Mental Mayhem

Category Archives: Christianity


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Watch The Orange Conference 2015 Live Stream

LiveStreamFB_01It’s here! It’s here! OC15 is this week! My company, Orange, hosts the largest family ministry event, The Orange Conference, and it’s all going down this week. We’ll be joined by almost 7,000 of our closest friends!

Not going to be here with us? No problem! You can still tune in to our Live Stream. We’ll be streaming a few of the main sessions, give away LOTS of prizes, conducting speaker and author interviews, and generally having a good time. So, you should make plans to hang out with us.

A couple pointers:

  • Check the Live Stream site for the schedule. BUT if you can only watch one thing, tune in Wednesday night at 7:30 p.m. ET to hear our founder, Reggie Joiner. It’s going to be a great message! Plus, it’s the opening session so there will be lots of fun things happening.
  • Be sure to RSVP for additional perks and offers you won’t see anywhere else.
  • Get your game face on! You could win a variety of fantastic prizes just for watching—including a ticket to next year’s conference!

Hope you can make it!


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Interrupted: Book Review

InterruptedI just finished reading Jen Hatmaker’s book, Interrupted: When Jesus Wrecks Your Comfortable Christianity, last week. Ummm, pretty FANTASTIC!

If you aren’t familiar with Jen, you need to become part of the fold. She’s funny and smart and honest, and most of us regular Christian gals just wish we could be friends with her. Jen’s most popular book, 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess, is one you may be more familiar with. It was where I first formed my girl crush. Or if you are an HGTV junkie, you may know her from My Big Family Renovation.

So, she recently re-released Interrupted, and I thought that now was finally the time for me to read it. Soooo glad that I did. It is an inspiration to me for sure, and maybe it will be for you too.

It tells the story of her entry into social justice, and consequently, how she and her husband, Brandon, formed Austin New Church. Her story resonated with me on so many levels. We grew up in church, lived pretty comfortable lives, did lots of ministry work, worked our way toward what we thought was success . . . and were still left believing that, even though life was very good, there had to be more to this life of faith. We were both sort of blindsided with social justice, but now see it as a calling and glad it has wrapped itself around our hearts.

If you are a Christian and at least curious about social justice on some level, I highly recommend this book. It’s a great starter and entry point. She does a beautiful job of laying out scripture on social justice, and telling you of her struggle to basically allow God to interrupt her very comfortable life for this new venture. She could’ve say no thank you, but she chose to see God’s leading and embraced it. She lived a life many of us are familiar with, and may need to question in one way or another. She prayed a very simple prayer, and it changed everything. So, let that serve as your warning. 🙂

And even if you are a seasoned social justice advocate like me, you’ll love this book. For all the reasons that I’ve already outlined, and so many more, you’ll find a kindred spirit on this journey. It’ll remind you of where you started, and more importantly, why. And it’ll inspire you to continue your great work. On the days when it feels lonely and hard, you’ll remember you’re not alone.

So, check out Interrupted. Just be prepared for what may come next.

 

(Note: Amazon links are affiliate links.)


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Lent 2015

464613430It’s hard to believe, but we are about halfway through the Lenten season already. I’ve participated in Lent for a number of years now, and always feel that it’s an encouraging and challenging (in a good way) experience.

The New Year begins and we resolve to read our Bibles more, or pray more, or give more, but as we know, most resolutions are short-lived. And that is one reason I really like Lent. If I start the New Year off strong, but wane a few weeks or a month later, Lent is there to kick me in the pants and get me motivated again.

I didn’t really have a plan for what I was going to read this year. But I came across Margaret Feinberg’s 40-day plan via Twitter, and decided to give it a go. I’ve been spending a lot of time in the Old Testament, so I thought it would be a good idea to focus on Jesus’ life while looking toward Easter. (I’m actually reading it through YouVersion if you prefer to read it digitally. Plus, I really like those little check marks that it gives me. 😉 Another reason I really liked her plan was the post she wrote about her #LentChallenge, stating that she wanted us to start each day’s reading with this prayer, “As I read today, Lord, reveal that which I most need to read but least want to hear.” Wow. That’s asking to be challenged for sure!

Another thing that’s greatly influenced Lent for me this year is this article on Relevant Magazine’s website by Ken Wystma. I definitely tend to go into Lent each year with my own questions, my own agenda. Sometimes I get an answer, and sometimes I don’t. It doesn’t make the season any less valuable, but yep, I’d rather have the answers on my schedule. So this was a fantastic article for centering myself, and for my approach to prayer at any time of the year. I particularly resonated with this part, “We often start our prayers with: ‘God, what is your will for my life?’ when we should be asking, ‘God, how can I serve you with my life?’” Um, guilty as charged.

Both of these items have given me a strong foundation for Lent 2015. It’s not been particularly unique or life-changing so far, and that’s ok. I’m learning to slow down, focus and listen. Those are always valuable lessons, and I have no doubt that I’ll have to learn them again later. For now, I’ll take them and the time I’m spending with my Creator. And I’ll look to April 5, when we all get to celebrate together.

______________________________

Curious about Lent but don’t really know much about it? I read this post recently on Ken Wytsma’s blog, and thought this writer did a really good job of explaining it.

We’re halfway there, but it’s not too late for you to join! Why not make this your first Lent. If you do, I don’t think it’ll be your last.

 


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Living Each and Every Day

466825681I was reading the book of Ruth the other night. The intro talked about Ruth being full of everyday miracles. “God usually works in the ordinary events of everyday life. Miracles do happen, but God regularly accomplishes His purposes and blesses His people through routine occurrences. If we learn faithfulness in the everyday, we are equipped to be faithful when the miracle or crisis comes . . . The everyday and the ordinary can have breathtaking eternal results.” (NLT Study Bible)

Overall, Ruth is a pretty ordinary story, especially when compared to the plagues, tumbling walls and fire-consumed altars all around her. But God is there. He is always there, whether we see or feel Him. Perhaps that’s why so many find comfort in this book. It’s a good reminder to find God in the everyday-ness of life.

Most of life is lived between big events, but there’s still plenty worth celebrating or at least noting. He created us to live fully, and that means the in-between as well. You and I friend, and loads of others, are living in-between what we want our story to be about, what we want to be known for. The days are made up of errands, laundry, bills, work, too much television, long commutes and trying to see all the Oscars Best Picture nominees. (Just me on that last one?) But books aren’t comprised of just a first chapter and last chapter. There are all the words and phrases and sentences in between, sometimes beautiful and sometimes sorrowful, and we can choose to live them or skim over them. We can boldly add more exclamation points, or resign to suffer more footnotes.

There will undoubtedly be days that we just skim by. And that’s okay. Neither of us is perfect. But I pray we will live every syllable with the freedom we have been given.

 

(This post is dedicated to Katie.)


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Merry Christmas!

My company, Orange, makes a lot of fantastic videos each month to enhance our curriculum. But this is my favorite that we’ve ever done.

May it remind you why this day is so special. MERRY CHRISTMAS!