Glorious Mud

I was talking with one my leaders at church the other day about why we want to move away from traditional accountability groups specifically for our men (though we are doing the same for our women).    We are moving to a gospel-centered Fight Club model instead. Why? Because in a street fight, the gospel-centered Fight Club will beat the traditional Accountability Group into submission every time. It is just better and more effective. Why? First – accountability groups tend to be single-issue focused. Guys join accountability groups to help them because they look at porn or they spend too much money or they have problems controling their temper. The result is a group of guys who are all struggling (and failing) with the same thing in the same ways. This causes the guys involved to start looking at their struggle as an isolated unhealthy behavior instead of as a manefestation of a deeper heart issue. Gospel-centered Fight Clubs, on the other hand, pool guys togethe...

I have been reading through Ezekiel this month. And just for the record - this is one crazy book. Man, Ezekiel had one rough gig. I am tempted to complain when I run a 12 hour day of meetings. You know, rough stuff - St. Louis Bread Co. can get seriously old. Ezekiel, on the other hand, had to act out all these crazy judgments from God before they happened. He was God's living parable. He had to sit in a public square and build miniature cities out of bricks and then destroy them. He had to lay on his side in public for 390 days and then roll over and lay on the other side for 40 more days. He had to cook his food over human feces - well, until God recanted and allowed him to cook it over cow poop. And that is just the start. Ezekiel had it rough. But he was God's man. He loved God and he loved God's people and he was willing to suffer so that God's grace could come and bring repentance and restoration to people near to God in religious behavior but far from God i...