When Our Stories Come Crashing into the Story of God

Pastor John Eiselt is leading the team that will put on the outdoor service this weekend. Here are some of his reflections leading into the weekend.

As I'm reflecting on and reading through the stories and lives that are represented by those being baptized this weekend, I am inspired and humbled by what we get to be a part of as a church.

There are young stories, developing stories, and seasoned stories.

Stories of children running to relationship with their Creator, stories of students embracing depth and new-found ownership in their walk with God, and stories of adults who have found hope, redemption, renewal, passion, purpose, and joy. 

As I skimmed more asian beetles off of the pool this afternoon, and looked out over the lawn that will be filled with people this weekend, I am overwhelmed by the holy ground that this weekend represents. It's holy ground that represents lives and people and stories changed and formed by the story of God. 

 It's about stories that have come crashing into the story of God.

The celebration this weekend is a celebration of these individual stories, and a celebration of the kingdom and story of God of which we get to experience and express as a church family. 

It's about the living God, living in me, living in you, and living in the wonderful expression of God's church that we call Five Oaks.

When we cheer this weekend, that is what we're cheering for.

I can't wait to celebrate!!!

What Amazon Kindle’s most highlighted passage reveals about us

According to Amazon, the most highlighted passage in all books read on Kindle (as of November 2014)—highlighted almost twice as often as any other passage—is from the second volume of The Hunger Games: "Because sometimes things happen to people and they're not equipped to deal with them.”

Photo by Mark Turnauckas (http://bit.ly/2uiQ7lG)

The Hunger Games is a young adult novel and series, so this might be a generational thing, but I think it speaks beyond the younger generation. 

For instance, my 87-year-old mom uses of a variation of this quite often when working on her computer. 

I remember hearing a Manhattan pastor say this about how he felt after 911. 

And for all of us, we often find ourselves unequipped to face the challenges that come with the speed of change, innovation and new information. 

But it’s not just about change and the speed of information. We also face more and more choices in our world. Think of choosing a career or a major in a world where skills and degrees pursued for years in school become obsolete so quickly. 

With the speed of change, I’ve encouraged our staff to never stop learning. But constant learning and gaining more information is inadequate to meet today’s challenges. It’s not enough. Something more is needed. 

That something more is wisdom. 

Wisdom will seek out knowledge—it’s not wise to make decisions without sufficient information. A wise person is a constant learner.

Wisdom will rightly apply information so that better decisions can be made. 

Wisdom will also know when there's enough information for a decision to be made.

And wisdom will know that rest from information is needed.

This weekend we’re looking at Solomon’s prayer for wisdom in 1 Kings 3. We’ll explore what biblical wisdom looks like and what might be the most important key for growing wiser. 

We need wisdom to make better decisions. We need wisdom for navigating our most important relationships. We need wisdom for life.