Reality Church

There is a great post on Dan Kimball's blog entitled "Reality Church".

In an extremely insightful manner he details ten stages many people go through in their church life... from new believer enthusiasm to disillusionment to understanding to a real commitment to Christ and the church.

As a pastor, I have seen this very thing happen and have always tried to be understanding as people experience these stages. I always seek to leave an "open door" finding that many feel the freedom to re-enter life in our local body.

http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/2979167

-dave

Conversation and Dialogue

Last evening I realized again just how much I enjoy conversation and dialogue. What happened is that my daughter, her boyfriend, my youth pastor and I spent over an hour talking about our views on life and the church. It was great. There was difference of opinion in some areas but no sense of "one-upmanship" or superiority.

So often, and especially when it comes to "spiritual" things, we can quickly pass over into polemics, defensive postures and justifications for our point of view. I really am uncomfortable with that.

I thrive when that special atmosphere fills the room... where there emerges a genuine dialogue and desire to listen to and learn from the other person...

Wikipedia offers this definition:

A dialogue is a reciprocal conversation between two or more entities.

It's reciprocal... each side taking part. It's a conversation... not a monologue. I don't know about you, but that's how I find myself learning the most.

-dave

It's an auspicious occasion!

Wow... what an auspicious occasion. A first blog post. I figured it's about time I got into the blogosphere with my thoughts on this journey called life. Go figure... in my church some call me "Pastor Gadget". I've been doing computers since the early '80's when I first got a "real" computer... The TI99/4a... yet here I am 27 years later in 2007 and finally putting together a blog of my own.

Kind of late, isn't it. I guess I should be putting videos on YouTube, writing lenses on Squidoo, networking on MySpace or FaceBook, and bookmarking on de.licio.us, huh?

Anyway, here I am. I welcome myself to this next step in the journey and hope I find it fulfilling sharing my thoughts with the world!

See ya soon. :)