My Strength Weakness: [intro]

the other day i was listening to one of my friends share some of their story with a group of people – four of our friends were speaking on the topic of serving God [and people] with our Time, our Talents [skills, giftings] and our Treasures [money, things] with each person dealing with a specific one of them.

as i listened to Lara [who is, among other things, a mom, a wife, a daughter, a nurse, a church member, a Simple Way board member] speak about Time, something she said jumped out at me and i was hit once again with the idea that sometimes our biggest strength can also become our biggest weakness [or if not the biggest then at least a source of weakness]

i think for me, something like competitiveness can be a good thing because it drives me to succeed and to push and to go further than maybe others think i can and so on, and to attempt things a lot of people might not, but when it is bad it is really bad and it can be a source of choosing goals over relationship, or getting into a bad mood [and generally helping other people feel bad] when i am losing in a game [Stop nodding, anyonewhohaseverplayedabunchofgamesagainstme!] or having some choice but not to kind words to say to the opposition on the hockey field.

it becomes tricky because unlike something that is just seen as a bad thing in my life, the answer is not eliminating it because it is a strength as well. and so i have to learn how to work on and emphasise the strong points while looking at diminishing or at the very least being aware of the weak points so i can hopefully let them appear less.

but that was just a taster… i have asked some of my friends and people who i respect if they will take some time to look at their own lives and choose a strength that they have which they have also witnessed the weakness side of and a number of them graciously agreed and so i will be running this series over the next few days.

i invite you to take a look at some of the strengths you have and see if you can identify the weakness that might lurk behind them. and feel free to share in the comments section. i am hoping that awareness of this will help us to be more focused on strengthening the strengths and weakening the weaknesses.

what is your Strength Weakness?

read the story of Steve Graybill as he speaks about a THIRST FOR KNOWLEDGE

read the story of Tshego Motiang and her experience with EMPATHY

read the story of my good mate Bruce Collins and his experience with PEOPLE…

read the story of Lara and her take on SENSITIVITY…

read the story of Robert Murray as he speaks about the WOO FACTOR

read the story of Shae Leigh Bloem and her experience with being HARDCORE

read the story of Dalene Reyburn and her experience with AMBITION…

read the story of Sharné Finn Osborne and her experience with INCLUSIVITY

read the story of Tim Tucker as he looks at being a MULTI-TASKER

read the story of Jane Lee as she talks a little bit about CONTEXT

Conversations 1: part outgiving God

yesterday at the Simple Way we had our very first session of Conversations at the Simple Way which three of us had largely been working on pulling together for a while – 15 people signed up to hang out with us as we did a couple of different sessions including one on intentional community, a practical serving the community aspect, a story over lunch from someone in the neighborhood who is involved in doing some really life-giving stuff within Kensington, where we live, and a sharing and question time around a specific theme – this one being ‘how to serve God with your Time, Treasures and Talents’ – it really was a great day and a few lines of thort or concept struck me as different people were sharing and i wanted to be able to pass those on:

Coz is a friend of ours from Australia [i know!] and he shared a little about being a good steward of your Treasures [so money and things] and one thing he said which really stood out was that “You can’t outgive God!”

now, maybe to some of you that will seem like an obvious thing. But i think to many of us, and even perhaps a lot of us that ‘know’ it as ‘an obvious thing’ we often don’t really believe it. i mean, not really. Rather our picture of God [whether stated or not, and usually not] is that of this long-bearded fellow sitting on a cloud with his lightning bolt waiting for the second we step out of line so that He can absolutely nail us and make sure that we behave better [which is possibly why we as the church have ended up so often focusing on what we are against and trying to avoid than what we are for?

but it is so true that we cannot outgive God – God is so completely generous and Loving and kind and compassionate and opportunity-giving and the list just goes on… we just maybe need to realign our minds [and our actions] to the fact…

it reminded me of this passage in Luke 11:

“So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

“Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

Coz spoke about it in terms of putting the focus on our giving. Trusting God and at times risking what might seem ridiculous in terms of being generous to others with the idea in mind that we cannot outgive God and so God will constantly supply our needs and how much more so if we have held loosely on to the things He has entrusted us with before. Those who are faithful with little will be entrusted with much.

How are you doing on the scale of generosity? [money yes, but also time and things and energy] And would it help you to be a little more generous if you truly believed that you had an uber generous God watching over you?

to read about “no technology time” head over here…

the word church, ‘church’, church is a verb.

last nite at enGAGE (our sunday evening vineyard church congregation weekly gathering) we held an open mic vibe

not after ‘church’, not on a different day to ‘church’, not instead of ‘church’, but as church, and it was great

it was a celebration of some of the talents and giftings that God has placed in different people in our group and so we sat around tables and munched on chips and sweets and spinach and feta rolls (as one does) we watched some Flight of the Conchords (a band parodying a parody band and they nailed it!) and heard some songs and saxophone and watched some magically illusioned tricks performed by the Roy (who also excellently mc’d the event) and some photos on the big screen and some poetry (in two different languages) and hung out and gave God thankx and vibed

and then everyone pretty much got involved in the cleaning (you know, all the smashed piggy banks and burnt cards on the floor curtesy of the Roy) and setting up of the hall and a bunch of us headed off to our weekly hangout at Ginos for some drinks and to hang out with American Phil just before he heads back home

some people, a lot of people, would not call what happened last night ‘church’ cos we didn’t read out of the bible or have an official worship team leading us in worship or have a thirty minute preach or any of that…

but we had biblical stuff happening, and we welcomed and celebrated and called on God and He was definitely there in the midst of us, we had some words on celebrating community and if you really wanted to you would find reference to all of it in Corinthians 12, and we definitely had some worship going on courtesy of Megs ‘mountain’ and other songs and Phil’s worship songs and the photos we got to witness and all the living in and celebrating of community we did…

i love being part of a church where that’s seen as ok, no more than ok, where that’s seen as church

i’m not saying that what happens on a Sunday week after week in traditional churches is not church, cos it is, or a part of it anyways, but i am definitely saying that other expressions, other celebrations, other gatherings, other instances can also be church as well

as one pastory type guy made a few congregations and gatherings awkwardly try join him in the past in singing this refrain to a Fall Out Boy parody chorus – “Church is the people, it is, not, the, place”

let’s break that box. let’s do church.