In ANY case...

"In any case..." those are the words of Jesus that jumped off of the page this morning as I read Luke chapter 13. Jesus is going through the town healing and teaching and of coarse his enemies once again are not happy about the attention and acclaim that is coming His way. In verse 31 it states "At that time some Pharisees came to Jesus and said to Him, 'Leave this place and go somewhere else. Herod wants to kill you.' Jesus replied, "God tell that fox, I will keep on driving out demons and healing people today, tomorrow and on the third day I will reach my goal. verse 33 In any case, I must press on today and tomorrow and the next day-"

I just loved that response. Nothing could deter Jesus from His God-given goal. Jesus knew His mission and no amount of threats were going to keep Him from fulfilling His destiny. I looked at that and thought, I must become unswerving in the things that God has called me to do. If the Lord has spoken and the goal and mission is His than I must press toward the mark regardless of opposition and hardships I may encounter. The Lord is with us therefore we have no cause for fear.

Surely, today we are not being threatened by death over the things God has called us to, at least not here in the west, but what are some of the things we do face. Fear, doubt, faithlessness, discouragement, nay-sayers, and the list goes on, my prayer would be that in those moments and in every moment we would continue to abide in Christ, because in Christ we have the strength to do all things. So today, remember the words of Jesus, "In ANY case, I MUST press on today..." The Lord bless you and fill you with His presence and power. Keep pressing!!!

Are You Blessed Today?

I am in the airport in Atlanta waiting for my connecting flight to Nashville. I spent some time this morning reading in Luke chapters 11 and 12. In the ending verses of Luke chapter 11 Jesus cast out a demon and the religious leaders of the day begin to accuse him of essentially being a demon himself. Jesus in a way that only He could do, quickly address the outlandish remarks by presenting truth and turning the tables on them. He turns their comments into an opportunity for his accusers and nay sayers to examine their own hearts. As a result of this exchange that Jesus is having a woman who is watching all of this go down yells out from the crowd..."Blessed is the mother who gave you birth and nursed you." Jesus repled, "Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it!"
I love that Jesus always points us back to the essential truth which is obedience. Hearing God and obeying Him is what leads to a blessed life. The Bible is consistent in this theme of hearing and responding to God, yet we struggle so much with this...well maybe you don't I know for sure I do. Why is that? There can be an exhaustive list of reasons why this is true, but I felt strongly that God revealed a couple of reasons to me this morning:

#1. I spend more time analyzing and justifying why it may be okay not to obey immediately to what God has spoken. It as I reason God's Word right out the window. How stupid is that? But when you read the Scriptures you see quickly that many of the men written about did the same thing. To no effect mind you.

#2. I read God's Word consistently but do not invest enough time internalizing it, processing it, meditating on it. To many times I read as a practice or a tool of study or even worse I read it and feel as though what I have read was clearly for someone else. Again, I know, I know, how stupid is that? Read John 21 and again you will see that I am in pretty good company when it comes to this brutal mistake.


#3. I do not take the time to see the pain that can come from my failure to obey God immediately. Let's face it how many of us ever think about the ticket we will receive if we break the law by speeding. That thought doesn't come to our mind until we see the lights behind us and we see the officer approaching our driver side window...yup been there too many times.

Again I could have listed many reasons, but these were the ones that God truly laid on my heart this morning. So, here's the question how are you doing in responding to God's Word? Are you obeying immediately? Are you still trying to reason it away? Well, I can't say it better than Jesus..."Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it." If you've stumbled across these ramblings my prayer is that you would be "blessed" today. God Bless You!

Busy Week

So it has been an extremely busy and full week. Things at Summit continue to roll and there never seems to be a dull moment. Today was a great day of services, a little bitter sweet though. Jamin Stinziano, who is on our Leadership Team and is one of our Teaching Pastors will be moving to Naples with his family to help give leadership to our Naples Campus. It was a little weird not having Jamin lead worship today. It has been great to work with Jamin each weekend, God has truly formed a great partnership there. That being said I am extremely excited to see what God is going to do through this transition. I believe whole heartedly that God has some big things in store for both our University and Naples Campuses.

By the way if you haven't checked out our new website, please do so now: www.summitlife.com. We are still putting the finishing touches on the site but I am really happy on how it turned out. I would write more but the truth is I am exhausted and Milby and I have an early flight to Nashville today and for some stupid reason we thought it might be good to get one last 5am run in before we leave...yeah that's what I thought. Please pray for my fam. while I am away. God Bless You!

Great Weekend

Well this weekend was a first of sorts for me. This weekend my wife taught with me in all of our services. We were in part two of our Desperate Household series and we were looking at the roles that the husband and wife are to play in the context of marriage as designed by God. As a teaching team we thought it would be great if Pam could speak to the role of a wife. It sounded really good in our meeting, but then I had to convince my wife. She handled it like a champ. This truly stretched her out of her comfort zone. Even though my wife has been blessed with an incredible voice and even though she is a part of our worship band and leads worship each week, she absolutley hates being in front of people. She tried hard to get out of it, but when it came time, she step to the plate and hit the long ball.


God anointed her and used her mightily in all of our services. I was up on stage sitting next to her just beaming, not because she did so well, but because I knew she is so passionate about living out her role as God's suitable helper and I know that she seeks to provide an environment where I feel respected. I am truly blessed to have such an incredible wife. She truly is a gift and I pray that God would help me to steward the gift and honor that gift accordingly. Pam, I love you and I feel so blessed to call you my wife. Thanks for teaching with me this weekend, but above that thanks for sharing your heart and life with me. You're an amazing woman, a wonderful wife and a terrific mom! Let's worship!

Celebrating Life Change

Sunday was our Beach Baptism. It is always a wonderful time as we gather and get to celebrate life change that could only come through the Gospel of Jesus Christ. On Sunday we were blessed to baptized over twenty people. Every individual had a wonderful salvation story. It is always an encouraging time for our staff and for our church. It is a powerful reminder of what this ministry is to be all about. Baptism is this beautiful picture of the fruit of the mission of "presenting the Gospel to every man, woman and child." I received this picture and email from one of the couples that were baptized on Sunday...

What an amazing day for us!! I can't put it into words really. I do know that I am very Blessed and thankful that we are a part of Summit. It's hard to think about what my life was like for the 25+ years I lived prior to coming to Summit last Fall. WOW is all I can say...and that is all thanks to my Savior Jesus Christ. Chris and I both have changed so much...when people ask what is different the only thing we can say is that we have Jesus. Well thank you again for everything. We are so excited about the new life we have been given and what is in store.

Awesome Day...

This morning was Summit's First Autism Speaks Golf Tournament. It was an awesome day. A small group of unbelievable kind hearted people along with my wife, Pam, worked hard for three months to pull this golf tournament off. They did a terrific job. Last year our church participated in the Southwest Florida Walk Now for Autism event. We had over 400 volunteers and walkers. Through God's grace and generosity we were able to raise over $25,000, but above that we were able to be a visible representation of God's grace to our community. Well our team believed having a golf tournament would be a great way to kick off our team and extend our influence into our community. We had over 120 golfers, 32 sponsors and God was gracious enough to allow us to raise over $10,000. It was a beautiful day of golf on one of Florida's toughest Jack Nicklaus designed golf courses, Old Corkscrew. As a dad of a child with autism and as a pastor I once again stood in awe of our people being the church. It continues to be an extreme privilege to be a small part of God's mission and vision of bringing the Gospel to every man, woman and child. It truly was a great day, even though my team was by far one of the worst out there...Jeremy, Jorge, Loren, you guys are awesome...on behalf of my son, Max, thanks for playing, in fact thanks to everyone who played, gave and continues to pray. May God return it to you.

Convictions...

My bible reading plan has me reading through Daniel now. I read Daniel chapter one and two. A few months ago we taught through the first 6 chapter of Daniel in a series we entitled "Stand". As a staff we felt as though it was a good series for our church and for us personally. That being said it was good to start reading through this book again. What jumped out at me in chapter one is the very familiar verse that many of us know; verse 8 "But Daniel resolved not to defile himself..."
I love that. Daniel decided to take a stand. Daniel decided that it would be better to trust God with his life and follow the Lord with all his heart. That is essentially what this verse is saying. Daniel in the most challenging of circumstances decides to stand on what he believed. He had conviction and commitment.

A lot of times in the Christian faith we say we have some convictions, but what it turns out is that we have some legalistic stance or jargon that if the truth be told we would compromise at the drop of a hat. I know at times I can be guilty of that. Conviction in the Christian faith I believe should be so much more than just my stance in opposition to something, but moreso my belief and trust in someone, that someone being Jesus Christ. I think that is what maybe missing in our society. Our "conviction" speak louder to what we are against rather than point to who we serve and worship. I want my convictions of course to line up with biblical principles but I also want them to lead to life change and point people to Christ. I want my convictions to be so rooted in who I am that I won't compromise them for anything. I want my convictions to be fueled and sustained by the ongoing presence and power of the Holy Spirit and not a week to week sermon or gathering. Daniel stood on God and he was willing to face the consequences. You could take the man from his homeland but you could not strip him of his commitment to an almighty God. That is awesome! So today I pray that God would help me and cause my heart to "resolve not to defile myself..." If you've stumbled across this rambling, I hope you will pray the same for yourself. Don't settle for religion, that will never lead to a life of commitment, but to a life full of compromises. My friend, Todd, always says there is no power in a compromised life! God Bless You.