New Life Assembly

Summer Schedule Monday

As noted last week, the summer blogging schedule is going to be a challenge as I attempt to balance work priorities and managing the daily lives of the children for the next few weeks.  We have established their daily routines to some degree (at least on paper) so tomorrow we'll hopefully get into the swing of things which will be the norm until I head out for Nicaragua.

Another great weekend overall.  Saturday we celebrated Aislinn's sixth birthday with a fairly small gathering of friends and family.  Then in the evening the family headed out to Spain in Narragansett for dinner in celebration of my mom's 60th birthday.  From there it was heading home to get some rest for our first service on the early summer schedule at church.

I was pleasantly surprised to see us as full as we've been the last several weeks - though it took a little while for everyone to get there, I was proud of everyone who made the extra effort to get out to service an hour earlier.  We'll see how you do next week!  I must admit, after the first song, I turned to the other guys in the band and told them I was feeling just a little sleepy myself.  Fortunately, I think we all woke up enough by the end of the set.

This week we talked redemption and prayer - looking at Psalm 44 as a prayer for rescue that has both personal and corporate implications.  I hope we all walked away encouraged to pray from our gut at times, and to pray for stuff that's bigger than just ourselves.  Every one of us has issues we're trying to deal with, and part of the beauty of the church is that God has given us to one another so we can bear each other's burdens in prayer together as we open up our lives to be real and honest about what we're experiencing. 

We continue to make progress towards our first ever block party, and I can feel the temperature rising as we keep pushing to make it the kind of event that will involve everyone in the church.  I'm so looking forward to us pulling this off!  It's going to be a great day for our church to invite the community in to get to know us a little bit more.  I'm hoping it will open up even more doors for us to reach out into the lives of the people God has called us to serve.

And, one last note:  next week I'm starting a three week series called "The Table".  It's going to be a look at the ways that God uses such an ordinary thing as a meal to communicate spiritual truths to his people.  Week one we are going to talk about grace, week two about fellowship, and week three about thanksgiving - all in the context of a meal.  Looking forward to the way the series is going to develop,
and to continuing to share life with this great group of people God has given me the privilege to serve.

Grace and Peace.  Good stuff.  Enjoy them both.

Mondays are a-changing

This will be the last Monday post to be written without children home from school for a couple of months.  It's actually going to feel like a very short summer, since they don't get out of school until Friday, then we'll have about a month together before I head off to Nicaragua.  I'll be back for a few days, and then we're taking our family vacation for two weeks at the end of August.

Another good weekend at New Life for sure, though the way everyone straggled in yesterday, I'm having some serious doubts about the early service time starting next week.  If you haven't heard - we're moving to 9:30 just for the summer, and we'll be back to 10:30 in September. 

Finished up the three week series on parenting yesterday by talking about the ways that we as parents need to teach our kids to be on mission with Jesus to the world, not running away from the world.  I do pray, as I said yesterday, that when my kids are unleashed in the world that hell literally trembles at the sight of these revolutionaries for the kingdom of God who will be confident in their convictions and their character and will advance the gospel everywhere they go.  I hope that we can raise up a generation of kids who will see themselves empowered by the Spirit of God to be powerful, culture-shaping agents in the world God sends them into.  Yes, the world can be a dangerous place, but it's the context for the mission of making disciples of Jesus.

Next week we'll touch back on the theme of redemption by looking at Psalm 44.  And then following that will be a three week series in July I'm calling "The Table".  We're going to examine the ways that God uses something as simple as food and a meal to communicate spirituality to his people both in the Old Testament and the New.  So for all you food-lovers (who isn't really?) this will be the series for you!

I continue to enjoy reading the biography of John Adams, by David McCullough, and will likely post some thoughts on that when I finish it up in the next couple of days.  For now I'll leave with this, hauntingly prophetic word from a letter in May, 1790:  "There is nothing I dread so much as a division of the Republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader and converting measures in opposition to each other."  Hmm, sounds vaguely familiar, doesn't it?

Ah, the sun just broke through the clouds.  You remember the sun, don't you?  I'll take it as a sign of grace for the day. 

Reflective Monday

Friday afternoon at about 3:45 or so the rain began to fade from the skies surrounding Crystal Lake, the sun began to punch through the ragged rain clouds to the north of the lake, and my beautiful little sister dressed in white walked down a runner in the same backyard where we used to play baseball, climb the old leaning tree and race to the water shouting "Last one in's a rotten egg!!".

She walked down the "aisle" accompanied by my father who made the 100 foot trek without the assistance of his oxygen tank, and displayed again his remarkable resilience and determination as he gave his only daughter away in marriage while my mom's eyes swam with tears. 

I managed to make it through the whole ceremony without any tears of my own, though I was on the verge a couple of times.  It was a spectacular day for the McNamar family as we celebrated together at the wedding and reception that followed.  And I couldn't help but feel a little sentimental as the night wound down with my nearly six year old daughter sleeping on my chest and I had the occasion to think forward to a day when I'll walk her down an aisle, and dance with her on her wedding day. 

Friday melted into Saturday and a string of events for us - baseball game, birthday party, church on Sunday morning, a quick nap, another birthday party and then a worship and prayer night in the evening.  All that to say I'm feeling a little melancholy this Monday afternoon, and all the same looking forward to a full week of work.

Yesterday I continued the three week series on parenting by talking to parents (and some kids) about the task of shaping character, and of parents taking the initiative in developing the kind of environment in their homes where they can shape the character of their kids.  I want my kids to honor and obey me, but it's my responsibility to live my life as a man and as a father in such a way that's worthy of the honor and obedience.  I want to invite them to follow me in my own journey as God shapes my character into one of goodness and courage in his story. 

Jacob chose to stay upstairs and listen to Dad teach instead of Mom downstairs in Kid's church.  If you were there you can probably guess the first "note" he made in his notebook:  "My parent's are not perfect!"  Of course he did follow it up with #2 saying "I am not perfect" also, so I guess he was getting the gist of it.

Next week is Father's day, and we'll close the series out with a time for our families to share a moment together dedicating ourselves to this task of raising extraordinary children in a time when they are most desperately needed in the world.  Really looking forward to that time together!

New Life, the best is yet to come!  God is up to something significant among us, and I can't wait to see where the ride will take us...

Intentional Parenting: Character

This week we touched on how to train our children's character in such a way that they honor and obey our God-given leadership in their lives:  Download 24 Intentional Parenting - Character

Mid-Day Monday

It's a short week for me this week as I'm preparing for my sister's wedding on Friday, so I'll only be working until Wednesday.  My feet hit the ground running and my brain was far down the trail of the day by the time I got out of bed.

Another great, great weekend at New Life!  Friday night we had our the second cafe/concert night with our band, and it was again a great success.  It seemed like everyone had a good time, though there was some discussion about how loud the music was.  We're still tweaking the mix with all the new equipment on stage, so please try to be patient with us as we do that.

Sunday morning kicked off a three week series on parenting, and it seemed to get off to a great start.  I felt good about the message, and saw lots of heads nodding and eyes engaged during the message, so that's always a good sign. 

This week I touched on the idea that if we are followers of Jesus, then our responsibility as parents is to develop kids who also choose to follow Jesus - to make disciples of our kids in other words.  I shared that a huge part of that process is sharing the story of scripture with them, but sharing it in a way that we actually own the story for ourselves.  It's one thing to point kids to the Scriptures and say, "That's what we believe."  It's another thing to be able to share it yourself, and then invite your children into conversations with questions and responses that keep the conversations going.

I hope that if you're actively parenting, you'll take a few minutes to think through the end result you'd like to see with your kids.  Far too often we're flying by the seat of our pants with no clear thought on what we're hoping to see with our kids, and I believe that a healthy discussion about who you want them to be will be very helpful in you evaluating how you're doing as a parent. 

Next week we'll talk more about developing character in our kids, and I'll hope to keep inspiring you to work at the task of parenting with all the wisdom, skill, grace and patience God can give you.  Remember, your kids are invited to sit in on the service as we talk about parenting.  We're going to end this series on Father's day with a time to dedicate all of us to the task of being the families that God wants us to be, so I'm really, really looking forward to that.

Also, in three weeks (starting June 28th), we're switching up the service time from 10:30 to 9:30, so keep that in mind as you're planning.

That's all for now.  Grace and Peace to you.

Monday, Monday, Monday

I'm writing while attempting to prop up my eyelids to keep from falling back to sleep.  Rita was away most of Saturday and Sunday, so I had to manage the kids both days on my own.  It's always a good reminder for me when I do that of just how much work she puts into keeping up the house, taking care of the kids, and in general keeping our family functioning fairly smoothly.  I'm incredibly blessed that God brought her into my life!

Yesterday was another great day at New Life!  We're seeing new faces every week, and God continues to do incredible things among us.  The band sounded (in my opinion) as good as we've sounded lately, and I feel like each week they get better and better.  I know that music isn't everything when it comes to a church's worship, but I do know that good music enhances the vibe of a church like nothing else I can think of.  The great thing is that I see in our worship team a heart not just to perform, but to really worship and lead others in worship.  I think that's showing up when we play every week.

I taught on a topic I haven't spent much time talking about in my pastoral career - God's heart for the poor in our backyard, but also around the world.  It's a concern that's been growing in my heart over the last year or so, and it's gotten me involved in an organization called Beautiful World along with my good friend Scott Axtmann.  So I shared from Isaiah 58 and also Matthew 25 on the desire of God's heart for his covenant people to share his concern for those among us who have significantly less than we do.  I hope I was able to pull off the sharing without laying on a guilt trip, which I think is a fine line you walk any time you share about things like that.

If you're interested in hearing more about the Beautiful World mission, or becoming an advocate for the poor, I'd encourage you to visit the site or talk to me and I'd be glad to share more about our heart in this mission. 

A couple of things coming up I'm really excited about: 

1. The cafe/concert night THIS FRIDAY!!  The band will be playing, but we'll also be opening up for an open-mic type opportunity.  The coffee will be brewing, Rita will be making lattes and the music is going to be good, as always.  Hope you can come join us, and definitely, definitely bring a friend with you!
2. Starting Sunday I'm doing a three-week series on parenting.  Try as I might I can't come up with any clever titles or anything, so I'll just give you the three basic ideas I'll communicate each week.  The overarching theme is that if we are followers of Jesus, then it's important for us to communicate the story of Jesus and stir up others to follow Jesus, and that work first starts at home.  So the first week, we'll talk about the stories we tell to our children, and the ways we immerse them into the Biblical story.  The second week we'll touch on how we work to shape character into our kids, dealing with the reality that shaping character is a fundamental reality to good parenting.  And the third week we'll talk about ways that we can work alongside our kids to advance the kingdom of God and the message of life and hope in Jesus to our community and world.  If you're struggling with your parenting at the moment, if you just need some help along the way, or know someone else who does, do your best to get them here for these three weeks!

As always, I pray that the Lord would bless you and keep you, make his face to shine upon you, lift up his countenance towards you, be gracious to you, and give you peace.