Jeff Jackson Live

Most of the time we go through life not expecting anything to happen. The sad culmination is that when God does show up unexpectedly we are so caught off guard we miss the blessing.  What if everyday you started with the thought, “Today God is going to reveal Himself to me.” Would your prayer life change?  Would your weeks become shorter because you wouldn’t be drawn down but the mundane things in life?  I believe that we would be set free to serve our Lord to our greatest capacity if we prayed and lived with expectant hearts.  Every ordinary day has a miracle waiting to happen and I want to experience everything that God has to offer.

As we move closer to our Grand Opening at Journey Church we need to expect God to show up and take care of business.  Lives are at stake here.  Decide to change, to be different and experience God in the fullness of His Glory.

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I believe there is an element where we have forgotten our own personal freedoms whether we’ve forgot the freedom the American Solider fought for or the freedom in Christ we have from the Cross. We have to balance the fact the we are dead in sin and that we have been set free in Christ through His sacrifice on the cross. Its easy to camp out on one side of the spectrum but I find it is difficult to live a balance between man’s sinful nature and the freedom of the cross.

My fear is that we live content with the vanishing thought of those who fought and paid the ultimate price for our freedom and an eternal tragedy if we forget the freedom found in Christ. What are your thoughts?

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I recently had the opportunity to speak at a camp in Missouri and here is what I learned.

1.  Outdoor tabernacles still exist and they are HOT!!
2. Toilet seats can break just by sitting on them. (ask and i will explain)
3. Students today want to be challenged with the Word.
4. God can work despite your defects.
5. You can learn a lot about life and God from an afternoon swim at the pool.
6. I Love spending time with my family.
7. 100 degrees without a breeze really means 110.
8. Coffee is still good in extreme heat.
9. My wife is the best!
10. There is such a thing as a Happy, Gospel-Preaching Calvinist (in other words not all Calvinist are angry)!!

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There are lots of joys of being a dad.  There is something that is unexplainable when my daughter shows her reliance on me.  Recently my daughter woke up from her nap in a very different way.  She usually cries when she wakes up but this time she had a bit of angst in her cry.  Upon hearing her cry I quickly walked into her room and saw something that I was not prepared for.  My daughter stood at the corner of her bed with her little arms stretched as far has she could reaching for someone to save her.  I scanned her crib to survey the situation and I found her diaper lying in the middle of her bed and poop everywhere.  I forgot to put her pants back on her after I changed her diaper before putting her down for bed and the result of my mistake was a mess!  My daughter starts to whine louder because I did not remove her immediately from the situation.  My daughter was helpless.  Even though it was her mess she could not clean up the situation.  That is exactly how our lives are before we enter into a relationship with Jesus Christ.  There are three things that i realized from this poppie mess, I realized that we

1.  We don’t need encouragement – I could have really encouraged my daughter. “Come on Addison you can clean up your mess!”  Same goes for our lives.  Although encouragement makes us feel good it doesn’t help us clean up the mess we have made of our lives.

2.  We don’t need self help – My daughter didn’t need a 10 step program to cleaning up poop.  All though self help programs seem appealing to help clean up our lives…the fact is that they will always come up short because of one key work “self”

3.  We need to be rescued – There was only one way my daughter was getting out of that messy situation, I had to rescue her.  Just like my daughter the only way you will ever clean up your life is to allow Jesus to rescue you from a situation that is destined to produce failure and we can only be cleaned up if  Jesus has our heart.

No matter what situation you find yourself in the only answer is to allow yourself to be rescued.  To learn more about allowing Jesus to rescue your life click here.

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Why is there a common misconception that you have to clean up your life before you can go to church?  Most likely because the church has lost the essential essence of what it means to be the church.  Read what Jesus said when the Pharisees tested Jesus on God’s commandments:

Jesus replied: ” ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. ‘This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Matthew 22:37-40

The commands are simple, “Love God and Love People.”  This means love people where they are at no matter what the condition of the person’s life.  I recently had time to work with hoseashouse.com who ministers to women who have been abused mentally, physically and emotionally. Hosea’s House does most of their ministry in the west end of Louisville.  This area is a very diverse area and the only discriminator is the economy.  This area is not a common area for churches to go because of the common violence and the bad reputation the area has, which is too bad because I found tons of people who welcomed the token white guy with open arms.  The main reason I was in West Louisville was to take picture for hoseashouse.com and here is what I found:

Remember that there are no perfect people allowed in the church.  LOVE GOD LOVE PEOPLE!!

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That last statistic that game from the Barna Group told us that on average 3500-4500 churches are closing their doors each year.  We are on the forefront of becoming a post Christian country and I fear that our churches are oblivious to our own death.  Although there are many signs of a dying church I have come up with three that I want to discuss.

1.  Saving the Saved (No Conversions)-this sounds very simple but it is crucial to church growth.  If your church is not adding lives to the Kingdom of God and teaching them to drill down deep in their spiritual life then we are failing God.  Sometimes we settle for complacency when we need to be striving for excellence.  For example, some churches are just fine with the people who show up on a regular basis and they do not want to reach out to new people when clearly Jesus gave us the commandment to go into all the world.

2.  Little excitement for outreach or mission to reach the unreached-it is so easy to be inwardly focused when it is clear in scripture that our focus should be on those who are need and those who need everlasting life only found on the Cross of Jesus and yet we find churches who have no zeal for the hurting, impoverished or people who just need hope in Christ.

3.  Lack of fully devoted disciples of Christ (not the denomination)-the whole point of the church is to train up disciples for Christ and yet we fail to produce thriving warrior for the cause of the Gospel.  When we fail as a church to move people through the process of growing as a disciple then we are dying or are already dead.

These are just a few signs that a church is either at a plateau or declining, like the Laodicean church in the Book of Revelation. To them, Jesus said:

“I know you inside and out, and find little to my liking. You’re not cold, you’re not hot — far better to be either cold or hot! You’re stale. You’re stagnant. You make me want to vomit. You brag, ‘I’m rich, I’ve got it made, I need nothing from anyone,’ oblivious that in fact you’re a pitiful, blind beggar, threadbare and homeless. (Revelation 3:15-17 MSG)

The solution to such problems? Jesus replies:

“Be diligent and turn from your indifference. Look! Here I stand at the door and knock. If you hear me calling and open the door, I will come in, and we will share a meal as friends.” (Revelation 3:19-20 NLT)

I did not write this post just to be negative, I did however write this to be a warning to those who are in church leadership.  Do not become comfortable in your position.  Seek to evangelize.  Create a passion for missions.  Disciple your people.

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I have partnered with another youth pastor on a website called www.staffyourchurch.com This is a career builder type website that will link ministers.

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“Perhaps our eyes need to be washed by our tears once in a while, so that we can see Life with a clearer view again.”

Do you ever wonder why we have to struggle through life’s challenges? The times in life we grow the most is when we are standing on life’s summit looking down at the valley and all the mud and the muck that we have traveled through. We realize that the trials we went through shaped our lives into something that we never thought we would see. Our response to situations surprised us. The sheer determination developed a hunger in our hearts to never give up.

I will never forget the phone call I received from a very scared and worried young man. It was a phone call that i wasn’t prepare for. The young man started to tell me how his dad was packing up and moving out of the house. In his time of struggle he was looking to me for an answer. As a young youth pastor I was wordless and had no idea what to say to this hurting young man. With the feeling of inadequacies came rushing to our conversations I quickly grabbed my bible. It wasn’t too much longer and I turned straight to Romans 5:3-5. These verses basically instruct us to rejoice in our long sufferings. The in midst of trouble God tells us to rejoice. WOW! How awesome is our God that he can turn a tragedy into something that shapes our future in a positive manner. Next time you are in a deep valley and it feels like you can’t even see the surface, remember to rejoice in the midst of pain and see how God’s plan will strengthen your perseverance, build your character and instill the hope of God.

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I have partnered with another youth pastor on a website called www.staffyourchurch.com This is a career builder type website that will link ministers looking for jobs across the us. We …

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