Category: Today @ The Gathering

Today @ The Gathering we continued with part two of our present series, “We Don’t Do Fear,” with an installment entitled, “Let’s Get Our Story Straight.”You can’t talk about the Good News until you first talk about the bad news. Because good news is only good in relation to just how tragic the bad news is.

I’ll just simply say it this way, you are personally more sinful and broken, and indebted to God than you ever dare imagine. It’s not just that we smoke, or chew, or curse, or go to R-rated movies.

We are deeply damaged and broken. We are head-over-heels in a moral deficit; one that we can’t get out of by our good works, and even our best religious efforts.Until you understand that we’re all moving toward a day of personal reckoning; we will stand before a just God who demands, not retribution, but simple justice. We simply don’t have the moral capacity to save ourselves against that awful day. That’s how bad the bad news is. And when the bad news reigns, the world suffers and groans, waiting for her full redemption.

Up against that is this Good News Movement. It started the day that Jesus Christ defeated our last enemy: Death. Think of it. Think of the radical revolution that started and continues to this day. When you have a group of people who have been redeemed, restored in their relationship to God, being renewed each and every day in their mind and spirit, waiting for the day of bodily resurrection, not fearing man, nor death, a fearless, bold, courageous army; yet humble and under orders to serve the good.

This Good News Movement deals in grace, joy, and new beginnings; not fear, dread, anger or manipulation. We’re not legalists or long-list judgmental Pharisees. We’re common people, ordinary people; your friends, neighbors, co-workers who have found hope, real hope that the future indeed will be better, much better.

This week we saw a lot of new faces and enjoyed the privilege of being able to enter in through the front lobby of this huge theatre building. It’s hard to believe how just a little change has made such a big difference out in the lobby where we can put our tables, our café, and greet and talk and connect to people around the Good News.

These are incredibly great days at The Gathering. I can’t wait to see what God’s going to do next!

Today @ The Gathering we completed our nine-week series “You Got Great Potential” with the last essential of an extraordinary life, a long-look ability. We talked about the importance of perseverance and determination, and how we live today will determine not only our success, but our legacy. The Scriptures are clear when they warn, “To whom much is given, much shall be required.”

In order to determine if you’re living today in light of eternity, or as if what you do today matters forever, we asked three questions to help us realize whether we’re living up to our God-given potential.

1. Are you giving everything you do, everything you’ve got?
2. Are you doing work that matters?
3. Are you doing what you were born to do?

When we’re going through a difficult time, in the middle of a transition facing a much-needed change, it often seems there is not much we can do in the moment. But that would be false because there are four daily decisions that will determine what your long-term legacy will be.

1. Get up.
2. Suit up.
3. Show up. 99% of almost all daily successes are just simply being at the right place at the right time.
4. Do the next right thing. The next right think might not seem like a big thing, a bold thing, or a world-changing thing. But it is always the next right thing that gets us to where we want to be. When you do that 365 days of every year that you live, you’d be amazed at how much progress you can make.

We hold onto the promise that we’re given in the Scriptures: if we don’t become weary and give up, we will reap a harvest. That’s God’s promise.

Today we were introduced to Portable Church Industries who have been with us all weekend meeting with our leadership and all of our ministry people, helping us turn the theatre into an exciting environment where people of all ages can come and experience God. It will be exciting to see what new changes are up ahead.

Today it was also announced that beginning next Sunday, we will be entering through the front of the theatre. Since we’ve been at the Carmike Theater we’ve been asked to enter through the back. But it all changes next weekend. So you can park in the front and enter through the front. That’s a lot more exciting than entering through the back door, wouldn’t you agree?

We also announced our brand new series called “We Don’t Do Fear.” For the next four weeks we’ll be talking about how we join together to be the good news that Jesus called us to be. It’s especially important in a bad news world. So be sure and be here for the first of four parts, “Let’s Create Something Cool.”

Today @ The Gathering we continued in the series, “You Got Great Potential,” with the message entitled, “You Gotta Stay Hungry.”

Today we dealt with the promise of Jesus that simply says, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.”

Too many of us go through life with a small cup easily filled, or a cup turned upside down, which simply can’t be filled. God dares us to measure the size of the life we want and to go for it.

We also learned that when we say we are Christians there are many things we are not saying, but there are three positive things we are saying.
1. We are seekers. That we take seriously Jesus’ invitation to seek and knock, and we don’t quit. We continue to do it. It’s not a one-time thing or a quick fix in a desperate situation. It’s a life lived hungry for more of God and more of life.
2. When I say I’m a Christian, I’m saying I’m a learner, which means I’m constantly reading and studying God’s word and reading other great books and learning from other great people. I have been given a great gift to be a truth-seeker and to have a love of learning. All truth is God’s truth wherever I find it and if I honestly seek truth, wherever it is, whether it’s in the classroom or the factory floor, ultimately that truth will lead me to Jesus.
3. When I say I’m a Christian, I’m definitely saying that I’m a work in progress.

As a work in progress, by God’s grace and with His help:
1. I will be confident but never arrogant.
2. I will be content but never satisfied.
3. I will be full but never finished.
4. I will be loved but never lazy.
5. I will be at peace but never passive.
6. I will suffer but never sour.

Join us next week when we continue in this series with a talk entitled, “What if You Had Green Teeth?”
You can follow along with this series by subscribing to the podcast and you can follow Dr. Foster at twitter.com by looking for DavidHFoster.

Today @ The Gathering we continued in the series, “You Got Great Potential,” with the message “Can I Have Your Business Card?” We talked about how extraordinary people multiply their efforts.

We started off being challenged to think of the possibilities. You can make one of these four choices in the way you engage the world:
1. You can be a Do-It-Yourself person, which means you’re going to have a limited impact on life but you also cut down on a lot of frustration because it will only be you doing what you can do, fixing what you can fix, expending as mush energy as you have and then being done. It’ll be small, it may even be short, but life will be much neater this way because you won’t spend all your time blaming all those other people who let you down or betrayed you, because you will indeed be an army of one.
2. You can ask for help. This is a difficult option because you’ll have to admit that you need help. And who of us wants to swallow our pride and admit that we’re not king of the world?
3. You can enlist a team. This takes longer initially. All those personalities, those people, and agendas. But it’s the team who gets the job done. In sports no single player, no matter how good they are, can ever win the game alone.
4. If you really want to go crazy you can join a movement.

As you move down this list, your potential for impact increases. It’s a way to multiply your single effort by ten, or twenty, or even a thousand.

We also talked about getting a business card to carry with us to exchange with other people, to make connections, write down names, numbers, and emails to remember. Make the connection. Form a friendship. It’s contact, engage, enlist, equip, and deploy. This is the way we do life with others as leaders. And that’s exactly what you are.

We also heard about the 3 kinds of people you can’t avoid, and the 4 kinds of people you need in your life. Make sure you subscribe to the podcast and do not miss this timely talk.

Today @ The Gathering we continued in our current series “You Got Great Potential” with installment number three dealing with targeted energy.

In this series, we are dealing with the how-to’s of reaching your potential. All of us have it. The question is, are you living up to it right now? And if you’re not, how do you stay on the path? What are the essentials of living an extraordinary life?

This weekend we talked about targeted energy, the idea of doing fewer things; of targeting our energy rather than being roped into the myth of more.

One of the things that destroys our drive is we keep doing things under a set of assumptions that don’t work. It’s like riding a dead horse. It’s never going to take us anywhere, even though we’re going through all the right motions. We talked about the three aspects of dismounting a dead horse.

1. Realize that you don’t have to fix everything.
2. Realize you don’t have to please everyone.
3. Realize you don’t have to jump at every opportunity. There will be more coming in the future.

We also dealt with the three myths of more.
1. Hurry is not a sign of importance.
2. Stuff, and gaining more of it, is not a sign of significance.
3. Weariness is not a sign of progress.

We learned about the genius of the few. First, making a serious personal assessment of our abilities. The Scriptures tell us to think of ourselves soberly. We talked about recognizing our stress capacity, and also figuring out where we f.i.t.t.

If you haven’t subscribed to the podcast, this would be one to download and figure out how to find out where you f.i.t.t., and how you maintain your drive over time.

It’s hard to believe that this is only our second Easter @ The Gathering. It was awesome to see great crowds of people coming in with great expectations, and leaving, celebrating the real hope that we have in the here and now world of Jesus Christ.

We launched our new series, “7 Ways Weird Families Work” today, explaining that Easter is all about 2 important, world-changing ideas: the idea of redemption and reconciliation.

Jesus died and was resurrected in order to complete God’s plan of redemption, to buy back that which was lost through separation and sin; and then once redeemed, to reconcile. These are the two fundamental tools we all use in our relationships today.

In today’s message we gave three stark contrasts about Easter.

1. Easter is about relationships, not religion. Religion is about rules. It’s about coming to God your way. It’s man’s attempt to bully God. Christianity is about a relationship made possible by redemption through Jesus Christ.

2. Easter is about redemption, not reform. Religion is about moralism, trying to do better. Christianity is about ethics. It’s not what we do for God, but what God has done for us. In other words, Christianity is spelled, “done,” while religion is spelled, “do.”

3. Easter is about reconciliation, not restitution. This is key when you think about your core relationships in life, your inner circle, your family. Because if restitution is what you demand, separation is what you’ll always get. If revenge is in your heart, then there will be no joy or connection in your family relationships.

As you follow along in this 8-week journey, one of the ways we’ve made it easy is to create a web site, weirdfamilies.com. Go there, sign up, and receive all eight weeks of this email series to discuss with your family, or in your small group.

Today at The Gathering we continued with installment six in our series “7 Ways Weird Families Work” with way number five, “Weird Families Work When W.W.O.N.D.A. Reigns.”

The premise today is simply this: there is no winner in a war of words and high emotions. God gave us the ability to talk not in order to be right, but in order to be close.

We talked about the three goals of intelligent talking:
1. To gain perspective from the other person’s point of view.
2. To gain understanding of our own point of view.
3. To gain W.W.O.N.D.A. – win-win or no deal always.

We also talked about the seven insights of an intelligent talker.
Intelligent talkers:
1. Think before they speak.
2. Choose their words wisely.
3. Slow their responses.
4. Temper their tone.
5. Tame their tongue.
6. Love their listeners.
7. Say they’re sorry.

So as of today, we’ve dealt with five of the seven ways that weird families work. As a review, here they are. Weird families work when:
1. There is no them.
2. Love is LOUD.
3. Promises are kept.
4. Closets have no doors.
5. W.W.O.N.D.A. reigns.

If you haven’t signed up to receive the Weird Families series, now would be a good time to take the journey. Another web site that will also help is 31words.com. If you haven’t taken that course, you can sign up today and have it delivered directly to your inbox.

You can use these web sites and online courses to help stimulate your thinking and also to carry on a conversation in your small group or friendship circles. Or even at home around the dinner table.

Today @ The Gathering we continued our series “7 Ways Weird Families Work,” with the fourth installment entitled, “Weird Families Work When Promises Are Kept.”

God put us into families on the basis of covenants, not contracts, or civil ordinances. Covenants are written in our hearts with love and formed by two or more people making promises to each other. When promises are broken, families disintegrate and relationships shrink, becoming small, shrill, and bitter. All of us know how important promises are. But the question is, what are the promises that members of families make to each other?

Today we talked about 3 generational promises which are found in 1 John 2:12-14.
1. The promise of the mature is wisdom.
2. The promise youth is strength.
3. The promise of children is potential.

We then turned to the four promises that families make to each other. They are:
1. The promise of a home-base.
2. The promise of a helping hand.
3. The promise of a healing word.
4. The promise of a hope-filled faith.

Next time you look at a logo on the side of a building or car, think of the promise behind it. For Honda, for example, it’s a great, reliable car. For Harley, identifying with a certain group who like to live free, and live to ride.

If your family name were a logo, and we were to see it on the side of your car every day, what is the promise that we would identify with your family? This week, talk about it. And ask yourself what are the promises that we’re making and keeping to each other and to the outside world?

Today @ The Gathering we completed our series “Angry in America,” with the message entitled, “Anger Can Be a Beautiful Thing.”

In spite of what the myths about anger try to teach us, anger can be a beautiful thing. That has to be true because Jesus was angry. We know that he was upset when the temple was used to cheat people. He was upset when people used the truth to put people in bondage. So there is a time to be angry; when just ice is denied, when the poor are exploited, when the weak are abused, when the sacred is profaned, when the lonely are ignored, and when apathy is not an option.

We learned through a ten-step process, how angry people change the world and we ended with this formula: W+AP+V+MAP+T=Revolution.

Anger is the way God changes things. It’s how revolution starts, when things go from how they ought never be and more toward how they should be. “W” stands for a wrong, a wrong so grievous it can’t be ignored. Plus an Angry Person, a person who is willing to take that wrong and allow it to become a burden a holy discontent. “V” stands for Vision. A wrong plus an angry person with a vision of how it ought to be and can be, a clear picture in his or her head of what should be done, plus more angry people infected with that vision, plus time equal revolution.

Next weekend is Easter Sunday. We’ll begin a brand new series entitled, “7 Ways Weird Families Work.” Make sure you join us for this exciting new series on how to turn your real-life family into your lifelong friends.

Today @ The Gathering we continued our series, “Angry in America,” with the message entitled “What to Do When Angry People Come After You.”

Too many of us think that Christianity is just about being right with God; about forgiveness of sin, and about going to heaven when we die. We have a very narrow, one-dimensional view.

The truth is you can be truly right with God and wrong with the people around you all at the same time. Interacting with people, loving people, and extending yourself to people is all an integral part, or should we say, the fruit of a relationship with God. In that process you’re going to confront a lot of angry people. And sometimes their anger, when it gets taken out on you, has nothing to do with you, but revolves around broken relationships and wounds they’ve had in the past.

So, during this talk, we dealt with how to get good at letting people off the hook, or how to get good at extending forgiveness to those around you. It’s one of the core teachings of Jesus. As a matter of fact, Jesus said that if you refuse to forgive your brothers, your heavenly Father would refuse to forgive you. That makes it pretty serious business.

We dealt with the two facts about forgiving, the three rewards of forgiving, the three signs that you’re stuck in victim mode, which were really eye-opening; and finally, the mechanics of forgiving.

It’s one thing to want to forgive. It’s another thing to know how to do it, or the mechanics. In this talk we learned the six practical steps you can take if you’re ready to forgive and move toward healing and health both in your relationships with others and your relationship with God.

Today @ The Gathering we continued our brand new series entitled “Angry In America” with the second installment, “I’m Angry Because Life is Unfair.”

It doesn’t take very long to realize that, while all men and women are created equal, life has a way of separating us. Some people seem to have all the advantages, while others seem to suffer one calamity after the other. In a world like this, how can you believe in a good and loving God? And if there is a God, why is He so unfair?

This message helped us to get to the place where we could tell the honest truth to God. And that is, there are times when we don’t understand Him and we disapprove of the way He does things. We started today learning that it is our perspective, our framing story of how we see God, that determines how we see life.

For some, God is a guilt-inducing bully. For others, God is a demanding drill-sergeant. While for others, God is a vengeful tyrant. And while everyone has their opinion about who God is and what He’s like, the only real authority on the subject are the sacred Scriptures.

When we go to the Scriptures, what we find is that God describes Himself as a loving Father. Hard to believe sometimes because of the way things work in life. But truthfully, a father who loves his children must at times allow things, for the long-term good, that his child would disapprove of.

We talked about the three times we’re tempted to get mad at God:

1. When you think God is unfair.
2. When you think God is unresponsive.
3. When you think God is unsympathetic.

One of the most important things we dealt with today are the three things to remember that we dare not forget about God:

1. God owes me nothing except to be Himself.
2. If God is indeed loving, this means that God knows, cares, and is willing to act on my behalf.
3. Therefore my secret weapon in the light of all of life’s circumstances is the deep, core conviction that God is loving.

Today @ The Gathering we continued the series “Finding My Motivation” with the 5th installment, “What to Do When There’s Not Enough of You to Go Around: How to live well, love well, and have a life all at the same time.”

We highlighted the importance of living a 3-D Life in all three dimensions; public, personal, and private.

We talked about the Three Great Successes in life: succeeding at work that matters, loving well those people around you, and having a private life out of which both of those things flow. We talked about the importance of your personal identity of who you are, in forming your relationships, and then your public dimension.

We learned about the Three Dangers of 1-Dimensional Living:
1. Succeeding in ways that don’t matter.
2. Succeeding in ways that do damage to the people you love.
3. Succeeding in ways that do damage to your own soul.
What a timely installment.

One of the other issues we discussed is recognizing that there always will be more to do than can be done by you. The urgent will indeed crowd out the important. And in light of those two things, you and only you are responsible for taking care of yourself first. This would be a great talk to listen to particularly if you’ve been told that you serve others to the detriment of yourself.

We were given an interesting definition to business. If you find yourself saying to people, “I’m tired and behind” when they ask you how you’re doing, this is definitely the talk for you.

Today @ The Gathering we continued the series “Finding My Motivation” with the 4th installment, “The 4 Most Draining Doubts a Human Can Have”

Today we learned about the 4 most important questions all of us as humans have to answer, and answer with great conviction. And here are the four questions.

1. The question of origin: where did I come from?
2. The question of meaning: why am I here?
3. The question of ethics: what should I do today?
4. The question of destiny: what should I do with who I am and what I have for the rest of my life?

These are important questions. Most people spend all of their lives just talking about and walking around these issues. But they are really important because they create the foundation upon which a great life is built.

If I realize I was created on purpose, by God, that God had an intention when He allowed me to have life; and that the meaning of my life is found in relationships that I build, the people that I help; and that if my ethical standard of how I operate is set high in a different world because of who I am and Whose I am, and I realize I’ve been created with the strengths and weaknesses I have for a very specific purpose, life gets really interesting.

Because at the end of the day, don’t we all want to be able to live a life of our greatest joy?

So if you’re searching for answers to those really deep questions and to understand how they fit together, and how they can come out with a confident, joy-filled, bold statement of intention and purpose, then make sure you listen to this important talk.

If you want to learn more, sign up at www.findingmymotivation.com for the weekly course, or go to your iTunes store and sign up for our weekly iPod download.

Today @ The Gathering we heard the third installment of our new series, “Finding My Motivation,” with the message entitled “The #1 Sure-fire Cure for Killer Stress.”

The very best gift that God gives those who love Him is to live each and every day in the Trinity of Prosperity, which we defined today as love, joy, and peace.

Love is important because it is our soul’s security. It is the confidence to know that we are always loved. There will never be a day when we are outside of God’s love.

Joy is the soul’s strength. Knowing that I’m loved and nothing can shake that or take that away gives me the freedom of a joy-filled, energetic life.

And peace is the soul’s stress-reliever. When love and joy are attacked from without by circumstances, it is the soul at peace that allows God to do what only God can do. And that is to solve the problem and supply the need.

In the Scriptures, we are told, “do not be anxious about anything.” That covers a really broad spectrum: anything. It doesn’t matter what it is. If it matters to you, it matters to God.

If just affirming these things were all that was needed, then we all would live at peace. How many billions of Christians are there in the world who believe in God’s love, who live in God’s joy, and who know God’s peace? It’s the fact that these very core realities are attacked every single day; not only from without, but from within.

For example we develop self-defeating mindsets. We dealt with three of them today.
1. F.U.D.: Fear, uncertainty, and doubt lead our lives to be stagnant.
2. F.O.P.: Fear of people, which causes us to live in intimidation.
3. F.O.F.: Fear of future, which leaves us isolated.

One of the major points made today was that these self-defeating mindsets have to be displaced and not replaced. If you take at the core of your heart, your dominating thought pattern, you leave a vacuum and something else will come in to takes its place.

Stress is displaced in three ways:
1. When I remember that my past is forgiven.
2. When I remember my present makes sense.
3. When I remember my future is secure.

Be sure and join us next week when we talk about “The 4 Most Draining Thoughts a Human Can Have.”

Today @ The Gathering we introduced the new logo for The Gathering. It’s a logo that represents our philosophy of ministry in our 3 G-words; Gather, Grow, and Give.

We talked about the importance of each Christian committing him or herself to the mission of advancing the American church; not the institution, and not the denomination, or the set of doctrines that will divide, but a force, a redemptive movement made up of people filled with the love of Jesus Christ and freedom to dream how it might advance the good.

This message described the brave, new, wall-less, wireless, worn-out world and how doing ministry in that world has radically changed, along with the multiple opportunities that it offers to do truly great things for God.

One of the most insightful things presented this weekend was how to know whether or not you’re growing. One of the biggest challenges for Christians is to not just simply be stuck or stagnant, but to be vital and growing in their faith.

We talked about the four tests we can apply to tell whether or not we’re growing spiritually.
1. Are you growing together with other believers in love?
2. Are you growing up into Christ and understanding who He is in your life and in the world?
3. Are you growing out through ministry and service; are you being productive, and do you see the fruit of your activity because you’re doing what you do best and contributing your part?
4. Are you growing more through conversion; are people’s lives being changed and transformed?

For more details that help explain the philosophy of The Gathering, sign on at the Gathering Way.