FredMcKinnon.Com

“In the beginning the church was a fellowship of men and women centered on the living Christ. Then the Church moved to Greece, where it became a philosophy. Then it moved to Rome, where it became an institution. Next, it moved to Europe where it became a culture. And, finally it moved to America, where it became an enterprise.”  (Richard Halverson, former Chaplain of the US Senate, as referenced by Skye Jethani in “The Divine Commodity”.)

(ht) innovativeministryleader.com

Hey Everyone,

Here’s a few “That’s Quotables” from this week in my reading … one of my goals this year is to READ more.

“We should never worship God in an unprescribed manner”. (Pure Praise, Dwayne Moore)

“Friendship with God is based on our present obedience, while a relationship with him is based on our permanent adoption as his children.” (Pure Praise, Dwayne Moore)

“In the same way, we worship leaders are in danger of merely going through the motions of “professional praise” without connecting on an intimate level with the One to whom the praise is directed.  Friendship with a personal God is an absolute must for us.” (Pure Praise, Dwayne Moore)

(for more incredible discussion on the “Pure Praise” Bible Study, join the discussions at TheWorshipCommunity.Com)

“Francis didn’t criticize the institutional church, nor did he settle for doing church the way it had always been done.  He rose above those two alternatives and decided that the best way to overhaul something was to keep your mouth shut and simply do it better “. (Chasing Francis, Ian Morgan Cron)

“Seek to be the change you wish to see in the world”. (Ghandi, as quoted by Ian Morgan Cron in “Chasing Francis”)

“To be always relevant, you have to say things which are eternal.” (Simone Well, as quoted by Marshall Shelley, Leadership Magazine)

Speaking of Leadership Magazine – Chris (a blogger and worship leader in Canada, I’ll be meeting him in a few days, checkout his blog) IM’d me yesterday and told me that my blog made a list of “Helpful Worship Blogs” in the Winter 2009 issue.  Wow – I have that magazine on my desk that arrived last week, and haven’t had time to take it in yet … but here it is … way cool, and thanks for the honor!

So what are you reading right now – and what’s speaking to you?  (Yeah, hopefully, the Bible is included) … share you favorite quotes or verses from things you’ve been reading this month.

Comment away!

I’ve been taking the time each morning to go back through this wonderful book, “Worship Matters” by Bob Kauflin, one chapter at a time.

Ponder these lyrics, and comment with your thoughts.  If you’re like me, sadly – I don’t read prose so well, so I had to read this several times before I could feel the meter and rhyming, and make sense of it.  Now I’ve got it, and it’s so powerful.

A debtor to mercy alone,
Of covenant mercy I sing.
I come with Your righteousness on,
My humble offering to bring.
The judgments of Your holy law
With me can have nothing to do;
My Savior’s obedience and blood
Hide all my transgressions from view.

(From “A Debtor to Mercy Alone”, words by Augustus M. Toplady, music and alternate words by Bob Kauflin.  © 1998, Sovereign Grace Praise, Sovereign Grace Music, a division of Sovereign Grace MInistries)

Your thoughts?

Hey Everyone -

Continuing on our discussion of Leadership: Budgeting Time …
(review Part 1 and Part 2)

Jordan over @ WorshipTrench let me know pretty quickly that I’m getting the “contexts” idea at Vitalist all wrong. Apparently, my contexts were still too broad. I’ve not modified them yet and haven’t even touched it since our last post, so you can see how well I’m progressing in this whole GTD System (Get Things Done). I did pick up the “Getting Things Done” audiobook on iTunes by David Allen, so guru of GTD. If I can force myself to listen to his monotone voice I just may learn something.

Back to time tracking, though – in my quest to find something “web 2.0″ for time management and tracking (or to create a business that will build one) I got some great leads from a couple of programmers who spoke with. I thought about starting a powerful portal that will be GTD-friendly and will let you track and audit your time, but didn’t want to “reinvent the wheel”.

Ryan over at ArtofMission.Com offered some great insights. We both agreed that I may have a marketable business idea but I’m not sure I’m ready to jump into it. In the meantime, he recommended two sites that are available for time audits. Neither of these implement some of the additional GTD features and “communication features” (I won’t disclose what those are about just now!) that I’d like to see with an incredible “all-in-one” portal, but they seem promising.

Checkout:
Tick (www.tickspot.com)
Harvest (www.getharvest.com)

One thing is for sure … living life on the go, in a hurry, with more to do than time allows … that’s not the way to live. It’s not God’s way. I’m reading a great book called The Life You’ve Always Wanted: Spiritual Disciplines for Ordinary People by John Ortberg .. and one of those disciplines is slowing down … one of the quotes in the book is “You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your day”. Another great quote is “Hurry is the great enemy of spiritual life in our day”.

How is your time management coming along?
Fred

I’m reading “The Life You’ve Always Wanted” – Spiritual Disciplines for Ordinary People by John Ortberg.

So, this is a quote of a quote:

“Earth’s crammed with Heaven,
And every common bush afire with God,
But only he who sees an takes off his shoes -
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries”.

(Elizabeth Barret Browning)

Powerful, isn’t it?
Fred