Eric Taylor

Yard Sale Friday

I have no idea how I got talked into this but I'm writing this post from our driveway while I survey all the stuff we can no longer 'not live without'. We are having a yard sale!

Most of the stuff we have for sale was at one time stuff we just couldn't live without. But like everyone else, we got more stuff and newer stuff and better stuff and this stuff goes in the closet waiting for the next yard.

Since I started writing we've had 2 customers for a grand total of $15. That works out to be $7.50 divided by 3 people (Sonja & Abby are here too). This doesn't seem like a good business plan. At least I get to spend the morning with my 2 favorite girls! We've already had some great laughs and Abby can't stop making fun of my "stylish" clothes I finally agreed to sell! Whether or not we make any money, I'm glad I get to spend a few hours hanging out with my girls!

7 Things I Pray for Every Day

This past week I began teaching on Prayer and how to develop an effective prayer life.  I was encouraged by so many people who committed to praying consistently and intentionally for 15, 30 even 60 minutes a day.  I'm praying for you guys that you stay strong in that commitment and that you experience Jesus like you never have before! 

I thought I would share some of the things that I pray for every day.  My prayer life is not as regimented as some, but I have a list of things I pray for consistently on a stack of index cards held together by a big metal ring. (I got the idea from my friend Ritchie Miller, who prays through his cards as he walks.) I will pray for the requests that come in on the Connection Cards and for some that people email me but there are 7 things that I always pray for every day. 

1. Before anything else happens, I pray that I hear from God.
2. Help me to honor God with my life, words and actions.
3. Help me to be completely obedient to His Word. 
4. Give me clarity  for my next step as a leader, pastor, and church planter. 
5. Give me strategic focus, creative thoughts and above all else-- His Hand of Favor! 
6. Let me lead my family to be more like Jesus. 
7. Let me lead someone to faith in Jesus today. 

I pray this every day, sometimes before my feet hit the floor.  These 7 prayers help shape my life, my thoughts, my schedule and my  conversations.   Do you have anything you pray for consistently every day?  I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Catch Up Day

I'm back from vacation and ready to jump back into work.  We had a great time at the beach...I didn't get sunburned (a first!).  I had great intentions of reading a couple of books while I was there, but didn't make it through one of them.  I started reading John Maxwell's "Put your dream to the test".  It's been on my list for a while so I thought I'd knock it out by the pool or on the beach... wrong!  I made it through 2 chapters and was stopped dead in my tracks.  I realized I wasn't going to conquer this book in a few days. The first 2 chapters wrecked me and messed up my reading schedule.  I had to stop and spend time thinking, evaluating, journaling and praying... I spent more time doing that than I did reading the 2 chapters.  But it was well worth it.  The book asks 10 questions to help you "seek and seize" your dream.  The first 2 were: 

1) The Ownership Question.  Is your dream really your dream?  and 

2) The Clarity Question.  Do I clearly see my dream?

That's all it took to be the catalyst for me to drill down deep and rethink what we've been doing at Journey the past 3 years.  

I can tell you that I answered yes to both questions... even though we have been tempted 

to "adopt and adapt" the someone else's dream, We've stood firm on the dream God has burned in my heart over 9 years ago.  We haven't abandoned the dream in order to build a larger ministry quicker.  

I am more committed to that dream now than I was when we launched the church!  Here's the dream that God burned in my heart 9 years ago... and we will work diligently to see it happen at Journey:

• We are building a mission "sending center"  where our focus is to reach people who are far from God, who are living marginalized lives disconnected from God and the church.  We want to introduce them to Jesus, not the "religious figure" they might know about, but the passionate and powerful Leader, Savior, Forgiver and help them grow to be more like Him.  Then we want to equip them to be sent out into our community and all across the nation and world to impact the lives of others. 

That's the dream in it's original form as I wrote it down in my journal in 1996.

The 2nd chapter of the book talked about CLARITY.  This is where God really wrecked me!  I have been clear in my mind where we are headed, but I haven't always communicated that to our people.  I have been clear in my mind what the expectations are, but I haven't always clearly communicated that either.  So... now that I'm back in the saddle, it's time to work on clarity.  Making things plain and crystal clear so that people can not only know where we are going, but they can clearly see the path and the dream.  

I have a lot of catching up to do.  A lot of conversations to have.  A lot of "BIG ASKS" to make.  A lot of clarification of expectations to get down on paper.  I can't wait to read the rest of Maxwell's book... but I'm committed NOT to until I put the first 2 chapters into practice!

Sunday Rewind

What a busy weekend!  

It all started with our One Prayer Community Service Project.  Almost 200 volunteers from 6 or more churches showed up to help the 10 Auburn City Schools.  My family worked at Cary Woods Elementary and then moved over to Dean Road (where Sonja teaches) and joined the fun there!  Yes, it was HOT!  Yes, it was hard work!  Yes we got scratched up, beat up and banged up... but every volunteer left that day with a heart thankful they could serve the community.  Together the Church (big C Church-- the body of Christ) made a BIG impact in Auburn because we came together in the spirit of One Prayer and lived out Jesus' prayer in John 17, that we may be one!  If you missed it, you'll have another opportunity because we will do it again-- soon!

We experienced an awesome time of worship today with Nathan Harbin and Perry Noble brought it as he always does!  He talked on the subject-- God is Here!  It was a great way to end our One Prayer series.  If you missed any of the messages, go to our webpage and click on the videos tab and you can view them or you can go to the podcast page and listen to and/or download the audio.  Either way... you may want to go back and watch or listen again... All 4 messages were that good!

It's been great to have some great teaching over the last 4 weeks and I have been able to focus on some strategic leadership development and focused time in prayer and we are headed to the beach tomorrow through Thursday.  (We're tagging along with Sonja who has a writers' conference there)  So, while she's in class, I'll be laying around the pool, or on the beach.  The only thing I have "scheduled" for next week is to get up early-- yes, I still do that on vacation-- and spend time reading, praying and journaling.  I don't know what it is about the beach, but it seems like God always speaks to me very loudly when I'm there.  Other than that... I'm taking a vacation from blogging, email, etc so I can be refreshed and renewed and be ready when I get back on stage next Sunday to teach again... and you don't want to miss it... it's going to be a powerful message on prayer... I know it's a holiday weekend, but if you're in town-- get there early... it will be worth it- I promise!

See you in a week!

Study Less... Pray More

I was reading Mark Batterson's blog this morning and it really resonated with me because I've been reading and studying 2 Timothy and moving very slowly through the passages and I actually got hung up on the one that Batterson mentions in his blog- 2 Tim 2:15.  I camped out there for a while and really was compelled to study more intentionally.  But also, while we've been in our One Prayer series, I've been more focused on extended times of prayer.  Prayer and Study.  Study and Prayer.  Which one's more important?  That's like asking me which one of my children I love more!  There is no answer for that.  But I love how Mark put it in his blog:  

"I think we'd preach with more passion if we tweaked the amount of time we pray in proportion to the amount of time we study. So maybe I should say: study more and pray even more."

I have found myself spending a lot of time studying but little time praying through the message.  Those are the times I wonder where the power and passion was.  So... an intentional addition to my Saturday night schedule as well as my Sunday early schedule will be not to "practice" the delivery outloud as much, but to "rehearse it before God" as I pray through each word of my message.  

As pastors and preachers we have an audience that has willingly volunteered 30-40 minutes, sometimes more, of their time to listen to what we have to say.  So, we have to be prayed up, studied up and fired up about standing up and proclaiming the most powerful story in the world.  Here are some things I want to make sure of before I stand up to speak on Sunday:

1.  Have I heard from God?

2.  Am I a clean and useful vessel?

3. Am I calling people to act on what they have just heard?

Those 3 questions will be part of my prayer time as I study and prepare for one of my favorite things -- standing up and proclaiming Jesus.

By the way, you can read the full post that Mark Batterson wrote here.

One Prayer Service Project

I'm getting all pumped up about this Saturday.  We are coming together with other One Prayer churches in Auburn to impact the community.  To be more specific, we are going to be working with our public schools to do some landscaping and general clean up/spruce up around the schools.  Auburn City Schools have a great reputation in our state, even nationwide, and it's one of the reasons Auburn was named by U.S. News and World Report as one of the top 10 places to live.  We have a lot to be proud of in our schools here.  As the Church ("Capital C"), the Body of Christ, we have a great opportunity to impact our city as we come together this Saturday and serve our schools.  

Here's the plan:

• go to http://auburnoneprayer.wordpress.com and register.  This is not required, but it gives us an idea how many people to expect.
• Show up this Saturday, June 27th at 8:00am at the Bruno's Parking Lot (at the corner of E. University and Glenn Ave).  You will check in and be assigned to a school. (your family will be assigned together) 
• Bring any lawn care tools you can- hedge clippers, weed eaters, etc.  And be sure to wear gloves and close toed shoes. 
• Be ready to work until 12:30. 
• Celebrate in the spirit of One Prayer that, together, we all made a significant impact in our community! 
•  Come to Journey on Sunday and continue the celebration as we close out our One Prayer series with Scott Hodge, Pastor of The Orchard Community Church.

Monday Rewind

• Yesterday was BLAZING HOT in Auburn.  I walked outside to talk to our greeters and just about passed out from the heat.  Those guys are awesome to be able to stand out in the heat to be the first friendly face guests and attenders see.  
• Great conversations with some first time guests yesterday.   
• One of those guests gave their life to Christ!  Woo-Hoo! 
• God is continuing to work even in the summer!  We may take vacations and gear down a little, but God is always at work drawing people to Himself!   
• It was a great Father's Day!   
• We watched Craig Groschel talk about "God is... Father".  He nailed it!  Talked about the prodigal son and the Loving Father!  Great stuff! 
• I love One Prayer and I am really being refreshed by not having to prepare messages each week (I am actually writing messages for upcoming series, but the pressure to get it done for the upcoming Sunday isn't there-- that's helpful) 
• As much as I love hearing from great teachers via video-- I can't wait to preach again... it's like Jeremiah said-- it's a "fire shut up in my bones"!  There's some great stuff I want to share in the coming months!  God has been refreshing me and renewing my passion for preaching and teaching! 
• We had an awesome time of worship yesterday- Thanks Joey Seales for always being willing to lead people to experience Jesus in worship! 
• I had an awesome Father's Day nap.  I mean a real deal, drooling on the pillow nap!  (probably too much informaiton!)
• Sonja and I went to see The Proposal while the kids were at the Youth Meeting.  Lots of Laughs!  I think Betty White is one of the funniest people on the planet!  And Oscar from The Office was way funnier as an exotic dancer/waiter/minister than he is as an accountant! 
• Woke up this morning at 2am and couldn't get back to sleep until 4:30.  I've gotta get my sleep patterns back in line.  I'm carrying around a killer headache today and I've got too much to do to get sidelined.   
• Finally-- Saturday we had a meeting of what I'm calling my "Mighty Men".  Just like David's Mighty Men in 2 Samuel 23... these are men I love doing life and ministry with.  I gave them a copy of the Strengthsfinder 2.0 book and Brian Bloye's talk about Spiritual Vitality.  I want to pour into their lives so they can be the best leaders, husbands, fathers and Christ followers they can be.  I can't wait to see how God uses these men over the next few months to help our church get to the next level.  

Book Review- The Disappearance of God

More faulty information about God swirls around us today than ever before. No wonder so many followers of Christ are unsure of what they really believe in the face of the new spiritual openness attempting to alter unchanging truth.

For centuries the church has taught and guarded the core Christian beliefs that make up the essential foundations of the faith. But in our postmodern age, sloppy teaching and outright lies create rampant confusion, and many Christians are free-falling for “feel-good” theology. 

We need to know the truth to save ourselves from errors that will derail our faith. 

As biblical scholar, author, and president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Dr. Albert Mohler, writes, “The entire structure of Christian truth is now under attack.” With wit and wisdom he tackles the most important aspects of these modern issues: 
Is God changing His mind about sin?
Why is hell off limits for many pastors?
What’s good or bad about the “dangerous” emergent movement? 
Have Christians stopped seeing God as God?
Is the social justice movement misguided?
Could the role of beauty be critical to our theology?
Is liberal faith any less destructive than atheism?
Are churches pandering to their members to survive?

In the age-old battle to preserve the foundations of faith, it's up to a new generation to confront and disarm the contemporary shams and fight for the truth. Dr. Mohler provides the scriptural answers to show you how.  For me, this was a pretty good read.  There was some great insights in the book, but it was a little hard for me to get through.  Still, it will be a resource that I will keep handy when I deal with issues of an ever increasing secular culture.  You can check out more about the book and the author here.

Church Planting in Alabama

I was honored to take part in a meeting at our state denominational office that included church planters, missionaries, associational mission directors, and pastors as well as the head honcho of our state convention, Dr Rick Lance.  It was an awesome meeting that was full of healthy discussion and questions about how we can raise the bar in church planting in the state.  The topics included funding, building and strengthening relationships and networking, coaching and mentoring as well as some other topics.  Usually I HATE meetings that last all day, but this was different- this was very encouraging and energizing because there were some very significant discussions that took place.  I got to meet some folks that I didn't know and reconnect with guys that I haven't seen in a while.  Men like Terry Cutrer, pastor of Moffitt Road Baptist in Mobile.  He's a pastor I want to learn from.  Not only is he an advocate for church planters, he's just flat out wise-- I can learn a lot from him. I hope to be able to connect with him more.  Men like Randall Stoner, Associational Missionary from Albertville, AL.  He's a former pastor, and a traditional guy, but loves church planters and loves reaching people for Jesus.  I got a chance to meet Teman Knight who leads our state office's Leadership department.  I will definitely be spending time with him in the future.  There were lots of guys in the room from all different backgrounds and even a variety of theological differences, but the most encouraging thing from the meeting yesterday is that we were all united in the thought that we want to reach the 2 million people in Alabama who are disconnected from God and the Church.  I loved the way my friend Matt Brooks put it, we want to be about "pushing back lostness" in Alabama.  

Here's what I came away with- I was reminded that in established churches the ratio of members it takes to lead one person to Christ is 40:1.  In church plants that number is around 14:1.  At Journey, our numbers are about 10:1 and that makes me very proud as your pastor.  It shows our commitment to going all out to reach disconnected people.  But that doesn't mean we can relax or get comfortable. It means we have to keep pressing ahead to "push back lostness"  In Auburn.  There are 40000 people who are disconnected from God and the church. It's a HUGE task and it's going to take more than just our church to reach 40000 people.  But, I believe that God is going to use our church to help lead the charge in reaching them!  Some of those 40000 are your neighbors, your co-workers, your teachers, your employees, your roommates, even your family.  Journey will reach a lot of them, but we want to be able to help plant more churches in Auburn, Opelika, and Lee County that will make it hard to go to hell!  I'm more fired up than ever about what God can do through our church.  Maybe it's because we're in this One Prayer series and I'm pumped about working together with other Kingdom minded folks to reach our area;  maybe it's because I haven't had to prepare a message for the upcoming week and I've had more time to pray, think, dream, strategize and envision the future of our city as Journey church and other churches, as well as churches that we help plant, go all out to help "push back lostness" in our city.   I hope you're with me!  It's going to be an awesome adventure as we see God do far more than we could ever ask or imagine!  Get ready Journey Church... God's going to do something great in Alabama and we get to be a part of it!

Eyes Wide Open

Ever so often publishers send me books to review and blog  about.  I used to say yes to most of them but it got to where I couldn't read everything and honestly, the books didn't captivate my attention.   But recently I had a chance to read Jud Wilhite's new book, Eyes Wide Open.  Jud is the pastor of Central Christian Church in Las Vegas.  He's an amazing communicator and pastor and we've used some of their resources at Journey.  The subtitle of the book is "see and live the real you".  That's what captured me.  He breaks the book down into 4 parts- Part 1 is Wide Open to God.  In this section he tells about his own quest for acceptance and how he surrendered his view of himself and embraced God's view of him.  That is foundational if we're ever going to become passionate Christ followers and experience all that we were created for.  He talks about grace, not just for when we first come to faith in Christ, but grace that sustains us day by day.  Then he finished the section by talking about God being FOR US.  It's interesting because we began our One Prayer series with John Burke teaching that same message "God is For Us".   One of the best quotes in the book is, "if you have entered by faith into an agreement with God through Christ, He is bound by His own character to be there for you."  Yes!

Part 2 talks about our Identity- the way we see ourselves and how God sees us... and many times they're 2 very different pictures.  If you see yourself as worthless,  you will start to behave in that manner.  But the truth is our worth doesn't start with our behavior, it starts with God... and believing we are who He says we are.  He goes on to talk about accepting and living in our new identity as a saint.

Part 3 is all about being wide open to change, to embrace our true selves and reject the cookie cutter, wanna be attitude that if I were like this person or dressed like that person or went to this church or that church, then I could get it together.  WRONG.  Jud explains that restoration is a lifelong process, not a quick fix.  He offers this formula- Grace+Truth+Time =Growth.

Then the last part to the book is about being Wide Open to Influence.  He makes a great point that people spend their lives exclusively on individual change and transformation, but that's only half the story.  The full story "includes the call to create culture and restore it" by using our gifts and strengths. He finishes the book reminding us that there is always hope- Hope to change, hope to heal, to grow, to reach our full potential in Christ.  

I loved this book.  It was a very quick and easy read.  It was  a great reminder of who we are and mostly who we are in Christ!  I love the stories Jud tells in the book.  Being a pastor on the Las Vegas strip certainly opens you up to some amazing stories of life change and transformation.  As Jud shares those stories we see how we can experience that transformation personally and lead that transformation as pastors and leaders.  I only have one negative thing to say about the book-- and I know you're not suppose to judge a book by it's cover-- but the cover of this book is way too plain.  Hopefully by the second printing they'll make a change.  But it's definitely worth picking it up and reading it. Click here if you'd like more information on the book or Jud Wilhite.  If you'd like to buy this book now, click the link below.