The vote on Amendment One is finished but the conversation isn’t over. Same sex couples are still seeking to marry, and there will be lawsuits over the issue. Homosexuality will remain a prominent social issue the church cannot avoid.

Despite the amendment vote, the church is significantly out of step with our culture Continue Reading…

May 8th is a very important election day in North Carolina, and it has nothing to do with presidential politics or primaries. Amendment One to the North Carolina constitution is on the ballot, and it puts a definition of marriage into our constitution. Any time we are changing our state constitution, everyone should pay attention.

Sadly, this vote has spawned campaigns of disinformation. Continue Reading…

Like chocolate and peanut butter or “Peaches & Herb,” some things are better together. That’s the premise of a new church leadership book released today by Leadership Network and Josey Bass.

Better Together: Making Church Mergers Work, by Jim Tomberlin and Warren Bird, went on sale today and is the first book on church mergers, and unlike most “first” books, it’s insightful and practical.  It is a must read for any church leader in a church that has struggled to find adequate facilities to expand, is passionate about a particular community where they do not have connection, or for those leading churches that are stuck or struggling.

The book does an excellent job of identifying the kind of churches that would be a good fit for a merger, which upon examination, is nearly all.  It also identifies that in most mergers there is a “lead church” and a “joining church” that often is struggling or stuck and looking for an infusion of life. As well it provides helpful categories on how to think through mergers (rebirth, adoption, marriage, icu).

But beyond the theoretical categories, Better Together is an intensely practical resource. Bird and Tomberlin cover things like legal questions and how to start a merger conversation with other church leaders. They provide dozens of examples and in depth discussion of a few mergers in each category to give you a sense of how mergers progress and are derailed. There are appendices with research, examples, checklists, faq’s, categories to examine for fit as well as a list of churches used as examples.

If your church has been stuck or struggling, or is trying to find a way to expand your kingdom impact, this book will expand your thinking and help you move into the process with passion and practicality. You may discover your church is Better Together.

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For more than a year the Vanderbilt University administration have been driving this wedge forward. Friday the Vanderbilt Board of Trust retained their inane policy that requires student groups to allow any student to become a leader in the group, regardless of ideology or belief. I wrote about court rulings last fall allowing state universities to enforce “all comers” policies.

Vanderbilt began this controversy by reviewing student organization charters for compliance to the new “all comers” policy. Five groups were put on provisional status because they had not changed their constitutions. The new policy prohibits belief-based student organizations from requiring that their leaders share the group’s beliefs. Student groups were no longer able to Continue Reading…

The LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.” (Gen 4:6-7)

Recently I wrote about the desires of the flesh that wage war against our soul (1 Peter 2:11). Meditating on that passage brought this one to mind. It’s kind of a mind blower for a bunch of reasons:

1) God talks to Cain. Today the Lord primarily speaks through the scriptures, but it wasn’t always so.

2) God warns Cain. How amazing would it be to have God verbally advise you when you are about to get into trouble?

3) God reminds Cain. Before Cain makes a monumental mistake, God tugs him toward what he knows, that doing the right thing leads to Continue Reading…