Here’s this week’s highlights from the Coffee Church:

Our youth were at camp this weekend! Heard some good reports throughout and can’t wait to hear all of the stories. God has a way of using time away at camp to change and shape our hearts. My memories from different camps are truly some of the most treasured parts of my life. It’s worth every penny!

Tracy pulled off a miracle in worship this weekend! We had several people unavailable, so we rallied a mostly new team of people together and they did a great job! Thank you to Olga, Scott, and Barbara for joining us and to the other Scott for being a phenomal drummer, as usual.

I was in the service once, the Little Adventurers once, and the Great Adventurers once. So much fun! I highly recommend going to kids church once in a while. Delaney and I have been singing worship songs together for the last two days and I was able to do all the motions for her memory verse. Seriously valuable bonding time with my soon-to-be first grader!

LOTS of new guests this weekend! Can’t wait for summer to dwindle down and go into the fall with all of our regular people back and some of our new guests finding their home with us! I am glad that everybody gets to go on vacations and such, but I gotta tell you…I miss my people!

My dad is a signpainter so while we were in Montana I had him make Mike Dix a “Motorcycle Parking” sign. I couldn’t wait to give it to him on Saturday night. What a great guy! He was excited about it to say the least!

We dove into working on the new area for our nursery and the Little Adventurers! It’s not a little project, but it’s 600 square feet of valuable space, so ready or not, here we come. I got the coolest orange leather couch off of craiglist yesterday for the nursery! It’s going to be the best nursery/jr high small group room/office ever…what can I say, we are a multi-use church!

I hope you have a great week! Please pray for me in the next few days. I’m preaching this weekend and I really want God to use that message in amazing ways!

Thanks for being the best church in the world…

One of the things that I am grateful that we learned in the last ten years of ministry is not to be combative with a bitter person. If someone has allowed a root of bitterness in their heart, the best defense is to keep your mouth shut, gain some distance in the situation, and pray. In the past I felt like I needed to defend myself, God, the church…whoever… Now I realize that defending bitterness makes you a part of it, whereas if you remain a loving, kind, non-gossiping person, in the end that will speak volumes.

I really try to guard my own heart against bitterness. It’s easy to get it inside of you and it’s something that you have to keep in check 100% of the time. Bitterness holds you back from experiencing all that God has for your life. Bitterness stops dreams, it limits growth, and it steals joy. Hurt is just a reality that we’ve all got to come to grips with. Welcome to the Club of Humanity. We all wound people and we’re all wounded. It’s not right, but it is a part of life that we’ve all got to get over.

My general rule of thumb is to keep a good distance between myself and people who are “always mad at somebody”. The matter of the fact is that if they are always mad at somebody, it’s just a matter of time until they are mad at you. In the church world, it’s called a “divisive spirit”. The Bible has lots to say about divisive people and none of it is pleasant. Titus 3:10 says, “Warn a divisive person once, and then warn him a second time. After that, have nothing to do with him.” That’s pretty amazing if you think about it. A loving, welcoming, forgiving, amazing God tells us to have nothing to do with one of His own children if they are divisive…I’m pretty sure that if God Himself says that, it’s serious.

So, to all of the bitter people in the world…let bitterness go. And to the rest of you…let bitter people go.

At Silverwood Theme Park last week there was a little kids roller coaster called the Tiny Toot Train. As you exit, there are two choices – right out of the treehouse or left down a normal sidewalk. Of course, my girls chose to go right and navigate through the cute little treehouse. Being the good mother that I am, I hopped along with them. As we went over the suspended bridge, I stepped up to the platform and hit my head against the ceiling. It was one of those hits that goes from the top of your head down to the middle of your back and stops you in your tracks. I grumbled at the child size exit and went on about my day.

Later we returned for a second ride on the Tiny Toot Train. Being the good mother that I am, I hopped along with them when faced with the same choice. Want to know what I did this time? As we went over the suspended bridge, I stepped up to the platform and hit my head against the ceiling. Again. And again, the pain shot through my body. I had to laugh at my own stupidity. How did I not learn this lesson the first time?

Later on we returned to the Tiny Toot Train for our final ride. When faced with the same choice for the third time, I am proud to say that I went left. I calmly walked down the sidewalk, met my kids at the treehouse exit and they jumped into my waiting arms!

Sometimes in life you just gotta go a different way. You are more than welcome to hit your head against the same obstacles if you’d like, but I guarantee that God is providing you an alternate route that requires far fewer visits to the chiropractor.

For instance, earlier this year we decided to give it a shot for another campus to help alleviate our packed service space. Everywhere we turned we just hit our heads. Some would say to hit it harder, but wisdom said, “There’s another way.” We looked around and Saturday nights were there waiting for us. And it has temporarily solved our problem and has actually created growth in our current numbers already in the last four weeks. And it was fairly painless!

Will we try the route of a second campus again someday? Yes. Absolutely. And in God’s perfect timing, it might work that time. But if it doesn’t…I guarantee you this…there’s another way.

We had a missions trip recap meeting last week. It was nice to see the people we travelled with and to process some of our emotions about the experience that we all shared together! Such an emotional roller coaster that I wasn’t really expecting.

I think the main thing that summed up our adventure is that poverty is just a matter of perspective. We were in a pretty desolate place overall. The orphanage was quite liveable, but all around it was extreme poverty. The houses were mostly crumbling shacks, garbage was piled everywhere, dogs ran through the streets, and the stores were filled with dusty merchandise in little storefronts.

The interesting thing is that I kept feeling sorry for Americans in the midst of it all. As Lisa stated, “Poverty isn’t always about money. Sometimes our souls can be very poor.” That was solidified in each smile given to us and the kind nature of the Mexican people. They were not consumed with being busy and stressed. They were concerned with their family and friends in a remarkable balance.

We have SO much in our country and yet very often it doesn’t result in any happiness or benefit to our families whatsoever. We begin to be burdened by our things, our children become ungrateful, and our debt weighs heavily on our hearts. It’s just so backwards.

Wouldn’t it be something if Americans chose to live well (compared to the rest of the world), but simply? What if debt was really a four letter word in our lives, and stuff wasn’t a status symbol? What if we revered those who bought a car with cash instead of a loan? I think if we could go back to a balance of a “good” life and yet one that was truly lived within our means, we would have that same joy and perspective as the people in that Mexican community.

It’s not about having nothing and never spending money to bless your family and friends, but I think all of us could agree…a good portion of America has a very poor soul. We need to be on a mission to America to heal our soul and get back to some of the basic principles that are so important to God…love Him and love people.

May you be very prosperous in your heart!

Mark and I are on vacation this week, so my highlights are a combo of our personal weekend and what we heard from North Creek! Here they are:

It’s healthy to be gone, but I don’t have to like it. I miss my church and the people in it. I miss the percolated coffee and the dingy bar that we call home. I miss the kids and Grandma Dix. I miss the stories and watching people do ministry. I miss it all!

On that note, Mark went to one church on Saturday night and we both went on Sunday morning to another church. We also have a church that we want to visit on Wednesday night. You might think that’s an odd way to do vacation, but we actually like visiting other churches! There’s always something to learn and to grow in…and great ideas to steal!!!!

Our church just survived the first weekend without lead pastors, a youth pastor, a children’s pastor, and the director of our preschool department…yikes! We all were on vacation at the same time by accident. Good news…our church is full of capable, amazing leaders, and I heard that nobody even realized we were all gone. That’s a high compliment to the type of church we have. A true body of Christ that compensates where needed to remain strong in all areas!

I delegated my list to Chrystal Steinborn. What a lady! I knew she would make sure that it all got done, but I was most impressed that so many people asked to help her that she was never overwhelmed and was able to accomplish all that I needed her to do and more..

Hats off to our regular staff who were there as well…the Youngs, the Malones, and the Harolds didn’t even flinch when we told them we would all be gone. I think they secretly said, “Finally, all of these Type A people are out of the picture and we can relax and have some fun!” HA! Who’s kidding who? We all know Chris Harold wins the prize for worst Type A!!!!

We are having a good time in Montana. This is the longest break we’ve had in 13 years and it has felt good to “forget” for a bit. But (as Kris Gray teases me about all of the time) when we get time off, we dream about all the new things we want to do. We usually come home much more passionate and motivated than normal…so brace yourselves!

I’ll write more later about some of our church experiences this week! I’m off for another night out on the town with Mark!