Follow Jesus. Lead the church. Change the world.
Music plays an important role in our lives. It helps us express our hearts to God. And some music inspires us to change the world! So, this has me thinking about songs that challenge the leader in me. Many songs inspire leaders, no doubt, but here are a few songs that are inspiring me these … Read more
Awhile back I (Randy) was thinking about my life as a Christ-follower and I thought about the importance of the following three words: know, honor, and obey. Know God. Honor God. Obey God. It doesn’t get much more basic than that! Three important words for Christ-followers are know, honor, and obey! Shortly after beginning to … Read more
Everyone keeps telling us that our lives are going to change dramatically when we bring our child home from Korea. We’re sure that will indeed be the case and we’re trying to “get our house in order” before we become parents. By that we don’t only mean setting up the baby’s room. We mean getting … Read more
A couple months ago, I (Randy) did a 3-week sermon series called, Who’s in Charge? Sermon 1.0 made the point, We grow when we face our storms with faith in God! The reality is, we all face things that cause us fear. When we face them head on, in spite of our deepest fears, it … Read more
Today is Blog Action Day. Bloggers everywhere are talking about one issue. The issue this year is the environment. When I think about the environment, I think about the importance of caring for God’s creation. Many stories exist of St. Francis of Assisi, often called the patron saint of animals and the environment, and his … Read more
Ever since we received the photos of Baby Willis we’ve had this image in our minds. And even before the referral, this message from the future Baby Willis has been a big motivation for us this year. What a year it has been! We went to Asbury in January 2007 to take a dissertation-writing class … Read more
I wrote about parenting as character building a couple days ago. Since then I’ve reflected more on this and I’ve been thinking about the work of character building as the work of shaping a heart. The backdrop for this idea is Reggie McNeal’s book, A Work of Heart: Understanding How God Shapes Spiritual Leaders. God’s … Read more
As we’ve talked with many people over the last year about our adoption process, we’ve received two primary responses: 1) excitement about the prospect of an addition to our family, and 2) certainty that our lives are going to be turned upside down. 🙂 Well, with our adoption process nearing the end, much of our … Read more
God certainly has perfect timing. We received our referral on a Tuesday, while at Asbury. Wednesday we went to visit with Randy’s family in TN. Upon arrival one of the first questions was, “What’s your theme?” We had no theme. We had decided not to do any preparations for a nursery until we had our … Read more
A little about our dissertations. So far in our doctor of ministry / dissertation journeys we have not said a whole lot about our specific topics. However, we just noticed that Asbury’s current proposal’s page now lists our dissertation proposal topics: Joleen: The Integrated Small Group: Bible Study, Community, Ministry, and Mission Randy: Leadership Communication: … Read more