My last post was almost two weeks ago. The church issued a 30 Day Positivity Challenge on Facebook. It’s been amazing to see how people are responding. Every day, people are creatively posting something they are thankful about. Many of the posts are an absolute blessing to me. If you haven’t done so, check out the VCC Facebook page and get in on the challenge!

Since issuing the challenge, I had no idea we would face such a roller coaster of emotions. I thought I’d take some time to share some thoughts on the past few weeks.

The Info Day & Swap Meet was a huge success. We saw record numbers. In fact, Bikers Church now hosts the largest swap meet outside of Toronto! Stop. Read that sentence again. A church hosts the largest swap meet in Ontario outside of Toronto. In fact, the 2800 people who attended the event likely puts us into the category of one of the largest motorcycle swap meets in all of Canada! We don’t charge our vendors anything to set up. We don’t charge admission for people to attend. And yet, every year, we make money on the event. I am absolutely convinced that God is in on it.

This year’s Swap Meet ended with tragedy. M&M wasn’t at the swap meet, but while it was going on, he had picked up Sandy from work. They were on their bike when something happened. What exactly is still uncertain, but Mike went down, collided with a van, and passed away. He was one of the longest standing members of Bikers Church and his death was the first motorcycle related death we had to deal with as a church family. In the end, it brought many of the old timers together in a way nothing else could have. Again, I believe God took tragedy and used it for good. He was in on it.

But Mike’s death did more than just touch the hearts of church members. In the days following his death, momentum began to build among the motorcycle community. As word spread and the stories of how Mike lived life were passed on, more and more people were touched. By the time we gathered for our Thursday night service, his story was front page news. We had a record crowd for a Thursday night as we took time to honour Mike’s life.

But, it wasn’t over yet. A call was put out to the motorcycle community. Anyone was welcome to show tribute to a biker who left a large impact. Saturday afternoon, 170+ motorcycles were lined up outside the funeral home, ready to take Mike on his final ride. The local CTV station kicked off their 6pm newscast with the story. This wasn’t just a biker who had passed away, it was a Bikers Church member who died. The CTV website even carried a direct link to the church’s website. Twenty four hours later, I am still in awe of what has happened.

In the midst of all of this, God keeps touching lives. As I looked out at the crowd gathered at VCC this morning, I was disappointed in the small gathering. Until it hit me: there were five times as many people in attendance than 1.5 years ago. Today’s “small” crowd would have caused us to leap for joy only six months ago. Once again, there were those attending today for the very first time. A few approached me after the service to tell me they believed they had found a home. They would be back. Every week, we are growing. Every week, there is another story of a life changed by God. Every. Single. Week.

This morning, the good folks at Jericho Road took the service. I am so excited to have many of them as part of our church family. John & Vikki Ruby are an incredible couple, and I am convinced that they are an answer to prayer.

I am also blessed with an incredible team. I believe we have an amazing staff at the church. The personalities, giftings, and abilities of each person compliment the others. There is a lot of laughter, passion, and vision around the office. It is a joy to serve with these individuals.

The same is true of the Pastor’s Council. We meet on Saturday morning, spending time evaluating the past five months since the merger of City Church and Bikers Church. I love that these leaders recognize that even in the midst of great success, we cannot fear change. And so, we continue to tweak things, celebrating what is working with the merger, and being honest about what needs to change. I look forward to sharing some of those changes this Thursday and Sunday in a special vision update service.

I attended the PAOC’s General Conference last week (they were kind enough to host it in Ottawa). I had a number of pastors tell me that they were praying for me personally and also for our church. I was reminded of the many challenges we have had to face over the past seven months. The death of my dad, the tragedy in Alberta and the shooting of Shayna, and now, the death of M&M. And yet, in the midst of the challenges, God has shone through like only he can. He has demonstrated clearly that he is on the throne. His strength and grace are sufficient, and the journey with him is beyond rewarding.

Yeah, it’s been an incredibly season.

Negative words will set the course for a negative life.

With those words, we began week three of our Four Things I Dislike About You series. The subject this past week was “negativity”, and it seemed to resonate with so many people. To be honest, I was a little surprised with just how many found God speaking to them through the words of the message.

One of those who felt moved by the message came up with the idea of doing a 30 day challenge. You see, I suggested that negativity was a habit, and the best way to break a habit of negativity was to develop a habit of positivity. This individual asked me what would happen if we invited people to a 30 day challenge of positivity. That if we could find something positive to say every day for 30 days, a habit would be formed.

Can you say, “BRILLIANT!”

And so, for the month of May, we’re going to do just that. And I’d like to extend the invitation to anyone who’d like to participate.

What do you need to do? A few things:

• if you haven’t seen the message, take time to watch it. I’ll post the link to the video here, on Twitter & Facebook, and on the church’s page as soon as it is uploaded. Update: You can go here to view there video: https://vimeo.com/41395797
• “like” the Vanier Community Church Facebook page. You can find it here.
• visit the VCC page everyday and share one positive thing.

Let’s see how it goes. I have no doubt that some will find the words of others to be incredibly encouraging. Habits of positivity will be formed. Life will be experienced.

So, get ready. It starts in the morning!

The morning went off beautifully. I’m so proud of everyone who worked so hard to make sure the dramatized sermon was a success. The worship team, the drama team, and all the media people, dedicated so many hours practicing and preparing in advance of Sunday. They didn’t do it for recognition, but so that people would hear the message of God’s love. Amazing job, folks!

I’m also proud of all of you who invited out friends and family. Many of you took up my challenge to invite others. And, many of you were blown away when your family and friends said yes to attending. Almost all of our visitors were there because someone asked them to come. I loved meeting many of our visitors. Over and over, they told me just how much they loved the service and that they will be back again. More than a few plan on taking in our new series starting this week.

You did it. Each of you who took pride in your church and made the effort to invite others. Let me challenge you to not stop doing it. Instead of seeing Easter (and Christmas) as the only times you can invite others, why not do it every week. Do you know someone who could use a series on relationships? Then why not invite them to attend this week? Our new series, Four Things I Unlike About You, is all about some of the relationship killers we all face. This week, we’ll be talking about what we do when relationships get tense. Why not invite someone?

We did video our Easter service and hope to have the video out in the next day or so. As soon as we do, I’ll post it here.

Watch the video below:

Again, great job everyone!

That brings me to my second reason for neglecting this place over the past few weeks. I’m trying to figure out exactly what I want to do here. Yeah, I know … I’ve been in this place before. Lately, the majority of the posts have been focused on the church, and that’s good. I’m trying to decide if I want to keep that the primary focus, or to dedicate more time writing about other things here at robdale.ca. It’s something I’ll figure out soon (hopefully).

Easter Week

I wanted to take a few minutes to let you know some of the things you can plug into this Easter weekend at Vanier Community Church. After all, we have a lot going on.

On Good Friday, we have two events happening:

• The Way of the Cross. Once again, we’ll be joining with Vanier-area churches to walk through the community. We’ll be pausing at specific places to pray together. This is an incredibly meaningful event and anyone who participates will come away truly blessed. We will be meeting at St. Margaret’s Church (206 Montreal Rd) at 11:45am and concluding at our building no later than 2pm. Trust me, you’ll want to participate.
• The Passion of the Christ. On Friday evening we will be showing the Mel Gibson produced movie about the final week of Jesus’ life. It is a very moving and deeply touching account of what Jesus endured on our behalf. Doors open at 6pm.

On Saturday, the women of VCC will be holding their very first Ladies’ Breakfast at Louis’ Steakhouse on Cyrville Road. To quote many of the women, “It’s about time!” I have no doubt they’re going to have an awesome time together.

On Easter Sunday we are hosting The Advocate, a special “Dramatized Message”. It is looking like our Easter Sunday service is going to be packed to overflowing. I am so pumped at the work being put into making this event so special. The script has been written by our own drama team. We even have some very moving things happening during the music portion of the service. Again, it’s going to be a must-see event. I am hearing of people who have family and friends planning on joining them for the service. Make sure you take some time today to personally invite a family member or friend to join you this Easter Sunday.

It’s going to be an amazing weekend. Hope to see you at all the events!!

Paul never travelled alone. You see, he understood the secret to living a successful spiritual journey: You can’t do it on your own. Paul made sure he surrounded himself with the right type of people.

Who do you have in your circle of close friends? Are they people who encourage you, challenge you, believe in you? Or are they more likely to bring you down and cause you to struggle spiritually? It cannot be overstated: if you want to be successful on the spiritual journey, you need to surround yourself with the right people.

Have you ever noticed how creative people can be with the exuses they come up with? We like to blame our circumstances, our trials, and other people for the fact that we’re not doing the things necessary to see God thrive in our lives.

Paul had the best excuses available. He was imprisoned when he wrote this letter (along with most of his letters). He had been falsely accused, beaten, shipwrecked, and even the victim of attempted murder. And yet, Paul never allowed his circumstances to affect his spiritual walk. In fact, he viewed his hardships as an opportunity for God to demonstrate his power. Paul understood that in his weakness was found the greatest strength.

Enjoy this week’s video:

The kickoff was given by Steven Furtick. It was my first chance to hear him live, and … wow. The boy can preach!

He spoke from 2 Kings 3:9–20. I wont take the time to tell the story found in the passage, other than to say that there was a drought in the land. Elisha is called upon to give a word from God, and his response is simple: “Dig a ditch. The water is coming.”

Furtick’s offered a number of thoughts from the passage. Here’s a few I wrote down:

• Sometimes you have to close your eyes before you can see the vision. In other words, take your eyes of what you see in the natural so that God can speak to you.
• God doesn’t offer guidance, he wants to be our guide. Often, he only gives us one thing to do (“dig a ditch”) and doesn’t tell us the rest of the details. Can we trust him with the one thing he wants us to do even if we can’t explain the rest of the details?
• Only God can make it rain, but he expects us to dig the ditch. In other words, do our part by following what he tells us to do.
• In God’s economy, the rain only comes after we’ve dug the ditch. Too often, we have a vision, we know what God wants us to do, but we wait until everything is in place. “I’ll bring on that staff member once we have the money in the budget.” “We’ll launch that ministry once we have all the volunteers in place.” However, if God says, “Do it.” Then, our job is to … do it, not figure out all the details before doing it.

Furtick then jumped to Acts 3. He read the story of Peter & John and the crippled beggar.

• We want the miracle, but we don’t want to work with what we have. Far too often, we say things like, “When I have _____, then I’ll do ______.” God never works that way. He takes a few fishes and feeds thousands. Peter admitted to the beggar, “We don’t have much … but with what we have, get up and walk.”
• Far too often we want to think outside the box, which isn’t a bad thing. However, we must begin with what we have inside the box. Take what you do have and trust God with it. Only then will he do a miracle using what you already have. God wants to enlarge the box you are working in, but we must first be willing to use what we already have.

Anyway, it was a great launch to what promises to be an amazing week. It’s a blast hanging with Heather, Cam, and Erin as well.

I can’t wait to bring some of this back to VCC!

I’m sitting at the Delta Hotel in Detroit, Michigan waiting for a flight to Tulsa, Oklahoma. Those who follow me on Twitter & Facebook know that I was supposed to arrive in Tulsa last night, but due to a mess up with my first flight, ended up stuck in Detroit overnight.

Oh well, it gives me time to do some writing.

As I sit here, I’m reflecting on all the great things that God is doing at Vanier Community Church. Whether it’s the Thursday night Bikers Church serivce, or the Sunday morning City Church gathering, we are in a season of incredible blessing. As someone who has pastored for over 20 years, I’ve learned to enjoy these seasons when they come. I’m praying that we will see it continue for many, many years.

In the midst of such amazing blessing, I find it intersting that some people still find things to be unhappy about. Now, I get it that not everyone will like the style of music, or the lenght of my preaching, or even the personality of me or one of the other leaders. That’s inevitable, and I’ve learned to deal with that a long time ago.

But, what I find sad is how some people allow past hurt or offense to keep them from experiencing the awesomeness of what God is doing. In the end, the only one who is hurt by holding on to the offense is the one offended.

I was reminded of this on Sunday morning. I walked over to someone who was having a coffee at the bar. We enjoyed some small talk, and then he opened up. You see, this individual has struggled with many of the changes that have occured over the past few years. He picked up an offense, and there were times it was obvious.

As he spoke, he shared that truth. He admitted that it’s been a rough few months for him as he struggled spiritually because he felt offended. And then, he began to cry. He told me how he was praying, and God asked him why he wasn’t just enjoying the ride. Why wasn’t he taking in all that was happening in the church and seeing the good? He didn’t have an answer, so God offered one to him. He felt God say to him that the reason he wasn’t enjoying what was happening was because he had forgotten how special it is to be a follower of Christ. He was caught up in himself, rather than focusing outward. He told me how he let go of the offense, and suddenly felt free. From that point on, he was simply going to enjoy the ride that God was taking VCC on.

Being offended is a choice we make. Someone does something to wrong us (often we are legitimately wronged), and rather than forgive, we pick up an offense. We coddle that offense and get comfortable holding it. It feels right to keep the offense close. In some ways, holding the offense is comforting.

The problem is, the offense is deadly. It doesn’t seem that way, and it disguises is nasty poison, but the more we coddle our offenses, the stronger they become. They squeeze the joy out of us until all that’s left is death. In the end, they kill our spirituality.

One of the best books on the subject is “Bait of Satan” (pictured in this post). If you are struggling with offense, or if you are the type of person who is offended easily. I would suggest you picking up a copy and begin the process of letting go.

Life is so much more beautiful when you do.

This week, we talk about having an eternal mindset. We are called to live a life that resonates far beyond today. Paul suggests that Christ followers should live their lives with eternity in mind. That includes the choices they make. In this week’s passage, Paul begins to talk about behaviour. He lists a number of “bad behaviours” and “good behaviours.”

The challenge for us is what do we do with Paul’s list. Are we supposed to compile a list of things we should do and things we shouldn’t? OR is there a better way to understand the behaviour lists found in the Bible.

Watch the video to find out!

It’s been almost two years since I decided to wrap up The Oil Change. There were many reasons why I felt it was time to stop writing the devotionals, but the main reason was because of the demand it put on my time. It was a hard decision to make, and there were many times over the past few years when I wrestled with whether to begin writing the devotionals again.

Well, it’s time. Over the past few months I have heard from half a dozen people who have shared with me that The Oil Change made a significant impact in their life. It amazed me that people would still talk about a devotional that hadn’t been published in two years. God began to push me to consider it again.

Then, this January, I announced to the people of Vanier Community Church that we would be emphasizing the need to go deeper in 2012. Our theme is rooted. I believe one of the best ways one can be rooted in their faith is through a daily time with God. My hope is that The Oil Change will help people establish that time.

So, it’s coming.

I won’t give you a set date on when we will do the relaunch, but it will happen in the next few weeks. I’m considering releasing one of the previous books of the Bible first while I prepare new material. We’ll see.

However, I need your help. I want to get the word out about this devotional. Would you do me a favour and share this post with at least five friends? And, if you’re on Facebook or Twitter, would you take a minute and post something about The Oil Change along with a link to the website (www.oilchange.robdale.ca) so that people who follow you will consider signing up?

Discovering what God’s Word has to say to us is one of the most important things we can do with our time. Thank you for staying with me on this journey. I look forward to the next chapter.

See you in a few weeks!