Campus Impact » Summer

“Guardrails” summary so far!

LydiaJ — Thu, 28 Jul 2011 16:17:56 +0000

During this second half of the summer we’ve begun a new video series by Andy Stanley, a Bible teacher from Texas. If you read the first summer communique, you know that we concluded a series called “Your Move”, which was all about four major questions you should ask yourself when making a decision: “Am I being honest with myself?” or “Why am I doing this, really?”, “What story do I want to tell?”, “Is there a tension that needs my attention?”, and “What would be most glorifying to God?” We’ve now moved into another video series which complements the concepts from “Your Move” well. It’s called “Guardrails”, and it’s all about what it looks like to have appropriate boundaries in several areas of our lives—friendships, relationships, finances, time, etc. The concept Andy works with is that a guardrail, literally, is a system designed to keep vehicles from straying to unsafe areas. They are located within a safe area of the road, leaving margin for error so that if you bump them you’re still safe rather than bumping them and immediately being in an unsafe situation. In a more personal sense, a guardrail is a personal standard of behavior —not one that you impose on others—that informs your conscience when you’re nearing a danger zone so you can give yourself a warning to stay away from a bigger possible mistake.

Ephesians 5:15-18 was written by Paul to a very corrupt culture, and can offer helpful insight into how to maintain healthy boundaries in an unhealthily boundary-less culture. From that chunk of scripture we can learn to be wise, to be intentional with our time, to be honest with ourselves of what we know will happen if we don’t stay within healthy guardrails, to set guardrails for ourselves in areas where we have a tendency to lose control, and to be sensitive and obedient to the direction of the Holy Spirit in our lives. God wants to protect us from bad things. It’s not that we want to mess up, but we don’t plan not to mess up. We can do this by setting guardrails for ourselves.

Proverbs 13:20 says that if we walk with the wise we become wise, but if we walk with fools—people who knowingly do things that can harm themselves and those around them—will eventually be harmed by the outcome of that fool’s behavior. The reality is that if you spend time with people who don’t care about how their actions effect themselves, they’re not going to care about how they effect you.

Your conscience should light up when…

It dawns on you that your core group of friends is not going in the same direction as you are.
You catch yourself pretending to be someone other than who you really are.
You feel pressure to compromise and consider behavior you’ve always considered off limits.
You hear yourself saying, “I’ll go with, I just won’t participate.”
You can’t tell the people you care about most or who care about you most where you’ve been or who you’ve been with.

Don’t confuse the ideas of compassion and wisdom! Be friends with non-Christians, but the best thing you can do is be on the safe side of the guardrail so when they crash you are able to be the healthy and safe person who can help them and show them tons of compassion.

I don’t know about you guys but my testimony is that I have hit the ditch more times than I care to admit and it hurts. Praise God that He’s always reached in and placed my feet on solid ground again! I want to live wisely and have guardrails that will protect me and those around me from the pain of not having healthy boundaries!

It’s Your Move — a summary of the Andy Stanley series

LydiaJ — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 23:56:55 +0000

This summer we have been gathering at the Campus Life House on 68^th and Pine Lake every Thursday night at 7 pm. We start with either a meal or some worship, watch a video of Andy Stanley, and then break into small groups for a discussion. We are about to wrap up a series called “Your Move”, which is about learning how to make wise decisions by asking yourself four questions.

The first is “Am I being honest with myself?” or, “Why am I doing this… really?” “We don’t often ask ourselves this because it’s convicting and uncomfortable. There are times we don’t really want to know why we’re making a certain choice.” Andy makes the case that most of us aren’t on a truth quest, we’re on a happiness quest, and that because “our hearts are deceitful above all else” (Jer 17:9), we will talk ourselves into unwise decisions. It can be terrifying, but identifying the motivation behind a decision—insecurity, laziness, selfishness, pride—can be the “truth that sets you free” (John 8:32) if you let it.

The next question to ask yourself is, “What story do I want to tell?” Andy says, “In every transition and every decision-making environment, we’re writing the script for [our] story.” When making decisions he suggests it’s incredibly important to stop and ask which choice best fits your story so far and what God has done in your life so far. He points to Joseph’s life—how Joseph (see Genesis 37-50) took responsibility in each situation, facing each dilemma and making tough choices that were consistent with his life of God-centered integrity and faithfulness. He also points to Joseph’s brothers, who had to lie for years to cover up the poor choice they made. “Write your story well—and live your story well—because in the future you want to be able to tell the whole story. What you do now really does matter.”

The third question to ask is “Is there a tension that needs my attention?” We call this tension a “red flag” or a “twinge of conscience.” It’s tempting to ignore the tension, “but instead of taking that risk—and especially since we can never really know the future—we need to entrust our lives to the only One who does know the future.” The final question to ask ourselves is, “What would be most honoring to God?” We all live to glorify someone and it’s tempting to make that someone us, but living for our own glory makes us insignificant.

Live for God’s glory! What freedom is found there! Live a life that others celebrate!

Couch-O-RAMA 2011!!!

LydiaJ — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 23:29:50 +0000

For a kick-off to the summer events, we did Couch-O-RAMA. For those of you who don’t know what it is, allow me to explain: Matt makes a super secret list of locations/monuments around Lincoln and assigns points to each one. Everyone is divided into teams of about 20 people per team and each team has a pick-up truck and a couch. They have two hours to drive around Lincoln and take as many pictures of their team sitting on their couch at each location. Whoever has the most points worth of photos at the end of two hours wins.

This year, it ended up pouring rain the whole game, which made for some muddy people and trashed couches, but it was still SO MUCH FUN And the “Lazy Boys & Girls” were the winners with 890 points! Way to go, guys

We’re so excited to see what the rest of the summer hold

It's a little blurry, but it captures the craziness of the scene after Matt says "go"!

On their way out the door...

Some people discussing preparations while teams are loading up their trucks and others are already on their way!

"The Lazy Boys & Girls" team about to leave the lot.

"The Chase Loungers" in front of Jimmy Johns for 40 points!

"The Love Seats" in front of the 'Lincoln Airpark' sign for 100 points!!

"The Lazy Boys & Girls" unpacking their couch at Pioneers Park... look at their determination!

"The Chase Loungers" on the pillars at Pioneers Park--200 points!!!!!

"Lazy Boys & Girls" team on train tracks for 90 points!

"The Love Seats" on top of a skate park ramp for 30 points!

"The Lazy Boys & Girls" in front of the Legacy fountain! 50 points!

The last team bringing sprinting with their couch back to the church... with 2 minutes to spare!

That's whatcha get for running around in the mud with a couch!

Hanging out and warming up afterwards

Summer Reading Lists…

mattmeyer — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 20:49:52 +0000

So it’s been several weeks since my last post…sorry, things got busy. Below are several lists of books you could consider reading this summer as you pursue Christ. The first list is a recommended reading list of some of my favorite spiritual growth/leadership books. The second is my personal summer reading list. All links go to books on Half.com because Amazon was acting up and said nothing was in stock!

Spiritual Growth/Leadership Recommended Reading

1. The Life You’ve Always Wanted by John Ortberg – Probably one of the simplest and best books I’ve read on Spiritual Disciplines and how we should approach them.
2. The Next Generation Leader by Andy Stanley – A quick read on the 5 essentials college students need to be thinking about and seeking to develop since they are going to be the next leaders in our world.
3. I Became a Christian and all I got was this lousy t-shirt by Vince Antonucci – Great book on the basics of following Jesus. Much of this stuff you may already know, but it is brought to your attention in a new fresh way.
4. Just Do Something by Kevin DeYoung – Great, short book on decision making and God’s will.
5. Principles of Spiritual Growth by Miles Stanford – A classic book on spiritual growth. I think this book should be read once a year. You’ll want your highlighter handy!
6. The Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer – Probably Tozer’s most well-known book.
7. A Long Obedience in the Same Direction by Eugene Peterson – Great book on the Song of Ascent Psalms (Psalms 120-134)
8. Louder Than Words by Andy Stanley – A very challenging read on what it means to live with integrity while pursuing God.
9. If You Want To Walk on Water, You’ve Got to Get Out of the Boat by John Ortberg – Ortberg does a great job looking at the story of Jesus and Peter walking on water in Matthew 14.
10. Hinds Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnard – Join Much Afraid on her journey to the High Places, a wonderful allegory about the Christian life.

Matt’s Personal Summer Reading List

1. The Epic of Eden by Sandra Richter
2. Faith of My Fathers by Chris Seay
3. From Eternity to Here by Frank Viola
4. Jesus Manifesto by Leonard Sweet & Frank Viola
5. The Untold Story of the New Testament Church by Frank Viola
6. Just Do Something by Kevin DeYoung
7. This Beautiful Mess by Rick McKinley
8. Wild Goose Chase by Mark Batterson
9. Crave by Chris Tomlinson
10. He Loves Me by Wayne Jacobsen
11. Guerrilla Lovers by Vince Antonucci
12. Experiential Storytelling by Mark Miller

Happy Reading! Keep Seeking Jesus….Matt

Summer Fun Pics!

mattmeyer — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 17:22:44 +0000

Here’s a few pics from the last 2 summer gatherings!

May 16th – Grillin’ & Chillin’ @Lehman’s and an outdoor movie that was moved indoors on a big screen due to the rain.

Doughboys in the Lehman's garage because of the rain!

Trent is always up for Frisbee - even in the rain!

May 30 – Picnic at Pioneers & KickBall!

Waiting in Line to kick

Olivia winds up

Excited Kickball Fans!

Derek on a rare miss....

Action in the field!

Allison nails one

My, what big feet you have!

The next Summer Gathering is June 13th – the Amazing Race! Check here for more info…