Chris Elrod is Founder and Senior Pastor of Compass Point Church and had this post on his blog a while back.  He was wondering about 15 random things... I loved it and asked for permission to repost it on our site.  Thanks Chris for allowing us to do... Here it is, enjoy...  

"There is some stuff I just cannot comprehend.  Try as I may to get it…it doesn’t make any logical or Scriptural sense. Here is a partial of things I do not understand.

Ephesians 3:20 keeps running over and over again in my mind…and I keep dreaming of a church (and churches…)

■That the ministry goes beyond the walls of the building and actually IMPACTS the community in a radical way.

■Where the broken, hurting and lost are received with open arms…and the religious are challenged to repent of their “perfection.”

■Where generosity is embraced.

■Where the staff and volunteers give their best to God in every task that they take on!  (I don’t believe the church should look to organization like Disney and Apple for inspiration…I believe they should be looking at the church!!!  Yes, they have great thinkers…we have the HOLY SPIRIT of the LIVING GOD!  There is no excuse for half hearted, watered down effort in the Kingdom!)

■Where JESUS is exalted…NOT a denomination or a political party.

■Where Scripture, not Robert’s Rules of Order, govern the Body.

■Where people in the church REFUSE to ignore injustice…and EMBRACE that God has called the church to do more about it than simply pray…but rather to DIVE IN and do all we can to help all we can.

■That refuses to accept that the way things are is the way they have to be.

■That champions the next generation instead of teaching them they are insignificant until they can get a job and begin to tithe.

■That excitement and passion surrounds the Sunday services…and also an expectation that God is going to do something huge!

■That throws the desire to compete with other churches out the window…and does all that they can to help the body.

■That embraces the fact that Jesus originally called “unschooled, ordinary men” to change the world…and He’s STILL doing the same thing today. (See Acts 4:13)

The church’s best days are yet to come…and I can’t wait to see what Jesus does next.  He loves His church way more than we do!!!

To learn more about Perry Noble and NewSpring Church, click here

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Heb 11:1.

The New Testament was originally written in Greek. The Old Testament was originally written in Aramaic and Hebrew. It is important to know the original words written and their meanings. It helps to put everything in its proper context. These give the reader of the Word greater insight to the actual meaning of the Scriptures. Although the greatest insight comes from the Holy Spirit.

Strong’s Concordance defines the Greek word for ‘faith’ as ‘pistis’ - persuasion, i.e. credence; moral conviction (of religious truth, or the truthfulness of God or a religious teacher), especially reliance upon Christ for salvation; abstractly, constancy in such profession; by extension, the system of religious (Gospel) truth itself:--assurance, belief, believe, faith, fidelity.

Strong’s Concordance defines the Greek word for ‘believe’ as ‘pisteuo’ - from pistis- to have faith (in, upon, or with respect to, a person or thing), i.e. credit; by implication, to entrust (especially one's spiritual well-being to Christ):--believe(-r), commit (to trust), put in trust with.

Self-analysis is hard work!  It’s tiring work!  It’s endless work!  But worse than all these things, it holds an implicit danger. It can be futile work.  Self-analysis can become so self-absorbing that it keeps us from turning outward to see what we really should be doing.  It is dangerously interiorating.  When we spend the store of our time on understanding ourselves we are usually letting a lot of other things go.  It’s a kind of paralysis diabolicus!  Satan likes us best when we are completely absorbed in trying to figure ourselves out, because at such moments all forward motion in our lives stop.

Those people who accomplish a great deal for God are people who never forget the atoning work of the blood of Jesus Christ. They are people who care less about idiosyncratic self, and more about the work, will and purpose of Jesus functioning in their new lives, which are in Christ.

It’s sexy among young people — my generation — to talk about ditching institutional religion and starting a revolution of real Christ-followers living in real community without the confines of church. Besides being unbiblical, such notions of churchless Christianity are unrealistic. It’s immaturity actually, like the newly engaged couple who think romance preserves the marriage, when the couple celebrating their golden anniversary know it’s the institution of marriage that preserves the romance. Without the God-given habit of corporate worship and the God-given mandate of corporate accountability, we will not prove faithful over the long haul.

What we need are fewer revolutionaries and a few more plodding visionaries. That’s my dream for the church — a multitude of faithful, risktaking plodders. The best churches are full of gospel-saturated people holding tenaciously to a vision of godly obedience and God’s glory, and pursuing that godliness and glory with relentless, often unnoticed, plodding consistency.