Blue Notes

Sunday's message was on Bouncing Back from a Breakdown:

1. Build a Dream Team
• Surround yourself with people that you know are leaders
• When everyone in your life is a taker, it will wear you out. Having leaders in your life will lift you up.
• There's an epidemic of isolationism and loneliness, hand in hand with epidemic of depression
• The wrong crowd will corrupt a good person. Leaders will change the life of a teachable person.
  
• Standing with Leaders Helps Me...
A. Hear God

• Christians go through seasons of hearing and not hearing from God.
• Sometimes you need others to hear with you / for you and confirm
  
B. Remain Encouraged

• Being around people with similar calls, similar, goals, similar ambitions encourages your spirit
  
C. Bear Burdens

• Every great blessing of God comes with responsibility, many times greater than our ability to bear on our own.
• Marriage and parenting are hard so that we will seek God's help and others' help.
  
• How do we even make friends anymore? The Church was designed to foster relationships with God and with others.
• Growth groups
  
• Ministry teams - Serving together, working in the trenches builds bonds like nothing else in life.
2. Get Myself Ready
• Numbers 11:17c - "Tell the people to get ready for tomorrow." Sometimes, the big act of faith is just to get ready for another day.
• When you're jobless and depressed, that's when God says, "Let's work on your resume today."
• Listen for God. Be prepared when you enter your time with God (e.g., Bible, highlighter, pen, notebook). "God, I know you're going to talk to me. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but when you do, I'll be ready."
• "I really believe God's working on Tony 2.0 right now. He's had me make change after change. I almost went from PC to Mac; that's how bad things have gotten."
  
• Get dressed, shower, and shave. Get ready for the day.
  
• Set your sights on God. There is a tomorrow.
  
3. Speak Faithfully
• Speak in faith based on the promises God's given you.
• Say it to yourself and others.
• Psalm 6:9 - "The Lord has heard my cry for help; the Lord will answer my prayer."
  
4. Trust God's Ability
• Too often we overestimate our problem and underestimate God's ability.
• God is smarter than me.
• Just because you can't see a way out doesn't mean there isn't one.
• We seek solutions more than we seek God.
• The times when problems arise are when we need to seek God.
  
5. Trust God's Timing
• Numbers 11:23 - "God answered Moses, 'So, you you think I can't take care of you? You'll see soon enough whether what I say happens for you or not.'"
• "Soon enough" doesn't mean "when I want."
• Your whole life doesn't unfold the day you're born. You're whole life unfolds over your whole life.

• Numbers 11:31b - "The quail were about three feet deep on the ground, and there were quail a day's walk in any direction."
• God's plan is always bigger than we can possibly imagine.
  

Promotions

Tony posted some great news for the Fusioneers. The amazing Greg Troxell will be heading up the student ministries for Fusion Church starting this August, and the incomparable Scott Stewart will be heading up all of our guest services! These guys are some great men, and if you've seen them in action around the church, you know the joyful service they always give. Excellent choices, Fusion staff!

Growing Up

Rick Warren (pastor of Saddleback Church and author of "The Purpose-Driven Life") shares some very cool insights on renewal and growth in our relationships with God, with others, as well as in our ministry. They are reported by Perry Noble of NewSpring Church in his blog posts here and here.