Tag Archives: New Song Christian Fellowship

Culture, God, Internet Life, New Song Christian Fellowship, Unity/Community

Counting the Cost of Discipleship

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In September of 2009, I started an Immersion Discipleship Training (IDT) program. Now, a year later, I have much to reflect on.

This week, I started my second year of my IDT student internship at New Song Christian Fellowship in Nashville, Tennessee. It’s safe to say that I’ve been effectively discipled in this last year. I am more proficient in the Word and Spirit. I walk in more power and authority. I also have a lot less free time on my hands.

Biblical discipleship is not that common of a thing. Few churches and Christian communities invest the time in the upcoming generations.

The current trend is quite opposite of what I’m experiencing at New Song. Most leaders today hoard their positions, grasping them with a greedy death grip. New Song’s leaders don’t do that.

Discipleship is expensive! But not necessarily in the monetary sense. Sure books and materials for Bible classes cost money. Yes, the cost of food to feed students is consequential. But the greatest cost of biblical discipleship is time.

Time, talent and treasure. God asks us to sow all of those things into His Kingdom. These triad T’s are being sown into me.

Time
Want to show somebody you love them and care about their future? Invest time in them. Give them the thing that cannot be repaid. Give them the ticking seconds on your life’s clock.

The staff at New Song Christian Fellowship believes in pouring into the next generation and they do it very well.

Talent
Each person is created by God with a unique set of gifts. These gifts are not meant to be exploited for personal gain. Rather, they are designed to be shared. We are created to bless and complement each other. We are meant to work together. We’re weak in some areas so others can be strong and help us with them. Too, we are strong in particular practices so we can practically provide for others. Daily I am strengthened in my weak areas because the staff at New Song share their talents with me and help me refine the talents God gave me.

Treasure
I admit it. Money is important. But money doesn’t make the world go ’round. The earth spins because Jesus holds all of the universe together. We can’t serve two masters, God and money. We have to instead master our money and use it for God’s Kingdom. Numerous people have sown financially into me. I live in a host home rent-free. I’ve received anonymous financial gifts. I’ve gotten gift cards to buy food. My high school mascot was a Pirate. As a Pirate, I really love treasure. 😀

My hope for every person reading this is that you have an opportunity to be discipled. Know Christ better. Grow in your knowledge of the Word. Know that the Bible is not this obscure, impossible to understand book. Realize Christ is alive. Life a life of dynamic power and movement.

If you’re not plugged into a dynamic community of believers, don’t despair. There’s hope for you.

The Lord has impressed it upon the hearts of the New Song leadership to create a resource called Disciple’s Handbook. This way anybody who wants to can be effectively discipled. The Great Commission is carried out through this resource. We’re currently in the process of writing the pilot edition of Disciple’s Handbook. It’s not perfect. There may be a typo or thirty. But we know that it’s God-inspired and Holy Spirit directed. The end result of Disciple’s Handbook will be three editions with 12 lessons. Right now we’re up to lesson seven in edition one. We’re working on writing lesson 11 right now. However, the rest of the book and editions haven’t even been written yet! That’s how fresh this is.

Go to New Song’s website to download the lessons for Disciple’s Handbook. Post a comment and let me know what you think of it!

Pastor Dale Evrist, Senior Pastor of New Song Nashville does a daily Old Testament podcast on iTunes. If you want to grow in understanding the Old Testament and how it applies to you today, listen to his free podcast. It’s full of great truth and life lessons. Download iTunes if you don’t already have it. Here’s a link to his Walking Through the Word Podcast on iTunes.

Consider yourself resourced! I am going to warn you, though. Laying down your life in obedience to Christ is costly. But it’s absolutely worth the investment!

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Culture, Dominican Republic, God, Internet Life, Unity/Community, Writing

Off to the DR

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So, it’s finally here!

Tomorrow at 3:45 a.m., I leave for the Dominican Republic! I’m excited! I know God will do a marvelous work in me and through me while I’m away. Please pray for me/our team while we’re gone. i.e. team unity, safety, protection, etc., etc.

Also, for updates while we’re in the DR, read our team blog at http://newsongdrteam.wordpress.com.

I’ll post when we get back with lots of pics, stories, testimonies…

Culture, Dominican Republic, God

The Funds Are In

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Hola,

I have great news! I am fully funded for my mission trip to the Dominican Republic! I received two checks yesterday that put me over my support-raising goal! I am so thrilled! God is so faithful to provide!

*deep breath* My mind has not totally wrapped itself around the fact that I will be traveling to another country in July. I have another Dominican Republic team meeting on Friday. I also start rehearsing the drama we will be doing on Saturday. I think things will become more real when I start the drama reherasals. It gives me something tangible and concrete to do. It takes this concept from discussion to application.

If you donated to my cause, thank you. If you’ve prayed for me, thank you. I ask that you continue to pray for me as the trip draws near. And please, definitely pray for me while I’m gone from July 2-14.

Dominican Republic, God, Writing

Dominican Republic Support Update

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Hola!

Good news! I received three support checks early this week. God is faithful and He has now provided a large chunk of the money I need to go to the DR.

I am still short on the total amount of financial support needed. But I am so excited for the financial boost that I’ve received.

Praise God!

God, Writing

I’ve Become What I Aspire Not To Be

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I’ve become what I aspire not to be: a lax blogger.

I love surfing around and reading peoples’ blogs.  It’s exciting to me to read about all the goings on in the lives of my friends.

Somewhere along the line, I got off track with updating my own blog.

I’ll be frank with you…I think it’s cheesy and cliche to not blog for a really long time and then come back and write a blog about how bad of a blogger you are.  And yet, here I am doing that very thing.

It’s amusing to me that people admit things like that.  People who read the blog are already aware that the person has not blogged in a long time.  So why talk about it?  Although, I also find it gratifying to read someone’s web apology for a lack of blogging.  *shrug*

Moving on.  What have I learned lately?  Well, the biggest thing I’ve learned is that humility is a personal responsibility.  “What’s that mean, Lindsay?”  It means that humility is something that always needs to be tended.  It always needs to be cultivated.  It always needs to be pursued.  It always needs to be monitored.  It always needs attention.

To me, responsibility means all those things I listed above.  Humility can’t be apathetic because apathetic humility leads to pride.  A lack of care for humility leads to an excess growth of pride.

For all of my life as a commited follower of Christ, I’ve struggled with humility.  I would either be totally lacking in confidence, thinking of myself as totally unworthy of anything.  Or, I’d be completely overconfident and haughty.  Instead of finding balance in the middle, I’d teeter and fall from one side to the other.

After I moved to TN, I started attending New Song Christian Fellowship.  My pastor teaches that “humility is confidence properly placed in Christ.”  So, with humility there can be confidence, but it needs to be placed in Christ.  Not in the flesh.

That makes it so simple.  It’s not about shoving down confidence.  It’s not about bolstering confidence.  It’s about placing it in the right place.  When I fully realize that God is the One who will never fail and He is the only thing worthy of total faith and devotion, that brings me low.  Not low in a bad way.  But just lower in comparison to His awesome glory and splendor.  It elevates Him above me and puts me in my place.  A place of humble submission to His direction and plan.  It also takes the pressure off me to portray a flawless facade.

Back to personal responsibility.  My perspective of that has changed.  I used to be focused on keeping up appearances or scrambling to make myself not feel worthless.  Now I realize it’s my responsibility to stay humbly submitted under God’s hand. 

That pretty much sums it up.  I’ve learned other things, but that concept is resounding the loudest in my head.  Hopefully it will create a ping in your head, too.