As I write these thoughts, I am flying home from Seattle where our youngest son, Matthew, was just married. My heart is thrilled to think of how God has blessed him with a new bride. I am excited to know that they are going to serve the Lord with their lives in the days ahead.

While I am glad that each of our four children is married to a godly spouse, I must admit I am a little sad at the passing of time. As I look back over the years of raising our children, I certainly can think of areas in which we could have done better. But I also thank the Lord that our four children went to the wedding altar in purity and with a dedication for the Lord Jesus Christ.

When I was thinking about why I should be glad, twenty-three reasons came to my mind: (more…)

Since our first days in Lancaster, it has been my passion to develop a cohesive team at Lancaster Baptist Church and ministries. I praise the Lord that on our staff and among our church family there is a unified team spirit—a shared heart to exalt Christ and win the lost. I attribute the great team spirit in our ministry to the work of the Holy Spirit and the yieldedness of individual team members.

There was never a more cohesive and victorious time in the early history of the church than at Jerusalem around the time of Pentecost. An obvious reason for this was the empowerment of the Holy Spirit. Yet there was another factor—the common convictions these Christians shared about the truth.

In the August edition of the Spiritual Leadership Podcast, we explore the convictions necessary to developing a cohesive team.

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Strong teams have an alignment of four leadership domains—the heart, head, hands, and habits. Each member must have a heart for God, the mind of Christ, a willingness to lend a helping hand, and a shared habit of soulwinning. These four areas are properly aligned when members of the team share the very convictions common to the early Christians in Jerusalem. (more…)

The past twenty-four hours have been a vital time of training for our staff. It’s been thrilling for me to share the goals the Lord has placed on my heart for the coming year with a group of like-minded servants. We’ve all been encouraged and greatly challenged also by the teaching of Dr. David Gibbs and his assistant, Brother Steve Kluth. I’m thankful they would give of their time to us.

In these hours, I’ve shared much in the way of philosophies and implementing strategy, but during the lunch break today, I saw what captures the heart of our entire time of training. A group of staff members were gathered around a large map of the Antelope Valley that we’ve yearly displayed. They were identifying the areas their adult classes are given to reach with the Gospel and were, no doubt, praying for the Lord to give a harvest of souls. Even with binders full of notes, ideas, and lists, their focus was on reaching the lost. (more…)

In a recent blog post, I pointed out the convictions of urgency, eternity, and salvation that motivate the passionate soulwinner. Yet the heart of a soulwinner must carry more than conviction to be effective. The heart of Christ, the greatest soulwinner ever, overflowed with compassion for the lost.

Matthew 9:36 records, “But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.” Simply put, compassion moves us to passionate action. Genuine compassion will be tangibly expressed.

A soulwinner with the heart of Christ will express compassion in two ways: (more…)

This week was filled with unexpected challenges. Although these challenges were unexpected by us, they were, of course, known to our sovereign and loving God.

Our son, Larry, preached a powerful message at Coastline Baptist Church Sunday morning, where my brother Steve pastors. After the service, Larry became extremely ill and for the next thirty-six hours was in intense pain. After meeting with the doctors, they felt that Larry would need to have emergency surgery for what appeared to be an obstruction in his bowels, perhaps related to his previous surgeries.

We made the very difficult drive back down to Los Angeles to one of the major hospitals of our HMO. After spending twelve or thirteen hours in the emergency room, we met with surgeons, and through various therapies, they were able to avert the need for emergency surgery. (more…)