Sot his past Tuesday, I go in for what I think will be a quick oral surgery. A couple of years ago, when living in the O.C., I had a root canal (2nd root canal) on a back molar. There was just a little left but the dentist went ahead and salvaged the tooth and placed a crown on the bit that was left. Well…it lasted for a while and then popped off while driving home from the office a few weeks ago. The roots were still there but the top of the tooth broke off at the gumline. so I go in for the oral surgery. There wasn’t really a problem with the surgery and I even drove myself there and back.

But then the trouble began. I had a meeting at the office after the surgery and made it through that but then had to leave before another meeting. The pain began and didn’t stop. The medicine didn’t really seem to work and then I reacted to the medicine in a “not so pleasent” way. The pain continued until yesterday when it was simply getting worse and worse. I called my dentist (Mark Blackmore) who rocks and he opened up his office after hours to see what was going on. After he lifted a few large of clumps of stuff he exposed the bone to affirm that I had developed a dry socket! OUCH and unvelievable! I have has oral surgery before but am a good clotter so have never had any lingering effects like this. He packed the tooth and I am doing much better…but still have some lingering pain!

I continued to work out, go to work, clean the garage, prepare the message for tomorrow, be dad…so on and so on with a dry socket…..looking back I realized something…if I had known that I had a dry socket I would have tended to the problem. So why dind’t I do that? Well…..maybe its because I kept thinking that things would be better and I wouldn’t need to trouble anyone.

When there is a problem…when you know something is wrong or think that someone could be wrong…just pick up the phone and call someone. Ask someone a worthy person for their opinion, ask your child what’s up, ask your spouse if something is bothering them, ask your boyfriend if there is anything that you need to talk about…just ask. Asking only leeds to the answer but if you never ask the question…you can rest assured that you WILL NEVER KNOW THE ANSWER.

testing out this new site to see if twitter and my blog are integrated…www.claytoncoates.com

I began a exegetical series yesterday in the book of Titus. In my opinion, this is the easiest type of series to do for someone who loves to dig deeper into God’s word. The key filter for me is to always remember that I am speaking to a very diverse audience. I have people from senior adult to 6 year olds, married couples to single parent families, and single adults to married adults with no kids and all the life stages in-between.

There has been a trend over the past decade to separate out demographics within a church for the service time. For many churches, children who grow up never see the teaching pastor of the church until they graduate from college. This is a result of convention and not of Christ…

Why do I say this? I say this because I have been able to sit is a seat and observe what this produces. It may produce some quick growth as the teaching pastor is able to cover some “hot-button/ shock-value” type messages, but in the end, it produces “Me-Church.”

We have experienced growth in our “Christian Culture” where churches are very narrow in the demographic composition. Several churches that are known for their excellerated growth with young adults who grew up in “Me-Church.”

I would argue that the Body of Christ is going to look pretty diverse in heaven. Jesus loved on and spoke directly to children and in the same breath their parents and His disciples. This is the example of Christ and not a result of convention. I am sure the purest of intentions precipitated this movement, however, I am confident that the real solution lies within having a teaching pastor who is open to suggestions, comments and help while preparing a message that is culturally relevant, packed with Biblical truth, and applicable to all demographics. Just my thoughts this morning

Father’s Day hasn’t been around for very long….as a federal holiday that is. Father’s Day was first observed in 1908 by a local church in Fairmont, West Virginia. The pastor was Dr. Robert Webb and the church was Williams Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church. It took until 1966 for this special day to become a federal holiday. The origianl bill was introduced to congress in 1913 and supported by President Coolidge in 1924. Needless to say it took a long time for this special day to be considered worthy of “holiday” status.

So just in case you were wondering (like I was), here is the answer to why we even have this day……and yes, mother’s day started first……

boy, has it been a long time since I last blogged. Taking over this church has been a joy…but a lot of work. There are some new things that I deal with that I have not in any other position over the past 15 years of ministry:
1) hitting it out of the park preaching every single week
2) weight of the spiritual health of the church
3) weight of the financial health of the church
4) continued casting of vision for the church
5) building a staff that oversees all the areas of the church
6) transitioning a church from a program based model to a more healthy model which is intended to simplify their lives while deepening all of their relationships

And all of this is just added to what I already knew and practiced about ministry….

My family is doing well but we are all growing up and having to make sure we are intentionally spending quality time together….

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I will post a video at some point which shows a juggler we saw while on vacation. He was a street performer and was really very, very good. The girls were captivated by him. As I watched him I learned something…and no, it wasn’t how to juggle. I learned that when you have a bunch of stuff up in the air at the same time, you will sometimes drop something. But I learned that if the people you are juggling for want you to succeed, they want you to amaze them, then they are quick to forgive, quick to cheer, and quick to encourage. 

Do you feel like you are juggling projects (stuff) in life? Do the people around you cheer you on if you slip up and drop something or do they condemn you for not being perfect? 

You know what happened as I/we watched this juggling man juggle and cheered him on? As more cheered and encouraged him, he did better and better….he succeeded. I just wonder how many of us would do better at/in life if we had a crowd around us that supported us. This is the type of church I am trying to build….a church for jugglers….