Category: Uncategorized

Stealing the Pope

On By Daniel CooleyIn Confessions of an Idiot Pastor, UncategorizedLeave a comment

We only borrowed him, really.

It’s Saturday, and we have been in the hospital since Monday waiting for seizures. Amanda is constantly hooked up to an EEG, with 28 electrode things glued to her head, limited by a 15 foot umbilical cord. Life is dull.

So, on my way back from purchasing a junior bacon cheeseburger and fries, the very last thing she remembers smelling when she had her first major seizure, i noticed the Pope in the lobby. And, i said to myself, “Self,” i said, “He looks lonely, and Amanda needs a pastoral visit, and there is no one here on the weekend to stop us.”

After the failed attempt to resurrect a seizure with a cheeseburger and fries, I zipped down six flights of stairs, and checked out the lobby. There were a few nurses wondering through, and a someone cleaning up the place. Once things looked clear, the Pope and i made our way back upstairs. People normally use the elevators here, so i figured that was safest. I was wrong.

There must have been half a dozen people staring at me on their way down, watching the Pope and i go up. I tried to look important and like i was too busy to stop. Besides, who would steal a Pope and go UPstairs? We made it unscathed.

John Paul is back down in his normal spot now – glad, i believe, to have been able to get out of the lobby for a change. Thankfully i only got a couple odd looks bringing him back home.

Still no seizures. Maybe if i brought up the baptismal font…

3 Lessons from the Storm

On By Daniel CooleyIn Confessions of an Idiot Pastor, UncategorizedLeave a comment

This week Howard Hendricks gave three terrific observations about the storm in Mark 4:35-41. It’s when Jesus told the disciples to cross the lake at night, and the storm came up, and they were afraid they would all drown, but Jesus calmed the storm. OK, here we go…

  1. We don’t develop faith by listening to lectures (they had been listening to Christ all day). We develop faith in the laboratory of life.
  2. Fear and faith are like oil and water. They do not mix.
  3. When Jesus Christ — is in my boat — it will not sink. Or, another way he put it was, “When Jesus says, ‘Lets go to the other side of the lake,’ He is not saying, ‘Lets go half way across and drown.'”

Another thought from the end of the lesson: Jesus wants what is best, He knows what is best, and He will do what is best.

Good stuff.

AllBks

 

3 Loves, 1 Huge Disappointment

On By Daniel CooleyIn Confessions of an Idiot Pastor, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Watching the first week’s course was a mixed bag. First my 3 loves.

3 Favorite Quotes:

  1. The Bible wasn’t written to make you a smarter sinner. It was written to make you more like the Son.
  2. There is no growth apart from the word of God.
  3. This book will keep you from sin – or sin will keep you from this book.

That was good stuff. But now for the disappointment.

I was disappointed these lectures were not recorded directly from the classes. They were SO GOOD! The change is a bit like my memory of watching the first, original Star Wars movie (is it #1 or #4 now? way too complicated). Everyone gasped in wonder when the light-saber came out, gasped in horror when Obi Wan died, and cheered at the end. It’s not the same now watching it with my grand-kids after hooking up the old VHS. It has the same great content, but somehow loses it’s soul in the presentation.

This course is still worth it for the content, but i miss its soul. Still, I’ll keep watching one a week this month.

I need the content in my soul.

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Take My Favorite Seminary Class With Me

On By Daniel CooleyIn Confessions of an Idiot Pastor, UncategorizedLeave a comment

I went to Dallas Theological Seminary, Western Seminary, and Moody Seminary. After taking a zillion hours due to moving and switching schools, my favorite class was…

My first class. And my first class was…

Bible Study Methods – but DTS called it Hermeneutics. That’s because they are a seminary, and the class cost $900 back in 1985. No one in there right mind would pay close to a grand for Bible Study Methods. But for Hermeneutics it was a steal. And you can get an even better deal.

FREE!!

And, there may be no more important class than Bible Study Methods. So Take a Class a Week for the Month of May with Me – sign up here!

This class was taught by Howard Hendricks, and I took it on Thursday nights. I was bummed, because The Cosby Show had just started, and it was really funny, and we didn’t know that we shouldn’t like him back then.

But a strange thing happened – I liked Heremeneutics even better than The Cosby Show. Thankfully, it’s still OK to like this.

The truth is – you won’t get the whole class for free – but you will get the four key lessons that all Bible Study Methods are based on. And did I mention this was my favorite class from three seminaries? And – these are the four best lessons of my favorite class.

DON’T MISS THIS!

Sign up today and let me know on Facebook Message or email dan@danielcooley.com. I’ll do the first class tomorrow and we can start posting our comments.

AllBks

Unreal Reunion

On By Daniel CooleyIn Confessions of an Idiot Pastor, UncategorizedLeave a comment

If you ever feel like your life is worthless, have a Reunion. A Youth Group Reunion. It’s great therapy, even if it is unreal.

Back in the 90s I was Youth Pastor for Del Norte (now New Life) Church. I was paid to organize trips to Mexico, Disneyland, Mark Matlock and Magic Mountain; to go camping and rappelling in the White Mountains and Colorado; to raft down the Salt River and study my Bible. It was a tough life.

When the kids (now all around 40!) showed up, it’s amazing what you remember. There is no telling what brings a kid back to Christ. You remember the difficult conversations, the crazy stupid things the kids got into in High School, and the crazy stupid things I did to try to help out. But now, decades later, to see young families of believers, I’m reminded, God’s Word really does work. There is a reason to be in this job – a reason besides Disneyland.

But – Disneyland was cool.

But – Disneyland was temporary cool. The reunion was a little piece of Heaven. Eternally cool. Totally unreal.

Thanks New Life / Del Norte youth for putting it all together.

Cottonwood – will see you on Sunday!

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Why We Love Easter

On By Daniel CooleyIn Fav blogs by others, UncategorizedLeave a comment

unnamedThis blog was written by Chuck Swindoll

Why We Love Easter

But now Christ has been raised from the dead. (1 Corinthians 15:20, NASB)

The path of the pale horse snakes through a grim, dark valley. All attempts to remove the venom of death’s sting prove futile. Try as we may to steer clear of that pale path, we finally realize it’s inescapable. Like an uninvited guest at dinner, it shows up—always at inappropriate times—and there it stands, expecting to be seated and served. When it decides to return to its grim, dark valley, it never leaves alone; without asking permission, it takes someone we love with it. We grieve in its wake . . . our loss is palpable.

Not wanting to call the intruder by name, we seek less-offensive titles. No matter which we choose, each sends a chill down our spine: life’s final exit, an untimely end, the last roundup, the Grim Reaper, the grisly terror, one’s final hour, gone away, passed on, “journey’s end” (Shakespeare), “that dreamless sleep” (Byron), “the last enemy” (Paul), “the debt we all must pay” (Euripides).

If that marks the end of our existence, “we are of all men most to be pitied” (1 Cor. 15:19). Truth be told, that is the pitiable existence of most who lose their loved ones. Since they haven’t the one ingredient that could lift them above their grief, most folks get trampled beneath the hoofs of the pale horse. Their emptiness is reflected in Peggy Lee’s cynical song of yesteryear. In it she asks, “Is that all there is?”

No! A thousand times, No! That is not “all there is.” But in order for anyone to give such a bold answer, there must be that one ingredient I mentioned earlier. HOPE.

And what gives us this hope? The resurrection of Jesus!

Because He has been raised, death loses its sting. Listen to the hope in this magnificent promise: “For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive” (1 Cor. 15:22).

Why do we love Easter? Because it reroutes the grim, dark valley of death, leading us onto a glorious highway of hope.

—Dr. Charles R. Swindoll, Chancellor Dallas Theological Seminary

An Easter Confession

On By Daniel CooleyIn Confessions of an Idiot Pastor, UncategorizedLeave a comment

unnamedFor pastors like me, Easter can be too busy to worship. Well, we go to worship, lead it even, but the sit-down-get -your -personal-life-in-order-contemplative worship isn’t happening. It’s ironic, stupid even, but true. There’s extra services, extra set-up and tear-down for us portable folks, eggs to color and a special service to plan. Who has time for worship?

I stole the blog below from the department chair of Media Arts and Worship at Dallas Seminary. It was convicting for me, was hoping it could be helpful for you too.

Face-Time Worship

Jesus entered the temple area and began to drive out those who were selling and buying in the temple courts. . . . and he would not permit anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts. (Mark 11:15–16, NET)

It’s the Monday before the cross. But Jesus isn’t frazzled, rushing about, desperate to get His house in order. Instead, He is calmly getting His Father’s house in order. For us. The Gentiles.

Jesus first encountered Gentiles in His home when wise men from the east arrived after a long journey by starlight to worship Him as a child. Now, in His Father’s house, those living on God’s doorstep had co-opted true worship by streamlining and commercializing the process.

Here, in the court of the Gentiles, worshipers purchased sacrificial animals without missing a beat. Facebook worship. Casual. Easy-breezy. Limp. “Friending” God doesn’t work. He requires face time.

But, then as now, time was in short supply—so those in charge of the facility (as I’m sure the spiritual bean-counters had come to regard it) created a shortcut through the court of the Gentiles lest marketplace shoppers be inconvenienced by having to walk around the temple. “Good for business,” we can hear them rationalize. “A way to consolidate commerce and communion. Besides, some of the shoppers may be seekers. A shortcut would at least get them close to the spiritual action.” But Jesus blows the whistle, stopping the hurly-burly traffic through the plaza dedicated to Gentile worship.

I feel Him tugging at my sleeve too. Because I sometimes regard worship as an interruption. Which is precisely what it is intended to be. An interruption of my soul-scorching pace. Real worship forces me to pause—to acknowledge that no amount of hurry will improve the odds that I will “win.” Speed doesn’t alter the fact that we are hurtling toward a spiritual dead end. It just gets us there faster. The velocity of authentic worship is as slow as starlight.

This Easter, let’s slow down. Let’s savor slow and contemplative worship.

—Dr. Reg Grant, Department Chair and Senior Professor of Media Arts and Worship

 

RENOVATE: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

On By Daniel CooleyIn Book Reviews, UncategorizedLeave a comment

renovateThe Good: Léonce Crump lives in a city that needs help. Radical help. Rather than give up on it – he believes God has called us to do something about the mess our world is in. I love the way he challenges us to see where we live as a gift from God – a gift to bring heaven to earth, to bring change to our cities and our own lives. It’s a new idea to me, this idea of settling down to bring lasting change and reconciliation to our community. In spite of the bad and ugly, I recommend this book!

The Bad: In the chapter The Way Home Leonce makes a point out of Heaven being a temporary place where God currently lives. He shows that our world will be reborn when Jesus returns, and so he believes we should look, strive really, for a universal restoration of all things. I get that theology, but also see other scriptures talking about a later time when our world seems to be blown to cinders. At any rate, it seems like he is making a big deal out of something that’s difficult to prove from Scripture. I also disagreed with the idea from page 25 that Eve after the Fall would somehow long after her husband’s role. In a book with this much theology, that’s not much to disagree on. But, it brings me to the ugly.

The Ugly: I felt at times (like those listed above) that Leonce stretches Scripture to find more support for his thesis of “Changing Who You Are by Loving Where You Are.” That being said, I like the thesis. Sometimes, however, I think you change who you are by learning to accept where you are. But, he loves Atlanta. Yuck. Maybe I’m wrong – if you can love Atlanta, you can love anywhere.

OH – I received this book for free from Multnomah Books for writing a review. Trust me, a free book didn’t change my review. I might can be bought, but not for ten bucks.

dan@danielcooley.com

AllBks

 

7 STEPS TO CATCHING A MENNONITE MAN

On By Daniel CooleyIn Uncategorized1 Comment

No time to blog? Reblog your daughter’s, she writes better anyway!

mrsmpenner's avatarLateToEveryParty

20160127_164405Between school, holidays and an unexpected pregnancy, I’ve been a little busy. Or rather, sick, tired and stupid. They tell me it’s normal for someone in my “condition”. If being the bringer if life is a “condition”, where’s my medal?

So what shook me out of my sick and tired pregnancy hiatus? Under my blog settings, there’s a section that shows what people have google searched before clicking on your site. One search read, “How to make a Mennonite boy like you.”

Great question.

How To Make a Mennonite Boy Like You:

Jon, my husband, thinks the very idea of this blog is manipulative. He hates it. Since I’m currently growing his Mennonite baby – which is sucking all forms of life and energy from my inferior, non-Mennonite body – I can and will do what I want.

Immediately my heart went out to this girl. No doubt she’s been sitting in her school cafeteria…

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A GOOD IDEA ISN’T ALWAYS A GOD IDEA

On By Daniel CooleyIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

I can so relate to this. Great insight!

johnmchoul's avatarHeartline Haiti Blog

nap_dv21094When making decisions, we’ll generally try to arrive at answers or solutions that are to our advantage. In the decision making process, we’ll probably have several questions, such as: Is this good for me? How does it help me? Is this a step forward? Is this a step up? Will I make more money? Will this make my life easier? What will others think? Does it make sense?

The issue though, for the believer, is that God’s ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts, (Isaiah 55:8) and so what, in our minds, seems like a good idea or a good decision may not be what God wants.

In Joshua chapter 9, we read that the Gibeonites came to Israel, lied to the leaders and asked for a treaty because they were afraid that Israel would conquer them in battle. It seemed that the Gibeonites were…

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