jayhardwick.com

Hi, I'm Jay...Let's Talk About Sex

I've preached I don't know how many times in I don't know how many places and have never done what I did yesterday at The River Church.

When Bryan invited me to speak, he told me they would be in a series on marriage and that it would great if I could stick with the series.  The good news is that he is a part of a network of pastors/churches that plan their series and sermons together, so I wouldn't be on my own to come up with content.  But I'd still have to preach the message and make it personal...

So, in my first ever visit to The River Church, not only did I preach, but I preached on sex!  In the words of Gary Lamb, "Yeah...come on!"

And, since it was only 15 minutes away and they have one service, Lara Beth and the girls were able to go, too.  No, the girls were not in the service :-), but LB was on the second row smiling and laughing at me the whole time.  We had fun with it...no pun intended! ;-)

All in all, I had a blast! The people were great...they laughed at my jokes, talked back when it got good, and were gracious when it was all said and done.

So, if you need a sexologist to come in and drop some hammers, I'm your guy! I've got my opening line..."Hi, I'm Jay...let's talk about sex..." :-)

My So Called Writing Day

Started off nicely with a Grande Caffe Verona...my fave Starbucks blend

Flowin'...

"Look a bird..."

"Where did that thought go...it's in there somewhere..."

"Maybe that bird got it...'cause it's gone..."

MAJOR case of writer's block...or speaker's block...or ADD...today.

How do you break through "the block?" Help a brutha out...

Ain't Skeered

If you communicate on a regular basis, want to someday, or know you should but are sacred to death, check out Tina Su's advice over on the Think Simple. Be Decisive. blog. Then, come back here and let's discuss...

What do you think? What would you add? How do you deal with the nerves and/or the fear?

For Such a Time As This

Guess who has the unbelievable challenge and opportunity of speaking at FCA at USC tonight?

Wow, talk about a God thing.  I was supposed to speak back in September, but it didn't work for me, and so I slid into this slot.  Think God knew then how important of tonight's FCA would be?  Why He chose me to be His voicebox, I have no idea.  But I'm humbled and praying like crazy for Him to use me.  And, tomorrow is the campus-wide memorial service to honor and remember the victims.  Wow.  My hands are shaking as I type.

Would you pray with me...that God would speak to and beyond however many students are at FCA tonight?  That I would hear clearly from Him and that He would give me great clarity, accuracy, and power in preaching?  He's up to something on that campus - I'm humbled to be a part of it.

Party People in Cola Town

Looking forward to speaking on Tuesday night at Columbia Metro, a gathering for young professionals in downtown Columbia. I'll be there on October 30 as well. And...no pressure on me...Stuart Hall is following me the first of November and rumor has it that Dave Edwards, Mr. Metro/722 speaker man, might be coming in soon as well. Hmmm...guess who doesn't belong? :-)

Should be a fun night. If you're around downtown, come check it out at 7:00 pm at first baptist.

Darrin Patrick on Preaching

Had the opportunity to hear from Darrin Patrick, Lead Pastor of The Journey in St. Louis, during the Church Planters Lab at Catalyst. I don't know much about Darrin, but he had some great thoughts on preaching that I thought were blogworthy.

Your preaching always follows your understanding. You need a working definition of the gospel.

Gospel = I'm accepted, therefore I obey.
Religion = I obey, therefore I am accepted.

Most unbelievers haven't been confronted with the gospel; they've been confronted with religion.

If you don't teach people the gospel, then you'll come off as just trying to help them act moral.

The true gospel deconstructs the core problem most people battle: idolatry

Idolatry is the sin under the sin.

You'll never preach the gospel to people better than you preach it to yourself.

In the gospel. we learn that we're bigger sinners than we thought and that Jesus is a bigger Savior than we thought.

The gospel: Jesus lived for me. Jesus died for me. God sees me in Jesus. Jesus lives in me. NOT: try harder.

Godin and Paul on Preaching

Seth Godin's take on preaching (at least my take away):

Perhaps you should consider sitting down.

When you are asked to give a short talk at the big company gathering, or contribute a few minutes in a large group discussion, and you're ready to stand up and have all eyes on you, sometimes, perhaps, it makes sense to sit down instead.

If you're a bit nervous and you've written everything out and your main goal is to say nothing controversial, nothing memorable, nothing that might get you in trouble... well, why say it?

Paul said it this way:

God didn't send me out to collect a following for myself, but to preach the Message of what he has done, collecting a following for him. And he didn't send me to do it with a lot of fancy rhetoric of my own, lest the powerful action at the center—Christ on the Cross—be trivialized into mere words.

The Message that points to Christ on the Cross seems like sheer silliness to those hellbent on destruction, but for those on the way of salvation it makes perfect sense. This is the way God works, and most powerfully as it turns out. It's written,

"I'll turn conventional wisdom on its head,
I'll expose so-called experts as crackpots."

Get in the Ring

We're launching a new series on Sunday called Fight Club. The series will focus on family relationships and how to "fight" for restoration of broken relationships. I'll be speaking live this week and Andy will be on video for week 2 and 3.

I'm stoked about this series because it connects...who doesn't have a weird family relationship that needs restoration? How many times have you been at Thanksgiving and everyone sees the elephant in the room between you and Uncle Joe, yet no one wants to address it, especially you and Uncle Joe. Or, for a lot of us, it's more serious than a distant relative. It's your dad that walked out when you were 8. It's your mom who never gave you the affection you desired. It's your sister who has resented you for 10 years.

This series is about having the guts to fight...to fight for peace. To fight for health. To fight for forgiveness. NOT to fight for your way. NOT to fight for being right. There's a big difference...and we're going to talk about it.

So, to carry on the theme...Ryan is building a stinkin' boxing ring RIGHT NOW in our office! Yeah, pretty sweet. Inspires me to kick it old school and break out a little Mike Tyson's Punch Out on the original Nintendo. Nothing like throwing the smack down on Glass Joe, Soda Popinski, and Bald Bull on the way to Tyson himself. Wow...I just named three characters from the game without even thinking. :-)

Going to be a great series...why don't you go ahead and decide now that Sunday at 11:00 am, you're going to get in the ring and start fighting for those broken relationships. It's worth it, but you won't ever know it unless you take the first step.

One Day I'll Get It

Simplyfying has never been a strength of mine when it comes to communicating. Call it ADD, call it messy, call it whatever...simplyfying is a tough task for me.

It's hard because I want to find a way to say everything...ridiculous, I know, but I'm just being honest. Last night as I was looking over my notes, I literally felt like I was looking at the cutting room floor and trying to splice back in parts I had trimmed out. Weird. Moving forward, I have to learn to leave the extra on the floor...there will be other days and other messages to use it. To top it all off, I literally started getting sick in the middle of the message. I had to bolt immediately after I was finished...not fun.

All in all, God was big today at Catalyst. The crowd was loud during the worship set. Ryan did a great job on the videos. Sound was great. Good crowd. I'm so thankful for year one...and year two is off to a solid start!

Remember...beginning May 6, EVERY Sunday is a Catalyst Sunday!

In The Battle

I said on Monday that it felt a little different looking ahead to the week knowing I am communicating on Sunday. Well, it's Saturday and TOMORROW is Sunday...WOW! I'm pumped and nervous all at the same time. Which is weird...

In college, I traveled across the East coast speaking nearly every weekend during the school year and nearly every week in the summer. In my student ministry days, I was so protective over who stood in front of the students that I wound up speaking for most all of our retreats, camps, and weekly environments. As we had capable communicators that I trusted, I would give them the chance, but I was no doubt the primary communicator.

One of the biggest adjustments for me personally was giving up that role as part of our partnership with North Point. Of course, it's a lot easier to do it when Andy Stanley is the primary communicator...:-)...but it's still difficult.

The difficulty comes out the most during the weeks leading up to Sundays when I am communicating. One of the aspects that I either forgot about or didn't take seriously enough was the spiritual battle that you subject yourself to when you are "on" to communicate the Word of God with clarity. No doubt, the enemy works overtime to distract and create doubt. I've been in the middle of it all week.

The past 72 hours have been arguably the craziest 72 hours of my life. Tough stuff. Emotional stuff. Stuff that the enemy is definitely attempting to use against me as I prepare for tomorrow.

Tomorrow is big...not for me, but for Catalyst. It's big for Greenville. It's big for the 162,000 people that need to know Jesus in our city. And I am feeling it today.

Would you pray for me today? Nothing helps me through these battles with the enemy more than knowing people are there to fight the battle with me. You're awesome...God is big...and together, we're going to kick the enemy in the mouth today and tomorrow!