1. You cannot sustain long-term relationships.
2. You cannot say no.
3. Your list of friends is shrinking and your list of enemies is growing.
4. You fall head over heals in love with someone on the first date.
5. You do things you do not want to do tin order to please other people.
6. You get into trouble often because of the people you hang out with.
7. You own other people’s responsibilities as your own and often feel over whelmed by their needs.
8. You often get frustrated because you are always doing things for others and they do not seem to appreciate it.
9. You avoid people you have issues with. You are consistently in relational cold wars.
10. Other people’s chaos becomes your chaos
11. You have no limits on the amount of time someone can be with you, amount of energy someone can take from you and amount of help someone can ask from you.
12. You often fall prey to emotional vampires and find yourself in intravenous relationships where people are sucking the life out of you.

Even now, though I am not on the diet, I will experience hunger before a trip to Mellow Mushroom. I will watch what I eat during the day so that I can experience hunger before dinner, and then enjoy fulfilling that hunger with the best pizza on the planet.

Hunger is a gift from God

I think hunger is one of the greatest things God created in us. I am talking both of physical hunger for food, and of a spiritual hunger, for more of God.  Hunger can feel like a curse, or like a problem to be solved, but hunger is a blessing from God. Hunger, you see, helps us to define what we want. Hunger has a way of purifying.  It is when we are hungry that we work, with utmost focus and dilegence, to get that which will satisfy us.

Hunger must be cultivated

Currently, as I am writing this, I am sitting in a coffee shop, and I keep looking over and seeing some amazing snacks.  Right now, physical hunger is being cultivated in me by my environment. If I were sitting outside, away from the scented influence of food, this hunger would likely not be as strong.  Right now, my physical hunger is being influenced. In the same way, if we are to have spiritual hunger, it must be cultivated.  A hunger for God, and for the things of God, does not come by accident. It can be sought after through reading, through disciples and through placing yourself in environments that invite you to hunger afte God. One of the many blessings of the Church is that it offers an environment that invites hunger into the life of a Christ follower.

Those who are hungry will be satisfied?

In one of Jesus’ most famous sermon’s, he talks through a series of scenarios will be true in His Kingdom.  In Matt 5, we find him declaring, “those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, they will be satisfied.”  Now when we hear the word hunger, usually our minds first go to physical hunger. There is no promise that this hunger will find satisfaction. For those of you who go to bed with a full stomach tonight, count yourselves as blessed on this earth. In this sermon, Jesus isn’t talking about a type of physical hunger.  He is describing the reality of being hungry (spiritually) for more of God. Hungry for more of His presence in our lives, more of His truth in our area, more of His Kingdom come…he is saying that when you hunger for these things, you will be satisfied. A hunger for God, and for the things of God, will not return null-in-void.

A Common Hunger

I remember when Water’s Edge first started, the common thread of those who gathered was a desire to see more of God in our lives. The only commonality for a few of us who gathered in a living room, was the fact that we found a common desire…a hunger for God.  So, we prayed. We asked God to show himself to us and show himself to others around us. We asked, and begged, that God would draw the college-age generation to Him…and that He would use our gatherings as a way to introduce him to others.

I look at Water’s Edge today on a given Tuesday night, and I find the hunger within growing once again. Some would look at all that God has done in our ministry over the past years and say that God has fulfilled…He has taken our hunger and replaced it with a meal. I like to look at it another way. I love what I witness as we gather together every Tuesday night. I see the way God is moving in our ministry, and I like to believe this is the awesome appetizer, a small snack as we hunger for the feast that is to come.

I am hungry for more of God.

-Cory

“Now you should carry this project through to completion just as enthusiastically as you began it. Give whatever you can according to what you have.”

-2 Corinthians 8:11 (NLT)

Excited, pumped, thrilled, lets do this! rock on, im in! All very common expression for our generation, the 20 somethings. But what happens when the honeymoon stage of a job, idea, project, vision, or relationship fade? Difficulty appears, tension, challenges, stress.

At this point, many of us give in and call it quits. I have been guilty of this in the past, possibly too many times. I was recently talking with a director of a national mentorship organization, and learned that the highest drop out rate of mentors is the college age students. They sign up to mentor a child, and after a couple of months back out, leaving the boy or girl heart broken in anticipation. All because of what? the sizzle faded, no more carbonation in the sprite, so we throw it away. A child’s life is crucial, so those kind of statistics frustrate me to no end. I was informed that often times they avoid recruiting college students because of their lack of follow through. What can we do to change situations like this? A few thoughts come to mind

• God does not change his mind.

In scripture, I have not found a circumstance when the angle of the heart of God shifted and all of a sudden his mind changes. The only situation where that happens is in the disobedience of the Israelites, and that was posture of mans heart, and God responding to their rebellion.

• Lets not confuse our ADD of priorities with the Holy Spirit.

Circumstances may change, job situations, family life, and trouble may come. But that does not mean that we can just back out of something because of conflict. At the end of the day, we make time for what matters most to us.

• Unless you can see yourself following through, avoid committing.

Ask yourself if you can see yourself doing the task at hand at least until its completion. Set a goal or ask what is expected of you. And if you have doubts on your ability to deliver, do not commit.

I believe that doing things like this can change the cliche that our generation is known as. We could be known as revolutionaries, visionaries, and an uncontrollable force of good.

Press through, my brothers and sisters,

- Yanni

I want to see impossibilities bow their knee to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Many of you know that the 6 mission teams that Waters Edge is sending out this summer are now in the process of watching God provide thousands of dollars for them. Before they applied, none of these people looked at the cost of their trips to South Asia, Greece, Guatemala, NYC or Moose Factory, and said, “Oh, I’ve got that.” We are all simple poor college-age people like everyone else in Waters Edge.

In planning and preparing for the South Asia trip I began to feel like maybe we were stretching God’s capacity. (haha)  It is the most expensive trip by far, and we had to all raise our money in an extremely short amount of time even in comparison to the other trips.

I am learning again, that God is never ending. Right on the day of the last deadline, Friday, that number miraculously went straight up and over the $15,000 that we needed to go.  We just have to celebrate!!! Our God loves us, and he is able to meet all our needs!! He responds when we pray!!  I am completely convinced that God sincerely enjoys glorifying himself through “unlikely” circumstance.  All earthly wisdom said that our goal was impossible, but the LORD has ordained it—and therefore it happens.  If I have any purpose on the earth, this is what I want the world to see:  I want to see impossibilities bow their knee to the Lord Jesus Christ.

So now our team can move on to other forms of preparation.  We are SO EXCITED to go love people on the other side of the globe.

A Note on God’s Provision for the Other Mission Teams:  Do not give up.  God is certainly able, and his love never fails—even when you do.

A Note on God’s Provision for Everyone Else:  God isn’t providing for us because we are extra special.  He is providing to complete his purposes and to glorify himself.  God is trying to teach us something through these extravagant displays of provision.  Trust him, and pray!  He will provide for your every need.

Two Things I’d like for you to do:

1. Please go download a South Asia prayer guide, and pray for us while we are gone.  Pray HUGE prayers for us.  Prayer moves mountains. (Download it on the World Missions page.)
2. If God has recently provided for you (mission trip or something else), please write up a short story and submit it, so that it can be posted on the webpage. http://www.watersedgeatl.com/we-news/share-my-story

-Danielle

I like to start my day with the end in mind.  My wife Cami likes to laugh at me because I am an extreme planner.  In the morning I get up and while I am still on my first cup of coffee, I am asking questions about what today should look like.  What things do I need to do today?  Who do I need to meet with?  What places do I need to go?  What times do I already have commitments? I am a planner through and through.  These questions I ask each day, they help me look at the 16-18 hours ahead of me and make the most of them.  I think about my day with the end in mind, trying to make sure I accomplish everything I need to on a given day.

I think that starting with the end in mind is a perspective God wants us to have.  Our days become busy with activities and obligations that are good, but without a long-term perspective we can find ourselves very busy, but not on-track with God’s plans and desires for our life.  In order to actually give a majority of our time to the right things, we need to live with the end in mind.

What is the end?

Admittedly, I don’t have a great way to explain or label the things we should do each day to live with the end in mind.  But, when I am trying to figure out how I should live or what I should give my time towards, I look at the parable of the Talents from Matthew 25.

In that parable, the Master goes away for a time, and leaves his servants with certain talents.  After some time, the Master comes back and each servant then accounts for what he/she did with their talents.  To those who took their talents and used them to produce good things for the Master, they were able to look to the Master and hear him say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

Now, I wont claim to know what the end goal is supposed to be for you.  In fact, I think while we all have a common (Universal) end goal we are moving towards (eternity with Him), I think we also each have a specific (Unique) end goal we should be moving towards.  The uniqueness is the reality that we each have different gifts, talents, abilities and time.  I can’t tell you exactly what those things are supposed to be used for in your life…but I can tell you that to live with the end in mind means this:

To use all of my God given gifts, talents, abilities and time in such a way that when I get to look into the eyes of my creator, I will get to hear Him say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

-Cory

Our first focus is on preparation.  We put as much intentionality, passion and spiritual intensity in the process of creating the worship experience as we do in the actual event.  We develop creative ideas that are designed to inspire and connect people to a greater message, and we have some fun along the way.  Planning weeks ahead has allowed us to pray for God’s favor and anointing in specific ways, and answer the question “what is the point” from week to week.

Then comes the actual event.  Week to week you gather with us and hear great musicians and great teaching. God has truly blessed our ministry with gifted people.  Although our lights are bright and our instruments are loud, God desires the most important instrument, out heart.  Romans 12 says, “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship.”  If we look at the word bodies it translates to–our entire agenda, meaning what we bring to God in worship is not just our physical presence but also all our attention and all of our heart.

So my challenge to you in weeks to come is to remember Romans 12.  Keep in mind that true worship comes from the heart’s expression of thanksgiving towards the grace given by the father.  And the next time you enter into worship enter in with your entire body and make your agenda to meet and worship God, knowing this is your spiritual act of worship.

-Justin

P.S. you all sound great on Tuesday nights! Except that one guy who sits back by the sound booth, you’re a little off key!

On a regular basis, I bump into wounded, angry, and bitter people that have a bone to pick with 21st century Christians, many that have been “burned” by the church(the people of the church).  As I delve into conversation with them there is a recurring theme in most of them. The main word that comes to mind for us is Re-think.

Perhaps we have it all upside down, I know I do at times. Let me give you an example of one of my mistakes. Talking with random people on campuses is part of what I love to do, and part of what I get to as a part of Origin. A couple of semesters ago I had invited an acquaintance to come to W|E, without knowing much at all about him except that he was an atheist. His response to me was loud and clear, he wanted nothing to do with any church or people like me. I asked him why he felt that way, and he said something that made my stomach turn.”You don’t care about me, all you care is that I come to your thing” then walked away. I went about my day with a new perspective that day. My motive was good but my method needed to be upgraded.

Our culture has painted a picture of how we should approach people in regards to being a part of the church, however I believe that the “if we build it they will come” philosophy is wrong. The reason why I think so is because when I navigate the New Testament church, specifically the church in Acts, what I see is stories of people being living examples of Christ and testifying to his name. Not inviting people to a gathering. Perhaps they were gaining the trust of the people as well, before they proclaimed the gospel.

Something that has been engraved down into my core over the last year is that people do not care about what you have to say until they first know that you care. It is simple to invite people to church without investing into their lives, it is actually easy. What we are communicating is that we want the guru(pastor) to do all the work, while we sit there and watch it happen. What if our method changed and we intentionally engaged into real life conversations with our co-workers, friends, and classmates? Imagine what could happen. Our community and ministry would grow, but most importantly, the Kingdom would expand through us. We have to be okay with the fact that there are some people in our circles that will not step foot into a church building, but the same people will almost always sit down for coffee. We can still try to bring them in, but lets not loose their trust in potential redemptive friendships for the sake of marketing. Speaking of marketing, it may get them in the door but its the Mark of God that keeps them there. Never confuse clever marketing with the Mark of God. In case you were wondering, I still meet up with my atheist friend on a regular basis, he now considers himself a skeptic, he is hungry.

My hope for all of us is that we would rethink our method. Lets go be urban missionaries. Thanks for listening

Follower of the Way (Acts 24:14)
-Yanni

The creation: woman, is displaying a kind of power and beauty that moves people into the heart of God.

Have you ever had a moment when you’ve just been struck with beauty? (Just smacked in the middle of your soul with it?)

Once, in the flattest land in America (the plains of South Dakota), I stood out in a field before going into bed, and a thunderstorm sprawled out against the dark horizon.  One by one, lightening cracked in the distance, and the sound rolled towards us.  It was a panoramic view, and although I didn’t care to count, there must have been thirty various lightning bolts sparkling across the entire horizon.  I think it’s one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen.

When Jesus spoke the world into being, he made it to reflect his own beauty.  In the book of Revelation, in the throne room, God reveals himself as astoundingly beautiful.

“And the one who sat there had the appearance of jasper and carnelian. A rainbow, resembling an emerald, encircled the throne.”

Rev 4:3

However, if you were to type the one word “beauty” into Google Images, you wouldn’t see lightning or God.  You would see women, hundreds of them. It’s common knowledge that part of a women’s purpose is to be beautiful.  It’s like we can’t even help thinking about it. (For now, I’ll avoid all the negative aspects of this. I’ll admit, our obsession over beauty doesn’t always go well.)

I personally love being a woman.  It’s like we have special access to the beauty of God when we seek him. When our hearts belong to Jesus, he replaces our hearts of stone for something unearthly. When spiritual beauty captures your eyes, there is nothing like it.  It’s mysterious and deeper then what I’m able to testify…but I do know that God has set it inside of us.

It is the force that shuts down cynicism and quiets people’s souls into peace.  Beauty invites people into God’s presence without even trying hard.

As you read the next few sentences receive them as a prayer over you:

Jesus, I pray over the women of Waters Edge, that you would replace the hard and numb places of their heart for a heart of flesh.  I pray that your Spirit would come and meet them where they are, and quiet their souls into peace.  You are taking care of them Lord.  I pray that you would create in their own spirit a deep spiritual beauty that compels other people towards you- Jesus.  I pray that you would allow us to be a group of women that embody the spiritual beauty and power of lightning storms, and the splendor of precious gems.  All to glorify your name, and to become who you created us to be.

Jesus, I pray over the hearts of men in our ministry.  I pray that you would use us to minister to them.  I pray that as we women become fully spiritually beautiful in the way that you created us to be, that it would cause them to be full of joy in front of you Jesus—full of worship to you whenever they see it. Smack them in the middle of their soul with it.  I pray that you would teach them about your mystery and who you are.

My favorite quotes this month:

“God is telling a love story and the setting is war.”

John Eldridge

-Danielle

I have come to believe that the local church is the hope of the world.

As we go through-out life, we see people put their hope in a lot of different things. Some people put their hope into their achievements.  Giving days months or years at a time towards making a name for themselves, attempting to prove themselves to family or friends. Others put hope into relationships, thinking that if you know enough people, or have enough dates, you might be able to ignore the loneliness that creeps up within. All around us there are people placing their hope in temporal things.

But we, the gathering of Christ followers, we the Church, are the hope of this world. We are the only hope this world has. In a dark and dying world, the Church is a bright light, a source of hope, where people can find forgiveness & freedom, reconciliation & redemption.

We are a refuge to this world. I am a follower of Christ, as part of His Church. I am a link to hope for the people around me. I stand at the doorway, a doorkeeper in the house of God, trying to quickly usher people into His presence, and into redemptive relationships. That is our role, for any of us who are Christ followers. You see we who belong to Jesus, we gather together and experience this hope that is found in Christ, this same hope that our world is desperate for. We stand in a place where we can be used by God to offer a refuge, safety to others, in a world that is offering imitation hope (at best).

So Church (that is every one of you who consider yourself a follower of Christ), take this hope seriously. If it is true that we the Church are the hope of the world, then we should take every chance we get and talk boldly about what He has done for us, and about His Church.

Praying we see His Church continue to grow this summer.

Have you ever walked into a concert…you, in a crowd of thousands of people, excited to see the same band, sharing the same love of their music with the of hope experiencing an emotional encounter or movement of some sort?

One of the many things I love about the culture of the worship at Water’s Edge is that it continues to be one where “common ground” is found quickly. We all come from different families, life experiences, cultures, denominations but one thing is true…when we gather every week, posture our hearts to worship God there is instant common ground. The lines that individualize us, rank us, and separate us quickly erase and we not only become “one” but we find that we stand as “one” in power, hope, love, and authority again.

Worship is all-inclusive. Anything else outside of that labels us and categorizes us but when gather to worship no one is excluded….no one. The broken, the insecure, the physically fit, the ones that the world views as successful, the handicapped, the widowed…no one is excluded!

We find that inside our team (the band) as well…we gather and find common ground and unity amongst ourselves as a team and then hit the platform with the goal of bringing passion, intensity, life and strength in identity to the inner man in people through the power of God in worship, including ourselves!

So our heart for us as a team and for the worship culture of Water’s Edge is that we put the name of God on the forefront of our hearts and gather with the intent to worship and meet with Him only!

-Miriam