There are only three types of Bible verses read at Christian weddings.

1. Proverbs 31 – Which paints the Biblical picture of a wife.

2. 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 – Which paints the Biblical picture of love.

3. Obscure 2:1-5– Which paints the Biblical picture that your friends are “not going to go with the typical verses and instead picked a passage that no one in the history of mankind has ever read in a wedding.”

I’m a fan of all three, but recently realized that there are a lot of things I love about my wife that are not mentioned in Proverbs 31. I thought it might be fun to remix Proverbs 31, or “Message it” if you will.

Here are 5 ways I would remix the “Wife of Noble Character” description:

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(I was surprised by the reaction to the phrase, “Jesus Juke.” People emailed me t-shirt designs, it got turned into a hashtag on Twitter, #JesusJuke, and became something I actually say in conversations, e.g. “The guy just juked me.” I didn’t expect that to happen, but let me clear up one misconception. Don’t confuse a rebuke with a Jesus Juke. One in does in love and causes change, one is done in pride and causes shame. They’re antonyms not synonyms. Thanks for all the great comments the first time around on this one!)

The Jesus Juke

Weird things happen to me when I fly. If you followed me on Twitter you would know this because I tend to have “tweet explosions,” when I’m at airports.

Last Sunday morning, as our plane lifted off the ground, the person behind me started to play what sounded like a pan flute. Just as we began to soar above the clouds, we were greeted with a Zamfir melody from what I can only assume was some sort of satyr. In his defense, the flight attendant did not say, “Please return your seats to their upright position, carefully stow your carry on luggage and put your pan flute back in its elk skin satchel.” He had every right to play that beautiful wooden instrument and play he did.

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Last week, someone tweeted a picture that blew me away.

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(Growing up, I was a sermon note doodler. I wasn’t as good as the winner of our “bulletin bored” contest, but I had some skills. I’d draw on additions to the illustration of the church building, fill in all the “O’s” and occasionally add mustaches if anyone’s photo was in the bulletin. Thick, handsome, Godly mustaches. Now that I’m grown up, I don’t do that. Or I do it a lot less often. But it turns out I’m not the only one with a weird approach to sermon notes. In today’s great guest post, Robert Campbell points out 4 other types of folks you’ll encounter when it comes to sermon notes. Enjoy! )

Corporate Sermon Note Turning

There is a moment in every sermon when you reach the end of the page of sermon notes and everyone turns the page in ‘mostly’ corporate unison. I call it Corporate Sermon Note Turning. This simple act of paper flipping & swishing through the air often has a even greater success rate than clapping together during a worship song. We’re all on the same page, literally. Whether we’re flipping through the bulletin to find the notes or actually going to page two of a multi-page sermon, we’re all in this together!

After months of studying this phenomenon, I’ve discovered 4 approaches you might find in your church:

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(This one was funny to me because it happens so often. A friend promises you that a book 180 pages long is going to forever change the very fiber of your existence. And when it doesn’t you have to let them down easy. This was the #3 most popular post in 2010)

Not knowing how to tell someone their favorite book didn’t completely change your life too.

Christians don’t casually recommend books. When we read a book about faith that we like, we say things like:

“This book changed my life.”

“That book spoke to my heart.”

“That book taught me how to be a man.”

We make wildly powerful statements about the wisdom shared between the pages of a book. And that’s great. Passion is a good thing, but it does create a potential problem. What do you do if you read the book too and didn’t have the same experience?

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The winner of the 2 free West Coast Catalyst lab and main stage tickets is Seth Rowoldt. Email me Seth and I will make sure you get them.

Can’t wait to see a bunch of you guys/girls out at West Coast Catalyst!

I once heard Rob Bell joke that every pastor hopes to have one specific problem – a parking problem. Nothing makes a pastor happier about church attendance than hearing that there are so many people coming that there aren’t enough parking spaces. As a pastor’s kid, I have to agree. My dad certainly wanted to make sure we had enough space, but I never heard him once complain that too many people were coming to his church. Recently, I experienced another “problem” that every church wants …

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Contest is over, thanks for the great comments!

As always, Catalyst is putting on a crazy Wes Coast event this year March 2-4. The lineup includes Dave Ramsey, Matt Chandler, Andy Stanley, me and … Reverend Run. As in Run DMC.

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As we continue to redesign SCL, I wanted to take a quick second and recognize the guy who built the original SCL.

A few years ago, John Saddington took Stuff Christians Like from a flat, dull, blogspot free template to a fun, vibrantly designed site. I was terrified of the process because I lost my first blog due to some technical idiocy on my part. But from the front end to the back end, he completely wowed me. Not only did he design the site, we still use the WordPress theme he designed, Standard, because it’s widely considered one of the best ever developed. If you ever want to connect with one of the premier voices in blogging and social media, check out John Saddington.

The only business I ever started ended up punching my marriage in the face, ruining an important friendship and ripping off the church my grandmother has attended for 30 years.

It was such an abject failure that if there had been whipped cream pies and people running quickly after each other with a musical background we could have filmed an episode of Benny Hill.

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