Decision time

Commit to the Lord whatever you do,
and your plans will succeed. - Proverbs 16:3

Please pray for me. I am at the crossroads of two very big decisions, either of which could impact my family and me for years and years to come. Either choice is an exciting ministry opportunity and I will confess I am completely confused as to the next step.

"Do you seek any further reward beyond that of having pleased God? In truth, you know not how great a good it is to please Him." - John Chrysostom

OBEDIENCE

"How many observe Christ's birthday! How few, His precepts!"

- Ben Franklin

"It will not do to say that you have no special call to go to China. With these facts before you and with the command of the Lord Jesus to go and preach the gospel to every creature, you need rather to ascertain whether you have a special call to stay at home."

- Hudson Taylor

"Unless he obeys, a man cannot believe."

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

"Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any [man] will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me."

- Matthew 16:24

The ministry needs your prayers

Please pray as I seek the proper homestead for us to initiate the Hepta project. The timeline is that we would be able to start the ministry in Septmeber as the high school students have settled in and the college students are starting classes. We want to have Care packages on their way and the first evening Bible classes humming along. If possible, I would like to have our first book published in order to have a study guide as we journey through the Bible.

There are five homes in the Knoxville area that seem to meet our needs. Please pray that I clearly see God's choice of the proper house.

A local carpentry ministry has told me that if we need additions to the home for expansion purposes, then all our ministry needs to do is supply the material and they will build it at no cost!

Please write me if you have any questions or comments:

bradzockoll@hotmail.com

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In the total expanse of human life there is not a single square inch of which the Christ, who alone is sovereign, does not declare, "That is mine!"

~ Abraham Kuyper

The Seven Year Plan, part 3

To the left you can see another one of the L'Abri homes (I believe this one was in Switzerland) as well as a photo of Francis Schaeffer. I would like to build this ministry based on the Schaeffer model of Christian study.

The extreme burden of my ministry at CAK is to prepare and equip the students for the next years after secondary school. ("You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them" - 2 Timothy 3:14) It will be called Hepta, the Greek word for "seven". The Hepta: Seven Year Ministry will incorporate numerous teaching tools including:

Biblical study and note-taking

Debate and speech skills

Group study and also one-on-one care

Private devotion time available in "refuge rooms"

No-holds-barred Q&A time each week (I am already conducting this on the UT campus and the Lord has greatly blessed)

Second-level teaching (going into Greek and Hebrew word study, possibly offering certificates)

Speech and devotional practice (each student will be trained and will deliver at least one message during the course of the week)

Summer Evening Retreats that will be both social and spiritual helps for the students

Overall, the James 1:22 principle will be employed: "Be ye doers of the Word and not hearers only."

The Seven Year Plan, part 2

This picture is of the L-Abri ministry in England - a shelter for the student seeking a deeper spiritual life. I'd like to make a ministry here in Knoxville with the basics of L'Abri in mind...but with a wider purpose. Please read on.

Here is my burden: one of the most dramatic and traumatic times of a student’s life occurs at graduation: the changing of campuses. In more than one way, a graduating senior undergoes a major paradigm shift. He will change in:

physical location
decision-making opportunities
reality of worship and his "God-walk"
his circle of friends
financial matters
his position of dependent to becoming an independent

In realizing these needs of teens and young adults all over Knoxville, I’ve created this document in order to set forth a proposal to lay out a plan for the overall Bible training that can set an anchor at CAK and reach beyond the campus. Having been a teacher at three other Christian schools and a speaker/observer at over fifty others in the past twenty years, I truly believe that Christian Academy of Knoxville (CAK) to be among the top-tier schools in areas of energy, direction and desire when it comes to taking responsible steps in the scholastic and spiritual education of enrolled students. I feel, though, that the ministry on or near the CAK campus needs to have a longer reach - on toward college and beyond..

The Plan

Two truths come to mind that will give us an answer:

The James 1:22 principle: "Be ye doers of the Word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves." The Bible education is not complete if it remains potential and is never activated as kinetic. There must be action following the education. Part of the proposed ministry is to take this principle beyond the May graduation.

The Westminster Shorter Catechism’s teaching of the duty of all Christians: "Question: What is the chief end of man? Answer: To worship God and enjoy Him forever." Yet many grads will not really understand how to continue on in a walk with God when they feel they’ve been "kicked out of the nest."
I would like to pursue a dream of taking teens into a deeper walk with the Lord.

I want to start a homestead ministry as a place for students to come and study God off-campus...take the next steps of spiritual maturation in walking with Jesus.

The L'Abri centers around the world have intrigued me. From the L'Abri site: "L'Abri is a French word that means shelter. The first L'Abri community was founded in Switzerland in 1955 by Dr. Francis Schaeffer and his wife, Edith. Dr. Schaeffer was a Christian theologian and philosopher who also authored a number of books on theology, philosophy, general culture and the arts.
The L'Abri communities are study centers in Europe, Asia and America where individuals have the opportunity to seek answers to honest questions about God and the significance of human life. L'Abri believes that Christianity speaks to all aspects of life."

WE SHOULD HAVE A L’ABRI HERE, RIGHT IN KNOXVILLE, NEAR THE CAK CAMPUS. We would call it "hepta", meaning "seven," for that would be the main focus of the ministry. We would concentrate our resources on reaching and assisting the CAK student through the seven transitional years - from the Junior year in high school to the first year out of college.

I will tell you more tomorrow.

7 year plan

Here's my great frustration: there are two cliffs that need bridges, and we Christian educators have not done enough to construct one.

I'm talking about two gaps in the career path that need to be addressed by concerned Christians.

The first one is at high school graduation. We hand our students a diploma and warmly thank them for the work they've done. We send them off with our prayers and then ... what? They head to a college with little or no on-site mentoring or helps when the liberalism of many campuses try to wear them down.

The second one is at college graduation. The student has finished his four years, and then steps out into the world of decision-making and solitary choices with little or no guidance. Many a student flounders or suffers from bad advice gleaned from a less-than-caring source.

I propose a Seven Year Plan - one that will join with a student from his or her junior year and be alongside them through to their first year out of college. It'll be a helpmeet ministry, one that sends caring e-mails and care packages along with resources to make this new step in the world a bit easier for the eager but needy Christian.

I will share some more of my plan in the next blog.

Closeness of God Himself

I just got back from Maryland, driving through back to Tennessee in 11 hours. I left on Saturday morning and drove back on Monday morning, and I am tired but happy. It was a great trip, getting to see my family - my mom and dad, brothers and sisters - once again.

There is a closeness to family that you cannot replicate anywhere else. This is true in God's dealing with us.

What intrigues me is that God displays to us one of His names as Father. The thought, then, is that He wants us to see Him as more than Creator. He wants to allow us to let Him draw near to us. He wants to be one-on-one.

We hear so may people talk about this belief, but where does the Bible show it?

Job 34:19: For God carefully watches the way people live; he sees everything they do.

Mattew 11: 28 - Jesus said, "Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest."

James 4:8 - Come near to God and he will come near to you.

Zeph. 3:17 - The LORD your God is with you, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, He will quiet you with his love, He will rejoice over you with singing.

Jeremiah 31:3-4 - The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: ‘I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness. I will build you up again and you will be rebuilt, O Virgin Israel. Again you will take up your tambourines and go out to dance with the joyful.’

True belief

The Santa Claus Syndrome worries me.

Here we have Santa....people talk about him. They hang up pictures about him, even sing songs about him. They do more than acknowledge him - they exchange gifts in connection with his image, and they will even have parties based upon the example he sets. They'll teach their kids about him.

Probelm is, he doesn't change their lives, because they don't really believe that he exists.

Here we have Santa....people talk about him. They know his history. The thought of himmakes them feel good inside. They hang up pictures about him, even sing songs about him. They do more than acknowledge him - they exchange gifts in connection with his image, and they will even have parties based upon the example he sets. They'll teach their kids about him.

Problem is, he doesn't change their lives, because they don't really believe that he exists. They compartmentalize his effect on them, because overall, he doesn't mean that much to them.

Here we have Jesus....people talk about him. They know His history. The thought of Himmakes them feel good inside. They hang up pictures about Him, even sing songs about him. They do more than acknowledge Him - they gather and socialize and talk about His life, and they will even have celebrations based upon the example He sets. They'll teach their kids about Him.

Problem is, He doesn't change their lives, because they don't really believe that He exists. They compartmentalize his effect on them, because overall, He doesn't mean that much to them. Their lives haven't changed.

And that is a tragedy.

God is unchanging

IMMUTABLE: unchanging

When Lloyd C. Douglas, author of The Robe and other novels, was a university student, he lived an a boarding house. Downstairs on the first floor was an elderly, retired music teacher, not infirm and unable to leave the apartment. Douglas said that every morning they had a ritual they would go through together. He would come down the steps, open the old man’s door, and ask, “Well, what’s the good news?” The old man would pick up his tuning fork, tap it on the side of his wheelchair and say, That’s middle C! It was middle C yesterday; it will be middle C tomorrow; it will be middle C a thousand years from now. The tenor upstairs sings flat, the piano across the hall is out of tune, but, my friend, THAT is middle C!”

The old man had discovered one thing upon which he could depend, one constant reality in his life, one “still point in a turning world.” For Christians, the one “still point in a turning world,” the one absolute of which there is no shadow of turning, is Jesus Christ.

"And also the Glory of Israel will not lie or change His mind; for He is not a man that He should change His mind" (1 Samuel 15:29).

His Word is ‘forever settled in heaven’ (Ps 119:89).

His love is eternal: ‘I have loved thee with an everlasting love’ (Jer 31:3) and,

‘Having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end’ (Jn 13:1).

His mercy ceases not, for it is ‘everlasting’ (Ps l00:5)

One of God's attributes is that He is immutable. Praise God for this truth!