Grats to the techies over at LifeChurch.tv who just recently launched a brand new Internet Campus. It has serious cool factor as church websites go, so I had to say something. Here in Elements at Pantano we’ll be trying to build an online community as well. The Elements worship gathering is live with video teaching, but those videos will often be available on YouTube. We’re also looking at live chatroom options during the gathering for people who can’t make it (or don’t feel like coming), and Skype is looking like the best candidate so far.

On that note, let people know Elements is coming. Post to your blogs, link to the videos once they start showing up. Soon we’ll be making some Elements buttons you can put on your blog or MySpace to help get the word out too.

“What’s the catch? Nothing in life is free.” I imagine that’s the response I would get from someone if I tried to buy them coffee or a beer. It’s true, that coffee isn’t really free. I’m buying it and a monetary transaction will occur. But for that random lucky guy, he’s really getting it free. I’m not going to ask him to do anything or give me anything (or lend me an ear so I can spew religiosities his direction). Free. By the very definition of free, it must not have any strings attached.

In most cases, there is a purpose for buying someone free coffee. Not a caveat, catch or string, just a purpose. For my purpose, the only reasons I would buy something for someone I didn’t know are:

a) random act of kindness
b) starting a conversation
c) all of the above

But if this lucky guy finishes his drink and doesn’t want to have anything to do with me, that’s fine. I buy the drink with the hope that we can talk, not the requirement that we must talk.

God has given us the best free gift ever: an eternal life with him. So what’s the catch? Get this: there isn’t one! Christians try to formulate those caveats, catches and strings because they don’t fully understand the meaning of “free.”

“The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life.” John Piper describes that to mean that we can have one of two masters: sin-master or God-master. Put our allegiance in sin and Satan, and he will pay us for our deeds. That payment is death. But God has a free gift, which we can ourselves do nothing to acquire. It cost God a GREAT deal (he had to sacrifice his own son), and so it certainly wasn’t free for him, but it is free for us. He gives us eternal life with no strings, but like me sharing free drinks, he has a purpose.

God gives us eternal life so that we will glorify and worship him. But if we choose not to receive his gift, then we choose sin-master and death instead. God gives us eternal life with the divine hope that we will receive it, not the requirement that we must receive it. (Reformists believe that God’s grace is irresistible, and so we as mortal humans aren’t able to decide for ourselves to receive eternal life; he also makes that decision for us. That’s a different perspective than what I personally tend to believe.)

Yes, IMHO, things in life can be free. The best things in life are free… (sorry, couldn’t resist). So now maybe you can go and buy someone a coffee or drink, or even pay for their meal. When they start looking for strings, you know what to do. :P

…cuz Elements is coming soon! As you can hopefully see here, we’ve launched a blog (+ podcast, but we haven’t started the podcast quite yet). The theme is a work in progress, so don’t be surprised if things disappear or move around unexpectedly. Also, I’m pretty sure the site is 100% broken in IE6. If you’re using Windows, I highly recommend using Firefox or upgrading to IE7. I’ll make it work for everybody……… eventually…….

One of the goals for the The Elements Team is to build a community. A big chunk of that community is going to happen virtually – and we have selected some of the finest meat from the Web 2.0 cow.

MySpace – you love the networking, you hate the Friend Request spam. We’ve got a group set up at MySpace which will generally be used as our “discussion forum.”

YouTube – no, not another homemade light saber video. There’s an Elements group at YouTube where we will be posting the video content we’ll be creating. You can also submit your own videos to be listed in the Elements group.

Flickr – coolest photos anywhere… period. I’m not sure how we’re going to use the Flickr group, but Elements is all about creativity, and that includes art/photography.

43Things – “Do it!” (That’s Zoolander, not the Nike slogan). 43Things is where we can “sign up” for goals and projects that the Elements is working on.