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Tag: church (Page 17 of 28)

Leaders Ride ATVs

October 17, 2023 / / 0 Comments

It might seem weird to put the ideas of leadership and ATVs in the same line. For those of you who have no idea (not sure how but I’m sure you exist) ATVs are those cool all terrain vehicles. I have one myself actually. I love my 4-wheeler! Tons of fun to go cruising through the field. Not to mention it’s super helpful to haul things around the property! Oh and don’t forget it’s how I plow my driveway. But that’s not really the ATV to which I’m referring.

I think leaders need a different kind of ATV in their lives. In a leader’s life, ATV stands for Authentic, Transparent, and Vulnerable. These are hyper critical elements that every leader needs to be effective and grow in her or his leadership capabilities.

Authentic

We start with authenticity. Authenticity is one of those hot button kind of words. More commonly we use words like genuine and real. Have you ever met someone who was just fake? I don’t mean they were a cartoon figure but they just didn’t live out who they said they were. Authenticity is the trait of being in real life who you say you are. When a person’s actions match their confession then they are authentic, genuine, real.

There are tons of examples of people who are just not authentic. We see it in many politicians and movie stars. They are people we look up to on the big screen. Then we get a glimpse into their personal lives and realize they might not be someone we want to look up to after all.

Leaders need to be people who are real or those who follow them won’t know who they are following. An authentic leader is one who is tested against their own words. When a leader is authentic, they can be trusted. A leader who is not authentic isn’t trustworthy or follow-worthy for that matter.

Transparent

This one is a bit more complicated for some leaders. There’s a fine line between being transparent and oversharing. This doesn’t mean that every leader has to air all of their dirty laundry in public. There are some things that no one really needs to know! So keep some of those behind closed door moments, behind the closed door of silence.

Being transparent is really about letting people see the real you. Between authenticity and transparency a leader is walking with the people he/she is leading. Transparency is the ability to say what’s going on and let people see inside. There are some emotional parts of our lives that we need to let people see into. Transparency is about admitting faults and asking for forgiveness when you’ve done wrong. Which leads us to the last part of this…

Vulnerable

Vulnerability is a tricky one. Leaders don’t like to be vulnerable. I’ll be honest this is one the harder ones for me as well. Letting people in means we have to trust them not to use what they see against us. Some people will take your authenticity and transparency to highlight your vulnerabilities and blast you with it. Those people are not people with whom you need to surround yourself.

Being vulnerable is really about lowering your guard enough to not just let people see inside but to have access to your weaknesses. And yes it takes trust – immense trust! But leadership requires trust as well. A good leader needs to be able to trust the people she is leading. The leader has to demonstrate that he isn’t above everyone else. When our authenticity and transparency give way to a level of vulnerability we become even more real and more relatable to those around us.

So in short, every good leader needs to have an ATV. We need to be real and authentic. We need to open ourselves up and show the real us even when we’re in charge. And we must do the hard work of letting our guard down and letting people in so we can expose some of those soft spots in our character.

Just like my ATV lets me ride over some pretty intense terrain, when as a leader you are willing to expose your true self through authenticity, transparency and vulnerably you will go places you could never go otherwise!

It’s time to ride friends!

I’ve Never Had A Job

October 13, 2023 / / 0 Comments

Some of you are going to call me a liar here but I have never had a job. You’re probably thinking yeah right! I know you have a job because you tell us all the time that you’re a pastor. But just because I have a place where I go and thing that I do for a living doesn’t make it a job.

You might not agree but that’s ok. One of us is right and the other one is reading this right now. In all seriousness, to me a job is something that’s burdensome and a task that we all too often dislike. I’ve never had a job in that sense. I’ve worked at so many places that I can’t even list them all. From bartending to line cook to landscape to helping on the farm to building and selling cars I’ve done a lot of different things in life! But they all have one thing in common.

I really enjoyed each of them. They weren’t a job for me. They were work. They took an investment of my time, energy and effort but they weren’t a job. I didn’t dread them. Even when I worked at 3 different places at once, it wasn’t a job because I could find value in each of those places.

Enjoying your work is one thing but really thriving in it is a totally different thing. In my current occupation as a pastor I really feel like this is what I’ve been built to do. I’m not perfect at it but it’s something I’m passionate about and that is fulfilling. I love what I do!

Honestly though it causes me some trouble from time to time loving this so much. There are regular conferences and gatherings where I get to sit with other pastors sharing insights and stories and getting training to make me better. The biggest challenge to loving this so much is when I sit with other guys who do the same thing that I get to do and they talk about it like it’s the worst thing in the world.

I mean seriously as a pastor we get to do some pretty cool things. If you can’t find value and meaning in that, then you probably should do something else!

This is pastor appreciation month. I don’t say that so that anyone will recognize me. Actually I say that so that pastors can start to appreciate what they do! Do you know what your work means? Do you know what you’re called to do? It’s not a job! Your obligation is not to fill your church with people. It’s not to preserve rituals or traditions of how we’ve done it. It’s not to lead engaging worship or do great outreach gigs. It’s not to have great praise teams or strong pipe organ music.

None of these are wrong but they are not the point! They are all good and right in their own way, but they are not why you’re here.

You are to be a shepherd of the people. What do shepherds do?

  • Make sure the sheep have good food. Lay out a good variety of healthy options for them to engage in for spiritual maturity. Show them how to use their bible. Teach from it. Connect some of the dots between passages. Teach on different levels from generalities to specific details. Give them a good diet to choose from.
  • They keep the wolves away. Those who seek to harm and kill the sheep. We do this by exposing teachings and thoughts that are against scripture (not against our preference).
  • Challenge them to be in new places. If a shepherd kept the sheep in one place, the grass would be bare and nothing would be left. So often the shepherd needs to lead the sheep to new pastures. This doesn’t mean to use different things than the Bible. It means to find new ways to teach similar content. It means understanding the needs of the people you serve. It means different teaching styles and showing how the Bible actually is still relevant to our current culture.
  • Equip them. It’s odd that the Bible never tells us to spoon feed the people in our churches but to equip them with utensils and wisdom to know what is good food to eat and what is not. A good shepherd will make sure the sheep know what plants are against scripture and keep them away from the people at all costs. But this isn’t about preference it’s about the Bible.

Really those are the pieces we are called to do. If you can’t find joy in helping someone dig into the Bible or giving them tools to be able to understand what’s been written or fighting off a wolf or two then I think you might want to work at Build a Bear and stuff a heart into a ball of cotton. If you’d rather fight with people than show the truths of the Bible then join the military.

If you don’t like it. If you aren’t fed by doing it. If you aren’t passionate about the calling of being a pastor. If it’s just a job to you, then maybe it’s not right for you.

My goal is to never have a job. I’ll work my backside off everyday of my life, but I never want to have a job. And I don’t think you should either.

Character > Competency

October 4, 2023 / / 0 Comments

Imagine that you have a job that really needs done. I mean really needs done. You have a deadline that is rapidly approaching. And your back is against the wall to get this thing completed. These are the scenarios when we are more likely to make a really bad decision, so here’s your caution.

The greater the emergency we face the more likely we are to choose someone for what they can do, not for who they are. Let that sink in for a second. It’s super easy to choose someone for their competency and capacity and ignore their character and integrity.

Character trumps competency any day of the week!

There’s a saying in leadership that goes something along the lines of you can never out lead your character. Man is that true or what! Have you ever seen this? Someone has all the right stuff to get the job done, but they’re a real selfish jerk. You do know that won’t end well right?

I remember when I was a car salesman. We had a great team, for the most part. There was that one sales person however that was really good at what they did, but they had some spots on their character that were pretty questionable. Now questionable character isn’t about being a good vs bad person. It’s about being immoral and selfish vs a kind team player. No matter how many cars this person sold, no one wanted to be around them. And they had fewer repeat and referral customers because this person was obviously in it for themselves and thought waaaay too much of themselves!

Character trumps competency any day of the week.

So when it comes to hiring or staffing for the next job or bringing on volunteers to help with that thing your nonprofit is doing, take a few extra minutes to look beyond a person’s capacity. Ask a few character questions to make sure they don’t burn the organization to the ground while they’re getting the job done.

Here are some of the quick character questions I use.

  • How well do I really know this person?
  • What do their friends/family say about them?
  • What are they really good at doing?
  • What are they really bad at doing?
  • Ask the person when’s the last time they failed, and how they reacted. This is less about competency and achievement. The purpose here is to determine if they are willing to admit mistakes and how well they recover from those mistakes. These are character issues.
  • What one word do others use to describe this person?

There are a ton more questions you can ask. I’d love to hear what character questions you find helpful in this process. By the way, these questions are good questions to use on yourself as well. Your character matters too!

The Same Team

October 3, 2023 / / 0 Comments

I’m a pretty big sports fan. I love college football. As a matter of fact I will do just about everything in my power to rearrange my life for 14 Saturdays a year just so I can watch what in my opinion is the best sport around. Now you don’t have to agree with me. But it’s not going to change my mind.

I really think we can learn a little from the sport of football. Life lessons. Business approaches. Relationship learnings. And I really think the church can take a lesson or two from the game of football as well.

It really hit me the other day when I was looking at the sideline. Why was the coach on the sidelines wearing that bright green shirt? Then another coach for the same team was wearing a bright blue one. These are not their colors. What’s the deal? Why not wear apparel for the team you’re coaching?!?! It seemed really absurd to me. Until I realized who they were and what role they had. Then it started to make a lot more sense!

You see one of the coaches on the sideline was one of the defensive coaches. He was letting the defense know how they should be lining up based on what the offense was showing. The one in blue? Yeah he had a different function. Not defense but his position on the team related to the offense.

They had to stand out so the men on the field could see them easily enough in the moment. They were on the same team, but they had different methods for achieving the same goal. They both wanted the team to win. They both wanted their team to score more points than the other team. One dealt with a really strong offensive strategy. For them it was all about scoring points. The defense however wasn’t as focused on scoring points. They just didn’t want the other team to score. While their tactics were different their end goal was the same.

Then it hit me. It’s the same way in the church. It’s not about offense and defense but different approaches to accomplish the same goal. What’s the goal of the church? According to the Bible the goal of the church should be to equip the saints for works of ministry and to disciple people through relationships built around God’s promises (baptism) and His commands (obedience).

Nothing in that tells us what color shirt to wear. As a matter of fact there is a ton of flexibility in developing relationships leading to discipleship. And just as much freedom in equipping the saints. As long as the end goal is the same – eternal life in Jesus. It’s about believing and living out the belief that Jesus is the only way to heaven.

He doesn’t tell us to wear special clothes when we preach or teach. He doesn’t tell us what songs are better than others. He doesn’t have a preferred musical styling. It’s almost like Jesus knew that one day we’d have a full team standing ready on the sidelines. It’s almost like Jesus had some kind of knowledge that helped him realize we don’t all learn the same way.

As big of a football fan as I am, I am a much larger fan of Jesus and the way he describes his church in the Bible. I’m not really a huge fan of how the church functions in the world all of the time today however. I’ve been on the receiving end of comments saying you’re not a real pastor because you don’t wear a robe. Or others have told me you’re not really teaching the Bible if your church is growing that fast. You mean that teaching the Bible is a deterrent for growing the local church?! Yikes! Pretty sure someone needs to read the bible a bit!

Look, I know that one size doesn’t fit all. And that’s the beauty of the church. Some of us are wearing the blue shirts of the offensive line coach. While others feel more comfortable in the stylings of the defending the ways we’ve done it approach. Both offense and defense are necessary for a football game! What’s it going to take for us to get this through our thick skulls?

It’s like this – Jesus is the only way to heaven. But my blue shirt or your green shirt are not the only way to Jesus. We’re on the same team, so for the sake of everything holy let’s act like it!

The Necessity Of The Hunter

September 7, 2023 / / 1 Comment

Yellowstone National Park is a beautiful place. My family took our last long vacation out to Yellowstone and the surrounding area. We absolutely loved everything about it. The scenery was amazing. There was wildlife everywhere. The trees were huge and fields filled with green grasses and other natural elements. The rivers were beautifully bubbling streams of sparkling water. But it didn’t always used to be that way.

In the early 1990s things in the park didn’t look quite like this. The elk had nearly overpopulated the park. The grass was more sparse. The trees were stripped of bark. The rivers and streams weren’t as clean. All of it because there were too many elk populating the park. But why were there so many elk? Good question! I’m glad you asked.

It all started in the late 1800s and early 1900s when it was open season on the gray wolf. By the end of the 1920s the gray wolf was eradicated from the park altogether. Some thought this was going to be helpful. From not having to worry about visitors to the park region being attacked by a wolf to giving some freedom for the elk to run free, getting rid of the wolf seemed the right thing to do at the time. But little did they know at the time, removing the hunter from the park would have drastic effects on the entire ecosystem of Yellowstone.

Then in 1995 a truck carrying eight gray wolves came into the park and released a controlled population back into the system. What followed could only be hoped for…the park returned to a thriving ecosystem. It turns out hunter are necessary for a thriving system. Predators, while doing bad things in the eyes of some, are necessary to create an atmosphere where all can thrive.

This truth transfers beyond wolves in a national park. As a matter of fact, I think in our lives in general we need predators. We need those people who contradict us and challenge us. Those who seemingly are out to get us because they keep us on our toes.

Just like bringing the wolves back to Yellowstone balanced the ecosystem and brought the elk population back in check which made the rivers run cleaner – so also having some of these challenges in our lives brings our lives back on track as well.

We like to eliminate the problems and run from adversity, but perhaps we should embrace some of the challenges in life a little more intentionally. Perhaps we should give thanks for the circumstances in our lives that make us more alert. Paul tells us to rejoice in all things and to even have joy in our trials. This is very likely the reason why.

In the church we like to complain when things don’t go right, when the government oversteps a line, when we feel like being a Christian is hard. But living a life without challenges is a lot like Yellowstone without wolves. We become complacent and think the world owes us something. We dry up and start caring less about the world around us. Eventually the streams of life get all muddy with troubles of the world and we forget what’s most important.

I’ve heard so many lately say that it’s getting harder and harder to be a pastor in the world. Oddly enough Jesus never told us it would be easy. As a matter of fact if it is easy, I tend to believe that we’re probably not doing something right. Jesus told us that we’ll have struggles in this life. He said the world will try to do to his followers what they did to him. Sure sounds like we should be expecting trouble of some sort doesn’t it?

Look. I know it’s no fun being pursued by wolves. I’ve been in my fair share of situations where someone has thought I was prey. But when we have friendships where people turn on us, jobs where coworkers don’t like us, scenarios where we’re not fully embraced – those moments shape us into who we’re supposed to be.

My advice. Don’t necessarily pray for wolves to surround you. But I would thank God for the times when you are pursued by a predator because predators aren’t always evil. Sometimes predators are necessary to help you live a more alert, focused, and dynamic life.

Is This Burnout?

August 18, 2023 / / 0 Comments

There is a huge epidemic floating around the world right now that has people burning out in their jobs and lives. But is burn out really burn out? Or is it something else?

I recently listened to a man who is very much in tune with the mental well being of people today. And he draws an interesting distinction between burn out and something he calls stress out. To be honest, I’ve never heard of stress out before but his explanation got me thinking a bit.

Burn out for most people is when they just feel tired and unable to push through something. It’s like everything in life has them down. But burnout is actually deeper than that. Burnout squashes a person’s soul. It makes them stoic. Emotionless. They don’t have the capacity for caring anymore. They are carrying a weight that has them buckling at the knees constantly.

Please note it’s not that a person in burnout doesn’t care. It’s that they are unable to care. They do not have the ability to care. They might want to care but they just simply can’t. Their heart has grown numb. Their mental and emotional self has been so burned by the stresses of life that they just can’t feel anymore.

Burnout is the constant feeling of failure which has broken a person’s ability to engage emotionally in the tasks in front of them. Burnout is very real and it can be very dangerous. The best way to handle a situation where burnout is likely is to have very clear expectations. Remember, burnout has to do with feeling like a failure at nearly everything. Clarifying expectations makes burnout a less likely outcome. If you’re in a scenario where there are not clear expectations, do yourself a favor and find a way to clarify what’s expected of you to keep you from burning out. Burnout leads someone to feel not like they failed at something but like they are a failure.

But there’s another side to this. Not everyone who feels pulled in too many directions, like a failure and just plain exhausted is actually in burnout. This speaker called it stress out. The idea of carrying too much stress is that you can’t keep up. You’re running too many things at the same time. Your role exceeds your character. Living with too much stress is dangerous.

Stress in and of itself is not a bad thing. Actually there is level of stress that can be healthy. Healthy stress forces us to be and do things we otherwise would never be and do. But too much stress for too long can be dangerous. As a matter of fact, too much stress carried for too long leads a person to lead a frenzied life that never slows down. The longer we carry high levels of stress the higher the levels of cortisol in our body. Extremely elevated levels of cortisol can lead to major health concerns. Everything from blood sugar problems to heart trouble to weight gain to massive agitation and mood swings are all a result of elevated levels of cortisol in the body.

Stress can be a dangerous animal when it comes to our overall health and well being. But severe stress is not the same as burnout. While burnout makes us unable to care, elevated stress for long periods of time can cause us to care too much about things we normally wouldn’t think matter. Stress out tends to trigger snap reactions in life.

A person living in a stress filled environment will be unable to manage change or handle simple questions. Changes, no matter how small, are seen as another weight added to their life. While questions are seen as complete challenges to their authority.

If you’re struggling with burnout or stress, it’s critically important to find someone to help. Find someone to talk to. Talk to a friend or colleague. See a therapist. Seek help from a counselor. These are not signs of weakness! They are the most important things you can do to protect your mental, emotional, relational and spiritual well being. (It can even protect your physical well being too!)

We all have different capacities for what we can handle, so please don’t compare yourself to someone else. Both of these are real. Both are dangerous if left unattended or unaddressed.

The Church And The Monkey Trap

August 10, 2023 / / 0 Comments

Have you ever seen a video of a monkey trap? I was going to put a video on here but some of you might be offended by the content so I’ll just describe it to you. You’re welcome to go search for a video online, they’re pretty easy to find.

The idea is simple. The monkey gets trapped because it sees something it wants and won’t let go. Therefore trapping its hand in a jar. Historically there are cultures that have trapped monkeys in the wild. They would take a jar or a coconut and put a hole in it large enough for the monkey to put its hand inside. Inside the jar is something the monkey wants, often rice or another food substance they just simply can’t ignore.

The monkey puts his hand into the coconut and grasps the rice only to realize that he can’t get his hand out again. Mind you, the hole did not change size. The opening is the same size it was when the monkey put his hand in. The only difference is, now the monkey’s hand is closed around the rice. The hole is just large enough for the open hand to enter but too small for the closed fist to pull out.

I really think this is what we’re seeing in the institutional, denominational churches in North America. We are the monkey in the story. We live our lives and things are going well. As we look around, we see the values of society and culture shifting around us. Sometimes shifting faster than we can even define.

Add to the scenario that we see our numbers shrinking as churches are closing, pastors retiring, men not going into the ministry – it’s a situation that causes great fear and anxiety for some people. Enter church as monkey.

If we were to define the parts of this analogy to meet our current situation, we’d see the church is represented by the monkey. The rice inside is the way we’ve always done it. Really it’s anything that has become something we just can’t loosen our grip on (aside from the proper teaching of the Bible – really that’s the only non negotiable in the mix). And the jar is the culture war surrounding the church, the crisis of leadership in the church at large.

The church has its hand in the jar because that’s where we live. We have our churches embedded in communities and neighborhoods. Our hand is in the jar. It’s hidden in that jar and somewhat safe inside there. But we’re not called to hide in that place. We are to stand out and live differently, but how do we do that when culture shifts so fast?

When we feel threatened by the cultural shift around us, we clench our fist. In this case, we grasp whatever is known and comfortable. These things are actually, in and of themselves good and historically proven. For the church body to which I belong, that thing we are grasping is historicity, traditionalism, and structure. These are the rice in the coconut that we don’t know what to do with so we just cling to it more tightly.

The problem is the church is supposed to love God and love our neighbors, but we are not able to love our neighbor if our hand is stuck in the jar. The longer we hold so tightly to the things we have in the jar, the farther away from serving the culture we move. Now before you get all honked off here don’t hear what’s not being said. I’m not saying throw out the tradition and history. That’s absurd and will actually do more harm than good!

Know when the structures of the past will work and when they won’t. Understand that structures in the life of the church can’t be a one size fits all kind of deal. Every congregation is unique in its expression of faith because every community that it serves is unique. Forcing an historic structure, no matter how good and worthwhile in its day, to a thriving modern environment at best won’t always work. And at worst will hinder the expansion of the gospel in that context.

The solution? Let go a little.

If the monkey would loosen the grip on the rice, it would be able to get its hand out of the jar. When it releases the rice, it’s still a monkey. Letting go did not change the fact that it was a monkey. It just allowed that monkey to be free. Likewise if the church would loosen its grip on some of the things to which it clings, we could be released to do more ministry in our individual contexts. It won’t stop us from being the church anymore than releasing the rice changed the monkey from being a monkey. It won’t change us from being Lutheran either. It will simply make the church more able to pivot to meet the needs of the people in and outside of the church.

Look I get it. There’s comfort in the known things. There’s something cool about the liturgy and the formal structures of things. But to say that it’s the only way it can be done is bordering on being a pharisee, you know the very people that Jesus told were white washed tombs! I surely don’t want to be considered a pretty coffin – fancy on the outside and dead on the inside.

The church is a people gathered and on mission to make disciples. How, where, when we gather are not really things the Bible addresses. More than anything I want the message of the gospel to be spread to the ends of the earth. I want to see my friends and neighbors come to know and believe in Jesus. I believe that Jesus is the only way to heaven, but I also believe that this one structure of how we do church life isn’t the only way to Jesus. It’s good and meaningful but it isn’t the only way. If we loosen up a little while clinging tightly to the truths of the Bible, we just might see the gates of hell start to fall like Jesus promises to Peter.

In short monkeys, it’s time to let go of the rice so we can get our hand out of the jar.

Outreach Doesn’t Work

August 8, 2023 / / 0 Comments

If you’re a church going person then this will likely hit you hard. You probably won’t like these words. And there’s a chance you might be put off by some of what I’m about to say. That doesn’t change it from being true however.

Not liking getting a speeding ticket doesn’t make it so I don’t have to pay for it. It just means I don’t like the harsh realities that stand before me. Sometimes the truth hurts. And lest someone pull a Bible verse out of context speak the truth in love please read what that’s about. It has nothing to do with calling out a misinterpretation or a misunderstanding. Ok with that out of the way, here we go.

I’ve read far too many articles, social media posts, how to bloggers, podcasters and more on the topic of outreach. I’ve heard people ask for the best outreach strategies. Today I read a question about what are the most effective outreach strategies your churches have done.

Sorry friends you’re asking the wrong question because outreach won’t work.

I say this as a former mission and ministry coordinator. I was an outreach pastor. I do outreach events, although very limited few of them. I slowed that way down when I realized I had it backwards.

Outreach does not work!

Look think of it this way. Who is going to come to a church’s outreach event? I mean who attends your VBS? Easter Egg Hunt? Block party? Normally the ones that come are the ones that have a predisposition to the gospel. They’ve already heard the message. Will you get to connect with someone who doesn’t have a church home currently? Maybe? Possibly. But are they people who don’t know Jesus? Are they people who have limited knowledge of the workings of God in their lives? Probably not.

The people who come to church events, even the cool outreach ones, have some acceptance factors built in toward the church already. They’ve already been in a church before. You might be shuffling people around from one church to another. You might gain another face or two. But where are they coming from? Probably, if stats hold true they’re from another church down the road. The church that just got a new pastor or whose pastor isn’t cutting it for them anymore. That’s not the purpose of outreach.

Outreach doesn’t work because it’s not for the purpose we think it is.

Churches tend to want some silver bullet type of outreach strategy. We try to find the one thing that will work across all spectrums, races, economic levels, just simple and easy. Plug and play. Well that actually does exist but it takes work. It’s not quite easy but it’s actually pretty simple.

The best outreach you can do for your church is to not lower expectations. Don’t make it easier to just be a butt in a seat. Do you expect the people who call themselves members of the church to be involved in the life of the church beyond Sunday? Volunteerism? Ministry leadership? Actually doing something?

The Bible doesn’t tell us to be about outreach. It tells us to be about discipleship. If we’d focus on discipleship, you know equipping the saints for works of ministry and all that, then the outreach stuff would happen organically, naturally and constantly!

Please stop looking for the best outreach method when you’re not willing to sink the time and effort into raising up and equipping the men and women that you already have. What makes you think that God will send you new people if you’re not leading the ones you have (parable of talents anyone).

I’m not trying to be snarky and nasty or mean or rude. It’s just quit griping and complaining about how hard life and ministry are if you’re not going to double down on the talent God has given you. Don’t complain about something God never promised. Don’t focus on the things God never told you to make your main focus.

That’s it. Outreach does not work. But working on discipleship has tremendous impacts on outreach.

Changing Times

August 1, 2023 / / 0 Comments

The times we’re living right now are times many of us never thought we’d see. The speed of cultural shift is so drastic it’s almost dizzying! Look at how fast things have morphed in the past 3-5 years. Some blame the pandemic others blow the thing off like it never happened. I think a better assessment is that it happened, whether we like it or not, and that it accelerated our lives to a speed many of us are not comfortable with. It’s even been said that our society jumped forward about 10 years in the span of 2 years time.

Changing times are terrifying. We don’t like change often because we can’t control it. Something being out of control is not fun. I’m often branded a control freak. But that’s not totally accurate. I tend to embrace change pretty easily and change is out of control. I would say I have a need to be informed about what’s happening so I can be prepared to address challenges that arise. That’s not control it’s desiring information.

Recently the national version of the church body to which I belong made some pretty bold moves. And not bold in a good way necessarily. Honestly I think they’re bold in a way that shows some lack of faith and a bit of cowardice.

I know this is going to probably push someone’s buttons. While that is not the intent, if it does get people having a dialogue instead of unilaterally legislating how we handle change in the world then so be it. I’ll push away!

There are two matters that have really stood out to me as I’ve participated virtually in this conference: as a church body we really have a trust issue and control is pretty important.

There are a couple topics that make this super evident to me. One of which is the desire to focus on one method for raising up pastors in the church body. While I admittedly did not hear anyone say that only pastors going through a residential seminary training process are real and everyone else is fake or lesser, that sure seems to be the tenor of the conversation. I am willing to be wrong here.

The matter from my perspective is one of control. While I do believe it is important that anyone who is rightly called as a pastor within this church body know what we believe, teach and confess. And while I also know that it is important to have diligent study of the Bible and our confessional structure, I also believe wholeheartedly that there is more than one way to get that same result.

Just like I was able to participate in the conference virtually and virtual education methods are numerous and getting more user friendly, having a strong virtual element to the raising up of pastors would be fantastic. I have men in the congregation I serve who would make phenomenal pastors but they just can’t uproot their families or quit their jobs. So alas that’s one less pastoral candidate our church body has in circulation.

The unwillingness to release a little control over the structure of how things are taught (not what is taught but how and where) is really disheartening. I honestly am shocked when I see how the apostles led the churches in the book of Acts. They were uneducated men. They didn’t uproot their families to go off to an institution for a 4 year stint to learn something. They were able to learn while they lived their daily lives.

Are there some trade offs? Yes there are but doing the same thing the same way will not yield a higher result. It just won’t work that way. We should still cherish the traditional route to ministry that has served us well for many years! But releasing a little control back to the parish pastors and working alongside them to raise up and train men for works of ministry sounds kind of Book of Acts to me. Keep high standards. Work on curriculum or teaching points/methods. But leave the how and where to the local guys with regular checkins from the structures that already exist.

But then there’s the whole trust issue. Do we trust that the men in the field are going to steward their gifts properly? I think this is a huge struggle as well. I mean most of them were trained in the residential program that is being held up as the only way to do it. And yet we don’t seem to trust them to be able to teach other men to do the same job? Seems to show a lack of trust in our own teaching! One of the signs of a great teaching is that the student is able to teach the material to someone else.

Look I get it. None of this is going to be easy. But it doesn’t have to be impossible either. The tighter we hold to this method as the only method, the more we’re going to lose. But why is it so hard for us to let go a little?

Change is hard because it leaves things out of control for a period of time. I’m not one of those change everything just because we can kind of guys but we need to know what can change and what can’t change. Changing nothing is not an option. It just isn’t possible. If we can manage change well, we can better manage the chaos that’s so often associated with change.

I think a long and hard conversation needs to be had about where God wants his church to go. Not where we want it to stay. It’s time to make some bold moves for the sake of the kingdom. Repent where we’ve made mistakes. But keep moving and advancing the kingdom. It’s only then that we will see how weak hell’s gates truly are (as long as we’re sitting here those gates hold up pretty darn well).

The times are changing and while the message can’t change – the methods are going to have to change.

A Place More Religious Than Church

July 31, 2023 / / 0 Comments

I love audiobooks. I probably like them so much because I spend a lot of time driving to the gym, church, on visits, and back home. I spend well over an hour in my truck daily. So needless to say I get to listen to a lot of books. A couple of years ago I was able to consume nearly 70 books in a year all due to using audiobooks. Another key reason for audio books is that I’m a slow reader and I can change the speed of an audio book whereas I cannot change the speed of my reading.

One of the books I read (listened to) recently had a concept in it that has been rattling around in my head. I cannot for the life of me remember which book it actually was but know this is not my own original content. I’m fairly certain this was from a book by Eugene Peterson however.

The idea is this the most religious places in the world are not churches, but battlefields and mental hospitals.

Wow that one hit me. Not sure why that stuck with me so tightly but I was hurt in my heart to hear that reality. And even more saddened to think it was probably a correct assessment of reality!

But why are mental hospitals and battlefields more religious than churches?

I think it has a lot to do with despair, desperation, and destruction. You see when we live in a world of despair and desperation it’s easy to realize that there’s really only one place to turn. When we’re face with life altering destruction, there’s really only one place that can change our perception of reality.

I really think that the church has it too easy. We have our well decorated buildings and our set structures. We have some nice tax benefits. We have the ability to do much more than we let on. We aren’t forced to do things that go against conscience or faith. It’s actually a pretty nice set up.

But what do you hear when you talk to Christians today? We hear about the trouble and hardships and struggles in the world. We hear people complaining about how challenging life is but what we’re not on a battlefield or in a mental hospital so it’s easy to complain instead of doing something about it.

Perhaps the church needs a few more battlefield moments. We need to come to grips with the challenges we face in moments of despair. The more we have the more comfortable we grow and the more we tend to take the things of God for granted.

We’ve heard the analogy that the church is the hospital for sinners but that’s just not enough. It’s not enough to admit that we need Jesus and that he saved us. Yes it’s essential but when it comes to the driving forward of our faith into real life, it just isn’t enough unfortunately.

It’s not until we’re met with disaster and devastation that we actually buckle our knees in prayer. It’s not until our loved one dies or our marriage is on the rocks that we really see the power of God in our lives. It’s not until our job is ended and our life hits a low point that God becomes God again.

I hate how true the statement is, but the church really could use a life altering moment or two in order for us to realize just how much we need God again.

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