Banter from the Basement

Collegiate Church Collaborative round two

2011-03-11T06:51:00.000-08:00

Just spent two days with some great guys who are getting it done in the area of collegiate church planting. We met just outside of Atlanta for a 2 day brainstorming session about how to accelerate Collegiate Church Planting around North America. It was a really fruitful time which you will be hearing more about in the coming days. Each of us believe that planting churches on or near college campuses is strategic not only for reaching college students who happen to be the least reached people group in North America but are also great church planters who are willing to do whatever it takes to get a church off the ground.

Hearing the stories of the starts of these other church plants and returning to the start of MERCYhouse and our own 2020 Network was a good reminder of just how fruitful planting among students can really be. Here are some of the guys who were part of the discussions this past week:

Keith Wieser - Keith is pastor of Resonate Church which is a multi-site church at Washington State University and The University of Idaho.

Ed Traverse - Ed is the pastor of New Life Church at Ohio State University

Tim Lubinus - Tim is Missions Pastor at Cornerstone Church who has a collegiate church called Sa lt Company that ministers on the campus of Iowa State University and has just planted a new collegiate church in Iowa City at The University of Iowa .

Bryan Wiles - Bryan is the pastor of H2O Church in Bowling Green KY who serves the campus of Bowling Green State University.

Dave Proffit - Dave was representing the Aletheia Church and their Network of churches who have planted Collegiate Churches for some time, they started at James Madison University in Virginia.

Collegiate Church Collaborative

2011-01-13T22:39:00.000-08:00

Let Them Go - Robert Krumrey from Collegiate Church Collaborative on Vimeo.

Master Plan for Evangelism :: Selection

2010-10-06T09:18:00.001-07:00

I'm meeting with fellow church planters in our 2020 network every other Tuesday. It's a time when we share the victories and the defeats of church planting in New England. It's a great group of guys that are committed to reestablishing a beachhead for the Gospel in a hard to reach place. This semester we are reading a book called Master Plan for Evangelism by Robert Coleman. It's an older book but contains some of the basics of how Jesus changed the world with a small band of committed followers - perfect for the Pioneer Valley.

The idea in the Selection chapter (ch 1) is that Jesus didn't spend a lot of time with a massive amount of people. He selected a few. Those few were the 12 disciples and within that group, He even chose 3 (Peter, James and John) with whom He spent even more concentrated time. Why did he do that?

He did it because he wanted to start a movement and not an organization. Organizations grow by addition (adding new people to the group and then maintaining). Movements grow by Multiplication (training people who will train others who will train others). It is so easy to fall into "addition" thinking as a pastor because you love to see those numbers grow in your services, small groups, events, whatever.

When you are in the beginning of your church plant, it is easy to focus on a few because you only have a few and you need that few to produce some numerical growth to justify your existence. After you've reached a certain critical mass, it is so natural to shift into addition thinking because numerical growth feels really good for you and for your church and there are some things you can put time and energy and money into to boost those numbers. A little time spent on a lot of people = addition to your church.

I know that we've (MERCYhouse) fallen into an addition paradigm more than a few times over the years and as we stumble into our 12th year as a church I find it continues to be as challenging as ever. So as a pastor, but also as one who really wants to see a movement in this valley, I have to ask myself, "Am I focusing on a few?" Who are my 12? Who are my 3? If I'm not, to begin to pray for who God desires for me to focus my time on.

As a church planting church, one must not weary of this process. You are constantly sending out those who are devoted and trained. One, because these kinds of leaders are needed in a church planting core and Two, because these kinds of leaders are going to gravitate toward a church planting vision. So it is a necessity that you be raising up twice the leadership as a non planting church - enough to send out the door to plant new churches and continue in the ministry of the mother church.

I underestimated the need for this and realize this in the wake of 2 church plants in 2 years. Disciplemaking is the call of every church but is the lifeblood of the church planting church. In the past, I've simply prayed and then initiated with the few that God led me to, or just invested in whoever was at the top of the church org chart. This year I'm trying something a little different. I'm certainly still praying and investing in church leaders, but I'm also leading what I'm calling a bootcamp. It's a group of guys that I meet with on Sunday afternoons. There is homework and accountability and the group environment has a bit more intensity (fines for missing and not being prepared . . .). It's something I experienced with my own mentor long ago as a college student. My hope is that in this environment, I'll be able to encourage all in their walk with Christ, but also see who those are who are movement makers. Devoted and trained and ready to lead others in the same direction.

Hot Topic: Dealing with the World

2009-08-27T11:21:00.000-07:00

There were a lot of questions about dealing with "the world". This is terminology from the Bible when speaking of everything and everyone on planet earth that is not submitted to Jesus. Things like old friends, some family relationships, movies we watch, things we read, music, websites we surf, certain conversations at work . . .

There is a real tension when helping a new Christian sort through this stuff. On one hand, there are parts of their lives that they need to flee from because they are destructive. Verses like the following come to mind:

1 Corinthians 15:33
³³Do not be misled: "Bad company corrupts good character."

1 Corinthians 6:18a
¹⁸Flee from sexual immorality.

On the other hand, there will never be a more opportune time for a new Christian to share their faith. It is likely that they will never have more friendships with preChristians than they do in the first few months after becoming a Christian. So how do you navigate this tension in the area of relationships as well as everything else that makes up the world.

Here is a helpful scripture for making these choices:

John 17
¹⁴I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. ¹⁵My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. ¹⁶They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. ¹⁷Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. ¹⁸As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. ¹⁹For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.

Jesus paints a pretty grim picture of his disciple's relationship with the world. He says they will be hated by the world just as Jesus was. That doesn't sound like too good of news seeing as how Jesus ended up hanging on a cross. You'd think that his next instructions would be to run away as fast as you can. Build a compound in Montana and only listen to Michael W. Smith music from the 80s.

This isn't what He says. He lets them know that even though they are not of the world, they are still staying around for a while. He then lets them know how they and all of the Christ followers after them are going to make it in such a hostile environment. If anyone would know, Jesus former occupant of heaven, would know about such an unnatural existence.

First he prays for the disciples protection - protection from the evil one. The reason that the environment is hostile is because of what is going on in the supernatural realm. That in that realm there is an enemy and he is out to get every Christian. The Apostle Peter describes it this way:

⁸Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. ⁹Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings. (1 Peter 5:8,9)

This real enemy is no one to be afraid of but is to be taken seriously and in that seriousness we should pray for ourselves and others that we won't be "devoured" by him . It's also a reminder that people are not the enemy. The Apostle Paul says it this way:

¹¹Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. ¹²For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. (Ephesians 6:11,12)

This keeps us from falling into an us vs. them mentality when dealing with the world and keeps our alert vigilance aimed in the right direction - at the face of evil.

Jesus also mentions another means for living in the world - truth. He prays that God would sanctify (set apart, make holy) his disciples with the truth of his word. Again, Jesus makes it clear that it is not ones distance from the "bad people" that keeps them holy but prayer and exposure to the truth of God's word.

So when it comes to interacting with the world, the goal is to develop a good spiritual skin. A skin that is a boundary to be sure but is also permeable and can let some things in. What it lets in will be different for each Christian and will even change as he or she becomes more mature.

The job of the disciplemaker is to walk with the young Christian as they develop this skin. You should pray for them what Jesus prayed for His disciples (for protection for the evil one) and help them navigate their decisions about what to block out and let in by searching the scriptures for guidance. Never give them a extrabiblical list of dos and don'ts but help them search the truth and allow it to make them a holy person in an unholy world.

Hot Topic: Is Jesus the Only Way

2009-08-27T10:20:00.000-07:00

Our last two wrap-up sessions in the leadership class involved some of the hot button issues that shepherds face when walking with new Christians. Here is what ended up on the dry erase board after a few minutes of brainstorming:

Sexuality (Stance, dating, transformation)

Jesus is the Only way

Spiritual Disciplines

Stewardship (time, resources, $$)

Sloth/laziness vs Workaholism

Partying/College Culture/Non-Christian friends

Habitual Sin (addiction)

Pride/Self-righteousness

Parents

Use of media

Vocation

Navigating Culture

Modesty

Authority of the Bible

The Creepy Church

We've dealt with some of these in earlier posts like Sloth, Stewardship, Spiritual Disciplines. Let's look at a few that we haven't like the question of the exclusivity of Jesus.

This is a tough one for many people. Our culture values tolerance and what they mean by that is recognizing all truth claims (especially religious ones) as equally valid which means that all truth claims are equally invalid. The resulting belief is that we really can't know anything for sure (which is a truth claim right?) so the best we can do is adopt truth for ourselves and keep our noses out of everyone elses business.

This is incompatible with orthodox Christian belief not to mention orthodox Islamic and Jewish belief as well. Any committed adherent to any of the world's religions cannot accept that everybody's belief is equal in validity.
So how can Christians make exclusive claims about Jesus?

This takes us to the Bible. Many hot button conversations (sex, money, salvation, etc. ) will require a foundational conversation about the Bible. Do I believe that the Bible is true? Is it inspired by God? If it is, then I must interact with it as an authoritative document and it is required of me to read it, interpret what it is saying, and obey it. If not, then I'm stuck with figuring out my own reality based on my own experiences.

If I believe that the Bible is true, then I must believe that Jesus is the exclusive gateway to God. This is made abundantly clear throughout the New Testament. Here are two examples:

John 14:6

⁶Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

1 John 5:11,12

¹¹And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. ¹²He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.

But what if someone says, they don't believe the Bible? It's so old or corrupted or they've been reading too many Dan Brown novels. One approach is to talk about how we got the Bible that we have today and why we can trust it. There is strong evidence for believing that the Bible we have today is an accurate transmission of the original writings and that those that wrote the Bible were eyewitnesses to the events of Jesus' life, death, resurrection, and ascension. Here is the short list of evidences:

1. The writers themselves are adamant about being eyewitnesses (1John 1 and Luke 1)
2. We have over 25,000 ancient manuscripts of the New Testament and when compared they all say the same thing and do not reveal corruption especially on theological matters
3. The entire New Testament is quoted in the works of the "church fathers" which are the generation of church leaders after the original Apostles. They too affirm the writings of the New Testament that we have in our Bible
4. The Bible is the most well attested document of antiquity both in number of manuscripts in existence but also in the age of those manuscripts. No document has copies of manuscripts that are so close to the original. See the oldest complete Bible and the oldest Bible fragment
5. Very small band of uneducated, unorganized, powerless, persecuted people started a movement that took over the Roman empire within 2 decades before it became the official religion of the Roman empire. Their message seemed to change them and the people with whom they came in contact
6. Almost the entire group of the original progenitors of the Gospel message who were contemporaries of Jesus died as martyrs. We have no example in the course of human history of people dying for something they know is a lie.

But what if after all of this, a person is not persuaded that the Bible is an authoritative book? This is no time to draw a line in the sand and tell people to call back when they get their head on straight. One of the most important things to understand about the Bible is that it is self-authenticating.

What I mean by that is that as people read it, the Holy Spirit speaks it supernaturally into the person's life. They begin to hear the voice of God through his written word and are often convinced through experience (not thinking) that God's word is true and can be trusted. The practical end of this is that we should encourage everyone who is interested in the Bible, regardless of their views on the Bible, to study it and then let the Holy Spirit do the rest.

Session Seven: Small Group Leadership 101

2009-08-13T09:20:00.000-07:00

Reflection Questions: What was it like for you to attend your first small group? Why did you go? What was the result of becoming a part of one?

Making disciples is most fruitful when the follower of Christ is connected to a small group of people who are pursuing the same life in Christ as they are. This is also often where one connects with a person who is interested in being mentored in their spiritual life.

The overarching concept for understanding small group leadership is “hospitality”. Peter writes in 1Peter 4:9 to “offer hospitality to one another without grumbling”. The Greek word translated hospitality is “philoxenos” and means to love the alien or stranger. It’s the opposite of a word often associated with Christians, xenophobic, which means fear of the stranger.

Christian culture overall should be a place where those who are new and on the outside are given special attention and helped to move inward toward meaningful relationships in the family of God. This is never more true than in the small group.

When a new person arrives it is a big deal. It takes a tremendous amount of courage to take the step of walking into a new setting where who knows what is going on. While we don’t want to overwhelm the person, we do want to make them feel welcome and do everything we can to connect with them.

The basics are speaking to them, getting to know them, introducing them to others, sitting by them. You want to tactfully explain what is going on as the evening unfolds so that they don’t feel awkward or out of place. If at all possible, getting their information and if appropriate scheduling a follow-up meeting with them in the next few days. When meeting with the person, perhaps even bringing one of your small group members along to also connect and learn more about how you are following up with new people. This is the heart of building a small group.

Reflection Question: What makes a good small group?

There are as many answers to this question as there are people in small groups. Some groups are built around fellowship, some around Bible study, some around prayer, some around worship. We, at MERCYhouse, try to build our groups around the five devotions of our church (worship, word, prayer, mission, church).

The schedule for the evening reflects our desire to devote ourselves to these five things:

Hospitality (30 minutes)

You may notice that I put a time on each of these elements. One of the things to remember as a small group leader is to plan your evening in such a way that you will be respecting people’s time. If you tell them it will be 2 hours then follow through on that promise.

I love Bible study so my tendency as a small group leader is to go way over in the Bible study portion of the evening. In one of our groups, it was getting out of hand and people were complaining to me that they needed to get out on time so they could get to bed or study. What I noticed was that when I finished the official content of the evening on time, those same people stayed for another hour to hang out. Whether they actually need to leave or not, the respecting of time will help build the community that you are trying to foster in your group.

So what is the hospitality part of the group time? This starts before people even walk in. The space where you are hosting needs to be clean, uncluttered, and smell good. We live in a 1950’s house with a big dog in our mud room and my wife always lights some candles before people show up for a gathering. There is something about smell that either invites or repels people when they come into a space. When you live in a space, you don’t notice the same things that an outsider would. Do your best to put yourself in their place.

In addition to the aesthetics, you also want to provide some food and drink. Whether it is a full meal or just snacks and lemonade, food helps people socialize by putting them at ease. For some reason, hiding behind a coffee cup helps most Americans to feel more confident in social settings. Make sure that when people arrive, all the preparation has been done so that you can focus on relating and helping others to relate with each other.

Worship (15 minutes)

If we go directly from chit chat about the Red Sox to Bible study, the time usually feels very pragmatic and self-centered. Most of us need a moment to remember why we are there and Who it is that we’ve come to relate with as we are relating with our brothers and sisters in Christ. A moment of worship helps us move from the horizontal to the vertical.

This can be done in a number of ways. The most common is singing. If you or someone in your group can sing and perhaps play an instrument, this can be a great way to shift to an upward focus. This can also be done by reading something from the Bible and having a moment of silent meditation. If you have a knack for creative worship, try different ways of helping people express things to each other and to God using some sort of artistic media. Regardless of what you do, the goal is the shift to the vertical.

Bible Study (30 minutes)

For Bible study to be this short, people need to come prepared. People need to understand what they are signing up for at the beginning of the semester and need to enter into a covenant (agreement with group and God) regarding their commitment to preparation. When leading a Bible study discussion, I try to work through the following framework:

Content: What does the passage say?
Principle: What does the passage mean?
Application: How do I apply the principle to my own life?

I think of it like an hour glass. The content is more general which then narrows down to one or two principles which are truths that are true for all people at all times in all places. Then things open back up again as we discuss the multiple ways that people will apply these truths in their own lives.

Take for instance the following scripture from Matthew 5:

29If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.

If we don’t do some content work and figure out that Jesus is using a figure of speech known as hyperbole we may end up with a small group known for its maimed members. After we’ve sorted that out, we are ready to move to principle. What does Jesus mean by this figure of speech? We are then able to discuss the truth of radical amputation of sin. That Jesus doesn’t ask us to wean ourselves off of sin when we discover it. He asks us to repent, to turn completely away from it like an alcoholic going sober.

After we’ve clarified our principle, we then open the conversation up to the many applications that could come out of this truth. For one person, it’s cutting off a relationship. For another, it’s getting rid of the TV. It is very important at this juncture, that the leader be sharing vulnerably how they have put this truth into practice or plan to. In addition, when the next week rolls around, you are also asking how the application went since you last met so that everyone knows that you aren’t just studying the Bible for the Bible’s sake but are doing so in pursuit of God and transformation that He brings through encountering Him through the word.

Prayer (30 minutes)

If you have a large group, it’s better to split people into groups of 3 or 4 for prayer time. You can also make this time the majority of your application for your Bible study. For example, you send people to their prayer groups to discuss the question, “What do I need to radically amputate from my life”. After a brief discussion of this, you now have some things to pray for each other in addition to Aunt Millie’s hip replacement.

You also want to encourage folks to pray for people in their sphere of relationships who are not Christians. Have people share a few names of those they come in contact with on a regular basis and encourage the whole prayer group to pray for these people during the week. Asking God to work in them and work through the speech and actions of the prayer group member to bring these people the gospel (see Colossians 4:2-6)

It is also helpful to encourage people in the group to be praying for these requests at times other than small group night. You can do this with a reminder email to your group that gives a brief recount of the requests from the group and encourage people to give any updates that are available by emailing back.

Open ended time (?)

Making people feel comfortable to stay around after the official group time is over is another great way to build community in your group. This is always some of the best time of conversation with group members. It’s a great time for both light hearted craziness or serious discussions and prayer in a corner of the house.

Responsibility

Sometimes we think that what makes people stick in a small group is that everything is done for them and all they have to do is come and enjoy the evening. The opposite is actually true. If people don’t feel vested in the group within a few weeks, they will probably not stick for long and they certainly won’t be moving toward leadership.

As a group leader, you want to be thinking of jobs that you can hand off to every member in the group. Here are a few examples:

1. Bring Food
2. Help set-up the meeting space
3. Give rides to fellow group members
4. Send out emails or make phone calls
5. Lead worship
6. Lead a prayer group
7. Make a short presentation on a topic related to Bible study
8. Lead a Bible study
9. Plan and lead a get together
10. Plan and lead a service project
11. Invite people to come to the group
12. Participate in serving on a Sunday morning
13. Mentor a new Christian

When handing off jobs to people, you want to be thinking in the following categories:

Recruit: Don’t just make blanket announcements about jobs that need to get done. Pull the person aside or meet with them outside of group time and ask them to take on a role in the group. Follow Jesus’ example of going to individuals and asking them to take on a particular role.

Train: Even if it’s only five minutes of instruction, tell them what your vision is for the particular job that you’d like them to do and practical tips for how to execute the job.

Feedback: After they begin executing the role, give them feedback about how they are doing. It’s here where people are most receptive to training, when they are trying something new on for size and wanting to learn how to do it better.

Appreciate: Write them a note, thank them in front of the group, etc. Make sure people know that you appreciate the work that they do for the group. Reward the kinds of speech and action that you want to make up the culture of your small group.

Session Six: Fishing for Humans

2009-08-13T07:31:00.000-07:00

So we’ve got all this great content to pass on to a new follower of Jesus. Now what? Well, we have to actually go meet someone and cultivate that relationship in such a way that we can move from an acquaintance to a mentoring relationship. Sounds daunting, but it has to happen for any sort of disciple making to get done.

When Jesus himself gave the disciples a formal invitation to join his ministry he told them if they followed him that he would make them “fishers of men” (see Matthew 4:19). Anyone who has taken on the life of the disciple has been invited to do so by another disciple. For me, it was when I was a college student.

I had been attending a weekly worship/Bible study gathering for a few weeks and had been leading a few songs for the singing time. I had been a Christian all of six months. Tom Westbrook, who was a college pastor at one of the local churches near campus, spotted me right away.

Seeing that I was young and dumb but hungry, he went fishing. We had chatted a few times before and he knew that I liked him and respected him at some level. He walked up to me after one of the meetings and asked me to meet him at his office on the following Tuesday to talk about going deeper in the Bible and learning more how to grow in Christ. I said I would and then asked a friend of mine from my dorm (Kevin) to come with me.

We walked into Tom’s office the following Tuesday and he handed us Bibles and he started teaching us from the Gospel of John. Then he gave us homework for the following week and when we returned he stepped up the pace considerably. He asked us what we had gotten from our study and we looked at him with blank faces and mumbled a few unintelligible phrases that amounted to “The Bible” “Jesus” “Be a better person”. He went on a mini rant, sort of like a football coach, about how weak our study habits were and our need to step it up.

It was a perfect approach for me (son of a football coach) and Kevin (former high school hero on the basketball and tennis courts). We went home the following week and dug into the Bible like never before. Staying up late nights talking about the truths that we were finding as we studied. Then we would show up again on Tuesday and get shot down (in love of course) for not really getting the full picture of what we were studying.

It was more than Tuesday afternoons. We also found ourselves in Tom’s house, spending time with his wife Jill and their two boys. We helped him with some landscaping in his yard and ate meals at their dinner table. We were around when they would discipline their children and even during a few marital squabbles.

We were then asked to teach Bible studies of our own and help lead out in a student worship service. I would travel with Tom when he would speak at youth retreats and be his sidekick, helping with video and audio or doing some music or leading a small part of the retreat. Both through formal instruction and just living life together, Tom made me a disciple.

There isn’t anything that I do today as a Christian man, husband, father, pastor that doesn’t have this guy’s fingerprints on it in some way. He is still a person that I often call when I am up against the wall and unable to sort out my life alone. I would not be doing what I am doing and growing in Christ as I have been these last 20 years if Tom had not fished me out of that crowd that night. Everyone needs to be fished for, invested in, and sent out to do the same thing. So how do you do it?

Reflection Question: What older/more mature Christians took initiative in your life? How did they go about it? What was the result?

There's a story in the first chapter of the book of John (John 1:35-42) that seems so insignificant. You may even wonder why it's there. It's (soon to be disciples of Jesus) John and Andrew. They've been hanging out with John the Baptist which incidentally had to be a weird ride. John tips them off that the whole reason he has been in ministry has just walked by in a robe and sandals.

John and Andrew abruptly start stalking Jesus until He gets the hibbee jibbees and turns around to inquire why they are intruding on His personal space. They are understandably nervous, having never met a Messiah before and they say to Jesus that they only want to see where He lives. His answer to them is to "Come and See."

Jesus is no idiot (a gross understatement I know). He knows what these guys are up to and could have gone into a red letter discourse that would have made your head spin, but He doesn't. He simply lets them come up close and personal. The scripture says they then spent the day with Him. Can you imagine? Spending the day with the Godman. We're hard pressed to find a regular old human who would be willing to spend the day with us much less want to. By the end of the day, Andrew is so stoked over his hang out time that he can't wait to go fishing for his brother Simon (soon to be Peter). Jesus has successfully begun to fish for men and did it through the ministry of hanging out.

When we came here to plant a church in 1999, we had been trained to market our vision for the start-up of a new church. The idea was to do a publicity blitz with slick post cards and news ads. It would cost thousands but was supposed to bring in a sizable crowd for our launch service. Before we could really get launched with this strategy, most of our start-up money was cut for one reason or another. Because of this, our "strategy" had to shift to the ministry of hanging out.

We set-up a table at Umass and met a few folks. Invited them to a start-up meeting and from there engaged in the ministry of hanging out. Some of those folks became Christians. Some, who were already Christians, grew immensely. All of them started doing the same in their own circles of influence. The result has been a church that has been planted in a place where most church plants have failed. While we've definitely spent money, it's been mostly on staff who spend lots of time cultivating relationships and encouraging others to do the same. Our biggest challenge is passing that vision on to each generation of MERCYhousers.

This hanging out ministry is so simple and yet so hard. It's simple because all you need is a living/growing/transforming relationship with Christ. You need not worry about having a huge storehouse of pat answers to spring on your unsuspecting victims at a moment’s notice. You only need Christ like love for the people you are hanging out with and your own story about walking with Christ.

It's hard because it takes a huge investment of time and energy and sometimes other resources as well. People are, well, messy, and there is no getting around it. It is so tempting (and yes it is a temptation to sin) to close the door on new relationships and hang out with only those who are safe and encouraging. Thank God Jesus didn't do that. He chose to risk and to be inconvenienced and give his whole day to a bunch of punks from Galilee. Come to think of it, gave His whole life to a bunch of punks from planet earth. It’s your turn to follow in His steps and do the same.

So start off by just engaging in relationships and loving people. Meet people on Sunday mornings and invite them to come to lunch with you and your friends. Ask someone from your midweek small group to meet up for coffee. As you are relating, ask the Lord to reveal to you who you could invest in to help them find Christ and/or grow in following Him. As Jesus tells his own disciples (see John 4) “the fields are ripe for harvest”. There is no shortage of people needing shepherding, only a shortage of shepherds willing to walk alongside people for the purpose of spurring them on in their spiritual growth.

Reflection question: Are you better at listening or talking?

The basics of initiating

You may be reading this and thinking, “I’m just not very good initiating conversations with people”. A lot of us aren’t, but we can’t let that get in the way. The basics of initiating with people include asking good questions and listening.
Here are a few basics:

1. Ask an open-ended question instead of something that could be answered by a yes or no or one word response?

Here are four suggestions for more productive questions from www.earthlingcommunication.com

a) Ask questions that elicit detail. These are often "What?" questions.

b) For example, "What did you finally decide about relocating?" or "What did you do on your trip to Mexico?" will usually stimulate detailed responses. Questions that don't require detail, such as "How are your plans coming along?" and "How was your trip?" can be answered with a mere "Good, thanks."

c) Ask open questions that require more than a Yes or No. These are the "Wh" and "H" questions beginning with What, Why, Where, and How. These work better than "closed questions" that limit the response, such as "Did you like the movie?" Instead, "What did you like about the movie?" draws out a more interesting and detailed response.

d) Ask some questions that are a little bit surprising or "edgy." These are not meant to put the person on the hot seat, or to make them uncomfortable, but to stimulate and get a lively response instead of a routine response. "What's the most exciting/challenging thing that's happening with you at this time?" is such an edgy question. Predictable questions usually evoke predictable responses, such as "What did you learn in school today?" "Oh, not much."

e) Use some "If?" questions such as "If you had the means to pursue your dream occupation, what would it be?" Or "If you could have dinner with a famous person, whom would you choose?" Such questions break out of the routine and add some fresh energy to the conversation. By the way, don't ask others any question you yourself would not want to be asked. Also, be prepared to answer the very "If?" questions you ask. The other converser may say, "Let me think about that for a minute. Meanwhile, you go first."

2. Ask people about their interests. Once you find out what a person’s job or major or hobby is, get them talking about those things that interest them. They will feel most comfortable talking about something that they know a lot about.

3. Don’t just ask the questions, contribute some of your own thoughts but make sure the focus of the conversation is the person you are engaging unless they start asking you back and show some interest in getting to know you.

4. Encourage. The Bible is full of exhortations for our conversation to be something that builds others up (see Ephesians 4:29 for starters). Recognize, with specificity, positive things that people do and positive character traits that people possess.

5. Be aware of nonverbal cues: reasonable eye contact, leaning in to listen, nodding your head, asking clarifying questions. These kinds of things let people know that you are listening and that you care about them.

6. The most important thing to remember is to just jump in. You will never hone your relating skills more than when you are, well, relating. Anybody can do these basics and once we jump in the Holy Spirit is there to empower and guide us through it all.

Leadership Training - Session Five - Devoting to the Devotions

2009-07-23T12:06:00.000-07:00

Devoting myself to the devotions: Time management

This may be the most important conversation that you’ll have with a young disciple (other than the gospel). While understanding the what and how of spiritual disciplines is important, they only benefit the Christ follower if they are put into practice. This is done by and intentional use of time.

Many college students and twenty somethings live in chaos tossed about by whatever “urgent” thing demands their attention. Bringing order out of that chaos is something that we as humans are designed to do. As God’s image bearers we can hover over that which is formless and void (See Genesis 1:2) and as an act of our will form it and fill it. In the creation account in Genesis we see God do this and then we see him give Adam and Eve the mandate to do the same. They are to “rule and subdue” the earth which is their instructions to tame and care for the untamed wilderness of the earth. So how do we do that?

Reflection Question: How do I go about bringing order to my life when thing get out of control?

# 1 - Begin with the end in mind (this phrase taken from Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey)

Proverbs 13:4 tells us ”The sluggard craves and gets nothing, but the desires of the diligent are fully satisfied.” The sluggard is described as someone who takes action based on what they feel. Cravings are completely devoid of any forethought. You feel like eating an entire chocolate cake so you do and find yourself spending several hours on the toilet. You feel like buying new clothes but you have no money so you charge up the credit card with no plan for how you will later pay the card off.

Desires are different. They are depicted in this verse as positive (i.e. godly) and are desiring something that is not yet obtained. We know that they are not yet obtained because they belong to the diligent and diligent people are all about doing hard things over a long period of time to get a desired result. Having long terms desires (or goals) help us say no to cravings that may destroy us and yes to behaviors that in the end are going to lead to blessings for us and those around us.

A time management conversation shouldn’t start with a depressing dialogue about the nitty gritty. Instead it should start with vision. Help the new Christ follower pray and think through what they see as their preferred future both for the short and long term. The short term conversation may be around when they finish their degree or leave their company in five years. What is it that the person want to both be and do at the end of that short time.

The long-term conversation can be as long term as the person’s funeral. What is it that the person hopes is going to be said about what kind of person they were and what they did with their life after they die? This will help develop and idea of where they want to go which will inform every decision that they make about their time in the here and now.

# 2 Plan

There is a saying in business that you should “plan your work and work your plan” Proverbs 21:5 reads that “The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty” Again, we see diligent people, not just staying faithful to whatever task is randomly set before them, but they first think through what it is that they are going to be diligent about. The result is profit – efficient and fruitful use of their time, while the one who works in unthinking haste ends up wasting time and not benefiting from their labor.

This flows out of the vision conversation. We ask ourselves, “ In light of my desired destination, what will I have to do with my time every day to get there?” The answer to this question is a to do list. Not the kind of to do list where you right down every kind of urgent thing you need to do and then start crossing it off. This kind of to do list is things that you know you need to do faithfully every week to accomplish your goals.

At this point in the conversation, I usually pull out a time grid. It’s a chart that represents 7 days a week / 24 hours a day. Before we start filling in boxes, I affirm the idea that the person’s time (just like their money, their body, etc.) is not their own. Colossians 3:17 states that “… whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. We are never off the clock when it comes to obeying Jesus with our time. It all belongs to him.

Now, before you start thinking this means no rest or play, a conversation about rest is in order. God is very serious about rest and relaxation. Humans were created on the 6th day of creation. Their first day on earth after being created? Sabbath. When Adam and Eve reported for duty to God on Saturday, he told them to go home and rest because that was what he was doing. In addition to weekly rest there are other rhythms designed into the creation itself. Every 24 hour period we see sun for half the day and darkness during the other half. It is a built in reminder that we are supposed to be resting every day.

In addition to these creation rhythms, there are also calendared events in the Jewish year that required rest. Three week-long festivals per year required people to pack up the family and the camping gear and make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. It was a time to disconnect from the everyday life of working and reconnect to God and each other. Not only were these festivals times of rest, but there was something called the year of Jubilee that was also instituted by God to be an entire year of rest every 7 years. In the year of Jubilee, the Jews would leave their farm lands fallow and only eat off of what came up as a result of the previous 6 years of cultivation. It’s where we get the idea of a sabbatical.

These rhythms of rest also include work. If you are planning to take off on the 7th day, then that means you’ve got to work diligently the other 6 days to buy the right to take off. The commitment to rest can often times also deal with the problem of being a sluggard and waiting until the last minute on everything. With these principles in mind, we can then take to filling in the grid.

When we start filling in the grid, we fill in the obvious first. If we are a student, we put our class times on there. Then we plan when we’ll study. This is where the vision plays into the conversation. If the person said they envision a 4.0 then they need to be realistic about the hours they will have to study in order to achieve that grade point. Next might be spiritual disciplines. If the person wants to grow in their prayer life, then some blocks of time for prayer need to be scheduled.

One of the revelations that we all have when we do this exercise is that our time is limited. The to do list that we made to accomplish our vision doesn’t fit into the 7 days/24 hours a day that We’ve been given. It is here that we start to prioritize. Getting rid of some things, spending less time doing others. Hopefully by the end of this exercise, some level of reality has set in.

# 3 Work your plan

Now that we’ve envisioned what we want our life to look like and made a plan for how to accomplish that vision, it’s time to just do it. Proverbs 12:24 tells us that “Diligent hands will rule, but laziness ends in slave labor.” When we roll out of bed on Monday morning and don’t feel especially inspired, we look at the schedule and we do whatever it says we planned to do during that hour. It is in this exhibition of self-control (part of the fruit of the Spirit) that we will see our vision accomplished.

Chances are, what we planned is not going to work exactly like we thought. We have to remember that we are not a slave to the schedule. It serves us and we can tweak it and change it as needed. What we don’t want to do is throw the whole thing out just because we hit a few snags. As a disciplemaker, you can help a young Christ follower troubleshoot their schedule until it seems to be a more realistic fit. Here are some helpful hints for getting through this process:

 Get rid of time wasters
 Start slow and celebrate small victories
 Join up with a few like-minded people
 You are not a slave to your schedule (evaluate and tweak weekly and semesterly)

Leadership Training - Session Four: The Mission

2009-07-23T12:02:00.000-07:00

Five Devotions: Mission

The fifth devotion is the mission of the church. It walks hand in hand with the fellowship of the church. In the Lord of the Rings, there is no fellowship until there is a mission. A commitment to that common mission (destroying the ring of power) brings together a very unlikely team. As the dwarf, the elf, the man, the wizard, and some hobbits seek to fulfill their mission they become the best of friends. Our conversion to Christ puts us in fellowship with God and fellowship with the church all at the same time. That fellowship of which we are now a part is on the mission of bearing witness of Jesus to the world. Jesus states it this way to his disciples before ascending into heaven:

Acts 1:8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

Jesus is very clear that the reason he is leaving the disciples behind is to tell the rest of the world about who he is and give them an opportunity to become disciples too. (See Matthew 28) He makes it clear that this message is not only to be delivered to the immediate neighborhood (Jerusalem) or the immediate region (Judea) but also across cultures (Samaria and the ends of the earth).

Christians are to be glocal when it comes to their involvement in the mission of the church. They are to see themselves as missionaries in their sphere of influence as well as seek to support the cause of the gospel in other cultures and in faraway places. They do this by praying for the work of spreading the gospel around the world, by giving money to these mission efforts, and by going themselves either short-term or as career missionaries.

You can help people keep informed with what is going on around the world by giving them some websites to monitor. www.imb.org is a great source of information for the world mission activities of the denomination with which we are affiliated (Southern Baptist Convention). www.joshuaproject.net is the site of an organization that is tracking all the unreached people groups on the planet. www.persecution.com is a good source for knowing what kinds of persecution our brothers and sisters around the globe are facing. Keeping up to date on a few websites will help to cultivate a prayer life that is consistent with Acts 1:8.

What usually happens when folks start praying for different people groups, is that they feel drawn to a particular group. This is a natural lead into giving to a ministry that serves that group and could then eventually lead to the person going and serving either on a short-term mission trip or discover that they have a call to go and serve overseas as a career missionary.

Reflection Question : How do I go about being a missionary in my own backyard?

So how do I devote myself to the mission of being a witness of Christ in my immediate sphere of influence? The Apostle Paul gives a great summation of his outreach strategy in Colossians 4:

2Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 3And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. 4Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. 5Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. 6Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.

The mission is accomplished in answer to prayer – devoted prayer. Paul begins by exhorting us to pray in a way that is watchful and thankful. The thankful part is a looking back. Considering all that God has done in the past in answer to prayer. It keeps us motivated to stay devoted especially at times when we just don’t see that much happening in answer to our prayers. The watchful part is a spurring on to have our eyes wide open to what God is doing around us so that we can join him by praying . We need to pray with the assumption that God isn’t going to do anything except in answer to prayer (this is a paraphrase of a quote from John Wesley).

Then Paul goes on to ask for specific prayer requests:

1. That God will open doors to the gospel
2. That gospel will be proclaimed clearly when door is opened

These two prayer requests reveal the two sides of human salvation. On one side, nothing happens if God doesn’t initiate with the unbeliever. We are dead in our sins (See Ephesians 2). A spiritual corpse can do nothing to save itself and has hope only if God intervenes. That said, the method that God has chosen to rescue people from spiritual death is the proclamation of the gospel by Christians to those who are outside of Christ. Paul says that the gospel is the “power of salvation” (Romans 1) and that “faith comes by hearing the word of God” (Romans 10). Paul is asking that prayers be lifted up for both parts of the missionary enterprise that has been entrusted to the church.

Once Paul speaks of proclaiming the gospel, he then gives some principles for how to do so. We’re exhorted to “be wise” in the way we act toward people who are not Christians. Christians (and really all other human beings) are notorious for creating their own subculture complete with its own language, music, entertainment, etc. We can become so insulated that we can no longer communicate the gospel in a way that makes sense to the average person on the street. It is very important that the church be a tight knit family that is constantly opening its arms to the newcomer. Consistently asking the question, “How is this understood by the outsider?” will help both the church and individual Christian to stay wise in the way they communicate the gospel to the world.

We’re also told to make the “most” of “every” opportunity. This reemphasizes that watchful idea. Not only are we remaining watchful for ways we can be praying within the will of God, but we are also looking for ways to represent Christ to those around us. These can be everything from a clear explanation of the gospel to a kind word or warm expression. Nothing is too small when it comes to being the witness spoken of in Acts 1:8.

This idea of making the most of opportunities is unpacked a bit in the next part. “Let your conversation . . .” One way that we bear witness is just by talking to people. Initiating conversation can be a first step to conversing about spiritual topics. If we never talk, then there isn’t even a chance for spiritual topics to be spoken of. Once we enter into that conversation, we’re told that our words should be “full of grace”. When we give grace, we give something good to someone that they don’t deserve. This sticks out like a sore thumb (in a good way) in our culture. Speaking words of encouragement to people around us is a way that we role play the gospel which is also something good that has been given to us that we don’t deserve. It builds relationships and cultivates favor and trust in those relationships.

This leads to opportunities to season our conversations with “salt” or truth. We don’t just want to be the nice guy in every conversation but also a person who is honest about who we are and how Christ has changed our lives. We don’t spend every minute of conversation trying to communicate the gospel – that would be like trying to serve someone a meal that consists only of salt. Instead, we wisely season our conversation with the truth of God and give the people we are talking to a chance to see what makes us tick. If we’ve prayed for open doors and the grace we’ve given has peaked their interest, the discovery that we are a Christian will hopefully lead to an in depth conversation/s about Jesus.

Leadership Training - Session Three: Part 2 The Church

2009-07-23T11:57:00.001-07:00

Reflection Questions: How and why did you start giving generously to the church?

Another way to help a young disciple take concrete steps in their devotion to the fellowship is to encourage them to start giving money to the church. Many Christians use the tithe (which means 10%) as their standard for giving which means that they are giving 10% of their gross income as an offering to the church before they give to anything else. Let’s take a look at where that comes from.

Leviticus 27:30-33 – this established the law that all of Israel was to give 10% (a tithe) of livestock and crops as an offering to God. This wasn’t the only offering mandated in the law but it was the backbone of Old Testament giving.

Numbers 18:21-24 – this explains that the 10% was to go to the Levites (spiritual leaders) so they could run the Tent of Meeting (Tabernacle) and later the Temple. The Levites have “no inheritance” meaning they weren’t given any land in the divvying up of territories to each tribe. They have no means of making a living from the land because they have no land and therefore are dependent on the tithes and offerings.

Malachi 3:6-12 – this is probably the most well known set of verses on tithing. God is accusing Israel of robbing him because they are not being faithful in their giving of tithes and offerings. He encourages his people to “test him” and see how their financial needs will be abundantly taken care of if they give faithfully.

Reflection Questions:

1. Why do you think that the Israelites are holding back on giving their tithe when God has made it so clear in the law that they should do so?
2. What are the consequences of holding back on their giving? For themselves? For the spiritual life of their people? (See Nehemiah 13:1-13 for a real life example of the consequences)
3. How does God go about motivating his people to get back on track in their giving?

The Israelites had the option of living independently from God or relying on Him for their livelihood. The result of relying on God was abundance and the result of relying on themselves was scarcity. By not giving obediently, they were declaring that they would rather take care of themselves. They stepped out of the child roll with its responsibilities and privileges which led to the consequences of God stepping out of his parental roll which included his provision.

Reflection question: It’s clear in the OT that tithing is mandatory, but what of New Testament giving?

The closest thing to a New Testament sanctioning of tithing is Matthew 23:23. In this verse, Jesus chastises the Pharisees for tithing everything (down to counting the seeds from their herb garden) while “forgetting” to practice things like justice and mercy toward the people around them. He then ends the rebuke by saying, “You should have practiced the latter without neglecting the former”. This phrase is often pointed to as proof that Jesus mandates that Christians tithe.

The problem with this is that it’s not mentioned anywhere else in Jesus’ teaching or the rest of the New Testament. You would think that if this was such a clear cut Christian discipline that you would see it lined out in a more direct way than an aside of a rebuke against hard hearted tithers. Like all spiritual disciplines, giving is taught by Jesus to instead be something experienced in the framework of a loving response to a loving God. When Jesus does teach more directly on giving, He says this:

Matthew 6
1"Be careful not to do your 'acts of righteousness' before men, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven. 2"So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. 3But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

Reflection Questions:

1. Does Jesus think giving is important? (“when you give”)
2. What does He warn us about regarding how we go about giving?
3. According to Jesus, what is the goal of giving? (as with all spiritual disciplines)

Principle one for New Testament Giving is that we give because we love God.
Jesus communicates that relationship with God (secret, intimate) is the framework for giving. This is at the heart of why we reach for our wallets – we love God and love to participate in his kingdom’s work through giving away resources. This is the most important principle for giving.

The Bible doesn’t stop there though. Human beings are stingy. Our default mode is to go into survival mode (just like the Israelites) and hoard our resources until the day comes when we are comfortable and feel the freedom to be generous. That day of financial security never comes. So there are scriptures that encourage generous giving:

2 Corinthians 9:6,7
Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. 7Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

Reflection Questions:

1. According to these verses, what should characterize Christian giving?
2. What will be the results of this kind of giving?
3. What will be the results of not giving generously?

Principle two of New Testament giving is to give generously. Christians have been given a gift of infinite value (salvation through Christ) so there is no place for being a cheapskate. If we get the gospel, we will be generous and we’ll actually be happy about it as we freely give our resources in response to being in relationship with a generous God.

Just like it’s helpful to set aside a regular time to pray even though the primary motivation for praying is love of God – it’s helpful to be intentional regarding our giving. The apostle Paul exhorts the Corinthians in this way:

1 Corinthians 16:2
2On the first day of every week, each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with his income, saving it up, so that when I come no collections will have to be made.

Reflection Questions:

1. What practical advice is Paul giving the Corinthians regarding their giving?
2. How might this kind of discipline help someone in the area of giving?
3. Have you decided upon your own plan for how you will go about giving on a regular basis?

The third principle of New Testament giving is to give intentionally. While the New Testament framework for giving is a grace initiated free for all (See Acts 2), it is always helpful for human beings to have some sort of plan. In this verse, we don’t see Paul uttering the 11th commandment, but we do see him sanctioning some sort of regular, planned out giving that is proportional to one’s income.

For many Christians, including the leadership of this church, the tithe provides a good way to plan one’s giving. It seems that if those under the law in the Old Testament gave 10% then those under grace should at least do that and more. We encourage people to adopt the 10% mark as their minimum standard for their giving although an even greater percentage should be sought after. God is serious about us trusting him financially by giving a significant portion of our income away. If we don’t practice this spiritual discipline, we end up missing out both spiritually and materially.

Common Questions

1. What if I’m in debt?
Still give in some sort of intentional way. I (Robert) have chosen to tithe no matter what – even if I found myself in a season of debt. It’s an act of faith and it further drives home the point that God is your provider and will have to come through in order for you to make it. In the end, the important thing is that you pray it through and do what God convicts you to follow through on.

Also, while it’s important to be faithful with the 10% we are giving away, we also want to be faithful with the 90% that we remain stewards of. That’s God’s money too and we are managing it for him. We need to have a plan for how we intend to get out of debt and stay out of debt once we’re there.

2. What if I’m a student and don’t have a job?
It may be a bit of a stretch to expect that students will be tithing their student loans or money being sent to them by their parents. We do think they should still participate in the offering in some sort of regular way that is somehow proportional to their income. If they can come up with cash for lattes and iTunes, surely they can come up with 5 or 10 bucks for the offering basket. This kind of giving will begin a discipline of giving that will carry over into their lives after graduation. Students often times have summer jobs or part time jobs. They are encouraged to tithe/give generously from those earnings.

3. What if tithing will cause me to not be able to pay my bills – at least on paper?
For the last 20 years of my life, tithing has seemingly kept me (Robert) from paying all of my bills – at least on paper. Somehow we’ve always paid the bills – I’d say that God has opened up the storehouses in heaven just like He promised. You will rarely find a more concrete laboratory of faith than money. It is a really exciting and sometimes scary journey of learning to trust in God and seeing Him come through in miraculous ways.

That said, it doesn’t mean that God won’t ask you to make sacrifices. If people are looking at their budget and not able to tithe/give generously, they should take intentional steps toward bringing in more income or reducing their spending so that they can do so. What I have noticed in my own life that as we sacrifice things (like travel for instance) we then somehow get it back in creative ways that were way better than anything we could have saved up for by not tithing.

Leadership Training - Session Three Part 1 (The Church)

2009-07-06T15:09:00.000-07:00

Five Devotions: Church

We’ve got two more devotions to cover. These are very horizontal in nature, that is, they deal with our relationship with others. They are a devotion to the church (stated “the fellowship” in Acts 2:42) and the mission (taken from Acts 1:8). There is a lot that could be said about how one is to devote them self to the church, but I think the best place to start is talking about spiritual gifts.

We want a new disciple to be thinking about the church as a place to serve, not a place to consume goods and services. Our culture is steeped in consumerism and unfortunately that has affected the church as well. A great place to start in discussing spiritual gifts, is Romans 12:

3For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. 4Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, 5so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. 6We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man's gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. 7If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; 8if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.

The Apostle Paul begins by speaking of humility – an accurate view of oneself. Thinking too highly of yourself or too lowly of yourself are both examples of thinking too much of yourself. Humility is the ability to see our strengths and weaknesses. The confidence to step up and make ourselves available to serve others according to our strengths and to rely on others according to our needs and weaknesses. This attitude of humility is a nonnegotiable in order to obtain the vision that God has for the church – which is that it would work like the human body.

Reflection Question: How does the human body serve to illustrate the church?

The human body is a perfect illustration for the church. The two things that Paul is wanting to draw attention to are encapsulated in the phrase “one body with many members”. On one hand, the human body is unified, working together to accomplish a single purpose like hitting a tennis ball with a racket. On the other hand, the human body is made up of many specialized parts that are working together to fulfill the purpose. It takes legs, arms, fingers, shoulders, heart, blood, etc. to hit the tennis ball.

The church functions in essentially the same way. A group of people who all have specialties (gifts) who are working together to accomplish the same purpose. That purpose is to be the physical presence of Christ on the earth. That takes humility in order to have the confidence to step forward in faith to fulfill your particular role as well as let others do the same. So what are these specialties?

There are 3 places in the Bible that speak of spiritual gifts. 1 Corinthians 12, Ephesians 4, and Romans 12. I believe that Romans 12 is the place to start. These gifts are very simple and straight forward. Here are some starting definitions for each:

Prophesy – Foretelling and Forth telling. Think of an old testament Prophet. They always have good news and bad news. Their bad news is always some sort of convicting message from God to His people about how they are messing up and it cuts to the heart. The good news is usually some sort of vision of the future that God has for his people once they repent.

While someone with the gift of prophecy is not delivering the very words of God that will one day become scripture, they are performing a very similar function. They have the ability to confront with the truth in such a way that it pierces to the heart . This can be done in a sermon or in a one on one conversation over coffee.

Their good news, much like the Old Testament prophet, is a vision of the future. The vision casters of the church are typically prophets and can really energize the church to move forward even when the road ahead seems very murky. In a one on one setting, the prophet can cast vision for someone’s life and be a powerful source of encouragement to that person.

Notice that the prophet is one of the three gifts that contain a footnote. That the church should let the prophet exercise their faith according to the measure of faith that they possess. Prophets are by nature very vocal and they always have an opinion about everything. If they are not careful, they will get way ahead of what they have earned the right to say and put people off instead of having an influence in the lives of others.

Serving – See needs and meet them. The servant is on the opposite end of the spectrum from the prophet which I think is very fitting. If the prophet is the mouth of the church, a servant is the hands. These folks can see needs (typically task oriented) and are energized in the meeting of those needs. These are the folks that get things done, often times even when they are not asked. They don’t have to ask, “Is there anything I can do to help?” They see what needs to be done and will hop right to it. Servants have to watch out that they don’t get frustrated with others who don’t see the needs and don’t naturally gravitate toward getting them done.

Teaching – Make the truth understandable. Teachers in the church know how to build a bridge, using explanation and illustration, from the truth of the Bible to the rest of the church. Things in the Bible that once seemed unclear and inaccessible to the church, become clear and applicable through the ministry of the teacher. Teachers have to watch out for focusing just on the transference of truth and forgetting that they actually have to relate to the people that they are teaching.

Encouragement – Move people forward. A person with this gift can’t stand to see anyone standing still. They are the people who come alongside others in the church and cheer them forward. They can do that by pointing out the strengths that they see in the person or confronting the person about things in their lives that are holding them back. People with this gift have to watch out that they don’t burn themselves out encouraging everyone else while they themselves are wondering if they are of any value in the church.

Giving – Conduit for God’s resources. Givers hold the resources that they have been given in an open hand. They joyfully release those resources into God’s kingdom’s work which can benefit both organizations and individuals. They typically don’t attach strings to their giving because the reason they give is to worship God and not get some sort of glory or control. Givers have to be careful that they don’t use their giving as an excuse not to also invest themselves relationally in the lives of others as well.

Leadership (or administration) – Systematize and Mobilize. This gift is less about vision casting (see Prophecy) and more about creating infrastructure. People with this gift are the organizers of the church. They create systems that make opportunities for using ones gifts available and help to place people in those opportunities. The caveat in Romans 12 for this gift is that they do so diligently. It’s an exhortation to maintain the system once it has been put into place so that the church does not become a series of monthly emphases and is instead a faithful execution of church basics over the long haul.

Mercy – Feel the emotion of others, empathy. People with the gift of mercy are the feelers of the church. If someone is hurting, the person with the gift of mercy hurts with them. If someone is joyful, the person with the gift of mercy is rejoicing with them. They are a tremendous source of comfort and encouragement for people in the church. They too have a footnote, to exercise their gift cheerfully. The person with the gift of mercy has a tendency to take on too much of people’s pain and end up depressed. The remedy is to see themselves as a temporary carrier of another’s pain that they quickly dump onto Jesus.

Reflection Question: What gifts have been entrusted to you?

Looking at these starting definitions for the gifts, which ones have been entrusted to you? You have a mix of these that God has placed in you and they do not belong to you. They belong to the church. If you don’t know, then ask someone else who knows you what they think. Even if you think you do know, ask someone else what they think. None of us can clearly see ourselves and need others to be an accurate mirror (remember the humility discussion) to tell us who we are.

If you are still not sure, then just start serving. One of the ways we discover what our gifts are is by trying on different roles in the church. Set up chairs, comfort someone you see that is hurting, secretly give some money away. Every Christian is called by God to exercise these different areas of service at some level so go for it. What you’ll find is that some of things that you try will really energize you and will come natural to you. These are most likely your gifts. Some may also scare you to death which is often times an indicator that you are getting close to one of your gifts as well. You are afraid because the Spirit is calling you toward that particular area, otherwise you probably wouldn’t even give it a second thought.

Leadership Training - Session Two part 2 (Prayer)

2009-07-03T11:16:00.000-07:00

Reflection Question: How did you learn to pray?

The next devotion of the Christian is prayer. How do you teach someone to pray? I’d say a good place to start is by taking a look at how Jesus trained his disciples to pray. Read this section from Matthew 6:5-13

Don’t pray like religious people (Mt 6:5)

Jesus begins his training on prayer by telling his disciples how not to pray. Don’t pray horizontally. As in, don’t pray to impress others. It’s a warning that applies to every spiritual discipline. A way to know if this is happening is to ask yourself whether you look down on others based on your personal practice of certain spiritual disciplines, or are you making sure that other people know that you are doing spiritual disciplines so that they will think well of you. If you answer yes to either of these, a motive other than the gospel has slipped into our heart and needs to be expelled.

Do pray in secret (Mt 6:6)

Now this is easier said than done. We are social creatures and naturally want to behave in ways that cause others to think well of us. Jesus doesn’t just leave us there feeling guilty but instead gives some very practical advice- pray in secret. When we are alone with God on a regular basis, prayer is more likely to become what it was intended which is to know God like a child knows their father.

It is helpful for a young disciple to be challenged to choose a place, a time, and a plan for how they are going to practice this discipline of secret prayer. Talking about the details of that and troubleshooting with them as they go will help establish this very essential Christian discipline.

Don’t pray like pagans (Mt 6:7,8)

Jesus then gives another teaching on what prayer is not. It’s not to be pagan. What he means by that is that prayer is not to be seen as a means to getting God to do what you want. Ancient paganism was filled with rituals and incantations that were participated in for the purpose of getting rain when you needed it or protection from danger or whatever. This is not the framework for Christian prayer.

The framework for understanding Christian prayer is a child interacting with a loving parent. Notice in this section how many times Jesus refers to God as Father. Even the beginning of his model prayer (often times called the Lord’s prayer) begins by calling God Father. Fathers are not to be seen as vending machines but as persons that we love and listen to. Prayer is speaking to someone with whom we are in a relationship and the relationship takes precedent over anything that we might get from them. Jesus then moves on to giving an example of what prayer should look like.

The model prayer (Mt. 6:9-13)

The most effective way to teach something to someone is to model it. The main way that Jesus taught the disciples to pray was by doing it. In fact, it was his prayer life (See Luke chapter 11) that spurred the disciples on to ask Jesus how they should be praying . It can’t be emphasized enough that making disciples primarily comes from displaying what it means to follow Jesus in our own lives and letting others pick up on that as we go. A really effective way to teach someone to pray is to pray with them. It usually starts with you doing most of the praying and the new disciple nervously attempting their hand at this very new and strange experience. What I find is that God’s Spirit really takes over as a new babe in Christ takes the scary step of praying out loud and I walk away from the experience examing the power and sincerity of my own prayer life.

So what is in this model prayer.

9"This, then, is how you should pray:
" 'Our Father

As was said before, the framework for understanding Christian prayer is a child to a Father. It is clear in Jesus’ teaching on prayer that this is the way we should think about it. This includes both intimacy and awe.

in heaven, hallowed be your name,

Just like a good earthly father, a child sees him not only in the context of a close and intimate relationship, but also as an authority who should be respected. In God’s case this includes reverence and worship.

Notice that we’ve started our prayer making much of God for who He is way before we make much of ourselves by asking for something. The prayer makes it clear that the relationship with God is first and foremost and the tangibles that we might get from it are secondary. And what is our response to who God is?

10your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Submission to God’s kingdom agenda. Starting with our own life and extending to every place where we have influence, we are all about the reign of our King. He knows what is best for extending that reign and we want that to be the filter for every one of our prayer requests. Now this doesn’t sound very good for us getting the things that we need. It appears that God’s concern for his kingdom leaves us out in the cold trying to scrape up some sort of existence. We couldn’t be further from the truth.

11Give us today our daily bread.

God, the good King and Father, is concerned with the very smallest details of our life. He is concerned with our daily needs. They are part of his kingdom agenda, in fact him answering these simple, concrete prayers display his rule and reign to others who are being invited to join the movement.

There is also a sense of desperate dependence in this request. Give us “today” our “daily” bread. It makes it sound like our need for God to make good on our request is like our need for oxygen. With each breath we take, we are thanking Him and humbly asking for another. This is to be the attitude of the follower of Jesus regarding prayer.

12Forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.

Asking for Forgiveness

We now find a request in the prayer that isn’t for something material but spiritual – forgiveness. This seems a little strange since as Christians we are all forgiven “once for all” (See Hebrews 9:26). It’s called justification and it happens the second that we receive the free gift of God’s grace provided for us on the cross. So why is Jesus asking his followers to ask for something they’ve already been given?

I think of it like my marriage. My wife has already promised that no matter what she is going to forgive and love me until death do us part. Knowing this doesn’t mean that I now do things that hurt her and refuse to ask for forgiveness because she’s already required to forgive. It means that even though she is required to forgive, I still confess my sins to her (which isn’t news to her) and ask her to forgive me. It is good for me to do this because it helps me grow as a husband. It is also good for her to hear it because it restores the intimacy of the relationship.

No Christian will ever outgrow the need to ask God for forgiveness. This prayer reminds us of the need to revisit the issue of our forgiveness again and again. It is also a big part of working with a new follower of Jesus. A big part of that first year of growth is coming to the place of really owning the truth that everything sinful from my past is forgiven and reinforcing that by going to God (and often times to others) and asking for forgiveness.

Forgiving others

This next part takes us into one of the most difficult but life giving, God glorifying parts of the Christian life and is a natural outflow of receiving forgiveness from God. In another part of the Sermon on the Mount (where this prayer comes from), Jesus teaches how to be “sons of our Father”. He states in Matthew 6:44,45 “But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.”

We’re never more like our Father than when we are giving grace to someone and the clearest way to do that is to forgive. We never exhibit more proof of our receiving grace than when we give that grace to others. Jesus tells a story in Matthew 18 about a servant that is in debt a bazillion dollars to the king. The king threatens to throw him in jail until he pays back the money. The servant begs the king not to do so and the king absolves the servant’s debt completely.

Then the story gets really bizarre. The servant is walking home from the king’s office and he sees a friend who owes him 5 dollars. He asks the friend to give him the money and the friend begs the servant for mercy. The servant has the friend thrown into prison until the debt is paid. This story is laughable. I’m pretty certain that when people heard Jesus tell this story, they laughed out loud. How could anyone do such a thing?

But we all do it. We receive an absolution of our spiritual debt (aka bazillion dollars) from God and then refuse to give forgiveness to the people in our lives who owe us a few bucks. Receiving the forgiveness of God will eventually lead to a grace giving life toward others. If it doesn’t, we probably don’t get grace and we are not Christians yet. This is what Jesus is getting at when He says: “For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.”

The final portion of the prayer deals with temptation and the devil.

13And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.'

Attitude toward sin

Asking God to not lead us into temptation is a little strange. For one, God can’t tempt us (see James 1) so asking Him not to do it is a bit overkill. Also, temptation isn’t sinning so why would we need to stay away from it? Jesus is using a provocative way of getting our attention in the area of temptation and sin. He is saying that the follower of Christ is so committed to following God’s ways that not only are they wanting to stay away from sin but even from temptation.

This is similar to other places in the Bible where we are called to “flee” from sin (see 1 Corinthians 6:18) Going up to the line, dabbling, trying to get away with as much as possible before crossing over into sin – these attitudes have no place in the disciple’s life.

This attitude regarding sin also reveals the disciple’s attitude regarding his or her susceptibility to falling into sin. Just like we need God for daily bread, we humbly admit our need for spiritual daily bread from God to stay free from old habits and patterns and free to embrace the new life that is found in Christ.

This will be an important part of the conversation with any new disciple. On almost a weekly basis, the new disciple will be finding parts of their lives that do not line up with their new life in Christ. They will be needing help to navigate how to turn away from their old life and embrace the new.

Deliverance from Satan

The final request of the prayer is the asking for deliverance from Satan. When the new disciple made the decision to leave the kingdom of Satan (aka prince of this world) and realign their allegiance to God as their King, they put themselves in harm’s way. They now have an enemy who hates them and would like nothing more than to destroy them (See John 8 and 10, Ephesians 6, 1Peter 5:8).

We need to be aware that this enemy exists but that he’s no match for our King. Knowing and living the truth is one of the biggest ways to fight this schemer, but prayer must also be an essential part of winning the war. Jesus himself prays for his disciples in John 17 that they would be protected against the evil one.

Leadership Training - Session Two part 1 (the Word)

2009-07-03T11:06:00.000-07:00

With worship at the center, we can now move to the next most important devotion – devotion to the word. In Acts 2:42 we see that the early church was devoted to “The Apostle’s teaching”. What is meant by that?

The Apostle’s teaching consisted of the preaching of the Old Testament in light of Jesus (See Peter’s sermon in Acts chapter 1), a retelling of the life and teachings of Jesus, and most importantly the explaining of Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection – the Gospel. What does this mean for Christians 2000 years later?

It means that we are to devote ourselves to the scripture. The New Testament is made up of the Apostle’s teaching and we must return to this on a regular basis in order to grow as a follower of Jesus.

Reflection Question: How were you first introduced to the Bible and how Christians are to relate to the scripture in their daily lives?

When working with a new Christian, I always use the Navigator hand as a helpful illustration for how Christians should relate with the scripture on a regular basis.

Hear: Growing Christians are people who regularly hear the word of God taught and discussed. This usually happens while listening to sermons and participating in Bible study discussions. Encourage a new disciple to attend Sunday mornings and to be a part of a weekly small group.

The Bible is designed to be experienced in community. Only encountering the Bible through our myopic lens leads to a mishandling of the word. Every cult leader became so in large part because they interpreted the Bible in isolation.

Additional ways to “hear” the Bible taught or discussed include reading what others have said in commentaries and other books. These are especially helpful in allowing us to hear the Bible in the context of how the Bible has been interpreted through the ages.

Read: This may seem obvious but often times people approach the Bible with such a focus that they only read a few verses at a time and end up taking the verses out of the context in which it was intended. We can protect ourselves from this by reading larger blocks of the scripture – entire books of the Bible, the Bible in a year, etc.

The end goal is that every time we look at a verse of scripture, we are interpreting that verse in the context of a chapter, a book, a testament, and ultimately the entire Bible. John Calvin wrote that we should “let scripture interpret scripture”. A view of the Bible at 30,000 feet will go a long way to keeping us from reshaping the Bible in our own image.

Study: While all of us have intentionally focused our mind on a particular body of knowledge for the purpose of learning it, many Christians fail to apply those same techniques to the Bible. Hearing and Reading are one thing, but Studying seems reserved for the professional.

It is essential that we help to turn this around in our churches. Biblical illiteracy in our current culture is downright dangerous for a Christian. A lifetime of scripture study will go a long way to knowing Christ to the fullest and living that knowledge out among those God has placed in our life. So how do you go about studying the Bible?

Reflection Question: What techniques do you currently use to study the Bible?

Much like you would go about studying anything else. Outlining, reading and rereading, diagramming, drawing images, reading aloud. Every learner is different so every Christian needs to figure out what study methods work best for them. Here is one of my favorites.

I encourage people to read and reread a portion of scripture. For example, pick a book in the Bible that you want to study. Read the whole book a few times then read the first chapter every day for a week, writing down your questions and insights. Do the same for the second chapter in the second week of study, perhaps reading the entire book a few times along the way.

This is very helpful in getting a 30,000 foot view of the book that will then facilitate proper interpretation of individual verses. You’ll be really surprised at the rich insights that you’ll get in these individual verses because you have a better grasp of the author’s intent and overall flow of the book.

Whether you use this method of study or another, you’ll naturally move to the next finger on the hand – memorize.

Memorize: All this hearing, reading and studying leads to a large storehouse of scriptural truth that is available for the Holy Spirit to bring to mind as we go through our lives. In Ephesians 6 the word of God is described as the “sword of the Spirit”.

It’s interesting to me that the word is not the sword of the Christian but of the Spirit. This means that for the Spirit to do it’s’ work both in us and in those around us we must have the word in us and be proclaiming it to others. This only happens if we have it (as the psalmist says) “hidden” in our heart (Psalm 119).

Memorization can be facilitated in a number of ways. Writing scriptures on cards and placing them in places that we will see everyday seems to be a common method among Christians. For some, carrying memory cards in a pack that fits in your pocket can also be helpful. It is most helpful when the person helping the new disciple memorizes verses along with them on some kind of regular basis.

Meditate: The purpose of the four fingers is to get to the thumb – Meditation. Christian meditation is having a conversation with God through his word. We expose ourselves to a portion of scripture and then ask the Spirit to help us understand it in light of our lives and the lives of those around us.

This can happen during a prayer time that we’ve set aside specifically for the purpose of thinking on God’s word or better yet while we are in the shower or in line at the video store. Our hope and prayer for the new disciple is that their experience with the scripture does not become compartmentalized (i.e. something they think about only at church or during their morning devotions), but instead is woven into their everyday experiences. In short, it will be a means for the disciple to worship God.

Leadership Training - Session One part 2 - Worship

2009-06-08T12:24:00.000-07:00

Reflection question: What should be the central motivation for a disciple of Christ?

So I know that the gospel should be central in leading others to Jesus, but what about after a person has become a Christian? How do we get a new Christian to take on the life of discipline that is presented in the Bible as the norm for the Christian? Jesus was clear that his expectations for disciples were very rigorous. Take this verse for example:

Luke 9:23

Then he said to them all: "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.

What could motivate a new disciple to give their lives with this kind of absolute surrender? Here are a few counterfeit motivators that often creep into the disciplemaking process:

1. Fear – Many who do religious things do so because they fear that if they don’t God will punish them. As long as they continue to meet God’s expectations, God will leave them alone.
2. Guilt – Some never accept the fact that they are forgiven so they are constantly striving to pay for their sins of the distant past or recent past by doing what they think God will be pleased with to pay for their failures.
3. Blessing – The flip side of the above two motivators is the motivation of blessing. If we believe that we’ve done what God expects then we usually think he should hold up His end of the bargain by blessing us.
4. Desire for power and influence – We are social creatures and the church is a relational place. Just like every other social environment, Christians find themselves wanting to gain power and influence in the church by doing what is expected in order to appear a loyal member of the group.
5. Desire to please others – Similar to the above motivator, this person may not want power but simply wants to be liked and accepted by the group and meets stated and unstated expectations to gain entrance and acceptance in the church.

While it is perfectly “natural” to be motivated by these and others, it is imperative that the disciplemaker continually lead those they seek to influence to the central motivator for Christian living. The Apostle Paul states it well in Romans 12 verse 1:

“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.”

Paul is talking to Christians here. “Urging” them to adopt a particular mindset regarding Christian discipleship. To let the mercy of God (that’s the Gospel) motivate them to offer their bodies as living sacrifices. The Bible makes it clear that the motivational core for the Christian disciple is the Gospel.

Worship makes up the first of what we call (at MERCYhouse) the five devotions. These devotions were practiced by the early church and can be found in Acts 1:8 and Acts 2:42. The five devotions are Worship, The Word, Prayer, The Church, and Our Mission in the World. Worship is the central devotion that gives life to all the others.

Reflection Question: What is Worship?

So what is worship? Again, let’s look at Romans chapter 12 verse 1:

"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."

He starts with the object of worship, that is, God. The Bible throughout Old and New Testament depicts human beings as worshipers. The first two commandments deal with having no other gods before God and prohibit worshiping idols. While this makes sense in an ancient world where everyone was worshiping multiple gods, does this really apply today?

I'd say it does. Worship doesn't have to revolve around something religious, it can be anything that we choose to put at the center of our lives. As human beings, we crave something that we can commit to, think on, work for, sacrifice for, celebrate, tell others about. We are never not worshiping something.

I was reminded of this, when a news story broke a few months back when a tweener, who really wanted to see Hannah Montana, wrote a phony letter into a radio station to try and win some free tickets and back stage passes. She put in the letter how her dad died in Iraq, which wasn't true, in order to better her chances of winning. The letter worked and she ended up getting the tickets.

Then the media started asking her and her mother about their fallen father/husband and they both kept up the lying until someone confirmed that it was a hoax. Most who saw this story shrugged and wondered when they'd be on the next Jerry Springer, but something more was happening here - worship.

The desire to see, be with, experience, celebrate Hannah Montana had become the center of this family's life and they were willing to sacrifice anything to make that happen. Something about that chip off the akey breaky heart, had taken over their mind, will, and emotions to the point that anything that tried to unseat this priority (common sense, fear of embarrassment, morality) was quickly pushed out of the way.

I can certainly remember days as a young tweener church goer when I'd never have dreamed of making that kind of sacrifice for Jesus. For example, I would say just about anything to fit in with friends and have a good time. Even if that included taking God's name in vain or making fun of a kid that wasn't part of our group. Even though I knew a lot about Jesus, believed he existed and that He died for my sin, I wasn't worshiping Him.

Everyone who experiences Christian conversion, becomes a worshiper of Jesus. They have gotten a view of His mercy (aka the gospel) and it has set in motion a surrender of their mind, will, and emotions to such a degree that that they now become a "living sacrifice." The Apostle Paul is most likely speaking of the "whole burnt offering" of the Old Testament that was not mandated by the law. It was instead a free will offering that was completely consumed as a way to communicate to God absolute surrender.

This is what our hearts are all longing for. Something that takes such a high priority in our lives that nothing, not even embarrassment or common sense, can unseat it from our center. It's what makes everything else (the Bible, prayer, church, our mission out in the world) come to life and maintain a level of power and perseverance that will maintain the living of the Christian life.

Shepherding toward worship

As shepherds, we are to be reminding those who we influence again and again of the central motivator of our faith - a response of gratitude for the gospel. If this motivator is not in place, the other four devotions will dry up and die or turn into something that actually detracts from the glory of God.

Think about the devotion to the word without worship. It becomes a means for knowing more than others and gaining power and prestige in the church. The moral standards that are encountered in the Bible become a system of legalism that puffs up and condemns the person and destroys relationships with those around them.

The devotion to prayer without worship becomes a ritual or some sort of magical incantation.

The devotion to the fellowship without worship causes relationships within the church to become merely social and eventually disunified and destructive.

The devotion to the mission of the church without worship causes the church to turn into a philanthropic organization and eventually burn out for lack of real fuel for the mission.

While it’s easy to understand with our minds that worship is to be central, it’s a little more difficult for us to get this at a heart level. John Calvin writes that our hearts are “idol factories”. It is the default mode of the human heart to replace Jesus on the throne of our heart with something or someone else.

This includes religion. In fact, religion is more likely to become an idol than anything else because it is seen as something good, and to some degree it is good. There is nothing wrong with praying and reading our Bibles and spending time with fellow Christians, but when these good things become a means to something else besides knowing and serving God, they become destructive.

Reflection Question: How do you cultivate a heart of worship and help others to do the same?

So how do you help a new Christian with whom you are walking or members of your house church continue to live from a heart of worship? There are a few things that are built into the regular life of the church to help with this.

1. Worship on Sunday. Every week the Sunday morning songs and the sermon bring us back to the main thing – the grace of Jesus. We role play our conversion of receiving the grace filled truth of the scriptures and then offer our lives yet again in absolute surrender. Encourage your folks to attend our worship service regularly.

2. Take communion on Sunday. In addition to songs and preaching, we participate in communion every other week. Christ instituted this ritual for the purpose of bringing us back to the main thing – his death, burial, and resurrection. Again, we role play our helpless need for the gospel every time we go up front to receive the free bread and juice that represent Christ’s body and blood. Help your folks to understand the purpose for participating in this important ritual.

3. Weekly worship in a house church or small group. House church leaders have as one of their goals to point people upward as part of the house church evening. To remember the grace of God and respond to that with singing, reading, meditation, etc. In addition to worship, there is also Bible study and spending time with others who are striving for the same kind of life in Christ. This midweek experience is really helpful for the Christian who desires to maintain a heart that is set on worshipping Jesus.

4. Daily Devotional Time. While Sundays and Midweek meetings are helpful, nothing is as helpful as spending time alone with God every day. Help your person make a plan for how they will spend daily time with God. This may include a plan for the when, where, and what of the time.

5. Keeping the Gospel and our response to it central to your conversations about everything. As a shepherd, it is very easy to slip into fix it mode. Help the person with whom you are walking to see that sexual purity is a response to God’s covenant relationship with us. That generous giving is a response to God’s generosity to us through the cross. That prayer is a means to know the one that paid infinite cost to be in relationship with us. At every turn, you want to bring it back to the gospel to weed out the heart’s desire to put self or something else in the throne of our hearts.

Leadership Training - Session One - The Gospel

2009-06-08T11:12:00.000-07:00

Session One: The Gospel

So where do we start as shepherds? What should be the foundation of everything we do in evangelism and discipleship ?

Take a look at Romans 1:16

16I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.

The answer? The Gospel. It’s translated from a greek word (Euaggelion) that means “good news”. It was used by Roman emperors that would announce the coming of their reign which in their estimation was a tremendous gift to humanity. Ruler after ruler came through Rome proclaiming their rulership as good news yet each would come and go and leave things more or less like they found them or worse.

The Christian Gospel is the proclamation of the reign of a ruler that is unlike anything the world has ever seen. It is a message that is profound and life changing, and it is not only for Romans and Jews but for all the nations of the world. It is an invitation to join a country that is above and beyond any political regime. A country that is even above and beyond this world and the existence that we experience here.

Reflection question: How would you characterize Paul’s attitude toward the gospel as is expressed in Romans 1:16?

Notice the kind of confidence that the Apostle Paul (writer of the letter to the Romans) has in this gospel. It is the “power of God”. How can gospel = power of God. Doesn’t this seem a little strange? Shouldn’t the power of God simply be the power of God. How can this good news be the power?

The reason for this is that the Gospel message (we’ll define it in a moment) is what God has chosen to be the means for his power to be released in the world. It certainly has no power apart from God but God has so exclusively limited himself to working through the gospel that it almost seems that the gospel itself is the power. We cannot forget this as shepherds. No gospel = no power. That is true both in evangelism and discipleship. If we do proclaim the gospel in our disciplemaking efforts, it will set the stage for a powerful intervention by God in the lives of those we seek to influence.

Reflection question: What is the Gospel?

So if this Gospel is so powerful and essential, then what is it? One of my favorite places to go to answer this question is 1 Corinthians 15. Paul writes:

3For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. 6After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep.

Paul grew up in Jewish culture where passing on tradition was of utmost importance. One of the reasons we know our Old Testament has been accurately translated is how the Jews painstakingly copied their biblical manuscripts. For example, they counted the number of letters from the first one to the middle of the Torah (first five books of the Bible). If their count was off by one, they would burn the manuscript and start over. Paul is using Jewish technical language (what I received I passed . . .) to describe the passing on that Christians are to do. They are to be diligently passing on the Gospel. Then he defines what that is in a nutshell.

“Christ died for sins”

It is essential that we understand that central to the gospel message is that our king (Jesus) died a sacrificial death in our place for sins that we committed. We can see right from the start that this is not your ordinary king. Before He is our Lord, He is first our Savior. Jesus himself proclaimed this in Matthew 20:28 – that he came to serve humanity by dying as a “ransom for many.” We, who had been kidnapped by sin and Satan were rescued, ransomed, by our Savior through His death on the cross.

“that he was buried”

He wasn’t faking his death. He really suffered and died. His heart, which was fully human, really stopped. His lungs, which were just like yours and mine, really ceased to take in air and he was laid in a cold dark tomb. As far as Jesus’ followers knew this was the end of their leader.

“and on the third day . . . he appeared”

Wait a minute? This is odd. Many a great leader has died for their cause. From William Wallace to MLK, leaders have died brutal deaths that spurred their followers on to participate in their movement with even greater zeal than before. This leader is different. This leader died, was buried, and rose again as a victor.

As might be expected, most people are skeptical of this claim. Perhaps this is metaphor? Perhaps Christ resurrected spiritually in the hearts of followers? A dead man rising? Come on. Paul is prepared for this and lets us know that the events that make up the Gospel happened in history in front of eyewitnesses. In fact that more than 500 people were eyewitnesses to the risen Christ.

A few of these eyewitnesses (and one who had access to eyewitnesses – Luke) wrote about their experiences with Jesus. We call these written records “the Gospels”. They are Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John and make up the first 4 books of the New Testament. They have often been described as very long introductions leading up to the body of their works which is the story of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.

This is the core of the Christian message. In the only two religious rituals instituted by Christ, the church role plays this story. Through communion and baptism we again and again point to the center of our faith - the death, burial and resurrection of Christ. In the words of Christ we do these “in remembrance of him” (see Luke 22:19). And what are we remembering while we are chewing on symbols of flesh and blood? It’s not that we should be nice to everybody and never tell lies. It is the Gospel, the foundation of our faith.

“According to the scriptures”

You may have noticed the phrase “according to the scriptures” being repeated twice in Paul’s telling of the gospel story. Why would he see the need for repeating himself like that in such a short verse? Paul is letting us know that the Gospel is part of a much larger story. It’s not something that dropped out of thin air in the 1st century in Palestine. This Gospel is the pinnacle of God’s work among humans that has been going on since the beginning of time. The church throughout history has often summarized that larger story into the following three acts: Created, Fallen, and Redeemed.

Created (Genesis 1,2)

In order to be a Christian, one must believe that there is a God and that this God has created us. Back in Genesis 1 and 2 we find God creating the world culminating in the creation of human beings. Those human beings are created to be in relationship with God, themselves, each other, and the earth.

If you take a look at Genesis chapter 2 you will find those relationships represented. Adam’s relationship with God is one of being the child with a father. God is providing for him, protecting him, instructing him. Then God tells Adam that “it is not good for man to be alone”. This is God’s way of introducing the need of every human to be in relationship with other humans. God solves this problem by creating Eve and giving her to Adam to be a companion and helper to him. Adam responds by professing his thanksgiving to God and admiration of Eve.

Then we find out that they are also in perfect relationship with themselves. They are said to be “naked and unashamed”. They are not self-conscious in any way wondering what the other might be thinking of them. And finally they are in perfect relationship with the earth. Adam and Eve are cultivating the garden that God planted for them and it is responding by producing good fruit for food.

Fallen (Genesis 3)

In Genesis chapter 2 (verses 16 and 17), we also see that there is a ground rule in the garden. God inserts an opportunity for Adam and Eve to choose to continue in relationship with Him or choose to separate themselves from Him. The ground rule is to never eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The consequence for disobeying this rule (i.e. forsaking their relationship with God) is death.

It doesn’t take long before we see that there is another voice in the garden. A serpent (we know to be Satan) adds to the laboratory of choice in the garden. He offers an alternative view of Adam and Eve’s existence. He proposes that God isn’t as good and trustworthy as they first thought. That eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil will actually not bring about death but instead bring about an illumination and an empowerment that God is trying to hold back from them. Adam and Eve choose to believe this other explanation of their existence and the result is horrific.

Just as God had promised, the consequence of their choice was death. While this death certainly included physical death, it also encompassed much more. This “death” spoken of by God included a separation within all those relationships that were mentioned earlier.

The first one that becomes obvious is the death in their relationship with themselves. They immediately try their hand at sewing so that they can cover up their naked bodies because now they are feeling shame and self-consciousness for the first time.

We then see a death in their relationship with God. He shows up for his daily afternoon walk with his son and daughter and instead of jumping into his arms, they are hiding in the bushes. This is the first time humans have known separation from God. God in his mercy, pursues Adam and asks him if he has eaten of the fruit. Adam reveals the death of his relationship with God and Eve by letting God know that it was “the woman” that “God gave him” that caused him to eat the fruit.

We don’t find out about the death in their relationship with the earth until we read the section in Genesis chapter 3 called “the curse”. It’s a listing off of the consequences that resulted from Adam and Eve’s decision to choose against God. In Adam’s section we find out that work will now be “toil” and that the earth will produce “thorns and thistles” instead of responding with fruitfulness to human cultivation.

It is a sad moment for humans. Like opening the exit door of a plane at 30,000 feet, a deathly chaos has replaced what was once a paradise. Paul describes this in Romans chapter 5 verse 12:

“Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned--”

But even in Genesis chapter 3, all hope is not lost. We see 2 glimmers of hope. The first glimmer is that God doesn’t seem to be done with humans. He sees the pathetically sewn fig leaves that they are wearing and responds by killing a few animals and giving their skins to Adam and Eve as clothing. It seems tragic that God would kill his own creation to take care of these two rebellious children but it is a foreshadowing of things to come in this larger story. Many animals will die for the good of humans before this story ends all pointing to the death of something much more precious than animals that will have to die to benefit humanity.

The other glimmer of hope is contained in Satan’s curse. In this curse, it is explained that Satan and human beings will be at war with one another for a good part of this larger story. The way this is stated is that God will put “enmity” between humans and Satan. Not only is the war predicted but so is the outcome. It is stated that Satan (a serpent at that moment) will strike the heal of the offspring of Eve but that this same offspring will crush Satan’s head.

While heal striking does not sound fun, it isn’t nearly as devastating as head striking. The hope in this is that somehow a human being will one day reverse the mess. The Apostle Paul follows up the problem of death in Romans 5 verse 17 with the solution:

“For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. “

Jesus eventually comes through the travail of many a birthing mother for the purpose of dying a death that would take on the consequences that were experienced by all humanity starting in the garden. The Apostle Paul writes it this way in Romans chapter 6 verse 23:
23For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

The wages for sin had to be paid by us or by someone else. That someone else is Jesus Christ. This then allows for the great exchange whereby through faith we receive the free gift of eternal life because Jesus was willing to receive an underserved death for sin.

Leadership Training - Introduction and Syllabus

2009-06-08T11:05:00.001-07:00

I'm doing 10 weeks of training with leaders this summer. I'm going to try to post the content each week. Here's the game plan:

Introduction:

The goal of this training is to raise up an army of shepherds who will intentionally seek to initiate in the lives of others for the purpose of helping them grow in the worship of God. All of Christian evangelism (helping nonchristians become Christians) and discipleship (helping Christians become spiritually mature) is aimed at the single purpose of the worship of God.

Here is the outline of what we will be covering for the next ten weeks:

House Church Leader Training – Summer ‘09

1. (June 3) The Gospel (How every topic on this page and more all stem from the gospel - the gift of grace given to us in the Christ event) This is the first of 5 devotions - worship

2. (June 10) The Five Devotions, (Five domains of the Christian life: Worship, Prayer, The Word, The Church, The World )

3. (June 17) The Five Devotions continued

4. (June 24) Time Management (the grid: roles, goals, time sheet, evaluation and tweaking)

5. (July 1) Fishing For Humans (taking initiative in the lives of others in your life or in a fishing pool event)

6. (July 8) The Small Group Experience: Hospitality; Community Building; Corporate Worship; Bible Study Discussion; Prayer

7. (July 15) Fishing For Humans (taking initiative in the lives of your small group members)

8. (July 22) Shepherding: Listening and Questions (the art of conversation)

9. (July 29) Shepherding: Biblical Guidance (common issues in the lives of disciples)

10. (August 5) Shepherding: Biblical Guidance

11. (August 12) Building your leadership team: Spiritual Gifts (Romans 12, Ephesians 4, 1 Corinthians 12)

12. (August 19) Training your leadership team: 3 stages of raising leaders (Jesus did it / they watched; they did it Jesus watched; they did it)

Make it to the Thumb

2009-05-11T06:33:00.000-07:00

This Sunday I mentioned the scripture hand from Navigators. I first saw this hand back when I was a freshman in College. It gives a good overview of how a Christian exposes themselves to the scripture as well as the reason for pursuing this exposure in such an intentional way. All of our hearing, reading, studying, and memorizing leads us to the "thumb" which is meditation. Psalm 1:2,3 says this about meditation:

¹ Blessed is the man
who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked
or stand in the way of sinners
or sit in the seat of mockers.

² But his delight is in the law of the LORD,
and on his law he meditates day and night.

I pray that this week we'll all make it to the thumb.

Going Under the Knife

2009-04-13T10:48:00.001-07:00

When my sister was an 8th grader, she was riding on the handlebars of another kid's bicycle. The bike fell over and ended up crashing into the side of a street curb. The result was a compound fracture of both her lower leg bones and a really bad abrasion. This is when we got to know Dr. Lamar P. Collie.

He was the local Orthopedic Surgeon, A University of Texas Grad (hookem horns!), drove a red Corvette, was a really snappy dresser, and a very gifted young surgeon. My family and I got really close to Dr. Collie. My sister's injury was serious, and even got more serious after the bones were set. The abrasion got infected inside the cast and there was a threat of gangrene and amputation.

Through the whole ordeal, Dr. Collie took excellent care of my sister and the result is that she has both her legs and can walk normally. Up to this point, I only had brief interactions with Dr. Collie. He knew me as the big brother who was tagging along with my mom at many of the doctors appointments. I knew from the experiences of my sister - her testimony about him if you will - that He could be trusted.

Then came my chance to really trust in Dr. Collie. I tore my ACL in my knee and based on the experiences of my sister, I immediately went to Dr. Collie. At this point, I was even living several miles away from him, but made a special trip into the city where he now worked so I could see him.

This was before the days of the MRI so we weren't exactly sure what was going on in with my knee. Dr. Collie informed me that he was going in orthoscopically to take a look and if the ligament was torn, he would then cut my knee wide open, remove a piece of my patella tendon and then use that to replace the ligament.

My response? I said yes. I let the anestesiologist put the mask over my face, not knowing what would happen next. I completely put my trust in this doctor perhaps in a way I had never trusted anyone before. 4-5 hours later I wake up in a morphene induced stupor with a 8 inch scar down the center of my knee and a new ligament.

The rehab was excrutiatingly painful and lasted for months but the end result was a knee that could withstand rotating and moving from side to side. I was right to trust Dr. Collie based on the testimony of my sister and many other patients. In fact, even today, (16 years later) I trusted the good doctor when I went on a run down the bike trail with my wife.

I say all this as a way to at least get at the kind of belief that Jesus is calling forth from us when he calls us to "believe". All through out the Gospel of John that I've been preaching through this semester, we see Jesus calling people to believe. It's a trust in him, based on the scriptures and the testimony of others that his absolute. It includes, but is much more than, just being able to think and to say that we trust in the good doctor. We must actually go under the knife.

When we a spiritually "baptized" into Him (see Romans 6), we are allowing him to put the mask over our face and render us dead with Him, trusting that He will also perform the spiritual procedure of resurrecting us from our spiritual death. Many have undergone this procedure (many more than those who have undergone ACL reconstruction) and can testify that the Great Physician is a spiritual specialist for whom there is no substitute.

Pharisees and Pharaohs

2009-03-30T11:03:00.000-07:00

This week I preached on John chapter 9. In this story we see what happens every time God reveals himself to humans. There are one of two options: "See" God like you've never seen him before or go from blind to worse.

In John chapter 9, the blind man goes from vaguely knowing about "the man called Jesus" to saying "Lord I believe" and laying flat faced in the dirt. The Pharisees go from being slightly annoyed by their latest competition to conspiring for the purpose of committing the murder of God himself. These extremes are seen throughout the Bible - both Old Testament and New.

This morning, my family and I were looking at the story of the ten plagues from the book of Exodus. God reveals himself to the Egyptians and specifically to Pharaoh in an amazing way. He starts with minor annoyances like the Nile turning to blood and frogs popping up everywhere. It's not without purpose though. For the Egyptians, the Nile was divine as was the sun (remember the plague of darkness?). One of their gods even resembled a frog.

God was sending a specially designed revelation of himself to the Egyptians and to Pharaoh. The result? Some see and some go from blind to worse. Pharaoh goes from blind to worse. Think of what he would have to do to believe in the one true God of the Hebrews. He'd have to completely dismantle the Egyptian religious system. A system that actually declares him divine. Then he has to kiss off most of his labor force and completely tank his economy.

He's not much different than the Pharisees of Jesus' day. They both stand to loose a great deal. Others are impacted by God's revelation. Even from a distance. Miles away in a town called Jericho, stories are flying through the streets about the God of the Hebrews. How that God delivered them from the hands of the most powerful military force on the planet. A prostitute named Rahab hears these stories and when she meets up with a few Hebrew spies on a fact finding mission, she says this to them:

"I know that the LORD has given this land to you and that a great fear of you has fallen on us, so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. ¹⁰ We have heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two kings of the Amorites east of the Jordan, whom you completely destroyed. ¹¹ When we heard of it, our hearts melted and everyone's courage failed because of you, for the LORD your God is God in heaven above and on the earth below. ¹² Now then, please swear to me by the LORD that you will show kindness to my family, because I have shown kindness to you. Give me a sure sign ¹³ that you will spare the lives of my father and mother, my brothers and sisters, and all who belong to them, and that you will save us from death." Joshua 2:8-13

Something tells me she would have been a better Pharoah. She has been impacted by the way that God has revealed himself through the exodus. Instead of seeing what she could loose for trusting in God, she sees what she can gain. Life and protection for her and her family. The blind man is in much the same situation. Nothing to loose and everything to gain.

The truth is that this is all of our predicaments. The control that we think we have over our lives is only an illusion. The only thing that we can know for sure is the character of God. That He is the "Lord God in heaven above and on the earth below" and can be trusted with our lives. So as God reveals himself to you this week (ultimately through Christ) think not of what you will loose if you believe - and therefore harden yourself to him. Remember the Pharisees and the Pharaoh and realize that in comparison to what you will be gaining, you have nothing to loose.

The Ultimate Weapon in the War

2009-03-23T09:55:00.001-07:00

We've been talking about the war that every Christian finds themselves in. How Jesus actually sends us into the fire fight and gives us His Joy and Truth as powerful weapons against a real life enemy. In Jesus' prayer for his disciples in John 17 we discover the ultimate weapon:

"For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified." (Jn 17:19)

As was said earlier, this sanctify word keeps popping up. It means to make holy, to be set apart for the purposes of God. Jesus uses it to describe his going to the cross. He means that his going to the cross is an expression of him being set apart for the purposes of His Father. Because He is willing to do that, he then makes a way for his disciples (and us) to be "truly" sanctified.

Earlier Jesus mentions that we are sanctified by truth (the word of God). Here he reveals that we are sanctified by His death on the cross. This is our ultimate weapon in the war against sin, death, the demonic. For one, we've already won. That's right, we've already won this battle in Christ. The Apostle Paul says it this way in Romans chapter 8:

"³⁷No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. ³⁸For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, ³⁹neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Notice that he says we "are" conquerors. No matter how successful or unsuccessful we are in this very messy spiritual battle that we find ourselves in, our victory is certain. It's sort of like watching Return of the King for the 50th time with my sons. Every time I watch Frodo decide to not throw the ring of power into the pit of molten lava below, I feel a little twinge of disappointment, wishing he would do the right thing, hoping maybe this time he will act like a hero and throw it in.

Then I remember, I know the ending. Yeah, he's not going to be the perfect hero, but victory is sure. Evil will be defeated and Frodo and the other hobbits will be seen as heroes, though imperfect and unlikely, but heroes.

So remember today as you battle. As you succeed and fail. Victory is sure because of the cross. The perfect hero has defeated sin and death and the demonic and transfers that victory over to us both in this life and the life to come.

Sent Like Jesus

2009-03-16T09:52:00.000-07:00

Bullets are flying everywhere. All you want to do is duck for cover and hope it all blows over. Jesus' disciples find themselves in such a predicament on the Thursday night before Good Friday. Tension is running high and Jesus starts praying (John 17). It calms their hearts and helps them believe that everything is going to be alright. Then they hear several disconcerting phrases in the prayer, one of which is this one:

"As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world." John 17:18

Earlier Jesus had said that the world hated the disciples. Now He says that He is sending the disciples into the teeth of that same world and doing so in much the same way that God the Father sent God the Son. What does He mean by this?

In a word, "Incarnation". God the Son stepped out of the heavenlies in order to become human, live like a human, hurt like a human, be tempted like a human, and then die like a human. This identification with human beings was God's way of communicating His love for us. It's now a model for the disciples (and all other Christians) for how they are now sent to impact the world.

So what does this mean for us as Christians being sent back into the war zone? It means that we step out of our comfortable heavenlies and into the lives of people who are in need of the good news of the Gospel. It translates into really practical actions:

Introducing yourself to people
Helping your neighbor shovel their snow
Sending a card on a special occasion
Making a meal for someone who is sick
Inviting someone to dinner, or to a hockey game, or game night
Asking people questions about their lives
Helping someone move, or paint their house, or . . .
Watching someone's house or pets for free
Complimenting someone on the good job that they do
Giving money to someone in need
Offering your tools, cars, house . . . with generosity
Being available to people who are in crisis
Offering to pray for people who are in tough situations
Celebrating big moments in the lives of others

The other day, I was shoveling snow in my front drive. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see my elderly neighbor struggling to get his car out of a snow bank. I quietly prayed that God would help him get unstuck so I wouldn't have to go over and help him out. Now that I think of it, that was a pretty dumb prayer. A lot of good it would have done my neighbor if God would have answered that prayer completely unbeknownst to him.

Of course he remained stuck, so I walked on over. For the next hour I shoveled and chipped and pushed and still the car stayed stuck. Every few minutes I would look around to see if any of the other neighbors were around to help out. Not one car in anyone's driveway. Finally, after the hour was up, my son Kory and I were able to get the car out. Immediately, as if on que, neighbors were driving into their driveways just missing the opportunity to help out. The result, thank God, was incarnation. An opportunity for me to sacrificially love my neighbor for a whole hour in the name of Christ.

It's these kinds of actions that not only bless people, but communicate something to them about the Gospel. As we step out of ourselves and into the lives of others, we are modeling what God did for us in the incarnation. He, who had every right to focus on Himself, got down on his hands and knees like a parent loving a little child and made it abundantly clear that He loved us. I'd say that most of us didn't believe that this love was real, until we first knew at least a facimile of that love from another person who claimed Christ as their source of love. So with that in mind, armed with joy, truth, and love, it's out of the bunker and back out into the world. See you in the battle.

Another Weapon for the War

2009-03-09T13:09:00.001-07:00

So last post I broke the disappointing news that Jesus is not going to extract us out of the combat zone that is our lives here on planet earth. I also said that weapon one for this battle is joy. I got all this from Jesus' prayer for his disciples in John 17. After praying about joy, he then moves on to another topic - that of holiness.

This seems to be a very important issue for a people who are supposed to be holy while living in an unholy place. So what would you expect Jesus to say? I know what I would expect. That He would pray about his people being protected from those bad ole nonchristians on planet earth. That they would stay pure and listen only to Christian music and only see G movies. Things like that. But that's not what he prays at all. Here's what He says:

^"17Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth." John 17:17

Notice the word "sanctify" popping up quite a bit. It's a word that means to make holy, to set apart for the purposes of God. In Jesus' prayer, He prays that this process would come about by exposure to truth and not a reduction in exposure to bad influences. Now don't get me wrong, there is a place for limiting the negative things (including some people) that influence us but listen to what Jesus is praying here.

He's saying that more important than isolationism is the regular exposure to truth and that through the power of God's Spirit, that truth makes us holy. It's another weapon in the war. Part of why truth is so important in this battle is that our enemy (not people but the evil one) has only one weapon and it's the lie. Hear Jesus describe the enemy's strategy:

"He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies." John 8:44b

Because the enemy is lobbing lies at every possible opportunity, we must be constantly reminded of the truth. The obvious source of this truth is the Bible. It is our storehouse for God's truth and is essential in the fighting off of a myriad of destructive influences that surround us every day.

It is this truth driven santification that then gives us the holiness to enter back into the war zone and keep ourselves in the fight as holy soldiers in an unholy world.

Weapon one for the war - JOY

2009-03-05T12:44:00.000-08:00

So we're in a war zone. Now what? How do we go about fighting, even winning, in this war? Take a look at a portion of a prayer of Jesus from John 17:

¹³"I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them."

Weapon one: Joy

Notice that Jesus explains what he hopes his training and prayers will lead to for the disciples - Joy. Not just any Joy, but the full measure of Jesus' joy within them. At first glance, we might be thinking that this must mean that Jesus is going to shield us from all of the blows of the battle. Maybe even evacuate us out of the combat zone. Not so. Read the next part:

^"14I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. ¹⁵My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. ¹⁶They are not of the world, even as I am not of it."

He makes it clear that the disciples are going to be hated and that there is a real enemy (the evil one) who is waging a war against them. He also makes it clear that He is not asking the Father to extract them out of harms way. So where's the joy in that?

Notice that Jesus says that the disciples are not of the world any more than Jesus is of the world. Now I can certainly understand how Jesus is not really at home on ole planet earth - but the disciples? Come on. These guys are about as "down to earth" as you can get.

Jesus is speaking of their citizenship. Even though the disciples have never hung out in heaven (like Jesus has) heaven is their home. They are no longer citizens of Israel or Rome or any other earthly designation. Their home is heaven. Now that is cause for Joy.

It's also a very needed concept for people living in a war zone. The fact that this earth is not our home, frees us up from being crushed every time it doesn't live up to our expectations - which is often. This helps us keep our heads up and our hearts full of courage as we meet the onslaught experienced in the battle.

It also helps us enjoy the abundant life that Christ is offering in the here and now. Knowing that we will always be hungry for deeper relationships, more rest, absence of pain . . . (aka heaven), we can see the good in life as glimpses of the eternal life to come. This way our soaring expectations can come down to earth and we can experience the Joy of knowing God through his good, through fallen, creation.

So here's to Joy in our eternal future. Relish in it often and do not lose heart in the fight for your life and the lives of those around you.

Welcome to the War Zone

2009-02-26T12:01:00.000-08:00

I've been chewing on a portion of the Bible known as the "Upper Room Discourse" from the Gospel of John from the last year. One of the things I've noticed is that Jesus if getting his disciples ready to live in a spiritual war zone. Listen to this from John 15:

¹⁸"If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. ¹⁹If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. ²⁰Remember the words I spoke to you: 'No servant is greater than his master.' If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also. ²¹They will treat you this way because of my name, for they do not know the One who sent me. ²²If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin. Now, however, they have no excuse for their sin. ²³He who hates me hates my Father as well. ²⁴If I had not done among them what no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. But now they have seen these miracles, and yet they have hated both me and my Father. ²⁵But this is to fulfill what is written in their Law: 'They hated me without reason.'

Doesn't this sound like fun? I think that if most of us were asked why we became a Christian, we wouldn't say because we get to fight in a war where we'll be hated and attacked. Yet this is exactly what Jesus is preparing them for. He even reminds them that if they had stayed "in the world" as in a member of the community that is made up of those who are not citizens of God's kingdom, they would be loved by the world - aka nobody is shooting at you.

I asked my kids in family devotions how that sounded? They looked at me with bewildered eyes. Why would anyone choose to put themselves in harms way like that? Worse than that - why would Jesus choose us to be placed in harms way like that (verse 19)?

Perhaps there is another way to look at this. I described a scenario where a person goes to boot camp for 6 weeks. They're ridiculed, yelled at, sleep deprived, pushed to their limits. At the end of the camp, the drill instructor walks over and informs you that you have shown yourself to be a soldier with enormous promise and they are recommending you for special operations. You then go to a school where you train in the most recent techniques in modern warfare.

The day comes when you are being dropped in enemy territory for your first special operations mission. Sure, it's a battle, but you find yourself honored to be given such an opportunity to serve.

The Thursday night that Jesus delivers this discourse he can hear the missiles being fired by the enemy. Satan has entered Judas, Satan has asked to sift Peter like wheat (see John 13). Jesus even states that the prince of this world (Satan) is coming (see John 14). The battle rages all around and is just going to get hotter. The disciples initially will run like little children in only a few hours from this discourse when the angry mob comes to arrest Jesus.

Yet, not soon after, they will stand and deliver the truth of the Gospel in the face of enormous opposition. All of them except one will be martyred for the cause. Judging from the spiritual battle raging around Jesus that night, I'm certain that they sustained spiritual wounds as well. At some point, they realized that it was worth it. That, in fact, they had been specially chosen to endure the hardships that they would face for the purpose of battling for their King.

If you are a Christian and find yourself wondering why you are having to fight so many battles. Maybe even wondering if your doing something wrong in the way that you are carrying out your Christian life. Take heart, you have been especially chosen for special operations here on planet earth.

We'll talk more about the ways of this war in the following post . . .

High Octane Obedience

2009-02-20T12:01:00.000-08:00

I was recently looking at a quote from Jesus in the Gospel of John chapter 14:

"If you love me, you will obey what I command" (John 14 verse 15)

I think most Christians have a knee jerk reaction to this verse. It's a reaction of guilt. It goes something like this - "I don't do everything that Jesus commands therefore I don't love Jesus and therefore I am a bad Christian or worse than that, I'm not a Christian at all." We then go about "applying" the verse by trying really hard to obey the commands of Jesus to prove to him that we love him. Does that sound the least bit Christian?

Jesus is teaching his disciples about a new, high octane, fuel for obedience. It's called love. Look at all the times he mentions it in chapter 14 alone:

"Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him." (verse 21)

"Jesus replied, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. ²⁴He who does not love me will not obey my teaching." (verse 23,24a)

"but the world must learn that I love the Father and that I do exactly what my Father has commanded me...." (verse 31)

I'd say Jesus is trying to get something across. That the motivation, the fuel if you will, of obedience is love and not fear or guilt or duty. Notice how he frames this concept in verse 31. He compares our loving obedience to his obedience to his Father. Jesus let's us know that what he is about to do the very next day on Good Friday is an act of love toward his Father.

It's here that we know for sure Jesus it not trying to induce guilt with his statement of "if you love me you will obey". Can you imagine Jesus obeying the Father through the gritted teeth of guilt and obligation? I think not.

So how are we supposed to apply these verses? Certainly Jesus is calling us to obey his teachings, but how can we "decide" to be fueled by love in our obedience? In a nut shell, receive what Christ has done for us. John writes in 1 John 4:19, "We love because He first loved us." This fuel that Christ speaks of is not something we can muster up but something that is the by product of drinking deeply of the gospel.

It's pictured beautifully in our experience of communion (Lord's supper, Eucharist). The food and drink is offered and we can do nothing but receive it. As it's received, the food and drink are taken into our body as nutrition which gives us physical strength. It's a symbolic experience that reminds us of our acceptance of the Gospel. A spiritual nourishment that fuels us into a life of loving obedience.

Thankful for Sex

2008-11-24T09:23:00.000-08:00

It's been a while since I've blogged so I thought I'd try to catch your attention. Jonah Goldshlag sent me this article about a church in Dallas who took the "Sex Challenge". Great Stuff. Have a Happy (maybe even sexy) Thanksgiving!

Little Foxes

2008-09-17T14:15:00.001-07:00

This week, I preached the second sermon of the Song of Solomon series. Part of that sermon was giving a list of the "little foxes" that couples should be looking out for. Here's the list:

• Insecurity
• Addictions
• Anger
• Inability to manage money
• Sexual past
• Sexual abuse
• Depression or other mental issues
• Communication
• Conflict (Cowboys or Eskimos)
• Conflict within families
• Faith

These are also issues to be aware of in general. Looking back at the sermon, I think I would have added this one caveat - whether you end up getting married or not you want to be cooperating with God's Spirit as He moves in you to transform these and other areas. All humans have little foxes that eat away at the root systems of our lives and need to be paid attention to. You don't want singleness or youthfulness to be an excuse to let things go until you get older and decide to deal later. The longer these issues are around, the more they sink their roots into our lives.

Not all Heroes Wear Capes - Bryan Hall

2008-09-06T10:31:00.001-07:00

I was in the Apple Store this week with my 13 year old son having his Ipod serviced. We were being waited on by a very helpful technician at the Genius Bar when I notice a message on one of the genius's shirts. It said "not all heroes wear capes". It got me thinking - "You know what? They're right!"

I've had a lot of heroes in my life so I thought that periodically I'd share about some of them. The first one that came to mind for some reason was Bryan Hall. Bryan was the youth minister at Woodlawn Baptist Church in Austin, TX when I was just starting out on my own journey in the church world. He's still there after serving over 20 years. Bryan isn't your typical youth dude. I noticed that most of the guys doing youth ministry were trying to be really cool so they could impress the kids which they thought would then lead to the kids wanting to listen to what they had to say.

Not Bryan. He is just comfortable being himself. For example, his main source of humor is punnery. This guy can make a pun out of anything and once on a roll he just can't be stopped. While the jokes are corny beyond compare, they stand as a symbol of his unique personality that God has shaped and used to bless a whole lot people in his church and beyond.

He has much more to offer than puns. He also has a really unique gift of administration. He can juggle a million and one details and make it look like he is having fun - I'm fairly certain it is because he is. While served as a youth minister at a church in Austin, he directed our yearly summer camp of 500 kids/chaperones and our yearly Mania Marathon event which was a New Years Celebration for teens that was attended by 2000 plus people and a yearly retreat for youth workers. All of this on top of his other duties at his local church.

While all of this admin looks like leaping tall buildings in a single bound - the most impressive part of his ministry is his relationships with his youth. He and I were assigned a Jr. High Boys cabin one year at camp. It was late at night. I had about had it with my little band of testostrone driven teeny boppers. They had finally gotten showered and in bed and I was settling in to my squeeky bunk for a moment to myself. As I lie there, I catch Bryan out of the corner of my eye.

He's working his way around the room to have an end of the day chat with every one of his junior high boys. With some, he had a laugh. With others, he had a serious conversation. With others, he said a quick prayer for whatever it was that was a pressing need. This man who had somehow got his sizable youth group through a day at camp, directed the whole camp, was now tending to God's flock that was under his care.

I don't think I said anything to Bryan that week but that moment sticks in my mind as a model for what ministry looks like. It's one life at a time. It's personal. It's delivered according to the needs of the person with whom you are working. It's done with a sacrificial love that can only come from Jesus.

Thanks Bryan - You're my hero.

Watchful and Thankful - On a Monday?

2008-09-01T08:27:00.000-07:00

Yesterday's sermon was on the nuts and bolts of prayer and came from Colossians chapter 4 verses 2-4. It was a reminder that we are called to devote ourselves to prayer (be consistent and intentional) and that we should be both "watchful" (looking forward for God's agenda instead of our own) and "thankful" (looking backward and remembering what He's done so far).

So here I am on a Monday morning. I'm not bantering from the basement because all three of my kids are down there and I'm in the living room trying to get some work done. My wife is out of town and so I'm on kid and pastor duty. I can hear the crying and fighting as I type knowing it's building up to a nuclear melt down that will need to be dealt with in the next few minutes.

Just a minute I hear them coming up the stairs now . . .

I suspect many of you are having a similar kind of Monday. Maybe it's kids that fight or finances that don't add up or morning sickness or who knows what. This is why we're told to "devote" ourselves to this prayer thing. It's when we feel the least like doing it that we need to do it. So from the bowels of a Monday morning, which is probably a better place to try this truth on for size than the Sunday morning hoopla, hear the sermon again. "Devote yourselves to prayer being watchful and thankful" and have a great Monday!

2020 vision (and the McCullahs) hits the ground

2008-08-14T05:03:00.000-07:00

Today, the 2020 vision of our church hits the ground in a major way. Ryan and Christie McCullah have arrived from Richmond, VA to join us in our efforts to plant more churches in our happy valley. Ryan is going to be our first "emerging planter" meaning he will be working alongside myself and other staff for the next year as well as be laying groundwork for a church plant in South Hadley, MA. They are in the middle of moving and raising financial support and trying to get their feet on the ground in a new culture. On top of that we are two weeks from lift off for the fall semester. I really appreciate their willingness to faith with us in this adventure and pray that God exceeds what they are currently imagining will be His work in them and through them.

Scoop the Poop

2008-07-21T13:08:00.000-07:00

When looking for qualified leaders in the church, I always watch to see whether they are willing to "scoop the poop". In our house, one of the most exciting chores is mowing the lawn. I have a riding lawn mower which for my two boys might as well be a Lamborghini. Every time they hear that engine roar, they come running to the garage to see if they can get a turn on 18 horses of pure adrenaline.

What they don't come running for is what precedes the YTD joy ride. In order to prepare the yard for mowing, one must first scoop the poop. We have an 80 pound golden retriever named Buddy that lives in our backyard and whatever he eats seems to always come out the other end. These deposits are made daily and rarely if ever removed until it's mowing time. When it comes time to do the deed, I often find myself combing the house looking for potential helpers.

When looking for church leadership, this scenario can play itself out in a very similar way. People are sometimes eager to serve in ways that bless them or give them recognition, but are not willing to be inconvenienced much less seek out menial jobs. Jesus did much to combat this consumerist way of thinking right up until and including his death.

In John 13, we see Jesus noticing that none of his disciples were interested in poop scooping. Everyone is sitting around the Passover table discussing who is going to get the top cabinet posts in the new kingdom. They were also probably wondering why one of the underlings wasn't hopping to it and getting their feet cleaned up before dinner. Then the embarrassingly unthinkable happens. Jesus scoops the poop.

Jesus, the one with the most credentials and the highest position in the company gets down on his hands and knees in order to wash off the dirt, poop, who knows what else from the disciple's feet. He then gives them a follow-up lecture on leadership which I'm sure He had given before but this time seemed more poignant.

"'Do you understand what I have done for you?' he asked them. 13'You call me 'Teacher' and 'Lord,' and rightly so, for that is what I am. 14Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. 15I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. 16I tell you the truth, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. 17Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.'" John 13:12b-17

He revealed to them that night (and the next day) what is at the heart of a leader - service. A Christian leader must have (and be constantly seeking) to serve others. We have hopefully found ourselves in the place of leadership in the church because the church has seen us giving ourselves away for others in response to the Gospel which is another scoop the poop story. Jesus describes His sacrificial death in this way

" just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many." Matthew 20:28

In other words, on a cosmic scale, he scooped the poop. The one who is highest doing that which is considered lowest. It is a special connection with Christ, when leaders embrace this calling in our lives to put the needs of others in front of our own as He did for us and for all of humanity.

My Big Fat Failure

2008-06-03T17:55:00.000-07:00

Every church planter has failures. One of mine was the way I communicated about money in the first few years of our church plant. I knew that people didn't like it when preacher types talked a lot about money so I wanted to stay as far away from it as I could. In our first 12 months, we didn't even put out an offering basket. The problem with this - giving is one of the most faith-building disciplines of the Christian life.

The Bible is clear that giving is something that every Christian should do. Generosity is to be one of the distinctives of the culture of church. We, who have received the most generous gift imaginable (the grace of the cross), are to mirror that same generosity toward others. The Apostle Paul communicates this to the church at Corinth in this way:

"Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work." (2 Corinthians 9:7,8)

New Testament giving is not something pressed on the Christian by some sort of compulsory law. It's a natural response to the generosity of God. This was my understanding of giving - and still is. My reasoning went something like this - If under the law, God's people gave 10 percent of their income back to Him, then Christians, who are under grace, should adopt at least 10 percent as their minimum standard for their giving.

I had adopted that minimum standard as my own when I was a college student. I was a 2 year old Christian. I had worked all summer painting and roofing houses. When I came back to school in the fall, I put in a tithe check for a few hundred dollars in the offering plate. From that point on, I have given at least ten percent to the church no matter what. Rarely has this worked out on paper. The writing of that check has always been an act of trust in God who is my provider and is intimately acquainted with my needs. Jesus says it this way:

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?" (Matthew 6:25,26)

Is God central to the reality that we live or not? This is rarely more real than when we are putting ourselves at financial risk in obedience to Him. When people ask me about trying to decide whether or not to give some money away to a friend in need or to a missionary or our church, I tell them that you can't go wrong giving resources away in the name of Christ. Can we really imagine the God Jesus is describing in Matthew 6 scolding us for being too generous and letting us starve? I think not. In fact, the opposite is true. When we're generous, God gives us an abundant harvest of new intimacy with Him, changed lives of those who receive the gift, and yes, more resources to take care of our needs and give away to others.

I was sitting in a conference a few months ago listening to the presenter talk about his own experience with giving. He and his wife had greatly sacrificed in order to bless their church and others. Then he started telling stories of how God had come through for them in concrete ways in order to meet the financial needs of their family. My mind immediately started to mull over my own list of stories. Cars given to us as gifts. Financial gifts of people I don't even know that enabled us to by our first house. A cabin in Maine that we're given the keys to every summer for a vacation at one of the most beautiful beaches in the country. Tens of thousands of dollars that have been given by individuals and one church that have paid our entire full-time salary for 8 years.

I started choking up thinking of all the ways God has blessed us even though our finances never work out on paper which is due in part because we give away over 10 percent of our salary each month. Then God spoke to me in my mind and He asked me a question, "Why are you hoarding this very meaningful spiritual discipline for yourself?" He was right. I had passed on the need for praying, for studying scripture, spending time with other Christians, sharing one's faith, but have rarely spoken to growing Christians about the importance of giving.

So I'm turning over a new leaf. I'm going to talk about money as part of the disciplemaking process. If you are reading this, I encourage you to do the same. To give extravagantly and teach others to do the same. It is one of the ways we can exhibit the grace we've been given to the glory of our exceedingly abundant God.

Welcoming Aliens

2008-05-29T12:18:00.000-07:00

My last blog post explored one of the major ways that we devote ourselves to "the fellowship" - that of discovering and employing our spiritual gifts. Another way is through hospitality. While some may have a special gift for hospitality, all Christians are exhorted throughout the New Testament to exercise this very important activity. Here are a couple of examples:

"Share with God's people who are in need. Practice hospitality" (Romans 12:13)

"Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling." (1 Peter 4:9)

This word, hospitality, is a translation of the greek word "Philoxenos" which means to be friendly (Philo) to the alien, stranger, or outsider (xenos). This hospitality is certainly to be extended to our close friends who are in the church but it is to be especially offered to those who are on the margins. Those who are new. Those who are nervous about stepping foot in a church. Those who are new to discussing the Bible and are unfamiliar with Christian terms. Those who have things in their lives about which they are feeling shame. These are the kinds of people that the church is making special effort to welcome into the family.

So how do you carry this out? The first is to adopt the mindset of "host" instead of "guest". Whenever we are in our home and people are coming over, we shift into the host mode. The doorbell rings and we answer it. We immediately greet whomever is at the door instead of waiting to be spoken to. We ask if there is anything that our guests would like to eat or drink. If someone spills, we hurry to get a napkin and clean things up so our guest doesn't feel any embarrassment.

This is how we want people to be thinking in regard to their interactions in the church. Our tendency is to meet enough people to feel socially comfortable and then ignore those that are new to the scene. If the new people want to break in, they have to initiate conversation themselves or have a friend on the inside that can help bridge the gap. This may work for some, but many will walk away, especially if engaging the church is scary to begin with.

Once you're looking outside yourself at those around who may be new, it's time to make the next step. Invite the person into your life. It's a great start to greet new people that you meet on a Sunday morning or at house church, but it's not enough to really welcome the alien. It will take an invite to grab a coffee or play softball or volunteer at a MH event. Those of us that are connected to the church, most likely had a person invite us into their lives in a significant way and that is why we stuck around.

The ultimate way of inviting someone into your life is to invite them into your home. In the early church, we see the first Christians meeting from house to house. There is something special that happens when a person gets to experience you where you live. So much is revealed about a person when you get to see them at home. The home itself. The other people that live there with you. Pets, hobbies, pictures, music . . . If you are a fully devoted follower of Christ, so much of Christ will be communicated through the experience of your home without you even knowing it.

This post is part of a series on the basics of being a disciple

God's Giveaway

2008-04-14T04:25:00.000-07:00

This past Sunday, I taught from Ephesians 4 where the Apostle Paul describes a team of spiritual coaches (Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors, Teachers) who are committed to helping every person in their local body of Christ discover and employ their spiritual gifts. This is a major way that we devote ourselves to "the fellowship" - one of the five devotions.

So what are spiritual gifts? Gifts given to every Christian for the purpose of building up the body of Christ. These unique graces are given on top of the grace of salvation. They are special gifts lavished on us by a loving Father and we are never more alive and in the zone than when we are putting these gifts to work in obedience to Christ.

So here's where I usually begin with teaching the gifts. Romans chapter twelve:

4Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, 5so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. 6We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man's gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. 7If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; 8if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.

1. Prophesying - This gift is able to foretell and forth tell. Foretell, as in cast a God inspired vision for individuals or for the church at large. Forth tell, as in speak truth to an individual or the church even when it hurts. Notice that there is a warning to do this only in proportion to "his faith" meaning that this person should be careful to not let there mouth get in front of their life and to be careful to speak only when prompted by the Spirit.

2. Serving - This gift sees needs and meets them. Very practical and behind the scenes.

3. Teaching - This gift is able to communicate the truth of the Bible in a way that is memorable and relevant.

4. Encouraging - This gift is able to help others move forward by specifically pointing out strength or weakness.

5. Giving - This gift enables a person to be a conduit for God's resources. They freely give away resources because they are fully confident that God will provide more.

6. Leadership / Administration - This gift enables a person to analyze a situation, strategize a plan to meet the needs of that situation, and mobilize others to execute the plan.

7. Mercy - This gift enables a person to empathize with someone who is hurting - entering into their pain which brings comfort and hope to the hurting person.

Each of the above seven gifts describe ways that all Christians are to serve in the church, but each Christian is also uniquely skilled to employ a certain combination of the gifts (see also 1 Corinthians 12).

So how do I discover which one's I have? Ask yourself these questions:

1. What things am I really passionate about when it comes to serving others?
(helping broken people (mercy); correcting error or communicating vision (prophecy); explaining truths (teaching); getting concrete tasks done (service); organization and delegation (leadership); resourcing ministry (giving); cheering others on (encouragement).

2. What things do I do well?
As in, what things have you done in the ministry of the church that have been fun and fruitful.

3. What things do people tell me I do well?
If you can't think of any encouragement that you've received from others in a specific area, ask someone you trust what they think. It is impossible for any one of us to see ourselves clearly. God's designed it this way so we will be interdependent - one of the important reasons for the diversity of these gifts.

Now go put your gifts to work!

Hannah Montanna and the Heart of Worship

2008-03-07T06:46:00.000-08:00

At MERCYhouse, we try to organize our church around 5 devotions - Worship, The Word, Prayer, The Church, and Our mission in the World. One of these devotions is central to all the others and that one is worship.

So what is worship? The closest thing to a definition that I've ever found in the Bible is Romans 12:1. The Apostle Paul writes:

"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."

He starts with the object of worship, that is, God. The Bible throughout Old and New Testament depicts human beings as worshipers. The first two commandments deal with having no other gods before God and prohibit worshiping idols. While this makes sense in an ancient world where everyone was worshiping multiple gods, does this really apply today?

I'd say it does. Worship doesn't have to revolve around something religious, it can be anything that we choose to put at the center of our lives. As human beings, we crave something that we can commit to, think on, work for, sacrifice for, celebrate, tell others about. We are never not worshiping something.

I was reminded of this, when a news story broke a few months back when a tweener, who really wanted to see Hannah Montana, wrote a phony letter into a radio station to try and win some free tickets and back stage passes. She put in the letter how her dad died in Iraq, which wasn't true, in order to better her chances of winning. The letter worked and she ended up getting the tickets.

Then the media started asking her and her mother about their fallen father/husband and they both kept up the lying until someone confirmed that it was a hoax. Most who saw this story shrugged and wondered when they'd be on the next Jerry Springer, but something more was happening here - worship.

The desire to see, be with, experience, celebrate Hannah Montana had become the center of this family's life and they were willing to sacrifice anything to make that happen. Something about that chip off the akey breaky heart, had taken over their mind, will, and emotions to the point that anything that tried to unseat this priority (common sense, fear of embarrassment, morality) was quickly pushed out of the way.

I can certainly remember days as a young tweener church goer when I'd never have dreamed of making that kind of sacrifice for Jesus. For example, I would say just about anything to fit in with friends and have a good time. Even if that included taking God's name in vain or making fun of a kid that wasn't part of our group. Even though I knew a lot about Jesus, believed he existed and that He died for my sin, I wasn't worshiping Him.

Everyone who experiences Christian conversion, becomes a worshiper of Jesus. They have gotten a view of His mercy (aka the gospel) and it has set in motion a surrender of their mind, will, and emotions to such a degree that that they now become a "living sacrifice." The Apostle Paul is most likely speaking of the "whole burnt offering" of the Old Testament that was not mandated by the law. It was instead a free will offering that was completely consumed as a way to communicate to God absolute surrender.

This is what our hearts are all longing for. Something that takes such a high priority in our lives that nothing, not even embarrassment or common sense, can unseat it from our center. It's what makes everything else (the Bible, prayer, church, our mission out in the world) come to life and maintain a level of passion and perseverance that will continue all the days of our life.

*This article is part of a series on leadership.

The Grip of The Gospel

2008-02-13T11:42:00.000-08:00

This past November I was reading Oswald Chambers' My Utmost for His Highest and was struck by this quote:

"The thing that awakens the deepest well of gratitude in a human being is that God has forgiven sin. When once you realize all that it cost God to forgive you , you will be held as in a vice constrained by the love of God."

My mind immediately went to memories of my grandfather working in his shop. He was always tinkering with some sort of metal object that needed bending or shaping. He would take it over to his old rusty vise and crank it down nice and tight. Then he'd take his ball pin hammer and wail away on it until he obtained his desired result.

I would then go over and try it on for size. Finding an old scrap of metal, I would put it in the vise , muster up all the power of my 70 pound frame and bang on it until my ears rang. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get the thing to let loose - which probably saved me from a good many shrapnel wounds. I couldn't help but be continually amazed at the grip that thing had.

The vise grip of the Gospel is the beginning of every person's story who is an authentic Christian. Though the method of delivery is different for everyone, all are gripped by the truth that they are in a hopeless situation because of their sin and out of His absolute goodness, God gave them (through Christ) a free gift of forgiveness. This is the Gospel - the good news.

Christian conversion via this gospel secures a surrender of our mind, will, and emotions such that we are lovingly constrained as in a spiritual vice. This is essential seeing as how life is going to come at us like a wild eyed junior higher with a ball pin hammer. Recently, a scripture about the centrality of the gospel in our Christian walk came to my attention. It's in Hebrews 13 and says "It is good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace." Implying that it may not be the best idea to seek strength from other (graceless) sources.

These other sources? Anything relating to performance comes to mind. As a pastor, I often find myself enslaved to an approval cycle. Feeling on top of the world on Sunday (if things go well) and then in a pit of despair on Monday when it's just me and God in silence. When I get in these patterns, the road out of them is always the same - go back to the gospel.

You don't have to be a pastor to fall into these cycles. The default of every human heart is to go back to earning our way into the good favor of God. A heart that draws strength primarily from consistent Bible reading, effective evangelism, intimate worship experiences . . . is headed for a manic-depressive spirituality that is going to end in some serious burnout. Unless, of course, these activities are a means to seeing and savoring (that's a John Piper) the gospel that gripped us in the first place.

Everything that we do on this side of conversion is a response of praise, thanksgiving, worship if you will for the free gift of grace given to us in the Christ event. So as we begin our road down a list of characteristics and skills to be sought after by leaders. Let's start with and stay with the most important - to be firmly constrained in the grip of the Gospel.

*This article is part of an ongoing series of articles about leadership

What I'll be blogging on in the new year.

2008-01-17T09:54:00.000-08:00

It's been a while since I've posted. I'm on the road for most of this month so I won't be posting much. So here's the plan for the coming months. I've been talking about the need for hanging out with folks. No matter how young a person is in Christ, they have something to offer as long as they continue to grow in their relationship with Jesus. For the next several posts, I'll be covering some of the basic areas of growth in a disciple's life. Below is a list of the particular areas. My hope is to use this process to get some writing done and then put the results in a book that will be used with our leaders. I'm hoping to hear some feedback as to what would be most helpful in the different areas mentioned or if there are areas that are missing.

1. The Gospel (How every topic on this page and more all stem from the gospel - the gift of grace given to us in the Christ event)

2. The Five Devotions, (Five domains of the Christian life: Worship, Prayer, The Word, The Church, The World )

3. Time Management (the grid: roles, goals, time sheet, evaluation and tweaking)

4. Fishing For Humans (taking initiative in the lives of others in your life or in a fishing pool event)

5. The Small Group Experience: Hospitality; Community Building; Corporate Worship; Bible Study Discussion; Prayer

6. Fishing For Humans (taking initiative in the lives of your small group members)

7. Shepherding: Listening and Questions (the art of conversation)

8. Shepherding: Biblical Guidance (common issues in the lives of disciples)

9. Mobilization: Spiritual Gifts (Romans 12, Ephesians 4, 1 Corinthians 12)

10. Multiplication: 3 stages of raising leaders (Jesus did it / they watched; they did it Jesus watched; they did it)

The How to of the Hook - Christmas

2007-12-27T12:53:00.000-08:00

If you've read my earlier two posts (hook for humans) you may be thinking yeah, yeah, yeah I know that stuff. Jesus and His mission are the only real food for searching hungry hearts, but how do you actually draw someone in with the Gospel bait. In a word - Christmas. I'm not talking about some sort of cool Christmas outreach. I'm talking about the theology behind Christmas.

Christmas is a time when we celebrate when God took on human flesh so He could do several things, one of which, is hang out with humans. There's a story in the first chapter of the book of John that seems so insignificant. You may even wonder why it's there. It's (soon to be disciples of Jesus) John and Andrew. They've been hanging out with John the Baptist which incidentally had to be a weird ride. John tips them off that the whole reason he has been in ministry has just walked by in a robe and sandals.

John and Andrew abruptly start stalking Jesus until He gets the hibbee jibbees and turns around to inquire why they are intruding on His personal space. They are understandably nervous, having never met a Messiah before and they say to Jesus that they only want to see where He lives. His answer to them is to "Come and See."

Jesus is no idiot (a gross understatement I know). He knows what these guys are up to and could have gone into a red letter discourse that would have made your head spin, but He doesn't. He simply let's them come up close and personal. The scripture says they then spent the day with Him. Can you imagine? Spending the day with the Godman. We're hard pressed to find a regular old human who would be willing to spend the day with us much less want to. By the end of the day, Andrew is so stoked over his hang out time that he can't wait to go fishing for his brother Simon (soon to be Peter). Jesus has successfully begun to fish for men and did it through the ministry of hanging out.

When we came here to plant a church in 1999, we had been trained to market our vision for the start-up of a new church. The idea was to do a publicity blitz with slick post cards and news ads. It would cost thousands but was supposed to bring in a sizable crowd for our launch service. Before we could really get launched with this strategy, most of our start-up money was cut for one reason or another. Because of this, our "strategy" had to shift to the ministry of hanging out.

We set-up a table at Umass and met a few folks. Invited them to a start-up meeting and from there engaged in the ministry of hanging out. Some of those folks became Christians. Some, who were already Christians, grew immensely. All of them started doing the same in their own circles of influence. The result has been a church that has been planted in a place where most church plants have failed. While we've definitely spent money, it's been mostly on staff who spend lots of time cultivating relationships and encouraging others to do the same. Our biggest challenge is passing that vision on to each generation of MERCYhousers.

This hanging out ministry is so simple and yet so hard. It's simple because all you need is a living/growing/transforming relationship with Christ. You need not worry about having a huge storehouse of pat answers to spring on your unsuspecting victims at a moments notice. You only need Christlike love for the people you are hanging out with and your own story about walking with Christ.

It's hard because it takes a huge investment of time and energy and sometimes other resources as well. People are, well, messy, and there is no getting around it. It is so tempting (and yes it is a temptation to sin) to close the door on new relationships and hang out with only those who are safe and encouraging. Thank God Jesus didn't do that. He chose to risk and to be inconvenienced and give his whole day to a bunch of punks from Galilee. Come to think of it, gave His whole life to a bunch of punks from planet earth. Let's follow in His steps and do the same.

A Hook for Humans II

2007-12-13T13:43:00.000-08:00

The other intriguing part (see earlier post for part I) of Jesus' invitation to his first followers is that it includes the opportunity to give one's life away to the mission of Jesus. This too rings strange in the ears of Christian consumers. Why would Jesus tell people He wanted them to do something for him before they've even decided they want to follow him in the first place. A couple of reasons come to mind.

As was stated in the earlier post, Jesus is good enough in and of himself to be followed no questions asked. The reason we are able to do this is because He has already shown that he can be trusted by going through the most humiliating, painful death imaginable before we said yes to anything. Whatever He asks of us will always pale in comparison to what He's already done for us - no questions asked.

But there is more to this invitation. Jesus knows that we are hard wired to be on a mission with God. From the very beginning, God and human beings are working alongside each other. When God creates Adam (6th day), the first thing Adam does is rest (7th day) but immediately after the one day rest God and Adam are on the job bright and early on Sunday morning - naming animals and tending the garden. God still sees our vocations in a similar light. Fishing for fish (or designing semi conductors or sweeping the floor) is a way to co labor with the Creator. We are wired to work with God.

Because of the fall of man, we've got an extra thing on our to do list that Adam and Eve didn't have back in Genesis 2. Those who have reconciled with God through Christ are not only on mission with God in whatever career they find themselves in at the moment, but they are also commissioned to be a fisher of humans. We get to ride shotgun with Christ as He continues to do the same kind of fishing that we see Him doing on that sandy beach in Galilee. It is one of the most exciting, challenging, stretching experiences that you will ever have and is one of the "hooks" that pulls you into a relationship with Jesus.

I'll talk more about what it means to fish for humans in the next post

The Hook for Humans

2007-12-03T12:34:00.000-08:00

I've always found it interesting how Jesus gets his first followers. He doesn't invite them to a big meeting with free lattes or promise them 10 steps to a better life. He says "follow me and I will make you fishers of men". This seems strange in the age of consumer church. What is Jesus getting at by using such a "hook".

Two things. The first is that Jesus is good enough in and of himself to be followed. These first followers were certainly not following Jesus because they thought he was going to give them the easy life nor did Jesus represent that he was offering this. We find Jesus talking with a group of potential followers in the Gospel of Matthew. One of them declares with great emotion that he plans to follow Jesus wherever he goes. Jesus' quick reply is that he (Jesus) has no place to lay his head implying that the man should perhaps reconsider his decision to follow Jesus because of the unknown hardships he may end up facing. Another person pipes in and declares his need to take care of aging parents before fully following Jesus. Again, Jesus answers with a surprisingly harsh statement that the dead should be left to bury themselves.

Still people signed up to follow. They even signed up to die for him. Why did they do this? This is one of the proofs that Jesus was who he said he was. That people were willing to follow him with nothing to gain. This is an especially powerful argument when we see that many of these same followers continued to follow Jesus even after his crucifixion and did so to their own peril.

There have been many who have tried to explain this phenomenon away. Everything from grand conspiracy theories to group hallucinations. The fact remains that these followers of Jesus remained true to Christ and true to the message of his death, burial, and resurrection and did so without any promise of earthly health and wealth. Their encounter with Jesus, himself was all that it took.

Listen to this Apostle as he describes his encounter with Jesus: "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. 2The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. 3We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ." (1John 1:1-3)

While a relationship with Jesus can definitely improve your life in a variety of ways, this is not why we are to follow Him. We follow Him because he is who he said he was. The Godman who came to rescue us from our sin and did so by dying and rising. This is also how we are to "fish for men." While I do think the church should incorporate some of the principles of our marketplace into it's "outreach", all we have to offer once people are in the door is Jesus himself. If that's not good enough they're going to have to go somewhere else.

Next week I'll talk about the other part of the hook - getting to become a fisher of people.

Prayer of Confession

2007-11-29T09:52:00.001-08:00

Recently I got a really cool birthday gift from a great aunt of mine. They are A Man Called Peter and The Prayers of Peter Marshall. Peter Marshall was a pastor back in the 30's and 40's who was known for his amazing prayers. He was eventually asked to be the Senate Chaplain and served Republicans and Democrats alike. The books were originally owned by my great grandmother (Maude Clemons). She and my great grandfather (Thomas Lincoln Clemons) loved Jesus a lot and gave their whole lives in service to him.

Below is one of the prayers by Peter Marshall. It is a prayer of repentance that I plan to use this Sunday as a way to start the season of Advent. I've edited out the Thees and Thous to make it a little easier to read.

"Confession" by Peter Marshall O Lord, I come to you out of my great need. You have pledged your word that whosoever comes to You shall in no way be cast out.

I dare to pray something will happen to me in Your presence. Lord, I know I need to be changed! For the visions that once swept across the leaden skies of monotony, like white-winged gulls, have dimmed and faded, and I would see them again. Open my eyes.

Shame fills my heart as I remember the aspirations that I have breathed before You, the vows I made, the resolves that were born, the seedlings of consecration that were planted in my heart. I blush to remember the withering blight that touched them all – my failure, my shortcomings.

Lord, I confess before You that: I have had longings and nudges from You which I did not translate into action;

I have made decisions without consulting You, then have blamed You when things went wrong.

I have said that I trusted You, yet have not turned my affairs over to You.

I have been greedy for present delights and pleasures, unwilling to wait for those joys which time and discipline alone can give.

I have often sought the easy way, have consistently drawn back from the road that is hard.

I have been fond of giving myself to dreams of what I am going to do sometime, yet have been so slow in getting started to do them.

Forgive me for all the intentions that were born and somehow never lived. These, Lord Jesus, are sins, grievous in Your sight, grievous even in mine.

And now I claim Your promise to change me. Do You for me what I cannot do for myself. Lead me into a new tomorrow with a new spirit. Cleanse my heart, create within me new attitudes and new ideas, as only You can create them.

For these good gifts, I thank You, Lord. Amen.

The Marketing of God

2007-11-12T12:46:00.000-08:00

MERCYhouse made the news this week, or should I say The Buzz (click for article). If you live here in the Pioneer Valley, you've probably seen newstands with "The Buzz" in big red letters. It's an entertainment/news monthly that has been around a couple of years.

I had a blast talking to their executive editor Greg Saulmon. He planted the newspaper from scratch as one of several target specific papers distributed by the Sunday Republican. He and his counterpart did something you don't often see these days - journalism. They actually did their homework and wrote a stellar article about church in the valley.

What gave them the idea for a story about church was seeing the oldest Congregational church in Springfield close its doors because of dwindling funds and membership. At the same time they were seeing (and hearing) advertisements for the new Vineyard Church plant in Northampton and the new MERCYhouse site also in Northampton. This got Greg to thinking, "What's the difference?"

Their hunch was that it was marketing. That newer, growing churches are using more modern means for getting "the word" out. To some degree, they found what they were looking for. Growing churches seem to have websites and advertising. More modern worship environments and loud music. Even those that they interviewed from dying churches disdainfully confirmed that growing churches were selling out to Madison Ave.

I'd say that relevant marketing and communications are more than some slick technique to keep the church growing. They reveal something deeper about the ancient message that the church has held to for 2000 years. Usually referred to as "The Gospel" which means good news, it's the story of how God became a human in order to reconcile human beings to himself. It is God's cosmic marketing strategy for getting His product (himself) to his customers (human beings).

God, who is all knowing, all powerful, and all present considers his potential target - human beings. He tries thunder and lightening at Mt Sinai, appears as a low lying cloud in the Jerusalem temple, he even sends out 100's of salesmen (aka prophets) all with little success. He then unveils his most brilliant marketing approach yet. He becomes a little Jewish zygote in the womb of an unwed mother in a backwater village called Nazareth.

The fusion of God's bend over backwards accomodation with his unchanging message of a need for humans to reconcile with God is not only the source of salvation for the church, but also the model for how they are to go about proclaiming this good news. As Jesus is readying the disciples for his earthly departure, He gives them these instructions, "As the Father has sent me, so I am sending you."

As the church, our job is to continue to search for ways to communicate the ancient message of the gospel in ways that make sense to our culture. To dress it up in those neutral elements of the culture that serve as bridges to those who are seemingly far from God.

Life with Jesus is a Free Ride

2007-10-31T08:30:00.000-07:00

This past weekend, almost 100 people joined up at MERCYhouse for the purpose of driving drunk people around for 2 nights from 10pm to 3am. It was our annual "Free Rides" event. We've done this for the past 8 years for the purpose of keeping intoxicated people off the road during one of the biggest party weekends of the year. It is always a great weekend with hundreds of rides given to hundreds of people - most of whom are Umass students.

Every year I'm always struck by a contrast. The contrast of the free ride that is given to hundreds with the actual cost that goes into the ride. Before the event even happens there is planning, postering, passing out thousands of little business cards with the free rides number on them. Then the night of the event, people give up their weekend and a lot of sleep in order to drive the vans and cover the dispatch center. The day after when everyone is more hung over from free rides than are the passengers, there is still the cleaning of vans and returning them to the rental company. Last year that included some vomit removal. Just when you think that the expense of free rides is over, the credit card bill arrives with about $2000 of charges for van rentals, gas, and publicity.

Now wait a minute, I thought these rides were free? They are, to those that take the ride, but for those who provide the ride it is at a high cost. It's one of the things I like about this service event. It's something that people really appreciate and it comes at a relatively high cost to MERCYhouse. It is representative of the gospel that we love and try to live.

When we become a Christian, we are essentially taking a free ride from Jesus. His rescue of us from our drunken sinfully selfish stupor is free to us but comes at an infinite cost to Him. This is the essence of the good news that has come into the world. There are three responses that people make to this offer of a free ride and only one is appropriate.

Some respond by not recognizing the value of the free gift and their need for it. They simply take it for granted, even trample all over it. One of the challenges of the free rides weekend is that we always have more people calling for rides than we can handle. That means we have to stop taking calls. Whenever we answer the phones and try to explain to people that we are too swamped to pick anyone else up, many of the callers (granted, they are drunk) cuss out our dispatchers and try to heap blame on them saying that we are now responsible for them driving drunk and killing themselves on the road.

There are many who respond to Jesus this way. Jesus has died for the sins of the world and anyone who wants to take this free gift of forgiveness can have it, the result of which is new life now lasting throughout all eternity. Many scoff at this great offer and instead shake their angry fists at God, shouting at him because he doesn't run the universe (aka their lives) like they want Him to.

Some respond to the free gift by trying to pay for it. Every year we have people that insist on paying for the ride. We say over and over, "This is free rides. There is no cost." Still, a few people every year insist on paying by throwing money into the van as they run off because they feel guilty for taking something for nothing. This may be the result of proper breeding but when it comes to the free ride that Jesus is offering, trying to earn his gift is a big mistake.

We can't fully take the free gift that Jesus is offering unless we admit that we a bankrupt and unable to offer Him anything that makes us worthy of the gift. So many of us respond to the good news of Jesus' free ride by trying to clean ourselves up and somehow earn the "free ride". This makes absolutely no sense because not only can we not pay for the ride, we need Jesus to clean up our vomit and forgive us for a couple of million relapses. Our seemingly noble act of trying to pay a little something actually disqualifies us from receiving the free gift as much or more than response #1.

Some respond to the free gift with gratitude. Most of the riders on the vans simply can't say thank you enough. They are aware that people are giving their weekends. Some even mention the cost for vans and gas. This is the response to Jesus' free gift of grace and forgiveness that He is looking for. An ever growing awareness of his infinite cost that propels us not to get a little part-time job to pay him back but to live in gratitude for the free gift. A free rides service by Jesus that we then mimic as we represent Christ to the world around us. This is life with Jesus - a "free" ride.

The Dunkin' Donuts Church

2007-10-15T08:08:00.001-07:00

There have been some rumors being spread around MERCYhouse these days. Rumors that we're hoping and praying for a whole lot of churches to be planted and a whole lot of people to be in them. Last week someone told me "I heard MERCYhouse is going to plant 200 churches in 4 years". I knew at this point that we had a problem.

A good problem in fact. Imagine a church that gossips about church planting. Well imagine no more, MERCYhouse is such a church. It all started this summer with some brainstorming and prayer in the month of June. I was praying and so were others about the longer term dreams at MERCYhouse. Here are the beginnings of that vision.

Our prayer is that 10% of our immediate area would be reached for Christ by 2020. That's a total of about 10,000 people. If you haven't noticed, we live in an area with fewer Christians than some regions in China. 10% would be a major move of God in our area. So... we've got this God sized prayer request, now what.

Well, like most prayer requests, we have to consider if there are ways that we could cooperate with God in his work toward making this happen. Our answer? A church planting movement. If God is to reach into the hearts and lives of 10,000 people in our area, that means they are going to have to be gathered into a church in order to find Christ and find community. I don't think MERCYhouse has the parking for such a crowd. I also don't think people in the northeast are really into the whole mega church thing anyway.

Case in point - Dunkin' Donuts. I used to drink a few cups of their coffee every month two years ago. Now I drink multiple cups every week. What happened? Other than a growing addiction to caffeine, they erected one of their temples to the caffeine god practically in my backyard. I can walk there in 3 minutes. It's right next to my grocery store and my bank and the post office. Places I'd be going anyway.

So far we've got five DD stores in Amherst and Hadley alone and there are probably plans for more. You may wonder why they don't just put up a Dunkin' Donuts Supercenter on route 9 and be done with it. It's because they know that putting smaller stores in the crossroads of people's well worn paths is a better strategy for selling really good cups of coffee and stale donuts. So what's the point?

It illustrates one of the reasons we think a church planting movement is how we could best cooperate with God as He reaches into our valley. We could start a TV ministry, advertise on billboards, build a Jesus supercenter on route 9 and I think we might could grow to a whopping 500 people. It would be exciting but what would it really accomplish in the grand scheme of things.

Instead, our prayer is that we'd see 50 churches planted by the year 2020. If those churches grew to an average of MERCYhouse's size right now, we'd see 10,000 people reached for Christ and gathered into community. It will start slow but grow exponentially. Some churches will grow bigger others will stay smaller. Some won't make it and some will seem like the rock stars of the movement. The goal is not the "success" of individuals or churches but instead our cooperation with God's work here in the valley.

You'll be hearing more about this in the coming weeks and months. Begin (or continue) praying with us that God would awaken our valley and that we would be attentive to His invitation to get involved.

Banter from the Basement

2007-10-08T17:47:00.000-07:00

Here it goes. I'm joining the more than 40,000 people starting a blog today. I'm calling it "Banter from the Basement" because I office out of my basement and am often doing my work there among the piled up laundry, boxes of assorted junk, and everything else we don't want the rest of the world to see. I'm also calling it this because in the church I lead, we want everyone to come to the basement as quickly as possible.

When we talk about the journey that we hope people take, we start with the front door which is usually a friend. That friend then brings the person to the foyer - that's Sunday morning. Then as quickly as we can, we invite them into the living room - that's house churches. Before you know it, we're encouraging them toward the kitchen - which is service somewhere in our church or in the community. The final destination? The basement. This is leadership. It's the place where we most live out the teaching of Jesus, "whoever wants to save his life will loose it".

It's down in the basement where the chores get done. Where all the stuff that no one sees happens. It's the destiny of every person who desires to be a Christian leader. There is certainly a public face to leadership, but much of what makes a person a leader is what happens in the darkest corners of one's character as well as the behind the scenes work of worship and service.

The purpose of this blog is to encourage people down the ladder. To speak to the issues that people in leadership face. To add appendices to the Sunday morning sermon that may help people to step down a few more notches. To ultimately contribute to the movement of personal growth and church planting that we hope continues to expand here in the happy valley.