Weekend Reading, 11 September

Frank

I’m going to bypass my usually lengthy roundup of the week and instead direct you towards other compilations.

My recommended reading from last week is just one. On this day, for what all it means, we need to be reminded that monsters are real. Thank you Billy Coffey for such a terrific post.

God bless you all this weekend. Please say a prayer in remembrance of September 11, that the Prince of Peace will come to bring everlasting peace and that we may find what temporary peace there may be until He comes

Flashback Friday: Fast

Frank

***Originally posted on March 25, 2010. This has been heavy on my heart lately, stirred by Andrea Stasyszen’s post last week. The couple mentioned below has another hearing on the 18th. We pray it is the last. The couple mentioned later that adopted embryos just had a baby boy, 100% naturally, a week ago.***

I fasted yesterday. I don’t say that to boast, but rather to note that I don’t do it often. Maybe not often enough. But yesterday was too important not to. Some friends of ours had a court date over the custody of their adopted nine month-old daughter.

Since she was only two days old, this couple with two older boys, also adopted, has been the only family she’s known. Her birth mother had no objection to giving her up for adoption (having lost custody before to other children). And the birth father was unaware the mother was even pregnant. But that was then. Once the father did find out, he wanted to be involved, and has been fighting ever since. I don’t know anything about either parent other than that. But I do know the family that is on the verge of being ripped apart.

There’s nothing special about this court date. They’ve had others and they’ll likely have more. But our friends are tired. The weight of legal fees is multiplied by the economy reducing his hours and cutting her job. Tuesday they put their house on the market, unable to bear that additional weight. So my wife and I fasted yesterday. Only God knows what is best for this precious girl. But the prayer is for this just to be over.

My wife and I are especially sensitive to this. Both of us were adopted. Both under very different circumstances. In addition to these friends of ours, other couples we’re close to have adopted from China and have even adopted embryos. One of our good friends is a social worker for the Department of Child and Family Services. My wife teaches half-time [now back to full time] in an “alternative” school, a PC way of saying her school is one step away from Juvie. She teaches the other half at an “urban” school (inner-city wouldn’t accurately describe it because of geography, but urban certainly describes its demographics) that will permanently close its doors at the end of the school year. [side note: a 14 year-old would-be freshman girl and student at this school last year was just killed in a drive-by early Sunday morning, right around the corner from a park my church met at to reach out two weeks ago] So you might say we’re on the front lines of this battle for the health and welfare of these children.

It is the children who are at stake. I pray this baby girl has no recollection of this tug-of-war ever happening. I pray she never has to know. But I also pray that the bonding that has happened over the past year, that is so important developmentally, is not all for naught.

It is the children who are at stake. Tuesday I wrote about the faithfulness of God in context of the infidelity we see too frequently in our headlines. In each of these cases, Jesse James, Tiger Woods, John Edwards, children are sired and then transformed into gotcha headlines or publicity stunts. The media creates permanent memorials that will haunt these children the rest of their lives.

It is the children who are at stake. Every day a child is given up, either with the hope of a better life or out of despair of present circumstance, opposite sides to the same coin. Every day a child is born into a single-parent home. Boys raised without any father figures other than elder leadership in the neighborhood gang. Girls raised without the bonding they need to value their bodies so they spend the rest of their lives seeking that affirmation in any and every way.

It is the children who are at stake. The decisions we make. The relationships we have. The love we either share or willfully withhold. Abuse, either physical or verbal, and neglect or unavailability leave scars that do not heal.

It is the children who are at stake. Thank you JoAnne Bennett and Jeff Jordon [and also Andrea Stasyszen] for your battles to remind us. Thank you Lord for hearing our prayers. Thank you El Roi for seeing the need and answering our prayers by giving us clear instruction of what we must do to stop this cycle from repeating as it has for countless generations.

Learn to do right! Seek justice, encourage the oppressed. Defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow. (Isaiah 1:17)

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. (James 1:27)

Jesus Shaped

Frank

I wanted to figure out a way to shoe-horn chapter 4 of Michael Spencer’s Mere Churchianity into Bridget Chumbley’s blog carnival on Hope. But that’s been our problem hasn’t it, trying to pound a square peg into a round hole, making the message of Jesus into something it’s not? Don’t get me wrong, second to love I would say that hope best describes Jesus’ ministry. But you couldn’t tell that today. And that is Michael’s point. What if Jesus showed up at your church for an “inspection”? Would he find it hopeful, in-line with his teachings? Or would he find it hopeful, filled with pop-psychology and an over-emphasis on feeling good?Would he even recognize it?

Michael argues that we’ve become so comfortable in our Jesus-culture, that we forget Jesus. In fact, to suggest following Jesus can be so radical that you may find yourself rejected, or worse, labeled a cult. To even have the nerve to advertise your church as “making Jesus popular” is so not-Jesus shaped it isn’t funny. I was recently in a toy store and I saw a Jesus action figure. I wanted it for no other reason than to remind myself that Jesus is real, not plastic. On and on I could go with examples, casting stones, with no suggestions of what to do about it. So let me share a recent personal journey in hopes it will lead us all to be more Jesus shaped.

A couple of years ago I was at a large event and an Elder was preaching on one of the miracles of Jesus. He made an anecdotal point using this miracle that didn’t hold up against the rest of Jesus’ miracles. As soon as he said it (I won’t say what) I immediately thought to myself, “that can’t be right” and I spent the rest of the sermon thumbing through my Bible to make sure I wasn’t crazy. He shoe-horned a good point into one of Jesus’ miracles that had nothing to do with that point, and he misrepresented the Word of God doing so. Mind you, this was an Elder, whose Biblical role is to ensure that the Church is teaching the Truth.

Hard, cold reality set in at that moment. I couldn’t rely on leaders, preachers, pastors or evangelists to chart my course spiritually. I needed to be led by Christ and his Word. But did I know it? So I made a vow to the Lord that I would study out the life and teachings of Jesus. I set out to read through the four Gospels in chronological order using several Bibles mixing up translations and commentaries and planned to read Jesus-specific books following (titles like Jesus the Same, the Jesus I Never Knew, etc) to close out the year. What was meant to last a few months in the Gospels and finish the year with a book a month, took over a year. I still haven’t technically finished (there are a couple more books to read).

I’m not saying this to boast. In fact it was so overwhelming I really need to take the time and go back over it. But it was an example of being proactive to be Jesus shaped. How can we claim to follow Him if we don’t know what He said, or how He lived? I want to approach this book positively rather than a blanket condemnation against the Church today. I can’t think of a better way to combat that cultural and spiritual malaise in the Church than to challenge ourselves to be Jesus shaped and there’s no better way to do that than to spend time immersed in his life through the Gospels.

This post adds to the discussion on Michael Spencer’s book, Mere Churchianity being hosted by Nancy at Bend the Page. Visit there for links to others in the discussion. And don’t forget to stop by Bridget’s for the Carnival too!

Are you a member of a cult?

Frank

Scary title, but bear with me for a moment. The term cult is thrown around a lot to disparage churches whose doctrine we don’t agree with. I don’t want to minimize real Jim Jones-like cults, but I want us to think about the definition for a moment. What are the three main attributes of a cult?

  1. Religious devotion to a single individual who alone defines doctrine and lifestyle
  2. Separation from the world, including family and friends
  3. Unorthodox theology and practice

Now consider the following:

  1. John 14:6
  2. Luke 14:26
  3. John 6:60

The notion in Chapter 4 of Mere Churchianity is that our churches actually don’t want to follow Jesus. After all, wouldn’t that make them a cult?

So my question this week is, Is Your Church a Cult?

Please come back later today for more discussion on Mere Churchianity.

Weekend Reading, 4 September

Frank

As always, there are more quality blogs than I could possibly link. These are what I found via Twitter and there, it’s just a matter of timing- if I see a link while I’m on, I’ll click it. So my apologies if I missed you. I hope to catch you next time. Best (worst?) example was the effort of @ivoryjohn to raise money for Blood: Water Missions via retweets on Twitter. I retweeted the announcement that he was going to to this yesterday and then totally spaced it last night. I hope he does it again and I hope then I’m less flaky.

I also want to lead off with this post from Maurilio Amorim on the narcissism behind blogging and social media. It is a definite temptation, which is one of my main motivations for doing the “weekend readings“. I’m not in it for my glory, or even to hype these other bloggers, but for God’s glory. My hope and prayer is that through these links you might read something you might not have otherwise or catch a post you missed, and through the thoughts, convictions, and writings of others grow in your walk with Christ. Ok, on with the show…

A common theme I’ve found over the weeks is that of pastor burnout.

  • Perry Noble credits his wife and daughter for their encouragement and stresses that family remain a priority.
  • Ron Edmonson gives tips from his marathon training to avoid burnout by pacing yourself. (I personally love this, with my wife being a marathoner!)
  • Darryl at DashHouse posted on the value of sabbaticals to avoid burnout. A welcome suggestion and something I’m going to pursue for my own pastor.
  • Amy Sorrells challenges us to think like a Chilean miner when we get stuck. Good advice, pastor or not.
  • Johnathan Pearson reminds us that we need to continue to add fuel to our fire if we want to continue giving light and heat without burning out.

A couple of how-tos for pastors and lay leaders.

  • Steven Furtick reminds us not to be ashamed to call others higher, in fact it’s a compliment to do so.
  • Scott Couchenour offers his usual input to leaders and offers some additional links on don’t stop growing. (It helps to link to others who have lots of links ‘causse it saves me space! Yes, that’s cheating)
  • Nick Croft (aka Nick the Geek), guest posting at Make a Difference to One, encourages us to pray not only for our own children, but also for the children in our church and to not take children’s salvation for granted. (As a former youth leader, I really appreciate this post)

Another common theme is rethinking Church.

  • I’m participating in a discussion on Michael Spencer’s Mere Churchianity. You can follow that conversation over at Bend the Page (with links back here and to other bloggers in on the discussion). We’re only on Chapter 3, so there’s time to catch up and join us!
  • Shawn Smucker pulls no punches observing that Democracy is an easy crutch for our Church.
  • Jason Stasyszen (and many others- more links!) is reading and discussing The Hole in the Gospel and notes (pun not intended) that we’ve reduced the symphony of the Gospel down to a single note. 
  • Alise writes a scathing letter to the American Church (TM) reminding us that we need to deal with the plank in our own eyes before we can remove the specks outside our church’s walls.
  • Brandon O’Brien writes on how we take a Pagan approach to our relationship with God: we do good, he owes us- and how wrong that is.
  • Bethany Keeley-Jonker wonders if you can have an online church. (a means others like Brand New Church and Lifechurch.tv are testing out)
  • Darrin Patrick challenges the Church that we have a “man problem” through a video promoting his new book.

Of course, part of Church is each of our own personal journeys.

Relating back to the Blood: Water Missions fundraiser above is also a fundraiser of 30 bloggers in 30 days that is worth checking out and following (and obviously contributing towards).

Also relating back to the news of Glenn Coffee abandoning his NFL career for ministry (and other similar stories) is news of Ben Roethlisberger’s comeback on the field and in his faith. Compare then and now.

And after you get through all of this, don’t forget the purpose of this weekend. Rest and celebrate the Sabbath.

Flashback Friday: God’s Labor Day

Frank

***Originally posted on Labor Day, 2008. Still appropriate today, especially with so many recent headlines on pastor and church burnout. Have a great weekend everyone, and be sure to take some time off to rest up.***

[Monday] we celebrate Labor Day, the unofficial end of summer, but the official celebration of America’s work force. Originally, Labor Day was celebrated to honor workers’ unions through speeches and parades. Today, the typical Labor Day celebration consists of sleeping in, barbecues, and ironically work. In fact, as soon as I finish posting this, I’m going to tackle a couple of outdoor projects I’ve been putting off.

Despite how widely celebrated this holiday is (even I have it off, and that says something) God’s labor day is more widely, or at least frequently observed. I’m talking of course, about the Sabbath. Even though different Christian churches have various doctrines surrounding the Sabbath (Seventh Day Adventists for example) and debate whether we’re still compelled to observe the Sabbath Laws under the New Covenant, there’s still a perfectly good reason God instituted this day.

“Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God… For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. (Ex 20:8-11)

I’m not going to debate creation in six literal days here, but rather stress that even God took a break and there’s no reason we shouldn’t too. For this reason, we have in America the traditional 40 hour work-week (but who really works only 40 hours?) with “weekends” off. Even the term weekend is to intentionally set aside Saturday and Sunday on the calendar to respect the Judeo-Christian roots of this country.

I heard during a sermon, that even though we may not be commanded to observe the Sabbath under the New Covenant, if we don’t take the Sabbath, the Sabbath will take us. Each one of the Ten Commandments, besides honoring God, protects us. Like most laws, the intent isn’t just that of justice, but also to protect the general welfare of the populace. The Sabbath is no different. Think about your last big project at work, or finals week in college, or hell week in high school football, or the last week of planning and organizing before your wedding. Anytime you’ve dedicated yourself to something so thoroughly, there’s usually a “let-down” once you’re done. Why? You didn’t take a break as the Lord commanded. Just recently I returned from helping my mom move. What happened a few days after I got back? I got sick.

Unfortunately, we don’t observe the Sabbath the way God intends. We fool ourselves into thinking we’re honoring God by filling the day with church-related activities- morning worship, afternoon meetings, evening Bible study, you know the drill. I asked one of my co-workers if he had any big plans and he replied, “well the first two days are already shot.” His wife was hosting a bridal shower at their house on Saturday and Sunday was church. So on the usual Monday he, myself, and many other co-workers are more tired than we were on Friday. Why? Because we never really rested as God intended.

So here I am today, with a long list of “honey do’s”. Why such the long list? Because I didn’t do a dog-gone thing yesterday. And I feel great.

Thrill Ride

Frank

Last weekend I took my family to Legoland. My son has been asking for it all summer and we waited for Grandma to come and visit so she could join in on the fun. The park is definitely geared towards my son’s age group (a lot of rides specifically said “ages 5-12). It was fun to see my son react with, “look, dad, it’s made of all Legos!” There’s just something about being little where the world seems so big. Theme parks take advantage of this by presenting everything as larger than life.

I remember going to Disney World at 5 or 6 years old and combining that trip with a visit to Kennedy Space Center. At Disney I remember Mission to Mars vividly- the chairs raising slightly to give you a feeling of positive g’s then dropping back to give you a sensation of weightlessness all while looking up at a giant screen of space images as if we were looking ahead through a window. Visiting Kennedy right after, I remember returning to school convinced I had been to space. I couldn’t wait to raise my hand to answer the question, “where did you go this summer?”

“As he was leaving the temple, one of his disciples said to him, ‘Look, Teacher! What massive stones! What magnificent buildings!‘” (Mark 13:1)

Did you visit any theme parks as a child? What rides were “larger than life”?

Of course, seeing it later as a teenager (the ride sadly closed in 1993), I could see through the “smoke and mirrors”. It was obvious we never left the ground and the view out of the windows could not compare to what we could see in an IMAX.

Other rides seemed smaller, too. The roller-coasters weren’t as fast, the loops, twists, and turns not as large. The animatronics weren’t as realistic. I grew up and the “thrill ride” was no longer as thrilling.

“When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.” (1 Corinthians 13:11)

Have you ridden any of your favorite rides from your youth since you’ve grown up? Are they as fast, as large as you remember?

As a parent, the thrill is no longer found in the rides, but in my children’s joy. I can bear (usually) waiting in line for an hour for a ride my kids are excited for. I can handle two days at Legoland and (mostly) ignore how cheesy everything is. Because it’s not for me.

I stood back in wonder as I watched my children met a life-sized Mickey Mouse. I anxiously wait to hear what my son thought of the last ride he went on. And I can’t wait to return. Their perspective becomes my perspective.

“And he said: ‘I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.’” (Matthew 18:3)

“From the lips of children and infants
you have ordained praise ” (Psalm 8:2)

Do you have children? Have you ever taken them to a theme park? What was their reaction the first time?

As adults, our lives can easily become so hectic that we take the thrills in life for granted. We feel grown up so we stop having fun. Summer is a great time to recapture the simple joys in life, but it’s also a good time to remember that Jesus “came that [you] may have life, and have it to the full.” (John 10:10) That scripture can be twisted a number of ways, from a Prosperity Gospel (full means rich!) to asceticism (full life doesn’t come until our resurrection and the world offers nothing). I believe the answer lies in the middle. No, we shouldn’t get too comfortable here on this Earth, but we should still find joy in the life God has blessed us with.

“Be joyful always” (1 Thessalonians 5:16)

Do you see your life today as a thrill ride? Do you believe Jesus has given you “life to the full”?

Yesterday I went to the park with my kids. I rode on a twisting swing-like thingy with my son. It wasn’t fast and it wasn’t large, but my son was scared to death of falling off and I almost threw up. But it was really fun!

Today continues this summer’s ‘virtual small group’ (VSG in the tags). I hope you come back as I take this season to reflect on the wonders of God’s creation, share vacation stories, etc, with the prayer that we come out of this season closer to God than how we came into it.

The Uncomfortable Jesus

Frank

The premise behind Philip Yancey’s The Jesus I Never Knew is that the Jesus we know is so familiar he’s become routine. We know the stories. We know how it all ends. Nothing surprises us or makes us uncomfortable.

Michael Spencer approaches the third chapter of Mere Churchianity the same way. Imagine being a disciple of Jesus and having your world rocked with his unconventional take on the Jewish religion. Been praying all your life? Jesus will teach you how to really pray. Judgemental of that Samaritan woman? Jesus will go to her and strike up a conversation. It’s no wonder some of Jesus’ disciples responded to him saying, “This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?” and later turned away and left him (John 6:60-66).

I admit I’m young and naive and maybe too idealistic for my own good. Regrettably, I’ve taken the destruction I’ve seen in my fellowship of churches and combined that with the media stereotype of the Evangelical Megachurch to paint a broad brush over all of American Christianity (TM). But I look at the Christian blogosphere and twitterverse and I see brothers and sisters doing it; making things happen in the name of Jesus to God’s glory. And I realize I’m wrong. I need to “tear up my notes” as Michael puts it.

I’m wrong about my church, too. Last week I may have been overly harsh sharing a single anecdote in a sea of experiences. Not to say the criticism isn’t fair, but there’s more to the story. You see, there are some things my church gets right. Recognizing Jesus’ teachings as uncomfortable is one of them. Growing up religious, when I opened up the Bible with brothers who cared about teaching me what it really says, not just what I’ve always heard, it blew my mind. It resonated in my heart because I knew this is what I was missing in my relationship with God. Jesus was uncomfortable and that made following him challenging and exciting.

Yesterday I wrote about the Transformational Loop. Each of the seven properties listed are uncomfortable.

  • Missionary mentality, where you see your community as a mission field and serve it that way? Uncomfortable!
  • Vibrant Leadership where it’s not a cult of personality but of inspiring example? Uncomfortable!
  • Relational Intensity where you genuinely care about your brothers and sisters’ spiritual and physical well-being and “make every effort” to deliberately be involved in one another’s lives? Uncomfortable!
  • Prayerful dependence where going to God in prayer is natural and asking for help via prayer is common? Uncomfortable!
  • Worship that continues beyond Sunday mornings (Romans 12)? Raising your hands in praise? Uncomfortable!
  • Community that is intentionally built around the purpose and mission of the Church? Uncomfortable!
  • Mission, seeking and saving the lost, being a central part of your life, the focus of your conversations and relationships? Uncomfortable!

Of course, that’s just one of many similar books. You could add tithing, serving inside and outside your church’s walls, forgiving (ooh, that’s a toughie), fasting, eschewing the world, calling out sin, confessing sin, and I could go on and on.

Squirming in your chair yet? Well there’s nothing comfortable about being a disciple of Jesus. And you know what, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

(I also encourage you to visit Bend the Page, Faith Fiction and Friends, and A Simple Country Girl for more discussion of this challenging book)

What is your Church’s Strength?

Frank

I’m reading Transformational Church by Ed Stetzer and Thom Rainer as a compliment to my reading of Michael Spencer’s Mere Churchianity. Chapter two introduces the “Transformational Loop” of properties present in Transformational Churches. It is a loop because each area feeds into another and no one property can stand alone in a strong, transformational church. The areas are Discern, Embrace, and Engage and the properties present are a Missionary Mentality, Vibrant Leadership, Relational Intensity, Prayerful Dependence, Worship, Community, and Mission.

Reading through the description of each of these, it quickly became clear where my fellowship is strong and where it falls short. The recommendation for a stagnant church to become a transformational church is to identify your strengths and use them to build the other properties. For example, if your strength is worship, use that to build community, and so on.

I’ve been wrestling for some time with why things don’t seem to be clicking in my fellowship. We have our strengths and weaknesses just like any other congregation. And I don’t expect us to be perfect. But I just get the feeling that a piece is (or pieces are) missing. This loop helps me to identify what we need to build on and grow in.

My fellowship’s strengths are mission and community. We have a strong evangelistic focus, taking on the mission of Jesus to “seek and save the lost.” We build community through small groups for accountability, personal growth, and to facilitate evangelistic activities. These communities forge life-long relationships.

However these strengths ebb and flow. We take our strengths for granted and grow complacent. I believe this is because our strengths do not have deep roots and this loop bares that out. We are strong in mission, but lack a missionary mentality. We are strong in community but lack relational intensity. So our strengths are what we do, not who we are.

I am also convicted personally because I lack in prayerful dependence. I’m not a prayer warrior, though I need to grow in my prayer life. But I look around and I don’t see many prayer warriors around me either. I admired an Elder we had who would pray “without ceasing.” Ask him a question and he would pause, consider it, and then pray about it. Without fail, every question. But I don’t see that as my church’s culture.

I also admire one of my best friends who is strong in worship. He lives it, studies it, and teaches it but being worshipful has only rubbed off on a few. And our Sunday services are better for it!

So the pieces are there to build, despite my negativity. I’m sure if I looked around I could find individuals who are strong in one or more of these properties. The trick however is spreading those strengths through the congregation until it becomes part of its culture.

Given that background, what would you say are your church’s strengths?

What are your strengths and do they feed into your church’s?

Would you describe your church as “transformational”?

For your own assessment, check out the Transformational Church Diagnostic Tool (hopefully up and running soon)

Weekend Reading, 28 August

Frank

Wasn’t online much this week, so I’ll leave it to others to sum up the best of this week:

Jason Stasyzen has his Friday Hit List over at Connecting to Impact.

Glynn Young lists his Saturday Good Reads over at Faith, Fiction, Friends.

It’s not up yet, but look tomorrow for Kevin Martineau’s Link Love Sunday over at Shooting the Breeze.

There was also a blog carnival last week too. Bridget Chumbley’s One Word at a Time Carnival on Children is filled with gifted writers and inspired perspectives.

Pleasantly disturbed carnie, Duane Scott was in a car accident, so please keep him in your prayers.