icoc lessons learned

Making Jesus Popular

Frank

That was on a sign at a construction site for a new megachurch being built. Really. But popularity was never Jesus’ goal on earth. Just a sample (I love Biblegateway!):

All men will hate you because of me, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved. -Matthew 10:22

Blessed are you when men hate you, when they exclude you and insult you and reject your name as evil, because of the Son of Man. -Luke 6:22

The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that what it does is evil. -John 7:7

If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If 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. Remember 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. They will treat you this way because of my name, for they do not know the One who sent me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin. Now, however, they have no excuse for their sin. He who hates me hates my Father as well. If 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. But this is to fulfill what is written in their Law: ‘They hated me without reason.’ -John 15:18-25

Yet we try so hard to be “seeker sensitive” or to be “relatable” or “relevant” instead of being radical. We dress a certain way, we incorporate multimedia into sermons, we have bands playing contemporary worship music (or cheesy pop music) instead of letting the Gospel of Jesus stand on its own.

Many flock to Saddleback Church because of Rick Warren. Thousands fill the old Alamo Dome to hear Joel Osteen. Celebrity also draws people. The fastest growing church in America is that of American Idol winner Kris Allen. Coincidence?

Once upon a time in my church, growth was used as a “sign” of God’s blessing and that if the church wasn’t growing at an incredible pace then there was something wrong. Spirituality soon began to be measured with numbers. If you weren’t constantly bringing visitors, you were chastised. So begins the pressure to be popular.

But it is not supposed to be this way. Not to say a church that’s growing old and withering on the vine is ok, but we need to check our motivations and ask if we’re compromising the message of Jesus for the sake of attendance. We need to remind ourselves of what was prophesied about Jesus:

“He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.” (Isaiah 53:2b-3)

Where There’s Smoke…

Frank

I try to give other churches and other Christians the benefit of the doubt. Only God knows the heart and I’m in no position to judge anyone. However, I will challenge anyone who will listen to “live a life worth of the calling you have received.” (Ephesians 4:1) And I will also call out what I believe to be blatant cases of false doctrine (on this blog these are generally related to politics). But this is just fishy to me.

When I first saw the headline it read, “teen fears parents will kill her after conversion.” I was all ready to whip out a post on “perfect love drives out fear” (1 John 4:8) thinking it was the parents who converted. This is the common argument against parental notification for abortions by minors. It’s a sad world we live in when children are so fearful of their parents that they’d rather kill an unborn life than face them. Even more sad that so many have twisted their own religion to completely remove grace so that some children are right to be afraid.

But this is different. In this case, the girl converted from her Muslim upbringing. She fears her parents will kill her for the sake of their “honor”. Tragically, this is a reality in may parts of the world, but seems out of place in the United States where we can freely exercise our religion.

However, it’s not this case that I want to write about. Rather her church is what caught my attention. I recognized the name (only reported by AOL that I could find) from this lengthy discussion at theophiles. Both cases are similar- minor converts against the will of his and her parents, parents label church a cult, and “a man [is turned] against his father, a daughter against her mother…” (Matthew 10:35ff)

It’s a cycle my fellowship of churches recognizes all too well. In fact when the first story broke I thought it was a sister church. Even the church’s description (small groups, discipleship, evangelistic) made me think so. But there is one (doctrinally a couple) significant difference- we would never convert a minor against the will of their parents. (I’m not meaning to sound prideful, but I’ve spent most of my Christian life in the teen ministry and that is rule #1, even for teens whose parents are members of the church. If the parents say no, that’s the end of the story.)

While we enjoy religious freedom in this country, and the above scripture does tell us that the Gospel will divide our families, we still have to abide by the law of the land: “Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.” (Romans 13:1) And in this country, parents have the legal authority over their children while they are minors.

The runaway girl is an interesting case since she believes her life is in danger. If her church is trying to score “persecution” points in the media, shame on them. But they should have never pursued converting this girl until she was legally out of her home. Even if it was initiated by her, she still needs to follow the Bible and obey her parents (Ephesians 6:1-3, Colossians 3:20, Exodus 20:12). Her small group/discipleship partner/whatever should have been quick to point this out.

I pray for the safety of this girl and I pray for compassion from her parents. Most of all, I pray for her church, that it is a light to the world- who is an abassador of Christ that is spreading a true Gospel that unites believers.

Where There’s Smoke…

Frank

I try to give other churches and other Christians the benefit of the doubt. Only God knows the heart and I’m in no position to judge anyone. However, I will challenge anyone who will listen to “live a life worth of the calling you have received.” (Ephesians 4:1) And I will also call out what I believe to be blatant cases of false doctrine (on this blog these are generally related to politics). But this is just fishy to me.

When I first saw the headline it read, “teen fears parents will kill her after conversion.” I was all ready to whip out a post on “perfect love drives out fear” (1 John 4:8) thinking it was the parents who converted. This is the common argument against parental notification for abortions by minors. It’s a sad world we live in when children are so fearful of their parents that they’d rather kill an unborn life than face them. Even more sad that so many have twisted their own religion to completely remove grace so that some children are right to be afraid.

But this is different. In this case, the girl converted from her Muslim upbringing. She fears her parents will kill her for the sake of their “honor”. Tragically, this is a reality in may parts of the world, but seems out of place in the United States where we can freely exercise our religion.

However, it’s not this case that I want to write about. Rather her church is what caught my attention. I recognized the name (only reported by AOL that I could find) from this lengthy discussion at theophiles. Both cases are similar- minor converts against the will of his and her parents, parents label church a cult, and “a man [is turned] against his father, a daughter against her mother…” (Matthew 10:35ff)

It’s a cycle my fellowship of churches recognizes all too well. In fact when the first story broke I thought it was a sister church. Even the church’s description (small groups, discipleship, evangelistic) made me think so. But there is one (doctrinally a couple) significant difference- we would never convert a minor against the will of their parents. (I’m not meaning to sound prideful, but I’ve spent most of my Christian life in the teen ministry and that is rule #1, even for teens whose parents are members of the church. If the parents say no, that’s the end of the story.)

While we enjoy religious freedom in this country, and the above scripture does tell us that the Gospel will divide our families, we still have to abide by the law of the land: “Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.” (Romans 13:1) And in this country, parents have the legal authority over their children while they are minors.

The runaway girl is an interesting case since she believes her life is in danger. If her church is trying to score “persecution” points in the media, shame on them. But they should have never pursued converting this girl until she was legally out of her home. Even if it was initiated by her, she still needs to follow the Bible and obey her parents (Ephesians 6:1-3, Colossians 3:20, Exodus 20:12). Her small group/discipleship partner/whatever should have been quick to point this out.

I pray for the safety of this girl and I pray for compassion from her parents. Most of all, I pray for her church, that it is a light to the world- who is an abassador of Christ that is spreading a true Gospel that unites believers.

Purpose

Frank

Purpose. It’s become a loaded word in my fellowship of churches. Some of you may recall the debate (still ongoing in my heart) between our “purpose” as Christians and our “mission.” I won’t get into that debate here other than comment that my heart has recently been challenged with a recent run of sermons on this topic. I want to stand up and shout, “our purpose is not to bring people to church!” The topic of evangelism always makes me queasy, because I relate that to “numbers” and “accountability” that were used as abusive, manipulative, incorrect means to the correct end. To me, evangelism isn’t about church invites, or “visitors”, or “cranking.” Instead it is literally about “sharing my faith” with someone else. If they respond, amen! If not, that seed is planted and I trust God to do with it what He pleases.

Sadly, whenever I hear “purpose” or “share your faith” in a sermon, my ears tune out the message and my ego turns on with defensiveness. So it took an outside source to shake this from me. I was listening to a radio sermon last week (if you haven’t read my last post, let me sum it up: if you listen to a radio ministry, support it financially!) and the topic was Purpose. Right away I wanted to listen thinking that this lesson would validate all my feelings on the subject. It didn’t. Instead it reaffirmed the Christian purpose to “seek and save the lost.”

This lesson referenced Philippians 1:12-30 where Paul is referring to being imprisoned for the sake of the Gospel: “Now I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel… The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice…I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death…If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me…Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in one spirit, contending as one man for the faith of the gospel.” (Phil 1:12,18ff,20,22ff,27 emphasis added)

While the context was Paul’s sufferings, his encouragement to the Christians in Philippi was that this suffering can be used to advance the Gospel and therefore to not be discouraged by any hardship. With that in mind, I want to focus on how Paul was evangelistic here. Obviously he couldn’t invite his captors to church, where would they go? Instead he used his circumstance to explain his conviction. This is something we all can do, and is more literally sharing our faith than a simple invite to church.

Something else he points out here that is very important to me. He talks about “Christ being exalted in [his] body,” and, “conducting [our]selves in a manner worthy of the gospel.” Our lives should reflect the gospel of Jesus. Our very lives should be our evangelism. In my wallet I have a business card that reads, “How have I been Christ’s presence today?” I keep it in front of my driver’s license because I consider this my real ID. In this context, evangelism to advance the gospel of Christ is very much my purpose.

Purpose or mission, it’s all really just semantics anyway. The real question is how have you been Christ’s presence today?

You’ve Come a Long Ways, Baby

Frank

Tonight my congregation is hosting a public showing of the movie Fireproof, complete with all the resources available afterword. The movie kicks off the 8-week Marriage Dynamics course that we’ve been offering twice a year the past few years. Meanwhile, we’re a couple of weeks into the Financial Peace workshop done by Dave Ramsey.

Once upon a time, I’d hear criticism of the closed-mindedness of our fellowship of churches and the monopoly we thought we held on spiritual truths. A common statement would be something like, “I hear you guys are only allowed to read books written by other members of your church.” While that was never literally true (at least since I’ve been faithful), there was a point. You didn’t dare bring in another ministry, offer a different point of view, or even reference a pastor/bishop/deacon from another church. Though we isolated ourselves on a spiritual island, my best material as a first-time Bible Talk leader came from sermons I heard on the radio.

In the past few years however, we’ve begun to open ourselves up to the fact that maybe we aren’t the only ones who might know a thing or two about spirituality and discipleship. Congregations have studied The Purpose Driven Life together while leaders studied Leading Life-Changing Small Groups from Willow Creek. The Los Angeles Church of Christ hosted a “Men in White” retreat that spawned men’s purity groups based on Every Man’s Battle. Many congregations have done financial courses through Crown Financial Ministries, and I already mentioned the Marriage Dynamics course that many churches have conducted.

Personally, I’m very encouraged by this despite the present undercurrent that seems to want to keep us on our own spiritual and doctrinal islands. (Cooperation does not have to equal conformity!) I’m a bibliophile, and I’ll suck up any Christian resource I can get my hands on despite whatever theology is behind it. I hope we’re mature enough to discern the truth based on our own Bible study (“Now the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.” Acts 17:11). And by the looks of these ministries, it appears our spiritual leadership agrees. Amen to that.

Sell Out

Frank

One of the “tests of fellowship” my sisterhood of churches was infamous for was the call to be “sold out disciples” of Christ. As part of multiple lukewarm campus ministries over the years that sales pitch worked on me. While there is nothing wrong with that call in and of itself, that expectation unfortunately opened the fellowship up to all sorts of abuses. Part of the problem has been some just don’t get it. If they’re not being told how to be “sold out” they won’t be. While there have been many efforts to change parts of that old culture over the past few years I’ve noticed the cost has been “sold outedness”. Brothers and sisters just don’t seem to be motivated to serve and follow Jesus because no one is explicitly telling them to be. Don’t get me wrong, that’s not universal, but is prevalent enough to be noticeable.

I do believe there is a Biblical call to be sold out in our faith. Romans 12 reads, “Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord.” (Rom 12:11) At the same time, we can’t be zealous for zealous’ sake. Paul writes to the Galations, “Those people are zealous to win you over, but for no good. What they want is to alienate you from us, so that you may be zealous for them. It’s fine to be zealous, provided the purpose is good.” (Gal 4:17-18) And Proverbs 19:2 reads, “It is not good to have zeal without knowledge, nor to be hasty and miss the way.” That’s what I think hurt our churches in the past- too many were zealous more for their leaders, the latest evangelism drive, etc and not for zealous for Jesus.

I also think this is part of the problem in the American Christian Church (TM). Many are happy to be Sunday morning Christians, give their tithe (sometimes), and be on their way. For many, living as a disciple of Jesus means having a particular political persuasion rather than daily taking up their cross. Or they’re proud to be a member of some megachurch led by a best-selling author.

So we could all use a little wake up call. I mentioned before that some just don’t get it. Praise God though, some do. Thanks to Jessie at Surrender All and Marcus at Transplant Ministries for bringing these videos to my attention.