The interesting thing here is that while the structural problems with today's religion club structure are quite complex, the ways I see to respond are so far fairly simple. Let's start with...
Make friends --real friends-- with believers outside your club. I grew up in a very exclusive religion club where we were not encouraged to do this. When God gave me godly friends outside my group, my whole view on the church changed irrevocably. It's also hard to get trapped inside your club when that would exclude your own BFF.
If you are a member of a club, ask a leader to explain things to you. This may be tricky, because it's probably going to come off as a challenge. So pick a leader of your club who knows you and who won't get offended if you ask pointed questions. Buy lunch. Maybe several. Ask directly why your club does not have a whole lot of meaningful relationships with other local clubs. Ask him how he feels about you splitting your Sunday time up between your club and the clubs of your friends. Don't be sidetracked by minor issues. Ask, and sincerely try to understand, why he thinks your club should exist when there are lots of other clubs in town. See if he has vision beyond the club; you'd be surprised how many leaders do, and are afraid to follow what they see. Encourage him!
If you are not a member of a club, check out your friend's club. Don't join, just look for other believers to be friends with. By the way, there's no need to bang heads about joining, just tell anyone who offers that you are already his brother or sister and that's good enough for you. Small groups are a great way to do this, by the way. It's hard to really meet anyone at Sunday Services, but a club's small group or a class or home group works great. Make friends.
Look for service projects outside your club. Substitute this for a club activity if you have limited time available. Sling hash at a soup kitchen, build a Habitat house, mentor a kid at a Boys Club. The more servant-like and the less visible the job the better. You meet a tremendous grade of people this way. Make friends.
That'll do for a start...
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Is “Winning the World for Christ” Killing My Neighbors?
Great institutions have great dreams, or at least great aspirations. The most widely-claimed of these found in the evangelical church is found in the slogan, “Win the world for Christ!”. This is a noble and seemingly-inarguable aspiration. After all, who do we not hope will follow Jesus? For whom has Christ not died? As it is the Father’s express desire that “not any should perish”, should we not all embrace this as our life’s cause?
Well, at the risk of heresy, I’m not so sure.
How does the great task of “winning the world for Christ” actually manifest itself among us? On the positive, it has stirred many of us with a concern for those outside our own cultures, and has sent the message of the gospel into the far corners of the world. I have numerous friends in places like Uganda, Kenya, Morocco, China, Ukraine, and Afghanistan. I have a friend who is a missionary from Nigeria to the U.S. (As much as that may offend some, I see the same desperate needs he sees in our post-Christian culture.) I clearly see the work of the Holy Spirit in these callings.
But I fear the very grandiosity of the language we use has borne unintended consequences. After many years in the church, I do not see today’s believer to be any more likely to bear witness of the life of Christ to his neighbor than was his grandfather. In fact, a strong argument can be made that today’s Joe Christian is less likely to impact the family next door than perhaps ever before in American history.
Our drumbeat of “winning the world” has contributed to what I call the “myopia effect” among the church. Our suburban church loads up a hundred fired-up teens and takes them to a Mexican border town, or to the urban jungle of a large city, all in the interest of ministering to the lost. And they do it with great fervor. But that busload of kids drives right past our own blighted neighborhoods on the way out of town to “spread the gospel”. We can now see so far out “into the world” that our own neighbors have become only vague and fuzzy images to us. While we are able to communicate our thrill in “going into all the world”, we are much less effective at sharing God’s concern for the people who live within our own zip code. I do not think this is intentional neglect so much as romantic overlook. As a veteran missionary once told me, “There’s no magic in a plane ticket.”
When is the last time your congregation was asked for money to support a missionary living in the African interior? That fellow who is on furlough from Africa brought his Powerpoint presentation—it used to be slides, but Microsoft marches on—and everyone enjoyed the exotic photos of strange peoples in strange lands. You wondered at how those people were SO much more receptive to the gospel than are Americans. But when was the last time you considered the same kind of financial support for one living in the barrio in your own city? We get far more excited about unbelievers overseas than unbelievers in our neighborhood.
Our religious traditions are not making it any easier for us to touch the lives of our neighbors. Joe lives across the street from me, and his church home is across town. He saw that fellowship advertised on a billboard, and chose that group from a wide assortment of congregations, based on his compatibility with its doctrines and demographics, and on the attractiveness of its programs and public offerings. As Joe’s neighbors, we know that Joe loads up the family on Sunday and “goes to church”, and he has a fish on the back of his car, so we figure he’s a Christian, but we don’t know a lot more. Joe’s family is heavily involved in church activities, which are constantly expanding in an effort to grow the size of that fellowship. As a result, there is created a natural division of activity—the religious stuff, the “God stuff” happens across town, while the mundane everyday stuff happens here. There, Joe worships. There, he expresses his devotion to God and talks about it with others. Over here, he mows his lawn and takes his kid to Little League. We know if Joe has crabgrass, but we don’t see much of his Christian walk.
Joe is not intentionally neglecting his neighbors. But the epicenter of his “Christian life” is far from his neighborhood, and what happens here is a faint echo of what happens there. And so long as his local religion club maintains the steady call to “come to church” and “come with us and do good things”, this dynamic will continue.
The solution is simple, but counter-intuitive for most professional clergy and folks interested in “building our church”. Tell people to go home. Yep. Start carving out parts of the week when no “church activities” will be scheduled. Rather than recruiting and training people to teach Sunday school, teach them how to love their neighbors. Truly loving one’s neighbor is the most effective way of bringing people to Jesus. Most believers in my experience testify that they came to Christ mainly because of the actions of some non-clergy individual who loved them.
Now for the warning: this suggestion is much more radical than it seems, and far harder than I make it out to be. For I am suggesting that a local religion club begin to do things that are not consistent with the future of the club. That they choose against the club’s best interest to sow believers into the community. I am suggesting that they begin to seek for their members to identify less with First Church and more with Jesus, to serve their neighbors even if the club’s programs languish. This is a hard enough sell in and of itself. But in our competitive religious marketplace, the inevitable reaction will be for the religion club next door to quickly redouble its recruiting efforts, with the distinct possibility that once Religion Club A sends its members out into the community, Religion Club B will scoop up half of them and entice them into the building down the street for the hot new version of American Churchgoing’s Greatest Hits. Clergymen seem to know this reality almost instinctively and find it nearly impossible to embrace the kind of change that would put “their flock” at risk of changing membership to the club next door.
So with these obstacles in mind, what can we do to help this along?
More to come…
Well, at the risk of heresy, I’m not so sure.
How does the great task of “winning the world for Christ” actually manifest itself among us? On the positive, it has stirred many of us with a concern for those outside our own cultures, and has sent the message of the gospel into the far corners of the world. I have numerous friends in places like Uganda, Kenya, Morocco, China, Ukraine, and Afghanistan. I have a friend who is a missionary from Nigeria to the U.S. (As much as that may offend some, I see the same desperate needs he sees in our post-Christian culture.) I clearly see the work of the Holy Spirit in these callings.
But I fear the very grandiosity of the language we use has borne unintended consequences. After many years in the church, I do not see today’s believer to be any more likely to bear witness of the life of Christ to his neighbor than was his grandfather. In fact, a strong argument can be made that today’s Joe Christian is less likely to impact the family next door than perhaps ever before in American history.
Our drumbeat of “winning the world” has contributed to what I call the “myopia effect” among the church. Our suburban church loads up a hundred fired-up teens and takes them to a Mexican border town, or to the urban jungle of a large city, all in the interest of ministering to the lost. And they do it with great fervor. But that busload of kids drives right past our own blighted neighborhoods on the way out of town to “spread the gospel”. We can now see so far out “into the world” that our own neighbors have become only vague and fuzzy images to us. While we are able to communicate our thrill in “going into all the world”, we are much less effective at sharing God’s concern for the people who live within our own zip code. I do not think this is intentional neglect so much as romantic overlook. As a veteran missionary once told me, “There’s no magic in a plane ticket.”
When is the last time your congregation was asked for money to support a missionary living in the African interior? That fellow who is on furlough from Africa brought his Powerpoint presentation—it used to be slides, but Microsoft marches on—and everyone enjoyed the exotic photos of strange peoples in strange lands. You wondered at how those people were SO much more receptive to the gospel than are Americans. But when was the last time you considered the same kind of financial support for one living in the barrio in your own city? We get far more excited about unbelievers overseas than unbelievers in our neighborhood.
Our religious traditions are not making it any easier for us to touch the lives of our neighbors. Joe lives across the street from me, and his church home is across town. He saw that fellowship advertised on a billboard, and chose that group from a wide assortment of congregations, based on his compatibility with its doctrines and demographics, and on the attractiveness of its programs and public offerings. As Joe’s neighbors, we know that Joe loads up the family on Sunday and “goes to church”, and he has a fish on the back of his car, so we figure he’s a Christian, but we don’t know a lot more. Joe’s family is heavily involved in church activities, which are constantly expanding in an effort to grow the size of that fellowship. As a result, there is created a natural division of activity—the religious stuff, the “God stuff” happens across town, while the mundane everyday stuff happens here. There, Joe worships. There, he expresses his devotion to God and talks about it with others. Over here, he mows his lawn and takes his kid to Little League. We know if Joe has crabgrass, but we don’t see much of his Christian walk.
Joe is not intentionally neglecting his neighbors. But the epicenter of his “Christian life” is far from his neighborhood, and what happens here is a faint echo of what happens there. And so long as his local religion club maintains the steady call to “come to church” and “come with us and do good things”, this dynamic will continue.
The solution is simple, but counter-intuitive for most professional clergy and folks interested in “building our church”. Tell people to go home. Yep. Start carving out parts of the week when no “church activities” will be scheduled. Rather than recruiting and training people to teach Sunday school, teach them how to love their neighbors. Truly loving one’s neighbor is the most effective way of bringing people to Jesus. Most believers in my experience testify that they came to Christ mainly because of the actions of some non-clergy individual who loved them.
Now for the warning: this suggestion is much more radical than it seems, and far harder than I make it out to be. For I am suggesting that a local religion club begin to do things that are not consistent with the future of the club. That they choose against the club’s best interest to sow believers into the community. I am suggesting that they begin to seek for their members to identify less with First Church and more with Jesus, to serve their neighbors even if the club’s programs languish. This is a hard enough sell in and of itself. But in our competitive religious marketplace, the inevitable reaction will be for the religion club next door to quickly redouble its recruiting efforts, with the distinct possibility that once Religion Club A sends its members out into the community, Religion Club B will scoop up half of them and entice them into the building down the street for the hot new version of American Churchgoing’s Greatest Hits. Clergymen seem to know this reality almost instinctively and find it nearly impossible to embrace the kind of change that would put “their flock” at risk of changing membership to the club next door.
So with these obstacles in mind, what can we do to help this along?
More to come…
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
To Our Public Frogs
"But where else will I exercise my gifts?"
I'm beginning to notice that this unspoken question is keeping any number of folks inside the religion clubs. As a former pulpit preacher, worship leader, elder, and musician, I understand the quandry, and that understanding is what disturbs me.
It goes on in the mind of a person who is considering changing his identity from "First Whichever Church" to the kingdom of God. "But I'm a preacher!" I say. "Where will I preach? I'm a worship leader! Where will I set up my microphone and plug in my amp?" As if scheduling people to attend a gathering is a prerequisite for doing what I am called to do. What I am really asking, and cannot readily admit, is, "Who will be required to listen to me if their attendance at my performance is not mandated by tradition?"
I know, I've quit preaching and gone to meddling. But those of you who have gifts which are now used to serve the Body in the regularly-scheduled gathering we call a "church service"-- what would you do if those doors closed? Would you stop doing what you do? Would you know how to continue to obey God and employ your gifts with no church service involved? Or are you only useful in organized groups of a dozen to five thousand? If your calling is being defined and delimited by a tradition of Sunday-go-to-meetin', who really called you?
Yes, this is an out-and-out challenge. If singing Jesus Loves Me with your toddler is less satisfying than playing in a hot worship band at church, it's time to ask yourself what it is that drives your worship. If explaining who Jesus is to a ditchdigger on the tailgate of the truck is somehow not as fulfilling as giving a 50-minute oratorio before a packed house of shoutin', stompin', on-fire believers... perhaps it's a good idea to ask God why this is so.
It's easy to tell people all the different ways that our gifts can be manifest in the earth. We've done it many times. And we all nod... and head right back to the pulpit/microphone/public venue and go on with business as usual, either as performers or spectators. (Insert head shake here.) Until we as "gifted individuals" are willing to go to the Father for a bit of personal examination, this dynamic is likely to continue. And the only way for God to shake us into looking deeply into this will be to break up our "ministries". Perhaps it would be wise to fall on the rock this time, to keep it from having to fall on us.
Been there myself. Waited for the rock, got it. Trust me, it smarts.
I'm beginning to notice that this unspoken question is keeping any number of folks inside the religion clubs. As a former pulpit preacher, worship leader, elder, and musician, I understand the quandry, and that understanding is what disturbs me.
It goes on in the mind of a person who is considering changing his identity from "First Whichever Church" to the kingdom of God. "But I'm a preacher!" I say. "Where will I preach? I'm a worship leader! Where will I set up my microphone and plug in my amp?" As if scheduling people to attend a gathering is a prerequisite for doing what I am called to do. What I am really asking, and cannot readily admit, is, "Who will be required to listen to me if their attendance at my performance is not mandated by tradition?"
I know, I've quit preaching and gone to meddling. But those of you who have gifts which are now used to serve the Body in the regularly-scheduled gathering we call a "church service"-- what would you do if those doors closed? Would you stop doing what you do? Would you know how to continue to obey God and employ your gifts with no church service involved? Or are you only useful in organized groups of a dozen to five thousand? If your calling is being defined and delimited by a tradition of Sunday-go-to-meetin', who really called you?
Yes, this is an out-and-out challenge. If singing Jesus Loves Me with your toddler is less satisfying than playing in a hot worship band at church, it's time to ask yourself what it is that drives your worship. If explaining who Jesus is to a ditchdigger on the tailgate of the truck is somehow not as fulfilling as giving a 50-minute oratorio before a packed house of shoutin', stompin', on-fire believers... perhaps it's a good idea to ask God why this is so.
It's easy to tell people all the different ways that our gifts can be manifest in the earth. We've done it many times. And we all nod... and head right back to the pulpit/microphone/public venue and go on with business as usual, either as performers or spectators. (Insert head shake here.) Until we as "gifted individuals" are willing to go to the Father for a bit of personal examination, this dynamic is likely to continue. And the only way for God to shake us into looking deeply into this will be to break up our "ministries". Perhaps it would be wise to fall on the rock this time, to keep it from having to fall on us.
Been there myself. Waited for the rock, got it. Trust me, it smarts.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Today's Quote
If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people together to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.
--Antoine de Saint-Exupery
--Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Take Your Child To Work Day
I had the privilege of praying for a couple of missionaries from Afghanistan last night at home group. It's a pretty prophetic group, so if you ask for prayer, you usually get somewhat more.
There was a word for a brother named Jonathan that I think bears repeating. In essence, it reminded him that even on that mission field, that God's primary interest was in him, and the mission was secondary. This seems strange to us, who tend to measure things in terms of jobs and callings and ministries and measurable results of our labors. I was reminded that when God placed Jonathan in Afghanistan, it was not as though God posted a want ad and hired the qualified applicant. It was that God was doing something and wanted to share that with his child.
Ministry is truly like "Take Your Child To Work Day". God is doing something in the earth, and he calls us to Himself, taking us along to join in. His invitation is not based on what talent He sees in us, nor on what He thinks we will accomplish, but simply on the fact that we are his sons. I fear that we have made ministry into a job fair, looking at the options, finding what line of work suits us best and finding a way to sign on. If it's a paying gig, all the better. But this process establishes me as the central worker, the work as my place to shine, and "for God" as the fish on my business card.
I would suggest that we allow our minds to be renewed, from a mindset that says, "This is the thing I will accomplish for God," to a more childlike "Dad, where are you going today? What are you doing? Can I go? Please? Can I help?"
If you truly wish to see wonderful things, try following Dad to work.
There was a word for a brother named Jonathan that I think bears repeating. In essence, it reminded him that even on that mission field, that God's primary interest was in him, and the mission was secondary. This seems strange to us, who tend to measure things in terms of jobs and callings and ministries and measurable results of our labors. I was reminded that when God placed Jonathan in Afghanistan, it was not as though God posted a want ad and hired the qualified applicant. It was that God was doing something and wanted to share that with his child.
Ministry is truly like "Take Your Child To Work Day". God is doing something in the earth, and he calls us to Himself, taking us along to join in. His invitation is not based on what talent He sees in us, nor on what He thinks we will accomplish, but simply on the fact that we are his sons. I fear that we have made ministry into a job fair, looking at the options, finding what line of work suits us best and finding a way to sign on. If it's a paying gig, all the better. But this process establishes me as the central worker, the work as my place to shine, and "for God" as the fish on my business card.
I would suggest that we allow our minds to be renewed, from a mindset that says, "This is the thing I will accomplish for God," to a more childlike "Dad, where are you going today? What are you doing? Can I go? Please? Can I help?"
If you truly wish to see wonderful things, try following Dad to work.
Friday, September 11, 2009
Agricultural wisdom
This is better than anything I've written in a while, so I am unabashedly stealing it from my daughter Megan and posting it here--
I've never been one that God gave visions to, never heard words for people, or could distinctly hear his voice (without questioning myself). It never bothered me too much. I just figured our relationship wasn't like that---
Well, tonight during worship one of the speakers asked God to "tear us up" to give us a new vision of God and his love- This guided my prayers as I beseeched God-
"Make me sensitive to your spirit God..."
He gave me this---
I saw my life as hard ground.
Soil comfortably in place, not touched for an extended period of time.
A few sprouts have emerged from this soil but non significant in size or splendor
God gave me the image of this ground, not looking at it with disgust or disappointment but full of thought as he considered his plan.
A plan to till up the soil of my life that I have let remain motionless.
I felt only anticipation and excitement from my father as the ground began to display texture- No hint of hurry or frustration-
For he plans to grow so much in me; he expects a great harvest to come forth from me.
He showed me how I have cut myself off from his life by allowing myself to become sedimentary. The ground he showed me receives minimal nourishment from above as most of the rain is unable to soak in and therefore runs off-
The soil thrives because of the sustenance it has stored below. The relationship with him and the knowledge of his word have not evaporated; it is firmly in place- but it does not grow; it does not reap the harvest of the king-
My loving father knows me so well- Oh how he knows every uncertainty, every fear, every weakness, all of my hidden frailty he considers-
He carefully showed me in that moment that this ground could continue on in its current state--
No evil would occur, no angry wrath would ensue, no love withheld- even a minimal amount of growth would sustain---
But to continue on in its current state the ground would never reap the full harvest of God.
Oh my glorious creator- how I indeed comprehended the nature of psalms and the inability to call you by any other name than Marvelous- I need not to work in the soil, I need not tire in the sun - The only thing you require of my is to let go of this “life” I’ve created and become sensitive to your spirit-
You indeed are a glorious father; my only desire is to stay in your presence-
I've never been one that God gave visions to, never heard words for people, or could distinctly hear his voice (without questioning myself). It never bothered me too much. I just figured our relationship wasn't like that---
Well, tonight during worship one of the speakers asked God to "tear us up" to give us a new vision of God and his love- This guided my prayers as I beseeched God-
"Make me sensitive to your spirit God..."
He gave me this---
I saw my life as hard ground.
Soil comfortably in place, not touched for an extended period of time.
A few sprouts have emerged from this soil but non significant in size or splendor
God gave me the image of this ground, not looking at it with disgust or disappointment but full of thought as he considered his plan.
A plan to till up the soil of my life that I have let remain motionless.
I felt only anticipation and excitement from my father as the ground began to display texture- No hint of hurry or frustration-
For he plans to grow so much in me; he expects a great harvest to come forth from me.
He showed me how I have cut myself off from his life by allowing myself to become sedimentary. The ground he showed me receives minimal nourishment from above as most of the rain is unable to soak in and therefore runs off-
The soil thrives because of the sustenance it has stored below. The relationship with him and the knowledge of his word have not evaporated; it is firmly in place- but it does not grow; it does not reap the harvest of the king-
My loving father knows me so well- Oh how he knows every uncertainty, every fear, every weakness, all of my hidden frailty he considers-
He carefully showed me in that moment that this ground could continue on in its current state--
No evil would occur, no angry wrath would ensue, no love withheld- even a minimal amount of growth would sustain---
But to continue on in its current state the ground would never reap the full harvest of God.
Oh my glorious creator- how I indeed comprehended the nature of psalms and the inability to call you by any other name than Marvelous- I need not to work in the soil, I need not tire in the sun - The only thing you require of my is to let go of this “life” I’ve created and become sensitive to your spirit-
You indeed are a glorious father; my only desire is to stay in your presence-
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Brother Lawrence
I'm re-reading Brother Lawrence's "The Practice of the Presence of God". I'm reminded of a Bible class I once attended that required you to be able to testify about your "salvation experience". The suggestion was made that if you could not recount the point in time that you were saved, said salvation might be in doubt. This was always problematic for me, as I have no recollection of my days prior to belief in Christ, such reality being inculcated in me from the earliest age. I "walked the aisle" as a boy, as did most of my acquaintances, but could not really identify this as a starting point with God.
Brother Lawrence's testimony is even less categorical, but far more profound:
"The first time I saw Brother Lawrence was on the 3rd of August, 1666. He told me that God had done him a singular favor in his conversion at the age of eighteen. During that winter, upon seeing a tree stripped of its leaves and considering that, within a little time, the leaves would be renewed and, after that, the flowers and fruit appear; Brother Lawrence received a high view of the providence and power of God which has never since been effaced from his soul. This view had perfectly set him free from the world and kindled in him such a love for God, that he could not tell whether it had increased in the forty years that he had lived since."
Would that I were "perfectly set free from the world", and to the place where over forty years of life marked no change in the constancy of my own love for God.
Lawrence, a Carmelite monk, lived in the latter half of the seventeenth century and his words are remain inspiring and challenging over four hundred years later. I wonder how many writings of that century have continued to be regularly published and remain as important and relevant as this little collection of thoughts?
Brother Lawrence's testimony is even less categorical, but far more profound:
"The first time I saw Brother Lawrence was on the 3rd of August, 1666. He told me that God had done him a singular favor in his conversion at the age of eighteen. During that winter, upon seeing a tree stripped of its leaves and considering that, within a little time, the leaves would be renewed and, after that, the flowers and fruit appear; Brother Lawrence received a high view of the providence and power of God which has never since been effaced from his soul. This view had perfectly set him free from the world and kindled in him such a love for God, that he could not tell whether it had increased in the forty years that he had lived since."
Would that I were "perfectly set free from the world", and to the place where over forty years of life marked no change in the constancy of my own love for God.
Lawrence, a Carmelite monk, lived in the latter half of the seventeenth century and his words are remain inspiring and challenging over four hundred years later. I wonder how many writings of that century have continued to be regularly published and remain as important and relevant as this little collection of thoughts?
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