Have you ever done the terrifying task of moving furniture in your home? Ok so it’s not all that terrifying but it could be! Let me explain.
In our home, we most of the time eat in the kitchen but sometimes we’ll overflow into the living room. When we have more guests into our home than can fit around the table, we’ll generally spill over into the living room and use the couch. Or at night when we’re sitting down to watch tv sometimes we’ll grab a bowl of popcorn or other snack. And this very fact is what makes moving furniture a potentially dangerous, or at minimum humbling and embarrassing task.
The food that somehow miraculously misses our mouth hole tends to make its way into the crevasses in the couch. It lodges between the cushions and sometimes even bounces (or I’m convinced crawls) under the couch into the back most corner where it’s virtually unreachable.
We can vacuum the floors and even the couch but unless we remove the cushions and use the special tools on the vacuum, we’ll leave a lot of dirt and dust and food lodged under the cushions.
This is kind of like life in this world. As followers of Jesus, we have this thing called confession. And at its core, confession is like peeling back the couch cushions and revealing what’s underneath that we refused to deal with. Confession is coming to the harsh reality that something is a miss in our life and we need to have some help dealing with it.
Look I get it. No one likes to deal with the junk under the cushions. And if we’re being honest, most of the time no one can see what’s lurking in the hidden crevasses of our lives. But not dealing with these matters, doesn’t make them go away. It’s like Jesus’ words to the church leaders of his day that they were clean on the outside and dead on the inside. He called them whitewashed tombs. Nothing living exists in a tomb. It needs to be brought into the light to find life.
Confession is coming to Jesus in the mess of our lives and letting him have his way with us. Here’s the deal you don’t need to have it all together to come to Jesus but when you do come to Jesus you better expect to end up being changed.
It’s no secret that I’m a pastor. I serve in a medium sized church in a semi rural, becoming semi suburban part of central Ohio. Yeah I know that’s pretty vague but eh location really isn’t the point – the people are! I’ve done this whole ministry gig for going on 20 years now and there’s been a constant for me for my entire ministry career. It’s something referred to as the 20/80 rule. It says that 20% of the people do 80% of the work. And that normally holds true in churches to be sure, but also in other organizations and nonprofits as well. .
One of the things we’ve been called to do as pastors, and Christians for that matter, is to disciple people. Now discipleship is far more than just teaching someone the truths of Jesus. It’s about teaching those truths and leading them to obedience. You see, we’re called to raise people up and release them for ministry. We create programs where people get involved and learn and grow, but it’s so very hard to get many people to really connect beyond a Sunday morning worship time. But that has changed drastically in the past 12 months at this little miracle of a church in semi-rural central Ohio.
I really can’t put my finger on what happened or when it happened or why it happened but I can tell you that it happened!
As I look back on the past 7+ years of ministry life at Living Word, one thing has been evident – none of the good that’s happening is on me. I was able to step into a role where a very strong and very intentional Biblical foundation had been laid. My predecessor, Pastor Jim, took the utmost care to teach, lead and care for the people of this little church with everything he had. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it everyday til I die I am only as good as the great men upon whose shoulders I stand in ministry.
But I can’t just say “something happened” and leave it at that. There had to be a shift, a change or a strategy that has proven somewhat beneficial and led to this different approach to life inside this expression of the body of Christ. So here’s my feeble attempt at putting a finger on what precipitated this massive cultural shift.
Keep the main thing the main thing.
Again to Pastor Jim’s credit, the main thing was never in question. Neither he nor I are about the business of getting tangled in the weeds of politics, civic matters or worldly pursuits. Neither of us are/were perfect, so of course we slip but the focus – the thing that always matters and that we continue to come back to over and over again is the one thing that really matters – Jesus.
One thing that I firmly believe has led to this shift in participation and involvement is that we keep the goal clearly in front of people. We’re pressing in to what it means to be like Jesus. Our goal isn’t church growth or launching programs. Our goal is to help people see Jesus in the everyday moments of life and to walk with them along the path of being transformed into his image for the sake of others. And when we see it, we try to call it out or celebrate it (more on that one later).
A serious call to simple action
Another thing that has led to a greater involvement of those connected with Living Word is that we unapologetically keep the call to action in front of everyone. It’s taken a while for some to get it and we have to keep bringing it up from time to time but the call is serious. Without each of us living out the truths of Scripture, someone may never hear the goodness of God’s grace for them. The simple action part is essential as well. We’ve broken so many parts of ministry life into smaller chunks that are more manageable and don’t require lifelong commitments. It’s simple really. What can you do? What do you enjoy doing that can bring glory to God? How has God uniquely equipped you to fulfill the Great Commission? It’s really a matter of high exceptions, short term commitments, and helping people write their story of faith.
Celebrate Wins
If you do anything with a team of people you have to be sure to celebrate the victory of your team. Even if you just say thank you to those who went above and beyond to help pull off an event or a ministry program, just do something. Recognize the efforts of your team. The point is to build up momentum as you gather together for a common purpose.
Do NOT Lower the Bar
Finally the thing that I think really matters to the shift we’ve seen is to keep expectations high. We live in a society where we like to lower expectations to help people feel better about minimal accomplishments, but this is not the way of Jesus. So keep expectations high. Tell people what you want from them and for them. The point of being part of a church is to help, support, and provide for the group moving forward. Even the part of the worship service that recognizes new members joining a local church asks in part do you intend to support the work of the church with your time, talents and treasures? The idea is that church membership is like being part of a body. Each part needs to show up to do their part. No single part is not needed. No part is of lesser value. No part of the body or of the church can say they don’t need to pull their weight. Part of the secret that we’ve been able to tap into is that of continually seeking ways for all parts of the body to do something in the body. It’s part of our discipleship pathway to move worship attenders from observation to full on ownership of the mission of God in this place.
We’re all in it together so let’s join in to make the world recognize what and who the church is because without you it just won’t be the same!
Neither of these hands are my hands, but they are special hands. Most hands are special to be honest, but these are extra special. These hands have crafted some delicious goodies over the past 93 years. They’ve stitched some creatively amazing quilts. They’ve cooked amazing meals. But probably most importantly they’ve remained open in a loving way that not many can rival. These hands are not mine. They are not yours. I’m not even related to these hands, but they treated me as if I was part of the family.
Today these hands are finally at rest. They do not move. They no longer cook. No more quilts will be stitched or cookies baked. These hands now rest. From over nine decades of work and countless thousands of meals served, these hands are finally able to stop.
These hands belong to a woman one knew as wife, three knew as mom, and countless knew as friend. They belong to my wife’s grandma. She’s not my grandma by birth, but she always treated me like I was one of her grandchildren. When my grandma passed away over 20 years ago having started making a quilt for my then fiancé and me. She never got a chance to finish it, but now in our home is a quilt lovingly crafted by the caring hands of my Grandma Elaine and my Great Ma.
You see friends the moral of this little fable is that we never know when life will come to a close. We might be like Great Ma and live 93 amazingly blessed and fruitful years. But we might be called from this earth far earlier. Leave nothing on the table. Use your hands to do good for those around you. Serve where you can serve even when you’re tired, even when you really don’t want to, even when someone isn’t one of “your people.”
The time will come for each of us when we will give an account for the way we used our hands. Our accounting will not matter for our salvation because that was won for us by Jesus’ hands. But did we love well? Did we serve well? Did others see Jesus in the way we used our hands?
I pray that you take this time to look at what your hands are telling those around you. When someone looks at your hands, do they see someone who loved and served and welcomed like Great Ma? If not, there’s no time like the present to start loving well.
You will be missed, but we do not mourn like others mourn. We mourn as those with hope. Rest in Jesus’ hands. Til we meet again Great-Ma, we love you!
Imagine for a second a beautiful bride slowly progressing down the aisle to meet her groom. Her hair is perfectly done up with curls that swirl down her head like waves rolling on the ocean coast. Her makeup is done to perfection. The bouquet is gently held in her hands. But the dress, it’s something to behold. It’s a crisp and clean white. Long to the ground. It’s cut straight to fit her well but modestly designed at the same time. The train of the dress glides across the floor as she makes her way to her groom.
Then out of no where in a sudden movement, a 4 year old boy darts from his chair to give the bride a hug. He reaches out and grabs her dress before anyone can catch him. This would be a cute and loving moment if he hadn’t been eating a cheese coated snack that left his hands more orange than a pumpkin. Those hands grabbed the front of the bride’s dress transforming the perfectly fitted, white wedding gown into a canvas for this little guys finger painting.
Could you imagine! Now that scenario never happened, at least not that I’m aware. But imagine the horror on the bride’s face or the embarrassment the child’s mother would feel. Consider how terrifyingly awful that moment would be for all involved.
And as awful as that moment is, we live in a very similar situation nearly every day. As Christians, we are called to live a life worthy of the calling of Christ. We’re called to a high standard. We are commanded to be perfect, just like Jesus was perfect. Just like that pretty white dress was perfect. But just like that imaginary story, we’ve trashed the perfection God gave us. He doesn’t lower the bar or excuse our behavior. He doesn’t say everything is ok. He doesn’t say Well, they’re just sinners so I shouldn’t expect anything more than this. No, God demands perfect.
This week we look at the bible word – sin. It’s a word that describes anything that misses the benchmark of perfect. It’s the word that shows what happens when we put our dirty, grimy, selfish finger prints all over the perfect image in which God created us.
Look, I get it, no one likes to be shown they are wrong. No one likes to admit they are wrong, to themselves much less to other people. As we consider the stains we’ve made on life, it’s important to admit our fallenness. It’s critical to lay our cards out on the table of life and be honest when our actions don’t match our confession.
And when we do, be ready for a truly amazing change to occur. Be ready for your life to completely change trajectory, because when we admit our sins we gain admission to God’s freedom. We’ll look more at the action of admitting or confessing our flaws next week but for now revel in the glory of forgiveness gained by Jesus on your behalf.
Communication is a tough business. You can craft your message. You can select your words. You can work on inflection and delivery. If it’s printed material, you diligently work on type face and word spacing and all the cool graphic things. But there is a time when certain things are out of your control.
Some people are just going to look for any chance to roast you over what you said or how you said it. There are people in all of our lives who play the role of the eternal antagonist. They want nothing more than to stir the pot. While others have circumstances in their lives that act like those machines at the eye doctor that filter how we see what’s clearly right in front of us. When scenario “A” happens it changes how we see life in comparison to scenario “B.” So the point here is to not over worry about someone’s interpretation of something you did not communicate in the first place.
Acknowledging that some things eventually will be outside of your ability to control however does not give you the excuse to not do your due diligence. While certain things are out of our control, much of the art of communication is very much in our control. It is the responsibility of the communicator to, well communicate effectively and efficiently and eloquently.
I recently was sent an image of a church’s graphic material. It took about half a second for me to see that someone didn’t do their homework very well. While the message communicated was very much right on, there was an unintended snag in their communication. Whoever hung the banners below didn’t understand a cultural nuance in our society. Now I will warn you that if you are easily offended, then you will likely take offense at the image. I am using it as an example that sometimes innocent communication, when lazily put in front of an audience, can speak an unintentional message.
The image is telling us that this church values friends, teaching and worship. But if you look at the way they are set side by side, you’ll notice that the letters at the top are W.T.F.
That abbreviation is not exactly what this church was going for I am very certain. But when we fail to thoroughly look at our message we run the risk of doing exactly what happened here. We can communicate a message that is completely inappropriate without even knowing it. For those of you who don’t know what the three letters mean, you’re probably way better off! Let’s just say it’s not a message most churches would like hanging over their entry doors.
So what do we do with this? Simple, slow down. Get a second set of eyes or ears on the message you’re bringing. Whether it’s in a church or a small business or in front of massive crowds or even just a group of family and friends – what you say and how you say it communicates a lot about the care you give to your message.
Communication is totally out of your hands once it’s been received by someone else, so take your time to make sure what you’re about to say is what you really want to say.
Let’s be honest. We suck at life. I mean really. We go out of our way to prove ourselves right. We shut people out who disagree with us. We shut people down who do or say things that don’t line up with our views. When someone challenges us, we remove them from our circle of friends. We just flat suck at being human sometimes.
And to make matters worse – it’s not ok! No matter what someone tells you when you apologize, it is NOT ok! It never has been and never will be. If someone tells you they are sorry for doing something wrong or acting like a turd, don’t tell them it’s ok. They hurt you and hurting you isn’t ok.
A really big word in the life of the church is forgiveness. Forgiveness isn’t an excuse to do bad again. Forgiveness is not the license to give yourself a pass on bad behavior just because you’re not perfect. Forgiveness is the removal of our wrongs. Forgiveness is the wiping clean of the slate of our lives.
This month we started a 40 Day Journey called the Forgiving Challenge. Throughout these 40 days we’ll discover what forgiveness is, why it’s important, what we need forgiveness for, and what we’re supposed to do now that we’ve been forgiven. But it all starts with an honest assessment…
I am an awful person.
You can’t say those words about other people. When you hear me say those words you’re welcome to agree but the Bible is clear that we can’t go poking at someone else’s issues before we deal with our own.
Our first stop in this 40 day journey is to take an honest look in the mirror and seriously recognize our flaws and failures. Where have you gone wrong? What have you done that has offended someone else? What have you neglected to do that you said you would do? How have you let others down? Just pause for a minute to recognize that you’re not perfect. We all know that we’re not perfect but unfortunately we often act like we are.
Below is the message that kicked off this 40 Day journey of recognizing and practicing forgiveness. We’d love for you to walk with us through this challenge to give up on the failures and embrace a life of forgiveness.
As a product of the generation known as GenX, I know the struggles with absolute truth versus relative truth. The idea that what’s right for you isn’t right for me. And in some cases that’s right. There are somethings in life that are just not for everyone and that are very relative. But there are other things that are historically, across time and space to be considered truth. Some things are established as truth for the proper ordering of civilization and prosperity. Some things are intended to be in place for a very distinct purpose.
If you’ve ever studied economics or sociology you know that low income, high crime areas have something in common. Dads generally are no longer in the household picture. You see what happens when dads fail to live in their role is that families start to crumble. And when families crumble, communities crumble. And when communities crumble, so also to entire civilizations. As a matter of fact, I recently read that in ever civilization that at one time was thriving and now is a shadow of itself, the downfall started by the devaluing of the family structure.
In the video below, I address the family structure. Not mom, dad, two kids and a dog kind of family but the way God intended them to function. And whether you’re a believer in the whole Jesus thing or not, if you just look at history books, sociology studies, crime statistics and economics you’ll see evidence that backs this up. A proper understanding and valuing of family is the foundation of a thriving civilization and when we lose sight of this fundamental truth, we begin the degradation of not just family values but an entire culture.
So we all like to have options. We like to be able to chart our own course and pave our own way as the saying goes. We love to be able to look to the life we’ve mounted for ourselves and decide what we want to do with the life we have to live.
We live in a time in which we like to create options when options aren’t necessary. I mean seriously, do you really need to recreate the wheel when the wheel is working just fine? I was talking to someone the other day about a change he was trying to make in his routine. I was struck by the fact that this individual didn’t even know why he was making the change. Change for change sake is not really a good idea.
The problem with changing things up when you don’t really have a good reason to change them is that change causes turmoil, brokenness and conflict. By nature we don’t like change, so bringing change to a situation that is charged with uncertainty will only make the uncertainty greater. It’s the old adage if it isn’t broke don’t fix it. How true is that statement?
Think about it, you don’t change the tire in your car just because you feel like it. You wait until the tread is worn thing or it goes flat. Change for change sake just makes life harder than it has to be.
But there is a time when change is needed. When the system isn’t working. When harm is being inflicted. When someone, including yourself, is in danger. When a better, more productive method is present. These are some of the times when change is not only warranted but even encouraged.
When it comes time to bring change into your life, make sure to go slowly. All too often when it comes to change, we either refuse to change and stay in a harmful situation, throw the baby out with the bathwater so to speak, or change something that isn’t the real problem.
Before you make decisions on what needs to change and what doesn’t remember the car analogy. You have to evaluate the real problem, assess the size of the problem, then fix the problem (keep in mind you may need to seek help to fix some problems).
Evaluate the problem.
If your car has one of those cool indicator lights on the dashboard, it might tell you that you need an oil change. When that little dummy light turns on, it’s saying hey dummy change oil. Sometimes we rush into our troubles and address the wrong problem. We feel like something isn’t right or see something that is just a little off so we run away from everything we know to be true. That’s like seeing a light turn on in the dashboard and thinking our car is going to blow so you trade it in for a new one when all it needed was an oil change. Don’t overreact to the dummy lights in your life. If you slow down you’ll see more clearly the problem they are indicating.
Assess the size of the problem
When we realize what the problem is then we can determine who can address the problem. Some problems we can easily manage, others we can’t. When we assess the size of the problem we honestly, truthfully seek to find the best possible outcome for the problem at hand. It is often helpful in this stage to invite someone you trust to come alongside you to ask you some questions to help clarify what you’re seeing. In the car situation above, this is looking at the owner’s manual to see what the little light means, calling a friend who’s a mechanic, or even taking it somewhere to have one of those cool code readers attached to help diagnose the problem. We don’t need to go changing oil in a car that has low tire pressure. Seeing the size of the problem will help you better understand how and who can fix it.
Fix the problem
When you’ve effectively evaluated the situation, determined the problem and its size and know who can fix it. You need to make the appointment or set the time aside in your schedule and just get the job done. I’ve seen many people, read the indicator light correctly, realize who can fix the problem, but then they don’t do anything with the problem. They let it just sit there and fester and grow and get out of hand. The longer the problem sits without being taken care of the bigger it gets and likely the more damage is done. Remember the car scenario…know what happens when you don’t change the oil as you’re supposed to? Maybe nothing today or tomorrow but if you go long enough you can tear apart an engine. The same is true of your problems. If we don’t fix the right problem, we’ll end up with a lot of expense and be no better off. Likewise if we know the problem and do nothing we’ll be living in the carnage of our laziness.
So change sucks sometimes but when we’re honest, methodical, and intentional about the situation we’ll end up with a well oiled machine called life that we can drive. (Yeah I know bad pun but I’m a dad so what can you expect.)
There you have it. Change is hard but the right change at the right time by the right person is essential.
It’s no secret that what we do is important, but equally important at times is how we approach those things we hold near and dear. We’ve probably all heard the old adage that says doing the same thing the same way expecting different results is insanity. Well I think that applies to a lot of different scenarios in life.
One thing I have learned from the last 18 months is that some people care more about how they do things than what they actually do! Now it’s no secret that I serve as a pastor of a central Ohio church, so admittedly my examples will be slanted in that direction. But I know from conversations with those outside the church leadership realm, that some of these correlation apply across cultural settings.
I think something interesting happened when the initial wave of closures and shuttering of activities started. Many churches and small businesses realized that they had relied on one method of doing things. Predominantly, churches had a singular method of distributing their content. Come to a centralized location. Receive what we give. Go home and live it out.
This worked for decades in North America and even in pockets around the world. But take away the church’s ability to meet together and the whole system goes out the window. I’m not saying we shouldn’t meet together! Actually I think meeting together is very beneficial, if not essential. But is it the only way?
From what I’ve seen and experienced it appears many churches in mainline Christianity have made the structure of how we do church more important than the gospel the church is to proclaim. In other words, doing church has become more important than being the church.
Think about the operational system of the church. Many churches are formed around the principle of gathering. If the church gathers it is functioning properly, then it will be gathering in a large assembly. But can the church operate without mass gatherings? What are some alternatives to the church assembling in one location?
Now before we get all early church critical here. The early church, according to the book of Acts, tells us that they gathered as an assembly and they gathering in homes. It wasn’t one or the other, but it was both. However it seems in our 21st Century church tradition we worship the idea of gathering more than letting the gathering fuel our worship.
Think about a restaurant or fast food joint for a minute. If you have only dine in seating, and you can’t gather to sit inside, how are you going to stay in business? This very problem caused many small businesses to shutter and eventually go out of business last year. It had similar effects to some churches who just couldn’t pivot fast enough to provide connecting points beyond the Sunday morning in person worship gathering.
What happens when the church can’t gather like we expect it to gather?
I think we need to start looking at how we can do and be the church in the midst of rolling black outs of meeting together. Analysts have said this is not the last shut down we’ll experience. And if we believe the teachings of the Bible to be true, we’ll see things getting harder and harder for the church as time goes on. So we need to value highly our gathering times, not neglecting to gather by any means. But we also need to find creative ways to gather, get the message out, stay in touch with one another. We need to develop deep relationships with those around us. We need to look out for one another and be proactive in establishing emergency response plans where we take care of those in our community.
There is no hard and fast, silver bullet approach to navigating crisis. There’s no perfect solution to a disruption but we can see clearly that putting all of our eggs in one basket of how we do what we do, didn’t work so well. Look at strategies for staying connected and even reaching beyond your current circle to those a little farther off who are in need of the good news you have to share.
The point is your methods aren’t bad. But perhaps we need to look at additional methods to bolster the overall impact of the message we have to give.
The premise of welfare and the working of the welfare system can be some controversial topics at times. The intent here isn’t to belittle anyone in the welfare system. The intent is simply to provide some perspective on what seems to be a more biblical approach to what we call welfare.
I recently was reading the book of Ruth in the Bible. It’s the story of a woman, Naomi, who lost her husband and sons in a short span of time. She was left a widow with her two daughters-in-law as the only ones to care for her. Long story short there was no one to take care of them. One of the daughters-in-law left to go back home, so the story continues with Ruth taking care of Naomi.
Fast forward to chapter 2 and we see Ruth out in a field gathering left over grain off the ground. Enter God’s welfare system. The practice was simple actually, farmers would gather the grain but leave some in the field for the poor and widows and those needing help. They didn’t have a system where people got a handout. The system God designed in this time had work built into it. They had to work to get the food.
No hand outs, just hand ups.
It was a fantastic system, if you really think about it. It kept those needing a little help active. It taught responsibility and work ethic. It made the people an active part of the community. And it wasn’t morally degrading to anyone who was too embarrassed to receive a handout. They did an honest day’s work for an honest day’s wage. It was truly amazing! And better yet…it worked!
The issue faced in some parts of our country is that when we offer hand outs instead of hand ups we let people stay where they are. But when we offer a system designed to help people succeed and receive help at the same time, it’s a win – win for everyone!
When we think about helping those who are going through rough times, we have to understand that there is a time for handouts. But those times are not continual. If Ruth didn’t have to glean the fields for the leftover food, she wouldn’t have ever met her husband. When we sit back and rely on handouts and giveaway items, we run the risk of losing out on some massive opportunities for life!
How can you help give someone a hand up in your day to day life? If we would focus on empowering people to grow and succeed, we could quite possibly shatter any glass ceilings that exist in our culture for people of any and every life circumstance.
