Tag: discipleship (Page 2 of 15)

Forgiveness

January 25, 2024 / Derrick Hurst / 0 Comments

A super powerful word in the life of the Christian and a word we all should know very well is where we’ll focus today.

Forgiveness.

To forgive doesn’t mean you have to say it’s ok. As a matter of fact, when you forgive someone, you’re saying it’s not ok but you’re willing to not hold it against the relationship. It means that you’re willing to move past the moment, hurt, wrong so that you can heal. Admittedly, forgiveness requires some form of acknowledgment of wrong. Without any form of acknowledgment, it’s hard to offer forgiveness. In church-world, we call that confession. Confessing or admitting the wrong we did is the first step in this process.

There’s a lesson we’ve taught our children about forgiveness that I believe is important for just about everyone. I’ve taught it to every church I’ve served. Forgiveness must flow freely. When someone apologizes or says they’re sorry, the thing you should work toward immediately is forgiveness. It’s good for the person who apologized but it’s also good for you.

When we forgive someone, we free ourselves of the burden of that pain. When we get to a place of forgiveness we are able to bring healing. But all too often forgiveness is withheld. Maybe it’s withheld accidentally because we don’t think it’s really all that important. Let me assure you, it is very important. When someone apologizes or admits a wrong, the one thing they need is forgiveness. Unfortunately, there are times when withholding forgiveness isn’t unintentional. Sometimes it’s done on purpose.

We hold forgiveness to make sure the other person is really sorry. Or maybe to teach them a lesson. We withhold forgiveness because they really hurt us and it just seems right to make them suffer. We refuse to offer those three simple words I forgive you because we’re still hurt. But forgiveness doesn’t mean we’re not hurt. It means we forgive them. It means we’re willing to work on the relationship, through the struggle, even in the painful moments.

Forgiveness is massively important. And to think anything less is likely a reason why forgiveness isn’t a free flowing concept in our lives today.

I’m sure glad Jesus didn’t handle forgiveness with me the same way we handle it with those around us. I’m sure glad he didn’t wait until I had the right heart or asked the right way, or you fill in the blank, before he offered me forgiveness. The beauty of who Jesus is and who he calls us to be is freely forgiven and forgiving people.

The Bible says that while we were still sinners Christ died for us. This is what makes forgiveness so amazing! It was ours long before we deserved it (not that we even deserve it now). It was earned for us before we asked for it. A plan was set in motion to forgive me and you before we even committed the wrong.

We read that when we come to God and ask for forgiveness, he grants it. Fully. Freely. Forever. Every single time. He removes those wrongs as far as the east is from the west as the Psalmist tells us. There are countless ways we see the Bible tell us about forgiveness, but all of them have the same message. We confess. He forgives. It’s the easiest formula out there.

So from whom do you need to hear those words? And perhaps a better question is who do you need to say them to?

Forgiveness is earned but not by you or me. It was earned by Jesus. And it’s his forgiveness that gives us a model for ours.

Cynicism

January 24, 2024 / Derrick Hurst / 0 Comments

For starters this is one of those words the never looks right to me when I type it. It seems all weird and no spelling actually feels right. So I have to rely on the cool squiggly red line underneath to help me out.

Cynicism is a pretty dangerous thing. To be cynical is to doubt the reality of something. Here are a few different ways to look at cynicism.

One definition correlates cynicism with skepticism. The idea that someone is always up to something contrary to what they say. Someone with ulterior motives would be another way to put it.

In a book titled A Praying Life the author says that cynicism is to be distant, leading to a creeping deadness that destroys the spirit. The book goes on to say that cynicism leaves us doubting and unable to dream. The idea here is that when we become cynical to life, we shut down our hearts and kind of just go through the motions unable to see the reality that’s right in front of us.

C.S. Lewis says that cynicism is seeing through something. He then goes on to say, You cannot go on ‘seeing through’ things for ever. The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it. It is good that the window should be transparent, because the street or garden beyond it is opaque. How if you saw through the garden too? It is no use trying to ‘see through’ first principles. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To ‘see through’ all things is the same as not to see.

Do you get what C.S. Lewis is saying here? He’s essentially saying where does cynicism end. When you try to see through one thing only to find yourself trying to see through the next and the next as well, you see nothing. Eventually, everything is something else and you don’t know what’s real and what’s false.

This word cynicism comes out of a study of Isaiah 29 as I prepare for a bible study I’m leading. While he doesn’t use the word specifically, this is what he’s talking about. He’s talking about dullness or dryness of faith and life. Isaiah is basically telling the people that they’ve been so cynical of the things of faith that now they don’t even see what God is up to because they’re essentially looking through it.

If we take the word cynical as our word of the day this week, we need to wrestle with where it’s found its way into our daily lives. Where have you been overly cynical? Where has cynicism made life around you so transparent that you can’t even see what’s right there in front of you?

Is it your job? Making you think that nothing you can do is good enough for your boss. Perhaps it’s in your marriage? He’ll never really love me the way I need to be loved. She’ll never trust me again. Maybe it’s in your other relationships? Everyone’s out to get me. No one trusts me. I’m not worth anything. What about your worship? Just going through the motions without a second thought. Your heart isn’t really in it so you’re just faking it til you make it.

Whatever area your cynicism has crept in, you need to deal with it. And there are two things needed to deal with cynicism in life: truth and direction. Both are necessary but we can’t have the direction without first seeing the truth.

Cynicism is like a pair of glasses that cause us to look through the moment at the intentions. And if we’re being honest, the intentions we see aren’t the real intentions but rather ones our cynical minds have made up. This is because cynicism brings a disconnect between our head and our heart.

When we are submerged in the truth of a given scenario, it’s like someone takes those crazy x-ray glasses off. Now instead of seeing assumed motives, we’re able to see the words on the page. We’re able to hear the real voice on the other end of the phone. We’re able to see the actions for what they really are and not for something we formulated in our heads. The only way to do this is to remove the glasses by putting on new glasses of the truth.

Like a bad prescription changes how we see the world around us, so also a cynical lens negatively impacts how we see life. The lenses of truth are put back on when we surround ourselves with people who have the truth. We need to be able to listen to hard things. Be challenged. We need to be honest with ourselves and those around us. And when we do, the truth will shift our eyesight from seeing through something to seeing something through it.

After we change out our glasses to ones filled with truth, we need to look in the direction the truth is pointing us. Now that we’re able to see a little more clearly, we can see what’s in front of us and what’s on the other side of the window C.S. Lewis referred to in his quote.

As we navigate the challenge of cynicism in our lives, we are forced to deal with our own demons. Cynicism isn’t someone else’s problem. You can’t call out cynicism in someone else. You have to see it in you. Take an honest look. Where have you been cynical? What truth have you missed by looking through it to see something that isn’t even there? What direction are you supposed to be going that you didn’t even know existed because you looked through the road map by your cynical thinking?

Innovation Is Not The Enemy Of Tradition

January 23, 2024 / Derrick Hurst / 0 Comments

Something a lot of people may not know about me is that I’m a huge fan of tradition. I grew up in a historic church that was steeped in tradition. There was so much tradition that they often got stuck in the we’ve never done it that way loop. But there is a tremendous importance to recognizing the accomplishments of the past, the foundations of our identity, the parts and pieces of our history that got us to where we are and that still hold us together.

When people look at how I lead and the things that happen as part of the church I serve, many think that I am anti-tradition. But there’s a false dichotomy that’s often drawn in many circles. It says if you’re willing to try new things, then you must hate the traditions that got us here.

I think this is an absolutely ludicrous way of thinking, but it seems to be where some people are in life. Do it differently and you’ve abandoned the past. New is the enemy of old. Innovation is the killer of tradition. I just don’t get that assumption. But then again it seems to be an assumption and we all know how the saying goes with regard to assumptions.

Innovation doesn’t have to be the enemy of tradition.

Before a change is made or a new thing is started, it’s important to take the time to evaluate what history is behind the current situation. I’m a pastor so a lot of my illustrations come from that world. Here’s one I see a lot.

I talk to a lot of pastors who ask how to reach their community. We talk about different strategies for impacting the neighborhoods around their church building. We talk about starting new ministries, planting new churches, and pivoting to find a creative or innovative way to connect with people not yet connected. But before we make plans on the new thing, we have to take time to celebrate the history.

The parts of our past that got us to where we are today are things we need to recognize and celebrate. We need to champion our history. It doesn’t matter if that history is 10 years or 175 years, it all matters. History is history.

I will often talk about the man who served as pastor before I arrived at the church I currently serve. If he had not been there before me and done the wonderful job he did, I couldn’t be where I am today. If your organization, or if your past, didn’t go through the things it went through, you wouldn’t be where you are either.

Tradition and Innovation don’t have to be enemies. They need to respect each other. They need to build off of each other. When we let our tradition shape our innovation and our innovation celebrate our traditions, we set ourselves up for a thriving future as an organization.

It Just Takes One

January 15, 2024 / Derrick Hurst / 0 Comments

As we continue to walk through the book of Romans, we pause for four simple verses that are jam packed with power. If you’ve been in the church world for any length of time, I sure hope you’ve at least heard part of this. Here are the verses on which we’re focusing this week.

I am under obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish. So I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome.For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.” – Romans 1:14-17

These four verses can be summed up with just three simple words. Ashamed. Eager. Obligated.

Ashamed

Paul says he’s not ashamed of the gospel. For him to state that he’s not ashamed, asserts that there will be some that are in fact ashamed of the Gospel. So this kind of begs the question, why would someone be ashamed of the gospel if it’s the good news of God?

Well, the point of the gospel is the undeserved grace of God for us. That means we don’t earn it and that’s kind of an unpopular opinion in a world that’s focused on achievement and self promotion. So when the gospel says that we can’t but God did for us, that’s kind of a shameful thing if you think your good actions get you to heaven.

Another aspect of the gospel that can cause some people shame is how it all works. If you know the story of the Bible, you’ll know that the essence of the gospel is that Jesus died a pretty horrible death in our place. That means he got punished for something we did! And that can honestly make some people a bit ashamed. Either ashamed because they didn’t have the power to do it themselves, or ashamed because of the horrific nature of the Roman torture that Jesus endured to show his love for us. Both can really lead to a feeling of being ashamed.

Eager

When we settle in on the fact that this wonderful message of the gospel is something about which we have no need to be ashamed, then there is almost an eagerness in us to share it.

Think of it like finding a cure for cancer. If you found a cure for an ailment that was life threatening to millions of people around the world, you’d probably be eager to share that with as many people as you could! The same is true for the gospel. No it doesn’t stop cancer or lessen the intensity of earthquakes and tornadoes. But it does bring a cure of sorts to a totally different problem.

The gospel is a demonstration of our salvation. Jesus died so we don’t have to die like that, and then rose so we could live in the promise of heaven. But there’s more to it even than that.

The gospel actually addresses some of the deepest longings of our hearts. Acceptance. Belonging. Worth. Value. Identity. Purpose. Calling. All these are part of the message of the Gospel. When we really understand the gospel and are unashamed by its meaning, then we have an eagerness to share it with as many people as we can find!

Obligated

This one will strike some people a little odd. Some might even think this isn’t right. But the wonderful free nature of the gospel when understood correctly obligates us to share it.

The word obligated can also been seen like the word debt. We are indebted to the gospel. We don’t owe anything for our salvation. That’s not the point. The point of this obligation or indebtedness is that we were given something that is for us and for someone else. Think of it like this.

You receive a donation for the local Ronald McDonald House Charity. It’s a sizable stack of cash. Someone gives you $100,000 in cash to deliver to the charity. It’s for them. You don’t owe the person who gave it to you a penny. But you do owe the charity that $100,000.

The gospel is similar. By not being ashamed of the gospel, we’ve already received the gift for ourselves. When we really get what it means, we essentially deposit that gift for ourselves. But the point of the gospel isn’t just that we deposit it into our account. The point of the deposit of the gospel is that we give it to those around us because it’s just as much for them as it is for us. We’re obligated then by the gospel to hand it out to those for whom it’s intended. Which if you didn’t know, is everyone!

This week I’ll end with a bit of a challenge. We talk about large events and getting the world to know the message of the gospel. But what if we started with just one person. I mean the person living next door to you. Or the one in the cubicle across the hallway. Maybe it’s a classmate or person at the gym. You pick because the point is it only takes one.

Let’s say 5 people would take this idea seriously about sharing the gospel intentionally through the context of a relationship. Let’s say those 5 people each found one person. Walked with that one person to an understanding of the Gospel and by the end of a year those 5 people had doubled to 10. Then let’s pretend those 10 did the same thing. The next year you’d have 20. If we did this for 15 cycles, those initial 5 people who were unashamed, eager and obligated by the gospel would become 163,840 people in just 15 years time. But if they did it for 30 years, that original 5 would become 5,368,709,120 people.

And it all happens when 5 people who were unashamed, eager and obligated by the gospel call found one person each and become totally sold out on the message of the gospel in which they believed.

It just takes one!

Needy?

January 12, 2024 / Derrick Hurst / 0 Comments

I learned a lesson when I was selling cars that I believe is transferrable to just about every other field. Never make a significant and permanent decision as a result of a huge need.

Ok so that’s a tad vague so let me put some skin on that skeleton. In the car sales world, the easiest person to sell a car to was the one who came in saying My car just died and if I don’t get something today, I won’t be able to make it to work tomorrow!

Yep that actually happened. More than once! You know what that does to the sales person? There is a huge flashing neon sign above that person indicating they are a for sure sale. And it meant they were no longer in a position to negotiate on price much at all because they needed to buy more than I needed to sell.

The transferrable principle I try to live by is to never make a decision, or hire someone, when you’re feeling desperate and needy. The more needy we are, the more likely we will choose someone for what they can do instead of for the character and skill set they bring to the table. And this can be very dangerous!

Imagine for a minute that you need to hire someone to fill a critical role in your organization. You just fired half of your sales team because they weren’t performing and now you need to bring on more sales reps to handle the traffic that you know will be coming. A critical role in your business was just vacated by someone who left for another company or was removed for unethical practices. This can even be the case with volunteer teams when we just look for warm bodies instead of people who epitomize the character and values of our organization.

When we make a massive decision, like bringing someone onto the team, in the midst of a tremendous sense of desperation, it almost always ends really…really badly!

A better approach that I’ve found works fairly well in both the nonprofit landscape and even in for profit entities with which I’ve worked is to fill the gap for an intentionally temporary season. This means you might hire a sales person for a 3 month probationary period. Bring in the interim CEO to manage your growing company. Appoint an interim to fill the position at your nonprofit or ministry team.

When we make these massive shifts out of a sense of desperation, we often are so clouded by the need that we can’t see the reality in front of us. If the rest of the team is strong, then even a critical loss can be managed for a short duration of time by the rest of your competent staff.

Take a breath. Slow down. Look for a potential short term solution to give yourself a little room to make a clear headed decision.

Cracks in Concrete

January 9, 2024 / Derrick Hurst / 2 Comments

The church I pastor has a group that meets a couple times a month called Bible and Brew. We meet in a local pub, have a beverage of choice, share life stories, and talk about faith. Every time we get together I’m reminded how important this type of group really is, and it has nothing to do with the beverages!

This particular night one of the guys started us with the question, What does God want from us. Now that’s kind of a loaded question. And I’ll admit, it took every fiber of my being to not go all pastor on the group and try to answer the question. You see that’s the joy of this group. Generally the questions have no real answers, at least nothing that would be always right in every situation. Kind of like what does God want from us, there are hundreds of answers that all could apply perfectly.

As the discussion unfolded however, there was a theme that was starting to come into picture a little more clearly. In a world that is divided, how are we supposed to live. We talked about how political structures divide. We talked about how media has a tendency to sensualize everything only polarizing the divided landscape around us. What does God want from us?

It’s a pretty cool thought actually. When the world around us is divided and broken, how is the church supposed to act? The kind of obvious answer that came out of things was to not be divided. But how does that work?

We looked at passages like Hebrews 10 where the writer says do not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing. Ok so one way we stay undivided is to be together. The more together we experience, the less chance of cracks to come into our lives.

One image we sat on for a bit was the image of concrete. I have a concrete driveway. And as great as a concrete driveway is, there are some issues with concrete. One thing is pretty much certain. Concrete cracks. You’re pretty much not going to stop it from happening. They can put control joints in, you know those fancy lines in sidewalks and cuts in larger slabs. Those are intended not to prevent concrete from cracking but to stop cracks when they happen.

I made a bit of a mistake this year and didn’t fill the cracks in my driveway before winter. If you’re not aware, the little cracks in concrete, if left untreated, will eventually fill with water and in freezing temperatures as the water expands so will the crack. A tiny crack in concrete, if not taken care of immediately can result in some serious damage.

Ok back to the discussion of what does God want from us. I think if we look all over the place in the Bible, we’ll see a very common theme. Unity is kind of a big deal to Jesus. In Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer from John 17, Jesus says that they may be one as we are one. Oneness must be a huge thing. Jesus was kind of wrapping up his entire ministry and he did it by praying for unity in the body of Christ. What does God want from us?

If Jesus prayed for the church to be unified, then I’m pretty sure that’s what God wants from us and for us today. Our discussion was all over the map about unity, not uniformity but unity. We’re not all supposed to be the same or think the same but our purpose and identity is supposed to be tied to the same thing – the gospel. We used illustrations of tractor pulls and locomotives, teams of horses and mathematics lessons.

The long and short was that division isn’t math that God does. He’s not about dividing people. One of the first sermons I preached at the church I now serve was about a wedge. The principle of a wedge is that just the tiniest point of the wedge is all that’s needed to weaken the overall integrity of something. And just like that concrete sidewalk, if a crack is left unattended it can be devastating.

So what is it that unites us? Our common confession is the key. The thing that unites us isn’t a can’t we all just get along mindset, it’s not the sport team we cheer to victory, it’s not the political systems with which we align ourselves. The thing that unites us is the gospel. When the gospel isn’t the focus, when our attention shifts from the power and importance of the gospel, we run a strong risk of cracks popping up in the concrete of our lives.

What does God want? If the answer is unity, then we have to also admit that just like in concrete cracks happen in our daily lives as well. So what do we do when cracks show up? Well, we patch them. Seal them. Watch them closely over time. The same is true for all of us around the table that night. When disunity comes into play in our lives, we need to patch it with the gospel. We need to come back to who we are and what we’re called to be.

If the one thing God wants for us is unity, then we can be certain that coming to him is the best place to find that unity when a crack is discovered. Maybe it’s time to take a closer look at the driveway and patch up some of those cracks so that we may be one just as God is one.

Learning From The Master

January 5, 2024 / Derrick Hurst / 0 Comments

As we wrapped up 2023, I took a few of these posts to define Discipleship and discuss what Discipleship was not. Then we looked at the qualifications for being a disciple.

Now that we’ve turned the page on the calendar and have opened up a brand new year of possibilities, it’s time to dig in a little deeper into this idea of discipleship and spiritual formation. This will hopefully be the Friday rhythm for 2024 (only time will tell how well I hold to this schedule).

If we’re going to get started getting serious about discipleship, then we should probably start by taking a look at the master. I mean after all, the only way to be great at something is to follow the one who was the best at it. Right?

And since I’m a pastor and the whole topic of discipleship is a biblical one, you probably already guessed who the master is. But for those of you who are a bit late to the party, his name is Jesus. He kind of wrote the book on discipleship. Literally.

So Jesus was a real guy, very few people argue about that one. And for those of us who call ourselves followers of Jesus, we believe that he was also the Son of God. There’s also some pretty stark evidence to that fact as well. Regardless of what you believe about Jesus, pretty much everyone can agree that he had a pretty stellar way of doing life. I mean, if he wasn’t the Son of God and yet got thousands of people to follow him, then he’s probably pretty good at getting people on board with his way of thinking.

How did he do it? I mean, the whole discipleship thing. Remember the definition I work with is that Discipleship is the process of being transformed into the image of Christ for the sake of others. With that in mind, how did Jesus get the people of his day to actually follow him closely enough to want to do what he did.

Think about the story in the Bible of Jesus walking on the water. He’s out there for a nice evening stroll across the water by himself. His disciples are in the boat trying to get through the head wind, when one of them sees him. Not knowing what was going on and realizing that water walking was not a normal part of life, they kind of freaked out. Then Peter, the kind of rash one, asked Jesus to call him to the water.

Wait! Did you hear that? If it’s you, Jesus, call me to come to you. What would make a man who knows how water works, want to attempt to walk on water? He probably didn’t have the class on the idea of buoyancy, but he still knew that people did not walk on water. So why?

It’s the discipleship done the Jesus way. He didn’t coerce people to follow him. He didn’t bait and switch them. He didn’t try to sell them on anything fancy. He just said Come. Follow me. That’s it.

I think a huge part of discipleship the Jesus way, is about authenticity and integrity. These two words really go hand in hand and will likely make it to the word of the week post in the near future. The long and short of these two ideas is that he was real. He was the same in public and in private. And the disciples saw that. The men and women of his day saw that. And they were attracted to the realism of that way of life. There are plenty of fakes out there, so it makes sense to want to model your life after someone who is real.

The other part of it was that Jesus cared. So much of our discipleship ideology in today’s church culture is about classes and rituals. Not so much with Jesus. He wanted people to know how much he cared. He did it by being where the people were. Getting his hands dirty. Serving the people no one wanted to serve.

If we’re going to learn from the Master and do discipleship the Jesus way, then we need to start with knowing who we are and actually caring about the people in the world around us. If we start with caring, and I mean genuinely caring, then we’ll be leaps and bounds ahead of where we are now. By the way, genuinely caring means we don’t just say we care. It means we do something with that care and compassion. That’s a great start at discipleship the Jesus way.

A new weekly rhythm

January 4, 2024 / Derrick Hurst / 1 Comment

This year I’m trying to be more intentional about my writing. Some have said they enjoy having a place to disconnect from the stuff of life, so enjoy. Part of this new rhythm of writing intentionality will hopefully include a weekly devotion. We’ll cover all sorts of devotion-y topics. Things like prayer and bible study and transformation and who knows what. It’s still early in the year! Today though we talk prayer.

We’ll call this devotional thought Unleashing the power of prayer. Wow the title just sounds cool doesn’t it!?

I have a quilt in my house that my grandma started to make for my wife and I before we got married. Since she died before I got married, my wife’s grandma finished it. It’s a pretty cool gift that we don’t really use because I don’t want it to get ruined.

If you’ve ever looked at a quilt, you know there are patches of fabric sewn together to form a cool tapestry of shapes and colors. If we were to imagine our lives to be a tapestry like this, we would see that prayer is the thread that holds it all together. Weaving into this piece and out of that one, the prayers of our lives tie all the sorted and disjointed pieces into one beautiful whole. Often though the prayers go unseen and forgotten.

The power of our prayers isn’t in the cool words we use or the big theological terms. We don’t need to quote a bunch of bible verses or shout really loud. God’s actually close than you think and he does not have a hearing problem.

The power of prayer is found in the little pieces of our lives that we bring and the one to whom we bring them. Prayer is a sacred conversation with the God of the universe. (no not a conversation with the universe but the one who made the universe – big distinction!)

Matthew 21:21-22 in a paraphrased way say If you have faith and do not doubt, whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive. This is huge! First of all it’s not saying you’ll get a new car if you just pray hard enough. It’s saying that if you have faith in God and don’t doubt the power found in Jesus, then you’ll pray for the right things and you’ll see those things come about.

The power of prayer is a pretty cool thing that we often overlook. We tuck prayer away as that thing we do when we have a big test coming up, or before we go in for surgery. We have no problem praying when the car is sliding out of control on icy roads. We don’t even mind saying a quick “atta boy Jesus” when we score the game winning touchdown.

But the power of prayer isn’t found as much in the touchdown Jesus moments, good scores on test or everything going perfect days. The power of prayer is best experienced in the regularity of the everyday. We find it in the ugh it’s Monday again moments in life.

So grab the quilt of your life, all the little pieces, no matter how torn or tattered. Bring them to God in prayer. Let him be the golden thread that binds your patchwork life together into a beautiful tapestry of faith. That’s how we can experience the power of prayer.

Intentionality

January 3, 2024 / Derrick Hurst / 1 Comment

Accidents happen. I know that. Some accidents are pretty destructive. I remember getting a call one day that someone in my family was in an accident. I rushed to make sure everyone was ok. And sure enough all humans were fine, but the car…not so much. Accidents, in many cases, result in something getting broken, damaged, or disrupted.

But there are some things in life that are happy accidents. These are the kinds of things that happen accidentally and still end up leaving you better off than had they not happened. You leave late for work and end up just missing a crash at the end of your road. You drop something on the floor in your bedroom. And when you bend over to pick it up, you find the ring that you lost weeks ago.

Accidents come in all shapes and sizes. Some are good. Some not so good. And some downright terrible. But rarely does something get built by accident. Rarely do we make massive improvements without some form of a plan. Enter today’s word: intentionality.

Intentionality, by definition, means the fact or quality of being done on purpose or with intent.

That’s well and good but let’s simplify that a bit. Intentionality is doing something on purpose, in a manner that’s well thought out. Risks are calculated. Losses evaluated. Plan established. Steps mapped out. ON purpose. NOT on accident.

As we start a new year, many people are going to write some goals for 2024. Lose weight. Run longer distances. Save more money. Pay off debt. Eat healthier. Get an advanced degree. Graduate. Whatever the goal, or resolution, you’re not going to do this accidentally. You need some form of intentional plan to make it happen.

Let’s take lose weight as an example. You can’t just wake up one morning and say Today’s the day. I’m going to lose 25 pounds. Gain muscle mass. Lessen my waist size by 2 inches. Then expect the fat to magically melt away. You need some form of a plan and you have to be intentional about it!

You need to find a gym or get some workout gear. You need to dump the Doritos out and replace them with something that grows out of the ground, like celery. (By the way, just typing that sounds gross!) You need to get some workout clothes. Maybe talk to a friend who knows exercise or get a personal trainer or at least watch a YouTube video. You need to set an alarm to get up a little earlier. You should probably block off time on your calendar so nothing gets in the way. A menu plan should be created to make meal prepping a little easier. Packing up some healthy, grab and go kind of snacks will make this more of a reality as well.

You see it takes intentionality. You have to make a plan and set it in motion. Having a friend to hold you accountable is probably a really good idea. I know for myself, there are mornings I just don’t want to get out of bed to go workout. I mean I live 30 minutes from the gym. But I have a friend I meet there and I know if I don’t show up I leave him high and dry.

It’s not just with New Year’s resolutions though that we need to be intentional. It’s the same thing with our personal and professional development. Things don’t just happen accidentally. We need to be intentional.

As a pastor, I meet a lot of people who treat their faith like a happy accident waiting to happen. It’s like they think showing up for worship on a Sunday will get just enough Jesus on them to get them out of a bind. But that’s not how it works. You need to be intentional.

Story after story in the Bible shows us that our faith grows by being intentional. People have to take time to read what God says in the Bible before they can hear what he tells them in answers to prayers.

The same is true in leadership. We can’t lead accidentally. We need to be intentional. We need to make plans and do our best to stick to them, or communicate changes as they need to be made so people can keep following.

Intentionality is a massively powerful tool that everyone needs in their toolbox. You can’t oops I did it again your way through life. And yes that reference is for all of you pop music fans from the early 2000s.

The long and short here is take time to be intentional. Slow down. Map out the plan. Set some benchmarks. Bring in someone to hold you accountable. It may cost you some extra time, effort, or money now, but in the long run it will benefit you more than you can realize.

What Do You Do?

January 2, 2024 / Derrick Hurst / 2 Comments

This is one of my least favorite questions ever. Inevitably I get asked this question by someone I’ve recently met or with whom I’m just getting a relationship built. And as soon as this question is answered, the conversation stops. I mean the conversation stops as abruptly as a car hitting a brick wall.

Part of the reason is my title. Some people have the title of CEO and it sounds all spicy and cool. Others have Officer or Engineer or Lead something or another. But my title is scary for some people. What do you do? I’m a pastor.

Insert the sound of a car screeching its tires coming to a stop.

The next thing that happens is one of three options. The least likely is for the person to say something like Oh that’s super cool! I’ve always wanted to know a pastor. Admittedly, this one is so unlikely that it’s never actually happened! But I guess it always could?

The next potential reaction would be for the conversation to just stop and the person to act like I no longer exist. This has actually happened a couple of times. It’s almost as if we’re having a great conversation. They find out I’m a pastor, and then I disappear. It’s like I vanish from their midst and they go on to something else like I’ve been transported through some wormhole into a different dimension of time and space. It’s a very uncomfortable feeling.

The most common reaction I get is Oh wow I’m sorry! As weird as this sounds, it always gives me a chuckle. You’re sorry? Really? For what? It’s not like someone held a gun to my head and told me to be a pastor or else. Actually I had a few people who tried to convince me to do something different with my life. What this question actually means however is Oh crap! I’m so sorry! I know I said something that probably offended you and now you’re going to say some magical phrase that’s going to get me banished to hell forever. Or something close to that anyway.

I think the problem is that people, and by people I mean those not connected to a church and those connected to a church, really don’t know what it means for a person to be a pastor. I don’t intend for that to be demeaning toward people by any means. It’s just most people have a pretty limited view of what a pastor does.

I’m the backside of many of those must be nice to only work one day a week kind of jokes. And yes I do know they are joking. But I also think it does show that many people, again both inside and outside of the church, don’t really know what it is that I do.

What do you do? Ok so let’s hit the obvious. I preach and teach about the Bible on Sunday. That’s kind of the given part of this whole scenario. What most people don’t know however is how long it takes to get ready for a given Sunday. I mean when I stand up front on a Sunday without notes and no cool teleprompter, there are 20+ hours that go into making that a reality. I could skimp on that and lessen the teaching but if I do that I should be fired. Without a script or anything it may look like I’m just winging it, but there’s a lot that goes into those couple of hours on a Sunday.

Add to that, there’s preparing small group material, overseeing other staff members, being a volunteer coordinator for over 150 volunteers throughout the year, party planner for those who want fun events but don’t know how to plan them, ensure that all the wheels are greased and running smoothly. Oh then there’s visiting those who are in hospitals and shut ins. Being involved in the community enough that the community knows we exist and are here for them. Did I mention being somewhat accessible nearly 24-7?

What do you do? Well, I’ve canceled vacations because someone has been on their deathbed. I hear some of the most awful stories of brokenness imaginable. Stories I can’t share with anyone, even my wife, because part of being a pastor is confidentiality and trust. I have to watch people say and do some pretty dumb things and not react too harshly in the moment. (sometimes I’m better at this than others).

What do you do? I get up a 2am when you’re having the worst night of your life. I come to your bedside when you’re terrified. I’m the one standing in the room when your loved one is struggling with their final moments. I’m there to carry you when your marriage is shattered. I shift my schedule to meet with you because you have a day job and my schedule is more flexible. I stand in the room with the lifeless body until the coroner comes. I hold in my emotions so you feel free to unload yours.

What do you do? My favorite is when people tell me they’ve just finished a long 3 week stretch of working 60 hours a week. I mean that can be tiring I’m sure. If I were to log my hours, I’d say more than 3 out of every 4 weeks I’m logging about 60. From time preparing sermons to praying for you, from practicing to preaching, from creating programs to coming in to pinch hit when someone can’t show up, from teaching at least 2 different groups on 2 different topics per week to so many more things that you’re already bored reading this.

What do you do? I carry the spiritual, emotional and at times physical needs of over 250 people. I take it very seriously. If you know me, then you know what I do is give up myself for those +/-250 people. And lest you think this is me complaining, let me be very clear. I choose to do it again year after year, month after month, week after week, day after day.

Being a pastor isn’t just what I do. It’s who I am. It’s not just a job. It’s my very calling. This is what I’ve been made to be. I could do a million other things, but none of them are what God made me to do. What do I do? Well, simply put, I’m a pastor. More than a job, this is my life. And I’m so honored to be able to do all of it.

Tag: discipleship (Page 2 of 15)

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