by Tim | Feb 18, 2011 | God, My World, The Church World |
What are we striving for? What is our end-goal? When can we say alongside Jesus, “It is finished”? It’s no less than the evangelization of the entire world. What a daunting task! I look at my church–we’ve probably got 25-30 people in each location. Should this lofty concept be the goal of such a small, rural church? Seems like an unattainable goal to achieve. And yet, we aren’t supposed to look at how big or small we are, or how many resources we have (remember the parable of the man with one talent?). We are supposed to trust in the Gospel, that it is indeed the power of God. Our power doesn’t come from how intelligent we are, how wealthy we are, how large in size we are, or how talented we are. Our power comes from the truth coming alive by the power of the Holy Spirit. The evangelization of the world. That is what we work toward. For some, this sounds like some imperial concept–some selfish endeavor by Christians to convert everyone to their religion. On the contrary, Christians are called to utter selflessness. This isn’t about some jewel in our crown for sharing the Gospel. The motive is purely this: Jesus Christ is worthy of the praise of every single creature He has created. He deserves no less. He died so that all of God’s creation can be restored to Him. God rightly deserves everything and everyone to glorify Him and Him alone. Because of Jesus’ sacrifice, that is now possible, and we continue working toward that end. The Son of God’s reward must equal the...
by Tim | Jan 31, 2011 | God, Our Culture, The Church World, The Gospel |
As many of you know, I was a member of the North Alabama Conference (United Methodists) for 8 years by being a member of two of their churches during that time. During that time, I heard many sentiments expressed about the current struggles for Methodists. Methodists moaned that they were a minority in the land of Southern Baptists. They didn’t moan just because they were a minority, but because they continue to be a shrinking minority. This means less congregants, which means less churches and less money to do everything they want to do. That is definitely a frustrating thing to go through. The current bishop, Will Willimon, believes that a large part of the problem is poor leadership. While I can agree that there is a problem w/poor leadership (and I think this can be said for all denominations to a smaller or larger degree), the agreement stops there. Because how he measures leadership is different from me. For him, the best way to tell if a church has spiritual vitality is by looking at church attendance numbers. Click here to read his words on that matter. This idea is also mentioned in this other article. Here’s another. To those who would say it’s not about the numbers, he would disagree in yet another article. My response? While I disagree with the bishop, that doesn’t make him a bad person–it just makes him pretty much like so many other modern church leaders out there. I think we would all do ourselves a favor if we remembered that the same Jesus that said, “You will know them by their...
by Tim | Jan 12, 2011 | God, The Church World, Youth Ministry |
I remember several years ago having a conversation with a youth pastor when I was helping out in his youth ministry. The church was in a very rural setting and had a van that would go out each week to pick kids up for youth group. Most of the kids who came to youth group came from very broken homes and were the victims of poverty. These kids were not stable, and trying to keep control during youth group was often a struggle. During this conversation, we talked about how we wished we could have a youth group like other churches in the city, where the majority of kids who showed up came from strong, Christian homes. Those youth groups had kids heavily involved in Bible Quiz, mission trips, small groups, etc. Things were happening in those other youth ministries! Those kids had it together, and as a result a more vibrant youth ministry was possible in their settings. In our setting, just getting kids to show up w/out body odor and to keep quiet for five minutes would literally have been a divine miracle. We had a feeling that this was going nowhere, because we didn’t have those solid, Christian youth in the group. I remember thinking during that conversation that perhaps we are doing more “real” ministry than the other churches. I may have even vocalized this–I can’t remember. The reason I’m not sure is because at that time part of me questioned the validity of that statement. If you were to compare our youth ministry with a more “normal” youth ministry, it would be hard to...
by Tim | Jan 11, 2011 | God, The Church World |
Top 10 reasons most pastors wouldn’t want to have a ministry like Jesus’: Reason #1: Jesus never developed a financially-sustainable ministry, and never received a salary. Reason #2: While He did enjoy a short stint in success, in the end, it all fell apart as quickly as it started. Reason #3: None of His hired staff had any ministry experience and didn’t even really understand what His purpose was. Reason #4: Jesus’ idea of sending out missionaries/church planting included taking no money with you to help start the venture and just looking for homes to stay in. Reason #5: His target audience was the poor and the outcasts of society. Reason #6: He didn’t network. Reason #7: There was no building–church was always in some different location. Reason #8: One of the requirements on the membership form to join Jesus’ church was, “Will you give away all your possessions and follow Me?” Reason #9: It wasn’t until after He died and the next pastors took over that the thing took off. Reason #10: He tried His best to be a nobody. I’m not saying that our churches should model everything that Jesus did–obviously He did certain things for reasons specific to His own mission. My point is simply that most of us pastors zealously strive toward building a successful ministry. I wish we would re-channel that zeal/passion towards simply following God in our lives. Isn’t it interesting that it was only after Jesus had died that He became such a huge figure in history? Paul himself said it in Philippians 2:5-11: Have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: 6...
by Tim | Jan 10, 2011 | God, Our Culture, The Church World, The Gospel |
The Son of God didn’t need to come in order that people who are hungry could have food. There’s already plenty of food on earth, and people could be fed without Him having to leave His heavenly throne. He did, however, instruct us to feed the hungry. The Son of God didn’t need to come in order to give people money who were in poverty. If so, He did a poor job fulfilling His mission. The poor Guy (pardon the pun) had no money of His own. He did, however, instruct us to take care of the poor and give them money. But if the Son of God had never come to save humanity from our sins, we would all still be lost and eternally separated from God. That was the reason why He needed to come. Jesus did, in fact, perform “social” acts of justice. But these “social” acts of Jesus were done in the context of declaring that the Savior of the World had come. Not just as acts of social justice. For example, when Jesus would heal people, He often told them their sins were forgiven, and they would be healed. In one instance, Jesus tells a paralyzed man that his sins are forgiven. The leaders get upset at Him for claiming to have such authority. So Jesus proves it to them by telling the guy to rise up and walk. It’s no different today. Today, we declare a Gospel that itself declares that Jesus is the only Son of God, and that only He is worthy of worship. That all other gods and religions are...
by Tim | Nov 30, 2010 | The Church World |
Most congregants in your typical local church remain largely ignorant of what goes on “behind the scenes” at their church. It’s not until they are thrust into some sort of lay leadership role that much of this stuff becomes apparent. Many people thrust in these roles are unable to cope with the things they see or hear. Many leave the church, disillusioned.Perhaps it is a good thing that only a few people in a local church see these things; otherwise we might have a mass exodus from the Church. Some argue that this mass exodus is already happening. Maybe people see/hear more than we dare admit. Fewer and fewer people are attending church as time goes on. Despite our best tactics to get them to come, people continue to be turned off to church. As a person who has served on staff at a few churches, I can’t say I’m entirely surprised. As much “junk” as lay people see when they rise to leadership roles, often staff members see even more. Some of the things that seem innocent enough to congregants, if you were on staff at a church, you might feel differently. In my last blog post, I lamented over the way most churches are run: either with a government atmosphere or a business atmosphere. As a staff person who has served in both environments to a degree, I feel I can confidently say that neither atmosphere is spiritually healthy, even though it may appear so to many of the congregants. While it may look good to the congregant that their church is bringing in new visitors, that...
