Archive for category Church
Love Your Enemies
Posted by Erik in Church, Ecclesiology (Church), Theology on February 7, 2012
In the midst of terrorism and presidential elections (and sometimes I am not sure which people take more seriously), remember that historically human government has opposed the work of the Church far more often than government has supposed us.
Rather than complaining about the way the government makes life difficult, the followers of Christ should accept difficulty as a statement of reality. We cannot walk around with a chip on our shoulders, expecting to get special or even fair treatment from the world system.
Picturing the Church
Posted by Erik in Church, Eschatology on February 7, 2012
In the Christian Scriptures, the church is depicted in a number of metaphors and images. This varied imagery has led to a lot of crazy theology when taken too far, and not a few whacked out worship songs that I refer to as “prom songs for Jesus.”
Among the images we have in the Scriptures are:
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A flock of sheep
Harvested wheat
Lit lamps
Candlestands
Virgins at a wedding
Some fish in a net
A man made from two men
Christ’s body
Christ’s bride
Pillars in the temple
Participants in a marriage feast
For the next couple of days, I will be writing some posts on these images as they appear and hopefully clarify some issues that have arisen over the years.
Bloggers and Church Authority
Out of Ur posted an interesting discussion from the Elephant Room that touched on non-pastor bloggers and authority in the church.
In the panel discussing the topic are a couple of my favorite pastors: Matt Chandler and Perry Noble. I have respect for their ministries primarily because they have respect for God’s word. Also present were David Platt and Mark Driscoll, both of whom are also solid (if Driscoll is annoying and rude sometimes, he comes from a long tradition of cranky, rude preachers I have known and even liked).
What intrigues me about this conversation is that several of these guys blog extensively, especially Perry Noble. I felt that the article tried to give the impression that these guys were attacking blogging. I don’t think that was the case. They were, however, expressing concern about bloggers who God has not placed in pastoral ministry who are challenging and attacking those He has.
This is a very real issue. While I have several online friends who are not pastors and blog on Christianity, I do not view them in the same way I do other pastors. Whether people want to accept it or not, the Scriptures are very plain that pastors are uniquely gifted among the church (Ephesians 4, 1 Peter 5). We should never take leadership cues from those God has not chosen, gifted and called.
It is simply too easy to sound authoritative when you have no biblical authority.
That might upset the online Christian community, but it is biblically true.
Go Deeper!
Ed Stetzer recently wrote in Facts and Trends that the “Elephant in the Church” is the lack of robust disciple-making. He writes:
Many churches are now rediscovering ways to push more depth from the Sunday morning stage, better ways to assimilate the crowds into small groups and discipling relationships, more organic ways to nurture spiritual formation, and stronger ways to create missional expansion in their communities and around the world.
I have to say, I balk at the term “push more depth” because you can’t push depth. You can only explore it. Depth is not something to be possessed or controlled. You can’t “push” it.
Think of a kid in a swimming pool. If that child is not comfortable diving under the water and going down to the bottom, then it does not matter if the pool is 4′ deep or 20′ deep. The depth is present, but that does not mean the kid is going to explore it.
If you ask me (and I know no one is), the problem with the church today is not that we are not pushing depth but rather that we are out of our depth. The Bible teachers in most churches do not have the knowledge of the Scriptures necessary to take people on a “deep” journey through the Scriptures.
After growing up in a home where original languages were dinner table topics and discussing theological vagaries was just what my dad and I did, what most people consider “deep”, I consider elementary. This is not to sound condescending, but more often than not I find myself listening to a peer asking a question and thinking, “How did you not already learn this?”
But the reality is that for the most part, pastors are told that their job is to preach a good sermon and build a big congregation. They are given a basic, one-dimensional education on the Scriptures and then told to go out and get people to confess Christ.
You can’t “push” depth, especially if you’ve never seen the depths yourself.
What the church needs more than people “pushing depth” is people with true knowledge of the Scriptures. We need people who can do more than read the newest, most popular book and then teach it to congregations. We need people who can do more than design snazzy logos and preach entertaining messages.
Depth is not pushed. It is has to be explored. You have to get into it, get used to it and then go deeper. You have to train and think, then learn to present the dive in such a way that others go with you. You have to study theology, explore exposition. You have to spend more time studying the Scriptures than you do planning your organization.
Most sermons I hear are from the wading side of the pool. I don’t know about you, but I enjoy hearing the messages that come from a 20′ dive.
Most Underwhelming Change Ever?
The NFL’s Carolina Panthers have updated their logo in what has to be one of the most underwhelming changes I have ever seen. One of the team’s executives said it was a necessary update for “ever-increasing digital use.” I am still trying to figure out how this change really does much of anything for the team.
This reminds me of 1996 when the Miami Dolphins made this wholly unremarkable change:
Back then, the change was to make the Dolphin more aggressive. I have to say, that second dolphin looks pretty ferocious, doesn’t it?
Look, I am all for NFL teams changing their logos from time to time. When my Tampa Bay Buccaneers ditched their effeminate swashbuckler for the “blood and pewter” (that’s their official colors) skull and crossbones, I cheered the change. I hated Pat the Pirate, and even though the Patriots’ “Elvis” logo still looks kind of silly, at least it was a real change.
Changes like this Panthers thing are just silly.
Of course, you knew there was going to be a church-type application to this, didn’t you?
Most of the time, people love their old ideas and images too much to really part with them. They know something isn’t working, but they’re just not willing to part with it.
- So, you have a stayed-and-crusty old congregational church that decides to update their ministry. They bring in a young, hip worship leader who sets up a band, but they’re only allowed to play hymns and campfire songs.
- A congregation decides to revamp their children’s ministry, so they splash new paint on the walls and buy nifty curriculum, but they aren’t willing to gently retire the matronly teacher who believes children should be seen and not heard.
- You set out to start the next “cool church” but instead of all the artists and hippies, you attract middle-aged folks with kids. But you refuse to minister to the families because you are too interested in being trendy.
I am fairly convinced that in order to truly minister to the flock that the Shepherd gives you, leaders have to be willing to throw out old (and new) ideas in favor of doing whatever God requires of us to accomplish his vision. Don’t live for that old identity. God’s mercy and love is new every morning. How can we renew lives and redeem people from sin when we are not willing to be truly renewed ourselves?
Finding “Can Get the Job Done” People
Being the pastor of an intimate congregation is always a challenge. Our congregation is just about big enough to be able to pay our bills, but not big enough to have the financial base for hiring new staff. That means everything has to be done by volunteers cooperating.
One of the differences between working with staff and working with volunteers is that volunteers have far less time. A staff member is paid to be available to do a job while volunteers sacrifice time they could be spending on something else.
It is easy to develop a mentality that you are “only working with volunteers” so you cannot demand the same level of excellence. This simply isn’t true.
What is true working with volunteers is that you have to delegate tasks rather than jobs and develop something of a composite staff member from a team of volunteers. This is something I am still learning to do, and so far I have not had tremendous success outside of our music team.
Our music team is an incredibly talented group, almost entirely men, who give of their time to form two bands and an assortment of other ensembles. They have learned to work together, to be flexible in style and presentation. None of them give more than a couple hours per week, but they continually improve. They practice and buy their own equipment. Most importantly, a couple of them have particularly stepped up and done jobs they were not initially “qualified” to do because those jobs needed to be done.
That, I think, is the core value we need to look for in volunteers. I was reading through an article on hiring people for a startup, and one particular point seemed to apply to church volunteers. Amidst a lot of job-related stuff, the author mentioned learning how to separate the “Can Do the Job” people from the “Can Get the Job Done” people. This is very true when it comes to volunteers.
Volunteers who “can do” are fine for routine things, stuff that is repetitive and never changes. But for those who are going to lead and work together on larger, more public things, you need “get the job done” kind of people. You need people who look at a task, acquire new skills as needed and accomplish the task.
These kinds of people are rare – probably the rarest of the rare in the church. There are plenty of “can do” people in the world who would like you to believe that they are “get the job done” people, but they aren’t.
If you are a single pastor in an intimate congregation, you simply cannot build effective, growing ministry on “can do.” The ministry will be limited to you own ability to figure out how to get the job done and handing out menial tasks to others. You will wind out stretched beyond your capacity.
Narrow your focus, limit the number of ministries and programs according to the number of “get the job done” people you have to lead them. Meet with those people regularly, provide them with training and incentive. You will find your self far more effective when working with people who get the job done.
How Pastors Get Rich
A good article from Tall Skinny Kiwi on everything that is wrong with some pastors who use their place to make money.
Straddling Realities
Posted by Erik in Church, History, Ecclesiology (Church), Eschatology on January 25, 2012
Yochanan b. Zecharyah was a Jewish teacher and prophet known to the Christian world as John the Baptist. In the gospel of Luke, he is Jesus of Nazareth’s second cousin and the son of a Jewish priest.
Appearing at the beginning of all four gospels and described as the “forerunner” of the Messiah and the last of the Hebrew prophets, John straddles the line between the days of the prophets and the “Day of the Lord.” If we are to believe the gospels, then we must acknowledge that the authors of those books saw John as the end of an age.
Every gospel tells his story a little different, but in all them John’s message was simple: Repent, for God’s Kingdom is at hand. There was nothing complex about this message. John was saying that God was coming, and the time had come to get right. To drive home the point, Luke quotes the prophet Isaiah:
Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall become straight, and the rough places shall become level ways, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God. (Luke 3:4-6 ESV)
It was hard to miss or misinterpret John’s message, and yet for all of our supposed ability and intelligence, we miss what he was saying.
Jesus is the Kingdom of God. He is the Temple of God. He is the Lord’s Messiah. And we live in “The Day of the Lord.”
John represents all that was Hebrew, all that was rabbinical. John is a Jew declaring the end of Judaism and setting the stage for the Messianic Age.
That’s why John’s message is not normative for the Church today. The era he lived in is over. The Law and Prophets are fulfilled in Jesus. The Hebrew epic has been completed and has been transformed into something more. Now what has been anticipated is at work.
The Kingdom is not somewhere we go when we die. It is the One who died for us. Heaven is not some other reality. It is the fully realized reality of Jesus and His resurrection. It is not this life somewhere else, but this life as something else. We are being transformed into Christ’s image, collectively.
The Kingdom is being realized imperfectly now, but will one day be fully realized when Jesus returns. But that does not make it any less real now. We do not perceive it or live it all the time, because we are blinded by sin and restricted by the forces of this world and its would-be usurper who styles himself the Prince of This World, Satan. But make no mistake. Jesus is the Kingdom, and those found in him are citizens of that Kingdom.
It’s Not All About Me or You
Posted by Erik in Church, Cross Posts on January 20, 2012
Joel Watts and I don’t always see eye to eye on everything. We encountered each other through a third blogger, Jason Skipper, when Jason started a forum for revitalizing the Fundamentals called re:F.
Joel runs in what most would consider a more liberal, more mainline doctrinal discussion than I do, although more often than not we can find common ground on most subjects. That’s one of the great things about having a network of bloggers to interact with on doctrinal and exegetical grounds. The diversity of opinion and position helps us look at our own views and the views of others more carefully.
Anyway, Joel’s blog is considerably busier than mine, and he has a number of contributors who write posts for him. He probably gets as many hits in an afternoon as I do in a month.
This week, one of his contributors, Leslie Keeney, wrote an excellent piece on the false interpretations that arise from reading the Scriptures as if they are all about your personal relationship with God. It resonated with something I am working on concerning the church, and I thought you might benefit from it.
Here’s an excerpt:
Suddenly, it dawned on me that one of the benefits of reading the Bible primarily as a narrative is that it automatically reduces the self-centeredness inherent in the “instruction manual” metaphor. If the Bible is God’s story, then the purpose of reading it is to become intimate with God and how He works, not how He can fix my life. No longer does every passage have to have a “practical” application that I can “use.” If the Bible is a story about God, it is not all about me. (Why It’s Not All About Me or You, Leslie Keeney)
Like I said, Joel and I don’t always see eye-to-eye so this is not a wholesale recommendation of everything on his blog; but I thought this was insightful.
Genre: Epistle
Posted by Erik in Ancient History, Church, General, History on January 18, 2012
The final genre I am going to write about is epistle. I think that by and large, the church gets the reading of an epistle pretty close to right. In a way, that is the problem with how we read everything else. We tend to apply the interpretation schemes we use for epistles to everything else.
What is an epistle? It is a letter sent from a person in authority to those under his authority.
Epistles are not exhaustive theological treatises although they often contain a lot of theology.
An epistle is a carefully thought out, well-developed letter of information and command. Often they were written in response to specific questions, which makes reading them sometimes a challenge because we do not have the questions before us. This is particularly true of 1 & 2 Corinthians, which are clearly pointed responses to questions we never heard asked.
How do we read epistles?
First of all, read them for internal consistency. Don’t spend all your time trying to make connections to other epistles or other portions of Scripture unless the author makes a clear connection. (Galatians is a book that has a lot of clear connections made.) Instead, read the epistle as a stand-alone letter first.
Then, consult other epistles.</b< If there a passage that seems easily misunderstood or could have multiple meanings, keep it in mind when you read other epistles. You will be surprised how often the Scriptures interpret themselves.
Most importantly, read them understanding that the authors were placed in authority over the church by Jesus himself. The apostles develop the themes of the church in the epistles. Jesus did the work of salvation; and the apostles struggle to apply that work to the church’s life.
Remember also that the epistles do, to a certain extent, involve a dialogue – a give-and-take as the apostles worked through the ramifications of Jesus’ work and teachings. It is important to let these ideas be worked out. Be dogmatic about the body of work as a whole, but don’t be dogmatic on specific, isolated passages that seem to be inconsistent with the rest.
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