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Pastors / Leadership: How to Teach/Preach Truths They Will Always Remember

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How to Teach/Preach Truths They Will Always Remember Sep 12th 2011, 04:00 I've thought about that conversation ever since. A friend whom I know only from our internet exchanges wanted to know if in all the articles on my website, there was anything on a particular text. I responded that I could not recall dealing with those verses, but suggested where he might find help. Then, I said, "Are you preaching on that text?" I had no idea whether he was a pastor or not. It turned out he was a layman and had been asked to bring a message that Wednesday night to his church. The Lord had laid on his heart a particular text, and he was trying to find out all he could on it. Then he said something which has lingered with me ever since: I want to give the people truths from this passage which they will remember the rest of their lives. Wow. Big assignment he has given himself. My first thought--which I would not dared have stated, lest it seem I was trying to discourage him--was: "Yeah, me too. Every time I stand to preach, that's one of my goals." I suspect his pastor would say the same. Every preacher loves it when our sermons convey truths which people never forget. However--and this was my second thought: it's hard to do. Church people hear hundreds of messages, lessons, and sermons. They are fed such a relentless stream of revelations, insights, truths, principles, and biblical information that few of them walk into the sanctuary, take their seats, and look toward the pulpit expecting to hear something life-changing. Most will be satisfied to receive something interesting or thought-provoking. That said, I come before you this morning to declare that it is indeed possible to deliver a message to your people that will never be forgotten. I might add, with as much humility and gratitude as I can muster on this Wednesday morning, I have done it a few times in nearly a half century of preaching. Here's how. 1. Start early. You have given yourself a big assignment. If today is Friday and you're just getting started on a sermon you're preaching Sunday morning, chances are this message is not going to knock their socks off and win you a place in the sermonic hall of fame. If you are a pastor and delivering multiple sermons each week, the "sermon-of-sermons"--which is what we will call this "life-changing message containing never-forgotten truths"--must stand out from all the others you preach. For that, it will need special attention. 2. Start on your knees. Look at it like this: a) The Lord wants your sermons to succeed far more than you ever will, and b) He knows every message that has ever been delivered in history. So, He is your obvious starting place. Pray. Ask Him. Ask what He wants you to preach, what the people need, and how you shall go about it. After asking, don't rush away. Listen for the answer. If your experience is like mine, it will come in a still small voice. What that means is an idea pops into your head on what you should do. Start on your knees and go there often. 3. Pay attention to what the Lord has been burdening you with lately. The sermon-to-end-all-sermons will not be something you thought of Monday, researched Tuesday and Wednesday, wrote Thursday and preached Sunday. This one will be as much a part of you as your bones and marrow. This subject is as near and dear to you as the very fiber of your body, as one of your precious children. You will care deeply about this subject. In some ways, you will have been preparing for it all your life. 4. Listen. Listen very closely. As you prepare, listen to what your people are saying in their unguarded moments, what they're saying in hospital rooms, what they ask you on the way out the door on Sundays, what they say when reading the paper or watching the news. Listen to your family. Listen to your children when they get serious, your spouse when she gets worried, your elderly mother when she reminisces. Listen to your heart. God uses all of these--usually not at the same time--to send messages and insights to the preacher/teacher working on the SOS ("Sermon of Sermons"). 5. Keep it simple. If it's complicated, forget about anyone remembering it the rest of the week, much less the rest of their lives. Some years ago, I was asked at the last minute to speak to the annual recognition banquet for the board, supporters, adults and children at our state denomination's children's home. The challenge was to deliver a message which would pertain to the hundred or so children of all ages as well as to their benefactors and house parents. The message the Lord gave me I called "Four Things The Lord Wants You to Know About the Rest of Your Life." It turned out to be the most memorable sermon I had preached in years. In the decade or so since that banquet, I have revised that sermon again and again and preached it a dozen times in several states. In every case, some people walk away declaring they found it helpful, will not forget it, and will pass this on to others. In time, the sermon became "Five Things God Wants You to Know About the Rest of Your Life." 1. God has big plans for your life. (Earthly and Heavenly.) 2. He's not going to tell you what they are. (The good you would mess up and the difficult you couldn't handle.) 3. He's getting you ready for the future right now. (Which explains the boot camp He's putting you through.) 4. Your job is to be faithful today where He has placed you. To bloom where you are planted. 5. You will walk into the future by faith--trusting Him--or you will miss out on all He has planned. 6. Preach it several times. My strong hunch is my layman friend who wanted to deliver the SOS on a Wednesday night is asking for what never was and never can be: a single shot message that knocks the ball out of the park. Most (ahem) great sermons--or may we say, most highly effective messages--are worked on and refined and tweaked for years before they become the definitive sermon for a preacher. They are constantly prayed over, revised, and thought about. Points are thrown out and replaced, ideas are sharpened, illustrations are improved. 7. Get feedback. We're tempted to say one should get responses to the sermon from the sharpest Christians we know, the ones whose judgment we most respect. However, while that's a good idea, we do well to listen to our spouse, to the children, to anyone with a word about that sermon. Not to change anything, but simply to know what they are saying. Ask the Lord for feedback. No one knows preaching better than He. 8. Never consider that sermon "finished." After preaching it today, even if the sermon felt practically perfect, bear in mind that if you preach it next month, your setting with be different, the audience will not be the same, and the Lord may have something special in mind. So, you will regularly come back to this message and think it through. Does that story still work? Was that point clear enough? Is something going on in the news that pertains to this? 9. Finally, accept that you may never know which of your sermons people found most memorable. I remember a conversation with the chairman of a pastor search committee that had just interviewed me. Before I drove away, he said, "Our committee would like to come hear you preach. However, we will not tell you when. My experience is that every preacher has at least two good sermons. If he knows a committee is coming, he'll pull one out and preach it. And we don't want that." It must have been a year or more before I thought of the answer to what he said. It is true that every preacher has at least two good sermons. The problem is, he doesn't know which ones they are. He thinks it's these two, his wife thinks it's some others, and the congregation is all over the map in their choices. Best to just leave it with the Lord. Do your best on every message, preacher, then let Him take the truths home to the hearts and make them fit and endure as He wills. Only when we get to Heaven will we find out which of our sermons were the really good ones. Until then, we will pray and labor with the expectation that it will be the next one. Used by permission from www.joemckeever.com

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Pastors / Leadership: 21 Ways to Prepare for the Ministry

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21 Ways to Prepare for the Ministry Sep 9th 2011, 04:00 Twice in the last week I have been asked what advice I would give to a young person preparing to go into the ministry. The question is so broad that it defies an easy answer. But when you are asked the same question twice in the span  of a few days, that does make you pay closer attention. So here are my thoughts, arranged in no particular order, to the question, "What advice would I give to a young person preparing for the ministry?" 1. Read widely. In the years ahead we will need well-educated young men and women. So read widely, read from the bestseller list, read people you don't agree with. It's not a good sign if you've read 700 books and all of them support what you already believe.  2. Learn to speak well and write well. All things being equal, the people who can speak with confidence and who can write clearly will rise to the top in any field. Take a few speech classes, join Toastmasters, take every speaking opportunity you can get until you feel at home on your feet. As for writing, technology gives this generation a huge advantage. My parents were raised on manual typewriters, I started with an IBM Selectric. The advent of the personal computer means that no one has an excuse for not writing well. Keep a blog. Write out your sermons in full.  3. Find out what you can do well. This takes about ten years–or maybe a little longer. In the beginning, you naturally think you can do everything. You can't. You'll learn that the hard way. Find out what you do that God blesses–and keep on doing it.  4. Decide now to be flexible later. Don't get stuck in the trap of thinking that you have to be a pastor or a teacher or a missionary forever. We're past the day when people stay in the same position for a lifetime. Your only call is to serve the Lord in whatever way he chooses to use you and wherever he wants to put you. Flexibility is a great blessing and inflexibility tends to be a career-ender. So stay loose. 5. Ask the Lord to put you in over your head. He'll probably do it anyway, but it's more fun if you ask in advance. If you are so cool and so well-prepared and so competent that you can do it all, why do you need God? It's a good thing to be thrown in the deep end where you don't know what you're doing and if God doesn't help you, you're sunk. That's when you learn how to pray. 6. Beware of envy. It's a big time-waster. In the great game of life, we're all constantly being compared to everyone else around us. We're all being measured, quantified, and examined to see how well we're doing versus those around us. And there is nothing we can do about it. Envy tends to be the sin of moderately successful people. Pray to be delivered from it because it destroys your joy and makes you a miserable person to be around.  7. Learn to do a few things well and the rest just okay. In the beginning you won't be able to specialize so learn how to do it all. In my first church I folded the bulletins, printed them, opened the church, led the singing and preached. But I started my writing by doing a weekly column on the back of the bulletin and continued for 27 years. Do whatever needs to be done–and then learn to do a few things well.  8. Travel. In earlier generations travel was expensive and difficult. Today it's no big deal to go online, book a ticket, and fly to Spain or China or Kenya or Chile. Tom Friedman is right. The world is flat, and the future belongs to those who have multicultural experience. So take a semester and study abroad. Build an orphanage in Ecuador. Go to Russia and see the Hermitage. Ride a train through Europe. Spend a few months on a Mercy Ship. Put down the remote, stop playing video games, hop on a plane, and go see the world. It will give you new vision for the global cause of Christ.

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Pastors / Leadership: How Connected Churches Can Help Struggling Americans

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How Connected Churches Can Help Struggling Americans Sep 8th 2011, 04:00 Several facts recently caught our attention.  In 1940, seven percent of Americans lived in one-person households. By 2000, that number more than tripled to 25 percent so that today there are more people living alone than at any time in U.S. history. Between 1985 and 2004, the number of people with whom the average American discussed "important matters" dropped from three to two. During that same time period, the percentage of people who had no one with whom they discussed important matters tripled to nearly to nearly a quarter of those surveyed. A Stanford University study found that as people spend more time on the internet, they spent less face-to-face time with other human beings. These facts all point to the conclusion that loneliness is on the rise in America. Combined with the present difficult economic conditions, this represents a one-two punch to many Americans who are struggling to find their way.     As we pointed out in our book Fired Up or Burned Out, people need human connection to thrive. We are human beings, not machines. When we don't experience sufficient human connection, we dysfunction. This may include experiencing feelings of emptiness, boredom and depression.  It may lead some to engage in substance abuse to numb the pain (according to the National Center on Addition and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, America has four percent of the world's population yet consumes two-thirds of the world's illegal drugs and half of the world's supply of legal mood-altering pharmacological drugs).  Others may pursue illegitimate thrills to feel alive again and in doing so develop addictions to pornography, sexual encounters with prostitutes and one-night stands, or taking excessive business risks.   Current conditions present an enormous opportunity to glorify God.  Consider the church in Acts 2 and how connected the people felt to the Lord and to one another.  The 3,000 new believers were united together as one body with the Lord, just as Jesus prayed for in John 17. They were devoted to the Apostles' teaching, to fellowship, to sharing the Lord's Supper together and to prayer. They were generous in helping one another. They confessed their sins to one another and reconciled their differences before partaking in the Lord's Supper. As a result, they were a church family who felt embraced and valued.  The culture in the early church was in stark contrast to the cruel, harsh Roman culture that viewed compassion and mercy as irrational.  It's no wonder then, as Acts 2 states, the Lord added daily to their number. By 300 A.D. half the Roman Empire were Christians.  Our challenge to you is to play your part in making your church a place where everyone feels embraced and valued.  Pray for the Holy Spirit to fill your heart with God's overflowing love. Pray that you will love the people in your church family. Pray that you will love those you come in contact with daily outside your church, regardless of how loveable they might be, so that they might want to know the source of your joy and contentment during this difficult time.  To consider what you and your church might do to develop a church culture where everyone feels embraced and valued, download and read this free article entitled Alpha Church: The Church Flourishes When People Connect. (attach this link http://lifespringnetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/Alpha-Church-The-Church-Flourishes-When-People-Connect.pdf) We will be speaking about church cultures where people feel connected at the Connected Church Conference in Colorado Springs on September 21-23. (attach this link: http://www.connectedchurchconference.com/) Pankau and Stallard are co-authors of the bestselling book Fired Up or Burned Out: How to Reignite Your Team's Passion, Creativity and Productivity (Thomas Nelson).  Jason Pankau is president of Life Spring Network, a ministry that helps pastors and church leaders develop holistic, transformational, disciple-making communities (www.lifespringnetwork.org), and he is the author of Beyond Self Help: The True Path to Harnessing God's Wisdom, Realizing Life's Potential and Living the Abundant Life (Xulon Press). Michael Lee Stallard is president of E Pluribus Partners, a leadership training, consulting and coaching firm that helps leaders develop "Connection Cultures" that boost productivity, innovation and performance (www.fireduporburnedout.com). Publication date: September 8, 2011

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Pastors / Leadership: Rescuing Fallen Church Leaders

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Rescuing Fallen Church Leaders Sep 7th 2011, 04:00 "So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall!"  ~1 Corinthians 10:12, NIV If we knew the actual numbers, we would not like them.  Every year in nearly every denomination, men or women who are in some role of church leadership commit immorality that costs them their positions and puts their families in jeopardy. Some commit adultery. Others are caught with pornography on their computers. Pick the sin – start with the A's and go to the Z's – and it's likely that someone trusted as a leader in the kingdom of God has done it and finally been exposed.  Though we acknowledge that all of us are human, we expect one who is mature enough to serve in leadership is also one that is honest enough with self and God to live a life of holiness. We tend to see their sins as worse than the sins of John Q. Member who sporadically attends and has little involvement with the church. Therefore, when we discover the immorality of one of our leaders, whether on a national or local scale, we passionately proclaim our deep care for their souls and cry with them as they resign their roles, all the while hoping against hope that they pack up and move away as quickly as possible.  That is understandable.  The hurt, the sense of loss, and the feelings of being betrayed by a trusted person are powerful. Pretending the offense does not threaten the health of the church and passionately pleading that good Christians forgive and allow a fallen leader to continue in her role uninterrupted is not a valid course of action (ask the churches who tried that method!). There are repercussions, weaker Christians to think of, sin to deal with, and usually a scrambling to reorganize to cover the gap created by the fallen leader. However, in dealing with the sin and its consequences, this question should also be preeminent. Would it be good for the kingdom at large if we could rescue fallen leaders rather than making refuse of them?  We know that people with unloving hearts sometimes do good things, but that their good deeds do not wonderfully transform them into good, loving people (Matthew 7:22, 23). We also know that good, loving people sometimes do bad things (Romans 3:10, 23). Does an act, or an era of failing, definitely indicate that a person with a good heart has become bad or evil? Of course not. God redeemed King David after his adultery and used him in His work. He redeemed betrayal by Peter and made him a great apostle. He can and does do the same today with those who have lost their influence or positions through their own sin. These men and women can and should be restored, but with wisdom and circumspection.  Remove Responsibility To restore a fallen leader, there must first be a period of healing and recovery. A lead minister of a rather large church argued that because he publicly repented when his affair was exposed, he should not be required to step down from his leadership position. An associate pastor left the church that dismissed him for immorality, taking about 300 people with him, and started a new church immediately. A youth minister claimed that he was sorry for his sexual liaison with an underage teen in his group, and, therefore, if the parents in his congregation were truly Christian, they would not treat him so coldly. Galatians 6:7-8 teaches that there are consequences for our actions, both good and bad. For a leader to stumble badly and then to go on as if there has not been a great breach in her spirituality is to ignore that truth. Maturity and concern for the kingdom should lead her to understand that there must be a sabbatical from leadership during which she can heal spiritually, emotionally, and mentally. There should also be time for the congregation or organization to heal.

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Pastors / Leadership: Four Ways to Commemorate 9/11 at Church

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Four Ways to Commemorate 9/11 at Church Sep 7th 2011, 04:00 INDIANAPOLIS (BP)--It was 5 a.m. on the first anniversary of 9/11, and I was in New York as a victim chaplain to minister to family members at the memorial service. Standing in the darkness overlooking the gaping hole left by the disaster, I overheard a man nearby mumbling, "I was standing right here that day." After a long pause, he continued, "I haven't even been back until now. I still can't believe it happened." Suddenly I realized that he was talking to me. As I listened to his devastating story of friends who died and his personal terror that day, he sobbed uncontrollably, weeping huge tears. As we prayed, God gave comfort to the man who was trying to put his world back together. Since the 10th anniversary of 9/11 falls on a Sunday, how can you acknowledge it at your church? Here are a few ideas: Honor first responders. Invite local police, firefighters, EMTs, etc., to attend worship on September 11 by delivering a large invitation to the local fire and police station. Reinforce the invitation with email and snail mail. Personally invite the fire and police chief. Place an ad in the local newspaper to express appreciation and invite first responders to the service. During worship, present first responders with a gift. Our church this year will give a coffee mug imprinted with "We're praying for you," with the church website address, and Joshua 1:9: "… be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go." Express appreciation to them and pray for God's protection and wisdom. Make certain that church members visit with the guests and invite them to return for worship the next Sunday. Shield a badge with prayer. This would be a great Sunday to kick off a prayer plan, perhaps calling it "Shield a badge with prayer." Our church did a version of this for many years, with amazing results. Church members commit to pray for one specific policeman, fireman or other badged public official for one year, sending occasional notes of prayer. 9/11 prayer and testimony. Acknowledge the 9/11 anniversary with a prayer for God's continued comfort for victims' families. If a church member was personally affected or involved in the aftermath, he or she could share a brief testimony of God's sufficiency during those days. Challenge your church. Encourage members to rise up intentionally as God's church and show His love when disaster hits your community or the nation in the future. If that level-five tornado had hit your town instead of Joplin, Mo., how would your church have responded? Challenge some to acquire CPR and first aid training, SBC disaster relief training, or disaster relief chaplain training. Begin a plan for communication and church preparedness for disaster ministry. When 9/11 occurred, we lived across the country from New York. Our church hosted a community-wide prayer service the next day, and I saw God's peace and comfort.  I have walked the search line as a disaster chaplain during the Space Shuttle disaster recovery, helped grieving parents after a fatal bus crash, and stood beside people who lost loved ones in floods, tornados and gas explosions. Each time, I've watched the miraculous power of God as we prayed and ministered in His name during disaster. As we remember 9/11, will your church and church members recommit to be God's representatives during crisis? Diana Davis (www.keeponshining.com) is an author, speaker and wife of the North American Mission Board's vice president for the Midwest region, Steve Davis.  © Copyright 2011 Baptist Press. Used with permission. Publication date: September 6, 2011

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Pastors / Leadership: What Makes Evangelicalism Evangelical?

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What Makes Evangelicalism Evangelical? Sep 6th 2011, 04:00 The evangelical movement in America emerged in the twentieth century as conservative Protestants sought to perpetuate an intentional continuity with biblical Christianity. While the roots of the movement can be traced through centuries prior to its emergence in twentieth century America, its organizational shape appeared mainly in the years after World War II. And, as anyone who considers the movement with a careful eye understands, evangelical definition has been a central preoccupation of the movement from the moment of its inception. The word "evangelical" long predates the coalescence of the evangelical coalition of the last century. The word has been applied to Methodism in the eighteenth century, to nonconformists and low church Protestants in Great Britain in the nineteenth century, and to a host of groups, churches, and movements ever since. As early as the nineteenth century, frustration and confusion arose over the use and misuse of the term. The seventh Earl of Shaftesbury expressed the late-nineteenth century frustration when he declared, "I know what constituted an evangelical in former times . . . I have no clear notion what constitutes one now." In this light, one is tempted to identify with the late Justice Potter Stewart, who during deliberations of the U. S. Supreme Court in a 1964 case concerning pornography, simply declared: "I know it when I see it." In the most common usage of the term, it works in almost this very sense. An evangelical is recognized by a passion for the Gospel of Jesus Christ, by a deep commitment to biblical truth, by a sense of urgency to see lost persons hear the Gospel, and by a commitment to personal holiness and the local church. In any event, this is what we should hope to recognize as authentically evangelical. But there is more to the question, of course. Honesty requires that the term be defined by its necessity. In this sense, evangelical has been and still remains a crucial term because we simply cannot live without it. Some word has to define what it means to be a conservative Protestant who is not, quite simply, a Roman Catholic, nor a theological liberal. While Catholics and liberal Protestants may speak of themselves in terms of an evangelical spirit (and both have), the term makes no sense as applied to a movement unless it is held to be clearly distinct from both Roman Catholicism and Protestant Liberalism. Yet, there is more to the story of course, since the evangelical movement was also born out of a deep concern to identify a posture distinct from that of Protestant Fundamentalism. There have been attempts to replace the term with something more useful, but such efforts have met with little success. The reason for this is quite simple – the word really does accomplish what it sets out to do. It functions as a descriptor for many millions of Christians for whom no other aggregate denominator is appropriate. The word has enduring value precisely because we cannot operate without it. That is not to say that its use is uncontroversial. Dissatisfaction with the term was evident among many of the young leaders of the "New Evangelicalism" which emerged with such energy in the years just after World War II. Driven by a determination to distinguish themselves from separatistic Fundamentalism on the one hand, and Protestant Liberalism on the other hand, these ambitious founders of contemporary evangelicalism laid hold of the only term that seemed to describe their identity and aspirations. What other term would serve so well? During the 1970s and 1980s, laments over the word and its usage led figures such as William J. Abraham to argue that the word is an "essentially contested concept" – a concept borrowed from the world of philosophy. Abraham, a leading intellectual figure on the evangelical left, argued that the term was almost always used in the context of theological judgment. Yet, he asserted, "There is no single essence or one particular condition that captures the achievement concerned or will be agreed upon by all evangelicals." Of course, even in making his argument, Abraham had little choice but to use the term "evangelicals" even as he argued that the concept is "essentially contested."

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Pastors / Leadership: The Church in a Post-Christian Culture

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The Church in a Post-Christian Culture Sep 6th 2011, 04:00 In granting the Christian church special favors and privileges in the fourth century, the Roman Emperor Constantine ushered in the era of the church-state partnership that would profoundly shape European society and culture for centuries to come. As the protected and privileged religion of society, Christianity achieved unrivaled cultural dominance. The resulting cultures in Europe and later in North America became known as Christendom. Even though the legal structures of Christendom were removed in North America (i.e., the separation from the state), the legacy of this Constantinian system remained by means of powerful traditions, attitudes and social structures that could be described as "functional Christendom." In the age of Christendom, the church occupied a central and influential place in society and the Western world considered itself both formally and officially Christian. So when we speak of post-Christendom, we are making the point that the church no longer occupies this central place of social and cultural hegemony and Western civilization no longer considers itself to be formally or officially Christian.   This represents a monumental shift in the cultural context into which the Western, and specifically American, church is now attempting to carry out its mission. This raises two fundamental questions: What does this new cultural context mean for the church and its mission? And, what exactly is the church's mission?  To the first point, the vast majority of American churches still rest on the assumptions of Christendom, meaning they believe that Christianity still occupies a central and influential place in society, when this is no longer true. A brief survey of American culture should quickly and thoroughly convince anyone that Christianity is no longer the central informing influence. Every culture forming institution from academia, media, the Arts, business and government are today, convincingly secularized. Religion in general and Christianity in particular are excluded from the public square. Christianity has become a marginalized way of thinking that is largely relegated to the elderly and uneducated. In other words, Christianity is regarded as being irrelevant when it comes to having anything meaningful to offer relative to "non-religious" matters. The prior reality of Christendom naturally produced what could be thought of as a church-centered or ecclesiocentric perspective of its mission. Since Christianity was the dominant religion, the emphasis or mission of the church gradually became centered on recruiting "members" through evangelism as its social and cultural authority was firmly established. But, I would argue that this neither fully represents the true mission of the Church as God's sent people. Furthermore it disregards the post-Christendom reality. Christendom inevitably led to a view of "missions" as a program of the church while its de facto mission remained centered on the institutional maintenance of the church.   In the Missional Church: A Vision for the Sending of the Church in North America, the authors offer critical insight into the problem. Written in response to research inaugurated by the Gospel and Our Culture Network, a diverse team of Evangelical theologians writes: We have come to see that mission is not merely an activity of the church. Rather, mission is the result of God's initiative, rooted in God's purposes to restore and heal creation. "Mission" means "sending," and it is the central biblical theme describing the purpose of God in human history…. We have begun to learn that the biblical message is more radical, more inclusive, more transforming than we have allowed it to be…. We have begun to see that the church of Jesus Christ is not the purpose or goal of the gospel, but rather its instrument and witness. God's mission embraces all of creation. Using this definition, the authors point out that "neither the structures nor the theology of our established Western traditional churches is missional. They are shaped by the legacy of Christendom" and given the fact that the present cultural context is increasingly resistant to "member recruitment," the American church is scrambling to define its mission. Many churches have recently begun to use the term "missional" but this is often nothing more than a new word for evangelism operating under the same old assumptions of Christendom. It neither fully considers the post-Christian cultural context or the all-encompassing redemptive mission of God.  Because so many churches still labor under the illusion of Christendom their response to this loss of cultural relevance and missional ineffectiveness often ends up being misguided. "The typical North American response to our situation is to analyze the problem and find a solution. These solutions tend to be methodological. Arrange all the components of the church landscape differently, and many assume that the problem can be solved. Or use the best demographic or psychological or sociological insights, and one can redesign the church for success in our changing context." (Missional Church, p. 2) This inevitably results in the church trying to look like the world in order to be relevant when what is needed is an intelligent and loving representation of the Truth that is relevant to what the world really needs. The latter requires that the church better understand the cultural context, dominant ideas and worldviews shaping our culture. These worldviews, which purport to offer an all-embracing life system, must be met with a Christianity that offers an "equally comprehensive and far reaching power" in the words of Abraham Kuyper. It is, in large part, the church's present inability to both recognize the changing cultural context and to assert an all-encompassing view of the Christian faith and message that has rendered the church irrelevant and left it confused with regard to its purpose and mission. The American church must begin to see itself as existing within a "foreign" land and like foreign missionaries, properly contextualize its mission.  Next week we will examine what it truly means to be "missional" and how it carries out that mission in today's post-Christendom cultural context. © 2011 by S. Michael Craven Permission granted for non-commercial use. Comment on this article here Subscribe to Michael's free weekly commentary here Subscribe to Michael's free podcast here

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Pastors / Leadership: Tell Stories Like Life Depends on It

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Tell Stories Like Life Depends on It Sep 5th 2011, 04:00 The specific, nitty-gritty, sometimes disgusting, sometimes beautiful things that God has done really matter. We're saved by faith alone, but faith needs facts. We need to believe in something particular and concrete. After Joshua and all his contemporaries died, we are told that "there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel. And the people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the Lord" (Judges 2:10-11). They didn't know God, and this led them into sin. They didn't know God because they hadn't learned about the things he had done for them in the past. Their parents neglected to tell them the stories. They didn't know that God chose Abraham to be the father of his chosen people, and he gave him Isaac. Isaac had two sons--Jacob and Esau. Esau was given the hill country, but Jacob and his family went down to Egypt. Later, they were enslaved, but God led them out of Egypt and saved them by drowning the Egyptians in the Red Sea. These are simple stories--nothing convoluted or arcane. But forgetting them was the downfall of Israel over and over again. Why? What difference do the stories make? The stories--the facts--give shape to the one we ought to worship. What God does shows who he is. So when these Israelites began to forget the details, God began to seem like all the other options that were out there to worship. And "they whored after other gods and bowed down to them" (Judges 2:22). There are, of course, many other ways to protect ourselves and our kids from forsaking the truth, but this one is so simple and essential that it would be foolish to neglect it: tell your kids stories. Know the facts and then pass them on—it will help them be saved. It matters that God created the heavens and the earth; that man sinned and now deserves hell; that Christ came and died; and that if we believe in him we will be saved. It also matters that Enoch didn't die, but was taken up by the Lord when he was 365 years old; that Jael hammered a tent peg through the skull of Sisera; that Elijah was fed by ravens next to a brook before he went to Zarephath and raised a widow's son from the dead; that Isaiah had to walk naked for three years as a sign against Egypt and Cush; that Hosea married a prostitute named Gomer; that Peter cut Malchus's ear off; and that Paul escaped from Damascus through a window down a wall in a basket. Clearly some biblical facts matter less than others, but let's not discard any of them. My two-year-old's favorite stories right now are David killing Goliath, Jesus dying on the cross, and "King Saul pooping in dark cave" (1 Samuel 24:3)--his words, not mine. Obviously there is a hierarchy of importance here that he doesn't understand, but that will work itself out over time. My job right now is to tell him the things the Lord has done. I don't want my wife and me to be among the parents of a generation who forgets! The stories in the Bible--from the least important to the most important--show us who God is. The less our kids know about this book, the easier it will be for them to ignore God, because they won't recognize him. And the more they know about it, the more likely they will walk with him, because they will have seen the great things that a God like him can do. Abraham Piper is the Web Content Editor for Desiring God Ministries and a regular contributor to the Desiring God Blog. Piper also blogs at 22 Words.   © Desiring God. Used with permission. Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way and do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction. For web posting, a link to this document on our website is preferred. Any exceptions to the above must be approved by Desiring God. Website: desiringGod.org

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Pastors / Leadership: The Focus of Ministry is Focus

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The Focus of Ministry is Focus Sep 2nd 2011, 04:00 fo-cus (fo-kus) noun, [Latin, hearth] 1. A focal point. 2. To concentrate. 3. A center of interest or activity. 4. To sharpen or clearly define. 5. The point at which an object is most clearly seen. To the casual observer it might appear that Jesus was nomadic, wandering the dusty roads from village to village, dispensing his humanitarian miracles and pithy sayings. A first century Johnny Appleseed who scattered goodness seeds and golden rules like confetti. A kind of half-Houdini, half-Gandhi. A utilitarian genie who attracted disciples like stray cats. But nothing could be further from the truth. Jesus was the most focused leader and strategic planner of all time. He was a genius in organizational development and human resources. He specialized in visionary management. The world has never known a better synergist, the church being exhibit A. His methods, though ministerial, have been the model for industry and commerce for hundreds of years. His focus was constantly challenged, but he never wavered. He was harassed by the religious: "The Pharisees came out and began to argue with Him." His disciples volunteered new ideas: "...Command fire to come down from heaven to consume them." Even His family questioned his actions: "Why have you treated us this way?" His hometown friends, the ones who had watched Him grow up, "took offense at Him." Satan, too, took his best shot. "All the kingdoms of the world, and their glory, will I give you if you fall down and worship me." But Jesus was resolute with focus. Though simple, Jesus' ministerial focus was profound and permanent. It has served as the template for every true disciple since. First, Jesus focused His mission in doing God's will. Nothing was more important to Him. "My priority is to do the will of Him who sent me, and to accomplish His work." John Stott, in The Preacher's Portrait wrote, "I can't help wondering if this is why there are so few preachers God is using today. There are plenty of popular preachers but not many who preach in the power of the Holy Spirit." Stott wonders if preaching God's will is too costly for the preacher. It was costly for Jesus, too. But He remained focused. Second, Jesus focused His topics of conversations. Every dialogue was deliberate. No words were wasted or lost; they were customized for each audience. "The words which you gave to me, I have given to them." His material was fresh and applicable. To the hurting, He spoke of hope. At a funeral, He spoke of life. To the blind, he spoke of light. To the leper, He offered His touch. To the theologians, He spoke theology. To normal people, He sounded normal. For everyone he put the cookies on the bottom shelf. And they loved Him for it. Third, Jesus focused His message to a target audience. "I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance." He gravitated to the needy and the growing. He did not seek out the comfortable or stagnant. His ministry was one of depth, not breadth. He would hideaway with His students for in-depth training. He commanded others to "tell no one." He was unshaken when thousands walked out during His message claiming "this is too difficult." On the night before the crucifixion, Jesus had an audience with numerous Jewish and Roman power brokers "yet He opened not His mouth." Finally, Jesus focused His energies toward His replacements. "As you have sent me into the world, I also have sent them into the world." He chose an even-dozen from hundreds of candidates. For three years they stopped, looked, and listened. They heard it all, saw it all, and were involved in dozens of miraculous works. Jesus held nothing back from them. He schooled them in every phase of ministry. They saw him laugh, weep, teach, pray, challenge, rest, serve, heal, answer, and lead. When it was their turn they never asked "How?" They were focused. Our work is demanding but the model of our Teacher is simple: Focus. Ron Walters Vice President of Church Relations P.S. If you're looking for great preaching tools, don't forget Preaching Magazine. It's my favorite. Check it out at Preaching.com. Do your congregation a favor by subscribing. Copyright 2007 by Ron Walters Subscribe to The Pastor's Corner devotional by clicking here and checking the box in the top left corner.

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Pastors / Leadership: Is the Church the Hope of the World?

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Is the Church the Hope of the World? Sep 1st 2011, 04:00 We had a volunteer celebration this past Sunday night for children's ministry volunteers.  One of the challenges brought by our children's ministry staff to the volunteers was to take time during their devotions, at some point, and write a reflection on why they believed the church was the hope of the world - and specifically, in a child's life. The goal was to have them spend time reflecting on why their investment of time and energy matters so very much.  To know it deeply, viscerally, and not just on a surface level. One of the volunteers wrote the following words.  As I read them, I couldn't help wondering: is the church really the hope of the world? This was her answer: So this morning, I asked God to speak to me and answer for me; Is the church the hope of the world? I was immediately a mess. CS Lewis writes, "The church exists for nothing else but to draw men into Christ, to make them little Christs.  If they are not doing that, all the cathedrals, clergy, missions, sermons, even the Bible itself, are simply, a waste of time. God became Man for no other purpose. It is even doubtful, you know, whether the whole universe was created for any other purpose." God is saving the lost through Meck, I know because I was lost, very lost. Ephesians 2: 3-10 spoke to my heart on this, this morning.... "All of us once lived among them in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of our flesh and senses, and we were by nature children of wrath, like everyone else. But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ - by grace you have been saved - and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God- not the result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life." How do I know the church is the hope of the world? I see it in my own life, in my own testimony and in the living testimony of my family. When I came to Meck, I came alone, as a single parent, unchurched, a non-believer, invited by a friend of my mother's, never married, living in a mess of life…Slowly God moved in my life as I sat, week in, week out at Meck just listening and just thinking. God first came into my heart and then radically changed it. [My child's father] and I began to attend together, really date, and then were married within the year. The first time I ever read the bible was in response to a "take home" from MecKidz. The first time [my husband] and I prayed together was in response to a prompting from [my husband], brought on by a message we heard at Meck. The first time we served together was in response to a message we heard at Meck. The first time we committed our lives together to Christ as a family, and agreed to truly let him be leader was in a response to a message we heard at Meck. More recently, the decision to give, what in reality is our entire weekend, to the cause of Christ, through the building of his church at [Meck's Lake Norman campus] was in response to a message at Meck. We started a small group this way, I was baptized this way, invite our friends this way, and the list could go on, and on.....God works through the church, … How do I know, I live it! Is the church the hope of the world? She reminded me of the answer. James Emery White Editor's Note To enjoy a free subscription to the Church and Culture blog, log-on to www.churchandculture.org, where you can post your comments on this blog, view past blogs in our archive and read the latest church and culture news from around the world.  Follow Dr. White on twitter @JamesEmeryWhite.

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