Category: Ministry

It’s A Lie

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Most weeks, two or three come in. For the most part, they’re filled out by women. Primarily they’re checked single with children. I’m talking about benevolence forms. These are forms asking the church for assistance.

We have a team of volunteers that works to get these forms processed. I’m not involved with the process itself, but I see how carefully the team works to choose who qualifies for assistance.

Society tells us that men are unnecessary. We can do this parenting thing alone. We don’t need a man. They’re a nice accessory. After all, they only want one thing right? They cheat, they lie, they don’t work hard enough. Yet, could it be that our expectations are so low when choosing whom to father our children, that we choose a man who is ill equipped? That choice leaves us vulnerable. We can blame the down economy but single women with children have always ranked highest amongst those living below the poverty level.

I read these forms with great sadness. Generally speaking the average seems to be three children, two fathers, never married, no one pays child support, and she has never worked or barely worked because someone had to take care of those babies. There is a hardness and a sadness about her story and when I see her, she’s lost the sparkle in her eye. Yet, society tells her she can do it all by herself.

Could it be that God designed sex within the context of marriage to alleviate this pain? Could it be that in his infinite wisdom and compassion he was looking to save us and our children from this struggle, this life of poverty?

It seems judgmental, even to my own eyes, when I read what I have written here today, and yet, life takes some planning. We, as the church, help with what we can, in terms of goods and services, but it’s a band-aid on a more critical wound. We all make mistakes and we all have to live out those consequences. How do we educate the next generation that just because he says, I love you in the backseat of his mom’s car, doesn’t mean that it’s the right time to awaken love? How do we change the lie, and it is a lie, that life will go on as planned? How do we change the story? Even among my Christian friends, they say sex before marriage is unreasonable and unattainable. A nice thought in theory, but not practical in life. We all stand in freakish awe when someone publicly declares that they are going to wait until they get married to have sex. Surely there is something wrong with them, because we are too smart to fall for a lie.

Women suffer, children suffer even more so, yet we plow forward thinking this time it will be different for her. It’s a lie. There is an enemy of your soul who desires to destroy your dream. There is a Dream Giver who is calling you to take more care. Who will you believe and what has to change within you? Within us?

Christians Are Canceling Christmas

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It’s the oddest thing to me in the whole entire world. There are Christians wanting to cancel church on Christmas because it falls on a Sunday this year. You see, it will interfere with the gift exchange. It will interfere with the Christmas Eve hangover, it will interfere with the Christmas breakfast tradition. Canceling Christmas must be done! It’s inconvenient for MMMMMEEEEEE.

OH WAIT!!

It’s not Christmas we want to cancel. It’s the bride of Christ we want to cancel. We don’t want to gather corporately on a Sunday because of Christmas.

We want the commercial exchange without the holy interaction.

 

Okay, now it makes total sense! I get it! Push Jesus to the side so we can have our holiday.

Funny thing is that is exactly what the Pharisees did. Jesus came to save the world that was lost, but it was lost on them. They weren’t interested in a Messiah, they were interested in a tradition. Jesus’ timing has never been convenient. Nope, nothing convenient about it, but it was necessary.

Christianity started on the day Jesus arrived on the scene. We have decided to celebrate that moment on December 25. Only this year, it falls on a day we reserve for church service. So church service will have to wait because gifts are more important than the giver.

Maybe I will stand alone but I will be at church on Sunday morning, December 25, 2011 even if it is Christ’s Mass.

Thankful

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I was sitting with my husband having lunch yesterday when a thought occurred to me that just warmed my heart and made me thankful to God. This past Sunday my son, Anthony, preached the word to the church. He spoke on the relationship we have with God and the obligation we have to each other. The Sunday before son # 2, Charles, preached to the church at youth day. He spoke on humility before God and how we needed to stay pliable before him.

I had simply taken this for granted until the moment God gave me the realization of the blessing he had bestowed on us. Our children pay a high price for what we do, as families in ministry can attest. Ministry is what we do and there aren’t on and off hours for it. Sure, we have great discussions abut the bible and our faith. but we have great arguments about what other kids are allowed to do versus ours. Funny, our kids think we don’t allow certain things because we are a “ministry family”. They don’t understand that we don’t allow certain things because we’re strict parents.

In this moment of clarity the Lord made me realize that despite the guilt I carry, the kids are okay. They know the word of God, they are growing up in the faith that we have taught them and they will, no doubt about it, surpass all that we have done and do even greater still. God has kept his hand firmly on them. God has directed their path even when we felt we were failing at juggling all the balls in the air.

All this to say that the realization was not that the kids were on the platform preaching and that is what made it good. What made it good was their understanding of the word and how it fits in their lives. To see them talk about their struggles and triumphs is what made it good. Somehow we did something right or at least we were carried by abounding grace.

Our daughters haven’t hit the platform (yet). They may or may not but I’m secure in the knowledge that they know God, they love him, and they serve him. That is all I need to feel that life is good!

Breathing

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fubiz.net

I was sent this article written by musician, singer/songwriter, Jason Gray. I thought it was profound and wanted to share it with all of you!

The Sound of Our Breathing
Jason Gray

Take a breath and breathe it out. Do it again, slowly, and try to mean it. Breathing – of all things maybe we take it most for granted. Do we ever wonder why we are built this way, this soft machine of ours always pumping oxygen in and out?

In sadness, we breathe heavy sighs. In joy, our lungs feel almost like they will burst. In fear, we hold our breath and have to be told to breathe slowly to help us calm down. When we’re about to do something hard, we take a deep breath to find our courage. When I think about it, breathing looks almost like a kind of praying.

I heard a teaching not long ago about the moment when Moses had the nerve to ask God what His name is. God was gracious enough to answer, and the name He gave is recorded in the original Hebrew as YHWH.

Over time, we’ve arbitrarily added an “a” and an “e” in there to get YaHWeH, presumably because we have a preference for vowels. But scholars have noted that the letters YHWH represent breathing sounds, aspirated consonants that in the Hebrew alphabet would be transliterated like this:
Yod, rhymes with “rode,” which we transliterate “Y”
He, rhymes with “say,” which we transliterate “H”
Vav, like “lava,” which we transliterate “V” or “W”
He rhymes with “say,” which we transliterate “H”.

A wonderful question rises to excite the imagination: what if the name of God is the sound of breathing?

This is a beautiful thought to me, especially considering that for centuries there have been those who have insisted that the name of God is so holy that we dare not speak it because of how unworthy we are. How generous of God to choose to give Himself a name that we can’t help but speak every moment we’re alive. All of us, always, everywhere, waking, sleeping, with the name of God on our lips.

In his Nooma video, Breathe, Rob Bell (a pastor whose obvious gifts of curiosity and a knack for asking provocative questions can get him into trouble) wonders what this means in key moments like when a baby is born – newly arrived on planet Earth, must they take their first breath, or rather speak the name of God, if they are to be alive here? On our deathbed, do we breathe our last breath? Or is it that we cease to be alive when the name of God is no longer on our lips?
The most ironic of his questions is also the most beautiful: he wonders about the moment when an atheist friend looks across the table at you and says, “There. is. no. God.” And of course, what you hear is “Yod. He. Vav. He.”

There are few better illustrations of both God’s largesse as well as his humility, his omnipresence as well as his singular intimate presence within each of us.

Breathe in. Breathe out. “He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs…the word that saves is right here, as near as the tongue in your mouth…” (Romans 8:28, 10:8 The Message)

Who Is Called To Ignorance?

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Jammer's Blog

Recently I heard a man say he was called to preach to the ignorant who wished to remain so. He declared that the Lord had called him to preach to those who were uneducated and ignorant and did not want to change. He was called to preach to those who had never had an opportunity to learn and didn’t want to. These people, he declared, were not interested in an education and felt that church was expecting too much of them with bible study.

My heart began to beat rapidly because I had heard another pastor say this before. He also was called to preach to the ignorant who wanted to stay ignorant. It was a statement that resonated in my heart. I thought our job was to preach the good news to the poor so that they would realize their destiny in Christ and would be then rich? I thought that we were supposed to illuminate lives with the word? I thought the good news was that there was a Savior who came to bring them out of ignorance of their state of being and into knowledge of who their Father in heaven had called them to be and what their dominion and authority would be? I thought that our job was not to teach legalism but to teach freedom? I am beyond saddened by this thought process because it seems so far from Christ I don’t even know what to think.

The word warns us about this. It says that there will be false teachers, I just never wanted to know one. To say that someone doesn’t need to know the word for themselves and doesn’t need to learn it makes me wonder what else in life they don’t need to know? To perpetuate ignorance with misused authority is not the understanding of the Bible I read. Some believe thinking puffs up a soul. On the contrary thinking releases a soul to their destiny.

Wisdom cries in the streets. Does God desire only a select few to answer her call? I don’t think that’s the God I serve. I believe the God I serve is pleased when we are a success. Not a success as the world sees it but a success in love. Sorry folks, this is a punch I will never drink. I believe as followers of Christ our attitude should be the same as Jesus when he said:

John 14:12 The person who trusts me will not only do what I’m doing but even greater things, because I, on my way to the Father, am giving you the same work to do that I’ve been doing. You can count on it.

What work had Jesus been doing? Giving revelation. Life changing knowledge, wisdom and power. Proclaiming that if you were poor you no longer had to be poor because he was bringing wisdom not of this world but wisdom eternal. That is the God I serve! The One who believes our future lies in salvation, wisdom, and knowledge.

Ruining Your Teen’s Life

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I received this article from Family Life and really loved it! Thought I’d share it.

 

the blue moon grille

 

How to Ruin Your Teens for LifeEleven ways to ensure that your teenager will not be prepared for the future.Tricia Goyer
Editor’s note: Tricia Goyer’s tongue-in-cheek article earlier this summer on “How to Ruin Your Kid for Life” was so popular that we now present her sequel on how to raise a teenager who will not prepared for life.   

1. Hide your past mistakes. Put on an act that you are perfect and your teenagers are the ones with all the problems. (After all, if your teens hear what you did in your past, they might want to follow.)

2. Don’t worry about where they are going and what they are doing. You didn’t want to be hounded at that age. You didn’t want to be asked all those questions. Instead, trust that they know how they should act and where they should go.

3. Don’t worry about them getting a summer job and having to work to make money. Teens are only teens once. They need time to have fun with friends and relax. There will be time to work later. They don’t need to worry about a work ethic now.

4. Don’t force them to attend church and youth group. Things are already touchy—you have to hound them about homework, about their friends, and about their clothes—don’t make church another thing you hound them about.

5. Don’t worry about talking to them about sex and purity. You’re their parent, for goodness sake. You don’t want to bring the subject up and have them thinking about you having sex. And you don’t want to think about them in their sexual lives. There are other people more knowledgeable and trained to talk to your teens; leave it to them.

6.  Completely shelter your teens from the outside world.  Make sure they don’t watch any secular movies or to any secular music.  Hide the newspapers, too.  Their “world” should only be about your family’s values.  They don’t need to learn about all that bad stuff out there.  They don’t need to make wise media choices or deal with unwholesome people.  They don’t need to see that there’s a world out there that is greatly in need of Jesus.  Let someone else deal with impacting and influencing culture.*

7. Tell them, “Do what I say, not what I do.” Make them accept the areas where you fall short, but expect them to do better.

8. Buy your teens whatever they ask for. That’s your role as a parent—to make your teens happy.

9. Don’t let your teen get involved in an overseas mission trip. There are all types of scary things that happen on those trips, and your first priority is to keep your teen safe.

10. Don’t become your teens’ sounding board. They’ll need to learn to figure things out on their own in the future, so they might as well start now.

11. Don’t share with your teen how important God is in your life. A personal relationship with God is personal, and it should stay that way.

*Special note:  Point #6 was revised after the initial version led to disagreement from some readers (see comments below).  We recognize that parents have a responsibility to protect their children from a hostile culture.  Tricia’s point is that OVER-protection can also lead to problems.  Tricia rewrote #6 to communicate this more clearly.  We welcome any further comments.  

Copyright © 2011 Tricia Goyer. All rights reserved. This article originally appeared on MomLife Today, FamilyLife’s blog for moms.



Knowing The Truth Will Set You Free

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There are some people who are anti-church, anti-pastors. That’s cool with me, they are free to think as they please, but please speak in knowledge rather than in ignorance. I recently heard of one of these people saying Jesus never preached in a church so that he could be the example of why church is not necessary. For the sake of not belaboring a point, I did not quote all the scriptures that talk of Jesus preaching in a temple but just a few. Here is the truth:

Mark 1:21 They went to Capernaum, and when the Sabbath came, Jesus went into the synagogue and began to teach.22 The people were amazed at his teaching, because he taught them as one who had authority, not as the teachers of the law.

Luke 4:42 At daybreak Jesus went out to a solitary place. The people were looking for him and when they came to where he was, they tried to keep him from leaving them. 43 But he said, “I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent.” 44 And he kept on preaching in the synagogues of Judea.

Luke 19:47 Every day he was teaching at the temple. But the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the leaders among the people were trying to kill him.

NIV

Jesus was Jewish. Of course he was dedicated into his faith. He sat at the feet of temple scholars at a very early age:

Luke 2:41 Every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover. 42 When he was twelve years old, they went up to the Feast, according to the custom. 43 After the Feast was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they were unaware of it. 44 Thinking he was in their company, they traveled on for a day. Then they began looking for him among their relatives and friends. 45 When they did not find him, they went back to Jerusalem to look for him. 46 After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. 47 Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. 48 When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.” 49 “Why were you searching for me?” he asked. “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?”

I understand people have their beliefs but if you’re going to use the bible for your argument make sure it’s really in there.

A Known Atheist

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Listening to Dr. Laura Schlessinger on the radio I heard a call that at first was funny and then became thoughtful to me. A woman called in to say that her brother was a “known atheist” in the town they lived in and he was offended with the caller. I laughed out loud in my car because and the same time my thought came,  Dr. Laura chuckled, “as opposed to an unknown atheist?”! The woman went on to explain that her brother was the head of the local atheist organization.

His charge against his sister? That she had never chosen him as a godfather to any of her children. Dr. Laura had a good belly laugh at that, but I was thoughtful and have been since then. You see, the brother had a valid question and the sister needed to examine it. What about our walk with Christ makes a person who doesn’t believe in Christ think it’s perfectly okay to ask to participate in something regarding our faith? It may not be such an off the wall question. What is a godparent after all?

I have said on this blog that I have amazing godparents. My godfather went home to be with the Lord last year but they have been there for me since the day of my birth. They have instructed me in my spiritual walk, they have prayed for me, imparted wisdom into my life and corrected bad behavior when needed. They were strong in their faith and their marriage and taught me the practice of church and family and God and love. When I left the Catholic faith for a non-denominational church no one prayed harder for me. They never wavered in the duty of being godparents and never gave up on me. With love they have attempted to keep me on a clear path. They participated in my life. Better examples I could not have dreamed of.

Yet I see today followers of Christ who pick friends who aren’t even church attenders to be godparents. They put no thought into their child’s mentor in their religious upbringing. I’ve seen dedication services where the godparents couldn’t even stay for the service. They did their duty and left to go celebrate and prepare for a party or worse talked through the service with no reverence or acknowledgment of what they were there for. There is no inkling or recognition of the vow they are making to God. If in the end, we are only known by our word and character this doesn’t seem to matter to some Christians.

In the book, The Christian Atheist by Craig Groeschel, he starts the book off with two conversations on two different airplane flights. Travis was a man who was an atheist and there was no way any conversation was going to move him to change his mind. Travis tells the writer straight up what he thinks of the whole religion thing from his perspective, pulling no punches. On the other hand, he meets a woman named Michelle who professes Christ but whom the writer calls a Christian Atheist, she reveals that she lives with her boyfriend who doesn’t believe in Jesus and is scared to death of marriage, her life obviously conflicting with her beliefs. He makes a powerful statement on page 13 when he says that Christians Atheists look a lot like Christians but live like Travis. It’s really a good read and I recommend it.

So maybe this caller’s brother’s question wasn’t that far off track? I mean if the example we give to the world is one where our actions don’t match our talk, then at least we have to give credit to this brother for living out what he believes. Granted, this isn’t what the caller was calling about, but it did make me think about what kind of a life we collectively live as Christians that this brother felt comfortable enough to ask why not him?

Tapestry Of Love

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I heard a Pastor say that when storms come they take out the trees that are not deeply rooted.

Colossians 2:2 I want you woven into a tapestry of love, in touch with everything there is to know of God. Then you will have minds confident and at rest, focused on Christ, God’s great mystery. 3 All the richest treasures of wisdom and knowledge are embedded in that mystery and nowhere else. And we’ve been shown the mystery!

I heard a teaching once that God blesses with an open hand. Rain comes to the just and the unjust, just as sunshine, children, jobs and paychecks. But for those who seek relationship with him, for those who willingly place their hand in his, there in his fist is wisdom. The Proverbs say wisdom is crying in the street. Those who choose to answer the call are rewarded.

4 I’m telling you this because I don’t want anyone leading you off on some wild-goose chase, after other so-called mysteries, or “the Secret.” 5 I’m a long way off, true, and you may never lay eyes on me, but believe me, I’m on your side, right beside you. I am delighted to hear of the careful and orderly ways you conduct your affairs, and impressed with the solid substance of your faith in Christ. 6 My counsel for you is simple and straightforward: Just go ahead with what you’ve been given. You received Christ Jesus, the Master; now live him. 7 You’re deeply rooted in him. You’re well constructed upon him. You know your way around the faith. Now do what you’ve been taught. School’s out; quit studying the subject and start living it! And let your living spill over into thanksgiving. 8 Watch out for people who try to dazzle you with big words and intellectual double-talk. They want to drag you off into endless arguments that never amount to anything. They spread their ideas through the empty traditions of human beings and the empty superstitions of spirit beings. But that’s not the way of Christ. 9 Everything of God gets expressed in him, so you can see and hear him clearly. You don’t need a telescope, a microscope, or a horoscope to realize the fullness of Christ, and the emptiness of the universe without him. 10 When you come to him, that fullness comes together for you, too. His power extends over everything. 11 Entering into this fullness is not something you figure out or achieve. It’s not a matter of being circumcised or keeping a long list of laws. No, you’re already in – insiders – not through some secretive initiation rite but rather through what Christ has already gone through for you, destroying the power of sin. 12 If it’s an initiation ritual you’re after, you’ve already been through it by submitting to baptism. Going under the water was a burial of your old life; coming up out of it was a resurrection, God raising you from the dead as he did Christ.

The question that then follows is are we Sunday church attenders or are we answering the call? Do we seek the relationship which grants wisdom or are following the empty traditions of man and the empty superstition of spirit beings? I spoke to a new believer on Sunday. He said he sits and reads his bible one hour a day when he gets up in the morning, he says he becomes so engrossed in it, that he’s been late for work because he says he tells himself, “okay just one more page” then one turns to two. Funny thing is happening though. He is getting some pretty heavy revelation. I mean God is moving him at warp speed. He excites me with his knowledge because he’s asking deep questions and I am amazed at his wisdom.

But then
maybe I’m not

because he’s heard wisdom’s cry

        and has decided to answer the call.

The question then is are we deeply rooted in Christ? Or will we be swayed with the wind, off on those wild-goose chases trying to understand “the secret”? Will the storms of life come and uproot our delicate root system? Will we be able to stand when the world is quaking around us? I pray we are beloved. I pray we are learning, seeking, praying and most of all I pray that we have taken up the Lord’s promise to give wisdom to those who seek it and are living it out! Be someone who lives it and experiences Christ. Not someone who stands on the sidelines and watches. Be deeply rooted and know whose you are and what you’ve been called to! I pray that we woven into that tapestry of love.