Predicting, Listening, Craving, and Serving
As I wrote a few days ago, there are so many good blog posts in my feed reader right now that I can’t possibly create a separate post for each one of them. However, I do want to point my readers to them, because… well, like I said, they’re very good.
So here are another list of posts that I found extremely encouraging and challenging.
I hope you take the time to read these posts. I think you’ll be glad that you did.
Eric from “A Pilgrim’s Progress” writes “I Can’t Predict Who’s Interested“
In his post, Eric is primarily talking about church. Until he talks to people, he cannot tell who is interested in discussing and living out issues regarding the church. However, I think this applies to the gospel as well.
Guy from “The M Blog” writes “Listening to one another’s stories“
He says that we must listen to one another before we can help, teach, disciple, etc. one another. And, while I agree with Guy that “listen to one another” is not one of the commands found in Scripture, it does seem to be an important foundation to many of the commands, especially the “one another” commands.
Bobby at “Deconstructing Neverland” writes “Craving for community“
He talks about some of the obstacles and frustrations that people face when they seek community with other believers. I know these obstacles and frustrations are real. Not only have I faced them myself, but I get emails from people all the time who face the same things.
Chris at “The Amplified Life” writes “A Quick Thought on Serving Others“
He is surprised that a gesture as simple as holding the door for someone is rare. What about real acts of service? Is the church any better than culture at serving others?
I’d love to hear what you think about these posts.
Growing past church programs and activities is not easy
In a previous post, “Numbing our souls with church activities,” I said that church programs and activities keep us busy doing “good things” to the point that our souls become numbed to our real issues that we should be dealing with. However, recognizing the danger in filling our lives with programs and activities is only the first step, and the remaining steps toward growth are not easy.
To begin with, when we step away from the church programs and activities, we often learn that we don’t know how to serve people, to disciple people, to evangelize people, to teach people. All we know how to do is to attend programs. Even those who lead the programs often find themselves lost with the structures and confines of the program or activities.
This is probably most obvious when it comes to fellowship and activities. Often, those people that we feel closest to in the programs disappear when the program ends. We find that we do not really have relationships with those people. At the best, we have an acquaintance with one another.
It is a painful realization when we discover that we are actually very immature when it comes to service, teaching, evangelism, discipleship, and fellowship. The pain is enhanced for those of us who have been Christians for a long time. The pain, unfamiliarity, and discomfort often lead Christians to assume that it is wrong to move away from the programs and activities, and they begin to fill their lives with them again.
Once Christians grow beyond this stage, they began to form real relationships with other people. This is the next difficult step in growing past church programs and activities. Why? Because when we truly begin to grow in our relationships with one another, we learn people’s flaws as well as their strengths, and people learn about our flaws as well as our strengths as well. We can no longer hide behind church programs and activities.
Not only do we now have to learn to accept people in spite of their weaknesses, we have to trust other people with our own weaknesses. If we never reach this stage, then again our mutual growth will be hindered.
Once we are able to admit that we don’t truly know how to love God and others (because we had only been attending programs and activities), and once we admit that we don’t know how to build relationships with one another (we’ve only been acquaintances before), we are finally able to begin growing together.
The task is not easy. In fact, apart from Christ working in and through us by the Holy Spirit, the task is completely impossible. However, as we surrender ourselves to Christ together and learn to listen to, encourage, admonish, and help one another, we will find amazing growth toward maturity in Christ as a group.
Why do Christians believe some of these things?
The recent wrong prediction (again) of the rapture or end of the world (again) caused me to start thinking about how Christians (some anyone) often appear gullible to this kind of thing.
I think the main problem is that many, many Christians latch onto Christian celebrities and believe anything that the say.
But, prophecies concerning the end of the world (in spite of Jesus statement that no one will know) reminds me of other things that many Christians believe. Many of these things are also contrary to what Scripture teaches.
1. Every Christian needs a “spiritual covering” referring to some kind of human authority.
2. Christians must act a certain way (holy?) when we enter the church building (or other “holy” space).
3. The normal Christian cannot read and understand Scriptures, so they need someone to explain it to them.
4. Some Christians have a special calling to be a minister or missionary.
Believe it or not, I’ve even been taught this in the past: A church that does not have “services” on Sunday night is a liberal church and will soon begin to deny the resurrection of Jesus.
Are there other things like this that some Christians believe that cannot be supported by Scripture?
It seems that we’re still here
At 6:00 p.m., I was at a friend’s 4th birthday party. We had castle carrot cake. There were alot of gifts in pink and with kittens.
But, I didn’t see anyone floating away. We were all still there after 6:00 p.m., and, as a matter of fact, a few more came to the party.
So, I guess this wasn’t the day and the hour as someone had predicted.
Of course, I didn’t put much stock in that prediction, which you knew if you followed my tweets or facebook stati about it.
Maybe Jesus was right after all…
But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. (Matthew 24:36 ESV)
Perhaps, instead of trying to figure out the day and the hour again (using some awesome math skills) (and being wrong again) or listening to those who do want to calculate the date, all followers of Jesus would be better off living each day in Christ, proclaiming the good news of Jesus and strengthening the saints.
That way, we’ll be ready, whenever the end comes.
Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect. (Matthew 24:44 ESV)
Perspective: The way we see the church
My daughter is a photographer. She’s a young, amateur, budding photographer, but a photographer none the less.
One of the things that I’ve learned from my daughter recently is that owning a camera and taking pictures does not make someone a photographer. Recently, on a trip to visit family in the Atlanta area, we went to the World of Coca-Cola, the home of all things sweet and refreshing.
At one point during our trip, we were wandering around the gift shop, and I had Miranda’s camera. I saw a line of Coke bottles that I thought looked interesting. So, I snapped a picture. Later, when Miranda had her camera, I pointed the bottles out to her, and she snapped a picture of them also.
When we downloaded the images, there was a huge difference between my picture and her picture. Both pictures included the same subjects, and both were were in focus. (Yes, believe it or not, my picture was in focus.) So, why was there such a huge difference between the two pictures?
Perspective. I looked at the bottles and took a picture of a line of bottles. But, she looked at the bottles with the eye of a photographer, and her picture looked like more than a line of bottles. It was art. (The thumbnail image for this post is my daughter’s picture, and, no, I am not going to show you my picture. You can see a larger version of her picture by clicking here.)
And, because of her picture, I was able to see those bottles from a new perspective. It was amazing!
Did you know that we all look at the world from different perspectives? It’s true. Many, many things affect how we look at the world around us. Our background, education, personality, location, etc. all affect our perspective on the world – how we look at the people, places, and things around us. Yes, Scripture and the indwelling Holy Spirit can affect our perspective as well.
Now, let’s apply this idea of perspective to our understanding of the church. Based on our background, education, personality, interpretation of Scripture, submission to the Spirit, etc. we will all look at the church a little differently. That should be expected, and, in fact, welcomed.
Welcomed? Should we welcome the fact that we all look at the church differently? Absolutely!
How can I say that? Because no one (except for God) has a perfect perspective on this world, including the church. No one. My perspective is off. Your perspective is off. Her perspective is off. His perspective is off.
As Paul would say (paraphrasing), “We all look at the world as through a dark glass…”
Thus, the more we understand one another’s perspective on the world, the more we actually understand the world, and the more our own perspective becomes clearer. Even listening to and learning from a person whose perspective is obviously way off can help us see clearer, even if we don’t agree with that person’s perspective.
Here’s the problem… In much of the church today, only a few people are given the opportunity to offer their perspective on God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, humanity, the church, etc. The church has become dependent on one person (usually, but sometimes a few people) offering a clear perspective. However, it is impossible for that person to offer a clear perspective. He or she (or they) can only offer their perspective on the world and God and the church.
We need one another. We need to hear and understand one another’s perspective. We need to grow by seeing the world through the other person’s eyes, so to speak.
I think this is one of the reasons that the authors of Scripture continually and consistently called on their readers to “teach one another,” “admonish one another,” “edify one another,” “encourage one another,” etc. These “one another’s” are not tacked on to sound good. No! We truly depend on God working through the perspectives of other people to help us grow and mature in Jesus Christ.
As long as the church depends on the perspective of only a small sector of the body, the church will be stifled in its ability to grow. But, when the church learns to listen to and learn from the perspectives of the whole church, then we will find tremendous growth.
So, what do you think? What’s your perspective on this? 😉
(By the way, here’s a shameless plug for my daughter. She has entered a photo in a contest on facebook, and I would appreciate it if you would look at this other photo and “like” it.)
I need help serving my neighbor
Last Saturday was a bad day for me. I think I caught some kind of stomach bug. I’ll spare you the details.
But, Saturday evening, I received a phone call that was very encouraging!
A friend of mine called and told me about his neighbor. I knew a little about her already from talking with him before. She had recently experienced a couple of deaths in her immediate family, and she was not handling it well.
This neighbor had welcomed my friend and his family into her life. But, as my friend told me, they thought they needed help. The lady was open to meeting and talking with more people. Did I have any suggestions?
We talked about possibilities for a few minutes, then he said that he would bring it up with the church Sunday. He would ask our brothers and sisters if they had any suggestions on how his family could better serve this neighbor. He would also ask them if they would be willing to spend time with his neighbor.
Unfortunately, my unwelcomed visitor decided to stay with me through Sunday morning, so I did not meet with the church. I know that my friend talked about his neighbor, but I don’t know what was said.
Last night, some other friends invited Margaret (my wife) and me out to dinner. There were six of us all together. Guess what one of the topics of conversation was? Our friend’s neighbor. (And, no, I didn’t bring up the topic.)
I think something special happens when the church (as a whole) gets involved in someone’s life. Some call it “belonging” before “believing.” I call it taking Jesus Christ to people through his community.
What do you think? Have you ever been part of a church or group of believers who served someone together like this? Have you ever been served or helped in this way?
Disagreeing among the Church about Preaching
A few weeks ago, I was talking with someone about our history of meeting together as a church. We’ve been meeting together for around six years. When we started meeting together, we met in a much more traditional manner than we do now.
What do I mean by meeting together in a traditional manner? Well, we sat in rows with everyone looking forward at the platform or podium. Each week, someone chose songs for the entire group to sing. Each week, someone taught (preached) based on a predefined schedule.
Now, as you can tell, there were still some less-traditional aspects to our meeting. There may have been different people (from week to week) choosing songs or different people (from week to week) teaching/preaching.
Over the first couple of years, as we continued to study Scripture together, our manner of meeting began to change some. The first major change occurred when we added a “testimony” time after the planned teaching in which everyone present was given an opportunity to speak.
About a year after we added this new opportunity for others to speak, we had some discussions as a church to determine which direction we wanted to head. While the discussions covered many, many different topics, there were several disagreements about teaching/preaching.
Here are a few of the teaching/preaching topics that we discussed:
Who should preach/teach?
Some only wanted the elders (those recognized by the church as elders) to preach/teach when the church met together. Others wanted the elders plus a few more who had been approved and trained by the elders to be allowed to teach/preach. Still others wanted anyone to be allowed to teach/preach.
How should we preach/teach?
This was an interesting topic, because it was difficult for anyone to explain exactly. The best way to explain it (as I understood it) is that some wanted only a certain style or preaching/teaching, while others were open to different methods from different people.
What should be the goal of our preaching/teaching?
With this topic, we discussed the purpose of our meeting together, which, of course, would determine the purpose of any activity including preaching/teaching. As you can imagine, there were different options offered in this discussion.
And, on a related note, Does the “testimony time” take away from preaching/teaching?
This is self-explanatory, but some were concerned that allowing anyone to speak took away from the focus on the preaching/teaching. Again, this disagreement and discussion took us back to the purpose for meeting together.
I wish I could say that we always came to agreement on these topics related to preaching/teaching. But, we did not. I wish I could say that we always remained united in spite of our disagreements, but we did not.
Some people did decide to stop meeting with us because of these disagreements. I can understand the difficulty being part of a group that differed in an area (like preaching) that many concerned to be of utmost importance. Others decided to continue meeting with us in spite of the disagreements. I’m glad they did. I’ve learned alot from them.
By the way, and for the record: No, the church did not always make decisions that I agreed with.
I learned alot through those discussions and disagreements. For the most part, people responded in a Christ-like manner. There were some instances in which people did not respond in a way that honors Christ. At times, I was in the latter group.
In the years since, our teaching/preaching (and our meeting time in general) has continued to move from more traditional to less traditional. But, that will have to wait for another post.
Sometimes I talked when I should have listened
As I mentioned in my post “When there are more thorns than roses,” I’m planning to write more posts about “bad” and “ugly” side of our church experiences. I usually write about the “good,” but I think seeing the other side of the coin can be beneficial as well.
I refuse to write posts that point the finger at my brothers and sisters, even those who disagree with me and others. So, I’m going to write about myself.
After we had been meeting together for 2-3 years, some of our brothers and sisters were concerned about the direction of the church. Some thought the church was moving too far away from our traditional background. Others, believe it or not, thought the church wasn’t moving far enough.
We decided to meet together Sunday evenings to discuss these issues. Anyone was welcome to meet (or not) and talk about whatever they wanted to talk about. While there were disagreements, the tone was usually civil.
Looking back, I see there were times that I talked when I should have listened. I spent too much time explaining my own understandings and interpretations, and not enough time listening to others.
Did I agree with what they were saying? No. But, that doesn’t matter as much as showing them that I love them and care about their concerns. I didn’t do that often enough.
My Short Story: Running Late
Last week, I told you that my friend Dan had published an excerpt from an upcoming novel. The excerpt was called “Physician, Heal Thyself!”
I also told you that Dan is an avid fan of the zombie genre. While talking with him, I was encouraged to begin writing fiction again. As I told you a few weeks ago, I once wrote fiction, but I had gotten out of the habit. (See my post “Have you ever written fiction?“)
Well, I’ve now published a short story on Dan’s site called “Running Late.” Yes, it’s a short story that include zombies, but I think you’ll find that it has very little blood and gore. In fact, the zombies simply form the background to the story.
Plus, believe it or not, my short story does tie into the church and following Christ. (Sometimes it’s easier to see the “message” when portrayed in a fantasy world instead of our own world.)
I’d love to get your feedback, both on the story itself and on the message that I’m trying to get across. You can leave comments here or at “Running Late.”
Follow Christ so you can suffer and be hated
So, the title of this post is not the evangelical message you normally hear. But, it’s definitely a part of the message that Jesus proclaimed.
He did not pull any punches. He did not offer a good life. He did not offer smooth sailing. He did not offer food, clothing, or housing.
What did he say that people would get if they followed him? Well, several things such as these:
In this world you will have trouble. (John 16:33 ESV)
And you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. (Mark 13:13 ESV)
Nice picture, huh?
But, he also promised something else. He promised himself.
That’s the promise that we have to offer people.
If you sugar coat it and offer them something else, then you are not offering them Christ.
Offer them Christ… nothing more… nothing less. He’s enough.