Sabotaging Your Kingdom

Ambitions silently attach themselves to disciples who work for the Kingdom of God. The desire to be known. To be recognized. To be wanted. To be in demand. To make a name for yourself. To have a calendar full of important speaking engagements. We each indulge our favorite flavor. And often we think we’re helping Jesus out when we do it. With the same effect of a succulent burger ad, we salivate. Then we order “it.” We order to get what we saw the happy, successful Kingdom-workers enjoying. Then we pay for it. We justify a real sacrifice to get what others have and we want. Then we open the box. We encounter a disparity between the mess we’ve ordered and are experiencing and what was seductively held up to us through someone else’s life.

Two years ago, in the middle of my self-created busyness and self-supposed importance, I realized how desperately I was straining to be known. I was confronted with the reality that all of the “kingdom” work I was doing was really a convenient front for another empire I was building. My own.

In his book, Sensing Jesus, Zach Eswine recounts a jolt he received from a mentor (p. 243):

Bob looked at me.

“Zachary,” he said, “You are already discovered.”

“What?” I asked.

“I want you to know that you are already discovered. Jesus already knows you. You are already loved, already gifted, already known.”

Is that enough for us? To be known by Jesus? If you and I are never “discovered,” will our hearts survive?

Although this temptation is greatly pronounced in our modern evangelical celebrity culture, it is not a new problem. The Apostle Paul observed the same sin in the church while he sat in a Philippian jail. “Some preach Jesus out of rivalry and envy” (Phil 1:15). Paul was aware that many used the Kingdom of God as a platform to serve a more personal agenda—the kingdom of self.

I confess the sickness of my own heart and am disgusted by the surfacing of these motives in it. I’ve begun to wonder, “How can I destroy my kingdom? What measures must I take to keep my intentions and affections in check?”

Well, here are three habits I’ve begun to cultivate in response to this tension. In many ways these practices have the power to help us “seek first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness.”

1. Cultivate a Skepticism Towards Your Use of Social Media and Entertainment

I was about to drop the name of an impressive leader with whom I’d met to another impressive individual with whom I was tweeting. It was relevant to our conversation on international church planting trends. Though just before firing off the message, I realized the pride that was embedded in it. I didn’t send the message.

I’m fascinated by how social media affects our daily lives. People now sleep with their smart phones. I would never do that! I just kept it on my nightstand for a while, and during that time the first thing I would do in the morning is check my Facebook, Twitter, and e-mail. You might feel that’s bad. Or you might feel it’s acceptable. I’m not interested in the verdict. I’m primarily intrigued by what my behavior tells me about my heart. What is it that drives the average American to check their smart phone 150 times a day?

In a real sense, we are tempted by a desire for omnipresence. Social media propagates the idea that we can be in more than one place at the same time. The idea that I can maintain the awareness of what 900 “friends” are up to indulges the illusion of real engagement with their lives. I can like a status. Or try to post a status or picture that will compel others to engage with me through clicking “like.” Resultantly, many sociologists have observed that social media leads to more interactions – but not more meaningful interactions.

My love for TV furthers my desire for omniscience. When my son crashes around 9 p.m. or so, my wife and I use all the energy left in our bodies to drag ourselves onto the couch. We then transport ourselves to the wilderness of Alaska. Or into a crowd watching America’s favorite dancers. We become part of an exciting auction. For a moment, we aren’t full-time working, toddler-worn parents. We are in a different place and part of a different story.

I’m not condemning social media or TV, but I do want to cultivate a healthy skepticism for my use of both. What does the frequency of your social media usage say about your heart? What does your compulsive need to rest via TV say about your soul?

2. Combat Boredom by Embracing the Ordinary and Mundane

In Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton has said that we must learn to “exult in monotony.” Why? If the ordinary moments of life are not deserving of celebration, then life itself is not worthy of being lived. The essence of boredom is discontentment with “what is” and a desire to be somewhere else, doing something else. This state of being indicates that we do not yet possess gratitude for our lives. We haven’t yet absorbed the simple weight of what it means to be able to change diapers, pay taxes, and put in contact lenses.

“For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony” says Chesterton. “But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, ‘Do it again’ to the sun; and every evening, ‘Do it again’ to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike, it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never gotten tired of making them.”

What would it mean to oppose your boredom for the sin that hides beneath it? How might you and I come to celebrate those moments that leave us wishing we were present in another place and time? Perhaps, we were made to live like Jesus in life’s most simple moments. The Son of Man built stuff with wood in Nazareth for two decades. Perhaps, this is the kind of life Paul had in view when he said that we should seek to lead, “a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way” (1 Tm 2:2). If something in your soul recoils at this prospect, what is that part of you?

German theologian, Jurgen Moltmann, observed, “The knowledge of the cross brings a conflict of interest between God who has become man and man who wishes to become God.” The incarnation speaks to the astonishing reality that God was willing to become “one of us.” Furthermore, the Son became the very best “one of us” who ever lived. The Son was the most fully human human  being who has ever been. He relinquished the benefits of his membership in the Trinity so that he could live life as you and I.

But the ironic tension Moltmann noted is that although God descended to be with us, our universal desire is to ascend to the place of God. In many ways, I deny the limits of my humanity and posture myself as divine.

If the most human human being experienced life the way it was intended to be by occupying one place (an obscure and impoverished town) and simply “being there,” what can that teach us about embracing the glamour-less moments and places we tend to despise in our lives?

3. Remain Aware of What Your Worship is Doing

My sin causes me to love the wrong things. I am a “desiring being.” I have cravings that actually shape my entire person. These “wants” form me, rippling out from the core of my being and driving my thoughts, will, emotions, and behavior. This is what it means to be a worshiper. I am always worshiping and must remain conscious of what my heart is treasuring.

I must constantly ask myself, “What am I looking for right now? What is it that I most deeply want?” Sometimes it may be important to even ask a layer beneath that, “I crave acknowledgement. Why do I want that acknowledgement? What am I hoping it will do for me?”

Conversing with the Father after viewing both him and ourselves in the mirror of Scripture leads us to pray, “Your Kingdom come.” And when we pray with this heart, we are killing our own kingdoms.

There are moments I sit quietly with the Father, unable to offer my Creator any kind of adoration. I remain silent, wondering why I can’t piece together some string of affection that would communicate a perception of his worth. And then I realize why I can’t. I can’t worship God because I am simultaneously pouring out my heart to something else. There’s something that I want more than him. There is some good “second thing” that I have enthroned as my ultimate thing.

And then I have to do something even more pathetic. I must ask God to change what I want. The convenience of more superficial sanctification is that I can change myself. I can modify my behavior. I can filter my thoughts and words. But I am powerless to change what my heart wants. Only God can do that for me.

* * * *

If your inner traitor is as sneaky as mine, then it’s almost certain there is a way in which you’ve been secretly siphoning off glory intended for God and stockpiling it for yourself.

There’s an impending rationale for why each of us must halt construction of our personal kingdoms immediately. One day, Jesus will take possession of the kingdoms of this world. He will set up his rule on Earth, and it will never end. You and I will sit under his rule as willing captives to his unmatchable radiance.

Then for many of us, the tears of regret will come. On that day, we will wish we could relive each hour we spent preoccupied with building our own kingdoms. Jesus will then wipe away tears of regret.

With the vision of the New Jerusalem coming down from heaven in mind, let’s skip back a few scenes. Skip back to right now. Invite God to help you sabotage your kingdom so that you can begin to truly live in his. It’s not a kingdom where you rule. It’s a better and enduring empire.

—

Sean (@Sean_Post) lives in Maple Valley, WA with his wife and two sons and leads a one-year discipleship experience for young adults called “Adelphia”. He is completing his doctorate in Missional Leadership.

Being a Non-Conventional Intern

Most guys who finish seminary either intern or land their first ministry position in pastoral ministry; that or they continue cleaning pools, painting, or selling insurance. Either way there is this natural progression forward in pastoral ministry: seminary graduate, intern, youth pastor, associate pastor, then senior pastor. Sure enough, some people fill multiple roles at the same time—like seminary student and pastor. But for the most part this is the progression. Not for me. I’m a non-conventional intern. I graduated with my Th.M. from Dallas Seminary in 2009, then entered my first pastorate in Tulsa as a High School Pastor. After four years, I departed as an associate pastor and have been a church planting intern with Joe Thorn at Redeemer Fellowship in St. Charles, Illinois for the past year.

I remember one of the first times I shared this story with another pastor. They asked: “Aren’t you taking a step back?” Well, yes, and at the same time, no.

I’m kind of a trendsetter—a trend that no doubt others will adopt as well and already are adopting. Still, I imagine many probably wonder what’s wrong with me. Could you not get another position in pastoral ministry? Actually, I did. I had a number of churches asking me to candidate, some of them pretty notable too. I almost accepted an offer from one to be an associate pastor, but God drew us to Chicago, and we’re still discerning exactly why.

Many pastors will discover that if they wish to get involved in church planting then they will likely step back and serve in an internship and/or a residency first. It’s becoming a normal expectation for guys, wishing to church plant. This is wise, as I’m discovering, because it helps assess fit for this unique ministry.

Why should an experienced pastor be willing to intern? What should an experienced pastor expect from an internship? And how does an experienced pastor handle this transition? Let’s take these questions head on.

Why should an experienced pastor be willing to intern?

The benefits are numerous, beyond what I’m giving here, but here are three of the most significant benefits.

First, accepting an internship role builds in much needed rest. Every experienced pastor needs a sabbatical. And too few have ever experienced one. An internship is a great way for you to get a quasi-sabbatical. Let me tell you: being an intern is a breeze compared to being a pastor. I devote about twenty to twenty-five hours a week to my “official” responsibilities. The rest of my time is devoted to study, writing, and prayer. If need be, I would work, but the Lord keeps providing other avenues for our family’s provision. Because of this, I do what I can to honor that provision and serve the church “unofficially” as well. But still, an internship is like a part-time sabbatical, and you need one of those if you’ve never had one. If you’re like me, you were putting in sixty and sometimes eighty-hour weeks. You might also have been managing major anxiety issues like I was. This is a great way to get the rest your body and soul need.

Second, it offers you time for healing. Not everyone needs this, but I did. I experienced some amount of pain coming out of my last pastorate. It has taken time to rebuild confidence and process some of my feelings, expectations, and to learn more about my weaknesses that needed sharpening and skills that needed developing. My internship has offered time to rebuild that confidence, get fresh perspective from new friends and colleagues, and learn more about myself.

Third, it offers you time for personal development. You need fresh eyes on you telling you how you need to grow and what you need to learn. An internship gives you the opportunity to have godly men you respect and love sharpen you. At least that’s been the outcome for me. It’s given me ample time to study. I’ve been pushed to read a systematic theology and numerous other books on prayer, preaching, shepherding, and more. In turn, I’m given more time to pray, opportunities to preach, and people to shepherd. All of this will profit you.

What Should An Experienced Pastor Expect From An Internship?

I’m learning more and more that much of life is managing expectations, and my expectations need to match others’ expectations for me.

If you’re someone who preached every week in a pastorate, well, that’s just not going to happen in an internship. I’ve had half a dozen preaching opportunities during the last year. Of course, for others this may seem like a windfall. Nonetheless, you have to be ready and willing to accept that you won’t be filling the pulpit as much. That takes humility and patience, especially if you are set on fire by God to preach the Word.

People will also look at you different than when you were a pastor. Some of that has to do with your own public relations campaign at church. My elders haven’t broadcasted my pastoral experience. That’s actually a good thing for me, because being a pastoral staff member at a mega church is more like being a program director than a shepherd. Yes, I sure did shepherd a lot, but, tragically, most of my time was devoted to administration and events. Ask me how to manage thirty small group leaders and put together an event, and I have you covered. Ask me to counsel an addict or a marriage on the cusp of divorce, and you’ll find me hemming and hawing—all the more reason to be an intern.

If you think an internship is going to be one extensive hangout with the pastor—in my case a smoke—or that you are going to get to do everything with that pastor, then you may be disappointed. That’s not to say that I don’t spend a good chunk of time being coached by Joe. I do, but there will also be times where I won’t see him much because we have different rhythms and responsibilities in ministry.

There are couples that need to meet privately with him. He also needs private study time. At times I study parallel with Joe or do research for him, but I don’t expect him to hold my hand. That’s part of the benefit he gets from having an intern; he has someone to share the ministry load.

Furthermore, the lead pastor is not the only person you’ll learn from. I’ve learned a lot and enjoyed spending time with our associate pastor as much as I have cherished time with Joe. Likewise, one of our lay pastors/elders has been a constant source of encouragement and learning.

How Should An Experienced Pastor Handle This Transition?

First, you should handle the transition with humility (Ph. 2:5-8). A pastor who is willing to step back and put himself in such a teachable position must possess an attitude that says, “I care about protecting the reputation of Christ.” Having local eldership functioning as covering and accountability is a necessary precaution for testing, training, and affirming a church planter. The last thing we need is puffed up entrepreneurs creating the next big public relations nightmare for Jesus and the church.

Second, you must keep in mind the priority of providing for your family. Internships don’t pay a lot. I’ve got a wife and three kids, so I can only keep this up as long as the Lord provides the funds to do so. Likewise, there is an end in sight. You can’t be a perpetual intern like Ryan on The Office. There’s been times where I’ve stepped back and examined whether I need to work part-time or pursue full-time employment during my internship. So far I am 2/3s through and God has faithfully provided along the way, with a little help from freelance writing and editing here and there. Regardless, a man’s first priority is to care for his family. If you’re not managing your household, then you shouldn’t be managing God’s (1Tim. 3:4).

Third, remain teachable (Pr. 19:20). Your covering will call you to repent of sin, or at least you better hope they do. You’re not going to commit to a year of intern ministry without revealing a little bit of the indwelling sin you wrestle with. You’ll also need to ask lots of questions and earnestly ask for feedback. Being teachable means being tactical. As you receive instruction, you need to determine how to best deploy it so it bears fruit in your future ministry.

Being a church planting intern is a rewarding experience. If you’re someone who feels called to church planting, but you’re hesitant because being an intern or resident might be “taking a step back,” I encourage you to check your heart. It may say more about you than the role.

—

Joey Cochran, a ThM graduate of Dallas Seminary, is the church planting intern at Redeemer Fellowship in St. Charles, Illinois under the supervision of pastor Joe Thorn. You can follow him at jtcochran.com or @joeycochran.

Flee Youthful Passions, Pursue Christ

A GREAT HOUSE

Blowing on the gospel embers of young Timothy’s heart, the Apostle Paul fans into flame the grace-producing calling on the Ephesus disciple-maker. After laying down gospel thundering truths—the Word that is not bound (2:9), the Jesus who is not dead (2:8), the truth of the gospel that must be guarded (1:14), and the grace of God that strengthens (2:1)—Paul exhorts Timothy to “[cleanse] himself from what is dishonorable.”

“Now in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay, some for honorable use, some for dishonorable. Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work” (2 Tim. 2:20-21).

No one wants to be the dishonorable vessel in God’s house, right? In essence Paul is saying, “Your leadership ceiling is capped by your character.” This logic is incontrovertible with the number of texts claiming that discipleship is both a sharing of our doctrine and our lives:

“So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us” (1 Thess. 2:8).

“Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers” (1 Tim. 4:16).

“The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses' seat, so do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do. For they preach, but do not practice” (Matt. 23:2-3).

So how does Paul want us to cleanse ourselves? How do we move from the cardboard toilet paper roll in God’s house to the fine china?

THE TWO “YOOTS”

“So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart” (2 Tim. 2:22).

The church I pastor is full of twenty-somethings. We are 75% single! Although I’m on the wrong side of thirty now, I am still young in this wonderful vocation called “pastor” (Timothy was around 36 or so when Paul wrote this letter to him).

Youth carries a sidearm called “passion.” This is a good thing. It’s easier to redirect passion than to have to ignite it. Paul postulates a portrait of two youths for us: one pursues youthful passions and the other pursues Christ-likeness. He wants Timothy to flee the one and pursue the other—this is how he “cleanses himself.”

It is putting off the old self and putting on the new; it is mortification and vivification; it is Matt Chandler’s “what stirs your affections for Jesus and what robs you of your affections for Jesus?”

What are these “youthful passions” we must flee from?

UNRIGHTEOUSNESS. SKEPTICISM. LUST. DEBATE.

1. Flee unrighteousness; pursue righteousness

Our generation, specifically those of us that grew up in the church, railed against some of the legalistic teachings where Christianity had less to do with enjoying and worshiping God and more to do with obeying all the rules—even some that were made up. What happens, typically, is the pendulum swings too far and all of a sudden we are on the other side where there are no rules. Any church or authority that tells me I can’t do something gets labeled “fundamentalist” and we just go to the next one or leave the church altogether.

So now alcohol use, sex outside of marriage, what we do, where we go, and what kind of entertainment we enjoy have little to no boundaries even though biblically some lines are drawn.

The disciple and disciple-maker pursues righteousness in both our teaching and our lives, whether its in season or out.

2. Flee skepticism; pursue faith

We are easily skeptical of authority, of church, of anything institutional although it is God who created these institutions. Whereas doubt is a natural effect of a pursuit of truth—of a sincere faith—skepticism is the youthful passion of someone who just doesn’t want to commit to anything or submit to anything other than their own desires.

Where biblical love “believes all things [and] hopes all things” (1 Cor 13:7), youthful passion judges all things and scoffs at all things. Under the guise of pursuing truth the skeptic is skeptical; always blurred by the periphery and never fixing faithful eyes on Jesus—the Author and Perfector and object of our faith (Heb 12:2).

3. Flee lust; pursue love

Not necessarily sexual lust, but idealized relationships. We get on social media and see how great everyone’s marriage is, or boyfriend is, or church community is, and never hear about any of the problems. We think our relationships should look that way. Our kids should always be smiling and “super cute”; our spouse should always look “date night ready”; our small group should always be “so much fun!”

We lust after what we don’t have and covet everyone else’s experiences.

Youthful lust is transient, flakey, and surface-level; ready to move on when it takes some work, but the pursuit of biblical love is committed, raw, gritty, rock-solid, immovable. Lust takes, love gives. Lust is impatient and passive; love is patient and kind (1 Cor 13:4), long-suffering with one another as we all follow Jesus.

4. Flee debate; pursue peace

This becomes the natural outflow of the previous three. If we are relativistic on moral issues and never concerning ourselves with obedience, and if we aren’t pursuing a sincere faith but easily skeptical, then we have things we can debate.

Rules are in place to foster peace, but if there are no rules than you don’t have peace. If we aren’t unified in our humble, faithful pursuit of Jesus together, but always questioning one another’s motives, there is division, not peace.

The youthful passion of debate rages, especially in the church, but “he himself is our peace” (Eph 2:14), and he makes both those far from God and those near, one new peaceful people. Iron sharpening iron is one thing; humble communication and confrontation sharpens, it makes mature disciples. However, continual and perpetual divisive debate flowing out of a lustful, skeptical heart is just a dishonorable vessel in the church that should be stuck in the junk drawer somewhere never to be brought out.

Do you want to be the gold honorable vessel in God’s house? Remember then, again—the Word is not bound (2 Tim 2:9), Jesus is not dead (2:8), the truth of the Gospel must be guarded (1:14)—and the grace of God strengthens (2:1)! Flee youthful passions, and pursue your Christ.

—

Jim Essian planted The Paradox Church in 2011 and serves as Lead Pastor. The Paradox is an Acts 29 Network church in Downtown Fort Worth, TX. Jim played eight years of professional baseball in the Kansas City Royals, Los Angeles Dodgers, and Detroit Tigers organizations prior to planting a church. Jim and his wife, Heather, have two girls, Harper and Hollis.

Sacrificing for Our Idols

IDOLATRY: AGAIN

In his early years, Theodore Roosevelt traveled to Europe with his family. On one trip, they went hunting for a few days, but Roosevelt couldn’t hit a thing. He later wrote:

One day they read aloud an advertisement in huge letters on a distant billboard, and I then realized that something was the matter, for not only was I unable to read the sign but I could not even see the letters. I spoke of this to my father, and soon afterwards got my first pair of spectacles, which literally opened an entirely new world to me. I had no idea how beautiful the world was until I got those spectacles. I had been a clumsy and awkward little boy, and while much of my clumsiness and awkwardness was doubtless due to general characteristics, a good deal of it was due to the fact that I could not see and yet was wholly ignorant that I was not seeing¹

Idols make us blind. They not only make us blind, but also make us blind to our blindness. As many have noted, idolatry often turns good things into god things, where we seek ultimate satisfaction or security. I am not saying that every pastor who reads this is, right now, committing idolatry. I am saying, alongside men like Calvin, who said that our hearts are idol-making factories, that ministry idols can be and are a regular temptation for those in vocational ministry.

Colossians 3:1–10 is a great passage of Scripture to give us new “spectacles” to understand what is going on inside our hearts. To the extent that Christ is not supreme and preeminent in our hearts and lives, and to the extent that we are not seeking the things that are above, something else will be preeminent and our hearts will seek things here below. This is why it is so crucial for ministry leaders not only to feed others with the glory of Christ and the wonder of grace, but also to nourish their own souls at the feet of him who is the fountain of life. This is one of the reasons why Paul says that covetousness is idolatry (3:5). We are seeking life and fullness in someone or something other than God.

Keep this in mind: covetousness always says “more!” and never says “enough!” However, when the gospel of Christ and the glory of God capture our hearts, and when we see the supremacy of Christ and rest in his sufficiency, hearts that are content in the gospel will always say “enough!” and never say “more!”

Because I struggle with this idolatry in my heart, and I venture you do too, I am often tempted and often succumb to thinking like this: “I know I have Jesus, but I’d be happier if more people were sitting in the pews, if more people were grateful for what I do, if more people gave so we could have a larger budget or build a larger building, so that I could have more of a reputation and be known and admired by more people.” More. More. More. During the times when I am not sinking my heart deep into the “It is finished” of the gospel, I long for more, am never satisfied, and never say “enough.” What is the “I’d be happier if . . .” of your heart? Seriously. Take a moment and reflect on that question.

Reflection is important because ministry leaders make such enormous sacrifices for their idols, whatever they may be. All idols demand that we sacrifice in order that they will bless us, so in order to experience the blessing of recognition, power, comfort, control, acceptance, or any other idol, we sacrifice our health, our families, our relationships, and even our own walk with Christ. This is why, I believe, when we are pursuing the idols that promise more and always deliver less, we will be filled with the anger and lying and bad-mouthing of others that Paul describes in verses 8–9.

The consequences of this idol worship are that, deep down, leaders may be filled with anger or constant disappointment with others because they are not able to deliver what the leader is looking for. The consequences for the leader are a dry and hard heart toward the Lord and often wrecked health and strained relationships with other leaders, with other people in the congregation or ministry, and even with his own wife and children. Idols subtly bring death into practically every sphere of life.

If the idols we are pursuing are blessing us, we will feel alive and successful—and prideful. If the idols we are pursuing are cursing us, we will feel despair and death. In the moments (and there have been way too many) when I have thought about leaving the ministry, the Lord has usually been quick to point out that I have been building my own kingdom and pursuing false gods. The disappointment and discouragement that I have felt has been more about my reputation being hurt and my selfish kingdom being crushed than about genuinely feeling I wasn’t called to ministry. I have realized that I have needed to repent for acting like some kind of Pharaoh and forcing the lambs under my watch and care to work hard to build Clay Werner’s kingdom, rather than prayerfully advance God’s. It’s as if God has been saying, “Clay, let my people go!”

Here’s what I want to say: when you realize that your internal idolatry is driving your heart and ministry, you don’t change by mere willpower. Moving forward isn’t about sin management, but about worship realignment. Deep down, at your core, Christ must become more satisfying than anything and everything else. Thankfully, the Spirit is eager and willing to help reveal Christ to your heart in such a way that you’ll treasure Christ above all things and endure even when the kingdom of God around you seems so weak and slow.²

THE KINGDOM OF GOD REMAINS FOREVER

Kingdoms come and kingdoms go, but the kingdom of God will remain forever. The danger of ministry is that pursuing our own kingdom can be easily disguised by using language from the kingdom of God.³ Too often, leaders themselves are blind to the reality that they are making ministry “their world” rather than a place of nourishment for God’s people and equipping for God’s mission. However, once the little kingdom is forsaken and repented of, the kingdom of God that is invisible yet inevitable, seemingly insignificant but yet incomprehensible in its power and breadth, will provide the deepest joy and the greatest security, especially as the eyes of our hearts remain fixed on its King.

^{1. Quoted by Edmund Morris, The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt (New York: Random House, 2001), 34 (emphasis added).↩ 2. Some helpful material for diagnosing idolatry are David Powlison’s “X-Ray Questions” in Seeing with New Eyes: Counseling and the Human Condition through the Lens of Scripture (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2003), 129–44; Dan B. Allender and Tremper Longman, The Cry of the Soul: How Our Emotions Reveal Our Deepest Questions about God (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 1994). I have also found John Owen’s books Communion with God, Meditations on the Glory of Christ, and On Being Spiritually Minded very helpful in cultivating a heart of worship and adoration.↩ 3. See Paul David Tripp, A Quest for More: Living for Something Bigger Than You (Greensboro, NC: New Growth Press, 2007), 72–82.↩} —

Clay Werner (MDiv, Westminster Seminary in California) is senior pastor at Lexington Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Lexington, South Carolina, where he lives with his wife, Liz, and their five children.

From On the Brink: Grace for the Burned-Out Pastor by Clay Werner. Used by permission of P&R Publishing, http://www.prpbooks.com/.

Show Them Jesus

If kids are leaving the church, it’s because we’ve failed to give them a view of Jesus and his cross that’s compelling enough to satisfy their spiritual hunger and give them the zeal they crave. They haven’t seen that Jesus himself is better than any “Jesus program.” He’s better than the music used to worship him. He’s better than a missions trip. He’s better than their favorite youth leader. He’s also better than money. Better than video games. Better than romantic teen movies. Better than sex. Better than popularity or power. We’ve failed too many kids. We’ve fed them things to do. We’ve fed them “worshipful” experiences. But we’ve failed to feed them more than a spoonful of the good news. Now they’re starving and they’ll eat anything. They’re trying to feed their souls with something—maybe even a churchy thing—that feels like it fits them, when what they need is some one utterly better than themselves.

Who Has the Best Answers?

Church kids don’t just need the good news as much as other kids— they need it more. I saw an example of this while teaching at another Bible camp. Most of the campers were church kids, but not Ryan. His mom had signed him up because a neighbor had invited him and because camp was cheaper than other activities. Ryan had seldom been to church and didn’t even have a Bible at home.

At the start of the week I wondered if Ryan would be able to keep up. I needn’t have worried. He was my most attentive student, asking good questions and listening with excitement as I taught.

Most Bible teachers have experienced this phenomenon. Kids who are new to church are transfixed, while church kids hear the same lessons and remain ho-hum. Accepted wisdom says this is because the church kids have heard it before. But this time there was more to it. I was teaching the good news with every Bible story and the church kids were interested enough—they just weren’t excited by it. I soon realized that they weren’t even noticing the good news part of my teaching.

One evening near the end of the week I taught about King David and Mephibosheth. David had become king after his nemesis, Saul, died in battle. Not many descendants of Saul were left, which was good for David; they were a potential threat to his throne.

Mephibosheth was Saul’s grandson. As a boy he’d been crippled, but survived and lived in an obscure home on the fringe of Israel’s territory, away from his family’s land. From David’s perspective, this would have been a safe end for a potential enemy. But David was an extraordinary man who wanted to show kindness to a member of Saul’s family, so he summoned Mephibosheth to the palace. The lame man must have been terrified, but David told him, “Do not fear, for . . . I will restore to you all the land of Saul your father, and you shall eat at my table always” (2 Samuel 9:7). David treated Mephibosheth like one of his own sons, and the Bible mentions three more times how Mephibosheth always ate at the king’s table.

I asked the kids an open-ended question: “What can we learn about life with God from this lesson?”

Several hands shot up. “We should be kind too,” said one. “God wants us to love our enemies,” said another. More heads nodded in agreement. These were good answers. But were any of them the best answer?

“Anything else?” I asked. Nope. Everyone seemed to have the same thought.

Then I saw Ryan’s hand. “It sounds like us and God,” he said. “We’re like Mephibosheth. We’re the hurt guy who’s not on God’s side. But God is kind to us anyway. He’s so good!”

Yup. That was the best answer, all right—and Ryan saw it before any of the church kids did. The church kids had years of experience with Bible lessons and had learned to respond to questions about God by thinking first, “What do I have to do for him now?” They’d need to unlearn this before they could admire Jesus as the King who invites them, his crippled enemies, to sit at his table. Both they and Ryan had heard the good news for a full week, but only Ryan was ready to respond to a question about God by thinking, “He’s so good!”

How Christian Growth Stalls

There’s one more reason kids who are raised in Christian homes and familiar with church need more of the good news. This time it isn’t because of anything wrong; it’s because that’s just how Christian growth works.

As kids learn about God’s goodness and holiness, they ought to increase in awe of him. That’s growth. And as they examine themselves and see the ugliness inside, they ought to increase in conviction of sin. That’s growth too. But the combination of these will drive them to despair—unless their understanding of the forgiveness and righteousness they have in Jesus also grows.

Think of a kid who’s a new Christian as one starting to see God’s light. As he learns, the beam of light in his life shows him two things: (1) God’s holy demands and (2) the kid’s sin in falling short of those demands. We at Serge use a helpful illustration of this. The diagram shows these two things as the top edge and bottom edge of God’s light. The kid also sees the cross, which covers the gap between the kid’s sin and God’s demands. The kid has joy and confidence. He’s eager to live for God.

As his Christian life goes on, the kid learns more. His understanding of God’s holy demands grows. He also sees more fully how neither his life nor his heart can ever measure up, so his understanding of his own sinfulness grows as well. The beam of light widens. And if he hasn’t also been growing in appreciation for the good news—if the cross remains roughly the same size in his life—there will be gaps.

The kid becomes an Anxious Alice. He’s aware that his good deeds aren’t good enough and that his feelings for God aren’t strong enough. He knows he’s a hypocrite and is secretly haunted by guilt. He becomes a pretender, constantly scheming to make himself, his friends, and his parents believe the situation isn’t so bad.

He tries working harder to do better, but with no success. So he also acts like a Complacent Kyle. He fills the gap between the cross and God’s holiness by pretending that God’s demands aren’t really so extreme. Whatever little obedience he can muster up, he tells himself, must be okay.

The same kid acts like a Smug Sarah too. He fills the gap between the cross and his sin by pretending his sin actually isn’t so horrible. He stops repenting. Instead, to keep up a Christian image, he will lie, get defensive when corrected, tear others down, and do churchy things or obey his parents only to look good.

In short, the kid’s Christian growth stalls. Learning more about God’s greatness can’t help him because he can’t handle it. Telling him to sin less and obey more can’t help either, because he fights back, tunes out, or does both. For a church kid, this stall can happen very soon after becoming a Christian because he already knows so much about God and sin.

The solution is for the cross to grow along with everything else. The more a kid learns about himself and God, the more he must learn to trust and delight in the good news too. He must become ever more certain that he’s totally accepted in Christ, forgiven and adopted by God. It’s the only way he can keep growing.

The Bible tells us to expect this dynamic. Consider the prophet Isaiah, who had a thundering vision of God in the temple. His understanding of God’s holiness grew huge in an instant, and he couldn’t handle it: “Woe is me! For I am lost” (Isaiah 6:5). But an angel touched his lips with a hot coal and declared, “Your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for” (Isaiah 6:7). Only then, once Isaiah’s bigger understanding of God’s holiness and his own sin was matched by a bigger confidence in his forgiveness, was he ready for ministry.

A kid who’s fed by the good news has a growing appreciation for Jesus and all he has done for him. That kid will be an amazing, non-pretending Christian. He won’t try to look better than he is but instead will dare to confess sin openly and repent earnestly. He also won’t have to pretend God is easily satisfied with a little churchy behavior, but he will dare to draw ever nearer to a holy God. This is because his sin and God’s holiness just show him how much more he’s been forgiven. They enlarge his love for Jesus.

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Jack Klumpenhower is a Bible teacher and a children’s ministry curriculum writer with more than thirty years of experience. He has created Bible lessons and taught children about Jesus at churches, camps, clubs, conferences, and Christian schools all over the world, including Serge conferences. Currently he is working on a middle-school gospel curriculum in conjunction with Serge staff. He lives with his wife and two children in Durango, Colorado.

From Show Them Jesus: Teaching the Gospel to Kids, Copyright © 2014 by Jack Klumpenhower. Used by permission of New Growth Press, www.newgrowthpress.com.

Pinched by Generosity

Generosity and the Good Life

As Americans, we are born and bred on a version of the “good life.” Wal-Mart proclaims, “Save money, live better,” suggesting the more money we have, the better our lives will be. We pine to get that startup venture we’ve been financing off the ground, get paid the big bucks to do what we love, find that “perfect” home in which to raise a family, or save a huge nest egg so we feel safe and secure—financially, at least. We are told if we just seize the day (“carpe diem”), work hard, be smart with our finances, and clutch to the “land of opportunity,” we can be whoever and own whatever our hearts desire. Is this truly the good life?

Do we not more frequently hear the stories of feeling stressed out, over worked, in debt, or simply discontent? How often do we hear of material struggles due to finances? You may ask, “Is there something wrong with me wanting to invest in a small business? Should I not save for future purchases or retirement? Is it wrong of me to take ahold of the good opportunities that come my way?” Not necessarily. Perhaps you are not asking the right questions. It’s like the teenager asking about sex, “How far is too far?” Instead, you should ask, “What is the implication of being in Christ while living in a city of great comfort and wealth?” “What does it look like to be a disciple of Jesus in a city continually providing opportunities to consume?” Or maybe you should ask, “What does it mean to be generous in the midst of my piles of bills and debt, or limited income?”

In 2 Corinthians 9:6-15, Paul commends the church of Macedonia for its generous collection and calls the Corinthians to share in God’s grace through their generosity towards the Christians in Jerusalem. Much like we see in our great city of Austin (or any thriving, contemporary city), Corinth was an urban center of the region. It thrived off of a strong, flourishing economy and the peoples’ enjoyment of its pleasures. Corinth was modern, booming, and trendy. Opportunity and the hope for the good life filled the air and people inhaled the gratifications of this prosperous city. As such, Paul challenged the Corinthians’ default view of wealth, status, and their definition of the good life. In this passage, Paul plunges into the theological underpinnings of generosity.

Sowing Bountifully, Reaping Bountifully

Paul shares a familiar old farming principle “…whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully” (v. 6). Paul is not preaching a prosperity gospel to the Corinthians. Some use this passage as a proof text and, unfortunately, ignore Paul’s further words; they simply believe if I give, I will get. “Well, God I gave you 5% more last month. Where is my raise, the job you were supposed to provide . . . what about helping me pay this tax bill I just received from the IRS?” This belief demeans the core of Paul’s exhortation of the Corinthians. It appeals to a selfish, materialistic theology rather than to a theology of sacrificial, selfless generosity. When interacting with God in this manner, we move the focus from God to ourselves. We become more concerned with what we have received (or haven’t received) versus what we have been given. We miss the tremendous generosity and provisions that have already been graciously handed down to us. Paul does not provide the Corinthians a shrewd investment strategy for them to accumulate wealth nor is he teaching the key to negotiating and getting what you want from God. Rather, Paul reveals that through their willing generosity, they are participating in God’s generosity and provision, bringing glory to God—the source of all grace.

Farmers aren’t stingy with the seeds they sow because they know their harvest will continue to produce seed for further planting. For a farmer, sowing a lot of seed is not considered a loss, but rather gain. Paul says, “You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. For the ministry of this service is not only supplying the needs of the saints but is also overflowing in many thanksgivings to God” (vv. 11-12). God could provide everyone’s needs without us, but he chooses to allow us to participate in his generosity. He provides for our needs, and then he “enriches” us for the sake of generosity. And if we remain generous, he will continue to enrich us so that there will be much fruit from our giving. This is what Paul means when he says, “Whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully!”

Generosity, It’s a Heart Issue

What the Corinthians are to do as believers is clear in Paul’s mind, but he does not explicitly command them. Paul says, “Each one must give as he has decided in his heart” (v. 7). Paul goes out of his way to avoid giving the impression that he is trying to force them to give. He knows that if they comply with his appeal, they will do so out of obedience and love towards Christ rather than obedience to him. The implication is that we give willingly, thoughtfully, and joyfully.

C.S. Lewis makes this keen observation,

“I do not believe one can settle how much we ought to give. I am afraid the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare. In other words, if our expenditure on comforts, luxuries, amusement, etc., is up to the standard common among those with the same income as our own, we are probably giving away too little. If our giving does not at all pinch or hamper us, I should say it is too small. There ought to be things we should like to do and cannot because our commitment to giving excludes them.”

When did you last say “no” to something because of your commitment to generosity? Do you sit down, pray, and discuss your giving and if you are being pinched by your generosity?

We should routinely seek the Holy Spirit in our giving. Families need to do this together. Parents, you should include your children. Let them see true generosity. Let them in on how your family is being pinched by its commitment to God to be generous. Ask God to pinch your idea of comfort and security, and pray for your church, your city, world missions, and church planters. Also, consider sharing this with your Fight Club or City Group. Ask them to challenge the heart motives behind your giving. Share your fears and complacencies about giving. Let the Holy Spirit break down the money barrier.

Often times we do not enjoy discussing money because we all lean towards spending more on ourselves rather than others and God. Let the gospel in to work on your heart. Generosity is not just a money matter, it’s a gospel matter! The gospel should transform your heart and its views of spending, saving, and giving. It’s not simply about the amount you give, but it is about the condition of your heart from which you give. Are you giving out of joy or pressure? Do you not give so that you remain comfortable/secure or are you willing to be pinched by your generosity? It’s a heart issue . . . one that only the gospel can restore.

God Loves a Cheerful Giving

Paul continues, “. . . not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” When you give with a begrudging heart or merely out of pressure or necessity, you sow sparingly, unwillingly, and cheerlessly. Your gifts no longer come from a cheerful, hopeful heart for God and his mission, but rather a self-centered, self-worshipping heart that looks to yourself and your rights. “I’m a hard worker. I’m ‘wise’ with money. I save. And I give what I’m supposed to give. Am I not owed a little to buy the things I want. After all, I did work for it!”

Paul says, “He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness” (v. 10). “Now, wait a second, I went and bought the seed myself, and it was my hands that kneaded the dough.” We forget what we have is not owed to us, but rather was the righteous provision and generosity of God.

Miroslav Volf in Free of Charge gives the illustration of an interaction between a little boy and his father: “Daaad! Where’s my milk?” screams the little boy. He’s bothered that the glass of milk is not in his hand the moment he requested it. No need for “please” or “thank you” because that is why dads and moms exist, to serve him, at least in his little mind. The boy has yet to learn that much of what his mom and dad do for him is out of their generosity. They don’t owe it to him. I’m sure many parents can relate to this. Like the little boy, his dad too often makes the same mistake. He forgets that his money, job, every provision, even the demanding little boy are not somehow owed to him. They are God’s generosity and provision. Like the dad, we easily forget that all of it is God’s gift.

Perhaps you find yourself on the other side thinking, “Things are financially tight right now, so I can’t be generous. God, when you bless me with financial security I’ll start being generous.” In either scenario, you give your leftovers—assuming there are leftovers. Giving cheerfully of your first fruits acknowledges that God has bestowed his perfect generosity upon you and is your sole source of provision. David Garland, in his commentary on 2 Corinthians, says,

“Reluctance to sow generously, then, reflects a refusal to trust that God is all sufficient and all gracious. It also assumes that we can only give when we are prospering and have something extra that we will not need for ourselves. Paul says that at all times God provides us with all that we need so there is never any time when we cannot be generous.”

Paul’s point is “God loves a cheerful giver because he, himself, is the Cheerful Giver!”

God, the Cheerful Giver

How do we not give from our last fruits, but cheerfully, willingly, faithfully with hopeful anticipation? Paul says, “And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work” (v. 8). He says, “God loves cheerful givers, and God makes it possible for you to be a cheerful giver!” Why? Because God is the Cheerful Giver! Now, this doesn’t mean wait until you are ecstatic to give. It means we can repent of finding too much comfort in our financial security and materialism rather than the comfort of God’s perfect generosity. It means we can turn in cheerful repentance to God because he’s given us the greatest gift ever—Jesus Christ!

God did not have to redeem, restore, and bring us into his eternal generosity, “but he so loved the world, that he gave his only Son” because he is the Cheerful Giver! God the Father brings us into his perfect generosity through Jesus! Paul had just finished saying in 2 Corinthians 8:9, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.” How often do you consider yourself rich? How often do you wake up to the reality of your wealth and provision in Christ? Or how often do you wake desiring more and feeling discontent? People who, in faith, are pinched by their generosity, it’s not because they are merely obligated, it’s because their faith is in Jesus who was pinched, squeezed, and crushed so that we would be lavished by his generous grace! What’s more when we are pinched by the generosity of God’s grace it shines the glory of God in Christ (2 Cor. 9:13)! “[By the evidence of this service], they will glorify God because of your submission that comes from your confession of the gospel of Christ.” A false prosperity gospel teaches, “You need to give in order to get,” but God, the Cheerful Giver, says, “I’ve already given you provision for your every need—spiritually, physically, financially, simply because it’s my nature and I love you! This may even include giving you less financially in order to give you more spiritually, to truly enrich you so that you may abound in good works!”

Paul says, “Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift!” (v. 15). Paul doesn’t offer thanks to the Corinthians for being supportive to Paul’s exhortation and opening their wallets to one another. Rather, he appropriately directs it to God in Christ, the giver of all perfect gifts, who was pinched, squeezed, and crushed so that we could enter, share, and participate in his generosity! You want to live as you are in Christ, and be a part of God’s work and mission, be generous! You want God to use you and multiple you in good works, cheerfully and freely give. You really want the good life? Let your comfort be pinched by God’s generosity. Saying “no” because of your commitment to generosity is Christ saying “no” so that that his generosity spreads to the world.

It is my prayer that the Holy Spirit will free you from the bondage of materialism and wealth accumulation into selfless giving, (not because of your ability but) because of God’s infinite selfless generosity . . . that you feel the pinch of God’s call to be a generous people. We give because God first gave! That’s living a good life.

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Austin Becton and his wife, Caitlin, live in Austin, Texas where he serves as treasurer of City Life Church and board member of GCDiscipleship.com. An accounting consultant by trade, he partners with churches, non-profits, and small to mid-size companies. He is currently pursuing an MA in Biblical and Theological Studies from Western Seminary. Twitter: @AustinBecton

Catching God’s Vision for Multiplication

There are many reasons—some good and some not so good—why churches consider planting other churches. Church planting, going multisite, and revitalizing churches have increasingly become options for churches today. At the same time, evangelism and discipleship are being talked about and mulled over more than ever. Amidst all the debates about how to do it and what to avoid, we might begin by simply looking into the grand story of Scripture and being propelled by God’s big vision. The Bible tells us to gather around and listen to his plan for multiplication and the spread of his glory.

Filling the Gaps with Glory: A Theological Rationale for Multiplication

At Creation, and later in Redemption, God implements a grandiose vision for filling the earth with his glory. The Bible tells the story of God spreading his beautiful, holy, and glorious image to every nook and cranny on the earth. The endgame or supreme goal of missions, evangelism, or discipleship is the glory of God. Thankfully, the glory of God and the good of humankind aren’t at odds with each other. We don’t pursue God’s glory at the expense of our joy and fulfillment, but rather we pursue, proclaim, and replicate God’s glory as the means by which our joy and fulfillment can reach their highest heights.

Consider God’s original great commission to humankind. After God creates man—male and female together—in his image and likeness, he places them in his kingdom and says: “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over” every living thing (Gen. 1:28). Humankind is meant to exercise dominion and care over God’s creation as his ambassadors, but we’re also called to spread in the earth and bear fruit as we multiply. God intended that Adam and Eve would faithfully follow him and as they see what he’s like they’ll reflect him (similar to how kids mimic parents). As they multiply and spread, their children would also reflect the glory of God. As this happens from person to person through fruitful multiplication, and as it spreads throughout the earth, you can envision God’s image and glory filling the entire world.

God’s heart for multiplication is clear in this passage from Genesis. His desire is that we would be image-bearers who reflect the glory of God back to him. To take it a step further, the desire isn’t that we all stay in one place but that we fill up the earth with more glory-reflecting image-bearers who spread God’s glory to every square inch of his kingdom. Unfortunately, we know in Genesis 3 that sin comes into the picture, and with Adam’s fall we are plunged into darkness, and the image of God in us is marred (though not completely erased). We are now like dusty and cracked mirrors that reflect little of God and instead reflect increasingly of the earth’s corruption.

However, as heartbreaking and tragic as the fall is, God’s plan in redemption eclipses that with a soul-stirring hope that provides the “happily ever after” that our hearts long for. God is recreating a new humanity in Jesus, and all those united to him by faith are being restored back into the image of the glory of God. On earth that transformation is by degrees as we’re sanctified, but on the new earth it will be instantaneously completed as we’re glorified (Rom. 8:29; I Cor. 15:49; 2 Cor. 3:18; Col. 3:10).

The Great Commissions: How Genesis 1 Relates to Matthew 28

You might be asking at this point what this has to do with church planting in its various expressions. Church planting is really just about multiplication and the making of disciples who reflect God’s glory everywhere (“fill the earth”). When the New Testament speaks about evangelism or missions it isn’t a new idea and it’s not separate from God’s plan for us in Genesis 1. God’s vision is the fulfillment of his commission in Genesis 1—that man would fill the earth with his glory. This is the eschatological hope of the prophets and is stated beautifully in Habakkuk 2:14: “For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea” (cf. Mt. 28:18-20; Rev. 21:22-22:5).

In the Great Commission passages (Mt. 28:18-20; Acts 1:8), Jesus is tasking the new humanity in him with the Genesis 1 mandate. The goal is to go and make disciples, followers of Jesus Christ who know him, represent him, bring his kingdom, and reflect his glory. Throughout the book of Acts we see this taking place as the gospel spreads out from Jerusalem to Samaria to the surrounding countries to the ends of the earth. In all these locales new people are converted and new churches are set up. In the New Testament, there’s no idea of disciples being made apart from their incorporation into the church (Acts 14:23; Titus 1:5). Church planting wasn’t one way of “doing church” but was simply the necessary and authorized way of maturing disciples in the locations the gospel reached. Epaphras might hear the gospel and be converted in Ephesus (Acts 19:10), but he then goes back to his own community in Colossae where he shares the gospel and starts a local church (Col. 1:7). The commission to make disciples of people everywhere is accomplished by planting local churches, and people are discipled in community best when the local church is truly local.

Colossians: A New Testament Example of the Spread of God’s Glory

Let me provide one example in Paul’s letters where I believe he subtly builds on this theology. Paul writes this to the church at Colossae: “Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing” (Col. 1:5-6). Paul’s says what is happening in Colossae is fulfilling the commission in the garden and the commission Jesus gives to the Church. In the whole world, and in Colossae as one example, the gospel is bearing fruit and growing. God desires multiplication, not only numerically but also in a way that it spreads. The gospel is bearing fruit and growing as the whole world is filling up with the glory of God through the conversion of sinners and the planting of churches.

It’s not just that people are saved but that people are being remade into the image of God by becoming a new person in Christ. Later Paul tells them to act differently because they are “being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator” (Col. 3:10). They are reflections of the glory of God and should live in such a way that people get a glimpse of what God is really like and what it looks like to be an image-bearer flourishing. People in Colossae are being renewed into the image of God, and in this way the gospel is bearing fruit and growing in the whole world. Hopefully you see how multiplication through conversion and church planting in each pocket of the planet is accomplishing God’s plan for spreading out his glory over the entire world.

We’re told this will one day be fully realized when a new earth (God’s city) comes down out of heaven as the final home for the people of God. In that place, there will be no sin and no sinners (Rev. 21:1-4). Jesus will fill up the place with his radiant glory so that every piece of creation sparkles in his light (Rev. 21:18-27; 22:1-5). We ourselves will have a glory derived from Jesus that refracts back to him (Rev. 21:24-26). The hopes and visions of the prophets will be fulfilled as the glory of God does indeed cover the whole earth. This has always been God’s plan, and although dramatic twists and turns take place within the narrative, his plan will surely be accomplished. The work of the church now in making disciples, of planting churches in every community, and reaching the nations with the gospel is rooted in this theological vision of God’s glory spreading and increasing through multiplication.

Each of us are part of one local church, one drop in the bucket wanting to fulfill our God-given task of spreading the glory of God locally and globally. As your church thinks about multiplication—individually and corporately—pray to see the glory of God spread throughout your neighborhood, city, country, and globe through the transformation of image-bearers and the planting of local churches.

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Dustin Crowe has a bachelor’s degree in Historical Theology from the Moody Bible Institute and studied at the master’s level at Southern Seminary. He is Local Outreach Coordinator of College Park Church, a church of 4,000 in Indianapolis, where he also helps with theological development.

Multiplying Disciples in Bivocational Ministry

Bivocational ministry is a life many pastors find themselves in these days. Of course, it is not a new phenomenon among pastors. In the area that I live, there are many small rural churches that have been around for many years. Back when these churches were planted the pastors were bivocational, often farming besides preaching. For those pastors, being bivocational was not a choice instead of full-time vocational ministry, it was the norm and more or less required of those called to ministry. Today, there are still many pastors required to be bivocational because they live in a rural area, are church planters, or are pastoring a smaller church that couldn’t fully support them otherwise. Being bivocational is not the lesser calling. To be bivocational does not mean playing in the minors until God decides to send them up to the big leagues of full-time vocational ministry. I will confess that I held this view, though I would not have explicitly said it. Depending on what the “other” job is for bivocational pastors, it can be very easy to feel discontent and weighed down by the seemingly unimportant duties of what we incorrectly deem as our “secular” work. That’s good! Now we know how our entire congregation feels much of the time. When we view bivocational ministry as a lesser calling, we both belittle God’s explicit call on our lives and idolize full-time vocational ministry as something that will fix all our problems.

Work is hard, regardless of what it is that we do. We know this from our own experiences and because of the curse God spoke to Adam (Gen. 3:17-19). I have been bivocational for about seven years and I have friends that are also bivocational and friends that are in full-time vocational ministry. They all say that their work is hard. They all say there are days and seasons where they would like their situations to be different. Within the context of the hard work that all Christians do, pastor or not, we are still to be about the work of being a disciple of Jesus in, through, and by our vocations. A primary way that we do the work of being a disciple of Jesus is to make other disciples (Matt. 28:16-20). The New Testament gives many examples of disciples of Jesus that not only make new disciples, but make new disciples who make new disciples who make new disciples and on and on. The spread that took place stemming from the original twelve disciples is one example. There is a clear picture of multiplication that happens.

This process of multiplication can take place in the ministries of bivocational pastors both in their church work as well as in the supplemental work that they do. For bivocational pastors there are some distinct challenges and some real blessings that come from the work of multiplying disciples in both contexts in which they live and work.

Time

Full-time pastors have more margin in their schedules to be able to devote to meetings with people and, therefore, do the work of discipleship. Or do they? Do bivocational pastors really not have any time to disciple people? If you are bivocational, should you only look to preach and teach and leave the rest of the work to someone that has more time?

I think it comes back to redeeming the time that we have. We all have margin in our daily schedules; the challenge is whether we use it and how we use it. Everyone eats lunch, so there is anywhere from a half hour to an hour that could be used to meet with someone or make a phone call. Depending on what time work starts, other people in the congregation probably have to go to work too, so getting up a little earlier before work to meet is an option. Using the time in our commute to and from work for a phone call can be beneficial as well. These are all scenarios a bivocational pastor can use to connect with someone from his congregation in the midst of his work schedule. However, there is also a large pool of people at his workplace that need to and can be discipled.

The effort needed to disciple at work is less than one might think. A great example of how this is done is parenting. Parenting children is discipleship. The life of the parent is lived out with and in front of the children. The discipleship that occurs in parenting does not only consist of sitting down with the child to talk about their walk with Christ, although that happens.

Discipleship in parenting happens while the parent and the child are folding clothes, working in the yard, and so on. The same can be said for discipling coworkers. The little conversations on the way to a meeting, during a break or downtime, at the coffee pot are the primary avenues for discipling coworkers.

Reaching the multiplication stage at work requires a bit more organization and intentionality. This means setting some time aside to meet with fellow believers at work. I meet with a group of guys to do this very thing every other week at lunch. As one would do in the church, there should be an awareness of leaders and/or other strong Christians to develop. Once those folks are identified, then the process of making them into the second generation of disciples in that place begins. In Acts 14:23, Paul and Barnabas appoint elders in the churches on their way to Antioch in Syria and the same principle stands at work. We are not Paul and Barnabas and we are not appointing elders, but a similar work needs to take place for multiplication to happen. The development of leaders and the passing on of the responsibility for making disciples must take place so that disciples can be multiplied.

Purpose

A pitfall for many in bivocational ministry can be denying that they are bivocational. We can spend so much time pretending that our supplemental work is only temporary and that very soon God is going to give us that full-time gig. Our time in bivocational ministry may be our life’s calling or it may be only for a season. In any season of waiting on the Lord, there is work to be done while we wait. The sooner we realize we are indeed where we are for a purpose—and God sovereignly plans that purpose—the sooner we can be effective.

I look at God’s sovereign purpose in the time spent in bivocational ministry as a development of my gifts and laying down of my rights. In 1 Corinthians 9, Paul talks about all the rights that he has as an Apostle and a minister of the gospel. He immediately says that he does not take up those rights, but essentially lays them down for the sake of the gospel. “Nevertheless, we have not made use of this right, but we endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ,” (1 Corinthians 9:12b).

Like Paul, we who are bivocational (Paul was too by the way) are ministers of the gospel, who have the right to be taken care of through the ministering of the gospel. There is at least a partial surrender of those rights, whether it is by our volition or not, when we are bivocational. There was power that came from Paul’s laying down of his rights. There was an identification that Paul could have with others because he set aside these rights. “I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings,” (1 Cor. 9:22b-23). One of the evident purposes of God in the calling to bivocational ministry is the ability to identify with those to whom we minister. There is both purpose and blessing in this identification, which serves as a foundation for the multiplication of disciples in our contexts.

Humility

The reality is that if we are bivocational we are probably not speaking at conferences, writing best-selling books, and garnering thousands of Twitter followers. Of course, our mistaken definitions of “making it” in ministry in relation to any of these measures are far different from God’s. The ministry work that is done bivocationally is probably mostly done in the shadows of public view. Ministering bivocationally can be humbling. You may be a church planter that celebrates when there are more than thirty people that show up for a Sunday service. Your greatest joy in ministry for a week may be a good conversation you have with a coworker. This is all very, very good for our souls.

The pitfall of parts of our Christian subculture is an issue, not only for our congregation, but for all those in ministry. There is the fanboy culture of authors, speakers, and podcasts. There are those that many have deemed celebrity pastor. When we are working in the trenches of bivocational ministry, we need not covet fame and fortune in ministry. Our placement in bivocational ministry may be a protection from our own prideful selves. It may be a season that God uses to refine us and humble us. It may be a time where we learn how to celebrate all the small ways that God works. Some of us simply may not have been able or may not ever be able to handle the platform of full-time ministry. God may be protecting us and those to whom we minister from what we would become on that platform. He may at the same time be preparing us.

Humility is one of the most attractive things about Jesus. Think about it, “He is God and he did what?!” You probably know Philippians 2:5-11, but I will remind you. “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,” (Phil. 2:5). The mind that Paul is talking about is that of humility, which he goes on to describe in the verses following. When we exhibit Christlike humility, people see the grandeur and beauty of Jesus. We could say that Jesus makes and multiplies disciples through us by showing himself in us. As God teaches us humility in bivocational ministry, people start to see glimpses of Christlikeness in us. The humility that God is teaching us is for our good and his glory. His glory is then magnified by the disciples that are made and multiplied through our lives and ministries.

Thankfully, God does not put us anywhere that he does not intend to put us. If we find ourselves in bivocational ministry, we can be encouraged that it is God who has put us there. It is not the B team and this is not our lot because of some shortcoming that we have. It is the particular vocation that the God of the universe has prepared us for and placed us in for such a time as this. We have the responsibility of multiplying ourselves as disciples of Jesus Christ wherever we are. We have been given time to be redeemed and used for the kingdom. God has a Spirit-powered, Christ-exalting purpose for our vocations. In light of all this, we cannot help but seek humility in our hearts and in our actions as we embrace the challenges and receive the blessings of serving Christ.

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Nick Abraham (DMin student at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) lives in Navarre, OH with his wife and daughter. He serves as an Associate Pastor at Alpine Bible Church in Sugarcreek, OH. He is a contributor to Make, Mature, Multiply: Becoming Fully-Formed Disciples of Jesus and blogs at Like Living Stones.

Avoiding the Pitfalls of Pastoring

There are two common dangers in pastoral ministry and Paul is alert to both of them. They are what we might call over-pastoring and under-pastoring. Over-pastoring is what happens when a leader or leaders exercise too much control in the life of the church. They are quick to suppress any dissent and may even end up bullying people. They often personalize issues. Suggestions for change or criticism are responded to in a personal way with counter-accusations. The unconscious aim of such leaders is personal control rather than the maturity of the congregation. This is why Paul says an elder must not be “over-bearing, not quick-tempered” (1:7).

Under-pastoring is what happens when a leader or leaders exercise too little leadership within a congregation. They avoid confrontation, so they fail to correct false teachers or challenge ungodly living. They may be good at encouraging people, but weak at rebuking those in error If the aim of those who over-pastor is personal control, the aim of leaders who under-pastor is personal comfort. They want a quiet life. But Paul says an elder must “refute those who oppose” the gospel (v. 9) and tells Titus that “rebellious people . . . must be silenced” (v 10-11).

You may not be in leadership. But, as we shall see in Titus 2, we are all called to pastor one another in the church. So we can all have a tendency to over-pastor or under-pastor.

If you think you have a tendency toward over-pastoring or under-pastoring, then the key is not simply to modify your style. The key is to “hold firm to the trustworthy message as it has been taught” (v 9). This is why holding firmly to the gospel is so important.

Why Under- or Over-Pastor?

What is it that drives someone to over-pastor? Proverbs 4:23 says: “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life” (NLT). In others words, what shapes our behavior is the thoughts and desires of our hearts (Marks 7:20-23). Our behavior goes wrong when our thinking about God and desires for God are misaligned. People over-pastor because they want to feel they are in control, or they are trying to prove themselves through their ministry. They have not embraced the truth that God is great and he is in control; or they have not embraced the truth that God is gracious and their identity is found in Christ. They may believe these truths in theory, but they do not hold them firmly in their hearts—and this is revealed in moments of pressure.

What is it that drives someone to under-pastor? People under-pastor because they fear the rejection of other people or crave their approval or they want to be liked (what the Bible calls the “fear of man,” Proverbs 29:25). Or they may under-pastor because they want a comfortable life, so they avoid the hard things involved in leadership. They have not embraced the truth that God is the glorious One, who should be feared. Their fear of man is not being eclipses by the fear of God. Or they have not embraced the truth that the God is good. True and lasting joy is found in him—even in the midst of hard situations.

Leaders need to disciple themselves with the gospel before they can disciples others. That does not mean they need to be perfect—progress rather than perfection is what is required (1 Timothy 4:15). But leaders do need to apply the gospel to their own hearts—otherwise they will be like the hypocrites of whom Jesus warns, who try to take specks out of people’s eyes when they have planks in their own eyes (Matthew 7:1-5).

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Tim Chester (PhD, University of Wales) is pastor of the Crowded House in Sheffield, United Kingdom, and director of the Porterbrook Institute, which provides integrated theological and missional training for church leaders. Chester also coauthored Total Church (Re:Lit), Everyday Church (Re:Lit), and has written more than a dozen books.

Excerpt taken from Tim Chester, Titus for You, The Good Book Company, ©2014. Used by permission. http://www.thegoodbook.com/

Prioritizing Church Attendance

Let’s just face the facts. Today, many Christians do not think attending church is that important. In the past, Christians believed that actively being a part of a church body was absolutely necessary to one’s faith. There used to be an understanding in Christian families that unless one was deathly ill or there was a family emergency, you just never ever missed church. So what has changed and caused so many people to view the church as a disposable good instead of as an intricate part of one’s spiritual life?

Why We Don’t Attend Church: A 40-Hour a week job, but no time for God

Pastor Kevin DeYoung is right. Our lives really are “crazy busy.” There is no doubt about it. Whether you are a college student, a newly-wed couple, or have a family of seven, we live in a day and age where the mentality is simply: go, go, go! This is one of the main reasons why church attendance is viewed as optional. Most people work 40-hour a week jobs in the United States, and so once the weekend hits the mindset of rest and recovery sets in. Trust me, I get it. Everybody wants some downtime. But why do we think that rest and recovery should take place outside of the confines of the house of God?

Recently, Trevin Wax wrote an article titled: “Are You A Part-Time Church Goer? You May Be Surprised.” Wax explains various reasons why people miss church in today’s society. There are 52 Sundays a year. If you only attend 25-30 Sunday services, you are a part-time church goer. Congratulations!

Do you recognize what is clearly wrong with this? Our jobs, which of course we must have to be able to support ourselves and our families, are seen as absolute necessities, while church attendance is simply seen as a dispensable activity. Brothers and sisters, this is not how it should be. Of course, the mindset of just attending church, getting your church attendance ticket punched, is absolutely wrong as well. Pastors and church leaders should preach against this mentality as well. However, think about this for a second. Just like you gather with your biological family, shouldn’t you also desire to gather with your spiritual family?

Why We Need The Church: A Biblical Case

I know the arguments that are going to be raised about what I have said thus far. People are going to say: “Does he really believe that attending a local church, going to its building, and doing this once or twice a week is what the Bible is suggesting?” Well yes and no. Kevin DeYoung explains, “I know we are the church and don’t go to church (blah, blah, blah), but being persnickety about our language doesn’t change the exhortation of Hebrews 10:25.” I couldn’t agree more.

Fellowship with your spiritual family is a sign of maturing in the faith as a disciple. Hebrews 10:25 says, “not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.” Have we really become so “new-agey” in our thought that we now think that we have matured past the need to attend church? Lord, let it not be so.

Gospel-Motivated Church Attendance

There is no doubt that what we need to recover in the life of Christians today is a gospel-motivated church attendance. What might this look like? Well, in my opinion its demonstrating the fact that when the church gathers on the Lord’s day, she proclaims the gospel, meditates on the gospel, and rehearses the gospel. By doing this, lives will begin to fundamentally change. It really is just that simple.

When the gospel is at the center our focus shifts. We no longer view church attendance as something we just need to check off, but as an intricate part of our spiritual lives. Instead of serving the god of individuality, we will be serving the God of Scripture. The gospel changes everything. However, we must first let the gospel change our low views of the church, and recognize that the house of the Lord is absolutely vital to the Christian life—to the life of a mature disciple. Should not the good news of Jesus Christ dying for our sins motivate us enough to enter into God’s house on Sundays? I would say so.

We are all at different points in our spiritual walks with the Lord. No matter what point you are at on your journey, I hope that you will come to see the importance of attending church. Do not be so narcissistic and self-consumed to think that you do not need the body of Christ. That is simply a sign of spiritual immaturity and a straight-up lie from the Devil.

I am not trying to guilt anyone into attending church regularly either. However, I am issuing a challenge to those who consider themselves Christians. If you consider yourself to be a part of the bride of Christ (Rev. 19:7-9, 21:2), tell me why would you separate yourself from the body of Christ (Rom. 12:5; 1 Cor. 10:17)? Logically, that makes no sense at all.

So Christians, live in light of the fact that you have been redeemed and do not have to earn your acceptance before God through your church attendance. The community of Christ needs you because it cannot function without all of its body parts. This is not condemnation, but rather an exhortation. Attending church is a blessing that should not be taken for granted.

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Matt Manry is the Director of Discipleship at Life Bible Church in Canton, Georgia. He is a student at Reformed Theological Seminary and Knox Theological Seminary. He also works on the editorial team for Credo Magazine and Gospel-Centered Discipleship. He blogs regularly at gospelglory.net.

The Pastor’s Kid: An Interview with Barnabas Piper

Being a pastor's kid (PK) is not something most of us can relate to, and yet the PK is someone we cannot avoid. PKs live in a world different from ours, a world where their family's every move is under intense scrutiny. But even if we're not a PK, it's important to understand the unique difficulties they face.

Barnabas Piper has written a book, The Pastor's Kid: Finding Your Own Faith and Identity, hoping to use his experience to encourage PKs to trust in Christ and to seek community in the midst of public and private struggle. It is also an instructive book for those of us who want to love our pastor's kid better.

Barnabas was kind enough to answer a few questions for GCD, and I hope it will encourage you to buy the book.

BRANDON: What made you feel like this message was the one to turn into a book?

BARNABAS: I was reluctant, at first, to write a book from the perspective of PKs. I doubted whether it would connect with enough people and wondered if it might seem whiny or navel-gazing. But as I corresponded with PK after PK I heard the same stories and perspectives over and over again, and they meshed with mine almost perfectly. I saw a persistent need and consistent desire. After I wrote a couple articles on being a PK the responses flooded in—each one hit a nerve. I saw a clear void in resources speaking to and for PKs both to encourage them and help their parents too.

BRANDON: Pastors have the unique expectation of discipling everyone in the church at the same time, in some form or fashion. How did this affect your dad (John Piper) in discipleship at home with you and your siblings?

BARNABAS: My dad was always a preaching pastor. His calling was to preach and his gift was to preach, and he was uniquely gifted at it. For him, discipleship of the church was primarily in consistent faithful exposition of the Bible. It was similar at home, just without the booming voice and gesticulations. He exposited and applied scripture. It was a strength and a weakness. The consistent pointing to God’s word laid a foundation for understanding, but it sometimes fell short of feeling personal and relational. There are dads, especially pastors, who use scripture verses like a magic cure for every ailment. My dad was not one of those.  He was never trite in his use of verses and he didn’t proof text to make a point. Sometimes, though, I just wanted normal conversation and connection and his default was digging into the Bible.

BRANDON: Pastor's kids often carry the unfair weight of being expected to be perfect because of who their dad is. How can people in the church help pastor's kids feel more "normal"?

BARNABAS: The short answer is “treat them like you do all the other kids.” PKs get singled out for misbehaving and even small indiscretions get noticed and reprimanded or reported. Where one kid might be called out Sunday School for being a distraction the PK  will have his mother or father called about the same sort of incident. PKs often get singled out to answer questions in Sunday school even if they don’t want to or don’t really know the answer. In fact, not knowing isn’t really allowed either. It creates an expectation of perfection, or at least a faking of it. Last, let them ask questions, doubt, wonder, explore, and find faith. Too often faith is expected of PKs and what is actually there isn’t a relationship with Jesus but a recitation of what is expected.

BRANDON: What advice would you give pastors seeking to better disciple their own kids?

BARNABAS: Converse, don’t ever preach. Relate, don’t always council. Connect with your kids over what they enjoy and over what you enjoy. This means have a hobby that can be shared (not just reading or studying). Listen, don’t always teach. Sometimes they need to be heard and to know you care. Show them you enjoy being with them. And admit to your sins, not just to being a sinner, but to actual sins. Then ask their forgiveness. These kinds of actions create an atmosphere of trust, respect, and openness. Such an atmosphere is where faith is worked out, questions are more safely posed, and a real relationship with Jesus can be exemplified and developed.

BRANDON: What advice would you give pastor's kids struggling with the pressures they face?

BARNABAS: Trust somebody. Find one or two friends. (You don’t really need more than that.) No they might not totally understand, but they care. It will help you process your struggles to talk through them. You’ll begin to see the holes that exist in your life that only Jesus can fill.

Then look for Jesus. Sure, you’ve heard all about him for your whole life, but go look for him. What you see may differ greatly than the impression you have of him. He’s not your daddy’s boss. He’s not a killjoy or a judge. He’s not an angelic, halo-wearing, choir boy. He is profoundly powerful, gracious, loving, and present. What find see when you look for Jesus is that you find him. He will introduce himself to you in a way that is so real that all those pressures and challenges and issues become something that may still hurt but are manageable and secondary.

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Brandon D. Smith is Executive Director of Gospel-Centered Discipleship and serves in editorial roles for The Criswell Theological Review and The Council on Biblical Manhood & Womanhood. He is also Editor of Make, Mature, Multiply: Becoming Fully-Formed Disciples of Jesus. He is proud to be Christa’s husband and Harper Grace’s daddy. Follow him on Twitter: @BrandonSmith85.

Take It Back to Jesus

A lot of people are skeptical of Christianity and the the church in general. You’ll often hear statements like, “I don’t believe in organized religion.” How should we respond?

Take It Back To Jesus

Our goal isn’t to convince lost people that church is cool. We are witnesses of the Risen Lord, this is about Jesus. Jesus is the Savior of sinners, not a cool Sunday service.

When people say they don’t like organized religion, ask them their thoughts about Jesus Christ. More pointedly, ask them if their position on organized religion means that Jesus didn’t rise from the dead.

If they think Jesus is dead, why go to church? Who cares? Why be in a huff over organized religion if its founder is a loser?

But, if Jesus is alive—everything changes. Their thoughts about the church and “organized religion” have to be seen in light of the risen Lord. Since Jesus is breathing, everything the Bible says about Jesus’ church has weight to it. It is solid. If Jesus conquered the largest obstacle in our lives—that’d be death—than we need to listen, and seriously consider everything his book says.

• Jesus said he was going to build his church (Matt. 16:18).
• Jesus came for the church (Acts 20:28).
• Jesus picked twelve leaders to start his church.
• Jesus is the head of the church (Eph. 5:23).

Jesus wants a church; if he didn’t, don’t you think he would have told the apostles in Acts to stop organizing and corrupting his vision for Christianity? In Acts they are meeting, structuring themselves, sending out missionaries, appointing leaders, etc. I don’t think Jesus wants a disorganized religion.

Jesus loves the church (Eph. 5:25). You can’t truly follow Jesus and not be a part of his church. It’s backwards. The New Testament doesn’t recognize that as Christianity.

A Rebellious Christian

If they profess to be a Christian and are against the church, then they should be called to obey Jesus, who is the head of the church, which is his body. To have Jesus, the head, is to also have his body, the church.

A professing Christian that is against the church is against Christ. If you are anti-Church, you are acting more like Satan, more like an anti-Christ, than your professed Savior.

The New Testament is clear, Christians are meant to belong to a local church (Heb. 10:24). I’ve met far too many Christians who are too “mature” to obey the Bible and go to church. Sheesh. Repentance is in order.

God Isn’t Against Organization

There is nothing wrong with the words “organized” and “religion.” But put them together and people get goosebumps.

God isn’t against organized religion. The entire Old Testament shows that. And the New Testament affirms the gathering, structuring, and ministry activity of God’s people for the sake of God’s glory and the spread of the gospel. Again, the Bible doesn’t prefer a disorganized religion, “But all things should be done decently and in order” (1 Cor. 14:40).

So, the bigger reality is not what we think about “organized religion,” frankly, it doesn’t matter; the greater question is what does God think?

God is pro-organization. I’ll just give two pieces of evidence. Exhibit A: the Bible. And exhibit B: the universe.

What Do They Mean By “Organized Religion”?

When discussing or debating a word or phrase, define it. Ask what they mean by “organized religion”—it takes the conversation from the clouds to the ground. And then you can get going somewhere.

What they probably mean by “organized religion” is that they don’t want to be a part of some system that doesn’t care about them, doesn’t help them, just wants their money, etc. And I’d agree. That sucks. And frankly, that’s how Satan would run a “church”—which is not a church.

So, yeah, I’m against that kind of organized religion too—we all should be.

But the New Testament gives a different vision for the church—the main metaphor used is that of a family.

No one is against a family—or organized families.

We are brothers and sisters in Christ. God is our Father and Jesus is our big brother. We are adopted into God’s family (Rom. 8:15). We aren’t a perfect family. But we are family. There is real love, joy, and harmony to be had among the family God, the body of Christ, the local church.

We ought to acknowledge—and repudiate—the yuck of abusive, manipulative, serpent-like “organized religion,” and put forward the compelling vision of the family of God.

“And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved” (Acts 2:42–47).

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J.A. Medders is the Lead Pastor of Redeemer Church in Tomball, TX. He and Natalie have two kids, Ivy and Oliver. Jeff digs caffeinated drinks, books, and the Triune God. He blogs at www.jamedders.com and tweets from @mrmedders. Jeff’s first book, Gospel-Formed: Living a Grace-Addicted, Truth-Filled, Jesus-Exalting Life, is set to release this November from Kregel.

Originally published on JAMedders.com “How to Handle the ‘I Hate Organized Religion’ Talk.” Used with permission.

3 Ways to Serve Seminarians

Seminary is a journey unlike any other. There are dangers to be avoided and sweet moments to be cherished and celebrated (like actually finishing your reading load for the semester). It is a time filled with excitement, frustration, disappointment, and times of profound spiritual growth. However, seminarians cannot accomplish this task alone. They need the local church to come alongside them in this journey. After all, in Christ we are all one big family. While many Christians may want to come alongside seminarians during their years of study, they may often not know how or what to do. So, how can churches help seminarians mature as disciples and have a healthy experience—emotionally, physically, relationally, and spiritually?

1. Pray Seminarians Would Keep Our Eyes on Jesus

As a seminarian, I can tell you that it can be daunting. It can be overwhelming when “syllabus shock” sets in and you see all the assignments that you are required to complete. In fact, seminary can be dangerous, leaving many not with the white hot flame of godly affections for Christ, but a cold, dry orthodoxy that can’t sustain them during the many trials of life and ministry. This is not to say seminary is bad. Certainly not. Over the past semester, I have thanked God for the rich friendships that I have developed with other guys on campus and for the times in which my heart was stirred for Christ during a class lecture. In fact, there’s a group of guys I eat lunch with on a regular basis during the semester and inevitably, we bring up something said in one of the lectures and wrestle with it together.

These are good things I celebrate daily. However, that isn’t always the norm for students, especially as the semester goes along. Fatigue sets in, and so can discouragement. As seminarians, we need prayer. Just like any other Christian, we are at war daily, fighting for joy in Christ and mortifying indwelling sin that so easily can entangle us (Heb. 12:1). We need stamina and endurance that only God can provide to help us maintain a healthy perspective towards our studies, namely, that their aim is doxological, not merely to achieve some academic profundity. But most importantly, we need prayer that our eyes would remain on Jesus. As David Mathis in How to Stay Christian in Seminary writes,

“An essential mark of a solid seminary experience is continually being stunned by how everything relates to Jesus. When you look long enough, press hard enough, and feel deeply enough, you discover again and again that it all comes back to him. The whole universe is about Jesus. The whole Bible is about Jesus. Our whole lives are designed to be about Jesus. And any seminary experience worth a dime should be all about Jesus as well.”

It can be easy for us to take our eyes off Jesus and put them on our grades or our performance, instead of the glorious reality of what God has done for us in Christ. Additionally, recognize that seminary isn’t the only thing going on in our lives. We are still human beings. We struggle and worry about school and about the ordinary things of life. So as you pray, intercede for us not just in regards to our studies, but also in how we form relationships, how we embody our faith as employees, how we uphold honesty and integrity in all we do, and, for some, how we can best take care of our families who take part in seminary life as well.

2. Encourage Seminarians With Godly Wisdom

Seminary students need more than just, “Hey, keep up the good work.” Show them how their union with Christ changes their lives and how our justification is based on Christ’s merit, not how well they can exegete that pesky Greek participle. Your affirmation needs to have some depth to be an encouragement for the stress they may be under or the discouragement they can’t seem to shake.

For example, you don’t need to understand exactly what seminarians are going through because, unless you have gone through a seminary program yourself, you may not. We all have different experiences in our life, school, and work. But you can still encourage them by pointing them to the God of all comfort who has given them “every spiritual blessing” (Eph. 1:3) in Christ. You can remind them of the certainty of God’s fulfilling his promises to them and that, being a good Father, he will never leave them or forsake them (Heb. 13:5; see also Deut. 31:6; Ps. 94:14). Even still, encourage them to not neglect the local church. Seminarians can’t mature apart from the community of faith, which is just as true for the rest of the church body as well.

Help promote rest and a healthy view of their body by not demanding an excessive amount of their time. Help them recognize that rest is in fact a godly thing, that because Jesus is our Sabbath Rest, we can rest (and must rest) from our busy schedules and take a deep breath under “It is finished,” while being confident that God will still accomplishes his purposes for those eight hours we’re asleep. Let them know that their saying “No” to certain things doesn’t diminish your view of them as your sibling in Christ and that it doesn’t make God love them less either. Help them to see that saying “No” is crucial in surviving ministry and preventing burnout.

3. Come Alongside and Support Seminarians

Seminarian do want to use their gifts in the church, but that doesn’t mean they always have the time to fulfill every empty teaching role. For some, they simply do not have the time to faithfully prepare a sermon or small group lesson on top of their class work every week. Keep in mind that some seminarians struggle to faithfully serve the church and also use the little free time they have productively. The church must find other ways to come alongside seminarians and support them.

It can be devastating to sense that our local church has all but abandoned us and seemingly shows no care or concern for us, as if the local church finds our time at seminary irrelevant. While I’m sure no local church desires to come off this way (and while it is also the seminarian’s responsibility to find a local church to belong, serve, and be known in), sometimes a certain posture towards us may communicate that. One way a local church can support seminarians is through meeting tangible needs. For example, sometimes the busyness of a student’s schedule prevents him or her from being able to stop what they are doing and fix a home-cooked meal. Instead of leaving it up to the seminarian to pick up fast food, have a Sunday School class or home group sponsor that student and bring him or her meals every now and then.  Even better, have families set aside one night and have the student over for dinner. I would double this recommendation for single seminarians. Since you don’t have a spouse and kids there with you, it is nice to be welcomed in by members of your local church who treat you like family.

At my church, it’s always nice to sit down on Wednesday nights and share a meal with other believers who ask me what’s going on in my life and who are happy to see me. It’s an encouraging reminder of why I am in seminary in the first place and helps spur me on when I’m losing steam along the way and getting discouraged. Truthfully, doing life together is an integral part of discipleship. We need you to come alongside us and encourage us to rest, encourage us to know when to stop studying and spend time alone with God in prayer, or to set aside one night a week to do nothing school-related and just enjoy the company of friends. In fact, before you ask us what we could be doing for the church, consider asking us how the church can best serve us in this unique time of our lives. It can be much easier for a seminary to sense they belong to this family of believers if they know these believers actually care about them.

Additionally, a local church can be supportive by recognizing that many seminary students are struggling financially and could use some help—no matter how small. Whether it is tuition, books, or groceries, it can be encouraging to students to know their local church cares enough to not only meet spiritual needs, but physical needs as well. During one of the most stressful parts of my semester, one of my best friend’s mothers sent me a card in the mail. As I opened it, I saw that her entire Sunday School class signed it and told me they were praying for me and they included with the card a significant amount of money to help me with whatever I needed. I was so encouraged by their generosity and it was a simply gesture, but it meant so much to me.

Seminarians Need the Church

We seminarians need the local church, more than we might even realize. We need the encouragement and prayers of other saints, especially older ones who have much wisdom to share with us. We ask for grace when we get excited about something we learn in class and get frustrated when that same excitement isn’t reciprocated. We want to be encouraging to other believers and not a source of discouragement. More than anything, we need to be reminded that despite our perfectionist tendencies or, for some, academic apathy, that God still accepts us in Christ and the grounds for our hope is not in our exegesis skills, but in whether we have truly turned from sin and trusted Christ alone for salvation. Please, point us to that reality and always mention us in your prayers (Phil. 4; see also Eph. 1:16; 1 Thes. 1:2). Even if your church isn’t near a seminary or don’t have any seminarians in your congregation, don’t abdicate your role to pray for the seminaries and the students who will spend many years there.

Seminary is a time of discipleship. A time where we learn about Jesus, but an important part of that discipleship is the church and families coming alongside seminarians as they intentionally invest in them. They help us not only mature in our knowledge of the gospel while in class, but see how the gospel is lived out. And in the process, we may be able to share what God is teaching us along the way as well.

—

Chris Crane serves as Middle School Small Group Leader at Lake Highlands Baptist Church in Dallas, TX. He holds a B.A. in Biblical Studies from Dallas Baptist University and is currently pursuing a Th.M. at Dallas Seminary. He has previously written for Gospel-Centered Discipleship, as well as The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. He also writes at chriscrane.net. You can follow him on Twitter: @cmcrane87

Let's Mass Produce Discipleship

Discipleship. Discipleshift. Disciple-Making Disciples. It’s all the rage right now to talk about discipleship and we must. The current state of the declining church is the fruit of our lack of engaging in discipleship in recent history. It’s so bad that few even know what this looks like and so we’re left with a dilemma. How do we disciple all of these people who are in the church and have never been discipled?

In typical western and capitalistic fashion, we have tried to figure out how to mass produce discipleship. Websites, blogs, and discipleship pathways providing content have been developed. Programs and systems are in place to invite people to learn, know, and grow into a disciple, but have we missed the point altogether?

Jesus Could Have Mass Produced Discipleship. . . But He Didn’t

Jesus had the thousands waiting for his every word and the opportunity to mass produce discipleship was available. He could have told them to sit down; he would keep the food miraculously coming; he would download all the information they needed to become disciples and to go make disciples.

But he didn’t. Instead he gathered twelve men (Matt. 10:1-4) , three who were extra close to him (Matt. 26:36-46), seventy that hung around on the periphery and spent years with them (Lk. 10:1-12). He shared more than content, though he did teach them more than anyone else would know. He shared meals, laughter, probably made fun of Peter A LOT; he shared hurts, struggles, tears; he exhorted, encouraged, and modeled devotion; he performed miracles, taught them how, spoke vision into them, and rarely criticized.

He shared his heart, his doctrine, his every step of life, and his platform with them.

What were the results? A viral movement that changed the world.

In Acts, we see this personal viral approach spread beyond the original twelve. Thousands come to faith at Pentecost (Acts 2:1-13), yet the scriptures track the individuals who influenced and shaped the lives of others rather than the mass gatherings.

Pieces of discipleship happened (and continue to) in mass gatherings, house to house, and personal investment, but the development of individuals is the primary concern. As we enter into the letters, Paul references specific people by name (Rom. 16), faithful workers and he didn’t just impart his theology through sermons, mass classroom teaching, online discipleship pathways, and more! No, he gave them his life.

They knew him, his strengths and his weaknesses.

The disciples created a movement without making a movement their aim. They invested in people, discipling them into being like Jesus and sent them to repeat the pattern. It’s because their aim was bigger than themselves and they knew the movement of God did not depend on them.

Have a Long-Term View that is Beyond Yourself!

The innovation that is taking places is good and healthy. New contexts require new approaches, systems, and ideas. But discipleship is more simple than we make it and takes longer than we ever wish it would. It has massive setbacks, discouragements, and slow progress toward great victories. There’s nothing more sanctifying, challenging, and rewarding.

But it requires that we not be in a hurry to mass produce disciples and end up making Pharisees with a massive amount of knowledge, little intimacy, and no holiness. We are trying to reproduce Jesus in people and that takes time. It took the church decades of neglect to get us to this big need and it will take decades of engagement in discipleship to get us out.

Is your vision only for your ministry, your church, and your time on earth, or is it for the next generations?

Jesus’ Master Plan

Learn from the content that is produced out there, but gather four to six men or women near you, invite them into your life, open the scriptures with them to teach them scriptural systematic theology that is transferable, pray with them, and fast with them. Hurt with them, fight with them through their struggles, celebrate their small victories, and give them opportunities to succeed and fail. Speak vision into them.

Take the content and teach it through your own life. It has greater impact in those you are discipling than gathering them around a DVD, curriculum, or teacher they don’t know.

Practically, this looks like Barnabas and Paul, Barnabas and John Mark, Paul and Timothy, Timothy to faithful men, faithful men to others also, and the same goes for women.

This personal discipleship must be combined or supplemental to the engagement in the broader community aims of the local church so it fulfills God’s call for that specific church. It is not a separate system; it is personal, communal, and driven by vision.

We mass produce discipleship by discipling a few who then disciple more and it multiplies. If we try another way, we’re just gathering crowds and assuming that our different variations of sermons will do the trick--that hasn’t worked for decades.

The master, Jesus, has shown us the plan. Let’s follow Him.

_

Logan Gentry is the Pastor of Community and Equipping at Apostles Church in New York City. He blogs at Gentrified and has contributed to The Gospel Coalition. He is married to Amber and they have three children. Follow him on Twitter: @logangentry.

3 Essentials You Can’t Get Without the Church

In a recent book They like Jesus but Not the Church, Dan Kimball addresses some people’s negative view toward the church.  Sadly, the book is right about many people’s attitudes toward the church.  Before I was a Christian church was one of the last places on earth that I wanted to be.  Like many people, I thought church was boring, dry, stuffy, and irrelevant to my life. However, since I have become a Christian, I have grown to love the local church with all of my heart and have come to realize the church is essential to our discipleship. The truth is we need the church more than ever before. In an article “The Church Why Bother?” Tim Stafford says, “A living, breathing congregation is the only place to live in a healthy relationship to God. That is because it is the only place on earth where Jesus has chosen to dwell.”¹ The church is God’s plan for spiritual growth—there is no backup plan. Mark Dever says, “I’ve come to see that relationship with a local congregation is central to individual discipleship. The church isn’t an optional extra; it’s the shape of your following Jesus.”² Therefore, discipleship is one of the primary functions of the local church.

When we look to the Bible and church history, we see there are three things the church  alone can provide that are essential to discipleship and spiritual growth. The Reformation distinguished several unique marks of a healthy church including preaching and administration of the sacraments. The Thirty Nine Articles of the Church of England (1563) says, “The visible church of Christ is a congregation of faithful men in which the pure word of God is preached and the sacraments duly administered according to Christ’s ordinance in all those things that necessity are requisite to the same.” In The Institutes of the Christian Religion, John Calvin says, “Wherever we see the Word of God purely preached and heard, and the sacraments administered according to Christ’s institution, there, it is not to be doubted, a church of God exists.”³  The Belgic Confession (1561) adds a third mark of church discipline:

The marks by which the true Christian church is known are these: if the pure doctrine of the gospel is preached therein; if she maintains the pure administration of the sacraments as instituted by Christ; if church discipline is exercised in punishing of sin; in short, if all things are managed according to the pure Word of God, all things contrary thereto rejected, and Jesus Christ acknowledged as the only Head of the Church.

The Word: Biblical Preaching and Discipleship

The first mark that plays an important role in discipleship is Biblical preaching. Mark Dever devotes the first chapter of Nine Marks of a Healthy Church to preaching the Word.  He also includes preaching in his chapter on discipleship and says, “A church in which there is expositional preaching will be a church that is encouraging Christian growth.”⁴ One of the goals, then, of Biblical preaching is Christian growth and maturity in the gospel making it essential for discipleship of believers. Dever goes on to say, “We need God’s word to be saved, but we also need it to continually challenge and shape us. His word not only gives us life; it also gives us direction as it keeps molding and shaping us in the image of the God who is speaking to us.”⁵

John Stott says, “Preaching is indispensable to Christianity. Without preaching a necessary part of its authenticity has been lost. For Christianity is in its very essence, is a religion of the Word of God.”⁶ This is based on a conviction of the primacy of preaching in the local church.⁷ Preaching makes the Word of God central to the entire worship service.

The Water: Baptism and Discipleship

Christian baptism is the immersion of a believer in water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. It is an act of obedience symbolizing the believer's newness of life in Christ Jesus. In the Great Commission, Jesus says to make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” (Matt. 28:19). The fact that baptism is included in the Great Commission demonstrates that it plays an important role in discipleship. Stephen Smallman says that baptism is the first phase of being a disciple.⁸ Baptism is the initiation into the Christian community and the first steps into the life of discipleship. A new believer should be baptized because Jesus did it and taught it (Matt. 3:13-17).

Baptism is a public display and confession of faith of the free gift of salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord (Acts 2:38-39). The New Testament word for baptism is baptizo, which means to dip repeatedly.⁹ So, the biblical mode of baptism should be total immersion for believers who profess faith in Christ. Mark Driscoll and Gerry Breshears list the following support for this position:

• John the Baptist required that people repent of sin before being baptized.
• Every baptism in the New Testament is preceded by repentance of sin and faith in Jesus.
• Baptism is reserved solely for those people who have put on Christ.
• Baptism shows personal identification with the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
• The Bible does record occurrences where entire households were baptized.
• Both Jesus and His disciples gave the command for disciples to be baptized as an expression of that discipleship.¹⁰

Baptism is an amazing way for new Christians to feel accepted and loved by the Christian community. It can be an important celebratory event in believers’ lives, connecting them to the church family. Christians both old and new join together to celebrate the public declaration of faith of new believers. At Church of the Outer Banks, we make baptism a very special celebration. Several times a year we gather at the beach to perform ocean baptisms. After a new believer is baptized, we offer them an olive wood cross to commemorate their experience and entry into the community of faith.

The Wine: Lord’s Supper and Discipleship

In the midst of intimate community, early Christians shared the breaking of bread daily. We read in Acts 2:42, “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” The breaking of bread was a continual reminder of what Christ did for them. It was also a reminder of God’s continual presence and activity in the church: past, present, and future.

The Lord’s Supper is also commonly referred to as Communion or the Eucharist. The Lord's Supper is an act of obedience whereby members of the church, through partaking of the bread and the fruit of the vine, memorialize the death of the Redeemer and anticipate his second coming (Matt.26:26-27; Mk. 14:22-23; Lk. 22:17-19; 1 Cor. 11:20-24). While baptism is a one-time initiatory rite, the Lord’s Supper is a continuing rite that churches observe repeatedly.¹¹ Hammett says, “The Lord’s Supper is similar to an anniversary celebration in which wedding vows are renewed.”¹² John Wesley believed that the Lord’s Supper was one of the “chief” means of grace. He says:

“The chief of these means are prayer, whether in secret or with the great congregation; searching the scriptures; (which implies reading, hearing, and meditating thereon;) and receiving the Lord’s supper, eating bread and drinking wine in remembrance of Him: And these we believe to be ordained of God, as the ordinary channels of conveying his grace to the souls of men.”¹³

We are spiritually nourished as we share in the Lord’s Supper. Christ spiritually feeds us with His body and blood. John Wesley says, “Our bodies are strengthened by bread and wine, so are our souls by these tokens of the body and blood of Christ. This is the food of our souls: This gives strength to perform our duty and leads us on to perfection.” God’s grace is given through the presence of the Holy Spirit as believers share in the memorial meal.

Next time you take the Lord’s Supper, reflect on the spiritual reality of what Christ has done for you through His life, death, and resurrection. In a way, the Lord’s Supper is a picture of what heaven will be like when we are all one at Christ’s table. At the table of the Lord, our differences no longer matter. Young, old, black, white, rich, and poor are all welcome at the Supper.

God gave us the gift of the church, which is Christ’s body. The local church is designed to be the context for our discipleship and spiritual growth. The Word, the Water, and the Wine are three discipleship essentials that we cannot do without. Likewise, you cannot have them without the church. They were instituted by our Lord Jesus Christ to remind us of His love and to help us grow in faith.

—

Dr. Winfield Bevins serves as lead pastor of Church of the Outer Banks, which he founded in 2005.  His life’s passion in ministry is discipleship and helping start new churches. He lives in the beautiful beach community of the Outer Banks with his wife Kay and two daughters where he loves to surf and spend time at the beach with his family and friends. Twitter: @winfieldbevins

^{1. Tim Stafford “The Church Why Bother?”Christianity Today, 49, no.1 (January 2005): 42-49.↩ 2. Mark Dever, Nine Marks of a Healthy Church. 16.↩ 3. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion. 21:1025-6 (4.1.9).↩ 4. Dever, 205.↩ 5. Ibid, 51.↩ 6. John Stott, Between Two Worlds: The Art of Preaching in the Twentieth Century. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1982. 15.↩ 7. Ibid, 125.↩ 8. Stephen Smallman, The Walk, 186.↩ 9. Kenneth S. Wuest, Wuest’s Word Studies. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1945.↩ 10. Mark Driscoll and Gerry Breshears, Vintage Church. 115-116.↩ 11. John S. Hammett, Biblical Foundations for Baptist Churches: A Contemporary Ecclesiology. Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 2005. 278.↩ 12. Ibid, 278.↩ 13. John Wesley, Works, 5:222. ↩}

How to Proclaim Jesus and Make Disciples

Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me. (Col, 1:28-29)

Recently our elders and a few of our interns made a trip to Boston in order to explore the possibility of helping plant churches in New England. While there, we visited some historical sites. One of them was in Quincy, MA, the birthplace of John Adams. Before going to see his home, we were told that in order to see where he was laid to rest, we needed to walk down to the Unitarian Universalist church (formerly a Puritan Congregationalist church). So we went inside and walked around. On the way out, some of our interns took a few pamphlets describing the beliefs of the UU. As we sat down for lunch, we began reading them to each other. The UU doesn’t have a creed, so the statements are more personal opinions of its followers. Here are a few of them:

• [The] best of today’s scholarship – which I identify with the work of the Jesus Seminar – reveals a man who is believable but problematic…. He was best known as what we would today call a faith healer. His “Golden Rule” – turn the other cheek, repay injustice with forgiveness – was youthful idealism not seasoned with wisdom. (Rev. Davidson, Loehr)
• As a literal story the tale of Jesus’ resurrection is hard to sustain, but as a metaphor that illustrates that there is life beyond death of addiction, despair, and total loss, it’s hard to beat. (Rev. Lisa Schwartz)
• All contributors [in the pamphlet] agree that the Bible is riddled with errors but nonetheless can serve as an important repository of human truth. (Tom Goldsmith, editor)
• ‘If indeed revelation is not sealed,’ then we must remain open to the possibility of new and higher truths that may come to us from diverse sources … including the Bible. (Mark Christian)
• At sixty-nine, I now find myself almost never referring to the Bible for guidance or inspiration. (Jack Conyers)
• I claim the Bible as one more chapter, among several religious texts, in the Unitarian Universalist guide to living. (Laura Spencer)
• Yet the Bible remains for me but one rich source among many records that speak to us of the joys and challenges of being alive. (Rev. Donna Morrison-Reed)

What saddens me about these views isn’t that people in the UU believe these things. I don’t expect them to believe in the inspiration and inerrancy of the Bible, and a closed cannon. I don’t expect them to believe in the deity and exclusivity of Christ, and his bodily resurrection. I don’t expect them to read the Bible everyday for guidance and inspiration. What saddens me is that many today seem to be functional Unitarians. I think the UU is a good representation for what a lot of people – inside and outside the church – actually believe. It’s a religion based on one’s feelings; one in which there’s no absolute truth; a religion in which there are many ways to God; a religion in which you are free to live how you want, even if that lifestyle is contrary to the Bible. It’s speculative, mystical, ambiguous, and ultimately Christless, making it useless. Why do I raise this problem? I raise it because this is exactly why we need Christ-centered exposition today.

We are called to make disciples of all nations. As we go to the nations, we’re sure to find “religious people,” but we will rarely find a people who understand Scripture and the person and work of Christ sufficiently. Their beliefs will be similar to these mentioned above. We must take the truth of God’s word to them, just as Paul was taking the truth to the mixed up people in Colossae. Paul mentions four ways in which we do the work of Christ-centered exposition in order to make mature followers of Jesus in a diverse, confused, mixed up world.

Proclaim Like an Evangelist

Paul uses the term “proclaim” (kataggellomen) meaning “to announce throughout,” or “to proclaim far and wide.” Paul is speaking of announcing the facts. Proclamation involves declaring the good news. This word is used in Acts 13 when Paul and Barnabas go out on their first mission. They go to Salamis and “proclaimed the word of God in the synagogues” (5). They heralded the facts in the synagogue. As faithful expositors, we get to say what God has said and announce what God has done in Christ. We are not giving advice. We are declaring the news.

We must proclaim the facts about Jesus because we believe that there is “salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). Believe that the gospel contains converting power when you announce it (Rom. 1:16). I believe that exposition can be a life changing on the spot experience when the gospel of Christ is proclaimed. Don’t merely preach about the gospel. Preach the gospel.

We also need to declare the facts about Jesus to correct popular ideas about him. There are numerous ideas about Jesus, displayed in world religions and pop culture. It’s therefore imperative that the expositor understands the doctrine of Christ and salvation. The expository evangelist recognizes that there’s no separation from theology and evangelism. Every evangelist does theology. The only question is whether or not they’re doing good theology. Present the real Jesus to people.

Further, the evangelist must keep proclaiming Christ because this is the ultimate question for the skeptic. I remember talking to a guy in my office for about two hours one day. He asked me a bunch of questions, and then I finally said to my friend that the questions he must answer are questions related to Jesus (not whether or not Adam had a belly button or the historicity of dinosaurs). I told him these are the fundamental questions: “Who is Jesus?” “Did he rise from the dead?” Other questions aren’t unimportant, but they aren’t ultimate. Don’t stop declaring the powerful truth of the cross and resurrection.

Tim Keller shares how a skeptic once told a pastor that he would be happy to believe in Christianity if the pastor could give him a “watertight argument.” The pastor asked, “What if God hasn’t given us a watertight argument, but rather a watertight person?” (Keller, The Reason for God, 232, my emphasis). Paul says that the Greeks look for wisdom, the Jews for miracles, but we preach Christ crucified (1 Cor. 1:22). I think the best way a skeptic to find Christianity compelling is by simply considering Jesus from his word. Don’t underestimate the power of plainly proclaiming Jesus weekly, and pray for the Spirit to open eyes for people to believe. Tell them to look to Jesus, to come to Jesus, to find their rest in Jesus.

Are you holding up the gospel for people to see and believe? I’ve always been challenged by Paul’s words to the Galatians when he said, “It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified” (3:1b). He didn’t mean that the Galatians were there at Golgotha, but rather that his preaching was so cross-centered that it was as if they were there! Take them there and urge them to repent and believe.

Warn Like a Prophet

The next action word Paul uses is to “warn” or “admonish” or “counsel” (noutheteo). This word is often used of warning against wrong conduct (cf., Acts 20:31; 1 Cor. 4:14; 1 Thess. 5:12, 14; 2 Thess. 3:15). A primary role of the prophet-expositor is to warn people about false teaching and ungodly living. Paul uses this word for “warn” to the Ephesians elders saying, “Therefore be alert, remembering that for three years I did not cease night or day to admonish everyone with tears (Acts 20:31). I love that Paul says that he did the work of warning with “tears.” Prophetic instruction should come from a deep, broke-hearted love for people. Jeremiah was the “weeping prophet.” Jesus wept over Jerusalem. Be a broken-hearted prophet. Paul says, “I admonish you as my beloved children” (1 Cor. 4:14). Love your people deeply as you warn them about false gospels, the dangers of sin, God’s judgment, and living in futility. As expositors, we can’t be afraid to warn. Don’t be naive or simplistic. Be aware of the dangers and threats and help people stay on the path of truth. A good expositor is like a forest ranger, aware of the landscape, alerting people to dangerous wildlife in the area. To put it simply, if you aren’t warning people of heresy and ungodliness, then you aren’t doing your job. Paul was often viewed a troublemaker because he wasn’t afraid to sound the alarm. He warned of wolves and snakes in the area. Of course, to warn people is to confront people. This flies in the face of culture that loves its “autonomy” and “privacy.” But that doesn’t matter. We have to confront people with the truth of Scripture. A good shepherd will love his sheep enough to tell them the truth.

Teach Like a Theologian

The next way the expositor exalts Christ is through “teaching” (didasko). This refers to the skill of the teacher in imparting knowledge to the pupil. In proclamation we’re announcing the facts, and in teaching we’re explaining the facts.  Paul’s evangelistic outreach wasn’t devoid of doctrinal instruction. He regularly taught, building up believers. Both are critical for the church’s mission. We must reach the unreached people groups, proclaiming Christ where he has not been named, and we must teach and build up the church.

We need a generation of Christ-centered teachers. I love how Ezra “set his heart to study the Law of the Lord, and to do it, and to teach his statutes to Israel” (7:10). We need a generation like that! Paul tells Timothy “Devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching.” (4:13). Be devoted to exhortation and teaching. Be immersed in it. Paul told Timothy, in his famous charge to “preach the word” to also “teach with complete patience” (2 Tim. 4:3). Notice how he adds “with complete patience.” It takes time for people to understand gospel truths. The shepherd will feed the sheep bite by bite, over time, understanding the sanctification is a slow process.

I long for our people to have an “Emmaus Road experience” when they hear the gospel expounded from the text. The Emmaus disciples asked, “Did not our hearts burn within us on the road, while he opened the Scriptures?” (Luke 24:32). May hearts burn as we explain the Holy Scriptures and point people to Jesus! After all, that’s what we want from our teaching. The goal isn’t merely to transfer information, but to have hearts filled with adoration. Exposition is for exaltation. Theology should lead to doxology. In good exposition, there are moments when people put their pen down, and stop taking notes, in order to behold Christ in worship. Theologian James Hamilton says, “The transformation the church needs is the kind that results from beholding the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (God’s Glory in Salvation, 39). That kind of transformation will happen as we expound the Christ-centered Scriptures to people through careful theological teaching.

Make disciples of Jesus by proclaiming him like an evangelist, warning like a prophet, teaching like a theologian, and applying wisdom like a sage. Preach Christ until you die! Then worship him forever. Preach him on earth, until you see him in glory. I promise you on that day, you won’t regret having done the hard work of Christ-centered exposition.

--

Tony Merida serves as the Lead Pastor of Imago Dei Church, Raleigh, NC and as the Professor of Preaching at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is married to Kimberly, with whom he has five children. Tony is the co-author of Orphanology and author of Faithful Preaching. He travels and speaks all over the world at various events, especially pastor’s conferences, orphan care events, and youth/college conferences. Twitter: @tonymerida

*This is an excerpt of Tony Merida's book, Proclaiming Jesus, published by GCD Books.

When People Can't Listen

Frustration was brewing toward the Coleman family. Again and again and again Pastor Seth and the elders of the church had met with the family to encourage, counsel, and challenge them. Being the good "gospel-centered" church that they were, they demonstrated the glory of God and his goodness to them. They opened the Word of truth to them and called them to faith and obedience. They did everything "right" and by the book. Law, gospel, grace, and glory were all there in parts of their counseling. But the response of the Coleman's hearts hadn't changed. There might have been some momentary transitions in behavior, but they were really just momentary. For Pastor Seth, it was really aggravating. As the high-energy pastor/planter that he was, seeing movement in people's lives was his gift. It drove him batty to see lives stalled out and not listening. Often he would be tempted to dismiss these kinds of slow-moving sheep as unspiritual or immature or even un-saved. He found their lack of faith in his gospel disturbing. It gnawed at his mind that week after week, he would counsel the good news to them and yet they never moved forward in it. His theological system even told him that if they don't respond to the gospel it's because they were blind and dead to it. So he had to pray for their salvation. His conclusion was they were spiritually dead unbelievers that thought they were the people of God.

Unfortunately, for a guy who sees everything in black and white, he was missing something between the lines. The degrees and hues of trouble within their hearts and minds were invisible to a counselor who only saw in two variations - right and wrong. Spiritual temperatures were only gauged on the grounds of "hot" or "cold," and lukewarm people made him want to vomit. The unbelief of the Coleman's was so obvious that doing anything other than serving them notice seemed to be, in Seth's mind, a cop-out and passive failure to lead them. He couldn't see why they didn't get it.

Why Won't They Listen?

I'm often like my fictional friend, Pastor Seth. Often in Christian leadership and discipleship, I am stuck with the challenge of people who just don't get it. I spend time counseling and encouraging them. I point them again and again to the Word of God and the good news of Jesus, but they just won't respond. The answers and responses are as obvious to me as 2 + 2 = 4. I see their sin, I see the right response in the Word of God. I call them to repentance and faith and acceptance in Christ. I encourage them to move forward in him. And yet these people look up at me with dejected eyes agreeing that there is a rightness in what I'm saying, but a depression falls over them that indicates they just can't do what I'm challenging them towards. I'm quick to write them off as just not listening carefully enough, not believing well enough, not trusting deep enough, or worst of all, just being insolent, rebellious scum.

But I don't think that's always the case, at least not any more. Recently, I stumbled upon a verse in my personal Bible reading that shocked me. As I was plodding along in Exodus, I noticed that God was about to do something great. The people of Israel were slaves in Egypt. Because of their numbers and growing influence, the Pharaoh had enslaved and brought the Israelites into forced labor. He had murdered their infant boys. He had stripped all their wealth, prosperity, and laughter. Day by day, their lives were crushed by blow after blow.

And yet God had spared a son. He had raised him up as a leader and had given him a calling to take the captives out of their slavery. God had promised everything: deliverance, restoration, even his presence. He had confirmed it with signs and wonders. God was at work and doing powerful things. Who wouldn't believe? Who wouldn't be ready to charge the hill with God at the front and overcome the wicked Egyptians and their powerful slavery? The right leader seeing the right things would motivate this crowd the right way and they would respond in faith and obedience. Right?!

Exodus 6:9 tells us a different story:

“Moses spoke thus to the people of Israel, but they did not listen to Moses, because of their broken spirit and harsh slavery.”

Moses told them all of the great promises of God. He spoke to them about the power and glory of God. He told them of the love of God and his grace and kindness toward them. Yet in a poignant word about their hearts, we find that they didn't listen. More to the point, it seems that they couldn't listen. Their bodies, minds, hearts and souls had been so beat and trodden upon that any sort of good news was impossible to them. Their spirits were broken and their slavery was harsh.

The Seed of Pastoral Frustration

The old adage says, "Don't judge someone until you've walked a mile in their shoes." Maybe for pastoral counseling, that wisdom should be applied as well. It's probable that Moses felt deeply frustrated with Israel at this point. Instead of rallying an army to move forward and lay hold of the promises of God, he was faced with a bruised and beaten crowd of despairing people. His frustration caused him to question his gifting and call. "If these people won't listen to me God, what makes you think Pharaoh will?" (Ex. 6:12). I'm willing to bet that one of the first seeds of frustration between Moses and Israel was planted here.

In discipleship, we're frustrated too. Our words aren't heard. Our counsel not headed. Our sermons not considered and acted upon. The build up of frustration can form a mountain of bitterness and disappointment with the people of God we're trying to serve. Instead of gentle and compassionate shepherds, we become ranchers with sticks to beat our people out of anger. "These people just won't listen."

Could this verse be a rebuke and a challenge to us in leadership to see God's faltering people differently? Instead of letting frustration grow towards God's people because they won't listen, this verse needs to be a reminder to us of the deep hurt within their lives. It's quite possible that they won't listen because they can't listen. They can't listen because their burdens are too great.

Leading Sheep That Won't Listen

How do we lead these sorts of people? How do we rightly recognize their broken spirit and great burdens and love them well? Three pastoral clues are found in the rest of this story in Exodus that help me understand how to lead these broken sheep.

1. Be patient with them. This is, in a large sense, where the people fade into the background of the story. There are no thunderbolts hurled at them. Moses doesn't set up a platform and start a three-day preaching marathon against them and their unbelief. The movement of the story leaves the people here and focuses on God and his activity. It's as if God takes them off the stage, leads them them to the front row of the theater, gives them seats to rest in, and then he powerfully steps up again and goes to work against their oppressors. The action is a great measure of rescue and relief to them. If anything, it is a display of God's patience and kindness towards Israel.

People with broken spirits and heavy burdens don't need to hear "steps to take" or "just obey more" or "be faithful." They need rest. The burdened and weary need to hear Jesus's words from Matthew 11:28 about rest. They need patience. Remember, it's the kindness of God that leads us to repentance (Rom. 2:4). As Scotty W. Smith once tweeted, "If God uses kindness to lead US to repentance, why do we use harshness, shame, guilt, threat, anger and fear on one another?"¹ Why aren't we patient with those who are crushed?

Give them rest. Don't badger them about their weights. Let them come and be. Love them, encourage them, bless them. Let them have a front row seat to God's power and activity. Let them sit and watch the gospel unfold. Don't require works or action. Let them see and hear and experience a powerful Savior who rescues us from all our oppressors.

2. Be present with them. People with broken spirit's and heavy burdens don't merely want to be told they have those things and then left alone to figure it out. They need encouragement, help, and friendship that only comes from being with them. Often we don't understand the lives of the people we are trying to lead because we haven't lived with them in it. The nuances of why they do this or that isn't understood because the day-to-day experience of where those nuances dwell aren't understood or even known. Yes, I am saying that not everything is as black and white as you want to make it. Their failure to respond in faith to the good news might not be because they are hardened sinners, reprobate, and rebellious towards God. It might be because they have been abused, oppressed, and bullied around and as a result their spirit is broken. Their sins might come from the reality of the sins committed against them. It doesn't make it right, but your approach seems just like the approach the bullies and abusers have already afflicted them with.

Do you know that about your people? If we are going to lead them well, especially these sheep that don't listen we have to know their lives. We must live with the pained compassion of Christ that saw the sheep scattered and felt sorry and pity for them (Matt. 9:36).

As God powerfully acted to liberate and redeem Israel, he never failed to demonstrate his presence with them. In the midst of his work, he kept his promise to them, even at the most terrifying of times. Israel saw a powerfully present God who was for them. Shepherding people calls us to be present in the lives of those who don't listen. Do you know your people?

3. Be petitioning for them. Moses's role in this liberation wasn't as great as we like to think it was. He went and told Pharaoh what God had told him, raised his staff, and God everything else. In fact Moses's predominate activity in the unfolding of the plagues on Egypt didn't look like activity at all. He was God's messenger to Pharaoh and the people. Welcome to pastoral ministry.

As we lead people, our primary responsibility is to tell them what God says. Our primary responsibility for them is to be leaders who pray. Moses's leadership was bound up in his prayer for Israel. In fact, it's when Moses started acting, instead of praying, that he got in trouble.

If we find ourselves frustrated by people who won't listen, could it be because we've failed to petition our Father for them? Instead of telling them what to do, judging them for failure to do it, and then running them off to find some more "responsive people," we ought to consider long, engaged seasons of prayer. Does our Heavenly Father not possess all authority in heaven and earth? Does he not have the ability to raise up and lower powers and authorities. Can he not shatter the bounds of sin and death? Did he not send the Son of God and the Spirit of God to be our constant and faithful advocate and intercessor? Yes, yes, and yes!

Perhaps our people's failure to listen is because the leaders have been trying to do God's work instead of doing the work God gave them to do. Maybe our people won't listen because we haven't cared by praying for them. Maybe we've altered the life of ministry to be a drive for personal platform and greatness instead of the humble work of praying passionately for our people. We, as leaders, are all about the "preach!" and little about the "prayer."

Broken in Spirit

Jesus reminds us that the blessed ones are those who are broken in spirit (Matt. 5:2). They are the people who have trouble listening because the weight of the world, their sin, and their struggles in upon them. They mourn because they can't change their ways. They hunger and thirst for what is righteous and good, and yet it seems just out of their grasp because they aren't consistent enough, aren't powerful enough, aren't free enough. They are the meek that won't make a church or ministry impressive or relevant or powerful. They won't have anything to build you a larger platform.

Will you extend mercy to them? Will you care for them? Will you shepherd the people who won't listen because of their broken spirit and heavy burdens?

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Jeremy Writebol(@jwritebol) has been training leaders in the church for over thirteen years. He is the author of everPresent: How the Gospel Relocates Us in the Present (GCD Books, 2014) and writes at jwritebol.net. He lives and works in Plymouth, MI as the Campus Pastor of Woodside Bible Church.

6 Tips for Shepherding Your Small Group

Growing up in church, I have been in my fair share of small groups. Some good, some not so good. I’ve been in youth groups, college groups, groups that have met at homes, groups that have met informally, and groups in which I was the youngest by several decades. However, with all that time spent in small groups, I had spent very little time leading one. Last year, I became a small group leader at my local church, shepherding middle school guys on a weekly basis. While I wasn’t totally foreign to teaching middle school guys in a church setting, I certainly wasn’t a veteran either. Almost immediately, I had these great ideas about what my small group would look like and how great it would be. Needless to say, when my romanticized vision of small groups met with reality, it looked much different than I anticipated. In the process of trying to re-create a more realistic picture of small groups, Jesus taught me (and keeps reminding me of) several key lessons that I as a leader needed to hear.

1. Be Patient

I have lost track of how many times I wish the kids I taught would grow in grace and understanding faster or, for some of my kids, I wish they would trust in Jesus sooner rather than later. As small group leaders, we can subtly develop a Messiah complex of sorts. “If I just use this curriculum. If I just do things this way. If we just read this book or if I can be this sort of leader, then the group will change."

Whatever challenges you face, never stop reminding yourself, as Zac Eswine confesses in Sensing Jesus, “I am not the Christ.”[1] We were never intended to “be Jesus” to anyone, including our small group. You can’t carry that weight. You weren’t meant to. As much as we pour into our groups, as many seeds that get planted, we can never lose sight that God gives the growth (1 Cor. 3:6-7). We should testify to the good news of the gospel and trust God that it will produce fruit in its ordained time. When Paul writes that God, “who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:6), do you trust that it applies to your small group?

2. Don’t Be Afraid of Big Words

One of the qualms that I have with American Christianity, particularly in student ministry, is that we are afraid our people can’t handle big, theological words or concepts. They have minds as well as hearts, so engage both. When we don’t, not only is this insulting, it also (in the long run) is unhelpful. It shapes disciples who are a foot wide, but an inch deep, so to speak. Shallow teaching leads to shallow theology which leads to shallow worship. Our people need more than that. They need a deep gospel because in life they will face deep and complex problems, namely, the curse of sin that affects everything.

In Romans 1:16, Paul writes that the gospel is “the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.” In the gospel, the power of God works mightily, not just in saving, but in sustaining and maturing. Salvation isn’t just concerned with our justification, but also our sanctification and glorification. If we define salvation this way (which I think is the way the Bible would define it), and the gospel is the power of God for salvation, then we can be confident that as we lead our small groups and teach them biblical truth, that the Holy Spirit, in his wisdom, will bring change in our people’s hearts, not us. We are free to challenge those we lead with words they may not know and teach them what they do mean, knowing that the Holy Spirit will do his work.

Trevin Wax, in his excellent little book Gospel-Centered Teaching makes a helpful point in this regard:

“As a group leader, you want to provide a feast and let people draw the sustenance they need. But we may have to ‘cut up the meat’ for new believers and make sure that the truth is accessible. They key is to put the biblical ingredients together and provide the meal. Fill up the plate! Don’t be afraid to challenge people, just make sure you are continually thinking of ways to drive the point home.”[2]

Later, Wax further elaborates on this point, especially as it relates to children:

“Small kids need big words. Not because they understand everything all at once but because, over time, God uses the inspired words of His Book to convict kids of sin and convince them to repent and believe in Christ.”[3]

Regardless of the ages of people in your small group, give them meat and trust God to sharpen their teeth as they digest its riches.

3. Be Consistent and Committed

In their book Lead Small, Reggie Joiner and Tom Shefchunas discuss the importance of being a consistent small group leader “Show up consistently…You cannot lead a small group without trust. You cannot build a community without trust. And the first step to gaining the trust of your [group] is making sure they know you will show up.”[4] We need to fight against the human tendency, especially in Western contexts, to be autonomous. It can be suffocating, spiritually and emotionally, to have members be nothing more than one person in a sea of faces. “Everybody needs someone who knows their name, and what’s happening in their lives.”[5] This goes for the small group leader as well. When you are consistent and committed to leading a small group, not only does that give you an opportunity to really know your people, it also gives them an opportunity to know you.

4. Show Them Jesus

The greatest need your small group has is to have you point them to Jesus. More specifically, they need you to point them to Christ’s finished work on the cross as a substitute for sinners. They need a big view of Jesus. All the programs and events we can schedule as small group leaders won’t provide what they need that Christ alone has made provision for. They need to believe in Jesus as their Prophet, Priest, and King. Your people need to know the difference between “do this and live” and “it is finished.” In the midst of a law-driven church culture and a society that says your identity is wrapped up in your behavior, they need to hear the hope of the cross and resurrection, that “those whom [God] foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified” (Rom. 8:29-30).

Unfortunately, many of your small group members, specifically those who have already been born again, may live with a low-level guilt because they think somehow they haven’t done enough for God to be pleased with and they are scared he hates them. Give them some hope, some grace. Point them to the Living Word seen in the written Word. Show them all the promises that are already theirs in Christ. A small group who delights in Christ’s finished work for his people and is addicted to grace will be transformative and a place where people connect in genuine, honest community.

5. Help Them Love the Church

As of late, it has been “trendy” to hate on the Church. With the influence of postmodernism and various elements of the “emerging church” conversation still lingering about, we need to lead our people in seeing with new eyes the centrality of the local church in the life of a Christian. With all the problems in the Church (and yes, there are many), the Bride of Christ is Jesus’ chosen means by which he carries out his mission. In a Twitter post on December 30, Juan Sanchez, preaching pastor of High Pointe Austin, quotes D.A. Carson on the Church, saying, “It was inconceivable in the New Testament for someone to say I'm a Christian, but I'm not part of a church.”[6]

Jesus is gathering for himself a ransomed people, not just a bunch of isolated individuals. Your small group needs to see community in the local church as a place where Jesus is made much of, sin is fought against and joy is fought for, and people come from various backgrounds and seasons of life to do life as one family. They need the Church more than they know. Help them see that for themselves.

6. Don’t Be Discouraged

After reading all this, you might be thinking to yourself, “Chris, I can’t do this. If this is what it takes to be a small group leader, I won’t make the cut.” Let me provide a word of encouragement. First off, I by no means what to say, “This is the standard of being a small group leader.” Some of you reading this may have been small groups leaders longer than I have been alive, so I by no means what to suggest that I have formulated the perfect model for small group leadership. To be honest, I don’t think there is one. There are too many variables to consider to try and formulate a one-size fits all model for effective small groups.

Secondly, more than effective models, your people need a Substitute and they have one in Christ. And so do you. The gospel promises you that because Christ was strong for you, you can be weak.[7] You don’t have to have all the answers and can point to Christ, who is their Wisdom (1 Cor. 2). Jesus desires that you use your gifts and passions of leading and teaching people as a human being, not as the Messiah. The gospel announces that all the you need is yours in Christ. There is one thing you need to be an effective small group leader: a heart that has been awakened by the glorious gospel of grace. All the things you need to be equipped in this task, Christ will provide. In your weakness, Christ has not left you. As a small group leader and as a child of God, your identity is not wrapped up in your inadequacies and failures. Your identity is wrapped up in the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ, which causes your Heavenly Father to look upon you and say, “This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased.”

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Chris Crane serves as Middle School Small Group Leader at Lake Highlands Baptist Church in Dallas, TX. He holds a B.A. in Biblical Studies from Dallas Baptist University and is currently pursuing a Th.M. at Dallas Seminary. He writes at chriscrane.net. You can follow him on Twitter: @cmcrane87.

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[1] Zach Eswine, Sensing Jesus: Life and Ministry as a Human Being (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2013), 20

[2] Trevin Wax, Gospel-Centered Teaching (Nashville: B&H Publishing, 2013), 69

[3] Ibid., 73

[4] Reggie Joiner and Tom Shefchunas, Lead Small (Cumming, GA: Orange, 2012), 29

[5] Ibid., 29

[6] Juan Sanchez, Twitter post, December 30, 2013, 8:46 a.m., http://www.twitter.com/manorjuan

[7] I first heard this expression from Tullian Tchividjian’s very helpful book Jesus + Nothing = Everything (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2011).

Bringing Young and Old Together

It appears to me that there is a growing chasm between generations in local churches. Churches are becoming more and more generationally homogenous. If you entered a church on Sunday, you might easily label the church as either a baby boomer, generation X, or millennial church. Obviously, this is a broad observation. There are churches that do well at being generationally varied. But I don't think enough attention has been drawn to how uniform many churches are and how dangerous this is to discipleship and spiritual growth. Let me first share my own experience.

Generational Gaps

I’ve attended four churches in my Christian journey. Each of them had a generational makeup that defined them. Likewise, I’ve interacted with a handful of other churches from which I’ve built this experience.

Two churches that I attended had a strong constituency of young families. One was a baby boomer church; the other was a generation X church. In both, the singles and college ministry was a ghost town. In one of them, there was not a grey hair in the crowd, merely families with children through teens.

I attended the first as a college and single. I was the anomaly of the church. In order to find gospel community with people from my generation, I traveled through several college ministries or singles ministries for four years. I did what I could to build community within the church, but there were many barriers that prevented this. One of which was the lack of urgency that the older generations felt to remedy the situation.

In the second, my wife and I were married with children and I served the church as a pastor. I shepherded the teen generation and was at max capacity. I didn’t have time to pour into my own generation and build community. This generation remained fragmented with no voice or leadership; it had a tough time finding a place in the church.

The third church was a dying church with an aged congregation. Then it relaunched. After relaunch it was mostly constituted of college and single students. As I have watched this church progress, I have seen it turn the corner and develop more heterogeneity. But I can tell that this church has been intentional. My wife and I attended this church between the two churches I shared about above. We felt very connected to our own generation, but were hungry to have more mature saints to pour into our lives.

Then there are the churches I hear whispered about. “Did you hear that such and such church closed their doors?” These churches after decades of loyal saints serving could not afford to maintain their facilities. They atrophied. They lacked younger families, singles, and college-aged adults to sustain gospel ministry momentum. These church facilities become community centers, pubs, or small businesses. As I’ve traveled the Chicagoland area during the past few months, I have encountered the truth of this. What were once beautiful bastions of Christianity have been converted into businesses.

Thankfully, there are churches that have a healthy cross-section of generations present. The fourth church, which I attend now, represents this healthy cross-section. In this church, not one generation sticks out from another.

Why the Divide?

One reason that a church is generationally uniform is because it started that way and stayed that way.

For example, if the plaid, bearded, hipster, millennial church planting conferences that I’ve gone to during the last year is any indication of the uniformity within past generations, I might be onto something. These bearded, plaid-bearing men are a type that I am a part; I’m pointing the finger at myself here. We love to gather together with others just like us to learn how to minister those who are - shocker - just like us.

If churches strive to be generationally mixed, it is important to start that way. They cannot be started with young people who are reacting to the stagnancy of older generational churches. It is not outlandish to claim that younger generations of the church become frustrated with how older generational churches function. The reasons for frustration vary. It could involve theological, philosophical, or cultural generational preferences.

But these preferences have planted certain kinds of generational churches. Some may question if a generation can have theological preferences. But I guarantee there is a young, restless, and Reformed millennial generation that has “left behind” the generations before it.

Likewise, generation X made a pivotal shift philosophically. This generation became seeker sensitive. This generation valued church growth that emphasized programs. The generation before it resisted this shift. The one coming after has seen its foibles and is running away from it as well.

Finally, the baby boomer generation withstood all of these changes. They maintained the culture that it had before generation X. It resisted the philosophical shift. A segment of this generation is delighted with the Reformed part of the young, restless and Reformed millennials. Another segment feels more threatened than ever by how this generation embraces certain aspects of culture. They dress more relaxed, have tattoos, imbibe in alcohol, and smoke pipes and cigars. This generation navigates media in a redemptive mode. All of this frightens the older generations.

Unfortunately, these fears build gospel blockades rather than bridges. From one generation’s frustration, another generation of church dies; the younger generation abandons ship and starts a younger-aged church. This has been going on for decades now. Thus, we can recognize when a church began in the mid 20th-century, the 70's and 80's, or the 90's and 2000's. You can see the predominant life-stage represented within the church as easily as you can date the architecture of the building.

Here is a major caveat. Do not read this article and think that this guy is against church planting. On the contrary, I am a church-planting intern. I wholeheartedly believe that church planting is biblical. Paul traveled the Mediterranean region starting local churches and installing men that he mentored into elder roles in those churches.

In America, there is a great need of new churches because of gospel poverty. This is not a slam against church planting. It is a caution against a certain kind of church planting; the kind of church planting that does not possess a healthy cross-section of generations. New church plants should intentionally be generationally varied. We should be alarmed when visiting a church plant and the assembly is nearly all college students - regardless of how well-meaning, doctrinally sound, and genuine the community is. Likewise, be concerned if a church plant only has young families.

Listen church planters. Develop a core group that is generationally diversified and you have hope.

Building Gospel Bridges

So how does a church plant or established church build generational bridges and develop a healthy cross-section of generations? How do they take down the gospel blockades? The only way to bridge this growing chasm between these generations is through the gospel. Here are three gospel-bridges a church can build towards having an inter-generational church.

1. Construct Inter-Generational Gospel Communities

If Colossians 3:18-4.1 and Ephesians 5:25-6.9 are examples of household codes, Titus 2:1-10 is a church code. It is a code of how multiple generations and people from varied life situations relate with one another within the church in light of the gospel. Older men, younger men, older women, and younger women should all be present in the body.

Verse 11 explicitly mentions that the gospel is “for all people.” This is not incidental. The gospel saves and unites all people in gospel community. Is this what your gospel communities look like? Have you considered creating Sunday school classes or community groups that are intentionally generationally varied?

I know this is a risky task. How can these generations with such divergent views and lifestyles function in harmonious gospel communities? They do so by the gospel. The gospel has to be the number one undergirding principle in which the community submits. We have to submit to our theology first and then build our philosophy and culture around it. That philosophy and culture should value diversity and respect authority.

Inter-generational gospel communities will add a deeper dimension to your communities. Older men and women will provide wisdom and biblical guidance in the study of Scripture. Younger men and women will infuse the gospel community with vigor and zeal to be intentional to serve both the church and the surrounding community.

2. Promote Inter-Generational Gospel Discipleship

Titus 2:3-4 indicates how older women train younger women. Does your church offer discipleship groups for younger women to learn from older women?

Likewise, similar discipleship groups could be offered for men. The book of Proverbs sets this standard. Proverbs 1:8 indicates that this book is written from the standpoint of a father to a son on living skillfully. Obviously this is the ideal. A mother should instruct her daughter and a father should instruct his son in the ways of each gender.

But guess what? Your church has first generation Christians in it. Those Christians need spiritual fathers and mothers to mentor and lead them through Scripture. My wife and I are an example of this. We are grateful for the men and women who have come alongside us during our eight years of marriage to mentor us towards the gospel and godliness.

Does your church offer inter-generational gospel discipleship? Is this a bridge your church employs to help men and women grow in the gospel and godliness?

3. Make Disciples of Multiple Generations

The gospel is for every generation. In 1 John 2, there is a gospel refreshment course for fathers, young men, and children. John says that he writes to remind them of the sin they’ve been rescued from, the enemy they’ve overcome, and the God whom they know. The gospel refreshes these generations that exist harmoniously within the church.

This is the same gospel that should be preached to multiple generations. Is your church taking intentional steps to preach this gospel to multiple generations?

There are intentional steps that a church may take to make disciples of multiple generations. Serving these people in their natural environment is an excellent way to build a gospel bridge.

To reach mature generations, do outreach to an assisted living community. Maybe there is a person there with gospel interest that needs a ride to church on Sunday. To reach young families, college-aged, and singles with the gospel, look for outreach opportunities at elementary schools, colleges, or local businesses. Help paint a school. Adopt a fraternity or sorority. Offer to do landscaping for a local business.

Allow these service bridges to become gospel bridges. As you serve these people, you are earning the opportunity to share the gospel with them. You welcome them to cross the bridge from their natural environment into your church environment. Through these relationships you make disciples of multiple generations.

Together in the Gospel

The Church has a long way to go to reconcile the generational divide within her. When generations fail to interact with one another and listen to one another, it only widens the divide. When younger generations act as exiles or evacuate from one church to start new, younger, and hipster churches, it only aggravates the situation. Young and old have to come together to build gospel bridges because the gospel reconciles all people..

Galatians 3:28 says, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” We could apply that to young and old, as well. Joel 2:28 and Acts 2:17 anticipates this. These two Scriptures give a snapshot of the Church in the last days. It will constitute of sons and daughters and young and old. All of these generations will function together to bring attention to the gospel.

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Joey Cochran served as an Associate Pastor at Fellowship Bible Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma for four years before transitioning to be the Church Planting Intern at Redeemer Fellowship in St. Charles, Illinois under the supervision of Pastor Joe Thorn. Joey is a graduate of Dallas Seminary. Joey blogs at jtcochran.com and you can follow him on Twitter at @joeycochran.

When We Intentionally Invest

  The phone call between my future church employer and my former college campus director (and character reference) went like this:

“We’re looking to hire Jason for a position in our church. Have you ever known him to be interested in working with seniors?” “Seniors in college?” “No, senior adults.” “I gotta be honest: I’ve never known Jason to be interested in working with senior adults.”  

My campus director spoke the truth. He was a horrible job reference, but he spoke the truth. I still inexplicably landed the job. I had zero experience working with senior adults and even less of a desire to pursue a position that would require me to do so for 40 hours a week. The impetus for me was ignorance; not ignorance of what I was getting myself into—though that was certainly a reality—but an acknowledgement of my ignorance about the Church.

You see, I became a Christian just before college and had no healthy understanding of church for the first 18 years of my life. Then, in college, my college campus ministry was my de facto “church.” Post-college, I lived overseas for two years where I, for all intents and purposes, didn’t even have a church that I could attend.

Fast forward to the conversation mentioned above. I was entering seminary with a future in pastoral ministry looming on the horizon. I knew that I had to work at a church while walking through my post-graduate years. My ignorance forced my hand. I had no idea how a church operated, I had no clue why it was important, I had no picture of what it looked like to be a healthy church member, and I didn’t have an inkling of what it would be like for me to exercise my spiritual gifts in a local gathering of Christians.

So when the only position open at my church was “Associate Pastor to Senior Adults” I, as a 25-year old, applied. And it was one of the best jobs I’ve ever had. In fact, my one caveat to taking the job was that I would work with the ministry to seniors for two years and then excuse myself to work with a college campus ministry for my final two seminary years. Sure enough, after two years there was an opening in college ministry, but I didn’t even think about applying.

Loving & Fighting for the Church

A funny thing happened during seminary: the more I got to know the church, the more I loved her. I had no ecclesiological background except for bashing the church and arguing against those who defended the church. I arrogantly elevated parachurch organizations above local fellowships and couldn’t be convinced otherwise, despite loving encouragement from a couple close friends.

But things changed once I committed to the relationship. Influenced by a number of theologians and authors, I stopped dating the church (Harris), committed to being a healthy church member (Anyabwile), came to understand God’s plan to display His glory through the church (Dever), saw the importance of the church in the mission of God (Keller), and developed my doctrinal understanding of the ecclesia (Clowney; Horrell). I realized that contra my individualism, Jesus was saying, “I haven’t come for only you // But for My people to pursue // And you cannot care for Me with no regard for her // If you love Me you will love the church” (Webb).

A breakthrough moment for me came when a number of my peers and younger men I was discipling started leaving the church where my wife and I were members. Some were leaving for good reasons (e.g., geography) but others for not so good reasons (e.g., music preferences). I found myself not only loving the church but also defending her. I never thought I’d be an apologist for local church membership and commitment.

Through this whole process, I felt the need for how we gather together on Sunday to be a part of the discipleship process. It was really a spur-of-the-moment epiphany for me.

A close friend of mine was sitting in my living room, complaining about various aspects of church. I was getting more and more fed up since I had been in this conversation on an average of 28.6 times a week. He elaborated: “There’s no community; you just can’t get to know people in a big church.”

“You’re wrong,” I blurted out. I’m not sure why I offered up that unsolicited evaluation for my friend, but I did so nonetheless and figured I’d just roll with it.

“Can I challenge that statement? Let’s do this: on Sunday, let’s go to church together. You can pick the service [there were three from which to choose], we’ll walk in with each other, and between the car and the sanctuary, I promise you that I’ll introduce you to 20 people by name.”

I just picked the number 20 out of the air. It was never a goal of mine to be able to complete such a feat; I wasn’t building towards knowing 20 names between my Jeep and my seat, but I felt confident in my ability to deliver. In reality, I probably could have introduced my friend to closer to 40 people.

He got the point. And the point wasn’t to impress him; the point was to instruct him. “Do you know how I came to know all of these people?” I asked. He stared back at me. “It wasn’t by coming to church late, leaving early, and refusing to get in a small group.”

Invested & Intentional in the Church

I learned a great truth through this church challenge: we desperately need to disciple people through how to go to church. In the vast catalogue of areas of life and truth transference that are needed in discipleship is simply helping someone think through what it looks like to gather together with other believers in a helpful and mature manner. I fear this is too often neglected in our relationships with younger men and younger women.

Thus, when I’m asked about the topic of discipleship in the church, I’ve found it helpful to speak of (1) Investing in Your Local Church and (2) Intentionality in Your Local Church.

First, we need to be invested in a local church. The local gathering of believers is very important. I need to be a part of a community where I can know and be known. I need to be a part of a family that will shepherd me back to health if I wander and de-fellowship me if I go off the rails.

There is a sense in which the church is a global entity (e.g., Eph 5:25), but we see it more commonly in the NT as a local gathering (e.g., 1 Cor 1:2)—the church scattered and the church gathered, as some have phrased it.

If we don’t have a healthy view of church in this local, gathered sense, how can we obey Hebrews 13:17 where we are told to obey and submit to our leaders? How will our leaders know the people for whom they will one day have to give an account? Who are the elders we are to respect in 1 Thessalonians 5:12-13? Who are the specific men considered worthy of double honor in 1 Timothy 5:17?

If we don’t have a healthy view of church in this local, gathered sense, how can we live out the model of restoration that we see in Matthew 18:15-17 where we see the church disciplining its members?

If we don’t have a healthy view of church in this local, gathered sense, how can we make sense of a passage like 1 Corinthians 5:12-13 where someone is put “out of the church?” How can someone be put out of a nebulous, global, invisible entity? They can’t.

If we don’t have a healthy view of church in this local, gathered sense, who are “those among us” that we are to go after in James 5:19-20?

Second, we need to be intentional in a local church. Three things that have been a helpful reminder for me are to do what your church does, build relationships, and create an atmosphere.

Do what your church does. I often have conversations with guys who lament, “My church just doesn’t get it! I’m the only one who wants to do _______” (fill in the blank with small groups, community groups, cell groups, missional communities, Sunday school, etc). They go to a conference, complete a training program, or read a blog post and now want to clean shop and crack some skulls at their church. Bad idea. Exist within your church’s system for spiritual growth. Even if it’s not perfect, be the most faithful and transformative person in that system. If structural, systemic changes do need to be made (as they often do), you need to be the change first.

Build relationships at your church. Get to know people above, below, and beside you. Those “above” are older, more mature Christians who can pour into your life. Make sure you find some sages to live out Titus 2 with you and invest in your growth. Those “below” you are folks that are a life-stage or two behind you. You need to be the sage in their life and live out Titus 2 with them. Those “beside” you are peers with whom you also need to be living out the “one anothers” of Scripture. Do each other good spiritually as you walk side-by-side in this mutual season of life.

Create an atmosphere at your church. You might also call this an expectation at your church. The churches I’ve encountered that seem to “do the best” (whatever that means) at discipleship are the churches for whom discipleship is a culture, atmosphere, or expectation and not the churches where it is merely a program, class, or sermon series. It should be the normal thing for Christians to gather in homes to study the Bible together. It should be normal to inquire how someone came to know Jesus or what God is doing in their life recently or what they’re praying about and/or struggling with these days.

You don’t have to get permission to start loving other church members this way and you don’t need a formalized program to see it take root. Create an atmosphere of healthy discipleship at your church and watch Jesus do some amazing things as He grows, matures, and shapes his Bride.

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Jason Seville is the Director of Emerging Leaders for Downline Ministries, Chief Editor of "Downline Builder: Customizable Curriculum for Biblical Discipleship," and a church-planting resident with Fellowship Associates.

[This originally appeared at Downline Ministries.]