Flavorite Sins

This from an article on the Preaching Today blog, April 2, 2007:

At the 2007 National Pastors Convention in San Diego, editorial advisor John Ortberg gave a list of what he regards as the Ten Deadly Sins of the Preacher. Here they are:

1. The temptation to be inauthentic
2. The temptation to live for recognition
3. The temptation to live in fear
4. The temptation to compare myself to others
5. The temptation to exaggerate and plagiarize
6. The temptation to live with a chronic sense of inadequacy
7. The temptation to be proud
8. The temptation to manipulate people
9. The temptation to envy
10. The temptation to anger

Quite frankly, I can see myself in a few of those, but not all. It has nothing to do with maturity, just has to do with my particular flavor preference of sin. Comparing myself and inadequacy are the 2 that resonate the most with me. I know who I am in Christ, I know what I have in Christ, I know it's only Christ, and not me..and yet...

I live with a constant "need" to impress people. A pat on the back, a good word, a smile and wink from my wife, I hunger that feedback from people telling me I am doing ok. I can find feedback even in the looks people give. Their eyes tell the whole story, or at least I think they do. I am a people pleaser.

In truth, I have almost always known that, and because of that, I've worked (ing) through it. I know what I really "need." It's the reminder in my heart, not just my ears and head, but in my heart, that one day, I'll look Christ in the face. My longing must be, and most of the time is, that as He says hello, His eyes will say, "I'm proud of you."

Church Planting Video

I like this video, but quite frankly, I have a serious chance of never being able to find it again. Thus, here it is.

Interesting Article - Do We Praise too Soon?

Quite Frankly, this article has been eating me up. I can't shake it, mostly because, I don't know what it looks like with cloths on...but I think there are some very valid points to it.

Praise That's Premature?
Do we praise too soon?
by Shane Hipps

I scanned the congregation as we finished our third song extolling the wonders of God and our joy for all God has done. As we started the fourth song with the same spirit of energetic celebration, I glimpsed a friend, sitting in the back, who had told me that week that his wife had cheated on him and wanted a divorce.

At that moment the lyrics kicked in, and we started singing joyful thanks for God's abundant blessings. The words I was singing suddenly felt forced, false, and even mocking. I had to spend the rest of the song looking away from my friend, who stood with his mouth shut, staring out the window.

After the service I approached him and said, "I was thinking about you the entire service; it must have been painful sitting through some of the songs."

"Yeah," he said. "I'm not sure this is a good time for me to attend church. It is painful to observe celebration and not be able to join. It accentuates my loneliness."

I left thinking there was something very wrong with this situation.

Worship is often equated with joy and celebration. It's a kind of pep rally to inspire thanksgiving and excitement about who God is. While this is a legitimate aspect of worship, it is incomplete.

This comes into full relief when we consider the experience of my friend and even more so when we read the book of Psalms as a record of ancient worship and a rich resource for our worship today.

An important pattern in the psalms is that they repeatedly employ a narrative arc, a movement from grief and lamentation to celebration and joy. This pattern is strikingly absent in many worship services today. We tend to deny our suffering in favor of celebration.

Perhaps this is because we mistakenly believe that to acknowledge suffering might mean we are ungrateful or lacking in faith. More likely it is because grief is an inefficient and unpleasant emotion that conflicts with the efficient and entertaining biases of today's culture.

This repression of our heaviest emotions is tragic, and over time it leads to an inauthentic and unhealthy spiritual life.

Authenticity and integrity in worship means expressing both lament and praise. Each element completes the other. Without lament, praise is little more than shallow sentimentality and a denial of life's struggles and sin. Without praise, lament is a denial of hope and grace, both of which are central to our life of faith and to God's promises.

To value one over the other is like suggesting that breathing in is more important than breathing out.

This is not only an issue of authenticity and integrity. It cuts to the heart of hospitality and pastoral sensitivity. For those coming to a worship service immersed in pain, celebratory praise takes on a mocking tone that excludes them. They are unable to join honestly in these choruses.

By incorporating expressions of sorrow, pain, and grief into our worship, as the psalms do, the hurting are ushered into God's presence with honesty. At the same time, the rest of the congregation is reminded of the suffering community gathered in their midst. They are invited to weep with those who are weeping. By honoring their pain, we acknowledge those who are suffering and affirm them in their grief.

Yet worship is not complete without turning to praise. When pain has been acknowledged, those who suffer are invited beyond their pain to consider God's faithfulness in the midst of suffering and even to rejoice with those who are rejoicing.

These opportunities for lament and praise are not simply about meeting personal needs. They are missional practices of authenticity, hospitality, and pastoral care.

Copyright © 2007 by the author or Christianity Today International/Leadership Journal.
Spring 2007, Vol. XXVIII, No. 2, Page 64

Discovery in James

Working through James 1 for Bible Study actually taught me something I just plain didn't know before. Not that that should surprise me, but quite frankly, it did. I thought I had James 1 nailed!

Ok, the obvious, we are told to have pure joy when we meet temptations (meet isn't search out and find, but when it finds us, like the robbers who found the man traveling, and left him in the road for dead). Here's the question... HOW?!?!

Well, verses 2 - 4 tell us that we can be joyful because at the end of the trial there is a benefit - completion, maturity, perfection. If we have the right view, if we keep things in perspective, if we live with real integrity (the idea of a one track mind), we can be joyful through the trials, because we know what's at the end.

Fine and good, and a great spiritual thought, a wonderful Christian answer, the right answer, the easy (not simple) answer that I have used and clung to in life... but a pat answer at best. Because the real help in all of this comes next.

If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. - James 1:5-8

Why would James put that next? Is he just tossing out ideas left and right, kinda "proverbing" if you will? Nope.

The only way we can maintain our joy in the midst of trials is by seeing the end, and the only way to see the end is to ask for and receive the wisdom of God, which is totally opposite of the wisdom of this world.

In this world, the current trial would be all that mattered, as we live in the now, and we would do everything we possibly could do to make the pain stop, to feel better. And that's why alcoholism, drug abuse, porno addictions, prostitution and a myriad of other vices exist. We want out NOW. That is a direct result of our world view being now-centered.

The wisdom of God is needed in order to be then-centered, Him-centered. And that wisdom is there for the asking. And when He gives it to you, He gives it without reproach, without finding fault with us, without rubbing it in that we should have asked earlier, without mocking the snot out of us. He simply gives it, because He knows we need it, and it brings Him joy when we have it.

Now, if I could only be smart enough to ask for it.

Father's Day

As I sit in the shore house, with everyone else in bed (shocking that I am the only one up!!), I'm trying to wrap my head around some things. Mainly, what I did to deserve good kids.

From Luke telling Papa how great a dad I am, to Audrey thinking I am big enough to lift her to the sky so she can touch the clouds, to Jordan saying the only thing he wanted this morning was to spend time with me, to Amber telling me yesterday I am the greatest dad (mostly because I just bought her the biggest, ugliest, dangliest earrings ever seen by man's eyes), I am distraught by it all.

On one hand I want my kids to love me, to idolize me, to follow after me, but quite frankly, the other hand is rather strong...it's ME they are loving, idolizing and following...that scares the crap out of me.

I want to love my kids the way I should, to provide for them, to teach them. I want them to pass by me, and not get stuck trying to follow me. I want them see God in the right way... and to think I can screw this all up...

And yet, somehow, I haven't. I have Jordan, who wins a Christian character award; Amber, who is figuring bigger and bigger things out as she reads her Bible; Luke, who loves to pray, because he knows who he is talking to, and Audrey, who loves playing with me...no matter how crabby she is.

Reading 2 John 6 this morning,

And this is love, that we walk according to his commandments; this is the commandment, just as you have heard from the beginning, so that you should walk in it.

So, the honest truth is, as I love my God, as I learn to love Him more, I am loving my kids. That's what has made my parenting so "successful"... or who.

Cause it sure ain't me.

Am I overwhelmed?

So, yesterday, Eph 5 was the topic of our Singles ABF...it was also our 12th anniversary. I was reminded, quite frankly, of how selfish I can be, especially when I am reminded in that chapter not of Stephanie's job and responsibilities, but of the incredibly high calling of a husband... to love as Christ loved the church, and gave himself for it. (5.25) Yeah, that's easy. Deny myself completely, and live for Stephanie. Sounds like a great chick flick, but a tough life.

That is, of course, if I am living selfishly. The over-arching theme presented before the roles of marriage is that believers are to submit to each other, to be low, to not think on our own things, to be concerned with the good of others, and do that like we are serving Christ as we do it, because we are.

And the only way I can succeed in doing that? When the one controlling factor in my life is God, not wine, not feelings, not desires, but God. Being controlled by the outside influences fills my life with treachery and selfishness. Filling my life with God and God alone fills my life with songs and thankfulness, and an ability to joyfully serve those around me, including the wonderful gift of a wife I have been given.

I know Him, I name Him, I claim Him, I love Him...

I just need to be overwhelmed by Him.

Employment

So, it's time to work again. I have piles of paper covering my desk, my coffee pot is crying out to me to start it up, my emails are screaming for attention, and the little red light on my phone is reminding me of the perhaps dozens of people I need to call back today. I haven't looked at my calendar to see what has been added since I left yesterday, there are people walking by my office, almost like vultures, looking ready to dive in at any time. Quite frankly, I don't want to be here today.

I'd much rather be sleeping, lounging, golfing, hunting... I would actually even rather just be reading for the sake of reading, instead of digging out of the minutia. However, this morning, God slapped me around a bit with His Word. Great...that's what I needed, right? He used Psalm 84.10 to make me stop and think about what I am doing...

Psalm 84.10 I would rather be a gatekeeper in the house of my God than live the good life in the homes of the wicked.

The thing that jumped at me wasn't that I "serve in the house of my God," although I could argue I do. It was the Psalmist attitude of complete gratefulness for being used at all. The privilege, the blessing, the honor of being able to be anywhere near Him, that my service to Him wouldn't make him sick, that it would somehow be accepted.... I should be unemployed.

To the piles I go, after the coffee is done...

The Appearance of Wealth

So, we just made it through another National Leadership Conference. I found it hilarious that these guys from all of these ministries came to the conference to "learn." At times, I felt that many of the guys came to be learned from, as if they were the ones to be listened to.

Quite frankly, I found myself becoming very agitated with some of them, even referring to one as "that needy little man." Didn't they know they were here as listeners, as ones who needed to be refined and not ones to be doing the refining?

Thankfully, God's grace is constantly refreshing and constantly at work, as He used even "that needy little man" to point out a glaring deficiency in my character. I have found an incredible sense of pride and arrogance in my heart, a feeling of knowing it all, or at least being good friends with those who do know it all.

I was challenged to love my fellow man, pray for those men who are, quite honestly, out there on their own slaving away for Christ. I was challenged to be thankful for the gift it is to work at this church, surrounded by other men who are serving Him, who often willingly sacrifice their ideas to listen to some moronic idea from this poor man...

I need to fully recognize my standing...I need to own up to who I am...I need to be thankful for Him even hearing me. I am but a poor, poor man.

This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. Psalm 34.6