Category: Exploring Church Ministry Blog

Put Yourself Out There

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Exploring Church Ministry BlogLeave a comment
 
 
“I can’t offer the Lord my God a sacrifice that I got for nothing.” (2 Samuel 24:24).
 
            This seems to be one of those “lost” verses of the Bible.  No one really wants to sacrifice.  Anybody who has been around church for any length of time knows that the church is all for change – that is, everyone else should change to conform to the way we are already doing things.  People are not looking to change themselves – to offer God a sacrifice that is costly.  In fact, we want pastors and church leaders who will offer change with a minimal sacrifice on our part.  We want assurances and certainties that there will be changes made that will not disturb us, but will affect others.  After all, it’s the world that’s going to hell, not us.  They are the ones who need to change, not us, right!?
 
            Um, wrong.  Jesus did not die on the cross so that we could avoid the cost of discipleship.  The Holy Spirit was not given to us in order to fulfill all our ideas of how church and life should operate.  No, we are called to a radical life of following Jesus in a sacrificial life.  Taking up our crosses and following Jesus daily does not mean that we are suffering through media bias, or have to put up with mediocre preaching and/or pastoral care.  It means that there are demands on our lives as Christians to live sacrificially, giving our very lives for the sake of Jesus. 
 
            Let’s face it.  Living the Christian life and committing ourselves to a life of following Christ is dangerous business.  Following God got Daniel in the lions’ den; Isaac on the altar; and, Paul at the end of a whole lot of stones being thrown.  But we have no record of Daniel, Abraham, or Paul whining about how hard it all was; or, how much they would have to give up to actually change and live for God.  In fact, we get just the opposite:  “Christ has shown me that what I once thought was valuable is worthless.  Nothing is as wonderful as knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.  I have given up everything and count it all as garbage” (Philippians 3:7-8).
 
            Let’s be honest with ourselves:  We don’t put ourselves out there and live for God with complete abandon because we are afraid, risk-averse, and just do not consider it worth committing to some church thing that may or may not pan-out for me.  What we need to hear, and what we want to hear, are often two very different things.  When parishioners simply look to pastors and leaders for easy answers and simple solutions to the complex challenges of our world, the church ends up with dysfunction.  If our concept of leadership is expecting a pastor, elder, or ministry leader to solve problems with no ramifications for ourselves, then it ought to be no surprise when churches do nothing but routine management instead of boldly reaching others with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
 
            I’m not delusional.  I get it that congregations rarely hire pastors to disturb their lives.  Members expect that pastors will use their authority to provide them with right answers, and not to confront them with the need for growth, change, and completely wrapping their entire lives around the person and work of Jesus.  But the work of ministry demands disturbing people – just doing so at a rate they can absorb.  Even then, after all has been done with discernment and love, it could still all implode like a house of cards.  After all, Jesus was perfect and he ended up being killed by people who could not absorb the life he was calling them to live.
 

 

            So, you and I have a decision to make.  Will we be the kind of leaders that shrink from the rigors of ministry, fearing what people will think of us?  Or, will we be leaders who embrace the good news of Jesus and seek to orient all of church ministry around Father, Son, and Spirit?  Put yourself out there.  For we all really play to an audience of One.

Good Grief

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Exploring Church Ministry BlogLeave a comment
 
 
            Sometimes we just need permission to grieve.  In the evangelical church today it is sometimes looked down upon to grieve since we know the reality of heaven.  This is both unfortunate and unbiblical.  Bereavement is Scripture is a reality and recognized as an important part of coming to grips with death.  Far from stuffing his feelings, the Old Testament character David personally expressed his grief and agony over the death of his best friend, Jonathan.
 
            The final chapter of the book of 1 Samuel is the account of a decisive battle in which the Philistines defeated the Israelites.  As a result, both King Saul and his son Jonathan were killed.  Jonathan and David were close – so close that their relationship was as if they were one soul, not two.  So, to have his friend no longer with him was a great loss to David.  The beginning of the book 2 Samuel tells us of David’s response to the news that his friend was gone:  he lamented the loss.  To lament means to have a deep and passionate expression of sorrow over a significant loss.
 
            Here are a few observations about David’s lament (2 Samuel 1:17-27):  it was not only personal, but was voiced publicly, meaning that others were invited to grieve along with him; it affirmed the tragedy of death and its deep impact upon us; it focused on remembering the positive characteristics of the deceased; and, it was verbalized with heartfelt thoughts and emotions.
 
            Grief and lament is as individual as a fingerprint; there is not a fixed process to a person’s bereavement.  Therefore we cannot pigeon-hole ourselves or someone else to fit a certain way of grieving.  But no matter how we grieve, we must do it so that we come to a point of making sense how to live without the person’s presence and relationship.  David was close to the Lord, and God’s presence was the most decisive factor in helping him move on to the demands of serving others as their new king.
 
            There are times when we simply feel stuck.  Not much seems to be happening and nothing apparently makes any difference.  Oftentimes, at the root of such feelings, is some unrecognized and/or unresolved grief underneath.  It causes us to respond to life as if we were moving in slow motion.  There is no quick and easy solution to the reality of a loss; it must be acknowledged and worked-through with some attention and care.  If not, it will inevitably lead to problems down the road, and end-up causing emotional breakdowns over the smallest of issues.
 
            So, let’s take our cues from David.  Let’s do the good work of lamenting losses and grieving significant changes of life.  Otherwise, we will only run into each other in the church like uncaring zombies and avoid the truly important things which God has for us as his people. 
 

 

            May you know the comfort and grace of God today through his encouraging Word, his comforting Spirit, and his compassionate people as you do the good and important work of grieving your losses.

A Christian View of the Body

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Exploring Church Ministry BlogLeave a comment
“Don’t you realize that your body is a sacred place, the place of the Holy Spirit? Don’t you see that you can’t live however you please, squandering what God paid such a high price for? The physical part of you is not some piece of property belonging to the spiritual part of you. God owns the whole works. So let people see God in and through your body” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20, The Message).
 
           

 

 
            You probably already know you should lose weight, or stop smoking, or get in shape, or have better sleep hygiene, and generally take much better care of your body.  I am not here to add to the burden.  Rather, I am here to bring out a very important point:  Our bodies are the vehicle given to us to glorify God.  In other words, our spirituality is really quite embodied.
 
            One of the reasons we fail our bodies is that we do not always make the biblical connection of seeing our physical selves as important as other things – as if care of the body is somehow optional to the Christian life.  The major reason Paul brought up a discussion about the body was because Corinth was a Greek city thoroughly imbibed with a Platonic philosophy of life.  At the core of Plato’s view of humanity was that the immaterial and the spiritual were of higher value than the body.  For Plato, the body is a necessary evil.  He referred to our souls being imprisoned within the flesh.  When we die the soul is released and is freed from its bodily jail.
 
            Western civilization has been significantly influenced, even today, by Plato’s view of humanity.  But that is not the biblical view of the body.  Instead of being a prison, the body is a temple, a sacred place which is no better or no worse than the soul.  When we die, Paul made it clear to the Corinthians at the end of his letter to them that we will not be disembodied souls, but will experience a bodily resurrection at the end of the age.  Eternity will be spent existing in a renewed body free from sin, but nonetheless a real body.
 
            If it is true that the body is sacred, and that we cannot glorify God apart from our bodies, then it is of great spiritual importance that we steward our bodies just like we would steward any other physical material possession we own.  We have bought into Platonic philosophy, for example, when we treat our cars better than we treat our bodies.  If a warning light comes on in our cars, we get it checked out by the mechanic.  He fixes the problem and tells us what we need to do to prevent it from happening again, and we listen to him.  But when warning lights go off in our bodies, we ignore them until our bodies literally break down and we have to go to the doctor.  And even then, the doctor tells us to do something, and we don’t do it.  We do not even think of ignoring the advice of our mechanic, and yet we do it with our doctor.  Why in the world would we do that?  We function in such a wrongheaded way because we need to listen carefully to the biblical wisdom that we glorify God on this earth through using our bodies. 
 
            If we do not have time or priority for sleep, exercise, and eating well, then we do not have time for God because God has given us our bodies and he expects us to care for them and use them well.  I look at my body the same way I look at borrowing something from another person:  I return it in the best condition I can.  When God takes me home someday, I don’t want it to be because I did not take care of my body and hastened my own death.
 
            People often give up on their best laid plans for physical health because it is disconnected from the rest of their lives.  What I am insisting is that care of the body is as important as anything we do in the spiritual realm because our bodies belong to God.  The church, rather than ignoring proper care of the body, really ought to be at the forefront of promoting physical fitness and health by stopping the insanity of bifurcating body and soul. 
 

 

            I am not my own, but belong – body and soul, in life and in death – to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ.  We are holistic beings, created by God to glorify him in the church and the world.  Let’s uphold this by taking care to be responsible with how we treat and use our bodies.  After all, it is a spiritual issue.

Facing Transitions

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Exploring Church Ministry BlogLeave a comment
 
 
            Life has its seasons.  The journey from childhood to teenager, from adult to spouse, from parent to empty-nester, from caregiver to being cared-for, are all just a sampling of the different seasons of life that people travel through.  Each period of life has its own joys and sorrows, rewards and regrets.  But the really difficult trick is moving from one season to the next.  Transitions imply change – every time.  These transitions are things everyone experiences, and some are more difficult for us than others.  But if there ever were sure events of life, transitions are it.  So, we must learn to navigate them with some attention and care.
 
            At the time of this writing, I am in the process of moving my youngest daughter to a new job and new adventure in a new city for her.  It is all good stuff.  But it is a transition.  And it is not particularly easy.  But I am committed to not simply move on with life as if there were no challenge to it.  Her leaving marks a new era in the lives of me and my wife (who will certainly find this transition more than challenging!). 
 
            Churches also face the challenge of transitions because they inevitably go through cycles of change.  To try and never change is to forsake the sheer reality that congregations have their own life experience of birth, growth, change, maturity, decline, and eventually death.  None of the churches mentioned in the New Testament of the Bible still exist.  It does not necessarily mean they did anything wrong or unwise; they just underwent a particular life journey, experienced a full range of Christian life and service to their people and communities – then they passed away.  But just as we, in some ways, live forever through the ongoing generations of our progeny, so churches never really die in the sense that they live on in the many people who came to Christ, grew in spiritual maturity, and multiply by proclaiming the good news of Jesus to others.
 
            Since life transitions are highly significant, here are some ways to approach them when they occur:
 
—It is a new opportunity to be in a different role.  When a child leaves for college, the parental role is changed to become an adult peer and even a friend.  Yes, in one sense parenting never ends; but in another sense it just shifts to being a faithful mentor and example like never before.  When a church member or family leaves a congregation, the relationship is changed.  People leave for all kinds of reasons, but the relationship should be kept open to respond to them as the universal Body of Christ.
 
–It is okay to bawl and be sad.  Grief attaches itself to any significant change or loss, and not only to bereavement.  It is both normal and necessary to experience the passing of a season of life that you will never have again.  It is also appropriate to celebrate and remember a job well done in raising a well-adjusted person who is becoming an important contribution to society.  Go ahead, pat yourself on the back.  It’s okay.  It is also okay to remember and celebrate church ministries that have had their day, but are no longer viable.  Give them a decent remembrance so that you can move on to the new thing God is doing.
 
–It is important to connect with others who have been through it.  Everyone goes through transitions.  But not everyone has done it well.  Seek out and find those persons for whom you see a successful and fruitful transition from one season of life to another.  As it pertains to churches, they almost always need help from those outside the congregation to transition well into a new phase of ministry.  Let it happen by purposely seeking out wise people who have been through it.
 
–It is finally now your chance to pursue God’s unique calling.  That ministry, job, or education which has been set on the back burner for so long now has the chance to come to the fore in your life.  Embrace the new beginning that God has been stirring in you for a while to come out and have its day.
 

 

            I am not communicating as any sort of expert on the subject of transitions.  I just have had to experience a good many of them in my life, and have learned a few things along the way.  But I am still discovering along with everyone else.  And each transition is new and different than all the others before it.  I am not sure yet what God has for me with my daughter’s transition.  But I do know that I am entering a new season which is full of fresh possibilities.  May you discover yours, as well.