Life Here and There

Our church votes on things. I’m not seriously calling for the abolition of voting among churches, just a severe reduction in the practice. I’m a strong believer in the autonomy of the local church, but I’m the first to admit, I don’t like Baptist “business.”

I was once the Pastor of a church in central Arkansas that had battled years of political scheming and the resulting resentment. We once moved an old metal desk out of the auditorium into a side room and I got in huge trouble because the moving of the desk wasn’t voted on! On the basis of this and dozens of other frustrating experiences, here are some reasons I think we should vote not to vote on so much stuff…

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I love church planters and I love cutting edge, innovative ministry. I’m encouraged by the growth of a kind of Christianity that calls us back to the New Testament model of worship and ministry as we head into the turbulent waters of this next decade. But I’m concerned with what I perceive sometimes to be youthful arrogance, and this concern includes myself.

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What do you do when your church on a hill is snowed in? You gather a congregation and have church at home. Our congregation was quite diverse today including elephants, cats, a dog, a kid (there was no separate children’s church offered) and even a duck.

Ella played “O Come Let Us Adore Him” and “We Fall Down” on the piano and I “preached” from Philippians 3:14. Angie led a prayer and Beau was supposed to take up the offering, but refused at the last minute (he needs to re-dedicate His life…).

Can’t wait to be back with the Bethel family, but it sure was sweet to worship with my own little household church today!

Yesterday, our church family blessed us (yet again) with a wonderful luncheon for Pastor Appreciation month. I’m honored!! I often stand before our congregation and tell them I’d do what I do for free (of course, I don’t mind that they don’t take me up on that) because of the joy it brings. They really make it easy in many respects to be their Pastor. Let me tell you some ways this is true…

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I shared this message in revival last night and wanted to pass it along here…

Acts chapter 2 is a controversial chapter. Christians like to go there to argue about when the Holy Spirit arrived, whether we can duplicate the miracle of speaking in tongues, and whether this was the “baptism” Jesus talked about. But I think God’s focus is on the end of the chapter, in verses 41 and 47, where thousands of souls were being saved and lives changed.

In verse 41, the Day of Pentecost concludes with 3,000 souls being saved and added to the church. Verse 47 tells us that God kept doing this daily, but verse 42 is the bridge that connects the two. It simply says, “and they continued…” That phrase never really hit me before but it did this week. What’s the difference between having one big day (that soon passes) and having a series of big days? Continuing! Going on like the Energizer bunny!

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I’ve owned the domain ministrysitehosting.com for a year or so and have done nothing with it. The other day, a friend of mine (Chris Price) suggested I do some kind of post about how churches can get started with a web presence. Instead, I decided to use this domain to open a single page web site to offer some basic information. I’d like to add to it and tweak it to be as helpful as possible, but for now, meet ministrysitehosting.com and by all means, spread the word.

I had an interesting conversation with a member of our church last night who compared going to church on Sunday to eating a meal out at a restaurant. You get served and fed. Somebody else prepares the meal and puts in all the labor to serve it up fresh and hot. You converse and relax and enjoy the meal, then you leave while someone else cleans up after you. You even leave a tip.

She then went on to observe that eating out is okay, but not for every meal. There’s a lot to be said for the preparation and the work involved in feeding yourself a meal at home.

Going to church is easy. It’s essential to God’s plan for your life. Preaching is something God intends for you to enjoy on a regular basis, and from Chrysostom to Criswell, it’s been the backbone of healthy Christianity in every age. But the real work, and therefore the real blessing, comes from the work you invest in your prayer closet, at home, with the raw ingredients of prayer and God’s Word.

When was the last time you cooked at home?

photo credit: eschipul

Perry Noble really made me think this morning about the question, “what if?”… and a few other questions too.

What image comes to your mind when you think of the word “missions?” I think there are several that are fairly prominent – an old guy in a fat tie with a boring voice and a slide projector, a massive organization or denomination spending millions of dollars per year orchestrating global outreach, or just any humanitarian effort anywhere by anyone.

For me, there are two ways to define “missions.” One is the lifestyle every Christian ought to have of sharing Christ with others as God opens opportunities. In this sense, we’re to live our lives “on mission” with a sensitivity to God’s leading each and every moment as to where He would have us to speak well about Him next.

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Social media. What in the world is it? Well, think about it. “Social” has to do with people who converse, gather, and relate to each other. “Media” is any platform for spreading any message. Mass media is speaking to the masses through radio, television, etc. Print media is magazines, newspapers, and other printed periodicals. Social media, then, is promoting a message through people, and the phrase is typically used in reference to online media outlets.

I’m a firm believer that the rise of social media is a revolutionary moment for the church’s ministry. We’ll either embrace it (as we did print media and mass media) or we’ll begin to fade (as perhaps we are already doing). John Saddington runs a couple of great blogs and wrote a pertinent article related to why churches don’t “get” social media.

Before you read it, know that I don’t always get it either. I’ve learned a few tough lessons recently, and find it hard to keep up at times, but I’m determined to be a student of a movement that absolutely must be embraced and studied by thinkers and leaders in the kingdom today.