Life Here and There

I love being a Pastor. I’m passionate about preaching. I am humbled that God has called me to shepherd a flock of His choosing. And I especially love the fuel that fires me up – the Word of God and what it has to say about whom I am.

One of my favorite passages on the subject is Paul’s gut-wrenching goodbye to the Epehsian elders who met him at the island port city of Miletus. It’s recorded in Acts 20:17-38. I’ve been reading it afresh today and have discovered a pattern of ministry I hadn’t spotted before…

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This is the second Sunday in a row that we’ve cancelled services at Bethel. Last week the choice to do so was obvious – everybody in town cancelled. This week, we cancelled because our parking lot was a solid sheet of ice. Canceling the second week in a row was a tougher choice – one that has bummed me out today.

I really miss my church family, and being away from everybody two weeks in a row feels like six months. I also really miss preaching. I’m beginning 1 Samuel in our journey through the Bible and have been anxious to preach this first message about how God remembered Hannah in giving Samuel to her. There’s an amazing meaning behind that word “remembered” and it pops up multiple times in Scripture.

Study that word to see how God purposely involves Himself in our affairs, and stay tuned – I’ll write about it as soon as I preach the message next week. The sermon may be three times as long – I feel like I’m on fire in a pressure cooker – ready to explode! I can’t wait till next Sunday!

Last night in our midweek Bible study, as I was stumbling around the book of 1 Corinthians, a conversation / discussion erupted. Actually several did. We somehow wound up on the issues of people receiving “revelations” and the doctrine of baptismal regeneration (being baptized as a part of being born again).

I’m not writing to address either of those questions here (though I’ll tell you I’m wary of anyone with a “revelation” and don’t believe baptism is part of the new birth). I’m writing instead to challenge you as a Pastor, leader, writer, influencer, or whatever else you might be, to tackle the tough questions instead of avoiding them.

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Every time I stand up to preach, I have the privilege of watching God’s living word accomplish dynamic things in the lives of people. In 1 Thessalonians, Paul spells out three distinct functions that the Word of God performs in our lives…

As you know how we exhorted and comforted and charged every one of you, as a father does his children.
~ 1 Thessalonians 2:11

Now watch this…

To “exhort” is to BUILD UP people.

To “comfort” is to HOLD UP people.

To “charge” is to FIRE UP people.

I don’t know about you, but I need all three of those in my life every single day I need to be built up because I crumble on my own. So Word of God… exhort me. I need to be held up because I falter on my own, so Word of God… comfort me. I need to be fired up because I flicker out on my own. So Word of God… charge me.

And every time I preach, counsel, advise, or encourage, let me do these three things in the lives of others.

My favorite classes at Western Kentucky University weren’t the Religious Studies courses (my major), or even the History courses (my minor). My favorite classes were in the area of speech and professional communication (what I wish had been my major). I grew up super-shy like almost every other Pastor I know, but have grown to love speaking to crowds of people. I’m a student of public speaking, in fact.

But when I enter the pulpit to preach on Sundays, something is different. It’s more than a speech somehow. I think there are several factors that cause this to be reality.

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Disclaimer: I’m biased.

I see two ways to staying fresh and relevant in the pulpit. I like one way, the other annoys me. You might disagree (you can be wrong if you want to be), but I think one hundred years from now we’ll see the importance of this issue.

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I know, it’s been a long time coming, but we’re finally and officially podcasting our weekend messages at Bethel. We’re listed in the iTunes Store directory or you can just use this link. Help us spread the word around northwest Arkansas… or maybe the whole world?

You can’t undervalue truth and content in a message, but you can fail to drive it home if you can’t translate it. consider this thought from Making a Difference in Preaching: Haddon Robinson on Biblical Preaching…

Spurgeon was right: the people in the marketplace cannot learn the language of the academy, so the people in the academy must learn the language of the marketplace. It’s the pastor’s job to translate…

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No, this is not a post about the loss of our religious freedom – it’s a reflection on a quote I’ve looked at many times since I first wrote it down about nine years ago at a conference on preaching…

If you think the gathering of biblical facts and standing up with a Bible in your hand will automatically equip you to communicate well, you are desperately mistaken. It will not. You must work at being interesting. Boredom is a gross violation, being dull is a grave offense, and irrelevance is a disgrace to the gospel. Too often these three crimes go unpunished and we preachers are the criminals. ~ Charles Swindoll

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Pastors have a bad habit of forgetting that we are ultimately communicators. We fall into the pattern of preaching and presenting God’s Word the way we always have, or the way other preachers always have. That’s why we get made fun of! That’s also one of the reasons people don’t listen to us.

In addition to studying God’s Word deeply and serving people all week, we also need to become students of the arts of persuasion, communication, and public speaking. If you can’t connect with the audience on Sunday, you’re already facing a major growth roadblock in your own ministry and in your church’s ability to reach your community.

I wanted to pass on this link to one of my favorite sources of inspiration concerning the art of public speaking. It’s really a condensing of multiple links, all of which are valuable. Check out Best Public Speaking Tips and Techniques: Weekly Review [2009-03-14] and subscribe to their rss feed. And don’t stop being a student of communication – that’s what preaching is all about.