No Spectators Allowed

Chuck Swindoll once described American Christianity as the equivalent of a stadium filled with fans watching two professional sports teams play on the field below. “On the field are twenty-two men badly in need of rest, surrounded by fifty-thousand fans badly in need of exercise.” That imagery stems from a common myth that floats around many churches. It goes something like this: “the real work of ministry is done by the professionals. The rest of us are spectators.” Truth is, God doesn't want fans; He wants teammates actively involved on the field of play.

It’s a common temptation in many churches to conclude that the pastors and paid staff do the lion’s share of the work, and that the congregation is just the recipients or the spectators watching like a studio audience. The average person in the auditorium, according to this myth, is nothing more than the “water boy” who helps the team by ferrying supplies to the pros who are on the field sweating it out. This is a grand misconception, because this is not how God designed the church to operate. God wants all of us sharing and contributing and serving and discovering all the ways and outlets that our presence, gifts, strengths, etc. can be a useful tool for the work of ministry—and ultimately, the building of the Kingdom of God.

One of the things I LOVE about growth groups is that we attack that myth. We slice it and dice it. When all the members are sharing the responsibilities of a group’s welfare, we’re attacking it. When group members identify their passions and strengths and gifts to serve, we are skewering it. When members decide they want to undertake the role of becoming a leader because God is directing them that way, we are killing that myth. We are living out the way God has called us to live by actively engaging and contributing to each other’s spiritual growth and development.

Martin Luther exploded the Christian world in the sixteenth century with a radical new notion derived from the scriptures called the “priesthood of all believers”. I say radical and new because up to that time, people hadn’t seen this truth in scriptures (partly because it was only in Latin and most people couldn’t read, but that's besides the point).

What he meant was that every single follower of Christ was a priest (or priestess) of the King of Kings. What’s a priest do? Act as a go-between with God and man, communicating to each other the desires and wishes of the other. As we serve, engage, and share with our culture (our neighbors, family, friends, co-workers, etc) the good news of Jesus and a life lived in surrender to Him, we are acting as priests, representing the truth of Jesus to people who need Him most. Jesus is the chief priest, of course, acting as THE mediator between God and man. But we are partners in the process of spreading that opportunity to others.

We follow in the tradition of this principle today as we recognize that at the foot of the cross, we are all equal in God’s eyes. There are no second class citizens in the Kingdom of God. Every one of us has been bought with the same blood of Christ through his death.

Not only that, God has gifted each of us with some kind of gift or talent to bless and love other people around us. Whether some of us have five talents, ten talents, or just one or two, the point is that we are to use them. They are a blessing from God, and are meant to be used to bless others. When we discover and serve in them, we receive a strong sense of fulfillment through the glory of God by doing what He’s designed us to do. There’s great spiritual symmetry when we are surrendered to God and serving others in love.

Keep in mind, it’s only when the entire body is actively serving that the body of Christ is completely healthy. If only part of the body is working properly, the rest of the body feels the effect of it. This is why it’s so important to bring up this principle, and encourage as much as possible a fuller involvement by every member in your group, because the vitality and healthy of your group and our church depend on it.

Where is God at work?

What a powerful question. It raises eyebrows, begins the internal scan around the soul or the quick survey around the ministry. It can be a great reflective question to sit with and ask Him to reveal it to you. It even formed the basis of a book called Encountering God.

The goal of the question is to see where He is at work around you, celebrate that in delight, and possibly join Him in partnership. The beauty of it is that it’s a creative and flexible approach to evaluating oneself, because like beauty, it’s in the eye of the beholder. Nobody may see what you see, and could level the same kind of conclusion you make. But you see it, and you rejoice.

Sometimes, He’s moving mountains and shaking foundations, like Elijah at Mt Carmel or Samson in the great temple at Dagon. Big stuff: earth-shaking, highly visible, public and life-defining for many.

But other times, He’s the gentle whisper in the wind, speaking tenderly and quietly through the moments. Nobody else notices or gives pause. But you do.

There are so many areas in our lives for God to move in, that any time He makes a move, we’re glad and appreciative. Like an old eighteenth century farmhouse badly in need of repairs, our hearts and souls crave the continual work of the Spirit in molding and making us more like Jesus Christ. And not only for us – we love hearing Him at work in others, and celebrate vicariously with them.

I greatly enjoyed hearing someone recently tell me where they saw God at work around them. They shared how as this person was praying, he had the strong sense that God was especially listening to him while he poured out his heart to Him at that moment. He’s never experienced that before. It was a highlight of his week. I was overjoyed to hear that.

I did some reflection last night, and here are a few noteworthy moments that were special for me.

• During a recent spiritual direction session last week, I had a great moment with a directee as we discussed God’s great love for us. I sensed the Spirit was using this to speak deeply to them in very intimate ways. It was a powerful and rewarding time for me.

• On Monday night, as I taught at Conversations, God was at work in us in the room as we reckoned with the state of our desires, and had some profound moments with that. It was rewarding to see God use me in that way.

• On Wednesday night, as I successfully said ‘no’ a couple of times to my daughter’s delicious chocolate brownies because I am forgoing desserts late at night. The Holy Spirit helped me say no, because there’s no way on God’s great earth I could say no to her brownies on a normal night. God was giving me a strength of will that was surrendered to Him.

Where is God at work in you? Where might He be at work in your group? What do you see in people now that you might not have a few months ago? Where is Jesus peeking through the cracks in their life?

Just remember - It's not always in the places or moments or ways we're expecting. In fact, I've said before that:

“People miss opportunities to see God do amazing things because it comes dressed in awkwardness and looks like a crisis, resistance or insecurity.”

Don't be afraid to look. And be a man or woman of courage and bravery once you do. I want to encourage you to ask God to reveal His Work to you. He will if you ask.

May your heart be overjoyed by the realization that He’s been at work in some very key, very powerful ways in your life and the loved ones around you and in your group.

Growth Group Leader Training - March 3 & 10

 

Ramp up your group experience

 

Are you currently a member in a growth group?

 

Looking for a way to contribute significantly to your growth group?

 

Thought about facilitating lessons within your group, or even leading a group in the future?

 

If you’re sensing God is nudging you to consider helping with leading a group, the upcoming GG leader training is coming at the right time.

We’re looking for people who want a front row seat in helping others be transformed in their relationship with Christ.

It’s definitely a way to activate your faith. You will come away having a very clear idea of your group’s direction and purpose. The least that will happen is you’ll now become the best member any group could have – because you know where things are going, and can help make it happen.


GG Leadership Training
March 3^rd & 10^th
5-7pm
Room 300

Together, with all God's people

“I pray that you may receive power and strength…together with all of God’s people” – Ephesians 3:18

I recently read through Paul’s inspirational prayer he wrote out for the Ephesians in his letter to them. Here’s the guy who’s the founder and architect of their church, having been around since their inception, heavily involved in their growth and development, now pouring his heart out to them.

It’s an inspirational, moving passage, full of desire, hope, and as Pastor Brian likes to say, vital optimism. Paul dreams the big dreams of what he envisions for their lives, and allows them to see that this is near and dear to his heart for them. He shares with them what he most desires for them – a life full of the presence and power of God.

One detail I missed was the phrase that pops up embedded in the middle of verse 18 – “together with all God's holy people”. I never noticed that before. That verse seemed to linger with me after I finished reading it. I found it repeating itself through my ensuing days. I sat with that verse for a while and considered what God was impressing upon me.

When Paul talks about being rooted and established in love, it’s not merely a symbolic or ethereal term for him. He’s not waxing eloquent about some kind of vague knowledge that few grasp. He’s being very concrete about it. Follow me as a lay out what I think Paul is pointing to.

Being rooted is an agricultural reference that most people can quickly understand. When we are rooted in something we stay committed to it; we lock in and are able to withstand any attempts to pull us apart. We endure all kinds of flack and nonsense because what we’re connected to is worth it.

So what are we being rooted in? Love. Doesn’t strike you yet as compelling? What if I substituted the word “relationships” for “love—how does that sound? Paul is very clear in his allusion to love that it’s not something vague and nebulous we are to do throughout the day. He wants us to love people…in relationships. The way we treat our family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, acquaintances, even strangers is the focus and target of our love. We are to be anchored with each other as we together seek the fulfillment of this gripping vision. When we are rooted in healthy relationships, we are experiencing and reflecting our ultimate design by God. It’s at those moments where we see the complete fulfillment of the Great Commandment in our lives, as we simultaneously love God and love our neighbor.

What Paul prays for is also compelling. It’s as if Paul is audaciously asking the Lord to grant us the knowledge of something so wonderful, it seems to be beyond human comprehension. Getting our brains wrapped around the ginormous weight and scope of God’s love is incredible. Most of us marvel as to why and how God loves us. We mostly settle for a “He just does” when we ask, because the beauty of it seems to melt us and blow our minds. This seems to be the ultimate, most prized, greatest understanding anyone on earth through the history of man could get a handle on. And yet, this is the very thing Paul prays. What would be the very best for us is the very thing dearest to Paul’s heart.

It’s not just the select few, the elites, the super-saints who are encouraged to experience this. Just like when the temple veil was torn in two at the moment of Jesus’ death, and the barrier between God and man was lifted and ripped away, Paul is espousing a radical notion that every single one of us – from the smartest to dullest, most experienced to least, most likely to the unlikeliest – is now eligible for this beautiful treasure. No one gets left behind. The love of God for us is open for all to experience, to be thrilled with, to delight in.

So all of us, every last one of us, are on the list. No one is exempt. Nobody gets left behind. Nobody is left out in the cold. “All the saints” is how one translation goes – that pretty much means every single person who’s given their life to Christ.

May you live your day in the warm beauty of this compelling truth and vision. And may you actively love those around you and in your growth group, so they too can experience the joy of experiencing God’s love for them.

What makes a group "great"?

What does a “great group” look like? What would you see happening in a group that is hitting on all cylinders, eagerly seeking God’s joy and glory, and experiencing life changing moments of personal transformation?

We asked each other this question in our monthly coaches meeting just last week, and what follows is a compilation of some of the answers and opinions that were shared around the room.

Obviously, we’ll include some of the basics like a solid attendance record, people actively working through the material of study during the week around meeting nights, and people praying and caring for each other. I would say those things are actions and indicators of what a group does – but what makes it special, stand out, tremendously dynamic in the lives of all the members?

The first special indicator for me is relational credibility. A great group is one that has a deep and rich level of relational integrity – meaning, they’ve forged a cohesive bond that is strong and enduring, that is greatly elastic and flexible, and has a high level of value. This kind of group is one that has earned the right to be heard, can speak the truth in love with one another, has safely allowed sincere moments of total transparency, and can lean on each other when the crisis times emerge. This group knows their members’ stories, knows their pain, and has personal friendships that exist and interact outside the meeting times throughout the rest of the week. This group has its relational action down.

 

The second indicator may be a surprising one: it’s experiencing suffering together. Groups that have had awkward, uncomfortable, even painful moments with each other—and have responded to that painful stimulus in the right way—are groups that have opened a whole new universe of experiences they can share together. A group that has walked the journey of hurt with a member (or a few of them) develops the heart of Jesus in the process, and when that happens, the group elevates its game to a whole new level.

 

This doesn’t have to be simply suffering by an individual about something outside the group. It can also encompass pain and discomfort in the form of conflict within the group. Two people could be at odds over something, and it could end up being the catalyst towards growing intimacy versus remaining distant. Conflict can be a relational generator – again, handled in the right manner. It’s a pity most Christians run for the hills and avoid conflict like Bubonic plague.

 

The third indicator is a group that is experiencing transforming moments with Jesus Christ through the Word of God and the Holy Spirit. As people have the truth of Jesus light up their hearts and give them joy, peace, strength, cleansing, healing, forgiveness, power, and more, they are indelibly changed. They may never be the same again. Factor in that there could be more than one person experiencing this, and you have a catalytic opportunity in your group for tremendous spiritual growth like some spiritual version of a greenhouse.

 

The big question that begs to be asked is – where is your group in these areas? If each indicator was on a spectrum from “very little like us” to “completely like us”, what might you say your group was like? How far along that spectrum are you? What kinds of experiences have you had that might help you move along further down the route? Are there ones you’ve shied away from because they were, to be honest, intimidating and challenging?

 

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. Reply to me or post your comments on the GG Page on Facebook.

Tragedy in Newton

Long before the horrific tragedy of Newton, CT assaulted our consciences, there was another tragic massacre of children half way around the world. The same epic display of grief, horror, and loss was recorded as an entire town’s population of boys was wiped out in one moment, carried out by an insecure tyrant afraid to lose his power and wanting to make a statement about himself.

This time, the scene was Bethlehem. About two years after Jesus was born, Herod the Great received news via the wise men that a king was born who would rule the Jews. Well that won’t do, he thought. So he ordered the execution of every male child two years and younger, just to keep it that way. It was an act of brutality simply because he perceived a potential future challenger. A senseless crime if there ever was one.

The prophet Jeremiah touches on the intense ache and pain of this kind of loss:

"A cry of anguish is heard in Ramah -- mourning and weeping unrestrained.

Rachel weeps for her children, refusing to be comforted -- for her children are dead." (31:15)

How heart breaking this tragedy was. No parent should ever have to bury their child. Estimates are that in Bethlehem there were around a dozen boys murdered in this sleepy remote town due to the incredibly evil intent in a person’s heart. No evidence exists, but one has to wonder whether or not some families might have been related to Mary and Joseph, or each other. It was a tragic, horrific event that served no purpose other than to feed a madman’s spite.

It brings me to today, with the scope of the Newton massacre still fresh in our minds. Here are a few thoughts swirling around in my heart and mind as I process this awful catastrophe, ranging from evil to mental illness to Christmas.

The evil that has overrun the world is even greater and more pervasive than most of us give credit.
Like a dark stain we try to scrub and bleach out, or a germ we attempt to wipe out with massive loads of disinfectant, we’ve tried to erase the presence of evil and injustice in our society. And we’ve done a fairly good job at certain levels in our culture of eradicating some of the more obvious issues. But I think our very success has lulled us into a false sense of complacency. The truth is that evil will never be wiped out this side of death. We must always be vigilant. We can never declare “mission accomplished”—at least not till Jesus returns and ushers in a new existence. That can be a challenging and demoralizing truth, but it is the reality we face.

We also don’t just face the issue out there; we also wrestle in here. The inconsistencies of our own hearts, the selfishness we too quickly activate, the messes we make and must own up to are all evidences that we, too, are not a finished product. I like to say that we are works of art…in progress. Both realities are present: the beauty of our design, mixed with the mistakes and flaws that try to drag us down. Sometimes, these mistakes are pain-free. Other times, they hurt the very ones we love tremendously. I found myself thinking more than once this weekend “there but the grace of God go I” – whether as a grieving parent who lost a child, or as a lamenting parent of a child who is mentally ill and full of rage.

We can also detect a sense of irrationality as we try to analyze evil and sin. It makes no sense. Why does someone return acts of love and care with rejection, hatred, or harm? Why would they choose to walk away from a healthy loving relationship for the inferior alternatives? I actually have in mind Adam & Eve, the ones who started this disastrous merry go-round of futility. But it could sound like almost anyone, because we’re all like them. Possessing the seed of Adam means we all contain the same elementary impulse to do something that is just odd or bizarre with respect to loving relationships.  Sin makes no sense, but we all do it. Evil is the most ridiculous conclusion one could arrive at, but yet we can be blinded and bamboozled into thinking “maybe it’s not so bad”. Oh, it may be obvious when the contrast is stark and severe – but what about the subtle choices, the ones that don’t seem so blatantly depraved?

Even mental illness is a reflection of the brokenness of this earth caused by evil.
Please hear me - mental illness is not a sin at all; but it is a reflection of a severely and deeply broken world. No healthy human mind would arrive at the conclusions that young man did. A healthy heart does not attack children. A healthy soul does not conclude that killing little ones for no sound reason is a good decision. Adam Lanza sure sounded mentally ill. His mind was defective by his illness. It's part and parcel of a broken world that some children will carry defects throughout their lives - some physical, others mental.

My bet is that we all know families who have a member that might remind us of an Adam. We see the odd eccentricities, the loner or anti-social behavior. Our natural instinct is to recoil and avoid someone like that, but this begs the question – is that what might have precipitated his murderous rage, or fed his sense of resentment and antipathy for people?

Mental illness is not easy, fun, clean, or quick. I’d argue it’s one of the most challenging aspects we face while living in community. I know from some personal experience. Dealing with someone with mental issues is a long-term, draining existence, especially if they’re a loved one or relative. Would it have helped Adam’s mom to have a network of loving support around her as she wrestled through the daily rhythms and rages that awaited her? I don’t know, but it’s worth asking every person who has a situation like this one.

We have to figure out how freedom and responsibility are going to exist side by side.
Because the reality is that you cannot have one without the other.  Whether you favor gun-possession or elimination, the truth is that there needs to be a better way to prevent mentally ill people from obtaining access to firearms. I don’t have an answer, and I strongly doubt whether the simplest answers are the best ones.

But if we are to be a free society, that means we need to develop responsibilities that match the freedoms. Wild-west anarchy and totalitarian shut downs are two extremes being tossed around the internet, and it’s a shame – because we should be better and smarter than that. Or maybe we are not a culture that is as far removed from the days of brute survival as we initially thought.

We discover that most things in life are secondary to being alive.
Nothing beats life. We grab and hug our kids more. We watch them with a more alert eye. We take their immature moments and tantrums with a little more salt because in the final analysis, they are alive. And we want to keep it that way. Living in an affluent society like we do can sometimes mask the truth that for all of our advances, we are just one incident shy of injury or even death. None of those things can insulate us from the frailty of our existence. Having lots of belongings may deceive us in thinking we’re shielded from the hard ravages of a broken world full of evil, but it doesn’t. At any moment, on any given day, we can meet the moment that will be our last on earth. And no amount of control on our or anyone else’s part is going to alter that.

Maybe this Christmas should be a simpler, humbler expression of love for Jesus and each other.

Jesus himself said that a life does not consist in the abundance of possessions. I say this because Christmas has been so commercialized over the years, that I think we’ve become numb to the idea of celebrating the Savior’s entrance into our world with simple acts of affection, worship, or love to others—and nothing more. Maybe this year could be a year we practice a simple and plain Advent.

 

Truth is, we desperately need a savior. We've needed one for a long, long time. The joy of Christmas is that God has answered our cries with a definitive "yes". We celebrate the baby Jesus this month, but it was the adult Jesus that took the weight of all our combined sinfulness on his own and paid the price to enable us to experience true freedom. That hope, that these burdens and demands of life we flail over will not be the final chapter or the end of us, is stil real and alive today as it was almost two thousand years ago.

 

Perhaps this year could be a year where we celebrate the true meaning of Christmas with more meager and simple expressions of love, joy, and appreciation, and leave the volumes of gifts and goodies in the garage (or at the store) for another day.

In the company of good friends...or familiar strangers?

Which is your experience of the Christian life– being on a journey with good friends, who know you and most of your quirks; or with transitional groups of strangers, who barely know you enough to ask more than ‘how was your week’?

Increasingly, in churches, it is becoming more of the latter.

Chris Gambill, of the Center for Congregational Health, says that “Increasingly in congregational life we have a growing deficit of what might be called ‘social capital’. In many contexts — not by intentionality, but by accident — churches are a company of familiar strangers.”

Social capital is the relational connective tissue for the soul. God designed us to be in significant relationships with others through whom we can grow and develop into mature social beings that live in harmony in community.

But because of the mobility of our culture, the transient nature of fast change today, the massive amount of everyday choices set before us, and the advent of invasive technology, we are distracted and obstructed from having those relationships around us become such a force for good relational development.

Instead, we are delayed or even stunted in our relational capability. This has a profound effect on how we manage life with others, especially the more challenging and difficult moments. This is particularly so when it comes to having difficult conversations with people.

Gambill: “It’s difficult to have a significant conversation with someone you don’t know well. For one thing, you don’t trust them, and you don’t know how much you can say. So when we have a difficult conversation at church, we don’t have a group of people who have a deep relationship they can build off of — we have a group of strangers.”

Think about it – how intimate will we truly become if all we ever discuss and share are surface facts and opinions? The road to closer relationships has to run, at some point, through the land of difficulty and conflict. If we never head that way, how can we be a people who know each other well enough to speak truth lovingly to each other?

It wasn’t always this way. In the past, church members’ daily activities kept them in close contact with one another throughout the week and outside the church.

But those days of repetitive connections with the same people over the span of days and weeks are gone. Now, it is possible to not see the same people for more than once a month, or even longer. This either hinders the development of social capital or delays it significantly from growing .

If there ever was a screaming, crying need for the role of small groups in the life of the church as a central means to help people get relationally connected [even before beginning the growth process!], this should help spell it out clearly.

We need to be in relationship. And if our culture is going to delay, distract, or even obstruct that from happening, then we need to be intentional and prioritize our time and space to help create it.

A healthy small group is what every individual serious about becoming mature in Christ, relationally speaking, must be involved in.

More here