leaving a church

The idea of leaving a church family has always been an interesting one to me.  While I want to avoid making broad/sweeping statements, I believe that, in many circumstances, a lot of people leave churches due to a consumeristic and individualistic Christian faith.  Church exists to serve me... and if I feel as though I am not being served adequately, I will find another place that will.  In fact, this trend is not too shocking, especially when we look at the number of broken families and marriages in our country.  For so many people, divorce and separation is a convenient and easily accessible answer when a spouse is not meeting our needs.  Our country affirms the creed, "you can't enforce your believes and values on me.  I've got to do me.  I have to take care of me and my needs."

So why should anyone be surprised when people leave one church to find another church that, "better fits our needs?"  

Along similar lines, sometimes people who have attended a church for years will simply stop showing up and go somewhere else without any explanation.  Again, this is where the consumer says, "I don't owe you an explanation... I don't have to run my plans by you."  But if we truly believe that we are the Body of Christ and are family, wouldn't we want to be in conversation with our family if we were considering a departure as opposed to just disappearing?  

As I read through Acts today, I came across a passage where Paul and Barnabas found themselves in stark disagreement over a practical issue and decided to part company.  While this comparison does not perfectly fit this conversation, it has caused me to ask the question, "When is it appropriate and good to part company with a church family?  And if so, what is the proper way to do it?"

grace/mercy

While helping pastor the church here at Fort Osage, there have been several times where I have found myself thinking thoughts like, "why didn't we think about doing 'this' years earlier?"  Or, "Imagine if we came up with this idea five years ago, we could be much further along!"

I am currently having one of these experiences.  There is this amazing opportunity to serve our community and as I am dreaming and brainstorming, my thoughts have drifted to, "why didn't we start this years ago?"  As I pondered the question, I gradually came to a realization.  I am so thankful that we serve a God who is patient with his children and nurtures us along the long road of maturity and growth.  When I finished up college and seminary, I remember thinking to myself that it shouldn't be long until I reach full maturity as a pastor and leader.  Having that type of mindset naturally lent itself to discouragement as I would become increasingly aware of my limitations and shortfalls as a minister.

But may I say it again, praise God for his mercy and grace in our lives.  Thank God for continuing to speak truth and love to his children as we seek to grow and understand what it means and looks like to be faithful.

ordination

It looks like in August I will be receiving my ordination in the Church of the Nazarene.  To be quite honest, for a while I viewed ordination as simply a hoop to be jumped through.  However, as the process is coming to a close, I am quite humbled by the entire process.

There have been and will be times when people will look at me and question my abilities and calling as a pastor and a minister of the gospel.  There will be times when I will wonder I even bother being a pastor.  However, it is during times like this I will remember that my local church, my district, and the leadership of the denomination has looked at me and affirmed God's call, gifting, and graces in my life... and that will be what I need to keep going.

I thank God for all those ministers, pastors, teachers, men, and women who have gone before us in the faith for the sake of the Gospel and I thank God that I, along with many others, many continue to join them.

wednesday night

Our youth service finished up about 10 minutes ago and I am still sitting here in the room where we all gather together every Wednesday night.  This is one of those nights where all the students have left and I find myself wondering, 'Am I nothing more than a boxer trying to beat up the air?'  There are times when I think that pastoral ministry has to be one of the most humbling jobs out there... And after thinking about it for a little bit, I think the reason is because pastoral ministry cannot be reduced to a simple formula of A+B=C when it comes to seeking results.  There are times where you pour yourself into your job and your calling and sense little, if anything, to show for it.  It is times like these that I think the best thing to do is to take a step back, look with a broad lens, and unwind for the evening.  After 6 years of ministry, I have learned that nights/times like these come with the territory.

war and the Bible

I remember when I was a junior in college and sitting in a small group with some young adults from my local church.  While I forget the central text of the lesson, I do remember us reading a passage from the Old Testament that made me feel a little uncomfortable.  In the passage God had instructed the Israelites to kill their enemies and to show them no mercy... And not just the opposing soldiers... God also instructed them to kill women, and children too.  That's when a hand went up and a lady asked the group, "Does this strike anyone as odd?  Why in the world would God call the Israelites to kill other people when the Bible tells us not to murder?  Jesus talks about forgiveness and loving our enemies... How does this fit in?"  And while I am sure there were not crickets in the room, I could have sworn I heard them in the silence that followed.

To make matters worse, after not receiving any sort of coherent answer, she turned to me and said, "Jay, you're a religion major, right?  What is your take on this?"  My guess is that some combination of words came out of my mouth, but I know my response didn't satisfy her and it surely didn't satisfy me either.

Since this episode, I have asked this same question to a few other adults who are five times more intelligent than myself, yet, I am still not sure I have ever been able to find 'rest' with the whole issue.  I eventually got to a point where I was embarrassed to ask the question because I was nearing the completion of seminary and I figured I would sound dumb for not having found reconciliation with the issue.

What I have come to believe and witness is that a vast majority of educated Christians do not know how to address and respond to the issue of war in the Old Testament.  Most people and teachers within the local church try to leapfrog these difficult passages and conversations and skip to other passages that are much more 'postcard friendly.'  Many times these stories of violence and massacre are quickly skimmed over so we can quickly arrive to a 'listener-friendly' conclusion, like: "God helps us in life's 'battles,' or, "God will never leave us..."  The issue of God and war throughout scripture has become one of the 'elephant in the room' topics that many people avoid and pretend that it is not there.

For thousands of years, many Jewish and Christian traditions have shielded their children from reading the Songs of Solomon due to the sexual imagery in it's pages.  Parents are encouraged to only allow their children to read this section of scripture once they are ready to have the difficult, yet necessary, conversations that are soon to follow... But what about the war narratives in scripture? What are they supposed to conclude when they come across graphic texts like the slaughter of the Canannites in Joshua?  If we are not ready to have intelligent and informed conversations about the topic, we must be OK if our students conclude:

1. God has no problem with war and the loss of human life.
2. Our God is an aggressive God who is ready and eager to punish and kill those who do wrong.
3. God does not care about killing innocent children.
And so on...

And while there is still a part of me that may always struggle holding together a God who would call his chosen people to 'show no mercy' on a foreign people and a God who was willing to die for my sins, I have come to a few conclusions regarding the topic of war in the Old Testament.

In the Old Testament, we read of an immanent God who actively participated in normal human history.  The unfortunate truth is that war was a constant reality for most nations in the time of the Exodus and following.  Going to war was not something 'new' that God thought up. Warefare is a human institution and is evil in nature.  Throughout the Old Testament scriptures, we read about a God who worked and acted amongst a society and world that was all too familiar with war, territorial battles, etc, to achieve the ends of both judgment and redemption.

It is also important to note that God never rejoiced in the act of war.  While God used the human institution of war to achieve certain ends, we must also remember that throughout the Old Testament we read about a God who envisions a time when "swords will be beaten into ploughshares" (Isaiah 2, Micah 4).  Isaiah 53 also speaks of the suffering servant who will willingly lay down his life for the sins and iniquities of many.  In the New Testament, we see the fullness of God's face in the one who taught people to love their enemies, to turn the other cheek, who came to serve and not to be served, who washed the feet of his betrayer,and who didn't lift a hand at his own crucifixion.

emotionalism and youth ministry

This entry was written as a response to Paul Sheneman's article at Barefoot Ministries

There are some youth ministries (and churches) out there who believe that the level of emotion that one experiences in their worship, prayer times, testimonies, etc, is an accurate gauge of one’s discipleship and growth as a believer.  The equation is pretty simple: the greater/deeper emotional response = the greater/deeper encounter with Christ.  And while emotion should definitely not be suppressed or avoided, we must be careful not to blindly adopt this equation of ‘emotion = discipleship.’ 

I speak as one who was quite susceptible to emotionalism as a teenager in the youth ministry I was a part of growing up.  Discipleship and spiritual maturity was all about who generated the greatest emotional response to a sermon, music set, at a retreat, an alter call, and so on.  One particular night I remember my youth pastor challenging us during a time of corporate confession (around a bonfire of course) to "not hold back and be real before Jesus."  As students began to share, I was well aware of my sin and didn't want to leave that night still 'hiding my sins from Jesus.' So, as a 17 year old teenager, I confessed everything in front of the group... Everything I could possibly think of.  The mood had definitely been set by my youth leader and he later commended me for how open and honest I was.  While I believed I was being obedient to God at the time by airing out all of my garbage, I look back at the whole experience and cringe at how honest I was before them...  Not because confession is wrong but because of the young ears who heard all of those confessions.  I lacked the discernment that 'confessing everything' might not have been the best thing to do.

Fast forward several years and I find myself as a youth minister.  My first year at the church, we attended 'Acquire the Fire' because, as one student informed me, "that is what our youth group did every year before you became... It’s the best event that we go on."  With the help of smoke machines, loud bands, and youth speakers who can tell gripping stories filled with well-placed tears and effective pauses, ATF has mastered the skill of evoking an emotional response from teenagers... And just like all highs, it is, and was, just a matter of time until the crash.  How can we expect anything else?  How are the teens supposed to get as excited back at their local church when our ‘worship band’ consists of just Bob… a balding middle-aged man who is still learning to play guitar?  All that to say: I no longer attend ATF.  Every once in awhile a parent or student will come up to me and ask why we don't go to ATF anymore.  While my response varies depending on who is the one asking me, my most common response goes something like this, "Because discipleship is a marathon... It is a daily decision and a daily directing of our paths toward Christ.  It is not about getting emotionally hyped up for 24 hours and trying to ride it out for as long as possible… only having to try and duplicate the experience later… We don’t go to Acquire the Fire because I don’t want to teach our teens that their ‘level of emotion’ determines the truth of the gospel and the necessity to pursue a deeper walk with Christ, even when we don’t feel like it… Something along those lines.

Up until just a year or so ago, I experienced quite a bit of guilt and shame when I would compare the current student ministry I find myself in with that of the one I was a part of growing up in my teenage years.  I remember the emotion filled testimonies... I remember worshiping with my fellow teenage peers... I remember some great retreats that we went on together.  And quite honestly, I don't see that as much with the youth ministry that I am currently leading.  At times I wonder if I am in the wrong.  I wonder if I have become so cautious about not being manipulative that I have actually robbed them of something deeper.  However, what I have begun to see is something that has less highs and lows and something that appears to be more true and lasting.  

My conclusion is a very predictable one.  Emotions are some of the very fabrics that make us human.  As youth pastors/leaders, we must seek the healthy balance of not suppressing and avoiding a Christian faith that is void of emotions, which would be unhealthy and lacking.  Also,  we must make sure that our chief aim is not to simply seek out an 'emotional response' from our students because that has little to do with the gospel and more to do with adolescent development.  


May we all seek to honestly and faithfully preach, teach, and present the gospel in a manner that is accessible and understandable to our students.

the cross and the suburbs

I recently read through Lee C. Camp's 'Mere Discipleship.'  While I have never been the best at summarizing books, Camp believes that much of the Western Church has adopted a view of discipleship and Christianity that is not loyal to the way of Christ.  As a whole, the Church is much quicker to seek out self preservation, self maximization, financial/physical security, and self sustenance long before we consider the difficult words of Christ that call us to the way of the servant, to not store up treasures on earth, and to pick up our cross.  Bonhoeffer said, "suffering is the true badge of discipleship."  To follow Jesus in a real way actually costs something.

Well, here is my confession...  I struggle seeing any of this in my own life.  Please, I don't make a statement like this to evoke any cheap or cheesy encouragement, I am simply being honest.  My wife and I live in a wonderful little townhouse in Independence, MO.  If you were to compare our income to that of the entire world, you would find that we are filthy rich.  We own two vehicles and our fridge is fully stocked.  The last thing I worry about is a roof over my head, gunshots through my windows, what clothes I am going to wear tomorrow, or where my next meal is going to come from.  I don't wake up at night wondering if tonight is the night I will be arrested for being a minister (China, several parts of Africa, Middle East, southeast Asia).  All of our basic needs are fully provided for, and then some.  Yet, it is quite clear from Paul's writings that the suffering endured by the Messiah is paradigmatic for the disciples of the Messiah, for those who follow the footsteps of the suffering Christ will endure suffering as well.  

As for the local church I serve in... We are located in a very blue collar, predominantly middle class community.  While there are definite needs and struggles in our community that we strive to meet (family issues, clothing, lack of food, utility bills, etc), I struggle seeing and knowing what it means and looks like to be a radical disciple in my community.  Perhaps I am wrestling with guilt in knowing that while I am free, there are many others taking on a similar responsibility as mine who are very familiar with suffering.