Full Proof

When the Witch made the Switch

2011-07-05T22:34:00.002-04:00

This morning I was listening to Acts 8 and I heard something that grabbed my attention. I have read this chapter many times, but I have never considered something about Simon.

"Then Simon himself believed also: and when he was baptized, he continued with Philip, and wondered, beholding the miracles and signs which were done." Acts 8:13

We are told in this chapter a little bit about Simon.

"But there was a certain man, called Simon, which beforetime in the same city used sorcery, and bewitched the people of Samaria, giving out that himself was some great one:" Acts 8:9

So here we have Philip was preaching to Samaria. Philip is preaching,people are believing, miracles were taking place, healings and it says that people were being delivered of evil spirits.

And as Philip is preaching he comes face to face with the Witch doctor. A man that scripture tells us of the power he held over the people.

"And to him they had regard, because that of long time he had bewitched them with sorceries."

This witch doctor, sorcerer that had held this city in fear and confusion and connected them to the evil world of the spirit.

When this man heard the words of Philip, he believed. We are given to know that this, believing was something special by what the scripture states. This enviroment and atmosphere of faith where healings, miracles and deliverance was taking place to such a degree that the scripture says, "There was great joy in that city."

And to top it off, Simon himself is a believer and is baptized. WOW!

The Witch made the Switch.

That is some kind of revival.

Scripture tells us that Philip sent for Peter and other Apostles of this unprecedented move of God. It is the first time we see this happening after Pentecost outside of Jerusalem. Peter and the apostles are moved to come down.

Why?

They had all had demonstrated and experienced faith. Many experienced healing, miracles, deliverance and the joy that accompanies an encounter with God.

Sounds like a lot more than happens in a lot of churches these days. However all of this was not sufficient to put a period on it.

"(For as yet he was fallen upon none of them: only they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.) Then laid they [their] hands on them, and they received the Holy Ghost."

Believing is a good beginning... they had even been immersed in water in Jesus Name, but there is an experience beyond, above and better than faith alone. Scripture shows us this is a separate, unique and important part of the salvation experience.

Believing is a good beginning.

Remember Simon. We find him again in our story. When he saw the miraculous, powerful and spiritual experience received by these people, his old ways appeared. He saw the power of God move through these men that facilitated the impartation of a spiritual benefit.

"And when Simon saw that through laying on of the apostles' hands the Holy Ghost was given, he offered them money, Saying, Give me also this power, that on whomsoever I lay hands, he may receive the Holy Ghost."

This was a logical conclusion to come to from his background. He was a witch doctor. Much like the palm readers of our day, he equated spiritual power as a way to make a buck. He was about to learn something. The kingdom of God is not about making merchandise or profiting from the work, ministry or gifting of the Holy Ghost. I know we see some do it. They are walking in the error of Simon. It is akin to the error of Balaam.

Peter Rebuked him, straightly

"But Peter said unto him, Thy money perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money. Thou hast neither part nor lot in this matter: for thy heart is not right in the sight of God. Repent therefore of this thy wickedness, and pray God, if perhaps the thought of thine heart may be forgiven thee. For I perceive that thou art in the gall of bitterness, and [in] the bond of iniquity."

Wow.

Simon, Believing is a good beginning. However there are some things that God has to work out of our spirit, mind and thought process. For Simon it was witchcraft. For others it might be prejudice. Everyone has some things that God is going to have to work out and we are going to have to ask God to forgive us, change us and deliver from our thinking and living.

The Witch Doctor Simon, responded properly. He did not get mad at this correction. He recognized that what Peter said was true and words of repentance flowed out of his mouth. May we all demonstrate a spirit of humility that would embrace correction from a man of God when he speaks the truth concerning our heart.

"Then answered Simon, and said, Pray ye to the Lord for me, that none of these things which ye have spoken come upon me."

"Pray for me."

Many people today have seen the power of God.
They have believed and been baptized. Further, they have experienced healing, deliverance and the joy that God brings. However they are still bound my a mindset that hinders them from moving forward in God.

This story tells us that there is a competing spiritual power in this world. Simon had operated and been used by the Devil in the realm of the spirit. We refer this as witchcraft today. Many things we face may not be as blatant as witch craft, but there the deception and error these things can lead people into are just as real.

Good Intentions is not enough. Simon needed deep repentance to be a part of his life beyond the commitment of believing and experience of baptism. We see that God was filling people with the Gift of the Holy Ghost.

Many times the greatest deliverance that we need to experience is not from an evil spirit. We need deliverance from Stinking thinking that causes us to have a false perception of how God and his kingdom works.

The great battle we fight is not the Devil or Hell or even a witch Doctor. We are sabotaged by our own thinking. Our background, culture and family/religious traditions can be a great hinderance from what God has for us.

We do not know the end of the story for Simon. I hope that he was able to gain deliverance from his previous occupation.

Believing is Great, neccessary and important part of what God has for you. But the greatest part of our salvation is to have our mind continually transformed into the kingdom concepts and ideals. This does not happen over night. It happens through prayer, studying the word of God and having a good constant diet of anointed teaching and preaching.

Thankful that God can save, deliver and transform anyone.

In Him, By Him, Through Him,

Scott Phillips

"3 For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: 4 (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty * through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) 5 Casting down * imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every rthought to sthe obedience of Christ; 6 Andehaving in a readiness to revenge all disobedience,twhen your obedience is fulfilled." 2 Corinthians 10

Diverse Weights and Diverse Measures

2011-06-24T20:08:00.001-04:00

Proverbs 20:10 “Diverse weights, and diverse measures, Both of them alike are an abomination to Jehovah.”

While I am well aware that context of the preceding verse deals specifically with fair and impartial business dealings and treatment of other people in an honest and forthright way, I am also finding a parallel to an area of ministry that may well be applicable.

Over the last few months I have found and re-connected with many old friends via the medium of Facebook. It has been enjoyable for the most part to read where many people from days gone by now find themselves. It is especially rewarding to see that many young people that I have had the privilege of teaching in a Bible College setting are now doing great things for God. Some are evangelizing. Others are pastoring. Some are missionaries while others are filling various ministerial roles.

Sadly, there is also the other side of the coin. There are those who are no longer involved in ministry but are pursuing academia and/or a secular career. Saddest of all are those who are no longer living for God. The spiritual emotional roller coaster one experiences at reading the pages of these folks can be heart rending and gut clinching.

It didn’t take long for me to begin to ask several key and pertinent questions, such as: “Where did they go wrong?” “How could they be raised in truth and abandon it so easily?” “How is it that they sat in classrooms and heard these subjects taught, studied the material, passed the tests and even graduated yet have ended up in false doctrine?”

Ultimately I began to ponder if I might somehow be culpable in some way for their failing? Obviously, one rises and falls in the kingdom of God on their own merits but I never want to forget we are products of our environment and those who have touched our lives. Through introspection and reflection I seriously have sought out whether there is anything I, or anyone else for that matter, could have done differently.

After prayer I did come to a rather sobering conclusion. While no one can be specifically blamed for the backsliding of another individual we can be accountable for errors we may have caused that facilitated such an action. In this case I came to realize that teaching and preaching that only fills one side of the scale creates an unbalanced scale.

What am I saying? Just this: It is so easy to drive home the points of salvific doctrine, Godly living, sanctification, righteousness and so on without ever giving the balancing part of the equation. It is so easy for us to spew out information that folks need to understand what it takes to be saved and to live for God. We have become quite adept at that. Likewise, young folks have become quite adept at taking the information in and knowing it well enough to pass a test or to recite it back from rote memory in order to answer a question.

Where I, and others, have failed is in not equally filling the other side of the scale of why a person MUST know these things and embrace them as truth. We spend way too much time preaching/teaching what they need to know without telling them the consequences of what will occur if they do not live out these things. We give them right answers and tell them that those things will get them to heaven. Sadly, we rarely tell them emphatically that not doing them will cause them to burn in the flames of hell for eternity.

Why are so many young ministers getting fouled up today? Oh, it’s not because we are not telling them the right things to do to be saved. We just are not telling them with equal measure what happens if they do not do those things. Our tolerance has become our pitfall. Our “mercy” has become their path to damnation. Our latitude has become their “broad way to destruction.” Our desire to reach out to them has actually driven them closer to the precipice of the point of no return.

I will continue to teach and to preach the things they need to do. But from this point on I will balance the scale with the consequences of failing to do the right things. On a regular basis I will also speak of eternal damnation for false doctrine and for walking away from truth. On a regular basis I will attempt to balance the scale with equal amounts of encouragement and admonition. More importantly, there are some scales I need to revisit and do my best to balance instead of continuing to feed the imbalance.

Heaven help us to not enable a generation of young ministry to live on an unbalanced scale and think it is alright. We all have a responsibility to keep the weights equal.

Reflections on "And the Shofar Blew" Part 1

2010-10-21T15:49:00.001-04:00

One of the most provoking works of fiction that I have ever read is And the Shofar Blew by Francine Rivers. It was published in 2003 and having read one of her other books, I picked it up on a whim and read it. In the subsequent years that have passed, I have re-read it a couple of times. Recently I picked it up again and read it for a third time. This time I had a pen and underlined a number of places in the book that can serve as jumping off places for blog posts in the next several days.

If you are involved in ministry in any form, it is a very worthy book to be read and then ruminated over for the rest of your life in ministry. So as not to totally spoil it with a lot of details, it basically is a story of a young man who is called to take over a dying church who allows a maddening personal ambition and uncrucified dark motives to destroy him.

The first lesson that boldly stood out to me was the gradual deceptiveness of the gravity of human means. H. B. London of Focus on the Family gave some statistics about those involved in various forms of Christian ministry of all denominations some time ago. He noted that 1500 men left the ministry on a monthly basis. Five years after commencement fully half of the men who graduate from seminary are no longer involved in ministry. Another major denomination asserted that for every twenty men who enter ministry only one would still be involved by the age of 65. They gave up despite all of the energy and effort they spent on education, training, and adapting to the call.

Various reasons were given in the statistical study for their exits of public ministry. Health reasons, personal issues, others may determine that they misread the initial calling, and some give up because of the monumental stress that is placed on them. Others are forced out by their churches and determine never again to allow themselves to get into a position to be hurt again, so they walk away. Some give up in discouragement, others give in to frustrating challenges, and others give up because of the constant nagging feeling of failure.

For some money becomes an issue—either the heady pursuit of it or the bitter gnawing battle of not having enough. For some, immorality derails them. For others, ministry becomes a power struggle. This can take place on a local level in a local church or it can be a pursuit of power through the positions that denominational work may offer to them. For these men, political twists and turns become the sole motivation of what they ministry is all about. Those who find power to be a temptation have to become adept at manipulating and jockeying for position so that the seat they occupy is safe from attack. The struggle with pride also hammers them.

Paul Hudson, the major character in this story, struggled with every single one of the issues that have been listed. As he pursued the building of his own personal kingdom, the more he had to resort to political and human workings to build something that would ultimately fall apart. A recent Twitter that I received noted that far too many pastors have come to fill the roles as a CEO or board chairman rather than that of a humble shepherd.

At the outset of the story, the heart of Paul is soft, humble, and open to hearing the voice of God. However, it was not too long into his role of pastor, two or three years at most, that he had started an ominous change that would destroy him. He got so busy building his kingdom that he neglected the priorities of the inner life. The longer that you are in the ministry the more that you must understand that the joys of ministry begin to turn into assignments and responsibilities. This is why it is crucial to know that the ministry is not a sprint but rather a marathon. You are either making progress in your personal ministry or you are slowly becoming an enemy of the Cross. The longer you are in ministry the more you realize that every day you run across people who have empty buckets that have to be filled, if the well-spring of devotion does not find itself being replenished, you will find yourself being poured out in such a way that soon depletion will destroy you.

One of the paradoxes the Lord mentioned was that the Kingdom of God was going to be built only when our heart was like that of a child. Life and ministry will get complex, especially if a church starts growing. However, you must still maintain the discipline of a personal devotion on your heart. You have to make some choices about what to do with that situation. Far too many men buy into the idea of a messiah complex who believes that if they weren’t there the whole thing would implode. The real test of ministry is this; if the church implodes, you built it! If it lasts, God built it; you just happened to be a worthy servant for Him to work through! Those who fall admit after the fact that they quit reading the Bible and they quit praying. Prayer and devotion to the word is the life-source of ministry and you have to make sure that the ministry does not keep you from Jesus! There is a barrenness of busyness!

Paul Hudson soon learned that there were complainers in the congregation and he let them get the best of him. I will never forget a number of years ago when a physician I worked with (George Veale, M.D.) gave me a very good piece of advice. We (he more than I) were having to deal with another recalcitrant, obstreperous, arrogant physician (and every other adjective you can think of to describe him) who was not a happy camper on that day. In fact, I think the guy only had three or four happy camper days per year and he had already exhausted those when he found us. But Dr. Veale told me, “Philip, that guy just isn’t a happy guy!” Most chronic complainers are not happy campers and you will have to ignore their gripes and come to realize that they complain everywhere they go. Restaurants, department stores, and so forth seem to be in the complainers sights at all times. Paul Hudson let those complainers turn him into a cynic and his heart began to harden. Tie that up with less time in prayer and the Word and disaster is lurking.

Another element of gravity on the down grade put Paul Hudson into a place of professionalism. The more professional he became the more that style gave way to substance. He allowed the shortcuts to sink him. This is where technology can become disastrous to us. You can download sermon notes, MP3 sermons, and Powerpoints and use them without ever having to do anything spiritual again. But as the shortcuts are embraced, increasingly shallowness will rob your soul.

For the last two weeks, I have found that 1 and 2 Peter in the ESV has been more than just words on the page of the Bible. There are words that Peter left us that can stimulate great spiritual growth in our lives if we will allow the Word to transform us.

Do it for yourself and do it for me. . . Go somewhere and find a closet of prayer and open up your Bible and mark up 1 and 2 Peter. . . Your life and ministry depends on it. . .

Hell's Disappearing Act

2010-09-02T14:50:00.001-04:00

J. C. Ryle—The watchman who keeps silent when he sees a fire is guilty of gross neglect. The doctor who tells us we are getting well when we are dying is a false friend, and the minister who keeps back hell from his people in his sermons is neither a faithful nor a charitable man.

Hell has disappeared! Hell has been sanitized from the modern theological mind. Hell has become an off limits message for most pulpits. The sheep have either stated so publically to the other sheep or the sheep have privately inferred to the shepherd that this is not what they want to hear. The reasoning of the sheep goes in this manner, “We are so stressed out! We feel the pressure of moving from pasture to pasture. We are having babies and they are demanding our time. We are worried that the drought is going to wither and destroy all the grass. We have a shepherd who is always trying to lead us where we don’t want to go. The last things we want to hear about are ravenous wolves, bad waterholes, poisonous grass, and worrisome flies that will drive us mad. ”

Some shepherds have a tailor made view about this too. They say, “Keep it upbeat! Tell the sheep about the still waters, about the overrunning cups, and the mercy that chases the sheep. You will kill the flock with the negative message.” The shepherd conferences and confabs all promote greener pastures, fences that never need repairing, pure waterholes, and a place without wolves. However, this is a fantasy land for shepherds. A shepherd always will contend with sub-par grass, fences that get holes in them, watering spots that become contaminated, and predators that are always licking their chops.

The startling question that I have for you is this: When was the last time you heard a sermon on Hell that jolted you from your reverie of pursuing the American Dream? If it has been recently, you need to thank God that someone was willing to put this in front of you. If you cannot remember, you need to ask God to press it into the pastor’s mind with such force that he has to preach this troubling, terrifying message to the flock.

Despite the fact that hell has disappeared from the American pulpit does not make its existence any less true. In his book, No Place for Truth: Or Whatever Happened to Evangelical Theology?, author David Wells writes about the truth that used to work and “. . . once watered the evangelical soul is now dammed by a worldliness that many fail to recognize as worldliness because of the cultural innocence with which it presents itself. . . . We now have less biblical fidelity, less interest in truth, less seriousness, less depth, and less capacity to speak the Word of God to our own generation in a way that offers an alternative to what it already thinks.”

When Hell disappears, the Church loses her sense of direction. The presence of Hell out to motivate evangelism, it should encourage a devotion to God, it should heighten the desire for holiness, and it should keep us in a place of individual spiritual evaluation. The very existence of Hell places a sense of personal responsibility on every person who calls themselves a Christian. We are to give ourselves to actions, attitudes, and aptitudes that are distinctly Word-driven. Our directions come from the Bible not from the talking heads.

As Hell disappears from the landscape of the pulpit, worldliness gets a chokehold on the Church to such a degree that those who come go and go in houses of worship have very little difference in their actions, attitudes, and thinking patterns as the worldlings they view as lost. Perhaps it has to be considered that the greatest mission field in America is not outside the Church but inside the Church. But with the exit of Hell, shame and guilt are removed from the equation in the human heart although both of these emotions are distinctly God-given to us for a reason. When Hell is gone, sin is reduced to self-esteem issues that can be fixed by talking through them or better yet, dismissing it totally. I can only wonder how many people sit on pews that have never been converted but are really self-deceived and think that they are safe and saved.

It has become popular in our society to laugh at and mock those who do proclaim that there will be such a place as Hell. The mockers cast anyone who dares to venture into the subject matter as a “fire and brimstone” preacher. We are so beyond that they contend. We are so educated beyond that they intone. We are so advanced beyond that idea they stutter. But the fact remains that one’s opinion about what God has clearly stipulated in His Word is unchanging regardless of what a man thinks or does about it. This includes the matters of how educated, how financially secure, or how socially acceptable he may be, truth is unchanging.

A few weeks ago, I again found a compelling and pressing need to again preach about Hell. Personally for me it is always a challenge to preach about Hell. The reason is because I do know about the pressures and stresses that are facing people every single day of their lives and a message about Hell is always very heavy and ominous. But the fact remains that if I help people manage their stress, their finances, their marriages but they end up in Hell, of what use was the “spiritual” advice. While the message was loaded with Bible, I want to share with you a couple of the illustrations that I used.

A number of years ago, a pastor was summoned to the bedside of a dying man from his church. When he entered the room, the man extended his hand and with deep emotion said, “I am dying and you never warned me of the state I was in. You did not tell me about the danger that I was going to face. You never told me I was neglecting the salvation of my own soul!”

The pastor, taken aback, said, “Oh no, my brother, I took every reasonable opportunity to talk to you about spiritual matters and the actions of the church and the importance of living for God.”

The man replied back, “Yes that is true. You did do those things. But that was not enough. You never came close to me and closed the door and took me by the collar of my coat and told me I was unconverted and that if I died in this state I would be lost. And now I am dying and I will be lost forever because you were too soft in your approach.”

It is told that this had such a huge effect on that pastor that from then on he went about his task with an urgency and fear for the souls of man.

I am aware that the majority of readers of this blog are ministers, so my question to you is this: When was the last time you preached a message on Hell? When was the last time that you preached a message on Hell and you were so moved by it that tears marked your words? Can you pay the price to become a man who preaches with conviction?

I concluded with a story told to me by one of the men who attends our church. Hoyd Sanders is a retired USAF fire chief who for forty years worked as a fire-fighter literally all over the world.

Several months ago, Brother Sanders started talking to me about some of his experiences with fires that he had been involved in putting out. He told me about a time in January, 1965 when he tried to help a lieutenant get out of a fire.

A fire broke out in a large building and the Air Force firemen showed up to put it out. When they got there, a portion of the building on one end was engulfed with fire. They soon discovered that there was a lieutenant in the building but his escape had been blocked by the fire. So he turned around and started running toward the end of the building where the fire had not progressed to find another exit. The bad part was that there weren’t any alternative exits. By the time the lieutenant discovered this, the fire had caught up with him. He ran to a window and about that time Brother Sanders saw him running toward the window and decided he would go and try to break it so the guy could escape. The only problem was that there bars covering the window and he could not rip them away from the window casing. Furthermore when he reached up to grab the bars on the window they were so hot he could not hold on to them.

This man was on the other side of the window and Brother Sanders said he could see the fire racing up behind the man but he could not escape nor could he be rescued. Brother Sanders told me that in just seconds he could see the man’s ears literally melting off the sides of his head. He could hear his screams pouring out of his mouth. But the part that still haunts him to this day and he told me that rarely does a week go by that he does not see that man’s eyes. . . . those horrible, terror, pain-filled eyes pleading with him to get him out of that fire. . . . .

Jude. . . said it like this. . . . others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire.

Pastor, preacher, evangelist. . . You have a job to do this weekend when you get into that pulpit! Are you going to manage the stress, massage the egos, or pull them out of the fire????

Places Where Worlds Are Moved

2010-08-26T15:06:00.001-04:00

Last week, I got a series twitter messages that brought some inspiration for this post. They are as follow:

• The no heat/AC garage storage room where my dad birthed a 1,000 soul revival at 5AM daily 1:42 PM Aug 20th via Twitter for iPhone

• The financial cost? Zero! The killing the flesh cost? Staggering. Went on for 20 years. 1:45 PM Aug 20th via Twitter for iPhone

• I looked inside that tiny hot closet yesterday and it felt like I was standing in front of a burning bush. Take off your shoes 1:48 PM Aug 20th via Twitter for iPhone

• His altar was a knee high floor fan with a blanket on top and a quilt on the floor. When Zion travails. Let's have another planning session 1:50 PM Aug 20th via Twitter for iPhone

• God, where is Elijah? He put his head between his knees into the Oriental birthing position. The effectual fervent prayer ... availeth much Friday, August 20, 2010 1:55:31 PM via Twitter for iPhone

• Planning is essential and I need help in this area. However Paul said, first of all PRAYER Friday, August 20, 2010 2:20:11 PM via Twitter for iPhone

All of these came from Pastor Jerry Dean who pastors The Pentecostals of Bossier City in Louisiana. The pictures that accompanied the first tweet:

When I read those tweets, I felt immediately convicted. Here I am the same kind of pastor, preaching the same kind of doctrine, moving in the same avenues of men, attempting to move in same realms of the Spirit. . . . minus a 5 AM prayer meeting. . . or a 6 AM prayer meeting. . . or a 7 AM prayer meeting. “Oh, I pray,” I say to myself. But confronted by a garage closet that had no heat or AC, I realize that my little prayer is so disjointed and distracted that there is no wonder that active apostolic ministry only occasionally finds its way into my life.

Brother Dean’s father, Bill, also a WW II vet, found a place to move his world in a very humble place. Try to put the majority of modern day pastors and evangelists in a little hovel like that and tell them to pray and one would hear loud protests. No carpet? No wall murals? No music? No books? No cool office? When the real facts are that the modern day apostolic church is choking on carpet, wall murals, music, books, and fancy offices. Devoid of power but “wow!” don’t we have all the nifty gadgets and tricks? All the planning sessions in the world will only fill the churches with crowds who never experience the life-changing power of the Holy Spirit. Could it be that we are so busy pursuing cool that we have become lukewarm?

I feel the overwhelming weight of ministry. I am consumed with the busy responsibilities of the problems of people’s lives. I feel the financial pressures of embarking on a building program while trying to juggle our responsibilities to our Foreign Missionaries and Home Missionaries who needs our money too. I feel the grip of evil on the families in the church I pastor. I stay awake at night worrying and wrestling with their challenges. I am awakened at night with the same burdens of the fits and starts of those who cannot make up their minds as to whether or not God is big enough to work out the tangled webs they weave. I feel the pressure of preaching holiness to a generation that does not want to hear my cry for separation from the world. I feel the pressure of feeling like I am too mean and too authoritative and too dictatorial while knowing the terror of the Lord and trying to persuade them as Paul did.

But I am also rigorously busy trying to get the best out of both worlds—my world and God’s world. I want the big house in the gated community, the fancy car(s), the big bank account, the nifty office, the honor and respect of the community AND a walloping apostolic church where people are delivered, the prophet’s mantle, a command of the Scriptures, and a powerful prayer life.

Then the jolt comes, I see Brother Dean’s father’s prayer closet in a garage via twitter. Another jolt comes as I look at a rock that Tim Kelley got for me from G. A. Mangun’s memorial service. Another shock comes when I read the scribbled words in J. T. Pugh’s book “The Wisdom and the Power of the Cross” that he personally addressed to me back in 1995. Still another jolt comes when I look at the mantle that I received in the Columbus, Ohio General Conference hanging on a towel rod in my study. It will never happen.

When Brother Dean’s twitter came across last week, for once in about a 1000 times, TECHNOLOGY smote my heart! I felt so humbled. . . I felt so convicted. . . I felt so average. . . I felt so lukewarm. . . To my crowd and under (I am 43) the old men are leaving us! Note it . . . in the last few years we have lost N. A. Urshan, E. L. and Nona Freeman, Tom Barnes, J. T. Pugh, and most recently G. A. Mangun. . . Who will replace them? They were men who prayed earnestly and moved forward in the place of prayer.

Gracious God, forgive us of our backslidings from our closets. Forgive us of thinking that we can manage and manipulate true spiritual revival with weak, human, beggarly techniques. Forgive us for getting so exalted with our education, our gadgets, our stuff, our things, and our money. Please forgive us for not being able to get on our knees and cry out for You to invade our churches, one more time. Forgive us for loading our bookshelves with books so we look like we are in touch and are smart. Gracious God, forgive us of our backslidings from our closets.

Gracious God, please forgive us for making ministry a profession instead of calling. Forgive us for our petty competitions and bickering that does nothing but put little scorecards in our spirits that keep getting longer and longer.

Great God, please wash us from the dirtiness of our human ambition and elevate us to a place where we are willing to sweat as we tug our Crosses. Help us to quit glorying in how big our crowds are and how big the budget is and how good the sermons are. Pull that kind of glory out of us and put the glory of the Cross in us. Help us to find comfort in our crosses and let those crosses put us in closets, just like the one that Brother Dean has shared with us. Please pull all the hurt from our heart no matter where it came from whether it was from district boards, church boards, or just regular folks. It can even be the disappointments with where we are and what we have done, please pull all of that stuff out of us! We know that all of that stuff only makes us fresh targets for bitterness and revenge and it paralyzes Your Spirit in us. Gracious God, please, please forgive us of our backslidings from our closets.

Savior, Redeemer, Shepherd, when You are finished cleansing us all the filthiness of the flesh, would You please just show up one more time in our places of worship on Sunday? Can You please brush us one more time with the innocence of that first anointing that came to us in the early years? Just once more, Lord, move through your men in America. We are fragile, weak, and sometimes confused vessels but way down deep we still feel the remnants of that first calling, that first burst of strength that came from another world, and even though it has been so long ago, we remember. . . The glory may have departed but we well remember what it was like so long ago. Gracious God, forgive us of our backslidings from our closets.

Lord, it isn’t just for our sakes that we are pleading with You about this restoration of the closet. It is for the mostly good folks who come every week to a place of worship. They need You just as badly as I do. So as I stumble to my closet, I am sure that You will be there! Amen. . .

Some Books on Preaching--Part 1

2010-08-24T15:24:00.001-04:00

A couple of weeks ago, we visited the aspect of the responsibilities of those who are listening to preaching and how important it is to literally hear what is being preached. What is being preached is a back and forth between the pulpit and the congregation, it is to be a living moment of worship. However, I think it is absolutely of crucial importance that those who do preach constantly work toward improving both the mechanics of preaching—the wording, the presentation, and so forth—and the spiritual aspect of preaching—private prayer, personal holiness, and inner hunger for God and the Word.

I have a responsibility to do everything in my power to make preaching/teaching effective. Sometimes the content of the message can be very heavy and convicting. It is imperative that the heart of the preacher be clear and free of the prejudices, offenses of life, and pressure of the times so he does not soil what God is intending to get across to the church. This huge burden of personal holiness, prayer, and purity can be weighty but embracing these qualities only makes the message that much more powerful and provoking.

As far as the mechanics of preaching, as technology has advanced, there are massive resources that are available to the man who is diligent in looking for them. MP3 sermons, homiletic seminars, and a host of academic resources are available to us. Despite the newer inventions of the Nook, the Kindle, and now the IPad, it is still very hard to beat a book! Preachers should read much because doing so increases our range to draw from in messages that will help. However, for those who are readers, one category that often slips under the radar and is sorely neglected as those writings that are literally on preaching.

I recommend to you a book written by Jim Shaddix entitled The Passion Driven Sermon—Changing the Way Pastors Preach and Congregations Listen. There is an urge for men not to be pulpiteers but rather to take the Word and use it in a very powerful way that causes a confidence to rise in the Word of God and not the man who is preaching. We all have our heroes but when their personality overshadows the power of the Word—biblical preaching suffers. In fact, I am no longer sure it falls in the category of true biblical preaching when the overriding personality of the preacher supersedes what is being preached.

Shaddix tells a story in the opening chapter about a little country church that he served in as an assistant. He remembered a brewing bitterness in the soul of the pastor who felt like that this church was far beneath his abilities. One Sunday, he allowed the bitterness to overtake him and the frustrations and aggravations of congregational life had so sapped him that he got up in the pulpit on that Sunday and said, “I don’t have a Word from the Lord this week so we shall dismiss and go home.” Shaddix admits his own youthful immaturity but he writes that he was appalled at this man’s admission. Shaddix thought to himself that here in his hands was a Bible that was loaded with passages and that somewhere in that vast storehouse, there was something to render effectively to this group of worshipers. He said that on that day he made a commitment to always have a familiarity with Scripture so that he would have something to preach.

While this may seem far-fetched, I am certain that most preachers at some point will have the same feelings concerning preaching to a bickering, unwieldy, and discouraged flock. You would really rather choose to send the folks home instead of wading through the dilemma of preaching. However, you will soon learn that more often than not, the longer you are in the ministry, the more you work out of the responsibility of your calling than the inspiration of your calling.

Shaddix comes from three angles with his encouragement to preach. Passion-Driven Scripturology which is a passionate hunger for the study of the Word. Passion-Driven Shepherdology which is ministry that works toward the church and not toward entertainment and man-centered worship. A lot of preaching in our generation at large is good stuff. The greater question: Is it God-stuff??? There is a big difference between good stuff and God stuff! Passion-Driven Sermonology focuses in on the delivery of the message that one is to preach. How serious a man is about Scripture and how serious he is about the church makes the delivery of the message!

This book is a strong encouragement to get away from so much “life-application” sermons that give ten steps to a better marriage or fifty-five ways to improve your self-esteem. All of these kinds of messages have a bent toward humanistic pragmatism that leaves the glory of God in the proverbial dust. Life application messages may be relevant but there are a lot of motivational speakers who are relevant too. Why lower the Word into the mud of human effort when we can exalt God with Word-driven preaching?

The Bible is filled with incredible things to preach to churches we just have to make a concentrated effort to mine those treasures out. This book will be a motivational tool that you might need to jump-start your inspiration for preaching. Let me remind you of Thomas Manton who preached 65 sermons from Hebrews 11 and from Psalm 119 pulled one-hundred and ninety-one sermons from that acre of diamonds!

God Bless,
PH

When Church Leaders Fall--Part 4--Final Thoughts

2010-08-20T14:13:00.001-04:00

John Owen—If a man teach uprightly and walk crookedly more, will fall down in the night of his life than he built in the day of his doctrine.

Several years ago, I found a book in another Barnes and Noble in Tallahassee, Florida while Teresa and I were on a spring break trip with our kids. Few books have troubled me more, in fact I cannot think of one that ranks as its equal, it was entitled Our Fathers by David France. It chronicled the abuses by the Roman Catholic Church priests who were involved in pedophilia and the cover-ups that took place in the diocese in Boston and Los Angeles and various other places. What makes the book so troubling was the fallout that was forever created in the lives of those who had been abused. When those who are in a position of spiritual authority—no matter what church affiliation it may be—the fallout continues for generations.

While these posts have been primarily about the lessons learned when church leaders fall, the most important aspect to understand is that we do things that keeps us from being in that category. It takes place when we take care of our soul. This is where it all starts, in the dark recesses of the soul. We are either a man of honor in the heart or we are not. For those who are darkly involved, it is only a matter of time before exposure will take place.

Richard Baxter—If it be not your daily business to study your own hearts and to subdue corrupt ion and to walk with God, if you make not this a work to which you constantly tend, all will go wrong in your ministry and you will starve your hearers. We must study as hard how to live well as to how to preach well.

Make it your daily business to study your heart and then be demanding of your soul. I leave you with some ways to do this. These are ways to cultivate the growth of personal holiness in your life.

1. Know and love the Scriptures. To know the Scriptures means that you will have to read them but more than just reading them, you will need to learn how to apply them in avenues of daily living. It will not take place with a hit and miss approach, nor will it take place with small blocks of time.

2. Pray! If your prayers are lacking a punch then find some helps along the way. Praying the offensive Psalms, those which are pleading with God to take care of the enemies of the soul are useful (Ps. 54, 55, 61, etc.). Old hymn books are rich sources to motivate your praying.

3. Flee worldliness! We have to actively strike against any avenue that willingly attempts to cater to appetites that are not motivated by godliness and righteousness. The challenge of our culture is ever with us because there are a thousand and one avenues that the devil will use to introduce darkness into our spirit. Materials we read, recreation we participate in, and entertainment that consumes us are all ways the heart becomes hardened with darkness.

4. Have godly friends. Who we hang out with has a great impact on our spiritual lives also. It basically sets the tone for the direction of spiritual life. There are some who are toxic to our faith and there are others who are incredibly strengthening to us in our walk.

Until next time. . .

Thanks for reading. . .

PH

When Church Leaders Fall--Part 3

2010-08-19T16:23:00.000-04:00

To clarify a point on this particular series of posts concerning when church leaders fall—it is not limited to immoral relationships—it can also be related to misuse of money, poorly exercised authority (either too little or not enough), doctrinal compromise, laziness, and a host of other issues. Church leaders fall when they are not actively carrying out their responsibilities and work of ministry. Generally speaking when the man is initially confronted by the maligning behavior, he will initially deny it.

Denial is a deadly form of self-slaughter. Henry Ford made that mistake after his company had been viable for a little over a decade. The things that made it great in the past were the things that drug it down in the present. Compound that with the fact that Ford began to believe his and be overcome with his own press releases. Don’t ever, ever believe what people are telling you about yourself! If you can deflect the criticism that comes to all ministers then you will have to deflect the praise that comes also. We can get caught up in great deception when we believe all of the compliments we receive and all the criticism we receive. Get a balance on that or it will ruin you. You are never as good as people think you are and you are never as bad as they think you are either.

When flattery is no longer fiction, you will be put on spiritual life-support and it won’t be long until a stumble takes you down. If our motivations are not principled, any form of success will cause a man to be corrupted in the long haul. Success does funny things to us. It makes us unbending, unyielding, and prone to mistakes. You will be overcome with the mentality of ‘just go out and do it!’ or ‘you’ve done this a thousand times, no need to continue the spiritual disciplines of prayer and so on’ and you are about half-way in the trap when you buy into that. I am glad that there are times that I am still nervous before I preach, before I am involved in the work of the church, and as I muddle through counseling sessions. Invincibility is an illusion that we all can buy into no matter if the church has 25 or 2500. You can’t do this by yourself!!!

I come to the last couple of points concerning what happened to me when one of my spiritual heroes fell. (Part 1 and Part 2.)

8. It will not be the first time that someone fell nor will it be the last time I will witness a failure. Be prepared for it!

In fact as time has passed, I have witnessed multiple failures of men who were church leaders. It is not nearly as ground-shaking as it was for me twenty years ago or so. As time has passed and the numbers have increased somewhat, it appears that the thing that contributed most to all of the failures was a prevailing sense of pride. That pride manifested itself in many different forms but two of them appeared to be prevalent. Those who thought they could control their motives and desires without the active work of the Spirit or they were increasingly absent from their home and their own church where they were called to work. Being absent from their home was not necessarily that they were taking cross-country trips but just away for various reasons.

Get used to the fact that failure is going to occur. It does not mean the Church is any less powerful, it just means that God uses the winds of the trials to expose the charlatans. We are often somewhat skewed in our thinking to believe the idea that our days are different from that of Paul. He routinely warned the Church that there were wolves among the flock, false brethren populating positions of authority, and weeds in the wheat. Why should we expect our days to be any different?

9. It made me appreciate the wall-flowers of the ministry world.

I mean by this that I quit looking for the organ grinders who had hopping monkeys. I started looking for men whose lives reflected a quiet godliness and a calm spiritual authority, men whose names never graced the marquees or the organizational flyers. I found a lot of heroes riding Shetland ponies. More than once I had to repent for my former attitude about the regular “Joe’s” of life and came to understand that they could contribute so much to my life that would be important in the years to come.

10. Every man must have a personal devotion to God.

You will find this particular thought woven through much of these blog posts. You will have to fight with your life for this time to get alone. We are by nature given to busyness and the doing part of the ministry. We can preach canned sermons, pray canned prayers, and lead canned programs and starve our souls to death.

Family problems, church problems, financial problems, and fill-in-the-blank problems will deplete your spiritual life. One man said that the bucket will leak even if nothing is being poured out of it. Maybe this series of blogs has scared you—it has me! I don’t want to fall because there is a lot of influence that God has granted to me but I am not alone in that. God has granted you an incredible amount of influence in the circle of the world where you are too! If I am not constantly dependent on the grace of God to sustain me, my life will run low.

I will have some concluding thoughts tomorrow. . . .

Thanks for reading. . .

God Bless,
PH

When Church Leaders Fall--Part 2

2010-08-18T16:23:00.000-04:00

Picking up from yesterday’s post concerning when Church Leaders Fall, I want to give you some more thoughts that helped me to continue on in what we are called to do. The enemy loves nothing more than to challenge our faith by the failure of others. In fact, William Gurnall in his classic work, The Christian in Complete Armour, lists as one of the strategies of temptation that the devil uses is to get us looking at those who are in positions of influence and success and then create public failure to discourage us.

4. Public ministry “success” does not always mean that all is well.

The soul of the man collapses long before the trappings of his public ministry unravels. The old adage, “A man never falls far” is true. When we see a church leader fall, you can count on it that it rarely was a sudden failure. A man can be publicly lauded and elevated and behind the scenes be rejected by God.

Years ago, I was in the Barnes and Noble in Montgomery, Alabama and ran across a biography of Jimmy Swaggart. That book noted that during the 1980’s that within his own denomination, he had no peer as a preacher. Any conference that wanted to have a good attendance always made arrangements for him to preach because it had some sense of credibility with his presence. But when one gets so busy that he trusts in the arm of flesh instead of the anointing of the Spirit, complications will occur. One may compartmentalize his sin for a certain amount of time, but over the course of the long haul, carnality always will reveal its presence. No matter what level of talent that we have been gifted with, talents have never provided salvation for anyone. Please, please do not allow the trappings of success to justify improper or even immoral activities. Be a man of integrity.

Just because it appears to be successful does not necessarily mean that God is in it.

5. A man has to live what he preaches.

If you can rationalize and justify your wayward behavior and then get up and rail against those sins in a pulpit, your soul is that of a worm. The sharpest words that Jesus had were for those who were hypocrites (Matthew 23). You must live what you preach. If you don’t live it, don’t preach it!

We can get so busy doing that he forgot about being. We are human beings not human doings. The farther along in the ministry that one progresses the more of a premium that spiritual disciplines must be fostered. Prayer, fasting, and reading Scripture just for the sake of reading the Book are invaluable. Prayer develops and nourishes the passion of the preacher. Fasting develops the discipline of both body and soul. Reading Scripture adds wisdom and gives us options when we are faced with weariness, temptation, and discouragement.

No ministry will ever rise above what occurs in the secret place of the closet. An old survey conducted by Leadership Journal found that pastors pray an average of 22 minutes per day. Of the 572 who were surveyed, 57% spend less than 20 minutes a day in prayer, 34% spend between 20 minutes and one hour a day in prayer and 9% pray for an hour or longer daily. This thing about renewing your mind that Paul mentions in Romans 12 really works. But perhaps we have gotten so high tech with all of our gadgets that we think that praying our way through something is too old-fashioned. However, that was what Paul affirmed would keep us from conforming to this world and then transforming the average man into a noble instrument to be used for God’s purpose.

Prayer and devotion to the Word will help us to live what we preach.

6. I will never again be trapped into believing that success is what I can “see.”

We Americans put way too much emphasis on buildings and bucks or nickels and noses as someone has aptly said. We place way too much emphasis on image at the expense of substance. Preaching at conferences, camp-meetings, and seminars is not necessarily the benchmark of successful pastoral ministry. The real pattern for ministry is what you will read about namely the Bible, more specifically the job description you find in 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus.

You may see outward “success” but God is more concerned with inward godliness than with public persona.

7. The real heroes are usually the men that you cannot see.

While it is crucial for God to have visible and capable leaders, the majority of the work is going to be accomplished in the trenches where real pastoral ministry takes place. It is amazing how that God uses the sanctifying work of a godly ministry to hone and shape our souls. When we are given to prayer, ministry of the Word, evangelism, encouragement, helping, and serving it puts a lot in the tank so to speak.

Over the years, I have come into contact with men whose real holiness and godliness put a longing in my heart to be closer to God. I have met men who truly gave themselves to the ministry of prayer and it showed in the complexities of life. I have met men who were literally filled with the Spirit in such a manner that it provoked me to good works. The vast majority of those men would be looked upon with disdain because they do not pastor large churches. They just serve where they are called to serve. They love their people and their people love them.

On a concluding note, a long time ago a minister, whose name now slips my memory, said that it was a must that I read Richard Exley’s book The Perils of Power. It is long now out of print but I want to leave this thought with you. Every man has his own blind spots and dangerous Achilles’ heel. Consider your areas of weakness and face up to them. Where spiritual self-examination occurs, is where the power of the Spirit moves into our lives. The following describes one pastor’s experience:

Somehow I made it through the public confession, on adrenalin I think, but following the benediction an awful weariness settled upon me. Like a sleep walker I made my way down the center aisle to the front doors. Years of weekly repetition gave my handshake firmness, my smile warmth I didn’t feel, and my words of personableness which belied the awful emptiness within. Eventually the last worshiper departed and I re-entered the now empty sanctuary and looked around in despair. The silence was overwhelming, almost eerie. I made my way to the altar, then to the pulpit.

Standing there it all came back--my call to the ministry, the skimpy years when we both had to work so I could finish seminary, my first sermon, the night I was ordained, our first church. Then I begin to weep, soundlessly at first, just huge tears running down my cheeks, then harder until my whole body shook. Great heaving sobs rent my soul. I wept for what might have been, what should have been. I cried for my wife, for the terrible pain I had caused her, for the anguish that now locked her in painful silence. I cried for my church. They deserved better than this. They had trusted me, loved me, and I had betrayed them. And I cried for me, for the man I might have been.

I stood behind the pulpit, touched it, ran my fingers over the smooth wood and realized as never before what a sacred place it was. And with that realization came guilt so great that I couldn’t breathe. The magnitude of my sin, my betrayal, drove me from the pulpit and I stumbled to the altar and sat down. An accusing voice inside of me whispered, ‘How are the mighty fallen.’

There was no reason to stay, no reason to linger longer, but I couldn’t tear myself away. My life was ending, unraveling thread by thread, and I was powerless to stop it. Over the years, I had told ministers, again and again, that they had identity as persons not just as preachers, but now I discovered it wasn’t true for me. Without the pulpit, the church, the ministry, I had no self. I could feel myself becoming invisible, turning into a nonentity--breathing and taking up space but having absolutely no reason to exist.

Think long and hard about it! Read those words again and think about what one tosses away when immorality enters into his personal life. Think about what it was like when you preached the first sermon that God really used. Think about your wife and children. Think about those saints that you serve. Guard yourself. Keep yourself. Maintain your love for God.

More tomorrow. . .

Thanks for reading. . . .

Philip Harrelson

When Church Leaders Fall--Part 1

2010-08-17T16:12:00.000-04:00

I am currently working through a long series of studies through the book of Acts and I have come to the part in Acts 1 where the replacement of Judas is being dealt with by the Apostles (1:12-26). (If you want the notes send me an e-mail and I will send them to you in a Word doc.) As I worked through this passage, again I am confronted with how unsettling it can be when a church leader falls. In fact, it is almost ground-shaking to us when we see someone who once stood for the core doctrines of the faith find themselves disqualified from public ministry because of their actions. Not only did Judas disqualify himself from public ministry he committed suicide which totally removed any potential for his recovery at a later time.

We have grown accustomed to public spectacles taking place when men make foolish choices and destroy the influence that they had carefully worked toward creating. This has always been the case as time marches on—the names change but the times of man’s failing or his potential for falling does not. In fact, when men are given an opportunity to make poor choices they always do unless they have allowed the influence of the Spirit to take place in their lives (Romans 8:13-14; 12:1-2). We are can still be somewhat surprised when the Bernie Madoffs’, Tiger Woods’, John Edwards’, and others in the secular world make destructive choices motivated by their sin but when it comes into the church it can be ground-shaking.

Never can I forget when one of my spiritual heroes plummeted almost 20 years ago when I was still in a state of youthful immaturity. For months I was in a state of disbelief with the constant nagging thought that the same thing could happen to me. Furthermore, I lamented, if it could happen to him then I was even more susceptible that it could happen to me because I did not have nearly the spiritual status that my hero had. I thought, ‘If he can fall, what will happen to me?’ I worried, ‘If he can’t make, can I?’ I agonized over all of those things at the time. It pushed me to a place of prayerful consideration and evaluation and caused me to put up some boundaries in my life that to this day have continued to help. It forced me to understand that prophecies, “words” from the Lord, will all be forgotten as the clock marches on but Scripture is with me all the time and the more I get in my heart and head, the safer that I will against the attacks that surround our passage on this earth.

As time has marched on, I have discovered that this prominent failure would not be the only one I would encounter but that there were other men who would fall too. In all of that I discovered some valuable lessons that were helpful to me and may be helpful to you also.

1. I understood the pervasive and powerful influence that private sin has on one’s life.

One cannot expect to engage in frequent, private, and secretive sins and not be marred by the impact it will have on your life. To do so proves that there is an incredible self-deception that one has bought into. Private sins have a way of corroding every aspect of our lives. We all have a public persona that is present with us, it is the level of living that we are expected to do and it can be deadly to us because it does not take much to be acceptable to the public eye. However, a public anointing will never rise any higher than a private devotion! The private life of a man, the secret chambers of his heart is where all of the action is and that secret chamber of the soul must literally be saturated with the Word and with prayer. If that does not take place, it is only a matter of time before the door is thrown open to the sin that will mar your influence. Public credibility is already fragile enough and it will be axed when private sin is being entertained. You can put whatever sin you wish to place in the area of private sin—there are a multitude of choices—all of them being as pervasive as leprosy.

2. It caused me to take deep (and constant) inventory of my own soul of which I continue to do even to this day.

Soul inventory requires that you not be gentle with yourself! You cannot afford to allow yourself outs on any issue. Years ago, an old preacher told me that four things will ruin a man who is called to public ministry—silver, self, sloth, and sex. That pretty well sums up for us the avenues of life that we must always hold the line and never allow a drift to take place.

Soul inventory is more than just a checklist that you go through on a daily basis because lists in themselves can become very legalistic and you will soon find an out if you look hard enough. Deep soul inventory requires that you constantly realize that that you are in a perpetual, relentless spiritual battle that requires constant vigilance. Paul said that you would have to buffet the body and reign in your body (1 Corinthians 9:25-27). Peter notes that your mind has to be held in a sober manner of thinking (1 Peter 5:8-9). He would later give a picture of those men who refused to deal harshly with their motives and actions in 2 Peter 2.

3. It caused me to look deeply at who this failure affected.

Who was affected by the failure of Judas? I am certain that because he was a disciple that he had someone he was influencing and I feel fairly certain in saying that his dramatic betrayal and suicide affected those who loved and admired him. The sad thing is that when men fall there are others who wash out with them. The wash outs are not as dramatic but their failure is just as dire and their destination is the same as that of Judas because some never recover.

I conclude this post with a list that I wrote down in my Bible about two years ago. I found it on Randy Alcorn’s blog and thought it provoking enough to put it at the end of Genesis because of the association with the integrity that Joseph demonstrated. Alcorn entitled the list “Anticipated Consequences of Immorality.”

• Grieving my Lord; displeasing the One whose opinion matters most.
• Dragging into the mud Christ’s sacred reputation.
• Loss of reward and commendation of God at the judgment.
• Having one day to look Jesus in the face at the judgment seat and give an account of why I did it. Forcing Him to discipline me in various ways.
• Following in the footsteps of men I know of whose immorality forfeited their ministry and caused me to shudder. (List these names.)
• Suffering of innocent people around me who would get hit by the shrapnel of my disobedience (Achan).
• Untold hurt to my loyal wife and best friend.
• Loss of my wife’s trust and respect.
• Hurt to my children. Why listen to a man who betrayed Mom and us?
• If my blindness should continue or my family is unable to forgive, I could lose my wife and children forever.
• Shame to my family.
• Shame to my church family.
• Shame and hurt to my fellow pastors, ministers, and elders and hurt to my friends who I have influence with.

I realize this is heavy thinking stuff and I have more of it that I scribbled down in the moleskin that I will share this week. We are rarely given to this kind of soul inventory much anymore because we don’t even want to entertain the fact that we could very well be guilty of being way too easy on ourselves. Don’t do it!!!! Too much is at stake. . .

More tomorrow. . .

Thanks for reading. . .

Philip Harrelson (philipharrelson@gmail.com)

P.S. -- I am taking a brief hiatus from the Christopher Hitchens posts until I have a chance to read through his memoir which will be in a few days.

Christopher Hitchens' Great Dilemma -- Part 2

2010-08-16T15:07:00.001-04:00

Continuing on that same stream from last week with Christopher Hitchens' battle with cancer and his obvious and perhaps delightful embrace of atheism, we have to note the obvious hopelessness that comes to those who are intent on embracing this theory. If you listen closely to what Hitchens has to say about life in general, there are some obvious comparisons with the thoughts and ideas of George Carlin who also recently passed away. George Carlin was another figure with who I wasn’t familiar with until his death and happened to read a book review from another blog about his life. Considered one top comedians of our age, he was another man who was trapped in the same defiled thinking patterns as is Hitchens.

I made the mistake of searching for Carlin on YouTube and could only manage about 3 minutes of the vile monologue that was dubbed as entertainment. But in reality both Hitchens and Carlin were both saying the same thing in a round-about way. Hitchens is being hailed as one of the foremost thinkers and progressives of our times and Carlin was being touted as one of the best comedians of our day—either education is being confused as comedy or comedy is being confused as education. Initial surprise at these two characters was soon replaced by proper theology—don’t be surprised at the actions and words of those who are sinners—they are just doing what comes natural to them, fighting with God. Despite their greatest inclinations to say there is not a God, all of their actions put them unknowingly in direct opposition to God. Anything opposed to God always fights with God!

All one has to do is again go to Scripture to look at the mindset of a man who has no hope in God. Perhaps it is most reflected in the most cynical book in the Bible, the Ecclesiastes, written by Solomon when his life was devoid of the hope of God. His idols and his wives had caused him to forget who God was.

Ecclesiastes 3:18-22 ESV [18] I said in my heart with regard to the children of man that God is testing them that they may see that they themselves are but beasts. [19] For what happens to the children of man and what happens to the beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts, for all is vanity. [20] All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return. [21] Who knows whether the spirit of man goes upward and the spirit of the beast goes down into the earth? [22] So I saw that there is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his work, for that is his lot. Who can bring him to see what will be after him?

This is what happens to men who pursue the American dream at a maddening pace and either they get it or it is like chasing butterflies that are always elusive and never captured. If you only pursue things that are confined to the earth and never consider the spiritual aspects of your soul, it always comes up with emptiness. Hitchens soul is empty because he bought into the deceptiveness of the temporary and refused to believe in the permanence of the eternal.

Chuck Swindoll in his devotional commentary on Ecclesiastes provokes my thinking with the following thoughts:

Before we travel with Solomon through his journal account, allow me to state in three simple comments how directly his observations and experiences, though ancient, tie in with our journey today.

1. The sensual lure of something better tomorrow robs us of the joys offered today.
2. The personal temptation to escape is always stronger than the realization of its consequences.
3. The final destination, if God is absent from the scene, will not satisfy.

The good life—the one that truly satisfies—exists only when we stop wanting a better one. It is the condition of savoring what is rather than longing for what might be. The itch for things, the lust for more—so brilliantly injected by those who peddle them—is a virus draining our souls of happy contentment. Have you noticed? A man never earns enough. A woman is never beautiful enough. Clothes are never fashionable enough. Cars are never nice enough. Gadgets are never modern enough. Houses are never furnished enough. Food is never fancy enough. Relationships are never romantic enough. Life is never full enough.

Satisfaction comes when we step off the escalator of desire and say, “This is enough. What I have will do. What I make of it is up to me and my vital union with the living Lord.”

I plan on reading Hitchens biography in the next few days and have to believe that somewhere in that autobiographical work that there is some evidence of a man who never had enough. His dissatisfaction with life paralyzed the ability of his soul to rise to gratitude.

Finally, here is another video clip of the trailer for the Collision debates. The disclaimer that comes with this clip is that this is purely an intellectual and academic pursuit of God (or with Hitchens the absence of God) which always leads men astray. God cannot be confined to a classroom or a Petri dish. The great danger of seminaries that started with biblical foundations found that they drifted when they turned God into a purely academic pursuit; God always becomes lifeless when He is confined to academic nuances. God means and intends to live in the hearts of men through the occasion of the New Birth (John 3:3-5; Acts 2:38; 10:44-48; 19:1-6).

More later. . .

Thanks for reading. . .

PH

Christopher Hitchens' Great Dilemma -- Part 1

2010-08-12T14:34:00.002-04:00

Last November, I wrote a series of posts (which I did not finish) about a neurosurgeon that I have worked with and known since the summer of ’92 and his recommendations of Richard Dawkins’ works (Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3). At the time of his suggestion, I had no idea who Dawkins was. But after I read through one of his books and sorted through a couple more, it became clear that Dawkins was a radical, hostile, and sarcastic atheist who enjoyed humiliating anyone who would attempt to defend a Christian worldview and the existence of God.

As I became acquainted with the Dawkins spin, I also discovered a few other fellows that are comrades with Dawkins in their efforts to become what has commonly been referred to as the New Atheists. One such author, and very popular I might add, is Christopher Hitchens. He is also an avowed atheist but is not nearly as sarcastic and pugnacious as Dawkins, at least in my opinion. Although I have not read any of Hitchens work, my exposure to him came through the Collision Debates that he had with Douglas Wilson. All of the debate is on You-Tube but unless you are interested in debates you probably won’t find it very compelling.

Last evening, I noticed a news article concerning Christopher Hitchens who has been diagnosed with esophageal cancer with apparent metastasis. The cancer not only is in his esophagus but also has spread to the lymph nodes. For anyone who remotely knows anything about medicine and the disease process, this is a ticking time bomb that Hitchens is dealing with. So take note of the interview and hear what the man says. Listen carefully to a man who is now sitting on death row about to go where we all will ultimately end up, facing the judgment (Hebrews 9:27).

I will post more thoughts on this in the days to come but I want you to contemplate what hopeless this man unknowingly is presenting to his watching fan base. I conclude with Paul’s words to the Romans:

Romans 3:4 ASV God forbid: yea, let God be found true, but every man a liar; as it is written, That thou mightest be justified in thy words, And mightest prevail when thou comest into judgment.

For Mr. Hitchens, and everyone else for that matter, it doesn’t matter what you believe or do not believe about God! Your unbelief does not change the equation of God’s existence and His active work to redeem man through the power of the Cross.

More later. . .

Thanks for reading. . .

PH

How Is Your Listening?. . . . Part 4

2010-08-10T15:13:00.001-04:00

With this last blog on how is your listening, I want to continue with the ways that Ken Ramey states that we can help our listening.

Fifth, be consistent with church attendance. Haphazard church attendance is an Achilles heel for many Christians in our times. They do not even realize what they have missed after they start having sporadic patterns of attending church. When we assemble together for a time of fellowship and encouragement it helps all of us (Hebrews 10:23-25). When I was growing up, my parents attended church every time the doors were open, so this habit became ingrained into my life and it has continued to reward great benefits to me. When you are regularly attending church, God has the ability to pick up where you left off from the last time. Not only do I feel that weekends are important for corporate worship, I am also a strong advocate of coming to mid-week services.

David Eby summed it up like this, concerning church attendance: “You grieve over flaky folks who don’t take preaching very seriously, who will miss services with seemingly no conscience pangs, at almost any flimsy excuse. You mourn for a generation, red-eyed from Nintendo and TV, bloated with soccer, scouts, hot tubs, and designer vacations, but bored with the Word of God."

You have to make time for worship and when you go, have a sense of expectancy. Expect something in the worship to engage you. God is a speaking God and when we go to the house of worship, we should intentionally determine to experience something great from God. Plan your Saturday night to facilitate your Sunday morning and Sunday night. There are a lot of things that could be done in 15 minutes of Saturday night that would severely diminish the stress levels that some families face on Sunday mornings getting ready for worship. It’s hard to hear from God if marital tension, unruly kids, and NASCAR style driving all had to accompany you on the way to worship.

Sixth, worship with all of your heart. Worship helps us to focus our thoughts and minds in prior to the preached Word. The songs, the prayers, even the offering are all a series of active things taking place to help us to be receptive to the Word and Spirit of God. We need to sing! Some can sing in their car but can’t sing in their church. We need to pray! Some men can call in on nation-wide sports call-in shows and talk about their favorite team but cannot pray in front of their wives and children. We need to give! Again, most people spend $100 and even more eating out on a weekly basis but quibble when someone expects them to give 10% in tithes. As you can see worship is always a matter of priority and whatever your priorities are they will get your time and attention.

Seventh, fight off distractions. There are a thousand and one distractions that one can find attractive in the course of a worship service. You can watch people, you can look at the sanctuary, you can day-dream, and in fact the sky is the limit as to what distractions you can pay attention to. However, most of us have been in a class before whose intent it was to prep us for taking a final or a board examination. Nobody had to tell you to get focused and pay attention because you were fearful of failing the test. It’s funny but sad how we can put much more effort in paying attention for some earthly examination we want to pass but pay little attention to the words that can help us to gain eternal life.

You can fight off distractions by making eye contact with the preacher. You can mentally follow along with what he is saying and you can physically follow along in your Bible. Don’t give in to laziness by leaving your Bible at home, take it to church! By the way, sermons are not for entertainment, they are for instruction in righteousness and sometimes the Word will confront where you are living and it will convict (or confront) you. If you are living low, the tendency is to get angry with the preacher but if you are living high, spiritually speaking, you will embrace the biblical message and determine to do better after you repent and confess your sin to God.

So, on a closing note, my question again is, “How Is Your Listening?”

Thanks for reading. . . .

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

When God Plans Your Pain

2010-08-06T13:44:00.000-04:00

Fishermen know the sea, but they also know the sky.

They understand that knowing the color of the horizon, the types of clouds present, the direction, smell, and the velocity of the breeze can determine life or death. A wrong move can put you into shipwreck.

If it's dark, clouds are mounting, and the water seems rigid... it may not be the greatest decision to go out on the lake for the afternoon!

How many times I have expected the will of God to place my boat on easily manuevered waters. That is a normal and natural response for any human. But it is not always God's choice...

Mark 6:45

"And straightway he CONSTRAINED His disciples to get into the ship, and to go to the other side..."

The all-knowing God pressured sky-knowing men

to get into a ship on a not-so-good, very bad day.

This is a process to which every called minister of God must submit. It is the process of understanding that the will of God is often done in the midst of obvious circumstances which are bent toward the not-so-favorable and absolutely uncomfortable and generally fearful!

The hardest part about making the decision is when you know what God has asked you to do, you have some fear mixed with your faith, the Word is in agreement with you.... but others look at you and say, "LOOK AT THE SKY! BE LOGICAL! CAN YOU NOT SEE THERE IS A STORM BREWING IN WHAT YOU "THINK" IS THE WILL OF GOD???"

But I have learned...

It will cause you to call on God.

It will put your feet on the waves of the miraculous.

It will guide you into a new dimension of the Revelation of God.

It will show you the power of a promise.

It will show you God's ability to resign your fears.

It will prepare you for the "Legion"-level of God you meet on the other side.

Abraham was in the will of God... and he was on his way to sacrifice his son.

Paul was in the will of God...shipwrecked and viper-bitten.

If it doesn't require faith, it generally doesn't require God. If it doesn't require God, you should questions whether it is the will of God!

The will of God often end up in storms beyond our control. It is in this position that GOD becomes the center of everything. It becomes all about HIM. Jesus knew there was a storm brewing. I believe the disciples has some inclination. Jesus constrains them to get on the boat...puts them into the place of fear, pain, and powerlessness - so HE can walk on the water and invite them into a new dimension!

God is interested in the process of His will. It is not an easy one - but it does unleash a new level of intimacy and trust with the Almighty.

There was never a person in the Word or in History that experienced the power and the raw might of the Lord without first being constrained to get in a ship with a storm brewing in the heavens.

In my recent step of faith in ministry I realized...

The multitude of comfortable opportunities were places without faith and called for the arm of flesh alone.

Then one called that many said, "Bro. you had best look at the sky cause that looks like a rough sea in the making, and God may not be in it."

Well, they were right... "God may not be in it..."; however, I have found that he generally is... in the rough sea and in the storm. He has to be... or I die.

Never refuse to step out in faith. It is the hardest thing to do... but the most pleasing to God.

How Is Your Listening?. . . . Part 3

2010-08-05T18:08:00.001-04:00

We have established the importance of listening to preaching and the effectiveness of jotting down notes while you are listening, and now we come to the important part of getting your ears ready to listen. You are probably familiar with the song “Open the Eyes of My Heart” which is more of a prayer that it is a song but it has a powerful lesson in it. We listen with our ears but we hear with our heart. For the right thing to be heard in the heart, the heart has to be prepared to hear what is being preached. If your heart is dead to spiritual things, more times than not you are going to come away from the preaching/teaching event with the idea that it was boring and had little to say to you. However, if your heart is set in a tone of spiritual responsiveness to God, you are going to glean a lot from the preaching.

But preparing our hearts to listen can be an overwhelming challenge for us on a weekly basis. We have developed what one writer (who slips my mind at this time) terms as infobesity. We are little fat with information. We have become road kill on the information superhighway. The information superhighway roars at you all day long with massive doses on media of various sorts, tack on the internet with e-mail, add to those cell phones which text, tweet, and talk, and your head and heart can be spinning round and round!

In Ken Ramey’s excellent little book on Expository Listening, he has a chapter entitled “Harrowing Your Heart to Hear.” The indication is that your heart is a field and it has to be plowed, cultivated, and watered just as a garden would have to be taken care of. I am going to summarize some the points that he lists that are helpful to help us to hear.

First, meditate on God’s Word every day. We are a Bible rich society. They are everywhere but I have come to discover that just because they are everywhere does not necessarily translate into us reading them. You really can’t expect to be hungry for the Word on Sunday if you have not been reading it during the week. Richard Baxter said, “Read and meditate on the Holy Scriptures much in private, and then you will be the better able to understand what is preached on it in public.” I long for every person that I know to keep working at the Word until they literally see how applicable it is to your daily life. There are all sorts of different things to help you gain a love for the Word. All you have to do is go to ITunes and search “You’ve Got The Time” or “Faith Comes by Hearing” in the podcast area and you can download the New Testament free in two formats, KJV or ESV.

Second, pray throughout the week. Prayer is very crucial to help us to hunger for the Word. If you will ask God to give you the ability to hear and pursue the Word, He will! Ask the Lord to turn the lights on in your mind and the Bible will explode in your life. Suddenly what your pastor is preaching will begin to fall into place and you will begin to see what real spiritual life is all about.

Third, confess your sin. For those who think they are not sinning, let me follow you around for about a week. If you are not praying, you are sinning. If you are not evangelizing, you are sinning. What about those websites, movies, books, or conversations that you are actively involved in that are not encouraging Godly and clean living? What about you’re comments on Facebook or the forums that you are a part of? Are all of those Facebook polling questions that provide a characterization of you something that God would be pleased with? When you plow through Romans 6, 7, and 8, you will immediately discover that the American culture is constantly pulling at us and it is deadly to our spiritual life. All of those things obstruct our vision of God and His Word. That is sin and it calls for repentance.

Fourth, reduce your media intake. I am constantly fighting over this very lonely battlefield. I often think I am a lone voice crying out against this. Ramey writes that the average American watches TV just over 4 hours a day. But we can’t stand sermons over 30 minutes! That speaks to our priorities! The latest rage among the young teenage girls is the attraction to the vampire books and movies. It is hard for a preacher to get past that. For the men who saturate their lives with sporting events, college and pro, watching ESPN until you waddling about from sportsbesity is killing your ability to listen to the Word. Then we have the gamers, hours wasted building the dynasties inside of a little electronic box. Can you imagine proudly standing in front of God one of these days and proudly telling Him that you were the champeen of all championships in the little e-world.

Ramey writes, “After TV watching and going to the movies and surfing the Internet all week long, you come to church and have to sit and listen to a lengthy sermon that requires a great deal of concentration and exertion you aren’t used to. You’re expected to go from being a passive viewer to an aggressive listener literally overnight.” When a preacher cries out against this he is looked at with suspicion, as a legalist, as a real fruit-loop who needs therapy. The reality is that he doesn’t need therapy, our world needs to clearly again understand the calling out of holiness that will separate us from all of this soul-deadening nonsense!

A final quote from Jay Adams: “Many today drift into church with their minds turned off, slouch in the pew, and expect the preacher to do the rest. Examine yourself, brother or sister: have you been guilty of becoming a Sunday morning version of the couch potato?” (From Be Careful How You Listen.)

More tomorrow. . .

How Is Your Listening?. . . . Part 2

2010-08-04T14:42:00.001-04:00

What struck my thoughts on this idea of listening is a book that I am currently reading and a sermon that I downloaded by Pastor Anthony Mangun. The book I am reading is called “Expository Listening” by Ken Ramey who noted the wealth of books on preaching and homiletics and that he had never noticed a book about listening to sermons.

The podcast that I heard of Brother Mangun was a series that he was starting at the church he pastors about the Fruit of the Spirit. He began with Matthew 13 in the parable of the soils and before he really got into the message he mentioned that there would be people who didn’t hear a word he would say during the message. There would be others who would listen and have some emotional or intellectual reaction that would be gone by the middle of the day on Monday. However, he also said that there were also hearers who had hearts that was like the good ground that Jesus spoke of that would have true spiritual growth because they had been willing to pull in the Word into their heart and mind and let it help them make adjustments in the course of their spiritual walk. Basically what he was saying that your response to preaching is an affair of your heart! Wherever your heart is will greatly depend on your response to the Word.

I will never forget my junior year at Texas Bible College when it struck me that first week that I needed to be more proactive with my listening. I was sitting next to Paul Jacks and Bryan Aaron in a chapel service and I looked over at them and saw varying degrees of dazed lethargy. They were not quite to the point of nodding off and drooling but they were pretty close to it. Glazed eyes that had a faraway look keyed me in to the fact that both of them were present physically but not mentally. But I have to drop my rocks on the ground for I too had been in the dazed zone chapel before too.

Anytime that you get a bunch of rookie preachers who are in their early twenties and know everything about the Bible (if you don’t believe it just ask them) you have a recipe for a dazed-glazed preaching event to take place. I can well remember some of the antics of preaching about the identity of Melchizedek, forty-nine aspects of praise, and climbing into the third heaven using Jacob’s ladder. In between all of that were the nifty little poems, stories, and personal experiences that were pulled together in those “sermons.”

On the other hand, I heard some jacked-up masterpieces in that chapel at Texas Bible College. Some of them I have never forgotten despite the fact that this month is twenty-years ago that I walked into that place (I was welcomed to Houston by having my car stolen and stripped the second night I was there but that is for another day). I will never forget Ken Gurley’s opening chapel when he preached “The Beauty of the Beast.” Phil White’s “Overloaded with Goats” and “The Eyes of the Bride.” O. R. Fauss who preached “The Peril of Not Being Anointed” along with Mike Chance’s three shot Accent weekend with every sermon being on prayer. Never will I forget Brother Griffin’s series on “Blessed Assurance” and the series on the Sermon on the Mount. Two very troubling sermons came from Brother Hunt and Brother Griffin; “Concerned with Gourds” and “Despise Not the Day of Small Things.” Nor will I ever forget Brother Ensey preaching “The Ghost of Ephraim” and “Loving Much.”

However, it was not long before I begin to pick up things from even the rookies that helped me in my spiritual growth and it all had to do with how I listened to sermons. This all came about because of my purchase of one of those cheap little marble notebooks from Office Depot and good pen. Now twenty years, fifty notebooks (that I still have), and innumerable dead pens (that I don’t have), I have benefited from going back and reading through some of the things that struck me during the sermons I have listened to.

There are those who disagree with people taking notes while someone is preaching because they argue that it takes away from the listener’s ability to pay attention to the preacher. I strongly disagree with that, in fact I believe that it actually heightens the ability of the listener to pay attention and on Tuesday of Thursday one can still be mulling over some of the things that were said. I have to carefully demonstrate the difference between note-taking that you would take in listening to a sermon versus what you would do with Anatomy and Physiology in a college classroom. Some notes are very detailed and others hit the high points—hitting the high points and jotting down the Scripture references helps us to listen. I also might add that it goes a long way in helping a bad sermon move a little quicker.

Thomas Watson—When we come to the Word preached, we come to a matter of the highest importance; therefore we should stir up ourselves and hear with the greatest devotion. (From Heaven Taken By Storm)

If you begin to take notes, you will suddenly figure out who are the real Biblical preachers and those who are not. You may ask, “How so?” I want to give you a few areas to consider.

Keeping track with notes will determine the biblical content of the message. The cry of one of the minor prophets was that the people were being destroyed because of a lack of knowledge (Hosea 4:6). If you follow along and really listen the acid testing of biblical preaching is that it will contain the Word; not jokes, not stories,

Keeping track with notes will determine the spiritual content of the message. When I say spiritual content, I am meaning those things that apply to the spiritual disciplines of our lives—prayer, fasting, corporate worship, and church attendance. These are all spiritual practices that gives leanings toward growing spiritually. The world sees a lot of “Christians” who are not much different in their activities than those who are in the world—if we go to all the same places, do the same things, pursue the same things, etc. that the unsaved are pursuing. . . then are we really converted. . . have we really been saved?

Keeping track with notes will awaken a spiritual discernment in you that you have never experienced. You will suddenly be brought into understanding the power of the Word in the application of how you live day-to-day. Spiritual discernment is directly related to spiritual maturity. Find a person who is spiritually mature and you will find a person who is spiritually discerning. I have also discovered that spiritual maturity and spiritual discernment will bring out a boldness that will help you resort to the Word instead of opinions, theories, and ideas.

More tomorrow. . . .

How Is Your Listening?. . . . Part 1

2010-08-03T15:54:00.001-04:00

Every week preachers are routinely evaluated by how well they did or did not do with the messages they preach. The congregation is constantly evaluating, for the most part in the private confines of their mind, the value of a sermon. In the interest of time, they evaluate the length. The complaints are that it is usually too long. While I have certainly been trapped a few times with long, windy sermons the other end of the spectrum ought to be considered too. Was the sermon too short? So the private thoughts continue about preaching—length, subject matter, tasteful, diplomatic, and so forth. Consider with me how deadly it is to begin to evaluate sermons in this particular manner.

First of all, it caters toward making preaching entertainment. Preaching is nothing more than a dish that is being sampled at a recipe contest and tested for its sweet taste. Preaching becomes just another venue to say “Good!” or “Bad!?” just like one of John Grisham’s latest novels. Preaching can be evaluated just like a cake, a steak, a book, a play, a podcast, or you fill in the blank.

When we listen to preaching for the sake of entertainment, it will do nothing for our soul growth in the long run. What few people understand is that this is a very active role of spiritual warfare that takes place every single Sunday of the year. Spiritual warfare is anything that reduces your ability to take in spiritual things and accommodate them to your life. Most people who think of spiritual warfare immediately want to equate it with an ethereal, mystical never-land that is filled with ghosts and goblins and all sorts of other matters. To do this means that we have fallen into Screwtape’s trap—making too much of spiritual warfare. So you have to watch your listening and stay focused on what you are hearing. If it helps, take notes. If taking notes is not a good option for you then consider that preaching is just as much an act of worship as is praying, singing, and giving. All worship is a verb and preaching means that we are active participants in the preaching—through listening!

Secondly, it creates hero worship. When we thumb up and thumb down preaching with our expectations, it won’t take you long to understand that some men are more gifted in the pulpit than others are. I am convinced that there are some who could be jerked from their beds at 3 AM and hastily thrown into a pulpit and ordered to preach and they could do it. Not only could they do it, you would be blown away by their personal gifting and talents. Thank God for those men like that but all of us don’t pass the muster in the 3 AM test!

Take it from me as I am well aware of this fact. In my early (undiscerning?) years, I was very impressed by those with a flair for talent in the pulpit. As the years passed and I gained some maturity and discernment, I started noticing that flair in the pulpit did not always equate to personal holiness and personal godliness of life. A man could be a star-studded wonder in the pulpit and could be a rogue in his personal life and he was given a pass for it. Forgive me for my forthrightness but we need more authenticity of life than flair in the pulpit. If you have an authentic life, you will have an authentic anointing to preach the Word.

So be careful how you listen. One of the things that can happen to a pastor who spends his life in one church is that more often than not, he preaches with his life and not so much his words. That congregation hears what he says but they do far more hearing with their eyes than with their ears. All of us who have been called to preach owe it to those places that we serve to live cleanly and clearly as we articulate the Gospel.

Thirdly, it diminishes the power of the provoking Word in your life. We all love those moments when the encouragement is flowing and the inspiration is at a high pitch during the preaching. We can feel good because our spiritual and moral flaws are not confronted. We can feel the mental massage as the Word brings about a spiritual rush of adrenaline in our lives. But constantly evaluating preaching in this way quickly reduces (annihilates?) the ability of the Word to provoke us toward living a higher life. You need more than a “feel-good” sermon, you need transformation. This necessary transformation takes place in our minds (Romans 12:1-2) and it is greatly facilitated when we are willing to hear the Word and allow it to provoke us.

Most spiritual provocation is going to make you mad but just stay with it because you are now on the way toward spiritual growth. We love for our physicians to talk straight to us about our temporary human bodies but we take great offense for our pastors to talk straight to us about our souls which are eternal. You will resort to all sorts of suggestions to get your weight down, your blood pressure down, your cholesterol down, and a host of other things but it is hard to make the same changes that lead to spiritual growth. Yet the provoking preaching of the Word is the only real way that we will notice that we have true spiritual revival and personal growth.

So if you are evaluating preachers on their preaching. . . Can we evaluate you on you’re listening???

More tomorrow. . .

Certain Men. . . . Jude 4

2010-07-29T16:38:00.000-04:00

The news has been caught up this week with Wikileaks and its very troubling posting of critical documents concerning the war in Afghanistan. The man in charge of the website is Julian Assange whose decision to release the documents for the whole world to see has placed a number of allies of the United States military at great risk. It is not without reason to believe that it could lead to the death of these Afghani supporters by the Taliban once they have determined their identities.

But the greater and more troubling issue is how that Wikileaks obtained the documents. According to the Wall Street Journal Online, it appears that they were helped by Pfc. Bradley Manning who worked on the inside to gain access to these top-secret files who then managed to download them and pass them to Assange. As stated today (7/29/10), the military and government investigators have “concrete evidence” that Manning is the culprit.

In observing this story at the periphery during the last week, I have continually been drawn toward the Scripture that Jude left for us in his brief epistle:

Jude 4 KJV For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.

Jude 4 ESV For certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ. [Cross References: 2 Pet. 2:1; Gal. 2:4; 1 Pet. 2:8; Acts 11:23; Titus 1:16; 2 Pet. 2:1; 1 John 2:22]

There are those who would bring about a breach from the inside. The greatest challenge the church has is not from the outside but those who work to destroy it from within. When you look at the history of the Great Wall of China you will discover that it was never breached from the outside but it was always from within. Some unscrupulous and unprincipled gatekeeper was bribed with money to let the enemy gain the entrance.

Most people who attend church rarely like to entertain the idea that there are negative spiritual influences that is at work on the inside of the church. Far too many have a sentimental view of the church that makes it just a warm fuzzy playground to get our fears and anxieties massaged and put to rest. It is a place more of fellowship than of stimulating personal spiritual growth that directs us to a deeper prayer life and greater understanding of the Word of God. It is not about transformation as much as it is about affirmation.

Over the years, I have greatly enjoyed to read through the commentaries and writings of the Puritans. As with all books, it is important to read with a filter and have the ability to critically think and analyze what you are reading. I subscribe to this idea with all that I expose my mind and spirit to. It is important that we not just let our minds be open to anything and everything that comes down the pike; ultimately it has to stand the principles and tests of Scripture no matter who the author or speaker is. With that thought in mind, I am going to list a few lines from Thomas Manton’s commentary on Jude. Particularly notice the fantastic word pictures that Manton is given to.

From the Preface:

When the Christian church began first to look forth in the world, there were adverse powers without ready to crush it, and Libertines, who like worms bred within in the body, sought to devour the entrails and eat out the very bowels of it.

The monsters of Africa came from the unnatural commixtures of the beasts running wild in the deserts; so when men had once broken through the hedge, mingling in their own fancies with the Word of God, by an unnatural production they brought forth such monstrous and absurd opinions.

Our greatest defense against the enemies from within is a strong hunger for the Word and the constant exposure to it. Both hunger and exposure to the Word helps us to be able to identify and ward off the attacks of those who have “crept in.” One of the jobs of the shepherd is to provide a solid and secure sheepfold. This only takes place through prayer and the ministry of the Word. Nothing else has the capacity to preserve the fold like these two elements (Acts 6:4).

How does a pastor open up the fold to the wolves who can creep in? The following ways are some of the ways that it can happen:

• Soft and easy messages that never confront anything.
• Marketing the church to get a crowd.
• Not allowing the Word to be authoritative in its call for holiness, surrender, and dedication.
• Having a majority of people attending who are actively embracing worldly lifestyles, who have unholy minds, and commit ungodly actions.
• Pastors who do not commit themselves to teaching and preaching through consecutive passages of Scripture that deals with the righteousness that God longs for.
• Being critical of those who love the Truth of God’s Word enough to defend their convictions.
• When worship becomes more entertaining than it does soul-building.
• When the examples in leadership falls into mire that Nadab and Abihu along with Samuel’s sons lived in. Worldly, carnal, immoral, and distracted sums up their actions.
• Falling prey to the sin of silence that never raises a voice of concern about the direction of the ship.

I have a feeling now that the Pentagon is wishing that they had been much more vigilant than what they had been before Pfc. Manning got into their top secrets.

Until next time. . .

Hired to Be Holy -- Part 3 -- Tell 'Em What They Want To Hear

2010-07-27T15:53:00.001-04:00

In this series of blogs, we have been entertaining the different aspects of what it means to be in a position where you are “hired” to be holy. The first post was more introductory about the position. The second post dealt with authority and its abuse despite the appearances of being “holy.” This third in the series goes at the opposite end of spectrum by just giving people what they want. Not nearly what they need but what they want.

Most have probably heard a variation of the story about the fellow who was walking down the street and saw a sign in the window of a shop that said “Fresh Bread.” When he saw the sign, his mouth began to water as he thought about the fresh baked bread. So despite time constraints, he went in the door of the shop and told the proprietor that he would like some of the fresh bread. The proprietor laughed heartily and told the man, “Sorry, we don’t make bread, we paint signs.” It really wasn’t false advertising because it was indeed a sign company instead of a bakery. However, if a sign out front clearly states that we are a church shouldn’t there be something righteous and holy being offered on the inside?

What a diluted time that we live in! But when the pastor is under the pressure to perform with preaching a deadly path can be taken. No matter what we preachers do, we have to understand that the Gospel is confrontational. It is confrontational in that its premise is that man is a sinner and if he does not experience the new birth and is converted, he is lost and will end up in hell. There is no way to soft-soap that message unless you forget it and instead try to use a mental massage to relieve the stresses and pressures of the daily life and the reality is that you can. You can learn to use gimmicks and scatter a few Scriptures here and there and turn the message into a cream puff of inspiration that does not create any hunger for God or His Word or the Spirit either. When that takes place, it will not be too long before the church has turned into a crowd of unconverted people. But the pastor is still living up to his expectations of everyone because of his public trappings of holiness.

But just as deadly as pastor who is an authoritative dictator so is the man who cannot open his mouth and preach to a generation of people who are experiencing a spiritual famine in the land. Sermons that are “feel-good” sermons or those that are constructed to meet the “felt-needs” of the people are superficially shallow and will be forgotten before the people clear out from the restaurants. The temptation toward the superficial is one of the oldest tricks the devil resorts to among men who are told to proclaim the Word. Jeremiah and Ezekiel both preached vehemently against those shepherds who did not lead. They were compared to dogs that could not bark and to shepherds who used the flock to the meet their own needs.

I am pleading with you men who preach to get on your knees somewhere and determine to become a man that is willing to preach with conviction. There will never be any passionate, convicting preaching unless a preacher has poured his soul somewhere in a place of private prayer. He cannot be a preacher of conviction unless he has also given himself to constant study of the Word. Tear the sign off of the door that says office and replace it with a sign that says STUDY. More times than I have ever deserved, God has used my mouth to get the Word through to a people who live in a land of idolatry that is constantly working to entice them. That is what a land of idolatry calls for, a Word from God.

Where were you on September 11, 2001? Most of us will never forget where we were on the fateful Tuesday morning when the terrorist attacks begin. I had just finished a CT biopsy and was rolling a patient to the recovery area when one of the guys I worked with told me what had happened. I just happened to be checking a patient in when I saw the first tower collapse in New York City. A kaleidoscope of emotions were felt by all of us on that day—anger, sadness, fear, deep grief, and a fear of the unknown. On that night, our church was opened for prayer and despite it being an off night it was pretty packed with people. There were even strangers we did not know who came in for prayer.

But let’s play a what-if scenario. What if on September 9, 2001 you would have had a dream that would have shown to you everything that was going to happen on 9/11? What if you were an employee at the World Trade Center or the Pentagon? What would you have said to those people on September 10? Chances are no matter what you would have said you would have been dismissed as a crackpot. You could have warned that planes would be used as weapons to destroy the building and that three-thousand would die and others would have multiple injuries. But because it was not what people would have wanted to hear, I feel sure that most of them would have dismissed it.

That is the exact same scenario that every preacher/pastor/teacher faces every week in America. We have so much to enjoy and take part with here. We have so many perks and freedoms that we often forget that there is a great day coming when we will have to give an accounting for our deeds, words, choices, and actions. There are planes that are about to hit the building. . . the worst thing that those who are hired to be holy is not tell the people what information they need to help them. . . . .

Until next time. . .

Hired to Be Holy -- Part 2 -- Authority

2010-07-22T17:23:00.002-04:00

As described yesterday, vocational holiness is the defined boundaries which those men who are in public ministry positions must uphold. There are certain places and things that a pastor cannot do. For instance, I cannot go to one of the local watering holes here in my hometown and say that I am just going to get a Coke. I cannot spend time riding around town with a young attractive twenty-something in my little Civic as this does not fall into the acceptable lines of vocational holiness. I cannot attend events that are unbecoming to the ministry that I am called to fulfill. However, as stated yesterday, this tenor of vocational holiness for ministry leaders can create a host of problems because it causes them to fall into the default mode of holiness by avoidance. Avoidance of certain places, certain people, and certain situations falls far short of God’s high call for holiness.

One of the areas that holiness has to prevail is the area of authority. A pastor, who is also considered a shepherd, has to allow the tools of his trade to be touched by holiness. A shepherd commonly has a staff—used for guidance and direction—and a rod—used for correction and discipline. Just as a shepherd would wield a rod of correction for the sheep, the pastor has to use the rod of correction sometimes to manage and deal with situations that calls for righteous judgment.

In a little book written by Kevin Leman and William Pentak called The Way of the Shepherd; they make some observations about the rod of the shepherd. A rod that is used too much will lead to a loss of goodwill from the people and a rod that is not used enough or not at all will lead to the loss of their respect. The rod is responsible for three things: protection from predators, protecting the sheep from themselves, and for the work of inspection.

But if a shepherd has only been hired for holiness, he will abuse and misuse the rod in such a way that will destroy the flock. Too much, too soon is never good! However, if that rod has been touched with the holiness of God, the instruction of the Scriptures, and a love for the flock, the shepherd will find a life that is pleasing to God.

Our authority has to have a constant baptism of holiness for if it does not, one can resort to manipulation and political maneuvering. It can lead to the same trap that Diotrephes fell into when he decided he wanted pre-eminence and began to soil the church with his unholy ambitions. No where are the temptations the highest than in the precincts of the structured forms of church government. Power can cause people to do maddening things and it routinely can cause preachers to lose every bit of their sense of spiritual direction. They can begin to jockey for position and for votes because of the subtle temptation to be something in the Temple yard (Matthew 4:5-6).

Authority that is out of control can soon become mired in things that are far less than holy but if a minister is still fulfilling the capacities of vocational holiness it is difficult to deal with out of control authority. How can a minister be certain that he is not falling into the trap of taking authority that is not rightfully his? There are several ominous signs that one is in for a fall when these characteristics are present:

• If a pastor has no one that he is accountable to. All decisions have to come through him for the functionality of the church to continue. A man who operates in this manner will soon become a law unto himself. This holds true for a church of 25 or an organization of 25,000. I encourage you to look for your own historical examples. . . they exist in your own circle of experiences.

• If a pastor becomes less and less approachable and those who have needs will use a “middle-man” to come to him with difficulties because they are fearful of him, trouble is brewing for this leader.

• If a man increasingly becomes isolated—from criticism, from close personal relationships with ordinary members, and from life in general—this is another sign that failure is on the horizon.

• If a pastor has a congregation that is always deferring their praise toward him instead of God, this calls for alarm.

• If a pastor resorts to politically manipulating young budding ministries and crushing them because he is intimidated by their talents, authority has become too heavy handed.

• If a minister, in his preaching or in his casual conversation, is always the hero of every situation, be careful. . . authority is most likely being abused.

• If a pastor increasingly resorts to stating that the voice of God is speaking to him or the famous “God told me” at the expense of purely Scriptural guidelines, he is in hot water. It matters not a whit to us what “God told you,” if it does not line up with Scripture. . . you are wrong! (For this kind of behavior to be confronted there has to be a strong proficiency to know the Scriptures. One cannot just be acquainted with the stories but he must know the Book.)

These are the steps that the real, literal devil (aka Satan) seeks for a man to follow as he entices him to the pinnacle of the Temple to leap. Uzziah fell like this. Aaron fell like this. A host of others fell to this trap but all the while they were living in correct vocational holiness.

What does real, godly and holy authority look like? He is more than willing to admit his own fallibility. This does not mean he is involved in low-living but just that he has a holy task to fulfill which taxes all of his spiritual senses. Holy authority will be Christ-like in that there is never an attempt to cover his ignorance, weakness, or failure. Holy authority is constantly in a training mode that is making disciples and training others to fulfill our overwhelming task of evangelism. Holy authority has one goal—to encourage a vibrant relationship with Jesus Christ.

We who are leaders must constantly be working toward having a strong exposure to personal, private prayer and a constant diet of the Word. Prayer and the Word are two of the primary ways that God uses to cleanse imperfect vessels. We have to commit both to the discipline and duty of these aspects of worship or it will not be long until we become spiritually vulnerable to mediocrity.

Hired to Be Holy -- Part 1

2010-07-21T15:42:00.001-04:00

Robert Murray McCheyne—Do not forget the culture of the inner man—I mean of the heart. How diligently the calvary officer keeps his sabre clean and sharp; every stain he rubs off with the greatest care. Remember you are God’s sword, His instrument—I trust a chosen vessel unto Him to bear His name. In great measure, according to the purity and perfections of the instrument, will be the success. It is not great talents God blesses so much as likeness to Jesus. A holy minister is an awful weapon in the hand of God.

A few days ago, I was foraging around the house looking for something to read. I wanted something easy that required little thinking on my part, purely entertaining in its content. My eyes caught a Louis L’Amour western entitled Galloway. Although I had read it years ago, I could not remember the plot and so I launched into it. Before too many pages I started tracking along with the story again.

Galloway is a member of the famous Sackett family and has a brother named Flagan. In the book, they band together with some of their cousins and work to establish a ranch in a place called Shalako and the story revolves around that episode in their lives. I won’t spoil it for you in case you want to pick it up and read it for the first time or the second time.

However, in that book, my thoughts were stimulated when I started reading about the contentious range boss, Bull Dunn, who has a bunch of rowdy roughnecks for sons. Not only are his sons obnoxious bullies they are gifted with an inbred meanness that pours out all the little town of Shalako. To compound their nasty presence, Bull Dunn, hires a couple of killers to tote pistols and intimidate and beat down folks who oppose them.

In consideration of those hired guns, I begin to think about all the jobs that can be hired out—plumbers, electricians, carpenters, accountants, physicians, and preachers. When there are certain jobs that we want done, somebody to hire is never far away from a Google search or those things called phone books.

It was with that understanding that I started thinking along the lines that I, too, am hired to do something. I am now a pastor and our society, despite all the public ministerial collapses that have made national news in the last few years, there is still a certain expectation that they have for a pastor to be “holy.” It is called vocational holiness. . . . and it can be deadly!

If we pastors and ministers are not careful our calling to vocational holiness can become very legalistic in appearance. It is important for me to stay away from certain places. It is important for me to maintain a certain sense of dignity with the public calling. It is important for me to associate with some folks and not to associate with other folks. It is important for my conversation to be free of profanity. It is important for me to be kind and considerate. It is important to be holy because I am hired to be holy.

But when you are hired to be holy, you can keep up a public façade outwardly and be a dirty dog inwardly and very few people will know it. That was the driving point the Lord was getting at in Matthew 23 when He begin to call out the Pharisees for who they were. Clean outwardly but putrid inwardly. White outwardly but dead inwardly.

Charles Spurgeon—All our libraries and studies are mere emptiness compared with our closets. We grow, we wax mighty, when we prevail in private prayer.

You see a minister can perform at a level of vocational holiness, which is his job, and never really be holy. He can speak in the religious platitudes that people expect him to fulfill and have a spirit that is totally foreign to God. My mind has been drawn to this ever since I read that little western by L’Amour while at the same time was working through a series on the book of Acts.

Luke tells us that Jesus begin to both do and teach. When it is a part of your teaching is part of your life, much credibility is gained. But when your life is not part of your teaching, trouble can be on the horizon. The old adages, “practice what you preach,” or “walk the talk” are good encouragers that often we teach more with our actions than we do with our words. The same pattern has to take place in the life of all of those who are seeking to be authentic models of godliness. Obviously there are none who are perfect but this mentality should not cause us to throw in the towel and decide to just quit, there has to be a desire and pursuit of a higher level of living.

A minister has an even higher calling in both vocational holiness (the public aspect of ministry) and personal holiness (the aspects of the inner life). Every minister must both do and teach! A crucial part of a minister’s life means that he must be given to being godly and holy. Week-in and week-out there must be a steady diet of the Word and of prayer for every minister. If there is the steady diet of the Word and prayer, spiritual growth is a certainty. It will keep us living in the light of integrity.

A minister has to take great to follow the example set forth by the Lord. There are several reasons that he must be given to a life of character.

First, he endures much more severe temptations than others simply because of the intensity of the spiritual battle. As a spiritual leader there are those who look to his example and the bar needs to remain high.

Secondly, if he falls the impact is often devastating. It can rend a church and the devil is aware that if the shepherd is smitten the sheep will scatter.

Thirdly, because a minister has a greater knowledge of the truth, he is more accountable, and has a greater chastening to endure for his sin.

Fourth, the sins of the elders are more hypocritical than others because they preach against the very sins they commit. Every leader needs an abundance of the grace and power of God because of their greater responsibility and visibility (This list adapted from 1 Timothy commentary by John MacArthur, p. 103).

Richard Baxter—Many a tailor goes in rags, that maketh costly clothes for others; and many a cook scarcely licks his fingers, when he hath dressed for others the most costly dishes. . . It is a fearful thing to be an unsanctified (unholy) professor, but much more to be an unsanctified preacher.

Book Recommendation -- Ashamed of the Gospel -- John MacArthur

2010-06-01T16:27:00.001-04:00

As always, I am constantly in the hunt for good books that will inspire me toward more spiritual growth. One such book that I have benefited from over the years has been one written by John MacArthur in 1993. He wrote Ashamed of the Gospel as a call to action for biblical preaching, a lifestyle of holiness, and the great need for discernment in our times. More often than not the trends that MacArthur pointed out in our times mirrored what happened during the “Down Grade Controversy” in Charles Spurgeon’s times over 100 years ago. If you are interested in a challenging, thought-provoking book then you need to read it. If you are uncomfortable with a straight-forward and direct approach to the supposed new trends of the modern church era, save your money.

The book has been reprinted and there are several new chapters that have been added and some revisions have also taken place in the new edition. Suffice it to say that what was written nearly 20 years ago has almost come to pass. The subtitle of the book reflects that “when the church becomes like the world.” Theology and doctrine has taken a back seat to life “app” preaching. Life “app” preaching is that preaching which helps manage stress, work situations, raising kids, and a host of other ways to help make life very man-centered and not too God-focused. The power of Scripture has almost been totally discarded and when someone does point out that Scripture clearly addresses moral and social issues of the day, that person finds himself cast into the uncomfortable role of being judgmental. Worship has progressively become more focused on feeling than it has meaning which is backwards. If a man has meaning in his worship, you better believe that there will be feeling in his worship.

In Chapter 5, The Foolishness of God, MacArthur spends an important amount of time writing about the need for solid biblical preaching that radically opposes the wisdom of this world. The wisdom of this world is foolishness to God but a number of detractors in our times, particularly of doctrinal preaching, seem to think that worldly wisdom is so much better than God’s wisdom.

MacArthur makes the following comparisons based on 1 Corinthians 1:18-31:

1. Human wisdom is temporary while divine wisdom is eternal.
2. Human wisdom is impotent and divine wisdom is powerful.
3. Human wisdom is for the elite and divine wisdom is for all.
4. Human wisdom exalts man but divine wisdom glorifies God.

From the next chapter there are suggestions given to preachers about where to get their sermons from and a sort of how-to guide for modern preachers:

1. Visit those how-to sections in your local bookstores.
2. Regularly have a small group submit a list of their greatest challenges at home and on the job.
3. Similarly, acquire inventories of needs from several secular people in your community.
4. Periodically, examine issues of Time, Newsweek, and USA Today, as these publications tend to be on the cutting edge of the felt needs and fears that people are facing.
5. Apply practical aims to every study, message or program in your church.
6. Practice composing practical, catchy titles for your messages (sermons) from various biblical texts.
7. Limit your preaching to roughly 20 minutes, because boomers don’t have too much time to spare. And don’t forget to keep your messages light and informal, liberally sprinkling them with humor and personal anecdotes.

This is a list for weak and insipid preaching and it is also diametrically opposed to biblical ministry writes MacArthur.

In response to this idea, he quotes Douglas D. Webster about this user-friendly approach:

Biblical preaching was God-centered, sin-exposing, self-convicting and life-challenging—the direct opposite of today’s light, informal sermons that Christianize self-help and entertain better than they convict.

There are so many illustrations in today’s market-sensitive sermons that the hearer forgets the biblical truth that is being illustrated; so many personal anecdotes that the hearer knows the pastor better than she knows Christ; so many human-interest stories that listening to a sermon is easier than reading the Sunday paper; so practical that there is hardly anything to practice.

No wonder nominal Christians leave church feeling upbeat. Their self-esteem is safely intact. Their minds and hearts have been sparked and soothed with sound-bite theology, Christian maxims and a few practical pointers dealing with self-esteem, kids or work. But the question remains: has the Word of God been effectively and faithfully proclaimed, penetrating comfort zones and the veneer of self-satisfaction with the truth of Jesus Christ?

This is a just a taste of a very good book. My old copy has been read and re-read numerous times in the last several years and this one will fall into that same category.

The Highest Cost of Revival

2010-05-25T16:25:00.000-04:00

During an outreach event last week I began to assess the cost of the event….

The snow cones and printed material were costly…

Busses and van moving people from place to place which involved insurance, fuel, registration and maintenance cost….

People took personal vehicles and there was personal cost involved in that….

The event was successful and the church was full of people…

Several received the Holy Ghost and there was a baptism….

Refreshments for the kiddos cost….

Again busses and fuel and insurance and maintenance expenses were consumed…..

Revival is not cheap…

I have never seen a revival that did not cost…..

Many of the cost are hidden and most around the church never realize they were incurred….

But after 48 years in the church and 29 years of ministry….

I have come to conclude that none of these is truly The Highest Cost of a Revival…

The hidden and visible Highest Cost of Revival is people…

Invariably…..

In the midst of revival….

In the moment dreams are coming true….

The invoice arrives with a demand for immediate payment….

And a family exits the back door of the church while the rejoicing of revival is heard around the altars….

I know….

A front door revival requires a back door revival…..

And while I understand this principle….

This pastor’s heart hates The Highest Cost of Revival….

For just as the church does not understand the hidden cost of fuel, insurance and refreshments….

They understand The Highest Cost of Revival even less….

So many times I have longed to rejoice as the waters of baptism splashed, but was distracted as the back door of the church closed behind those I loved….

I have wept as I cognized that relationships would be broken…

Friends….

I could care less how much fuel, insurance, vehicles, snow cones and printing cost….

I could care less how much 10,000 bottles of water cost to give away.....

I could care less how large the bill is when it comes to a soul….

Containment of these costs is the least of my concerns….

However…

I would do anything in the world to contain…..

The people cost…

For indeed this is…..

The Highest Cost of Revival

Off the Chart Preachers

2010-05-03T13:26:00.000-04:00

Brother Martyn Ballestero, over at his Home Missions Chronicles blog, has given me a bit of inspiration to tag into for today’s blog. He wrote about preachers that used to teach off the charts. You owe it to yourself to go to his blog and read about it. I won’t rehash what he wrote but I have taken the liberties to get his pictures and post them on my blog.

I, too, remember the off the ‘charts preachers.’ My own pastor, Brother Patterson, used various charts back in the ‘70’s when I was a kid. Although his charts weren’t the hand painted ones, he would routinely use the old Search for Truth charts and various others during the mid-week Bible studies. We really thought we were moving up when he started using the overhead projector with various transparencies as he taught his mid-week Bible studies. Those were the times that life seemed so much simpler and our lives had so much order and structure to them. Our days, despite all of the modern conveniences, seem to be filled with chaos as we breathlessly try to keep up with all of our commitments.

Perhaps the most striking memory that I have of an ‘off the chart’ preacher was a man named Wayne Pounders. He was a gifted Bible teacher that had such ability with his teaching that even the kids would pay attention to him. To show the power of his gifting, he could hold the attention of a congregation for well over an hour and for the most part those listening were held in rapt attention to what he was speaking on.

My dad was relocated to the Fort Walton Beach area and we attended the First United Pentecostal Church in Niceville pastored by Henry Dennis. Brother Dennis was big on revivals and looking back it seems like we were having a revival about every other month. Some of the most colorful evangelists you have ever seen graced the pulpit at the FUPC in Niceville. Brother Haypenny was an evangelist that was about 4 foot tall and he played the organ. What was so nifty about Brother Haypenny was that every night before he preached, he would get on the organ and tell a Bible story to all the kids as he played along on the organ in a dramatic fashion. All of the kids were awed by his stories and the flair with which he told them. I also remember a time when some evangelist came through, whose name I cannot remember, and for quite some time preached a ‘blistering’ on the church and finally Brother Dennis stood up and told him quite authoritatively, “That’ll be enough, Brother!” I was too young to remember the content of the message but what does prevail in my mind was how much Brother Dennis loved his church.

My exposure to Brother Pounders took place in Niceville, Florida when I was in the 4th grade or so. His teaching specialty was the book of Revelation. He had taken four white bed-sheets and sewn them together, lengthwise, end-to-end. I would guess that each sheet was probably six feet long and the normal wide of probably four feet wide. On this large space, he had painted the whole book of Revelation. He started with John’s vision of Jesus Christ, progressed to the seven churches, to the seals, the trumpets, the bowls, and a final segment on heaven. It was incredible to walk into the church and see that sheet hung up all the way across the front of the church entirely covering the place where all of the musicians sat.

When Brother Pounders came through, Brother Dennis started him on Sunday night, and then the teaching revival continued every night for the rest of the week and he would conclude on the following Sunday night. Any pastor who would even attempt to try that kind of thing in our times would be sorely disappointed because it is highly doubtful that people would make it every night. That says much about our times whether we are willing to admit it or not.

Brother Pounders encouraged all to bring their Bibles to church which during those times was not a problem because everybody always brought their Bibles to church. He would literally start at Revelation 1:1 and when it was over he had concluded with Revelation 22:21. One of the things that stands out to me the most was Brother Pounders ‘pointer.’ It appeared to me to be an old car antenna and at the end of the night he would close it up and put it into his leather Bible case and zip it shut as Brother Dennis would make his concluding remarks before we went home with our heads filled with the scary images of Revelation and Daniel but our hearts filled with faith that God was going to work everything out in the end.

Perhaps the last ‘off the chart’ preacher that I would be exposed to was Brother David Gray. Although he did not have hand painted charts, he did use transparencies. These took place during my Texas Bible College days in Houston back in the late ‘80’s and early ‘90’s. Brother Gray during this time was beginning to grapple with his age. I look back at those days and think how I would have liked to have been exposed to Brother Gray during his prime.

Heritage does not mean much to you when you are young but as your years begin to stack up there is a gratefulness that begins to appear as you think how much that God was quietly working out the details of your life. I am profoundly thankful for the heritage that I have and hope that in some small measure I am able to pass it on.

If you have any recollections of old-time off the chart preachers, I would love to post your comments that would add to the content of this particular post.

Thanks for reading. . . . .

The following pictures are various ones that I have in my collection.

A. W. Buie's chart on the Fruit of the Spirit and Works of the Flesh from Galatians 5.

Clyde Haney teaching on Prophecy:

Carl Ballestero and his chart at an unknown location:

David Gray pamphlet on the Two Natures of Man. I understand that he had an accompanying chart with this in years past.

Too Much, Too Soon

2010-04-13T16:03:00.001-04:00

“You are now the leader and people are looking for you to make some major changes.” “Changes,” I asked? “Yeah, things need to be updated and improved on.” And then a litany of things was listed for me to change in the church that I grew up in and was now the pastor of. This “change” was couched in such a way that for me not to make the “necessary” changes that I would be perceived as a weak leader sort of a catch-22 situation. It was a very base appeal to my own personal ego and a beckoning to the nastiness of an unholy ambition that I have to keep restrained on a pretty routine basis.

Time passed and I did not change a thing except that we baptized people at the beginning of the Sunday night service instead of at the end. Everything else stayed the same.

The point of this whole blog is that sometimes those who are church leaders can be falsely wooed into making changes that will literally cripple and perhaps even split an already healthy congregation. Woe to the man who comes into an established congregation to serve as pastor and turns the place upside down with irrational changes. We don’t like change! So if we don’t like change, what makes us think that people will like sudden and drastic changes especially in their spiritual life?

I remember well a few years ago when the hospital where I worked went to computers for all sorts of record-keeping and so forth. I still remember the duress and struggles with some of the older employees as they tried to cope with the changes that had been suddenly flung on them. The difference between the radical changes that takes place in the workplace versus the church is that in the workplace they are being paid. We who are in ministry are working with a bunch of volunteers and whether we believe it or not we need every one of them.

More times than once I have watched from the outside looking in at places where new pastors went and destroyed churches because of their drastic and unreasonable changes in the outset. It was a train-wreck and when the guy was finally drummed out of town, the poor fellow who was incoming after the train-wreck had his work cut out for him trying to re-establish trust and confidence. Additionally it had a very negative impact on the man who had to leave and it also usually affected his family, especially his wife.

The prevailing mentalities that usually cause these fellows to make such drastic changes goes something like this:

We are going to have a harvest in this place. It has been a dead church long enough. We are going to have revival!

I am going to clean this place up! These people don’t know anything about holiness! Revival! Outreach! ____________!

Boy, that previous pastor was a real winner! He didn’t know his head from a hole in the ground and I have to fix all this incompetence he had going around here!

These people just don’t get it!

Those sorts of comments are quite telling about the messiah complex that has engulfed this man. Are there churches out there that fit the bill as described above? Absolutely! But I have also discovered that just as there are mean churches (Church Trouble Part 1 and Part 2)there are some mean pastors who are going to make the gate so narrow and the path so hard to find that only about 30 are going to be saved.

A little food for thought about changing too much too soon might be good for all of us. These thoughts are in no particular order of priority.

First, if you go into an existing church, the people there already have a mindset about what they want to do and what they want you to do. They probably did not get this mindset from the devil, they got it from the man who was there before you were. If he was a great man, your work is easy, just keep doing what he did. If he was a scoundrel, your work is cut out for you and of primary importance is for you to be flexible with the flow of things.

Secondly, the majority of people who come to church are not motivated to fight. Work with those. Inspire and challenge them to grow in their spiritual walk. Be a useful teacher, preacher, influencer to them. On the other hand, there will always be a couple of people whose primary purpose in life is making your life miserable. Their demands are unreasonable, their attitude is un-Christian, and they aren’t happy and don’t think anyone else ought to be happy either. Look at the small minority that the Lord has put in your life to make you better. Let their attitude sand you down into becoming an incredible example of a Christian. These people DO NOT make up the majority. They may be the money people but God can work on them with the authority of your prayers. Pray for them and watch God do some drastic things that you will stand in awe of. They will either get better or they will make their exit. Let me tell you what will happen to you when you do this, your disgust with them will turn in to a profound sorrow and compassion will grip you as you watch them struggle through life corrupting everything they come in contact with.

Thirdly, don’t change things too quickly (as in don’t change anything for a long time). Most changes that people try to make are usually in areas of secondary importance. Before it is over, a lot of blood has been spilled over something that has zero influence over the Gospel. If you want to change something, take your time. It took C. Everett Koop, the former Surgeon General, ten years to get Congress to go along with his idea of putting a warning label on all tobacco products and tobacco advertisements. But he persisted and it happened. Now we have the warnings on the packages but we also enjoy transit systems where passengers cannot smoke. We can eat in restaurants where we can enjoy a smoke-free environment. If you think it needs to change, take your time. Furthermore, if you are only going to be there for three to seven years, you probably ought to leave it alone. If you are not committed to being there for the rest of your life, you probably ought not to insist on such radical changes anyway. Just preach the Word and pray for them and love them and move on.

Fourth, consider what malpractice is. Far too often, we have a tendency to confine malpractice to the medical field. We think of negligent physicians who are incompetent and wound more than they heal. But there can be something called ministerial malpractice also. The easy out is that we cannot be sued. However there will be a day that the Lord will look squarely at us and ask us what we did with the church we were called to pastor (Hebrews 13:17). On that day, we will have to give an answer. Radical and unreasonable change is ministerial malpractice. As Warren Wiersbe wrote one time about a church battle caused by too much change, “It was witnessed by angels, applauded by demons, but is best left unrecorded among the saints.”

Fifthly, most change is motivated by some sort of emphasis on a program. Don’t put your trust in a program to change a church. Put your trust and confidence in the preached Word and the passionate prayers of the pastor and the church at large to accomplish long lasting spiritual change. Increasingly, it is clear that activities do more to suck the spiritual life out of people and it kills the faithful few who are called to do all the work while the spectators watch.

Sixthly, don’t change because of fads that attempt to drive a pastor toward so-called success. John R. W. Stott wrote in his book The Preachers Portrait, “The shameful cult of human personalities which tarnished the life of the first century Corinthian church still persists in Christendom, and a most improper and unbecoming regard is paid to some church leaders today.” Pastors who get caught up in the numbers game will in the end be destroyed by the numbers game. Chasing numbers is going to create a great angst in your preaching because you will have to aesthetically improve some areas of Scripture to fit our American mindset.

Sometimes we can get so caught up in changing in the maddened pursuit of numbers it will cause us to sell our calling for a mess of faddage. In the end, you will not have a church but you will have a crowd. For those who chase fads, they end up like dogs chasing their tails because there will be a new method out next year and the next year and the next year. It is the job of marketers to take your money and the only way to do that is to sell you something that is new and improved. Brother Harrell in Bridge City, Texas has told me multiple times that it’s hard to beat three songs, an offering, and a sermon. You might scoff at that but a whole lot of guys preach his sermons every year at camp-meetings all over the country and this coming Sunday, they will have a full house.

Seventh, when you do begin to make changes, don’t ever create a divide between young and old. If a man does that he will pit the generational groups in a battle against each other. This is a crime. 1st John creates the pattern of spiritual maturity and the older generation needs to be stalwarts and influence the younger generation in the right direction. When you create a rift between the old and the young, you are destroying God’s biblical pattern of growth. We need elders and youth working together!

I conclude with a quote from Thomas Jefferson which just makes good sense, “In matters of principle, stand like a rock; in matters of taste, swim with the current.”

Soul Fuel--Part 1

2010-04-12T12:31:00.000-04:00

It’s Monday! Welcome to Monday! It is that proverbial day when a lot of pastors scattered about the world have already loaded up their U-Hauls and determined that yesterday was their last Sunday wherever they may be serving. I would be very deceptive if I were to say that I have never had those days before. I think that those who say that they have never thought about loading up their U-Hauls are either seriously out of touch or not telling the truth.

Think about it for a bit. Pastors are firemen who have to constantly attend to putting out brush fires on various fronts. They have to bolster sagging marriages. They put up with criticism. They counsel those who are experiencing financial calamities usually that are self-induced. They have to keep everyone encouraged. They have to look across the way and see places that are seemingly booming and deal with that gnawing self-doubt that promotes self-pity. Add to this the incredible, overwhelming burden of the harvest. Sometimes the sheer volume of the job can be overwhelming.

A lot of men feel like they are pulling a train uphill and its brakes are firmly locked in. They work under financial hardship that may be personal but more often than not from the corporate body called the church. They have to preach hard things. Things that nobody wants to hear but are eternally important that they do hear it. They endure, suffer, work, climb, and generally pour it all out trying to do the work of God. This is what a man who shoulders the yoke of the ministry finds himself called to do. So what does he do to keep his soul fit to work out such a task? There are some things a man can do to fuel up his soul to help him continue this path.

Foremost, he has to trust in the sovereignty of God. That means that God is absolutely in control of every detail of life and ministry. God knows exactly where you are and has measured out every trial and difficulty measured out specifically for you. Don’t curse the darkness you may be in presently just believe that the entire situation has been tailor made for you.

I have come to understand that God is more concerned with me being saved than being comfortable. He is more interested in my holiness than my happiness. He is more concerned with my worship than my work. Keeping this in mind helps me from getting all the priorities from mixed up. Wherever you are standing is holy ground.

Holy ground is just as much in the courts of Pharoah as it was in the desert by the burning bush. Holy ground is still present whether you are confronting Korahs’ or on the mountain top with fire, thunder, and lightning accompanying the presence of God. Wherever your feet are in ministry, it is holy ground.

Back in 1994, I just sort of haphazardly purchased a little book. It literally is a little book in both shape and size entitled The Heart of a Great Pastor by H.B. London and Neil Wiseman. Periodically I pick this little book up and glance back at the scribbling in the margins and retrace the dog-eared pages. In the first chapter, they listed seven resources that are available in every assignment that you may find yourself in. You are where you are because God has placed you there and He has given you some things that will help you and the church grow.

Resource #1: Every Place is Unique—Just like individuals, every place has unique gifts, opportunities, and problems but they are still places to grow. God places us in the places He wants us to be because there is something He is trying to develop in us as well as the church we are called to serve.

Resource #2: Every Place Needs a Pastor’s Love—An important quote, “The sheep grow restless without an attentive shepherd.” The presence of a pastor is crucial for our generation. Your church needs to see your example of personal godliness more than anything else. Our world is constantly in change and turmoil. It is a blessing for people to be able to come in week-in and week-out and look at you and see a model of consistency. Get into their lives and impact and influence them!

Resource #3: God Provides Supernatural Empowerment—Churches that are dead will never change their world. This places a premium on having a constant flow of the Spirit. More than one time, I have heard Pastor Anthony Mangun tell of when he was a kid growing up in that church in Alexandria on 16th and Day Street that his dad and mother would take a dead service and stand it on its head. Elder G. A. Mangun take up a tambourine and Sister Mangun would take up an old accordion and they would do a victory march (when was the last time you had one of those in your church????). They would march around that church singing and praying until the Spirit started moving. To my dear readers who resorting to nifty lights, cool power-points, and neat little 20 minute “life app” sermons, you are spitting in the wind. If you want a supernatural move of the Holy Ghost, you have to get engaged in the Spirit. It will cost you some meals as in fasting, it will cost you some time as in on your knees pleading with God to awaken that dead place you are pasturing, and it will cost you some passion as in you might have to look a little unprofessional in your preaching but it will have a huge impact on your church. (NOTE: This was not what London and Wiseman wrote, I just took the liberty with their #3 Resource.)

Resource #4: Every Place Needs Bible Preaching—This takes time and discipline to develop things to preach. You will never expose your church to the power of the Word until you get invested in the Word. Sound preaching will help us to grow. Preach hard things. . . preach challenging things. . . No coach has ever won a championship by not challenging, inspiring, and lifting his players to a level beyond mediocrity. Do this to your church with your preaching. Make them hunger for holiness, help them to desire prayer, give them a passion for the Word!

Resource #5: Every Pastor Is Distinctively Gifted—It took me a little while to get this one because I wanted to imitate somebody down the road and across the country. But consider this: Amos never would have worked in the courts of the kings but by the same token Isaiah wouldn’t have made much headway with the fig-tree farmers. The courtiers would have dismissed Amos as a redneck and the fig-tree farmers would have dismissed Isaiah as a stuck-up academic know-it-all. God used both of those prophets to bring His word to the right places. You are distinctly gifted to work exactly where you are at. Take the focus off of your inabilities and look at your God-given abilities. Don’t let self-pity wipe you out!

Resource #6: Every Setting Has Potential—If you have some folks who jerking your chain and making life generally miserable for you. Consider a couple of things. First, is your heart right? When you heart gets out of sorts, you can get out of sorts with good people. But if you heart is right, then I have a second consideration. There are ten people that can replace that one who appears to be the nephew of the Wormwood, as of the Screwtape Letters fame. It is a matter of you hunting them down and picking up your evangelism efforts.

Resource #7: Every Church Has Something to Give—You may be thinking of your limitations; lack of youth, lack of funds, lack of spiritual maturity among new converts, lack of music, lack of good lay leadership, and so forth. In fact you can get so focused on your limitations that you not only want to load up the U-Haul, you just want to throw in the towel. . . if you could just find it! “We have been lulled into believing that the small church has little to offer. We have allowed the big-is-best mind-set to dilute the fact that when the church is the Church, it is a mighty instrument in hand of God regardless of size.”

Hey Pastor, Assistant Pastor, Youth Pastor, or whatever your title may be. . . a little fuel for your soul on this Monday. . . Trust in the sovereignty of God, He has you right where He wants you. . . If you are supposed to be somewhere else, He is quite big enough to pull all the strings to get you where you need to be. . .

More Later. . .

What Do Those Who Influence You Say About You?

2010-04-09T13:28:00.002-04:00

This is the last of the series about what different things say about us. Our stats and our schedules say much about us. In addition those things that we allow to influence us says much about us also.

Practically everywhere you look—websites, print media, television, radio—one of the dominant stories of the week has been the return of Tiger Woods to the world of golf. He is competing in the most prestigious event that professional golfing hosts—The Masters at the Augusta National over in Georgia. There is a vast array of responses that are appearing from those who feel as if he should just go away contrasting with those who hope he wins it all in what might be hailed as the greatest comeback of any athlete ever.

The Tiger saga started several months ago when some of his very private moments hit the national scene because of his marital difficulties. Very little details were spared from the national scene through various news outlets. There appeared to be a morbid but quite naughty curiosity apparently from the whole world. The thing that struck me most was the incredible amounts of money that Tiger Woods made and then turned around and spent on very expensive toys. In fact when the figures were given as to the cost of his yacht, I thought to myself that if I were to just have the money he spent on the yacht, our church building fund would escalate and we literally could build fifteen churches for what that yacht cost.

We live in culture of deception and the last few years have brought this to light. You cannot hide sin forever and it has a way of worming itself out of the soul of men after it has devoured them. Think Bernie Madoff and his Ponzi scheme where he rooked 55 billion dollars from unsuspecting investors. Think John Edwards who had a strong run at the White House, most likely as a Vice-President, but ruined it with his dalliances with Rielle Hunter. Mark McGuire, Sammy Sosa, Barry Bonds, and others resorted to “juicing” and they hit more home runs than ever but in the end their achievements were sullied. Ted Haggard fits in the same box with Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker as all of these men tried to compartmentalize their sins while working in the religious world. The reason that men can do this sort of thing is because the culture of deception causes them to ultimately fall to the trap of self-deception.

How does one become self-deceived? There are facts that are blatantly ignored. There is a pressure to continue to perform despite the tank being empty. There is a blind pressing on that overruns the inner voice of the conscience. Tiger Woods was living in a pit of corruption whose depths were bottomless. How much money did he waste in this pit? How much of his soul did he sell to get to that place? Will his marriage ever recover? Will there ever be the level of trust established with his wife that was present at the beginning of his courtship? As with most rhetorical questions, we can only contemplate the answers within.

As the Masters plays itself out this weekend and Tiger Woods tries to get back to his game, my mind went to some of the comments that Charles Barkley made shortly after the Tiger story hit the headlines. He was offended that Tiger would not call him or Michael Jordan because they were his “friends” and could help him more than anyone else. Apparently it was the influence of Barkley and Jordan that led Tiger into his dark world of regret and failure. There are consequences of a man’s influences. One man challenged me a few years ago with this statement, “Tell me who your friends are and the books you read and I will tell you where you will be in five years!” This fellow was not clairvoyant, it was far more than that, and it was called godly wisdom. Influences make all the difference in the world!

It is in the early stages of a man’s life that often sets us in the direction that we will follow for the duration of our lives. Very rarely do men break out from under those earliest influences that contributed so much to their lives. Whether it was parents, teachers, pastors, or friends the level of early influence set the direction for their lives and they are now following through on that path.

My own life was shaped very much by my parents who demonstrated responsibility, honesty, integrity, and persistence that to some degree are present in my own life today. My pastor who is my father-in-law influenced me in areas of ministry that continue to prevail today. I think he would give his last dollar to missions and our church has endeavored over the years to follow that example and do the same thing. I have had good friends who have influenced me in proper ways toward a greater understanding of God and His Word. The world of medicine also had a deep impact on me and promoted an inquisitive mind that wants to turn Scripture upside down and ferret out every nugget that can be found. For all of these things I am profoundly grateful.

But there have been crossroads that I have come to when I had to make choices, particularly with people that I would meet, who would have had a very negative effect on my spiritual life. Just as Jordan and Barkley were bad for Tiger, there have been those who would have been detrimental to me. As time has passed on, I have become aware of this, but when I was vacillating about whether or not to allow this influence into my life, I did not have the barometer of experience to give me the forecast of how it would turn out. But I did have the guidance of the Spirit and I learned that sometimes that the gift of discernment will express itself my making you very, very uncomfortable with the surroundings you are in and the voices that you are listening to. It was but for the grace of God that I ignored those voices and their siren calls.

Give yourself to reading the books of dead men. Men like Ravenhill, Tozer, Bounds, and the Puritans. You certainly have to read with filters but take a sermon of Spurgeon’s and compare it with the sermons of modern day preachers and it won’t take very long to discover an obvious difference in the depth of understanding in previous generations to ours today. Read Maclaren Macartney, J. C. Ryle and G. Campbell Morgan. I have some older blogs about devotional reading, sermon preparation, one created by E. E. Jolley and personal growth that might point you in a direction of growth.

Ralph Turnbull—During my ministry I was able to devote a year to reading all of Alexander Whyte. Other years were given to W. Graham Scroggie, G. Campbell Morgan, Samuel Chadwick, J. H. Jowett, and G. H. Morrison. A winter apiece was spent with C. H. Spurgeon, Jonathon Edwards, and Phillips Brooks. I read selections from the last three to gain a feel for their preaching styles, whereas the works of others mentioned were read in their entirety. Biographical studies of each were part of the investment.

Give yourself to friendships that stretch you to be godly, righteous, and more spiritual. Listen to what these voices are saying and it won’t be long before their conversation is going to give you some insight into their soul. Words are an expression of our soul.

Thomas Watson—Walk with them that are holy. ‘He that walketh with the wise shall be wise’ (Proverbs 13:20). Be among the spices and you will smell of them. Association begets assimilation. Nothing is greater in power and energy to effect holiness than the communion of saints.

Give yourself to being saturated by the Word. The only way we will become Word saturated is to spend time with it. The Word can so saturate your life that you will begin to view your world through the lenses of Scripture.

Thomas Watson—David valued the Word more than gold. What would the martyrs have given for a leaf of the Bible! The Word is the field where Christ the pearl of price is hid. In this sacred mine we dig, not for a wedge of gold, but for a weight of glory. The Scripture is sacred eye-salve to illuminate us. ‘The commandment is a lamp, and the law is light’ (Proverbs 6:23). The Scripture is the chart and compass by which we sail to the New Jerusalem. It is a sovereign cordial in all distresses. What are the promises but the water of life to renew fainting spirits?

Give yourself to prayer. This prayer business is hard work but it is what Epaphras did with his life.

Thomas Watson—These wandering thoughts [in prayer] arise from the world. These vermin are bred out of the earth. Worldly business often crowds into our duties, and while we are speaking to God, our hearts are talking with the world: ‘They sit before me as my people, but their heart goeth after their covetousness’ (Ezekiel 33:31).

I trust you choose your influences as well as you choose other things. . .

What Does Your Schedule Say?

2010-04-06T14:02:00.001-04:00

In the same vein of thought with yesterday’s post about “What Do Your Stats Say?” another worthy question for us would be what does your schedule say? To be an effective person, you have to control your time. If your schedule has not been determined then days will get frittered away and wasted or they end up being consumed with the well described tyranny of the urgent. The man who masters his time will master his life. Go buy you one of the cheap Timex watches that have the number 1440 on it and then wear it. When you glance at the time you will forced to remember that every day has 1440 minutes. How you spend those minutes make all the difference in the world.

Malcolm Gladwell pointed out the 10,000 Hour Rule in his book, Outliers, and how that concert violinists, professional pianists, and master chess players were those who had the discipline to spend 10,000 hours working to become what they were. You may think that 10,000 hours is a long time but when broken down it is really a ten year time frame where you spend about 20 hours a week with whatever discipline you are pursuing. Just think what might happen to you if you were to determine to begin spending 20 hours a week on your primary calling—preaching the Word? It is the most important and effective way that you can lead and direct a church. Such efforts add to the health, vision, and general well-being of the church.

The big question for a lot of preachers would be ‘where is your time going?’ In my thoughts, where your time is being spent is a huge matter of faithfulness. It is good to develop a rigid schedule that you follow to pull every bit of the ability that God longs to get out of us. If you don’t have a schedule, you will find that the demands of small things will consume the large priority of life. I remember J. T. Pugh in a seminar one time talking about the man who couldn’t get up and get going every day. By the time he made it out of bed around 10 or so, his day was already half-way gone and little could be accomplished. Brother Pugh then shared with us that he was very big on a disciplined approach to time. He told us that we should know our time and that it is the one commodity that cannot be saved; it can only be spent during that particular time frame. I have often quoted him from that particular seminar when he told us that “time is the coin of life, don’t let a fool spend it for you.”

To be effective, you must budget your time just as you would budget your money. Last year about this same time, I wrote a series of blogs about various preachers and their habits of preparation and while they all were varied in their approaches, the key was that all of these men were disciplined with their time. (The posts follow: Jeff Arnold, Scott Graham, Doug White, Jason Calhoun, John Carroll, Ben Weeks, J. H. Osborn.)

More often than not our time can get out from under us if we are not diligent about it. I remember a time management seminar that I once went to and the speaker was talking about the necessity for ministers to have a schedule. The argument was raised by one man that he did not want a schedule because it would confine him and not allow him to respond to the needs of the people he was serving. The speaker began to dismantle that view by showing the man how much time he was wasting as he was in his self-described wait mode. This is the sin of the convenient season.

J. C. Ryle—Laziness and frivolity are bad enough in any profession, but worst of all in that of a watchman for souls.

Every day needs to be filled with time for prayer and study. In fact, I strongly believe that the most important thing that I do for the church I pastor are fulfilled in those two areas. The congregations need most of all to see a godly example of purity, holiness, and a life that points them God-ward. This will not take place unless a man gives himself to prayer and the Word. In addition to this there are other components of leading a church—meetings of various sorts, hospital visits, etc.—and all of these have time factors involved.

What if I were to walk with you through your week, would I recognize your passion as being focused on God and His work or would your schedule tell me otherwise?

Do you consistently set aside blocks of time to prepare yourself spiritually and mentally for the task of preaching?

Do you guard your schedule from distractions that hinder this?

Are you willing to have the courage to decline some meetings that are going to waste time even though they may not be inherently wrong?

Do your recreational pursuits overwhelm your spiritual pursuits?

Do you waste large amounts to time clicking from one website to another? (Even this blog that I appreciate you reading, it can still waste your time.)

What do our schedules say about our passions and priorities?

I will not exhaust you with further questions but I would encourage you to see where your time is going. There are many different websites concerning time management that might be helpful for you.

What Do Your Stats Say?

2010-04-05T15:37:00.001-04:00

I have developed a ritual every Thursday morning of going to the local Barnes and Noble here in Dothan. I go in and drink their overpriced coffee and read their books. Several weeks ago, I was just browsing around and stumbled across a book and found myself hooked by the opening chapter. It was written by Michael Lewis entitled Moneyball. It has turned out to be one the best books that I have read in the last year.

The book surrounds a philosophy that was developed by Billy Beane who was the general manager of the Oakland A’s. In the decade of the 1990’s, he had the formidable task of having the lowest operating budget among professional baseball teams but still faced with the challenge of winning. He would have 30 million dollars to work with as opposed to some clubs which had operating costs approaching 100 million dollars. Obviously those teams who had deep pockets could afford to purchase ball-players that were going to place them in contention for a championship but Beane did not have this luxury.

Just to give you an idea I rounded off these figures to show you what Beane meant. In the 2002 season his budget was $42 million and he won the division with 103 wins. The second place team was the Angels at $62 million; third was Seattle at $86 million; and last place was Texas at $106 million. Beane’s A’s won 31 more games than Texas with $60 million dollars less. The lesson in this: You have to quit looking at what you don’t have and make a difference with what you do have. It is funny now but Beane said it wasn’t too funny in the developing stages especially on draft day when the A’s looked like they had lost their marbles so to speak.

So with this challenge facing Billy Beane, he found some computer wizards and started looking at the statistics of college players and a small number of high school players. He discovered very a remarkable fact. Sometimes those fellows who looked like ballplayers weren’t worth what they got paid. It wasn’t long before he started drafting these very unlikely players and in doing so put the Oakland A’s in a position to beat some of the teams that supposedly had more talent because they had guys who looked like ballplayers.

He came to understand that talent is a curse rather than an asset for a ballplayer. Over time a player who depends on his talent never develops or reaches his potential. In fact, Beane discovered that players who had little or no talent but had a good work ethic and discipline were able to exceed what the players who supposedly had more talent did. There was a great quote that I scribbled down from the book by Cyril Connolly (Enemies of Promise): Whom the gods wish to destroy, they first call promising.

As I read this book about ballplayers, I started firing off some personal questions about whom I was and what I was about and this blog are some of those observations.

What do my habits say about me? There was a chapter about “How to Find a Ballplayer” and it went into the huge thing that baseball scouts often miss. They are overwhelmed by a player’s hitting streaks, size, and personality but rarely look beyond his batting average. Beane discovered that if he would draft guys who just got on base consistently it would be more important in the long run than someone who jacked the ball out of the park occasionally but had far more strikeouts and pop-ups. One part of the book describes a scene where Beane is in a very heated battle with about 10 of the A’s scouts. He wanted to draft a catcher who they all said was too fat. Beane finally yelled at them that he was not finding guys for jeans commercials but for guys who could get on base. They drafted him and he ended up playing a role in a year when they won 90 games. All of the players that Beane drafted had incredible habits. They were consistently on time for practice and did everything their coaches asked of them and it doing so their habits shaped their success.

Our society is consumed with image. Not only was this evident with the A’s scouts but it is played out on a much larger scale in our society. There is a maddening obsession with image not character. Image leads one to believe one thing but if there is no character to match the image, the image will dry up like last year’s corn husks. The scouts were only interested in players who looked like they could play. The real test is whether they can play or not. There has to be a conscious quest for godly and righteous things to rule us. But if you take great care in the condition of your soul, time will put you in places of influence to be able to encourage and care for others.

Power isn’t everything. Lewis wrote that the tendency is to gravitate toward power hitters and a massive amount of money is often wasted. When the Beane boys sought out players who had the stats and could get on base the coaches understood these players could be coached to develop power. But power did not necessarily equate to more runs or championships. The older I get the more impressed I am with those faithful ministers who started as plodders and have spent 10 or 15 years developing their calling. If you are a young minister and you are reading this blog, don’t let those fellows who blow by you, so to speak, confuse or discourage you. Don’t be victimized by what you can see. You slog your way into greatness and persistence and dedication are so crucial in ministry. Furthermore don’t fall for the bait of a denominational position because positions will drastically limit who you are and who you can become.

Discipline is always better than talent. Talent will make treaties with the status quo and little or no growth will ever be experienced. Don’t sell your soul to talent. Keep in mind a principled approach to God and life and over the years you will have invested in the most worthy things of life.

There is more than one season. Don’t ever forget mistakes and errors are part of your life. Just because you strike out a few times or make some throwing errors, pick it up and go on to the next play. Some men let themselves become paralyzed by a past mistake and they never recover from it and go on to the next level.
Everyone who has ever picked up a bat or put on a glove is an expert. You will contend with armchair ballplayers and spectators for the rest of your life. Get your plan and work it out and stick with it. You don’t build something overnight; you do it with your life. Don’t let the subjective tide of public opinion discourage you.

These things caused me to remember an A. W. Tozer quote from sometime back:

There are preachers looked upon by their people as divine oracles, who wag their tongues all day in light, frivolous conversation. Then before entering the pulpit . . . seek a last minute reprieve in a brief prayer. Thereby they put themselves into the position where the Spirit of the prophet will descend upon them. It may be that by working themselves into an emotional heat they may get by, may even congratulate themselves that they had liberty in preaching the Word. What they have been all day and all week is what they are when they open up the Book to expound it to the congregation. . . .

What do your stats say about you?

How much time do you pray . . . not preach about it or read about it?

How much time do you read the Word . . . not preach from it or talk about it?

How much effort are you putting forth in evangelism. . . .Not encouraging others to do it but your own involvement in it?

What do your stats say about you?

How are you spending your life?

How much are you studying to bring forth meaty and weighty messages to the congregation who hears the wisdom of the world all week long but are starving from the famine of the Word in our pulpits at large?

Are my sermons more stories than Scriptures?

Am I a true man of God . . . not the American caricature but the man of God that Paul describes in 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus?

What do your stats say about you?

Is my preaching my own . . . or is it something I hastily scribbled down because I wasted time all week long?

Am I more aware of the things of the world or the things of the Kingdom of God?

J. T. Pugh -- 1923--2010 -- The Lighter Side

2010-03-25T15:52:00.000-04:00

When I was at Texas Bible College (1989-1992), J. R. Ensey was the president of the school. It just so happened that some years prior to this, he had been the promotions director for the Home Missions Department when Brother J. T. Pugh was the Home Missions director. During that time, their close proximity working together had built a friendship between the two.

Brother Ensey was telling us one day in class that every Monday about mid-morning that he would go to Brother Pugh’s office and they would swap tales from their weekend preaching engagements. For those readers who come by and aren’t Pentecostal, an explanation might be in order leading up to this tale.

For whatever reason, Pentecostal churches over the years have always had the ability to attract some of the world’s first-class fruitcakes (as in people, not the brick-like dessert). I can remember as a kid some of the loony tunes who came through our church and I always held my breath, fearful of what antics they might get involved with before the service ended. In fact when I was in Houston going to school, one of the instructors, Ken Gurley, gave us a good piece of advice. He told us not to run off the village idiot (and every church had one) but to keep them around because if we ran them off they would be replaced with seven who were worse than they were. This provoked great mirth from our class. However as the years have flown by I have just about come to the same conclusion that Brother Gurley had.

So on this Monday morning, Brother Ensey came in and sat down and Brother Pugh, who was an incredible story-teller, began his tale. He had been invited to preach for Brother John Cupit who pastored a great church in New Orleans. Brother Pugh preached and gave the altar call. When he did, most of the church responded. A rather large crowd gathered in the altar area and before long, one of the village misfits began their harangue. Whatever this woman was doing it was complicated by some shaking activity and before long Pastor Cupit felt it wise to call her down. So he told her to stop shaking to which nothing happened, she kept on shaking; this continued on about five times or so until finally Pastor Cupit, with a great booming voice said, “I said stop that confounded shaking!”

As Brother Pugh was telling this story, each time he repeated what Pastor Cupit had said, he notched his voice up a bit. What Brother Ensey was not aware of was that with the HM Director’s office door open, a small group of people had been collecting out in the hall and were creeping up every time Brother Pugh would repeat the words to stop shaking. On that last, long, loud call with Brother Pugh almost shouting, “I said stop that confounded shaking!” there were five or six people with their heads stuck through the door all looking at Brother Ensey, who was sitting in his chair, back to the door, totally unaware of the gathering crowd. So engrossed in the story that Brother Pugh was telling, he had forgotten the open door.

When one of the people who was looking in the door asked, ‘Brother Pugh, is everything alright?’; Brother Ensey told us he looked around saw the crowd and then heard Brother Pugh say to them, “He’s OK now.” We all howled at this story. As time has passed, I periodically remember that tale and think of how hilarious that it must have been on that Monday morning at WEC when Brother Pugh was Home Missions Director.

Brother Ensey told us another story about a hospital visit that Brother Pugh made one day with General Superintendent Stanley Chambers. In addition to Brother Chambers there was another WEC official with him. Brother Pugh took off about four or five steps in front of these men and headed down the hall at a quick clip right behind him because they assumed he knew where to go. After a few turns, Brother Pugh walks up to a door, opens it, and holds out his arm leading Brother Chambers and his neighbor in the door. Both step in and Brother Pugh closes the door and heads off down the hall. He stops at the nurses’ station and then turns around and watches the door that he has just led these men into. In about 30 seconds or so, Brother Chambers and his cohort both step out and began looking around trying to get their bearings. . . . Brother Pugh had opened the door to a large janitor’s closet and they had both walked in. Again, we all howled at the antics of Brother Pugh.

Obviously, while he was a very serious man, it was also evident that he had a great sense of humor. . . .

What a bittersweet experience this has been remembering Brother Pugh but there is another chapter in his life. From the website of the church in Odessa comes the following announcement:

UPDATE: Bessie Pugh, wife of Bishop J.T. Pugh, passed away in her home at about 11:30PM on Wednesday March 24, 2010. Preliminary funeral arrangements are set for a double funeral service as initially scheduled for Friday, March 26, 2010.

J. T. Pugh -- 1923--2010 -- The Wisdom and Power of the Cross

2010-03-24T13:20:00.001-04:00

With the passing of Brother J. T. Pugh, I am drawn to some memories that I have of him. I mentioned yesterday how that I had about a 30 minute conversation with him back in September, 1997. We were at a licensing seminar and he was the main speaker. After lunch I did not have a session that I was required to teach at the time and so just he and I were at a table in the fellowship hall of the church.

It was during that time that he was writing the book, The Wisdom and the Power of the Cross, which is one of the most incredible books I have ever read. Over the years, I have picked it up over and over and re-read various portions of it and now as I flip through some its pages, they are quit marked up and have numerous comments written out in the margins.

As he was writing this book, he told me a story about a bridge in Michigan. From that particular bridge 100 people have jumped in an attempt to commit suicide. Of those 100, 87 have died and thirteen have lived. Of those thirteen who lived, they have gone on to become very successful people in business and finance, education, and so forth. One of the thirteen was asked what it was that had made the change in his life. He related that the “shock” of the water, how cold that it was, how that he suddenly realized that if he did not swim that he was going to die. From this shock, he found the motivation to give life his all.

Brother Pugh then told me that the Cross brings a similar shock to our lives. Once men gain the understanding of the Cross Principle, it forces them to come to terms with their soul. What are we going to do with the shock that takes place with conversion? Will it have the capacity to change us? Will it direct us or will we direct it? Will it cause us to reach beyond ourselves in a spiritual sense for God or will we fritter away our opportunities?

The Cross brings the following to our lives:

The Shock of Contradiction -- No matter what we may tell ourselves or that others may tell us, the power of the Cross gives to us an identification of our own sin.

The Shock of Repentance -- Suddenly finding our lives convicted by the Spirit, we must do something. That something is the emptying of our hearts of the vile things that are generated by the flesh.

The Shock of Self-Surrender -- This goes against all that we have ever known. To give up, to give in to the call of God. Self-preservation is not the real focus of the kingdom. When self-surrender occurs, suddenly we began to overflow to others what God has given to us. Self-surrender helps us to understand that there is something of higher value and a greater cause in life.

The Shock of Holiness -- The power to overcome the wickedness of the flesh not on our own but by the drives of the Spirit.

Galatians 6:14 -- “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”

Jesus reached the conviction that He must bear the Cross. He could not come to terms with the world, but was compelled by love to renounce deliverance and bear the Cross.

To take up the Cross:

Means to take sides with Christ.
Means to stand with Him at all hazards.
Means to oppose the worldly spirit even until our death.
Means you will have to bear some shame and loss what this world has to offer.
Means you will have to have far more courage than those in the world.

The Lord leaves us no room to doubt that every true follower of His must bear a Cross. It has to be a definite act of faith and taken up to follow him.

This was the gist of the conversation because as soon as it was over, I went and took my marble notebook and scribbled down all that I could remember that he had said. In the conversation, he did mention Brother Kilgore as a man who had entirely lived out the Cross Principle in his ministry. Today as I write this, it comes to me that both of these stalwarts grew up in incredible poverty and determined to change their worlds with the help of God. What does this say to our generation who has so much of an entitlement mentality? Will our entitlement mentality sink us whereas those who grew up in great poverty become world changers?

Here are some excerpts from that book that I underlined:

Ours is the generation that has witnessed the death of the American dream. The dream died because it was based on economic growth, technological progress, and military prowess. There is nothing in this to cause us to reach beyond ourselves in a spiritual sense. (p. 9)

The basic principle of self-giving is symbolized in the cross of Jesus Christ. The cross stands for self-sacrifice. The cross is a principle that spawns true Christian character and generates the only energy that drives the church in evangelism and missions. Church history reveals that the church is healthy, balanced and invincible when the cross is the center of all its considerations. (p. 11)

Often the children and successors of vanguard champions do not share the same vision and this first flaming zeal is reduced to a smoldering nostalgia. (p. 11)

How can we be captured by a new biblical vision of the future? How can we begin to truly live out the faith that we claim? The first step to a closer walk with God is repentance. This involves turning our backs on the current agenda of the world and all it embraces. It means to recognize and unmask the selfish motives of the flesh that are a major part of mere religion. Mere religious function must be put away in a hungry quest for a real personal relationship with Jesus Himself. To that end have I written this book. (p. 12)

Jesus had not clothed the task of evangelism with romance and glory but had introduced it in rough garments of duty. (p. 28)

Just last night, I stood on the parking lot at the Texas District camp meeting and, for over an hour, poured my heart out to a very promising young preacher. One of the things I tried to point out was the difference between a man who is only a preacher and another who may be both a preacher and a minister. I did my best to show that no preacher attains a ministry without suffering. Only in the folly of the Cross does our vision clear and our hearts truly “burn within us.” (p. 45)

There are a host of other things in this book that I cannot place here but you owe it to yourself to get it and read it over and over again.

On a closing note, I share with you some of the comments that I wrote in my copy of Brother Pugh’s book, The Wisdom and Power of the Cross, which he also signed for me:

The life totally devoted to God is a lifetime process, primarily because we often lack knowledge of what God is attempting to do. As our knowledge increases, often our commitment increases. This has to be applied to my life every single day! To become one who longs for and chases after the Kingdom of God. Often the pursuit of God’s kingdom takes us through humiliation, defeats, distresses, pressures, but as we go through these rites of passage, we become God’s man!

J. T. Pugh -- 1923--2010

2010-03-23T15:00:00.001-04:00

An incredible stalwart among us has passed to his reward on this day. An e-mail found its way to my box this afternoon from UPCI General Superintendent David Bernard informing us of the passing of Jessie Truman Pugh. Over the years Brother Pugh has provided great insight and encouragement to a lot of men who are in the ministry. He was an icon among us and did his job with incredible discipline and insight. A number of sermons preached by Brother Pugh over the years can be found at Faithbuilder (enter the site and then select his name from the drop-down menu).

This week I will resurrect some of the recollections that I have of Brother Pugh. Although I cannot say that I was close to him, I did have a few opportunities to spend some time with him. The first time was in the fall of 1996 when I was involved in teaching a few sessions at the district licensing seminar in Alabama. He happened to sit down at the table where I was eating and since I did not have an immediate obligation in one of the after lunch sessions, I was able to spend about 30 minutes talking to him. It has been one of those lifetime memories that remain with me.

I heard another story recently about J. T. Pugh that probably fits well with this blog. J. T. Pugh was raised by his two older sisters in an old clapboard sharecropper’s cabin in Noble, Louisiana. His father died when Brother Pugh was just. A tornado came through the town and he died in the tragedy of that storm. His mother died when he was just in his early teens and he was left with his two sisters to make the best of things as they could. He said that there never was a day in his life when he felt that he would just skip school and quit because he say it as a way out of the deep poverty that he was so accustomed to growing up with.

It just so happened that when he was in high school that a teacher noticed that Brother Pugh had a talent for public speaking and the more she noticed him the more convinced she became that he could perhaps do something with it. She would go home at night and tell her husband about Brother Pugh’s thirst to learn and better himself.

Her husband owned a general story in Noble but this man had some attachment to the local VFW. One day, Brother Pugh was walking home and passed by this story when the man was out front sweeping off the porch. He called out and said, “Are you J. T. Pugh?” to which Brother Pugh answered, “Yes sir, I am.” He told Brother Pugh that his wife, the schoolteacher, had been telling him about how he had applied himself to the books and lessons and also that he had a knack for public speaking. The conversation went on and he mentioned that the VFW every year would sponsor a student to give a patriotic speech and that there were prizes that were awarded to the winners. If Brother Pugh was interested, the store owner told him he would work with him and it could be that he might win. He told Brother Pugh that every year that they gave out some very nice prizes to those who won and some were scholarships to various colleges around the country.

Time passed and Brother Pugh, the storeowner, and the schoolteacher, worked long hours after school with Brother Pugh crafting and working through his speech. Somewhere deep in his mind, Brother Pugh saw this as an opportunity for education to get him out of his deep seated poverty. So the work, the self-denial, was not a task but almost a relief.

The day arrived when he was to give his speech for the state competition. He did it flawlessly and won the competition at the state. The next step was the regional which took place in Memphis. On the night that they gathered in Memphis, all of the contestants were taken behind the stage and placed in individual rooms so that they could not hear the presentation of the other speakers. Brother Pugh was in his room pacing back and forth giving his speech to the air when there was a knock on his door. One of the assistants stepped in and said, “Jessie Truman Pugh, it’s your time!” Brother Pugh said in his mind, “Mister, you’re mighty right, it is my time!”

One of the finer details had been revealed to all of the contestants just before the competition had begun. The winner of the regional event would go on to New York City and compete nationally for a scholarship to Yale University. Brother Pugh felt like this was his ticket to get out of all of poverty and downtrodden life he had lived.

He went out on that stage in Memphis and delivered his patriotic speech and he won the southeastern regional division. Now it was on to New York to deliver his speech and to get the scholarship from Yale. Opportunity had finally swung in his direction!

There was a space of time between the regional competition and the national competition and Brother Pugh had two sisters who were praying for him. The praying sisters lived in Tupelo, Mississippi where a very primitive Pentecostal Bible college had been set up. It so just happened that Brother Pugh went over to see them during the Christmas break. He said that when you get around praying people it has an effect on you and the Lord started pulling at him in Tupelo. His sisters were praying because they knew the end effect that would happen if he were to win this scholarship to Yale.

So late one night after going to church and getting in late, his sisters went on to bed and Brother Pugh was sitting in front of a pot-bellied wood stove in that cold December winter. The Lord was dealing with him about a call to preach and he was having all of his excuses torn down by God. After a while, he reached into his pocket and pulled out that speech and began to pace back and forth while he read his speech on that tattered notebook paper. Finally at last, he walked over to that stove and opened up the door and tossed his speech into the roaring fire. However it happened, it did. . . Brother Pugh said that in that moment the Lord showed him his whole entire life. He won the speech contest, he went on to Yale and finished. The Lord showed him the woman he would have married. The Lord showed him the job he would have had and then it all turned and the Lord showed him a miserable life. One in which his material dreams would have been realized but his marriage would have been a prison trying to love a women who despised him, children out of control with no spiritual aspirations, and largely a very miserable life.

Fast forward in time to Deleon, Texas where he knelt down in a clapboard house by a threadbare, worn couch and asked, “Bessie, will you marry me? I can only promise you a life of wearing worn-out shoes, faded out dresses, without a car for several years, and you won’t have much. I can only promise you a life of doing the will of God but if you will have me, I will love you with all of my heart.” He said that with tears dripping off of her face, she said yes.

That was well over sixty years ago. Now, Sister Pugh is stricken with Parkinson’s and Brother Pugh is confined to the house and takes care of her night and day. He feeds and dresses her. He takes care of every need. Someone asked, “Brother Pugh, how do you feel about it now?” He told them, “It is my happy privilege to do it because for years she has sacrificed for the call. . . and her reward will be great!”

I told this story in a sermon I preached about 2 months ago to the home crowd here in Dothan. The story demonstrates the power of the call on a man’s life. It is highly, highly doubtful if Brother Pugh would have gone on to Yale that he would have made the impact on the Kingdom as he has done over the years. . . .

NOTE: Photo of Brother Pugh was from flickr account of Keith Womack. Apparently taken at a conference in Monroe, Louisiana.

The Neurosurgeon, Richard Dawkins, and Me -- Part 2

2009-12-30T13:21:00.001-05:00

Picking up from yesterday’s post about Richard Dawkins’ book The Greatest Show on the Earth, I have had several e-mails asking me if I would recommend someone to read this book. I have two answers to that.

First, I would suggest that anyone who is not very well founded in Scripture or if they are questioning the authority of Scripture not to read it. What Dawkins is doing is preying on those who are on the fringe of the Church. Having done a bit of investigation on Dawkins, it is very important for us to note that he has a very strong influence among a younger set, generally college-aged crowd. YouTube has some various lectures that he has given and one that I watched was at Oklahoma University. Another lecture that I watched as given in Washington, D.C. to a large and somewhat rowdy group of old fat guys (like me) who fancied themselves as intellectuals.

Paul (1 Timothy 4:1) mentions a seducing spirit and it is my thoughts that this is what this book is based on. Dawkins is an outright atheist, but his tone in this book is not necessarily one of antagonism but more so the serpent trick that Eve encountered in Genesis 3. The serpent inserted doubt by asking a question, “Has God said?” and the question plagued her mind until she fell. Dawkins works the questions that attempts to do nothing more than create doubt. There are times that Dawkins is very antagonistic, in fact one of his earlier books The God Delusion takes that approach.

Secondly, I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to get down to the nitty gritty of apologetics. The reality of the fact is that you don’t need a lot of theology to discount Dawkins arguments. If you are a logical and critical thinker, you won’t even get through the preface before all sorts of questions begin to arise concerning Dawkins ideas about evolution and atheism. Frankly I enjoyed the challenge that Dawkins presented because it pushed me in a direction of study that I rarely go, the zone of apologetics. The majority of people to whom I preach, teach, and write to are either believers or they are leaning in that direction. Dawkins is an outright atheist but what was very scary to me was that some of the ideas that he was touting were embraced by some of the popular authors of our times, not just popular secular authors, but popular “Christian” authors. It is apparent that the fox is guarding the henhouse. 2010 needs to be a year of increased discernment. Discernment is very closely attached to loving God with your mind!

Dawkins begins his book by creating a scenario about Rome not existing and how that a teacher cannot even explore the intricacies of Roman society because he is too busy having to defend its existence. He moves from this concept and makes the comparison with evolution and how that teachers cannot even explore evolution because they are having to defend it against the creationists or intelligent design proponents.

Dawkins also threw in a blurb about atheism in his opening salvo. The first thing that struck me was what Paul wrote to the church at Rome.

Romans 3:3 KJV For what if some did not believe? shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?

Romans 3:3 NASB What then? If some did not believe, their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, will it?

It does not matter what men think about God, He is still there! It does not matter if it is a 7th grade science teacher, a full-blown atheist like Dawkins or my friend, the neurosurgeon, the thoughts and intents of their heart has zero effect on whether or not God exists or does not exist. The sad thing is that they will face God when their lives are finished and have to give an explanation for how they spent their personal talents and gifting.

Another thing that struck me was a rising question that came to mind, “Do you know everything?” For an atheist to say there is no God, he has to know everything. It is very obvious to me that they do not know everything because we are still waiting on a number of cures for various diseases in the medical field. They do not know a solution for the economic problems that the world is currently embroiled in. They do not have answers to the plaguing problems of world peace. These three areas are just the tip of the iceberg for what they do not know. So if they cannot give answers to those social questions of the day then how in the world can they give a valid answer to a spiritual question?

Yet another question that came to mind was one of ethics and behavior. All men come with an innate and I believe God-given process of conscience which causes them to observe some form of moral law. Man basically knows that murder is wrong. He is also aware of various other degrees of behavior that is either right or wrong. From where did this come from if there is no God? The question of conscience has to be answered.

I shall continue this. . . .

Thanks for reading. . . . .

PH

The Neurosurgeon, Richard Dawkins, and Me

2009-12-29T14:19:00.001-05:00

A little over a month ago, my dad ended up needing a five vessel bypass via open heart surgery. Throughout the process, I spent a lot of time at the hospital that I have worked in off and on since 1985. I occasionally still work in the Radiology department and in some of the intensive care units but have not been full-time since January 2006. I discovered once again some of the advantages of being an insider when a family member is in need of health care although that may change after Obama has committed his “bailout.” My dad is now doing well and overall did remarkable throughout the affair.

On one of the days that I was spending with him, I left the hospital for a bit and returned after lunch. As I was getting into the elevator, I ran into Dr. Dennis Becker who is a neurosurgeon that I have known since the summer of ’92 or so. He is a kind-hearted soul and has always been very genial and I have never personally observed him demonstrate the messiah complex that most neurosurgeons seem to get equipped with when they are in medical school. Now before you send me a derogatory e-mail for being judgmental at least give me the consideration of allowing you to know that my point of reference is not just the two hospitals here in Dothan but St. Luke’s Episcopal/Texas Heart Institute and M. D. Anderson in Houston both of which were crawling with neurosurgeon’s. Generally neurosurgeon’s egos need a lot of room as in wide doors and tall ceilings to accommodate their antics. I would be wrong if I did not also add that I have noted some preachers who came into my airspace a time or two that would rival any neurosurgeon’s ego hands down. Funny what perceived self-importance does to us.

Anyway, Dr. Becker struck up a conversation with me and wanted to know what was going on with my dad. He then spied a book I was holding and asked me what it was. Just so happens that I had been in a used bookstore and ran across a copy of Richard Dortch’s two books, Integrity and Secrets of the Heart. I had picked them up and re-read the account of Jim Bakker’s fall from grace with the PTL scam back in the late ‘80’s and it is still a little mind-boggling to read of the amounts of money that flows among the televangelists and how largely these folks were living. Dr. Becker had never heard of Dortch, which not many people outside of the religious world have, so I was not necessarily surprised. Then he asked me what PTL was and I told him it was “Praise the Lord” or “People That Love” whatever they chose to call it on that particular day during the broadcast.

With this he asked me, “Philip, do you read very much?” to which I replied, “Ahh, I usually read a couple of books a year.” Probably a huge understatement but one needs to be modest so I happened to be in the manner mode that day and flew under the radar with that answer. It was then that he told me that he had a book recommendation by one Richard Dawkins entitled The Greatest Show on the Earth. I have to confess that I had never even heard of Richard Dawkins but I told Dr. Becker that I would indeed see about it. So I wrote the author’s name down and determined that I would see about it because I am always in the hunt for new author’s and books. The reality of the fact is that I was in for an awakening.

Two days later after my dad had sufficiently recovered from his heart cath, I took off to Barnes and Noble for a little while to get out of the hospital. When I got there I was in for a big surprise! I hunted down Dawkins book and found out that he is one of the rising proponents of evolution and a big chief among what is being referred to as the New Atheists. He is somewhat of a free-thinker although very articulate in being able to explain some of his points.

As I read through The Greatest Show on the Earth, I remembered something about kind-hearted, soft-spoken, old Dr. Becker that I had forgotten—he is an atheist. Not a rabble-rousing, saber-rattling, street-marching type but one who on numerous occasions has documented in his progress notes that he would tell families that he was an atheist and if that was problematic for them, he would get another neurosurgeon for them to see. As a sidebar, I have sometimes asked good Christian folks if they would rather have an incompetent Christian surgeon or a vile-sinner but extremely competent surgeon. Just in case you are wondering about me, give me the vile-sinner but competent guy ever day over the incompetent brother. Just because someone is saved doesn’t necessarily make them competent (insert your own smiley here).

As I read through Dawkins’ book, it came back to me that when I told Dr. Becker about the Dortch/Bakker/PTL connection that he was attempting to subvert my thinking by recommending The Greatest Show etc. Indeed the book was provoking but the problem (or advantage) is that I have not been one of those “Christians” who just checked their brains in at the backdoor when I showed up to hear someone preach/teach or for that matter lecture in a college classroom. Everything goes through a filter and over the next few posts, I shall try to accommodate you with some of the things that come out of that very, very beneficial foray into Richard Dawkins’ world. For you see Mars Hill (Acts 17:16-34) is still alive and well at this juncture in history and whether or not you are facing the philosophers on Mars Hill or the modern day Nimrods who are building their towers of Babel, there are solid answers for the loose threads they are attempting to unravel on the fringes.

Harry Blamire wrote The Christian Mind in 1963 and some of his words were very blunt but bracing as Os Guinness quotes in Fit Bodies, Fat Minds (subtitled: Why Evangelicals Don’t Think and What To Do About It): “We speak of ‘the modern mind’ and of ‘the scientific mind,’ using that word mind of a collectively accepted set of notions and attitudes. On the pattern of such usage I have posited a Christian Mind, chiefly for the purpose of showing it does not exist.” Blamire continued “There is no longer a Christian Mind. . . The Christian Mind has succumbed to the secular drift with a degree of weakness unmatched in Christian History.”

I would be foolish to propose a cold, clinical intellectual approach to theology because this can be deadening to one’s spiritual life. On the other hand, if somebody (or” somebodies”) does not get a grip on their Bibles and begin to love God with their mind (Matthew 22:37; Mark 12:30; Luke 10:27; Acts 17:11; Romans 7:25; etc.) many are going to be swept away by the prevailing and shifting winds of doctrine flowing in our times. This shores up my encouragement for expository preaching which I did a series sometime back on the Barnabas Blog.

Since I have become acutely aware of the competition I have with twitter and Facebook, I am attempting valiantly not to be as verbose so I will pick up the Dawkins/Becker exercise in tomorrow’s post.

Thanks for reading. . . .

PH

The Hope of the Soul Winner

2009-11-13T14:07:00.001-05:00

Just some reflections on the role sower, the seed and the soil.

The Voices of Vanity Fair -- Part 2 -- The Voice of the Consumer

2009-11-03T13:33:00.000-05:00

Continuing with a blog that I wrote back in August concerning the voices of Vanity Fair (Part 1), I trust you will find some food for thought with this thought. Long before Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress Paul wrote a letter to the Galatians addressing some of the voices of Vanity Fair.

Galatians 1:6-7 KJV I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel: [7] Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.

He was alarmed that there were those who would work to create great upheaval in the soul. It was of such a nature that it could be described as a hellish agitation attempting to perplex the soul. It was with the subtle suggestions of doubt or half-truth created by asking questions that would subvert the simple. The Greek indicates that the words “trouble” and “pervert” the Gospel implies a shaking back and forth with the intent of stirring up spiritual distress.

They would work to twist or turn around the message of truth. Our generation is no different from the one Paul was confronting. He was preaching the thought that everything has to flow through the filter of Scripture and the direction of the Spirit. Discernment must be one of the prevailing traits in our relationship with God. The reality is that Paul understood the fragile nature of faith and that listening to the wrong voices can turn us away from the faith. A certain amount of vigilance is required in our spiritual life. This thought opens up a question, “What voices are you allowing to influence you?”

There is a pattern in the book of Galatians. . .

• It starts with a troubling and a perversion of the Gospel (1:6-9).
• Then it progresses to a bewitching that will lead one toward disobedience (3:1-3).
• Then it moves even further in that it changes the appetite for godly things into the things of the world (4:9).
• Its deadly conclusion leads to a disabled runner who cannot complete his race (5:7-8).

Everything about Vanity Fair was designed with the spiritual shopper in mind. You can still have a bit of religion and a lot of the trinkets of Vanity. Everything about the American culture encourages us to seek after a wide variety of things. Take note of the choices, it is from bottled water (strawberry, raspberry, or lemon), to burgers (Whoppers, Big Macs, Swiss and Mushroom, or even Chicken), to computers (Dell’s, Macs, or simple PC’s), or to cell phones (Blackberries, I-Phones, Voyagers). It becomes almost endless as the sellers attempt to coerce people to spend their money on their newest invention.

With a deadly accuracy these voices of Vanity Fair wants us to make the same application in our service to serving God. The consumer has a mentality that makes him in charge instead of God being in charge. But in the process, God ends up being bought out and He disappears from the scene.

The reality is that the Gospel is a call to the denial of self. The Gospel is not a call to self-fulfillment but it is a call to sacrifice. I might add that there are hard demands to following this Jesus Christ of Nazareth.

Luke 9:22-27 KJV Saying, The Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be slain, and be raised the third day. [23] And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. [24] For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it. [25] For what is a man advantaged, if he gain the whole world, and lose himself, or be cast away? [26] For whosoever shall be ashamed of me and of my words, of him shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he shall come in his own glory, and in his Father's, and of the holy angels. [27] But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the kingdom of God.

Living for God is not about us. Being a saint of God is not about us. In fact, it’s not even about our self-esteem. Being a saint of God is being sick of sin and having a sense of desperation for redemption. It is about seeing the Lord as the crucified Savior and His offer as being priceless and saving us from sin, death, and hell.

The popularity of cross-bearing is as popular now as it was back then, not very! However, we have no choice in the matter as to how that we come to him. Don’t listen to the voices of Vanity Fair that says that you can have it your way! When it comes to the kingdom of God, a consumer mentality is deadly. You cannot shop for choices in your relationship with God. What was required of the primitive, first church is the same requirements that fit in today’s society.

The consumer mentality causes people to “shop” their doctrine, “shop” their church, “shop” their pastors and elders, and “shop” spirituality. Instead of what is good for the soul, the choices are made on what is good for their schedule, their family, or their location. The consumer mentality fills churches while it empties the soul.

Someone recently sent me a link from Facebook for an online sermon in one of the most popular churches in my hometown. I watched with a progressive sense of horror and astonishment as a sermon from Mark 5 was preached by the pastor and before it was over, the demoniac from Gadara had been labeled as mentally ill and not demon possessed. The place was packed and the crowd appeared to be hanging on every word and I could only wonder how many people on that day had been misled, most if not all. How many people in that room on that particular day really were being oppressed by a very real devil (of which he has almost disappeared from American pulpits and church life) and it was being billed as mental illness? Can a host of pills fix a spiritual problem? That question is rhetorical in nature and needs no answer but just in case, let me say that there are no pharmaceutical answers for spiritual dilemmas. I was incredibly sad as the sermon came to a close on that day because I realized that many in that crowd were simply there because of programs, social contacts, and nice facilities rather than a true love for Christ and His Word.

The sad fact is that spiritual consumerism wipes out biblical discernment and true discipleship but it fills up buildings and makes budgets blossom. For a moment transition to the material side of being a consumer and its effects and note what happens. Professor Barry Schwartz of Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania wrote concerning the American “happiness quotient” being in a consistent decline for more than a generation: “In the last 30 years—a time of great prosperity—the proportion of the population describing itself as ‘very happy’ has declined. It has decreased because of an abundance of choices and a consumer attitude that pervades our lives.” Having more “choices” probably is not going to make anyone more spiritual. The cost of discipleship is the only thing that brings about lasting spiritual transformation.

Resist the flow of that voice of Vanity Fair that calls you to a life of ease and comfort and invest yourself to the hilt in the Kingdom. . . it is the only thing that really matters (Matthew 6:33).

The Persecuted Church

2009-10-08T15:46:00.000-04:00

For the most part, I feel that many in the American church are very unaware of the international persecution that some in the global church have to endure. Recently while working on a set of sermon notes, I paged through Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and once again felt the deep-seated conviction that most of the American church probably would not be able to endure physical challenges to their faith. In fact, I even questioned whether or not I would stand in the face of persecution and even martyrdom for what I believed to be true. Perhaps many are choking on God’s blessings at the expense of our soul. Blessings and prosperity have a way of dulling one’s spiritual senses. Why do we really need God when we have a surplus of wealth and health? Why should we depend on God when we have become self-made men by following the advice of the best life now routine?

I have been accused by some of my “preaching buddies” of always reading heavy or even dark books and they are probably right! Of course Scripture has been the main fair of my efforts because I want the Book to master me and it will not happen unless I spend time with it. But in addition to Scripture I have been fortunate enough to have for years devoted much reading to Tozer, Ravenhill, Chambers (among others), and a host of the Puritans. The Puritans have had to endure an incredible amount of undue criticism by those of more carnal “spiritual” appetites because they confront the way that men live. Spend a little time with Boston, Brooks, Watson (my personal favorite), Edwards, and such like and you will suddenly find much encouragement in the areas of personal holiness, dedication to prayer and the Scriptures. All of these working in tandem have had the ability to create a formidable team of voices that continue to remain productive. Piper’s Don’t Waste Your Life (which has a free download) was another clarion call to me to simply do that not waste my life.

This matter of the persecuted church has again taken front and center in my life due to a book that was recently recommended to me to read. It is written by Randy Alcorn and is entitled Safely Home and recounts the persecution of the Christians in China. It was so troubling to me when I read in the opening chapter of the account of the saints on their way to church in the middle of the night and having to ride bicycles at that.

They meet at night in “house-churches” so that they will not be caught by the government officials. They were ever so careful with their Bibles and wrapped them in a waterproof covering. When they got to their place of worship, the prayer was reverent, the singing was heart-felt, and the response to the Word was majestic. What troubled me so much was that this coming up Sunday, there will be people (saints?) who will lay out of church for every conceivable and weak reason. They have not had any real interaction with the Word or with God all week long. They have Bibles that are not valued, prayer is basically non-existent, and their experience with worship borders on an emotional attachment to entertainment.

Just a few questions for you:

1. How many Bibles do you have and how long has it been since you treasured them in such a way as those in the persecuted church?

2. What was your reaction to the call for prayer on an “off-night” at the Church? Was it one of expectation or were you upset that your schedule was going to be disrupted?

3. Take a look at the last ten years of your tax returns and see how much money you have given to spread the Gospel and support the church? Now compare that amount with how much you spent on other things? (Going to an Alabama or Auburn football game is going to cost right at $400 +/- for the trip. Going on a weekend shopping spree in Atlanta or Birmingham has the potential to cost even more.) For you Dothan folks who are reading this blog, 65 foreign missionaries are depending on your commitment to God to keep them in the fray all over the world. . . we cannot let them or God down. . . we must stay on the firing line!

4. How much time have you spent this week with God-saturated people compared to those who were dead spiritually? Analyze the voices you listened to this week. Was it the frivolity of Facebook, the incessant voices of talk radio (political and/or sports focused), or was your MP3 player loaded to the gills with good spiritual voices?

When you have to answer those sorts of questions, it immediately sheds a lot of light on how much devotion you have to God. If faith has any value whatsoever, there will be an equal amount dedication that will be manifested in “works.” If you don’t believe me, go and read the Acts of the Apostles and then Romans 6-8 and then James 2:14-26.

I trust that you are feeling some heat right now as you read this, because I have felt high heat. . . as in the gentle but very convicting voice of the Spirit with every page I have turned in Safely Home. Almost fearfully, I did not want to even consider the thought that I could not endure the challenges of persecution faced by these Chinese Christians. Would I have been one of those who gave up because of the threat of personal pain? Is there even enough devotion and commitment in my heart to withstand such pressure? Or do I only live in the blessing trap that when God is filling His role as Santa Claus I can serve Him and when He does not live up to my expectations I am ready to give up? What an indictment against me. . . perhaps that same indictment is against you also. . .

C. S. Lewis—You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life and death to you.

The book is dedicated to Graham Staines and his two sons, Philip (age ten) and Timothy (age six) who at half-past midnight on January 23, 1999 were burned to death by a mob in India for their beliefs. The reports are that Graham, in the midst of the fire, huddled his two young sons up close to him, as they were burning to death.

I can only pray that God brings this blog to your mind next Sunday night when you leave church and pile into Appleby’s or Ruby Tuesday’s or Burger King or wherever and bite into the chicken fingers or the burger. . . .

I trust that you will read this in the spirit in which I have written it. . . suffice it to say that although fictional Safely Home has moved me toward a deeper commitment to God. . . for that I am thankful!

God Bless,
PH

A Novel Ministry Concept

2009-10-06T23:34:00.000-04:00

We live amid a constant barrage of marketing concepts. There seems to be a new gimmick ever day. The best sale ever is going on this week and next week a better one is coming. I told someone recently if the sales keep getting better pretty soon they will be giving us the stuff. But in all reality it is not so. Rather, only another gimmick to transfer your money to their pocket.

The church and ministry is not exempt from such things. We all want revival. We all want to grow. We want bigger and better facilities. We want to make sure no visitors slip through our fingers. We want our website to be a little slicker than the church across town. Therefore we seek out the best means and methods to make our churches just a little bit better.

At 48 years old I am a web sort of guy. I get the ether world. Blog sites, forums, online communities, Facebook, Twitter and who knows what is next. I see the way our culture is moving via the web and technologies. I can also remember a different time when truth was truth and absolutes were just that. I can remember being confused with the term post-modern and now the church is afflicted with it.

It seems that today Pentecostal ministry concepts are gleaned from non Pentecostal sources more so than the Word of God. Golf courses have replaced the prayer rooms. Ministerial values are assumed from associates rather than an altar. Ministerial concept books are consumed while dust gathers on leather bound bibles. Laptops, projectors, stools and music stands have replaced reference bibles, battle scarred pulpits and tear stained altars. Casual has replaced the careful dress of yesteryear. Grace replaced conviction. Sin is now called spiritual liberties. Morality in the pulpit is being challenged.

How did we get here?

What did Jesus say?

Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. Matt 16:24

Jesus indicated three distinct things should be found in those that were to lead his church. Self denial, cross bearing, and following Him.

Self Denial seems to be a thing of the past in ministerial circles. Churches are blessed and young men are able to live above the levels of their fathers. Financial blessings are handed over instead of sacrificed for.

Along with these blessings we see ministers who do not deny any liberty to their flocks. Nor do they deny anything to their families. Wife and children are carnal because their minister daddy or husband denies them nothing. The church duplicates the pastor’s home and the things he allows, the members take further. A sad cycle begins that spins out of control quickly.

Pastor denies no liberties to his church because he denies no liberties to his family because he has never denied liberties to himself.

Jesus told the carriers of his gospel to first deny themselves and then to take up their cross….

Cross bearing is not fun. It is not cool. It is not sexy nor is it socially desirable. But then cross bearing was never intended to be so.

When a minister carries a cross he cannot go some places and do some things. He cannot carry it alone so his family helps him. A cross bearing parsonage will result in a cross bearing congregation.

Some doors are not accessible to one who carries his cross. The cross prevents access to some places. The minister who checks his cross at the door, and then tries to pick it up on the way out finds the cross overly burdensome. Therefore instead of carrying it to the door he just leaves it at home and his cross bearing is for personal conviction rather than public view. Soon the cross seldom leaves the parsonage and often can only be found stored away with the stuff from yesteryear.

But Jesus said if you are going to propagate my gospel you must deny yourself and take up you cross and follow. This might be where some of the real issue is found.

For nearly a generation we in the ministry have been consumed with leadership and ceased followership.

A few years ago I found myself without organizational leadership or inclusion in any way. I felt forgotten and unappreciated. Then I decided to do my leading from the pew of whatever meeting I attended. Instead of leadership books I began looking for books about following. I found far fewer followership books than leadership. Jesus seemed to think that following him was much more important than anyone following us.

Heed this word of caution my good preacher friend. Following him never disallows self denial and cross bearing. Post modern emergent concepts claim the Grace of Christ without repentence or self denial. Walking in grace does not create a license to partake in sins of the flesh. Jesus had this figured out long before any of these modern scruffy looking shirt tail flapping ministers were conceived.

What a Novel Ministry Concept!

Self denial, cross bearing and following HIM.

rks

Joe Pentecost

2009-09-29T18:04:00.004-04:00

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How important is Holiness?

2009-09-25T10:57:00.003-04:00

There is a great discussion in our world of Apostolic Pentecostals about the priority of holiness principles that have defined us for decades.

There is a great desire among many of us to be more acceptable in the wider world of Christianity so that we might be able to be more main stream and be heard by a larger group of humanity. To some degree to gain access you have to play by another persons rules and homogenize your message and manner to the groups who control access.

We are viewed by a large percentage of mainstream culture as an anomaly. Our ladies have long hair, wear dresses, don't wear makeup and very little to no jewelry. There are a wide range of other things we discourage and believe as well. This puts us outside of the norm. Even very devout "Christians" have no basis of understanding for the reasons this is done.

Why have they not heard or do not understand?
The reason is quite simple, many have never heard messages from Paul, Peter, James and Jesus dealing with the concept of modesty, righteousness and Godly distinction. The additional reason is some who have heard it have rejected it and are on a mission to inoculate others from even considering the wisdom in it.

And now within this environment, we have those who are among us have been influenced by all of these things for various reasons are beginning to question, doubt and outright reject the very essence of who we have been as a people and movement for decades. I don't doubt some have very pure and honorable motives. Naivete, ignorance, foolishness, pride and deception have different causes, however the outcomes are the same.

Why would some who have been on the forefront speaking to the virtues of holiness for decades change their minds? Were they wrong then or are they wrong now?

When holiness was preached in years gone by it was rooted in scriptural teaching and directives. Today the current message is rooted in feelings, philosophies and other paradigms that are heavy on opinions and light on scripture.

I am currently involved in an effort to set a baseline of agreement on the essentials and even in this list, there is much liberty granted. Some would be highly offended that we have not compromised the list to the level of their own individual folly.

Read the Red Letters. Love Jesus. Evangelize the World.

Well, that all sounds great. However, there is folly and deception in this.

I am five years into a church plant. We have experienced virtually no transfers. If you visited on Sunday, there are three or four that were "raised" in pentecost. So I have wrestled with how to approach and teach holiness. I confess that I have been less than great. I have made some fundamental mistakes in the area of not teaching and preaching it as often as I should.

I still am not a hard nosed person. I simply have decided, for myself, I am an Apostolic Pentecostal because I thoroughly and completely know this is right both from a biblical standpoint and the answer to our culture.

I know that many would be offended at some liberty I allow. However on very fundamental issues of Biblical essentials I have began to be much more vocal and consistent. Do I still love people? Absolutely. Am I beating people over the head? No, a thousand times no.

If I truly love people, I am going to tell them the truth even if they may reject me for it. Because my love for God and his approval is greater than my own personal need for approval from those I pastor.

Has it cost me? Absolutely. Do I regret it? No.

Before our church started, we ran our first add in the paper. It went in the thursday paper and at 7:00 a.m. I got a call the very morning. A lady asked me about the church. She told me there were about thirty people in her group and they had music, money and excitement. She said, "I have one question for you. "Are you going to preach holiness?" I confess I hemhawed around, but the essense of what I told her was, "I will not allow what you want to hear redefine what I believe to be true, so yes I will be preaching and teaching holiness." I never heard from this lady again.

I have been confronted by this on two other occasions. As time has passed I have found that when I will preach the message of Jesus, people seem to make conversion and consecration.

What do I mean? The message of Jesus was about cross bearing, self denial and following him. The epistles that we teach and preach are full of "Holiness" teaching, lessons and mandates that are the ways that we as Christians deny, carry our cross and follow him.

If I am to be true to the one who called me and if I truly love those who I am going to give an account for, I am going to have to stand on the word of God and speak clearly on these issues of Holiness, sanctification and modesty.

If I am unwilling to do that, I am less than what God called me to be. Anyone that would encourage me down a path of compromise is the enemy to the purpose of God in my life and ministry.

I believe there is a hunger and conviction in this generation to do what is right over what is convenient and popular.

How important is holiness? I believe it is worth contending for. So I stand and lift up my voice against the flow of our times and say to one and all,

"Follow peace with all me and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord."

The Ark of the Lord and the Glory of God dwelled in the Holy of Holies.

In Him, By Him, Through Him,

Scott A. Phillips
www.inbythroughhim.blogspot.com

If your interested, a website for UPC lic. Ministers to declare they believe and will endeavor to teach/preach this baseline of holiness.

www.wedeclare.org

Those of you are not UPC or not ministry, if you are interested in the reasons behind the declarations, please send me a note and I will endeavor to give you the biblical reasons for our convictions.

Why I believe in Fixed Term Limits

2009-09-18T15:37:00.002-04:00

by Scott A. Phillips
scottaphillips@mac.com

From a national perspective and a District and sectional perspective, we would benefit from permanent term limits without an exception clause. Eight Year Consecutive being the limit.

Right now we are going to General Conference and we have term limits kicking in. For the incumbent to stay in office he will be required to get 2/3 on nominating ballot. This is questionable as to the likelihood of happening. I believe Bro. Haney has given his best and has done a honorable job of leading the largest apostolic movement in the world. This is not a slight on Bro. Haney or any other current or past leader. Please, don't read that in my comments that follow. That is not the intent.

I am for term limits for Greater Involvement, ownership and leadership development.

I believe a lot of the current problems we are having and have had over the past few years is a direct product of not having term limits.

I believe the more people that serve, the more buy in that will be enjoyed because of involvement. This will empower people to be more "Defensive" about the ORG, rather than critical.

When men are involved at leadership a few things happen.

1. It broadens your understanding, appreciation and reach of the organization.
2. It helps you see some things that can be done to make the organization to be better.
3. It provides an opportunity to connect and build relationships with men and churches in ways that would not happen otherwise.

For All offices, the current exception of 2/3 on nominating ballot is causing problems. I believe we just need to complete this and make it permanent. I believe that this puts undue pressure on the incumbent and the voters. A man can bow out gracefully, without feeling offended. They served their time. They are now prepared to serve at the next level if they choose and are elected. No one owns the office.

This is not to impugn or glorify anyone. However the following are a few of the results.

A few Men become very gifted at leading.
Power and Influence is held by a few.
Many men miss out on an opportunity to lead, that would grow to become better leaders.

I believe if we look at 24 years. We could have 3 men serve eight years. I believe we would be better served with three men serving rather than one.

I use the following as an example. I hope those that read this will understand I hold my Elders and Leaders in the highest esteem. I have been blessed incredibly by them. However, I still have an opinion and share this because I believe this will help our organization.

In Mississippi we have ten sections and two executive offices. In a 24 year period, you would have 36 men with experience, rather than 12.

Opportunity produces growth. A man never learns how to pastor, till he pastors. Are there mistakes? Absolutely. However, long term men make mistakes as well, having experience does not exempt anyone from mistakes...

Here in Mississippi we have went through a season where men served for decades beside each other. Good Men. Godly Men. Men that deserve honor and respect. In fact a man I would almost change my opinion on because of him. G.R. Travis was an example of Godly, Wise and a Elder Statesman. He would have been that as Superintendent or as a pastor. The office did not make him, he made the Office. His serving as Superintendent was a blessing to Mississippi. Men in his day were elected to office at the age of 30. They in turn served till retirement age. We have a district that had a board who had all served for decades together. With all that in mind, I still believe Mississippi would be better served going forward that all positions would be filled by men for a set period.

In this time very few men grew or had a voice in our district and there was an obvious leadership vacuum. Did we/Do we have great leadership? Absolutely. James Carney was great as a Superintendent. David Tipton, who I greatly respect and is doing a great job. However, in the discussion of who would be available, there were literally just a few even mentioned, and in that it illustrates the leadership vacuum. In a district with 180 Pastors, and we only think of four or five men is a travesty. I dare say that, if more men were involved and had developed and given an opportunity to be known on a broader basis, the actual number of men who could serve honorably would be thirty or more.

Very few men have served in leadership to have the experience deemed necessary to be Superintendent under the age of sixty.

So, few have gotten the opportunity to be seen, heard and appreciated for the depth and wisdom they have to share because a lack of opportunity.

If I was writing this as a man who had not had opportunity, this might all seem self serving. I have had awesome opportunities and I am not wanting an office. I am thirty nine. Have had ordained since 1996. In thirteen years I have served as Sectional Youth, Home Missions, Secretary, Mens Ministry Committee, District Home Missions Secretary as well as currently serve as the Home Missions Director. My predecessor to Home Missions was David Tipton. Bro. Tipton resigned, so I did not compete with him, because there would have been no competition. I don't know a more competent, organized or fine man than David Tipton. My opportunity to serve came because he vacated the office.

What I am advocating is that I should step out of the way in six years. I am under no illusions. Being elected again is not a guarantee. Why? Because there are other men capable, able and willing to serve in this office. In fact there are some that will do a better job. I am alright with that. The office does not define me. No one owes me this office. If my brothers vote another man in, I will continue to be a supporter and believer in Home Missions. No doubt writing things like this might expedite my "Term" Limit. However, anyone that knows me, knows I try to say what I believe as polite as I can, but I will and do say clearly what I believe. I do not believe leadership is silent on difficult situations. Leadership should be bold enough to say what it believes and stand by it, kindly and respectfully.

My perspective is not coming from wanting an office. I have a position. Love the Department I serve in and love the Mississippi district.

I believe that no matter what happens at general conference, we need to study and implement a term limit that is fixed. This is not in disrespect to any current leader. It is out of a respect for the rank and file member of the UPC. There is greatness found in this organization that is displayed in thousands of churches every Sunday. No doubt, many men have no wiliness to serve. But for those that are willing, I think they individually would be blessed to serve... as well as we would be blessed by their serving.

I also believe terms should be four years rather than two. Limit the Total concurrent years served to eight years.

Why am I writing this?

Have you heard what happened in Illinois?

We are going to General Conference and there is a bit of confusion on if Bro. Haney can go back in with 2/3 and if he does not go in, who will we vote on. We are going to have 1,500 voters that have not really had an opportunity to think about this as a whole and many will not even know who are possible candidates. To approach a General Conference of the largest Apostolic Church with this type of indecision and confusion can not be the will of God.

I believe the men who might possibly be in the running need to have some opportunity to consider if they would leave their churches and make some contingent plans if this transpires. We as members need to know who is available and have some opportunity pray about who we think would be best ... rather than a writing a name down on a little blank piece of paper... while we go back and forth with the men beside, before and behind us who to vote for.

Fixed term limits would at least give us more time to consider this. Those of us who believe in term limits need to make them fixed to eliminate the confusion, or do away with them all together to eliminate the confusion.

The Names I have heard, but don't know if they are willing to serve. It would be nice if through the advent of technology we could find out.

David Bernard
Paul Mooney
Jerry Jones
Randy Keyes
Anthony Mangun

When Bathrooms Are No Longer the Priority. . .

2009-08-17T20:43:00.001-04:00

Teresa said, “Philip, let’s go do the Parade of Homes!”

Philip said, “Teresa, I don’t want to do the Parade of Homes!”

Teresa said, “Philip, we are going to do the Parade of Homes!”

Philip said, “Teresa, we are not going to do the Parade of Homes!”

Then we got in the car and went to the Parade of Homes! I have found that doing such things as this creates for a mostly blissful state of marriage.

Little did I know what was in store for me on that day several weeks ago. I have not gone to the Parade of Homes in over ten years because. . . well, just because. One of the reasons that I don’t go is because it has a tendency to skew my priorities and it gives me the “Greedy Galloping Gimme’s.” This is one of the good lessons the Berenstain Bears taught me years ago when I was reading to my kids. The Parade of Homes, in times past, has created an uncomfortable discontentment with where I currently live which is not a good thing (not that there is anything wrong with where I currently live). Furthermore it has encouraged a ‘keeping up with the Jones’ mentality, which is not good either.

For the uninitiated, the Parade of Homes is when the Dothan area homebuilders leave about 200 home newly built homes open for two consecutive weekends so they can be viewed by potential buyers. They are usually in top-notch neighborhoods and are tricked out with all the modern conveniences that incite an insatiable sense of materialism in most of the folks who walk through them. When you add to it immaculate lawns and manicured flower beds, it can get the best of even the most sensible buyers.

Since I had not been in more than 10 years it did not take long for me to see the new trendy architectural shift that has occurred. After about the third house, when we walked in the door, I took off in great haste for the coolest room in the house. Teresa, wanting to almost act as if she wasn’t with me, half-whispers and half-shouts, “Where are you going?” to which I yell over my shoulder “To the bathroom!!!!”

Amazing changes have happened in American bathrooms these days! First, they are huge. As in giant-sized 10 feet wide and in some of the houses as much as 25 feet long. They have jet Jacuzzis with a separate adjoining shower, nifty Delta faucets that are a dulled gold or bronze, sinks that look like large sea-shells or fancy cabinets, commodes that have all sorts of various designs, and the accompanying glass and mirrors are incredible. My only complaint about these new bathrooms is the windows that are not opaque. It appears to me that even in our “liberated” age that such an invention could lead to some downright embarrassing moments, especially if the neighbor in the back yard is mowing his grass or BBQ’ing with the buddies. Imagine looking up and seeing a group of local rednecks huddled around a grill sipping their favorite beverages and instead of their focus being on the grill and their drinks, they are peering across the backyard at the sight framed in one of these large bay window things. I doubt that would make you want to say, “Howdy neighbor!”

Toward the end of the day, a creeping madness had started raging in my heart. I knew that I was half-mad when at the next the last stop, I screeched up to the curb, slammed the brakes and with the car half-stopped and Teresa attempting to get over the whiplash from the sudden stop, I leaped out and cleared the manicured lawn in a full scale sprint. Flying up the steps, hustling across the long porch, and muttering under my breath, “Jet Jaccuzzi! Delta faucet!” I was in a nearly catatonic state. Teresa told me later that she was a little concerned about the glazed look I had in my eyes. I informed her that she should not worry about it because it was a near morbid state of materialism-itis. This is generally an inflammation of a greedy heart that usually passes with strong doses of Scripture, a reorientation of priorities, and hanging out with missionaries. I was almost at a point of critical mass when two missionaries dragged me back from the abyss.

It was fortuitous that on that weekend that our church had been blessed with two missionary families. The Mike Patterson family (Romania, Muldova, & my brother-in-law) and the Robert Rodenbush family (Regional Field Supervisor-Eastern Europe) had come to the wedding of my niece. So for two hours after my near fatal onset of madness, I had the Patterson’s and Rodenbush’s unfiltered. I am unsure of how we got around to the point of the conversation now, but eventually Sister Rodenbush began to tell us of standing in a bread line in with a missionary in that area of the world. She also shared that the apartment of these missionaries somewhere between 600-800 square feet. They chose one of the smallest they could find because they wanted to be frugal and spend their money in other areas to further the Gospel. When she said 600-800 square feet, I was smitten in my heart because just earlier in the day, I had stood in bathrooms that were at least 200 square feet, maybe more and I had wanted it! I had been almost willing to sell my birthright for a mess of pottage!

Her story continued and I was told of a kitchen sink that had those outside variety spigots like you find in our gardens here. The kitchen sink was mounted on a 2X4 frame that was without cabinet doors and only had cloth coverings. My brother-in-law told me later that this missionary had worked diligently and faithfully and over the years (more than 30) had seen three of the churches he served totally collapse and he had to start over from scratch. I had the occasion to spend two hours or so with this man and his wife about two years ago at a conference in Bucharest, Romania. Even before knowing of their sacrifice I felt an incredible spirit in them. It is of such a nature that it almost reaches out and grabs you (in a good way).

At the end of that day, I was thankful that God had providentially put these folks in my path because their lives (not just their stories) had helped to re-fire my priorities. Please don’t choke on the good life that American churchianity is offering these days there is much more to the picture than what most realize. Unless you make a concerted effort in your spiritual life, you will live a pale, lifeless, and cross-less life that will make no contribution and sadly in the end you will say, “I have wasted it!”

Last night when I got in late from church, I asked Teresa, “Where is our money going?” When she told me, my conscience was at rest because bathrooms are no longer the priority. . . The Gospel is!

To accent this blog, I encourage you to watch the following video. . . and then do something!

Go, Send, or Disobey. . . John Piper

When a Body becomes a Business; The Question that Saved my Life

2009-08-13T10:46:00.003-04:00

Someone emailed this very poignant article to me today. Amazing!

The Question that Saved My Life

by Dr. David Ryser

A number of years ago, I had the privilege of teaching at a school of ministry. My students were hungry for God, and I was constantly searching for ways to challenge them to fall more in love with Jesus and to become voices for revival in the Church. I came across a quote attributed most often to Rev. Sam Pascoe. It is a short version of the history of Christianity, and it goes like this:

Christianity started in Palestine as a fellowship; it moved to Greece and became a philosophy; it moved to Italy and became an institution; it moved to Europe and became a culture; it came to America and became an enterprise.

Some of the students were only 18 or 19 years old--barely out of diapers--and I wanted them to understand and appreciate the import of the last line, so I clarified it by adding, "An enterprise. That's a business."

After a few moments Martha, the youngest student in the class, raised her hand. I could not imagine what her question might be. I thought the little vignette was self-explanatory, and that I had performed it brilliantly. Nevertheless, I acknowledged Martha's raised hand, "Yes, Martha."

She asked such a simple question, "A business? But isn't it supposed to be a body?"

I could not envision where this line of questioning was going, and the only response I could think of was, "Yes." She continued, "But when a body becomes a business, isn't that a prostitute?"

The room went dead silent. For several seconds no one moved or spoke. We were stunned, afraid to make a sound because the presence of God had flooded into the room, and we knew we were on holy ground. All I could think in those sacred moments was, "Wow, I wish I'd thought of that." I didn't dare express that thought aloud. God had taken over the class.

Martha's question changed my life. For six months, I thought about her question at least once every day. "When a body becomes a business, isn't that a prostitute?" There is only one answer to her question. The answer is "Yes."

The American Church , tragically, is heavily populated by people who do not love God. How can we love Him? We don't even know Him; and I mean really know Him.

I stand by my statement that most American Christians do not know God--much less love Him. The root of this condition originates in how we came to God. Most of us came to Him because of what we were told He would do for us. We were promised that He would bless us in life and take us to heaven after death.

We married Him for His money, and we don't care if He lives or dies as long as we can get His stuff. We have made the Kingdom of God into a business, merchandising His anointing. This should not be.

We are commanded to love God, and are called to be the Bride of Christ--that' s pretty intimate stuff. We are supposed to be His lovers. How can we love someone we don't even know? And even if we do know someone, is that a guarantee that we truly love them? Are we lovers or prostitutes?

I was pondering Martha's question again one day, and considered the question, "What's the difference between a lover and a prostitute?" I realized that both do many of the same things, but a lover does what she does because she loves. A prostitute pretends to love, but only as long as you pay.

Then I asked the question, "What would happen if God stopped paying me?"

For the next several months, I allowed God to search me to uncover my motives for loving and serving Him. Was I really a true lover of God? What would happen if He stopped blessing me? What if He never did another thing for me? Would I still love Him?

Please understand, I believe in the promises and blessings of God. The issue here is not whether God blesses His children; the issue is the condition of my heart. Why do I serve Him? Are His blessings in my life the gifts of a loving Father, or are they a wage that I have earned or a bribe/payment to love Him? Do I love God without any conditions?

It took several months to work through these questions. Even now I wonder if my desire to love God is always matched by my attitude and behavior. I still catch myself being disappointed with God and angry that He has not met some perceived need in my life. I suspect this is something which is never fully resolved, but I want more than anything else to be a true lover of God.

So what is it going to be? Which are we? Lover or prostitute? There are no prostitutes in heaven, or in the Kingdom of God for that matter, but there are plenty of former prostitutes in both places.

Take it from a recovering prostitute when I say there is no substitute or unconditional, intimate relationship with God. And I mean there is no palatable substitute available to us (take another look at Matthew 7:21-23 sometime). We must choose...

-Dr. David Ryser
Water's Edge Ministries

Clerical Malpractice

2009-08-04T00:52:00.002-04:00

Malpractice defined is the “misconduct in a professional capacity”…

Such misconduct can cost the doctor or lawyer or other professional his privilege to practice…..

Such is the privilege of credentialed ministry…

Paul gave us the code of qualifications in I Timothy and II Thessalonians….

Both accounts begin with the same word…

The bishop must be blameless….

Every other qualification listed is and must be built upon the overseer being blameless…

Unquestionable integrity is a mandate for the man who shepherds the sheep….

Brethren I humbly suggest that no matter the number of other good qualifications a minister may possess….

If he does not live morally with unquestionable integrity then he forsakes all qualifications because he forsook the first ….

He must be blameless….

To have on his resume the fact that he once had an illicit affair reveals to prospective congregations that he is not blameless….

The ministry represents the highest moral code….

The ministry preaches that morality is a mandate…..

The ministry who does not practice the mandates of blameless morality is guilty of malpractice….

Clerical malpractice….

If his district board found him to have conducted himself in such a way to remove his credentials….

How logically or spiritually can the same board forgive his clerical malpractice in the light that many still suffer from his ill decisions?

Gentlemen…

Our district boards have done their best to show compassion over the years…

Malpractice in the pulpit forfeits the privilidge for a second chance….

Our compassion for the man must not cloud our views of what moral purity means…..

Our love for our friend cannot be allowed to overlook the first qualification of a bishop….

A man stands blameless and is qualified for the credentials…

Or he is not blameless and has no one to point the finger to but himself…..

My writings on this subject could be labeled as uncompassionate and uncaring….

However might I humbly suggest that the uncompassionate and uncaring was the minister who set himself in the position of…

Clerical malpractice…..

Decisions have consequences…..

Should we decide to change these consequences….

That decision too will have its own set of consequences….

The Invented Doctrine of Ministerial Restoration

2009-08-03T23:06:00.000-04:00

I cannot find it in the Old Testament…

I cannot find it in the New Testament…..

I cannot find it among our elders….

I cannot find it among our traditions….

Who found it for us?

Rather….

Who invented it?

And why?

The Scarlet Apostolics?

2009-08-03T01:13:00.000-04:00

Nathaniel Hawethorne’s classic might just be relived in the United Pentecostal Church….

Dimmesdale the eloquent minister secretly fathers a young Helen’s child and after the woman is released from prison she is required to wear a scarlet A for adultery on her blouse. Meanwhile Dimmesdale wastes away and we soon learn though Helen protects his identity he is so grieved that he burns an A into his own chest. Such is the guilt and condemnation he carries.

Do we presume to place a scarlet A on the bosom of our adulterous ministers yet allow them to continue to stand in our pulpits?

Do we presume to hold that sin ever before the man?

Do we presume to take his wife through that over and over?

Do we presume to take our churches through this?

Will we be so presumptuous to vote for ministerial restoration and then pat ourselves on the back for being such an open and understanding movement?

Will we become Scarlet Apostolics with known adulterers standing in our pulpits every Sunday?

Might I simply pose one more question?

There was a day we sought moral high ground for our ministry….

Do we now presume to accept those who chose the low path of immorality and unfaithfulness?

Will we presume to walk the path of modern denominationalism and tolerate the immoral choices of our “finest”?

I pray this resolution fails and that the United Pentecostal Church never burn a scarred A into her bosom…..

Ultimate Arrogance

2009-08-03T01:10:00.001-04:00

Brethren….

We are arrogant to suppose that we mere men can put the blessings of God on things HE has cursed….

God accepts no moral sin….

Especially from HIS ministry….

For the constituency of the United Pentecostal Church to restore adulterers who chose, counted the cost, took the chance, walked the calculated risk all to drink “stolen waters” …..

Is to by vote reveal the arrogance of men to “turn the grace of God into lasciviousness”….

Ultimate arrogance…..

Many will again say that these comments are hard and intolerant….

Some are saying that Galatians 6:1 tells us to “restore” the person “overtaken in a fault” and therefore we have a mandate bring back to the pulpits of the United Pentecostal Church men who calculated and lusted their way into illicit relationships….

Many of us stand up and say NO!!!

Ministerial adultery is not a “fault”….

Rather ministerial adultery was a process and series of decisions that left a path of devastation….

These men disqualified themselves when they partook of the sweetness of “stolen waters”….

Paul went on to say in the same chapter….

“Be not deceived; God is not mocked; whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap”….

Gentlemen….

The adulterer will reap the rewards of his betrayal and calculated decisions…..

And so will we if we arrogantly try to place the approval of God on an ugly sin that disqualifies men from ministry…

Whatever happened to the ministry being a higher calling?

Whatever happened to our wanting our best and most pure in our pulpits?

Is the answer to these questions a true spirit of compassion or the bleeding and broken heart of men who tire from the battle?

We show ultimate arrogance when we say that a man does not have to be blameless and the husband of one wife and of good report….

Tis arrogance that says adultery is not to be blamed….

Tis arrogance that says adultery will not hurt the good report…..

We display the ultimate in arrogance when we resolve to endorse the “ministry” of unfaithful adulterers who chose an illicit affair over the affairs of God….

Has the plight and failure of near kinsmen numbed us to the place we are willing to accept the adulterer in our pulpits as long as he sits in time-out for three years….

In many cases the man will still be on the payroll during that time….

Ministerial restitution shows the arrogance of weak men who have tired of the spiritual battle….

Have certain of us grown weary of holding fast and high the Word of God?

Do we have Eli’s among us?

Eli’s who are willing to tolerate son’s who “lay with the women who assembled at the door of the tabernacle”…..

Gentlemen we cannot play God…..

There was no restoration of the priesthood in the Old Testament…..

There is no ministerial restitution in the New Testament…

Have we grown so sophisticated that we now know more than the elders who went before us…..

Do we dare suggest that we know better than God….

I humbly offer that some among us have grown nonchalant about the purity of our pulpits….

And arrogant enough to presume we have the ability to restore a spiritual office….

That even God will not restore……

Churches Appalled To Consider Ministerial Restoration

2009-08-03T01:04:00.000-04:00

I heard report this evening of two pastors broached the subject of ministerial restoration to their churches this weekend and found the same results....

The churches were appalled....

The wives were appalled.....

Unanimously the churches agreed that a minister with a moral failure on his resume would not be considered for pastor....

So I pose a question....

If the saints and sisters are appalled that we consider this subject....

What is wrong with the actual ministry that we are not appalled to consider it?

Why are we not embarrassed that the sheep have more discernment and wisdom in the matter than do their shepherds?

My Flip-Flop on the Restoration Issue

2009-07-31T18:37:00.000-04:00

WRITTEN BY JOHN CARROLL

Restoration. What a beautiful word. Who doesn't want to believe in mercy and grace, forgiveness and healing?

As preachers of the Gospel, that is what we are about, after all. The ministry of reconciliation.

We preach every week that God can give you a clean slate, a fresh start.

But when a man of God fails, what then? Can he not receive the same mercy he preaches to others about?

I grew up in a very conservative spiritual environment. I cut my teeth on hellfire and brimstone sermons. I wasn't sure what blasphemy was, but I knew that if I ever did it, I was going to be beyond the mercy of God.

I knew that there was an unseen line that crosses every path, marking the boundary between God's mercy and His wrath. When as a young person, I slipped and stumbled, I was often afraid that I had crossed that line.

Eventually I finally got myself pulled together, and after a time, accepted my call to preach.

Lots of water ran under the bridge, and I saw a very strict and stern man whom I loved fail colossally. Not in moral sin, but ethically and in matters of integrity.

I was crushed and nearly destroyed.

And then God led me to one of the kindest, sweetest men I had ever met. He took me under his wing and treated me like a son. He was no wild-eyed, flaming liberal, but certainly more moderate than the pastoral leadership to which I had been accustomed. I felt as if I had had an epiphany. I was exposed to a leadership style that was completely different. He encouraged me. He asked my opinion about things and acted as if he was interested. He treated me with respect, and not like a distant, lowly minion.

I loved him.

And then he committed adultery.

My world was rocked. I suddenly decided that I now believed in restoration. After all, this man had too much to give. His sin was a one time thing, not an extended affair.

He was entrapped, I rationalized. He was caught in a moment of weakness.

And then there was the exemplary, honorable way he took the consequences of his sin.

He humbled himself. He manifested profound remorse and deep repentance. He wept. He never made a single excuse for his behavior.

I became a passionate advocate of ministerial restoration.

After a year of sitting, he was asked by the pastor of the church he attended to return to the pulpit. His answer was impressive. He said that he would only return to the pulpit if his wife, whom he had wronged so utterly, would feel comfortable with him preaching again.

Out of her own mouth, she told me that she gave him her complete approval. She said she had never known it was possible to repent like he repented. She told me of the countless hours she heard him travailing in prayer, pleading with God to not let anyone stumble over his sin.

My confidence in my new "revelation" of the efficacy of restoration was further solidified. I felt so thankful to have been delivered from my former judgmental views.

And then...

His son, who took the church after his fall, began taking the church charismatic.

I went in distress to my dear pastor, who seemed so solid on this great Message, and tried to reason with him. I found that his mind and spirit were not the same as they had been.

He was so enthralled with the idea of mercy and grace, his idea of it, that he was unable to take a stand against the direction of his son. After all, had he not fallen so far and been restored? Perhaps the narrow, judgmental doctrines we had taught were keeping people from receiving the wonderful grace and mercy of God.

He had been deceived by mercy.

When I took a stand against the new "revelation" his son, and now he had received, he turned on me. Our relationship, which had survived his adultery, did not survive his newfound enlightenment.

In praying and seeking God for some kind of peace and understanding in the midst of this devastating storm in my world, I came to a grievous conclusion.

When a man of God willfully tears down all the barriers of conscience that stand between him and an adulterous affair, he does damage to that very delicate instrument.

His conscience is so mangled that, while he can be restored to salvation again, he is probably not going to be reliable in matters requiring strong judgment and keen discernment.

He will tend to go to one extreme or the other, depending on his temperament and makeup.

He will either become an unrelenting, harsh Pharisee, or a permissive liberal, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness.

In any case, his conscience and judgment and character are impaired in such a way that I would never want to trust him again in a place of "the buck stops here" leadership.

Could he still minister in certain capacities? Of course.

Are there exceptions to the scenario I have described?

I'm sure there are.

But I believe them to be rare enough that it is folly for us as an organization to officially sanction the re-licensing of ministers who have committed adultery.

Solomon knew what he was talking about when he penned these words of ancient wisdom:

Pro 6:32 But whoso committeth adultery with a woman lacketh understanding: he that doeth it destroyeth his own soul.
Pro 6:33 A wound and dishonour shall he get; and his reproach shall not be wiped away.

Adultery wounds not only the wronged spouse, families, and friends, but it is a self-inflicted wound against one's own conscience, a wound that a leader cannot afford.

WRITTEN BY JOHN CARROLL

Ultimate Betrayal

2009-07-31T11:20:00.001-04:00

Gentlemen…

Ministerial adultery is the ultimate betrayal……

The man of God betrayed….

His wife…

His kids…..

Himself….

His church…..

His brethren……

His God…

The adulterous minister betrays on so many levels….

Some will comment on this writing that RKS is so hard….

God has high expectations of His man…..

I do not find any accounting of ministerial restitution in the New Testament….

Oh I see in Galatians 6:1 that the weaker brother overtaken in a fault should be restored….

However ministerial adultery is a calculated disdainful decision that the man knew the consequence of before he partook…..

Ministerial adultery is not a fault or failure or weakness…..

Ministerial adultery is a calculated betrayal….

Ultimate betrayal….

And how does God look at betrayal?

Judas forsook the trust placed in him by the Lord and his brethren…

He used the intimacy of a kiss to betray the Lord….

When betrayal is on an intimate level the consequences are tragic…..

After the betrayal reality began to sink in….

Judas tried to undo the deed but one cannot return “the rewards of iniquity”…

Realizing his situation he invested his silver into a field that became known as “The field of blood”…

Betrayal of our Lord is a bloody business….

His brethren commented “ He was numbered with us, and hath obtained a part of this ministry”…

Each of us have commented that is just does not seem right that a certain minister is no longer numbered with us….

Ponder this, “His habitation became desolate”….

Sirs, the adulterous minister chooses a very lonely place to live…..

“Let no man dwell therein”….

Indeed the empty place left by the betraying minister is never filled….

Then the ultimate price must is required of the betrayer….

“And his bishoprick, let another take”….

Gentleman there is no place in the pulpits of the Apostolic Church for the betrayals of the adulterous minister….

We are arrogant to think as mere men we can offer a justification and restitution to those that counted the cost and made the decision to imbibe in the sweetness of stolen waters…..

The adulterer knew this before he drank…..

He can be saved, for the blood of Jesus Christ is available for every sinner….

If we the United Pentecostal Church welcome to our pulpits those that have betrayed at this level we are but one step closer to our own apostasy…..

Random Thought on Ministerial Restitution

2009-07-31T10:27:00.000-04:00

Gentleman....

No minister falls into sin....

We choose to jump into moral sin.....

The minister knows the consequence.....

He calculates the risk.....

He measures and rides the wave of testosterone.....

He looks....

He reaches.....

He touches........

He drinks from stolen waters and they are sweet until digested.....

Then he wants to give the water back or ask for mercy......

The minister made the calculated risk counting the cost treating the sacredness of his calling like the return line of Wal Mart......

Remember....

David partook.....

David repented......

David found mercy......

God forgave him and allowed him to continue to be king....

However.....

God told him to keep his hands off the temple.....

"Your hands are too bloody" the Lord said.....

And gentleman....

When the minister drinks stolen waters he leaves a path of bloody devastation of his own making.....

Jehovah did not want bloody hands on his temple.....

I humbly suggest that Jesus does not need bloody hands on his church......

Restoration is on the Docket for General Conferene and I am Mad!

2009-07-29T17:03:00.001-04:00

I am outraged that the Resolution committee has allowed this on the floor for this year at General Conference. It is not like we are already reeling and recovering from our Resolution 4 Debacle. And it was and is. This should be a year of healing and "restoration" of our movement... not restoring Adulterers.

Who ever you are, I believe good sense has left the senses to allow something that will be even more divisive and destructive than Resolution 4.

Resolution 1 has a long detailed list with the Caveat inserted, OR at the discretion of the District Board.

Resolution 5 tightens up the "Guilty Party in Divorce".... so both of these together means... if you get divorced and your the guilty party, you can be restored...or that is how I read it.

I appreciate that it does appear to be pretty thorough in a "IF YOUR GOING TO DO RESTORATION"... however I do not think restoration should be a part of an Organizational Construct.

Do I think a man can have a Ministry? I don't deny some men do have a ministry and I rejoice with them. They are doing it all over. However, You don't need a Lic. with an Org to have a ministry. For an ORG. to give a way out for a man who has betrayed the closest human relationship in the world, demonstrated a lack of love for his kids, an abandonment of his ministerial ethics, not to mention his responsibility to the party he is having sexual relations with.

David was restored is the line of reasoning you hear. Well let me ask you, what good happened in Davids life after his failure?
Every bad thing that happened in his life, happened after his failure.

The son that came from this union, Solomon, was the doorway that lead to the eventual destruction of Isreal. Remember all those wives and temples to false God's he built for them? Solomon was a very smart fool.

I am for restoring a man in right relationship with his God. However the Bible says that a Bishop must be blameless. Are we going to ignore that little fact?

If a man falls... and feels the ministry is still for him, there are plenty of Apostolic ORGs that will take you in. We do not have to change the ORG to accommodate the carnal dalliances of a few.

I know there have been back room deals for years with the sons of prominent men. Shame on these district boards and Daddy's that accommodated the failure of carnal sons.

It was done in the past is what is stated. Why did we change our approach to restoration? Anybody want to ask that question? Maybe someone realized what a very bad idea it was.

It is still a bad idea.

Let he that is without sin cast the first stone. I am not casting stones at the sinners. I am questioning the wisdom of those who would give credentials to those who have fallen.

If they are given lic. Every Church that this man apply to become pastor at needs to be told, "This man was found to be in adultery. Keep your wife, daughters and grand daughters away from him."

I know this sounds really harsh and mean. I am against being harsh and mean. However I am more against being soft on the requirements for those who are responsible for our Apostolic Churches, Families and Children. It is not like we are having enough problem with marriage and divorce in our churches... how much worse will it be when the Pastor does not even have the moral authority to deal with it from a Biblical stand point?

This is a bad idea. If your against it, go to conference. If your for it. Conference has been moved to Las Vegas.

If anyone has any questions to how I really feel about this, please send me a note for clarification.

In Christian Love and Charity,

Scott Phillips
www.inbythroughhim.blogspot.com