Third Servant Church

The Church is full of third person servants. When you read the parable of the talents in Matthew 25, you typically realize that everything we have been given is a gift. We should use those things to further the kingdom. We commonly think about our gifts, talents, abilities, and our money. We wonder what we could do to better use those gifts to further the kingdom of Christ. We commonly remember that we are called to be effective ministers of the gospel with the things we have been given, but there are other things we have been given than resources alone. Our God has given us hope, grace, mercy, and an outstanding love.

We have been given these phenomenal gifts, and our common response to the parable is to think of our abilities, our talents, our money that, yes, IS God's. We tend to overlook other gifts like hope, mercy, grace, salvation, love. We have been entrusted with those as well, and the question is the same. What do we do with those gifts?

When I look at those gifts, I see an American church nearly full of third servants. We have hoarded those things in ourselves. Every Sunday we come and bury those things in the field of our common services. We talk about those things with people who already believe what we believe. We have not taken many risks to invest those gifts for a larger return.

It IS a risk to invest, but the first 2 servants take those risks and find blessing and return on those investments. They also come to see that there are so many opportunities to expand the kingdom with the gifts we have of hope, mercy, grace, love, salvation.

The only way to reveal the kingdom and become one of the first two servants is to take those things OUT of the burial ground of our walls and invest them in areas outside of our comfort. There are risks of fear, awkwardness, etc. But the return on those risks are incredible.

You Are Writing My Blog Next Week

Words contain power concepts explode with it.

One conceptual word can contain vast definitions.

Next week, each day You will only find a word on my post.

Comment with your definition of that word Comment with your antithesis of that word Comment with a quote you've held on to about that word

YOU write my blog next week.

Its Why I Come In Here

I haven't been to this coffee shop in maybe months. It started as a need to return to another coffee shop for a while, and then we had our first child a few weeks ago; keeping me from ANY of the coffee shops I frequent. A matter of moments after sitting down with my glass of Pranqster Belgian Ale (another reason I returned to this coffee shop), the chef came out from the back to say hello and to give me a hug.

THAT is why I come in here.

What friendships are you building around you?

Are The Youngsters Killing the Church?

"Hypocrisy is really curious. A lot of younger evangelicals are massively into debt, lots of toys, living at a lifestyle beyond their means, and then saying, 'I don't trust the church with my money.'"

When interviewed in Neue Magazine, this was Pastor Mark Driscoll's response to the question:

"Do you think it's that younger generations are less generous, or is it that they don't trust the Church  as much with their money?"

Now off the bat, it is important to clarify I am NOT a Mark Driscoll freak. In fact, in the past I have resisted Driscoll as I would fall pretty well in line theologically with him, but I agree that any theology which makes you a jerk is not a good theology.

But the interview in Neue and specifically this discussion has me very intrigued and in agreement with Pastor Mark. This question and his response was within an overarching discussion about the reality many of the older generations upon which the financial support of the American Church has been built are going to die off, and there is reason for concern to whether the mainline Church is going to survive the lack of generosity, giving, and tithing of the younger generation.

This has really had me thinking A LOT lately, and I wonder WHAT SAY YOU?

Purdue vs Iraq

"I wouldn't pick Purdue if they were playing Iraq." - Lee Corso

Today opens college football, and I love it even though these teams may as well be playing high school teams. My team is Notre Dame, and they open their season against Purdue. Sports commentator, Lee Corso stated the quote above, and I loved it enough to share.

I think if I could replace Purdue with USC, I'd buy a shirt.

Why You Don't Go To Churches that Challenge You

Few phrases make a pastor cringe and fight the urge to cup their hands over their ears in a childish I-can't-hear-you motion. Some of these include:"I'm not being fed here." "Where is MY tithe being used?" "We've never done it that way before." "How far is 'too far'?" "Was that you at the pub Friday night?"

One statement which has not particularly made me cringe but has had me really searching and thinking lately is the idea of "being challenged".

We like to say there are churches we don't go to because we aren't challenged.

We go to churches because we are challenged.

We want to listen to podcasts from speakers who challenge us and avoid books by authors who don't challenge us.

We say that we want to be challenged, but that is not true.

We say we want to go to places and people who can challenge us, but we lie.

Granted, we lie because we have re-defined (falsely) what "challenge" actually means. When we say want to be challenged, we mean we want someone to blow our minds. We want someone to communicate something in a way we have never thought about it before. We want to think of things more loftily than we had before.

We want to read books that really make us think, and in so doing, make us learn a lot.

We want these things, and we call it challenge, but we have misunderstood and forgotten the primary element to challenge.

Action! Movement! Application!

Challenge is a call to engage and change.

We do not want to be challenged. We want to learn more, maybe. We want to know more information, perhaps. We want to answer more questions correctly than someone else, probably.

But very few really want to be challenged, because being challenged means being called to engage and change. Very few of us want to change anything as most of us are too comfortable to engage.

Challenge has to do with whether or not you want to engage something enough to enact change in the way you live, act, or do. Challenge has to do with whether or not what you are reading, hearing, studying, or interacting with engages you to act.

Will my life be different? Will I live differently or am I just waiting for you to blow my mind?

Do I really want to be challenged, or do I really want to know more information than you?

I think of books we commonly call 'challenging' by guys like C.S. Lewis, NT Wright, Bonhoeffer, and I wonder if any of them, as brilliant as they may be, actually engaged me enough to change, act, and live differently.

I think of books by people like Shane Claiborne, SD Gordon, and Francis Chan; books I could read in a day or two but I was engaged to see choices I needed to make to really be more like Jesus.

I think of podcasts I've listened to that I once thought were great challenging sermons, but I cannot remember many that really rocked my life in a way which made me say, "I need to change some things."

The most challenging speakers, writers, and pastors are not necessarily the most profound.

This is because it is not their role to be challenging. It is not up to THEM for YOU to be challenged.

Being challenged is up to YOU! When presented with something, no matter how simple the presentation, its up to YOU to determine whether you will engage and change.

Words to God

I once preached a sermon in a series about the various distorted images we have of God. It was intended to recognize the images we have of God that we create out of our experiences, relationships, and circumstances instead of the true images of God we see in Scripture. Once you recognize them, you can replace them with truth.

This particular night I was revealing the distorted image of the 'disinterested God'. We took a look at those distortions that make us doubt God, in his immense realities, could actually be interested in me personally, intimately, and truthfully.

We looked at the true image of God who knows me far more than I could imagine. This is a God who is Immanuel, God with us. This is the God who knows when I sit and when I rise. The true God is one who knows my deepest thoughts, desires, and imaginations. (Psalm 139)

At this point, a strong quote by Matthew Henry came to the forefront.

"Our thoughts are words to God."

It was a beautiful answer to those of us who may struggle from time to time with a distorted image in our heart of a God who is aloof or disinterested in my tiny individual life. To someone who struggles to pray to an immense God, this quote soothes the soul a bit and frees the heart a lot more to rest in prayer.

On the way home, Tonya shared with me the shadow of the quote. She was challenged to recognize how scary it can be when we really think about the thoughts we commonly have. There are a lot of thoughts we have in the course of a day we certainly would not want God to hear or know.

If our thoughts are words to God, there is a risk to that, of course, but I would say with risks included, it STILL means our God is close. Even if it must include all our thoughts, it still means God is interested in you personally and intimately.