Here is a wild thought that I stumbled on recently. It’s nothing original to me, but rather a collection of reading and thinking. So here is the thought:
Solomon asked for wisdom more that provision. But God provided him with so much more; family, riches, influences…
Maybe I ought to be more concerned with the pursuit or prayer for wisdom and discernment than with money, food, or goals/pursuits and more.
What do you think?
Thanxgiving is my favorite holiday! I like to spell it Thanx because it puts the Christ back in Thanksgiving! Christ’s name begins with an X in Greek. Therefore, I give Thanx for the many blessings He has provided me. Here are a few reasons that I love Thanxgiving:
One thing I don’t fully enjoy is the whole Black Friday mess… especially now that they are bleeding over into my Hallowed Thursday. Michelle and Kaitlyn are braving the crowds and the chaos while Eli and I sleep off the comma!
I pray you enjoy this blessed holiday with the “F’s” and hopefully not the Black!
This is not blog borrow moment, but more of an editorial twist on yesterdays post from Alan about the church…
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Do you think the church has become too much a show these days? Me too. I find it amazing that we seek to engage the people flooding church campus’s every week with a similar musical and video entertainment the culture offers at rock concerts and via the television. What is the desire to compete with an entertaining culture? I don’t see that in the scriptures– and does it show our lack of faith to say, “How else will we get them?”
Some might say, “Well it’s the greatest news in the word, share it like such.” True. And yet what I seem to find more is the greatest news shared in a minimal way because more time is devoted to the art of entertaining or “polishing”. We grease the wheels of seekerism, oil the machine of entertainment. And while we polish the brass and brighten the lights, we loose the message.
Why is it that telling the story is not enough. Tell is well. Tell is with passion. Tell it engaging and authentic. But tell it simply and significant. People can find the show, the concert, or the special effects elsewhere. Let’s be peculiar in the way we live and share. Besides the summer blockbuster full of CGI always falls to a well told story with a bit less budget. Let the Sunday blockbuster fade in comparison to the well told narrative of Christ in us, the hope of glory!
When the rush of a day is over, I like to sit and just exhale awhile. It’s good for the soul. In fact, it is challenging to the soul because the it forces me to think and evaluate my life. I wonder if the church is so programmed with sound, noise, and movement that people don’t have that space anymore. The golden days of the faith a decade or so back saw the open cathedral with people littered throughout the pews quietly dealing with the Lord in prayer.
And that’s not even to mention the acts of justice that should be defining us instead; give Isaiah 1 and 58 a read. And if you get a chance, find Jon Foreman’s song, instead of a show online somewhere and give it a listen.
These are just my thoughts as of late… What are yours?
Below is a post from Alan Fadling that you should read… I couldn’t agree more.
A very simple question that we might consider asking ourselves as paid or volunteer church leaders is, “What is the church?” Sometimes it feels more like a machine than a community of people sharing Christ together. Along these lines, I always appreciate Eugene Peterson’s seasoned insights, like this one:
“Another common way to avoid community is to turn the church into an institution. In this way people are not treated on the basis of personal relationships but in terms of impersonal functions. Goals are set that will catch the imagination of the largest numbers of people; structures are developed that will accomplish the goal through planning and organization. Organizational planning and institutional goals become the criteria by which the community is defined and evaluated. In the process the church becomes less and less a community, that is, people who pay attention to each other, ‘brothers and sisters,’ and more and more a collectivism of ‘contributing units.’” (Eugene H. Peterson. A Long Obedience in the Same Direction. Downer’s Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1980, 2000, p. 179-80.)
In The Leadership Institute, we call this the difference between a “program-centered” church and a “people-centered” church.
Program-centered ministry can become more of an “it” than an “us”… {the rest} …
