I often sit with my very dear neighbor, who could be my mother, in that she is 18 years older than I am. I have learned much about this city from her. Much of the history of this island. She corrects my Italian as I periodically mix in some other language or dialect and we enjoy a daily “miranda” which is the afternoon snack around 4:30 PM. I check in with her every day before I leave the house, and every night before I go to bed.
She loves the Lord. She has great faith and at times, I feel she is giving me a preview of my future. She inadvertently turns off her cell data while swiping her phone and is frustrated she cannot send messages so I turn it back on for her. She is stressed that she cannot do what she once did. Her air-conditioner controls are confusing and one is in English, so she spent weeks sweltering as her controls were set to cool the room to the upper 80s and hence did little to assist those of us on the top floor of a stone building when triple digit temps were the norm outside. As we age, we need more time to recover, the importance of staying comfortably cool is greater, and the inability to control that for oneself is even more frustrating.
She reminisces about her family and her life reflectively, at times with sorrow, as her life has not been easy. People are unable to see past the wealth her husband acquired years ago, now long on spent medical tragedies that have devastated their family. She is fully dependent on her stipend to meet her needs but people speak as though she had not a care in the world. She is frustrated by the limitations of age and like us all, is surprised as each year imposes some new limit for which we were unprepared. When she does not sleep she is easily confused and yet mentally she is sharp. Her body is changing as happens to us all, but she senses the sudden change it alarms her. She is a brilliant and gifted woman who wishes to acquire nothing because she realizes life does not go on forever.
She is a vital part of my life, and one of the reasons Jesus has us here. That is a good thing. If you are near a person advanced in years, see yourself as the hands of Jesus to your neighbor.
So to you young pastors out there, take the time needed to sit and listen. The most vital thing you can do at any moment is listen. The media presentation is not as urgent as the profound loss of being needed as we age.
To those of us who are older, we have a purpose, but we must accept the fact our limitations grow with each passing year. That makes us normal, not useless. It is incredibly frustrating, but it is the one result of the fall none of us can escape. We will eventually die and a generation following us will carry on, most of them full speed ahead, until we are suddenly no more, and they realize this too shall happen to them.
No ages are given for those in the Bible for whom the Lord took the time to stop and listen and heal. But I am sure if an old man or woman cried out, they would merit no less of His time or attention than someone younger.
Category: adulting
Don’t Let Social Media Eat Your Fruit
One of the nice things about being older is you can say the truth and don’t really care if it upsets anyone. So I am going to say a vital truth because you really got to get this one folks. Really. It’s really important.
In ancient times, meaning before digital cameras and phones, people in our line of work frantically took photos to create a “slide show” just before they went home on furlough. This was a step of faith as the photos were not automatically in focus. But people were remarkably forgiving. The reality is, normal people do not spend their entire day creating events of which to take photos unless they are “influencers” which I believe is job that might be summarized as “I can tell a good story and do no work, but I make great pics that get likes”.
I have read posts that are very moving, and only in the last couple of years have learned how deceiving posts can be. There is a pressure to post to sound impactful. The truth is stretched, details that are untrue are added and honestly, I have read some and thought, “Wow, quite the tale, about half of it is true”. Posting pressure is so great, posts can be very misleading. People run into something, take photos, write a story based on their incorrect understanding and get a lot of likes. They are not trying to deceive, but they posted something, much of which was untrue, to meet a need to seem to be making an impact. For whose sake are we posting? For prayer? For support? For the glory of Jesus? Those are important questions to consider every time we hit the button.
Not every day is amazing, nor remotely fit for social media. The hours you spend sweeping up after the youth group do not make for great IG moments. The kid who calls you at 2AM is when you are dazed and half asleep and his girlfriend broke up with him, is your real job. You just can’t post that but it mattered a lot more than the paint ball party that made it to your feed.
Do what matters, not what the world wants to see. Jesus so often pulled people OUT OF SIGHT to heal them. He told them, “DON’T TELL ANYONE” after doing the miraculous. I guess He did not understand marketing. Maybe we are wisest to follow His example.
My concern for the current generation is that the pressure to look good outweighs the need to do well. Do things that matter, without a preoccupation that to sound like you are daily changing the world. None of us is changing the world. Jesus is. Your best moments are servant-like. They are not glamorous. Take out the trash even though you can’t do a post about molded plastic bags. Do it out anyway. Serve. We are called to imitate the Humble One, not to make amazing impressions. Those in the most difficult situations in the world, cannot share a thing about their lives, but the Almighty sees. Keep in mind, the importance audience is the Audience of One.
The character of Christ is summed up in the fruit of the Spirit. None of those traits can be captured on social media. Don’t let the pressures of the day, eat your fruit. Concentrate on fruit that “shall remain” and He, who sees that which cannot be posted, nor shared in public, will reward you with a crown that gets the only “Like” that matters.
Ministry is a Real Job
Thirty-six years ago, I was attending what was then called, “District Council”, the annual meeting of ministers in our region of the country. I remember the message well, because the speaker had the good sense to speak the truth in humor, which in our neck of the woods is the same thing as love. Laying a foundation of scripture, he pointed out that many a ministry struggles because the ground where the worker labors is hard ground. Many other ministries, however, struggle because the stewards of the ministry simply don’t show up and put in the work necessary to see fruit. He told the story of a pastor who complained of the challenges where he worked, and with whom he spent a week to observe how things functioned in the church on a daily basis. What struck him most was that the pastor arrived at 9:30 in the morning, had his devotions, and by the time 11 AM rolled around felt it was too close to lunch time to begin anything new, so he would go home for two to three hours for family time. He would then return in the afternoon around 2 PM and finish up around 4 PM when the church secretary left the office. For clearly predictable reasons, he was often stressed out on Saturdays trying to prepare his message for Sunday morning and again for the evening service. He was working about ten to fifteen hours a week, plus speaking on Wednesday night and twice on Sunday.
I recall a church planter who said the best thing that ever happened to him was getting off a church staff and having to plant. To launch the church he needed a part time secular job and he had his first glimpse into the lives of his congregation. The people who attend your church are out the door at 7 AM to get to work by 8 AM and rare is the soul who works only 8 hours in a day. In our years leading up to full time ministry we worked about 50 hours a week at our regular jobs, drove straight to church, and were there for volunteer staff meetings, youth events, and the twice Sunday service. That meant we spent another 12 to 15 hours a week at church after our secular jobs, and the commute to church was about thirty minutes each way.
The pastor under whom we worked, had four kids and a house close to the church, and recognizing that his volunteer staff was fairly hungry by 8:30 PM would often have us all over and his wife would cook something up, so we were happy as we headed back home to rise at 5:30 the next morning. (I was normally at work by 7AM and left about 6PM). The staff were all full time professionals but one mom, who was a full time mom, which as we all know, is a 24/7 occupation.
As I look at the young people making an impact, they understand the importance of “showing up”. If they are tired, or the baby cried all night or whatever else it might be, they take their ministerial work for what it is: a matter of life and death for the lost. They understand that if the people supporting the work of the ministry, do not have checks magically appear on their desks but must spend time in prayer and intercession before they attend their day job, and often are showing up at service after a long and stressful day at work. That is entirely healthy. It is a sign of good stewardship.
In these days of storytelling, influencing, and social media, there are invariably people who appear to be doing a great deal when in fact, they are just really super with media. I have read posts and chuckled, because I either knew the real story, or recognized that a moving and emotional post that would cause people to believe they were following a planet shaker, was in fact, created by someone who spent about an hour on the job and an equal amount of time “content creating” to keep themselves employed. The kingdom of God is not so built.
We rely on the strength and the power of the Holy Spirit. We have a message so compelling that if we truly believe it, we will be unable to keep it to ourselves. To share the gospel effectively, no matter what form of ministry in which one is involved, also requires an honest work ethic. If you do not put as much time and effort into ministry as you would if you had a secular job, you need to remember to Whom you ultimately will give an account. “It is required of a steward, that a man be found faithful” (I Cor. 4:2). Be faithful. Work at ministry with the at the very least, the level of commitment you would be required to give to a secular employer. Daily faithfulness, will bring rewards.
The Terrible Twenties
“IT WAS the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way- in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.” (Charles Dickens, the opening line of his classic: Tale of Two Cities)
If I did not know the two cities of which Dickens wrote were London and Paris, and if I did not know he was speaking of that period of time surrounding the French Revolution, I might well have thought he was describing what it is like to be in your 20’s. He was right in say, “The period was so far like the present period” because since the time when Dickens wrote to the present day, the struggles of life are very much the same. Dickens words describe the era of those who are twenty-something as well as any.
The twenties boil down to the issue of choice. What you choose in your twenties will be the foundation for the rest of your life. You live with the consequences of those choices. You choose Light or darkness, hope or despair, belief or unbelief.
The choices are clearly defined. Choose wisely.
When No One Shows Up
A youth pastor asked me this question recently so I want to encourage those of you who have poured a lot of time into an event and had only one or two people show up, that what looks like a flop to you, might look very different from an eternal perspective.
Several years ago my best friend and her husband decided to run an Alpha course in their neighborhood. They asked neighbors, cooked, prepared, and several neighbors promised to come. On the first night exactly one woman showed up. With four of us present, only one of whom was a guest, my friends asked me, “What do we do now?” I suggested we carry on like it was the most normal thing in the world to have just four of us.
After four weeks of meeting, the woman told us she could no longer continue to come but wanted to know if she could purchase the DVDs. We were willing to give them to her in the hopes at least one person would be reached. She said she’d rather buy them because, “I’m Sikh and I share this with the community but there are too man of them to invite to your house”. Somewhat stunned we asked her to clarify and she thought she would show them to her community center since it would have been presumptuos to bring several dozen people to the house. Our “one” person “flop” was not what we thought.
In reality, welll over 100 people were being exposed on a weekly basis to the content of Alpha because our faithful friends treated one person just as it she’d been a dozen. All the time they were unaware their faithfulness to one was multiplied a hunred fold or more. How totally human to see with our eyes and how totally like God to see a whole lot of people we could not.
Will there be nights when you are alone? Perhaps. If so, you have demonstrated to the heavenlies that you will be faithful to your God even if no one one else shows up. Will there be nights when one or two show? Yes. Treat them like they are the most important people in the world. Don’t be ashamed of having a “flop”. Perhaps what looked like a “flop” to you was the Lord proving to the unseen accusers that you will not give up, you will stay faithful, and you will trust God for results.
When no one shows up carry on like they had and remember the audience of One is the only audience that matters. God is not big on wasting stuff, so don’t you worry. He’s got something in the works. I am not a fan of Woody Allen but in this regard he was right. He said the harest part of life was showing up. Sometimes in ministry the hardest part is showing up and trusting that God has shown up as well. All is well.
Processing That Summer Ministry Experience
This post is dedicated to those of you who think you already have, or still are processing your summer ministry experience. You will generally fall into one of these two categories:
- “Everything was amazing. It changed my life forever”. This reaction is normally spoken by those who got on airplanes and went to new and exotic places. Some worked very hard building things for two weeks, sweating profusely and being exposed in real life to sights, sounds, faces and souls that are a lot more heart-tugging up front and in person than they are on a video. For those who took those trips I applaud you for going and remind you to please remember the following: you took a two week trip. You did not commit a lifetime to the foreign field, don’t really know what it is like, and all Americans are not spoiled hypocrites. You are in the initial stages of processing an experience unlike any you had before so give it time to gain perspective. Be nice to your classmates and fellow church members when you get home. For those who spent an “entire summer” in (name that country) you are not experts on any place you lived in for just a couple of months. You were probably caught tourist sights, had some ministry experiences, and got just enough exposure to fall in love with someplace.
- “It was a total waste of time and all I know is I never want to do that with my life. I might even crawl through glass before I spend another week in a cabin with 7th graders”. This reactions is typical of people who spent the summer doing things within the realm of their skill set, faithfully serving in settings with fairly predictable outcomes. Nothing was spectacular except the level of aggravation pre-teens can arouse in an adult and the work got to be rather repetitious “I never want to do that” can be said of many jobs. I once spent a summer making shoe tongues (really, 40 hours a week, stamping out leather shoe tongues) and I can honestly say the high point was sharing the gospel with people at lunch. The job itself was mind-numbing. Years later I learned that five people converted as a result lunch time conversations but at the time I thought God had me in the factory so I would have greater insight if I needed to write an essay on the hardships of working conditions around the time of the Industrial Revolution.
To those in group “a”, the dust will settle and while the grass always looks greener on the other side of the fence, you were entrusted with a great experience and now need to ask the Lord how to best use it for His glory. Other people are not called to live up to your experience, but you are, so if the Lord gave you that opportunity, He gave it to you to use wisely for His Name’s sake. Whether it is pray for the people with a certain need, support work in such a place, or return there yourself, treasure the experience. It will not be wasted.
To those in group b, you have had the tough and real experience of faithfully doing things that need to be done and are not personally thrilling. Good. It’s part of growing up and growing up means learning there is a lot of value in things you do not enjoy. As you get some distance you will see more of the bright spots, remember the kid at camp who dogged you and will one day pray he or she can find you again and thank you for what you have done to help them. For those camp counselors and youth pastors you met who looked tired and burned out, the summer is a lot of work for camp leaders and youth pastors and they were tired. Cut them some slack and buy them a smoothie. They are not less genuine or less passionate. They might just be tired. But they are faithfully serving an age group that is notoriously time consuming, self-centered and thankless. It is an interesting reality that if a group of 50 people banded together to save a life it would make national news. Yet that scene is repeated over and over again in camps and VBS and summer programs across this nation, when college students, and youth workers spend themselves and the eternal lives of dozens are saved and as it was not observably dramatic the miracle of what occurred goes unnoticed. The fact remains that 80% of those who come to Christ do so before the age of 18, so before anyone bashes a youth pastor, show some respect. Those of you doing those jobs no one wants to do, are actually the “top harvesters” in the kingdom.
Fall is coming. Perhaps you graduated and are now beginning to really transition. Perhaps you are returning to school. If you graduated and don’t know what to do next, take a peek at my last blog. If you are going back to school, embrace what you learned this summer and keep growing and you will find that you eventually have a healthy perspective. The great part about having a fantastic experience is you realize this is not about you but something so much bigger.
The great part about having an uninspiring experience is you will understand it was not a waste because the experience wasn’t about you. You did those skits, sang those songs, and got covered in mud for some kid for whom that was the greatest week of his or her life. Life is not about you and your ride on an elephant or the camp staff who showed the same maturity as the campers. It’s bigger than that and you all did the part you were given for these short weeks. Now be thankful: You all had a great summer.
Things You Did Not Learn in Bible College 