Remember these words brothers. A Bible, a pen, and a note pad make a man powerful for the duties and challenges of our task. Even if the pen and the note pad are replaced by a screen and a keyboard, there is no substitute for …
for more see: What is the Symbol of Your Ministry? A Bible or a Cell Phone?.
I was alerted to this article by Ed Stetzer in his Monday Morning Round Up. It was stunning to read that:
No Birth Certificate Required – National Right to Life
The Director of the White House Visitor’s Office, Ellie Shafer, today distributed an email newsletter (“Tuesday’s Tidbits”) to many recipients, including Members of Congress, which gives detailed instructions on how to register an unborn child (“a baby that has not yet been born,” as Shafer puts it) into the security system that is employed to arrange White House tours.
“We have received a number of calls regarding how to enter security information for a baby that has not yet been born,” Shafer wrote. “Crazy as it may sound, you MUST include the baby in the overall count of guests in the tour. It’s an easy process.”
The newsletter then proceeds to spell out how “the baby’s security information should be entered” into the White House system, including such details as: “GENDER: if the parents know put that gender down if not, you can enter either M or F as we’ll ask you to update it at the time of birth.” All of the information should be updated “once, the baby is born,” the newsletter instructs.
“It is ironic that President Obama’s staff recognizes the existence of unborn babies for purposes of providing security within the White House — yet, there is no indication that President Obama has any problem with the fact that throughout the District of Columbia, abortion is now legal for any reason up to the moment of birth,” said Douglas Johnson, National Right to Life legislative director. “Notably, the newsletter provides no guidance on what the staff should do if an unborn baby is first registered for security purposes, but then aborted. On May 17, the House Judiciary Constitution Subcommittee plans to hold a hearing on the District of Columbia Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act (H.R. 3803), which would generally prohibit abortion in the sixth month and later in the District. If the President wants to provide for the security of the unborn child immediately outside of the White House gates, as well as inside, he should endorse this bill.”
Further information on the District of Columbia Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act is available on the NRLC website at http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/Fetal_Pain/index.html
Thought:
Question:
Preachers:
Have the guts to preach on the issues the government (and even many Christians) wants you to shut up about.
Marty Schoenleber, Jr. is the founding pastor of one church, the interim pastor of another and the church planting trainer/mentor of over 200 other church planting pastors. He is adjunct professor of Church Planting at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and has taught Preaching at the International School of Theology, and Evangelism at Moody Graduate School of Theology. He is also the Director of the Saint John’s Pastoral Center, a pastoral care and retreat center located in a growing number of Bed and Breakfast houses across the mid-west. His latest book is Picking a President: Or Any Other Elected Official (CrossBooks, [late May 2012]). To enjoy a free subscription to his blog, log-on to www.chosenrebel.wordpress.com, where you can post your comments, view past blogs in our archive and read the latest reflections on church planting, Biblical Expositions and musings about church, culture and spiritual formation. Follow Pastor Marty on twitter @1Chosenrebel4JC.The prosperity gospel is a false gospel and an embarrassment to the people of God. Unfortunately too many genuine believers have been sucked into its abysmal theology and the result is that their lives are plummeting toward idolatry. What is perhaps more alarming is that pastors who should no better and who despise the theology of the “prosperity gospel” of men like Creflo Dollar, Joel Osteen, TBN, Jimmy Swaggert and their ilk, fall prey to the subtle appeal of “success” defined by bigger budgets and salaries for pastors.
Pastor, you weren’t called to your post to be rewarded now. You were called to your post to preach the word of God to the people of God so that the people of God, the bride of Christ, would be ready for her wedding day when Christ returns in glory. Preach the word. Preach the Gospel. Pray for your people and equip them to preach and live out the word in their lives. That’s your job. [For the uninformed, Here is a great link to InternetMonk.com defining what the prosperity gospel is and isn't.]
The source for the following is Kairos Journal.
We Need to Hold the Things of This World Lightly—Jonathan Lamb
Jonathan Lamb serves as one of the directors of Langham Partnership International, an organization committed to encouraging expository biblical preaching. His book Integrity: Leading with God Watching (2006) is a challenge to pastors. He wrote of a conversation with Christian leaders who wanted to argue that their credibility depended upon visible success. These leaders despised the prosperity gospel but nonetheless argued “that dressing well and having a reasonable car and an appropriate title were all necessary elements of a leadership style which won an audience.” Lamb’s response, based upon 2 Corinthians 6:8-10, offers a perspective sadly missing in the Church today.
It is very easy for our circumstances or for the expectations of others around us to control our lives. If we are honest, we will admit that our self-esteem is often bound up with our popular ratings, or our status, or our income. However self-assured we might be, when some of these things are stripped away from our lives we can see how much of our identity as individuals is bound up with them…
In a world which thinks very differently, we can easily be tempted to compromise our faith or dilute our Christian witness. Christian leaders can easily succumb to the world’s pressures. We need to hold the things of this world lightly, for if we are concerned with our own reputation or honour, with material comfort and security, then it is unlikely that we will live a life worthy of the gospel. Our ministry will be ‘discredited’ and, instead of encouraging others forward, we will be placing a road block across their path. But true servants of God, filled with his Spirit, will seek to live lives which are consistent with the gospel they proclaim. It was a radical statement in the Greek world of Paul’s day, and it will be just as radical today.
If we judge Christians by the superficial criteria of the world—titles, clothes, bank balance—we have missed what really matters. Our calling to serve Christ is likely to be very different. It might cost us our comfort, our security, or our health, and maybe even our family or life itself. We do not measure the effectiveness of leaders by the indices of worldly success, but by their conformity to the way of the cross…
Integrity as a way of life means living contentedly whatever our circumstances. It means that we rely on God’s resources, live under his watchful eye and enjoy his fatherly care.1
| 1 | Jonathan Lamb, Integrity: Leading with God Watching (Nottingham, England: InterVarsity, 2006), 147-149. |
Prayer: At Home in the Prayer Chamber
Now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went home. And in his upper room, with his windows open toward Jerusalem, he knelt down on his knees three times that day, and prayed and gave thanks before his God, as was his custom since early days. –Daniel 6:10
Thomas a’ Kempis wrote that the man of God ought to be more at home
in his prayer chamber than before the public….
No man should stand before an audience who has not first stood before God. Many hours of communion should precede one hour in the pulpit. The prayer chamber should be more familiar than the public platform. Prayer should be continuous, preaching but intermittent.
It is significant that the schools teach everything about preaching except the important part, praying. For this weakness the schools are not to be blamed, for the reason that prayer cannot be taught; it can only be done. The best any school or any book (or any article) can do is to recommend prayer and exhort to its practice. Praying itself must be the work of the individual. That it is the one religious work which gets done with the least enthusiasm cannot but be one of the tragedies of our times.
(A.W. Tozer, God Tells the Man Who Cares, 70-71.)
Word for Today: Cultivate deep seasons of prayer. Preaching will come.
Matthew 9:36-38 (ESV)Questions for Discussion:
All over the country, pastors are preparing two very different messages this week. Many will be preaching 3 to 7 messages in the span of three days. Some will be preaching on Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday. One set of messages will be filled with mourning over sin and another set of messages will be filled with the joy of sin and death being conquered in the resurrection.
All of those messages will be more powerful if the people of God are praying for their pastors and asking God to give them great insight, great clarity of expression, and great passion in their delivery. All of those messages will be more effective if we are asking the Lord of the Harvest (Luke 10:2) and the Spirit to convict the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment (John 16:8)
Would you join me in praying for pastors around the country? And while you are at it, would you pray for me?) I will be preaching on Thursday [1x], Friday [2x], and Sunday [3x]). Prayer is the work we are called to. Thanks.
There is a way of preaching that is all ancient and interesting but powerless and counter productive.
There is a way of preaching that is all modern and interesting but powerless and counter productive.
Every age has its new temptations and pitfalls to avoid. Ours is no exception. Here’s a great quote from a young voice (Jonathan Dodson) that needs to be heard.
When we become primarily concerned with church forms—building, music, service, website design—we dip below superficial contextualization into syncretism, blending Christianity with another religion, in this case consumerism. Christian consumerism gives people what we think they want, instead of calling them to what they need: repentance and faith in Jesus Christ as Lord.
Instead of cracking the missional code, many churches have cracked a consumer code, attracting people to culturally bland but comfortable services while occasionally injecting them with the feel-good serum of social justice. But if Jesus Christ is Lord, his lordship should produce particular expressions of the gospel—music with local flavor and gospel-rich lyrics, community that incarnates grace in the neighborhood, culture-making that reflects his grandeur, and fresh language that awakens locals to grace. (Source: http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc/2012/01/12/be-missional-not-superficially-contextual/ )
Questions:
On my way to Racine, Wisconsin to train church planters with Dynamic Church Planting International. Looking forward to the next three days.
But I also wanted to stimulate your thinking about preaching with a simple thought. Every ministry in a church needs to multiply itself. That includes preaching. If we want to do what the Apostle Paul (that prince of church planters) did, then we have to think about planting churches that plant churches and that means planting churches that will develop more preachers than just ourselves.
It is so tempting, consciously and unconsciously, to trust in our education, our training, our experience, our personality, our mentors, our past successes, and the smiles and good favor of the people in front of us, rather than the Spirit of the Living God. Don’t let it happen brother.
“Spurgeon used to walk up the stairs to his pulpit, and every step he would say ‘I believe in the Holy Spirit’, ‘I believe in the Holy Spirit’…Now why was this? Is this because Spurgeon had butterflies? Why is Saint Paul after many years in ministry asking believers of his day to pray for boldness so that he could preach the Word? Why his he praying for boldness? It is not because Paul struggled with stage fright. That’s not why. He knew what happened when he preached the Word.”
—Douglas Wilson, From his talk, The Sacred Script in the Theater of God, given at the 2009 Desiring God National Conference. (sited at Passion for Preaching)
Applications:
I love it when creativity meets good theology meets timely and bold. This is one of those video’s that does all of that. Sharing the gospel with Muslims is a skill set that the American church needs to develop and here is one of the growing number of resources with which to love our Muslim neighbors by proclaiming the gospel.
I'm investing my remaining years in the young leaders of the next great worldwide church planting movement.
