Moving to the Big Boy Bed

We had a transition happen this week at home. On Monday afternoon Canyon climbed out of his baby bed and moved immediately to his "big boy" bed. We now have no more "babies" at the house and at my old age, maybe that is good.

What makes the transition so good is that we have subsequently put him in bed for nap and a full night of sleep and we just put him in the bed and he stays just as he did in the baby bed until we come to get him out. We are hoping it stays this way. So far so good in his next step toward maturity.

It has caused me to think about the transition that is to take place in the believers life. The writer of Hebrews wrote about spiritual maturity and the steps that we all should make, but sadly many believers do not make. Far to many stay in the realm of immaturity. Look at these words from Hebrews 5:11-14
"About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you our to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who are mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil."
Let's look at a couple of these things in regard to our lives and keeping us from maturity.

• Becoming dull of hearing prevents maturity. Not hearing and obeying the word cannot ever mature us. Ignoring the Word means we ignore the truth and we only become dull, boring and ineffective.
• Whenever we become dull, we need to start at the basics again. It means that are no longer fit to take on the solid food of good doctrine and challenging messages. Look what the scripture says - you live only on milk, we will be unskilled in the ways of righteousness. We will not be able to discern who is right and one stays a child. This is where far to many seem to stay. If you do not like messages that challenge you, then you are immature, because a person who is mature wants deeper and deeper truth. When you are a child, you act like a child - gossip, throw fits, manipulate, lie, etc. If this is you, then it is time to grow up.
• Solid Food is for the Mature. Maturity brings discernment, that when practiced, allows us to really discern what is good and evil. There is a perspective that comes from eating solid food of doctrine and deep truth that equips us better for life.

Have you moved to the "Big Boy Bed" spiritually? If not, it is time.

The New Normal

Pam and I were talking yesterday and we finally think we have something figured out. Living in a day and time where there is not such a clear cut and dry standard for what shapes how we live our lives or what shapes a society, the natural result is that everyone is free to do whatever they want. After all, my life is my life and I should not be told what to do as I live it and I should be free to make decisions regardless of what others really think about me. "I am you know, the center of the universe" - so we often think and live. Call it postmodernism or me-centered living, but it has definitely become the mainstream and the NORM.

There was a time in our society in the not too distant past where this life view was considered foreign. Yes, one could argue that life in the 1940's and 50's was a bit stuffy, etc., but one can also not deny that children and communities had a much better understanding on how to love and care for one another than we do now. There were also life and behavior standards that communities and society at large considered NORMAL. Those certain ideals shaped family, church, government and community life and honestly, gone are those days. The days of respect and mutual accountability to certain standards that were acceptable before no longer really exist. There was, even with the flaws of that generation, something NORMAL to their existence. And if you did not live by those standards, then one was seen outside the NORM and excluded from the group. Certain important ideals were embraced and we have lost those today.

The new normal is now this: Everyone is Normal. Everyone who lives gets to be considered the NORMAL and the new NORM is whatever you may want to do. No matter the choices one makes, no matter the value system one holds, no matter who you may affect - we all have the right to do as we please because what we do is normal. Everyone gets included in the NORM because everything is normal. Obviously I am not talking about breaking the law, as that still carries a penalty, but I am referring to how we talk and treat police officers, teachers, parents, neighbors, coaches, family, and etc. The new NORMAL gives us the right to say and do whatever we feel is right to them and anyone else who may get in our way. These questions must be asked: How is this working for our society? Are we friendlier and more joyful than the previous generations? Have we moved into a higher plane of respect and honor for others? Of course not!! Everyone being NORMAL is not a good thing and our current culture is proof. Accepting and placing anyone and everyone under the NORMAL banner is scary!

I don't like the new NORMAL, in how I live it out at times and how people treat me because they are infected by it. Somehow I don't see that the new NORM has made us more content or loving. We are worse off than ever. Some abnormalcy to the NORM is in order. Anyone want to join me? Maybe we could form a support group called the ABNORMALS.

Let's keep in mind these words of Jesus in John 15:19 - "If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, therefore the world hates you". Let us live in such a way that the world's NORMAL does not get our NORMAL and in so doing we find we are living for the glory of Christ.

Are you normal or abnormal?

Samual Adams quote

The quote today is quite timely for our county.

"Is it not high time for the people of this country explicitly to declare, whether they will be freemen or slaves? It is an important question which ought to be decided. It concerns us more than any thing in this life. The salvation of our souls is interested in the event: for wherever tyranny is established, Immorality of every kind comes in like a torrent. It is in the Interest of tyrants to reduce the people to ignorance and vice. For they cannot live in any country where virtue and knowledge prevail. The religion and public liberty of a people are intimately connected; their interests are interwoven, they cannot subsist separately; and therefore they rise and fall together. For this reason, it is always observable, that those who are combined to destroy the people's liberties practice every art to poison their morals. How greatly then does it concern us, at all events, to put a stop to the progress of tyranny."

Leadership Disappointments

I have learned this quite awhile ago, but it is still not always easy to face when it comes. As much as I might try to make people happy and on board with what we are doing and where we are going, sometimes it is just not enough for them. People get upset, blame you, talk behind your back and sometimes they leave. Though it may not have anything really to do with you as a leader, the blame lies with the leader anyway.

Pleasing people is not our job, but the relationship and love we have for them never makes it easy as they go, but at the same time, we cannot succumb to their whims just to keep them around and happy. Obviously, if we are at fault, we should do everything we can to make it right, but the reality also is, is that some people are just never going to be happy and we cannot curtail ministry just to make them happy. That can make ministry man-centered, not God centered. Disappointment and rejection come with the job and we are not alone in this. Everyone who has gone before us in any kind of ministry have dealt with this.

In fact, Jesus faced it his whole 3 years of ministry. Remember these from his life:

• Rejected and run out of his hometown.
• His family members thought he was crazy.
• His closest disciples all ran away when he needed them most.
• When he needed them to pray in the garden, his inner circle fell asleep on Him.
• "He came to His own and his own people did not receive him." John 1:11
• Rejected at every corner by the religious and traditional establishment.
• Told he did his miracles by Beelzebub, not by the power of God.
• He was accused by being a drunkard.
• John 6 tells us that after a difficult teaching many of the disciples left and no longer followed anymore.
  
• He was rejected and despised by men according to Isaiah.

The list could go on and on. Since it is going to happen to us, how can we best deal with it? John records these words in chapter 2. Here they are: "Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs he was doing. But Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man". John 2:23-25

The crowd wanted Jesus to do what they alone wanted but He knew He can come for another reason. He knew the fickle nature of man and that they did not have in mind the things of God for him or for the kingdom. They were selfish and had in mind the things of man. We are not Jesus, but the implication applies to us in ministry. We are to do what God wants us to do and in doing that, it can cost us plenty.

People will leave, reject us, falsely accuse, manipulate and the like and we have to keep our eyes on Him or we will get swallowed up in all the expectations that are not of God, but of man. Also, in these moments of brokenness, we have to run and hide in Him. It is the only real place that can keep us focused and to get us through the disappointments of people.

Being a Fool for Christ

1 Corinthians 4:10 We are fools for Christ's sake, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are held in honor, but we in disrepute. 11 To the present hour we hunger and thirst, we are poorly dressed and buffeted and homeless, 12 and we labor, working with our own hands. When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; 13 when slandered, we entreat. We have become, and are still, like the scum of the world, the refuse of all things.

Being a fool for Christ means that we are secure enough and passionate enough in our faith that we simply don't mind looking a bit foolish in the eyes of other church members, family, neighbors, and co-workers. This term of Paul's is not so much discussed today, but was easily understood at the time Paul wrote. Back then, being a believer was not so mainstream and it meant that you were fully out of step with all of the societal norms of the day. It is what is needed today.

Being a fool for Christ meant ministering to prostitutes, the poor, Samaritans, lepers, and other morally unclean people. Doing these things would be seen as foolish by fellow church members or by the standards of the society at the time. How are you and I seen by others?

Paul is simply saying, that those who choose to live for Christ are willing to risk reputation and status for the express purpose of pleasing God above all things.

Leadership among the Thessalonians

In 1 Thessalonians Paul writes unique insight about leadership. He clearly sets forth how he did ministry among them and how we should do ministry among people. Since we definitely hold Paul in such high esteem, we ought to maybe pay more attention to what he says he did, instead of so much that is out there today in regard to leadership. Here are his words:

1 Thessalonians 2:1 For you yourselves know, brothers, that our coming to you was not in vain. 2 But though we had already suffered and been shamefully treated at Philippi, as you know, we had boldness in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in the midst of much conflict. 3 For our appeal does not spring from error or impurity or any attempt to deceive, 4 but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts. 5 For we never came with words of flattery, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed—God is witness. 6 Nor did we seek glory from people, whether from you or from others, though we could have made demands as apostles of Christ. 7 But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children. 8 So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us.9 For you remember, brothers, our labor and toil: we worked night and day, that we might not be a burden to any of you, while we proclaimed to you the gospel of God. 10 You are witnesses, and God also, how holy and righteous and blameless was our conduct toward you believers. 11 For you know how, like a father with his children, 12 we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.

Here is how he explained how he ministered among them.

• vs. 1-2 - Extending the Gospel is not done in vain - We are a part of something bigger than anything in the world
  
• vs. 3 - We make the appeal to people so they will know God and truth - There they will find hope.
  
• Ministry Looks Like this among those we serve:

1. We have to be approved by God - This is not an occupation, but a calling. vs. 4a
2. Those approved, are allowed to be entrusted with the very gospel of God. vs 4b
3. Those approved and entrusted - have to live to please God, not men. vs 4c
If we do not then we will not be able to overcome the pettiness of people and will succumb to their wishes and not God's.
4. Leadership is more about authenticity than fancy words. vs. 5-6
5. Be Gentle, yet strong. vs. 7
6. Share Yourself and the Gospel. vs. 8
7. Be a Hard Worker. vs. 9
This does not mean to just be busy, but to work effectively and efficiently alongside others.
8. Incarnational Ministry is the most effective Ministry. vs. 10-12)
We should set the course for how all this works.

Let's line up with scriptural teaching about leadership from the best church planter in history.

The Missing Link in Passing on Faith

These inspired words of Asaph are the key to re-establishing a stronger church, community and nation. The real question is: Where are those who will establish the family as the central place of seeing significant revival in our land. There are to many passages in the Old Testament that lay this forth as the key place of authentic faith.

I will let them speak for themselves. This is Psalm 78.

78:1 Give ear, O my people, to my teaching; incline your ears to the words of my mouth! 2 I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings from of old, 3 things that we have heard and known, that our fathers have told us. 4 We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the Lord, and his might, and the wonders that he has done. 5 He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children,6 that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children,7 so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God,but keep his commandments;8 and that they should not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not steadfast, whose spirit was not faithful to God.