Review on $$

Here's a quick review on 3 money messages --

WEEK 1

• Money is more than a thing.  Highway signs are things and don't become fetishes.  Money is a thing and becomes a fetish.
• Money can't and won't.  It's limited.  It can't make the lame walk.  You won't take it with you. 
• Money is to be used in the service of love.  The temporary serves the eternal.  It is termporary and people are eternal.  Don't use people and cherish things.  Cherish people and use things.

WEEK 2

• from Malachi 3:6
• How to get right with God is a question asked in hard times for a person or country.
• Answer:  Tithe.
• Huh?  It's a core issue and for that there was a core story.  A part of the Garden of Eden the Lord said was his.  One tree.  Everything else he shared.  We think that if take it all, we'll have more.  We think that taking his is ok.  Was it ok for Adam & Eve?  That thinking?  What the tree was in the garden, is what the tithe is in our income.  And we don't get back on track until we go back to where we got off track.  Not surrendering to God.
• When we don't tithe we rob God of his desire to share and the way he has worked the natural laws on this is, "You give me the tithe, I bless."  So when you don't tithe, he can't do what he likes.  We rob him of pleasure. 
• When we tithe there's a three-fold promise:  blessing comes, depreciation kept away, and respect given.

WEEK 3

• God set up a sacrficial system so we would remember him ... we do better when we do remember him and we don't when we don't.  So he sets up a system. 
• Sacrifice means it isn't superfluous or unfelt.  It is meaningful, costly, and perhaps even painful.
• Sacrifice = giving.
• Giving in the Bible is Regular, Responsive (fluctuates according to what extra comes in), Reliant (I'll trust God to provide me with $5 extra a week to give ... but I give first and then rely on him to provide), and Revelational (a specific cause he tells you to give to). 

QUESTION:  HOW AM I DOING ON GIVING?

A Season for Christians

In the next eight weeks Americans will have more special gatherings than the rest of the year put together I think.  We will meet at the Thanksgiving table.  We will then find each other at the Christmas party at the office and the Christmas open house at the neighbors'.  Before you know it we will be at the table again for Christmas Eve and/or Christmas Day.  Next up is New Year's Eve.  Some of us will be toasting with others of us.  January 1 is football and football and nachos and nachos.  More cavorting. 

In all of these situations there will be someone who is lonely, someone who is not in the inner circle, someone who drinks too much, someone who overstressed, someone with a daughter who is struggling, someone with a parent with dementia, someone who is labelled the black sheep of the family, someone who dislikes his brother, someone going through a divorce, someone who's dating a member of the family, someone invited because they're a "stray," .... 

The world is divided up into guests and hosts.  Christ-followers are hosts.  They go into the above situations not trying to be saviors but asking of themselves to be servants.  They go into the avove situations asking God for less judgmentalism inside themselves and a lot of, lot of mercy.  They go into the above situations knowing that they will pull themselves away from their natural cliches and build a bridge to someone outside their circle.  They go into the above situations with prayer, "God, help me to be sensitive to your Spirit, to speak when you would have me speak, to not speak when you would have me not speak."  They go into the above situations being willing to say to someone, "I'll pray for you about that." 

You are the light of the world.  Let that light shine. 

Thank You & & &

Cocoa's family sure surprised me on Sunday!  I knew my sermon was heavy-weight and had waved off one announcement and was hoping for short children's message.  So when Kathy asked to make an announcement and wouldn't tell me what it was about, I was like the rooster to the hen who wanted for some reason to lay an egg on the highway. "Well, then I'd lay it on the line and do it quick!"  What followed was a lot of love to me and thank you, thank you.  It continued all the way to my kitchen and as I unpacked cocoa and more cocoa :) as was again blessed.  Thank you. 

I ended up in the last blog with the pastor.  I am afraid today that too often we give points to the pastor in terms of pastoral care and not in terms of pastoral leadership.  The pastor is to visit hospitals and when it comes to session, to moderate the meetings but not lead them, or so we think.  

And the session, it is thought, then provides leadership.  However, as a tour of Richmond, VA will show, there are many statues of generals and not a one of a committee.  When we go to the Bible, instead of to the secular business arena, we will find the first “elders” being suggested by Moses’ father-in-law for assistance to Moses in a great work.  If a leader is to endure, if a bottleneck is to be avoided and a work is to expand, then there must be help and delegation.  Once the elders were appointed for helping Moses and all the Hebrews manage better, we don’t find the elders sitting in judgment on Moses like a Board of Directors or him asking their permission to do this or that. 

Now just to clarify, in Presbyterian polity the pastor is a member of the session and has a vote.  So he or she is not just a moderator but a member of the session who participates in its discusssion, work, and votes. 

As I bring up the elders with Moses let me at the same time say the Bible clearly commends to us that we are part of a body and one part is not sufficient unto itself.  So others’ gifts and viewpoints are needed.  There is wisdom, the Bible continues, in counselors.  We are not talking, then, about leaders without accountability.  But we are talking about leaders leading. 

And remember the Ephesian elders who wept and enjoined Paul, by virtue of their sense of the Holy Spirit, not to return to Jerusalem?  What did he do?  Returned to Jerusalem.  The conscience of the leader (and all of us) must always act ultimately in response to God. 

If They Are Not Bothering You, They May Not Be Doing Their Job

The congregation must decide.  It is a nice statement.  But what does it mean?  The congregation is made up of people and some are bossy, some are crazy, some are quiet, some are gone for that meeting, some are just really sweet, some get what the issues are and some don’t get what the issues are. 

John Carver, who has written extensively about governing boards, reminds board members that they are trustees.  They are entrusted with the task of operating in the best interests of the organization.  One might be tempted to say, “In the best interests of the members.”  That is perfectly okay if the board members understand that the members may renege on the purpose of the organization here and there and must, therefore, be withstood.  They may renege out of short-sightedness or excessive self-interest.  Or the members may not have all the information necessary to comprehend what is best for the organization.  So boards must always be educating the very membership for whom they are trustees. 

Boards are servants of the membership as trustees not as people to whom the congregation says, “You will do what we say.”  They are to look out for the interests not of any subset but of the whole.  They are to look long term.  They are to keep fixed on the founding purpose even if members forget.  They are trustees.

So for a congregation to decide, the session must educate and lead them.  There must be process of laying the groundwork, letting ideas germinate, and getting everyone involved.  For the session to educate and lead, shouldn’t the pastor be to them what they are to be to the congregation?  Otherwise, we have a small group of the blind leading a larger group of the blind.  Or the bland leading the bland. 

One caveat – the church is a privately held company.  Trustees act on behalf of the owner who is God.  Aaron got that mixed up and built a golden calf.  He acted on behalf of the congregation rather than the owner.  If your session is always making you happy, watch out.  The session should always be making God happy.  And given our sin natures that will mean, from time to time, that their being faithful to God necessitates being firm with us. 

Do You Have a Special Call?

I was off on a Presbyterian pastor matter called CREDO for eight days.  I am grateful for the caring ways of our denomination when it comes to pastors.  But now it is time for another blogpost and what I am going to give today is NOT related to anything I have experienced recently.  I find there are some things that it is good to talk about when they are not on the front burner.  Sometimes if we talk about it in regular ol' times, we less frequently have that matter go to the front burner!  So here we go.

I have a friend, Ron, who is pastor in Texas.  He has kind of a gravelly voice and I can still hear him telling me about a conversation in a new church that began in an unnerving way for him.  I think it was the way the man approached him and made eye contact.  But it ended up as a conversation of great blessing. 

The man said, “Pastor, do you know who I am?” 

Ron replied, “No.” 

“I am a man who will take a bullet for the pastor of this church.”

This was not blind allegiance to Ron but it was dedication to the office of pastor and Ron was grateful.  It reminded me of a friend who was in the Secret Service.  I asked him about taking a bullet for a President you may not personally like.  He said that he was caring for a human being in front of personal tastes but more importantly he was protecting the office of President, a democratic decision of the American people.

Now fast forward several years and I will give you a conversation as a pastor with a church member of my own.  Steve seemed very quiet to me.  Maybe he was shy or uncomfortable around church.  I couldn’t tell.  But the first words I remember hearing from Steve were, “I am called to help pastors.  So whatever you need, please let me know.  Is there a way I can help you today?”  He kept that up until I finally really did ask him to help me with something I really did need. 

I know that there are stories of pastors who are bulls-in-a-china-shop.  And they need love plus truth just like everyone else.  But there are also a lot of stories of pastors getting roundly criticized, of the prevailing wind not being forgiveness or respect but something grumpier.    Just like in a marriage where you can love yourself if you’ll love your partner well, so in a church.  If you love your church, love your pastor! 

There is no pastor who’s perfect.  There’s no church member who’s perfect.  I like the small group curriculum where everyone begins by asking for forgiveness because in the course of doing real life together we’re going to offend one another.  Let’s admit the difficulties we all face in doing church together and move forward. 

Paul tells us to esteem and honor church leaders.  It is a tough job being out in front and viewed by many, many others who can be armchair quarterbacks.  So let’s watch gossip.  Let’s shovel on encouragement and prayers.  Amen?   Amen.