The Truth About Lies

I recently preached on truth telling and I got to thinking about how this might apply to something at the church.  Or not.  You decide.

We recently made a temporary change in our worship venue in order to try some new things in our worship style and at the same time save a little money in a more energy effecient space than our big, not-energy-efficient sanctuary.

What was great was that the congregation as a whole was pretty good natured about it and rolled with the punches.  A good, good sign of flexibility and good will.

As you'd expect, some were not so keen about it.  I'm not sure what all those not-avid attenders did.  I noted that some left temporarily.  They went to another church or they stopped coming to church for a bit.  They did what they needed to do, I guess.  We could have used their presence to foster the love and sense of success we need for one another and for visitors but they did what they needed to do.

Some came, maybe less consistently but not all that off-pattern, and they just tolerated it, accepted it, managed it.

Some added to these other options an outloud comment to someone of, "I don't like it," and that's their perfect right.

I've gone all this way because what I found interesting and typical and worth putting reigns on is how a few people said, "There are people who are upset by this move."  Here are my observations or thoughts on this comment.  One, it is feedback and feeback is critical.  Thank you!  Two, it is imprecise.  It doesn't tell us how many or who.  Is it two people out of a hundred?  Is it our resident curmudgeon who is against anything and everything?  Three, some people are very concerned that someone is upset and some people don't really care whether they are or not.  Maybe this is the difference between those who are fearful by anyone having uncomfortable feelings and those who are fearful of giving up reasonable goals because of a couple people having uncomfortable feelings?  The people oriented versus the task oriented?  (P.S.  If someone regularly receives others' fear and negativity, he or she or I might ask if we are giving off some kind of signal that we are good receptacle or receiving dock for such.)  Four, we hear, I think, "People are upset," more than we hear, "People are good with it."  When we repeat, "People are upset," it can start to get a life and everyone who hears this starts wondering who it is and what kind of thin ice we are on.  If we equally reported, "People are loving this," it can get a life too.  To find the truth we need to say both.  Otherwise, the negative can get a disproportianate influence.  To tell the truth we need to say all of the above and then some (stuff that you see that I am not seeing).  Telling the truth is simple and it is complicated.

Now go out there and be honest ... and loving.  Truth needs love.  Love needs truth.

5 Principles for Leadership

5 Principles of Leadership for Everyone

I was reflecting on what I believe about leadership.  Don’t stop reading because you’re thinking, “I’m not a leader.”  If you have contact with another human being, you are consciously or unconsciously influencing them and that, my friend, is leadership. 

Leadership is dynamic.  When it is time to hunt, the best hunters lead, not the best farmers.  When it is time to farm, the best farmers lead, not the best hunters.  So it is dynamic according to the objective.  It’s also dynamic by size.  Leading a three person company is different than leading a 3,000 person company.  Or what about situation – in wartime are we more directive than in peacetime?  And there are always moves between interpersonal needs and organizational tasks – are you feeling ok versus are we getting something done? 

Having said the above here are five principles for everyone.  One, it is modeling and translates into being the first one to roll up his or her sleeves.  This means being an example in terms of attitude and behavior.  Do and be what you want imitated.

Two, it is forecasting.  If everyone is looking at trees and no one is looking at forest, we won’t be as productive as we could be.  Someone needs to get out in front and scout out what’s coming opportunity-wise, what’s coming need-wise.

Three, it is having courage.  If a surgeon stopped surgery because he couldn’t handle the patient being uncomfortable, comfort rules and not health.  A doctor needs courage to pursue health.  And we need courage to tell the truth about how things are and not air brush what’s going on.  And we need courage to try again when we have failed.  Leadership just plain takes courage.

Four, it is having integrity.  Honesty is the best policy.  Authenticity merges into this.  If you can be trusted and you can’t be yourself, then leadership will tank.

Five, it is having love.  People know if you care.  Love the people you are with.  Yes, they are imperfect.  So am I.  You are too.  But there is no one without a special story and a special gift.  Value the people you are with.

Earlier I said that I’d share what I believed about leadership.  Frankly, as I typed those words I asked myself, “It is what you believe but is it what you practice?”  Ahhh.  We all believe stuff we don’t practice, right?  Funny how we do that.  But I hope I’m practicing it.  I’m trying.  I hope you will too. 

Jeff Wood, Interim Pastor at Cocoa Presbyterian Church.

Read more at www.talkingwithjeff.blogspot.com

Fear is Stronger than Hope?

"How do we know if we are making the right decision?"   That’s what the elder asked.  Good question.  An important one.  I suggested to her that the right decision needed to be related to a goal or a mission or some criteria.  If the goal is hospice, then the right decision has to do with comfort and non-heroic measures.  If the goal is survival, then comfort and non-heroic measures are the wrong decisions. 

"Well, don’t we need more information?"  That what the elder asked next.  Another good question.  I suggested to her this time that find out both how much information we have and how much time we have.  If we have five years, then we have time to get more and half the information we have will probably become obsolete by then anyway.  If we have five weeks, it’s another matter. 

And how much information do we have now?  “Well,” she replied, “there must be lots of different options.”  Ok.  Let’s brainstorm.  We came up with five.  “But there must be experts out there who could come up with a lot more.”  Probably.  Maybe not lots more.  But maybe more.  

Then I wondered to her, "Can we afford them?  Might some of them say contradictory things or different things?  It happens occasionally in medicine and other fields."  I don’t know if we have all the information but I am pretty sure we never will.  We live in an information age and there’s always more of it.  The amount of it and insecurity we have about making less than 100% perfect decisions, leads to questing for more instead of decisions and action.

"What if this change we make is bad?"  That’s another comment she had.  It could be.  But there is no option without change.  Staying as is will mean changes.  Going a different direction will mean changes.  Which is going to be for the better?

 

"Some people aren’t going to like what we decide."  Another comment.  True.  True.  So this is a reason not to do something??  No way.  That puts the naysayer or critic in charge of the church.  And someone will always be unhappy.  Even Jesus, the Son of God, who had only twelve faced one of them being unhappy -- Judas.  If someone’s going to be miffed period, let’s gird up our loins and make the best decision we can. 

This isn't far different from, "I heard people don't like program x, y, or z."  That's when I ask, "How many?"  Usually it is two or less.  Did you talk to the other 98 who were there?  So you don't know if they liked it or didn't like it?  It could be 98 to 2.   I also ask, pardon me, "Which people?"  Oh them, they're nuts and against everything.  Everybody knows that. And you saying that you heard some people don't like it helps the rest of us hearing it how?  Or does it spawn a rumor mill of dis-ease?  

Let’s focus not on the naysayers (although we don’t want to not hear or care for them) but let’s see the many who are willing, interested, and able.  Somehow we see the negative more easily than the positive.  Yes, fear unfortunately is stronger than hope sometimes.  But let’s go with the hope.  

What Industrious Churches Do

What industrious churches do at this time of year is

• Contact everyone from January to present about getting back into the swing of things at church as summer winds down.  Tell them what new Sunday School classes there are.  Invite anyone with musical interest to give the choir a try as they come back from summer break.  
• They start a new class or classes to invite everyone to.  
• They contact all the schools nearby and let them know that there will be special prayers said for them on the Sunday before school starts, that the staff and parents are invited to come, and that throughout the year the church is here to help.  If a staff member suffers a loss and has no church, if a student has a particular struggle, ... you are here. 
• They contact the PTO or PTA and communicate the same as above.  But also insert a message that parents and kids can "commission" the year together in church, get off to the right start with a prayer.  Education of the mind is only part of our education.  There's education of the heart as well.
• They let nearby hotels/motels/campgrounds know that you are here for their customers looking for church services.
• They let funeral homes know that if there are families without church support in a time of grief, that you are here.  
• They let nearby businesses know that you are here for another good school year and enjoy partnering with them to make this community a good one.  Let them know that if you can be of service to them or their employees in a time of need or for spiritual counsel or for a meeting place to do an in-service, you'd like to help.
• They put up signs if they haven't already that "XYZ Church is 1 Block" thataway.  
• They recommit to making the main event (worship) inspiring and start a new message series with the start of school.  

Anyone want to add to the list?  Please do!  Let's hear from you.

Good News

Last week I ended the blog saying, “Let’s never give up on sharing the good news of Jesus Christ.”  Many consider Christianity a moral code – teaching and advice on how to live.  But it is not first that.  It is first news.  There’s a big, big difference. 

Advice is something you believe someone should follows so that things go well for them.  It’s about the future.  News is about what has happened, the past.

Let’s say an army was approaching.  Advisors … advice-givers would tell everyone in the town, barricade this, build up that, store this, cover that, … archers here.  On the basis of worry, how might we save ourselves is the matter.  We live in a certain way based on advice rooted in effort.

The phrase “good news” is a translation of the word, “euangellion.”  See the prefix, “eu,” for “good.”  See “angel” in “angellion” and an angel is a messenger.  An euangellion was a technical term for a herald, someone who ran back from, say, a field of battle, to the hometown.  They’d shout, “Our King won!” People would then live a certain way but based on news rooted in someone else’s effort.

Christianity is all about good news.  Two thousand years ago Jesus rose from the dead.  It’s possibly harder to disbelieve the evidence than to believe it.  Based on that victory we live in a certain way.  Thanks be to God!

For info on the resurrection I recommend:  The Case for Easter by Lee Strobel and The Resurrection of the Son of God by Tom Wright.  The first is short and the second is long.  

New Christian

New Christian …

I was at a meeting today.  A guy named Joe asked Reuben and then me how we met Jesus.  He was asking because he just met him on May 23.  Someone asked him to church and out of politeness he went.  The message and the presence of Jesus hit him like a ton of bricks.  He became, in his words, “born again.”  He travels a lot and this was his first men’s disciple meeting.  He had a new Bible that was called, The Beginner’s Bible. 

He shared that he told a colleague about his experience and got the reply, “Oh yeah, I tried that once.”  After a bit, Joe was pretty confused and a little angry at some other ways the man was treating him.  Instead of taking it to him, he prayed.  He prayed because that was the first advice he got about being born again – you should pray.  A little while later the man apologized and Joe thought, “Man, this really does work!” 

I noticed the whole room nodding and encouraging Joe.  It was as if everyone was remembering anew, “Jesus does work!  I mean, truly.”  New Christians I have always thought are vital to churches.  Worship, it’s higher when you are standing next to a person who is feeling like, well, they have been born again.  Education, it’s real when you are the one teaching a brand new Christian what’s what.  (Joe said he’d been propositioned by three women in the last month and that had not happened to him in years.  The men in the room said, “It’s Satan trying to mess you up.”  See, they were teaching him.)  Fellowship, go to the nursery window of a hospital and watch the family peering in at the newborn.  Is that fellowship or what?  Evangelism, it’s higher because you see once more but up close and personal and now, Jesus is touching lives.  So off you go ready to share him convinced he’s who he said he was. 

Let’s never give up on sharing the good news of Jesus Christ.  

Still Time

There's still time to sign up for the Leadership Summit.  It is avaliable in every major city in the United States.  It is the one conference I go to year in and year out.

There's still time to volunteer to help with VBS at Cocoa.  We'll be doing it in conjunction with Celebration Tabernacle.  It starts this Sunday evening in Flaniken Hall.

I do a little volunteering at Civil Air Patrol, Merritt Island.  One of the first mini-lectures I gave was on the difference between the urgent and the important.  Do you know the difference?  It's critical to realize that the urgent feels important but may or may not be.  Conversely, the important may or may not feel urgent.  It is simply the road to ruin to not get that some very, very important parts of life are not and never will be urgent.

A deepening life with God is seldom experienced as urgent.  But is there anything truly more important?  Make room in today for the important.

Have you heard of C.S. Lewis' essay, "On Learning in War Time"?  He was in university when he was called up to WWI.  He took a little Latin book or something like that with him.  For everyone else, they'd get back to learning after the war.  For everyone else, the trenches were too dirty to read in.  For everyone else, the situation wasn't quite right.  He realized that in real life there is always something that makes it less than ideal to learn, some reason to say, "I'll do it tomorrow."  But learning is important.  It may not be urgent.  It is important.  And he made room in today for it.