Happy Reformation Day 2013!

Today Protestant Christians celebrate what has been labeled as Reformation Day. A good summary of it can be found here. 

Currently, I am preaching through Galatians in my congregation, which was a book so instrumental in Martin Luther’s theology of the Reformation. To honor his work, I wanted to share a quote from him as he reflects on Galatians 3:27 and the phrase “have put on Christ” (the quote was found in his Second Lectures in Galatians):  

“To put on Christ is not a matter of imitation but of new birth and new creation. We have not just changed our clothes in the outward sense but become entirely new people”

I am thankful for how Christ-centered the Reformation was and how Luther encourages Christians to consider their new identity in Christ. God brought about something new in the year 1517 by his Spirit in the church. The same Spirit is at work today to bring about newness in Christ and reformation in our lives.

Happy Reformation Day 2013!

Pastor's Wife Appreciation Month

The month of October has been traditionally designated as Pastor Appreciation Month. This is a time when churches somehow thank their pastor for his service. It is a nice idea, and I appreciate the words of encouragement that come from my congregation. But I would gladly trade it for a Pastor’s Wife Appreciation Month.

I’ve heard that John D. Rockefeller once said that without his wife he would have been a poor man. The honest pastor will have similar words about his wife. Without her he would be a “poor man” in a pastoral sense or may not be a pastor at all.

Here are a few things that I realize about my wife, that without her I would be a “poor man” when it comes to ministry.

1. My wife helped me get through schooling so I could serve the church. She agreed to the Ph.T. program (putting husband through). In college she worked full-time so I could go to class full-time. In seminary she took care of our three children while I worked two jobs and chipped away at my M.Div. These degrees were for the purpose of serving the church in the future and my wife did all she could to help me get through. This does not even count in all of the financial sacrifice we had to make during those days, which she never complained about.  Pastors and churches should appreciate the sacrifice that many wives made in the days of preparation.

2. My wife helped me take my first call. My first full-time pastorate call was over 1,000 miles from our family and in a small town that can have some harsh winters.  My wife has always demonstrated the “go wherever” mentality when it comes to ministry. Without her support, I would never have made it to northwest Iowa to serve my first church. Pastors and churches should appreciate the sacrifice that many wives made to be serving in a certain locality.

3. My wife helps me to love the church. A wife will either be a help or hindrance in ministry. My wife is a great help. She has a positive outlook on the church even on the worse days. She eagerly serves where God has gifted her. She avoids bitterness when things are sour and does not repay evil for evil. These are all essential character traits. She demonstrates a love and commitment to our church.

The ministry is one of the few vocations where having a supportive wife is essential. If a plumber or investor has a wife who is not too crazy about his job, he can still get by and earn a living. This is not true in the pastorate. An unsupportive wife will kill the husband’s ministry and possibly the church.

The takeaway from this is for both pastors and churches. As pastors, we need to be sure our wives know how much we appreciate their sacrifice and love for the church. They need to know how essential their positive role is in our lives and how we deeply appreciate it.

Churches also need to realize how much of a sacrifice that the pastor’s wife makes. The wife has often agreed to go wherever her husband has been called to. The wife often has agreed with her husband to voluntarily take a low-paying job in the non-profit world for the rest of their lives to serve Christ. The wife stands by her husband during times of deep discouragement and often helps support his faith so he can persevere. The truth is, without the support of the wife, many churches would not have their pastor today.

So as I said earlier, I would gladly trade this month for a Pastor’s Wife Appreciation Month.  

Tornados and Teachable Moments

On Friday about a dozen tornados ripped through parts of Nebraska and Iowa close to us.  We were having our Friday family fun night—on Friday evening our family routine is to have homemade pizza, play games, and watch a movie as a family. Nothing, except for an extreme emergency, is supposed to interrupt our Friday family fun night. We agree to regularly fight to guard this time. So the Ipad and cell phones go into another room and we enjoy the relationships that God has given us as family. As it turns out, a tornado warning falls under the “extreme emergency” category and our evening got interrupted briefly this this past Friday.  

What stood out to me was the way my older children responded to the situation. At about 7:20pm the tornado sirens went off in our town.  The kids asked if it was real and we told them yes, we need to get to the basement fast. This was a warning which means that a tornado has touched down and is imminent.  

There was initial panic at first, but after things settled down (at this point I broke the Ipad rule and grabbed it to check the Doppler radar and updates from the Sheriff) my kids, led by my oldest son, suggested that we pray. What I found remarkable is that they knew, almost instinctively, that when there is a crisis, as a family we pray to God who is bigger than the crisis.  They were communicating that God is greater than the tornado. So here was a moment in real life where they were affirming the truth that God is sovereign and we can trust him in any and every circumstance.

Now I hope for my children that prayer becomes a very real and vital part of their lives as they mature. I hope prayer goes far beyond the moment of a crisis. Far too many people only look to God in a moment of crisis. When things are good, they go on living independent of him. I hope that this is not what we model in our family. We have tried as a family to model prayer both in times of crisis and during times of happiness so they get a balanced picture of what it looks like to pray daily.

But this was a good teachable moment for my kids and they did well. I encouraged them with that as we retuned back upstairs to finish our movie. But before the movie began, we gave God thanks for his protection and hearing our prayers. All glory to him. Tornados can be teachable moments.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Duck Dynasty and the Idol of Consumerism

First, I want to say that I have enjoyed watching the show Duck Dynasty recently. You could call me a fan since I purchased the first two seasons on DVD. It is family-centered outdoor fun that ends with prayer each episode. My son Elijah loves watching Jase catch bullfrogs and has attempted it in our local pond. The Robertson’s appear to have a clear testimony of Christ from what I have heard. All this is good.

But I do have some concerns that the whole fascination with Duck Dynasty may not be helping American Christians with certain idols of the heart (cf. Ezek 14:3). The main idol I am referring to is the materialism in our culture.  This hit me the other day when I visited a Christian bookstore. There were two product displays: one was full of Duck Dynasty trinkets. The other was a child sponsorship display for World Vision and some other orphan care ministry. They were at opposite ends of the store.  They reveal opposite mentalities I believe: the consumerism and wastefulness that characterizes our culture that will soon be forgotten on the one end of the store and the sacrificial, generous giving that has eternal rewards on the other end.  

Now I’m not anti-capitalist and I am genuinely happy for the Robertson’s who have worked hard to build a business. And they may give their wealth away very generously to missions and the poor. But how often do we Christians pour out our money on things that in a few years are almost forgotten and sold at a garage sale? That is my prediction of what will happen with Duck Dynasty t-shirts and bobble heads that are being bought right now. In five years they will be hawked for a couple of bucks, lost or thrown away.  I once volunteered to work a booth at a Christian music concert in the Deep South. The well-known group sold over $13,000 in merchandise that night. That was ten years ago. I wonder where that $13,000 in merchandise is today.

The words from the Prophet Isaiah are well worth meditating on:

“if you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as the noonday.” (Is 58:10)

Remember, this is coming from a guy who has already spent $20 on Duck Dynasty DVDs. I have a long way to go in pouring myself out for the hungry and afflicted. But I do want to battle the idol of wastefulness and consumerism that rages in my own heart.  

The Solid Gospel Foundation

The house I currently live in was built over 100 years ago. It fits our family well, but structurally has a foundation problem. The foundation is hodgepodge: a mixture of brick, cement and dirt. It looks as if it was put together in phases, using whatever material was available in the late 1800's. So our floors are quite uneven, which I occasionally use for putting practice. 

This phase in my life is foundational. In my early 30's with young preschool/elementary age children, we are building a foundation in our home.  Entering my third year of pastoral ministry, I'm building a foundation in the church. By the grace of God, I want to build a solid foundation of Christ and the gospel. Some of the Christ-centered gospel "material" I'm using is the book of Galatians, which I'm preaching though this fall, and Matt Chandler's book The Explicit Gospel which I'm reading now. Chandler noticed something troubling in his church among those who are in the foundational stage of life:

"What I found was that for a great many young twentysomethings and thirtysomethings, the gospel had been merely assumed, not taught or proclaimed as central. It hadn't been explicit" (p. 13).

It can be easy,convenient and cost effective to build a foundation with hodgepodge materials. But the problems are noticed years later, even a century later, as in the case of our house. The same is true with the foundation we build in our homes and churches now. It can be easy to build a hodgepodge foundation, using only the materials of our culture. A consumer mentality, with extreme self-focus and little thought about Christ is what the average twenty and thirtysomething is building with right now. Sadly, this is true in many of the homes and even churches in our culture. When Christ and the gospel are absent, the foundation will crumble at some point. It may be years down the road, but it will crumble eventually. 

Jesus said this very thing in Matt 7:24-27. A hodgepodge foundation did not work 2000 years ago, or 100 years ago, and it will not work today. Paul also understood the solid foundation was essential to build in life and ministry: 

"But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world" (Gal 6:14).

Reading the Bible Wrong

I remember reading the Bible for the first time as a teenager. It was not the easiest task. The book is big (1,104 pages in my personal copy) with many chapters and verses that are supposed to make it easier to read somehow.

One of the most common problems with the Bible is that people can read it the wrong way. I’m positive that I have done this countless times. Thankfully, the more you read it the better Bible reader you become.

I came across an example this morning where a verse can be read wrongly:

“Cursed is he who does the work of the LORD with slackness…” (Jeremiah 48:10a ESV).

I can almost picture the young man eager to go into ministry. This would sound like a great visionary verse for his calling right? Or maybe it’s a warning for pastors who are prone to take some short cuts or who have lost their zeal? Can we use this verse to encourage any of these situations? No.

This verse has nothing to do with pastoral ministry or church leadership. If you read the rest of the verse you see what the “work of the LORD” really is:

“…and cursed is he who keeps back his sword from bloodshed” (Jeremiah 48:10b ESV).

In this context the work of the Lord is executing judgment on Moab. So it’s probably not the best verse to take and apply to pastoral ministry or any other work that God has called you to…unless it is executing judgment on an idolatrous nation perhaps.

This is simply a reminder that Bible reading and understanding the Bible well take a lot of hard work and effort. It takes reading through books of the Bible over long periods of time, often years again and again.  

D.A. Carson has said it well: “At their best, Christians have saturated themselves in the Bible.” This means more than a verse here and there, and takes real effort and elbow grease over long periods of time.

Back to the Blog Again

I took a couple of months off from the blog since my daughter, Karis, was born in May. Not that I was a consistent blogger by any means but the break was helpful. After returning from vacation I’m back at it again.

Since the fall season marks times of change, like kids going back to school, harvest time approaching, and football season beginning, here are a few changes in my blog.

First, my purpose has been modified a bit. My new purpose behind the blog is to record personal thoughts on gospel living, marriage, parenting and ministry. These themes will guide my posting for the most part. Not that I have much to offer on these topics compared to those much further down the path of Christian maturity. But we are all on this journey by His grace, aren't we?

Second, the blog will have more of a pastoral focus. I know at least a couple of folks in my church check out my blog so I also want to see it as an extension of ministry.  Hopefully it provides a glimpse into what is going on in my heart and mind from time to time, which may be quite scary I admit, like a disengaged dad confessing.

Third, I do hope to be a more regular blogger. I have set out to do this before, only to have other things take over my time, like crying babies and a son who wants to play catch.  These are good things I don’t want to neglect. But since I am viewing the blog now as an extension of ministry, hopefully I will be able to work it into my schedule like other important things I do in ministry, such as prayer and sermon preparation.

Anyhow, I look forward to writing more and appreciate all of you who take time to read my thoughts! 

 

A child of God living by His grace,

Ryan