The life of a believer is not always rosy. I’m quite sorry if you are new to the faith and that surprises or disappoints you. Sometimes the outside world assumes that because we claim to know God personally that we have somehow risen above the stresses of life. That is far from the truth.
The breaking news involves Tiger Woods. You may have heard all the rumors, watched ESPN and all the other newscasts try to get “to the bottom” of the story, or even read that Tiger personally admits he disappointed his family by not being true to the values he believes.
One thing it means to me is that whatever we value most, needs to be at “eye level”, or promoted in a way that it receives the most attention. In my experience, sometimes churches, even in my own church, do better at promoting things that have lesser importance, and sometimes don’t promote enough the things that deserve the most attention. One example is that we often promote our programs more than we promote the person of Jesus.
Another variable in determining strategy that is often overlooked is the strengths of the people within the organization at the time. I posted before about the way organizations typically replace senior leaders. (Read that post HERE.) Organizations usually replace the top position with someone opposite from the one that leaves. They do this to build on a strength they feel the former leader didn’t have.
What is the end goal of being a disciple?
Let me try to explain. Throughout the 16th chapter of Exodus, Moses recounts the story of the Israelites gathering manna, which were thin flakes of bread. Every morning, each person gathered the manna by a measure called an omer. For 35 verses in chapter 16, if you are inquisitive like me, you are wondering, “Moses, what is an omer? How much is that?”
I had a great couple days this week hanging out with Casey Graham of The Change Group as he visited with Kristin Ruther from The Aspen Group and Tim Stevens and Kem Meyer at Granger Church one day and then Scott Hodge from Orchard Community Church the next day. It was challenging, tiring, and personally rewarding.
So why do I share this? Well, it gives you another pie recipe you can try, but really to illustrate that, if you don’t follow the directions carefully, your recipes will fail. So it is in the Christian life, or any life for that matter. God has a plan. He has spelled it out in His Word. If we follow it, we will experience rich reward. His first command is to “love the Lord with all our heart”. Then, we are told to “love your neighbor as yourself”. The rest of the commands are in the Book. We aren’t saved by works and we don’t remain saved by works, but Jesus said “If you love Me, you will do as I command.” So our proper response to God’s love is obedience. In fact, it’s how life works best.
Even so, in my position, I often have to say “No”. I have to consider the amount of money and energy expended as it relates to the entire church organization. Honestly, there are times I feel like the dream killer more than I get to be the dream enhancer, because I often have to be the “No” voice, but the fact is, as with any organization, we operate with limited resources and sometimes saying no is the right decision at the time. In these times, I have to walk the delicate balance between saying yes and saying no.
Change is necessary, however, if organizations want to continue to improve and grow. The simple fact is that change requires a certain amount of faith. Faith is much easier to believe, and even to preach, than it ever is to live by.
