the work is in God's hands

Matt Chandler was recently asked, How has fighting cancer changed your perspective as a leader? This was his reply:

It’s made me think a lot more about my mortality. For example, if I die and The Village Church falls apart, do I care? I’ll be honest, I don’t. When you look at history, God raises up certain men for certain seasons in certain places. He pours out his Spirit on them, and when they’re done, its very rare for God to continue the work that was done uniquely through them. If I die and The Village ends, I’m alright with that. If believers here find a place where the gospel is preached, and people are being saved, and the mission is being lived out, then I will not have failed.

Initially I put a lot of pressure on myself because in our culture there is the expectation that a ministry has to flourish even after you’re gone. That’s unfair, unhistoric, and maybe even unbiblical. Realizing that took a lot of pressure off of me. I had peace to just faithfully do what I’ve been doing here since day one, and then just let go and see what the Lord does with it.

Praying for Jesus' return

I was at a 'concert of prayer for revival' on Saturday. Many thoughts went through my mind in relation to it but one that has stuck with me is this: why don't we ever have 'a concert of prayer for the return of Jesus'?

Is it less likely to happen than revival? I guess it must be - there's only one 2nd Coming; there have been, and may yet be, many revivals. But I don't think we pray out of mathematical probabilities.

No. I wonder if our heart really is intent on the glory of God? Prayer for revival would seem to say it is, but lack of prayer for Jesus' return in glory would seem to suggest otherwise. Do persecuted Christians pray for revival or for the second advent? And if it's the latter, does the lack of prayer for it amongst the not-so-persecuted suggest a lack of empathy for suffering brothers and sisters?

I was sharing some of these thoughts with a friend and he told me of a conversation with a Brethren brother some years back, who said something to the effect that the place held in reformed theology by revival was held in brethren theology by the second coming of Jesus.

And I went away pondering where the emphasis lies in the New Testament.

Five Pioneer Missionaries

(The most helpful books - no.2)

I guess I must have read this book in about 1987/88, as a fairly young Christian. It's a collection of essays, originally written for a competition, I believe, on the lives of significant pioneer missionaries and covers David Brainerd, William C Burns, John Eliot, Henry Martyn and John G Paton.

It made a real impact on me. Here were serious men, intent on serving Jesus irrespective of cost and their focus was on people who hadn't yet heard of Jesus.

I'm sure I read it with an unhealthy dose of romanticism and unrealism, which was my fault, not the book's. But its impact on me was significant.

You can still buy it.

Are you a sentimental pastor?

Sentimentalists cannot distinguish their anxiety from their empathy. They confuse their own need to be less anxious in the face of pain with true regard for another. Thus they rescue others. They take over the life of helpless souls. Sometimes they appease others and give up their own souls. Sentimentalists cannot balance sensitivity with awareness.

Peter L. Steinke, How Your Church Family Works: Understanding Congregations as Emotional Systems, p.58

Anxiety in the church

When anxiety is high, resilience is low. Behaviors are extreme and rigid; thoughts are unclear and disjointed. Anxious people speak harsh words or cut themselves off from others through silence. To manage their threatening situation, people hurry to localize their anxiety. They blame and criticize. Yet it is one thing for a system to be shattered by shocking events and another to be shackled by its own reactive tremors. Once a system fortifies its stability by its reactivity, it cannot get what it needs most: time and distance, calm and objectivity, clarity and imagination. It is caught in its own automatic processes. But a relationship system does not live by reaction alone but by every resource at its disposal. Therefore a system that maintains its stability by reactivity alone will not be stable in the long run. Continuous reactivity creates three processes that prevent the system from being resourceful and flexible—a shrinking of perspective, a tightening of the circle, and a shifting of the burden. Consequently it is not apt to repair itself, plan for the future, and find a new direction.

Peter L Steinke, How Your Church Family Works: Understanding Congregations As Emotional Systems 

John Murray on the phrase 'the last days'

This implies ages of this world's history that were not the last days; they were prior, preparatory, anticipatory. The last days are characterised by two comings, notable, unprecedented, indeed astounding - the coming into the world of the Son of God and the Spirit of God. In order to accentuate the marvel of these comings we must say that God came into the world, first in the person of the Son and then in the person of the Holy Spirit. They came by radically different modes and for different functions. But both are spoken of as comings and they are both epochal events. These comings not only introduce and characterise the last days; they create or constitute them.

John Murray, The Unity of the Old and New Testaments, Collected Works Volume 1, page 23

John Murray on The Bible

Apart from the Scriptures and the knowledge derived from them, we today would be in complete darkness respecting the content of our Christian faith. We must not deceive ourselves as to the darkness and confusion that would be ours if there were no Bible. We depend upon the message of Scripture for every tenet of our faith, for every ray of redemptive light that illumines our minds, and for every ray of hope against the issues of time and eternity. Christianity for us today without the Bible is something inconceivable.

John Murray, The Infallibility of Scripture, Collected Works Volume 1, p.11

Why Sin Matters (Mark McMinn)

(The most helpful books - no.1)

I first came across Mark McMinn when I got hold of what is itself a really helpful book, Integrative Psychotherapy, co-authored with Clark Campbell. It sent me looking for author things Mark has written and Why Sin Matters is top of that list for me (but you ought to also see his more specialist work, Sin and Grace in Christian Counselling).

Why Sin Matters is neither soft on sin, nor light on grace. It affirms the terrible problem that sin is, in all the fulness of its putrid infection, and it then shows the absolute sufficiency of God's grace to overcome sin. He makes helpful use of Rembrandt's work, 'The Return of the Prodigal' and writes with a disarming honesty (itself the fruit of grace).

Every pastor - indeed, every Christian - would benefit hugely from reading this.