The Two Kinds of Conversations You Need to Have With Your Children
I really appreciated this.
5 Key Difference Between Church Shoppers and the Unchurched
Helpful distinction.
Talking Baseball with Your Enemies
I’m always open to talking baseball.
Advice for Better Bible Memory
This is a discipline I really need to work on.
Want to see a flamethrower in slow-mo? Here you go:
I’ve been doing ministry now for over a decade. That’s enough time to know both how to be a complete moron and how to actually do a few things correctly. If I had a few minutes to sit a new minister down and share a few things I’ve learned, I know that I’d tell him things about loving Jesus, loving people, and being an absolute servant to the Word of God. But there is one piece of advice that I believe is vital which probably wouldn’t make it incredibly high up on our list of things to say. Here it is:
You cannot fulfill your God-given job of being cold water to a thirsty soul if you give in to wicked men.
I get this principle from Proverbs 25:25-26. “Like cold water to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country. Like a muddied spring or a polluted fountain is a righteous man who gives way before the wicked.”
You are called to be one who gives cold water to thirsty souls. This means that we are to proclaim unadulterated truth. We are to point people to Jesus alone and encourage them to drink only from this fountain. He alone will satisfy. Only the gospel will do. This requires that we have compassion on the thirsty and the chutzpah to travel even from the farthest of countries to give this water to the weary.
But you’ll be tempted time and time again to muddy that stream.
In verse 26 we see the person who ought to be a thirst quencher has now become an unhealthy drinking source because he is now carried along by the wicked. He has made a deal with the wicked and given in to his demands. As a result what ought to be a life-giving stream—and one which people likely formerly relied upon—has now become tainted. This happened because you gave in to the wicked.
Unfortunately the wicked do not walk around with a horn growing out of their head.
They are likely brilliant and successful people. They are the kind of person who you’ll want to pick for your team. If they are in church they won’t be on the sidelines—after all, it goes against the nature of wicked people to remain behind the scenes amongst a bunch of Jesus-followers. They’ll be the ones rising to the top. The one who wants to “serve” in all sorts of places.
These will likely be your best buds as you launch out into ministry. But watch and see what happens when you start fighting for those thirsty souls (Proverbs 29:7). See what happens when things stop being about them (Proverbs 21:4) and how they respond when they don’t get their way (Proverbs 9:7). They’ll be at times overcome with outright paranoia (Proverbs 28:1) and at other times with violent outbursts (Proverbs 12:6).
But remember you won’t see that horn sprout. Their wickedness will almost always be cloaked behind religiosity. But if you pull away the layers you’ll soon discover that it’s all about them and its not about the thirsty souls. This proverb shows says you cannot serve both. You cannot cater to the wicked and be a refuge for the broken at the same time. The thirsty souls need the gospel and the gospel alone. Giving away such a precious treasure is not compatible with the self-serving wicked.
So, you’ll have to choose. And it won’t be easy. Compromise is always an easier path than compassion.
Follow Christ. You are satisfied in Christ because he fought for your thirsty soul. He never caved to wicked men. You don’t either. Even if it costs you your life, your job, or your reputation. No applause is worth polluting the stream. Your fear of any man should not be greater than the one of muddying up the water you are to give to thirsty souls.
There are so many disputable matters in ministry that will demand give-and-take on your part. This isn’t talking about caving on matters of opinion. This is saying don’t move away from what God’s Word clearly says in order to please the wicked. If you do this, if you bow to them in order to keep your job, you are complicit in their wickedness. This is true if you carry out their orders AND if you passively do nothing while their ruin spreads like cancer.
Be about giving water to thirsty souls. Never compromise on that.
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Photo source: here
It’s probably a grace to our family that our son doesn’t like baseball as much as I did. This could be a real temptation for me as a daddy.
Keeping the Faith in a Faithless Age
Just Al Mohler doing what he do
When Your Twenties Are Darker Than Expected
I’m past my twenties but some of our readers are still in that demographic.
The Singular Humility of America’s Only Ordained President
I’ve enjoyed studying the life of James Garfield, very intriguing man.
Let’s be honest, this little girl perfectly shows how most of us dance:
Please keep reading after this next sentence.
I used to be a fan of the Cleveland Browns.
Stay with me. I’ve got a point about leadership and in order to do so I need to confess my error of judgment in cheering for the Browns. You see, I love to cheer for the underdogs. That’s why I’m also a huge fan of the Kansas City Royals—have been for several years. I like seeing teams rise from the ashes and prove everyone wrong. (You can psychologically analyze me on this if you desire).
The truth is I’d still be a Browns fan if it wasn’t for Johnny Manziel. Once they drafted Johnny Football I knew that they’d never be rising from the ashes—at least not until the culture of leadership changed. The thing about Manziel is that he has a ton of talent. He’s also got amazing passion. But they knew he had serious character issues when they drafted him. They drafted him in the hopes that they could fix the character issues—or at least minimize them—while they reaped a harvest off his talents.
I wonder how many churches—and para-churches, for that matter—use the same logic in picking their leaders. If you look at some of the celebrity pastors who have recently fallen you can see a pattern. They had obvious talents and gifts and passion, but there were a few questions about character. But we let some of those character issues slide in the hopes that character would eventually catch up with the talents.
Think with me about that logic. Take someone who struggles with pride and arrogance. And say that these character issues are evident in the early stages of their celebrity. What in the world makes us think that the spotlight will serve as an incubator for holiness?
Craig Hamilton is correct when he says,
“People can pick up skills relatively quickly, but character isn’t something you just pick up. Character is often forged over a long period of time and over multiple experiences, and it only changes with great and sustained effort. It can and does change, but it’s much harder to change your character than it is to learn skills.” (Wisdom in Leadership, 48)
It’s easy to pick on celebrity culture, but I wonder how often this plays out in the local church? You’ve got a gaping whole in your children’s ministry. It seems that all of your prayers are answered as Mr. Good-Theology expresses interest in heading up the department. He has passion, great theology, and tremendous talent. He’s also got a good deal of arrogance to match his gifts.
So what do you do?
Most will propel him to that position of leadership. On the front end the benefits seem to outweigh the pitfalls. We hope that eventually his character will catch up with his gifts. But it seldom does.
Now contrast all of this with my favorite baseball team—the Kansas City Royals. They too were once the underdog. And they still are in the eyes of many baseball projections. But they, unlike the Cleveland Browns, built a culture of character. What is happening in KC is no accident. If given the choice between an A+ talent who has little character and a B+ talent who has great character, KC will choose that second player every time.
Character matters.
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Photo source: here