Leadership Competency in the Local Church: Meet Our Panel

On October 2, our Association will host our annual session at Hope Baptist Church in Laurel MD. This year's theme is "Great Leaders . . .Great Churches," and our primary emphasis will be on the issue of Leadership Competency in the Local Church. Both our annual meeting and the next day's Pastor Leadership Forums will focus on this crucial topic, and the plenary meeting on Sunday night will include a panel discussion on this issue by seasoned pastors and leaders in our churches. In this post, I want to introduce you to those men.

Our Association is blessed to have a number of competent leaders as pastors, as well as many skilled lay-leaders. The panel below represents some of the best and wisest in our network of churches. I hope you will join us for this time of learning if you are in the Baltimore-Washington, D.C. area. You can sign up here.



Dr. Chris Brammer.
For the past 24 years, Chris has served as Senior Pastor of Hampstead Baptist Church in northern Carroll County. Under his leadership, the church has grown to an average attendance of more than 450 every Sunday. Currently, he is leading the church through its next expansion project, and simultaneously working with our Association in establishing a satellite campus in Upperco called "The Mount." He is a graduate of Southwestern Seminary, and Luther Rice Seminary. Chris is from Roanoke, VA, and he and his wife Lee have three children and 2 grandchildren.

In his more than two decades of pastoral leadership in Hampstead, Chris has been instrumental in raising up pastors and missionaries. Because of this, Hampstead Baptist Church has representation on mission fields and in pulpits all over the world.




Pastor Gary Glanville.
Gary has served as Senior Pastor of Northwest Baptist Church in Reisterstown for 32 years. Under his leadership, the church has grown to more than 500, and has planted four other churches over the past 7 years. He and his wife Debbie have three children and three grandchildren. He is a graduate of Dallas Baptist University.

After three decades of ministry to the same local congregation, Pastor Gary is uniquely qualified to discuss the various stages of change, power, and conflict that a church experiences through the years, and how best to navigate through that change.




Pastor Dan Hyun
Originally from Philadelphia, Dan is the founding and Lead Pastor of The Village, a new church he started in 2008 in Hampden Village in Baltimore. In less than 3 years, the church has grown to more than 80 people in worship, and more than 20 people finding Jesus. Dan has a missionary's heart, and is passionate about "planting the Gospel" in the city, and seeing church emerge from that evangelistic work.

A graduate of Biblical Seminary in Hatfield, PA, He and his wife Judie have two daughters. Dan will bring much insight to the discussion of leading the mission of the church.



Pastor Paul Andrews
Paul is the founding and Lead Pastor of Faith Family Church in Finksburg, MD. Under his leadership the church has grown to an average attendance of 250 since it was planted in 2002. He is a ministry veteran of more than 30 years, and as such, is able to speak with authority to issues of leading change and leading mission. He and his wife Judy have 3children and 2 grandchildren.

Paul is a graduate of Bob Jones University, and is currently working on a D.Min. from The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY.



Dr. Steve Neel
This year, Steve will celebrate 30 years as Senior Pastor of South Columbia Baptist Church. Steve became pastor at
South Columbia while the church was still a “mission church” with just a few dozen people. Over the past three decades the church has grown exponentially under his steady leadership to an average attendance of more than 350 each Sunday.

Steve is known as a steady pastoral leader, and can speak with authority to the issue of how to guide God's church with a steady hand, that is in turn governed by a steady head. Born in Washington, D.C., Steve is a graduate of Dallas Theological Seminary. He and his wife Nancy have three adult children.



Pastor Terry Felton
For the past 10 years, Terry has served the Mason-Dixon Baptist Church in New Freedom, PA, first as Associate Pastor, and since 2006 as Senior Pastor. A decade ago, Terry entered a ministry environment that had been marked to a large degree by conflict. Today, Mason-Dixon is a unified body of believers committed to accomplishing the mission of God both locally and globally.

Terry's experiences over the past 10 years can more greatly inform the process of change, power and conflict in a church, and many younger church leaders can learn from Terry's efforts to earn the respect and trust needed to lead a congregation as a young man.

He is a graduate of Liberty Baptist Theological Seminary in Lynchburg, VA. He and his wife Amanda have four children.



Mr. Neil Romano
Neil joins our panel as a layman, and will help us see the issues we discuss from the standpoint of laity, as well as speak to the aspects of leadership outside the church that will be helpful to pastors. He is the owner of The Romano Group, LLC, a media company that has produced, among other things, commercial material for Major League Baseball. Additionally, Neil has vast experience in government, having served as Communications Director for the White House Office of Drug Abuse Policy under President Reagan, and most recently as Assistant Secretary of Labor for Dissability Policy under President Bush. He is a national spokesman and strong advocate for employment of the disabled.

He and his wife Barbara have two children, and live in Clarksville, MD. They are members of Gethsemane Baptist Church in Glenwood.



Dr. Tom Fillinger
Tom has served as Senior Pastor of Southeast Community Church in Columbia, SC for more than 10 years, and is also CEO of IgniteUS, a leadership development and church consulting organization that seeks to empower pastors and churches toward transformational change. A veteran of the U.S. Navy, Tom had the privilege of having a front row seat to the Cuban missle blockade in 1962, so he knows a little something about conflict to say the least. In many ways, military conflict may have prepared him well for pastoral ministry in a Baptist church. :) He has decades of experience transitioning churches to be more effective in impacting their communities and fulfilling the Great Commission to make disciples.

He is a graduate of Denver Seminary, and has been married to his wife Peggy for 50 years. They have 3 children and 13 grandchildren.


I have the privilege of serving as Moderator of this panel. I hope you will join us to learn from these experienced pastors and leaders. What, in particular, will we talk about? The answer to that question is coming in subsequent posts. And if you have a question for this panel, leave it here at the blog, or email it to wecare@wecare.org with "Leadership Panel" in the subject line. We will also take questions from the floor, and text message questions at the meeting.

Sign up now, and sign up here. And check back here for updated information as we move toward October 2.

Great Leaders, Great Churches: A Discussion about Leadership Competency in the Church

On October 2, our Association will host our annual session with the theme "Great Leaders. . .Great Churches." The next day, we will host two Pastor's Forums in two different locations in our area to continue the conversation.

Thus far, the response has been roughly twice what we usually receive at this time, and I think I know why.

Instictively, pastors and the people they lead are aware of the crucial importance of skilled leadership. Though they tend to lag behind the curve, even colleges and seminaries are now acknowledging the need to address this issue from an academic standpoint. For the past 10 years, programs have been developed to better prepare aspiring church leaders for the seas they will have to navigate once they leave the academy and accompanying study of the church as it should be, and enter into service in the church as it actually is. The Editor of Preaching magazine said only a year ago that "there is a desparate need for more training in leadership."

Those who study the church have long recognized this. George Barna noted six years ago that "our ongoing research continued to show that churches do not act strategically because of a paucity of leadership."

Yet still the question remains, "What is a competent leader?" The need for such has been widely acknowleged, but a Biblically sound, clear and succinct description of what it looks like is scarce, if it exists at all.

The lack of clarity on this issue leaves many pastors wondering if they are truly effective, if they are spending their time in the wisest way, if they are accomplishing anything of eternal value. It also leaves many churches without a clear way to evaluate their pastor's service. For some churches, this means there is no accountability for their pastor. Other churches make up their own rules, and usually end up crucifying a guy.

If pastors were simply C.E.O.s of a business, the "bottom line" would be a sufficient marker of success, and of course in the church, the "bottom line" consists of attendance, baptisms, and giving. Church leaders are correct to point out that while these are incredibly important markers (those numbers, after all, represent the souls of people Jesus died to save), they are not the only ones that should be used to judge the competency of a ministry leader. The Scriptures bear out in many contexts that faithfulness sometimes means less numbers instead of more.

On the other hand, I have over almost 20 years of vocational ministry seen the occassional pastor who did not want accountability at all. "We aren't about numbers" is sometimes simply a cover to hide a Hyper-Calvinist aversion to evangelism, or laziness, or outright incompetence. These men take personal advantage of the church's nebulous approach to how competency is judged. I've also seen churches use the ambiguity on this issue in order to pick virtually anything they can find to criticize, demean, and even destroy a faithful pastor.

On October 2-3, we will begin a conversation that I hope at least for our context, will provide our pastors and churches with the tools to evaluate their leadership. Until that time, I will be posting leading questions here for discussion, as well as taking suggested questions back to our panel of pastors who will lead us on October 2.

In my next post, I'll be introducing that panel to you. These are all men who are faithful and effective pastors within our Association, and I'll be giving a brief profile of each of them so you can see for yourself the kind of men who will be fielding these questions. After this, I'll spend a few weeks discussing some of the subject matter we hope to cover in October. If you are in the Baltimore-Washington D.C. area you are welcome to join us, and you can find details and sign up online here.

But no matter where you are, this is a critical issue for all churches, and I hope you will join in the forthcoming discussion.

Summer Reading for Pastors and Church Leaders

"What are you reading?" I've been hearing that question since I started out in ministry more than 19 years ago. In the beginning, it came from older, wiser and seasoned pastors who used the question as a way to start a conversation that would guide me in my own development. Years later, the question continues to be asked by ministry colleagues as an avenue of inquiry and accountability.

But in recent years, I'm beginning to notice that when I answer this question, people actually take my answers seriously. Whether I'm old enough or wise enough for this reaction to be justified I can't tell, but regardless, I'm always recommending what I believe to be good (and also not-so-good, but neccesary) reading to those who lead our churches.

As the summer continues, I wanted to provide a recommended reading list for 2011, as I have done in past years. The list below is diverse. Some books are strictly theological in nature, others deal with cultural engagement and mission, and still others amount to heresy. But if you were to ask me to list for you the seven books that any pastor or church leader MUST put on their read list for the summer, I'd respond with the following (in no particular order):

1. Alan Hirsch and Dave Ferguson. "On the Verge: A Journey into the Apostolic Future of the Church." (Zondervan, 2011)
*The western church is currently swimming (or drowning!) in a sea of data that says its days as a relevant entity to civilization are numbered. In this bold work, Hirsch and Ferguson contend just the opposite: that the western church is at the point of "turning a corner" and becoming more powerful and effective than it has been in hundreds of years. But this new future won't look very much like the past. As Hirsch repeatedly states throughout the book, "what got us HERE, won't neccesarily get us THERE." Through four main sections of the book entitled "Imagine," "Shift," "Innovate," and "Move," the authors challenge the reader to conceptualize new expressions of church that don't contradict or compete with church in its current expression, but instead compliment it. As is usually the case with Hirsch, the book is almost conceptual to a fault, leavng the reader with the work of translating the concepts practially into his own ministry field. But I finished this volume highly encouraged about the future of the bride of Christ in the United States and Europe.

2. Timothy Webster. "Christ-Centered Pastors: Four Essentials Pastors Must Do To Focus on Christ, Not Man." (Cross Books, 2010)
Tim Webster is a Bible church pastor in my local area here in Maryland, and a friend to pastors everywhere. This concise volume (less than 300 pages, which is quite short when one considers the total content covered) deals with basics like pastoral character and qualifications, as well as church polity, church discipline, and the spiritual development of disciples. And unlike so many books written on these subjects, Webster's book actually lays out practical ways that a pastor can lead his congregation toward these ideals. He does take what I consider to be a few unfair swipes at guys like Jim Collins, and paints a picture of the business literature many pastors read today as more mutually exclusive from Biblical leadership than I personally believe it is. He is also an adamant supporter of a plurality of elders style of leadership, so some in my Baptist tribe might be a bit uneasy with his conclusions. But I believe he is fair in his representation of congregational govenance, and in fact believes the two can coexist (I agree!). In the end, this is a great "refresher read" for pastors, and a healthy challenge to ensure that one's focus is truly on Jesus and His mission.

3. Millard J. Erickson. "Who's Tampering with the Trinity? An Assessment of the Subordination Debate." (Kregel Academic and Professional, 2009)
For those who may be unaware, there is a debate currently raging in evangelical academic circles over certain elements of the doctrine of the trinity. In academic vernacular, this debate is between those holding the "gradational-authority view" and the "equivalent authority view" of the relationship of the persons within the Godhead. Erickson, the consummate theologian in his classic fashion, makes this debate understandable, and applicable in the life of the local church.
If you are wondering why on earth I would recommend a book like this, or why on earth the average pastor should care, I will propose that one's understanding of these issues will eventually affect one's views of church leadership, the role of women in the church, and even one's understanding of prayer. In short, this debate is eventually going to find its way into the local church, although admittedly it will do so using more common language. Understanding the theological issues in play that will lie behind these discussions will help the local church pastor to be ready, and to effectively lead his people through these discussions.

4. Rob Bell. "Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived." (HarperOne, 2011)
Be honest, you knew this one was coming, didn't you? Too many pastors simply dismiss best-selling books from the pulpit rather than deal with the actual content--usually because they don't agree with the book's conclusions. The result is that your people will read these books anyway, and have no guidance on how to assess or process its contents. So yes, I'm recommending you buy the book, which admittedly will add to Bell's royalties. I'm also recommending that you read it thoroughly, and be prepared to agree with Bell on several issues. There is much valid content in this book, although it can only be found squeezed in between shoddy historical research, "cherry-picked" Bible verses and irresponsible hermaneutics. As a pastor, you should be familiar with books like this one. And you should admit to your people that there is in fact, some good to be found in them. You should also remind them that they can find clean water in the bottom of the toilet too, and that doesn't mean they should drink it.

5. David Hesselgrave and Ed Stetzer. "MissionSHIFT: Global Mission Issues in the Third Millenium." (B&H, 2010)
I recommend this book assuming that you are a church leader who understands God's command for every local assembly to have a vision for evangelism as large as history and as all-encompassing as the globe. At the same time, this volume will help the local church leader to understand all the conversation currently surrounding western, domestic missions as well. Words like "relavancy" and "contextualization" are a bit spooky to some, and the concepts, as well as examples of good and not-so-good application of them, are outlined and debated well by more than a dozen seasoned pastors and missiologists. Like any aquisition work, not all articles are of the same caliber, and some even miss the point completely (I'm looking at you, Norman Geisler.) But I am aware of no better resource that helps bring understanding to the future of God's global mission.

6. Darrin Patrick and Matt Carter. "For the City: Proclaiming and Living Out the Gospel" (Zondervan, 2011)
Don't look for a ton of practical instruction on how urban ministry and church planting should be done here. (Instead, read virtually anything Harvie Conn has published). But do look forward to being encouraged, challenged, and having your own heart enlarged for the urban centers of the world. These two Acts29 network pastors share their own ministry biographies, and in so doing are communicating how God is at work in two of American's great cities through the impact of local churches with a passion for the city.

7. James Davison Hunter. "To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy, and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World." (Oxford, 2010)
I've already written a comprehensive review of this book, which can be found here, and also in the forthcoming edition of the Great Commission Research Journal. In short, this book provides a helpful beginning to a conversation about how best to engage and change culture with the Gospel. Hunter's conclusions are a bit fuzzy, but he asks ALL the right questions . . . questions that every pastor and church leader should also be asking.

False Prophecy is No Laughing Matter: What I've Learned from Harold Camping

"When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him." -Deuteronomy 18:22, ESV

"But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction." " -2 Peter 2:1 ESV

Let's face it, both the world and the church got a big kick out of Harold Camping's failed prophecy. It wasn't just late night comedians who benefited from Camping's idiocy. Christians everywhere made fun of this man and his prophecies. I should know. I was one of them.

And I was wrong.

By this, I don't mean that I've suddenly begun to grant credibility to Camping and his twisted message. I simply mean that for a follower of Jesus, false prophets and false messages are no laughing matter. They are eternally and deadly serious. And I was reminded of this as I read Al Mohler's article on this issue this morning.

Several weeks ago, I joined many of my non-Christian friends in their mockery of Camping. To be honest, they had some brilliant ideas about how to milk this thing for all it was worth! Leaving clothes on the ground surrounded by dry ice to make it appear as though they had been "raptured" struck a humorous chord with me, and I have to admit to laughing out loud at the pictures.

To be sure, many an Old Testament prophet spent his fair share of time mocking false prophets. (Elijah's suggestion that Baal might be too constipated to play "King of the Hill" on Mt. Carmel comes immediately to mind.) But in the end, even when mockery is employed as an apologetic tool, the seriousness of false prophecy is always made plain in the Biblical text. For the most part, this was not the case on May 21.

So after some reflection on these recent events, I've come to the conclusion that my approach to all this Camping madness was wrong. Though Camping and his "interpretations" are most certainly a joke, what this teaching has done to the name of Jesus Christ for the past 20 years is no laughing matter at all.

Within Christendom, sheep have been led astray by this false teacher, to the point that many of them emptied bank accounts and left gainful employment only to see May 21 come and go, and their livelihoods with it. Outside the body of Christ, many had their focus turned from Jesus to Harold Camping, and beginning early on May 22, secular news outlets turned from merely mocking Camping, to mocking the idea of Jesus' second coming altogether.

The name of Christ was drug through the mud by Harold Camping, and all I did was laugh about it.

Mohler's article this morning simply confirmed for me that the church needs to renew its commitment to confronting false teachers. Like wolves in a sheep pen, it is not sufficient to simply acknowlege their existence. It is not enough to simply identify the wolves among the sheep. We must also draw them out, separate them, and shoot them (not literally of course, but the analogy of wolf-hunting does indicate how ferocious out confrontation of false teachers should be) out of our love for the name of Jesus, and His true sheep.

To be sure, a man who denies the reality of hell, denies the legitimacy of Christ's church and refuses to be held accountable by other brothers in Christ has clearly exhibited the characteristics of a wolf. And wolves are no laughing matter.

So to my non-Christian friends, though it is always fun to laugh with you, I'm very sorry to have misrepresented how serious this issue was to you. Camping is wrong, but Jesus IS coming back . . .to the wailing of those who do not follow Him. It is true that no one knows the day or hour, but that day/hour is coming with absolute certainty, and I am sorry to have wasted an opportunity like this to talk about the REAL second coming of Jesus Christ. Camping does not represent Jesus or His message, but I should have made that message more plain to you.

To my Christian friends, let us commit from this moment on to stand vigilant against anyone who would defame the name of our Lord and Savior. Rest assured, this is not the last time a false prophet will make a ridiculous claim in the name of Jesus. Next time, lets commit to treating this issue as seriously as the Bible does.

Mohler's excellent article can be found here.

Tornadoes, Terrorism, and Other Reasons we need a Sovereign God: Part II

As I write, the clean-up from terrible storms that tore through the south three weeks ago continues. Two weeks ago when seeking to address these storms, and other current and terrible events from a proper God-centered perspective, no one was aware that this same region of the country would continue to reel from the effects of storms in the upper mid-west, which in turn caused massive flooding along the southern Mississippi River, and in turn have forced officials to intentionally flood lesser populated areas for the sake of cities like Baton Rouge and New Orleans, LA, in a game of “lesser of two evils.”

Our God on the other hand, knew of these events even prior to creation! Furthermore, the Scriptures declare that His good and sovereign purposes are accomplished in such things. And this truth, whether applied to national crises such as storms and terrorism, or personal crises such as my own family has sometimes faced, gives the kind of assurance to believers that only a sovereign God can give.

Still, these blanket statements of God's complete control over all things beg further questions in our minds. How can such horrific events as the Japan nuclear disaster, or the perishing of newborn babies, or the flooding of entire town and subsequent washing away of history be part of the plans of a God who is always good?! Admittedly, no final answer to these questions can be given on this side of eternity. Yet even in the midst of this uncertainty, the Scriptures declare that there are things we can know for sure, and things in which our hope must lie, not only during crises, but throughout every moment of our lives.

In Deuteronomy 29:29, Moses sucinctly describes this juxtaposition when he says to the people of Israel: "The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and our sons forever, that we may observe all the words of this law." The first phrase of this statement speaks poignantly, if bluntly, to our present situation. Put simply, Almighty God is not obligated to explain Himself or His actions to any of us! There are things that take place in this world in which lie God's "secret things." The Hebrew term here translated "secret" means, in its verbal form, "to conceal." Whether it is because of our self-centerdness, or because God knows we would never understand anyway, He has chosen to keep certain of His purposes hidden from us. As I said in the last post, the ultimate why question simply cannot be answered.

And never have such Biblical truths been more profoundly driven into my own heart than in times of personal and family crisis! On a Sunday night almost 6 years ago, my then-pregnant wife went into pre-term labor. Sixteen hours later, our son Seth was born just before noon and five weeks early! Early reports were not good, and we sat, as do many new moms and dads in this situation, on "pins and needles." It would be fifteen days before he would be allowed to go home, and in that time period, a myriad of tests, and painful procedures such as spinal taps would have to be performed. Today, he is a healthy, 5 ½ year-old little boy who is the delight of his father’s heart, and full of energy. But in the midst of that crisis, the uncertainty and anxiety were palpable. Additionally, as I ponder the wonderful way our trying story ended, I’m acutely aware of young parent’s whose stories do not end on such a joyful note. I have pastored those families, and officiated at those funerals where the casket in front of me was unnaturally small. As always, the question comes: Why?

In such a situation, both sides of Deuteronomy 29:29 are imminently applicable. First, just as God isn't obligated to explain why He allows the things he allows. To speak bluntly, His reasons for this are His business!

Still, we have yet to look more closely at the other half of this verse: "but the things revealed belong to us and to our sons forever, that we may observe all the words of this law." My wife and I have learned through the above and other examples that while God chooses to keep some things to Himself, He does not want us totally ignorant. But while such events may tempt us to search for knowledge of the events themselves, God uses such events to steer us toward knowing Him. God doesn't want the United States to know why we have experienced an historic number of terrible storms, or why we continue to live anxiously in the current environment of terrorism, just as God didn't want me to know why we had to helplessly watch our second-born son spend more than two weeks in NICU. But through all of these things, He does want humanity to know Him. And when we know Him, we learn other things the Word has revealed:

Our Dependence: Isaiah Chapters 13-23 describe the future of a number of powerful nations that existed in the prophet's day. . . powerful nations, I might add, that either longer exist, or have barely survived to the present day in a severely weakened state! In this section of Biblical prophecy, God through his servant Isaiah predicts the destruction of Babylon (13:1-14:23), Assyria (14:24-28), Phillistia (14:29-32), Moab (15:1-16:13), Damascus (17:1-14), Ethiopia (18:1-7), Egypt (19:1-24), and a host of other nations. The political context of these passages suggest that Isaiah, through these predictions, is warning Judah not to enter into alliances with these countries to shore up its own security. This is also consistent with the overall political nuance of Isaiah's message: "Trust in the Lord, not in alliances with foreign and pagan nations." The point is simple: Judah will not find security in any nation, only in God!

With that said, the question must always be poised as to where our hope lies. In the wake of a natural disaster or attack of terror, some will hope in the cooperation of local, state and federal government. Still, even the most efficient coordination efforts cannot totally prevent the damage. Some may even hope in the return of Christ.(In fact, I hear there are a few expecting Him to make His entrance this Saturday, but I digress onto the ridiculous!) But while Scripture commends such hope, it does not do so on the basis of escape from the hardships of life. In addition, the second coming didn't prevent believers along with unbelievers from feeling the wrath of last month’s storms.

Similarly, while waiting on my son’s health to improve years ago, I was forced to continually ask myself whether the greater portion of my hope lay with the excellent physicians and nurses who treated him, or in God who at this very moment continues to allow his now-healthy heart to beat. During any crisis, be it personal, national, or somewhere in between, the first step to finding peace is to realize that we are often more vulnerable than we think we are! Such a realization will compel us to look to God alone.

Our Responsibility: We may not know why God allows calamity, but even the one casually aquainted with Scripture knows what God expects of us when such clamity strikes. It is during times like these that the public at large is able to see the feet, hands, and compassion of Jesus Christ Himself through the presence of His church. And God commands that we act, not only as His mouth, but as His hands and feet.

Bob Foster is a walking example of this principle. Struck blind in an auto accident, Bob could have spend the rest of his life asking why. Instead, he asked what. And over the past several years since his accident, he has walked the halls of nursing homes in Howard County, ministering to residents there, and leading over 40 of them to faith in Jesus Christ! In short, we may not know all that God is doing through crises, but the text of Scripture is clear as to what our responsibilities are during such times.

Our Calling: Some things God doesn't intend for His people to know. Other things He wants us to know! And Deuteronomy tells us that those revealed things are for the purpose of our observing "all the words of this law." I don't know all the reasons God allows intense trial, but none of that allows me to abdicate my responsibilities as a husband, father, neighbor, citizen, and pastor! Sometimes, we simply don't know what God is up to. We do, however, know from the Bible what He wants from us in obedience, and those requirements don't change in bad times.

Our Confidence: Moses tells us that the things God has revealed have been given to us "and to our sons forever." My last post dealt more specifically with the neccesity of believing in a sovereign God, but this emphasis must be reiterated again. Promises of a secure eternity, the end of sin and death, the final, triumphant return of Jesus Christ and the subsequent inauguration of an eternity of the glory of God are things we can be confident in only because the God we serve has declared the end from the beginning! It is illogical, not to mention unBiblical, to claim that God has somehow lost control of His creation, yet at the same time claim absolute assurance of His promises in Scripture. You simply cannot have one without the other!

This requires believing the hard truth that God really does control all things. It requires believing that although he is not responsible for sin and evil, such things are used, even against the will of those who perpetrate them, toward the advancement of an ultimate good. As Rick Warren has simply stated, we aren't in heaven. We are on earth! And this means that heartache, destruction, pain, death, sadness, sickness, perversion, crime, poverty, injustice, confusion, and other issues will always be with us on this sin-sick planet. But the Word of God tells us that even these things are under His control. Such a truth may be difficult short-term, but in the long run, it is the only basis on which we base our confidence in His promises, and cry along with John in absolute certainty, "even so, come Lord Jesus!"

For Further Reading:

Bray, Gerald. 1993. The Doctrine of God: Contours of Christian Theology. Downers Grove, IL: Intevarsity Press.

Packer, J.I. 1973. Knowing God. Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press.

McCullough, Donald W. 1995. The Trivialization of God: The Dangerous Illusion of a Manageable Deity. Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress.

Ware, Bruce A. 2003. Their god is Too Small: Open Theism and the Undermining of Confidence in God. Wheaton, IL: Crossway.

Tornadoes, Terrorism, and Other Reasons we need a Sovereign God: Part I

Does God know the future? Furthermore, has God declared the future? How much control does He actually exert over His creation? Questions of this sort often seem to be relegated to the "ivory towers" of theologial conjecture. But when the kind of chaos—both positive and negative--that has recently affected our nation encloses itself around our lives, those deeply philosophical questions quickly become the ones for which we seek answers.

While we try with all our being to think of God as good, right and just, we look at the soaring energy prices at home, with the devastation brought about by terrible storms throughout the south last week against the backdrop, and ask in anguish the age-old question best coined by the prophet Amos: "Does disaster come to a city unless the Lord has done it?"

Philosophers of Religion call this question one of "theodicy," or an attempt to explain and justify the actions of God. Why would He allow such devastation? Yet when disaster of this magnitude strikes, any attempt to verbally express what God is up to seems to fall short, and those who claim to have a handle on God's plans (think Jerry Falwell after September 11) seem as naive as they really are.

Still others assume that God must simply be "asleep at the wheel." Throughout the American media the assumption seems to be that "God can either be all-powerful, or all-good, but he cannot be both." As the average American surveys the landscape in our country today, it would be easy to come to the same conclusion, regardless of how ahistorical and unBiblical such a position would be.

The ironic thing is how many suporters of this view of God exist inside Christendom! A relatively recent theological movement called open theism, which has been afoot in the church for a little over 15 years now, takes the side of this populist view of God: namely, that He doesn't control everything that happens in the world, and that He too is often caught off-guard by the chaotic events of our planet. Such a view goes beyond the historical debate between Calvinists and Arminians, which deals primarily with the extent of God's sovereignty over against the extent of man's freedom. The current debate moves beyond the issue of "free-will" to suggest not only that God doesn't predetermine events in history, but that He sometimes is competely unaware of these events!

Gregory Boyd, Senior Pastor at Woodland Hills Church in Minneapolis and Open Theism's most vocal proponent, introduced this view of God to the church en masse via his 2000 book God of the Possible. Boyd's intentions were honorable. Seeking an explanation for the seemingly inexplicable suffering many Christians are forced to experience in life, Boyd simply suggested that perhaps our concept of God as omniscient (all-knowing of all past, present and future events) was in error. Says Boyd, "The open view, I submit, allows us to say consistently in unequivocal terms that the ultimate source for all evil is found in the will of free agents rather than in God."

On the surface, this view seems to serve as the ultimate and final answer to the question of theodicy: God isn't causing the affliction because He is love, and would never send something like this on a person. This is not to say that open theists believe God is ignorant of the possibility of catastrophe, but rather does not know that something will actually happen. Therefore, catastrophes like the tornadoes of last week aren't something caused by God. They just happened! In reality, God is just as surprised as the rest of us, because often He simply doesn't know about coming affliction, much less how severe it will be. Similarly, the squeeze you and I have felt over this past month as gas prices have risen by double-digit percentages, and the accompanying anxiety over whether we will be able to afford transportation are not the result of a God-ordained event. They can't be, because God is just as much in shock over these things as we are!

Furthermore, it must be asserted that the Scriptures do indeed place the responsibility for evil squarely upon the will of man. The justice of Osama bin Laden’s extermination by American military forces is vindicated by his evil acts over the years against innocent human beings, and his behavior is the epitome of human depravity within a context most conducive to its development.. But is this where the questions end? Is there no higher purpose behind chaos and catastrophe? In the end, Open Theism's attempt to "get God off the hook" leaves the seeker with little hope, and little incentive to look to the God of Scripture for an answer. To seekers of truth, a deeper investigation must ensue.

Contrary to the claims of open theists, the historical view of God, while not answering every question definitively, gives great hope to the one who truly believes. The Scriptural teaching concerning God's sovereignty can basically be boiled down to three truths:
1. All that God decrees or permits is ultimately for good, because God cannot sin, nor does He tempt others to sin.
2. All evil falls upon the shoulders of men.
3. Evil is thus allowed by a sovereign God, but He is not responsible for the evil permitted.

One Biblical example among many that could be given summarizes these truths well. In Isaiah 10, the prophet foretells of the destruction of the nation of Assyria. In the 8th century B.C., Assyria was to the world what the United States is today to the world: a lone superpower. Yet because of her disdain for and mistreatment of the people of God in Israel, God through Isaiah foretells of their ultimate demise.

Still, this demise did not come until after the Assyrian armies invaded Israel, killed, raped, maimed and scattered God's people, and settled in the land to intermarry with the leftover Israelites and create a new, Samaritan race. Furthermore, God through the prophet declares that the plan to invade Israel did not belong first to Assyria, but to God Himself as punishment for Israel's idolatry. This ironic juxtaposition is revealed by the grammatical structure of the text: "Ah Assyria, the rod of my anger; the staff in their hands is my fury! Against a godless nation I send him, and against the people of my wrath I command him to take spoil and seize plunder, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets. But he does not so intend, and in his heart does not so think; but it is in his heart to destroy, and to cutt off nations not a few." (10:5-7 ESV)

The text could not be any more clear! God ordained that His own people should be utterly and embarrasingly defeated at the hands of enemies even more godless than they were! Yet while the evil actions of the Assyrian armies is used by God to correct and ultimately bring His people back to Himself, the evil desire behind those actions is the fault of the Assyrians. In this passage, Isaiah has struck the correct balance between divine sovereingty and human responsibility, and he has done so without diminishing God's knowlege and power, or man's culpability and free choice to do evil.

How can the prophet do this? Ultimately because his prophecy is based within a more fully-orbed picture of a God who really does control everything, even those unimaginable and horrific events that boggle the human mind. That true and Biblical picture of God is given by the Lord himself to Isaiah later in the text, and in a way that reminds His followers in the midst of seeming chaos to stand on the promises of His sovereign will: "Remember this and stand firm, recall it to mind, you transgressors, remember the former things of old; for I am God and there is no other; I am God and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things not yet done."

Such a picture of God gives people hope in times of uncertainty. But it does far more than this.

As our nation struggles to make sense of last week’s storms, while simultaneously bracing itself for any potential backlash from Sunday night’s fatal confrontation with bin Laden, followers of Jesus Christ are called upon to be the feet, hands, voice and compassion of God Himself. And the church for the most part has responded beautifully, as is but partially evidenced by meals served and rebuilding already taking place by my own denomination's disaster relief efforts in the area.

But how do we connect the relief efforts with the above lessons on a sovereign God? What hath Isaiah 46 to do with Matthew 25:31-46? I will speak to this issue more particulary next week. But for now, suffice it to say that it is not only Christians who need a sovereign God in times of crisis. Now, more than ever, the people of Mississippi, Alabama and surrounding areas need a God who is sovereign! Receiving the truth about this God means that we also accept the hard truth that these tornadoes were His storms, traveling His path, and accomplishing His purposes!

But what purpose? How could those purposes have possibly included the hundreds of innocent lives lost? How can we conceive of a God who allows such things? These questtions have no easy answer, and what His purposes were will likely never be fully known on this side of eternity! But this much we know--the same great God who controls the weather commands that we give shelter, food and clothing to the homeless, hungry and naked. And with these supplies, He also commands that we communicate to the victims of this disaster that God is not only great. He is also good!

How can this be? Reflection on this question will come next week.

New Paradigms for Cultural Engagement: A Review of "To Change the World."

This week, I'm at the Exponential conference in Orlando, the largest gathering of church planters in the world. As is usually the case with conferences of this nature, much time is being spent emphasizing the importance of cultural exegesis and contextualization. Being surrounded by these themes all week reminds me of the vociferous nature of the debate surrounding all these issues.

Recently, I wrote a book review that is scheduled to be published in the forthcoming issue of The Great Commission Research Journal. The book I reviewed contains one man's take on how the church needs to adjust its approach to mission in the West in order to make a significant impact. James Davison Hunter's book is a mind-bending read, and a great "iron-sharpening" tool for followers of Christ who are truly looking for ways to have more influence on an increasingly post-Christian world in the United States and Europe.

James Davison Hunter is the LaBrosse-Levinson Distinguished Professor of Religion, Culture and Social Theory at the University of Virginia, and also serves as the Director of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture. He is also the author of Culture Wars and The Death of Character.

Hunter’s latest volume is the product of roughly ten years of research into the subject of cultural engagement. It consists of three major essays that address the Christian mandate relative to culture, issues of change, power and conflict related to this mandate, and a suggested model for accomplishing this mandate respectively. A Christian himself, Hunter states, “I find many perplexing disparities between the Christian faith that I have come to know and what I see acted out in the world” (ix). His ultimate goal in this volume is to reconcile the Christian responsibility for world-changing with a western form of Christianity he perceives to be largely impotent at accomplishing this goal.

In Essay One, Hunter contrasts the Scriptural mandate of leading culture with the common view of culture he believes fails at this task. On the one hand, “human beings are, by divine intent and their very nature, world-makers” (3). On the other, “the dominant ways of thinking about culture and cultural change are flawed, for they are based on both specious social science and problematic theology” (5).

With these corollary propositions in mind, Hunter examines the view of culture held by most within Evangelical Christianity—namely, that cultures are, at heart, driven by ideas and worldviews. He credits (or blames, depending on the reader’s perspective), conservative Christian figures such as Chuck Colson and James Dobson, and progressive Christians such as Jim Wallis for this popular view. He laments the practical result of this philosophy of culture, believing “it is not an exaggeration to say that the dominant public witness of the Christian churches in America since the early 1980s has been a political witness” (12).

Hunter confronts this common view by stating that cultural values are shaped in a much more complex fashion, not only dependent on ideas, but also artifacts, history, and dialectical interdependence, and are generated within networks that are eventually guided by unprecedented leadership. In contrast to the “great man theory” of leadership, Hunter believes that the aforementioned networks are “where we do find the greatness of a Martin Luther or John Calvin, a William Wilberforce, a Dorothy Day, a Martin Luther King, and so on” (38). Building on this theory of cultural development, Hunter contends that “the deepest and most enduring forms of cultural change nearly always occur from the “’top down’” (41). In short, lasting cultural shifts rarely happen at the popular level, but instead take place within networks of institutions led by cultural elites. He then examines these claims against the measuring stick of Christian history, tracing how the development and growth of Christianity (from its first century Jewish roots to the European Barbarian conversions to the Reformation to the Great Awakenings to the present) followed the pattern he describes in the first four chapters. He ends the first essay by seeking to balance the inherently despicable nature of elitism with the equally disturbing picture of cultural egalitarianism, with a view toward laying the groundwork for a church that “exercises itself in all realms of life, not just a few” (95).

In Essay Two, Hunter critiques what he perceives as the misuse and abuse of power—and in particular political power—by the three most commonly identified expressions of Christianity in America, the Christian Right, the Christian Left, and the neo-Anabaptist movement. Hunter suggests that what binds a diverse society together is power, and that in democratic environments, “the final repository of legitimate force is found in the state” (101). As a result, these various fragments of diverse society, including those identified as “Christian” tend toward the use of politics, a pattern that Hunter believes has been common in the west since the time of the New Deal. He states that “Slowly, often imperceptively, there has been a turn toward law and politics as the primary way of understanding all aspects of collective life” (108). Hunter further illustrates how this “turn toward law and politics” has negatively affected what he identifies as the three primary streams of Christianity in the West.

Where the Christian Right and Left are concerned, Hunter believes that both have resorted to the “selective use of scripture to justify political interests” (147), and that the primary goals of each group, which through a more fully-orbed understanding of Scripture should be viewed as complimentary, are ironically divided through an identically applied realpolitick. Hunter then compares the approaches of the Right and Left with the view of the neo-Anabaptists, who seek to essentially disengage from all aspects of political life. Yet in the end, Hunter presents neo-Anabaptism as itself “a political theology that reinforces rather than contradicts the discourse of negation so ubiquitous in our late modern political culture” (166).

Hunter concludes the second essay with a challenge to fresh thinking about the issue of power from a theological perspective, leading the reader inevitably to the third and final essay in which he envisions a “postpolitical witness” (184). In this final essay Hunter posits a vision for a fresh Christian encounter with culture that evolves beyond the current paradigms of engagement and toward what he describes as “faithful presence.” Beginning with one’s own local community and branching outward, Hunter describes the possibility of Christians making a decipherable mark on the world in which they live.

Self-critique is always a painful business, and as a Christian Hunter speaks well to the apparent failures of his faith as it is often applied in the West. His encouragement to move beyond mere political engagement is timely, and his revelation that culture is primarily changed at the level of the elite—though this be an unpalatable truth to an Evangelical Christianity that is largely grassroots—is poignantly accurate. At the same time, his comparison of conservative and progressive versions of Christianity cloud over his failure to distinguish cultural and evangelical Christianity. He is correct to point out that many in the Christian Right and Left do not hold to a holistic understanding of their faith, but in the process he neglects the possibility that neither of these approaches is genuinely Christian.

Perhaps what is missing in the midst of thorough definitions of “left,” “right” and “Anabaptist” is an equally thorough understanding of “evangelical.” It seems apparent to this reviewer that the author’s focus on the social and cultural is certainly more accurate than his treatment of the theological, which results in the occasional abuse of terminology that is first and foremost theological in nature.

Additionally, Hunter’s understanding of current approaches to cultural engagement is at times overly -simplistic. His use of the term “always” to describe the approach of Christian conservative action, for example, seems a broad generalization hardly compatible with a scholarly work of this magnitude (219). Likewise, though he is familiar with precedent literature such as Niebuhr’s Christ and Culture, he appears to confuse Niebuhr’s own categories of engagement. For example, he describes Calvin’s views on cultural engagement—which in reality were philosophically close to his own—in terms that when examined resemble more closely the views of cultural interface held by Tertullian (231). Such may be the cause for Hunter’s assumption that any attempt by the church to build God’s Kingdom “this side of heaven is to begin with an assumption that tends to lead to one version or another of the Constantinian project” (233). Such categorical confusion also appears as Hunter unveils his own model of cultural engagement, which places great emphasis on disengagement with almost all things political and thus, seems strangely reflective of the neo-Anabaptist view which he finds insufficient.

Two final concerns where this book is concerned involve a relatively vague description of the meaning of “faithful presence,” and an overly pessimistic view of the result of this presence. In an anti-climactic conclusion, Hunter contends that if the reader takes to heart and applies the principles he suggests, “it is possible, just possible, that they will help to make the world a little bit better” (286). Such a statement, in the end, betrays an underdeveloped eschatology, and a negative understanding of the power of the church as the presence of Jesus in culture.

Still, the book’s shortcomings are overshadowed by the positive challenge toward an alternative route of cultural engagement for the church. The overall thesis of Hunter’s work—that God’s people must move beyond “culture wars” toward a more productive path to world impact—will well-serve the follower of Christ who rises to the challenge to become a “culture-maker.” Hunter gives ample evidence that the current approach to cultural engagement is not working, and grounds his primary emphases firmly in history, social science, and Scripture. The church will be better and more effective for heeding the exhortations of this book.

It is certain that Hunter would find a military analogy for his book to be an ironic thing indeed. Nevertheless, one moment in military history does serve as a great object lesson for what Hunter aspires to communicate. On the last day of the Battle of Gettysburg, Confederate General James Longstreet tried in vain to convince Robert E. Lee to pull back from the current battle lines and head south to re-engage Union soldiers on ground of their choosing. Lee refused, believing not only that his Army of Northern Virginia could successfully overwhelm Union forces at the center of their lines, but also that any sign of pullback indicated a retreat from battle that Lee found unacceptable. Longstreet’s response was that he was not asking for retreat, only redeployment. The subsequent bloodshed that day vindicated Longstreet’s appeal.

James Davison Hunter has written a comprehensive analysis of the current state of Christianity in the West and its failure to be the global force for good that Jesus demands. His call is essentially to back away from the current “lines of battle,” to get a realistic and practical view of the world as it is rather than as we wish it would be. Many who are heavily involved in the current “culture war” approach to extending the influence of Christian faith will see his book as a call to retreat. To be sure, some of the solutions he suggests are vague, others simply not practical. Still, his overall point is worthy of strong consideration. Christians should take a fresh look at how the spiritual battlefield has manifested itself in our current culture and “redeploy,” lest American Christianity meet with its own Pickett’s charge.

Why Maryland Should Grant In-State Tuition Benefits to Illegal Immigrants

If you want to see tempers flare up quickly on both sides of a volatile issue, just start a conversation about illegal immigration. If ever there was an example of an issue where the fringe elements on each side are permitted to dictate the terms of debate, immigration fits the bill! Unfortunately, those who believe this issue is as simple as choosing sides between Republicans and Democrats--or between CNN and FOX News, fail to understand the deep complexity of the issue at hand. What's worse is that followers of Jesus, for the most part, don't appear to have realized that God speaks much in His Word about how just nations are to treat the alien and stranger from another land.

The latest manifestation of this unfortunate shouting match is now occuring in my state. This week, the Maryland legislature is considering a bill that would grant in-state tuition to the children of illegal immigrants. As usual, reactions to this bill have been predictably strong and shallow. On the far left are those who are simply content to ignore the law. On the far right are those who have confused respect for the law with the worship of law. Since I have written on this issue in a more comprehensive fashion before (here, and here), this post will be relatively short. But as much as my politically conservative friends might lament my position here, I feel compelled to give a rationale for why I do believe this bill should become law in Maryland:

1. From a financial point of view, the reason we grant "in state" vs. "out of state" tuition has to do with whether students and their families have actually contributed financially to the public University system in a given state. Unless I am mistaken, I believe this legislation stipulates that the families of illegals have to pay income taxes in Maryland before their children can qualify. If this is not true, then I would join others in opposition to its passage. Those who aren't paying taxes in MD should not have "in state" rates for the same reason my kids won't get in state tuition if they choose to attend JMU--because our family doesn't pay income taxes in Virginia and thus, we don't contribute to the public support of James Madison University. If they pay taxes in Maryland, they have contributed to the public support of our institutions of higher learning. Thus, I have no problem with them receiving the same benefits as my family.

2. From a practical point of view, we have to remember that in most cases, we are talking about the children of illegals, who were brought here by their parents, thus having their illegal status chosen for them. We might rightly call them victims of their parents illegal choices. Since we aren't living in an ideal world, and consequently will continue to live with these individuals among us, we should ask a very simple question: Would we rather them remain uneducated, possibly start down a spiral toward volitional criminal activity themselves, and take from our society, or would we rather offer them the opportunity to contribute to our society?

3. Finally, from a Christian point of view, those who claim the name of Christ must speak first and foremost as His followers, not as Republicans or Democrats. Anyone with the ability to read and common sense can clearly see that our current immigration situation represents the epitome of mistreatment of "aliens and strangers," and embodies the very kind of unjust law that Christians should oppose with all our might. As one who works with immigrant Pastors (our Association of churches worships every Sunday in eight different languages) and helps them legally navigate the nightmare that is the USCIS, I can readily testify to the fact that when our pastors try to obey the law (as they should) and do the right thing, they are jerked around, malligned, and in some cases, even abused by the system, while simultaneously, thousands every day cross our borders illegally. In short, our current immigration system does indeed reward lawbreakers, but it also punishes those who try to obey the law, and makes victims out of the children of both groups. This is unjust law by any standard! Isaiah 10 contains strong words for those who would write and support such law, and as a Christian, I am forced by my obsevations of our current situation to favor extending grace to the children of illegals. But more than this, I believe evangelical Christians should join with President Obama in calling for comprehensive reform of this ungodly mess that we call immigration law.

I certainly welcome any comments, counterpoints, and respectful disagreement here. But we must remember that this issue is far more complex than the talking heads in either political party have made it out to be.

Passing the Baton: Ensuring an Ongoing Church Planting Strategy

This is my last installment on the subject of how to facilitate effective church planting in the Baptist Association. This post also covers a key piece to the puzzle if you want a church planting emphasis to outlast your own ministry as a Director of Missions.

At this point in the game, you have created a culture that understands the Great Commission neccesity of church planting. A system of recruitment, assessment, training, deployment, and support is in place. The cooperation of state, national, and network partners is in place, and you are beginning to see the Kingdom advance that always ensues when new churches are planted to penetrate lostness. Now comes the hard part: You have to give it away!

I love church planting. But its been more than six years since I've started a church, and my stories started getting old a couple of years ago. Were I to start another church today, the learning curve would be steep even with my prior experience. Culture shifts so rapidly and quickly now that it is simply impossible to keep pace with the constant change in approaches to church planting without actually planting a church. The church planters we have in the field however, are still neck-deep in their experiences. Sponsor churches likewise are actually riding the waves of change as I write. As such, the best way to ensure an ongoing and plausibly perpetual church planting strategy is to turn the entire strategy over to the planters themselves.

We are currently in the middle of this process now, and have begun to develop a "Parent Church Network" (PCN). All members of this network have recently planted a church themselves, or they have parented a plant and demonstrated through that experience that they know what they are doing. Though I'm technically still in the driver's seat, the goal is to have the lion's share of the operation, policy-making, budgeting, etc. turned over to the PCN within the next two years.

This doesn't mean I won't be involved. On the contrary, I will continue to "start fires" in this area by expanding partnerships between churches, church plants, pastors, church planters, church planting networks and other denominational entities. But the process will be governed by those who are actually doing the work. If I get hit by a bus, they can always replace a catalyst, but the overall process should not have to suffer in the event that the DOM is removed from the picture.

But the greatest reason to turn church planting over to the planters is given by Bob Logan: He states that church planting movements "that reproduce quickly and spread among the people, can best be led by grassroots movements of ordinary believers doing what Jesus called them to do."

Currently, one of our planters who serves on our Association's Executive Board is working alongside me in anything related to church planting. My goal by the end of the year is to help him build a team that will oversee this work in MMBA. One awesome part of this is the people we have identified to date to join this team. One is a former moderator who has served as pastor of his church for more than 30 years, and who has helped us plant four churches. Another is the pastor of one of those church plants. Yet another is a planter currently starting a church with the support of the church that was itself started by our former moderator's church. Literally, we have three "generations" of folks who believe in church multiplication serving on this team. Our great hope is that they will lead future church planting in central Maryland, and anywhere else in the world where our member churches are called to go.

If those planting churches are to have any sense of ownership when it comes to the Association, you have to grant that ownership. So don't be afraid to hand it off! As I said earlier, their experience is more recent than mine, so they will know better than me how the next generation can be successful. For my part, I'm honored to have played a role in bringing them to this point, and I'm giddy with excitement over how God will use them as our network of churches moves forward.

If you are a Director of Missions, a church planter trying to start a CPM within your association, or a local church pastor with similar passion, I hope this series has been helpful to you, and that it will be helpful to your Association. With 258 million lost people living in the United States, the roughly 1000 Baptist Associations can serve a vital and role in reaching those people by helping plant new churches--or they can become totally irrelevant. I pray you choose to go forth and multiply!

Tom Elliff Speaks to the Parents of Missionaries

Ideas, as Francis Shaeffer once said, have consequences, and this statement is never more true than when contemplating the result of promoting Christian missions in your own home!

Recently, my denominations International Mission Board commissioned another batch of missionaries to take the Gospel to the ends of the earth. During the commissioning sermon, preached by new IMB President Tom Elliff, Dr. Elliff addressed the concerns of parents whose promotion of and passion for missions had now manifested itself in their son or daughter answering the call to go to the uttermost, and often dangerous, places of the world. The IMB article quotes Dr. Elliff as follows:

New IMB President Tom Elliff spoke specifically to missionaries’ parents. As a former missionary and father of two missionaries, he said the parents may be thinking, “Why is my son or daughter being called to the mission field?” Elliff believes the answer begins with the reality of hell.

“Hell is an actual place. It’s an awful place. And it’s an always place. There’s never a moment where a person who spends eternity in hell will say, ‘Well, I’ve about got this handled.’ No — there’s always as much out in front as there is behind.

“There are soon to be 7 billion people on this globe. Over half of them have very little access to the Gospel. [These new missionaries are] saying, ‘Well, not the ones that I meet. Not the people where I’m going, no sir — I’m going to share the name of Jesus with them.’”



You can find the article in its entirety here.

To Fund or Not to Fund: The Question of Financial Support in Church Planting

Former President Ronald Reagan had a particularly narrow philosophy when it came to the idea of government funding. He expressed it in three propositions that he felt accurately reflected the disposition of the federal government: 1. If it moves, tax it. 2. If it keeps moving, regulate it. 3. When it stops moving, subsidize it.

Its probably appropriate after an illustration like that to point out clearly that I do NOT believe denominations are in the same category as the federal government. At the same time, the former President's humorous example does appropriately call us toward thinking rightly about money and its use when on mission. Where church planting is concerned, it is of high importance that our strategy for funding an effort be as contextualized as the overal strategy itself. Otherwise, we run the risk of providing "help that hurts." In light of this observation, I want to dedicate this post to a discussion about how to think rightly about funding new churches.

Of course, the discussion itself presupposes that funding IS NECCESARY for a healthy church planting environment. Any Baptist Association or state convention that is chincy when it comes to the direct funding of new churches has already betrayed what it really thinks about God's mandate to extend His Kingdom exponentially. If you don't plan financially for new churches, it says a lot Thankfully, I'm not in that kind of environment. In 2011, roughly 14% of our Association's budget is dedicated to the direct funding of new churches, and another 14% is set aside in a reserved fund for strategic expenditures related to church planting. Additionally, we work with a state convention that, as far as I'm concerned, is unparalleled in its financial commitment to starting new churches. Still, it is not enough to just to have money for church planting. You need to spend it wisely. And contrary to the popular belief of church planters (who all think you can never have enough money. I should know, as I was once one of those guys!), you CAN over-fund. And when you do, you hurt the mission.

I learned this lesson the hard way after first coming to Maryland. With the financial resources at my disposal at both Associational and state levels, together with the generous spirit toward church planting displayed by both of those entities, I figured we could take over the world! After all, my own church planting experience involved "shoe-stringing" almost everything, so as a planter I was always thinking "if I just had more money." Well, now I had it, and was fairly free to grant it to church planters in Maryland.

As a result, we funded very heavily early on, and the result was that in the first two years we had three failures. One of those was a church that had been planted prior to my arrival on the field. But the other two were planted on my watch, and they were our two most heavily funded plants. One of them never even reached the point of a launch service!

I should probably state at this point that there were many factors involved in the demise of these new churches. At the same time, the exorbiant amount of money we invested in them was a huge issue, primarily because once the denominational funding began to dry up the church quickly died. We had funded them to the point that they had become over-dependent on the denominational system. After some intense research into these failures, we made major changes in the way we funded new churches. Thankfully we were able to learn from our mistakes, and no church planted in our Association since 2007 has failed.

So how do you determine how much is too much? The following are some guidelines related to healthy levels of funding for a new church:

1. View Church Plant Funding as an Investment, not as Wellfare.. Before church planting was as sexy as it presently is in the ministry world, those who started new churches were essentially considered the wellfare-recipients of the clerical class. When I served as Senior Pastor of an established church, I "earned" a "salary." But when I left that church to start a new church, I began to "receive funding."

The way such expressions were made betrayed a view that church planters were simply receiving aid so that they could pay their bills. To be sure, I was happy to have a way to pay the mortgage with the support I received. But ultimately, that financial help resulted in a healthy, evangelistic and reproducing church. In other words, the "investment" paid off!

When denominational entities and other supporters of church planting see funding as nothing more than a way of supplementing someone's income, we tend to view such funding as wellfare. This perception yields two corollary and tragic results. On the one hand, those on the front lines of apostolic ministry are treated as though they are taking something they have not earned. On the other hand, pity sometimes becomes the motivation for continued funding of a failing effort simply because we feel sorry for the guy whose church planting effort is failing, and we in effect end up burying the talent God has given us to multiply.

Funding should be seen as an investment in the multiplication of God's Kingdom . . .no less! When our planters are raising funds, I encourage them to encourage others to "invest in this group of people who, as a majority, don't know Jesus" rather than "support me and my family."

Investment also expects a return. If we see no fruit, then we "re-invest" God's money in a way that yields the Kingdom advance He expects. Obviously, this won't look the same in every context. Not every new church is destined to become a "mega-church," and thus, we can't judge success in a uniform way. I once had a church planting leader in another state convention tell me that if the planter hadn't reached 100 people by the end of his first year, he would cut his funding. I responded by saying "I'm glad you aren't overseeing church planting nationally. Otherwise, you would kill 80% of the new work we do in the United States."

But if we are investing in this way, and with this mentality, we will determine in advance what "success" looks like, and judge according to that standard. Conversely, we will not fear putting every dollar neccesary into Kingdom multiplication. In short, viewing funding as an investment means MORE dollars given to church planting, not less.

2. Allow for Scalability during, and Sustainability after the plant. For many years, the standard practice for church plant funding was what I call the "two years and out" approach. Essentially, we would fully fund a church planter for two years, and by year three he was on his own. When you think "scalability," this is NOT the picture you should see!

Part of every church planting strategy should be a plan to offset giving from the outside. No church that is perpetually dependent on outside sources of income can ever be truly autonomous, or truly self-propogating. Funding streams should be scalable, meaning that they should reflect a gradual decrease that is commensurate with the projected increase in internal giving.

But funding should also reflect sustainability. No church planter should be compensated more in the beginning of the church planting effort than the target group he is reaching is estimated to be able to pay him when supporting entities pull out. For example, in central Maryland, the "bottom-line" support package for a full-time, and fully-funded church planter is never less than $60K annually. Due to the high cost of living in our area, this is actually a very modest compensation package for someone considered full-time. But if the receptor culture he is reaching with the Gospel does not possess the financial ability to pay at this level, then the planter should start working bi-vocationally, and plan on remaining bi-vocational. A congregation of 80-100 hispanic immigrant agricultural workers is a huge win in our area, but that church will never be able to pay $60K a year to its pastor. For the funding to produce a sustainable strategy, these things must be taken into account.

3. With Rare Exceptions, Tangible Results should Precede Heavy Funding. Certain church planting networks like Acts29 already have policies like this in place, and require a baseline threshhold of core participants before member churches coalesce to grant financial support. At a minimum, most church planters should demonstrate the ability to pull together a leadership team prior to funded deployment. There are obvious exceptions to this rule, but for the most part, guidelines should reflect these expectations. Make sure a planter is faithful with a few things before granting him stewardship over many dollars.

For the most part, our culture makes way too much of the monetary, and unfortunately, many of our churches have been enculturated into this way of thinking. The result is "tight-wad" misering disguised as "prudence" on the one hand, and over-zealous but undiscerning waste on the other. We want to be good stewards of any resources God grants us to plant churches. Being a good steward means we take care of those who are doing the work, but not in a way that handicapps them in dependency. When it comes to planting churches, give generously, give intelligently . . .give strategically!

Repost: Making Love and the Glory of God

Pastor Douglas Wilson correctly and graphically observed a couple of weeks ago that our culture is doing to sex what people who chew with their mouths open are doing to food. God's plan for human sexuality looks markedly different, and has a distinctly different goal than the plans for sex that have been mapped out by the world. In light of these observations, I decided to repost a blog I wrote several years ago reviewing a book on this subject edited by Justin Taylor and John Piper. Almost five years later, I still commend this book enthusiastically to married couples, and to those who aspire to marriage. The book can be ordered here.

Following Jesus and having great sex are two concepts that, unfortunately, are rarely viewed as belonging together. The hijacking of human sexuality by a sinful culture has certainly caused a raw perversion of one of God's good gifts to us. But while the world is largely responsible for contaminating sex, the church, with its ample prudishness, is equally responsible for perverting what God has to say about this powerful subject.

But John Piper and Justin Taylor have just edited a superb new book that introduces us afresh to what God has to say on this matter.

The book, Sex and the Supremacy of Christ, has an obviously "Piperian" bent, as is indicated by the title. Among the assumptions laid out in the first part of the text is that the act of sex, like any other human act, has as it's ultimate purpose to glorify God. Piper, along with Ben Patterson of Westmont College in Santa Barbara, do a masterful job in Part One at communicating the close relationship between the goodness of sexuality and the glory of God in Jesus Christ. For those who have read Piper's other works, the central theme of the chapters he writes are no different from all the other books he has written. But two reciprocal points presented by Piper undergird the rest of the book. First, Piper contends that "sexuality is designed by God as a way to know God more fully," and second, "knowing God is designed by God as a way of guarding and guiding our sexuality." In short, this intense physical experience was created by God to point to an even more intense spiritual reality.

Echoing Piper in the conclusion of Part One is Ben Patterson, who asserts with Biblical authority an axiom that will be novel to many Christians: "Pleasure is God's idea, and God is the devil's enemy. The devil actually hates pleasure, because he hates the God of pleasure." As a result, all sexual perversion, from pornography to fornication and adultery, to homosexuality, should simply be seen as a cheap Satanic replication of God's intended design. Says Patterson: "The devil's grand strategy against pleasure is to twist it, to get us to misuse it." Patterson presents a very candid conversation in which he is transparent enough to describe his own struggles with sexual temptation, and how God has helped him to overcome them.

So what happens when God's sexual gift is misused? Moreover, what can be done to heal the deep hurt caused by its misuse? Al Mohler of Southern Seminary and David Powlison of Westminster Seminary address these questions in Part Two. Powlison provides what in my estimation is the most insightful chapter of the entire book, which deals with how sexual brokennes may be healed. Powlison's wisdom points the reader to the fact that most sexual sins have something other than sex as their root. Using examples from his own experience as a Christian counselor, Powlison unveils the multiple avenues through which Satan leads both men and women into sexual sin.

Al Mohler's chapter on the Christian response to homosexual marriage is both timely and straightforward. On the one hand, Mohler strongly contends that homosexual marriage "is a tragic oxymoron," and states that even the discussion of its possibility in the legislature "demonstrates that we are a civilization in crisis, because a great many barriers must be breached in order to put this question on the cultural agenda." But Mohler doesn't limit his challenge to those favoring homosexual marriage. He also takes dead aim at the overly simplistic rationale that is often used by evangelicals in their opposition to homosexuality (just one example of this contention: "We, as Christians, must be the people who cannot start a conversation about homosexual marriage by talking about homosexual marriage."), their lack of compassion and willingness to walk with homosexuals through the long and messy healing process, and their objection to the lifestyle based solely on the "yuck factor." The end result is a comprehensive and well-thought-out polemic for us to "speak the truth in love."

In Part Three, readers are introduced to the Biblical way that men are to view sex. Mark Dever, Michael Lawrence and Matt Schumucker each contribute to the chapter on sex and the single man. The reader will not be surprised at their basic view that "the first thing to say about sex and the single man is, there should be none!" However, the authors go further in describing how the church has often presented a truncated message on sex and singleness that has left single men physically pure, but emotionally and spiritually bankrupt. Without resorting to a new form of legalism, the authors encourage single men not only to save their bodies, but also their hearts, for their future spouses. (Wow, if I had only read this when I was 16 years old!)

C.J. Mahanney, President of Sovereign Grace Ministries in Gaithersburg, MD, concludes Part Three with an authentic and transparent look at a man's view of sex within marriage. Using the Song of Solomon as his primary teaching tool, Pastor Mahanney combines his scholarly mind and pastoral heart with his experience as a husband of more than two decades, and the result is a godly wisdom from which every husband will benefit. Principally, he speaks of the sex act as one of service to one's wife. Mahanney reveals the "elephant in the room" by addressing the "extremely common tendency for husbands to find satisfaction in lovemaking sooner than their wives." From 1 Corinthians Mahanney asserts that if a husband is having sex in a way that is honoring to God and his wife "I will take my thoughts captive during lovemaking, disciplining my body in order to focus primarily on giving to my wife sexually, rather than only receiving from her." Mahanney also speaks of the dichotomy between the sexual fantasy world hopelessly aspired to, and the reality of God's gift, and courageously calls Christian husbands back to reality in some quite humorous ways. Mahanney also speaks candidly (although not graphically) about his own experiences with his wife, and with the wisdom of a father speaking to sons, shares with younger Christian men how they can be servants to their one flesh in the bedroom.

In Part Four, Carolyn McCulley, media specialist for Sovereign Grace Ministries and a single woman, speaks in a straightforward way to other single women. Acknowledging the role of radical feminism in how single women now approach the subject of sexuality (and admitting that she herself was at one time an avowed feminist), McCulley laments the result: "When I read articles about the spreadsheets college women keep about their sexual activities, or when I watch how the Christian men I know struggle to avoid the parade of barely dressed women before them at a mall or restaurant, or when I have to turn over all ten womens' magazines at the grocery checkout because my nieces can now read the soft-porn headlines, I find I am more than shocked; I am deeply grieved. This is what feminism has done to improve the standing of women? It's a very poor trade-off, indeed." The alternative McCulley presents is a countercultural revolution of female sexuality. The rest of the chapter addresses practical ways that this can be accomplished, including relishing in the gift of singleness, and dodging sexual snares at the office. Along with the other contributors, McCulley offers her own personal experiences along with Biblical counsel to single women who desire to honor God and their future husbands with their bodies, and who want their bodies honored by others.

Carolyn Mahanney, the wife of C.J. Mahanney, concludes Part Four by speaking to married women on how to glorify God in the sex act with their husbands. She offers practical, Biblical principles of "Grade A passion" that, like her husband's teaching, commends an attitude of servanthood in the bedroom. Chief among these principles is that of training the female mind to anticipate sex, based on Song of Songs 5:10-16. For those who have lost their sexual passion and desire for their husbands, Mahhanney gives encouragement, stating that "God is able to renew your sexual desire, empower you to change, and revive you with hope."

The final part of this work contains information regarding how sexuality has been viewed in two different epochs of church history. Justin Taylor, Executive Editor of Desiring God Ministries, speaks in detail of Martin Luther's reform of marriage, and Mark Dever, Senior Pastor of Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Wahington D.C., sheds new light on the popular perception of how the Puritans viewed the act of sex.

In a sexually broken world informed more by radical sex education and Cialis commercials than the Word of God, the church has often been guilty of giving simplistic and anemic answers to the question of human sexuality. The authors of this book present a view of sex with the comprehensiveness and authority of the Scriptures themselves, and the result is a fully-orbed presentation of God's view of sex. And who better to speak to this powerful topic than the One who invented it? Maybe you have a perception of Christianity as overly-pruddish and ascetic, or maybe you are a victim of the combination of Satan's sexual snares and your own bad choices. Let me beg you to do an Amazon search of the reference below, because this book will point you to the right answers, and more importantly to Christ, who is the end-all, be-all answer to all things!