Search Results for: women in ministry

Reflecting on Sunday’s Message, Women In Ministry, Depression and Hope

This past Sunday, our Pastor of Global and Regional Outreach, Jeanette Yep gave a powerful message as part of our summer series entitled, “Psalms: A Soundtrack For Our Lives.” You can watch/listen to it here.

Jeanette got me thinking about a number of things. This is the first church that I’ve served at where we’ve had women preaching from the [Read more…]

On Being Out of Youth Ministry For a Year

If you have been around, you may have heard me say that I miss being in vocational youth ministry. This was the first year I haven’t been on a youth retreat or a student mission trip or planned a fundraiser or the ten thousand other things youth pastors do. Some of these things I’ve literally done regularly throughout the last 12 years of my life.

Of course, I miss the students but I promise not to get overly romantic about missing all the aspects of youth ministry. For instance, I don’t miss the fundraisers. Not because I’m embarrassed by raising money for important needs but because I refuse to believe that there are so many grandparents celebrating milestone birthdays on the mornings of our car washes.

If I’m being honest, I’m grateful for having this season off. With the arrival of our third and moving to a new community without our family and the supportive friends we had in NJ, it’s been a good thing to not have a mission trip, retreats and various weekend activities. It’s not just being away for those weekends but also the time in preparation, in meetings, in the gearing up – whoever thinks a mission trip consists of a that week has never led one.

Like everybody, I’m still busy – it’s a different type these days. But I do get to be home more at night and have more weekends free. Which has helped us connect with the relationships we were fortunate enough to have prior to moving here and the new ones we are creating.

It’s good for me to feel the honestly of missing so many things in youth ministry. It was a special and important time in my life. Also, it was very beneficial and here are some of the ways how:

Teaching. If you can teach high school and/or middle school students, you can teach just about anyone. I mean that. These kids are smart, they can be tough, they can be short on attention, respect, and can be apathetic to content that is not being graded and may not seem practical. Crafting messages that have been based on Scripture, that are relevant and beneficial to their lives, interesting enough to sustain attention, prophetic enough to challenge, and encouraging enough to proclaim that there is a God who exists and loves us has been the task I’ve been tackling for years. Every teacher knows there never really is a finished product but my current preparing/delivering has certainly been shaped by youth ministry. In teaching in different adult ministry contexts throughout this past year, one of the few things that I have knowingly changed has simply been asking myself, “Who is the audience?” Different starting point, very similar methodology.

So what’s the lesson here? If you suck at teaching students, there may be a place for you in adult ministry? Not really. However, it does seem that working with students really helps in all aspects of communication.

Relational Connection – Youth ministry taught me the difference between being a talking head and the indispensable qualities of being a pastor of young people. Most of us have heard the Howard Hendricks line, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” I was never really impressed with the line, probably because I hadn’t met Hendricks (or that he didn’t know to care about me ;) but everyone who cares about the people they are leading discovers some form of this maxim eventually.  The other thing I learned was while you cannot be all things to all people (even if you consider yourself to be a “people person”)

You cannot relate to everyone, there is no such thing as a “universal personality.” It is impossible to learn every caveat of pop-culture and counter-culture. Part of the reason is due to the way counter-culture works – it’s intentionally exclusive.

So what’s the lesson here? If you can identify with a 14 year old girl obsessed with Twilight, you can connect with anyone? Not at all, simply celebrate all the people in your sphere of influence and build healthy Christian relationships.

Working With Dedicated Volunteers – These volunteers are the difference between the church as a serving body and a professionally pastorally run organization. They work together for sure but when volunteers are not supported by ministry staff and if ministry staff don’t have reliable volunteers, well, not only does the unity of the church suffer but very little execution of ministry and capacity for mission happens.

I’ve been preparing to do the training for our women’s Bible study tomorrow. A lot had gone into the vision of the year long before I was asked to help with the training. There’s a lot of depth to this ministry and there are a lot of people it utilizes. In fact, tomorrow there are separate training sessions for morning and evening respectively. Throughout the year they will be leading their women’s small groups through the book of Acts and I’ve been told that many of them have been leading for years and years and they do much, much more than teach.

There’s a lot of talk about “equipping and releasing” people for ministry and what qualifies as “discipleship” and what is dismissed as a Christian hobby. Dedication to the leading of the Holy Spirit from all is essential.

What’s the lesson here? Ministry involves people, time, training, and empowering others to serve. Regardless of the size of the church, there are a lot of moving parts, consider yourself blessed to play whatever role you are asked.

That last one comes natural for most youth pastors. Many don’t see the fruit of their labor for years.

I’m not going to suggest that everyone should go through youth ministry. For many reasons, I don’t think that’s true and among them is that it seems to limit how God uses people. But I do find myself extremely grateful for all the blessings of having served in youth ministry – the relationships, the memories, and how the experience continues to shape my heart and work today.

It will be interesting to reflect on how I continue to look back on this season. To the reader, feel free to share your insights on youth ministry or your respective past experiences – thanks for reading.

Does Piper’s “Masculine Christianity” Undermine Women, Men and the Scriptures?

Rachel Held Evans (a blog that many of you would love) opened with this on a post entitled, “John Piper wants a Masculine Christianity. What do you think?”:
On Tuesday, at the annual Desiring God pastors conference, popular evangelical pastor John Piper spoke on the importance of maintaining what he calls a “masculine Christianity,” arguing that “God has given Christianity a masculine feel.” … She directed us to see more of his comments here.

Although I joke a good bit about John Piper and have criticized some of his blog posts and tweets in the past (the obvious ones, like his explanation of why the bridge that tragically collapsed in Minneapolis and the “Farewell Rob Bell” tweet), he still holds a special place for me. In the mid 90’s, his books were helpfu, kinda like Dave Matthews Band. Sure, I don’t listen much to DMB anymore but he’s still part of my life soundtrack.

I’ve changed a bit over the years but Dr. Piper and I still have some similarities:
Though I’m not a hyper-Calvinist, I do believe in God’s sovereignty.
Though I’m not Baptist, I think baptism is an essential sacrament and I love John the Baptist.
Though I’m not a complementarian, I am happily married to a woman (and I think she is happily married to me ;)
Though I’m not from Minnesota, I think their accent is cool “Minnasoooda” – Beautiful.
So as you can see, we have a great deal in common.

Despite all our seemingly identical views, Piper’s complementarianism has always thrown me. One thing is to have a conviction about it but I’ve always been surprised by the enormous amount of effort that he and his friends have placed in trying to “put women in their place.” They may not be “saying” that but that’s what I’m “hearing.” That’s what struck me regarding Rachel’s post – why is he still talking about this? And what more must a woman do to be treated respectfully in the Church today?

The statements that Piper is making causes great concern for me because in my estimation, he is undermining three important aspects:
1. Clearly he is undermining women. You can spin it however you want (“This benefits women”, “This is divinely ordained”), complementarianism is undermining.
2. But he’s also undermining men. Many of them having been born from women, wed to them and countless others know a woman, maybe even two ;) Seriously it undermines men because the distance created in these battles only creates more lonely men. This is completely antithetical to Genesis 2:18 (“It’s not good for man to be alone …”)
3. It undermines the Scriptures in their original context. Allow me to repeat and clarify – the original Scriptures in their original context, not the English translations being read and understood in our modern day western contexts. But I will be the first to say that we all contextualize (whether we realize it or not).

Rachel asked for men to post about the female imagery of God in the Bible. I rarely respond to these types of posts but this conversation keeps coming up online and offline so here I am. So, the first that came to my mind is the imagery of a nursing mother describing the tenderness of God in Psalm131:2 – “But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; my soul is like the weaned child that is with me.” If I were to contextualize it to a young father such as myself, I suppose I could alter it to, “But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a child that I was able to quiet by playing the Thomas the Tank Engine dvd.” You think that’s odd? Picturing a masculine God nursing is quite disturbing, right?

The second is Isaiah 42:14, ” For a long time I have held my peace, I have kept myself still and restrained myself; now I will cry out like a woman in labor, I will gasp and pant.” God going through laboring does not sound very masculine. Perhaps we could change it to “For a long time I have kept the safety switch on my power, I have determined to hold my ground, but now I will cry out like a dragon. I will breathe fire and roar!” Not only does my translation remove this female imagery but I’ve also made it a little more Hollywood friendly. Your welcome.

I imagine I was standing outside the Church, it’s very realistic that I would see this as a crusade against women. Had it none been for my evangelical background and a life-long history of dealing with literalists, I would be utterly confused. But what may also be confusing is that although we don’t fight crusades anymore with violent swords, today we use rhetoric, which can be seen as a different type of attack. Is it possible that so many men respond to Piper’s words in fear of being seen as less manly if they don’t? It reminds me of the bullying tactics we’ve all experienced in our childhood and adolescents.

A few years ago, I was in a context where I asked fellow ministry leader types (mostly men with a few women in attendance) if anyone actually made decisions in their marriage without consulting their spouse. I’ve been married for 12 years and I realize that’s not a long time but I have never uttered the words, “God has ordained me as the man of the house, I make the decisions, and I have decided …..” I asked if anyone else had.

No one said they did and no offered or suggested that my question was loaded and offered an alternative. The possibility remains that everyone was intimidated by my bullying. It’s a reality that every 5’7″ pastor thinks of every time he hops out of his mini-van. But I remember in that moment thinking, “When it comes down to it, I don’t know any real complementarians personally.” They say they are and it may because they want to identify themselves with a position they believe is more Biblical or whatever. I see chauvinism, I see unhealthy dynamics and healthy dynamics but I just don’t see complementarians function the way they say they do.

Perhaps when Dr. Piper prays, he imagines a more masculine God, I’m ok with that – that’s his conviction, his prayer, his mind’s eye. If I am being honest, as much as I try to see God as Spirit, I probably do invoke a masculine presence as well. In meditating about this earlier, I probably do picture God to be more olive-skinned. Is it because Jesus is Jewish? Is it because I’m Egyptian? Why do I picture God speaking in English?

When the day comes to meet God, I will not be disappointed if God has Asian, Hispanic or Anglo features. The imagery that I/we use to describe God is only that – descriptive language. Descriptive language is limited and if you think about it, it can only aid the soul so much.

As has been said numerous times, the Scriptures use masculine language because it was a reflection of the ancient culture. It’s very similar to why God uses our languages to speak to us as opposed to forcing us to learn some theological language. Forget circumcision and baptism, you want an easy way to identify the chosen, make them learn the divine tongue. If you can get past my sarcasm, I think there’s a point worth considering.

While I too would like to see more men in our churches today, I don’t think complementarianism has much to offer in aiding that. Thus, I don’t get too excited when I hear people complain about the “feminization” of the church. Those statements tend to sound like campaign slogans to me. Seems to me you take the missing desire of the church and create the anthem of your choosing. Want more traditional music? Here you go – “The Church today has lost one of its true God-given treasures, its history, it’s rich tradition, it’s hymns!.” Now I think that sentence is true to some extent. But so is this one: Want more progressive music? – “The church today has lost its pioneering spirit. The Church used to champion the arts, now we offer cheap imitations while being stuck in the past.” I find there is truth to that statement as well.

Is it possible that part of the weakness of today’s church is that it’s being operated as a collection of single dads running things? Now I liked My Two Dads and “Uncle Jesse” in Full House as much as the next person, I just don’t think they are an adequate model for leading the church. Perhaps more on that topic another time but this is very much part of the conversation.

Among my favorite aspects of the Scriptures is that despite a male-dominated middle eastern culture, the role and value of women have always been ahead of their time culturally in the Bible. Why do some in evangelicalism want to oppose that? There are so many issues obviously linked to this (women in ministry, just how much leadership, “The head/the source debate”, Paul’s understanding, etc. I’m including a 5 minute NT Wright clip below. I’d also like to recommend Scot McKnight’s ebook Junia is Not Alone. For less than a latte, you can have a better understanding of the New Testament’s teaching on women. That’s incredible for $3.)

I close with this question. Bob Dylan asks in his classic song, “Blowin’ in the Wind”, “How many roads must a man walk down, before you can call him a man?” If I may apply that sentiment to my post here, “How many must a woman walk before we can celebrate her in the way God intended?” Let us examine our hearts and our theology, do our positions undermine women, men and the Scriptures?

Reflecting on Rick Warren’s Poorly Worded Tweet – We Need to Give Grace to These Men and Women When They Fail

So I’m a little late to this party but I figure so are some of you as well so here you go.
On Wednesday, Rick Warren made this tweet:

Wow.

Now, i actually respect a great deal about Rick Warren. I admire him, his wife Kay, and the Saddleback ministry on a number of levels. Like most, I already knew he was not perfect so I’m ok with a lot of what he says because really, I don’t really care enough to figure out what he’s trying to really say and I figure he’s a smart enough and godly enough guy – I’m sure between him and the Lord, they’ll figure it out.

To his credit, the man tweets a lot. Supposedly it’s really him, he has said so on several occasions and I believe it.

When I saw this, my reaction was … ughh. Now who am I to question Rick Warren’s motives? Maybe the criticisms and pressures are catching up with him and something was on his mind and this was the reaction. Aside from a few thoughts and a joke or two that will not make it online, I have no idea.

But here’s the thing – the Church has to start responding in better ways to these moments, including when our higher profile leaders/pastors/personalities make a mistake. On the blogosphere and twitterverse, many were merciless, absolute merciless. Others responded with gentle push-back fitting for Christians, particularly younger brothers in the Lord (as they make up quite a bit of the Twitter population, you know). Frankly I was blessed by that.

We need to give grace to these men and women when they fail. We can’t stand there and say things like, “I knew he was an arrogant tv preacher guy only interested in selling book and creating his own kingdom”. I didn’t actually quote any comment exactly, but that’s the gist of it. We also need to remember that we fail regularly. The difference is very few people notice and fewer actually care.

I am all for accountability but we need to be really careful what and who we condemn and dismiss. It’s very antithetical to being the loving followers that Jesus has called us to be.

I Have 2 Questions After Listening to Condoleezza Rice’s Powerful Message at the Willow Creek Leadership Summit – Post 2 #wcagls

One of the highlights of the Willow Creek Leadership Summit was Condoleezza Rice. Her words and presence were powerful and I kept hearing how she connected with so many watching.

When I first saw her on the schedule, I thought a couple things: “Wow, they got Rice.” Then I wondered about the motives, “Hmm, is this just Willow showing off [Read more…]

What The Church Can Learn From FIFA

I am not a soccer fan. Obviously not, because I refer to it by its American name, instead of its nickname given by its loyal fans. To be honest, I think I would like soccer and every so often I consider keeping up with it. I like the international feel of soccer, its simplicity, and besides baseball, I would prefer my boys to play soccer than football (unless they grow to be Christian Goliath types, than football it is).

I was all set for the World Cup, even filled out a bracket – US beating Spain 27-21, whoops, I mean 2-1. I even watched Bend It Like Beckham. Yeah it was a girls night that Susan was hosting 3 years ago but I remember the movie (Ok, I watched 15 mins, ate some chips, and left but again, this all counts as evidence of building an appreciation for soccer). But everything changed for me with this World Cup with the poor officiating and the terrible leadership of this all-world grand event. I think it’s absolutely ridiculous to not have some type of instant reply or utilize technology in professional sports. The simple reason is that the fan should not know more than the official. This is a problem for all major sports (beloved baseball included, but with such a long season, many mistakes can be accounted for. That said, tennis is probably the best sport at using technology to account for human error).

If you saw my Facebook status update the other day, I compared the President of FIFA, Blatter to a deadbeat dad who promises to get his kids real Christmas gifts … next year. I said that in light of his recent comments that said he would look into bringing the technology debate back to FIFA … after the WC is over. Then, yesterday I read on the ESPN ticker that the officials who made poor calls during the WC would not be officiating the next round. Now unless there is evidence that they were bribed and not simply mistaken, I find this incredulous. They decide not to use technology to get the call right and then banish the official for getting the call wrong – he’s human, of course they are going to miss calls!

It really bothers me to willingly withhold a solution (or at the very least, attempt to begin to solve a problem). Further, it especially bothers me when it pertains to something with truly enormous life-altering (and eternal) importance. As someone outside of the soccer world, FIFA looks quite idiotic. Similarly, it’s a worthy exercise to imagine what those outside the Church think of it. What do they believe is idiotic? Certainly they may be wrong on some points. From outside the soccer world it may seem, it may be hard to truly appreciate the reason that the goalie gets to use his hands (seems inconsistent). If you have played the game or ever been a goalie, you probably see it as a rather obvious solution. Those outside the Church may not see the need or the significance of Jesus’ sacrificial death and the centrality of the resurrection. If you understand evil and redemption or have experienced forgiveness, you probably see its necessity.

At this point, some of you are thinking, “Ok, so what?”. Others are thinking, “Did you just compare the resurrection to a goalie using his hands”. Yeah sorry about that but keep reading, I’ll try to upset you further.

What are some issues that the Church today needs to rethink, consider and discuss? Let’s discuss consumerism. Let’s begin with women in ministry. Already decided on that, what about colonialism? What about a retelling of the Gospel that answers global and local crises (yes Jesus is the hope for all. That is the foundation, but there is an entire tower to be built on Jesus’ mission, His Kingdom, His Hope …)?

Usually when you mention these examples, conservatives accuse you of being liberal. Please hear what I am saying, as one who believes in the orthodox doctrines of the Church (Jesus is Lord, Scripture is infallible, etc.), words like rethinking, reframing, even redefining are not bad words. Words, concepts, ideologies are fluid, they need to be adapted to be understood in culture. We as evangelicals do this with international missions and children’s ministry. It’s part of contextualization and in a post-Christian Western society, the problem is we don’t do it enough.

Though I wish it was only a matter of technology that could help the Church rethink some issues, I do believe that unlike sports organizations, the Church does not have to wait for meetings. We can have these discussions in our living rooms tomorrow, in the car with our family, in Sunday Schools, online, in coffee shops, and wherever else conversations happen.

I gave up on FIFA and the World Cup, nobody cares (nor should they). But we as a Church should care when people give up on the Christian faith. In fact, we mock the work of Jesus to not be grieved for people. It’s not about being “relevant” but it is about caring enough to reframe conversations so it is understandable, it is about loving people enough to care for them in order to share about a Savior who cares even more. It is about listening, sharing loving and allowing the Holy Spirit to work through us.

Monday Morning Brief 3.2.09

(once again posted on Tuesday)

Highlights of the Week Will Now Be Called Brighter Moments for this Week … yeah for Lent I gave up pastoral exaggerations and highlights just seems to overstated. 1.  There were some good moments and among them was celebrating my mom’s first birthday as a grandmother.  If I being objective, Nathan hasn’t always been kind to my mom.  We don’t hold that against the 10monther but on Saturday, they had a ball together.    2.  Had some real solid conversations with several people throughout my church. 3. Spoke to a different youth group about worship this past Friday night.  It was well-received.  4.  Lost – brilliant.  4.5. 24 has been pretty entertaining too.

 

Disappointed by … nothing personal that I can remember.  I think lately, I’ve just been burdened by my family/friends who live in fear of being laid off or have been laid off and now job hunting.  God’s grace to them.

Listening to … U2’s New Line On the Horizon (available thru Amazon mp3 store for $3.99).   As part of Lent, I’m trying to spend money on only essentials.  But I’m pretty sure that the Lord Himself will be buying this tomorrow (that is assuming He hasn’t already downloaded it, legally of course, since God’s Ipod exists beyond the time-space continuum).  2. Heard a great Mars Hill Podcast by Jeff Manion called a Life that Shines available here.

Loving … that some of my friends started blogging over the last two weeks.  My favorite youth pastor, fellow brother in Christ and in the Yankees, Tim Nye just started blogging. Also there is my seventeenth favorite seminary cohort member KJ (also a youth pastor) is blogging again and my favorite prodigal son story of 2008 Jeremy Stephens who was delivered from being a car salesman and is now serving the Lord as an underpaid youth pastor and bivocations at a board game company.  I think his job is manufacturing the top hat game piece in the classic game Monopoly.  I know what you’re thinking, don’t they just outsource that to a like a steel company?  He told me otherwise and a former car-salesman doesn’t lie.  Hey check out their blogs.  

 

Reading … a little of everything.  No class this week at school so I got back to Pete Enn’s Inspiration andIncarnation.  Also reading Cross-Shattered Christ by Stanely Hauerwas as part of my Lenten reading and …  Also the new Relevant magazine just came in.  I urge you to subscribe, it’s the best $12 you will spend all year.

 

Watched …  Slumdog Millionaire finally.  Loved it, was beautiful but not sure if I can ever watch it again. There are some movies that are too moving for me to sit through again.  Saving Private Ryan comes to mind. The first hour, I was just so broken by the poverty, abandonment, violence and exploitation.  Further, it’s not just a movie, this not only happens but it’s happening.  Beautiful movie that takes these terrible circumstances and offers some redemption and a great love story.  They deserved all their awards. Speaking of awards, still have yet to see the “Mickey Rourke was robbed” in the Wrestler.  Some people are angrier about that then the bailout.  Also watched on the dvd documentary “Escape From Suburbia” which deals with energy and the American way of life.  I ended up watching it twice.  Here are my two cents.  Good info, I agree with the crux of it, but the documentary was not that well done, way too many interviews, and while I know they were intending on waking people up, it was a little too over-stated.  I’m curious in knowing if there are better documentaries that do a better job with this issue.

Youth Ministry Update … Our Video Series They Like Jesus but Not the Church (by Dan Kimball) is still going real well.  Small groups have been lively and this past week we discussed the issue of women in the church.  Controversial huh?  Not really.  Dan does a real good job cutting to the issue.  Here was his point, “The church has been charged by some by being male-domineering and oppressive to women.  How do we as Christ-following Christians respond?”  We can discuss women in ministry, interpretations of passages like I Timothy 2, remind each other the role women played in Jesus’ ministry and in Paul’s but we have to agree that the we need to affirm and encourage our sisters in Christ. 

Looking forward to …  Playing fantasy baseball with my friends.  I just registered and my team name is “I Am Wolverine!”  

Reflecting on Franklin Graham’s “Listen Up” Comments, Sojourner’s Open Letter, and the Reaction

I’m trying to think through this Franklin Graham situation that’s been filling my news feed and has been on mind for about a week now. In response to his comments was this Open Letter to Graham and now there’s reaction. I too, have a reaction.  And I hope it’s Christian, charitable and best-case, adds perspective and is on the side of peace-making.

In short, I feel that Graham missed an opportunity to contribute positively and for many, he worsened an already troubled situation. He is such a recognized figure in evangelical Christianity and I feel the need to begin at the obvious but still needs to be said, his Facebook statement is not a sufficient representation of all evangelicals, like me and many I know.

At the same time, I am not trying to throw Franklin Graham under the bus. What he said was not scandalous; it was short on mercy. When considering the scope of his platform and our cultural tension, it’s fair to say this lacked the necessary discernment and consideration. In addition to what Franklin said is the social media reaction of supporting Graham. Among them are those I regard as friends and/or have respect for. Again, I’m not looking for Graham to be punished or vilified, nor am I [Read more…]

Brian Williams, Preaching, and “Everyone Loves a Good Story”

Brian Williams is the cautionary tale of the week. As you probably know, he’s taken himself off the air and has admitted to being untruthful in his accounts such as his helicopter being shot down while he was covering the war in Iraq. Many of his other stories are now under suspicion as well and it’s likely going to be a long year for him. And of course, when you are found out today, you get made fun all over cable and flogged on social media.

There’s a lot in this story for me. One his actions represent to me why we cannot take the media to be a reliable source of information and truth. At best, it’s a system of partial half-truths. The news business is compromised with its competition for ratings, advertising dollars, reputations, status and more. In a world uncontrolled by business and status, could we get better news? I believe so but the question still remains, how well we can actually know something?

This of course sends me back to the posts from last week, “I don’t know what to believe” from the significant to the trivial, to current events, to the spiritual, etc. I used to think if I just had the right data, I could arrive to reliable conclusions. If I applied the right hermeneutics, and prayed just enough, I could understand this particular passage of Scripture. The experience of life has taught me (and probably you), that this is not a reliable strategy and being Spirit-led is more for the journey than the occasion. 

Back in college, there was this guest preacher who came and gave these messages filled with some amazing stories. On this particular night following the chapel service, the campus pastor invited me [Read more…]

What We Learned From Mark Driscoll and What We Can Pray For Next

Image from Mars Hill Church

On Sunday Pastor Mark Driscoll announced to his Mars Hill congregation that he will be stepping back for six weeks as the elders examine the charges against Mark and determine the appropriate next steps. It’s hard for me not to see this as a good thing as I’ve discussed him on this blog a few times and he’s come up in countless conversations over the years. Too much has gone on for too long and Mark needs to be held accountable.

Being a pastor and in this space, an amateur blogger, I know how this can look. I’m another kicking a guy when he’s down, another example of the church eating their own and clearly motivated by jealousy, etc. I am also well aware of Jesus’ warning of judging others as you will be judged by the same measure (Matt 7:1-2). May the Lord judge my heart here but I hope to communicate as “Christianly” as possible of where I am coming from.

It’s actually healthy to talk about this in loving and restorative ways. It’s not only ok, it’s actually necessary because this scene in Mark Driscoll’s life is a cautionary tale for all of us. Further, hopefully some goodness can be found in the mess of all this. And lastly, should the day come when my personal behavior has become such a distraction to the Christian mission, I hope my faith community would be courageous enough to ask me to step down. May God give the Church the wisdom to discern between judging, rebuking and enabling.

In the meantime, here are three lessons learned.

Good, acceptable, conservative orthodox doctrine does not give you license to do whatever you want. In so many words, Mark has acted like a jerk. Like many, I had heard of Driscoll more than ten years ago. He was the “cussing pastor” out of Don Miller’s soul-worthy [Read more…]