Life of a Hypocrite?

"Take the case of a sour old maid, who is a Christian, but cantankerous.  On the other hand, take some pleasant and popular fellow, but who has never been to Church.  Who knows how much more cantankerous the old maid might be if she were not a Christian, and how much more likable the nice fellow might be if he were a Christian?  You can't judge Christianity simply by comparing the product in these two people; you would need to know what kind of raw material Christ was working on in both cases."

C.S. Lewis, God in the Dock.

Why are Christians such hypocrites?  Because everyone who tries to act like they have it all together is a hypocrite!

We all "have our moments."  It is just a plain, simple, and awful fact.  I sure wish it were not so.  I wish I could control my tongue perfectly, always be marked by self-control, and love with such passion and purity that everyone around me is touched by the grace of God.

I have my moments when I do these things.  Each is a scriptural command.  Yet, I also have my moments when I spectacularly violate these commandments!

Why are we such a jumbled mix of redeemed "saint" and fallen, sinful child of Adam?  How do we understand and explain these two competing tendencies?  

Let me begin by looking at the life and actions of a typical believer like you or me.  How do we understand our actions in light of the gospel?  As people there are many factors that shape how each of us respond to any given circumstance. 

I know I respond to difficulties in life and even the small inconveniences so differently when I am sick or really tired than when I am healthy and have had a good night's sleep.  If someone sees me respond on a bad day they might see something different than my actions on a good day.  Should I despair of this known fact?  Should I deny it is true?

Furthermore, I became a believer at age 18.  There were some really rough spots within my formed character when I became a believer.  God was and is so merciful to me, but I am still surprised by the thoughts that flow out of my heart and often pass through my mouth.  Why does the Lord not just zap me and change my heart so I think and say "darn" instead of "damn" when I do something wrong?  I honestly do not think about such words and thoughts, they just come out.  

How about you?  In what areas do you struggle?  How are you often surprised and humiliated by the evil that still dwells within?

What does this struggle illustrate?

Like the cantankerous, sour old maid, I am in need of grace!

I wonder, what would I be like if Christ did not bring me to Himself all those years ago?  I know that the raw material God had to work with was greatly defaced and misshaped by sin and death before I even came to Jesus.  Those tendencies remain even today!  Yes I am still a sinner.  If you catch me on a bad day, I am sure I do not look like a saint.  In fact, if you are looking for hypocrisy and defining it as not always doing right, I am a hypocrite.

According to the definition of hypocrite as one who always does right, there is only one truly righteous person ever born.  This person is Jesus Christ.  I am a mere fallen follower of this great man!  I do not have it all together and I look to Him for grace and forgiveness daily.  

So, if you catch me in some sin, I hope I will be willing to confess my sin and need for this grace.  When I am disappointed and humiliated by my sinful heart, I look to Jesus as my only hope.  

Let me assure you, such thoughts are not natural to me!  My natural inclination is to deny my sin or to try to pass it off as less than what it is.  My natural inclination is to maintain my reputation instead of confessing my need.

In other words, I would define hypocrisy differently than always doing right.  I don't even think it is always being consistent.  Hypocrisy is much worse than doing wrong when I should know better.  At times, all of us fail to do the good we know we should do!

No, I think true hypocrisy is not confessing and living the truth that I am a sinner in desperate need of grace.  Hypocrisy is knowing I have such wrong tendencies (what the bible calls sin) that flow out of my heart and yet I do not address or confess them.

Are you living in active repentance and dependent faith?  Does confession and repentance come easy to you?  Can you see where you need grace and do you ask God for grace to transform these areas?

If the answers to these three questions are all yes, I think God is doing a great work in your life.  Cling to Christ and grow in grace!  Always point yourself and others to Jesus.

If your answers are no to any of these three questions, you are most likely a self-deluded hypocrite (wow that sounds harsh!  Please know I have lived much of my life in this state.).  Repent and believe.  Ask for grace to see your need.  Cling to Jesus as your only hope.

Growth comes as we reorient our life around Jesus Christ.  Such reorientation is a life-long process.  It is hard work because it goes against our fallen natural tendencies.  May each of us repent and believe in deeper ways this day and this week!

Cultural Intelligence in Ministry and Life

It has been a busy and distracting past week or so.  Nothing major, but I feel like I am working harder and getting less done.  Unfortunately, this means less writing on this blog and my other writing.  I hate when this happens.  

Last week I wrote about the importance of emotional intelligence.  Successful ministry leaders are marked by strong emotional intelligence.  There is no way around it.

Today, I wish to move to a mark of successful ministry that will determine whether one oversees a growing ministry marked by evangelistic growth.  We all know that it is possible to grow a ministry without doing real evangelism.  All that occurs is that Christians move from one church to another.  While this feels good to the growing church, it is not real kingdom growth!

How do we grow a ministry marked by increasing depth for believers and solid growth through evangelism to not-yet believers?  We must have a solid cultural intelligence.

So what is cultural intelligence?

Cultural intelligence is "the ability to understand, acknowledge, and appreciate current contextual forces as well as the cultural background of oneself and others." (Covenant, Spring/Summer 2012, 24)  What does this mean?  I like how one Pastors Summit participant put it, "It is vital in ministry to understand cultural norms and nuances in order to discern between what we accept as correct in culture and what is truth as defined in Scripture." (24)

I could not agree more!  Study after study, as well as my experience, illustrate that biblically strong and faithful churches have a chance to grow, but churches that neglect scripture as their norm are by and large shrinking.  Why?  Churches that ignore scripture have "A form of godliness, but they deny its power."  2 Timothy 3:5  I do not believe these churches are attractive to the true spiritual seeker.

The problem is that many church that profess fidelity to scripture are more wed to their cultural understanding of the gospel and its application than they are to the true gospel and its application!

What do I mean?  Most of us are shaped by our childhood.  From that childhood, we assume that our experience is just the way things should be.  As believers in Christ, we do the same thing.  Our early experiences in Christian community often dictate "just how things should be."  

What happens when our church experience declares cultural assumptions as biblical assumptions?  We short-circuit the power of the Spirit and replace it with a cheap cultural substitute.

Let's give an example.  Children should be taught to sit through church at an early age.  Why?  They need to learn the bible and how to worship.  This is best done in our worship experience.

Is this a bad idea?  Obviously no!  It is a great ideal.  It is particularly a good ideal if the children come from homes where the bible is taught in family devotions and where church is a regular part of life.  I know entire churches where this is the accepted practice.

Yet, is this ideal both biblical and culturally aware?  I think we could argue that this is a biblical ideal.  We are to train our children in how to walk with God.  Yet, is having them sit through a worship service the best way to do this?  Maybe yes, but maybe no!

What happens when someone who the Lord is seeking comes to worship at your church?  Immediately they feel and know that their children are different.  They are not well-behaved and not able to sit still through an hour or more of worship.  In fact, they are not learning about the Lord in worship, but they also are distracting mom and dad from learning about God (notice the other cultural assumption!  Mom and Dad?  Most likely the person walking in the door with children is a single parent).  

What about our biblical ideal?  We have replaced a biblical ideal with a cultural assumption.  Culturally, many folks in leadership were brought up in homes where the bible was honored, devotions were insisted upon, and worship was a regular part of life.  These cultural assumptions no longer hold.  In fact, they are impediments to those coming to faith and to those who are in the process of becoming part of our churches!

Today, a church and leadership with solid cultural awareness and intelligence has an intentional, detailed, and culturally sensitive plan for dealing with children.  They fulfill the biblical ideal and goal of training up children in the fear and admonition of the Lord in a different way.  Maybe fifty years from now a great revival will change everything and everyone will go to church again.  At that time, we will train our children differently!

In other words, a cultural intelligent person and church will be aware of their cultural assumptions, the cultural assumptions of their surrounding area, and the unchanging principles of Scripture.  A culturally intelligent person will learn and know how to apply the principles of Scripture to their own life and to the life of the church.

So, are you culturally intelligent?  Is your church culturally intelligent?  What keeps you and your church from growing in this area?  How can you help sharpen your ability and the church's ability to reach out to those the Lord is seeking?

Emotional Intelligence in Life and Ministry

Without (emotional intelligence), a person can have first-class training,
an incisive mind, and an endless supply of good ideas,
but he still won't be effective.

Quoted in Covenant (Spring-Summer 2012), 24.

Without strong emotional intelligence, long-term ministry is impossible.

What is emotional intelligence?

It is the ability to process, understand, and balance our emotions with our actions.  It is having proper emotional self-control that allows one to deal with people and situations without emotional outbursts.  It is an understanding that people, including ourselves, often behave emotionally instead of rationally.  Thus, it is the ability to step back from emotional responses to allow grace and truth to prevail.

Wow, this is tough to define.  How to best define it?  Perhaps a negative but common example is the best  place to start.

In life and ministry I often run into people who display an almost negative emotional intelligence.  These folks do not know how to manage their emotions, and they project the intensity of their emotional instability upon those in the Church, the Church staff, and ultimately God.  Most of the time, the cause of their emotional upheaval has nothing to do with the situation in which they find themselves so angry.  Yet, instead of dealing with their emotions concerning the real issue, they strike out at a "safe" target like those in the Church.

Why do folks do this?  We live in a fallen world, and I bet that all of us have shown low emotional intelligence at times.  I know when my dad died unexpectedly I found myself angry at even small inconveniences much of the time.  I could not understand it.  Ultimately I needed grace from others as  well as the Lord to deal with my ailing and bruised heart!  I also needed better friends and mature believers who could help me deal with my emotions by helping me identify my hurt and reminding me of the Lord's love.  In my experience the Lord was much more faithful than my friends and fellow believers.

In ministry, we must learn how to manage our emotions.  All the rest of the of keys to successful ministry are merely aids to help us keep our emotions in check.  If our emotions flow from the heart, which I believe is most likely, then a heart transformed by God's grace and mercy will help keep the emotions in check.  The gospel will also allow us to ask folks for forgiveness when we respond inappropriately to their attacks and our own emotional meltdowns.  

Yet, I warn each of us, if you have too many emotional meltdowns as a ministry leader, you will quickly find yourself as a "former ministry leader!"  If you have constant meltdowns, people will avoid you out of fear because they will not know how you will respond to criticism, helpful advice, or their needs.  You cannot be effective in ministry if you are emotionally unstable.  

Furthermore, if you do not know how to deal with the emotional upheaval and outbursts of others, you also will not last long in ministry.  One of the biggest surprises of my life was learning that much of the time people do not respond logically to a situation.  Instead, people respond emotionally.

What does this look like?

Are you proposing changes to the worship service?  You can lay out all the reasons for making these changes.  Yet, some people will respond with anger and hurt.  The real key is to not be surprised!  Acknowledge that these emotions are real and help people to process their emotions.  Yet, they must process!  While they process, we should affirm that love them, we will pray for them, and we should look for chances to help them grow in their emotional intelligence.

The best way to help these folks grow in emotional intelligence is not to allow their emotional outburst to stop the proposed changes!  If you cave long-term to an emotional outburst, you encourage and promote low emotional intelligence.

Furthermore, I say again, a ministry leader must be emotionally mature.  You cannot change how others behave, but you can deal with your own emotions.  Be above the fray with your emotions even as you are present dealing with the emotions of others.  Is this not what Jesus did time and time again?  Such maturity is also needed in His under-shepherds.

As a pastor known for helping turn churches around, here is where careful discernment is needed.  If the leadership team always reacts emotionally and lacks emotional intelligence, it will take a miracle of biblical proportions to change the church culture.  There will be no will to maturely deal with emotional outbursts and the "squeaking wheel will get all the grease."  Do the best you can to identify a high emotional intelligence level on your leadership team.  Most importantly, lead by being emotionally intelligent yourself!

The Law of Unintended Consequences

"I was asking hard questions: 'How do we make a just society?' 'How do we look at the immorality in our world?'  I had tried to make life better through social reform and psychological reform and educational reform and political reform," he says.  "After I got to a certain point, I began to understand that the undergirding of all of those principles has to be spiritual, not something that Freud said but something spiritual.  So that's when I went to seminary."

Gerald Durley in "Pastor and Activist," Leadership (Summer 2000), 54.

In politics, the law of unintended consequences always wins.

What does this mean?

As a group of people, we seek to solve one problem, and we cause at least two more.  We think we can easily solve these two problems, but now we have four new ones.  Before long, we make an unintended problem that is bigger than any issue we tried to solve!

Why does this happen?

We live in a fallen world while we long for a perfect world.

In other words, the primary problem in this world is a spiritual problem.  I agree with Gerald Durley, who has lived an interesting life as a civil rights activist, a political activist, and a pastor.  At its root, the problem in our country, the problem in every country, the problem with every "system" is its tendency toward decay and ruin by running away from God's ways.  

We should never be surprised when we see injustice and immorality.  It is a mark of a world turned in upon itself and away from God.  As the world system pulls further away from how God made it to be, more injustice and immorality will come to pass.  It will become codified into law.  It will be enforced by the heavy hand of the state.  

What is the answer and cure to all these problems?  Believers of every stripe have taken up the cause of politics, education, psychology and other social answers.  In particular, we have aligned ourselves with political parties, and we live and die mentally and spiritually by who wins elections.  We fight using political means to change our culture, our educational system, and every other system thinking that the arm of the state can make things right.  Then we are disappointed when every political solution has more harmful unintended consequences than helpful results!

While we are called to pursue God's Kingdom by promoting justice and love, our embrace of politics as  "God's primary means" of changing the world is wrong-headed.

Why?

Humans as individuals and humans collectively are a fallen lot!  Our biggest problem is spiritual.  The more fallen people who get together to create a "system" the greater the possibility of corruption and evil to become the new law.  This goes for our political system, our educational system, and even our local churches!  It is a fact that should not be ignored.  If we choose to ignore it, as our culture does, we do so to our own peril.

As a culture, our system is broken.  I believe no amount of tinkering with the fringes of the system will cure the problem.  In fact, I think because the heart of the system is in rebellion against God, the entire system will only grow worse no matter what political party or powerful group tries to take control.

What is really our greatest need as a culture?

We need to repent and believe in Jesus Christ as individuals and as people involved in a cultural "system."  Instead of claiming "Bush did it" or "Obama is the problem" we need to confess that selfish pride and independence from God because of unbelief are the real problems in our culture.  

Our system is broken because the heart of the system is bad!

Our biggest problem is spiritual.  I am thankful that none of us as individuals is beyond redemption.  Take hope!

I also think that culture is constantly reinventing itself, so perhaps out of the ashes of our consumeristic Western culture will arise a new culture formed on the anvil of repentance and renewed faith.  But just as "bleeding" or "leeches" were once thought as  the best medical cure but later proved to be false, we need to look to the true cure of our individual and cultural woes.

We are sinners in need of grace.  God's ways and truth should not be ignored but recognized.  We recognize God's ways by repenting our our sin against Him and others and believing in Jesus Christ as our source of forgiveness and power for transformation.  We must live this truth as individuals and pray it through and for our country.

Living an Authentic Life of Faith

Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons, through the insincerity of liars whose consciences are seared, who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth.  For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected it it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer.

1 Timothy 4: 1-5

Recently I was talking with a new convert to the faith.  This man had lived a rough and hard life away from God.  In the past couple of months, the Lord pursued him and brought him to faith.  It is so encouraging to see God work the ultimate miracle of bringing folks from darkness to light!

As we talked, it became evident that he was searching for what to do next.  What does faith mean in the real world?  What about my love for having a beer, watching football, listening to country music, etc.?  Now that I am a believer, what should I do?

I find this is often the question that keeps people from growing in their faith.  It is a question that keeps them in fear and doubt.  On the one hand, they do not wish to be a hypocrite who now goes to church but is at a bar.  On the other hand, they hear the call for faith that brings life, but they do not wish to be miserable by having to give up all they love.  What should they do?

I think much of what passes for Christian counsel on this issue is well intended, but not helpful.  Here is what I heard as a new believer.  

"You must give up all that worldliness.  You should listen to Christian music.  You should come out and be separate from all the evil of the world.  Destroy the music CDs, clean off the iPod and get music that is godly.  Come hang out with only Christians because your worldly friends will lead you astray."

Have you ever heard this advice?  Have you given it?

I think some of this advice is solid.  Worldliness will kill your soul.  Yet, what is worldliness?  My definition is that it is anything that makes the truth of God look foolish and the foolish traditions of our age look like truth.  There is much of "hard living" that is marked by worldliness.  Yet, as I often have argued in this blog, there is also much of our "Christian community" that is also marked by a strange "religious" worldliness.

What do I mean?

What is the most important element of the truth of God?

We are saved, sustained, and grow by faith in the objective work of Christ on our behalf.  Through repenting of our unbelief and believing in Christ as our only hope, the Holy Spirit transforms our heart by grace so that we live more and more in light of God's presence and will.  This is a process that often moves in fits and starts.  Yet, by His grace we do grow!

In place of this truth, many sincere (and some not so sincere- see Paul above) believers emphasize the human law and tradition in place of an emphasis on repentance and faith.  They emphasize the human will and "making right choices" without understanding that our will and our choices are driven by our corrupt heart.  Why?  Because their understanding of life is more often marked by our corrupt cultural understanding of humanity (coming from the Enlightenment and through postmodernism) than by a Biblical perspective.  

So, these folks emphasize what you should and shouldn't do to "help" people grow.  They emphasize avoiding "worldly" activities and enforce total immersion in the Christian community.  Many of these folks use church and the Christian community as a totally separate world- I would call it a Christian bubble- to protect themselves from the evil outside their bubble.

Notice the above passage by Paul.  "The Spirit says that in the later times people will depart from the faith  by ... forbidding things that should not be forbidden."  Honestly, did you see that coming?  Does he not care about protecting folks from worldliness, sin and death?

Of course he does!  He just realizes that worldliness, sin, and death can take many forms.  From this passage, what would he say about today's world and to new convert who is struggling to apply the faith to everyday life?

First, the bar scene can easily be marked by worldliness.  If it leads one away from faith, it is best to avoid it.  If drinking leads you astray, stop it.  If surfing the web leads you to surfing the porn sites, don't surf the web or don't ever surf while alone.  Avoid those places and behaviors that lead to sin.  Protect your faith by remaining in a place of repenting for your unbelief and believing in Jesus by asking Him for grace to grow deeper and to tell others about Jesus.

Yet, as a new believer, you will never have more contacts with folks that need Jesus than you do right now.  Go tell folks about Jesus and what He has done in your life!  Some will reject this message and perhaps you.  Others will share in your journey of faith and join you!  Tell your friends about what God is doing.

This might well mean that you meet them in the bar.  Why?  This is where you met them for years.  What is different?  This time take Jesus and your faith with you.  Ask Him to open conversations.  If drinking is a problem, drink a coke instead.  Most folks will assume it is rum and coke anyway.  The bar is not necessarily evil.  It is what you do while there that determines if the place or activity is good or bad.

In terms of music, does becoming a believer mean your music choices have to change?  Perhaps.  Perhaps not.  What would Paul say?  "Everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer."  As part of the created order, music has a profound impact on our soul.  It can point us and prepare our hearts to reflect goodness or evil.  Like all art, it is a doorway to the heart.

Does the music you listen to lead you to sin by leading you away from depending on Jesus in repentance and faith?  If it does, then stop listening to it.  Perhaps as you grow in grace, you will be able to pick it back up later when you can bring Jesus with you as you listen to music.  

I have to be honest here.  I find that listening to much of what passes for "Christian music" does not help me grow in faith.  I find the lyrics trite and the musical ability of the bands mediocre at best.  I also find that much of the "Christian radio teaching" is not helpful to my growth.  Thus, I avoid it!  I love music and I have been musician and hung out with good musicians for decades.  I prefer good music and real lyrics to some worldly version of the Christian faith.

So, where does this lead us?  "For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer."  Bring Jesus with you in all you do- work, play, hobbies, relationships, sex, eating, worship, and hanging out.  When you do, He will use it all to help you grow deeper!

Also, those new to the faith have an opportunity to witness that will never come again in the same way. Tell your friends.  You do not have to have it all together (trust me you never will), but you can point to the only one who does- the Lord Jesus Christ.