LORD, YOU DECEIVED ME! YET IT BURNS ON…

Shaping one to be fit, or well placed, in Christian ministry is a creative act of God. But sometimes we are broken in the process. In fact, we are often broken in the process.

Recently I was looking at Jeremiah 18 in preparation for a Bible study. You recall Jeremiah’s visit to the potter’s house and the example and instruction given him by God. The potter was shaping a vessel. It became marred in the potter’s hand. He broke it only to reshape it “as it pleased the potter to make it” (Jeremiah 18:4, NASB). This became a prophetic message for Jeremiah to proclaim to the men of Judah and residents of Jerusalem (18:11).

Fast forward one day. I went back to that passage and when I opened my Bible, my eyes fell on the bottom right side of my copy and Jeremiah 20:7 seemed to leap off the page. Here Jeremiah is saying, “O Lord, you deceived me, and I was deceived; You have overcome me and prevailed. I have become a laughingstock all day long; everyone mocks me.”

What happened between the message given at the potter’s house and Jeremiah seemingly ready to throw in the towel and accuse God of deception?

He gave out the message of the Lord. Rather than the people repenting, they rejected the message and plotted to harm him with their “tongue” (18:18). The gossip and rumor mills began to grind and Jeremiah was the grist. Again he prophesied. And this time the priest had him beaten and incarcerated.

Have you ever felt like Jeremiah must have felt? You hear a message from God through the text of Scripture and the leading of the Holy Spirit and you present it to the people. You can envision their accepting the message and responding appropriately. You have heard of others: Wesley who said, “I rode into town and I gave them Christ”; Spurgeon who preached to 6,000 as a 19-year-old; the great evangelistic crusades of Billy Graham and the mega-churches of today. You, too, are preaching God’s truth.

But something happens. No one repents. Instead, your motives are criticized and the tongues begin to wag. Oh, you are not physically beaten, but you are whipped in many ways. In my growing up years, I overheard adult conversations in which it would be said, “we must keep him humble”, referring to the pastor. I once heard Grady Wilson jokingly speak of his friendship with Billy Graham. Grady once told a story about Mr. Graham (he was one of the best at telling stories about their campaigns) and concluded, “if God will keep him anointed, I will keep him humbled.” What was in friendship and humor to them has often become a reality with which pastors must navigate.

How do you respond? Jeremiah wanted to quit and put God out of his mind. Then Jeremiah experienced what I believe is true of every God-called preacher. He experienced a “holy oughtness”  that was undeniable. It was as if the message of God was a burning fire in his heart. He HAD to speak it out!

Jeremiah is one of my heroes. He never had a convert and someone was always after him. He was among the “others” of Hebrews 11:36-38. Yet he remained faithful to God. The book of Jeremiah and Lamentations are more than a record of God’s dealing with Judah. They are Jeremiah’s journal.

Most of us fare much better in ministry than Jeremiah. We see some fruit of our labor and most people are really kind and respectful. Yet there are days when frustration mounts and rides us like the Jackasses we sometimes are. And we accuse God. The evidence of our humanity is all around us.

The next time you are tempted to quit, let me encourage you to step back. Listen to your heart. If the message burns within you. know that God has called you and as Jeremiah discovered, He will sustain you.

Fulfill your calling – with a burning heart!

Waiting On The Lord

One of my responsibilities with the SBTC  is in Facilitating Ministries. Here I work with a large number of pastors and directors of mission from Wichita Falls to Georgetown.

One of those pastors, Doug Helms (Crowley, TX) and his family are going through a very trying time. Their 17-year-old son, Peter, was severely injured (head trauma) in an auto accident 4 weeks ago. He is in a coma at John Peter Smith Hospital in Ft. Worth.

There is a page on Facebook with continual updates. Peter’s mother, Selah, posted this yesterday. I emailed Doug and asked permission to re-post. He has given permission in the hope that God will be glorified in all this.

These are Selah’s musings as she waits by her son’s side. May God strengthen the Helms and us as we learn through the grace in which this family is living.  And please pray for Peter and the family.

From Peter’s Mom:

Today marks the beginning of week 4 since Peter’s car accident. The doctors and nurses tell us that, though it seems like a long wait to us, it’s actually still very early on in the recovery process for an injury like Pete’s.

My husband reminds me often (and I’m thankful) that we are not just waiting on Peter to wake up, but that we are also learning to wait on the Lord, and that there are promises in Scripture for those who wait on the Lord. I really like C.J. Mahaney’s definition of waiting on the Lord. It showed up in a post by Sunny Shell on the group wall: “It takes faith to wait tranquilly for something for which we have a promise from God, but no date. . . . Waiting is not resignation; waiting is active trust in God to provide fulfillment in His perfect timing, according to His ultimate purpose of glorifying His Son.”

As we wait on the Lord “more than the watchmen wait for the morning,” He promises to renew our strength. He also promises that He will give what is good to His children, just as an earthly father would – that if we ask Him for bread, He won’t give us a stone. So we come to Him fully trusting His character, asking for bread. Then, we wait. But we know while we wait that in whatever manner God chooses to give to us, what he gives will be bread and not a stone. We cry out to the Lord, asking for many things regarding Peter’s healing, and we know His answer will be good, and it will come in His perfect timing.

People ask me how I’m doing. Well, as I’m learning to wait, here’s what I am doing: the duty of this particular day. It’s a discipline included in waiting – that I learn what my duty is only for the day at hand, without giving in to speculating on future days.

What is trust and what is obedience for this day? I’ll tell you what it looks like, practically speaking. For one thing, I am learning much about physical therapy and respiratory therapy. We do Passive Range of Motion (PROM) exercises with Peter throughout the day, along with talking to him about things he is familiar with. Here’s the schedule we have been loosely adhering to around the interruptions that typically happen in hospital-life:

7:00 a.m.–Family member who spent the night with Peter wakes up. Miriam Simmons (dear friend who was once an ER nurse, now homeschooling mom of Peter’s good friend Caleb) arrives. She goes through PROM with Peter, talks about date, time and weather, sings “Give Thanks” to him and reads Isaiah 40. Nurses come through and give him meds.

9:00–PROM with Dad. Doug reads through questions #1-5 of the Shorter Catechism with Peter, including Scriptural proofs. Peter memorized the Shorter Catechism in high school. Doug sings “Before the Throne of God Above,” prays with Peter and talks to him. He also reads James 1, as Peter memorized the book in the past.

11:00–PROM with Doug again, then questions #6-10 of Shorter Catechism. Doug then sings another hymn, reads James 2 and talks to Pete. Then we put on YoYo Ma playing the Unaccompanied Bach Cello Suites in the background. It’s soothing.

2:00–PROM with Mom. Then Mom reads James 3 to Peter, talks to him and sings “Great is Thy Faithfulness.” Often I also read Shakespeare’s version of King Henry’s speech before the battle of Agincourt to him. As Pete is an avid history buff, this was another piece of memory work he chose a couple of years ago.

4:00–PROM with Mom again. Then James 4 and “Great is Thy Faithfulness” again. Then I either put on “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” and some other Mozart, or some of the pieces he has recently performed in piano recitals.

7:00–PROM with Andrew. Then Andrew reads James 5 to him, and we all sing “Jesus, I My Cross Have Taken” around his bed. This is often the song Pete chooses for his turn during family devotions. When Caleb, Hope, and Beth are there, it really sounds good because they sing in parts. We miss Pete though, because Peter is the only one in the family who sings the bass line, so it doesn’t sound as fully rounded out without him. We hope he can hear the difference, and that it will prompt him to wake up and help us out.

Last night, Andrew and I were trying to be creative in coming up with some things to talk to Peter about. “Twenty Questions” has been an old family favorite from the time the kids were young. So we played it over Pete’s bed. Andrew guessed Knight Roland and Neville Chamberlain from my clues. I guessed Bede, but got stumped on King Hrothgar from his clues. So he won. Pete would have guessed King Hrothgar.

“Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!” Psalm 27:14

Selah

SERVING A GOD OF SOVEREIGN PURPOSE

God is good!

I am not a “Calvinist”, but I may be leaning…:). Not really. But I do believe in the Sovereignty of God and in the purpose of God for all things. And I am rebuked for being among those to whom Jesus referred as “O ye of little faith!”.

When I discovered my journal missing after our family vacation, I grieved. I have ideas, prayers, private thoughts, etc. I called where we stayed and the company from whom we leased the van. No journal. I prayed. One day last week I learned to not trust “impressions”. I had a strong impression the journal was in my mail box. I rushed to the post office and there wasn’t even lint in it, much less a journal.

Thursday morning I got a text message from Greg Wells. Greg is a good friend from 121 Community Church. We meet every other week. Greg helped sponsor our SBTC Pastor’s Golf Retreat. His text simply said, “Did you lose a journal?” I was stunned and discovered he had my journal. We met for lunch. While waiting for him I told the story to the waitress whom I will call “Kelly”. Pray for “Kelly”.

Here is the story. Enterprise had no 15 passenger vans when I first tried to find one. But a few days before leaving, I got a call: “Mr. Elmore, we have located a van for you.” Apparently they got it from Capps (we paid $200 less than what Capps was going to charge me). Little did I know that the youth from 121 Community Church were going to New Orleans and were renting vans from Capps. When Capps cleaned the vans from the 121 trip, they found a journal in the console. They called the youth pastor and he picked it up. He saw my name, knows me, and knows Greg and I meet. He put it in Greg’s in-box.

I told this story to the “Kelly”. When Greg and I were finishing lunch, she brought the bill and brought up the story and said, “God works in mysterious ways.” The story on “Kelly”. She was not raised in a Christian home. She said she did not go to church until she was old enough to choose for herself. She began going to a church in the southern part of the metroplex but dropped out because some would “party on Saturday night and act holier-than-thou on Sunday”. In the conversation we discovered that she believes she is a Christian and she and her fiance are looking for a church. They want to begin their marriage right. Greg gave her his card.

I said to “Kelly”, “I don’t want to make more of this than it is and I really don’t know all that is going on. But if someday in heaven I discover the whole purpose for this was to encourage you to live for Jesus, I would jump up and down with joy.”

God is sovereign! Pray for “Kelly”. I thank those who knew and prayed I would find my journal. It is beside me.

HE OPENED A DOOR

We stood side by side – 5 feet apart. Teens sat at our feet. The building was packed and the doors open with standing room only. I was the pastor and the other the guest evangelist. He had spoken daily in the local high school and our time was filled with his speaking in the high school classes or myself counseling with people. Jesus was the topic of the week. That week was blessed of God with many coming to Christ. Lives were changed.

It began like any other local church revival meeting. We prayed. We prepared. He was on staff at a suburban church and was driving back and forth. Sunday morning was typical. Sunday night a little better than expected. He had asked to get into the high school. The local officials said “no”.

But that Sunday evening one local teacher said, “You are welcome to come speak to my classes.” On Monday morning we showed up. We called him an Evangelist in those days. I see via the web they are now “Communicators”. Whatever. He began his school talk. I don’t recall all he said, but for those students on that day, they were captured. This resulted in other teachers, at the insistence of the students, inviting the guest to speak in their classes. Even the principal relented and invited him to a called chapel on Wednesday. It was an incredible week with some very significant spiritual victories and people coming to Christ. I became friends with a couple of pastors from other denominations. God was good.

The Evangelist was an incredibly gifted “Communicator”. Sadly his gifting took him farther than his integrity could sustain him.

The school teacher? I had lunch with him a few days ago. He loves Jesus. His family loves Jesus. He is no longer a school teacher. He is retired from an oil company and is pastoring a small church in Texas. He has served in the local church in some capacity since those days and has been a bi-vocational pastor.

It is interesting. The Evangelist a much better speaker than myself or my friend. And yet, it was my friend who was the human instrument who opened the door for God to bless that week…”I would rather be a doorman in the house of the Lord than…”. My friend has never pastored a large church. And yet, he has been mightily used of God in the lives of countless numbers of people. He is trusted. He is a friend of mine and of all who know him. His integrity is without question. He desires no credit and if he reads this he will be embarrassed.

He took several phone calls while we were eating. What was that all about? Doesn’t he know that is impolite? Yes, he knows. But, I told you he cares. Someone called him. They couldn’t find a senior adult in the congregation. There was pause and cause for concern. His wife, at the request of a family member, went looking for her. She was located just prior to the pastor’s wife dialing 911. Yes, he knows. But he cares.

Pastors, most of us will never speak on the Evangelism Conference and even fewer will preach a revival meeting in which the auditorium is so full the pastor and evangelist have to stand the entire service. But maybe we can open doors. We can be faithful and we can be men of integrity.

Today I spoke with a waitress at lunch. She told me a bit of her story. She was not raised in a Christian home and didn’t go to church until a teen-ager. You hear so many who say, “my parents forced church down my throat until I could make my own decision and I left”. Her story was, “my parents never took me to church and I didn’t go until I was old enough to make my own decision.”

But she had dropped out. Why? She saw those who “partied on Saturday night and acted ‘holier-than-thou’ on Sunday morning. She was not looking for the great “Communicator”. She was looking for an authentic congregation. My friend and I were able to suggest some good options for her.

I serve as an interim pastor. The former pastor left a little over a year ago. To this day I consistently hear these descriptions of his tenure among them: “Brother __ was a very Godly man” and “Brother __ was a man of integrity.”

You may not have the technical support, the crowd, or have people ordering your cd’s. But you are making an eternal impact upon people’s lives, and sometimes all you are doing is opening a door. The example of David is encouraging: “He shepherded them with a pure heart and guided them with his skillful hands” (Ps. 78:72, HCSB).

Be encouraged! You never know when God will walk through the door you open!

HAVE YOU TAKEN SOME TIME OFF THIS SUMMER?

“I don’t take a day off. The devil doesn’t take time off.” This was one pastor’s philosophy. Both he and his wife have entered their reward. And yes, he did retire and between retirement and death had numerous very serious health issues. The story came from a staff member.

It sounds “spiritual”, doesn’t it? And this was a very Godly man who served the Lord faithfully in terms of his works.

My cute reply to the staff member was, “Well, I am following Jesus, not the devil.” And so was this pastor, although the quip lends itself to some friendly kidding.

Jesus did take time off. He withdrew from the crowds and the disciples to find time alone with the Father. Vance Havner had a sermon on rest. He took the passage where, in the KJV, Jesus said, “Come ye apart…”. Havner said, “If you don’t “come apart” you will come apart!

Recently our family took a family vacation. This was difficult to accomplish because there are 14 of us and it is difficult to coordinate married children’s schedules and finances. We planned this for six months and last week pulled it off! It was incredible and such fun.

One must realize that for the pastor, physical fatigue is seldom an issue. However, spiritual and emotional fatigue precede burnout. The Sunday prior to our leaving I asked the congregation I serve to not call me unless an emergency. They honored that and for the time of vacation I did not talk “business” nor did I take my laptop. I dis-engaged from the routine. I packed my clothes in a backpack and took a hardback Bible to just read. No study.

Cell phones and computers are wonderful tools. We choose to be slaves to them. Mine has “off” buttons, and the cell phone has voice mail. I haven’t missed anything because I am not available 24-7. One commented on the person who is always available and said, “Those who are always available are sometimes not worth much when you get them.”

I am prone to take on too much. Are you? I want to be in this for the long haul and finish well. What can we do as men of God and pastors to accomplish that goal?

1. Take your day off each week. Dis-engage from your “vocation” and spend time with God, do something for yourself, and spend time with family.

2. Take all of your vacation. One colleague tells me, “I need two weeks to relax. The first week I dis-engage and the second I relax.”

3. Do something different on your vacation. Your budget may dictate what you can do, but be creative and find things in your area that are inexpensive but get you out of your comfort zone.

4. Plan for your time off so as to eliminate the tyranny of the urgent while taking a day off or vacation – get away from the cell and laptop!

5. Set the example and insist your staff take their time off. Create a culture of working hard, smart, and effective, but also dis-engaging when it is appropriate. They will have a much better attitude and they will know of your care for them. It is a pastoral issue.

6. Be proactive. Look at your year ahead. Your emotionally “down” times will follow a mountain-top experience or a time of high stress. When you know those times are coming, plan for some time of dis-engagement following.

7. There are several retreat centers the Minister/Church Relations Dept. of the SBTC can recommend for you. These are designed as pastor retreat centers to help prevent or overcome burnout. Perhaps the SBTC can help your church leadership see the need to put some monies in the budget to enable this type of retreat every three or five  years.

Summer 2010 is almost ended. Most of you could have written this post. But if there are some left who have not taken some time off, do yourself and your church a favor. Relax and dis-engage for a brief time before the fall rush!

COOKING WITH OIL…again!!

PC out, Mac is in. My laptop died. Absolutely dead. I tried to resurrect it. Nope. Still dead. It had been dying for some time. You know, death never comes at a good time, even when expected. As a part-timer, I am required to furnish my own equipment. So, I went shopping and when dollar for dollar and other variables (such as a lack of spam and viruses on Mac at this time) were considered, I chose Mac.

Only one problem – huge adjustment and learning curve. You know what? No problem. I want to die the day I stop learning. I do not long for the good old days. The learning curve is steep at times and I have been very frustrated learning some of the differences. But that is OK. I am liking Mac world.

Actually, that brings up another problem. How do we communicate to churches that the good old days were maybe not that good overall and it is no longer Mayberry? I love Andy Griffith. But have you ever counted the number of people in that little church? Most I’ve ever counted was 24. They must have been powerful tithers to support a pastor full-time. Oh, I forgot. It wasn’t a Baptist church, so maybe the denomination supported Rev. Tucker.

Do you really want a church whose most influential member is a single sheriff who double-dates with his hormone driven deputy in the marked police cruiser and parks at Myers Lake to make out with one of the single elementary school teachers? Or whoever he is dating at the time? The unspoken example of this reminds me that the hidden sins of the “good old days” were maybe not so much greater than the open sins of today. I know, I know – that may be somewhat of a stretch, but think about it in terms of example.

Do we really have to go back to the old spiritual awakenings of hundreds of years ago to find an example? Very few talk about the Jesus Movement of the late ’60′s and early ’70′s. However, two of the continuing products of that small awakening are Calvary Chapels and Praise music (Maranatha label began with a $1,000 loan from Chuck Smith and studios were in Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa). Out that movement came evangelist/pastors such as Greg Laurie and Rick Warren. Casual dress on Sunday a.m. was another aspect. It isn’t necessarily a spiritual one, but then neither are suits.

Seminaries grew as result of young men and women “turned on to Jesus” who realized a need for further training. Others who were not part of the “hippie revival” in California but whose lives were affected by what God was doing in and with a younger generation.

I recall those early ’70′s. Vietnam was raging. I was barely 21 and a police officer. We were instructed to take the drunks to a federally funded “detox” center. I remember taking one to that center and was told, “He is too drunk to be here. Take him to jail.” I did. But on my ‘beat’ was a house church type thing that was operated by folk saved out of the drunk and rock music background. I got to know them. They said, “bring them (the drunks) here.” I did and saw young people in their early twenties and late teens who believe the Gospel of Jesus Christ cover any sin and change any person.

We are in an obvious time of change. It isn’t Mayberry. The issue is not style. The issue is the Gospel of Jesus Christ and whether or not we really believe the Gospel is sufficient to cover any sin and change any person. That is part of the “times of refreshing” for which I pray.

The point is this. Change is not always bad. Maintaining the status quo is.

REMEMBER TO PRAY FOR THE “YOUNG” PASTORS

I’m not old, but I remember. I am aging, so perhaps in some minds that is “old”.  I subscribe to the “sixty is the new fifty; fifty is the new forty” mantra. So come on, knees, get with it!

One of the great things about some age is that any one of us can say, “This is not my first rodeo.” We remember some things that should prompt us to pray for the many younger pastors and others fulfilling their calling in Christian leadership.

Because of the nature of this post, I will not call names. And really, names are not the point.

I am grateful to God for the younger faces I see in the streams and photos from the recently concluded Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting. I have not been privileged to attend an annual meeting for many years, so I follow on-line and through twitter.

God is so good to us. There are young men rising from their generation that God is empowering to build great Great Commission churches. Many are in demand as speakers at almost any conference.  Some are edgy in their delivery. Others have shaped their message to be a bit more smooth. Almost all are radically in love with Jesus.

Thus the issue. Are you praying for them? In Hebrews 11 fashion, time would fail me to tell of the many who were heroes to myself and others while we were in college and seminary that have fallen. For some, their pride was so severe that it appears God gave them over to themselves and they became casualties. Others had moral issues surface. And some, through no fault of their own were taken by disease and accident at an age we would call “premature”.

I believe it is well within the bounds of Scripture to say that the enemy is seeking to destroy the lives and ministries of any who serve God. One does not have to be on a large stage with a watching SBC world. Satan’s minions are everywhere and Paul reminds us Satan himself is disguised as an angel of light (2 Cor. 11:14). Jesus said the thief comes only to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10).

As I watched the streaming of the SBC and read The Southern Baptist Texan and Baptist Press, I was reminded of many who were my generations heroes when we were younger. They are the aging statesmen. Some have retired, others are retiring. I also saw the younger pastors typically profiled at the preaching events.

I was also reminded of several who could have been among the aging and retiring statesmen. Some have been taken in death. Others made shipwreck of their faith and ministry through sin.

1 Peter 5:8-9 exhorts, “Be sober! Be on the alert! Your adversary the Devil is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for anyone he can devour. Resist him, firm in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are being experienced by your brothers in the world.” (HCSB)

Let us thank God for these wonderful men and women whom He is raising to lead another generation to radically serve Jesus. And let us continually hold them up in prayer.

Baptists are by and large “list pray-ers”. So let me encourage you to make a list of some names you know. They may not be national names. Some may be. But make a list of younger men and women who are called to Christian leadership and pray for them on a regular basis. Ask God to bring into their lives those whom they will respect as accountability partners. Ask God to grant them protection from disease and sin and/or any other thing the enemy would bring into their lives to distract and discredit them. Pray for their humility. God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. And pray their Sabbath time – their times of solitude with the Lord – will be valued and frequented by them.

They may never know of your prayers. But God will. And the Kingdom of God will be strengthened. Remember Ezekiel 22:30? God was seeking for one to “stand in the gap” in intercession. Let us not fail to be one of those, to the glory of God!