Church Leadership Conversations

See the great quote by John Beukema at Out of Ur here.

"Ultimately, every text is about God. To focus constantly on the how can subtly influence our perspective of Scripture. For example, the awe-inspiring scene from Isaiah 6:1-4 should probably not become a sermon on ‘How to Meet with God.’"

–John Beukema is pastor of King Street Church in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania

Well said.  Is this Isaiah 6 event paradigmatic for worship?  What I mean is – should we expect Isaiah 6 everyday in quiet time?  Another example: should every worship service be just like the day of Pentecost?

Hmm . . . yes and no.  Ah, hermeneutics.  There are principles that are constant.  But we need to recognize that some aspects of the biblical narrative were more isolated events. 

This article reminds me of the classic Leadership Journal article by Haddon Robinson called "The Heresy of Application."  I often remembered that phrase. 

I remember one of the examples he gives is people who use Ruth to talk about how you should treat your mother-in-law when your husband dies.  Yes, but the hermeneutics needs a bit more reflection.   

Because social justice is now "cool" in churches, pastors are jumping in and starting new programs.  That is great and I don’t want to squelch that for an instant.  But I do think we should use the resources of the people in our congregation and run these programs with more wisdom.  Principal among our gifted congregation members are social workers.  I love social workers.  My dad had his Masters in Social Work and worked for the state of Illinois – Department of Children and Family Services – where he worked with cases of abuse and neglect of children.  In Vancouver, British Columbia, we had some outstanding social workers in our congregation who worked for the province, the Salvation Army, and did other social work consulting.  They were of enormous help to me as a pastor in an urban environment.   

I recently talked with a group of Taylor University social work majors in a class taught my friend Rukshan Fernando.  I gave them these final challenges. 

A pastor’s advice for people with passion and expertise in social work

1. Use your expertise to help us serve people.  Because we are new at this, we are trying to reinvent the wheel.  Help us put systems in place that treat people with dignity.  Help us tear down systems that dehumanize people.  Let us disturb the comfortable and comfort the disturbed. 
2. Learn to think theologically.  Ask questions of your Bible in community.  Learn what these terms mean: Church, Missional, Community, Incarnation, Kingdom.
3. Do not get caught with a cause.  Did Jesus just heal people?  Did he just do compassion?  No, he also taught and trained. 
4. Be a prophet.  Forth-tell the truth about how people are getting hurt.  You see it.  Say it.  Admit that emperor has no clothes.   
5. Begin to think of your social work as evangelism.  Evangelism usually means manipulation.  Shouldn’t it mean that the good news is  “is good for everyone” (John Ortberg)? 
6. Don’t get caught without Jesus.  Traditional liberal social gospel has often dismissed the Bible and God’s active presence in the world.
7. Study hard.  If you know something about caring for alcoholics, God will use you as a wise advisor.  You will help the church care for alcoholics more compassionately and effectively.   
8. Learn to tell stories.  Describe the situation, retell the dialogue, and give a reason for the hope that you have. 
9. Bring people with you as you serve.  Show us the dark alleys.  Help us to talk with the poor, the sick and the foreigner. 
10. Continue to be renewed spiritually.  Learn what Sabbath is.  Sabbath is about not being in slavery anymore.   
11. Understand the beauty of art.  Please don’t pinch pennies on beauty.  We need color.
12. Do not demonize business people.
13. Learn to eat with people.   

AIDS, as the premier example of the havoc wrought by income disparities, and pornography, taking a toll on the souls of church leaders, are the two new most difficult challenges faced by the next generation of pastors. 

At Skye Jethani’s post "AIDS Activism Makes Strange Bedfellow" at Out of Ur, he gives a nice little report on AIDS day.  See my previous posts on AIDS with a link to the free online PBS Frontine video here and my post on pornography here.      

One additional comment.  I have been thinking recently about how social justice is cool (Rick Warren, Emerging Churches, etc.)  Because it is a "trend" (sad, huh?), pastors need to be careful to not think they invented the concept!  We need to continue to access the resources of wise Christian social workers, missionaries, economists, etc. rather than reinventing the wheel. 

Social workers, stand up and help us pastors!  We know now that we need to be facilitating and encouraging this justice work but it would be great if you would help us do it! 

(See my next post about the advice I gave some Christian social workers in a lecture recently).