Tag: Church

Categories
Ministry Spiritual Growth Suffering & Trials

Coming Alongside One Another—Encouraging the Fainthearted


These are notes from a recent talk given at Calvary Grace Church’s Women’s Brunch.

1 Thess 5:14 “And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all.”

It can be hard to know exactly how to help a sister who is struggling. It’s easy to say (or do) the wrong thing. Or simply say and do nothing because you don’t know what to say. 

Hurting people will tell you that a lot of well-intentioned people have said hurtful or insensitive things to them.

Ed Welch has an article on CCEF called “The Steady Stream of Foolish Words Said to Hurting People”. In it he lists 4 things we should not say when someone is suffering.

  • don’t give advice,
  • don’t try to solve the problem,
  • don’t say you are available any time but don’t offer concrete ways to help,
  • don’t try to show your empathy by talking about a similar situation in your own life, and so on. 

You may be wondering what it left to say then? This is the question that we will discuss today. 

Read 1 Thess. 5:12-14. Notice these things:

  • Final instructions to the church
  • They are instructed in vv 12-13 to respect the elders and esteem them highly because of their work
  • They are then commanded to come alongside one another and minister to each other in v 14
  • Three kinds of struggling Christians in v 14 that need our care: 
    • idle (unruly, undisciplined, not lining up with what God has for them
    • Fainthearted (discouraged, timid, anxious–perhaps in personality or because trials have been hard on them. 
    • Weak (likely moral and spiritual weakness, ie struggling with temptation, perhaps rattled by ongoing persecution–whatever the case, they are not mature in their faith) 

There are 3 different ways to help these 3 types of struggling Christians

  • Admonish the Idle 
  • Encourage the fainthearted
  • Help the weak “The verb for help (antechomai) presents a graphic picture of the support which the weak needed. It is as if Paul wrote to the stronger Christians: ‘Hold on to them’, ‘cling to them’, even ‘put your arm round’ them.”

Today we will focus on encouraging the fainthearted. This word “translates a compound of oligos (few, or little) and psuchē (life, or soul). It occurs only here in the New Testament….It may indicate a person who is “timid” as a personality trait or one who is “discouraged” at a particular turn of events.” 

This is a person who doesn’t feel courageous and full of faith. They may be going through an intense season of suffering and loss that has worn them down and caused them to become discouraged. They may be grieving. They may feel bruised or like their faith is barely there. Whatever the reason for their struggle, Paul says that these fainthearted Christians need our encouragement.

How do we encourage our fainthearted sisters? 

3 truths that our fainthearted sisters need to be reminded of.

1. Fainthearted Christians need to know God is with them. 

We can embody this truth by being physically there for our suffering friends, loving them well and listening compassionately as they tell us their struggles. Suffering people need to know that God is with them, not just in theory, but his presence is literally with them in each moment that they are suffering.  

The Psalmist says, (139)

“Where shall I go from your Spirit?

Or where shall I flee from your presence?

8If I ascend to heaven, you are there!

If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!

9If I take the wings of the morning

and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,

10even there your hand shall lead me,

and your right hand shall hold me.

11If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,

and the light about me be night,”

12even the darkness is not dark to you;

the night is bright as the day,

for darkness is as light with you.”

This is important for the sufferer to know. There is no trial too deep or place too dark that God’s presence can’t penetrate. He is fully there with them in every moment, in every place.

It doesn’t matter if we feel like God is far away or if we feel like our faith is weak. God is “actually not far from each one of us, for “‘In him we live and move and have our being’ (Acts 17:27)

When people are suffering, God can feel very far from them. Our thoughts can become confused. Is God punishing me? Is He angry at me? Am I angry at him? Why doesn’t he help me? Doesn’t he care?

Our instinct is to turn away and hide our face from God until we get our emotions figured out, but suffering Christians need to know that they can go immediately to God for help and they will find it. God wants us to come to him–even with our angry, bitter and confused thoughts. 

He’s under no illusions about the degree of our sinfulness. He pursued us when we were his enemies. He knows the depths of your sinfulness better than you do, so you might as well talk to him about it. 

God will not turn his back on you when you are swamped by sinful emotions. Because Christ died for those sins. 

Jesus cried out on the cross, “My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me?” so that we would never have to. Christ bore God’s wrath for our sins on the cross so that our sin wouldn’t separate us from God.

Romans 8 tells us that we are spiritually joined to Christ so that there is literally nothing that can separate us from God’s love. 

Fainthearted Christians need to know that God is near to them in their suffering and even as they wrestle with their doubts. Because of Christ’s mediating work, they can (and should) bring those doubts and fears to God. Here, they will “receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” (Heb. 4:16). 

You don’t need a bold faith to approach God’s throne, you just need a genuine faith. You are not saved by the quality of your faith, but by the object–Clint. 

 “A weak hand can receive an expensive jewel” –Sibbes. We all have the same precious jewel of salvation. And that jewel is not diminished by the weakness of the hand that holds it.

So fainthearted Christians can freely go to God with their fears and doubts. Because of Christ, they have the same standing before God as the boldest Christian in the room.

When we are fainthearted, we may imagine there is distance between us and God. But there is none. He is right there with us in our worst trials and deepest fears.

2. Fainthearted Christians Need to Know that Christ Sympathizes with their weakness and will deal tenderly with them. 

Richard Sibbs talks about Christ’s ministry to suffering Christians in his book called The Bruised Reed. Based on Isaiah 42, he divides those who are suffering into two categories: bruised reeds and faintly burning wicks. 

Behold my servant, whom I uphold,    

my chosen, in whom my soul delights;

I have put my Spirit upon him;

    he will bring forth justice to the nations.

2 

He will not cry aloud or lift up his voice,

    or make it heard in the street;

3 

a bruised reed he will not break,

    and a faintly burning wick he will not quench;

    he will faithfully bring forth justice.

This servant —who we know is the Christ—comes to bring forth justice to the nations. And in the midst of his mission, the text says he deals tenderly with bruised reeds and faintly burning wicks.

Who are these wicks and reeds?

Bruised Reeds are being disciplined through trials. They are feeling bruised,  beaten down and weary. Faintly burning wicks are doubting Christians, perhaps struggling with assurance or anxiety. They feel timid in their faith. Their faith is there, it is not extinguished, but it’s small.  

When we are in a season of suffering, it’s easy to imagine that Christ grows tired of hearing our woes. I think we base this assumption largely on our own experience with struggling people. We might feel impatient with our children or someone in the church whose faith is barely there. We may feel exasperated. Why are they still struggling with this? Why haven’t they moved past it? We may be harsh and judgemental toward people who are in a season of bruising and faintheartedness. But Christ isn’t.

a bruised reed he will not break,

    and a faintly burning wick he will not quench;

We know that faintheartedness is not an end in itself. It is not something that a Christian should be content to stay in. God has something better for us. Faintheartedness is a symptom of the flesh at work. It is opposed to the Spirit, not something to glory in (Rom 6–What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?). We know that we are not meant to be faint-hearted Christians. However, there are seasons of life where weakness is a reality. So it’s important that we talk about it.

When Is. 42 talks about the “smoking flax” and “bruised reed”, these are descriptions of believers. When 1 Thess. 5:14 talks about the “fainthearted” in the church who need encouragement, we know that there are those among us who identify with this description. It’s important that we don’t shame fainthearted Christians into silence. 

If you are a “faintly-burning wick” here this morning, you need to know that there is hope for you, that Christ ministers to you tenderly to you and the church is here to support you.

It’s frustrating to be plagued by doubts and fears. It’s unpleasant and discouraging. But if this you, remember, that Christ will not grow impatient with you. He will not quench your faith altogether. And he will not break you if you are feeling brittle and bruised. 

Christianity is like no other religion in that you don’t have to earn God’s favour. This Suffering Servant died for our sins and rose again. He is completely unique in that he is able to sympathize with our weakness because he took on flesh. (Heb. 4:14-16) He felt every temptation we do, although he was without sin. 

He is God’s Son, 

he is the sacrifice for our sin and he is our high priest who makes intercession for us and sympathizes with us in our weakness. No other god is like him. 

If you are fainthearted here this morning, think of the advocate you have in Jesus Christ! 

Remember, “A weak hand can receive an expensive jewel”. If you have Christ, you have everything. You have access to God’s presence and every spiritual resource in Jesus Christ. Your compassionate high priest is praying for you even now.

3. Fainthearted Christians need to be reminded of God’s promises.

When I was first diagnosed with lupus, I remember feeling scared and grieving the loss of what I considered to be a normal life. And my grandmother encouraged me with God’s promise in Isaiah 41:10. She said it was a lifeline for her when she was going through her cancer treatment.

fear not, for I am with you;

    be not dismayed, for I am your God;

I will strengthen you, I will help you,

    I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

Notice how God motivates fearful believers to move forward in faith.. He doesn’t say “enough already, get your act together!”. He gives 5 compelling reasons based on His provision for us. 

  • I am with you
  • I am your God
  • I will strengthen you
  • I will help you
  • I will uphold you with my righteous right hand

This is such good news for fainthearted Christians. And it gives us a clue as to how we should encourage our fainthearted sisters. They need to know that—even though they may feel like a faintly-burning-wick, they can move forward in faith because God will provide what they need.

Sometimes we feel like God’s expectations for us are larger than our actual capabilities. But God always gives us the grace to do what He requires of us. When we are fainthearted it’s easy to feel defeated by all the ways that we fail rather than feeling hopeful that God will provide what he requires of us today.  We need a shift in perspective so that we can stop fixating on our own inability to cope and instead, rest in God’s future grace toward us.

Sibbes says, “He requires no more than he gives, but gives what he requires, and accepts what he gives”.  

In other words, God doesn’t require more from you than he enables you to do. 

And what’s more…whatever you do in reliance on him, he accepts. And He is pleased with it.

Doesn’t that take the pressure off? If you are a fainthearted Christian here this morning, remember you can keep moving forward in faith—not because you are strong—but because God is strong. And he is with you and fights for you. 

Some other promises to consider:

Is. 43:1 “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;

    I have summoned you by name; you are mine.

Josh 1:9 Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”

1 Peter 5:6-7  Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, 7 casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.

Ex. 14 And Moses said to the people, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the LORD, which he will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again. 14The LORD will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.”

These promises are all based on God’s ability and His care for us. Fainthearted Christians have very little life in them. They don’t have the gumption, the strength or the resources within themselves to get their life together. 

What they do have is a strong, compassionate God. And our faintheartedness is almost a blessing in disguise because it teaches us to rely on His strength, not our own. 

When someone is in a state of anxiety, depression or faintheartedness, they will struggle to act because their feelings are so unruly. They can do all of the things: get a good night’s sleep, pray, read their bible…and still these dysfunctional emotions may barely diminish. It’s freeing for a fainthearted person to know that they don’t have to feel in control before they step forward in faith. Rather they step forward in faith because God will provide everything they need that day AND he will accept what he provides. 

4. Faint-hearted Christians need the example of other Christians who continue to press on toward the goal. 

  • Heb. 12 talks about the painful necessity of discipline in a Christian’s life. The author encourages the Hebrews to not become weary when God disciplines them. He reminds them that God disciplines his children because he loves them and it “yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.”
  • Then he says, “Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, 13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed.”( Heb 12:12)  
  • The whole church is like a body. 
  • Think of a woman’s experience giving birth: big head, displaced tailbone, can’t stand straight, one thing out of line throws off the rest of the body. Having neck pain may be because your hip is out of line. Everything is connected in the human body.
  • Notice the whole church is to “lift drooping hands” and “strengthen your weak knees” and “make straight paths for their feet” Why? So that what is lame (read: despondent) will not be put out of joint, but be healed. 
  • “The reference to drooping hands and weak knees is familiar imagery in Jewish literature, often used to describe attitudes of discouragement and despair. Here the writer…urges these believers to press on to the goal so that those members of the church who have become despondent (lame) will notice their good example, receive fresh courage and begin to march again rather than fall even further behind. …But if healing is to come, it is not simply the responsibility of the leaders, tireless pastors though they are (13:17), but of every single member.

When the whole church presses on in faith, the lame part of the body begins to heal.  

  • When a fainthearted Christian comes to church on Sunday and is surrounded by people singing praises to God, that encourages her faith and helps her to heal.
  • When a fainthearted Christian sees you trusting Christ through your trials and hardships, that encourages her faith and helps her to heal.
  • When a fainthearted Christian knows you are praying for her and trusting that God will fight for her, that encourages her faith and helps her to heal.
  • When you keep speaking truth to her with patience and gentleness, that helps her to heal.

Sometimes we think, “I’m just one person, what can I do?”. But it’s the cumulative effect. When each member is striving to be faithful, the lame members are enveloped in testimonies of God’s faithfulness. They are surrounded by love, encouragement and good godly counsel. 

Fainthearted Christians will naturally want to avoid fellowship because it sort of exposes how much they are floundering. There is an unflattering contrast between the expansive faith of others and their own faintly burning wick.  

If you are fainthearted today, it is really encouraging that you are here. It takes a lot to get yourself to church and meet with other Christians. But the church is God’s gift to you, to help you heal. It protects you from going out of joint and helps you to line up again with what is healthy and good for you. 

You can help your fainthearted friends by making it as easy as possible for them to get to church and other community gatherings. Pick them up, find babysitting for their kids, etc..

Applications:

Nancie Guthrie (What Grieving People Wish You Knew About What Really Helps and What Really Hurts).–put a survey up on her website that asked grieving people wish others understood about grief. Here’s what they said:

4 things grieving people wish you knew

Here are Guthrie’s four things:

  1. How much it means for you to just show up and say something. Grief is lonely. There probably isn’t a perfect thing to say. You can’t fix the situation. Just being there (and maybe helping out a bit) helps.
  1. They don’t want to hear stories about someone else’s loss. Or your own loss. It diminishes their experience. IT takes the focus off of the grieving person and puts it on someone else. We’re trying to relate to them, but it can come across as “Your loss shouldn’t hurt so much because a lot of people have had that experience.”
  1. They want to talk about the person who they lost. Bring up the person. Use their name. You won’t make them cry, you may allow them to release some tears. They are always thinking about it in the background. 
  1. They need time and space to simply be sad. Don’t try to rush them or fix it.When you talk with people about heaven, don’t expect that it makes everything okay

If you have someone in your life who is fainthearted. Remember it’s not your job to fix them. You just need to be there for them. If they are grieving, grieve with them. Help them in practical ways. If they are anxious about the future, encourage them with God’s promises, his nearness to them and Christ’s compassionate intercession for them. 

As Paul says in 1 Thess. 5 “Be Patient with them all”. Fainthearted-ness is not a quick-fix scenario. It requires time and patience on our part. They need help and support over the long haul.

Make it as easy as possible for them to come to church and meet with God’s people so that they are surrounded by love, encouragement and good godly counsel. If that’s not possible, maybe offer to communicate with the church on their behalf so that they can be as integrated into body-life as possible. 

One of the best things we can do for our fainthearted friends is to pray for them and believe that God is able to restore to them the joy of their salvation. (Ps. 51).

Resources Consulted:

  • Commentaries:
    • John Stott
    • Raymond Brown
    • D. Michael Martin
  • Websites
    • Ed Welch
    • Nancy Guthrie
  • Books
    • Richard Sibbes
Categories
Church Clint Ministry Pastors Theology

6 Things to Ask An Elder Candidate

When a candidate for the office of elder is being examined, it’s necessary for the examiner (likely the senior pastor, or another designated pastor) to have a series of talking points and questions to ask.

Normally an elder candidate will have to do some type of theological project, most likely an exegetical or theological essay which shows his ability to discern biblical truths and articulate them clearly. He would also have to be able to defend his conclusion against other positions and especially false doctrine.

Assuming that the potential candidate has been in a discipling process, having been tested in different ways, these talking points could be used to apply to a potential candidate. They are given as suggestions for a way to further discover the qualifications outlined in 1 Timothy 3:1-7, Titus 1:5-9, and all the rest of the biblical characteristics for elders.

Below are six areas to consider in examining the potential candidate.

1. Personal

  • Share Testimony
    • Used Alcohol or Illegal Drugs; Any anti-depressants? 
    • Viewed Pornography [_____]
    • Marriage: 
      • Honest, objective pastoral assessment of your marriage. 
      • What is your wife’s view of your calling to ministry?
      • How does your wife’s ministry in the church potentially relate to being married to a pastor (Eg. is she active in women’s ministry; or faithful church member; etc).
      • What is the spiritual maturity of your wife compared to yourself?
    • What is your temperament? 
    • What are the scenarios when you are most easily tempted to be angry?
    • What are the scenarios when you are most easily tempted to be depressed?
    • Briefly describe your personal prayer life.
    • Briefly describe your practice of family worship, couple’s devotion or other spiritual leadership in your home. 
    • Is there anything you haven’t told us that could be revealed about you that would be scandalous or potentially disqualifying? 

2. Doctrinal

  • Statement of Faith
    • Compatibility. 
      • What are the points of the Statement of Faith which you are 
        • More newly convinced of, 
        • Have had a lesser amount of reflection upon?
      • How different is this church in doctrine, compared with a previous church, and the most influential church your wife has come from? 
    • Influences
      • Identify the major influences on your theological development (both positively and negatively).
      • What are the areas of theological study you have given a lot of attention to, and less attention to?
    • Possible Doctrinal Questions (These can be expanded depending on the candidate, the length of the examination, and the prerequisites completed):
      • How many wills does the Incarnate Son of God have?
      • How many wills does God have? 
      • What does divine simplicity mean? 
      • State briefly your view of the sign gifts.
      • What is your view on divorce and remarriage?
      • Explain the difference between the Reformed view of sanctification and the Keswick view.
      • [____________]

3. Ecclesiastical

  • Compatibility
    • What are the areas of practice in this church (philosophy of ministry, worship/liturgy, cultural context, etc) which differ compared with a previous church, and the most influential church your wife has come from? 
  • Elder Role
    • What is your understanding of the application of the elder’s role:
      • Ideally according to Scripture
      • In practical application at your local church.
  • Is your potential role as an elder interchangeable with the role of the current pastor? Explain. 

4. Practical

  • What would the scenario of  “serving this church” look like? What would the scenario of “using or exploiting this church” look like?
  • What are the areas of ministry in which you are likely to be tempted? 
  • When your youth is ‘disregarded’, what is a) your fleshly style of response, b) your Spirit-filled response? 
  • When you have received feedback about the manner of your liturgical leadership or preaching, how have you felt when you received that feedback, and what have you done in response?
  • How willing are you to adapt your personal preferences in order to promote the mission of the church and the unity of the church? Give examples.  
  • Who have you personally discipled or mentored? 
  • Who has discipled or mentored you?
  • Explain the ways you are doing the work of an evangelist.

5. Logistical

  • Capacity
    • Do you have the realistic physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual capacity for you to undertake the work of a presbyter/bishop/pastor, recognizing your other roles/priorities:
      • As a husband
      • As a father
      • As an employee
      • Within your church context

6. Prayerful

  • Describe the life and ministry that you are asking God to cultivate in you.

unsplash-logoNik MacMillan

Categories
Canada Church Clint Family

Make Family Reunions a Way of Life

I was in Montreal for the first time, standing by the sloping shores of the St Laurence River with my friend Paul Martin, shooting a video for Together for the Gospel. We were inviting Canadians to the conference, which is located in the American state of Kentucky, in order to have a family reunion.

Now it might seem strange for Canadians to travel to the US for a conference. But when those gatherings are understood as family reunions, they take on a different tone and aim.

Church gatherings are like family reunions

Family reunions are casual and comfortable. And they are an opportunity to learn about the lives of distant loved ones.

Anytime the church gathers, it is like a family reunion. Every Christian can testify to the truth of what Jesus said, “where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.” (Matt 18:20). Christians enjoy the presence of Jesus as the guest of honour in any gathering.

In the apostle Paul’s correspondence, he repeatedly has an emotional, affected longing for reunion. In his first letter to the Thessalonians, he said, “we endeavoured the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face” (2:17) and “you always remember us kindly and long to see us, as we long to see you” (3:6). We can imagine that Paul would have been the first to sign up when the aunt sends the family reunion email to everyone.

Church gatherings are the reunion of the adopted

Paul repeated celebrated the fact that he was a part of this new family. In his early letter to the Galatians, he highlights the intent of the saving mission of Jesus, “that we might receive adoption as sons” (Gal 4:5), telling the Ephesians, “he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will” (1:5), and to the Romans he said that we have even received the Spirit of adoption (8:15), which makes us offer the same familial cry, “Abba, Father!”

When we gather at church, there is more going on than simply consumption. Just like a family reunion might have great food, and you can overindulge yourself, yet the food is not the point. The point is to bring together different people from different places and reunite them in their common family bonds.

The family reunion this Sunday

Every Sunday in a special way, and also at other times throughout the week, the church gathers to be reunited in those family connections. The same applies to conferences, special events, prayer meetings, and any other gathering where Christians come together. It is a family reunion, celebrating our adoption into God’s own family through the saving work of the Son and the power of the Spirit of God.

Imagine how our attitude would change if we anticipated Sunday’s church gathering like it was a family reunion? Let’s change how we think of church, conferences and other get-togethers. Let’s treat them like family reunions because that is what they are.

unsplash-logoSamantha Gades

Categories
Church Clint Ministry Pastors Reformers Spiritual Growth

The Necessity of Church Members for Soul Care

Returning from vacation, pastors might be jolted with the reminder that they can’t do their job. Or at least they will see that they can’t do all that their job demands of them. The needs of people are so many and so deep that only God’s supply can meet the demand. 

So what is the pastor to do? Does he simply pray that God will enable him with supernatural capacity to meet every need in the church? Prayer for God-given empowerment is good, but if we seek it to meet every need, we will shift from being a servant to being a messiah. 

People Are Gifts

What pastors and congregations need to realize is that God has already answered such prayers by providing gifts, supernatural gifts to the church. I’m not talking about the extra-ordinary apostolic gifts of miracles and prophecy which God sent to vindicate the foundation-laying apostolic message. I’m talking about God giving blood-won sinners who have been Spirit-empowered to serve God and one another. God has given people as supernatural gifts to the church. 

In the gift lists of Romans 12 and 1 Corinthians 12 and Ephesians 4, we see that God has given a diversity of gifts to the church by setting individuals in vital union with Jesus Christ and each other. 

The marvel of this miraculous union shows God’s practical provision. Each believing person does not merely have a gift but is a gift. That means that no matter who they are, what their background is, or what their personality type might be, a sinner saved by grace is themselves a grace-gift to the church. They have a role to play. As they play it, everyone else will benefit. As Paul told the Ephesians: 

“When each part is working properly [Christ]makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love

Eph 4:16

In the modern church, this has come to be known as every member ministry. The description attempts to clarify that church members, all of them, have a role to play in the ministry, not just the clerical class. 

Caring For Souls

One area where every member ministry is critical, but often overlooked is in soul care. Today many people in Protestant churches still think that the only person who can help them is the pastor. It is as if they think that the pastor has a special direct line to God. Or they think that the pastor is the leading expert who alone has the professional expertise. Or they think that the pastor is paid to be on-call for their spiritual needs, so they want to get their money’s worth. 

Unfortunately, a lot of bad thinking sounds more like the unbiblical priestly models of Roman Catholicism, or the consumeristic therapy models of modern secular counselling. The two results that such an approach will achieve is either pushing pastors to become more like ‘professionals’ or it will push them to burn out. 


The Reformer Martin Bucer addressed this point: 

The care of souls makes so many demands that even in  small congregation it cannot be properly exercised by just one or a few…there is so much involved in the true care of souls that even those who are the most skilled in this ministry; if they are alone or few in number, will not achieve very much; because all skill and ability comes from God, who desires to carry out this his work in his church by means of many and not by means of few. 

Martin Bucer, Concerning the True Care of Souls, 58

To get ‘the many’ involved in ministry, pastors will have to do a number of things which will take effort, but the result will be better soul care for the congregation. 

Equip

Pastors must start by obeying Ephesians 4:12 and aim to “equip the saints for the work of the ministry for building up the body of Christ.” This means teaching the saints the content of the faith, but also equipping them in such a way that they know the work of the ministry they are to do, and that they have the chance to do it. To equip the saints, they need both direction and teaching. 

Direction

I think pastors can be good at teaching the content of the Christian faith but can assume that people in the church will automatically know how to minister to each other from that doctrinal foundation. I know for myself that I’ve had to be more explicit in helping people make connections between their role in the body of Christ and their responsibilities in the work of the ministry. 

Teaching

To equip people well requires all of the best elements of teaching. People need the content, examples, illustrations, analogies, steps and opportunities to practice. This kind of teaching takes a lot of work on the part of pastors. It is the part of my own experience that I find the most difficult. Teaching doctrine is easier, but it can be harder to help a member become a needs-aware role player in the body of Christ. 

Unity

If pastors work at equipping the saints for the work of the ministry, the result as Paul argues through the fourth chapter of Ephesians will be unity. A church that “builds itself up in love” will be supernaturally unified through the relationships of its visible members.  As Bucer put it:

In this work of building [God] wishes to have and make use of many tools, so that he may raise many of his own to honoour and hold them all the more firmly together…None of his members must be idle, and there must be the highest degree of unity and order among them, each one must depend on and be depended on by the other; thus everything must be one and in common, beginning and continuing by means of common activity. 

Martin Bucer, Concerning the True Care of Souls, 58

Don’t Just Do It Yourself

As pastors (and church members) return from summer vacation, they can be tempted to slip into the thinking that says if you want a job done right, you have to do it yourself. But if we give in to that, we will burn out. Silo ministry will only expose how dysfunctional we are. Yet when we live according to God’s design, we will rejoice that he has gifted the church with many hands. Many hands make light work. 

unsplash-logoShane Rounce

***affiliate links

Categories
Church Clint Sunday Recap

Sunday Recap: Adoptions, Hogs, Hopes, and Mountains

credit: Kym Unsplash.com

We just finished our conference on Puritan spirituality with Dr. Stephen Yuille on Saturday. As is often the case, we have a Q&A in Sunday School with the visiting speaker. So sticking with the routine, we started our Sunday in the same way.

I asked Stephen, a Canadian who is pastoring in Texas, about life and ministry there. He shared the amazing story of adopting his youngest daughter from China (the story is in his book A Hope Deferred: Adoption and the Fatherhood of God).

The funny moment in the interview was when I asked Stephen about the practice of hunting feral hogs in Texas.

We also discussed the challenges faced by churches in Texas, as well as the prospects for theological education in Canada. Stephen is taking a new position at Heritage Theological Seminary as VP of Academics.

In the main service, Stephen preached from Romans 15:13, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.”. The message was blessed by the Spirit, as we engaged in what Stephen had earlier described as the Puritan practice of “public meditation” on God’s Word.

Afterwards, Christel, myself and our sons took Stephen to the Canadian Rocky Mountains. We were worried that the cold clouds would obscure our view. But as we drove west and the mountains rose up, the fog parted and the brilliant sun shone through the blue sky on the crisp white towers.

We toured Canmore but it was cold in the sunshine (- 20 degrees Celsius). Surely it was a reminder for Stephen about Canadian winters, but we knew he would return for his warm Texas reprieve.

How humbling to see the towering Rockies and know that God is our mighty fortress who will last when they are gone. And so he and he alone is our true hope.

Categories
Church Clint Ministry

What’s Your Threshold?

Over the years I’ve given this article to many people. It’s a perennial question about conscience and church membership.

In our day people can either leave a church for poor reasons or stay too long condoning false teaching. The tough part comes when you try to discern what is less clear in between.

What’s your threshold? Maybe this series of questions can help you think through those issues a little better.

Questions to Help You Consider Your Threshold

1. What can your conscience stand?  

 If you can stay without deadening your discernment or bruising your conscience then that needs to be thought through.  What doctrines are non-negotiable? What practices are non-negotiable? Which doctrines and practices are very important to you, but you can live with other people in the church differing?  What do you consider essential for the leadership to hold to?

2. What do you condone by your presence?

 Since all Christians are sinners, we acknowledge it, yet we don’t condone sin.  However it gets a bit more confusing when things are going on in the church, with the leadership’s sanction, that we consider to be sinful (commission or omission) or erroneous (neglect of truth or contrary to the truth).  We also need to honestly differentiate between what is sin/error versus what is merely unwise or not suited to our preference. Every church will do some foolish things, but that is different than being clearly neglectful, sinful or false.

3. What is the relative need for you to stay?  

Some churches have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to available people for ministry.  Other churches depend greatly on certain individuals for the strength of the whole. Are you in an indispensable role at the church?  Possibly out of compassion for the church’s need you will have a higher threshold of tolerance. But is being ‘indispensable’ necessarily a good thing?  Sometimes it is unhealthy to have too much of a church’s well-being riding on one person’s shoulders whether it’s a pastor or some other Christian worker. A great temptation is that we become people’s messiah by fixing and maintaining everything rather than pointing them to depend on Christ, the Messiah.

4. What is the cost of leaving? To others? To yourself?   

If our threshold is reached we need to calculate the honest cost of leaving a church.  It is notable that when Jesus bore his cross to Calvary, Simon of Cyrene, an innocent bystander was conscripted to carry the cursed cross for a bit (see Mark 15.21).  Jesus did not halt his journey to death because he was worried that Simon might be inconvenienced by Jesus’ obedience. In the same way, our obedience will often cost others something, not just ourselves.  And there is a cost to ourselves. We may be misunderstood, slandered, shunned, etc due to our decision. If we leave we must be aware of such costs.

5. What is the cost of staying?

 If I consider my threshold to be high enough that I can stay at a church, I must ask what does obedience demand of me.  It likely means that I have to take a more active role in teaching, relationships, and overall body-life in order to be an obedient change-agent there.  This means sacrifice and real wrestling with error, sin and foolishness as it is encountered in the church. It also means that your convictions may put you in the constant position of being the ‘contrarian’ voice.  This can be a discouraging, taxing position. Most of the time, unless you are in a position of leadership (i.e. an elder or the pastor) it is very difficult to effect significant change in a church. Even minor changes can be difficult for a pastor to bring to pass.  Many laypersons have expended great energy trying to ‘renew from within’ when they have little real authority and opportunity to change anything. Pastors and elders have both, and it is still a difficult task to ‘reform and renew’ a church.

6. Is your threshold based on a God-ward, biblical perspective or a man-ward, pragmatic one?

 Many issues become clarified when we look at the biblical testimony concerning the function of the church in the world, and the role and responsibility of the overseers of the church.  We need to ask, in what areas is the church faithful to its biblical calling? How about the overseers? Are the weaknesses we see based upon intentional design, or limited vision?

7. If you leave the church, where will you go?

 Sometimes in an age of spiritual declension, our nearby options for churches are less than satisfactory.  Yet if these are our only options it is better to worship with believers than to neglect the assembling of the saints (Heb. 10:25).  But if other options are available, you must weigh out whether having a ‘higher’ threshold is damaging to your conscience and the health of your soul.  Such considerations ought to be weighed clearly since the Church is not merely a collection of individuals, but the very Bride of Christ.

Categories
Clint Society

A Call for Pioneers

My guess is that you and I have been surprised at the rapid loss of confidence in the institutions of the West. Daily we have reports of scandal in leadership, whether it’s political, ecclesiastical, social, and familial.

Why would anyone want to start a family, or serve in a public way as a public figure? Aren’t you just setting yourself up for crushing scrutiny, and peer pressure that creates powerful temptations to lie, cheat or steal?

With online mobbing and social media character assassinations, you would assume that all of us will develop some type of anxiety disorder like agoraphobia, the fear of places that are “unsafe with no easy way to escape”.

The result is that there is a self-censuring going on that is different than the self-control which aims to inhibit our fleshly passions. The self-censure is entirely based upon fear of man. It means we are afraid to speak words into the public square, or anywhere because there may be no way to say enough to defend those words from attack.

If you know that what you say might be swarmed, even if it is innocuous, you just won’t say it. You won’t say innocent things because they might be doomed to defeat. Even a tweet or Facebook post can be subject to the Two Minutes Hate.

So it’s clear. There is a cost to sticking your neck out.

So now I think we need to put the call out. We need Pioneers. Trailblazers. Companies of Adventurers.

We should actively encourage the next generation to try things, take a risk, and walk forward in wisdom and in faith.

I believe it is important to emphasize this with young people in the churches. They need to be encouraged to establish new institutions: marriages, families, churches, businesses, schools, and social organizations.

As it is now, many young people are too afraid to venture out into a relationship. Friendships are perilous. Marriage seems a lost cause. But they must be encouraged to pursue friendships and seek to bind themselves to someone from the opposite sex in a covenant under God. Their mutual joy, fruitfulness and worship is the true nucleus of new societies. Without it, whole civilizations simply die off in a generation or two.

This new pioneering spirit must be promoted among Christians in their relationship with the church. For many, there is a malaise when it comes to the church. They are finding many other things to fill up their time. The call of God on the Lord’s Day has been shoved to the periphery. The collective power of the church made up of committed members is a rare occurrence. This is due largely to the absence of supernatural community that has the power to bind diverse people together in unified purpose. This can only happen in common confession of “one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” (Ephesians 4:5-6).

There is thankfully a move toward church planting in the West that is attempting to keep this pioneering missionary spirit alive. We need this kind of hopeful, expectant approach to church extension and flourishing.

I think we should also encourage the coming generation with the hope that God can send revival in a profoundly free and sovereign way. He can make the hard hearts of the Twitterverse be surgically removed and replaced with hearts of flesh.

It can be easy to sit back in cynicism and lament. But we shouldn’t dwell on what is lacking. Instead, we should look out on the vistas of opportunity, the calling to which we have been called and seek new ways to be witnesses, martyroi (cf. Acts 1:8 Gr.).

Maybe we can all start by attempting to share the gospel. Bear witness to the gospel reign of Jesus Christ.

Speak up. Speak out. In love for our Saviour and love for the lost, let us think about new ventures for our words and witness.

Categories
Clint Sunday Recap

Sunday Recap: Snow, TULIP, Texas, Empty Nest, Tom Clancy

Unsplash: Paul Gilmore

Our Lord’s Day was filled with blessing even as we were thankful to God for protecting us on the way to church. The snowpack on the highways made for slippery driving. Some people were late getting to church because of large drifts of snow blocking driveways and side roads. One elder said that he was nearly t-boned by another vehicle on the way to church. Praise God everyone arrived safely.

I preached the final of my series on the doctrines of grace, looking at the P in TULIP, ‘the perseverance of the saints’. My hope is that many people we encouraged to press on, suffer ‘outside the camp’ with Christ, bearing his reproach as ‘martyr/witnesses’.

It was encouraging to have a visitor from Texas with us. He attends a church in Laredo on the Mexico border. He was vacationing in the Rockies and looked up our church. How encouraging to know that this young man had such good teaching in Texas which fit with what he was taught in Calgary.

After the service, we dispatched our three sons with friends who took them home with them. Later reports indicated there was lots of D-Day planning and assaulting the ramparts. But such is the case with a large group of young boys.

Later on, as empty nesters, Christel and I rested with food and drink by the fire and watched an old Tom Clancy movie. We enjoyed seeing how archaic the computers seemed from way back in 1990.

Categories
Clint Ministry

5 Questions to ask in a Church Membership Interview

This Lord’s Day, I’m doing some church membership interviews along with my fellow pastor/elders.

There are a few questions which we are wanting to ask potential members who have gone through our membership class. After the interview, the congregation reviews their candidacy and responds in writing with their affirmation or objections and issues of concern. Then the elders board evaluates the congregation’s review and affirms or withholds the person’s entrance into membership. Each new member recieved is called a “gospel partner” echoing the language of Philippians 1:5.

Here are the questions we ask in the interview for Gospel Partnership.

  1. In your own words, what is the gospel? (theological)
  2. Explain how God transferred you from darkness to light in Christ? (testimonial)
  3. Are you walking in known sin? Eg. Are you consuming pornography? (pastoral)
  4. Do you confess your agreement with the Congregational Statement of Faith, and submit yourself to the Congregational Covenant along with all of the other members? (confessional)
  5. Have you been baptised on confession of your faith in Christ? (ecclesiastical)

Maybe you have other questions or better ones. Or maybe your church doesn’t ask any questions at all.

Categories
Sunday Recap

Sunday Recap: – 40 Below, Church On Time, Golden Chain, Budgets

Credit: Mark Basarab

This Sunday was a bit strange and difficult and special.

Of our two vehicles neither would start in the -40 below weather. I worked on them intermittently from 7:30 to 9:45 am to no avail.

Christel was sick along with one son and a pastor was down for the count and unable to lead the congregational meeting. It was shaping up for a difficult day.

So I walked to 2 blocks in the sub-forty-degree weather and borrowed a van from one of my elders. His wife mentioned God’s providence in it all and I had to wonder.

With the help of this family, I was able to drive to church and walk in as people were finishing the last of the opening hymns.

I preached from Romans 8 and the golden chain of the “ordo salutis” focussing on the effectual calling of God.

I had to confess my struggle with trusting in God and that all things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to his purpose.

But God was gracious and gave me liberty and it seemed, some sweet unction as I praying for God to compellingly convert many sinners to himself.

After the service, we had a congregational meeting with a church budget discussion. I outlined the prospects for our new church plant and the need for more staff. We ate food and read aloud our covenant with one another.

I got the friends’ minivan home and was gratified to get one of two cars going.

It was a good Sunday even with all the hurdles.

We spent 5 hours together as a church family.

And -40 didn’t stop us.

A deacon at Calvary Grace, Jared Harfield, tweeted out:

Why do Christians battle icy roads and -40°C wind chill to get to church on Sundays like this?

Because God’s word is like fire (Jer. 23:29).

When the Bible is read, prayed, sung, and preached – cold hearts are set aflame with love for Jesus and each other.

And that is the latest Sunday Recap.