Hey readers! I know it has been a while (like 2 months) since I have posted anything but I decided to begin putting more focus on my Youth lessons for church. And with new Sunday School material I had to spend a lot of time figuring out the best way to present it so that the students grasped it and made it their own. But now I am hopefully back to blogging on a consistent basis.
I live in North Arkansas and since Christmas we have had tons of snow and ice and just downright bad weather. We have had to cancel church services more in the last 2 months than I have seen cancelled the rest of my life. And I will admit I am downright miserable because of all the snow. But it got me to thinking. When it is summer finally comes, will it be the same people complaining about the heat? Or in Spring complaining about the bugs? Or in Fall having to rake leaves? For some people they will never be happy.
Now to pull it out of left field (which reminds me baseball season is on its way!) it really got me thinking about pleasing people. And a major question came to my mind. As a minister do I need to please people? Does the church exist to please people?
There are 3 main problems that I see in churches today:
Entertaining People
In youth minister their is a constant struggle between doing games and activities to draw students in and having enough meat (the gospel) for it to be beneficial. In a perfect world people would come to just because of their thriving to know more about Christ, but in my small town that just isn't the case. When I first arrived here I was the first "Youth Pastor" at this church. There were parents and leaders that volunteered but none that had a calling as a minister. The first thing that slammed me in the face was the reason the students came. It was a place to hangout, play games, and see your friends with a short lesson tacked on the end. 75% of the night was for games and hangout and the last was for the bible lesson. And I am here to tell you that it has taken almost 2 years to overcome that mindset. To me church is not a social gathering. To me church is about coming to learn more about Christ. If the church is simply here to entertain people we are failing as a church. The church of Acts was not together to simply entertain. They had a purpose, and that purpose was to tell the world about the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Why should our purpose today be any different?
Easy Lessons
"How can something be a legit move of God when the preaching is you finding your purpose rather than repenting of your sins & being forgiven?"
I believe that lessons and sermons should be hard to swallow. Easy lessons about how to live a better life and 3 points that we need to follow are not what church is about. On twitter this morning Chris Rosebrough (@piratechristian) tweeted "How can something be a legit move of God when the preaching is you finding your purpose rather than repenting of your sins & being forgiven?" When did the point of a sermon shift from what Christ did for us to how we now should live? If our focus is on giving our life fully to Christ, then how we live will closely follow. Most church going Christians would agree that the focus of church service should be on Christ and the cross. Chris also points out "How can a sermon be Christ-Centered and cross-focused if Jesus and his sacrifice on the cross are never even mentioned?" We wonder why small town churches are dying away? Because there is no emphasis on the gospel message it is all about how to live a "more" christian life.
Too much "Fellowship"
Now I will start this by saying, I am a Baptist and I like my potlucks and fellowship suppers, and that is not what I am talking about. Sunday morning service has become to much of a social gathering. At my church we have "shaking hands time" in the middle of the service where we get up and spend at least 5 minutes walking about and shaking hands with everyone that we have just finished shaking hands with when we came in. To me it takes away from the worship and the meaning of our service. Don't get me wrong I am a very social person, but I do not think that in the middle of worship is the time to get up and visit. I also know people who come to church just to see people. They don't come to be fed the word of God they come to socialize. And the argument "Well at least they are hear and hearing the word" to me is invalid. If you come to socialize you are not going to pay attention during the sermon. If your heart is not at church to worship and learn about God you are just not going to do it.
I know this is all about what is wrong with the church, and not much on solutions on how to do it better, but sometimes just pointing out problems can cause people to reevaluate their purpose for church. It can really be summed up in this, Church is not about us. Church is about God. I pray that you will be the one to stand up and make a difference and let's get back to the purpose of the church of Acts. To bring the Gospel of Christ to a lost and dying world.
Just my thoughts,
Tyler
The new year brings about many things. But one that seems to come around every year (at least for the first month or two) are New Year Resolutions. Why do we set high goals for ourselves and then 6 weeks later completely give them up?
For New Years this year I took our group of students to a "Lock-in and Rock-out." It was a get together for the entire community and the sponsoring group brought in the band "Hardie Avenue." During one of the breaks the lead singer shared his testimony and a few steps to follow to live a life of Christian faith. This post is loosely based around the testimony that he gave. I think those steps can easily be applied to life as we set and hope to achieve our new year resolutions as well as enhance our faith in Christ.
Small Steps
Why do we have to set goals that are so high we will never achieve them? When you have a baby, you don't go out and celebrate by buying him a huge steak. You don't take them out to run a marathon the day they start to walk. Why are our lives any different? You have to be realistic. One example I have seen in my time as a student minister is a young person accepting what Christ did for them on the cross and starting a new life in Him. That same student is filled with the fire and excitement of Christ and they think they are going to change the world and bring revival to all their friends, so they set out to try a week after coming to know Christ. Then one of their friends rejects their new found relationship, and the student's faith is shaken a little. The next day they go to someone else and share what Christ has done for him, that person just ignores the student, and their faith is shaken a little more. Finally a week later then have decided they are going to tell their parents the wonderful news and try to convince them to start going to church. The student is just dismissed by their unbelieving parents. The spiritual high the student was on is suddenly gone. They tried to go out and conquer mountains right after beginning to walk. Our Christian faith has to grow and be developed. I'm not saying what the student did was wrong, I wish more students would be bold in sharing their faith, I am saying that we have to take small steps. Same goes for our resolutions, don't say you're going to work out every single day this year. Or say you're going to lose 30 lbs this year. Start small with I'm going to work our twice a week at least. Or I'm going to lose 5 lbs this month. You will find yourself more motivated by the smaller short term goals than the big resolutions.
Pay attention
One of the biggest regrets in March is that people forgot what their new years resolutions were. We set them in January and then in February we are focused on one maybe two that we are still keeping and by March most have completely forgotten the resolutions they made. This is another that relates directly to our Christian faith. In order for our faith to grow we need to have goals. One of mine includes sharing my testimony with a certain number of people a month. The number changes based on how well I did the previous month. A goal that me and my wife have set this year is to read our Bible more together. Talking about the Bible with other people goes a long way in helping you grow. As far as new year resolutions go, having someone remind you and keep you accountable can go a long way in helping you not only remember but achieve your goals. Another suggestion that I have found is extremely helpful to many students is write them down and post them somewhere you see them daily. The more you think about your goals and resolutions the more likely you are to uphold them.
Small Achievements
I am the type of person who gets motivated by completing something. I might even say I have OCD (Obsessive Completion Disorder). Over the Christmas break my wife and her sister started a 2000 piece puzzle in our living room. They got the outside edges done before the break was over. After her sister left we could have just picked it up and put it away, but something in my mind told me we needed to complete it. Well a week later we finally finished it and I felt successful. It really helps me to set short term goals that I know I can reach to build motivation for the harder, bigger goals. As I mentioned before I like to set weekly or monthly goals to help achieve the larger resolutions.
Don't look back, keep looking forward
One thing that Yuri, the lead singer, said that stuck with me was, "Your past is your past, do not cling to it overcome it." We all have a past. There was a point sometime in our life when we did not know Christ. When we set resolutions one major reason we do not keep them is discouragement. We set goals to work out twice a week, and a week goes by and we didn't work out at all. The next week it becomes a little bit harder because that perfect record has a scratch on it. If we set a resolution to not eat any ice cream in 2014 (as if anybody would even try), then on January 5th we give into our old ways and have a bowl of ice cream, our resolution and confidence are both on edge. However, we need to view each day as a new day and not look backwards towards our failures. In our Christian life Christ came to forgive our sins. He died for all the things you did yesterday (and the things you will do today and tomorrow) so put them in your past and become a new person.
So basically I think new year resolutions can be a good thing as look as we also apply those principles to our Christian faith year round.
God Bless Y'all,
Tyler
P.S - I set a goal for myself to write at least one post a week, and here I am on the last day of the first week. Gonna be a good year!
