Undercover Pastor

Romans 10:8-15

“The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,” that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming: That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. As the Scripture says, “Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame.” For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile—the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”

Good mission statement?  There are lots of ways to preach and send.  Literally preaching is surely important.  So is showing love in other ways.  It’s hard to contemplate the Good News when your family’s hungry.

You can’t send without showing confidence in people’s gifts.  And of course, no one can be sent unless they’re willing to reorder their life enough to make the time/energy.

My friend Eric gave me a copy of C. H. Spurgeon’s Faith’s Checkbook, and I’ve been using it as a daily devotion lately.  Today I happened to peek ahead at the July 10th entry and thought this was worth sharing.  (It’s in the public domain so copy away!) You can find more at www.eternallifeministries.org/fcb_toc.htm In the meantime, meditate on this:

Love the Church

Thou shalt arise, and have mercy upon Zion: for the time to favor her, yea, the set time, is come. For thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and favor the dust thereof. (Psalm 102:13-14)

Yes, our prayers for the church will be heard. The set time is come. We love the prayer meetings, and the Sunday school, and all the services of the Lord’s house. We are bound in heart to all the people of God and can truly say,

There’s not a lamb in all thy flock
I would disdain to feed
There’s not a foe before whose face
I’d fear thy cause to plead.

If this is the general feeling, we shall soon enjoy times of refreshing horn the presence of the Lord. Our assemblies will be filled, saints will be revived, and sinners will be converted. This can only come of the Lord’s mercy; but it will come, and we are called upon to expect it. The time, the set time, is come. Let us bestir ourselves. Let us love every stone of our Zion, even though it may be fallen down. Let us treasure up the least truth, the least ordinance, the least believer, even though some may despise them as only so much dust. When we favor Zion, God is about to favor her. When we take pleasure in the Lord’s work, the Lord Himself will take pleasure in it.

The annual Presbyterian Church “Bible Content Exam” happened again today. And as of this evening, my web tool for studying the Bible – mainly for people taking that test, has been used 163440 times! I never would have imagined that 9 years ago. It’s very cool that I get to help so many people learn God’s word and also get a step closer to ordination.

The word pastor comes from our job as shepherds.  Of course, Jesus is the real shepherd, but we pastors try our best to represent him well as we seek to care for his flock.  Jesus taught us that he’s the kind of shepherd who cares if a single sheep goes astray and wanders into danger, away from the flock (Luke 15:3-7).  But it turns out that being that kind of shepherd hurts a lot.

Right now in our church, we have people hurting, someone dying, people grieving (including me and my family for the loss of my grandma), people struggling to make it financially, people in difficult relationships, people with ongoing health problems and pain…  Lots of stuff.  And I’m finding it harder to handle than it ws five years ago.  The thing is that these aren’t just “people I know.”  They’re friends and part of my church family.  When your family is suffering, you hurt too.

Now the trick to dealing with all of this is to realize that I am not really the shepherd.  I can reach out, but I can’t heal people’s pain.  Only the real shepherd, Jesus himself, can do that.  I try to offer my hurting friends and family to Jesus for his care.  But he hasn’t made me of stone so it hurts along the way.

Even Jesus himself cried, so I know that I’m not doing it wrong.  People teach “detachment” and “strong boundaries,” but if they keep us from loving and connecting with people, they’re not from God.  Still, even Jesus had to face situations in which people he loved wouldn’t receive him (e.g., Mark 10:17-22)

I’m hurting right now, but only because I’ve allowed myself to care about people.  I do not believe that a life free of pain because it’s free of caring is worthy of a Christian – particularly a pastor.  Pain comes with the job and so does joy, in its season.

Eleanor and I were headed for a rare cup of coffee without the kids and during the five-minute drive, we encountered two different people who were angry over someone getting into the lane of traffic ahead of them.  Eleanor and I actually let a couple of people in and then found a great parking place!  Is it better to be in front or at the back?  Usually we’d say “at the front,” but I was reading my Morning and Evening devotion by Charles Spurgeon today, and he took a contrarian view.  (His writings are in the public domain now, and you can read today’s devotions for free at The Spurgeon Archive.)

July 18th’s morning reading from Morning and Evening:

“They shall go hindmost with their standards.” — Numbers 2:31

The camp of Dan brought up the rear when the armies of Israel were on the march. The Danites occupied the hindmost place, but what mattered the position, since they were as truly part of the host as were the foremost tribes; they followed the same fiery cloudy pillar, they ate of the same manna, drank of the same spiritual rock, and journeyed to the same inheritance. Come, my heart, cheer up, though last and least; it is thy privilege to be in the army, and to fare as they fare who lead the van. Some one must be hindmost in honour and esteem, some one must do menial work for Jesus, and why should not I? In a poor village, among an ignorant peasantry; or in a back street, among degraded sinners, I will work on, and “go hindmost with my standard.”

The Danites occupied a very useful place. Stragglers have to be picked up upon the march, and lost property has to be gathered from the field. Fiery spirits may dash forward over untrodden paths to learn fresh truth, and win more souls to Jesus; but some of a more conservative spirit may be well engaged in reminding the church of her ancient faith, and restoring her fainting sons. Every position has its duties, and the slowly moving children of God will find their peculiar state one in which they may be eminently a blessing to the whole host.

The rear guard is a place of danger.There are foes behind us as well as before us. Attacks may come from any quarter. We read that Amalek fell upon Israel, and slew some of the hindmost of them. The experienced Christian will find much work for his weapons in aiding those poor doubting, desponding, wavering, souls, who are hindmost in faith, knowledge, and joy. These must not be left unaided, and therefore be it the business of well-taught saints to bear their standards among the hindmost. My soul, do thou tenderly watch to help the hindmost this day.

There are some big churches who seem to be marching in to conquer the Promised Land with great resources,  filled with capable people who seem to have it all together.  But many of us smaller churches find ourselves in the tribe of Dan’s position – bringing up the rear and gathering those who have wandered away or who have been left behind in the march. We have an awful lot of people in our congregation who have been hurt by churches. Welcoming them is a really important calling, and one that smaller churches may be uniquely qualified to handle.

It may not be glamorous, but Jesus had different ideas about position and status than we do. In Matthew 19:30, he tells us that “many who are last will be first and many who are first will be last.”  I believe that helping those who have been left behind by those ahead is something Jesus celebrates.

In response to my earlier post about the difficulty of making space in a smaller church, Becky made this suggestion:

Have you thought of starting a new (small) church? I love the idea of small churches being so appealing that they multiply like bunnies.

It’s really a reasonable thing to think about too – a different model for ministry.  Assuming that God continues to bring growth, there will probably come a time when our church would make the decision to start a new church rather than growing endlessly…

In fact, someone who has been through a similar transition with a church suggested that we consider allowing the older people to have their more traditional church and taking the younger people to start anew church.  But we believe we are called to be a multigenerational church – which is counter-cultural and not the easiest way to grow a church in a world where many seek “instant community” through a common context.

You could still split a church to form two small churches that could seek to serve God in their own separate ways.  I think if we served a large geographic area, that would be a very wise thing to do. But right now, I think we want to stay together and gro together.  Also, we have a pretty big vision.  We see more unmet need in our community than we have resources to address.  We have more ideas for ways to help people grow and serve than we have people to lead them.  And we have have yet to reach a critical mass of younger families and young adults.  We thank God for the pioneers who don’t have to be part of a larger group, but we know that people are more comfortable in a community when there are others their age in the mix.  We strive for diversity and also for enough people that people can also find others who share things in common with them.  (Right now, several parents are helping each other with childcare, for example.)

So I won’t rule it out, but I don’t think that we’re being called to start another small church right now.  It will be very interesting to see what God does.

For those who are interested, we decided yesterday to start a Sunday evening worship service at 5:00 p.m., followed immediately by the Alpha Course (at least for the first 12 weeks).

I had a wonderful opportunity to address pastors and elders from small churches at the Presbyterian Church’s biannual General Assembly on Monday.  I really do believe in the ministry of small churches.  By their definition, we are Trinity are now a medium-size church, but we’re still a lot smaller than many of the churches around here.  We can respond faster and get things going on short notice to respond to needs in the congregation and the community.

You can read an article on my talk “Pastor Advocates Speedboat Ministry” at the Presbyterian Outlook Website.  Feel free to comment!  The comments on this site were broken, but KC Wahe clued me in and they’re fixed now.

The past couple of weeks, I’ve been troubled in my spirit…  Is that good Bible language for spiritually messed up?

Our church has experienced a lot of growth lately and we’re having growing pains.  That’s partly because our building is way too small.  It was built in a time when a) churches didn’t have parking lots – they expected to fill the whole property with buildings and b) neighborhood churches were the thing.  There was a plan for a bigger building across what is now grass and parking lot, (it would never be approved under current building codes), but the small “chapel” that was built first was the only worship space that ever made it off the drawing board.  On Christmas Eve or Easter or at the memorial service of a beloved person we can fit 144 people in the pews (6 per small pew), but nobody will sit at that density the rest of the time.  The more realistic four per pew yields 96.  The subtract the first three pews that nobody wants to sit in (maybe they don’t think I bathe) and you have 72.

We almost always have more than 72 people.  Adding the Trinity Cafe, our video venue with coffee and snacks, we can get 120 people on a good Sunday at our 9:00 service.  At 11:00, people don’t sit in the cafe so it’s stuck at about 100 tops.

So we need to do something to make space to grow God’s family!  How do you do that in a small building?  The simplest plan is to add another worship service.  That means either reworking the Sunday morning schedule and maybe shrinking the existing services and fellowship time to make it all fit.  Or it could mean installing seating that would allow more people in the same space (you can fit 20% more people in separate chairs than you can in pews).  Or it could mean moving an existing worship service off site to a bigger space.

The things least likely to mess up what we’ve got going already are adding a new evening worship service and changing the seating in our sanctuary.  Adding a service is a big commitment and it requires a number of committed people to keep it going.  Buying new chairs is expensive (maybe $20,000 to get 150 nice-looking, comfortable seats with wooden legs that hook together).  I find both of those daunting – mostly because the needed resources are out of my control.

There’s that word again!  We’re called to make leaps of faith and to allow God to do great things, but God rarely writes the plans in the clouds of the sky or delivers the plan engraved in stone tablets.

We meet tomorrow to see what the group’s discernment (fancy theological word for looking for God’s will) has been.  We may be able to make a decision and then move ahead with making it happen.  I’ll keep you posted.

What we’re not going to do is sit idly by and allow the momentum that God has provided to die.  We do not plan to “quench the Spirit.”  We will do something and it will be risky.  But – whether it succeeds wildly or fizzles – God will be there with us.

If you read this, please pray for us (and me personally) as we step out in faith!  Where are you headed, Lord?  We want to follow you there!

A recent study claims that kids in daycare have better immune systems than those with stay-at-home parents, possibly leading to a reduced likelihood of leukemia.  See the New York Times article here.

This makes me feel a lot better about the various sicknesses that some of our church kids passed around recently.  You see, as it turns out, going to church is good for kids’ immune systems!  Do you think the New York Times will write about it? Maybe we should put it in our church visior brochure!

Last week, I attended a “round table” of sexual assault survivors and members of the clergy. The honesty of the six women who had survived sexual assault was extraordinary – and extremely difficult to hear. But the hardest part of what they had to say was the part about how their churches had treated them. The horrible things pastors, counselors, and church friends had told these women. If you have time, please take a look at my church newsletter post in the Trinity blog and leave your comments. I think it’s time to shine a light on this whole area in the church, let go of our denial, learn how to treat people as they should be treated, and bear witness to the love and grace of God for sexual assault survivors.

About a year ago, I was at a ministry conference and someone I had been talking to the day before came up to me and said, “I have a message for you, Steve!” “Uh, OK…” I replied. “The message is that you’re ministry is on hold until you can stop caring what people think.”

Now, that isn’t a license to do whatever you want and to run rough-shod over people. What I believe he meant was that a pastor is called on to do what’s right and what God calls him/her to do, and that sometimes isn’t popular.

What the people wants isn’t always what God wants. The Bible is full of stories about how God spoke to one person or a small group and then did things that nobody thought were possible.

What brought this up for me tonight is that Tom Smith – our Wednesday ministry speaker – was talking about Moses receiving the Law up on Mount Sinai and what was happening below. While Moses was up getting the rules God wanted the people to live by during their time in the wilderness, the people – including their high priest – were making and worshiping a golden calf.

Moses was furious! Why did Moses’ brother Aaron make a golden calf for the people to worship?

“Do not be angry, my lord,” Aaron answered. “You know how prone these people are to evil. They said to me, ‘Make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him.’ So I told them, ‘Whoever has any gold jewelry, take it off.’ Then they gave me the gold, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!” Exodus 32:22-24

The people asked him to so he did. Is that a good reason? Is that the right way to do ministry? No way.

Last Sunday, many things went wrong in worship at Trinity.

Now we’re not one of those churches were everything is polished and perfect, but even we are not accustomed to the sheer number of small things that went wrong, from people being out sick to sound system glitches to bulletin information being wrong.  And you know what?  God showed up anyway!  It was a bit like “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.”  God came even without many of the things that we seem to feel are so necessary.  God worked in people’s hearts even though the praise team’s monitors weren’t working right.  God showed up in the Lord’s Supper even though we weren’t singing the song that was planned.

There’s a lesson in there.  We seem to think that we’re in control of life and that God can only do anything there if we get everything lined up and straightened out.  Well, it seems that more often than not, God does the best work when everything that we rely on is messed up.

I hope that gives you hope.  Because in both worship and in life, when the night is darkest and the mess is biggest, God is most likely to do something extraordinary.

OK, I’m not a big Nintendo Wii player, but why are people so disturbed by this image of Jesus? Check out a blog entry about Mission Bay Community Church’s attempt to reach people by using the culture. The blog post by “Ryan” at the Two Small Coins blog does a nice analysis.

Our church used secular Easter culture by featuring a chocolate bunny in our local newspaper Easter ad, “You can’t live on chocolate bunnies.”

Is the Wii Jesus using humor to reach people? Or has it gone too far? I think it’s funny and challenges people in a nonthreatening way that tells them that church doesn’t have to be stuffy and boring. But others might argue that it doesn’t take Jesus seriously enough.

What do you think? As we move farther away from a Christian Culture, the church needs to decide where to use culture and where to challenge culture. This is just one of many chances for us to think about it.

NOTE FOR THOSE WHO DON’T FOLLOW VIDEO GAME CULTURE: The Nintendo Wii video game system allows users to create a version of themselves called a “Mii” (pronounced just like “me”) by choosing hair, eyes, skin color, etc. That’s what Mission Bay is playing with.

Today is the 40th anniversary of the death of Dr. Martin Luther King Junior. I think everyone in this country owes him a debt of gratitude for raising the consciousness of a nation that has always prided itself on being the land of the free.

Well, it’s not over.  Since I’m a white man, people sometimes think its safe to make racist comments to me. The vast majority of people don’t, but every so often someone does. And that means we haven’t arrived yet.

As a pastor, I am acutely aware of the cultural divisions in our society and how they affect the church. The old saying is that Sunday morning at 11:00 is the most segregated hour of the week. That’s not 100% true, but the effort to build multicultural churches isn’t an easy one. It’s much easier to gather around people who have as many things in common with us as possible. For example, many new “start-up” churches are built around that concept – build community around middle class parents between 25 and 45 with children between 1 and 10 – usually without a lot of cultural diversity. The families all share a very similar context so it’s easy for them to understand each other, make connections, and form community.

The problem is that the Body of Christ is made up of many different parts. Where do older people fit in? Or young adults? Or unmarried people? Or people struggling financially? Or people from other cultures?

I firmly believe that the church is at its strongest when it embraces diversity. Our Christian faith is enough to unite us. And when more voices are present in the conversation, we can challenge each other. We can challenge stereotypes and assumptions about who “the others” are.

And there’s a strictly practical reason too. Increasingly, American families are mixed. My wife is Mexican-American and my kids all have the middle name “Mendoza.” Our church is drawing more and more couples of mixed racial-ethnic backgrounds. Are we going to create a separate church for 50-50 European and Mexican background families like mine? Obviously that makes no sense. It’s impossible!

But becoming multicultural means giving up some amount of comfort. You don’t have “instant community.” Sometimes we have to work at it. For example, it’s not possible for every part of worship to speak equally to every person. Sometimes, something will be in a language that we don’t understand. Or a tradition will be unfamiliar and possibly uncomfortable. But we can learn from each other! And over time, we find the beauty in traditions that others bring.

Trinity’s church board has made a commitment to becoming a multicultural church. It won’t be easy. But it wasn’t easy to get from where we were 50 years ago to where we are today. Dr. King and those who worked with him were able to see a possible future that didn’t yet exist, and many paid a high price for that vision. The price to continue their work today is much lower because of the strides that have already been made, and the potential payoff is great.

The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ. 1 Corinthians 12:12

I look forward to seeing Christ’s Church lead the way in bringing people together to become the very different, equally necessary, parts of the body of Christ.

I’m sitting here in a huge group of Presbyterian Church pastors, and I’m struck by how real these people are!

If you’ve heard me preach or have come to my Bible studies, you know that being real is a biggie for me. I think that one of the biggest problems that the Christian Church faces is that people aren’t real… Some people have secret lives, but even more people just hide their imperfections or struggles. That means when someone shows up at the church, one of two things happens

1) They believe the act and think that everyone in the church “has it all together.” Since the person checking out the church knows the problems and challenges in their own life, they figure this isn’t for them.

OR

2) They see through the act or figure it’s impossible that these folks are perfect. That makes us a bunch of phonies.

The antidote is being real. If you don’t feel like smiling today, don’t smile until you actually feel it. If you have a problem, find someone to share it with. We can help each other. If you need to cry, do it. If you feel angry, maybe have someone pray with you. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, ask for help! Then when we see you smiling, it will be real. Yea!

That’s what God wants from us anyway:

“Bear one another’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.” – Galatians 6:2

It’s good to see pastors being real, it’s certainly how I try to be, and I believe our church is becoming more and more authentic each day. It’s sure a better witness to the world. We may be just as messed up as everyone else, but we have help!

“Can I have some apple juice?” my son Joshua asked.
“Sure,” I responded.
“DAD, HE ALREADY ASKED MOM AND SHE SAID NO!” my older son Johnny yelled.

Yes, Joshua has discovered the fine art of continuing to ask until you get the answer you want.  Dave Barney, a system software director I worked for for a while, called it “toddler syndrome.”  People did it in big technology companies too.  Just keep asking people at all levels of the organization until you find someone who will give the answer you want.  Sometimes even the corporate big wigs would do.  It’s like something out of a Dilbert comic strip:

Corporate VP to software development manager: “Can you get the project finished by the end of this month?”
Software manager: “No, even if we finished today, the testing cycle would last longer than that.”

Corporate VP to software development manager’s boss: “Can you get the project finished by the end of this month?”
Software manager’s boss: “I don’t see why not!”

That got us into a lot of trouble in the computer business.  It gets me into trouble at home too.  “What did you just tell Joshua?”

But it’s most dangerous in our lives as Christians.  People look for churches or small groups or friends who will tell them that whatever they want to do or not do, or to believe or not believe, is OK.  We don’t want to face difficult truths, and today, there is enough variety of belief and practice out there that we don’t have to.

Sometimes that saves us from error or persecution.  Sometimes it lets us continue down paths that harm us and others.

I wish Joshua had been honest with me.  In this case, Mom said no to the request for apple juice because she was taking care of the baby.  It was no problem for me to get the little guy some juice.  But the “toddler syndrome” kept us from getting to the root issue.  I hope more of us can get to that point in our faith too.

 Mark 15:15 says, “Wanting to satisfy the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas to them. He had Jesus flogged, and handed him over to be crucified.”

Last spring another pastor said that he had a word for me: ”God has your ministry on hold until you can stop worryign about what other people think.”  OUCH!  Do I really let what other people think affect my actions as a pastor.  Am I a leader swayed by the whims of the crowd?  Well, sure, I listen to others.  We’re supposed to.  After all, those of us in the Reformed family of churches believe that it’s easier to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit in groups than in person…

But what about those times when I know that something is right, but I expect it to be unpopular.  Or what about those times when someone sends me an email complaining about what I preached.  Or what about the times when I know that addressing a particular verse in my sermon will set someone off…  Do those things change my course of action?  That’s not right!

Pontius Pilate knew that Jesus was innocent:

“‘Do you want me to release to you the king of the Jews?’ asked Pilate, knowing it was out of envy that the chief priests had handed Jesus over to him.” (Mark 5:9-10)

So what did he do?  He allowed Jesus to be crucified to please the people.  That’s not the good kind of listening to the people.  I don’t want to allow myself to be turned away from God’s will in order to avoid conflict…

I don’t want to satisfy the crowd at the price of crucifying Jesus – or even to satisfy the crowd at the price of turning from Jesus’ plan for me and for my church.  The price is just too high.

I’m on my way home from the Presbyterian Church’s Evangelism Conference.  It’s clear to me that evangelism has really changed since the days when you could follow a script or hand people a booklet and they would make a decision to be a Christian.  These days it’s all about having relationships with people and about demonstrating love through treating people well and serving those in need.

Which is why the dinner conversation I had was so surprising.  At one of our meals, I had a conversation with two men from big churches who told me that the most important thing a church can do to attract people is to have a polished worship service.  You need professional-quality musicians, and if you can’t get them, you must do simple music.  “Aunt Millie missing every third note is not OK anymore.”

Yikes!  So the church is just like the rest of the world.  If you’re not sufficiently talented, you can’t serve.  And instead of having something that’s more real than what we find in the rest of the world, we must emulate it…  I just don’t think that’s what people are looking for.  I think they want worship that’s authentic and sincere.  Scratch that.  They need worship that’s authentic and sincere.  It’s not an infomercial for Jesus.  It’s where we have an experience of God’s presence, where we connect with God’s people, where we see a different kind of life demonstrated.  If what we demonstrate in worship is the same message that the wealthy, the beautiful, the talented are worth more than others, we have failed.

Yes, worship should glorify God, but I don’t think that towering spires, perfectly produced music, and seamless transitions between worship elements are the things that please God.

To quote the prophet Micah,

“With what shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?  Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?”  He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God? (Micah 6:6-8)

Shouldn’t worship be about doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with God too?

Jesus didn’t mention polish and “quality” when he spoke about worship.  He said, “God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”  (John 4:24)

Let’s not clone the world and adopt its tactics.  Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God– what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:2)  Let’s keep demonstrating that we’re different because we know Jesus, making space for God to transform the lives of those who worship, and go out to change the world! 

A dream that was in the making for some time came true this week.  Our kids’ choir sang the national anthem at a Sacramento River Cats game!  They did really well.  Click below to see and hear them:

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“For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
       neither are your ways my ways,”
       declares the LORD.
“As the heavens are higher than the earth,
       so are my ways higher than your ways
       and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
- Isaiah 55:8-9

Our church is making an important decision about whether we should purchase a piece of property in Southport – an area of new development here in West Sacramento.  Eleanor and I visited the land and prayed over it.  We could feel the potential of the ministry that could be done there.

I’d like to go to our church board (Session) and say, “Let’s do this!  Can’t you see the possibilities?!?”  But that’s not my job.  This is not a nonnegotiable.  It may or may not be the best way for out church to move forward, but unless the board wants it, we can’t go ahead.

In this and other areas, I have to trust that God is at work.  This passage from Isaiah showed up today on our church website as the daily scripture reading.  Nice timing.  I have to trust that God will work through the session.  My job is to help them consider it properly and encourage them to seek God’s wisdom.  The rest is up to them!  God’s ways truly are above my ways and God’s thoughts truly are above my thoughts.  I’ll let you know what happens next.