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.

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.

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).

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.

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!

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!

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.

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.

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.

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!

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.

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.

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! 

Get the Flash
Player to see this player.

“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.

It turns out that the traditional way to produce the ashes for the worship service is to save some of the palm fronds from the previous year’s Palm Sunday and burn them to create the ashes.

There’s something deep and true about it…  Palm Sunday is when we remember Jesus’ trimphant entry into Jerusalem.  Everyone was singing praises, throwing down their coats before him, and waving palm branches as they would to welcome royalty.  But within days, they were shouting to ”crucify him.”  It is the symbol of these feigned praises that we burn and mark ourselves with as we enter into a time of reflection and self-examination.

Are we doomed to repeat this cycle endlessly, or can the power of the Risen Christ burn away our pretension and lead us into an authentic faith that can endure?  That is the promise of Easter.  But we can’t get there until we walk the road to the cross.

He looked at me uncomfortably and started gesturing to another employee. I decided that he probably spoke only Spanish so I started talking to him in Spanish, but he kept gesturing to the young woman behind the counter. I finally asked, “No habla español?” He said “No.” “No español.” And he proceeded to ask the woman he had been pointing to to translate for us. I told her what I wanted to communicate. Then she translated it into Spanish for him!

This man was so certain that someone who looked like me couldn’t speak a word of Spanish that he didn’t hear it when I spoke it. He must even have convinced himself that I was so inept that I meant “ingles” when I said “español.”

Surprisingly, this isn’t the first time I’ve experienced exactly the same thing. Now I’m not fluent in Spanish, but I can communicate just fine… if the other person is listening!

How often does that happen to us? We’re so confident of our assessment of a situation that we can’t see anything different even when it’s right their in our face…

And what does it tell us about relationships between different racial-ethnic groups in the United States? Here in California there is no longer a majority racial-ethnic group, and very soon it will be Hispanics. But the experience of Spanish speakers has been so consistent that some of them can’t even conceive of the idea that I might speak a few words o Spanish. That’s a shame.

Because of a dedicated Christian who wants to build bridges, our church is getting ready to start a Spanish-speaking ministry. It’s a great opportunity to create community and undo some isolation and mistrust between God’s children. We’re hoping to teach the congregation a handful of basic phrases to help us build the other side of the bridge. Pray for us! I believe that this is exactly what Christians are called to do. I’m sure that this will be uncomfortable for a few of our older members, but they’ll adjust. As long as this is what God is calling us to do, and I believe it is, God will enable us to do it!

And if you do, please leave a comment or two on there.  The silence is deafening.

The options seem to be to cut back our ministry significantly –  which would be a big step backwards – or to trust that our needs for ministry will be met somehow.  But where is the line between trust in God and foolishness?

I have prayed and asked people to pray.  God has been acting in our church, and I don’t believe that he’s done with us.  Still, we have to make a decision before the end of the year.  Well, I received a message today.

Johnny was “reading” his children’s Bible this morning, and he came up to a page with a picture of a fish with a coin in its mouth.  “What’s this Daddy?” he asked.

It was the story of Jesus and Peter paying the Temple tax.  They didn’t have any money so Jesus told Peter, “go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours.”  (Matthew 17:24-27)

The children’s Bible stated confidently that we can trust God to provide for our needs.  The message?  If Jesus can provide for monetary needs with a fish, won’t he provide for our church?  There are many possible ways for God to provide.  There were 199 people in worship on Sunday.  Can’t God move them to give?  Or provide some other means of support?

Johnny pointing out this story as I was struggling this morning really felt like a message from God.  “Don’t worry, Steve.  We’ll get through this together.”  I look forward to telling you how it works out.

If you read this posting, please pray for Trinity Church.  “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” – James 5:16b