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Category: Preaching (Page 12 of 25)

Augustine’s Pain

November 27, 2012 / / 0 Comments

“My own way of expressing myself almost always disappoints me. I am anxious for the best possible, as I feel it in me before I start bringing it into the open in plain words; and when I see that it is less impressive than I had felt it to be, I am saddened that my tongue cannot live up to my heart.” ~Augustine

Augustine the preacher penned these words more than 1,600 years ago. And from time to time I, too, feel his great pain. Not all the time; not every single Sunday; not even every month or so. But there are times when I am almost crushed by a painfully horrible sermon that I’ve delivered.

The old joke goes that the only thing worse than finishing a sermon and realizing it wasn’t very good is just getting started preaching a sermon and realizing it isn’t very good.

I was there this past Sunday. I don’t know what it was. I think I tried to say too much in too short amount of time. I think I tried to do too much. I think the subject matter (Exodus 34:7b) was too complex and difficult. Maybe I was distracted by some heavy things we had just finished discussing in our Bible class. Maybe I was a little travel logged from the drive home from our family Thanksgiving back to Amarillo that was made a bit longer by the blowout in Bowie. Maybe it was the sparse, sparse, sparse crowd in our worship center. Maybe it was none of those things at all. But for whatever reason, or reasons, nothing was flowing. Nothing was communicating. Ten minutes into the sermon, I couldn’t wait for it to be over. And I just knew 650 other people in the room were feeling the same way.

When it was over, I couldn’t hardly pray with our brother who had walked down to the front to ask for the prayers of our church family. I found myself asking God to forgive me instead of him, to help me instead of him. It’s the first time I’ve ever welcomed a person responding to the sermon by grabbing that person’s hand and begging God to help me.

And I sat there through most of our communion time wondering how weird it would be if I stood up one more time — to the shock and horror of the congregation, no doubt — to apologize for delivering such a poor sermon. I don’t think it was a homilitical homicide, as my friend Jason Reeves says about really catastrophic sermons that can set a church back several decades theologically. It wasn’t like that. It just wasn’t very good.

I had great hopes for the sermon. I was prepared to preach about the utter holiness of our God and the utter repulsiveness of our sins against that holiness and the unexplainable gift of his grace and forgiveness that allows us to dwell in his presence anyway. I was ready. But it just fell flat. And it was crushing me. My tongue didn’t live up to what was in my heart. I felt I had really let everybody down.

I walked to my study — pitiful, pathetic, sad — and was greeted by an email from one of our teenagers at Legacy, a great young man with an eager spirit for our Lord, getting ready to finish school now at ACU and enter the ministry. He wrote the email from Fort Worth at 11:15, right in the middle of my lousy sermon:

Allan, you’re probably preaching right now but I want to say something to you. Years ago, you challenged this church at Legacy and me to consider others. You spoke of how it didn’t make sense for anyone to take communion alone. You encouraged us to move, and some did, but you instilled something in my heart and soul that I will never forget. We don’t have to be alone in this life, we don’t have to do it on our own.

This morning I was encouraged by the Spirit to go sit by a brother of mine who was by himself. I know the Spirit compelled me, encouraged me, and supported me to do it past all the lies that Satan was filling my head with.

You know this, but you have made a difference in my life and I am blessed to call you a mentor, a brother, and a friend.

Thank you for being bold enough to spur people on to act. You are a servant of God and I am blessed to have you in my life. I want to tell you that I have been praying for you and am intentionally praying right now that the words from your mouth will encourage Central and others to believe in the Spirit and act. To be bold! To know that God is with them and that they are not doing it alone.

Reading this young man’s email didn’t cause me to smile. Reading it a second and third and fourth time didn’t bring me to laugh out loud. It buckled my knees and brought into sharp focus my own pettiness and shortsightedness, my own sin in the presence and service of God. It reminded me that every sentence I speak from the Word of God will serve an eternal purpose that I’m not always going to recognize. It reminded me that our Father is in charge of our sermons, not our preachers. He alone inspires, he alone speaks, he alone puts his Word exactly where it needs to go and when it needs to go there and he alone causes it to grow and bear Kingdom fruit to his eternal glory and praise.

Who am I, sweating out a sermon that I don’t think stacks up to my standards, when 300 miles away a young man is begging God in trusting faith to use my words, no matter how poorly written or delivered, to encourage the saints? Who am I? I am shallow and weak.  I have a big ego and a low self esteem, a terribly dangerous combination. And I can get really defensive. I take things way too personally and I worry a lot.

And when I get in a really weird place — not every single Sunday, not even every month or so — our God sends a divinely ordained messenger to lift me up and remind me of who I am and who God is. This is God’s work, not mine. These are his sermons, this is his Church, not mine. Thank you, Lord, for not destroying me. Thank you, God, for reminding me and encouraging me. Thank you for using me at my best and at my worst.

Amen

Utterly Disproportionate to Who I Am

July 2, 2012 / / 0 Comments

David Platt, the author of Radical and Radical Together and all the workbooks, study guides, and DVDs that go with it, is like most of us preachers and pastors. He, like us, is completely and totally unqualified for the task that’s been given him by our God. He’s overwhelmed  by the enormity of the challenge, disoriented by the eternal nature of his job, intimidated by the stakes. Yeah, me too! Sometimes it’s just too much!

Like us, Platt finds great comfort and strength in prayer. Like us, he knows that he’s in over his head with this pastoring thing. So, like us, he acknowledges this before God. And I really, really like his prayer:

“Lord, let me make a difference for you that is utterly disproportionate to who I am.”

In my more serious moments of reflection, I see very clearly how ill-suited for this job I really am. I’m still terrified to speak a word from God to our people. To dare to vocalize his eternal truths scares me. I’m truly intimidated by it. Walking into hospital rooms where people are hanging between life and death — they and their loved ones are paralyzed by fear, overcome with the uncertainty — and pretending to be able to comfort or encourage is crazy. I’m not capeable. I’m definitely going to mess that up every time. Telling people what God wants for thier lives when my own life can be horribly out of whack; attempting to teach people who’ve been studying and teaching the Word of God much longer than me; planning and promoting events that are supposed to inspire faith and good works; writing and delivering sermons that are supposed to compel; and, all the while, rationalizing and justifying the inconsistencies in my own life that betray my inadequacies for this position.

“Lord, let me make a difference for you that is utterly disproportionate to who I am.”

I do know that our gracious God specializes in the weak. He’s an expert in dealing with the unqualified. He chooses the last one you’d expect and then works to do the totally unexpected. It’s truly mind-blowing.

If it’s up to me, my congregation dies. My sermons are boring. The sick people I visit are discouraged. Nobody is saved. And I am a terrible waste of everybody’s time. If it’s up to me and my own strengths and talents and gifts and abilities, we’re all in trouble. I can’t do this. I know it. And everybody who’s ever met me knows it.

The Spirit of God must give me every word, he must provide every ounce of strength, he must come up with every nugget of wisdom and drop of inspiration if this is going to work. He must guide my every move. He has to steer me through every hour. He has to show up every single time. I know it. And the One who created me knows it.

“Lord, let me make a difference for you that is utterly disproportionate to who I am.”

~~~~~~~~~

I’ve generally been pretty luke warm about Bud Selig’s crazy rule that gives home field advantage in the World Series to the league that wins the All-Star Game. I’ve always been negative about it — come on, what commissioner in his right mind awards a competitive advantage in his championship event based on the outcome of an exhibition game played three months earlier?!? — but it never affected me personally because my Rangers were never even close to being impacted. It has never made sense for random players on tricked-up rosters to determine home field advantage in the World Series. Players on teams that had already been eliminated from contention and had no stake in the outcome were determining home field for the World Series. Yes, it’s that crazy. But we never talked it too much because it never hurt the Rangers. Or particularly helped them. The American League won the Mid-Summer Classic thirteen straight years and I always joked, “Good, now the Rangers will have home field if they win the pennant.” Ha-ha.

When the NL broke the streak in 2010, I didn’t pay any attention. When the Rangers beat the Yankees three months later to qualify for the first World Series in club history, suddenly it mattered. During last year’s All-Star game, I paid close attention. When the Senior Circuit won it 5-1, I cringed. It’s not fair. When the St. Louis Cardinals received home field advantage in the World Series — a wild card that didn’t even win its own division over the division-winning Rangers who had six more regular season wins than the Cards— I was livid. And, yeah, it mattered. Game Six at Busch mattered. Harrison starting Game Seven in St. Louis instead of the Ballpark in Arlington mattered. The truth is that in the past nine straight Game Sevens in the World Series, the home team has won all nine times. Look it up. It matters a great deal.

The good news is that Texas is sending a club record seven players to the All-Star game in KC next week, quite possibly eight if Yu Darvish wins the fan voting. Ron Washington will manage with his staff beside him on the bench. Matt Harrison, Major League Baseball pitcher of the month for June, should be the starter and Mike Napoli will be the other half of the battery. Josh Hamilton will play center and Adrian Beltre will be stationed at the hot corner. Elvis and Kinsler will play and Joe Nathan will be called upon to close it out. They can do something about this. They can determine their own destiny.

The American League has scored a grand total of two runs in their past two All-Star Game losses. That can’t happen next Tuesday.

This current Rangers team racked up 50 wins before July. They’re not just winning games, they’re blowing people out. And if Holland and Feliz and Colby and Ogando get healthy, the Rangers are the World Series favorites again.

I’d have to do a lot more research on this — maybe somebody can help me — but this may be the first time since Selig’s rule, with the manager and coaching staff and eight players from a true contender, that the World Series participants actually determine in the All-Star game where they themselves play in October.

Peace,

Allan

The Leader as Pauper

February 16, 2012 / / 0 Comments

I’m re-reading several parts of Norman Shawchuck and Roger Heuser’s book, Leading the Congregation, in advance of our elders / ministers retreat this weekend. I’m especially interested in chapter two: The Interior Attitudes of the Leader. A couple of days ago, I wrote a little bit about childlikeness in our spiritual leaders. Today, let’s consider the church leader as a pauper. A poor person.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.” ~Matthew 5:3

This is the first of the Beatitudes, those ideas and promises at the beginning of Jesus’ “Sermon on the Mount” that are intended to shape our thoughts and lives. Bonhoeffer says it’s not the actual poverty that is the virtue — there’s nothing good about being poor. Instead, it’s the willingness to be poor, it’s the desire to follow Christ at the risk of becoming poor, it’s embracing the call of Jesus knowing that you may very well lose everything. I’m obviously paraphrasing here. But, that’s the virtue. That’s the blessing.

Shawchuck and Heuser put another twist on it. They say that church leaders go into their roles, they accept their mantels of leadership, from a position of poverty. We know that when it comes to leading God’s people, we have nothing. We’re wholly inadequate. We can’t do this; and we know it. Inherent in our call to ministry is the realization that we are not by nature equipped to bear this burden of leadership that God has dropped in our laps. We always embrace our calling as paupers.

Now, personally, this one’s easy for me. I feel completely inadequate every single time I jump in the pulpit to preach. I’m terrified every single Sunday morning. Scared to death. The words of God are too powerful for me. Knowledge of him and his great love for us is too lofty for me to attain. I rarely ever feel like I’ve done our holy God justice. In the words of Augustine, I am saddened that my tongue cannot live up to my heart.

I’m not smart enough to teach these classes I’m supposed to teach. I’m not trained to counsel these brothers and sisters in Christ through their marital problems and addictions and depression. I’m not equipped at all to visit with parents who just lost their teenage daughter to cancer. I’m not able to adequately lead this church staff. I’m not prepared for any of this.

I know what that means to entirely lean on God for my ministry. It’s his; it’s not mine. I couldn’t even begin to do any of this without his power, his strength, his pushing and guiding and equipping. I have no competence on my own; it all belongs to and comes from God. I get that part of it. I understand fully that the apostle is staring right at me when he says, “Consider your own call… not many were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth (sorry, dad). But God chose what is foolish… what is weak. God chose what is low and despised in the world” (1 Corinthians 1:26-31).

Humility? Yeah, I guess. It’s the same; but different.

The authors move on to say that being a pauper, being poor in spirit as a church leader, means to actually desire this poor position. To be a faithful leader of God’s people means, in their view, to seek this poverty. Because that’s what our Lord did.

“It is hard to desire littleness and nothingness, obscurity and benign respect, in a world obsessed with possessions and positions. It is hard to choose a pauper’s station when everyone around us is scrambling for upward mobility. The temptation that afflicts us as leaders is not that of monetary wealth. Only a fool would choose a profession in the church if the goal were to become rich. Indeed, the ‘to be rich’ temptations among most clergy are not for money but for admiration, respect, adulation, prestige, and power. These are the riches that must be guarded against, if ever we are to experience the freedom of being poor in spirit. God means this poverty as a gift and blessing, not as a practical joke upon those whom God has chosen as leaders in the church.”

Downward mobility. (Did Nouwen coin that term?) The way of the cross is downward mobility. We empty ourselves of all desire for gain — monetary or otherwise — just like Jesus in order to take on the role of a lowly servant. Like our Lord, we move down to the bottom of the ladder, down the depth chart, giving up all power and position and prestige to seek the good of others.

This world draws hard lines between the winners and losers. We label everything as failure or success. No middle ground. What a difference is God’s way for us! His Word came down to us and lived among us in order to serve us. He became poor so that we, through his poverty, might become rich.

Bishop Walpole is credited with saying to a friend who was considering a call to ministry, “If you are uncertain of which two paths to take, choose the one on which the shadow of the cross falls.” That’s the way and the spirit of poverty, to which our Christ calls every Christian leader.

Peace,

Allan

On Charles, A Great Man

February 1, 2012 / / 3 Comments

I’ve only heard Charles Siburt speak a couple of times. I’ve shaken his hand once. Just once. But I’m profoundly and eternally impacted by this great man. Chances are, so are you.

Charles Siburt is the “go-to guy” when it comes to healing churches, fixing church leaders, maturing disciples along the Way. He has worked with countless Church of Christ congregations, scores of elders and shepherds, and more preachers than any of us could count. He’s written books and articles, preached and taught sermons and lessons, and in some way counseled and advised almost every church leader I know.

I was blessed to spend three hours with Charles in two separate phone conversations in June last year. I wanted to find out what he knew about this Central Church of Christ in Amarillo. Turns out, he knew everything. And everybody. He gave me some things to consider. He cautioned me about a couple of potential problems. He probed into my own issues and problems like we had known each other for years. He dug deep to find out where I was spiritually, emotionally, mentally. But mostly he just went on and on about how great this church was. How healthy the leadership is here. How unified and focused and committed the elders and ministers are here to lead the church family in living and growing in Christ-likeness.

I remember a preacher friend of mine telling me after my first conversation with Charles, “If Charles says that’s a healthy church, you can know without a doubt it’s a healthy church. Charles knows a healthy church.”

At the end of my second and last phone conversation with Charles — I was sitting in my truck in my driveway in North Richland Hills, Charles was in some airport somewhere — he told me, “I think you and Central would be a perfect fit; you’re made for each other.”

That night I told another preaching colleague what Charles had said. He replied, “If Charles says it’s a good fit, then you know it’s a good fit. Charles knows how to match preachers and churches.”

They were all correct. Charles was correct. I couldn’t be happier. The match couldn’t be better. The fit here couldn’t be more perfect. And I know I went into this next phase of my Christian ministry in Amarillo in a better frame of mind more appropriately equipped because of Charles’ counsel. I read the books he recommended. I answered the questions he told me to ask myself. And I spoke to the people he said I should.

And I’m grateful. Eternally grateful.

We’re all expecting Charles to pass from this life to the next in just a few days. Our brother Charles is close, very close, to being in the intense face-to-face glory and presence of our God. How great for him. People who know Charles much better than I do are setting aside this Friday, February 3, day after tomorrow, as a day of prayer and fasting. I plan to join them. I plan to spend a great part of that day thanking our gracious God for blessing so many of us and our congregations with Charles’ expertise and passion; asking God to bless Charles’ wife, Judy, as she experiences the loss of her dearest companion; begging God to raise up others to pick up the encouraging and mentoring and healing where Charles is leaving off.

To read much more about Charles and this day of prayer and fasting please click on these links to people who really, really, really know him. My great friend Jim Martin’s thoughts can be found here. Dan Bouchelle has penned his own thoughts here. And Jordan Hubbard’s reflections are here.

During my two conversations with Charles seven months ago, he never told me that he was a big part of the reason Central is such a healthy church. Charles has been working very closely with this family of believers in downtown Amarillo for many, many years. He has encouraged our shepherds, he’s helped heal some very painful hurts, and he’s counseled our ministers here for a long, long time. It shows. The Kingdom of God is greater for it. The city of Amarillo is blessed because of it. And the new preacher here is grateful. Eternally grateful.

God bless Charles Siburt with his merciful comfort and peace.

Allan

Faithful Among the Stumps

October 1, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Of all the really cool stuff in Isaiah — the servant songs, the allusions to Christ, the prophesies about the Messiah, the comfort passages — the words at the end of chapter six about preaching to people who refuse to listen are the most quoted in the New Testament.

Jesus uses Isaiah’s words in Matthew 13 after telling the parable of the four soils. Same thing in Mark 4 and Luke 8. Jesus says, man, this is how Isaiah must have felt.

In John 12, right after Jesus predicts his death, God’s voice thunders down from heaven for the benefit of the people in the crowds. But they’re not listening. They don’t understand. They refuse to change. And, again, Jesus uses the Isaiah 6 passage to account for the blind eyes and stubborn hearts.

Paul’s near the end of his life in Acts 28, under house arrest in Rome. And he’s failed to make a dent in the sight or the hearing or the hearts of the religious leaders who’ve come to hear him preach. Nothing. And he quotes the Isaiah 6 passage. Same thing in Romans 11. “It’s still happening!” Paul says, “To this very day!” Paul’s a failed preacher in pretty good company.

The point of the last half of Isaiah 6, and the reason the passage is repeated so many times in the early history of God’s Church, is that we are called to be faithful to our Father and to his mission, regardless of where it takes us. No matter how bad it gets, no matter how many people reject the truth, we are called to keep preaching the truth.

The point of Isaiah 6:8-13 is that if we trust God, if we’ll remain faithful to him, he’ll do something with those closed eyes and plugged up ears. Those stumps (Isaiah 6:13). Isaiah and Jesus and the apostles are reminding us that God does his best work in the middle of a desolate field of worthless stumps.

God created the universe out of nothing. He raised a mighty nation out of a 90-year-old barren womb. He pulled a young boy from the bottom of a well and made him a powerful ruler of the most important nation in the world. He uses the death of a preacher and the persecution of his Church to spread the Good News of salvation from Jerusalem to Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth. He delivered forgiveness and righteousness to all mankind through a cruel wooden cross.

There’s more happening in horrible situations than we ever realize. These awful circumstances are holy. God does holy things with faithful people in a field full of stumps.

“The holy seed is its stump.” ~Isaiah 6:13

Peace,

Allan

The Hope of Glory

September 18, 2011 / / 0 Comments

I have become the Church’s servant by the commission God gave me to present to you the Word of God in its fullness — the mystery that has been kept hidden for ages and generations, but is now disclosed to the saints. To them God has chosen to make known the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

Peace,

Allan

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