Category Archives: Pastoral Ministry

A Bedtime Prayer…

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Years ago a college student I know was having trouble with nightmares. Every night, she would lose sleep as she would awaken with a sense of fear and dread. Eventually she couldn’t even get to sleep, fearing what she might dream. Every night she would call her mom and ask her to pray with her so she might get some rest.

Eventually, I sent her this prayer in email, hoping it would be of assistance. She called me and said it had been a great help. The words of the prayer aren’t some kind of magic formula, however the truth represented and the commitment made were key to having a good night’s sleep.

God — thank You for bringing me into Your family, making me Your child, and blessing me with “every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms with Christ Jesus.” Thank You for giving me this time of physical renewal, mental rest, and emotional refreshment as I sleep. I receive it as one of Your gifts for me — one of Your children — and I trust You to guard my body and mind as I sleep.

I have thought about You and Your truth throughout this day. I choose to dwell on those thoughts as I go to sleep. I commit myself to You for protection against every attempt of Satan and any other unclean spirits to attack me as I sleep. Guard my heart and mind from nightmares. I reject all fear and cast every anxiety upon You, Lord, for You care for me. I resolve to rest in You as my rock, my fortress and my strong tower. Place Your peace upon this resting place. In the strong name of the Lord Jesus Christ I pray. Amen.

Sleep tight.

Public Speaking — Where did Aunty Seedent go?

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In the past few weeks I’ve had about a dozen conversations where the the listener was completely lost. At first, you might think it was the fault of the listener, but as I began to look more closely to the conversations, I realized that the problem was not with the listeners, but with the speakers. They were using pronouns without antecedents.

She doesn’t help her, but just sits and listens to him. That makes her wonder if he even cares about the work she does while she sits there doing nothing. “What’s wrong with him? What’s wrong with her?” she wonders?

Wow — what does that mean?

In good communication, every pronoun must be preceded by a noun and identified with that noun. If that doesn’t happen, the listener is frustrated and eventually, the speaker is frustrated.

Here’s some pointers to follow to help others not get lost in what you’re saying:

  1. At the onset of your speech, refrain from using pronouns at all. Instead, establish the persons, places, or things you are discussing by using their names or identity.
  2. In the course of communication, reintroduce the nouns — not to exclude pronouns, but to affirm their identity.
  3. When there is a possibility that a pronoun could be misidentified, use the noun.
  4. If you are speaking hypothetically, use different genders so that you can take advantage of gender-specific pronouns.

So, what happens if we follow these pointers in regard to the sample text above?

Mary doesn’t help Martha, but just sits and listens to Jesus. That makes Martha wonder if he even cares about the work she does while Mary sits there doing nothing. “What’s wrong with him? What’s wrong with Mary?” Martha wonders.

Aunty Seedent would be proud.

Is the Church too High-tech?

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Hanging out with a lot of pastors for the ten days of Family Camp is good for me. It’s good because of those who encourage me, those whose perspectives stretch me, and even those who get under my skin.

This year, I observed something I hadn’t before: A stagnancy of those who refuse to embrace new technologies compared with the vibrancy of those who do. I know — vibrancy should not come from technology; it should come from the Holy Spirit. But let me tell you what I saw.

On one hand you have the pastor who resists technological change. He hates facebook, although he’s never been on it. He mocks tweets and twitters. His church doesn’t even have a web site. He’s almost a Luddite in his perspective on such things. If people want to hear from him, “…they can read the bulletin and listen to the sermon.” I can type whatever negative thing I want about the pastors in this camp because they won’t even read this blog. The problem is that he is only speaking the language of part of our society. He’s refusing to adjust the medium of his message. Believe it or not, I actually heard, some 20 years ago, an older pastor making the same case concerning technology — namely the technology of a sound system. I remember one gentleman saying to me, “We don’t need these loud speakers here at camp. People have forgotten how to listen. We need to teach their ears to hear!” What!? The mission of the church is to teach people to hear without technology!? We would all say that’s absurd. But frankly, a churches reluctance to embrace today’s mobile technology is not dissimilar.

On the other hand you have the pastor who has embraced technological change. I like to think I am this guy, but I am not. I am trying. This pastor has his hand on the pulse of technology. He emails. He has a church web site. He blogs. He uses facebook. You can text him on his phone. He might even tweet every now and again. You can listen to his sermons on your smartphone. You can find current information about the church on the web site. To a wireless generation, this pastor seems relevant. They feel they can connect with him as they could a friend. His ministry seems vibrant.

OK — now hear this: The technology does not make his ministry vibrant. The Spirit does. But the work the Spirit is doing in him is as important as the work the Spirit is doing through him. Part of that inner work is helping him adjust to changes necessary in ministry. May I suggest that, in a way, the Spirit of God is teaching him to blog. And by the way, you can tell a Spirit-filled blogger from one who is not, right? So technology does not guarantee vibrancy any more than a lack of technology guarantees stagnancy. But resistance to technology does suggest something about the pastor. Permit me to illustrate this:

When she was in her seventies, my mother got a computer. She wanted to get on that “email web thing.” And she did. She learned to email, to surf, to look at blogs, to go to family picture sites, to listen to sermons from my church web site. Why? Why did she do that? The answer is that she saw her children and grandchildren doing it and she wanted to connect with them because…. SHE LOVED THEM.

Hmm… How does the Luddite pastor compare with Mom? From my perspective, and from the perspective of many of the tech-savvy, he simply doesn’t care enough to climb the learning curve and get into the digital stream. Sadly, he is like the guy in the 1950’s who refused to get a telephone — disconnected, disenfranchised, and soon to be disaffected.

Perhaps the greatest technological advance in history was the invention of the printing press. Think about it — before the printing press, there were no Bibles in homes. Readers were rare. No one was doing family devotions. How did Christians respond to this new technology? Thank God they embraced it. Accounts vary, but many historians agree that the first book published on Gutenberg’s machine was the Gutenberg Bible, in 1454.

So, is the church too high-tech? Well, it seems to me that, if we, as Christians believe it is our job to influence people for Jesus, leading them to turn from their sin and trust in his sacrificial death on their behalf, then we will embrace every tool we possibly can.

Oh — and by the way, if you have Luddite tendencies, this post probably got under your skin. Welcome to Family Camp!