the value of the frenzy

"Lord search my heart, create in me something clean
Dandelions- you see flowers in these weeds" (Dandelions)

I've had the words of this song running through my head for the past number of days. This used to be my favorite song when the album came out my senior year of high school- and it had slipped to the back of my mind. Then it came back to me as i began listening to music on my computer again for the first time in a while (i've got my entire library of cds on my pc). it came back to me, and then i used the album for something the other night and got listening to it through again.

I love it! and i remember how much i love the band! And i'm holding off saying the band name for my wife. Not because she won't like it, but i wonder if she'll be surprised to discover this band wrote a song with lyrics as profoud (I consider them to be that) as these are. It's Five Iron Frenzy. Hence, the value of the frenzy.

Now, I understand not everyone likes the music, but i must say that I honestly believe this is one of the greatest bands to dawn the Christian charts. For two main reasons- the first is that they are by no means the "same" as every other band. they were quite different, in all regards. The second is that they were not under the assumption that every song needed to say Jesus in it. And not every song with spiritual meaning had to say it directly. They valued the tongue in cheek (My Evil Plan to Save the World), and the flat out comedy (see the "Pants Opera").

I remember in the youth group i used to work with in college, there were a few brothers whose father didn't like the band. He didn't like any Christian band that didn't blatantly say Jesus. So he was very wary to let them buy the music, or listen to too much of it. But, he would have loved it if they got into some group like MercyMe, or... anyway- not remembering if i've said tis before, I'm going to bash most of Christian music. Although there is some decent quality, and some stuff that is just amazing in the lyrics department, there is generally something I dislike about most Christian music.

it is predictable, and it offers little for the brain. You can always, ALWAYS expect the word "love" to rhyme with "above", and for some bands, you can expect every album to sound like a duplicate of their previous one. the style is the same, and there is very little that offers new ideas, or new anything.

Five Iron Frenzy was not that. I was on this kick where I put all of their albums in a playlist and cycled through them randomly, and I could hear the differnces in songs from each album, and... They were just a great band, with great creativity, and they knew how to have fun. I'm convinced that there are still Christians who think that having fun is a sin. But I'm pretty sure it's not, cuz i'm pretty sure God had fun creating the universe.

I loved seeing these guys in concert, and I loved to listen to their albums. "They sang, they danced, they made me laugh. I really wanted to be like them" (modified quote from Superpowers)

i don't know if i had much more to say, but... Even though they've been gone for a while from the Christian music scene, i still miss them. you guys rock... and they weren't above posing in pictures with and a sign saying they like my band.

going to hell

So a guy came up to me while i was at the gas station the other day- i'd stopped in to get some milk and a candy bar. This guy walked up to me as i was walking back to my car and told me this- "You are going to hell! You need Jesus to save you or else you're going to burn in hell forever." Or something like that- i'm not sure i've got the exact quote.

For some reason, I was really bothered by this. I mean, this was disturbing news that I was going to hell- especially since I am a Christian and a pastorat a Christian church. That certainly is disturbing...

Well, I say this because i want to get a discussion going. Discuss one or all of the following (i'm hoping more people than my wife and luke read this now).

• the effectiveness of street evangelism
• the effectiveness of condemning someone to hell
• the effectiveness of preaching to an audience you do not know/understand
• the possibility that there is more to Christianity than simply "fire insurance"

Go!

letter to the "stayer"

To those in the small church:

A truly heartfelt thank you! It is people like yourselves who have advanced the Church in years past, and you are my greatest hope for the future of the Church. There are a great many situations that you are in and have come from, but you all deserve much gratitude.

To those who are in a(n) (older) church that is struggling, and yet continue to be there in an attempt to turn things around, and to see things different. I do not envy your position because there are a great number of churches struggling for relevancy in our society and it is a very tough decision to make on where to go, what advances to make, and how true to stay to prior examples. It is amazingly tough, and we are grateful to you!

To those of you who are in a church plant- a smaller, younger church dedicated to being vibrant and cutting edge- thank you. You are in a church with huge potential- often times untapped. Your vigilance and support have made the church grow to where it is, and will continue to grow with more people such as yourselves! Your love and caring have created families for many unchurched people, or for many post-churched adults who grew up in church and have since left. Your loving and giving spirits have made it possible to make a lasting impact and difference in peoples lives. Thanks- it is truly appreciated!

Instead of going to other churches that may have more to offer you, or may have more to keep you interested, you have given up your desire to be served and serve instead. It has always been God’s intention that believers move from being ministered to into being the ministers! You are wonderful examples of that!

To those of you who left a larger church in search of a true community, thank you! I understand that church changing is not a good thing, however, tapping into God’s heartbeat to connect directly and personally with people rather than being a face in a myriad of faces, a number instead of a person, is a great challenge, and one that many should take up. It is not easy to leave behind what you once knew, but the change could be the most significant thing in your life as a smaller church often times encourages greater growth, and true growth in many areas that you will not in a larger church.

Those of you who stayed, those of you who are in the small church- thanks! It is true to the biblical example what you’ve done! God works in many ways, but one of the ways the early church was used was to have many smaller house churches rather than one big church for a big meeting and lots of pastors! Thank you for recognizing that God’s work isn’t always measured in quantity, but is often measured in the quality of the change in people! Your faithfulness to Christ, and to your shepherds is exemplary, and I applaud those of you who have helped to grow these ministries!

You have not traded the hard for the convenient, you have not traded family for ease, and you have not traded fellowship for security! It is an amazing thing to find people who are faithful to God’s heart, and I say thanks! It is a blessing to serve in a small church, and it’s a blessing to be grouped in with people such as yourselves who have been so wonderful.

Thanks cannot say enough of the true appreciation I, as a pastor, feel for those of you who are committed! You have not counted yourselves as the most important, but often have laid down your lives, laid down your desires and offered of yourselves to see the kingdom of God furthered! There is no higher calling than to be a minister of reconciliation between God and men! There is no greater task than to be faithful to God’s calling in your lives to make a difference, and an impact on others!

Blessings on you!

Letter to the leaver

Dear leavers,

Thank you very much! I would like to thank each of you for continuing to sustain a terrible epidemic that is sweeping across our country. I like to call it church consumerism. It is a terrible thing that seems all to common in our society and culture, and it is a tragedy that so many are a part of it.

You see, the mega-church is something that many Americans have flocked to. This is terribly unfortunate because it has led to the decline of the smaller church. The smaller church, although some may be old and dying, there are many small churches that are young and attempting to realize a new phase of the Church. The biblical view for Church is NOT a huge, gigantic church that has everything for everyone, rather it is smaller churches with specialized areas, meeting different needs of different people.

By leaving a smaller church and going to a larger one, you are continuing a problematic trend. By leaving a church and going to another continues the same trend. Church consumerism is a problem because it asks this- “what can I get from church?” The real question that God is desiring for His people to ask is “what can I offer a church?” But because we are looking for our needs to be met, we will continue to go from church to church until they are.

And while we are thanking you for continuing this trend, I will also thank you on behalf of your children. Younger children can grow easily attached to people. When they are continually moved from place to place with new children’s workers to connect to, they are going to have more trouble trusting that someone will be there for them. They will continue to lose trust until they have become completely untrusting of people because there has been no one constant in their lives outside of family.

And while I’m thanking you for your children, let me thank you for your teenager as well. Your teenager doesn’t connect well with do, does he? You don’t understand him, you can communicate the way you want to- it’s tough for you. Am I right? Don’t be mad about this- it’s normal for your teenager to become more interested in friends and less interested in family at that stage of life. But when you jump from church to church, their circle of Christian friends is constantly changing, as well as the influence of youth pastors on them. If you have stayed for close to year before moving on, your teenager has connected just barely with youth pastors/leaders and they will be forced to connect with new ones- except they won’t because they were almost trusting last time and then yanked away from that.

And while I’m thinking you on behalf of your teenager, let me thank you on behalf of the smaller churches. Because you cannot stay here long, we are unable to provide consistently in all the ministries we want to offer. We are unable to offer fair compensation to workers, we hire people to do many jobs (which take more than a normal work week). We are unable to provide the best of anything because we are consistently needing people to help more than they should.

And while on that strand, let me thank you on behalf of our ministries. We are unable to find enough people to teach and other things in our ministries- because you are not here and committed enough, and therefore, are contributing to the burnout of our people. They are important to us, and we do not want to overwork them, but we do not have anyone else to help.

The youth ministry thanks you- because we are small, your teenager and his/her friends are important. When you leave with your teenager, his/her friends leave as well, and we are left hobbling, crippled and with less desire for involvement.

Let me thank you on behalf of myself and my wife, as well. As a pastor at a small church, I am asked to do many jobs. And these jobs make for long work weeks for me. I have months where I only have 1 day off in the whole month. I do more than I should, and yet I cannot do less because our church stays small. You have kept us small by leaving, and continued to ask me to work for a lower wage than the 4 jobs that I do. Although I am paid well for a church, if I were to go anywhere else and take 4 jobs as big as mine are, I would be ludicrous to accept my current salary. Not only that, but my time is precious and I barely get enough for my family and for my wife- she’s so glad that you’ve forced me to do so much.

And while we’re at that, let me thank you for the mega-church. You see, I’m sure that the children’s and youth pastors there don’t care about your children as much as our ministry heads do- and as personally. Because they have so many more children and kids to care for. But because you have chosen to go there, they are thankful. You have increased their attendance, and their feeling of self-worth. As people continue to go to mega-churches, they will continue to feel as though they are doing things correctly. After all, even though we are not all about numbers, if we have high numbers, we can’t be doing it wrong, can we? They will never see that the true heart of God is for close, intimate connection on smaller levels and not huge corporate meetings where we feel good, or agree with the sermon, but are not moved to change.

Thank you- you have contributed to one of the worst epidemics the church has ever seen. If it were not for you, this would not be possible. So to all of you who are church shoppers, church hoppers and trading churches, thanks! You are a product of your country, and examples of what make America so “great”.

how to kill enthusiasm

how do you kill enthusiasm? it's actually quite simple. let me use a story to illustrate... mind you, i'm still processing this, so bear in mind...

You see, i came home from our youth ministry last night excited. We just had our new class of youth come up for the first time last night- it was good- 3 of our 4 new students were there. We had a fun time, and we were finishing up a lesson series about how to read the Bible- different types of books in the Bible, etc. And as we finsihed with Revelation, I told our students to bring in their questions for me for last night.

there were a few questions, which i tried my best to handle- and eventually that died down. I already know what our next series will be for the youth, so I offered it to them to throw out some questions that they would like to talk about in youth over this summer, maybe the fall- when it comes up kinda thing. And I got some great questions! Great- I mean, one student asked me this "what is God's plan for saving the world?" !?!?! I was stunned, and yet i'm so excited because our youth ministy is moving past the stage of a handful of students and focussed on the fun every week- we're moving into something that i think can be great!

And so as we talk about the basics of our faith over the next few months, i'm totally stoked to talk about God's plan to save the world next week... Because that means i get to tell them that the plan is... THEM! God's instrument is the church! That's exciting stuff for me...

and then i walk into the church this morning and discover that we may be losing not only a potential 5 of our youth, but an amazingly fun and great family from the church- which may or may not include a bunch more families connected to them...

i don't even know what to do right now.... maybe i'll do something mindless like cleaning the church...

ouch...

deciding game 7

Can i rant for a moment? I have read some sports commentaries, and watched enough sports playoffs to have heard a phrase i can't stand. It's the obligatory "deciding game 7" or "7th and deciding game". as though anyone who has half a brain doesn't realize that the outcome of the 7th game, in a 7-game series, is going to decide the series... I mean, do we even think about it?

I'm sure someone used it years ago, and everyone decided it sounded good- so they started using it. And now, even the most intelligent of people don't even think about what it means and how much of a redundant statement that is. of course the 7th game is going to decide the series- it's a 7-game series! there is no 8th or 9th game- the last game always decides, and when there are 7 games, there are no more games to decide the outcome...

duh...