"Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation taking the form of a bondservant and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to to the point of death, even the death of the cross."
Phillipians 2:5-8
I have been invited to a Christian camping conference. I've been invited because I am a Christian camp director. I get to attend conferences about camp so I can learn how to improve the camp where I work. For this camping conference I have been asked to read a book that details a number of ways to make an organization outstanding. Rats! I have required reading for my upcoming conference. I enjoy books, so that part doesn't bother me. What I cannot understand is that it is a Christian camping conference, yet we are being asked to read a secular book about making our corporation more profitable (ka-ching).
If this was an isolated incident I would ignore it. However, it is even more prevalent in our churches. I used to work for a church that gave its staff a number of secular books aimed at building a better organization. It seems business "experts" have become the darlings of church leaders across the country. Churches have made them very wealthy men by holding nationwide leadership conferences inside our houses of worship by way of live streaming video (ka-ching).
Pastors are forming their own learning communities (book clubs) in which they assign a book of the month, then gather to discuss the books. For the most part they are using secular books about building their businesses, er, uh, churches (ka-ching).
Using today's business standards, Jesus Christ was probably the worst businessman in history. If Jesus were to apply for any job today, the outcome would be hilarious. He had no interest in being a businessman, but if He did, I'm not sure how long it would last. My point is that Christian ministry is not big business. The religious leaders in Jesus' time were excellent businessmen. They were making sound business decisions for the temple which were filling the treasury with cash. Jesus hated the fact that they were operating the temple as a business. He hated it so much He threw them out of His Father's house.
The model of Christian leadership is the complete opposite of the popular business model. It is actually exemplified for us in the verse above: Humility . . . being comfortable with one's position enough to consider everyone else first. Jesus, as God, wrapped Himself in the skin of a man, limiting Himself to just what a man can do. He set aside what he was capable of and humbled himself to the point of taking blows, to the point of being spit upon, to the point of whips, cords and thorns, to the point of nails and spear, to the point of death. Today, such a model of leadership is a sign of weakness. Today's church-goers do not want to follow such weak leadership. We want a leader who will hold tightly the reins of our faith and make it comfortable. We want to come to church and be led and fed. We want to come to church and be inspired. We want a Chicken-Soup-for-the-Churched-Soul experience: short little vignettes, packaged very tidily with no obligation to read past the preface.
Because of this current propensity toward having our salvation "worked out" by a person on stage, we have become a nation of Christians who haven't even cut their baby teeth. We are unable to chew on the meat of the Word. We have been Christians for so many years, yet we can only drink the milk of the Word because we have not made our salvation our own. We rely on great contemporary praise music peppered with inspiring Sunday sermons.
I mentioned this in my last post, and I find myself being asked to include it this one as well: Your church attendance is not a time for you to be fed. If you are a born-again Christian, your presence in church should be about ministry and fellowship. It is a time to give of your gifts and talents to others. Your relationship with God is a minute by minute, every day journey, nurtured by frequent conversation and prayer. At least, that's the goal. Your daily intimacy with the Father is how you prepare yourself for Sunday morning.
We trust our pastors for spiritual leadership. We trust our pastors for biblical wisdom as they are led by the Holy Spirit. A pastor's ability to micro-manage a multi-layered business model in order to market a church to religious consumers makes him the impetus of a church's success, not Jesus. "Rock star" pastors, appealing to the masses by offering Sunday self-help seminars, are one reason why we have a church body still suckling on Christian nominalism. Jesus drew followers to Himself not to draw a crowd, but to make disciples who would go and do likewise. He really didn't have much use for those who gathered around Him for the "show."
The required reading for my camping conference is a secular book on improving my business. I am halfway through it, and now I'm thinking of starting up a successful business. As for my ministry to young people, I will continue to use the best textbook on ministry leadership; the author: Jesus Christ.
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1 comment:
just read a Bob Kauflin post and saw this same point on his blog:
In our desire to be relevant, we mustn’t forget how “unflashy” Christianity can be.
This is a thought about two things we don’t see in this video - communion and baptism (Mt. 28:19; Acts 20:7; 1 Cor. 11:20-26). In his excellent book, The Good News We Almost Forgot, Kevin DeYoung writes, “Many evangelicals see more movie clips in church during the year than they see sacraments.”
I’m not assuming that the churches this video parodies don’t practice the sacraments. I am asking if in the midst of making our meetings creative, relevant, fresh, and inspiring we think we have better ideas than the Lord himself of the best ways to remember his death and resurrection.
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