An Invisible Footprint; Do We Trust the Social Networking Scene?

Facebook recently made significant changes to security. Since that time I have not been posting updates on FB. Why? Because I have not gone through the step of making the required “privacy settings” decisions. Members must choose the level of access that they are willing to grant to others. Does everyone in the world get to access my personal information or do I want to restrict that privilege to only those who are my family? Or friends? Or friends of friends?


My wife tells me that I am naïve. I want to believe the best in people, that they do not intend to be hurtful, that they will not use knowledge about me to their own gain and my detriment. That leaves me asking why I should not allow everyone to have access to my personal information. I trust them. And trust is a big issue.

Facebook has raised interesting issues for those involved in social networking and the safety of those who utilize tools like Facebook to stay in touch with friends. As I was reviewing the options, I began to think about how the same issues must be addressed in any community. Trust is paramount. We must have confidence that others will not abuse our transparency. When we take off the masks and allow ourselves to be known, we open ourselves to potential abuse. Someone may divulge things shared in confidence. Or they may hold those confidences dear while graciously helping us to become more of who we were created to be, conformed to the image of Christ.

One thing I know, missional lifestyles are not lived in isolation. Being missional requires relationship with others. Facebook has a limit on the number of “friends” one can have. Ed Stetzer became a “big deal” when his friends numbered 5000. (You can laugh with Ed by clicking here.) In reality, probably none of us could have that many true “friends.” The number of persons in whom we can invest and be invested emotionally is much lower. It is in the smaller group that authentic relationships develop; those that move beyond superficial to significant. Without community we are incomplete. Yet community carries a price tag that is too great for many.

Hugh Halter and Matt Smay got it right: “Everyone’s talking about community. Everyone seems to want it, most complain if they don’t find it, but it’s harder to pull off than you think.”(From the introduction to The Tangible Kingdom Primer) Where have you experienced real community? Do you currently have a relational community whom you trust completely? Do the words “church” and “community” intersect for you? If so, how? If not, why?


I look forward to dialogue about “missional community” with people like you who are on the journey at VERGE on February 4-6 in Austin, Texas. I’ll see you there.

Impressions of Russia - By Shafer Parker

Pastor, Hawkwood Baptist Church
Calgary, Alberta


The Rostov Baptist Bible School was created in the mid-1990s after the fall of Communism. In meetings with Russian Baptist leaders, North American Baptists asked how they could best support what Russian churches were already doing. Educating pastors and young adults for Christian ministry became a priority. Financially the school is supported by NAB churches in Canada and the U.S. All costs for each student are covered, including a tiny amount of spending money. The program is completed in one year, with each subject handled in two-week intensives (Bible survey courses, theology, hermeneutics, homiletics, etc.), led by volunteer professors and pastors from North America. Teaching is done through a professional translator and visiting professors live in a well-furnished apartment a five-minute walk away.


As I write this I’m on my way home from two weeks of teaching the Pentateuch at the Rostov Baptist Bible School in Rostov-on-Don, Russia. This was my second teaching trip and as I left for Russia this time I mistakenly assumed I would simply pick up where I had left off in 2008. Well, that notion disappeared in a hurry. I’d forgotten how much the translation process slows everything down. I also failed to realize that with a brand new group of students (10 men and 3 women) it would take a few days to assess their level of Biblical knowledge and develop the same rapport I had enjoyed with the students by the end of my first visit.

Nor had it crossed my mind how different the weather could be. I mean different from last year because this year it never varied from one day to the next. It rained, except for short periods of heavy overcast and dripping trees, then it rained some more. The hour of the day made no difference. It just rained. As we discussed Noah’s flood in the classroom, nature was giving us a graphic illustration of 40 days of inclemency just outside the window, with narry a rainbow in sight. Rostov is on the Don River just 20 miles east of the Sea of Asov, so I expected the humidity to be a little higher than in my home town of Calgary, Alberta. But this was ridiculous. Ah well, I made up for the dampness outdoors by the dryness of my teaching style indoors.

To meet a Russian Evangelical Christian is to meet someone who understands total commitment to Christ. Exceptions must surely exist, but I’ve not met any. Russia is no longer Communist and religious freedom is a reality, but by and large the culture is so opposed to Christianity, and evangelical Christianity in particular, that no one decides to confess Christ without counting the cost. Or else, like many of this year’s students, they’ve traveled the way of the world to its bitter end and know how to compare the cost of that journey to the rewards of following Jesus. Several of the men in this year’s class have spent time in prison, or in drug and alcohol rehab. They came to faith with the desperation of a Jacob, begging for a blessing from God after all natural strength has been torn away. None of them harbor any illusions as to the source of the new life they presently enjoy, nor would they return to their old way of life for anything this world can offer.


The classroom and the dormitory for the Bible school are in the basement of Central Baptist Church, the only new Baptist Church building to be built in Russia during the Communist era. The Soviet Union hosted the Olympics in Moscow in 1980 and the government was anxious to show the world that its people enjoyed religious freedom, which meant that precisely one church in one city got permission to build — at the end of a narrow, pot-holed lane that appears more alley than street, and where the church building is hidden from view behind some of the most dilapidated buildings in Rostov. No one just drops in at Central. To get there you have to be looking for it, and even then you probably need guidance from someone who knows the way.

Despite the difficulties, a growing number of people are attending Christian worship in Russia. The thousand-seat sanctuary at Central Baptist is nearly full every Sunday, with enough young people present to convince even a convinced skeptic that Christianity cannot be dismissed as nothing more than delusional comfort for a dying generation.

Still, attendance at Central isn’t what it once was — not, surprisingly enough, necessarily a bad thing. Before the fall of communism standing-room-only crowds were the order of the day. But over the past 15 years many members have used their new-found freedom to immigrate away from Russia, and an equal number have gone out to plant new churches around the city — one of them an imposing brick structure on a major thoroughfare with a large cross on top that leaves no room for the passing crowds to misunderstand what goes on inside.


For me, it’s the students I will always remember. Andre, who grew up as one of the good guys but remained haunted by the thought that something was wrong with his life. It was when one of the local pastors suggested he help out at a drug rehab centre that he began to understand his own need for repentance. Michael was a patient at that same centre who shared with me that he had dedicated 20 years of his life to drugs, alcohol and prisons. Within six weeks of entering rehab last year, and being exposed to a Christian witness, he had repented and believed. “Since then God has led me with His own hand,” he reports.

Then there’s Alexander (Sasha to his friends), who was a “danger to other people and a danger to myself.” Twice he tried to commit suicide, and twice the Lord preserved him until he finally went back to his believing parents and asked them to “tell me about God.” Since then “God has released me from my burdens,” he says.

These days Andre, Michael and Sasha are focused on preparing for a lifetime of ministry to others. They’ve got a long way to go to be completely ready, but I have little doubt they’ll make it. To God be the glory! Great things He has done!

My Heart is full…I am Thankful

Introduction by: Milfred Minatrea

Matt Chandler, pastor of the Village Church, will have surgery this morning in Dallas. Through this year it has been my privilege to walk with Matt, the staff and elders of the Village Church through the transition of Northway Baptist Church as it became The Village Church Dallas Northway. The most recent series Matt has been preaching was designed in part to introduce the Northway family to the Biblical doctrines that underpin the dynamic faith shared among the Village Church family. As Matt prepared to entered surgery, he communicated through a blog post matters that were foremost in his thoughts. You will be blessed as you read his post. He and his family will be blessed as you intercede. God will be blessed as His glory is shown in power through the touch of His mighty hand.

Here is Matt's post:

The last seven days have been some of the most interesting of my life. I have felt anxiety, fear, sadness and a deep and unmovable joy simultaneously and in deeper ways than I have felt before. I am grateful for this heightened sense of things. Today at 10:45 a.m. CST I will have a good portion of my right frontal lobe removed. I head into that surgery with a heart that is filled with gratitude and hope.

Here are some of the things I am thankful for in no particular order:

1. I am thankful for the thousands of you who have prayed and fasted for my health. It has brought far more tears to Lauren’s and my eyes to receive this kind of attention from the Church universal than this tumor has.
2. I’m thankful for health insurance because I’m guessing they aren’t doing my five-hour surgery for free!
3. I am thankful that I have deep, real friendships at The Village with Michael Bleecker, Josh Patterson, Brian Miller, Chris Chavez and Beau Hughes. They have been such a comfort to me and my family this past week. Pastors should have good friends on their staff. It’s risky but worth the risk.
4. I am grateful for the men of God in my life, namely John Piper who taught me to hold my life cheap and to join with Paul in saying “I don’t count my life of any value or as precious to myself if only I might finish my course and complete the work that He gave me to do to testify to the Gospel of the grace of God. I’m nothing, I just have a job. God keep me faithful on the job and then let me drop and go to the reward.” Without this strong view of God’s sovereign will, I’m not sure how you don’t despair in circumstances like mine.
5. I am thankful for my wife Lauren. “Strength and dignity are her clothing, and she laughs at the time to come. She opens her mouth with wisdom, and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue. She looks well to the ways of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children rise up and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her: ‘Many women have done excellently, but you surpass them all.’” “Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.”
6. I am thankful for my children. Audrey the Beautiful, Reid the Valiant and Norah the Joyous. Being a daddy to these three is one of the greatest joys of my life.
7. The privilege of seeing and appreciating all of life through the grid of a heightened sense of my own mortality.
8. I am thankful for brilliant doctors and surgeons who have been given a real gift by our great God and King to repair things as complex as the brain.
9. I am thankful for The Village Church. If there is a place that loves Jesus more, takes sanctification as seriously and wants to see the lost love the great King deeply I am unaware of it. These last seven years have been a spectacular joy!
10. More than anything else I am grateful to my King Eternal, my Lord Immortal, for my God invisible. He alone is God. All Glory and Honor, Forever to You O God. I am overwhelmed in these moments by God Himself and the assurance of a future inheritance of a Kingdom that cannot be shaken and where all things are made new (Hebrews 12).
    

Christ is All,
Matt Chandler

Some Things Money Can’t Buy

Even in economically difficult times, most of us in the West know little of the pain of poverty. Do not misunderstand, I am not saying that poverty is absent in our communities. In my own state statistics indicate that one of every ten children will experience hunger. Globally poverty is multiplied exponentially compared to that experienced in North America. One out of five people on earth exists on less than one dollar per day, and nearly half of the world’s population exists on less than two dollars per day. Ninety-five percent of the “poorest of the poor” live outside the North American context.

The fundamental cause of hunger is poverty. God is very clear; hunger cannot be attributed to inadequate supply, but to lack of compassionate justice in distribution. Abundant food is in the fallow ground of the poor; but it is swept away by injustice (Proverbs 13:23).

Consider the following thoughts on poverty from The Needs: Hunger in the World: “Virtually every country in the world has the potential of growing sufficient food for the indigenous population on a sustainable basis. This basic capability is too often undermined by a variety of factors, some related to technology and material resources (soil degradation, water shortages and pollution, inappropriate or destructive agricultural practices) and others related to human frailty (war, ethnic rivalry, corruption, greed, political oppression).

More than 16,000 children die every day in the developing world from preventable and treatable diseases. Worldwide, one-half of deaths for children under five years of age are caused by malnutrition. Seventy percent of all childhood deaths are associated with malnutrition and preventable diseases.”

These facts are a dart that should pierce the heart of the American church. Too often we have become creatures of comfort rather than compassionate Christians. I recently drove past a number of large ranches, each of which had intricate gated entrances identifying the owners with their proudly emblazoned surnames. Driving past I was reminded of these words from Psalm 49:

Why should I fear in days of adversity, when the iniquity of my foes surrounds me, Even those who trust in their wealth, and boast in the abundance of their riches?

Their inner thought is, that their houses are forever, and their dwelling places to all generations; They have called their lands after their own names. But man in his pomp will not endure; he is like the beasts that perish.

Do not be afraid when a man becomes rich, when the glory of his house is increased; For when he dies he will carry nothing away; his glory will not descend after him.

Though while he lives he congratulates himself – And though men praise you when you do well for yourself – He shall go to the generation of his fathers.

It is not my intent to demean or judge those ranchers, they may in fact be caring and compassionate sharers of the resources they possess. I do not know. But I do know that too often Christians in the West fall victim to an abusive “wealth and prosperity” Gospel that focuses on our own consumption rather than on sharing resources as agents of Godly compassion among those living in poverty.

The feature article of a recent issue of The Atlantic magazine was titled, Did Christianity Cause the Crash? The article investigates links between churches proclaiming a wealth and prosperity gospel and the church’s role in guiding parishioners toward assuming high risk sub-prime loans. These together with other factors are identified as primary contributors to the economic crash.

The article merits our attention. As the missional people of God, we must seek answers to poverty and injustice. Where our consumption contributes to these conditions, then repentance is mandated. We must remember that repentance is not just expressing sorrow for that which we have done wrong, but actively pursuing that which is right.

When I read the Atlantic article I immediately thought of the ongoing question of the appropriate engagement of Christians in and with culture. What is our appropriate role? That question has been the ongoing topic of reflection by gifted writers such as Richard Niebhur in his book Christ and Culture or contemporary theologian James Westgate, professor at Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary in Fresno, California in Spiritual Edgewalkers. Missional thinker Alan Roxburgh responded to The Atlantic article with his typically adept reasoning and insight.

All of us who follow Christ bear responsibility for confronting ideologies and systems that perpetuate poverty and hunger. We must adhere to the Good News that resonates with the ancient voice of our Master; the message of a Kingdom whose foundations are righteousness and justice (Psalm 97:2). We reject all false gospels. As those who have the mind of Christ, we must find a different way to complete the familiar commercial: There are some things money can’t buy, for everything else there’s…

Learn from the Ants

Introduction by: Milfred Minatrea

Bill Tinsley is a colleague in ministry, a gifted author, as well as a passionate disciple of Christ who possesses the mind of a missiologist. I like the guy and love spending time with him. We meet regularly to encourage one another, stimulate one another in mission ministry, to drink coffee and lavish praise on his remarkable dog, Buddy. Bill is my friend. In fact, Buddy is too.

Most recently Tinsley served as the designer of WorldconneX, a new paradigm mission entity that sought to ensure the local church as the primary equipping and sending entity in God’s mission. Among other leadership roles, he formerly served as Associate Executive Director of Baptist General Convention of Texas and Executive Director of Minnesota Wisconsin Baptist Convention

Upon dissolution of WorldconneX by the Baptist General Convention of Texas, Tinsley founded the Tinsley Center which is partnering with Missional Church Center to assist congregations in finding their way forward in God’s mission. The following article is one of a series of reflection columns that Tinsley write weekly for distribution through local newspapers. In this article he addresses a subject that none can ignore if they are Shaped by God’s Heart.

ANTS

We have ants. We have kept them at bay inside the house, but outside, that is a different matter. A single dropped crumb on the patio and the next morning a stream of ants appear, hundreds of them in a neatly organized operation to dismantle the discarded food and store it in bits and bites for later use.

How do they do this? Do the wandering scout-ants have cell phones? When they make a discovery do they place a call back to home base and say, “Send the troops. We have food!” Who organizes the operation? Who tells these worker ants to answer the call, and who plots the route, usually the shortest and least obstructed line to the treasure?


If they were humans, the searchers who discovered the food supply would immediately stake a claim, lay title to it and horde it so that they could be wealthier than all the other ants. They would let the weaker ants in the colony starve. And, they would probably spend most of their time in “ant court” defending the right to their possessions. “Ant lawyers” would probably claim the greatest portion of the wealth.

Why can’t we learn from these little creatures? Every year a billion people on the earth die of starvation. Every day 25,000 children, world wide, whose stomachs are bloated and empty draw their last breath. They die in remote villages far from public scrutiny. Over half the world’s population, three billion people, live on less than $2.50 per day.

I have to admit this convicts and alarms me. I need to be more like the little critters who invade my patio. I need to sound the alarm, send out the signal, martial others and join them in distributing food and resources to those who need it. But how do we do this? How do we know that our gifts get to the people and places where they are needed? There is so much graft and corruption in the world that charitable gifts are often routed into the pockets of the greedy.

I guess the best thing is to be alert to opportunities. When a beggar approached me on a parking lot in downtown Dallas, I took him across the street to Subway and bought him a sandwich. Unfortunately, as I listened to him, his story seemed to unravel and I am not sure it was the best thing to do. But it was something. When one of our church members returned from Kenya and made an appeal for people she knows who are starving, I sent a check. When I visited Tillie Bergin at Mission Arlington and saw the difference she was making among the poor in the inner city, I sent a gift. It’s not much. But, for me it is a start. If all of us gave more generously we could make a difference, like the ant.

Proverbs says, “Go to the ant … consider its ways and be wise! It has no commander, no overseer or ruler, yet it stores its provisions in summer and gathers its food at harvest.” (Prov. 6:6-8). John, describing true repentance and faith, said, “Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same.” (Luke 3:11)

Bill Tinsley has served as pastor and mission leader in Texas, Minnesota and Wisconsin. He has international experience in South America, Africa, Asia, Australia and Europe. He can be reached at bill@tinsleycenter.com. His books are available at www.tinsleycenter.com.

Depression: Pastors in Pain

David Treadway, pastor of Sandy Ridge Baptist Church in Hickory, North Carolina committed suicide in September. His tragic death is the fourth pastor suicide in the Carolinas during the past four years. Pastor Treadway was undergoing treatment for depression. In a USA Today article published October 29, 2009, Greg Warner addressed depression among pastors. He wrote, “Most depression does not lead to suicide, but almost all suicides begin with depression.”

The article identified impossible role expectations often placed upon pastors, together with their innate resistance to seek help when they become depressed. They fear, too often appropriately, that congregational leaders would understand their depression to be a failure of faith rather than an illness to be treated. So, pastors suffer alone while trying to care for others.

Matthew Stanford, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Baylor University in Waco, Texas said “The likelihood is that one out of every four pastors is depressed." Further, “Anxiety and depression in the pulpit are "markedly higher" in the last five years...The current economic crisis has caused many of our pastors to go into depression."

The author clearly cited the economic environment as a primary cause. Then he added, “Besides the recession's strain on church budgets, depressed pastors increasingly report frustration over their congregations' resistance to cultural change.” When I read those words, a passing comment on a secondary cause of depression in the article, my heart leaped. For that is precisely what I repeatedly hear from pastors across North America.

“My congregation wants to return to the way things used to be. They are unwilling to accept the reality of cultural changes in our world. Further, they perceive culture, “the way we do things” as sacred. Even when those things are no longer working, they say we should just try to do them better. And when those old methods are not successful, the failure is perceived as being the fault of the pastoral staff. They are unwilling to allow our congregational culture to change so that we can be more relevant among a changing population.” This resistance to change is sometimes public. At other times it skims just beneath the surface like a private torpedo locked on target, ready to do massive destruction.

As pastors understand the marginalization of Christianity in contemporary culture, consequently perceiving the requisite adaptation of the church toward an incarnational missionary posture, their passion to lead toward such culture shifts is often met with resistance. Leading a conventional congregation to perceive the need for change is a massive undertaking, a challenge that will often result in things getting worse before they get better. Those who cannot accept the need for internal congregational change will voice opposition. Those who support internal change will then find themselves defending the need for change. Repeatedly I have seen the dialogue move from the issue of “changing the way we do things” to challenges of personal loyalty within the congregation. Instead of conflict about process, the conflict becomes personal.

In those moments, pastors are caught in the untenable position of loving, serving, and leading a flock that has become divided. I can recall the deep pain of having a man whom I loved dearly, but who did not agree with new directions in ministry, unleash a barrage of vindictive verbal assaults. He was mad. Plain and simple. And his words were not filled with grace in that instance. His words were fiery darts. I felt the darts tear through my heart, a heart that had given eight years of pastoral care to our flock. In my own immaturity I tried to reason with him while he was still angry. I so wanted to please. To make it all right. And when I could not, I walked away wounded. When I was alone, I wept bitterly. Over the next weeks, I was too bruised and weak to continue to lead toward the kind of changes that needed to be made in order for effective ministry to continue. And I walked into a dark night that lasted for months.

Ultimately I found solace through the counsel of Ken Sharp, the tallest Christian counselor I have ever known, who became a dear friend in ministry. Further, I warmed to my own condition as I read Don Baker and Emery Nester’s, Depression: Finding Hope and Meaning in Life’s Darkest Shadow, a wonderful treatment published by Multnomah Press. Not nearly every pastor is blessed with an understanding friend and counselor. Many do not find voices to accompany them through their pain.

As North American churches struggle in a changed and changing culture, the role of pastoral leadership is challenging. We constantly encounter brothers and sisters in ministry who are walking a tightrope as they lead. It is highly improbable that they will be able to walk the tightrope, lead toward a new way of being church in a changing culture, and keep everybody happy in the process. I pray that we can be fellow pilgrims on their journey offering support and encouragement where we can. And sometimes, our greatest help may be simply to walk with them through the darkness.

One thing I know. We must not let those who are suffering walk the path alone.

Resource Beyond Ourselves

Introduction by: Milfred Minatrea

Curtis Ferrell continues to bless me with the insights He is gleaning through God’s activity at South Memorial Church of God in New Castle, Indiana. This church continues an extensive Missional Journey as a congregation. Here are some of Curt’s most recent insights from Scripture:


I saw something new in scripture recently that gets me excited about where we are at in our Missional journey. Remember the story of Jesus feeding the five thousand? You can find it in several locations in the gospel. (Matthew 14:13-21; Mark 6:32-44; Luke 9:10-17) In each of these accounts Jesus tells his disciples, "You give them something to eat."

At first this seems like a cruel joke. Jesus knew that the disciples could see the need of the crowd. He knew they had compassion in their hearts for the crowd. He knew the disciples had almost nothing in physical resources. He knew the frustration in their hearts because they knew they couldn't meet the needs that they saw all around them. Why would Jesus tweak His disciples like this?

I believe it was because Jesus saw an even greater need. The disciples thought that they were depleted of resources. The disciples were blind to the REAL source of their resources. They were blind, spiritually, and needed to have their eyes opened.

Jesus could have called quail down from the sky, or prayed for manna, or asked the ravens to feed the people. He could have had a whirlwind pick up fish from the sea and drop them in the people's laps.

Instead, Jesus took what the disciples had (which really came from a child in the crowd), multiplied it and fed thousands of people. The disciples’ eyes were opened. They no longer thought they were their own source of resources. God could take whatever they had and supply answers to the needs that they saw in the world.

Fast-forward to Acts 3:1-10. Peter and John were on their way into the temple through the Beautiful Gate. A beggar cried out to them for money. They saw the need. They didn't have money. But they did have resources; the resources of heaven. The result was better than anyone could have imagined. Instead of giving the beggar a few coins, the beggar regained the use of his legs, God was praised, and a door was opened for the gospel to be shared.

As we become aware of the needs of the community around us, we may be tempted to think the needs are too great and our resources are too small. What we need to do is move from the hillside to the Beautiful Gate. We need to acknowledge the REAL source of our resources. It's time to get Missional!