Category Archives: Pastoring

I am not what I ought to be …

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John Newton“I am not what I ought to be — ah, how imperfect and deficient! I am not what I wish to be — I abhor what is evil, and I would cleave to what is good! I am not what I hope to be — soon, soon shall I put off mortality, and with mortality all sin and imperfection. Yet, though I am not what I ought to be, nor what I wish to be, nor what I hope to be, I can truly say, I am not what I once was; a slave to sin and Satan; and I can heartily join with the apostle, and acknowledge, ‘By the grace of God I am what I am.'”

—John Newton1 reflecting on 1 Corinthians 15:10.

  1. As quoted in The Christian Pioneer (1856) edited by Joseph Foulkes Winks, p. 84. Also in The Christian Spectator, vol. 3 (1821), p. 186. ↩
 

Supernaturally brilliant.

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“What is merely human, however brilliant, will not pull us out of the ditch we have fallen into. But the words that Jesus spoke to us, they are spirit and they are life.”
—Ray Ortlund, Jr., preface to Supernatural Living for Natural People: The Life-giving Message of Romans 8

In the eighth chapter in his Epistle to the Romans, Paul takes the words, work, will and ways of Jesus to the depths our hearts need. Personally, I cannot get enough of it, and have wore out a few Bibles over the last decade from underlining and revisiting the life-giving words of this chapter.

Luther said our Bibles should be so worn from use that they almost automatically open to Romans, and especially to a crease in the binding at the brilliant eighth chapter.

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” —Romans 8:1

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Whenever I need renewal and revival in my heart, I turn to this chapter, drawer from the deep well, plenty of water for this thirsty soul.
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Sing along: One Glorious Day.

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Today is D-Day, when sixty-nine years ago, on June 6th, 1944 at Normandy the tide turned and momentum swung in World War II. A significant day in recent world history. That day is known as “the beginning of the end” of the war. There’s another beginning of the end of the war, this war is between men and God. Jesus came to make the beginning of the end, and so it’s fitting to consider today the coming One Glorious Day when all wrongs will be righted, and everything will be set to the way God intended the world to be. Because King Jesus will wrap up the scrolls of history and mete out all justice in the way only His Grace is able to handle. Oh glorious Day!

Most days this week we’re highlighting songs in this space, particularly hymns we sang together at RENEW on Sunday. Having begun with Be Thou My Vision and In Tenderness, we continue with One Day, written in 1910 by John Wilbur Chapman, and recently reprised with a new verse melody for the new album “God of Victory” by Michael Bleecker of The Village Church in Texas. You may have sung it as we did, known as Glorious Day (Living He Loved Me), made more known by the band Casting Crowns. (Listen and watch John Mark Hall of Casting Crowns tell the story behind the song.)

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Glorious Day (Living He Loved Me)

Chords in the key of D

One day when Heaven was filled with His praises
One day when sin was as black as could be
Jesus came forth to be born of a virgin
Dwelt among men, my example is He
Word became flesh and the light shined among us
His glory revealed

Living, He loved me
Dying, He saved me
Buried, He carried my sins far away
Rising, He justified freely forever
One day He’s coming
Oh glorious day, oh glorious day

One day they led Him up Calvary’s mountain
One day they nailed Him to die on a tree
Suffering anguish, despised and rejected
Bearing our sins, my Redeemer is He
Hands that healed nations, stretched out on a tree
And took the nails for me

One day the grave could conceal Him no longer
One day the stone rolled away from the door
Then He arose, over death He had conquered
Now He’s ascended, my Lord evermore
Death could not hold Him, the grave could not keep Him
From rising again

One day the trumpet will sound for His coming
One day the skies with His glories will shine
Wonderful day, my Beloved One, bringing
My Savior, Jesus, is mine

Oh, glorious day

Continue reading →

 

Sing along: In Tenderness He Sought Me.

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Highlighting five songs this week, hymns we sang together at RENEW on Sunday. Having begun with Be Thou My Vision, we continue with In Tenderness, written in 1894 by W. Spencer Walton, entitled “In Tenderness He Sought Me.” This beautiful, melodious song reminds us Jesus is both tough and tender. He loves us, and will do whatever it takes to bring us back to Him, to His fold, as the Good Shepherd.

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This song might be the key anthem of RENEW Church in this first year. Each of us have a life story that’s being re-written as we re-discover who God is, what He’s done, and who we are. Out of this new life flows new living. Yet before all of our attempts at a good and godly life, we come back to the truth: in tenderness He sought us, while we weary and sick with sin … He died for us while we were sinning…

O – o – oh the love that sought me!
O – o – oh the blood that bought me!
Oh the grace that brought me to the fold of God
Grace that brought me to the fold of God

I pray we never grow bored with the Gospel! As the light of the Gospel shines on us again and again, God renews us.

Sing along (and shout along) and join the party as The Citizens sing the rich Gospel anthem, In Tenderness:

In Tenderness

by The Citizens, from Already / Not Yet, track released 08 May 2012 (chords)

Verse 1
In tenderness He sought me
Weary and sick with sin
And on His shoulders brought me
Back to His fold again
While angels in His presence sang, until the courts of heaven rang

Chorus
O – o – oh the love that sought me!
O – o – oh the blood that bought me!
Oh the grace that brought me to the fold of God
Grace that brought me to the fold of God

Verse 2
He died for me while I was sinning..
Needy and poor and blind
He whispered to assure me…
“I’ve found thee; thou art Mine”
I never heard a sweeter voice, it made my aching heart rejoice

Verse 3
Upon His grace I’ll daily ponder
and sing anew His praise
With all adoring wonder,
His blessings I retrace.
It seems as if eternal days, are far too short to sing His praise. Continue reading →

 

Sing along: Be Thou My Vision.

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Last night at RENEW we sang five songs all older than (or about as old as) the building in which we gather. The Revival Building was built at the turn of last century, yet most of it burned down in the twenties, rebuilt in 1925. Originally it was the meeting place of the Presbyterian Church in the Singer Hill area of Oregon City. These days we’re grateful for the new owners, a dance studio, that let us gather there each Sunday afternoon.

All this week I’ll highlight a story behind these five songs, and the meaningful lyrics to which we get to sing along. A big thanks to Brian for selecting these songs and leading us so well!

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A 6th Century Irish monk, Dallan Forgaill, penned the words to Be Thou My Vision (original title, “Rop tú mo Baile”), as a tribute to St. Patrick’s wholehearted loyalty to God. The hymn was translated from Irish to English in 1905 by Mary E. Byrne. In 1912, Eleanor H. Hull arranged the song into the verse most commonly found in English hymnals today. (The version below was reprised by Ascend the Hill.) The music to accompany the lyrics is an ancient Irish folk tune called Slane.

The folk song got its start centuries earlier, in Ireland around 433 AD, when on the night before Easter, St. Patrick defied a royal decree by lighting candles. St. Patrick (385-461 AD) was a man filled with the Gospel of Grace and zealous to see Jesus reign and rule over the nation of Ireland. As a missionary, he defied an Irish King’s edict that restricted the lighting of candles on Easter Eve. King Logaire of Tara had decreed that no one was allowed light any fires until a pagan spring festival was launched by the lighting of a fire on Slane Hill — the King must be first. Patrick chose to honor God in spite the threat of death. King Logaire was so impressed with Patrick’s brave devotion, he let him continue his missionary work unhindered. This song harkens back to that day, and that man, and is a steady reminder of the one central theme of our lives.

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Be Thou My Vision

Continue reading →

 

Daily slogging.

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Not much time around here to write blog posts. Maybe I’ll gain a vision — or more precisely, carve out some time — to write before Summer arrives. In the meantime, these words from the wise Ray Ortlund, Jr. struck me, particularly as a young pastor simply desiring to be faithful, and especially as father, my first area of shepherding. Parenting and pastoring have a weight of responsibility that makes it all the more necessary to build long-term perspective, and to keep on keeping on, slogging ahead.

Ray Jr. writes about his father’s years and years of faithful service and leading a church, and the influence and depth of relationship they shared. It’s evident Junior as a man has been shaped deeply by Senior the man.

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“I am not impressed by young pastors who seem too eager to publish books and speak at big events and get noticed. They are doing the work of the Lord, and that’s good. But what impresses me is my dad’s daily slogging, year after year, in the power of the Spirit, with no big-deal-ness as the payoff.

This is the pastoral ministry that brings Jesus into the world today. ”
—Ray Ortlund, Jr., “Daily Slogging in the Power of the Spirit“

People often ask how church planting is going. It’s going. Slowly, but steadily and surely, I see RENEW becoming a family of missionary servants, and I see the Gospel of the Kingdom, Grace and the Cross overwhelming their hearts. No one is going to ask me to write a book about our experiences (too soon and too small), yet that’s not what matters in this.

Here’s what matters: Jesus our Senior Pastor is saving and leading His people, and there are many in the city who do not yet know Him. Let them one day tell others there were families in their cities who left the comforts of reputation and ease to form new relationships, recognizing their own brokenness while bringing the good news of Jesus to broken lives. He has made them whole, Jesus has renewed them forever!

Slog on.

 

Listening to life advice: how should we live?

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The currency of our culture is life advice.

Everywhere we look, someone is offering a better way to life. A better you.

This week we’ve asked all the RENEWers to take note of all the life advice they hear. Lean in on conversations, jot down what others share on social media, even listen to your parents! Everywhere and all the time people around us are answering the question, “How should we live?”

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This vital question comes from the Gospel Grid 1, a way of orienting our hearts and minds around God’s Word and His world.

In four questions the “grid” covers the basics of reality and purpose:

  1. Who is God?
  2. What has He done?
  3. Who are we?
  4. How do we live?

Have you noticed that we tend to reverse the order?

As broken people we take that last question and make it primary: How should we live? Then drawing from our successes or failures at living well, we carve out an identity for ourselves, figuring out who we are. This leads us to view what God has done in the world through the lens of self: what has God done for me?

On the basis of how we live, and who we think we are, leading to how we see God’s activity in our lives, we then arrive at a view of God. Either He’s been good and gracious, or He’s been less than stellar, not meeting our expectations. When we look at our circumstances … God’s got some explaining to do!

Society places self at the top of the pyramid, beginning with me, myself & I in all our questions. We take the place of God. We turn the Gospel Grid upside-down.

I’m convinced this is why so much life advice is shared — this is how I live, and you should too! (Cue the infomercial smile: “It worked for me, and it can work for you!”) In the midst the message of the Gospel seems like another pitch to adopt a new lifestyle, maybe a less awesome one than you’re working on right now. Add a little Jesus to your life; He’ll make it all better.

What life advice have you heard this week?

Was it helpful? How will that solid advice eventually let you down? Lets come back to the first question — forgetting ourselves and our circumstances for a moment — who is God?

  1. Thank you to the fellow students at Soma School Portland 2013 and the leaders of Bread & Wine for helping me re-discover the Gospel Grid, and re-apply it to my heart, life, and church family. ↩
 

Teach your children about their sexual development (5 ways).

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April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month in the United States. This year the focus is on healthy sexuality and child sexual abuse prevention


By Lindsey Holcomb for The Resurgence

As a parent, modeling respectful behaviors and boundaries and sharing age-appropriate information can counter unhealthy social norms around sexuality and relationships. Children are constantly learning social norms from peers and the media and it is your job to teach them what is expected or appropriate in interactions and relationships.

From infancy you can start talking about healthy childhood development. This may not be something natural for you, so you will need to learn about healthy childhood sexual development and age appropriate behaviors to better discuss unhealthy behaviors or abusive touch with your children.

To help get you started, here are five ways you can teach your children about their sexual development:

1. Create safe, positive, and open communication patterns, especially around sexuality and development. Your children will have lots of questions about their bodies, other people’s bodies, and life in general. Answer their questions with age-appropriate and candid responses. This will build confidence and trust with your child. Teach them that there are no secrets in the family and that they can always ask you anything and tell you everything. Instead of the word “secrets” use “surprises” when necessary. Explain the difference between a secret and a surprise.

2. Teach and use correct names of body parts, such as penis, vagina, breasts, bottom. You can begin this from infancy. It might be uncomfortable at first, but use the proper names of body parts. Children need to know the proper names for their genitals. This knowledge gives children correct language for understanding their bodies, for asking questions that need to be asked, and for telling about any behavior that could lead to sexual abuse.

3. Initiate conversations with your child about relationships and their body. “When I was a little girl I had a lot of questions about my body parts and other people’s body parts. Do you have any questions you want to talk about?” Or “I know you like to play dress up at school or your friend’s house, but it’s not okay to take off your clothes to put on a costume unless you are at your house with mom or dad home. Do you understand why I say that?”

Also, let your child know they can tell you if anyone touches them in the private areas or in any way that makes them feel uncomfortable—no matter who the person is, or what the person says to them.

4. Promote healthy behaviors by praising your children when their behaviors model healthy friendships and respect for personal boundaries. “Brian, that was great when you listened when Sara said she wanted you to stop hugging her. That was a good way to respect your friend’s boundaries and stop when she asked you to.”

5. Model respectful boundaries with your children by teaching them from a young age that they are in control of their bodies and have a responsibility to respect the boundaries of others. “Most of the time you like to be hugged, snuggled, tickled, and kissed, but sometimes you don’t and that’s okay. You have a right to personal space, privacy, and boundaries. Let me know if anyone—myself, family member, friend, or anyone else—touches any part of your body or talks to you in a way that makes you feel uncomfortable.”

If your son or daughter does not want to kiss or hug you or someone else do not force the exchange. Instead teach them to say, “No thank you.” They can give a high five or wave hello or goodbye. Encourage your child to seek help when something feels uncomfortable for them. It may take awhile for extended family members to catch on to this new trend in relating, so you as your child’s advocate will need to explain what is allowed and not allowed.

Rid of My Disgrace eBook: $0.99

In observation of Sexual Assault Awareness Month, the eBook version of Justin and Lindsey Holcomb’s book, Rid of My Disgrace: Hope and Healing for Victims of Sexual Assault is being offered for only $0.99 this week. Highly recommend this book. Pick it up here.

 

25 things someone learned about church planting (& I’m learning too).

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For our four-month anniversary of embarking on this adventure of RENEW (planting a church), I gave my wife a book that seemed helpful and hopeful.

The Church Planting WifeI knew Kari wouldn’t balk at the idea of encouragement, and it seemed that The Church Planting Wife really carried a dose of what the subtitle promised: “help and hope for her heart.” (Not just a bunch of stories and lists saying “you should do this.”)

Christine Hoover (the author) and her husband Kyle (the so-called church planter), tell of how God led them to plant a church in 2008. She writes:

“Though we had eight years of ministry experience under our belts at an established church, we didn’t yet know all that we didn’t know. We had much to learn and, more importantly, God had much sifting and pruning to do in our hearts.

God has shown me that, more than anything, he wants my heart. He wants a tender, moldable heart willing to obey more than he wants any obligatory service I can give him. As I write in my new book, The Church Planting Wife: Help and Hope for Her Heart (Moody, 2013), I’ve learned a thing or two in this crazy adventure called church planting—and I trust I’ll learn more as we move forward. Here are 25 things I’ve discovered so far.”

(Jeff’s note: I will resist the urge to add to or improve upon these. I could easily bold and underline every one. And we’re a mere six months or so into this. Simply nodding my head, rejoicing in this list, reflecting on them, and smiling right now. Maybe this post is just for me, the church planting wife’s husband.)

25 Things I’ve Learned from Church Planting

  1. Hospitality is essential.
  2. Church planting teaches two things more than any other: that God is faithful and that we must learn how to depend on that faithful God.
  3. Programs matter a lot to some people, especially families with small children. It takes special families who can grasp the vision of church planting to invest in a church plant on the ground level.
  4. On the other hand, some people love the early stages of church planting but become uncomfortable when the church grows to a size where they can no longer know everyone.
  5. Church planting happens one relationship at a time.
  6. Sometimes church planting feels like you’re pretending to be a church. And then one day (after backbreaking work and lots of prayer) you realize God has built an honest-to-goodness church right before your eyes.
  7. You cannot church plant apart from the support and encouragement of others.
  8. The Word is living and active. When we let God speak through his Word, he changes people. Every church plant must gather earnestly around the Word and the Christ to which it points.
  9. The church plant often takes on the personality and passions of the church planter and his wife. This is why it’s important to cling to Christ with biblical vision.
  10. Most people, especially outsiders, don’t know what it means when you say you’re church planting. And they think you’re a little crazy.
  11. One of the church planter’s greatest resources is other church planters and pastors in the same city. These relationships should be cultivated.
  12. Some of the hardest relationships a church planter may have are with other church planters and pastors in the same city. Sadly.
  13. The calling to church plant must be sure since you’ll need to return to it again and again in the face of discouragement, defeat, and uncertainty.
  14. The gospel is everything: it sustains when discouragement comes (and it always does), it keeps a church planter and his wife in their city (because there will be times when they want to give up and leave), it compels its ministers forward (and sometimes it’s the only motivation left), and it changes lives (which makes it all worth it).
  15. A church planter cannot drive by an established church without appreciating what it took to make it that way. And he will first think about the secretaries, the nursery workers, the janitors, and the seats permanently bolted to the ground.
  16. As much as possible, a church plant should be structured according to how leaders want it to look a year in the future.
  17. It’s unhealthy for the church planter, the church, and especially the church planting wife if she’s doing childcare during church each week.
  18. A failed church plant is not failure. Lack of faith is failure. Service in God’s name with a heart far away from him is failure.
  19. Slow and steady growth is healthy growth. Explosive growth can be fragile growth.
  20. A good worship leader is important and hard to find.
  21. Spiritual warfare is real.
  22. Church plants should never be started by someone disgruntled or unable to sit under authority at his former church. Church plants cannot be rebuttals to another pastor’s methods and ideas. They must be built on a clear call from God.
  23. A church planter and his wife must pray for and develop a love for their city—and not just the city but for its people.
  24. The church planting wife’s main role in helping her husband is, like Aaron holding up Moses’ arms in battle, praying for and encouraging him to press on.
  25. There is unimaginable joy and reward in sacrifice and service.
 

Not fools: We exist because of Jesus’s resurrection.

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On the morning of the third day [Sunday] Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Jesus go to His tomb to anoint His body. They expect to find it, and are anxious about how they might roll away the stone that covers His tomb.

And looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled back—it was very large. And entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed. And he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; He is not here.” (Mark 16:4-6)

It’s this moment that allows the apostle Paul to cry out, years later,

“Death is swallowed up in victory.”
“O death where is your victory?
O death, where is your sting?” (1 Cor. 15:54-55)

The empty tomb shows that the greatest oppression of all—the oppression of sin and death—has been defeated. It’s gospel Judo. In Judo, you learn to use the power and movement of your attacker against them, often in moves that end with your opponent landing headfirst. Jesus takes on all that is plagued—He becomes human, taking upon Himself all the wrath of God against sin and all the attack and oppression of death, turning it on its head to provide life for God’s children.

Why did Christianity arise, and why did it take the shape it did? The early Christians themselves reply: We exist because of Jesus’s resurrection. Were there no resurrection, we would have neither comfort nor hope, and everything else Christ did and suffered would be in vain.
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—Daniel Montgomery and Mike Cosper, Faithmapping: A Gospel Atlas for Your Spiritual Journey, 59, “The Gospel of the Cross.”

 

Passion Week » Wednesday. (What’s your price?)

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Passion Week readings for Wednesday: Matthew 26:1-5, 14-16; Mark 14:1-2, 10-11; Luke 22:1-6. Passion Week: Wednesday

Wednesday is a dark time in Gotham City Jerusalem. The religious leaders — the prominent and influential Sanhedrin — is plotting to kill the usurping “king” Jesus. They go in cahoots with Judas Iscariot, who knows his way around the city. Of the Twelve disciples, Judas is the only one from Judea, the metropolitan area of Jerusalem. He’s been bought with a price, and this one-time betrayal is no doubt the culmination of many calculations in his heart of how to get ahead (greed) and build a better life for himself. Apparently knowing God personally and walking with Him daily is not enough to satisfy his hunger for meaning and significance.

In the ancient (OT) times, thirty pieces of silver was the penalty paid by the owner of an ox that gored a slave to death (Ex. 21:32). Equivalent to about four months’ wages for a laborer (about $7,500 in modern terms), this meager sum suggests the low esteem in which Jesus was held by both Judas and the chief priests. 1 Also note that Judas (or Judah) was a popular and common name for sons in that day. Not so much since.

What’s your price?

  • What is the one thing, that if God doesn’t give it to you, you would hold it against Him and threaten to leave Him? (Is it a job or opportunity, a relationship, an award or accolade?)

Continue reading →

  1. Source: ESV Study Bible Notes on Matthew 26:15-16. ↩
 

Passion Week timeline.

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The events of Jesus’ last week leading up to His death on the cross and resurrection are called “Holy Week” or “Passion Week.” His passion speaks of His sufferings in our place, on our behalf, to bring us to God (1 Peter 3:18).

Starting in Matthew 21, Mark 11, Luke 19, and John 12, we get to walk beside Jesus, seeing and hearing what He did and said.

Creative artist Josh Byers has put the timeline of events of Passion Week in illustrated form. Follow along, from Palm Sunday to Resurrection Sunday, and everything vital movement in between.

Passion Week

The Passion Week timeline