Which Is Worse?

Yesterday, I heard a statement from Church Consultant, Conrad Lowe: “The church (in America) is not being persecuted, it is being ignored.” I cringed when I heard him say that. It’s not that I am itching to suffer persecution. The thought of being arrested or tortured for preaching the Gospel of Christ is not attractive to me. But the idea that we are having so little impact in our culture, we are making so little difference, that people are actually forgetting that we are even here – well that is truly troubling.

How can it be that there are so many Christ followers in our country, so much institutional Christianity, yet our neighbors don’t even know we are here? History tells us that the church used to be the epicenter of activity in our communities. In most town squares stood a church building that was as much a part of the happenings as the court house, school or the post office. Now most churches sit empty Monday through Saturday and many are just as empty on Sunday.

How can we go from being ignored to being recognized, known and, most important – effective? How can we become major players in the lives of people in our communities? A few ideas:

Get out! - we have to actually go out into the community, engage people where they live, work and go to school. The best thing the church can do in order to allow people to see us is get out of the building!

Connect – church leaders have to “do life” with those outside of the church. How long has it been since you hung out with someone other than a family member or church leader? Intentional connection is vital to our effectiveness.

Relate – we should try to stay current with trends and movements in our culture. If we appear to be out of touch, we probably are.

The truth is, we may one day have to make a choice. If we start making enough noise (through our Christ-like ministries) that we can no longer be ignored, we may find ourselves on the receiving end of persecution. If we have to choose one or the other, I think I would prefer persecution over being ignored.

Which is worse?

- Rick Whitter

Breakfast with "The Guys"

I just got back from a regional pastors' breakfast at the church and it was fun. (Yes, I said fun!) We had 13 in attendance, and I met some guys I did not know before...which is always a cool thing. David Nitz, North FL Evangelism Dir., attended and shared some neat leadership stuff. It was a good morning!

This was the first regional breakfast for us since FL went to regions, instead of districts for its churches. We plan to do one of these each quarter, including spouses next time and thereafter for connection and fellowship. I think the regional church program is going to be a good thing for our state. It has given us an opportunity to re-energize ministry connection and resourcing at a more local level because, like it or not, the district structure was broken. So, now we get a chance to begin again, and that is a good thing.

My takeaway from today is that it is almost always encouraging to sit, eat, and share with fellow pastors. It never ceases to amaze me just how much is being done for The Kingdom through one another's lives. Regardless of church size, we all have similar experiences, and we all need to feel the love and support of others who share in the journey of pastoral ministry. I, for one, always benefit and am uplifted when I spend time with my brothers. Consequently, I try to make time for these opportunities when they come up. We all should...life on this side is too short, and the load it too heavy to carry alone. Put simply, we need more time with "The Guys" around us.

The future of our movement is dependent, in part, on our connecting to one another. I believe it is a key element in sharing life, upholding one another's hands in the fight, and resourcing the ministry to be relevant in this quickly moving culture. Connection is critical...but it doesn't just happen: we must make the effort, take the time, and initiate contact with one another. If we don't, life is just too busy and...well, we know the rest.

- Clayton Watson

What are your thoughts/comments on the importance and future of connection in our movement?

Craig Groeschel on Reaching The Next Generation

To reach the next generation for Christ, we must be three things:

Conversational.
Missional.
Generational.

Let’s start today with conversational. This generation craves intimacy in relationships. They want to know and be known.

Too many Western Christians are turned off (or intimidated by) the young, tech savvy, tattooed, and pierced young adults. Some churches preach against these outward appearances. Others are striving full-time to be “cool” and “relevant” believing the right environment, best light show, or hot sermon series will win the young adults to Christ.

Both these strategies miss a key ingredient. This generation wants to talk. Conversation matters. Relationships matter. Intimacy matters.

Here are some rules of conversation:

Before they listen to you, they want to know if you’re listening to them.
If you’ll get to know them, they will listen to you.

If you’re quick to judge, don’t bother trying to connect.

It doesn’t matter if you’re cool or relevant. It matters if you bring the real you. Fake is the worst thing you can bring.

The fifth conversation might be the difference maker.
In my “Christian Witness Training” course at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, we were trained to knock on doors, present the gospel, and ask people to pray the sinners’ prayer. While this might occasionally still work, it isn’t a likely path to life change. This generation builds trust slowly. If you don’t plan on having a third, fourth, or fifth conversation, you might not want to spend a lot of time on the first.

They want to be loved.
My most consistent conversations with 20-somethings happens in the gym. After getting to know some young men, I genuinely care for them and believe in them. I try to tell them often, “I’m proud of you… I’m pulling for you… I believe in you… I love you.” They seem hungry for acceptance and affirmation and respond well to sincere Christian love.

What are your thoughts?

(If it is helpful, tell us how old you are.)

Wayne Cordeiro On Time...

The Necessity of Time...

I just got out of teaching a class on message prep to our Generation Acts students, and my talk included a point about the necessity of time. Basically, the idea is that there is no substitute for time spent in message preparation. The amount of time varies, of course, but the need for it does not. As I was teaching, God was talking, and I thought I would share some thoughts.

Its pretty clear to me that my primary role as a pastor/teacher is to share a relevant, God-inspired message each time I step up to talk to my congregation (or any other group for that matter.) I was recently reminded what an incredible privilege it is to be able to speak on behalf of God to His people. Just this week, someone shared with me how a recent message had totally changed his perspective on a pretty important topic. I am always amazed that anything I say has that kind of influence. Yet, repeatedly, God chooses to use regular guys like me and you to share a "word in season" into someone's life. What an awesome privilege...what a huge responsibility. A responsibility that probably demands more of my time.

I was convicted this morning (as I was teaching...of course) that when I fail to put in the time needed to really "develop" a message, I am undervaluing the privilege and underrating the responsibility. Of course, time needed to develop a message varies from topic to topic, and from speaker to speaker; however, we must never forget that time IS needed. All of us have walked to a podium at some time or another unprepared, for whatever reason, and God often will help us out in those moments. But don't you think that should be a rarity?. I do. Honestly, I already put a lot of time in on prep each week...but there is room for more. I'll bet most of us could push message prep a few notches up the list on our priorities. Am I wrong?

So, for me, I'm back to evaluating my prep practices and looking for ways to spend more time doing it. Time Blocks are a great for some folks, but they have never really worked for me. I use a concept I call Time Rhythms, which is basically understanding that every one of us has a typical rhythm/pace to their life, and we can cooperate or contend against those rhythms in getting things done. I choose to cooperate. Simply put...I know when my energies are up and when they are spent, when my mind is sharp and when it is dull (too often, btw), and I know when it is most productive for me to spend time in message prep mode. That process works for me, and I use that philosophy with most other things in my life as well. Guess I just need to cooperate a little better going forward!

One of the core values at our church is Relevant Truth, expressing our belief that His Word is always relevant to our lives. That value is reflected in my opinion that there is never an excuse for God's Word to be presented in an irrelevant, uninteresting way...it's way too important and alive for that! Further, there is no substitute for time in preparing a life-giving, relevant and God-inspired message for our people. I, for one, am committed to such.

Preach on, preachers!

- Clayton

A New Blog Is Born...

Today is a momentous day! Why?...We are launching the new Fusion Blog for young leaders in FL. (OK, so momentous might be overreaching a bit...but a cool day, nonetheless!)

Last August, we initiated something pretty important for the young leaders in the Church of God in FL: The Fusion Initiative. Fusion is all about giving us younger guys a way to connect to one another, to connect to the church and to contribute our thoughts, ideas, suggestions for positive progress and change in the church.

It all began with a great, albeit wet (remember TS Frances anyone?), weekend in Clearwater Beach. We met, we ate, we laughed, we shared and we came to some great conclusions. What a good time! In recent months, many of the things we talked about have been acted upon, and others are in the works. However, there is so much more that we can be as a group. Last Fall was just the beginning of the journey, there are many miles yet to travel together. This blog is but one step in that direction.

The Fusion Team will be blogging here, posting resources, etc., and we want to invite you to interact and to comment here. We are just getting started...so be kind! That's it for now...stay tuned.

- FUSION FL TEAM