The day after Christmas

My wife and I had a great time at our daughter's house on Christmas day.  We exchanged a lot of presents and ate way too much good food.  The grandkids seemed to enjoy their gifts, and almost everything we bought fit the intended recipient.  A predicted 4 inch snowfall didn't happen which made the drive home much easier that night.

The next morning I was trying to decide which of my churches to attend.  I serve 77 churches and couldn't decide which one to attend for worship.  One church that I had not been to in awhile kept coming to mind so I decided that was the one I would go to.

It's a small church, and the morning after Christmas the attendance was down even further.  The pastor seemed embarrassed by the small number that was there especially when I surprised him by walking in.  However, there were two there who definitely needed to be there that morning.  One was the Holy Spirit, and the other was a young woman who invited Jesus Christ into her life at the close of the service.  It was obvious that the Spirit had been speaking to her heart during the message when she briefly shared her appreciation to the church for ministering to her in the recent months she had been attending the services there.  The pastor invited another woman to the front as well stating that she had been very instrumental in this lady coming to church and, on that morning, coming to faith.  I do not know what gifts this lady may have received on Christmas day, but on the day after Christmas she received the most precious gift of all...a relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

Your church may not be the biggest in town, but that does not mean that you cannot see great things happen in your church in 2011.  Every day can be a celebration of the birth of the Savior, and every day we can offer people the gift that only God can provide.  Begin now praying for those people who need to receive the gift of eternal life.  Become involved in their lives and introduce them to the One who can bring them the gifts they really need...forgiveness, grace, unconditional love, and eternal life.

Merry Christmas

I want to wish each of you a very Merry Christmas!  May you and your family have a blessed Christmas day and an even more blessed 2011.

Who is my neighbor?

This question was of course asked of Jesus by one of the Jewish scribes, and it led to the parable of the Good Samaritan.  Today, in the 21st century, it is a question that needs to be asked again because the whole concept of community has changed.  We can no longer focus simply on those people in a certain geographic area because that is no longer where many of our relationships exist.  Through social media such as Facebook many people today have closer relationships with people who live thousands of miles away than they do their next door neighbor.  Community is not so much a matter of geography as it is a matter of sharing common interests.  Today I am related to people through my blog, my web site, Facebook, and e-mails.  It is not uncommon for me to talk more often to people across the country and in other countries through these various forms of media than I talk to my neighbors.  I can only talk to my neighbors if we both happen to be outside at the same time.  I can communicate with my on-line community at any time.  This is having a profound effect on churches, and I believe will have an even greater impact on how we "do church" in the future.

Many younger people today see little value in church membership.  One of the reasons for this is that they don't want to be tied down to one church.  In fact, one of the trends today is that people may be involved in two or more churches at one time. They may attend one church on Sunday morning because they find the worship meaningful and attend a different church during the week because they appreciate the depth of the Bible study.  Their children may attend yet a third church because of the quality of their youth ministry.  It's not too difficult to see that a cyber church could come into the picture as part of their spiritual life.  That church with the quality Bible study may be a cyber church, and the messages are downloaded as a podcast that can be listened to at the convenience of the listener.  I listen to the messages of 3-4 ministers each week on my I-Pod that are automatically downloaded on my computer each week.  Another scenario I can see is when a person moves to another community.  Rather than joining a new church a person may decide to remain connected to their old church back home.  Services can be downloaded or even watched in real time.  Sunday school classes may have a blog they can participate in.  If the site offers on-line giving it's easy for them to continue tithing to their old church.

All of these possibilities means the church must rethink how it ministers to its community, and in fact must rethink what its community might be.  While this presents challenges to the smaller, bivocational church it also offers some options that did not exist even a few years ago.  With a web site or blog your church can now minister to people throughout the world.  You might struggle to have more than 30 people sitting in the pews on Sunday morning, but at the same time there may be many times that involved in some way with your church through the Internet.  I am now a "member"of two of the churches I serve in my Area through Facebook.  I now know what is going on in those churches just as if I attended there every week.  It's really neat, and it means that your church can now go into all the world sharing the gospel and ministering to hurting people.

Web sites can be very inexpensive.  I pay less than $20 a month for mine.  This blog doesn't cost me anything.  Through these two channels alone I touch people across the country and around the world without ever leaving southern Indiana.  Your church can do the same.

Who is your neighbor?  Today it is anyone living anywhere in the world.  Although your primary responsibility is to your Jerusalem, your church also has a responsibility to take the gospel to the end of the earth, and today any church can do that.  It's an exciting time we live in, my friend.  Enjoy it.

Balancing life

This weekend I read an article about a busy female executive who struggled trying to balance the demands of her position with the demands of her family.  One day her young daughter wanted to talk, and the mother explained that she didn't have time to talk right now because she had to leave to meet with an important client.  Her daughter looked up at her and asked, "When will I be old enough to become an important client?"  Ouch!  Some of us in bivocational ministry may be able to identify with this article.

As you think about your goals and priorities for 2011 I encourage you to make time for all the important things in your life.  The needs of your family and your own personal self-care should certainly be at the top of that list.  I explained to my ordination council many years ago that my family came before my church work.  One pastor in the council claimed to have a problem with that statement.  I reminded him that the church I was serving was over 150 years old and had many pastors during those years.  If the Lord tarries, they will have many pastors follow me.  But, I am the only husband my wife has and the only father my children know, and my primary responsibility has to be to them. 

I have found that I'm seldom successful in finding time for important things; I need to make the time.  That means I have to put the weekly dates my wife and I take in my calendar in advance so other things don't fill those days.  It means we need to schedule vacations and trips to see our kids and grandkids early in the year or we soon find that there are no open weeks available for such things.  We will do that right after the Christmas holidays.  If someone calls wanting me to do something during that time I can simply tell them I am already booked for that week and we need to find another time for what they want to do.

There will come a time when our lives will end.  More important than anything else we'll leave behind are the memories we created.  I don't want my family to remember me for all the meetings I attended or any recognition I may have received.  I want them to remember the times we spent together laughing and playing and loving one another.  Make sure your life includes those times as well.

Discipleship in the smaller church

Our region will make discipleship its primary emphasis in 2011.  We've currently scheduled Jeffrey Jones to lead a workshp in our region in February to address the question of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ in the 21st century.  I'm excited about this emphasis because I really feel that making disciples is something the church often overlooks or goes about it the wrong way.

For many years we've associated discipleship with education.  When church leaders are asked about the discipleship program in their church too many of them want to talk about their Sunday school or small group programs.  We offer Sunday schools on Sunday mornings, Sunday night and mid-week Bible studies, perhaps a women's Bible study during the week, and another one for men on Saturday morning.  The theory seems to be that if we fill people's heads with enough information they will become disciples.  Unfortunately, this works better in theory than in practice.

Discipleship requires education plus involvement.  People have to be given the opportunity to use the information they have been taught, and we don't want to make the mistake of believing that they must first pass all the Bible study programs we offer before they can become involved in ministry.  Jesus didn't make His disciples graduate from seminary or from a church-led education program before they could be engaged in ministry.  He sent them out to minister while they were being taught.  This is the model the church today needs to recapture.

One of the problems is that if we expect members of our congregations to attend all the Bible studies and other church functions we offer, when do we expect them to be involved in ministry?  I recently read somewhere that the average person is willing to give four hours a week to church activities.  If this is true, it would be very easy to use up all that time in church activities while never providing them the time or opportunity to be involved in ministry outside the church.

Don't accuse me of being opposed to Bible study.  I think we need to provide as many ways as possible to help people understand the teachings of Scripture.  In the process let's not overlook the value of involving people in activities that will allow them to use what they are learning.  Let's teach our people the truths of the Bible and provide opportunities for them to be involved in ministry to others.  That is the process that will produce disciples.

I would be interested in knowing how your church balances that process.  What is your church doing to develop 21st century disciples, and how effective is it?  If you don't have an intentional plan for discipling your congregation what could you do in 2011 to begin such a plan?

Intentional ministry

What is your church planning to intentionally do to make a difference in people's lives in 2011?  As I think back to the years I served as a pastor I regret the many times our church was just drifting along enjoying the journey.  We were comfortable.  We enjoyed spending time with one another.  There was very little conflict during that twenty year pastorate.  But, there were also a lot of times when we really weren't doing much to make a difference.  The times when we were most alive and most effective were the times we were focused on some specific area of ministry, and it was during those times that people's lives were impacted for the good.

I want to encourage you to spend these last few days of 2010 praying about how God would like to use your church in the coming year.  As I repeatedly say in this blog and in my workshops, I am convinced that God has a specific vision for each church.  It does not matter how large or small your church is, the average age of the congregation, the amount of money you have in your church bank account, or the style of music in your worship service.  God has a unique purpose for your church in 2011.  There are ministries that your church can offer your community that will make a difference.  I also believe that the most exciting time in the life of your church is when your congregation identifies what that purpose is and seeks to fulfill it.

The leadership cannot force that purpose upon a congregation, but unless the leadership leads in the discovery process, the church is likely to continue to drift along.  What are the steps a church can take in discerning God's purpose for their congregation?  There are many ways to approach this, but you must begin with prayer.  Earnestly ask God what your church could do in 2011 that will have the greatest impact on the most people.  Help people understand their spiritual giftedness and help them identify ministries for which they feel passion.  Identify existing needs in your community.  You will find that where the gifts of the people, the passion of the people, and the needs of the community intersect is where God desires your church to minister.  If you can discover this place of service you will find 2011 can be one of the most exciting years of ministry you will ever know.

Transition to bivocational ministry

Over the past few months I've talked with some churches that have been served by fully-funded pastors and now find that they need to look for a bivocational minister.  Many of these churches struggle with this transition.  One of their struggles has to do with their self-image.  They wonder why they can no longer attract a fully-funded pastor or why their finances are such that they could not offer a suitable salary even if a fully-funded pastor was willing to come to their church.  Others struggle with issues of expectations.  Too often, they may pay a bivocational salary, but they still have the same expectations of the pastor they've always had.  Just this week I talked with an individual who is considering a call to a bivocational church.  Prior to him, this church has been served by a fully-funded pastor.  I encouraged him to help the church identify their expectations of his responsibilities before accepting the call.  Unless this church recognizes the limitations he will bring to his pastorate, and they are willing to step in and assume some of the ministry responsibilities, it may find itself in some real conflict within a very short period of time.

The denomination in which I serve has a model we use to assist our churches when they are searching for a new pastor, but the model we have is often not helpful for bivocational churches.  I've been able to modify it a little to provide some assistance, but we need to develop a new model to assist bivocational churches that are seeking pastoral leadership.  We especially need a model for those churches that are making the transition from fully-funded to bivocational leadership.  One of my goals for 2011 is to develop such a model, and I can use your help.

I would be very interested in hearing your stories if you have been involved in helping a church transition from a fully-funded pastorate to a bivocational one.  I want to hear the good, the bad, and the ugly that occurred in that transition.  It would be helpful to hear from both bivocational ministers and from lay leaders who have been involved in the transition so we can hear from both sides.  If you are a pastor who has been through this transition with your church, please send me your story and ask one of your lay leaders to share his or her perspective on how that transtion went and the obstacles that had to be overcome for it to be successful.

Many of us in judicatory leadership have churches that will be making this transition in the next few years, and I think developing this model could be a great help to all of us.  Your stories can help create that model.  Please send them to dbickers@roadrunner.com.  Thank you in advance for your assistance.