Monday Not Funday

Mondays are never popular with people. The weekend is over and work begins again with the promised land of Friday five long days away. For the pastor, Monday is often a day off but for a host of reasons, there is very little joy in having reached our ‘weekend’. Monday is the day on which many pastors consider leaving their post. Monday is the day on which all of our fears, concerns, and doubts come crawling out of the woodwork and infest our depleted souls. Monday is definitely not a fun day.

The vocational pastor’s focus during the week is often looking forward to the big event of the week, the worship service or services. A message must be prepared and a worship service crafted around the big idea of the sermon. While there are other pastoral duties that are assumed during the week, the big event takes most of our energy. Anticipation builds as Sunday gets closer; is the sermon ready? Has the music been selected and rehearsed? Are the video feed, the worship software presentation, and the Sunday school ready to go? Finally, Sunday arrives and the big moment comes. God’s word is preached with all the power given by the Spirit. People are moved, lives are changed, men and women are transformed and through all of the changed people the world is shaken and all of its ills are ended.

And then Monday morning arrives. The pastor sits back, sipping their coffee and wondering if their work had any effect at all. We wonder why God has called us to this position. Week after week we pour our lives into loving our flocks and seeking to infuse their lives with God’s will. Did the message or music change anything at all? Are we as men and women of God inadequate to the task? Are we going to face the same problems in our folks that we did the week before? Thoughts like these and countless others swirl through our minds, discouraging us if things are going badly and stirring doubt where things are on an upward trend. Head in hands, the pastor looks forward to Tuesday.

Ahhh, Tuesday. A new week dawns and a new message invites us back into the Word. Hope springs anew that the message this week will be the one to help this person or initiate change in that person. I can’t wait until Sunday!

Dangerous Sabbath

In his book, Mark Labberton continues to urge the church toward a reformation in worship that takes the focus off of comfort, stability, and safety and turns its back to the wild and frightening objective of seeking God’s presence that urges us toward a heart for justice. In an interesting turn, the chapter Doing Justice Starts with Rest, Labberton he asserts that rest – in the practice of Sabbath keeping – is essential to empowering the action that he urges on the other pages. To quote, “Scripture’s call to seek justice surely involves action, considerable and costly. But a life that does justice rises out of worship, which starts with rest, is sustained by rest and returns to rest.”

Sabbath keeping is a difficult spiritual exercise in our modern go-go society. To be at rest is often seen through cynical eyes as laziness and a lack of motivation. If we’re not moving and doing, we can’t possibly be accomplishing anything. God wants us to take a different perspective; He wants us to understand that our accomplishments come from Him and that the Sabbath demonstrates our reliance upon His power. God gives us the Sabbath as a boundary, helping us to understand that we can trust in our rest when God Himself took a day off after the greatest creative moments in history. When we practice the Sabbath we finally understand that it is the Father and not us that keeps the world spinning. Worship in its purest form.

When we finally slow down and recognize the providence in which we exist, we find a release that allows our eyes to rise to the One who also rested. Unplugged, our head clears to recognize who we are in the Father’s eyes. We also see who our neighbor is, not in MySpace or WordPress or some other artificial connection, but the living, breathing humans who inhabit our world and the heart of the Father. Imagine if we were all at rest together.

Am I Ever Going to See Your Face Again? Rock & Roll Memories

Thanks to the miracle of YouTube and the folks who have assiduously collected video of forgotten bands, today we get to enjoy the dulcet tones of one of my favorite Aussie bands. Angel City had the chops but never really broke huge. I think it had to do with Doc Neeson’s voice; you either liked it or hated it. Give this song a listen and see what you think…

So, what did you think? That song came off of the album Face to Face. If I remember correctly, this is an American compilation of their Australian releases. On the record, you’ll be grabbed immediately by ‘Take a Long Line’ and ‘Marseilles’ along with the best cut, the one you just listened to. (You did, didn’t you?) The band goes by two names, The Angels and Angel City because of a conflict with another group of lesser lights bearing the same name. There is a current band of Europop/Electronic musicians using the moniker so be cautious when pawing through the bins of the Used CD World when searching them out. Covers with scantily clad women are your first clue.

Find out more about Angel City/The Angels here.

Man of Integrity or Tickler of Ears

When His enemies were fully arrayed against Him near the end of His ministry, they still could not directly accuse Jesus of anything heretical in His teaching because it was marked by integrity. There is a telling verse in Mark (12:14) where they admit as much;

They came to him and said, “Teacher, we know you are a man of integrity. You aren’t swayed by men, because you pay no attention to who they are; but you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth.

As a Pastor, I long to hear the same thing said about me and yet, on the day after the message is delivered you can’t help but reflect on whether or not your sermon compromised at any point. Did I soften a hard passage in order not to offend? Did my application call a radical reordering of the lives of the Church or did I simply “suggest” some things that they might do? Integrity can be chipped away in countless ways each time we compromise the message that we care called to preach. Compromise comes from a lack of trust; we carry the burden of the church on our shoulders rather than trusting in the true owner of the Church to manage things. The good news is, it’s not irreversible. We can return to the Truth Giver again and again and refuse to be swayed by men & women knowing that one day we will hear the words “Well done, you were men and women of integrity. Welcome home” from One that really matters.

Worship Awakening From Our Dangerous Slumber

We’ve all had the experience of waking up while travelling and taking a moment or two to realize where we are, and to orient ourselves to our new surroundings. The slumbering Church, by and large, remains somnolent and unaware of the new address to which God has moved them. In our dream state we see ourselves residing at our old address, identified with our American culture and failing to see that God has relocated us to the larger world where our neighbors are oppressed and hungry and ill and living in poverty. We have been moved to a new neighborhood and just don’t know it yet. Welcome to Injusticeville.

For our worship to reflect the glory of the God we serve, we must be fully awake and locate ourselves in the God’s world. Mark Labberton leads us in his fifth chapter to rouse ourselves and to identify ourselves as a part of a new neighborhood filled with God’s people rather than remaining frozen in the comfort zone that we self selected. Coming to know and love our neighbors moves us to action in restoring justice in their lives, as God’s heart controls our own. We are woken up and, as our eyes adjust to our surroundings, God’s immense perspective becomes ours.

Is your alarm set?

 

Anything For Love…But I Won’t Do That

The heart of Hosea is a heart that is broken over and over again by the prophetic commands of Almighty God. How does he endure the shame of marrying the prostitute Gomer? His love for God exceeds his love for his own reputation. How does Hosea bear the horror of the Lord naming his children Jezreel, You Are Not My Beloved, and You Are Not My People? His love for God exceeds his love for his pride. When God commands him to redeem Gomer who has found herself in bondage to another man, why doesn’t he leave her there? His love for God exceeds his feelings of betrayal. Hosea places God in His proper place in his priorities and, because of this, he never denies a command of God, no matter the personal cost. Will you do the same?