CDM Archive

Discipleship Ministries of the PCA

Bob

Do I Know You?

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Most everybody talks about relational ministry. Yet relationships are so easy to miss because our agendas call for more important things.I’m embarrassed that I don’t know the names of some of the people in our little church. That creates an awkwardness that inhibits any attempt to go further. Think of the people in your congregation, your Sunday school class, people you see regularly, whose names you don’t know. It’s one reason why the church can seem so impersonal.

Consider the visitor-or is she a regular attendee you’ve simply never met? Do you introduce yourself? I never will forget the time I introduced myself to a woman at church. I asked if she was visiting and she informed me that she was a charter member. That sort of response can be a big inhibitor to saying, “Hi, my name is _____.” But if you don’t the visitor might leave saying, “I attended that church and no one spoke to me.” And knowing a person’s name is just the beginning.

A Session or Deacon’s meeting might start with a conversation about what’s happening in everyone’s life and a time of prayer for each other. It could take a half hour or more, and it could be the most important thing you do. It will help everyone come together for the business at hand. It could surface some significant information, and it will add a little more glue to the bond that solidifies each one’s commitment to the others.

A Sunday school class ought to be about more than increased understanding of a biblical text. To be effective it must rub that passage against our lives. One way to do that is to help people talk to each other about ways they think the Spirit might want them to respond. A class could break into groups of three to five for exercises that help them get to know each other better, know the Bible better, and listen to God apply the Word to their hearts. Variations on this theme work in almost any age group. For instance, take an egg timer to a children’s class and let everyone have one minute. While the sand falls each one in turn can talk about the most fun he ever had, his favorite toy or best friend, or describe his mother or father. As the teacher, don’t forget to take your turn, too.

Many of us live in metropolitan areas where most everybody is from some place else. Often relatives live a considerable distance away, and neighbors seldom know each other. Houses are empty during the day and closed up during the evening. Many times I’ve heard neighbors say, “People will be out when it’s warmer.” But summer comes and, “People will be out when it gets cooler.” The reality is people don’t come out much at all. Relationships in the neighborhood, at the office, or at school are important. But if they don’t extend beyond the confines of that environment they have limited value. And the same is true of relationships at church. Hopefully, the believer will have friendships with some that extend beyond the confines of a church program.These relationships are necessary for us to not simply survive, but thrive in this Christian pilgrimage.

The Cost of Love

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Sigmund Freud argued that each individual has a limited quantity of love. Consequently, the more a person loves someone else, the less love he has for himself.Rollo May took issue with that position. He observed that when a person falls in love he feels more valuable and treats himself with more care. He further suggested that this inner sense of worth comes whether or not the love is reciprocated. He agreed with those who say that we are able to love others to the extent that we are able to love ourselves.

For some time I have maintained that love is elicited. The more we are loved, the greater our potential for love. If such is the case Freud has given us a half-truth. We do have a limited capacity for love.And May has given us a half-truth. To love someone who loves us in return is scary (we are giving without any assurance that we will receive), but it is invigorating nonetheless. It renews us, giving us an even greater capacity for love. But to love someone who does not return our love can drain us.

Love is commanded in the Scripture. I’ve often been asked how that command squares with my position. Usually behind the question is the assumption that since love is commanded it must be controlled by the will.Not necessarily. I may be able to will to treat you in a loving way. But love is always greater than the sum of its parts. The difference between doing loving things for you and feeling love for you may be subtle but it is there. And at times that difference can register in a profound way. For instance, parents may determine to treat all their children alike, yet love one more than another. Teachers may consciously try to not allow favoritism even though they are attracted to some students and possibly even repelled by others. In each case I suggest that the individuals involved are able to see the difference between loving acts and love itself.

Some might maintain that we never express love to another person without meeting some need of our own. But if there is a love that approximates the love of Jesus, it must be possible to love someone who either cannot or will not acknowledge our love. And to love such a person is costly. Because our resource of love is not restored in the process.

Are we able to pay the price? We are if we are receiving love. The Christian experiences regularly the love of Jesus through friends, worship, instruction from His book, prayer and reflection on what He has told us and done for us, especially during the tough times.

Are we willing to pay the price? That is a question that must be answered within the context of specific relationships. Can I love the son who has broken my heart? Can I love the student who I can’t seem to reach? Can I love the church member who seems to have so little to give to me? Or the neighbor who irritates me?

We know God’s answer. He loved us while we were his enemies. And we know God’s desire. He tells us to love each other the way he loves us.Suppose that we belong to Jesus and we are willing to try to love someone we haven’t been able to love. If love is more than doing loving things, how do we go about it?

I suggest first, that we try to get to know the person. That knowledge might put our feelings in a different perspective. If we still have “problems” with the person try to think about why we consider those things to be problems. That also could give us a different perspective. Risk talking about our feelings with the person. That must be done with great care remembering that our objective is not alienation but to break through the barriers that keep us from loving. Ask for God’s wisdom as well as the ability to love that person.As we love we are renewing and enlarging the ability of others to love. And as representatives of Jesus Christ our love enables others to feel His love.

Love Your (Muslim) Neighbor as Yourself

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According to Open Doors with Brother Andrew (a nondenominational service agency primarily working to distribute Bibles to limited access or closed countries) of the forty countries where Christians are persecuted the most, seventy-five percent are dominated by Islam.

Islam is a theocratic religion that is designed to dominate other religions and peoples. We in America are not as sensitive to this fact as are Christians living in those countries. Many are being persecuted, even unto death. Fundamentalist Muslims tend to interpret passages regarding jihad in the Qur’an and the Hadiths (sayings of Muhammad) as referring to timeless commands for holy war, while other Muslims might see these passages as being more self-defensive or interpreted more broadly to mean striving for God’s truth. The media has kept both aspects before us recently. (See the interview with Dr. Anees Zaka in the lead article.) Terrorists tend to have a victim mindset and believe they have to defend their land, truth, and way of life. This is part of their aggressiveness as far as their religious orientation is concerned.

Several examples will illustrate this point:

Abu Huraira: Allah’s Apostle said, “I have been ordered (by Allah) to fight the people till they say: ‘None has the right to be worshipped but Allah,’ and whoever said it then he will save his life and property…” (2:272; 24:1.483). Saying attributed to Muhammad.

Narrated Ikrima: The statement of Allah’s Apostle, “Whoever changed his Islamic religion, then kill him” (9:45; 84.2.57).

Narrated Abu Haraira: Allah’s Apostle said, “To the person who carries out jihad for His Cause and nothing compelled him to go out but the Jihad for His Cause, and belief in His Words, Allah guarantees that He will either admit him into Paradise or return him with the reward or the booty he has earned to his residence from where he went out” (9.413.28.549).

Part of the motivation within Islam comes from their belief that there can be no assurance of salvation outside of dying in holy war.

As far as Americans living stateside are concerned, most Muslims are extremely approachable. They enjoy friendships and the giving and receiving of hospitality is a positive thing for them. Sadly, most expatriate Muslims who have been in the United States for five or ten years have never been inside a Christian’s home! Since the September 11 tragedy, there has never been a better time to get to know Muslim neighbors and love them as you love yourself! We encourage our readers of Equip for Ministry to see the importance of seizing this opportunity which was intended for evil and trust God to use us as part of transforming the evil into good. Let’s use this time to learn more about Islam, but even more to pray for opportunities to reach out and dialogue with them.

New Vision for an Old System

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I grew up in the church. More accurately, in the Sunday school. That was the requirement; worship services were optional.I was the kid every Sunday school teacher dreads. In the Kindergarten department I stood up when everybody else was sitting down, and vice versa. I talked when we were supposed to be silent. And when we were supposed to talk or sing I didn’t. It was so bad that at one point it was suggested to my mother that I might be retarded.

Somewhere around the fourth grade I was held back. I think I’m the only kid in the history of Sunday school who ever flunked. It was because my friend Jim McLean and I caused so much trouble. We had to be separated: he was put up, I was held back.I’m the kid who didn’t put his money in the offering. I bought candy on the way home. I’m the one who remembers the Junior Superintendent week after week going over the verse in James: “Be ye doers of the word and not hears only.” I had no idea what the lady was talking about. I first remembered hearing the gospel at the Billy Graham rally at age 15. I had attended catechetical classes and joined the church when I was 12.

Yet I’m committed to the Sunday school. Even though in many places it’s an anachronism. And for the most part kids like me don’t attend any more. Still it’s the one church program more people attend on a regular basis than any other. Sunday school and the worship service are bound together in the minds of many.

Some churches have focused on the small group or the house church but often the missing ingredient is the children. How are they nurtured? In places where children, especially older ones, attend Sunday school while parents are in worship, the missing ingredient is worship. (That’s become a significant problem where there are simultaneous Sunday school and worship schedules.) The children don’t experience God’s people of all ages coming together to enter the presence of God.But if Sunday school doesn’t do any more for others than it did for me, what’s the point? That’s a powerful argument.

What is needed is a fresh vision for that venerable institution. Maybe run it on a semester system with significant breaks so that there is a clear beginning and end. Perhaps use it as a means to mentor young people or develop high school students as mentors (which would give teachers and leaders a whole new area of responsibility).

I acted out in part because I felt horribly inferior. I wanted attention and chose the best way I knew to get it. By God’s grace things have worked out well for me. But it could have just as easily gone another way. I was on my way to becoming a bum.

Too many Sunday school teachers are going through the motions-not putting much into it, not expecting much to happen in the lives of those who come. That might be the biggest thing a fresh vision would address. We all want to be part of something significant. To think that what we are doing is worthwhile. And what is more important than to help set the direction of a child, or a teen, or an adult toward the Kingdom of God? Teacher it could turn your life upside down.

Willing to Change for the Better

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Fresh off another stint in Vacation Bible School, I’ve found myself reflecting on the week. I heard children recite verses – some lengthy sections from Philippians 2. I listened to our four-year-old granddaughter sing the songs in the afternoons. I watched child after child participate enthusiastically. And almost everybody was there every day-including a large number from outside the church.Could we transplant some of that enthusiasm into the Sunday school?

Before you say it’s different, bear with me. If we are going to reach this generation it will require more than tweaking a few things. We must rethink everything. That requires imagination, creativity with dependence on and direction from our God.

So, if you’re willing, ask some questions. Have you had a kid’s ministry effort that really worked? Why? Can some of those ingredients be incorporated into a program that’s struggling? Or maybe it’s time to stop doing one thing so that you can try another that might be more effective. Underscore the word “might.” You must have the courage to change, which is no small thing, particularly if you fear messing with success. Because you might fail, and then you will have to try again. Where and how will the Spirit work?

Back to Sunday school. What about breaks between the quarters or even a semester system with a lengthy hiatus? That way it doesn’t just keep going, and it can begin again with a fresh burst of energy.What about lengthening the time frame? That also means enlarging your staff to include special activities. What would it take to have a great time of singing? To focus on learning significant sections of the Bible? To have some fun time?

Is it possible to revive the attendance drives that were part of many Sunday schools years ago? That will require challenging programs for adults as well as kids-no small order. But the possible result is families beginning to attend church together and perhaps discovering for the first time the life-changing message of the gospel.Could you try Sunday school at a different time?And what about your teenagers? I saw a number of them taking on adult responsibilities last summer. Could their role in Sunday school be enlarged?

Hopefully I’ve raised enough issues to get you thinking. What you’re doing now may be effective. How can you make it more effective? Or you might have to stretch to justify it. What can you do with it to begin making a difference in the lives of those in your church and your community?

QUESTIONS?!

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A man in our congregation gave this testimony: He and his wife had visited various churches with their questions. But no one seemed to listen until they began attending a small group where their questions were welcomed.

That experience is not unique. I’ve had questions all my life. And questions lead to deeper questions-often about things viewed as basic, incontrovertible.My daughter, Holly, has always raised questions (maybe it’s in the genes). It hurt her in school. Many, if not most teachers are impatient with questions, possibly threatened by them. I studied under two of the foremost Christian thinkers of the twentieth century. Neither one dealt well with questions-especially ones that might challenge their perspectives. However, there is always the exception. Emily Gray, who is now with the Lord, was one of the most gifted teachers I have known. She taught Holly. And she loved the questions. Unanswered questions don’t go away, especially the ones never raised, never addressed.

A Sunday school teacher once asked class members to name their favorite holiday. A great get acquainted activity. One lady, new to the group, said, “Halloween.” There was a collective gasp. She never returned.Let’s speculate a little. Perhaps a few others in the group identified with the woman’s sentiments. Would they raise a question? Probably not. Would their thinking change? It’s doubtful. Those who disagreed with the group would quietly continue to hold their own ideas. If they discovered enough disagreements they might leave the group and drift away from the church without anyone knowing why.

A number of years ago I taught a senior high class. One Sunday I was talking about how we know we’re Christians and for some reason I locked in on a young man who was a student at an outstanding Christian school and whose parents were faithful in the church. I wanted him to tell me how he knew he was a Christian but the responses were vague at best so I kept pressing him. Finally he said, “I’m not sure I’m a Christian and I’m not sure I want to be.” Could such a question be raised in your setting without that collective gasp? Without a teacher being unnerved?

There are deep-seated differences in this society about politics, education and morality. Many differences exist even in the Christian community. We tend to respond to those differences in one of two ways. Either we identify with groups where virtually everyone thinks like we do, or we bury our questions. Neither is particularly helpful. Our thinking needs to be challenged. Our values, even those we cherish the most, need to be evaluated. Our faith must be examined lest we find ourselves losing that which we claim is most dear.So when the questions come – even the ones with hostile overtones – take them seriously. It could be God’s way of providing answers for all those involved.