Back at the Text and Conference a few months back with The Resurgence, CJ Mahaney who is pastor, author, and dear friend gave one of the most helpful sermons I have ever heard. In it he spoke of the need for pastors to continually seek and celebrate evidences of God’s grace in their life and ministry. As someone who is prone to inordinately focus on what remains to be done rather than what has been done and the critics instead of the converts I found his counsel both timely and wise. Subsequently, upon occasion I will blog about recent evidences of God’s grace in hopes of giving him glory and others joy.
A few weeks ago I had the honor of preaching the opening session for our men’s advance (Mars Hill men don’t retreat so we don’t like to have retreats). We Seattleites have had a horrid patch of weather since Creation, but on that day we broke all records with sun and warmth. After months of waiting I got to take the top off my Jeep and enjoy the long drive to the advance with the top down and old Social Distortion cranked up to the glory of God. After my evening sermon I stood around to meet, encourage, and pray for the men wanting some time. To be honest, I knew very few of the men as it seemed most were new. My three hours of standing outside until after midnight was incredibly encouraging as nearly every one of the dozens if not a hundred men I met were in their 20’s and had become Christians in the previous year. They were honest about sin they were fighting, but devoted to Jesus, reading their Bible, and growing in their responsibilities as men.
The following Sunday I preached on the cross of Jesus as part of the Doctrine series I’m working on. And, at every one of the services I preached at live at our Ballard Campus people joined me on stage to give their lives to Jesus. I have always preached the gospel, but I find that lately my belief that God will actually save people through the preaching of the gospel has grown more certain than ever. Nearly every preacher believes that God could use them for evangelism, but sadly too often they do not preach as if God would use them for evangelism. This is something God in his patience is helping me to mature in and the fruit of seeing people saved from Satan, sin, death, hell, and the wrath of God is an unspeakable joy.
On Monday a dear friend and I flew to Los Angeles to spend a few days participating in a conference for Rick Warren at Saddleback Church. It seems like everyone Christianity Today has written an article on over the past few years was on one of the teaching teams. I got to see Tim Keller, Erwin McManus, Jonathan Falwell, Miles McPherson, Rick McKinley, Dave Gibbons, Dave Ferguson, Greg Surratt, Bill Cornelius, Joel Hunter, Jud Wilhite etc. etc. etc. It was a great honor to be included and I learned a lot through side conversations with so many pastors.
And, I learned a lot watching Rick Warren behind the scenes and over meals. Not being part of the Purpose Driven Network, I was humbled by how eager he was to bring in leaders from many networks and denominations to share ideas and help influence in his Purpose Driven Network pastors for the cause of Jesus Christ. After spending some time with Rick I am convinced for four things. One, a lot of Christians are jealous of his success and they account for a good percentage of his critics. Two, he really loves the Jesus of the Bible. Three, he really loves pastors. Four, he really loves the church of Jesus in all of it’s expressions, even those who are not doing the Purpose Driven methods he extols.
To be honest, Rick has a brilliant mind that shines even when he sits down and simply lectures from a chair for an hour as he did at the conference. But, what really struck me is how much he loves pastors and churches and how much he wants to serve pastors and their churches by giving away resources and encouragement lavishly. And, it is his affection for Jesus, pastors, and churches that has in my observation endeared him to so many Christian leaders. For those who criticize his methods, it would behoove them to also share in his effort to do something to help pastors other than criticize those who are trying to help. I do not agree with him on everything. But, I also find him to be a servant leader who is willing to learn which is rare among those who are very successful and in that I rejoice.
Out of all I learned, one story he shared over dinner was particularly insightful. He explained that their large ministry campus needed to expand and in God’s providence a large adjacent piece of land came available for sale. After meeting with the land owner a very good deal was struck for the church. The problem was that to purchase the land required a congregational vote. But, if the terms of the deal were announced to the congregation they would undoubtedly leak and instigate counter offers from other developers thereby driving the price up. So, Rick stood before his church members and told them he found a good piece of land for a good price and could not share any of the details with them and so he asked the people to trust him and vote for it. And, they did…unanimously.
So few pastors enjoy any real trust or support among their people. Still others erroneously believe they have it only to see distrust and division reign when they need trust and support the most. Rick attributed the vote to, in part, the fact he has been at that church since he founded it nearly 30 years ago. Now being in my 11th year of ministry it gave me hope that if I continue to mature as a leader giving my life to Mars Hill Church perhaps the day will come when that kind of trust and support is built.
It’s been a good few weeks filled with evidences of God’s grace.
Lastly, my favorite evidences of God’s grace have been with my family. My two year old son Gideon aka Flip Flop (it’s the only shoes he likes to wear) is now sleeping in a big boy bed, getting potty trained, riding a bike with training wheels, and hitting baseballs off a tee with a vicious fury. Four year old Alexie (aka Goose) continues to sing, dance, laugh and leave love notes on my pillow to ensure that my life is filled with girlie goodness. Six year old Calvin (aka Buddy Calvin) is finishing up kindergarten, killing it in teeball, and a very loving boy with a pastors heart that shows up in all his relationships. Eight year old Zac (aka Buddy Zac) has turned into a left handed hitting machine in baseball cranking out homeruns to the degree that coaches and scouts now refer to me as "Zac’s dad" while they seek to coax me to put him on their team next year. Ten year old Ashley (aka girlie girl) just got her test score back for school and ranked near the top of all students her age as she is a super bright young lady who loves Jesus and makes her daddy cry by telling him good news about what God is doing in her life. And, my high school sweetheart/wife Grace (aka Beauty) and I are in a good season learning how to love each other better and better as we seek to keep up with the overwhelming grace of God that has made our lives richly full.
Everything in life is not perfect, but I have hope for progress because of the evidences of God’s grace elsewhere in life. For that, I rejoice and push forward with Grace to find more grace.
