My Gardener

There was a funny TV show, a comedy about marriage that sometimes hit fairly close to home - 'Til Death, starring Brad Garrett. One particular episode talked about how in marriage there is often one spouse who is the "gardener". That spouse is constantly thinking about the other person, and does so much for the 'plant' - often unnoticed. In the show, Brad realized with a touch of horror, that his wife was the gardener, and realized what a lucky man he was.

Today, on Mother's Day, it's time to head home from church and I'm hanging out in the lobby, with the kids running around nearby. Hmm, where's Dawn? She must be talking to someone... boy she sure can gab...

Next thing I know, I see her pulling up in front with my car - and that after already getting the van for the kids. She knows how much I hate getting wet and even on her special day, walked through the rain thinking of me.

She's the gardener. And I love her very much. Indeed, I'm a very lucky man!

Happy Mother's Day!

Gotta love the nerf

Kids came home with a nerf football today.

Oh my, guys, I had one of those when I was your age. I think that's the kind I used to learn how to throw a football. Hey! Any of you want to go outside and learn how to throw a football?

Four hands quickly shot up along with choruses of "Me! Me!" I soon found out that throwing a football is not as intuitive as you might think, and it's easier to just do it than to actually teach someone else. (Hmm, that sums up a major issue I'm wrestling with as I try to better understand the process of developing leaders, but I'll leave that for another day) Laces, proper grip, stance, transferring the weight, elbow and arm motion, aiming high...

We had a blast! Despite the fact that it was about as soft an object as you could imagine, they found it almost impossible not to close their eyes and look away in fear as the ball was thrown to them. The youngest and the oldest had better arms than I expected - good accuracy and speed. The middle two boys enjoyed seeing the nerf ball bounce off someone, even themselves.

I think what they liked best was "Go long! Run!!" They would sprint like the wind down the field and watch as the ball was thrown an almost unimaginable distance. They never managed to catch it, but they liked running it back while the other three tried to stop them. My girl outran them as all three boys ran straight at her. Our youngest pulled a super cut-back move and faked everyone out for a touchdown. Of course, that meant I had to pick him up on my shoulders for the victory dance.

All that, beautiful weather, some time biking all together as a family, and a special Mother's day dinner out...
Definitely a fun and memorable day for Daddy and the family:)

Clarifying the Vision of the Church

As we have been seeking to better understand what God is calling us to be and to do, we needed to pause briefly in our strategic planning process. Herrington describes that the "vision path is the next level of detail... It explains the meaning and implications of the vision. Vision describes the big picture of where the church is going, and visionpath begins to fill in details of how the church will get there." So first we just wanted to spell out some key aspects of the vision that would guide the development of the vision path. Though we have a ways to go in describing a clear, shared, compelling vision of the future to which God is calling us, the follow are definitely important pieces of this framework:

• Biblically Sound – Culturally Relevant

We will communicate a passionate message of God’s love which is culturally relevant, uncompromised and biblical.


• Accepting Environment

We will enthusiastically welcome all people at Calvary and provide a contagiously friendly environment where all are accepted and loved.


• Living Life on Purpose

We will encourage living an abundant and intentional life, never ceasing to grow, as we yearn to see all become fully devoted followers of Christ.


• Active in the Community

We strive to become vitally involved in our community, agents of transformation helping those who are hurt, and sharing God’s love with all around us.


• Nurturing Families

We are urgently committed to excellence in all aspects of ministry to families, radically devoted to serving the children and youth of our community.


• Connecting in Groups

We are not just a church with groups; we are a church of groups. We rely on small groups as a primary way to develop authentic relationships and to grow spiritually.


• Every Member a Minister

We will empower, encourage and equip every person to serve God according to their SHAPE as an expression of our radical devotion to Jesus Christ.

Vision of the Church

I like Jim Herrington's definition of vision - "Vision is a clear, shared, and compelling picture of the preferred future to which God is calling the congregation." Clear – so that people understand it. Shared or it leads to disunity. Compelling so it motivates the congregation to action. To be honest, we've been less clear on the vision for our church than on our purpose or values. When we say that we are encouraging the development of fully-devoted followers of Christ, what does that look like in practice? How does Calvary do that any different than other churches?

As part of our recent processing developing a strategic plan for priorities over the next two years, we've had some excellent discussion on our strengths and weaknesses, as well as some opportunities we have at this time, as well as some threats that must be guarded against. These discussions at our Wednesday evening services have included a broad cross-section of the congregation. A key benefit of doing this has been a better understanding of some things we could be doing better. From a high-level perspective, it was encouraging to see that there was strong unity among the congregation and a set of top priorities for improvement were identified. At the same time, there was not consensus on what 'success' in our mission would actually look like in the future. We could definitely benefit from a vision that was a bit more clear, shared, and more compelling to action. Fortunately, doing just that is one of the top hopes for our Pastor on his sabbatical next year. One thing we know is that we God is able and willing to do amazing things in our community and in our hearts - and we long to be used by Him to make a tremendous positive impact on our community. Next time I'll share some aspects of our vision that seemed to be clear.

Core Values of the Church

The mission of our church is not subject to change, as Christ's mission is unchanging. Our understanding of it may (should) improve, and the words we use to discuss it may vary, but we're looking to encourage people to become fully-devoted followers of Christ. What that looks like from one church to another may vary somewhat. In the same way God makes each of us unique as individuals, our churches and communities are also unique. Core Values are those things that help define a church, and express some of the heart of what God has called our particular congregation to be. Last year we spent some time discussing our Core Values, and the following expresses what we feel is most important at Calvary.

Christ-Centered Lives
Agents of Change
Loving Relationships
Volunteer Ministry
Authentic Leadership
Relevant Preaching
You are Loved

These core values are consistent both with our mission and who we are. We want to put Christ first in all things, and make sure that all we say and do communicates His love for all people. We want to share and live a clear biblical message, spoken not only in words but also in deeds. Calvary is a place for family, friends, and faith. Each one of us is called to serve, and has been uniquely shaped by God to do the good works He has prepared for us to do. It's important for us to accept and meet people where they are, but to encourage them to take a next step towards or in a relationship with Jesus Christ - to transform not only ourselves but our community.

Mission of the Church

Any biblical consideration of the mission of our church, of any church, must consider Christ's mission. Two tremendous passages that provide insight into this are the Great Commandment and the Great Commission:

"Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?" Jesus replied: 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." (Matthew 22:36-40, NIV)

"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." (Matthew 28:19-20, NIV)

Bottom line - we want to be who God wants us to be and do what He wants us to do. Our mission is to live out the commandments of Jesus Christ. What does this involve? Looking at these two passages, we are to worship God with all that we are, fellowship with other believers, evangelize and disciple people, and serve others. Based on these biblical passages, this is how we see the mission of our church:

"Calvary Baptist Church is a is a community of faith encouraging the development of fully devoted followers of Christ through commitments to church membership, spiritual maturity, personal ministry and world missions."

Transitions

For the past several months our church has been spending a lot of time in prayer and discussion as we've sought to be more intentional in strategic planning - both to clarify the vision and to focus efforts on our next steps in pursuing the vision. The urgency of this stems from two significant transitions we're facing. The long-term transition is that of shifting the mindset from a pastor-does-the-ministry small church to a pastor-equips-for-ministry growing church. Through our senior pastor's leadership over the past eight years we have broken out of the big 100-150 attendance barrier and have shifted away from the comfort of a place where you know everybody. But we've not yet reached the point where we have a well-trained experienced staff equipping dozens of volunteer leaders for ministry, nor are we likely to see fully see that mindset for volunteer ministry before we break through the next growth barrier of 500 or so. The second important transition is short-term, with Pastor Chuck planning to take a long-overdue sabbatical next year.

Pastor Chuck has pulled together a Strategic Leadership Team, both to start a more formal planning process and to form an advisory group and sounding board that will help in some aspects that would be covered by the staff in a larger church. The process we've been following has been to start with our mission and values, clarify our vision, and put together a 'vision path' of priorities or major goals to focus on over the next two years. One book that has been helpful in doing this has been "Leading Congregational Change - A practical guide for the transformational journey," by Jim Herrington, Mike Bonem, and James Furr. The book covers several important areas including preparation of the heart, a cohert planning sequence for change, as well as essential attitudes for leaders shepherding the change. Fortunately, we're starting from a fairly strong and unified position, looking to establish focus and elevate the vision, rather than navigate a turnaround or overcome great internal resistance.

During this process I've learned a lot about myself, my co-laborers in Christ, and have grown in awe and wonder of God and the love He has for all people. I'm very excited about our growing emphasis on helping people better connect to God and to each other in relationships, growing in Christ-likeness, developing faithful leaders with a heart to serve others, towards a goal of becoming better equipped to share God's love with those in our community who don't yet know Him. I'll be sharing more about our vision and vision path in upcoming posts.

Baptizing my Children

Today was an amazing day! It's been a great weekend overall, but the highlight by far was that today I was blessed to be able to baptize my four children at our church. Their ages range from 7 to 10. They were all very excited about it, although the boys are not big fans of water, and it didn't help that the baptismal was filled to almost neck level. Sierra's comment after breakfast summed up their attitude nicely - "Dad, my stomach is telling me I'm a little nervous, but my heart is telling me I'm very excited and happy!" The oldest, she was the first to accept Christ, followed by Christian and Justin, and just recently our middle child David chose to ask Jesus to be his savior as well. When she found out she started dancing for joy, hugged David then told mom and dad - "This is fantastic, the boys and I have been praying for him for years!" I found out recently that her previous hesitation about getting baptized wasn't really fear, but came from a desire to do it together as a family with her brothers. As she explained it, there was a mix of "leave no man behind" as well as "I just know David will ask Jesus into his heart someday soon. He can see all around here that Jesus loves him so much!" It was her last comment that really touched me. Not just from mom and dad, but from brothers and sister, from our friends, from his Sunday School teachers, David could see in the lives (not just the words) of others what it means to follow Jesus, to pray from the heart, to forgive, and to worship. God is in heaven, but he's ever-present in our home and church. Today was also special because it was 'Vision Sunday' and I was one of several people sharing our focus for the next year or so. On setting the date for the baptism I was hoping it wouldn't cut into time for the service. Pastor Chuck laughed and said "Are you kidding? Seeing people become followers of Christ is the vision!" I've never been prouder of my Church family than today - and I'm joyous that God has barely begun His work of transforming lives, and that He will do a great thing in our community and in the hearts of His people. Calvary Baptist Church... thank you so much for loving my family!

Review - "Pop Goes the Church"

This spring has been an intense time of seeking, reading, and praying to better understand God's vision for our church. Calvary has been making the effort to clarify what we're doing and the vision path for the next few years. (I hope to present a lot more on that subject soon.) Pastor Chuck recently gave a great message on the importance of being culturally relevant and biblically sound. An excellent book on this subject looks specifically on whether or not to use references, music, clips from pop culture as a bridge to those in the community asking tough life questions. The author is Tim Stevens, Executive Pastor at Granger Community Church (In our home state of Indiana. Tim also has an excellent blog called Leading Smart) I ordered the book as soon as it came out from Amazon and would like to share my review:

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Pop Goes the Church: Should the Church Engage Pop Culture
Tim Stevens - Power Publishing, 2008

Tim Stevens presents a strong case for the importance (and opportunity) of leveraging popular culture for building a bridge between those who see church as irrelevant and anti-culture, and the eternal message of redemption in Christ.

He begins with the problem of the church, so evident to those on the outside but a complete blindspot to many well-intentioned Christians whose focus has turned completely inward. Though not a theologian, Tim gives some strong biblical examples and principles to support engaging our culture, meeting people where they're at and sharing the good news - not in a watered-down diluted message but with the whole truth of the gospel.

The book also describes many examples of how his church and others have intentionally used music, movies and TV shows known to their audience to make a connection, and demonstrate that the questions they're asking are ones addressed by Christ and His church. It falls short of providing explicit help in 'how to' - but the sense is that creative people in the church with an outward focus will come up with their own ideas if just given permission to do so.

One of the most interesting parts of the book was an allegory of how five churches respond to a big pop culture event in their city. Churches may choose to condemn the culture, separate from it, embrace it, ignore it, or they may choose to leverage pop culture while staying focused on the Word of God and providing inspirational services that are relevant to the community as well as the church. The author presents a compelling case to leverage. Sadly, many pastors and churches will condemn and ignore this book, some will embrace it as rationalization for their watered down message. This book is not for them (and its tone may not even allow some to get past the first chapter). But for those who have been wondering why attendance in their church has been dwindling for years, why there are no members under the age of thirty, or those trying to understand how they become more culturally relevant while staying true to the gospel, this book is a must-read.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

I hope you all had a great Christmas and Holiday season. Our Christmas was fantastic. The kids were at the top of their form, and made for an energetic and fun-filled morning. Mercifully, they did let mom and I sleep in a little bit. (Mom made a killer coffee cake that was delicious) We followed that up with going to a friends house (along with 28 other people!) for a Christmas day feast. That was a very fun and relaxing time. Kids went wild in the basement and adults relaxed upstairs. The two came together in a game of Risk 2210 AD with a few of us adults and some teens and older kids. I pulled out some 'old school moves' to crush them :)

Today a smile was brought to my face by this short video clip of a baby with some interesting facial expression. I also stumbled across a comedy show that has some very funny moments - Whose Line is It Anyway. (Check out their Cops and Ducks video clip)

Coming up on the 31st is an all-day open house and gaming event plus New Year's Eve celebration. We're looking forward to relaxing with friends, playing lots of boardgames, and ringing in the New Year. I wish everyone a very Happy New Year and a great holiday season with friends and family!