Courage

Have you ever ridden a roller coaster? Of course you have. Everyone has. What was it like?

It seems to me that there are two kinds of people when it comes to roller coasters.

The first kind of person - and this was me as a kid - is overwhelmed with fear. They close their eyes, they wrap their arms around the bar, they clench their teeth, they squeeze their legs together and they press their feet into the floor of the car, hoping that it'll all be over soon. They don't like the feeling of having their stomach fly up into their throat, but they are afraid to admit this to their friends and afraid of being left out. It's fun hanging out at the theme park all day with your friends, and all you have to do to be accepted is endure the occasional minute and a half of pure, nightmarish torture. But hey, if you close your eyes and curl up in the fetal position, it's not so bad, and you'll survive. Then you will be accepted by the other cool kids, with whom now (they think) you have several shared experiences.

The second kind of person - which is apparently everyone ELSE in the entire world other than me - rides roller coasters much differently. They don't grip the bar, they throw their hands in the air. They don't close their eyes, they fling them open. They don't clench their teeth, they throw their heads back, open their mouths wide and let out a primal scream.

The first person survives. The second person thrives. The first person passively endures. The second person actively enjoys. The first is tortured, the second is thrilled. The first clings to security, the second embraces uncertainty.

But both are afraid. The first person is obviously afraid, but the second one is afraid too. That's why they're screaming - but they're screaming with delight as well as fear (or so I'm told). This is an important point. It's not the case that the second person lacks fear.

Courage is NOT the absence of fear. If you are not afraid, you have no opportunity to have courage because courage requires fear.

This is because courage is, fundamentally, a certain kind of RESPONSE to fear.

Courage is not the absence of fear, it is a response to fear.

In order to exhibit courage, you must first be afraid.

Often times, when we are afraid, we think we are cowardly. To be cowardly is to be afraid, right? In the church, our pious-sounding, proof-texting platitudes play into this. We quote the Lord's words to Joshua, "Be strong and courageous," and we say, "God has not given us a spirit of fear", so we think being afraid is sinful. This means that as soon as we feel fear, we are instantly overwhelmed with guilt, which only makes us embrace fear ever more tightly, which makes us feel more guilty, and the cycle feeds on itself until we're curled up on the floor in the fetal position.

So what exactly is the difference between the first person and the second person? It's not that one has fear and one doesn't. 

It's their response to fear. That is the difference.

The first person hides from fear. They are overwhelmed by it. Their fear has mastered them. They are terrified of their fear. Thus fear becomes exponentially greater. This poor soul responds to fear very much like an abused dog, hiding and whimpering in the corner.

The second person faces their fear. They stand up to their fear. They are like the child on the playground who refuses to give the bully their lunch money, even if it means getting a bloody nose. They are afraid, but their fear has not mastered them. And that's not because their fear is any less, but because they simply refuse to accept its mastery over them.

We can call this refusal defiance. They defy their fear.

This is what courage actually is. It is defying your fear. It is refusing to give in to it. It is a choice, an act of will.

But there is one more key aspect of courage that we must pursue, and we're going to need the Lord of the Rings to help us investigate it.

If you look up courage on Wikipedia, you'll eventually get to a part about pagan notions of courage, and I found that I was drawn toward Tolkien's description of Norse courage: 

"J.R.R. Tolkien identified in his 1936 lecture 'Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics' a 'Northern theory of courage'—the heroic or 'virtuous pagan' insistence on doing the right thing even in the face of certain defeat".

Something about that notion appeals to me. Perhaps an illustration of this idea is the 300 Spartans, who stood against the army of Persia, though they were doomed to die. Or we can think of the Lord of the Rings movies, when King Theoden gives a speech to his men before the armies of orcs and calls upon them to "Ride now! Ride to ruin and the world's ending!" and then he screams, "DEATH!" and all the Rohirrim echo him. It's an amazing moment that, if it doesn't affect you, there's something wrong with you.

And it is so moving that we are tempted to say, "There, now THAT is courage!"

Is it?

When God commands Joshua to "Be strong and courageous," is this what God calls him to? "Ride to ruin and the world's ending"?

Let's cut to the chase. There is a bright, shining example of courage that I think is very different from that of the King of the Rohirrim, or of the Spartans, moving as these examples are.

Once upon a time, the King of all the universe took on flesh in order to go to the cross for our sins. That is the greatest act of courage there ever was. Look at what he left behind! Look at how much he suffered!

Would you voluntarily become a grasshopper so your two boys (ages 5 and 6) could rip your legs and antennae off and leave you to be consumed alive by hungry ants? That's kind of like what Jesus did for us.

Now - it is one thing to go into battle, though you are outnumbered, and engage the enemy, risking your life. But it is quite another to be God, who created all things, and knows the future because he MAKES the future, to take on flesh, to willingly go to the cross and suffer and die, KNOWING EXACTLY how horrible it would be ahead of time. Jesus knew just exactly how awful the tortures of the cross would be, and he faced it.

Oh, you say, but he wasn't afraid. He knew he'd be raised from the dead. He went to the cross "for the joy set before him," right? 

If he wasn't afraid, then why was he sweating drops of blood in the Garden of Gethsemane? That was FEAR. That was ANXIETY. He asked his Father to take that cup away from him. He asked to be excused from the assignment. But he knew there was no other way, and knew his Father would not take that cup from him. And he knew just how bad it would be. Wouldn't you have been afraid? Only a FOOL wouldn't have been, and Jesus was certainly no fool.

So he, knowing exactly how much pain it would bring him, was cut off entirely from his Father, abandoned by his disciples, tortured by his creatures, and put to death by his people, the very people he'd come to save.

That is courage. 

Now, you might be tempted to say that it's just the same as the courage of the 300 Spartans or the countless Rohirrim, riding into battle, doomed to die. But it's not. There's a very important difference.

"For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol, or let your holy one see corruption."

The pagan unbeliever who faces their fear of death does exhibit courage in some measure, but it is an empty, baseless courage for courage's sake. Such men fight for their own glory and die vainly.

Jesus did not face a certain, painful and shameful death this way. Instead, he trusted his Father, that he would not abandon him to the grave, that he would not leave him to be consumed by death forever.

Now there is a very important distinction that is theologically necessary to make here. Jesus trusted his Father, but not for grace or mercy. Jesus earned the right to be raised from the dead by his righteousness. Death had no claim over him, once he had been baptized into death to pay the price for the sins of his people. Once that happened, he had a right to life that he had justly earned by his own righteousness, by his own merit. Jesus earned eternal life for himself by being sinless and perfectly righteous his whole life. He earned what Adam failed to earn.

So when I say that Jesus trusted his Father, do not take the silly route that many have taken in recent years and draw the conclusion that Jesus was therefore justified by faith. That's nonsense. There's a gigantic difference between us and Christ. We're sinners. He's not. It's that simple. He trusts in his Father's just response to his righteousness. He knew God would respond with raising him from the dead.

We too trust in God to raise us from the dead, even though we're sinners and should die eternally. Death has a claim on us sinners. But because Jesus was baptized into death for us, on our behalf - therefore we can be raised from the dead. Therefore we can be given eternal life, based not on OUR merits, but on the merits of Christ, which merits are granted us according to the terms of the eternal covenant of redemption between the Father and the Son, according to which the Father says of the Son, "You are a priest forever, after the order of Melchizadek."

So.

Jesus rides the roller coaster like the second person. He stands up and leaves the Garden of Gethsemane, where he anxiously sweat drops of blood, and walks out to face his false accusers. He faced the men who would torment him. He loved the men who abandoned him. And he trusted in his Father to raise him from the dead.

You see, the second person trusts that the bar will do its job. They're afraid, yes, but they also know that the bar will keep them from falling. That knowledge is their weapon against their fear, and THAT is how they stand up to it and defy it to its face.

Jesus' weapon was knowing his own and his Father's character. He knew he had been perfectly faithful. He knew his Father would reciprocate. He trusted his Father. Jesus truly said, "Though he slay me, yet will I trust him." And boy he owned that, and he proved that he owned it. He took the words of Scripture and owned them for his own because they are his. He IS the word incarnate.

And HE is our bar. Well, he and the Father and the Spirit, all three, working on our behalf. We trust the Spirit's testimony who promises that the Word of God is true, that his promises are real. We trust Christ's merit by which he earned eternal life for us. And we trust that the Father will be true to his Word and give us eternal life based on the righteousness of Christ, and not condemn us for all eternity based on our sin. This is our bar. The triune God in whom we trust. This is the foundation of our courage.

We can face our guilty fears because we trust that our sins are forgiven in Christ.

We can face our fears of death because we trust in God to save us by grace through faith in Christ.

We can face our fears of job loss because we trust that the Lord will make good on his promises to take care of us and our children.

We can face the fears of our children abandoning the faith because we know the Lord knows what he's doing.

We can face our fear of pain, of torments of all kinds, of hard work, of missing out, or any other fear that plagues us a thousand times a day, whether reasonable or completely irrational - all of it - we can face ALL of it because we trust in God.

Courage is the defiance of fear based on trust.

When I walked away from the ministry at last, in my own small way, I too owned those words: "Though he slay me, yet will I trust him."

Yes, walking away from the ministry definitely felt like riding to ruin and the world's ending.

But it wasn't.

I am still here.

And the church will survive without me in the pulpit.

And I'm certain my family and I are better off in myriad ways.

And you know, I still haven't quoted what the Lord ACTUALLY said to Joshua. He didn't just command him to be strong and courageous. He said:

"Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:9)

Why can you face your fear? Why can you exhibit courage? BECAUSE something is true: the Lord, who is YOUR God, is with you wherever you go. HE has commanded you, HE has directed your steps.

Courage takes practice. It takes cultivating. It is a worthy pursuit. Find ways to exhibit courage today.

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Have you left the ministry? Would you like to tell your story anonymously on this blog? Email us at new2pew@gmail.com. We're always looking for more stories.

Abandoning the Ministry, Clinging to Death

It began in seminary. Alcohol, well, tobacco too, became what comforted me in times of extreme stress - which were common in seminary, what with the papers, the readings, the language exams - all of which I felt were unjustifiably difficult and overwhelming, seemingly on purpose.

I got to a point where I smoked cigars and inhaled them. Actually, I chain smoked them literally all day long on my back porch with my laptop as I studied. The stress just kept building though, and I eventually found myself sipping scotch just to stay calm enough to concentrate.

Why did these things seem to comfort me, to soothe the savage beast?

I figured it out with tobacco first. I loved the feel of the smoke going into my lungs. Precisely because it was intoxicating, poisonous, ruinous - not to mention painful. I liked it if it kind of hurt. If it burned. If it made me feel like I was choking. Bizarre, right?

Why did that comfort me in times of stress?

After giving it much thought and doing much soul searching, I eventually figured it out, and I was so horrified that I quit smoking and haven't touched the stuff in over 4 years.

It wasn't that I liked it DESPITE the fact that it was deadly. I realized that I liked it BECAUSE it was deadly.

So what on earth does that mean? It means I liked it because it tended toward death. I liked it because it was like inhaling Death itself into my lungs.

This was my idolatry - I worshiped Death. Death was what I served as a slave. It was my master, and I was its slave. Therefore, Death was my false god that I spent so much of my time worshiping, adoring. And the more frustrated I got with my studies in seminary, I was comforted by the approval and acceptance of my false god, since I felt I was not getting it from the one true God.

Of course, this was because I had made my own secret bargain with God - one which he never agreed to, but that didn't stop me from holding him to it. You see, I figured that if I did what I needed to do in order to become a minister, then he would be obligated to make me a minister. And boy, as seminary got harder and harder and harder I got ever more resentful and bitter towards him for it. He was so mean and cruel to put me through such hoops.

And ultimately, I wanted to be a minister because I wanted THAT to be how I earned God's approval. Like Peter jumping out of the boat and swimming to shore to impress Jesus with how much he's willing to sacrifice to please him. And Jesus just sort of ignores it. And then Peter pouts till Jesus finally says, would you just feed my sheep already?

Anyway, I was pouting and petulant and resentful toward God because I had placed conditions and restrictions on our relationship that I had no right to put there. And it didn't work out so well in the end.

And as I pouted, I, like an unfaithful wife, took comfort in the arms of a lover. In this case, Death.

And yet, though I learned the lesson once with tobacco, I still embraced alcohol. So it should have come as no surprise that when my internship went horribly wrong, I turned to booze for comfort instead of the Lord. And I apparently needed a LOT of comforting.

It has taken a lot for me to finally see that the same thing was taking place with booze, only in a much more horrifying way.

It got to a point where every night I would drink until one of two things happened: either I ran out of booze or I passed out. Usually both.

Why?

Because I was embracing Death still? Sort of, yes. But more...intimately. I was, literally every night, indulging suicidal desires.

No, I didn't kill myself, nor did I ever try to. But I indulged those desires, even if only a little bit, like a man whose mouse clicks lead him into the murkier regions of the internet once in a while. He's not having an affair with a woman or seeing a prostitute, but he's just indulging his lust...just a little bit. So my drinking was the indulging of a lust of a very different sort...though just a little bit.

This eventually had a catastrophic impact on my health which reached a climax during which I very nearly died. That's perhaps a bit dramatic, but 50 years or so ago I sure would have died.

And that's when I realized that I had deceived myself into indulging these desires without even allowing myself to be fully aware I was doing it, and that I had further deceived myself into thinking that my indulgence was harmless, that I wasn't ACTUALLY killing myself. But it turns out I actually WAS killing myself. Just very...very...slowly. And it was my wicked heart that understood this deep down...and was perversely comforted in it.

How twisted and disgusting a sinner am I? I perversely assumed that because God wasn't fulfilling his end of a bargain that I had completely made up and imposed upon him without his consent, that therefore God had rejected me and didn't really love me because I hadn't REALLY proven myself to him and earned his love yet. How twisted! How perverse! 

There is the spirit of antichrist that lurks in my heart, preaching against the gospel of Jesus Christ, denying the truth that we are justified by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. And to support my delusions, I clung even MORE tightly to Death, my false god and the idol of my heart.

And as I laid there in the hospital, having nearly died and recovering, all of this reality came flooding into my awareness, and by the grace of God the self deception was melted away and the fog of my mind cleared at last.

And I found that I did not want another drop of alcohol. Ever.

And of course, as soon as you admit something like that, everyone says, "Oh, good for you, you're an alcoholic and you recognize that and you're ready to go to AA."

Not wanting to be arrogant and wise in my own eyes I thought, ok, I'll go and see what this is all about.

So I went to AA. I'm glad I went, but I'll never go back. You see, everyone there seemed to be stuck on the fact that they used to drink themselves silly constantly, and they'd get all teary-eyed about the fact that it was their 5 year anniversary of being sober or some such thing. This didn't make sense to me.

They also seemed stuck on the idea that the problem wasn't some sinful tendency within them, but the problem was some disease called alcoholism, which apparently you get at random like any other genetic defect, and of course it's totally not your fault. The problem was the disease, it's not your fault, and instead of drinking every day, you should participate in the program every day.

And it struck me that AA is actually a cult. So they were offering me a new false god to worship in place of my old one. It even had some trappings of Christianity.

I didn't go back. I was interested in discovering WHY I drank, WHY it comforted me in times of stress. And I wanted to get to the root of that sin and YANK IT OUT by the grace of God!

And you know, I've found that when you get to the root of your sin and expose it and confess it, it seems to lose its power. Funny how that works isn't it? It's almost like sin's power lies in its deceitfulness, but once it's exposed, it is revealed for the ugly thing it is and you don't desire it anymore. It's like flirting with what you think is a beautiful young woman online, only to find out it's some 50 year old fat man pretending to be a woman, who thinks it's fun to fool people.

What on earth would make me want to cling to DEATH as a lover, rather than Jesus Christ, the God who created all things and then left his throne, who took my sin upon himself and died on the cross, who rose again because Death no longer had any power over him, and who ascended into heaven and stepped into the age to come - all so that he could enter into covenant with and be united to his church, his bride, his people, among whom I am privileged to be counted.

Paul makes a similar argument in Romans 1. What explains me preferring Death to Jesus? Why would I choose this awful substitute over what I was created for? Why would I abandon natural relations for unnatural ones?

The answer is the same as Paul implies in Romans 1. It's sin. What other explanation could there be? I chose to embrace Death, not because Death is lovely, but because Death was the opposite of what I have been called by God TO embrace. As soon as God says to embrace life and live forever, the sinful nature screams that that's obviously the last thing I'd EVER want to do.

Have you weaved a similar web of self deception around yourself?

Yes, you have.

It's just a question of how deep the rabbit hole goes.

So what room is there for my self righteous condemnation of those who "destroyed" my life? It is excluded.

I have said for a very long time that a pastor under whom I served as an intern destroyed my life, my career in the ministry, etc. In some ways that's true.

But in far more important ways it's a lie - in my case at least. In my case it's a lie because the truth is: I DESTROYED MY LIFE. And I destroyed it only because God wants me to LIVE it. So I concocted some elaborate lie and pretended I hadn't, so that I could justify my resentment toward God and destroy my life in protest to his cruelty.

I am a worm, and not a man.

But when God looks upon this wicked fool, he sees only the righteousness of his Son and none of my sin. I will live for this God.

And if he asks me to abandon the ministry, then I do so willingly, and stand ready to do whatever else he desires because HE is my God.

Hear O Israel, Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone. He is the sum total of my pantheon, and I will worship no other.

Abandoned

Abandoned.

Maybe you abandoned the ministry, or maybe the ministry abandoned you. Either way, it's very likely that your friends, even the ministers you thought were your friends, have abandoned you.

"Oh, I'm sorry...I'm just SO busy these days. Things at the church are CRAZY! But things are good! Praise God! And hey, I'm sorry for what happened to you. I'll pray for you. I gotta go! Let's get together soon, ok?"

"Ummm...ok...but..." Dial tone. "But my church is holding the vote next week..."

"Ok...but..." Dial tone. "But they voted me out..."

As I languished in a particularly horrible internship that would eventually push me out of the ministry forever, my wife - MY WIFE - reached out to several ministers we thought were friends, begging them, pleading with them on multiple occasions - she emailed several times, called them, called their wives, anything she could think of - PLEASE, PLEASE call my husband. PLEASE help him! He's dying inside! He's losing his career before it even starts! He's SO depressed and I can't help him! Please!

The silence was deafening.

I was just as sure as sure can be that this was a completely unique experience. Only MY lousy friends, only THESE particular pastors could be so cruel, and God was punishing ME for daring to pursue the ministry out of selfish ambition (even though Paul said he didn't mind if the gospel was preached out of selfish ambition, so long as it's preached).

And of course, when we suffer and everyone abandons us, that's what we're tempted to believe, right? We're SURE that this is a horrible thing that has only happened to us.

And we are tempted to think that way because when someone in our church is sick, say they have some form of cancer that involves a battle that takes years to fight, then our perception is that the entire church rallies around them, bringing the family meals, praying for them at every single church gathering. It feels like we're ALWAYS hearing about that poor family and all they're going through. And if we're honest with ourselves, we tend to get a little sick of hearing about it.

Now stop and think about that. Everyone gets a little tired of hearing about it. Why? Because that's all they're doing. Hearing about it.

Next time someone in your church is dying, go and visit them in the hospital, and ask them how many visitors they've had. What they tell you will be very sad, especially as their stay in the hospital gets longer.

I once visited someone who had been sick for YEARS. Their spouse and children were SO sad! But they had grown almost numb to it after so long.Teenage children whose parent had been bed ridden their ENTIRE LIVES. Imagine!

Do you think they had a lot of friends? An active social life?

Have you ever visited someone in a nursing home? Most people have once or twice.

Did you enjoy the experience? How did it smell? Remember the poor suffering souls, dangling over the precipice of death, their lives hanging by a thread, literally just sitting around waiting to die. Did you make eye contact with them? Did you stop and talk to them all? Maybe you knelt down and looked them in the eye and asked them if you could pray for them? Maybe you held their hand and vowed to return daily after work, just to comfort them a little in their misery?

Neither did I. Nor does anyone else.

Would you like to work in a nursing home? It takes someone with rare gifts to do that kind of work. And of those, I imagine very few of them actually enjoy the work.

The truth is, the last thing you want to do in the world is go visit someone in a nursing home. Why?

It's because of the suffering. It's sad. It's depressing. You just want to get away from it. You have that reaction instinctively. It's just as natural as pulling your hand away from something hot that has just burned you. Touching it causes you pain. Being in a nursing home causes you pain. You want to just get away.

It's NOT just interns who are going through a horrible time in their internship who are abandoned. It's not just the minister whose congregation is crucifying him unjustly, or whose wife is leaving him or who is being put on trial for a crime he didn't commit.

It's also ANYONE who is suffering. Your minister friends don't want to be around you for the same reason you don't want to be in a nursing home.

Now, that's not an excuse - it's just a reason.

Maybe you can forgive your friends though when you realize the very same sinful tendencies lurk in every heart. Prove me wrong if you still feel defiant and go to the local nursing home. Even if you DO go once, you probably won't go back.

It's a good thing funerals only happen once, because no one would come back the second time.

But what is it about nursing homes that make us so uncomfortable? I could be wrong, but I think it's because it makes us feel vulnerable, like maybe some day we too will suffer such a fate. We don't want to be around death because we like to forget that one day we too will die. Or maybe that we too might get cancer or get sick or have to go through some awful, painful procedure for one reason or another.

If that's even remotely correct, or even if there's just a nugget of truth in it, then should it be any surprise that a minister wouldn't want to hang out with a minister whose congregation just voted him out of office, or whose presbytery just forced him to abandon the ministry?

They can't be around you any more than you want to be around the barely alive in a nursing home. They want to pretend like their job is secure. They want to believe that their congregation loves them and would never turn on them. Just like you once did, and turned your eyes away from the many signs that in retrospect were painfully obvious, but to which at the time you were blissfully - willfully - oblivious.

So yes, be angry, but only just. Remember that you would react the same way. Heck, maybe you knew someone who was once crushed and you stayed away from him. It's ok to be hurt, but don't add self righteousness to it, because you are no better.

And I'm not saying this from some ivory tower, just studying the theory. It happened to ME. This is MY thought process about MY experiences. I was abandoned. By ministers! Men I thought were my CLOSE friends! But gradually our conversations grew less and less frequent, till eventually they stopped returning my calls, even my wife's impassioned pleas.

This is how I've learned to forgive them.

But as my counselor recently explained, forgiveness doesn't necessarily entail giving trust back right away.

I've forgiven those men, but I no longer have a relationship with them, because I cannot trust them. Sadly, they have proven to me in ways I cannot forget that they are not worthy of trust. Those scars remain.

At any rate, they're too ashamed to return my phone calls at this point anyway.

Instead, I look forward to the day when we will at last be reconciled in glory.

In glory, when we're at last free from sin, I will see these men again, and they will apologize for abandoning me, and I will apologize for hating them for it, and we will be truly reconciled, and it will be forever.

And that's where our hope is right? Isn't that what I used to passionately insist upon in the pulpit, that we should abandon hope in this world and place it in the age to come?

Abandoned.

And so we come full circle. Let's abandon hope in this world, and instead live our lives with the age to come in mind, storing up treasure in heaven rather than here on earth.

Preaching to Satisfy Your Ego

Simplicity. Clarity. Brevity.

These are the very top virtues for any sermon.

Of course, you have to be true to the text you're preaching. That's absolutely important. But assuming you understand the text at all, then your sermon needs to aim at: simplicity, clarity and brevity.

If you are not aiming at those virtues, you are doing your congregation an incredible disservice. And why are you doing it? To satisfy your ego.

Yes, that's right. I'm posting anonymously and I'm about to say something that many ministers will consider an unfair, unjust judgment that lacks all the facts.

But I'm doing it anyway because I've been in that pulpit. I know what tempts ministers and their egos.

If you are not aiming at simplicity, clarity and brevity as your top three goals after doing justice to the text, it is because your ego has gotten in the way.

Why do I say this? It's quite simple really. Suppose that your number one concern after doing justice to the text was your listeners. Suppose that you were most interested in their best interests. What would that look like?

It looks like this: simplicity, clarity, brevity. When your biggest concern is being understood by your hearers, what isn't your biggest concern?

Impressing your audience.

Now stop and think about that for a minute. If you are concerned about impressing your audience, what will you necessarily NOT care about? You won't care about whether or not they actually understand what you're saying. You won't care if they get it. They don't need to get it to be impressed.

In fact, it's usually helpful if they don't get it, if you want them to be impressed. After all, all they really need to know is how smart you are, or how well read you are, or how good a job you do of crafting an excellent sermon. And if they come away saying, "Man, he knows so much! I'll never know as much as him!" then they're impressed with you, even though they didn't understand.

Who, you ask, are these crazy ministers who care more about impressing their audience than communicating with them? Well, frankly, most of them.

Oh, now I've got you agitated I suppose. But it's true. They want you to think they're brilliant.

You don't believe me do you? Ok, I'll prove it. This Sunday, after the service, when you're shaking your pastor's hand, tell him, "Hey, thanks for that sermon, it was really simple and easy to understand!"

What kind of reaction do you think you'll get?

Then the next Sunday, shake his hand and say, "Wow, pastor. Just WOW! That was absolutely brilliant! You're so well read! Pure genius! Just the way you have with words is astounding!"

I bet you'll get a much more positive and lively reaction. You may even have to excuse yourself from the conversation.

Look, Pastors are sinners just like the rest of us. We can forgive them for it, right?

But they are tempted with a desire to impress their audience. And this leads to all kinds of foolishness that would have no place for those seeking to communicate with simplicity, clarity and brevity.

I have actually heard people speak glowingly of a minister, "I never had any idea what he was saying till the last 2-3 minutes of his sermons, when it would all come together." And there are many ministers who foolishly and recklessly seek to mimic that style of preaching.

Really?

Most ministers aren't quite that far gone, but just about any minister can be tempted to use jargon from time to time. Or maybe they drop some names of some famous authors or ministers and quote them. At length. And no one has any idea what they said, because it's a translation of a Latin text written several hundred years ago. But boy, that minister did his homework, didn't he? We won't doubt his credibility will we? Never mind that we have no idea what he actually said.

But what if ministers sought to impress their hearers with the text instead?

What if their number one goal was for you to understand what this text was saying, even if you were only a child? What then?

You know, we Protestants are very quick to say that the Roman Church was crazy to conduct services in Latin for so long after Latin became a dead language. Why do we think that's so crazy? Because no one knew what they were saying, and therefore what was said was of no value.

Isn't that Paul's criticism of the Corinthian church in 1Cor 14? Verse 9 says, "So with yourselves, if with your tongue you utter speech that is not intelligible, how will anyone know what is said? For you will be speaking into the air."

Ministers - I wish you would actually stop and THINK about that. If no one knows what you're saying, it's of no value to the people you're speaking to. You're speaking into the air. It doesn't matter if you're babbling in some nonsense baby talk and claiming it's the language of angels, or if you're speaking in Latin to people who don't speak Latin, or if you're just arrogantly using big words and complex sermon structures because you have a fancy seminary degree and you want everyone to know it.

A lot of ministers like to say, "My sermon this morning has 3 points, and they are..." and then they proceed to list them. This is ridiculously helpful for people taking notes.

And yet, one minister once said to me that he never does that, and he never does it very deliberately because it insults the audience's intelligence. It's not that he had 3 points and just failed to disclose them, it's that he was against having points at all. His sermons were like one gigantic run on sentence.

My eyes were opened when I invited a friend to church one Sunday, and he actually came. And the sermon text was some passage from the Old Testament that was 3 chapters of genealogies. Yes, 3 chapters.

My poor friend walked out absolutely bewildered. He had no idea what had just been said and learned NOTHING. He certainly wasn't about to abandon hope in anything and everything but Christ.

What a shame.

Yes, I know. The genealogies are Scripture too. I get it. But seriously, muster a bit of courage. If you can't preach an intelligible sermon on some passage of Scripture - SKIP IT!

Oh, but my conscience won't let me do that! That'd be like saying that this passage isn't Scripture!

No, it's not like saying that at all. It's admitting that you can't preach a coherent sermon on that passage, and you're sparing your flock the pain of having to endure an incoherent sermon.

And seriously, WHERE is the principle of lectio continua found in Scripture? Or do we not believe in Sola Scriptura anymore?

For those of you who don't know the jargon, what I just said is that the principle of lectio continua - which just means preaching through a book of the bible, chapter by chapter, one passage at a time until you finish the book and move on to the next one - is not found in the Bible anywhere. Nowhere does God command that in Scripture. However wise the principle might be, it's nowhere to be found in Scripture. And Sola Scriptura is a Latin phrase that just means Scripture alone. The point is that the Bible alone gets to tell us what to do, not some stupid principle that men made up, no matter how wise.

So for Christ's sake, and the sake of your hearers, SKIP that passage you can't preach. Maybe no one can preach some of those genealogies. Then maybe no one should preach them.

Or is it better to speak into the air and waste an opportunity to drive the point of the gospel a little deeper into someone's thick skull this week? Or actually communicate to those visitors who aren't sure if they should be there?

Because if you're trying to impress your audience with what you know, with your mastery of the Old Testament canon, with your familiarity with the famous authors of the church, your knowledge of Greek and Hebrew, or the subtle nuances of how to craft the perfect sermon according to the coolest theory you've ever heard - then you aren't preaching the text anymore at all.

You're only preaching yourself.

You're not saying, "Hey, look at Jesus!"

You're saying, "Hey, look at me!"

I know how strong the temptation is. I have felt it. You want them to listen to you. You have to establish your credibility. They have to accept what you're saying. They shouldn't question you. They need to just do what you tell them...right?

No.

No, you don't need them to listen to you.

They need to fall in love with Jesus.

You need to decrease, he needs to increase. You need to DISAPPEAR in the pulpit.

Preach the WORD.

As long as you're preaching the Word, what you're saying has all the credibility your sermon needs. It's the Word of GOD.

It has been proven by Christ's resurrection from the dead and ascension into heaven. It has been proven by the apostolic authority bestowed on the men of his choosing. It has been proven by signs and miracles of all kinds performed at the time when the foundations of the church were laid.

The Bible's credibility has been MORE than established.

I have news for you, preachers. You HAVE no credibility in the pulpit except that which you BORROW from the text! No one gathers to hear YOU on Sunday morning. They gather to hear from GOD.

To the extent that simplicity, clarity, and brevity are NOT your goal in the pulpit is the extent to which your preaching is simply to feed your ego. To that extent, you are not preaching the Word of God but only preaching yourself. To that extent, you put up your own ego as an obstacle between your flock and Christ Jesus, their only hope for salvation. You are risking peoples' eternal salvation for the sake of your EGO.

I don't envy ministers on judgment day. 

This is one of the reasons why I no longer envy them for today. I know that temptation. I am glad I no longer have to face it, at least not with such high stakes.

If you think that temptation didn't have a strong pull on me, just look at how long all my posts are on this blog! Terrible! Sorry readers!

How an Internship Drove Me from the Ministry

Well, here goes.

When I graduated seminary, I took an internship as a way of easing into the ministry. I thought it would make the transition easier. I thought I would be under the care of a more experienced minister who would take me under his wing, guide me, shape me, patiently correct my mistakes and gently show me those more excellent ways.

I couldn't possibly have been more wrong.

In some churches, Sunday School classes are a very solemn, quiet affair. The pastor presents some teaching, everyone takes notes, and the class ends on time - with enough time for everyone to use the bathroom and chug a cup of stale, weak coffee before the worship service.

Other churches are a bit more...spontaneous. Colorful. Stressful for interns.

I was used to the former, but this church fell in the extreme fringe of the latter. When I began my Sunday School series on the world's least controversial topic, ecclesiology (ahem), several people complained quite passionately to me afterwards that I hadn't allowed for more discussion. You see, I had printed out handouts with room for note taking and even brought a bag of pens. And I timed the lecture perfectly, and had even allowed 5 minutes for questions.

What I would soon discover was a very powerful culture of contentiousness that permeated that church completely. My strong statements defending presbyterian church government and other classic reformed doctrines regarding the preaching of the Word and the administration of the sacraments proved to be like chum in the waters off the coast of Australia. Every Sunday was like a feeding frenzy. Boy did those folks like to argue and pick things apart.

Now if you've ever been in an adult Sunday School class, you know that there's almost always someone whose questions aren't really questions, but more of an attempt to teach from their seat. Often they try to prove the teacher wrong by logically backing him into some corner and forcing him to admit his mistake.

If you're well educated in seminary, have strong critical thinking skills, and most importantly have done your homework in preparation for the lesson, it's usually not too hard to handle such hecklers. A smile, keeping your cool and remaining respectful goes a long way. Not everyone acts that way out of malice - some people, that's just how they learn. And if it's a layman, most ministers, even some interns, can probably handle it just fine and the class is none the worse for wear.

But when it's the elders, that's when things get dicey. To disagree publicly with an elder immediately turns up the heat immensely. To say that this has to be handled delicately is a tremendous understatement. Many young wanna-be ministers have had to abandon their aspirations for the pulpit because a Sunday School class turned into an embarrassing scene from which there was no recovery.

And the elders of this church knew what they were about. They were well read and very sharp. Some of them were professors, some were executives, etc. And they wanted to see every single disagreement - of which there were shockingly many - to its bitter end.

And yet, I could have even dealt with that if the pastor had helped me. Had he rescued me from uncomfortable situations by defusing them, that would have been a huge relief. Had he taken me aside afterwards and made sure that I understood why it went down the way it did, and how I could avoid it next time, I would have been so grateful.

In fact, had he but prayed with me once in a while, or even just offered me a few meager scraps of encouragement, that would have been at least something.

But to my horror, the pastor was the worst of the bunch. He never encouraged me. He never prayed with me. Well, ok, I think he prayed with me 3 times over the course of the 2 years I was there; I shouldn't say never. That's unfair.

Instead, he led the charge. He led the people of this congregation into regularly publicly humiliating me. Almost no one in that church attended Sunday School hoping to learn something. They attended Sunday School to listen very, very carefully to see if there was something in what I said that they could take issue with. They were honestly constantly on the prowl, seeking to find some chink in my armor, some weak spot that they could attack.

And if the elders knew what they were about, this guy totally had me out-gunned. I think I'm a pretty smart guy. I did well as an undergrad and went to a very difficult seminary and obtained an MDiv with over 100 credit hours. And what's more, I did my homework in preparing these lessons. But this guy was scary smart. He had a PhD. He had a photographic memory. He could read his Greek or Hebrew like you and I read children's books. He'd forgotten the content of more journal articles than I'll ever read in my whole life. And his mind worked at the speed of light.

So naturally, my best answers came to me only after stewing on things he'd said for 3 days.

I learned extremely quickly that arguing or even appearing to argue or defend myself in any way was not only pointless but dangerous. I learned to just take the criticism, whatever it was, and smile and thank whoever it was. Anything to end the feeding frenzy.

Of course, it wasn't just Sunday School. No, this was one of those rare churches that actually had a question and answer time as a regular part of the evening worship service. So in the evening service, after finishing your sermon, you prayed and then took questions from the floor about either the evening sermon or the morning sermon.

And this was usually a bigger crowd than Sunday School. I usually preached about 3-4 times a month in the evening service, and I taught a Sunday School series that lasted about the first 5 months of my year-long internship. When that series was over, they decided to give me a break from Sunday School, and I politely declined to do so again.

Now, I also had to turn in every sermon outline, every lesson plan to the pastor the Thursday night before so that he could rip them apart on Friday and I'd have a day to make changes before Sunday came around. Every sermon. Every Sunday School outline. Youth Group lessons. Anything. And he would provide his criticism, which was always scathing, blunt and rude. No exceptions. And, also without any exceptions, I made the changes to accommodate his criticism and sent the materials back to him to give him an opportunity to be satisfied that I had listened to him before Sunday. Sometimes I was even treated to a second round of criticism. All via email of course.

You'd think that that would have prevented him from having any criticism left for Sunday, but you'd be wrong. There was no end to how much criticism this guy could generate. And it wasn't like, "Hey, you need to be more careful to uphold the doctrine of the Trinity." Instead, it was always nit picky, debatable stuff that he really should have allowed me liberty on.

Constant, regular, public humiliation. If every time the intern preaches a sermon and the pastor and elders constantly critiques it and makes him out to be a fool in front of the congregation, the intern has zero credibility. And I could feel it. There was an abundance of evidence of it. Yes, every now and then some lady would whisper a word or two about how horrified she was to my wife at how I was being treated, but this was very rare. And while those brief moments were like a drop of water in the desert, I was still dying of thirst.

To make matters much worse, about halfway through the internship, there was a vote in the congregation about keeping me on for another year as part of voting on the next year's budget. To make a long, painful story short, the pastor botched it by blindsiding the elders with this plan of his to keep me under his thumb another year. And having been blindsided, they obviously didn't support it, especially because they were all sure that I was a moron. (Ironically, when I was licensed in the presbytery, I passed unanimously and every single man present went out of their way to say how well I did and how impressed they were. Even my pastor felt constrained to say good job! Only time he ever did in two years.) And of course, I wasn't there when the congregation voted on it, but I imagine the pastor was too embarrassed to speak about it, and even if he did, he said something blunt and unhelpful that half the people present interpreted as hostile. I doubt any of the elders would have said anything supportive of the idea. And so of course the congregation voted no. It really couldn't have gone any other way, given the way that pastor handled it. (Which totally floored me, because when he brought it up to me, he said we shouldn't bring the idea up until my internship was almost over, and we could add it to the budget at that time. He blindsided me along with the elders.)

Of course, none of this poisoned the atmosphere at all. Nope, not one bit. Sigh.

I couldn't help but see everyone in that congregation as a wolf that voted to ruin my job prospects. My wife and I had no friends while we were there. We were far from family, far from friends, and everyone in our church became an enemy ready to stab me in the back as soon as they had an excuse.

After my internship ended, I was stuck there for about another year while I waited to move on and become a pastor. I filled pulpit still about 3 times a month or so. I would have left that church and attended somewhere else if there was anything remotely close by and if I thought I could do so without burning bridges. But no such luck. And of course I didn't have two pennies to rub together, so moving was out of the question.

Surely now my story is over and I've told the worst of it. No. Would that it were so.

During my internship I had preached a sermon series on a certain book of the Bible. You can't imagine the shock I felt when I came to church one Sunday morning - I had stopped attending Sunday School at this point because it honestly just sickened me to watch people fight over what Dietrich Bonhoeffer meant when he said: whatever - insert random unclear statement here. Who cares what some theologian in love with flowery expressions meant when he said some nonsensical thing that scholars have been debating for decades? What does the BIBLE say??? But I digress...

You can't imagine my horror when I opened the bulletin one Sunday morning to look at the sermon text and saw that the pastor was starting a new series...on a book I had just got done preaching through. I suddenly had a lurching feeling in my gut. This was going to be bad.

But, you say, it wasn't that bad right? I mean, he just really liked that book and it just seemed to fit with where the congregation was at and where he wanted to go, etc. ...right? I mean, maybe he's just that oblivious and insensitive.

Wrong. Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined someone would ever have the nerve to do what he did.

I couldn't be more serious when I say that it was painfully obvious to everyone that he was preaching through that book in order to do it justice, since I had fumbled it so horribly. He not only preached it completely differently than me, by which I mean that he took a completely different interpretation in every single passage, but he also preached in a very aggressive manner so that he was laying out an improper interpretation and then knocking it down by proving it wrong. And what was getting knocked down was MY position that I had just preached from that very pulpit 6 months ago. Every. Sunday. Morning.

Several times he even said, "It has been said that..." and then what followed was my interpretation of the passage (which by the way was in keeping with guys like, you know, Calvin). He frequently mocked how laughably wrong it was and how totally out of touch with the passage such views were. Just when I thought I'd heard the worst, the next week would be something even more outrageous. It became almost comical, cartoonish, yet in a creepy clown, horrifying sort of way.

Yes, instead of hearing the Word of God preached to me on Sunday morning, I got a sermon full of accusations of my incompetence and lack of fitness for the ministry. He never actually said my name, though he hardly needed to, so I'm not sure how much of the congregation actually knew what was happening. Probably not many of them, come to think of it. Doesn't matter. I knew.

And through it all, I did not defend myself. I did not argue with anyone's negative opinion of me or something I said or did. I simply accepted the criticism and sought to incorporate it as best I could going forward.

One Sunday night service, he apparently crossed his threshold. He took great offense to something I said and questioned me about it extensively in front of the congregation, but suddenly backed off and dropped it. It was very odd. As soon as I dismissed the people, he rushed up to me and said, "I didn't want to gainsay you in public but..." he wanted to know where I had learned such crazy ideas. So I mentioned a very well respected and recognized commentary on the passage in question which took the position I had, and mentioned some of the evidence that that author had very carefully amassed. He demanded that I let him see it. (The dispute was quite subtle, I assure you.) Naturally, I agreed to bring it by his office that week. Clearly he didn't believe that what I claimed was in that commentary actually was. So annoying and so typical.

Well, that week was Thanksgiving, so I thought I might be able to use that to delay bringing my commentary to him until the next Sunday, because I just really didn't want to deal with it. By Wednesday, he was calling me, wondering where I was, but I ignored him. Friday night there was a knock at the door. The peep hole revealed that it was...you guessed it...my pastor. Wow.

So I opened the door and let him in. He had come to demand to know why I couldn't return his phone call. He was clearly extremely upset. By this point I was so used to his bizarre behavior that it hardly affected me at all. I calmly led him to a seat and explained that I was hoping to avoid this conversation. And he demanded that we discuss what's going on.

So I did. I let him have it. I said he had done nothing but criticize me and humiliate me every chance he got. I said there was a culture of contentiousness in his church and that he had clearly fostered it. "You didn't want to gainsay me in public? You make opportunities to do so on a regular basis! No encouragement! No help!" On and on I went, telling him the truth.

In that one moment he responded with humility. I was totally shocked. He said that he had interpreted my silent acquiescence to his every criticism as defiance and so was always resolving afresh to be yet more hard on me in hopes of breaking me. He said from day one he viewed me as a threat and he labored against me. I couldn't believe it. Submissiveness is defiance and the weak intern is a threat to the PhD with the successful church, the books, a nice house, etc. It made absolutely no sense. What on earth was wrong with this guy?

But he actually prayed with me - one of the three times he did so - and confessed to God that he was ashamed of himself for how he had treated me.

About a month later, my barely pregnant wife began having contractions and had to go on bed rest for the rest of the pregnancy. I was totally unemployed, waiting for a call. Our only source of income was my wife. Which didn't bother me at all. I loved sitting around on my butt all day while my pregnant wife made a living. Sigh.

I began to think that there was a reason no one was calling, and it was my pastor. I began to think about how it might go down. Suppose someone had been interested in me as a potential candidate. Do you think I'd be the first one they'd call? Probably not. They'd probably call my current pastor first. And what would he say? I was absolutely sure what he would say: not ready. He had said it often enough to me.

I realized there was no way I would ever get a call to a church as long as I remained a member of this congregation. But until I got a job, I couldn't afford to move. Stuck.

And that's when I had no choice.

That's when I threw it all away. That's when I tore my heart out of my chest and cast it out into the sea. That's when I gave up and simply commended myself and my family to God. That's when I abandoned the ministry forever, with no hope I would ever return and no idea what I might do to make a living.

I had a horrible time getting a job of course. I couldn't even get a call back from McDonalds. I finally got 2 minutes of face time with a manager of Starbucks who told me that she had 700 applicants for one opening. When the shock wore off, I asked her how I could get to the top of the stack and she said that I needed to spend a lot of time there, buying coffee, making friends with the other workers, hanging out, being cool. Blogging about how cool everything is. Singing songs I wrote myself about how much I love Starbucks and having the Youtube video go viral. You know, nothing much.

I didn't bother buying a latte. I couldn't afford it anyway.

Eventually I did get a job. An awful manual labor job in a factory for minimum wage. I had several deep tissue injuries in most of my joints and a sprained knee by the time I found a real job on the other side of the country 2 months later.

But I did figure out how to put my training and experience as a ministerial candidate to work for me. Don't worry, I'll post about that too. That's one of the main reasons for creating this blog - to help you figure out how you can recover from this devastating blow. But this is not that post.

Before we moved at last - before our exodus - my pastor had my wife and me over for dinner, along with several other couples. Not to say goodbye to us, of course. He just had some system that allowed him to have everyone in the congregation over about 2-3 times a year. It was just our turn.

And since I was leaving, and I knew I'd regret not saying it, I grew bold during that dinner conversation. Several elders were present as well. I was trying to help my pastor understand why I was abandoning the ministry. He couldn't understand why I wouldn't want to remain unemployed indefinitely and be his whipping boy. He really didn't get it.

So I finally looked at him and said, "I'll tell you why. Because if some church is interested in me as a candidate, who's going to be the very first person they call? You. They're going to want to call you. You're the authority on me. You're my pastor right now. And so your opinion matters the most as to whether or not I'm fit for ministry. And if you were to get such a phone call, what would you say?"

At this point, he started to fumble his words - I had finally caught him off guard. Only time that ever happened. But I cut him off.

"I know exactly what you would say, and so do you. You'd say, 'Not ready,' wouldn't you? You'd say not ready."

The room is totally silent now and all eyes are on us. The elders have gone pale. One of them in particular looked totally shocked at my boldness, like he had seen a ghost.

He admitted it. "Yes, I'd say you're not ready."

I said, "Yep, I know, and so would the elders. But you know what? I don't buy it. Either I'm called or I'm not. This whole 'not ready' business is nonsense, pure nonsense. If I'm called to the ministry, then I'm called - warts and all. No minister is perfect. If I have flaws, then I don't need to get rid of them before becoming a minister. If I'm called, then I'm called as a flawed man. If you guys are so sure I'm not ready, then maybe the truth is simpler than that. I'm NOT called. I can't wait forever. I have a family to provide for and seminary to pay for."

I stayed another 10-15 minutes to be polite. Then I got up and left that godforsaken place forever.

Was I called to the ministry? Lots of people thought so. I thought so. For a long time I remained convinced that I was, and that this man had simply stolen that from me.

Many times it was his name that my screams of hateful rage formed into when I was alone with my thoughts on my long commutes home. I eventually realized that I needed counseling. It helped. A lot.

I actually felt guilty and ashamed because of it all. I figured I wasn't called, and therefore I must have quite arrogantly lusted to be in the pulpit, lusted for my own glory, lusted for an audience to feed my ego. I was arrogant and selfish to go so deep into debt, especially with my wife working so hard to pay the bills. And I wasted a lot of our very scarce resources on food and booze and cigars. Anything to make the pain subside for a while. How wrong I was for even pursuing seminary!

The counselor I saw said something very, very wise one day that clicked. "You may not have been called to become a minister, but you definitely were called to pursue the ministry. The proof is: that's what you did. You didn't sin by pursuing the ministry. In fact, 1 Tim 3:1 says, 'If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task.'

"There's nothing wrong with wanting to be a minister. That's a good thing! It's virtuous! It's noble! It is to be commended! So you didn't ultimately become a minister. You did no wrong in desiring this noble task. Of course, we know our intentions are always tainted with sin. Perhaps there was some arrogant lust for an audience. But no minister's motives are ever pure. We're sinners! That doesn't disqualify you from office!"

And then I remembered. How has the church always treated those who brought the Word of God to them? How did Israel treat the prophets? How were the apostles treated, and by whose hand?

How did the church react to Jesus?

Being mistreated by the church does NOT mean you are somehow unworthy of the ministry for some sin or other. In fact, it's precisely the opposite. If you've been mistreated by the church, it's probably a good sign that you are united to Christ, whom they crucified.

Being mistreated by the church doesn't disqualify you from ministry. More likely it qualifies you to inherit the kingdom of God, because you are being made to look like Jesus, who came unto his own, but his own did not accept him.

The book of Hebrews makes some very interesting comments about Melchizedek. It says more or less that Moses shaped his story to make him into a type of Christ, to make him resemble the Son of God. How? Just in how Moses speaks about him: not mentioning his lineage, his mysteriousness, the fact that his death isn't mentioned or what his religion was like, etc. Little details are omitted, questions are asked. And this is so powerful that Psalm 110 comments on it as well, saying that Christ (as we know now from Hebrews) is a priest after Melchizedek's mysterious priesthood that we know nothing about at all.

And here we are talking about it still to this day. One man's story was told in such a way to make him, in a very subtle way, resemble Christ. And thousands of years later we still marvel at it.

What would you be willing to suffer for the same to be said of you? What would you be willing to go through in order to bear witness to Christ as powerfully as Melchizedek did?

Or what would you be willing to suffer in order to gain wisdom? Or to gain eternal life?

There is no price so great that I am not willing to pay it, if only it means I can look a little bit more like Jesus.

When I was a child, I prayed that the Lord would give me wisdom. For some reason, it stuck that God was pleased when that's what Solomon asked for, so every night for years that's what I prayed for: wisdom.

God answered all those prayers when I was forced to abandon the ministry.

I was victimized by wicked shepherds who prey upon the flock. Like a lamb to the slaughter, I didn't fight them. Like Jesus, I did not defend myself. I bit my tongue. And it cost me everything. And it hurts. A lot.

But I guarantee that when we all get to glory, we won't regret it, you and I. Not one bit. Our scars will be badges of honor.

Christ is our wisdom. And he said, "Do not be surprised when the world hates you."

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