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Empty Promises pt. 1

I often rave over my local church – and rightly so. But sometimes a message is preached that does something to you inwardly that other messages just do not accomplish. That is the case with the first week of the new sermon series, Empty Promises by our pastor Pete Wilson.

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This week, Pete hit another milestone in his writing as he released his second book, EMPTY PROMISES. Of course we get the privilege of not only getting to read the book, but also getting to hear the message series live each week. So the next few Mondays on HLY I am going to share the sermon series notes and my thoughts from Sunday’s message.

I for one have many empty promises that I often chase. Pete opened up a can of worms in my life that I did know existed, or I chose to ignore them. I guess we all have those IDOLS in our live, but we also must be willing to confront and allow the image of Christ to replace the golden images of our own imagination and desire.

The points that I am going to share in this blog post are taken from Pete’s book and sermon series. So, I hope you enjoy what we learned today.

Empty Promises are those things in which we allow to take the place of Christ in our lives. They are nothing more than idols that we place, not only before God, but are those things we seek to give us only what God can give.
We often try to find peace in “stuff”. This is idolatry. Why? Because we look for fulfillment, peace, joy, and satisfaction within the creation and not the Creator.
Most of our idols are performance driven.
Idols will always exhaust us because they cannot breathe life back into us.
When we take a good thing and make it an ultimate thing, it becomes an idol thing, which then becomes a destructive thing.

Here are two ways to help you recognize your proclivity toward idols:

Am I willing to sin to get it?
Am I willing to sin if I think I am going to lose it?

The real problem with our culture is not external idolatry (sacrificing animals, etc), but internal idolatry (looking for “things” to bring us fulfillment).

Jesus doesn’t want to edit our behaviors, he wants to change our hearts.

My confession:

I have more idols than I realized. I am tempted to try to modify my sin behavior because I want to do what is right. However, Jesus does not want me to modify my behavior for His approval or love. He wants my heart to be purified from idols so that my love relationship with Him is fulfilled. My external actions produce little results. Why? I can’t measure up to my own rules, more or less God’s. That is why it is imperative that we rely on grace to move us into a place of freedom from idols, or as Pete calls them – EMPTY PROMISES.

Discussion Question:
What idols immediately come to mind that you have sought to bring fulfillment to your life in place of God?

You can purchase Pete’s book, Empty Promises HERE.

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10 Lies Leaders Tell

“10 Lies Leaders Tell” is a candid but serious book about the crazy things we lie about as church leaders.

I discuss common lies such as: “Sorry I didn’t get your message, my phone was on the fritz.” and my favorite “I would love to get together for lunch with you to hear your story.”

The purpose of this e-book is to bring to light the unimportant things on which we lie. Not that lying about anything is good – but particularly the small things that stain our character.

Preaching the Wrong Thing

This blog, for many will not apply in the least. However, there is still a sect of preachers and Christians that need this post. Please share it.

Fred Craddock is hailed as one of the greatest preachers in the English Speaking language. You probably have never heard of him. Neither had I until a few days ago. But after reading about him at length and gleaning from his sermons, I have come to revere his ability to use language to share stories and preach the Good News.

I want to share with you one of the great statements he shared concerning his fathers conversion to Christ.

In Craddock’s memoirs, “Reflections on My Call to Preach,” he wrote:

“I was confident that my being a Christian minister would have a life-changing effect on my father. With a son, his own namesake, going into the ministry, would not Daddy toss the bottle forever and return to the pew beside my mother? Surely. But I was naïve, knowing nothing about the power of addiction.”

You see, Craddock’s father was an alcoholic who never kicked the addiction. He was also a smoker. He was hospitalized with throat cancer and died soon thereafter.

When Craddock was 17, he learned of a prayer his mother uttered while laying on a bale of hay in a barn during a his childhood sickness called diphtheria, a highly infectious disease that forms blockages over the lungs, gradually suffocating a child.

She prayed,

“Dear God, if you will let him live, I will pray every day that he will serve you as a minister.”

He began to preach at the age of 17. She did not tell him what she had prayed until after he has shared with his mother the call to the ministry.

In reading his story, it was evident that his mother was convinced that Craddock’s call to preach would win his father to Christ. It never happened. Not in the traditional sense of hearing a sermon, walking the aisle, and making a public decision.

Craddock’s father went to church at one point. The church railed against all the town drunks every Sunday. Of course he did not return to church as he was one of the town drunks.

I shared this belabored story to give a few simple thoughts:

What if the gospel we are preaching has good intentions with the wrong message?
What happens if we turn our preaching to Good News?
What happens to addicts who simply cant “quit” but do want to know Jesus?
How far are we willing to walk with the addict?
Can we love the addict out of their pain and desire?
Can we simply preach the gospel of grace and allow the Holy Spirit to transform the mind?
Can we become less concerned with sin and more concerned with love, hope, and grace?
Do we believe in our preaching as a means of purging from a life of sin MORE than we believe in the power of grace?

When Craddock entered his father’s hospital room, he noticed that it was filled with flowers and a stack of get-well cards 20 inches deep besides his bed. Every card and every blossom came from Craddock’s childhood church in Humboldt, the church his father scorned.

His father confessed that he was wrong about the church and the people in the pews. They didn’t just want a name and a pledge. They wanted him.

Not everyone will be as fortunate as Craddock’s father and come to the realization that even in our fiery, condemnation laced preaching that we genuinely want them to be saved.

It is better to err on the side of grace and simply preach hope and declare Good News.

You can read his story on CNN HERE.

Make It Easy

In the church world we often provide some sort of care for different types of groups. We have care for the divorced. We have care for those who are married and want to remain married. Churches also provide “pastoral care”.

This title is a little confusing cause one might think that this means that the leader is being cared for.

Nope.

Pastoral care is different for every church. But one thing that this kind of ministry carries is the idea of caring for the sheep. The pastor cares for those at the local church.

So my question is this: Do you have some type of LEADER CARE at your church?

Let me ask a few more questions: Do you ever feel as though your pastor/leader is untouchable by pain, fear, or tragedy? Do you look at your leader with blind eyes when it come to his or her real life pain or struggle? Do you contribute to unnecessary weight in your leaders life?

I want to share five ways in which you can care for your leader on a practical level. Your church leadership structure may be set up in a way in which you do not have any say so in the matter. However, you do need to find those in the key roles and make suggestions on how to care for your leader.

Here are 5 Ways To Care for Your Leader:

Create a sabbatical month for your senior leader. Our pastor enjoys this every July. It is a great time for family and rest.
If possible, give them at least two paid vacations a year – with expense money.
Babysit for your leader a couple of times a month to give them a chance for a date night.
Be sensitive to their time. Time is the one thing that is constantly demanded.
Be a safe place for your leader to be human.

One time my pastor said to me, “Dude, you are always so easy.” I can say to you that this has not alway been the case. But over time you realize that you are not the only human in the world with dreams or needs. I want my all of my leaders to always know that when they come around me we are going to laugh and take it easy.

What about you? How will you contribute to their easiness?

Resources for Leaders:

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Why Do We Preach Them?

In the mid 90′s T.D. Jakes preached a messaged called, THE KING HAS A CRIPPLED CHILD. This message I memorized. It spoke so deeply to me as a teenage boy. I would watch the VHS tape of Bishop Jakes at least once a week for several months.

Bishop Jakes proposed a question in his sweaty, two hour message. “Why do we preach about David so much knowing all of David’s sin?”

Before we answer the question, let’s look at the major areas (the obvious) of sin in David’s life.

We could say this same list applies to many of the Biblical figures in the Old Testament as well as some in the New Testament.

A statement that our pastor, Pete Wilson shared this past Sunday: “Many would not have hired the people of the scripture to be a part of their staff because of their sin and problems.”

So why do we preach about David in lieu of what we know about his character? Why do we preach and hail him as one of our heroes of the faith? Why do we preach about David and strive to be “a man after God’s own heart”?

BECAUSE DAVID IS DEAD

It is easy to preach about dead people. It is easy to honor dead people. That is the human way. There are many preachers today that we will all one day honor that have committed ”crazy sin” (shaun king description) after they have died.

There is another perspective in which we must see. There is another question we must ask.

Bishop Jakes asks in his message:

“We can preach about the sins of dead men, BUT WHAT WILL WE DO WITH THE SINS OF LIVING MEN?”

How do we handle the promiscuous preacher? How do we deal with the drug dealing/using preacher? What do we do with a porn addict that preaches freedom to everyone else? How are we going to handle “crazy sin”?

There are a few things that I want to propose, but before I continue with my thoughts, let me interject this: We have a responsibility to live holy as believers/ministers of the gospel. I get it. I do.

Be aware of this truth – WE WANT TO LIVE RIGHT. We want to live better than most, but some of us do not know how. You may not get that – but it is true.

There are some struggles that some of us have had to deal with our entire lives. We have prayed, been through prayer lines, confessed to someone, and done all the things that we are supposed to do – and little has changed. We still struggle with old habits, mindsets, and sin.

Here are a few things to help:

1. As Shaun King suggested, bring the safe places for leaders to notoriety so that leaders know they are available.

2. Give them a break. Realize they are flesh and blood…with a calling. They need rest.

3. Don’t assume your leader is “OK”. Be sensitive to their struggle.

4. If your leader needs to take a LONG break, give it to them and compensate them well.

5. Don’t abandon a struggling leader. Find ways to make it easier for your leader.

6. Pray that your leader comes to a self realization that he or she needs help. Ego is major obstacle.

7. If you are close to your leader – inner circle close – and you see blatant sin, potential for disaster, or whatever – DO NOT SELL THEM OUT. Privately, do all that you can to get them to a SAFE counsel, overseer, or peer. They may despise you for a moment, but they will love you in the end.

I hope these will be “red flags” for you. Please be attentive and sensitive to your leader. All of us struggle in one way or another.

Please read Shaun Kings Blog. It is on target in every way. Follow Shaun on Twitter as well.