I first read “The Minister as Shepherd” in seminary as part of a class on Pastoral Ministry. As I was preparing to move down to Cool I decided to pick up this classic book on Pastoral Ministry and read it again, which turned out to be an excellent decision. The Minister as Shepherd was originally a lecture series that Charles Jefferson delivered in the 20’s on the topic of pastoral ministry. While the lecture series is nearly 100 years old, the truths that Jefferson presents are timeless. For example, he spends much of the first few chapters arguing for the current need for shepherds:
A few things are certain. We live in a universe created by a Shepherd God. The Lord is our Shepherd. Our world is redeemed by a Shepherd Savior. Our Elder Brother is a Shepherd. The man whom humanity most needs is a shepherd. Every messenger of Christ is sent to do a shepherd’s work. We are to stand at last before a Shepherd Judge. God is going to separate the good shepherds from the shepherds who are bad. The questions which every pastor must meet and answer are three: “Did you feed my lambs? Did you tend my sheep? Did you feed my sheep?”
The rest of the book is filled with powerful and practical counsel for shepherding. Some of this counsel comes in the form of warnings, some as encouragements but all are perfectly suited for the minister who desires to be a shepherd. I’ll close with one of my favorites:
If a man is dependent on the applause of the crowd, he ought never to enter the ministry. The finest things a minister does are done out of sight and never get reported.
August 30 2010 | Blog | No Comments »
I first saw A Gospel Primer for Christians at the Shepherds’ Conference a couple of years ago. It looked like an interesting read, so I picked up a copy but in the busyness of life and ministry forgot about it until just a few months ago. As I was packing up my library preparing to move down to Cool I found this little book (97 pages) and decided to read it. The result has been a powerful re-awakening of my love for the gospel and insight into it’s application to daily life.
A Gospel Primer is essentially a devotional book with a series of meditations. What makes this such a powerful book is the way that the author unfolds the implications of the gospel for every day life. Each meditation is well thought out, winsomely written, and directly applicable today. The second half of the book is called “A Gospel Narrative”, which walks step by step through the process of salvation in a way that exalts Christ and leaves one hungry for more of the gospel.
This is a fantastic little book and one that I highly recommend. I’ll close with my favorite meditation from the book on the topic of Liberation from Self-Love
Compared to greater endeavors, self-love is mundane and tiresome. Consequently, the more thoroughly I can be done with such tedium, the freer my soul will be to soar at its God-intended heights.
One of the leading causes of my natural tendency to self-love is fear. I fear that if I do not love myself there would be no one left to love me quite so well as I do. An even more significant cause of self-love is a lack of persuasion that there is someone out there who is worthy to be loved more than I. Arrogance lies underneath both of these causes: I love myself supremely because I am the most worthy person I know to be loved and also because I think I can do a better job at it than anyone else. Such arrogance makes me dangerous, yet it is deeply ingrained in my sinful flesh.
Thankfully, the gospel frees me from the shackles of self-love by addressing both of these causes. First, the gospel assures me that the love of God is infinitely superior to any love that I could ever give to myself. “Greater love has no one than this,” says Jesus while speaking of His love. And the deeper I go into the gospel, the more I experience the truth of His claim and thereby know how far His love for me surpasses even my own. His astonishing love for me renders self-absorption moot and frees me up to move on to causes and interests far greater than myself.
Second, the gospel reveals to me the breathtaking glory and loveliness of God, and in so doing, it lures my heart away from love of self and leaves me enthralled by Him instead. The more I behold God’s glory in the gospel, the more lovely He appears to me. And the more lovely He appears, the more self fades into the background like a former love interest who can no longer compete for my affections.
Preaching the gospel to myself every day reminds me of God’s astounding love for me and also of His infinite worthiness to be loved by me above all else. These reminders deliver a one-two punch to my innate self-absorption and leave me increasingly absorbed with Christ and with God’s ultimate plan to gather together all heavenly and earthly things in Him.
August 09 2010 | Blog | No Comments »
I’ve certainly been reading a lot of Paul Tripp books lately, which is probably a testimony to how much I love his work. There are very few authors who I’ve decided to attempt to read all of their writings, but Paul Tripp is quickly becoming one of those authors.
My latest Paul Tripp book is War of Words. Tripp begins with these words:
“Sometimes authors write because of expertise…An author may also write out of desperation. In his life there is a weakness or struggle that needs to be addressed. He examines, studies, meditates, and applies what he has learned to help himself grow. He then puts the fruit of his labors down on paper in the hope that others will benefit as he has.
I have not written this book out of expertise, but out of desperation. I have told many people during the writing process that I did not write this book, it wrote me!”
As you read through War of Words you can tell that this was a very personal book for Tripp to write. Each chapter is peppered with personal stories, some humorous, some serious but all very helpful.
One of the number one relational problems that people deal with is communication, which is what makes War of Words such a helpful book. Tripp, in his characteristic style, speaks directly to what’s wrong with our communication, which is idolatry. Tripp writes,
Idolatry is when my heart is controlled or rule by anything other than God.
This happens to us more than we would tend to think. The desire for success at work becomes a demand for appreciation from the boss. The desire to have enough money to pay the bills morphs into a lust for affluence. The desire to be a good parent becomes a desire to have children who enhance my reputation. The desire for friendship becomes a demand to be accepted and anger when I’m not. What was once a healthy desire takes control, and when this happens, the desire that originally motivated me changes into something very different. Rather than being motivated by a love for God and my neighbor, I am motivated by a pursuit of what will bring me pleasure, and I am angry at anyone who stands in the way.”
An idolatrous heart will produce idol words, words that serve the idol that grips us. It is hard for us to hold our desires loosely. Instead, they tend to take hold of us. Our desires tend to get elevated to a position where they should never be. Here is what happens: A desire battles for control until it becomes a demand. The demand is then expressed (and usually experienced) as a need. (“I need sex.” “I need respect.”) My sense of need sets up my expectation. Expectation when unfulfilled leads to disappointment. Disappointment leads to some kind of punishment. “You want something, but you cannot get it. You quarrel and fight.” So when James says, “You adulterous people,” he is not changing the subject. He is saying something very significant. Adultery takes place when I give the love I have promised one person to someone else. Spiritual adultery occurs when I give the love that belongs to God alone to something or someone else. James is saying that human conflict is rooted in spiritual adultery.!
War of Words is one of those books that you need to read and re-read in order to really glean all of what’s there. I thoroughly enjoyed my first read through and am confident that I will enjoy my next read even more. If you are married or any kind of a relationship with anyone, this book will help you. I highly recommend it.
June 16 2010 | Blog | No Comments »
I’ve been looking forward to reading The Trellis and the Vine for a long time now, ever since Mark Dever said that it is the best book he has ever read on the nature of church ministry.
The Trellis and the Vine is a powerful metaphor for the church. The trellis represents the structures of the church (buildings, committees, etc.) while the vine represents the actual work of the church which is making disciples. It is not that we don’t need the trellis, but rather that trellis work often takes over for vine work. Vine work is people intensive and is very hard to measure, while trellis work is measurable because it deals with things, structures, finances, etc., which is why it’s so appealing to work on the trellis.
What I loved about this book is that with every page I found myself saying, “That’s exactly what I’ve been thinking!” There is something intuitive about the metaphor of The Trellis and the Vine that just makes sense. The authors write:
We will be arguing that structures don’t grow ministry any more than trellises grow vines, and that most churches need to make a conscious shift – away from erecting and maintaining structures, and towards growing people who are disciple-making disciples of Christ.
At it’s heart The Trellis and the Vine is a call for Christians to be involved in the ministry of making disciples. The following quote from pages 26-27 is really worth the price of the whole book and is a perfect summary of what the authors are calling their readers to:
Imagine a reasonably solid Christian said to you after church one Sunday morning, “Look, I’d like to get more involved here and make a contribution, but I just feel like there’s nothing for me to do. I’m not on the ‘inside’; I don’t get asked to be on committees or lead Bible Studies. What can I do?”
What would you immediately think or say? Would you start thinking of some event or program about to start that they could help with? Some job that needed doing? Some ministry that they could join or support?
This is how we are used to thinking about the involvement of church members in congregational life – in terms of jobs and roles: usher, Bible study leader, Sunday School teacher, treasurer, elder, musician, song leader, money counter, and so on. The implication of this way of thinking for congregation members is clear: if all the jobs and roles are taken, then there’s really nothing for me to do in this church. I’m reducted to being a passenger. I’ll just wait until I’m asked to ‘do something’. The implication for the pastoral staff is similar: getting people involved and active means finding a job for them to do. In fact, the church growth gurus say that giving someone a job to do with the first six months of their joining your church is vital for them to feel like they belong.
However, if teh real work of God is people work – the prayerful speaking of his word by one person to another – then the jobs are never all taken. The opportunities for Christians to minister personally to others are limitless.
So you could pause, and reply to your friend, “See that guy sitting over there on his own? That’s Julie’s husband. he’s on the fringe of things here; in fact, I’m not really sure whether he’s crossed the line yet and become a Christina. How about i introduce you to him, and you arrange to have breakfast with once a fortnight and read the Bible together? Or see that couple over there? They are both fairly recently converted, and really in need of encouragement and mentoring. Why don’t you and your wife have them over, get to know them, and read and pray together once a month? And if you still have time, and want to contribute some more, start praying for the people in your street, and then invite them all to a barbeque at your place. That’s the first step towards talking with them about the gospel, or inviting them along to something.”
Of course, there’s every chance that the person will then say, “But i don’t know how to do those things! I’m not sure I’d know what to say or where to start.”
To which you reply, “Oh that’s okay. Let’s start meeting together, and I can train you.”
I loved every part of The Trellis and the Vine and would highly recommend it to anyone involved in church leadership. It really is a must read book for church leaders.
Here’s a video of Mark Dever introducing the book.
May 31 2010 | Blog | No Comments »
Back in January I took a class at TMS taught by Dr. Bruce Ware on the doctrine of the trinity, which I blogged about here. As a part of the class Dr. Ware assigned several reading assignments, one of which was the book Father, Son, & Holy Spirit.
Father, Son, & Holy Spirit is based on a series of lectures that Dr. Ware gave at a CBC pastor’s conference in 2004. The book begins with a broad overview of the doctrine of the Trinity and moves on to examine each of the persons of the Trinity in detail.
Father, Son, & Holy Spirit is a short book, weighing in at around 160 pages, but it is a very readable book due to it’s origin in a series of talks for pastors and their wives. Throughout most of my Christian life I have always viewed the Trinity as a mystery that was simply beyond my ability to understand, so for the most part I ignored it. What Dr. Ware does in this book is to bring the doctrine of the Trinity into full view for everyday people and to draw applications from this marvelous doctrine. Each chapter is concluded with a series of applications that range from marriage, to parenting, to business relationships, to pastoral ministry. Father, Son, & Holy Spirit truly is a theologically devotional book. I’ll close with a quote from Dr. Ware.
The one God is three! He is by very nature both a unity of Being while also existing eternally as a society of Persons. God’s tri-Personal reality is intrinsic to his existence as the one God who alone is God. He is a socially related being within himself. In this tri-Personal relationship the three Persons love one another, support one another, assist one another, team with one another, honor one another, communicate with one another, and in everything respect and enjoy one another. They are in need of nothing but each other throughout all eternity. Such is the richness and the fullness and the completion of the social relationship that exists in the Trinity.
May 26 2010 | Trinity | No Comments »
Just before I left to candidate at Cool Church the staff here at Emmanuel started reading Crazy Love by fellow Master’s Seminary grad Francis Chan, so I brought it down with me thinking that I would get through a few chapters in my spare time. The book was so compelling that I actually ended up finishing it while I was down in Cool, during one of the busiest weeks of my life (if you’ve ever candidated at a church, you know that’s not an exaggeration).
The subtitle to Crazy Love is: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God which is an excellent description of the entire book. It is relentless in a really good way. Chapter after chapter calls the reader to a greater love and devotion to Jesus Christ. One of the thing sthat I liked most about this book is that it is very raw and very real, but at the same time you don’t feel like you’re being brow-beaten by a know-it-all. Chan is careful to point out his own weaknesses and to call the reader to grow with him in love for Christ.
One of the major themes of Crazy Love is that God has called us a radical devotion to him, which means that we need to be generous. Chan writes,
One of the clearest ways we love “with actions and in truth” is through giving to others. By giving, I don’t mean just money, although that is certainly an element of it.
Another important element of giving is with our time. Most of us are so busy that the thought of adding one more thing to our weekly schedule is stressful. Instead of adding in another thing to our lives, perhaps God wants us to give Him all of our time and let Him direct it as He sees fit. One of the most memorized verses in the whole Bible says, “For God so loved the world that he gave” (John 3:16). Right there we see the connection between loving and giving evidently established.
Simply put, to follow after Christ requires radical giving. It takes a certain kind of obsession with Christ in order to give like this. Chan writes, “People who are obsessed with Jesus live lives that connect them with the poor in some way or another. Obsessed people believe that Jesus talked about money and the poor so often because it was really important to him.”
Chan wraps up the book with a simple call to living an others-centered life. Chan writes,
Should you put your house on the market today and downsize? maybe. Should you quit your job? maybe. Or perhaps God wants you to work harder at your job and be His witness there. Does He want you to move to another city or another country? Maybe. Perhaps He wants you to stay put and open your eyes to the needs of your neighbors. Honestly, it’s hard enough for me to discern how to live my own life!
My suggestion as you think, make decisions, and discern how God would have you live is to ask yourself, “Is this the most loving way to do life? Am I loving my neighbor and my God by living where I live, by driving what I drive, by talking how I talk?” I urge you to consider and actually live as though each person you come into contact with is Christ.”
I loved reading through Crazy Love. It challenged me in ways that I needed to be challenged in. I highly recommend it.
April 26 2010 | Blog | 3 Comments »
My Utmost for His Highest is by far the most well read and well known devotional book of modern times. It’s a book filled with priceless gems for the Christian life, such as this one:
“Never make a principle out of your experience; let God be as original with other people as He is with you.”
While many believers have read My Utmost for His Highest, very few know the intriguing story of the man who wrote this devotional book, Oswald Chambers or his precious wife Biddy.
Abandoned to God is the biography of this extraordinary man detailing his childhood, his salvation experience under the ministry of Charles Spurgeon, his teenage years, all the way up through his marriage, ministry as a college teacher and eventual call to serve as a chaplain in North Africa during World War I.
The book is extremely well researched and well written, including stories of personal interactions with Chambers, journal entries, as well as commentary on the times in which Oswald Chambers lived. One of my favorite stories of Chambers in found on page 147,
Oswald was used to the criticism of his family and friends, particularly in the area of money. He believed that Jesus’ words, “Give to everyone who asks,” meant exactly that. One evening, walking back to his lodgings after conducting a League meeting, he was accosted by a drunken man asking for money. Chambers listened intently to the man’s story, then told him, “Man, I believe your story is all lies, but my Master tells me to give to everyone that asks, so there is my last shilling.”
What I find so intriguing about Chambers is his absolute abandonment to God in every area of life. Even if you disagree with some of the decisions that He made, there is no arguing against the fact that he sought to be abandoned to God. He is by far the most spirit lead man who I’ve ever read about. I’m thankful for this book as it has introduced me to a man that I would never have been able to meet in this life, and has reintroduced me to a devotional book that has been very good for my soul.
March 31 2010 | Blog | No Comments »
About a year ago I read an article titled, “How to Get Your Email Inbox to Zero Every Day” over at Matt Perman’s blog. The result of reading this single blog post was a massive overhaul not only in how I handled e-mail but in the total picture of my work flow. Perman’s article consistently referenced a system of productivity called GTD (Getting Things Done), which is where he got most of his productivity principles from.
As I began to research the topic of productivity and to sharpen my system I kept running across the name David Allen and the book Getting Things Done, so I asked my wife to get it for me for Christmas and read it over Christmas break. Having finished reading Getting Things Done I now understand what all of the excitement is about!
Allen’s basic point is that everyone, from businessmen to housewives, needs some kind of a trusted system that they use in order to capture ideas, turn them into tasks and keep them organized so that they don’t feel like their work life is out of control. Prior to reading Getting Things Done I would routinely look over my pile of things to do and feel a sense of anxiety. What I didn’t realize was that the anxiety wasn’t the result of the work, but of my perception of the work. It all just looked like one massive pile (which it was), rather than an organized set of tasks that could be prioritized and accomplished one by one. The result of reading Getting Things Done has been a tremendous sense of freedom and control over my work life. I now look at my inbox with a sense of excitement and anticipation, rather than dread over what’s lurking in the pile that I’d forgotten about.
Here’s the basic formula that I’ve developed using the tools from Getting Things Done:
1) Anything that I need to do or want to think about ends up in one of three inboxes. I have a physical inbox in my office, my e-mail inbox, and my evernote inbox (I also have voice mail, but I don’t really get a lot of messages that way). What these inboxes do is serve as hoppers for me to store information, or tasks until I can get around to dealing with them.
2) Each day I process my inboxes by dealing with each item and deciding what to do with it. If something is in my inbox there are only two things that it can be there for. It’s either for reference or for me to do something with. If it’s for reference I can look it over and decide whether to throw it away or to keep it for later reference. If it needs an action associated with it I will either do the action (if it takes less than 2 minutes), or put it on a list that I review every day and get to it when I can.
3) In conjunction with my calendar, each day I review my action list and my project list to see what needs to get done and I do it.
4) There are a few other steps like reminders for items that I want to get to later, weekly reviews, etc. but this is the basic system.
I know this sounds incredibly simplistic and that’s really the beauty of the whole system. Because I know that all of my work responsibilities have been captured in this system, I can approach each day with a clear mind and a sense of confidence that nothing has slipped through the cracks.
Getting Things Done won’t improve your spiritual life, help your relationship with your kids, or give you a better marriage (that’s what the Bible is for), but it is an excellent tool for clearing your mind from all of the clutter of day to day life and helping you to focus more intently on the things in life that really do matter. I highly recommend it.
March 08 2010 | Blog | 6 Comments »
Few individuals in contemporary evangelicalism have thought as much, as hard or as well about the church as the author of 9 Marks of a Healthy Church, Mark Dever. I was fist introduced to the ministry of Mark Dever at a Shepherds’ Conference while I was in seminary. Dever is the pastor of Capital Hill Baptist Church in Washington D.C. and is a highly sought after conference speaker.
9 Marks of a Healthy Church is Dever’s best known work and for anyone involved in church leadership it really is a must read book. That is not to say that other Christians won’t benefit from this work, because they will, but church leaders will benefit especially from Dever’s wisdom in these pages.
9 Marks is organized around 9 distinguishing “marks” of a Biblical church. It’s important to note that Dever is not proposing that these are the only marks of a Biblical Church, but rather that they are 9 of the most neglected or misunderstood marks of a biblical church. These 9 Marks include:
- Expositional Preaching
- Biblical Theology
- The Gospel
- A Biblical Understanding of Conversion
- A Biblical Understanding of Evangelism
- A Biblical Understanding of Church Membership
- Biblical Church Discipline
- A Concern for Discipleship and Growth
- Biblical Church Leadership
Having spent my entire life in the church and having spent the last 8 years in church leadership, I believe that Dever has hit the nail on the head with these 9 marks. Any church seeking to find it’s identity in the Bible will be blessed by this book. I’ll close with one of my favorite quotes on the mark of Expositional Preaching.
“Living as we do after the Fall but before the Heavenly City, we are in a time when faith is central, and so the Word must be central – because God’s Holy Spirit creates His people by His Word! We can create a people by other means, and this is the great temptation of churches. We can create a people around a certain ethnicity. We can create a people around a fully-graded choir program. We can find people who will get excited about a building project or a denominational identity. We can create a people around a series of care groups, where each feels loved and cared for. We can create a people around a community service project. We can create a people around social opportunities for young mothers or Caribbean cruises for singles. We can create a people around men’s groups. We can even create a people around the personality of a preacher. And God can surely use all of these things. But in the final analysis the people of God, the church of God, can only be created around the Word of God.”
February 17 2010 | Blog | No Comments »
I started reading Get Outta My Face by Rick Horne several months ago with the High School and Junior High Staff based on several recommendations from a few of the blogs that I read as well as a glowing recommendation from Paul Tripp.
The subtitle to Get Outta My Face is “How to reach angry, unmotivated teens with biblical counsel.” The focus of this book is definitely on working with angry teens. In other words, this is not a generic book on how to work with teenagers, rather it is an extremely focused book on how to work with teenagers who are seemingly “out of control” and furious with everyone and everything. Through 171 pages Rick Horne takes you through a step by step process for working with angry teens. Horne introduces the book in this way:
Here’s a fact. Angry, unmotivated, and disinterested teens, whether Christian or not, are confused, insecure, and often blind to everything except what they want right now. Their desires and actions have been corrupted and polluted by sin. that’s why they have a problem.
Here’s another fact. Angry, unmotivated, and disinterested teens, whether Christian or not, are made in the image of God. This means that beneath their corrupted desires and actions the image of God remains. that’s the key to solving their problem.
Far from dismissing or sugar-coating sin, this approach opens wide the door to evangelizing the unsaved teen and to helping the Christian teen grow in holiness and wisdom. This book will teach you how to build a bridge to young adults on the basis of the ways in which their desires and actions reflect the image of God and the blessing of common grace.
One of the most important things to realize about this book is that it is extremely focused on one thing: the posture that adults take toward angry teens. Horne goes to great lengths to emphasize the importance of approaching angry teens in a biblical fashion in order to get an opportunity to present biblical truth to them. I suppose this is something of a weakness and a strength. If you are dealing with an angry teen, this is going to be a very helpful book for starting a conversation with him/her. On the other hand if you’re looking for general information on working with teens, you’ll probably find yourself wanting more than what Get Outta My Face offers. In which case, I would highly recommend Paul Tripp’s book Age of Opportunity.
Get Outta My Face is a great book for dealing with angry teenagers. I would definitely recommend it.
January 18 2010 | Blog | No Comments »
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