March 29, 2007

Goodbye Religion, Hello Spirituality

Doug Pagitt and Tony Jones, two prominent voices in the Emergent conversation, have edited a new book called An Emergent Manifesto of Hope (Baker, 2007). The dictionary defines the word manifesto as, "a public declaration of principles, policies, or intentions." That should encourage people who see Emergent as being too ambiguous, but the book will undoubtedly give additional ammunition to its critics. In the coming weeks Out of Ur will feature excerpts from the book. The first comes from a chapter titled "Converting Christianity: The End and Beginning of Faith" by Barry Taylor.

What it means exactly when a person declares himself or herself to be "spiritual but not religious" is a matter of some debate. Some people find spiritual an irritating term that means nothing of any real substance, a marker for a sort of "wishy-washy" sentimentalism that passes itself off as real faith. Others have embraced it wholeheartedly, and the rise of spiritual language in sermons and discussions, as well as a growing interest in spiritual directors in many churches, point to an embrace of the term on some levels even amongst the "religious."

I don't think there is one definition for the term or for its usage. Spirituality is an umbrella word, a catchall concept used to characterize a commitment to the sacred elements of life. It defies a singular definition, hence the fluidity of the usage of the word; it is also an evolving term rather than one of fixed determination.

One thing that it does signify, almost universally, is the rejection of traditional faiths as a primary source of connection to the divine. I would argue that traditional faiths are no longer the first resource that people go to in order to develop and nurture their spiritual lives, but instead function more as secondary archives with which new spiritual permutations are created. Those who do choose to explore their spiritual quests within traditional faith environments do so with very different eyes and intentions than previous generations of seekers have. For me spirituality is the religion of the twenty-first century.

This is a dramatic shift, and one that some might contest, but the momentum seems to be toward this perspective. It should come as no surprise to us that our understanding of religion is undergoing a transformation. In times of significant cultural change, all the ways in which we order ourselves socially are usually affected. For instance, religion as it was experienced in the post-Reformation period was quite unlike its pre-Reformation incarnation. That faith in the postmodern world is showing itself to be markedly different from faith in modernity only serves to underscore the significance of the cultural changes we are presently experiencing.

If then we truly find ourselves in a new situation, one in which the old ways simply no longer suffice, what then of the future for Christian faith? I have already raised the notion that there may not be a future for "Christianity," the religion of Christian faith. I mean no disrespect to historic Christianity when I make this comment, nor do I seek to simply dismiss centuries of faithful service, worship, and theology.

I think that the Christian faith has been held captive to a "pseudoorthodoxy" for much of the late twentieth century. Christianity's love affair with modernity and its universalizing tendencies created a climate in which the general assumption has been that what constitutes Christian faith has been "settled," and therefore any challenge to the status quo is often rejected as unbiblical or unorthodox. The assumption is a singular understanding of the faith. The easiest way to undermine different perspectives on issues like faith and practice during my lifetime has been to call someone's commitment to orthodoxy into question. But Christian faith is open to discussion. Historically it always has been. It can be questioned and reinterpreted. In fact, I would argue that it is meant to be questioned and reinterpreted.

Religion is always a cultural production, and sociocultural issues cannot be discounted from the ways in which we envision and understand faith. Issues and questions raised by our particular cultural situation not only inform but shape the various ways in which we interpret the gospel. If there ever was a time to question the status quo, it is now.

Barry Taylor teaches at Fuller Seminary in California, where he has developed a number of courses focusing on the intersections between theology and popular culture. He also teaches on advertising at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena.

Used by permission of Baker Books, a division of Baker Publishing Group, copyright ? 2007. All rights to this material are reserved. Materials are not to be distributed to other web locations for retrieval, published in other media, or mirrored at other sites without written permission from Baker Publishing Group.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at March 29, 2007 | Comments (46)

March 27, 2007

No Transformation Necessary

Dallas Willard has said, "We fail to be disciples only because we do not decide to be. We do not intend to be disciples." But which is the greater problem, the person who does not intend to be a disciple or the church that never expects him to be one? Dave Johnson, senior pastor of Church of the Open Door in Maple Grove, Minnesota, shares about a man from his childhood church. Ray was an elder who showed no evidence of transformation, and the church never seemed disturbed by that fact. Johnson asks the obvious question: What's up with that?

His name was Ray. He sat in the 3rd row on the aisle seat of the church I grew up in. Every Sunday, there he was - watching, critiquing, making sure my father said it right. Ray's Bible was a thing to behold. Words underlined and circled with arrows pointing to other words - notes in the margin of almost every page. I think he knew the Bible better than God.

Ray was a church guy. When I was 10, he scared me. When I was 20, after my father had begun to share with me the inside story of life in ministry, I came to realize that Ray scared him too. My dad was the pastor of our church. Ray was one of his elders - at least for a time - and he wasn't a happy guy. The Spirit's fruit, like love and joy, rarely showed up in him in any discernable way, and he didn't much like it if showed up in yours.

Sometimes I wonder if I've been too hard on Ray. He's somehow become the composite of every rigid, narrow minded person I've ever met in church. No matter - Ray's dead now - long gone - in heaven, no doubt. At least that's what we all thought, because Ray prayed the prayer. He believed all the right things about Jesus (His death, resurrection, 2nd coming, all that), and would fight you if you didn't. Like I said, Ray was a church guy. He just wasn't a good guy.

So here's my question: "What's up with that?" In all his years in church and in "the Word", Ray never became a different kind of person. He never changed. He never became more loving, gentle, peaceful, or patient. Indeed, he only seemed to become more angry and rigid as time went on. He became harder to be around. What's more, no one seemed to be bothered by that, as though something were out of the ordinary. No one wondered if maybe Ray had somehow missed the point.

In other words, not only did Ray never change but no one seemed to expect him to. Ray was just being Ray. He prayed the prayer, he believed the right stuff about Jesus, he was irritated with people who didn't, and he went to heaven when he died. So again the question: "What's up with that?"

Dave Johnson is the senior pastor of Church of the Open Door in Maple Grove, Minnesota. An interview with Johnson is featured in the upcoming spring issue of Leadership. He will also be a featured presenter at the 2007 Spiritual Formation Forum in Milwaukee June 6-8. You can learn more and register at the Spiritual Formation Forum website.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at March 27, 2007 | Comments (33)

March 22, 2007

Redefining Character

The spring issue of Leadership is just a few weeks away from the mailbox. The issue focuses upon the formation of the pastor's soul and character; the behind-the-scenes work of God in the lives of very public church leaders. Matt Branaugh, our colleague at Christianity Today International, recently attended a ministry conference where his assumptions about character were challenged. In this post he shares his new, broader, perspective on what a leader with character looks like.

"Our character," goes the quote often attributed to H. Jackson Browne, "is what we do when we think no one is looking." That's how I've typically defined character. But not anymore.

Last week, I heard Dr. Henry Cloud speak at Willow Creek's Children's Ministry Conference. The psychologist, author, and speaker said how we define character is at the core of understanding why leadership problems develop in the church and beyond. "Character equals the ability to meet the demands of reality," Cloud told the gathering of about 3,500 people.

Based upon his own research and consulting experience, Cloud said problems of character in situations he's asked to help repair rarely have to do with a lack of brains, competency, or even honesty with the leader.

Instead, he believes a leader with character displays these six traits:

1. You create and maintain trust by making sure your people know that you understand their opinions and concerns;

2. You view truthfulness as more than just honesty, genuinely longing to digest information and adjust to the realities around you;

3. You make a genuine effort to be results-oriented, and not just grace-oriented;

4. You embrace bad news. You get it and get moving;

5. You don't maintain your leadership abilities. You grow them.

6. You accept the question of transcendence - you say you're not God and act like it.

I agree with Cloud. Doing these things says a lot about the stuff we're made of in the volatile world of leadership. Plus, my previous definition seemed a little trite. Character should require more than just watching what I'm doing when no one else is looking.

Matt Branaugh is editor of Ministry Resources and BuildingChurchLeaders.com at Christianity Today International.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at March 22, 2007 | Comments (19)

March 19, 2007

The Future of the Emerging Church

Conversations about the future of the emerging church can be overheard at conferences, seminaries, chat rooms, or anywhere church leaders congregate. Does the movement have legs? Does it represent a passing trend or a new Reformation? Not long ago we sat down with author/scholar/editor Phyllis Tickle to discuss the subject. Tickle, a feisty Episcopalian from Tennessee with an intellect matched only by her sense of humor, has served as a religion editor for Publishers Weekly and has written over two dozen books. Her three-volume prayer manual, The Divine Hours, has renewed the discipline of fixed-hour prayer for Christians in many traditions.

What do you see happening to Christianity in the twenty-first century?
Many people have observed a five hundred year cycle in western history - a period of upheaval followed by a period of settling down, then codification, and then upheaval again because we do not like to be codified. So, about every five hundred years the church feels compelled to have a giant rummage sale, and we're in one of those periods now.

The Reformation was about five hundred years ago. Five hundred before that you hit the Great Schism. Five hundred more was the fall of Rome and the beginning of monasticism. Five hundred before that you hit the Babylonian captivity of the Jews, and five hundred before that was the end of the age of judges and the beginning of the dynasty.

So, how is the current upheaval different from what the church has experienced before?
For the first time we've done it in an age of media where we are historically informed and we can perceive the pattern, and for the first time we've had the ability to talk to each other, to be self-conscious about what is happening, and be somewhat intentional. This is very exhilarating.

We have a huge responsibility because of what we know. We are seeing the start of a post-Protestant and post-denominational era. Just as Protestantism took the hegemony from Roman Catholicism and Roman Catholicism from the East at the Great Schism, so the emerging church is now taking hegemony from Protestantism.

But would you place the emerging church with Evangelicalism, or it is something else?
No, it's not evangelicalism. American religion has four, pretty much equally divided, quadrants. Evangelicalism is one of them, charismatic Pentecostalism is another, the old mainline or social just Christians is a third quadrant, and then the liturgicals. And where the quadrants meet in the center there's a vortex like a whirlpool and they are blending.

So, much of the political energy is evangelical. There's no question about that. Much of the religious energy is Pentecostal, but that's combined with the strong ballast of social consciousness and of applied gospel that comes out of the mainline. And into the mix comes the liturgical traditions with the great gifts of the heritage of the church.

And the emerging church is bringing these different elements of the church back together.
The problem has been that since the Reformation belief for most of the people has gone north to the head. The emergents, supposedly, are saying it needs to go south to the heart. I don't think it needs to go south at all. I think it needs to meet somewhere in the strength of the life - mind, heart, spirit and strength. Belief needs to be incarnated.

The response for the emergents has been to incarnate their beliefs right in their own neighborhoods - and that's wonderful. They want to live where they worship, that's great. The problem is that the emerging church does not have enough organization within itself to get beyond the sound of its own voice. Each little cohort is very limited in its impact.

So, how can the emerging church expand its impact?
Right now we're beginning to see it organizing. It is institutionalizing. We're building the next model which in five hundred years will be thrown away. But nonetheless, the emerging church has got to find some way to reach out in a coherent and effective way beyond itself.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at March 19, 2007 | Comments (35)

March 16, 2007

Out of Context: Mark Batterson

"Maybe the central task of a worship leader is to keep worship from becoming routine? Maybe the central task of a teaching pastor is to keep the Bible from becoming routine? Maybe the central task of a lead pastor is to keep church from becoming routine?"

-Mark Batterson is pastor of National Community Church in Washington D.C. Taken from "Preaching with Half a Brain" in the Winter 2007 issue of Leadership journal. To see the quote IN context, you'll need to see the print version of Leadership. To subscribe, click on the cover of Leadership on this page.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at March 16, 2007 | Comments (4)

March 13, 2007

Where Have All the Prophets Gone?

While studying for my ordination a few years ago I was required to read Oswald Sanders' classic book, Spiritual Leadership. I've forgotten most of his practical advice about leading a church, but one short section has stayed with me. Sanders talks about the choice pastors face between being a popular leader or an unpopular prophet.

The logic seems rooted in the Old Testament differentiation of these roles. The kings of Israel served as leaders over God's people. They used their power to pull wires and drive the nation forward. The prophets, on the other hand, served as correctors. They came down from the hills to tell everyone what they were doing wrong. And after being rejected, stoned, and thoroughly despised they returned to the hills. Quoting A.C. Dixon, Sanders says, "If [the pastor] seeks to be a prophet and a leader, he is apt to make a failure of both."

Prior to reading Sanders I had already been wondering why few pastors led with any prophetic energy. Scanning my favorite books on my shelf, typically ones with a provocative challenge for the church, I realized that virtually all of them were written by professors. Few, if any, were composed by pastors. Where were the voices of correction in the local church? Where were the sermons calling God's people in a new direction? Where was there a pulpit challenging our popular assumptions about church, mission, and discipleship? Reading Sanders helped me see that we've driven the prophets out of the local church and into academia.

A recent post by David Fitch cited a new leadership model gaining popularity among missional churches. Referred to as APEPT by Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch in their book, The Shaping of Things to Come, it is pulled from Ephesians 4:11. Paul says God has given the church apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers. Frost and Hirsch, among other advocates of the model, say the contemporary church has focused its leadership almost exclusively on pastors and teachers while ignoring the contribution of evangelists, prophets, and apostles.

With structures intolerant of these other leadership functions the evangelists abandon local church ministry for para-church groups, apostles are driven to missions agencies, and prophets take their provocative ideas to academia. But, say Frost and Hirsch, "only when all five are operating in unity and harmony can we see effective missional engagement begin to occur."

So, why has the local church been so unwelcoming to prophets, and how do we get them back? I'd like to suggest a few ideas. This is certainly not an exhaustive list, but just a start.

1. Seminaries are not training prophets
My seminary education (and I assume my experience was not too different than most church leaders') primarily equipped me to teach the Bible. Professors taught me Greek and Hebrew, historical theology, hermeneutics - everything was designed to help me exegete the text, but no one equipped me to exegete the culture. Correction - one professor did, but his course was an elective not seen as essential for pastors. With seminaries churning out teachers we shouldn't be surprised that few prophetic voices are heard in the local church setting.

A first step toward reintroducing prophets is for seminary programs to value this calling. Since I left seminary I believe more schools are doing this. Tracks are now available in some progressive schools that focus on cultural engagement and discerning social phenomena. We need more pastors who can engage ministry ideas and not simply discern if they work, but if they are right.

2. Church structures are unsafe for prophets
A prophet by definition is going to disturb the status quo, make people uncomfortable, and rock the boat. But when a pastor with a prophetic function is completely dependant upon the congregation for his/her livelihood it creates a conflict of interests. Hirsch and Frost state the problem well:

Centralized funding makes the minister or leader economically subservient to the dominant interests of the group. It's very hard to have a prophetic ministry to the group that provides your salary. And this incapacity to cultivate an authentic prophetic ministry contributes directly to the institutionalization of ministry and the church. Leadership is thus always hostage to the reactionary groups in the congregation. Change becomes inordinately hard.

One way to overcome this problem is to decentralize funding for church leaders. David Fitch wrote about the value of bi-vocational pastors, and Hirsch and Frost recommend more leaders consider raising their support from outside their congregation the way missionaries do. Certainly, these ideas raise other challenges but they might allow a prophetic voice to once again be heard within the local church.

3. Ministries evaluate size not depth
Dallas Willard refers to them as the ABCs of ministry: Attendance, Buildings, and Cash. These are what we measure to determine if our ministry is effective and successful. The ability to increase these quantifiable elements is not the strength of a prophet. In fact, an unrestrained prophet is a sure to diminish attendance, buildings, and cash. For example, Greg Boyd, senior pastor of Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul, Minnesota, preached a prophetic series on the dangers of confusing the kingdom of God with partisan politics. As a result 20% of his congregation (about one thousand people) left the church.

If we only see success in ministry as numerical growth we'll never tolerate the ministry of prophets. Their role is not to add people to the church; that function belongs to the evangelist. Prophets bring depth and discernment to the community, they correct our course when we get off track, and they warn us when pragmatism begins to overshadow faithfulness.

Ultimately, if we have any hope of restoring a prophetic ministry to the local church we need to abandon our either-or thinking. We mustn't require pastors to be either leaders or prophets. We cannot value either expansion or depth. And we must not see the role of pastors as being either to comfort the flock or correct it. Both are necessary for meaningful and balanced ministry.

Posted by Skye Jethani at March 13, 2007 | Comments (38)

March 8, 2007

Brian McLaren Thanks God for Enemies

Have you ever heard of Nikolai Velimirovic? I hadn't either until Brian McLaren introduced me to a prayer written by the Serbian Orthodox bishop. McLaren credits the bishop with helping him process the increasing criticism he's received in recent years. In this interview, McLaren shares his thoughts about the blessing of having both friends and enemies.

How do you handle criticism? Did your years as a pastor prepare you for what you're now experiencing?
As you know, I have people writing books and saying very critical things about me, but in some ways it's no harder then being a pastor was. In fact, it might even be easier. Many pastors know what it's like to have people they've cared for - people they've married, and baptized, and counseled - come up and say, "You're not meeting our needs anymore, and we're leaving." It's wounding. It's very, very hard.

When we hear criticism, it can echo in our minds for days. On one hand, we can't stop beating ourselves up and second-guessing. On the other, we're tempted to get revenge. We torture ourselves. What I found I need to do is retrain my instinct to defend myself. Of course that is what Jesus was talking about when he says to turn the other cheek.

The second thing I've learned is to process the criticism with God. The prayer by the Serbian bishop has helped me do this. The bishop was taken to a concentration camp for speaking out against the Nazis. His own people betrayed him. But in his prayer he asks the Lord to bless his enemies, and he recognized how they actually help him. That has been incredibly helpful for me.

How do you think your critics have helped you?
We all want people to think we're better than we actually are. I want people to think I'm more holy than I actually am, more knowledgeable than I actually am. Well, a critic comes along, and they don't give me a chance to inflate my image. And in that way, if I can learn to live with a lower image through criticism, then maybe I won't be so prone to inflate my image in other circumstances. Critics teach us humility.

If we should thank God for our enemies, what about our friends? How do they help us grow?
I think we all need non-utilitarian friendships. In ministry it's easy for us to use people - to see them as a way of advancing our ministry or our agenda. And there are many ways people want to use us. A non-utilitarian friendship is where we build a relationship because I like the person and I'm not trying to use them for my success, and they're not trying to use me.

C.S. Lewis talked about this in idea in The Four Loves. These kinds of friends are not looking at each other. They stand side by side looking at the world because with that friend they have someone who loves the same things they love. It's about companionship. That's what I mean by a non-utilitarian friendship.

When I was a young Christian I went through a period of doubt. I just wasn't sure I believed anything anymore. I shared this with a good friend and mentor and he said to me, "I just want to assure you, Brian, I'll be your friend even if you become an atheist." That helped me believe in God more, because I felt the unconditional love of God through him. If he'd threatened me or put a lot of pressure on me, that would have made it harder to believe in God. To me there is something about unconditional friendship that demonstrates the grace of God.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at March 8, 2007 | Comments (23)

March 6, 2007

Gordon MacDonald's 2008 Questions

A bumper sticker I saw the other day asked, "Is it 2008 yet?" From the other stickers on the car, I surmised the political change the driver wanted - and soon. My reaction, after the chuckle, was the desire to skip a year of pointless arguing and name-calling. Can we simply hit fast-forward, and cut out the campaigning and haranguing by 12 or 14 months? Umm, no.

Gordon MacDonald's desire for the next year would appear to be the commitment by Christians to true scrutiny of the candidates, a year of asking hard questions about what really matters. His insight is below.

The other day I read this headline in our newspaper: "Christian Right Leaders Struggle to Find a Strong Candidate for President in '08."

It turns out that, a few weeks ago, there was an unpublicized meeting in Florida at a five-star hotel during which "Christian leaders" discussed who they would support in the upcoming presidential race. I worry about a situation in which a few people who are very adroit at seizing the microphone presume to make a movement out of all of us and then speak on our behalf.

I was not raised (by parents or mentors) to think politically or to participate in public political dialogue. My generation of men and women who felt called to the Christian ministry were told that our task was to develop deeply rooted Christians who would transform our discipleship into action items such as work ethics, family strength, financial responsibility, moral choices in entertainment, and responsible political decisions. It was not "ours," we were taught, to form or join political organizations and use our privilege as Christian influencers to pick and tout candidates from our pulpits or TV/radio shows or print publications.

But the rules seem to have changed.

And people like myself who are a bit unhappy about this may have to speak up a bit more. Thus, in an idle moment I imagined myself invited to the Florida meetings, and I began writing down issues and questions I would like to have raised had I been there. I am somewhat confident I know what others who did go would have talked about. So on my list I went in other directions.

As the various names would have been raised at the table in Florida (Clinton, Romney, Obama, McCain, Edwards, Giuliani - please note the randomized sample offered without prejudice), these are the questions I would have raised:

1. Can he/she give us a government that will recoup our reputation in the world as a generous and compassionate nation? And could he/she take more seriously the fact that a large part of this world now finds our country distasteful? And this goes for Christians in other lands also. (I'm embarrassed every time I go abroad.)

2. Is there a candidate brave enough to influence the formulation of bold new initiatives regarding energy-consumption, health-care, and Social Security? (If there isn't, the year 2030 isn't going to be a good year.)

3. Does he/she think they could stop putting our grandchildren in hock with hideous deficits? (Isn't being debt-free a Christian value?)

4. Would he/she take the issue of climate change and environmental care seriously? (It is God's creation, and some more generations may have to share it.)

5. Would he/she pledge to be so truthful with the American people that no reasonable person would question their integrity? Let's describe this as being Lincoln-esque. (I'm tired of spin.)

6. Would he/she renounce all forms of torture in the treatment of prisoners? (I'm ashamed that this is even an issue in America.)

7. Is he/she concerned about the growing social crisis of the separation between the rich and the poor? (It's becoming a gated world out there and one day there may be a new kind of homegrown terrorism.)

8. Does he/she think they might rethink the exporting of billions upon billions of dollars to places like Iraq when a few billion would make a lot of difference in the education of American children and the absurdly rising costs of college education? (I can't believe we are so silent on matters like this.)

9. Might he/she intend to offer any form of moral influence that would raise the tastes of our nation in its choices of entertainment, the spending of its money, and its growing addiction to sports? (Or does Rome live again?)

10. If there is ever again a justifiable reason to take this nation to war, could he/she make sure that everyone becomes involved in the sacrifice that war requires? To date the burden or war seems to be on a relatively small percentage of Americans while everyone else goes on living the so-called "good life?" (You destroy a nation by doing it the way we've been doing it. How did we forget Viet Nam so easily?)

11. Could he/she see themselves being as turned on by the dream of alleviating diseases, suppressing genocide, and rescuing the dying nations (debt forgiveness comes to mind) as America once was about getting someone to the moon?

These are all questions with an admitted political ring to them. But each arises from my convictions as a biblical person.

If I'd been invited to Florida to ask my questions, I would liked to have described an experience I had the other day while waiting at an airport gate for a plane. I found myself seated across the aisle from a young couple in their early twenties. He was suited up in army fatigues, a duffle bag in front of him. It was clear that he was headed for Iraq or Afghanistan. Next to him was his girlfriend or his wife (I couldn't tell).

I watched as she virtually connected herself to him from head to toe, trying every other minute to get even closer. The look of anguish on her face as she came nearer and nearer to the moment of their final goodbye was the look of one facing death. And I said to myself - as I watched youth in all of its idealism and romance about to be wrenched apart by forces over which they had no control - this isn't the way it was suppose to be. Somebody please change this!

Thus my final question for candidate: are they willing to do so?

Author and pastor Gordon MacDonald is chair of World Relief and editor at large for Leadership.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at March 6, 2007 | Comments (72)

March 2, 2007

The False Gospel of Impact

How can a church leader keep their soul rooted in Christ and still keep pace with their ministry? The next issue of Leadership, due in mailboxes in April, will focus on that question. Phil Vischer may seem like an unlikely person to address the darker corners of a pastors' souls, but his new book, Me, Myself, and Bob: A True Story about God, Dreams, and Talking Vegetables (Nelson, 2007), wrestles with questions every church leader should be asking.

In 2000, Phil Vischer was running the largest animation studio between the coasts, had revolutionized Christian family entertainment by selling thirty million Veggie Tales videos, and was named one of the top ten people to watch in worldwide religion. Vischer's vegetable empire, better known as Big Idea Productions, seemed poised to become a Christian Disney.

But by 2003 the dream was over. After a heartbreaking court decision, later overturned on appeal, Big Idea declared bankruptcy and Vischer had to sell the company's assets, including his computer animated characters Bob the Tomato and Larry the Cucumber. We spoke with him recently about his life after Big Idea, and how God has transformed his understanding of ministry.

In the book you talk about growing up in evangelicalism. How did that shape your sense of mission when you started Big Idea?
In college I heard a sermon in chapel about knowing God's will. It was given by a former mathematician. He said that if God's will is not clear we should use the test of spiritual expediency. Which of the two choices in front of me will impact more lives? That one is God's will. My evangelical upbringing said more impact is better. It's better to be Bill Bright than Mother Teresa. Better to impact millions at once than one at a time. God has given us limited time and resources and we have to help as many people as possible - not just two or three. Mother Teresa should have franchised a system for feeding the poor on a massive scale. She needed an MBA.

When did that perspective begin to change?
Near the end we were selling a gazillion [Veggie Tales] videos and I was getting four hundred fan letters a day, but one day I was reading my Bible and I came across the verse that lists the fruit of the Spirit. It occurred to me that none of those things were present in my life. It didn't say the fruit of the Spirit is impact, large numbers, or selling lots of videos. I realized something was not right.

I began asking, how am I supposed to live? I thought I had that figured out, but evidently I was completely wrong. So over three months I went through all of Paul's letters and wrote down every directive or instructive statement he made. And when I read all of those statements it became clear that the gospel I had was a sham. It was more the gospel of Benjamin Franklin than the gospel of Jesus Christ. It was more about self-improvement, and pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, and going out and changing the world. It was American cultural values masquerading as the words of Christ.

What is your understanding of success now?
Now I understand God has a unique journey for each of us with unique measures of success. Now I ask myself, have I done what God has asked me to do? Am I walking with him daily? Success has very little to do with where I end up. I don't know exactly why, but we seem wired to look for numerical results for affirmation. But success in ministry cannot be about measurable impact.

What advice do you have for church leaders? How can we keep our souls healthy?
I think we all have to start with a good self-assessment. That is what I did when I was sitting in the wreckage of my world-changing ministry reading the fruit of the Spirit and not finding it in my life. We should have peace. We should have joy. And that doesn't mean we should force ourselves to have it, because we can't. It will come from us when we've let go of our life, when we've let go of our ministry, when we've let go of any aspiration for having an impact. When it's just us and God we'll find the joy and the peace. Then, we can get back to work and help other people follow that path.

You can read more of the interview with Phil Vischer in the spring issue of Leadership.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at March 2, 2007 | Comments (16)

March 1, 2007

Out of Context: Sarah Cunningham

"Few people see Christianity as a shift of allegiance that prompts us to make personal changes in beliefs, habits, and lifestyles. We must continually examine our churches to make sure our message is one that requires transformation."

-Sarah Cunningham is a 28-year-old PK and former megachurch staffer now teaching high school history while part of a house church in Jackson, Michigan. She is also the author of Dear Church: Letters from a Disillusioned Generation (Zondervan, 2006). Taken from "Dissing Illusionment" in the Winter 2007 issue of Leadership journal. To see the quote IN context, you'll need to see the print version of Leadership. To subscribe, click on the cover of Leadership on this page.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at March 1, 2007