Thoughts from The Leading Edge

I have one more day of an already amazing few days as I meet with the pastors of the largest attended Methodist churches and 33 bishops, as well as several seminary presidents.  Our purpose is to pray and talk about ways we can renew the Methodist Church.  One of the things that has been discovered is that the same systems, ideas and passion that leads large Methodist churches to success is what the entire denomination needs.

Some of the topics we have discussed and concerns we have addressed so far:

• How to reach young adults for Christ as well as bring young adults into ministry;
• The ways we can expand mission beyond our walls and into the world;
• Improving preaching in worship;
• Changes that need to be made by the Methodist Church as a whole;
• Starting new faith communities;
• How the bishops and large church pastors and congregations can work together to renew the United Methodist Church;
• An examination of the issues that have led to our denomination’s decline and how we might help address those issues.

The sense here is how we as large church pastors and our congregations can influence other churches, pastors and our denomination as a whole in the list of tasks that I just named.  The idea is that since we typically do these things well, it is our responsibility to share what we know, to influence, model and inspire other churches, districts and conferences to expand their ability to do mission and ministry and serve Christ well as every church inherently wants to do.

For me in this process, I constantly think of you, of First United Methodist Church of Mansfield.  You have gone against the odds and expanded in growth, evangelism, mission and outreach in amazing ways, going against the grain of what is happening in our own denomination year after year.  I have been thinking why.

1. First Methodist Church is a church with a deep spiritual core.  Our Church family is on a first-name basis with Jesus Christ.
2. First Methodist Church has amazing leaders — in every cadre of our church and in every area — staff, laity, young people, long-term members, new members.  You are outstanding here.  Churches can’t do anything without great leaders.  We have great leaders that daily I am honored to serve God with.
3. Biblical faith is where we find our direction and the challenge that drives us.
4. You are extremely generous with your financial gifts, your service, your heart, yourself.
5. The volunteer spirit at First Methodist is crazy great.  I could think of no other words — hundreds who serve in mission and outreach, 400 volunteers for VBC this year, we just recruited enough parking lot greeters for all our services, ushers, greeters, music, class rooms, Bible studies, etc, etc, etc.  You are amazing.
6. You are willing, willing to step out, step up, make changes, do new things, adjust, adapt, expand, whatever it takes to be a great church, to reach people for Christ, to open your door to new people, to reach the least, the last, and the lost.
7. First Methodist is full of people serious about following Jesus Christ. I seldom feel that I have to inspire you to do better; you constantly inspire me to do better.

We have already stepped up to be a part of renewing our denomination.  I believe we have just taken the beginning steps to impact the church I love.  May God help us in that impact.

It is 9:00 a.m., and I am heading to the hotel lobby to meet with other pastors as we discuss the issues of our church and what we can do to transform it.  Our bishop, Mike Lowry, Bishop Will Wilimon, Pastor Mark Beeson, Pastor Adam Hamilton, Pastor Mike Slaughter, all will be there as we pray and look for the answers that First Methodist Mansfield is already living out.

Thoughts on healthy relationships

1. Does God seem far away, impersonal or distant?
2. Do you experience guilt and self condemnation?
3. Have you learned to survive on ability and talent alone?
4. Is your life defined by weakness, sin or addictions?
5. Would you see yourself as insecure, anxious or fearful?
6. Do you think by pleasing others you can earn love and acceptance?
7. Do you feel your life has stalled or is stagnant?
8. Have you given up on being or doing better?
9. Can you not be happy unless you feel in control of others?
10. Do you define your life by past successes or past failures?

I developed this list some time ago when I was thinking about what healthy relationships look like and especially what a healthy relationship with God looks like. In our buy-and-sell world we learn that everything of value must be purchased by money, by behavior, by paying some kind of price. We then make that payment and wait for the result we are looking for or wanting, either from others or from God. It can be rather distressing when this not only doesn’t happen, but the price we paid seems to make things even worse. The most unfortunate part about this system is that it often takes years to figure out “my life isn’t working” or that “we have been living by the wrong rules and not the offering of Jesus!”

The Bible tells us:
* While we were yet sinners, Jesus gave His life for us.
* Draw near to God, and God will draw near to you.
* For God so loved the world He gave His only begotten Son.
* Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven.
* Love God with all your heart, soul and mind.
* If God is for you, then who can be against you?
* Give and it will be given to you, pressed down, shaken together and running over.
* Come unto me all ye who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest.
* Life does not consist of the abundance of things we possess.
* Blessed are the pure in heart, the poor in spirit, the meek, the merciful.

If we are not happy with what we’ve got, we won’t be happy with what we get!

“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures: He leads me besides still waters. He restores my soul; He guides me in paths of righteousness for His names sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You anointed my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” Psalm 23

Thoughts on Jesus

When I was 20 years old, I attended a young adult Sunday School class for the first time, also the first time I had attended Sunday School since I was 12. The teacher decided to test us for service, and the first test was to see if we could sing. Each person in the small class sang a song. The only song I could think of was Jesus Loves Me, so that is what I sang. And Jesus does love us!

At the gym the other day, a young man I have talked with many times worked up the courage to ask me a question. He wanted to know about faith, sharing with me that he attended a church on occasion and prayed most days. But he still wasn’t sure if he had faith. I told him, “If you are in your car going 80, it spins out of control on ice, and you see a bridge abutment heading your way and know you are about to die, what would your last word be, ‘Jesus’ or ‘@#&*%$#’?” I think you know something about yourself by that last word.

But Jesus is more than a children’s song or the one we believe can help us in seasons and moments of trouble.

In the first chapter of Revelation, John has an encounter with Jesus, the same Jesus he followed around the Sea of Galilee and eventually to Golgotha.

“His head and his hair were white like wool, like snow, and his eyes were like a flame of fire. His feet were like burnished bronze when it has been made to glow in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of many waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, and out of his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in its strength. When I saw him, I fell at his feet like a dead man. And he placed his right hand on me saying, do not be afraid . . .”

“Do not be afraid,” the same words Jesus said to Peter and John as he walked on the water toward them in the storm. Do not be afraid! In a world that panders to fear, these words are a treasure of a promise.

I think sometimes people think that if they make Jesus small and more like them, then somehow He becomes more approachable, more palatable and friendlier somehow. But when we do this, He also becomes less than He really is, and in this, also less influential and much easier to ignore. People can do all kinds of things with Jesus, even turning His name into a curse word. But Jesus cannot be ignored.

Jesus loves us, is our savior but is also Lord and God before whose feet we must fall. When I do this, my problems, anxiety and fears get smaller and smaller, my temptations fade, my sins are washed away and my future is reshaped by the power of an amazing Christ.

The one whose face is like the sun shining in its strength is the one who loves us, is the one who we can call on in the moment of desperation, is the one we kneel before and then stand up after fearless.

Jesus loves me, this I know for the Bible tells me so!

Thoughts on loving God, loving others, and serving the world

I had another thought prepared for today, but I heard a story yesterday that demands telling.

I went to the hospital to visit a family with a new baby. It is one of the very enjoyable things I get to do on occasion. The brand new baby with such happy parents and grandparents was beautiful as you might imagine. As I was leaving the hospital, I ran into a member of our church who was on the way in. I asked why she was there (sometimes there is a concern I need to know about). And, then she told me this story.

She had gone to the hospital to see a friend. While there, she met a woman who was in crisis. The woman, who was from out of town, had a very ill husband in Intensive Care. He was not far from death. Our member saw this and felt moved to ask if she needed prayer. She said “yes,” and the prayer happened for this isolated, in crisis, lost woman who was far from home. Later it was discovered she attended a Methodist church in her hometown, and this connection with our church, through our member who typified spontaneously our mission statement — love God, love others and serve the world — became a channel for God’s grace in this most unlikely place. Jesus entered a time of tragedy through the alert, open and willing heart of one of His followers, just the way it is supposed to work.

Following Christ is not rocket science or something reserved for the professional and the trained, just the willing. I hope that I am just as willing today to love God, love others, and serve the world as Laverne was.

Thoughts on finding our place

This past weekend was a remarkable season of worship for me. I like to share God’s word, we got to pray many times, other people who love God and are getting to know God joined me, the attendance was pretty remarkable for this time of year, and we, of course, marked closely a few words in scripture. I felt God’s presence. The message was on finding our place (one of the more confusing and difficult things sometimes to do in a church family). But there was one special moment that was a highlight that I think really defines what the church is. (And no matter how it seems, Jesus is the architect of the church just as God is the architect of the world and universe.)

We celebrated Communion (the Lord’s Supper) in all our services. During the serving of communion in one of the services, one of the ushers let me know that someone at the back needed me to come to them as they could not make their way to the front. This often happens. So, I got a tray and a piece of bread and headed toward the back. Usually this is an elderly person. When I went to serve the young lady, I discovered she was from Haiti and was a double amputee here for medical care. A friend was with her and acted as interpreter. She was staying the weekend with a couple in our church family. She shared Christ with us and us with her in this small cup and piece of bread that symbolizes the body and blood of Christ, God’s gift reaching into a broken, earthquake-destroyed building in Haiti as well as into our air-conditioned Sanctuary on Sunday morning some months later. It was an inspiring moment for me.

The Church of Jesus Christ is remarkable, not just because we have great music and hopefully inspiring sermons, but because people find their way to Jesus and Jesus finds His way into our hearts in the smallest and yet most meaningful moments that make up what the Christian life really is. Look for Jesus in the small moments, and He will surely be found. “Knock and the door shall be opened, ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find,” Jesus said.

I would also like to add that we are preparing for a unique message series the last two weeks of August and the first week of September entitled “Coffee with Mike and David.” I and our teaching pastor are going to be sharing a message together in all our services, a little like the podcast we do on a weekly basis. Kevin Selle, our moderator, will join us for this special joint sermon. Kevin is the meteorologist for TXCN cable news. You will also hear him on occasion at local radio stations. What I would ask you to do is this, if there is a question you have or a subject you might like to see addressed in this more open time, please email me or David. I can’t say we can address every question or subject, but we will try within the parameters of time and worship.

Making disciples of Jesus Christ who will love God, love others and serve the world.

Thoughts on the Water of Life

Jesus told the woman at the well, “Ask me and I will give you living water that you will never thirst again.”  The Bible is full of the water of life images.  Revelation tells us that heaven has a river that flows through it with the water of life.  Psalm 1 speaks of the image of a tree planted by the water that will give its fruit in its season.  The cities of Israel are often defined by the wells that sit at their centers, such as Jacob’s well.

A praise song I learned long ago speaks of this.

“Here’s my cup, Lord, I lift it up, Lord, come and quench this thirsting of my soul!”

In West Texas where I spent some years growing up, it is often dry, even to the point of being desert.  Because of this, it was one of the last places in Texas to be settled, but then a discovery was made.  If one dug deep enough into the flint-filled, almost concrete colechie ground, one could find water.  This water came from an aquifer that was over a thousand square miles, a deep-ground lake of water that had probably been filled thousands of years ago.  It is almost unlimited.  But there is one problem — if someone pumps too much, too quickly, even a well with abundant water can go dry.  When this happens, the farmer or rancher must wait a day, a week or longer, and the well will eventually be replenished with fresh water from the aquifer.  Even though the water source is almost unlimited, the well’s ability to contain it is not.

The source of life-giving water that is God is unlimited.  But our ability to contain that living water is not.  When we begin to dry up, often having taken for granted the source, we must find time and ways to allow our inner “well” to be replenished.  In this fast-paced culture, we often lose the place that allows this to happen, and we fail to realize that we are trying to survive on dust.  When folks are living on dust, often bad decisions are made, emotions get fractured, souls become lifeless and the plan and purpose of God for abundant living gets lost.

Time, prayer, the Bible, simple Christian friendships, service and worship are where the life that is the water of God seeps into the hearts and souls of us all.

“Here’s my cup, Lord, I lift it up, Lord, come and quench this thirsting of my soul!”

Thoughts on my trip to Rwanda

A week ago I was still in Rwanda, Africa, spending time with orphans who lived (on a good day) on bananas, beans and peanuts.  Their living conditions were mud brick houses that had no furniture.  Some of the older kids were orphaned by the 1994 genocide and others by the death of their parents through AIDS. Their medicine cabinet was often a window sill with one old toothbrush on it.  Their family was the other orphans in their community.  But they were happy; the ZOE ministry program we help support had given them hope, something that would have been impossible without outside help.

Our flight home took almost 36 hours, from Rwanda to Ethiopia to Washington DC and then back to Dallas.  Even though we had only been gone less than 10 days, it was striking to enter the Dulles Airport in Washington.  To leave a country with almost nothing and then enter the overwhelming affluence represented by the nation’s capital was almost embarrassing; I really did not know how to think.  But still, after I made some emergency phone calls back to the church (I had not had access to a phone during the journey), I paused and had a hamburger with cheese and grilled onions.  It was good to be home.

I am once again used to a soft bed, hot water, abundant food and a comfortable world with almost every convenience possible, yet the Bible says, “The Kingdom of God is not food and drink, but righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit!”

When the tremendous trappings of our lives are cleared away for a few minutes, whether it is a trip to an area of the world in poverty, an experience with cancer, a broken marriage, a grievous loss or just a week where we figure out we are not really in control, we often see and experience things we haven’t been able to see in the midst of the myriads of unimportant details that seem to dominate our lives.  We discover things like faith, love, friendship, trust, family, the simplicity of a life shared with each other, with Jesus Christ, loving God, serving others, following Jesus, the day-by-day minutes that can be overwhelmed by the details of a complicated life and then set free by the surprises and the crises that may come our way.

I learned some of this by being thankful for the small banana and piece of pineapple I ate most mornings in Africa as I prepared to go out each day to experience the surprises God surely had for me.  I hope God surprises us all today!

Thoughts on Freedom

The 4th of July is a little over a week away, and I wanted to write my thoughts on it today.  You will know why as you read further.

I know you have heard the term “as American as apple pie!”  Tomorrow at 11:00 a.m., I will share in a funeral service for a very unique man who passed away at 92, a retired Army Colonel who was, you guessed it, “as American as apple pie!”

His obituary says something of this, “Colonel Stanley Turk is resting in the arms of the Lord, after a long, fully-lived life in service to his country, community and family.”

Stan, or Colonel Turk, was born at the end of WW I, grew up in Itasca, Texas, where he picked cotton.  He entered the army in 1935 as a private and became a Battalion Commander of the 26th Field Artillery Battalion by the end of the Korean War.  He served all the way through WWII, from Normandy into France through the Battle of the Bulge at Bastogne, until he was wounded in action on March 16, 1945 and evacuated to England. Much of this was in support of General Patton’s Armored Division.  As soon as he could, he returned to his unit, becoming known by his men as “Full-service Turk.”  He continued to lead his men all the way to the end of the war earning the Bronze Star and Purple Heart.  He would win many more citations and medals before the three wars he would be a part of ended.

He entered the Korean War almost on its first day where he became a Battalion Commander.  Now remember, he started out picking cotton and as a private in the Army.  He also suffered serious wounds in this war and again returned to his unit.  He led this battalion until the Korean War ended.  At this point, he had spent a great deal of his life fighting for his country.

As career Army, he was once again called on at the later stages of his military duty to enter the war in Vietnam.  Here his years of experience were put into use as he evaluated the needs and requirements of this new time and a new way of war, bringing back information that might be used by the Army at this difficult time in the history of America.  Stan was born during war and fought for America in three major wars.

After his Army retirement, he met Barbara and was married at the age of 61.  They celebrated 23 years of married life, spending much of it in this area where he began a new business and enjoyed golf as well as his church.  As he found his way to hospice, one of our lay chaplains, John, dropped by and asked if he could read Psalm 23 from the Bible.  Stan said, “We don’t need the Bible to do that,” and began to quote it from memory, “The Lord is my shepherd . . .”  I kind of imagine he had prayed that same prayer many times on the battlefield.

This year as we celebrate Independence Day, your freedom and mine, think of Colonel Stan Turk.

As they say, freedom is not free; men like Stan fought for it for us.

Thoughts on Mission

Vacation Bible Camp is preparing to begin on Monday (we still have openings for children . . . sign up online).  There will be some 1,200 children and adults on campus growing in all kinds of ways.  I enjoyed putting together a video as “Cowboy Parson Mike” to help kick it off!  It is one of the highest and most important seasons of our year as we seek to bless our kids in the good news of Christ, a God who loves them and a church that surrounds them with grace.

In this same season, we are kicking off a new phase in our ZOE Ministry (African) mission, a mission primarily aimed at the needs of orphans and children.  For a number of years we have supported missions with ZOE – feeding orphans, building a school, working to help with Malaria and AIDS issues.  Now we are ready to step up by making a commitment for the next three years:

A commitment of $250,000 over three years to ZOE Ministry’s Giving Hope Empowerment Project.

A contribution of this amount will move 1,000 children in Africa from lives of helplessness and dependency to lives of success and self-sufficiency.  First Methodist will be the first church to sponsor at this “community” level (transforming an entire community in Africa).  We hope God will use us to create Christian leaders who will then be used by God in transformational ways.  May God help us.

• Our first step will our Carry the Light concert at Bass Performance Hall on September 26.  We hope to raise $100,000 at this event.  The head of ZOE Ministry will be with us along with many other churches for this amazing event.  Put the date on your calendar!
• We will dedicate Christmas Eve offerings the next three years to this cause.
• Other events such as Son Run, golf tournaments, etc. will be aimed at this goal.

Individual donors will continue to make contributions as God leads us.  And, I and other members of our church family are going on a trip to Rwanda this July to begin this mission, and we will have three years to celebrate the ongoing results.

I have learned that First Methodist Church can do things at a level that is astonishing here in our community, day-by-day, as we serve one another in multiple ways as we continue to grow in God-blessed ways.  And now with this exciting phase, we enter as a church in national leadership in mission with ZOE, a work that we have grown with these last few years.  I look forward to sharing with you the videos, pictures and stories I will share from and on my trip with ZOE to Rwanda this July.

See you this weekend, Why People Leave Church . . . and Why They Are Coming Back!

Thoughts on Church

Some years ago I had an interesting conversation with a fellow — good man, father and husband.  He told me why he didn’t go to church anymore.  He said, “When I was a kid, my parents made me go to church every time the doors were opened.” He went on to say, “I promised that I would never do that to my kids, that I was going to let them choose for themselves when they were grown!”

I got to know him fairly well and discovered that he was a good guy, had a pretty deep faith, solid values and his belief in God was also important.  He also had a decent education and good teeth.  It seems his parents had supported him in faithful school attendance and getting his homework done, and beginning when the first tooth popped out, first brushed that tooth and then later made him brush his own.

He was a Christian man, had a successful life funded by his education, and his teeth worked well when it came time to chew his food.  You already know where I am going.  It is because his values and faith were formed by the church, his teeth were strengthened by Crest toothpaste that his parents purchased and made him use, and his brain had decent formation and was full of information that helped him get a good job and care for his family.

Why would he deny his children what made him the good Christian adult man he was?  Sometimes we make decisions from how we feel rather than from our faith.  Feelings are like building a house on sand, that when the wind and waves come, the house is washed away.  Faith is like building our house on a rock, that when that very same storm comes, the house remains standing because it was built on a rock (a rough paraphrase of the words of Jesus).