Pornography Addiction Recovery
Tough subject today. But if you doubt it is a needed one, just check out a couple statistics. A 1996 Promise Keepers survey at one of their stadium events revealed that over 50% of the men in attendance were involved with pornography within one week of attending the event. Maybe you are a pastor saying to yourself, yeah, but those guys were just the non-Christian friends who were invited to promise keepers. Over half of evangelical pastors admit viewing pornography last year. There are countless statistics that I could add to this page. If you want more for your own research, click
. Our God is an awesome God and he can help anyone recover from sin of any kind. I am sure there are testimonies of men or women who laid there sin on the altar and God took away all desire to look at pornography from them. I will also let you know, that is not the normal way it seems to go. Satan is a liar, and as long as he can keep the addict thinking that his or her sin is secret, then he has power over them. Just like any other addictive sin, the first step is admitting you have a problem. The second and more important step is admitting it to another human being who can hold you accountable! When that second step takes place, Satan no longer has the same hold on the person’s life! Does that mean that after that, recovery is easy? NO! But it does mean that the person is no longer alone in their struggle. Pastor’s and Lay leaders, if you are reading this and are thinking, Man, he is describing me, but if I tell anyone, I will lose my job or my position in the church! Find someone to hold you accountable! It is a tough step. If there is no one in your community you can talk to,email me and we can set up a time to talk on the phone. It isn’t perfect (unless you live in Pickens County South Carolina), but it is a step. I will probably blog more on this issue in the future. If it makes you uncomfortable, I am sorry, but it is something that is destroying families, marriages and churches across America! Remember, just because you are sinning doesn’t mean you “lost your salvation” it just means you need to ask forgiveness and then “go and sin no more.”
The Body
Yesterday, I was leaving lunch and talking with a friend. Since the conversation was going so well, I failed to notice a step down off the curb to the parking lot. The resulting twisted ankle has made me quite aware of the normal functions of the ankle that it is currently in rebellion against performing. I admit that on a normal day I take the ankle for granted; it is just that part of the body below the leg and not quite the foot. Today, however I am much more aware of it. All that to say that as pastors and leaders, we must constantly be on the lookout to encourage those parts of the body of Christ that may not be in the glory locations. People recognize the music minister, the soloist, even the piano player, but who spends time praising the person who cleans the toilets, or sets up chairs for various functions of the church. Some churches do a great job at this, but if you notice that your church has a hard time getting volunteers, it may be that people feel that certain jobs just aren’t important enough to be worth doing. Leaders set the tone to let people know that every job is important! And Lay people who read this, it is OK to encourage your senior pastor too! His job at the top can often feel thankless and lonely. To all of you who are working diligently for the Kingdom! Great Job! Keep up the good work!
Building on the Rock
Luke 6:48 tells us that the man who puts Gods words into practice “is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built.” Later, Jesus told Peter in Mathew 16: 18-19, “And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” God has a plan for your church! The context of this blog is that you as a pastor or leader have a choice to make to be in God’s will, and follow HIS plan or you can try to do it according to your own plan. When we plant a church firmly on the ROCK of Jesus Christ, then that church, as long as it follows Gods plan will be the church HE wants it to be. We as church leadership are like the stones planted firmly on a solid rock foundation. It won’t slip or settle. Following God’s plan is solid though not always predictable. Sometimes following HIS plan will mean that the church is growing like crazy, and sometimes not. God’s plan. Sometimes HIS plan is exactly what we think it should be, and sometimes not. God’s plan. Keep on the Rock, and it will keep us out of the quicksand of our own path. I like the words of Steven Furdick on this topic: “It’s better to be a rock that He can build on than a stumbling block that He has to remove.”
Prayer Teams
Prayer support is very important for a pastor. Today’s blog is a little more anecdotal than usual, but something that I did recently as a lay person in my church was go to our pastor and shared with him that I felt it is important to have a group of people praying for him while he is preaching. His response was positive and ended with “Burl, you have a passion for it, so why don’t you get it started?” So after asking a few men in the church if they would either stay late or come early and pray during the service they don’t attend. (Our church has two services) Some of them responded that they had been thinking the same thing, but just hadn’t voiced it. Soon a group of guys are getting together and praying for the service and our pastor while the service is going on in another part of the building. And while hard to prove a direct relationship scientifically, the number of people attending, and more importantly, the number of people asking Jesus into their hearts each week is increasing! God can do anything, and HE doesn’t need us, but HE asks us to pray to HIM. HE can do abundantly and exceedingly more than we can ask or imagine! If you are one of the lay people who read this blog; pray for your pastor! And if you are a pastor and don’t have group of people praying for you, I encourage you to ask some people in your congregation that you respect as people who love the Lord to begin praying for you. You may not have the luxury of having a “Prayer Warrior” in your congregation. But just like young men going off to basic training, they can start praying, and God can turn them into prayer warriors!
Overcoming Fear
Jesus walked on the water, fed thousands with only a few loaves and fish, healed the blind, lame, sick and demon possessed. Why are we in the church so often full of fear? Some of the fears we face are BIG…at least in our small human eyes. Others are not so big. In John 6:20, Jesus said, “It is I; do not be afraid.” He walks beside us through all things if we keep our faith on HIM. What do pastors and churches fear? I can’t begin to say that I understand every pastor’s fear, but here are a few I can think of. Changing worship styles. Reaching out to a new demographic. Try a new ministry. Give away a larger portion of our church budget. All these and more could give a pastor and church leadership a little cause for trepidation, but remember. God is with you always! Do not live in fear!
Tithing
In a blog for pastors, why write about tithing? Every pastor knows the importance of the personal tithe. What about the church? We are quick to exhort people to tithe by sharing with them how God blesses those who give. Do we believe that God will bless a church that tithes as well?
Over and over I have seen churches that practice giving to ministries, missions, and denominations beyond their walls blessed by God in miraculous ways! I have also seen churches who claim not to have a big enough budget to be able to help support other ministries struggle year after year just to meet the bills and keep the doors of the church open. “God loves a cheerful giver” goes beyond the individual level. If your church is not supporting missions or any ministry beyond itself and you feel like it is in a constant struggle to meet the bills, I encourage you to put this idea to a test. Trust God, give generously, and see how our Awesome Omnipotent God will pour out His blessings on your ministry.
My own thoughts…
Today’s blog is a little different. I want to share with you what doing this blog has meant for me in my own life. One thing has been that it makes me think throughout the day of things that might be helpful for pastors and lay leaders in a church. As I concentrate on that stuff, often things pop into my head that I need to pray about in the church where I am a member. A new ministry is birthing in our church in response to one post! The other thing that is more personal has been my own level of witnessing has changed. Since I am writing about things like prayer, evangelism etc. it would be hypocritical of me just to sit back and write about it without actually taking part in the things I write about. I think I have shared the gospel with and/or invited to church more people in the last weeks since beginning writing than I have in the 6 months prior to beginning this project.
Now you are thinking, why is this guy sharing this personal stuff on a blog for church leaders? The point that I hope is made is that when we involve people in leadership or in an area of ministry, even if we don’t see every quality we are looking for in that person, God can do amazing things in their lives as they step up to that next level in their own personal areas of ministry. The old church saying is true, “God doesn’t call the qualified; He qualifies the called.”
After the First Three Years…
A well known church planting fact is that the fastest growth happens in the first three years. Why is it that after that quick growth period, many churches fall into a lull and sadly, begin to decline after only those initial years of growth? When the church is young, there is almost always a heavy emphasis on evangelism. The church plant pastor and sometimes a small band of followers must get out and network and create excitement for the new church plant. This leads to many new Christians. George Barna shares in Marketing the Church that one out of four adults in the United States will go to church if someone invites them. When the church is young and full of passion, people invite everyone they meet. Somehow, that urgency seems to fade after a few years. The pastor who notices that trend setting in at his church has a decision to make. He could just let it happen as it is the natural tendency, or he can do something to be outside the norm. Here are some suggestions, should he choose the second route.
Taking another quote from Barna, in Evangelism That Works he wrote, “A church that strives to evangelize its community without saturating its efforts in prayer is like a race-car driver that jumps into his car at the starting line and discovers that the tank has not been filled with gasoline.” Not only should the pastor be in prayer for the souls of his community, but if he is to be successful, he will enlist those from his church that he can to pray earnestly with him as well. With the ease of blogs and e-mails, a weekly prayer list sent out to a prayer team is not a difficult task.
Once the prayer support is in place, modeling sharing the gospel with the lost is important. The easiest way is just to share one’s own testimony. What was I like before Christ? How did I meet Him? How has my life changed since? There are many approaches to evangelism, and many of them work. I think we can agree that there is no perfect system, but any of them is better than never opening one’s mouth to share Jesus with someone who is lost and going to hell! Perry Noble said that “50,000 people die every single day without knowing Jesus Christ.” Statistics like that should be motivating!
My last suggestion is to reconnect with the community. After a few years, the average Christian no longer has unsaved friends or has very few of them. We need to constantly cultivate new friendships outside our Christian community. Run for school board or city council, even if you don’t win, you get a chance to talk to a lot of people in the campaign process. The church could plan events that reach out to the community that aren’t churchy. While doing those things, the fact that the whole process was bathed in prayer from the beginning will help those involved keep the focus on evangelism.
Going Somewhere?
As a child, most likely you read the book Alice in Wonderland. At one point in the story, Alice comes to a fork in the road and there is the famous grinning Cheshire Cat. She asks him, “Which road should I take?” to which he responds, “Where are you going?” She answers him, “I don’t know.” And so the cat says, “Then it doesn’t matter which road you take.” The lesson for pastors or lay people here is that if we don’t have a plan for where our church is going, then we will most likely end up taking a lot of roads to nowhere. Casting the vision for the church must come from the leadership, but if the pastor and leaders in the church are unsure of God’s purpose and vision for their congregation, then the baby Christian in the pew has no chance of catching that vision and direction. Today’s blog is simple.
1. If you don’t already have a concrete vision for your church, get on your knees in prayer until you do.
2. Share that vision often with your church. As a Spanish teacher, I know that repetition is very important to get the average student to learn something. The same goes for teaching in the church.
3. Make sure the staff and leaders in your church know and share that vision and can share it with the people they are working with.
America’s Next Top Pastor
This is just for humor. America’s Next Top Pastor is a humorous view of what it takes to be a great pastor.
Subscribe to Church Life
Books by Burl Walker
