I do, however, want to examine the pros and cons of the contractual nature of many independent churches’ call for their pastors. I know my Anglican and Presbyterian friends don’t have to really deal with this issue, as their pastors basically have tenure. However at my own church that I’ve been serving at for the past 7 years, pastoral staff are called with terms of either 3 or 5 years. It hasn’t been an issue for me and I’ve been quite happy having my term renewed every 3-5 years. Even though I don’t have tenure, my church has never given me any doubt that they would keep me as long as I’m willing to serve there (provided moral or doctrinal failure doesn’t disqualify me).

So here’s an attempt at a working list of pros and cons to contract / limited term callings for pastors:

Pros

• It’s an automatic mechanism that ensures pastors get reviewed by the leadership in terms of suitability and performance. Many times pastors with tenure get too comfortable and just keep the ministry on ‘cruise-control’ because there isn’t a likelihood in their lifetime of losing their “keep”.
• It’s a safety net to rid a church of pastors who may have more serious doctrinal and personal problems in an easy way. Denominations with tenure tend to cement in bad teaching or doctrinal compromises that don’t disqualify one from the ministry (because definitions and doctrinal statements can always be flexed and re-interpreted). Within a generation liberalism and real heresy creeps in and then it’s nearly impossible to change the course of that church. Many denominations then have to put up with a diversity of parishes within its region/diocese – i.e. some high church, some broad church, some liberal, some charismatic, some conservative.
• It’s a way for congregational-model churches to make sure the balance of power still lies with the laity rather than the clergy. Without tenure, the clergy are very aware that they are there to serve the congregations and must empower the congregations to make the right choices. Democracy isn’t perfect, but it’s a good system when we know that all power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
• It gives the pastor a chance to re-examine his calling to that particular ministry every few years without leaving the congregation with the uncertainty that he will just up and leave with 3 months notice. Contracts cut both ways. The pastor is forced to re-think whether God wants him to stay in his particular church after a contractual term expires. It’s always a good thing for pastors to think about getting radical rather than comfortable, and this may be a good mechanism for reflection.

Cons

• The ‘automatic mechanism for review’ doesn’t work very well in actuality. Most church boards will rely on the automatic mechanism to relieve the pastor of his duties rather than actually face the pastor and do a brotherly and detailed review. It becomes a ‘cop-out’ way of terminating a pastor’s call without actually ‘speaking the truth in love’. Furthermore, by the time his contract has expired, usually the level of dissatisfaction in a church board has already risen to boiling point because an issue that should have been resolved earlier has been left to simmer. It’s easy just to think: ‘Let’s all save ourselves the trouble and save him face by just not renewing his contract in a year or two’s time.’ This isn’t how a church should operate.
• The contract renewal can be used as blackmail and control. I know of pastors who have essentially been asked to ‘tow the line’ on a non-doctrinal or Biblical issue or else his contract will not be up for renewal. That’s pretty despicable but yes, it does happen!
• In actual fact the congregational nature of the church gets eroded though the system is supposed to protect it. The reason is because most churches with contract terms put the renewal of contracts in the hands of the board, rather than the congregation. In other words, if the board decides the pastor shouldn’t be up for renewal, the congregations can’t really do anything about it short of sacking the board by a big majority vote. So even though the congregations have to vote to approve a pastor’s renewal of contract, the actual motion to renew lies in the hands of a few, not the many. Ironically what is supposed to protect congregational power actually undermines it.
• The pastor can be encouraged to be a people-pleaser every time his contract is up for renewal. In an ideal world pastors don’t have to ever bow to the pressure of people. In reality the longer a pastor has been in ministry, the less likely he is able to find secular work and the more likely he has a family to support. Furthermore the older he becomes, he is also less likely to have other churches knocking on his door offering him a job. This can create a situation whereby the pastor will decide to compromise rather than fight in order to retain his job. So churches have to really ask the question: do you want a pastor who is potentially going to be a people-pleaser every time renewal comes around?

Solutions?

Given that there are pros and cons, what may be the solution for independent churches who don’t have to lean one way or another on the issue of tenure?

One solution is this: offer tenure to the most senior pastoral leadership but not all pastoral workers. In other words, lead pastors and associate pastors can have tenure, while fresh-out-of-college graduates and others can be on a contract basis with a view to becoming an associate with tenure at a later date. This creates a balance whereby the ones who are required to really lead and guide the church can have security in doing so, even at the expense of popularity. Jonathan Edwards’ example shows us that some difficult decisions that are vastly unpopular were in fact the right ones. It’s a pity for a pastor to be easily ‘sacked’ over any decision that can be unpopular in the here-and-now.

However if any pastor is given tenure, then the process leading to his appointment must be given due care. It can’t be easy to ‘hire’ a pastor just on the decisions of a few. It should be a process that involves the whole leadership and the whole congregation, with lots of time for examination and prayer. The flip side is also true. If a pastor is found to be unsatisfactory on grounds other than doctrine or personal morality, then it should be equally ‘difficult’ to get rid of him. Again, the mechanisms must be in place to be able to take these issues to the congregation for careful examination and prayer.

What about accountability then? In order to safeguard accountability (and with it, doctrine and practices), the church should have in place a good policy of periodic review of each pastor’s personal life and performance. This means that he is given a brotherly examination by the board and other lay (and staff) leaders whether there is a ‘problem’ or not, and this must happen periodically (at least annually). In this way, he knows if he is under-performing in some way when measured against the (written) expectations of his calling when he was called. It also means that neither the congregation or the pastor can use the contract as a ‘cop-out’ so that no contentious issues have to be really dealt with because the contract is coming to an end soon anyway.

As I said, I haven’t worked all of this out. I would be interested in your thoughts and opinions on this matter. As you can tell, I have assumed that there is no particular Biblical mandate for either tenure nor contract when it comes to the appointment and calling of full-time church-funded workers of the gospel (thus you might have noticed the utter absence of Bible-references in this post). You might think differently on that and if so, I’m happy to consider your arguments as well.

We’ve all been there. A gorgeous wedding. Perfect day. Bride and groom look sparkling and splendid. Guests are enthusiastic. Wedding service goes off without a hitch. Then… the wedding sermon ruins everything.

It’s too long. It’s too preachy. It’s too generic. It’s too vague. It’s too specific. It’s too cringe-inducing. It’s frankly just soooo boring.

Now it is a wedding so out of politeness, people will put up with it. But chances are there are a large number of unchurched in the congregation as well. And their impressions of the church, your church, and especially the preached Word can be seriously damaged by that one bad wedding sermon.

So what do we do as preachers?

Well, I don’t have all the solutions. But I did have an excellent mentor when it came to teaching me how to craft better wedding sermons. My MTS trainer Dominic Steele of Village Church Annandale and Christians in the Media preached at our wedding in 2000, and since my very first wedding sermon in 2005 (I’m now up to sermon #24 this weekend), I’ve been rigorously applying his ‘formula’.

So maybe it’s time to share what I’ve learnt in the hope that it would improve this very important public ministry of our churches.

1. Keep it short. A wedding sermon should be no more than 15 mins (Dominic went for under 10 mins at my wedding!). No matter how accommodating the bride and groom are (or even if they request a full 30 min sermon), resist the temptation to go for more than 15 mins. No matter what you tell yourself, no one’s interested in anything longer.
2. Be realistic about your aims. Your aim is not to exegete a passage or lay-out Two Ways To Live. A more realistic aim would be to plant a gospel-seed in the hearts of unbelievers there, or perhaps give a glimpse of God’s wonderful blueprint for marriage, or maybe even both. But whatever it is, be modest in your aims.
3. Be winsome, humorous, and don’t be preachy. Treat it like an evangelistic sermon that you’ve been invited to speak at. Don’t take audience interest for granted. Help them ‘get aboard’ the train before you go on your sermonic journey.
4. Try and steer clear of Ephesians 5 and 1 Peter 3 Biblical submission passages. It’s not that we don’t believe them or are shy about standing up for male-headship in the home. However with a 15 min wedding sermon with lots of unbelievers and believers from all walks of life present, you have to cover a lot of ground to make sure people see these passages as God intends. You are fighting a defensive battle from the get-go from the moment these passages are read aloud. I’ve preached wedding sermons on them, but I strongly prefer not to.
5. Choose instead a passage that highlights marriage themes such as love, grace, commitment etc. It’ll also be easy to then take that nugget of an idea and relate it to the gospel. And of course it means that we must…
6. Preach the gospel. Regardless of what your other aims are, the wedding is an excellent opportunity to speak about Jesus and plant that ‘gospel-seed’ in people’s hearts.
7. Personalise the wedding sermon around the couple’s courtship and relationship. This is the most important thing I learnt from Dominic. I find out as much about the couple’s courtship as I can, especially details like first impressions, how they first starting dating, funny stories, engagement stories, how they’re different etc. Then I weave their story into the main idea of the Bible passage and use their story as an extended introduction to the idea of the passage. This is quite a lot of work, especially initially. I do it via email. I ask the couple the same set of questions and get them to email me back detailed answers separately (it’s more fun if they don’t show one another). Then I do the hard work of integrating the relevant bits into the sermon. Sure it’s more time and effort, but I see it as my personalised gift to the newlyweds. Also be assured that you’ll have all of the congregation still with you when you bring their attention to how this story (of the couple) relates to a bigger story (of the gospel).
8. Did I mention, keep it short?

Happy preaching!

I remember early in youth ministry one of my leaders asked us: “Why are some people still not yet Christians?”. In my head spun a host of theological answers to that question. It could be that they had some serious intellectual objections. Perhaps they weren’t willing to give it all up to follow Jesus. And ultimately, it’s a work of regeneration by the Holy Spirit, so maybe they’re just not ready.

My leader replied with a pithy answer that I’ll never forget: “It may be because no one’s ever showed them how to become one.”

In the last few months, I’ve deliberately met one-on-one with people who’ve been regular attendees at my church who have not yet become Christian or at least seemed unsure of their position before God. What I discovered were a couple of interesting things, none of which are rocket-science:

1. Most of them didn’t understand the gospel very well, especially the notion of grace. What surprised me was that we constantly teach and preach about grace at church and in Bible study. And yet when it came down to it, they still thought that becoming Christian was sort of a ‘journey’ towards being more ‘Christian-like’ in thinking and behaviour. What this showed me was to never assume. When someone with a particular grid (i.e. works) hears grace, they will often still filter it through their existing works-paradigm. More often than not, it takes a personal conversation to point that out.
2. A couple of them were just waiting for the invitation to become Christians. I had to ask them very directly: “So, you wanna do it now?” and show them how they could by praying a simple prayer with me. In the last two weeks, two men did exactly that. They had both been coming to church for a while (one for nearly 8 years, the other for the whole year). They were both ready, at the time of our conversation, to receive Christ, and they just needed someone to show them how.

Now of course behind all of this is the necessary work of the Holy Spirit in regenerating people’s hearts. However, regeneration isn’t always “pin-pointable” to a moment in time. God uses human means, and especially the means of prayer, to bring the fruit of regeneration to the fore. That’s where we come in.

Are there people in your church or Bible study group who may just be waiting for someone to meet up with them to clarify the gospel and extend to them an invitation to receive Jesus? My suspicion is that there are more than you think. And I reckon this is especially so in youth ministry. Don’t just wait for the big event evangelistic rallies. Find someone, pray for them, meet up with them, check they understand the gospel, and invite them to pray to become Christians. You might be surprised at how many will.

I came across this article in SMH.com, Indian Girls Are Renamed to Finally Feel Wanted:

More than 200 Indian girls whose names mean ”unwanted” in Hindi have chosen new names for a fresh start in life.

A central Indian district has held a renaming ceremony it hopes will give the girls new dignity and help fight widespread gender discrimination that gives India a skewed gender ratio, with far more boys than girls.

The 285 girls – wearing their best outfits with barrettes, braids and bows in their hair – lined up to receive certificates with their new names along with small bouquets from Satara district officials in Maharashtra state.

In shedding names like Nakusa or Nakushi, which mean ”unwanted” in Hindi, some girls chose to name themselves after Bollywood stars like Aishwarya or Hindu goddesses like Savitri. Some just wanted traditional names with happier meanings, such as Vaishali, meaning ”prosperous, beautiful and good”.

”Now in school, my classmates and friends will be calling me this new name, and that makes me very happy,” said a 15-year-old girl who had been named Nakusa by a grandfather disappointed by her birth.

She chose the new name Ashmita, which means ”very tough” or ”rock hard” in Hindi.

(Read more here)

It’s a wonderful story, and my heart goes out to all those now-delighted little Indian girls who have a new identity and a new sense of belonging. And the warmth of this story immediately made me think of how much more wonderful it is to have our personal histories rewritten and our unwanted statuses revoked by God our Creator. A couple of passages from the Bible came to mind:

Hosea 2:21 “In that day I will respond,” declares the LORD—  “I will respond to the skies, and they will respond to the earth; 22 and the earth will respond to the grain, the new wine and oil, and they will respond to Jezreel. 23 I will plant her for myself in the land; I will show my love to the one I called ‘Not my loved one.’ I will say to those called ‘Not my people,’ (“Lo-Ammi”, cf. Hos. 1:9) ‘You are my people’; and they will say, ‘You are my God.’”

Ephesians 2:11 Therefore, remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and called “uncircumcised” by those who call themselves “the circumcision” (that done in the body by the hands of men)— 12 remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.

In Christ, God gives us a new name. Those who were once far away, unwanted, not his people, have now been brought near by his blood and given a new name, a new identity… wanted. When you really understand that and revel in the amazing privilege of that, nothing will ever stay the same.

What would Jesus protest about?

One of the top news stories has to do with the protests that began on Wall Street now spreading throughout the world, especially in European countries like Italy and London. One of the protesters apparently dressed up as a Jesus with the placard: ‘I threw the moneylenders out for a reason!’

So it got me thinking: what did Jesus really protest about when he marched into the temple and threw out the money-changers? Was it really because they were corrupt or greedy or financially unscrupulous? Is this a parallel situation to the protests happening around the world against corporate greed?

A closer look at the Gospel accounts in Matthew 21, Mark 11, Luke 19 and John 2 would probably cause us to think again.

In short, by overturning the commerce of money-changers, Jesus was actually overturning the very fabric of Jewish temple worship. Nothing in the texts identify Jesus’ anger as directed against greed or financial dishonesty. In fact, the money-changers (note: not “money-lenders”) and those selling animals were doing the public a service. Without them, it was impossible for travelling pilgrims to come and offer sacrifices at the temple.

So Jesus kicking up a storm over their presence in the outer court (the court of the Gentiles) was a visual statement declaring two radical things: firstly, that the old order of temple worship was over. John 2 especially makes it clear: Jesus is the new temple. Then secondly as a related point, Jesus quotes the Old Testament that declares the goal of the temple is to be a house of prayer for “all nations” (Isaiah 56:7). By overturning and destroying the very system of Jewish temple worship which divided Jews from Gentiles (and here furthermore was actually preventing Gentiles from worshipping in their designated space), Jesus was declaring a new age when worship would equally be available to all, for he himself would be that temple in whose body Jew and Gentile are radically united as one (Ephesians 3).

So what would Jesus protest against?

If I could be so daring to suggest, I believe Jesus would protest in Italy at the Vatican. More than that, he’d protest in any place where ‘church’, sacred buildings, and ‘religion’ eclipsed the reality of Jesus being the one and only perfect meeting place between God and people. He’d also protest against any religious system that continued to separate God’s people based on culture, ethnicity, gender, tradition, experience, or education.

Jesus is the true temple. He’s come to bring a radical worship through his death and resurrection and by his Spirit (see John 4). This temple, unlike the Jewish temple, unites rather than divides. By his heavenly session and his Spirit of intercession, we truly have a ‘house of prayer’ in which we dwell and can freely relate to God our Father.

This was an email Sydney Morning Herald blogger and columnist Katherine Feeney received from her blog “City Kat“:

Hey Kat,

Long time reader and sometimes commenter of your blog. I have a topic I would love you to talk about as I need some advice from your readers.

Basically, male prostitutes, or escorts for women.

Let me tell you a bit about my situation. I’m a 21-year-old female who has never had a relationship, thus, I’m a virgin.

Whilst I have put away the thought of meeting someone sometime soon, I still crave intimacy.

I would love to experience what most people have by my age, and it’s safe to say I have been thinking about sex EVERY single day for the past maybe six years. I watch porn often and want to try out so many things…

Thing is though I do not like the thought of casual sex or one night stands. I don’t think I’m unattractive, but I never seem to be able to pick up or meet new guys, and only really have a small group of friends. 

So that’s where I have been doing a bit of research for male prostitutes. And from what I have read it sounds enticing.

These men are paid to make a girl feel special and ensure she gets the best out of the encounter. A lot also specialise in a girl’s first time.

So what better way for me to experience what I have missed out on?

I know I probably won’t go through with it – I’m a bit shy – and it is totally out of character for me.

However I can’t seem to get the idea out of my head and I know I don’t want to be a 25-year-old virgin.

What should I do guys?

Thanks,

Confused Virgin.

The SMH blog then went on to ask readers the question “is it okay to commoditise sex?” and how the readers would respond to this letter.

So it got me wondering: how would God respond to a letter like this? Maybe a little like…

Dear child,

I love you and I am saddened to read about your confusion.

In your letter, you wrote about wanting to experience sex. But you were honest enough to admit that you want sex because you want something deeper than sex. You want intimacy and you fear you’ll never find it before it’s too late.

I see your longing; I acknowledge your pain; I sense your fear.

And so I want you to know first of all, that I love you more than you can imagine. I created you. I watched over the formation of every cell in your body. Not one hair on your head has fallen out of my watchful eye. I love you.

And that’s why I also want you to know that your longings for intimacy and security and love can’t ever be met by anyone else. Though you might one day find a man, a lover, or a husband, even the best man can’t fulfil that longing you feel in the core of your being.

The reason is because that longing was created for relationship with me, your Creator. I gave you a God-shaped hole, and only I can fill it. Sin has kept you away from me; I sent my Son into the world to die for sin and rise again so that you can come back to me. Only that can fulfil your longing. Only I can give you the satisfaction that you seek.

So yes, you’re missing out on something and you’re missing out on someone, but it’s not what and whom you think.

I want you to know that I created sex, and I created it to be immensely pleasurable. But I created it to be only fulfilling and only satisfying within committed and covenanted marriage relationships. Sex is far too great a gift to be squandered in any other way. You’re far too precious to be giving yourself away to a male prostitute, or even to a lover. Sex in those situations won’t give you the joy and intimacy you seek. Rather, it’ll rob you of future joys and intimacy with someone whom you one day may marry.

Finally, I want you to know that you’re not defined by your sexual experiences or lack-thereof. You’re not defined by being a virgin, or not being a virgin. You’re not defined by being popular, outgoing and as someone who has a boyfriend, or alternatively, less popular, shy and single. I am offering you an identity that’s more permanent, more wonderful, more satisfying than anything this world can offer. You can have my Son Jesus give you his wonderful identity in the place of yours. You can be royalty – a daughter of the King of kings. You can have the unfading beauty and identity as an heiress of eternal life.

So will you?

Your loving Creator,

God.

Now, Mandarin Chinese is the language to learn. On the 100th anniversary of the birth of modern China (see Xinhai Revolution), China has eclipsed Japan and almost every other nation to be the global and economic powerhouse in the world. In the sci-fi futuristic film Serenity, the common speech is a combination of English and (bastardised) Mandarin Chinese. This is not so hard to imagine now that China is on the ascendancy and the U.S. is on the wane. Who knows what the world will look like in 50 years?

So I’m writing as a bit of a ramble, but not in any sense of being Chinese and feeling pride about it. In fact, China’s ascendency can be somewhat of a worry, since there’s no Christian worldview that undergirds its morality (unlike the post-Christian West), and the influence of Christians in China, though they number millions, is a shadow of their influence in the West. In other words, I worry that the growth of China in the world stage is not happening with any checks and balances that even a post-Christian worldview can provide. That’s a matter of prayer.

What I want to ramble about is Australia and Chinese ministry in Australia over the next few decades. In a conversation with RICE director Steve Chong, former Deputy PM John Anderson commented that the importance of a ministry like RICE, with its networking of Asian churches, lies precisely in the ascendancy of China in world influence, along with the strategic placement of Australia as a nexus between East and West in the Asia-Pacific region. And so I wonder if churches in Australia have thought about Chinese ministry in light of that.

My impression is that many churches are hopping on to Chinese ministry and perhaps even working with Chinese churches in order to reach the growing migrant and international student population flooding our shores. But most, as I understand it, see it primarily as meeting a current need. Rather, I think the tide of world events should make us prayerfully think about Chinese ministry in terms of the future. If, as John Anderson predicts, Chinese influence is only going to gather momentum both in the Asia-Pacific region and in the world, then doesn’t it make sense to invest heavily in Chinese ministry in order that Chinese Christians can be placed in positions of leadership and influence in the secular world both here in Australia and in China? If Australia, geographically and politically, as a nation bordering the East and West is going to be strategic for this next phase of development, then doesn’t it make Chinese ministry in Australia even more important, not just because of the needs now, but because of the possibilities in the future?

I have no idea what this might look like in detail but here are just some general initial ramblings:

• More genuine partnerships need to be forged between Chinese churches and Aussie churches; between the RICE network and other movements and networks.
• We need to raise up the next generation of Chinese leaders within the church, especially those who speak or are willing to learn Mandarin.
• Strengthening weak and under-resourced Chinese churches, rather than just taking away the best of their leadership in order to serve Anglo churches, may actually be an important strategic move for the next few decades, as bridges to the Chinese community and the key influencers there are more likely going to come from Chinese churches than Anglo churches.
• Australian-born or -raised Chinese who are part of Chinese churches ought not feel defensive or ashamed about their churches. Rather, they ought to see the opportunities advantages that lay  (perhaps dormant) within their churches. In other words, I’d love some to decide to stay in Chinese churches not out of personal preference but out of a desire to be strategic in where they serve.
• Allowing Chinese congregations in Anglo churches which are growing and outgrowing other congregations not just to play ‘second-fiddle’ but actually to take the lead and drive the ministries of the entire church has got to be a consideration, though it might be met with resistance.
• We need to give existing Chinese churches a vision to reach beyond their own ethnicity, especially to cross into other minority cultures, in order to allow God’s blessing to them to overflow to others.
• Promoting and investing in Chinese (language) theological scholarship both within Asian seminaries and Western ones.

Okay, enough of my rambling. What are your thoughts? I’d genuinely love to read some interaction along these lines.

“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”

Now I don’t particularly want to bring Biblical commentary on that. It’s obviously got so much to commend it as a perspective on life – something I wish more hedonistic non-Christians would share. However, Biblical Christians would clearly also want to take his statements further – much further, into eternity, and think about that should affect the way the sons and daughters of eternity ought to live. That’s for another person and perhaps another blog to comment on. (One such blog is here.)

The only thing I want to pick up on is to suggest that many Christians wouldn’t know that Steve Jobs’ worldview as articulated in that quote is something known as Existentialism (or at least something very similar to it). Whether Jobs himself is an existentialist or knows it is beside the point (in fact, he’s apparently a Buddhist). The point is simply that his words don’t come in a vacuum, they come from within a worldview.

And so it got me thinking: how many Christians know enough about other worldviews to know what Existentialism is, how it evolved from naturalism and nihilism (the non-theistic varieties anyhow), and how it can be understood and critiqued from within? I want to suggest that unless Christians do grapple with these philosophical questions and spend some time reading about and understanding worldviews, we’re going to be very shortchanged when it comes to engaging with people who embrace Steve Job’s (or anyone else’s) philosophy of life.

So where’s a good place to start? Let me recommend a fabulous book that’s helped me and so many in introducing the different kinds of worldviews. I think it’s essential reading for all Christians. It’s by James W. Sire called The Universe Next Door.

In the mean time, here’s the full video of Jobs’ commencement address.

Don’t surf away from this blog yet though! I wanted to draw attention to the ‘suckiness’ factor of being a pastor because sometimes it really is quite difficult. A good chapter I read yesterday from this book, Pastor to Pastor by Erwin Lutzer, really highlighted it. Chapter 2 deals with ‘A Congregation’s Expectations’.

So here it is. Pastors are in a Catch-22 situation when it comes to the expectations of the congregation. It’s often “damned if you do and damned if you don’t”. As Lutzer writes:

If he should lose the congregation’s goodwill, his ministry might soon be over. But if he consciously attempts to establish and maintain a correct impression, he courts spiritual disaster.

I don’t want to care about how my congregation feels about me, but as a pastor, I know how important perceptions are. If they perceive me in a generally negative light, then no matter what I do they’ll read it through a negative grid. Whereas a pastor who is loved and trusted by his flock will be able to get away with “multitude of sins”. Who doesn’t want to have a congregation whose “love tanks” towards their pastor is full? And yet as the quote rightly points out, if you seek it, you’re seeking an idol.

So what’s the solution? Lutzer helpfully points us to Christ, who was the most complete and satisfied human being ever because he was completely free from men’s opinions about him. He sought the approval and audience of One person alone – his Father in Heaven. And if I could build on Lutzer’s point, we Christians ought to be as secure as Christ was. Why? Because of the wonderful doctrines of justification by faith, Christ’s imputed righteousness, our union with him and our adoption through him. In short, in Christ we are completely approved and accepted, completely apart from our merits. This ought to provide the fatal blow against the idol of others’ approval. My Father’s will is what I should seek; his approval is something I already have and can’t lose. This frees me to truly perform to an audience of One.

The implications of this for pastors, according to Lutzer, are:

1. We wouldn’t let people push us into their mold.
2. We would profit from criticism.
3. We won’t be afraid to let our humanity (and failings) show
4. We wouldn’t see the success of another as a threat to our own ministry.

I don’t like writing book reviews. The main reason is, I’m a quick reader but not a detailed reader. I assume that for a book review to be decent, some attention has to be paid to the details, and I don’t particularly want to do that.

However, as someone who is one of the first in my circles to have gotten hold of this book (via Kindle) and read it, I thought it would be worth putting some thoughts down on a page somewhere. There will no doubt be better reviews than this one, and when they turn up, I’ll link them to this article.

I picked up this book because of its premise and its recommendations. Its premise is to “make sense of social justice, shalom and the Great Commission”. The first two items: social justice and shalom, have been the flavour of a new generation of young evangelicals who have been exposed to writers such as N.T. Wright and Christopher J.H. Wright (among others – those are the two who have influenced me). The recommendations of this book come from such respected luminaries as Mark Dever, D.A. Carson, Michael S. Horton, Thomas Shreiner, and P.T. O’Brien. When they write in such glowing terms, you gotta take notice.

Having read the book in nearly one sitting (I spent a lot of time on the train yesterday), I can say that it’s been ultra-helpful for me personally as I’ve been wrestling theologically with some of these issues for awhile now, ever since I picked up Surprised by Hope by N.T. Wright. I can say now that it’s probably one of the top three books I’ve read this year and I hope its influence will spread and its central thesis carefully chewed over, examined and appraised by my generation of socially active younger evangelicals.

Rather than going through a chapter-by-chapter analysis, here are my highlights from the book.

1. Attention to exegesis. The authors don’t allow us to be swept into convincing rhetoric that stays at the big picture level without dealing with specific texts.They do this so deftly, since this is not intended to be a scholarly work. Don’t be fooled though! Though they write as pastors, the exegetical work no doubt lies in the background and surfaces just enough to make their case very convincing.

2. Clarifying important concepts and ideas. The book rightly identifies that there is a lot of murkiness and slipperiness in a lot of recent talk about this issue. Much of the recent literature is very enthusiastic about concepts such ‘mission’, ‘social justice’, ‘shalom’ and ‘kingdom’ but never spend time to defend it exegetically or even clarify what is meant by these terms. They very helpfully ask (and deal with) important questions such as: Is there a difference between God’s mission and the church’s mission? Is the gospel primarily about cosmic renewal or forgiveness of sins? Is it biblical to speak about Christians ‘building the Kingdom’ through social or other means? What do we mean by ‘social justice’? Is ‘incarnational’ ministry a valid way of speaking about what Christians are called to do? What is biblical shalom and how does it come about? Will the new creation be continuous or discontinuous with this old one? Those are exactly the kinds of questions discerning young evangelicals should be asking in the midst of current enthusiasm for social concerns.

3. Recovering the centrality of the gospel. The best thing for me is that DeYoung and Gilbert show that the ‘old stuff’ that we young evangelicals have been taught isn’t that wrong: the mission of the church is essentially the Great Commission. Our mission is primarily that of bearing witness to, proclaiming and preaching a good news of forgiveness and reconciliation achieved by the work of Christ and calling people to repentance and faith in him. Our mission is to make disciples of all nations. That’s it. To summarise their central thesis:

The mission of the church is to go into the world and make disciples by declaring the gospel of Jesus Christ in the power of the Spirit and gathering these disciples into churches, that they might worship the Lord and obey his commands now and in eternity to the glory of God the Father. (p. 62)

4. Locating our social and mercy ministries under the category of ‘love’ rather than ‘social justice’. The authors are very clear that what they do not want to do is to discourage or deflate a concern for the poor, socially disadvantaged or enslaved peoples of the world. However, they want this concern to be Biblical both in its source and in its demonstration. Rather than locating it under the blurry term of ‘social justice’, they see that Christ’s command to ‘love our neighbours’ is sufficiently important as a motivator to get moving to care about those around us in holistic ways.

The Christian will be generous and compassionate toward the suffering and the disadvantaged, realizing that all we have is a gift from God and that we share God’s image with the poor. But in the constrained vision, this care is a matter of love and compassion, not automatically a matter of justice. (p. 182)

5. A call to Biblical realism.  Some of the calls for Christians to social action is enjoined with a grand vision of ‘participating in Kingdom building’ on earth as it is in heaven. It is the classic liberal vision of bringing God’s Kingdom here on earth through radical transformation of social structures. A lot of this talk neglects to take into account the ‘not yet’ aspect of eschatology, as well as (most importantly I think), the way in which the Bible speaks about God’s Kingdom. God’s Kingdom is God’s work, God’s mission, God’s accomplishment through Christ, not ours. We receive the Kingdom, enter the Kingdom, but are never told to ‘build the Kingdom’. In their words:

God certainly uses means and employs us in his work. But we are not makers or bringers of the kingdom. The kingdom can be received by more and more people but this does not entail growth of the kingdom. We herald the kingdom and live according to its rules. But we do not build it or cause it to grow because it already is and already has come. (p. 134)

There is a tendency towards a sort of triumphalism when we think of being able to ‘transform cities’ and ‘build God’s Kingdom’ in the here-and-now before Jesus returns. That’s a great vision but has always made me a little uncomfortable, as I don’t see that in the mission of the disciples in Acts or in the pages of the New Testament. The authors argue that Jeremiah 29 is a better way of understanding God’s call to his people while we live in the tension of the ‘now and not yet’. We’re to seek the welfare of the cities we are in, love people around us, do as much good as we can, but our hope is in God’s new city coming from heaven to earth, not in our ability to transform our cities to be the New Jerusalem before Jesus returns.

The new heavens and new earth are not something that we build for ourselves out of the ruins of our fallen world. They are a gift from God to his redeemed people. Christians do not build the holy city, New Jerusalem, from the ground up; it doesn’t rise from the ashes of Babylon (Revelation 18–19). Rather, it comes down from heaven (Rev. 21:2), a gift of God to his people. It is “the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God” (Heb. 11:10). (p. 206)

There’s a lot more I could write about, but I won’t given the length of this post already. If I have one criticism of this book it would be that I wish they would engage more openly with Tim Keller as they do with Chris Wright when it comes to these issues. They do quote Keller, but only in positive and supporting terms. I wonder however, if there are aspects of Keller’s vision for Redeemer and cultural / city transformation that should stand up to more direct scrutiny. I would also want to read Chris Wright’s Mission of God in more detail so I can see if all their critiques are fair, but I can’t help but feel that he is their main target in terms of evangelical scholarship on this topic.

And before I sign off, I reckon their last chapter, written as a sort of imagined dialogue between a young fiery new pastor and a seasoned evangelical pastor ought to be required reading for every young man wanting to head into the pastorate. I just wish I had read it when I finished Bible College 7 years ago.

Now read a “proper” book review by John Starke from the Gospel Coalition here.