Reformation v.2020 Part I: Solus Christus or Sola Cultura?
Culture is imploding, collapsing in upon itself. Denying all absolutes and objective truth, culture is now without safeguards, consuming itself in a death spiral of spiritual and moral chaos. In his outstanding essay, “The Supremacy of Christ in a Postmodern World,” David Wells writes: “The evangelical church has a sense that moral absolutes are evaporating like the morning mist, knows that truth of an ultimate kind has been dislodged from life, (but) apparently does not perceive that...
Death Matters (Each One)
It is hard to have patience with people who say, “There is no death” or “Death doesn’t matter.” There is death. And whatever is, matters. And whatever happens has consequences, and it and they are irrevocable and irreversible. You might as well say that birth doesn’t matter. C.S. Lewis The simple wooden casket was set on the far side of the plain and somewhat shabby room in northwest Indiana. Silence filled the space in an unearthly and...
Psalm 23 Pastors For a 21st Century Church
Some silver lining on this dark cloud called COVID-19. A long-standing prayer of mine may be in the process of being answered: the return of Psalm 23 pastors to the church of Jesus. Call them “undershepherds” of the Great Good Shepherd of John 10. TECHNIQUE-BASED PASTORS: Members of Journey Pastoral Coaching know that I am no fan of technique-based ministry. You’ve read the articles that fill the internet: “Five Steps to Church Growth,” “Seven Tricks to Turn...
7 Questions COVID-19 is Hand-Delivering to PASTORS
QUESTION 7: JOURNEY'S PASTORS OFFER THEIR THOUGHTS With the national conversation shifting to the question of ending the quarantine, pastors find their burden not lifted, but shifted as well. And deepened. As they shepherd their people in quarantine, they are asking how they will Psalm 23-shepherd through the transition back to normal. They are asking what the new normal will look like. In recent weeks as we have processed the COVID-19 crisis and lockdown, several...
7 Questions COVID-19 is Hand-Delivering to PASTORS
QUESTION 6: Will pastors survive or thrive? I was talking with a medical doctor just today who has kindly agreed to do a webinar with the members of Journey Pastoral Coaching. The subject of the webinar is handling stress. Like most doctors involved in surgical procedures, she’s well qualified to talk about stress: medical school, four years of residency, and now a career in a practice that deals with anesthesia, intensive care medicine, critical emergency medicine,...
7 Questions COVID-19 is Hand-Delivering to PASTORS: Question #5
QUESTION 5: Will pastoral ministry be primarily prophetic or merely visionary? Will the eternal or the temporal define pastoral ministry? Students of Scripture and world history are not surprised by challenges like COVID. We may not have foreseen this particular test, but neither are we surprised by it. The Bible tells us that we live in a fallen world, one where epidemics shake nations and sickness strikes individuals. Whatever wonderful advances medical science makes in...
7 Questions COVID-19 is Hand-Delivering to PASTORS: Question #4
QUESTION 4: Will Ephesians 4.12-16 pastoral ministry make a comeback? Many pastors are very good at doing ministry alone, and so, they think doing ministry alone is best. They create, plan, strategize and implement their ideas well, so each one asks himself, “Why do Ephesians 4.12-16 when I can do it better?” We’ve all heard it said – and probably even said it – how many times? But like edging along a cliff in the...
7 Questions COVID-19 is Hand-Delivering to PASTORS: Question #3
QUESTION 3: Will this lead to more pastoral care among people who are suffering? In the business model church in the 20th-Century, shepherds morphed into CEOs, talking vision statements, 5-year plans, numbers, and programs. Pastors came to see their primary role as that of business leader and vision-caster. With the advent of the digital age, CEO pastors are morphing into prime time talking heads and the language has changed to hits, viewers, and followers. Many...
7 Questions COVID-19 is Hand-Delivering to PASTORS: Question #2
QUESTION TWO: Will pastors become talking heads? Here’s how four U40 ministers phrased it: Will pastors be able to establish a balance between digital and analog? Will we define “ministry” as posting information on social media or will I make the effort to make personal touches and care for people one-on-one? Will pastors be Word and Prayer people or Script and Camera people? Will our churches be studios or gathering places? A U40 minister recently told...© [2015] — Journey Pastoral Coaching