Some Insights from Catalyst 2008 - Part 3

This may be the last installment in the Insights from Catalyst 2008. That may change when we get the CDs and I have another opportunity to listen … especially to listen to the sessions that I missed because I left at noon on Friday in order to get back home to be a good, involved husband and father. But from my written notes from what I actually heard, this may do it for a while.
Andy Stanley is the one speaker that I consistently learn more from than any other in the conference. I’m not alone in that feeling. That’s probably why they bookend the conference with his two talks. He speaks first and he speaks last every year. His opening message this year was titled Louder than Words, and focused on how it doesn’t matter so much what we say as what we do. Here’s what I wrote down:

• Once we become adults, the people who influence us the most rarely have official authority over us. The same is true for the people we influence. We can’t make them do anything. Our principle authority regarding the people we lead is moral authority … living our lives in such a way that our actions reflect what we say we believe.
• The most important areas in which our Moral Authority shows up are:
• Forgiveness. Our message is the message of forgiveness, and because of that we forgive. As leaders, we all have hurt stories, but we can’t carry the hurts of the past with us into the future. There is no excuse for angry, bitter, resentful church leaders. Forgiveness is not an option. We have to release the junk we’ve been carrying around.
• Family. If my spouse and/or my children feel like the church is my mistress, then I have failed. Personally, this is my area of greatest struggle, not because I don’t love my family, but because I don’t manage my time and tasks well. [Note from Jim Collins’ talk: Work is infinite … time is finite … take time off.
• Finances. My salary is paid out of funds that people have given, therefore I have a moral imperative to be a good steward and manage my finances well. Give. Save. Live on the rest.
• We have to lead by example in all three areas. Our goal should be to live so that people can say, “I don’t know whether I believe what he says he believes, but I know without a doubt that he believes what he says he believes.”

That’s enough to think about for now. The peace of Christ to you.

Musings – Some Insights from Catalyst 2008– part 2

This week’s Catalyst insight comes not from one of the speakers, but rather from an experience I had on Friday morning while there. My pastor brought it to mind when he talked about meaningful touch in his message last week.

It was Friday morning, and the worship leadership was doing something deeper than just the “get everybody hyped up on adrenaline” fare that sometimes misses for me. I can’t remember exactly what the songs were, but I do remember thinking, “This is different … this is deeper … this is feeding my soul rather than just ramping up my blood pressure.”

Because I was a little later getting in, I was sitting on the very end of one of the rows in our group block. Between me and the aisle there was a trio of guys who were not from our group, and they spent most of the worship time mostly having their own conversation … one guy was playing a game on his Blackberry and the other was asking him about it … that kind of stuff. It was more than just a little bit distracting. I remember thinking that they were missing out, and that they were irritating me, and “who do they think they are?” and … well … nothing really bad, just not so good things about these strangers. They were on OUR row, for crying out loud … and why did they have to act that way? Then I found out that they were from Michigan, of all places. Now when you have served a church that was in the shadow of Ohio State University, the last thing that’s going to change your mind about the annoying people next to you is to find out that they are from Michigan.

There came a time in the morning when we were led not just to hear about some of the issues that we face in the world today, but to group together to pray together about them. We stood to circle up in groups. There was one woman in front of us, me, and these three Michiganders. Holding hands with strangers has never been high on my list, but I’m a team player, so I held out my hand to her and she took it. I was preparing to do the same to the guy next to me when I felt this big, strong arm around my shoulders, pulling me in. It was my annoying Michigan neighbor. The oddest thing happened as we prayed together in the “buddy” position. My entire demeanor toward him – and toward the other guys with him – changed. My negative thoughts passed peacefully into oblivion; and as we prayed together, my heart recognized him as my brother in Christ. Two things were responsible for that: praying together, and the meaningful touch.

That's enough to think about for now. The peace of Christ to you.

Some Insights from Catalyst 2008 - Part 1

Many are aware that I spent Thursday and part of Friday last week at the Catalyst Conference. We were at the first one in 2000 and have not missed one since. Rarely will one see and hear as many gifted leaders and speakers in one place in such a short period of time. I have likened it to drinking from a fire hose. I take some notes, but not as frantically as in years past because we also get the recordings of the speakers in order to refresh our memories. I need the CDs also because I leave at noon to get back in time to work in support of the CHS band, therefore missing at least 3 speakers.

I heard Craig Groeschel for the first time last year when he challenged us to stop living our lives as if we were responsible in our own power for what God wants to do in our churches. This year his message theme was “Finding IT When You’ve Lost IT.” His scripture focus was Joel 2:12-13. What is IT? It’s almost a “you’ll know IT when you experience IT” kind of definition … but here are some things that are true about IT.

• God makes IT happen.
• We cannot create IT.
• IT is not a model.
• IT has an upside – it changes lives.
• IT has a downside – it attracts critics.
• Those who have IT have no guarantee of keeping IT.
• Those who don’t have IT can get IT.
• If you don’t know what IT is, you probably never had IT.
• The enemy is plotting to take IT away from anyone who has IT.
• IT is NOT about technology, style, or musical instruments.

When you have lost IT, it will take something drastic in order to get IT back … because if something simple would do, you would have done it already. So our prayer needs to be.

• God, stretch me. (There is more in you than you think).
• God, heal me. (from addictions to people pleasing, progress, work, adrenaline, narcissism, appearances, eating, behaviors, music …)
• God, ruin me. Break my heart with the things that break Your heart. (This one is actually the place to start but sometimes we can’t get there until we’ve wrestled with the other two. )

That’s enough to think about for now. The peace of Christ to you.

I Wish I Hadn't Read This

On Wednesdays I'm usually at the church until after 9:30pm, so I usually don't go in until after 10:00. This morning I was reading in Harold Best's Unceasing Worship: Biblical Perspectives on Worship and the Arts when I bumped into his articulation of a thought that I have held ... sometimes loosely, sometimes firmly ... about our divisions in worship. Because I serve a church that demands to be divided, I wrestle with the dichotomy present in my convictions and my actions. Here's what Best writes on pp. 74-75:

To divide a congregation into age groups, style groups and preference groups is to be semi- or ever pseudocorporate. The body of Christ is as chronologically and stylistically whole as it is spiritually whole. It is ironic -- worse, scripturally troublesome -- to see local assemblies broken into groups, each doing their niche worship, for that is all it really seems to be. ... If, for instance, a so-called traditional service and a so-called contemporary service were radically different in every respect, one could at least construct pro and con arguments based on internal consistency. But here's the rub: the divisions are primarily about music and musical style. This being true, worship is not really about the binding power of Jesus and his gospel but about something earthly, relative and transient.

If we took music out of worship, would we have the same problem and the same set of solutions? I do not think so. It is not pleasant to realize how much of a burden is placed on ministers of music and worship because of the dependence on style change as the core of the solution. ... How perplexing to think of the burden we have placed on music, this fleeting human construct! The problem is not with any one style but with the reluctance of people to rub up against a multiplicity of styles, for it is the rubbing -- the creative friction -- that could bring about the stylistic synthesis that the body of Christ so desperately needs.

Traditionalists have much to answer for in their reluctance to understand that tradition does not mean stasis but change. In their reaction against contemporary styles, they fail to understand that what they have gotten used to was once contemporary and often objectionable. Contemporists likewise fail to understand how blunted their tastes are when only "their music" seems to do the trick and when what they are doing has, ever so quickly, frozen itself into a tradition. So we end up with two kinds of shortsightedness, one supposedly old, the other supposedly new, and both wish fulfilling. The separation of worship into preference groups is everyone's fault, in that narrow musical satisfaction has turned out to be more important than style-proof outpouring. [Earlier in the book, Best describes worship as the outpouring of ourselves in response to God's outpouring of Himself ... not quite that simply, but it helps to explain the term style-proof outpouring.] I encourage people of all practices to become intently and intensely curious about each other's ways.

Harold Best's thoughts do not condense easily into one- to three- sentence quotes. Indeed, in order to fully understand one of the terms (outpouring) he uses above, one must read an entire chapter earlier in the book. It's deep stuff, but well worth wrestling with. The fact that we so easily divide over what we so easily divide over still grieves my heart.

That's enough to think about for now.

Stuff That Keeps Me Going When Other Stuff ...

Sunday morning had been a mixed bag. I felt I had done only an OK job of leading in the 8:30 service. First Light stepped up to the plate and made some really beautiful music … but the pace of things felt a little bit off … a little bit disconnected. Then as the Sanctuary Choir prepared for the 11:00 service, it became clear that we would have only 11 instead of our usual 20+. I had just come from the sanctuary were I had met a couple of guests. I had seen them in the 8:30 service, and they told me that they wanted to stay and experience the 11:00 service as well. All the while I’m thinking, “They won’t see how things usually are at 11:00 with half the choir gone.” As First Light did in the 8:30 service, our half-choir sang beautifully (with David singing the bass part instead of accompanying on organ). The morning still left me feeling somewhat a failure in my responsibilities, but thankful for those around me who made up for what I lacked.

In the wake of all of that stuff that I was feeling, this happened in the middle of Youth Choir on Sunday afternoon: At the end of “Sometimes I Hear God’s Music” (Williams/Martin), chills went up my spine when they got to the last “Praise God forever!” Their sound was glorious. As Dawn worked with the second sopranos who wanted to make sure they had their notes right a 7th grade tenor motioned me over, saying, “This is just awesome!” “What is?” I asked as I walked over to him. “These words right here,” he said, pointing to the phrase ‘… of a love that faileth never.’ “They’re just incredible … awesome.” His face was radiant with realization that God’s love never, ever fails. The truths of scripture were being firmly planted in his heart … and he loved it!

I’ve said it before. Asking me which style of music or worship I like better is like asking me which of my children I love more. And to denigrate one style or the other … or to put down those whose prefer a different style … is to stab me in the heart. After 8+ years of working to bridge the gap (the contemporary service started a little over a year before I got here) we’re still allowing worship style to divide us as a body. We call it “my worship” when it really doesn’t belong to us at all. And it’s not about style … it’s about substance … it’s about truth.

All creation sings together of a love that faileth never.

The music of forever. Praise God forever!

The music of forever is not an organ, piano, guitar, or drums. It is the music of our hearts responding to God’s love that faileth never. That’s enough to think about for now. The peace of Christ to you.