Daniel Darling's Blog, page 75

5 Things Every Son Needs to Hear From His Dad

By God’s good grace, I’m the father of four beautiful children: three girls and one boy. Last week I wrote about the 5 things a daughter must hear from her dad. Today I want to talk about fathers and sons.

Just as there is something wonderful about being the father of daughters, there is something wonderful about being the father of a son. In my house, Daniel Jr (4) and I are outmatched four-to-one by girls, so we sort of stick together to make sure everything is not painted pink, some football gets watched on a regular basis, and that we watch as many superhero movies as Barbie movies.

Seriously though, the job of raising a son is a noble and important task. It is a job many men abdicate, leading to what is now a full-blown crisis in our country: a crisis of fatherhood. Look up the statistics when you have time and you will see that a very high percentage of young men in prison experienced little or no involvement from Dad. In my pastoral role, I’ve seen the devastating effects of a father’s absence or lack of leadership in the life of his son.

Fathering your sons is a serious job, men. And so in that spirit, I’d like to offer five things every son needs to hear from his father:

1) You are loved. Every boy needs to hear and know that his father loves him. Without this affirmation, a man carries deep wounds that affect his most important relationships. I’ve talked to men at all stages of life who yearn to hear those magic words that mean the most when they come from Dad: I love you. Today, my son is only four years old, so it’s easy for me to do this. I suspect as he gets older, it will become a bit more awkward. But I plan on doing it still. Behind the sometimes rough exterior of every young boy is a heart that longs to experience the love of his father. What you don’t realize is that the first image your boy will have of his Heavenly Father will be the image of the human father looking down on him. So tell your boy you love him.

2) I’m proud of you. I can’t tell you how many men I know who, to this day, are still living their lives in search of their fathers’ approval. Down deep in their hearts they wonder, Am I good enough? Did I make it? Is Dad proud? I’m learning that it’s important for us dads to be hard on our sons in many ways (see below), but we should never withhold our approval. They need to know, at periodic junctures in their lives, that they measure up, that there is nothing they have to do to earn our favor. Sure, at times they will disappoint and they should know and feel this. And yet we should not be taskmasters who, in trying to motivate our sons to greatness, withhold the very ingredient that will fuel their success: confidence. I’m reminded of God’s approval of Jesus as His Son was baptized by John the Baptist. “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. (Matthew 3:17; Mark 19:35). Yes, there are important theological ramifications to that phrase beyond mere approval, but still I can’t help see God’s approval for Jesus as a model for our relationship with our sons. If your son doesn’t make Division 1, if he gets accepted into a school other than Harvard, if he becomes a truck driver instead of a pastor, don’t ever give him the impression you like him less. Don’t damage his soul this way.

3) You are not a slacker, you’re a soldier. Today the culture presents such a confusing picture of manhood. What is a man supposed to be, anyways? Pop culture tells him he’s sort of unnecessary and the best he can do is idle away his adolescence by satisfying his sexual urges, simulating warfare with a joystick, and lacking any kind of noble ambition. But God did not make your son or my son to be a slacker, but a soldier. Now don’t get uptight about the word soldier. It’s okay to encourage our sons to be masculine. This doesn’t have to mean a deer hunting, truck driving survivalist. Plenty of real men sip lattes, drive minivans, and hate camouflage (guys like me). There is a vision of manhood in the Bible, one of nobility and strength, of sacrifice and courage. A real man fights for what he loves. A real man cherishes the woman God gives him. He doesn’t exploit her. A real man pursues that calling God has stamped upon his soul, one that is discovered through intimacy with God, identification with gifts and talents, and meeting the world’s deep needs (to paraphrase Buechner). Nobody can help guide our sons along their mission more than us fathers. Let’s not leave our sons’ futures to chance. Let’s stand beside them, modeling for them what it looks like to live on purpose.

4) Hard Work is a Gift, Not a Curse. Idleness, laziness, and indecision are the devil’s best tools for ruining the lives of young men. Guys, our sons needs to see us work hard and to be encouraged, made to work hard. They need to see that work is harder because of the Fall, but was actually given by God to experience His pleasure. Getting our hands dirty, straining, struggling, sweating–these are all good things, not bad. Sadly many young men have not seen what it actually looks like for a man to work. Let’s show them that work brings joy. Work honors God. Work done well brings glory to the creator. It may be done with fingers on a keyboard or by swinging an ax-head or by maneuvering a fork lift. It can be done in air-conditioned offices, muddy swamps, and underneath a car. But make no mistake: work matters and what we do with our hands, done well, is a testament to the Creator.

5) You are gifted, but you are not God. Let’s imbue our sons with a sense of confidence, of approval, of dignity. But let’s remind them that while they are gifted by the Creator, they are actually not God. Let’s teach them that genuine masculinity doesn’t strut. It bows. It picks up a towel and washes feet. A real man is as comfortable praying as he is preaching. He knows that his strength isn’t found in his exploits or what he thinks people think of him. His strength comes from God. This humility will fuel his compassion and will allow him to forgive those who deeply wound him. Let’s let our sons know that their lives really begin, not when they walk down the aisle at 18 or when they get their first employment contract or when they fall in love with a woman. Their lives began on a dusty hill 2,000 years ago, at the foot of a Roman cross, where justice and forgiveness met in the bloody sacrifice of their Savior. Let’s teach them that to live their whole lives without Jesus is like playing a concerto on the deck of the Titanic. It’s beautiful while it lasts, but it ultimately ends with sorrow. If we do anything at all with our sons, men, let’s point them to the Jesus we know.

Finding Joy in Winter

This is a picture from outside our front door in the northwest suburbs of Chicago. It’s winter time. I love living in Chicago for a variety of reasons. I love the city. I love the Midwest. I love the Autumn season. I love the Bears, Bulls, and Cubs.

But I hate winter. Always have. People think snow is charming and romantic. I hate shoveling it and trudging through it and the mess it creates for a commute. I hate the bitter cold weather that blows through your bones in February. I hate the traffic and the fact that people drive 25 miles slower when there are a few flurries.

So, if you haven’t noticed, I hate winter. And yet . . . . there is beauty in winter. Tremendous, awe-inspiring, breathtaking beauty. On Saturday I drove along a main road near our house, a road lined with homes, white fences, and tall pine trees. The site of this landscape blanketed by heavy snow is something you only see in places where there is winter, only during seasons when snowstorms occur, when the weather is cold enough to numb your appendages.

As I drove down that road, enjoying the wonderful picture, hating winter, something struck me. It’s simple and yet profound: we need winter in our lives, because there is a certain beauty that only winter, only seasons of hardship and pain, can produce.

The Bible says that it is God who creates the seasons. The psalmist Asaph writes:

You have fixed all the boundaries of the earth; you have made summer and winter. Psalm 74:17 (ESV) 

The Scriptures often compare moments in our lives to seasons. The author of Ecclesiastes says there is a season for every phase of life: joy, sorrow, building, resting, planting, harvesting, etc. It is God who establishes those seasons, the sacred rhythms of life.

Which brings us back to winter. I find that my attitude toward Chicago winter is similar to my attitude toward the winter of suffering and hardship in life. I find that I don’t like these seasons very much. I find myself grumbling, questioning, waiting for the warm sun to break through the freeze and the frost. And yet . . . I find in those winter seasons a certain unexplainable beauty and joy that can’t be found when life is as I think it should be.

This must be why the writers of Scripture describe a joy in trials. Paul says: “I rejoice in my sufferings” (Colossians 1:24). Peter says, “Rejoice insomuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ”(1 Peter 4:13-16). James writes, “Consider it pure joy when you face trials of various kinds” (James 1:2). Chuck Swindoll says this: “Deep, contended joy comes from a place of complete security and confidence [in God] – even in the midst of trial.”

There is another benefit of winter. I’m no farmer and so what I say  here might be completely off. But I do know this. Without a winter, without a deep freeze and a without the heightened water table produced from the layer of snow, there is no harvest season. In life, without winter seasons, there is no fruit. I love what Elizabeth Elliot says:

Our vision is so limited we can hardly imagine a love that does not show itself in protection from suffering…. The love of God did not protect His own Son…. He will not necessarily protect us – not from anything it takes to make us like His Son. A lot of hammering and chiseling and purifying by fire will have to go into the process.

If you want to be like Christ, if you want to experience a deep sense of joy, you must embrace the winter seasons of life. You don’t have to enjoy the trial nor should you pursue suffering as some kind of false martyrdom. But it we can see winter for what it is: a temporary seasons of formation, we’ll not only endure, we’ll experience growth when harvest comes.

The beautiful thing about living in Chicago is that winter isn’t forever. Around the end of March and beginning of April, green shoots rise up in the barren soil, flowers begin to bloom, trees show signs of life. It’s a reminder that in every season, God is faithful, that not every winter lasts forever. And in another sense, the whole earth is in a winter, but spring is coming. The death and resurrection of Jesus was the first sign of spring, hope budding up among the barren landscape of a cursed creation. One day harvest will come, the King victorious, and the long winter of humanity will be over.

 

5 Things Every Daughter Needs to Hear From Her Dad

I’m a father of four beautiful children, three of whom are girls. My oldest daughter is eight years old and with each passing year since her birth, I’ve become more conservative when it comes to all things that pertain to my girls. I’m not a gun enthusiast, but I could be if it meant standing at the porch waiting for the first guy who dares to ask one of my daughters on a date.

Seriously though, I love having daughters. There is something about having a daughter that softens a man, adds a certain tenderness to his soul. In that spirit, I’d like to share five things every daughter needs to hear from her father:

1) You are beautiful and you are loved. This is something you should tell your daughter at least once a day and probably more than that. Telling her once every so often doesn’t cut it. I’m no psychologist, but daughters who know their father loves them grow up with more confidence and tend to avoid looking for love in all the wrong places. Hearing she is beautiful is oxygen for your daughter’s soul. So do it often, in different and creative ways.

2) Your mother is beautiful and she is loved. The best gift you can give your daughter is to show her how a man treats a woman. Let her see modeled in you, however imperfectly, the God-given love between a man and a woman. Tell your wife daily that she is beautiful, that you love her, and that you are glad you married her. Tell her you are committed to her for life. And say these things, periodically, in front of your children.

3) You belong to God and were created for his glory. Girls frequently battles insecurity over a number of issues: their weight, their looks, their friends. Maybe sometimes they feel unimportant or unwanted, even in a home with love. This is why you, as a father, should remind them often that they are special creations formed lovingly by the Creator in His image. You should read with them the words of David, “I am fearfully and wonderfully made,” from Psalm 139. That passage should be well-worn in your Bible and something internalized by your daughters for moments of doubt.

4) You are forgiven. Your girls will mess up. They will sin. They will disappoint you. And if you don’t have the good news of the gospel at the center of your family, she may grow up wondering how to measure up or what to do with her sins. Evangelize your daughter and then disciple her. Train in her in the vital Christian practice of repentance and forgiveness. Repentance for her sin and forgiveness of others’ sins. Let her know that Christ is always ready with fresh supplies of grace. Let her know that she must apply that grace not only to herself, but toward others who will wound her.

5) You are accepted. Whatever you do, don’t let your daughter consume the poison of the culture which measures a woman’s worth by her independence, by her ability to give away freely her purity. Don’t for a moment let her swallow the lie that sexual license is anything but a bondage of the worst kind, the enemy’s way of stealing the creativity and beauty and purpose for which she was created. Teach her what to look for in a man (hint: not the slackers you see on TV). Also: be that man so she knows what it looks like. Make her aware of the beautiful image of womanhood painted by the Creator. Her acceptance, her sense of self, her worth are bound up in her unique calling as God’s daughter.

*Next week I’ll share a similar list for fathers and their sons.

If There is No Sin, There is No Grace

Be of sin, the double cure, save from wrath and make me pure - Augustus Toplady

There is a hesitance, actually more like a firm resistance, to calling any behavior, “sin.” When the issue of sexual lifestyles are discussed, even evangelicals are wary of labeling any one behavior as sin. It’s the word we want to run far, far way from. Nobody sins anymore. They make mistakes. They were born that way. They are misunderstood.

The Bible, however, has clear categories. And some things are sin. Sexual license is sin. Murder is sin. Libel is sin. Gossip is sin. Furthermore, the Bible doesn’t just say that humans commit sin, but that humans are actually, by nature, sinners. That is they aren’t naturally good people who sometimes fall off the wagon and sin. We are sinners by nature.

But what about grace? Isn’t the church supposed to be about spreading the good news that God has accepted sinners by grace? Isn’t the message of the church that God’s grace covers even the vilest of sins? Yes, it is. And this is a message we should shout from the rooftops. It should be the core of what we evangelicals do and say.

Here’s the rub. If you stop acknowledging that some choices are sinful, you stop needing that wonderful thing called grace. In other words, if everything is okay, is just a different lifestyle, but not actually a gross violation of the righteousness of God, then why would you need grace? You wouldn’t, because nobody is doing anything wrong.

This is why the Church must talk about sin and about grace. At times, followers of Jesus have talked more about sin, as if God was violently angry at sinners and they have no hope. As if we were gleeful, like the Pharisees, to catch someone abusing God’s standard. This is the wrong message and denies the gospel.

And yet, we seem to be in a moment in the church when we want to talk about grace in a way that acts like sin is no big deal. Let’s not talk about sin, after all we’re suppose to be the people of grace. Wait a minute, though. If there is no sin, there is no need for grace.

The point I’m making here is this: Unless I realize I’m a sinner deserving of God’s just wrath against sin, I cannot experience the richness and fullness of His grace. If I deny my sin, I shut the door on grace. This was Jesus’ message to the woman at the well. Yes, you are a woman who is living in sin. Yes, you are just the kind of person I came to save. 

We have to acknowledge both realities. This is why talk of the word, “sin” should not frighten us who believe in the gospel. Because it was not mistakes or missteps or misunderstandings that Christ came to conquer and defeat. He came to defeat sin and sin’s awful child: death.

I’m not proud of my sin, but I’m glad to recognize that I’m a sinner. Because sinners are the only people eligible for Jesus’ unlimited grace.

Friday Five: Paul Rude

Last week I read an excellent article on the Gospel Coalition blog on the significance of everyday work. At times, pastors and ministry professionals tend to cast “secular” vocations as a sort of second-tier calling. I loved Paul’s perspective and asked him to join me today for a chat around this topic and his new book, Significant Work. 

Paul Rude is a ministry consultant, speaker, and founder of Everyday Significance, an organization dedicated to helping people connect Christ-centered faith to everyday life. Before launching Everyday Significance, Paul spent eight years working in missions as a ministry leader. Prior to that, he spent a decade in the adrenalin rush of Fortune 500 corporate finance–and loved it. When he’s not speaking or consulting, you might find him rafting whitewater rivers or climbing mountains. Paul lives in rural Alaska with his wife, Misty, and their five kids.

There seems to be a renaissance, of sorts, among evangelicals around the doctrine of work, with Tom Nelson‘s Work Matters, Gene Veith’s work, Tim Keller’s book, Every Good Endeavor and now your book. Why is this issue so important?

Hardworking, everyday Christians are tired of feeling like second-class citizens in the church.

Deep down, we know something is wrong with the paradigm that limits eternal significance to the short list of jobs we traditionally define as “ministry.”

Most of us earn our daily bread in the marketplace, not in religious ministry. If we assume that only acts of “ministry” (teaching Sunday school, witnessing, etc.) are significant to God, then we live two separate lives. We live a sliver of life that makes a difference in eternity, but everything else we do, the great bulk of life, has no eternal value—or worse, it’s a necessary evil.

As we become accustomed to living two separate lives, our faith gradually loses all relevance to our weekday lives. Church is church; work is work. We navigate between two unrelated spheres, two value systems, two moral codes. We begin to confine our faith to that sliver of time we spend doing “religious stuff.” The rest of the time—the great bulk of the time—our faith is off duty. It sits on the sidelines, unconsidered and unexpressed.

Now, at last, theologians, pastors, and authors are pushing back against this paradigm. We are trying to articulate the robust biblical doctrine of work. It’s a doctrine that gives extraordinary significance to the work of truckers and accountants and homemakers. Millions of people are discovering that Jesus Christ is Lord of all seven days of the week—not just Sunday.

You talk about a class system in the church where missionaries and pastors are “really serving the Lord” and lay people are sort of “walking wallets” to fund God’s work ,but whose daily job has no significance. How does this view conflict with God’s mission?

If we were all pastors and missionaries, the human race would starve to death. So we must ask: Did the sovereign God of the universe create a cruel game of musical chairs, where 90 percent of us must work in meaningless jobs so that 10 percent of us can work in significant jobs—ministry jobs? The absurdity of this class system is self-evident.

We make little of God and much of religion when we claim that only pastors and missionaries are serving the Lord with their work.

God’s mission is bigger than our job titles. And he doesn’t play cruel little games with significance.

His mission encompasses far more than simply preaching and witnessing. We see this when we read the rest of the Bible. The Bible begins and ends with creation. Our God is the Creator and Ruler of all things, and he made us in his image. We reflect his glory and character when we create things, when we fill the earth and subdue it, when we tend it—when we work!

How can pastor’s empower the laity to find purpose and mission in their daily work?

Talk about it with their congregations. It’s that simple. Oh, sure, there are many other things a pastor can do. But most pastors need to take the giant first step of initiating the conversation.

Surveys repeatedly tell us that pastors almost never preach or talk about everyday marketplace work—the activity that consumes the greatest portion of the congregation’s time and energy, the activity that puts them in direct contact with the world. This creates a huge disconnect between the heavenly bliss of Sunday and the gritty reality of Monday.

What about parenting? How can Christian families instill a sense of significance and worth in the everyday work life?

My grandmother was awesome, the coolest granny in California—she loved parasailing and polar bear swims, and she loved Jesus Christ.

But one day she told us, “My greatest hope is that all of you will grow up to serve the Lord as missionaries and pastors.”

She meant well. But her words dumped a crushing load of expectation into the heart of a kid who desperately wanted to please his parasailing granny. My dad wisely pulled me aside and corrected grandma’s well-meaning, but misguided, intentions. So no damage was done in my case. But what if my dad had agreed with her?

Parents and grandparents: guard your tongues! Do you carelessly imply that pastors are more significant than truckers? Do you imply that CEO’s are more successful than carpenters? Ouch! I preach and write on these topics, yet I easily fall into this trap. This is tough; we must steadfastly guard our tongues, as well as our hearts.

What is one thing you hope readers take away from your book?

I passionately hope the reader will lay hold of—will live, breathe, trust, know, and utterly experience—the life-giving freedom of the gospel. I want him or her to see how the gospel gives extraordinary value to their regular, everyday work—and to their lives.

Because of Jesus Christ, our undiscovered gifts, our unapplauded work, our forgotten names, and our unsung lives all matter. They matter to God. They matter for his glory. They’ll be part of his masterpiece for all eternity—and oh, what an astonishing, breathtaking wonder it will be!

Let’s Not Trade Unity for Clicks

I’m writing this post even as I’m supposed to be writing my sermon for Sunday. But there is just something God has put on my heart and so deeply convicted me about that I have to share it.

A few days ago I had a conversation with a wonderful, well-known pastor in my area. He’s a pastor in every sense of the calling. Kind, loving, shepherding, caring, gracious, studious, biblical, evangelical, evangelistic. All those things.

We had a wide-ranging conversation out of which I gleaned so many good things for my life and ministry. But one that I cannot let go of was this. We were discussing a controversial issue in the Church worldwide. I won’t mention the issue, but it’s a big one that is less important than orthodoxy and yet still very important to many good people. Personally I think it’s a huge issue. He and I agreed on the issue, but perhaps to varying degrees.

But there was a point he made that stuck with me. He said, “There is so much heat around this issue and it is hurting the Church.” I hung on this for a while and chewed on when I got home and am still chewing on it. He was right. On both sides of this issue there is a lot of heat.

I read a ton of blogs from a wide variety of perspectives in evangelicalism. I learn and grow from some of the many practitioners who write well and share important theological and practical information. I’m thankful for this new area of new media, for the openness of blogging, and for social media. And yet I sense, at least in my generation, among evangelicals who care deeply about issues, a dangerous gotcha mentality that is not healthy for Church unity. I’m not talking about all voices. I’m talking about a few voices on both sides of some major issues. But these are loud voices.

What bothers me is that it seems that we are tempted to trade unity for blog traffic. Let’s face it, controversy sells. It builds platforms. It garners book contracts. Write up a piece calling out a famous pastor for something and suddenly you have people on all sides batting it around. I’m not above this. Nobody is above doing this. That’s why I didn’t mention names.

But I really feel like there is, among some of us, a spirit of nitpicking, McCarthyism  and arrogance. We like it when a famous pastor goes over the line in criticizing the President, because it gives us a chance to beat our chest on social media and distance ourselves from that pastor and “not be one of those kinds of Christians.” We like that. We like when a famous religious figure continues to say weird things on his TV show. We like it because he makes us look normal by comparison and “not one of those kinds of Christians.” Some like it when they troll through a famous pastor’s thousands of online sermons (that he may have put there at his own church’s expense) and find a clip that has something articulated in a not-so-good way. We like to spread that on social media and blog about it so everyone comes to the blog and thereby we have increased the platform.

I don’t think this helps the cause of Christ. I don’t think this promotes unity in the body. Please hear me. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t correct public declarations of bad doctrine. I’m not saying robust dialogue and critique are not good for the Church. I’m not saying we should turn a blind eye to abuses of spiritual authority. We shouldn’t. We should vigorously defend orthodoxy in every generation. We should oppose unhealthy ideas contrary to Scripture.

But I think it would help if every Christian writer, blogger, pastor–anyone with a modicum of a platform–would periodically engage in self-examination. We should ask ourselves, “Are we building our audience, platform based on critiques that hurt Christ’s body?” A few months ago I was offered a chance to review a book I vehemently disagreed with. I really wanted to write that review. I’m sure it would have brought blog traffic. And yet I really was convicted by the Spirit to not do it, because my motivations were not right. And so I didn’t.

I think we all need to face up to the idea that Christians are sinners. The Church, made up of Christians who are sinners, will have a lot of imperfections, blind spots, bad things. They are not really all that hard to find. Some are glaring. And you can make a living, a career out of being the person who finds them, blogs about them, writes books about them, etc. But is that really a life worth living?

How God Uses Relationships to Make You Better

Everyone wants to be better. Self-improvement gurus call it, well, self-improvement. Wise people and many in the church call it growth. The Bible calls this process sanctification. And for the Christian, sanctification is not merely the process by which you become a nice, better person. Pretty much all religions and even quasi-non religions do that. Even Richard Dawkins, I’m thinking, is okay with growth.

Sanctification is something deeper, better, richer. The Bible asserts a bold idea that Christians–those who believe, know and follow Jesus Christ–have something deeper going onside them. They have God in them through the presence of the Holy Spirit. Christianity, at it’s truest form, is not really about getting better by self-improvement, but about dying to your old self and seeing the life of Christ form in you. It’s a spiritual thing. It’s a supernatural thing. But how does God accomplish this? Or, perhaps a better question, what tools does God use?

Well, we know first of all that the agent of change is the Holy Spirit. And we know that He uses the Word of God to penetrate our hearts, cut us deep, and bring about change. The Word delivered, both in private reading and corporate preaching, brings about renewed thinking and renewed thinking brings about new behaviors, new loves, new affections.

But there is another tool that we often overlook, a powerful factor in sanctification. We change through God-ordained, dynamic relationships. In fact, I might argue that relationships, outside of the Word itself, are the primary instrument by which God changes us. This is why the New Testament is pretty clear that faith in Christ is best lived out in community.

Let me explain this. When I was a single guy, I thought I was a pretty spiritual guy. I did my devotions every day. I was faithful attending church. I read widely. But then I got married. This new relationship, a daily, 24 hour/7 days a week committment to another person, revealed areas of sin and selfishness I didn’t know I had. And my committment to my marriage forced me to change. In other words, God used my wife, who is very different than me, to change me. As a husband, I’m forced to adapt to Angela. I have to die to some of my needs and desires. I have to repent, daily, of sins against her and have to forgive, daily her sins against me. I grow. I change. And ten years later, though far, far from perfect, I’m an altogether different man.

This process only ramped up when I had children. Four of them. They test my patience, my leadership, reveal further selfishness and sins in me. And so the process of sanctification grows. And in much smaller ways, God has used coworkers, staffers, colleagues, family members, even those who’ve hurt me. They are not here by accidents, but are instruments of sanctification for my good.

Community is where the gospel is most lived out. Every day you rub up against certain people who are different than you. And you have to love, tolerate, forgive, repent. You have to adapt, sacrifice and grow.

Now you might say that this process is the same for those who are not Christians and to a certain extent that is true. But for believers, we have the Spirit in us, convicting us of our sin. We have the gospel dynamic in our relationships, motivating and empower us to forgiveness and grace.

Why does this matter? This matters because it affects our perspective. We should see other people in our lives not as irritants, but as divine tools sent by God for our sanctification. So that irascible boss–perhaps God put him in your world to chip off parts of your old self that needed chipping off. That troublesome child that tests your patience. Perhaps its God wanting to work on your heart and soul to bear the fruits of the Spirit.

Every single relationship for a Christian is an opportunity for sanctification and growth. This is why the idea of Western individual spirituality–me and God–actually hurts the process of change.

Why You Need Your Church Every Week

We live in an age when, increasingly, people are asking the question, “Do we need to gather on Sunday mornings for worship anymore?” It’s a valid question. After all, isn’t there a plethora of good sermon content online? Aren’t there churches that actually offer online services? And isn’t it possible to read your Bible, pray, and perhaps listen/watch/read a sermon at home?

The truth is that you can experience some of what you get at church at home. You’ll likely find a better message by listening to one of the popular preachers. You’ll might carve out more time to pray by staying at home. And you can even roll up your sleeves and get involved in works of service in your local community rather than going to church. You can even worship and sing in your shower.

Yes, to all of those. And yet, this kind of attitude really misses the point when it comes to church. At church we do hear a message preached from a pastor. And we do pray and sing and serve. But that’s not all church is about. There is more than simply what we “get out” of a Sunday morning.

I call it body life. Some call it community. Regardless, you cannot replace that at home. You cannot get that at a conference. You cannot get that online. The truth is that God has wired us, created us, for commnity. And when God ordained the Church, calling out a special people for His name, you will notice that God didn’t call a “person”, but called a “people.” Our American Western individualism causes us to skip right over the plural aspect of the Christian faith.

In the Old Testament, God called out a people. In the New Testament, God called out a people. Read the Psalms, notice how often worship is spoken of us in a corporate context. Notice how often you find third person plural pronouns. It’s the same in the New Testament. The commands, the calls to worship, the theology. It was delivered to a people, not to a person.

Why is this? Because we grow best in community. When God’s people are gathered from every nation, tribe and tongue, when people of diverse social standing and race and financial status are put together by the Holy Spirit, something wonderful and powerful happens. We change. We learn from each other. We become family.

This is why it is so important to not simply be a token participant in your local church, but a full-on, all-in member. That means you attend as often as you physically can. That means you go to most of the events. Even the potlucks and the seemingly non-essential things. Why? Because you’re part of a local body, part of a family. We are all sacrificing time, energy, passion, and the best of our lives for Christ. And, here’s the big one, when God’s people gather corporately every week to bow their heads and lift up their hands in worship, it says something. It’s a powerful statement about who God is and who we are. It sends a loud message to our part of the world. Yes there is a God and yes we consider Him transcendant and holy and worthy of our deepest adoration.

We miss something when we check in on Sunday and then check out right after the service. We miss when we stay home and watch it online. We miss something when do a lot of Christian, churchy type stuff, but don’t actually attend church on Sunday. We miss the life of the body of Christ.

Church isn’t simply for self-improvement (I got nothing out of the message last week. I wish the music wasn’t so loud. Did you see that kid in the third row who was making all that noise?). Church isn’t just so I can change and be better at my job and my marriage and my golf game. It’s body life. And if you’re not all in, my friend, you’re missing out.

Writing, like anything worth doing, takes work . . . and love

I’m often asked by beginning writers how to “get started” in writing. How to get published. How to get that book on the shelves of Barnes and Noble. They assume I’m an expert, which I’m most assuredly not.

Nonetheless, I have been writing for a while and here is my advice: Writing takes talent, yes, but is mostly the combination of a lot of work and a little love.

I remember when I first got out of college and dreamt of being a writer. I had dreamy notions of a cabin in the mountains or a house by the beach. I’d listen to my favorite music and pound out thousands of words of beautiful prose every single day. I’d have publishers lining up outside my door and I’d be doing book tours, morning television, and would be an evangelical bestselling book hero.

The real world of writing, I’ve learned in the intervening years, is much, much different. I don’t say this to discourage, but to make writers aware of the work it will take to see their words good enough to be in print, which is to say, good enough to inspire.

Writing does take skill, a certain giftedness from God. And there is a rush when you are in the “writing flow” and pounding out words from heart to head to keyboard. Yes, those moments are exhilarating  when you know you are doing the very thing you were put on earth to do. I feel this way, sometimes, about preaching and studying.

But like any other skill, any other endeavor worth doing, writing is mostly work. By work I mean that you write a lot. You write often. You write when you don’t feel like it. You write really bad stuff to get to the good stuff. You write things about subjects you don’t want to write on to get your foot in the door or to get some income. And you learn along the way that you’re not writing to be famous or rich (there are much easier avenues to those fleeting goals), but you write because you can’t not write.

You must love to write if you are to endure. There are many many people who really say they want to publish a book, start a blog, become a columnist. Hundreds and thousands of these kinds of people. But there are few who love it enough to sit down beyond the keyboard at ten o’clock at night, when normal people are sleeping or watching Sportscenter or another episode of West Wing. In other words, real writers just start writing. They write and write and write. And at the end of their lives they will look up and realize they have created a body of work they can be proud of.

So I guess my best advice on writing is to work at it. Don’t fall for shortcuts that promise to get your words in print right now. Yes, you can easily self-publish a book tomorrow on Amazon.com. But will it be good and inspirational and weighty if you skip the rejections and the editing and the rewriting that the publishing process forces you to endure?

I don’t think so.

Do Truck Drivers Matter to God?

Paul Rude asks a great question, “Do Truck Drivers Matter to God?” His answer:

The truth is stunning. The truth is that the regular, everyday, earthly work of a Christian’s life possesses breathtaking significance bestowed by the touch of God’s magnificent glory. God pulls the white-hot ingot of eternity from the forging fire of his sovereignty. Then, like master to apprentice, he entrusts the hammer to our hands (Eccl. 9:10; Col. 3:17, 23; 1 Cor. 10:31; 2 Thess. 3:6-12). He says, “Strike it. Strike it right here. This is your place. This is where I want you to influence eternity. Live the life I gave you to live.” And so, in stammering awe, we take up the hammer. We live our lives—our regular, everyday, toilsome lives. The hammer falls. Sparks fly. Eternity bends, and the Master is delighted (Matt. 25:21).

God, the Maker of the universe, destines our everyday lives to make a difference? Yep. Fuel filters, tax returns, laundry, and Southern-style barbecue are important to him? Yep (especially Southern-style barbecue). A life as a gospel-driven engineer, florist, or realtor can be as meaningful to God as the life of a pastor, missionary, or humanitarian relief worker? Absolutely.

There’s something massive going on here—God’s epic cosmic story—and we’re smack in the middle of it. He knows your name and mine. He’s given us each a life to live—a regular, everyday life—a particular place for us to shape eternity (Phil. 1:27; Col. 1:10; 1 Thess. 2:12; 4:11; 2 Thess. 3:6-12)

Read the whole thing:  Do Truck Drivers Matter to God? – The Gospel Coalition Blog.