My Sister Karen

In the run up to Christmas my little sister died.  Karen was 44 and her brave battle with cancer was over.  I want to pay tribute to Karen's love of life and family.  She expressed her emotions openly and told us she loved us.  She had a smiling determination, a love of sport, animals and the outdoors.  Her lasting friendships were obvious at her funeral when we heard from three friends from three particular stages of her life.  I particularly appreciated hearing about her high school years, which were largely unknown to me having left home for University by then.  I also want to pay tribute to Karen's husband Dallas who cared for Karen so faithfully and well right through her many health struggles. 


My family and I have so appreciated the support of friends, family and our church family at East Taieri.  It has drawn us closer to people here.  As I said one Sunday morning, in a church the size of ET, some people won't have known that a sister, let alone that she had cancer.  That is completely understandable.  The wonderful thing is that some people knew, and those who were close to us have been incredibly thoughtful and supportive, especially elders and the ministry team, and those I work most closely with.  Thank you everyone.

I have taken many, many funerals in my 20 years as a pastor, and sat with many grieving people.  I'm reminded again how true it is that comfort came from people who managed to say a few halting words of sympathy or write a simple card.  It wasn't their profound words, but their love and care that counted.

It isn't easy for me to speak about the trials we face.  It makes me vulnerable.  In this case, the vulnerability led to people being able to care for us.  Keeping a "stiff upper lip" and not saying anything would have shut people out and kept the relationships shallow.  Have you had an experience of being vulnerable leading to deeper relationships?

This time has also reminded me that the message of the resurrection is amazing and full of hope.  I know this in my head, and preach it from the scriptures, but I've been reminded of the importance of the resurrection by seeing Karen's body waste away.

"Therefore we do not lose heart.  Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.  For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.  So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen.  For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.  Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands... Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come."  2 Cor 4:16ff

I have preached from these verses in the last week at a dear saints funeral.  I think I'm more motivated to share the good news of Jesus than I have ever been!

God bless you,
Martin.

How is Your Heart?

Last week I wrote in our Sunday Bulletin about checking inside on the condition of our heart.  I copy it below:
How are you inside? In some famous words from the Bible, “people look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” (1 Sam 16:7) It doesn’t mean the internal organ that pumps blood, but the governing centre of our lives – our character, personality, will, motives, and mind.


Taking part in God’s mission adventure means we will do things, but we need to be careful that we aren’t so preoccupied with what we are doing for God (as if he is relying on our help), that we miss what God is doing in us. Every day God will be working to shape us to be more like Christ, if we pay attention.

Want to take a quick heart check up? Here are some things to look for:
• Do I feel mad, sad, glad or scared? Grateful or demanding?
• Am I taking responsibility for how I feel or blaming it on others?
• Do I have a few safe relationships where I seek feedback about my behaviour?
• Do I have time for people, including those who don’t yet know Jesus?
• Am I growing in love for others, or impatience with others?
• Do I think everyone else is wrong?
• Am I falling into all-or-nothing, black-and-white thinking? E.g. if my performance falls short of perfect, I’m a failure.
• Am I picking out a single negative detail and dwelling on it exclusively, so that my vision or all reality becomes darkened, like a drop of ink that discolours a whole glass of water?
• Am I jumping to conclusions without the facts, or making assumptions about others without bothering to ask?

Let’s not ignore the health of our heart,
________________________________

Some readers might have recognised some of the above reflection which Jim Herrington, Robert Creech and Trisah Taylor offered as some practices for "calming" ourselves amidst the anxiety that can arise in congregations.  They are using the insights of Edwin Friedman and Bowen Family Systems Theory to consider how interactions and relationships can work better in church settings.  Their book is The Leader's Journey: Accepting the Call to Personal and Congregational Transformation (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2003).
I am finding the insights of this systems theory and in particular the concept of the leader being an "less-anxious presence" very helpful.
 
Will chat more about this,
Martin.

One Service - Touch Pause Engage

Last Sunday all 6 East Taieri congregations gathered in one service at the Hislop Hall, in Taieri College.

It was a wonderful opportunity to worship God together and to seek God for the year ahead.  We also appreciated the music ministry of David Lyle Morris, who joined us for the occassion.

I paste below a summary of my sermon notes for that service from Luke 10:1-9

Introduction

Members of a rugby team are all different, but together they make up the team – each member playing their part.

Together, we make up the East Taieri Church team. We are all different. There are six different services represented here. But together we make up the ET team, each member playing their part.
The mission of the All Blacks is clear – to get the ball across the try line, and stop the opposition doing the same, so they win the game.
What is our mission as a church?

 

One people in mission for God’s glory

Growing in Christ and making him known in love

through word, sign and deed

Because all people matter to God.

What does that look like? What’s our vision for that in the future?

 

1) The people were in touch with Jesus (Luke 10:1)

 

The 72 people Jesus chose and sent out were some of his followers. He knew them, and they knew him. Jesus was sending them out as his ambassadors to proclaim that the Kingdom of God is near. God’s powerful rule as King was being demonstrated in Jesus ministry, and now they were going to do the same kinds of things. Healing people, driving out demons, and telling people about turning back to God. They had seen Jesus do it, now they were to go out and do it themselves. But it came from their relationship with Jesus. Being in touch with Jesus.

Our mission is an overflow of our relationship with Jesus. At East Taieri Church our vision is that we are all close to Jesus. Knowing Jesus, so our lives are changed and we can be a part of Him changing other’s lives too.

How do we stay in touch with Jesus? God took the initiative in sending Jesus, but we also need to respond. There was a woman who had been subject to bleeding for 12 years. She had spent all her money on doctors and none of them could make her well. She thought, “Jesus is my only hope.” She thought “If I only reach out and touch his cloak, I will be healed.” And she was.

You can reach out and touch Jesus in worship. Those of us leading worship are praying, digging deep in the Scriptures, practicing music, preparing creative stuff, getting ready. But all of us need to get ready for worship. We need to come expecting to meet with God in all His love and power. We want to grow in our worship services in the year ahead.

You can be in touch with Jesus in your own of course. Growing in your relationship with Jesus in those quiet moments at home. In the year ahead, I will be teaching about spiritual gifts and spiritual practices that are part of living as Jesus lived.

 

Or when you meet with a mentor or in a small group. In the past year we had 4 new small groups start, 2 at FUEL, and 2 from the rest of ET, giving us over 25 groups now. People encouraging each other in their life with Jesus. God has good things for us as we draw close to Jesus

2) Pause – Prayer, Reflection, Learning, Growth (Luke 10:2)
Notice what happened before they actually went out.
Before going out, they were to pray. Prayer reminds us that we are dependent on God’s grace and power. We humble ourselves, and ask God to do what we cannot.

 

So we are making October a month of prayer. We will give you a prayer diary for the month, inviting you to seek God daily. There will be suggestions for prayer and space for you to write down what you sense God saying to you. We will finish the month with a major prayer gathering to worship God together and hear what the Lord has been saying. We will be praying for our whole mission as a church, including that God would draw us all close to Jesus.

Then they were to go according to some specific instructions from Jesus. (Lk 10:3-9) We will see in a moment that the basic idea of our mission is simple. Sometimes we over complicate things. But here Jesus did give them some mission instructions. They were to travel light: no money, no bag, or sandals. They weren’t to dilly dally along the way making small talk to the people they met. There was a sense of urgency to find those people that were open to the good news about Jesus, discovering where God was already at work in a town or village and joining in. (Jesus altered these in Lk 22:35-36).

The second part of our vision at ET is everyone growing in Christ, understanding that the Christian life isn’t just about going to heaven when we die, but living in the kingdom of God now – ambassadors for the King.
(Luke 10:9) Seeing God’s power at work putting things to rights, healing sickness and injustice, bringing forgiveness and reconciliation, changing lives, caring for God’s creation around us... A big view of what it means to follow Jesus as an ambassador of the King of Kings.

There are specific ways you can pause, reflect, learn and grow:

• There are opportunities for intentional discipleship.
• This ET brochure, “How can I grow spiritually?” has a menu for spiritual growth: starters, entrees, mains, desserts...
• This year we put together a ministry opportunities board, which highlights opportunities for you to step out into a new serving experience with God.
• We will be running the updated Network Course in the new year to help us be clear about our spiritual gifts, personal style and passion, so we understand more of where God is calling each of us to step out in mission.
• In March next year we are having a church camp which will be a fantastic opportunity to build relationships and grow as a disciple of Jesus.

 3) Engage in God’s Mission: In touch, pause, then go! You and I “go into mission” every day. When we get out of bed – our home is a mission. When we go out our gate, enter school, workplace, or join in with something through ET church or in the community, we are in mission. Our vision is that we all might be in a vital relationship with Jesus, growing in him, and overflowing to others in mission.

  

And while I’ve acknowledged that we need to be prayerful and reflective, learning & growing, the basic pattern in Lk 10:9 was fairly simple:

 1. Minister to real needs with God’s power,

 2. And tell people where it came from.

 

 Let me give you a few examples of our strategies for engaging:

 (a) Today, someone from FUEL gave you a brochure that explains the mission and vision of FUEL – a mission work of ET. FUEL is a breakfast cafe church that meets on Sunday morning in Fairfield. Their particular focus is reaching and discipling people not currently involved in church. FUEL has grown to around 30 adults and 20 children every week. We need to pray that God will raise up new leaders, so FUEL can go on and grow.

  

(b) We want to be a part of God changing lives and transforming communities. Our community facilitator Joy is doing a great job of research, networking, and seeing people join in opportunities that God raises. We want to engage our community.

 

It will mean building partnerships where we can be an influence for Jesus amidst something that may not be labelled “a ministry of ET church”. This already happens through our chaplaincy in schools... Through the way Christians from ET are involved in victims support, caring for the elderly, night patrols, sports clubs... The Father and Son’s breakfast Ben McK is helping organise. Our vision is that we would all be thinking “God’s Mission” as we go about these activities.

  

(c) We are going to consciously celebrate the way existing ET ministries are engaging people outside the church family. Sue Todd’s testimony: English for Speakers of Other Languages – Coffee & Conversation Group.

  

(d) We are going to introduce more people to Jesus.

Two key strategies:

(i) We attract and invite people to fantastic events (such as Christmas Eve – this year lets break the 1000 mark – and perhaps more importantly) and we attract and invite people to quality ministries (such as Mainly Music and the Marriage course).

(ii) We build relationships with people, and speak about Jesus.

 

Our attractional stuff is going well. But we aren’t great at actually saying something. I’m not saying this to heap guilt on us. But in the year ahead we are going to help you get better at speaking about Jesus in a relaxed, helpful way, using one simple, fun, training course. I’m sure we all have someone we know that we want to introduce to Jesus.

 

(e) Our vision is to grow our global mission too: Short term mission experiences; Supporting long term missionaries; Building the relationship that has begun with the San Pathong Church in Thailand...

 

Conclusion

Rubgy is just a game, but our mission is not a game. It’s life instead of death. Grace and truth instead of striving and lies...

 

My prayer is that these words, “Touch”, “Pause”, “Engage” will echo in our minds and will think of our vision of being in Touch with Jesus, Pausing to pray, reflect, learn and grow, and Engaging with God’s mission to a hurting world.

Mission Visit to Thailand

In June/July, my wife Sue and I had the privilege of travelling to Thailand to visit missionary families associated with East Taieri Church.  One family are members of our church so this was a particular focus.  A long way to go for a pastoral visit, but it was fantastic!  The other two families are also top people and it was inspiring to spend time with them.  All three are doing great work in quite different settings.

Some reflections on our time.  There is a saying "to be Thai is to be Buddhist", and while there is real openness and response to the gospel among hill tribe people in northern Thailand, Thai Buddhists are much less open.  Significant resistance and opposition occurs.  We were aware of principalities and powers also.  Sue & I found ourselves praying a lot.

I am sure we can learn much from the challenge of sharing the gospel in this culture.  One Thai church leader I spoke with said that the issue of Karma and the culture of shame (rather than guilt), required a foundation of loving acts of service before the words of the gospel could be shared.  That has some echos of NZ (though we don't have a culture of shame).  The church in which he is an elder has a significant community development programme underway - even though their church has and average attendance of only around 30 people!

The respect for Buddhism was evident in the people who scored priority seating at the airport! (The first icon is a monk).  I heard on the radio today the way our market economy ranks people in order of importance according to their contribution to
GDP.  This would give more value to the most lowly paid job, than to any volunteer role, or what I would regard as crucial roles of raising children, or caring for aged parents.

Perhaps Thailand has more insight than NZ on some of these priorities.  Certainly older parents or grandparents are well respected.  One Thai couple told us how much they appreciated the sacrifice our missionary family was making in coming to Thailand and leaving their parents back in NZ!

Meeting procedure in Thailand can be very slow (even to this Presbyterian), but it has the advantage of being highly relational.  Again we could learn something here.  One little personal reminder this somewhat task oriented pastor needs occasionally is "people before task Martin".  I sometimes say that to myself.

The importance and also difficulty of language learning was obvious. 

The different culture of missionaries from the US was apparent.  They had more resources behind them, and a different approach to engaging Thai nationals.  As in any church ministry team, missionary teams must work hard at their working relationships.  The health of the team is key.

We were able to begin a relationship with a Thai church near Chiang Mai.  I am excited about the mutual learning and support that will come from this as our relationship grows.  At this stage we are simply praying for each other, but that first step is a good step.  It's importance cannot be overlooked.

Looking forward to visiting again!

Martin.

God Space

East Taieri Church recently hosted Doug Pollock on his God Space Tour.  It was a privilege to spend an evening with Doug, who in addition to being a thoroughly nice guy, has one of the soundest, most effective approaches to evangelism in a postmodern context that I know.  You can find out more about Doug at his website http://www.godsgps.com/

I read Doug's book God Space: Where Spiritual Conversations Happen Naturally in a couple of hours.  A must read for every Christian - at least every Christian who wants to get better at having spiritual conversations so others can come to know the Saviour!  This is an easy read in that it is full of wonderful stories, and practical advice.  But it is a hard read in that Doug's style forces you to apply what you read and to look at yourself.

Key insights:
It starts with us.  "If we’re going to create God Space for others, it has to start inside us.  It takes safe people to create safe places.” p.16
He suggests that the reason we so often have spiritual conversations with people on airplanes is because on airplanes our spirituality has no bearing on where we sit.  It forces Christians to have time with people who aren't Christians yet.  We are fellow travellers on common ground, in close proximity, without distractions of cellphones...  The challenge is for us to find ways of creating this kind of God Space in the rest of life.

We need to notice people and be sensitive to the Holy Spirit's promptings.  Doug gives us some exercises to help us notice - seeing with Jesus' spectacles.

We need to grow in listening.  There are connections here with the Alpha Course, and with Dallas Willard's wisdom on evangelism.

We need to wonder - asking questions more than preaching at people.

And we need to be able to offer "spiritual appetisers" or bite sized chunks of the gospel peppered with our experience of it.  The challenge here is not to "share our testimony" - one size fits all - but to ask the person if they would like to hear aobut part of our experience that is relevant to the questions they are asking.

What does this mean for ministry at East Taieri?

1. I will be altering the first part of "Sharpening the Saw" - the training programme we have developed which helps people share their faith with others.  I'll do more on listening and asking appropriate (not pre-packaged) questions.  Interestingly the gospel illustrations we use on Sharpening the Saw, which come from the XEE course correspond well with Doug's idea of "spiritual appetisers", provided we don't force the whole menu on people if they aren't ready.
2. We need to consider how we are creating "God Space" within our various ministries.  Alpha already does this quite well.  FUEL also creates this over breakfast and during their discussions.  Night Church has been experimenting with this in various ways.  Other services also need to ask this question.  Our community ministries, including things like Mainly Music also need to wrestle with the question of creating room for spiritual conversations.
3. We need to wrestle with where drinking coffee and eating together fits into our ministry scene.
4. We also need to consider what physical God space we are offering.  Sometimes this can occur within the church building, but more often it is before and after services, and we could be more intentional about this in our morning services.
5. It is interesting how directly this connects with the preaching series I have just finished which used a title based on a book by Bill Hybels.  I called the series "The Power of God's Whisper."  It was about us all being sensitive to God prompting us to do or say something, and having the courage to respond.

May we all become more passionate about having spiritual conversations with people who don't yet know Jesus.
Martin.

Taking Discipleship Personally

Recently I wrote this short article for Candour Magazine and I thought others might be interested in it.

Discipleship as personal interaction rather than programme

In my early days as a Christian I was taken through the Navigator discipleship stuff (the Design for Discipleship Series): Bible study, memory verse, giving my testimony, the whole nine yards. Actually, it was good foundational material that contributed to my Christian growth. But what was most influential was my time with the man who led me through this course. I learned much more from the personal interaction with him than from the discipleship course itself and our relationship lasts to this day. He was an elder in a Presbyterian church and led the youth group and a home group. During our runs together I learned about a pastoral heart when, to my initial annoyance, he would allow our run to be interrupted by stopping to talk to someone we met. I learned about prayer from praying with him. Our prayers became more desperate when his first child had complications during birth. We weren’t sure if she was going to survive. It was a first hand example of trusting God in the midst of a trial, and then praising God together when his daughter survived and thrived.

Character discoveries occurred and rubbed off on me. One Sunday evening I was helping him show a gospel movie at church. We had invited lots of people who didn’t normally come to church. A good crowd had gathered, popcorn was popping and we were all praying, excited at the opportunity for changed lives! The movie was on an old reel-to-reel movie projector (before the days of data projectors) and just as we began, the film began jumping at the projector gate – chunkety, chunkety, chunk. Unless we could fix it, our carefully planned outreach evening was going to be a disaster. In the stress of the moment, I heard my mentor muttering under his breath and thought, “This will be interesting.” I leaned closer to find out what he was saying and heard the words, “Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord!”

My mentor sometimes addressed me “Martin, Martin my son” (from words attributed to one of Martin Luther’s mentors who said, “Martin, Martin my son. I see nothing but a cross before you.”) Once, when I had moved to another city, he phoned me and my flatmate answered. Mistaking my flatmate for me he said, “Martin, Martin my son...” My flatmate called out, “Martin, it’s your Dad!” We laughed, and yet in a 2 Tim 1:2 kind of way it was my Dad.

I have benefitted from many programmes over the years, and I have so appreciated the mentoring that people are able to do from a distant century through their writing, but my most significant discipleship moments have been with people like this man. It takes time, but it is lasting. Their personal interaction has shown me what life is like as an apprentice of Jesus.

We need to take discipleship personally, and not rely on programmes, because it works and of course because Jesus modelled it. But there is another reason. I believe life on life interactions are crucial in discipleship because of the nature of truth we are seeking to pass on to others. A Christian disciple is not someone who simply understands and gives assent to certain doctrinal statements. A disciple is one apprenticed to the master, who said, “I am the way, the truth and the life.”

Lesslie Newbigin wrote: "The manner in which Jesus makes the Father known is not in infallible, unrevisable irreformable statements. He did not write a book which would have served forever as the unquestionable and irreformable statement of the truth about God. He formed a community of friends and shared his life with them."  [Lesslie Newbigin, Proper Confidence: Faith, Doubt and Certainty in Christian Discipleship (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995), 89.]

Thankfully we can read in the scriptures what Jesus did and taught, and the effect Jesus had on those around him. But when we are discipled we experience another dimension to learning that is beyond reading a book. Michael Polanyi observed that the skills of a master are lost if they are not passed on first hand to apprentices in the next generation. The line of apprentices who made violins like Stradivarius has been broken.

"It is pathetic to watch the endless efforts – equipped with microscopy and chemistry, with mathematics and electronics – to reproduce a single violin of the kind the half-literate Stradivarius turned out as a matter of routine more than 200 years ago."


"To learn by example is to submit to authority. You follow your master because you trust his manner of doing things, even when you cannot analyse and account in detail for its effectiveness. By watching the master and emulating his efforts in the presence of his example, the apprentice unconsciously picks up the rules of the art... " [Michael Polanyi,  Personal Knowledge  (London: Routledge, 1958), 53.]

That sounds a lot like discipleship to me.

In my current role I contribute to discipleship in a variety of programmatic and structural ways. I preach, pray, lead worship, foster small group life, and ensure a range of programmes are running, including intentional discipleship using material such as the Omega studies. However, my most lasting impact is probably still time intensive, life on life discipleship. I think of the delight in seeing young ministry interns mature in Christ and go on in Christian ministry. I think of the challenges and joys of seeing people (including my own children) take steps in following Jesus. This doesn’t impact big numbers of people quickly, but I remain committed to having at least one person I’m relating to in this way. I’m taking that personally.

Inspired by the Good News of Easter

Maundy Thursday communion at East Taieri Church was thoughtful and meaningful. Easter Sunday was a great celebration of the resurrection of Jesus. All my children had great Easter Camps. I had some quality time with Sue. I even enjoyed some Easter eggs. However the most life-transforming moments for me this Easter were those I spent in the Milton Prison.

In January, David, a member of East Taieri Church, told me he felt prompted by God to form a prison ministry team. God has clearly been in this, and to our delight a team came together easily and has been inducted and joined the roster of churches taking service in the Otago Correction Facility. I am a member of that team. The first service I was involved with was on Good Friday. I feel that God spoke to me in several ways through it:

1. All the unknowns forced me to lean on God and not to trust on my years of ministry experience. That was a great reminder for me. I also felt very appreciative of the Prison staff and the other members of the team as we made our way through the security checks into the facility.

2. I was struck by how young the prison congregation were. In contrast to many church congregations around the country, I would say the majority of these men were in their 20’s. This is a sad reflection on the choices being made and situations faced by young men in our society. (43% of prisoners are younger than 30 years old).

3. I was encouraged by how friendly they were. Sadly I have visited churches where people have been much less friendly than these men. They walked up to us, introduced themselves, and thanked us for coming.

4. I was in awe at how carefully they listened to the Bible Reading of Jesus dying on the cross (Mark 15:22-39). Familiar, even routine words, which many church congregations on Good Friday may have taken for granted, rang out with fresh relevance as Mitch read them in that setting. One prisoner near me said, “Mean story!” at the end.

5. I was astounded at the openness of the prisoners in talking about Jesus dying for us all. I had more conversations about the sacrifice of Christ after that service than after any one church service in 20 years of ministry. Forgiveness, a new life, and the promise that there is more to life than this, truly do make for good news!

6. The importance of participation was highlighted for me by the prisoners taking ownership of the music and leading us in three worship songs.  They were great!

7. As senior pastor, one of the most inspiring things has been the way this enthusiastic prison ministry team has come together.  One church member felt prompted by the Holy Spirit.  He was supported by ministry leadership, who had hoped for such a team for some years and had invited the prision chaplain to preach at ET.  After the opportunity was promoted in one church service, others felt called to join the team and now it's underway.  This encourages me that God is speaking into the "missional imagination of the congregation".  By this I mean that God is prompting us to think like missionaries to Mosgiel, living the good news in our surroundings.  See Alan Roxburg's book The Missional Leader (San Francisco, Jossey-Bass, 2006), p.151.

May you also be inspired about the good news of Jesus dying for our sins!

Martin.