Tag Archives: cnn

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Summer Vacation Here I Come!

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Summer break

My elders have been kind enough to give me a longer summer preaching break than normal this year. Because of that I won’t be posting anything new on my blog until July 6th (at which time I’ll be back with some great new stuff for you), so that we can rest, recharge and enjoy some time as a family. I’ll also be posting less on social media, but I’ll be posting fun pictures of our adventures on Instagram.

In the meantime, here are some of the most recent top posts on my blog to keep you company until I get back:

Healthy Marriage

Healthy Church

Healthy Leadership

Healthy Faith

Healthy Preaching

If you’re curious about what I’m reading this summer, here you go (and yes, Katie and I take a suitcase of books on vacation):

Have a great summer!

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6 Things to do When Someone Insults You

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insults

You know the conversation. Someone in your church asks to meet with you, or you set up the meeting because you know they are angry at you, the church or a decision that was made.

The conversation is going well. You are making some headway and figuring out what the issues are (which is really important), and then the unexpected happens.

Not really unexpected.

You should have seen it coming.

The insults. The ‘several people’ comments. The, “I’ve asked around” comments.

What do you do? Do you defend your honor? Pushback? Take it like a man? Try to win?

If you as a pastor have not found yourself in this conversation, it is coming. When it happens, here are six things to keep in mind:

6 things to remember when you’re insulted.

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1. It will surprise you who it is. This is always the case. You will be blown away at who is angry at you and who hurls insults at you. Whenever I’ve made a change or decision at our church, the people who are mad and leave over it are never the ones I expected. In the same way, the ones who will criticize you unfairly, spread rumors about you, talk to a “bunch of other people about an issue” will surprise you. They will not be who you expect.

You will almost always be surprised by who gets mad at you in your church.

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This is one reason it hurts so much when it happens.

2. Don’t stoop to their level. It is easy in this situation to defend your honor, try to win (this is my default mode), prove your point, point out their shortcomings and sin (because they are there), or try to explain yourself. More than likely, in this meeting (there might be a second one) they are simply wanting to vent and “get something off their chest.” For the person this meeting is often not about reconciliation, understanding your perspective or seeing that they might be wrong. That will hopefully come later, but the reality is, they have been angry for quite some time and they have some pent up anger.

When someone is angry at you, have character and don’t stoop to their level.

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3. Listen as best as you can and figure out what the actual issue is. Often, not always, but often when someone comes and says, “I’m leaving _____ church because…” Or, “I’m angry because ________”, those are rarely the issues. They think they are the issues, but they aren’t. People will give you a reason for leaving your church that you won’t be able to argue with. This is the reason why “I’m not getting fed enough” or “God told me to leave” are such popular reasons.

In seminary I took one counseling class, and I got the best piece of advice in my entire seminary experience. A professor told me, “When someone’s life is out of control, they have sin in their life they can’t handle, they are angry at their spouse, parent, child, boss or feel letdown in life and don’t know what to do, they take their anger out on the closest authority figure they can find, and that tends to be a pastor and the church.”

I can’t tell you how many meetings I’ve had over the years with people who want to leave the church I lead or meet with me because they are angry at a decision we made, and more than half the meeting is about what frustrates them about their spouse, parent or child.

In an intense meeting, do your best to find the real issue.

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Once you are able to determine what you think is the real issue, start talking about that. Help them to see what the real issue is. This isn’t always possible. You might be told that isn’t the issue, but if your gut tells you that is the issue, it usually is.

4. If they want to leave your church, let them. As a pastor you want everyone possible to be a part of your church. Why? Because you love and care for them. You’ve walked with them, labored over sermons for them, prayed for them, listened to them, seen them grow, discipled them. You don’t want them to leave. It hurts every time it happens.

But it happens.

Don’t try to talk someone out of leaving your church.

Now, if they are leaving for a bad reason, tell them. If they are leaving for an immature reason, tell them.

But don’t stop them.

Why?

That might be God’s way of protecting you.

Sometimes when people leave your church, that is God protecting You.

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If they met with you and are angry at you, hurling insults at you (yes, people say horrible things to pastors), and they say they want to leave your church, don’t try to talk them out of it.

In fact, and this might be controversial so hear me out, you might need to encourage them to leave your church.

Their staying might not be healthy for them, their family, for you or the church.

5. Debrief with someone you trust, who loves you, to find the truth in what was said. The meeting is over and you feel like you have been punched in the gut (hopefully only figuratively).

The reality is, the person who talked with you might be right, they just did it in the worst way possible. So, you have to find the truth. Is what they said on target? Do you have any sin or shortcomings you need to confess or work on? Don’t waste what was said simply because it hurt or you don’t agree. They might be right, or at least partly right.

6. Reconcile to the best of your ability. It isn’t always possible or healthy to have a second meeting. It can easily become the two of you trying to remember what all was said. If you need to reconcile over an issue, try to. The other person may not want to, and you don’t always need to talk to them to reconcile it, but you need to make sure you don’t allow them to take up space in your heart over an issue.

6 ways to handle someone who is mad at you.

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What Makes Leadership so Hard?

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leadership

The other day I asked a friend why he thought leadership and being a leader is so hard. He looked at me and said, “That’s why only a few people aspire to it and only a few people ever do it.”

To cast a vision. To stand against a tide. To say that you are moving forward to a place that no one has ever been and you don’t know how you will get there, but you know you are going. That is hard.

To challenge people to become all that they can be. To withstand the criticism that comes with leadership and the misunderstanding that comes with being confident and purposeful. That is hard.

Romans 12:8 says if you have the gift of leadership you should lead with all diligence. Diligence means, “A zealous and careful nature in one’s work, a decisive work ethic, budgeting one’s time, to guard against laziness, putting forth full concentration in one’s work.”

That is leadership. That is what makes it hard. Leadership challenges. Leadership and vision divide because they say, “This is where we are going and this is what the win is, and consequently, that over there is not where we are going and that is not the win.”

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What to do When Your Husband Checks Out

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husband

Many couples have a tension that happens every night when a husband comes home from work. It doesn’t matter if his wife stays at home or she works, but most nights, in most houses, this scene plays out: He walks in the door, drops his stuff, says hi (or says nothing), walks onto the back porch, pulls out his phone or sits down in front of the TV and checks out. 

What do you do?

This is a question Katie or I get a lot.

What to do if your husband checks out at night.

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If this happens in your house, here are a few things you can do:

1. Have a conversation. Most couples don’t know what their spouse needs or wants from something. Many men do not understand the stress a wife feels from being home all day with kids and having zero adult interactions. Men also don’t understand the pressure a wife feels who works outside of the home, while trying to run a house at the same time.

Women often struggle to understand the pressure that a man is feeling and how he needs to disconnect from work so that he can connect at home and be emotionally present.

2. Set expectations. When you finally talk about how you are feeling and what you want, you need to move towards setting expectations.

What do you each expect life to be like when you get home from work? What do you each need to be able to engage as a family and as a couple as you head into the evening? Most couples aren’t sure what would make a successful night at home, so talking through that is incredibly important.

Do you and your spouse know what the other one expects in your relationship?

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What often happens in relationships is we have a picture in our head of what will happen, what a night or experience will be like. We build this expectation up, but we never share it with our spouse. Then when it doesn’t happen, we hold our spouse responsible for not fulfilling the picture in our head that we never verbalized.

That isn’t fair. But it is incredibly common.

3. Learn how to unwind on the way home (or some other way). The reality is that after a full day of working, meetings, running errands, helping kids, you need and want to unwind. You want to check out. I get it. Which means you need to figure out how to do that. For me, when I’m driving home I will use the quiet time to let go of things at work, use some time to pray. If I’m working from my home office all day, I’ll use the time between work and being off from  my work by walking around our neighborhood or working out.

You need to figure out what that is for you. What will you need to do so that you can let go of work and focus on being at home?

For many people, we don’t know how to unwind without technology, alcohol or food, and that leads to some incredibly unhealthy lifestyles. I remember talking recently with a leader about how to rest and recharge, and I asked him, “What gives you life? What fires you up and gives you energy after you’re done?”

Stop for a minute.

How would you answer those questions? Do you know?

4. Learn how to be engaged. On top of not knowing how to unwind or recharge, many men do not know how to engage relationally with their spouse and kids. Most men grew up watching a father (if he was around) who was simply there. He did not engage emotionally, relationally or spiritually.

Engaging with your family is being interested, being present. Not being on your phone. For most parents, if they stayed off their phone and social media until after their kids went to bed, there would be an enormous change in their family.

Want to make a big change in your family? Stay off your phone at night.

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When you sit down for dinner (and this is still the best way to engage your family because you are all sitting down), no electronics, and talk about your day.

I’d recommend having some questions prepared. Things like:

  1. What was your favorite part of today?
  2. What did you love about school or sports?
  3. What made you sad today?
  4. Were your feelings hurt at any time today? Do you want to talk about it?
  5. How can I pray for you?
5 questions to ask your wife and kids each night at dinner.

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While you may get grunts and “I don’t know”, the answers are not as important as your kids and wife knowing that you are interested and making an effort.

4 ways to engage with your family at night.

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Stop Assuming the People You Preach to Agree with You

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preach

Two things happened recently that has really made me think about my preaching and the preaching of others.

One was at the Preach the Word conference where Justin Anderson made the comment, “Stop assuming people agree with what you believe. Unchurched people don’t agree with your beliefs, most of the churched people don’t agree with your beliefs, stop assuming.” He went on to say, “Pastors need to say less and prove more.”

Think for a minute all the statements that pastors make in their sermons, with little context or explanation. Assuming that everyone is on board with basic biblical truths like: everyone is a sinner, apart from Jesus you’ll spend eternity in hell, God loves you, Jesus rose from the dead, you have an idol that you worship.

Let me be the first to say, I am guilty of this. I have really been growing in this area in the last year thanks to the mentoring of Justin and others.

Then, in the aftermath of the tornado in Oklahoma came this interview on CNN:

Here are a few things this means for pastors:

  1. Explain things more. One of the things a good communicator does is explain what they mean. Too many pastors and communicators simply think everyone knows what they are talking about. I will very rarely use the words justification, sovereignty of God, sanctification, or gospel. I believe in all of them and love the truth of them. The problem is some people have no idea what you are talking about or have the wrong idea. I used to say gospel over and over in a sermon and one day someone asked, “Why do you keep saying gospel in your sermon? You aren’t preaching from a gospel.” Others see the word gospel simply as what gets you to heaven. Instead of saying sanctification I’ll talk about becoming the person Jesus created you to be. Now, as a pastor if you do this, you’ll get push back from the people who want “deep” preaching. That’s okay.
  2. Talk about why you believe things. If a pastor says something in a sermon, something they believe to be true about God or the gospel, explain why you believe that. If you are talking about grace and forgiveness, talk about why you believe those things. Show from Scripture and from your life how you’ve seen them to be true. Too often pastors simply give the finished product. They wrestle with a text or concept alone in their study and then say, “Here’s where I landed.” It is helpful to show some of that struggle and share some of that for your church.
  3. Have less points. I’ve talked about this too many times to count. If you have more than one point in a sermon, you are wasting a lot of time. Your church can’t remember more than one point and you can’t remember more than one point. Say your one point, a lot.
  4. Affirm the questions people have, don’t dismiss them. You as a pastor have questions, so do the people in your church. You don’t have to answer them all every week in every sermon, but affirm that their questions exist and are real. People wonder why God doesn’t heal them, why their spouse walked out, why getting fired could be God’s plan for them or if they are being punished for something. They wonder if hell exists or if Jesus really is the hero of all things. Affirm those questions. Tell them they are real and okay to ask. People in Scripture have doubts and unbelief and Jesus engages them.
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