Tag Archives: holy spirit

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4 Things Healthy Leaders Do

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healthy leaders

No leader or pastor starts their career or starts a church with thinking about quitting. All of them start with grand plans and dreams of the future and finishing, retiring, making it to the end with friends and family around them.

Yet statistically that is incredibly rare. Most quit, give up, fall out of the race or simply stop trying while still collecting a paycheck.

According to stats:

  • 78% of pastors say they have no close friends.
  • 1,500 pastors quit each month.
  • 70% of pastors battle depression.
  • Only 10% of pastors will retire as a pastor.

Recently I’ve had several pastors talk about not wanting to burn out, which seems like a good goal. But the moment you start talking about burnout, you have moved into a dangerous place.

Let me throw out a different question, one I think is better: How can you lead and live at a sustainable pace?

How can you lead and live at a sustainable pace?

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There is a great passage in Matthew that you have more than likely heard a sermon on, or if you are a pastor you’ve preached on this passage. It is so common and so easy to forget the power in it.

To remind you, this is what it says in The Message version:

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”

I think according to this passage, there are four things healthy leaders (or non-leaders) do:

4 things healthy leaders do.

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1. Healthy leaders don’t try to be God.

We say we aren’t trying to be God or we say we can’t save anyone, only the Holy Spirit can, but many leaders carry the burden that they can, or at the very least, they will try.

We think, “If I can just talk to them, or get them to read this book or hear this podcast, that will help.” It might, but it might not.

We can also drift so far from God personally that we simply lead out of our abilities and strengths. This is easy to do if you have a strong speaking gift. You can cover up your lack of relationship with God by being charismatic or interesting on stage.

Healthy leaders don’t try to be God.

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2. Healthy leaders walk and work with Jesus, not for Jesus.

Yes, Jesus is the chief shepherd and the senior pastor of your church, but you don’t work for him. We work with him and through the power of the Holy Spirit. We follow what the Spirit starts and is doing.

We talk about our priority list as Christians being God, family, job. Yet it is easy for a pastor’s list to be God/job, family because of how closely connected his job and God are. Often this is so subtle that no one sees it, or if they do they don’t say anything about it.

I firmly believe there is a calling that comes with being a pastor, but, and please hear this: being a pastor is also a job. A job that will end. A job you will retire from one day.

If we aren’t careful, we start to become unhealthy when our identity is too wrapped up in what we do. This is why we get hurt when someone rejects a sermon, our advice or the vision of the church. We feel like they are rejecting us, because our sermon, that vision, is who we are. It is our identity.

That’s a dangerous spot.

Healthy leaders walk and work with Jesus, not for Jesus.

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3. Healthy leaders don’t force stuff.

The reason I love this version of these verses are two phrases. The first is, Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I am like most leaders. We are incredibly driven, we make things happen, and we force it.

How many times have you played a conversation in your head before it happens: you’ll say this, they’ll say this, then you’ll respond, then they’ll respond, and this is how it ends. Then the meeting goes just like that and you think, “That could’ve been an email.”

We also can very easily force our kids and our wife to be something they aren’t.

One of the saddest things to watch is, as a man is pushing his calling and planting his church, his wife is sitting there dying emotionally, physically, spiritually.

Here’s a question for you as a leader: Is your family too much about your calling and goals? Does your wife have space for hers?

Healthy leaders don’t force stuff.

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4. Healthy leaders don’t carry burdens they aren’t meant to carry.

I’m a perfectionist. In every part of my life, I carry a burden of wanting everything to be perfect. Every experience with my kids and my wife, I build up in my mind, and when it fails to reach that I get stressed out and angry.

Another struggle for many leaders is they don’t know how to handle the emotional side of ministry. We struggle with our emotions of hurt, depression, loss, anger, and then as those emotions entangle with the emotions of those in our church and we walk with them through divorce, miscarriages, death, suicide, and addictions (just to name a few), we become at a loss of what to do with all the burdens.

Healthy leaders don’t carry burdens they aren’t meant to carry.

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In the end, Matthew 11 is an invitation from Jesus to live freely and lightly. That’s the second phrase in this passage that is so beautiful. Many pastors do not live in this place. Many followers of Jesus never experience this, yet this is supposed to be the normal Christian experience.

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How Conversion Works

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conversion

Conversion is a mysterious thing. In many ways you are a part of it when you take the step of following Jesus, but there is also the reality that much of it is happening with God, and you are along for the ride. I know many people feel like it is all them and they are choosing Team Jesus, but that isn’t found in Scripture. It is not all you.

Do you choose Team Jesus, or does Jesus choose you?

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If we get this wrong, it starts us off thinking about change incorrectly. Much of our culture thinks about change in what they can do and the willpower they have to accomplish change. Want to change something? Make a resolution. Want to stop something? Simply think hard enough. Need to be less negative? Simply think positively and it will happen.

Many Christians think this way and find themselves spinning their wheels. Change isn’t completely on us, and don’t miss this: We don’t have the power on our own to change.

How change and conversion work.

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Acts 9 is a well known passage that shows the change that happens in Saul as he becomes Paul and becomes the messenger that will take the gospel to the Gentiles. It also shows us how change and conversion work and the implications of them.

1. Salvation starts with God. Salvation is a gift from God. We do not deserve it, and it is given freely by God. There should never be any pride in you about being better than someone, because without God changing you, you are stuck and broken on your own.

We also see in Saul that no one is ever beyond the reach of God. Saul is a first century terrorist, killing people over religion, and yet God saves him.

This reality that salvation starts with God is what makes grace so amazing. What is incredible about a choice we make, an effort we put forth? Instead God, not needing to extend grace and forgiveness, does so.

2. There is a personal encounter with Jesus. We all meet Jesus differently, but when we begin following Jesus it is because we have an encounter with him. We begin to have knowledge of who He really is.

This is the step of receiving God’s free gift of grace, admitting you are broken, you are a sinner and you can’t fix yourself.

This is when we apply Romans 8:1, where Paul later wrote: There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. The moment we take that step of responding to God’s grace, our sins are wiped clean. Many times, though, we hold ourselves accountable for things God does not.

We hold ourselves accountable for things God does not.

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3. Surrendering to the Lordship of Jesus. We often want to live our lives with a little bit of Jesus sprinkled on top. Saul calls him Lord, surrendering to follow Jesus no matter what. This is a crucial step. Jesus is not just your Redeemer and Savior; He is your King when you take the step of following Him.

4. Following Jesus always comes with a call to talk about Jesus. What we’re about to see is that immediately Saul started sharing about Jesus with others. The moment you become a follower of Jesus, you are called to tell people about Jesus.

It is easy to think God can’t use you or do anything with your life. After all, who are you really? You aren’t Billy Graham. Yet we are told that Stephen only had one convert (Saul), but he changed the world. You have no idea what God can do through you.

Right now there are people in your life that God wants to use you to reach.

While we know a lot about Paul’s teaching, writing, planting churches and developing leaders, God also made sure of something else in the Bible: that we knew Paul’s story. That we knew who Paul was. This is important as it relates to our story and how God changes us.

It’s also important because a lot of us can feel like our story is hopeless. We’re hopeless. We’re beyond redemption and forgiveness, beyond hope. Yet we aren’t. God is never finished with your story.

God is never finished with your story.

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Being a Pastor is Also a Job

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pastor

One of the things pastors and Christians talk a lot about is the calling of a pastor. While we often make that an incredibly mystical and mystifying conversation, being a pastor is more than that.

It is also a job.

Now before you get out pitchforks and torches, hear me out. I’ve said this in several circles, and the reactions are often the same. Some see this as completely heretical; others are convicted immediately as they think about it.

A pastor is a calling. Being a pastor is also a job.

Being a pastor is a calling, but it is also a job.

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A job ends. One day you will retire from your job. Your job is also something you do.

To many pastors their job never ends. They talk about dying in the pulpit, and for them their job is not something they do, but who they are.

Now to be clear, being a pastor is a calling. It is a role. It is a spiritual gift. But it is not the sum total of who I am. I am a man, a friend, a dad, a husband, a brother, a son and a neighbor.

Here’s why this is so important: Too many pastors over spiritualize their calling, which leads them to burnout, overworking and ultimately, sin. In fact, many pastors make their identities center around who they are as a pastor. I’m pastor so-and-so, which raises their level of importance.

This is also another reason why pastors take it so personally when a sermon doesn’t go well, people don’t respond to what they said, or someone is angry at a vision change. Why? Their role and personal identity are wrapped up in them. They haven’t separated the two, so when someone doesn’t respond the way they’d like, that person is rejecting them. But they aren’t. They are rejecting the message, the opportunity.

When you talk to pastors who burnout, you hear things about the needs of people, how they couldn’t say no, how they preached too much, didn’t take care of themselves, carried burdens into their sleep that they should’ve let go of.

In all this we sin, yet because we’re called we somehow give each other a pass, or at the very least talk about how hard ministry is and the suffering we endure.

Most of that, though, stems from our pride and need to be needed. We train our people in it, and they respond because it speaks to something in their hearts, a desire they have that resonates with wrapping up what we do with who we are.

While some have pushed back on this, this is a tension you have to wrestle with as a pastor. You are not as important as you think you are. You are not as needed as you think you are. And one day you will stop preaching, stop leading the meetings you lead, and someone will take your place.

It has been interesting to me watching pastors get closer to retirement and seeing the look of horror as they struggle with what is next. Many of them continue preaching and leading when they should hand those tasks off to someone else, but they don’t. They go past their effectiveness because this is their calling, without ever questioning how effective they are at their job.

Here’s another example. Many Christians trumpet the order of their priorities: God, family and job. For pastors their job is connected to God, so it is easy to see something like this: job/God, and family. It is dangerous because it is not always obvious.

Here are some ways I try to balance this tension:

  1. When someone rejects a vision, plan, strategy or sermon, do I take it personally? If so, why? Is that healthy or prideful?
  2. Do I have an overinflated view of my impact on my church?
  3. When was the last time I said no?
  4. Do I stop working at night and over the weekend? Do I stop thinking about work when I’m not working?
  5. Do I live out what I tell people they should do with their jobs: relationship with God, family, then work?
5 questions to help you be healthy as a pastor.

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5 Ways to Preach a Bad Sermon

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bad sermon

Yes, there are such things as bad sermons and sermons that should never be preached.

I’ve preached them, and if you are a preacher, you have preached them, too. They are painful, they put people to sleep, they make people decide church isn’t worth their time (and worse God isn’t worth their time), and they turn people away from the truth.

Now many pastors in an effort to not be accountable for their sermons and/or to not work hard on their sermons love to quote from Isaiah 55:11: “So shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.” I rest in this verse as all pastors should, but this verse does not say, “Don’t work at your craft, don’t put in effort.”

So here are five ways to guarantee that your next sermon will be awful:

5 ways to guarantee that your next sermon will be awful.

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1. Be unprepared. Walk up to the stage, look at your church and have absolutely no idea what you are going to say. Wing it. Make it up as you go along. Be all over the map. Preach someone else’s sermon and see what happens.

Lots of pastors preach when they aren’t prepared. I’m not talking about the text isn’t still convicting you, because that will never stop. I’m talking about, you didn’t prioritize your sermon prep time, so you aren’t prepared. You let your week get away from you and others decided your calendar, so you are working on it Saturday night when you should be asleep.

Apart from someone dying or some other unforeseen catastrophe, my sermon prep time is blocked out and not negotiable. Why? Preaching is the most important part of my job. It is when I have the most influence over the life of my church. When else is everyone in one room, hopefully listening? Never. Preaching isn’t all that I do, but it is the top priority of my week in terms of my role at my church, and yours too if you are the main communicator of your church.

One way to guarantee a bad sermon is to be unprepared.

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2. Say what you want the Bible to say. This is incredibly common in a lot of sermons and one I have to constantly work against. Often what the Bible says is not as cool as what we want the Bible to say. What we want to say isn’t as piercing, confrontational or invasive as what the Bible says. But no one changes based off what I want to say; they only change through the power of the Spirit working through the text.

This reason is why I started preaching through books of the Bible. I know pastors build their case through the Bible as to why you should preach through books. I do it because I know my heart and tendency is to decide what I want to say, go find a verse that says that or I can make say that, and then preach a sermon. Preaching through books of the Bible prevents that for me.

I know you think people came to hear you preach, and in a way they did, but what they don’t know or maybe can’t verbalize is they showed up at your church to hear from God. You are just the instrument for that.

3. Don’t talk about Jesus, just give good advice. Another way to guarantee a bad sermon is to simply give out good advice and never talk about Jesus. Most would say if you don’t talk about Jesus that isn’t a sermon, just a talk, which I would agree with. But I digress.

Remember #2, they didn’t show up to hear you but to connect with God. They maybe can’t verbalize that, but that’s their heart cry.

4. Don’t have a main point. This is one of the hardest things to do in a sermon, to boil down your sermon to one point. Not three or five, but one. That is all your church will remember if they remember anything. I know we want them to remember all of it, but they forget about 80-90% of what we say, which is incredibly humbling when you think about it.

To make your sermon last longer than Sunday morning, you must think of ways to communicate it in a memorable sentence.

If you can’t say your sermon in one sentence, you aren’t ready to preach.

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5. Don’t tell anyone what to do. Pastors love to use Isaiah 55:11 to avoid application. The thinking goes like this: Just get up there, read a verse, say what the Bible says and then sit down and let the Holy Spirit bring the application. Nowhere does this verse even allude to this. This is the one that I often struggle with the most, creating clear next steps. Moving from, “The Bible says this,” to, “So in light of that, go and do ________.”

This is the handle people are looking for to apply the sermon. Do we need to spell it out for people? Yes. Some people will get it on their own and may even get a next step from the Holy Spirit you don’t give them, and that is great, but most people are waiting for you to answer the “now what” question. Like #4, if you can’t tell them a next step, the sermon isn’t ready to preach.

If you can’t tell them a clear next step, the sermon isn’t ready to preach.

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Praying for Your Kids

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Praying for your kids

After posting on why we parent the way we do and the gospel and parenting, the response is interesting. What most Christian parents say when you ask for advice (especially if their kids turned out well) is, “We just prayed and by God’s grace it worked.”

Now, on one hand this is true and good. Prayer is an enormous part of parenting. Most of the praying I do as a parent, though, feels like it comes out of desperation more than anything else.

What this communicates to younger parents is, “Just pray and everything will work out.”

Let’s think about Luke 15 and the prodigal son. God is represented by the Father in that parable. Was God represented for the whole parable or just at the end when the son came home? I’d say in the whole parable we are seeing what God is like.

My point from a parenting perspective is this: The glory of God is the goal of God. That’s what we are called as Christians to pursue and do, to glorify God.

Let me say something that is hard to hear and doesn’t get said enough: God might be most glorified through your child’s rebellion. He might draw more people to Himself that way. He might draw you as a parent to Himself that way, and ultimately His plan to draw your child to Himself might be through a long, dark season of rebellion.

God might be most glorified through your child’s rebellion.

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If Ephesians 1 is true (and I believe it is) that God knew before the foundations of the world who He would draw to Himself, how do I know if my child is one of those? I will pray, cry out to God, bring the gospel to bear on my kids’ hearts, but ultimately God changes them.

This isn’t to bring a dark cloud into parenting. Parents do that well enough on their own. It is to bring a realistic view to parenting and the so-called “best practices” and “what worked for me” conversations.

If the glory of God is the goal of life (and God), how do I most glorify Him as a parent? How will my kids most glorify Him?

This becomes a matter of trust as a parent. This is us placing our kids in the hands of God, which is an incredibly scary proposition because we aren’t sure what will happen. As parents, we like controlling the outcome for our kids. We do it with school, church, sports teams, dance and band practice. We send them to camps to get an edge so that we can control the outcome. We say we do all those things for their betterment and the experiences they are having as kids (and that’s partly true), but we mostly do those things to control the outcome.

God does not give us control over the outcome.

God does not give us control over the outcome as parents.

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Does this mean that kids who turn out well, following Jesus as adults, had parents who prayed for them more than kids who don’t turn out that way? I’m not sure.

Take parents who raise two kids. One follows and loves Jesus as an adult, the other doesn’t. Did the parents only pray for the one kid? I doubt that.

The question is: How is God most glorified in and through that person’s life?

Parenting should drive us to our knees for our kids, for their hearts, for their future, for the person they will marry. Parenting should drive us to our knees because of their sin and our sin. And while we are on our knees, we can ask that our parenting will glorify God as God sees fit.

Here is how we pray for our kids:

  1. Their salvation. You should pray for your kids salvation, that the gospel of grace would grip them, that they would see the depth of their sin and need for God. Nothing else matters in parenting, this right here is the ball game.
  2. God’s direction in their life. Pray that Jesus would be not only their Savior and redeemer, but that He would be their King. That He would rule and reign in their lives, that they would see their lives as being lived under King Jesus. This affects the choices they make, the way they choose to live, purity, friendships, major in college, career moves, etc.
  3. Their future spouse. No other decision has more ripple affects than who one marries. Nothing else impacts your life more than this choice (outside of following Jesus). The two things you pray for your kids, you should be praying those things for their future spouse.
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12 Ways to Keep the Passion Alive in Your Marriage

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Keep the passion alive in your marriage

I came across this list in Daniel Akin’s book God on Sex: The Creator’s Ideas about Love, Intimacy, and Marriage and thought it was really helpful:

12 Ways to Keep the Passion Alive in Your Marriage

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  1. Work at it. A lifetime of love and romance takes effort. Few things in life are as complicated as building and maintaining an intimate, passionate relationship. You need to work on it constantly to get through those trying periods that require extra work.
  2. Think team. When making important decisions, such as whether to work overtime or accept a transfer or promotion, ask yourself this question: What will the choice I am making do to the people I love? Talk with your mate and family. Make “we” decisions that will have the most positive impact on your marriage and your family.
  3. Be protective. Guard and separate your marriage and your family from the rest of the world. This might mean refusing to work on certain days or nights. You might turn down relatives and friends who want more of you than you have the time, energy, or wisdom to give. You might even have to say no to your children to protect time with your spouse. The kids won’t suffer if this is done occasionally and not constantly. It will actually be beneficial for everyone!
  4. Accept that good and not perfect is okay when it comes to your mate. No one is perfect other than Jesus! You married a real person who will make real mistakes. However, never be content with bad. Always aim for great, but settle for good!
  5. Share your thoughts and feelings. We have seen this one over and over. Unless you consistently communicate, signaling to your spouse where you are and getting a recognizable message in return, you will lose each other along the way. Create or protect communication-generating rituals. No matter how busy you may be, make time for each other. For example, take a night off each week, go for a walk together on a regular basis, go out to breakfast if you can’t have dinner alone, or just sit together for 30 minutes each evening simply talking, without any other distractions.
  6. Manage anger and especially contempt better. Try to break the cycle in which hostile, cynical, contemptuous attitudes fuel unpleasant emotions, leading to negative behaviors that stress each other out and create more tension. Recognize that anger signals frustration of some underlying issue. Avoid igniting feelings of anger with the judgment that you are being mistreated. Watch your non-verbal signals, such as your tone of voice, hand and arm gestures, facial expressions, and body movements. Remain seated, don’t stand or march around the room. Deal with one issue at a time. Don’t let your anger about one thing lead you into showering the other with a cascade of issues. If different topics surface during your conflict, note them to address later. Try to notice subtle signs that anger or irritation is building. If you are harboring these feelings, express them before they build too much and lead to an angry outburst. Keep focused on the problem, not persons. Don’t turn a fairly manageable problem into a catastrophe. Emphasize where you agree.
  7. Declare your devotion to each other again and again. True long-range intimacy requires repeated affirmations of commitment to your spouse. Remember: love is in both what you say and in how you act. Buy flowers. Do the dishes and take out the trash without being asked. Give an unsolicited back or foot rub. Committed couples protect the boundaries around their relationship. Share secrets with each other more than with any circle of friends and relatives.
  8. Give each other permission to change. Pay attention. If you aren’t learning something new about each other every week or two, you simply aren’t observing closely enough. You are focusing on other things more than one another. Bored couples fail to update how they view each other. They act as though the roles they assigned and assumed early in the relationship will remain forever comfortable. Remain constantly abreast of each other’s dreams, fears, goals, disappointments, hopes, regrets, wishes, and fantasies. People continue to trust those people who know them best and who love and accept them.
  9. Have fun together. Human beings usually fall in love with the ones who make them laugh, who make them feel good on the inside. They stay in love with those who make them feel safe enough to come out to play. Keep delight a priority. Put your creative energy into making yourselves joyful and producing a relationship that regularly feels like recess.
  10. Make yourself trustworthy. People come to trust the ones who affirm them. They learn to distrust those who act as if a relationship were a continual competition over who is right and who gets their way. Always act as if each of you has thoughts, impressions, and preferences that make sense, even if your opinions or needs differ. Realize your spouse’s perceptions will always contain at least some truth, maybe more than yours, and validate those truths before adding your perspective to the discussion.
  11. Forgive and forget. Don’t be too hard on each other. If your passion and love are to survive, you must learn how to forgive. Ephesians 4:32 must always be front and center. You and your spouse regularly need to wipe the slate clean so that anger doesn’t build and resentment fester. Holding on to hurts and hostility will block real intimacy. It will only assure that no matter how hard you otherwise work at it, your relationship will not grow. Do what you can to heal the wounds in a relationship, even if you did not cause them. Be compassionate about the fact that neither of you intended to hurt the other as you set out on this journey.
  12. Cherish and applaud. One of the most fundamental ingredients in the intimacy formula is cherishing each other. You need to celebrate each other’s presence. If you don’t give your spouse admiration, applause, appreciation, acknowledgement, the benefit of the doubt, encouragement, and the message that you are happy to be there with them now, where will they receive those gifts? Be generous. Be gracious. One of the most painful mistakes a couple can make is the failure to notice their own mate’s heroics. These small acts of unselfishness include taking out the trash, doing the laundry, mowing the lawn, driving the carpool, preparing the taxes, keeping track of birthdays, calling the repairman, and cleaning the bathroom, as well as hundreds of other routine labors. People are amazingly resilient if they know that they are appreciated. Work hard at noticing and celebrating daily acts of heroism by your mate.
12 Ways to Rekindle the Passion in Your Marriage

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Your Goal for Parenting Makes all the Difference

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parenting, babywise

I posted last week about how many Christian parents fall into the trap of parenting out of what is easier instead of what is biblical.

I get it.

We have 5 kids and life gets hectic. Many times you want your child to just listen to you, stop doing what they’re doing and get their act together. Correcting, late nights, explaining yourself, engaging in why they did something, all takes effort. After a long day, that is often the last thing I want to do.

It is important for parents, in the midst of all the advice, books, blogs and hearsay, to take a step back and ask, “What is our goal as parents? What are we hoping to do? What kinds of kids do we want to send out into the world?” The answers to these questions will impact the way you parent.

The kind of kid you are hoping to raise will influence how you parent.

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Many times Katie and I will be asked about parenting styles; things like love & logic, baby wise, child directed feeding, parent directed. All kinds. Should you spank a child, ground them, put them in time-outs?

Parenting, adoption, babywise & the gospel.

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As parents, there is a sense of desperation. There is so much information out there, so many opinions, and we often feel at a loss. We hear successful parents talk about what they did, but what if your child is different than theirs?

One question has been running through my head recently as it relates to parenting (and I think it is one every Christian parent needs to think about). This question should shape how you communicate to your child, how you discipline, if you let them cry it out, etc.

The question is this: Does my parenting reveal the heart of God?

Does your parenting reveal the heart of God?

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Let me explain.

God is a parent. He identifies himself as Father in the Bible, writers talk about his attributes as a parent (disciplining, communicating, loving, holding, cherishing, etc.). I think most Christians can agree on this point: God is our Father, we are children of God. I am a parent to a child, so therefore one of my hopes as a parent is to reveal to my kids what God is like.

Take a step back from your parenting for a second.

When your child thinks of how you discipline, communicate, connect, talk to them, interact with them, are they getting an accurate picture of what God as a Father is like? (And this isn’t just for men.) Your kids are connecting you to what God is like because they hear him called Father. They do that on their own. You are just revealing to them what God is like. 

How you interact with them says to your child, “This is what God is like.”

Let me give an example about discipline. The question often comes up about time-out’s, spanking, grounding, etc. Often as a parent, I fall into the trap of handing down discipline out of frustration or wanting it to move faster. What does discipline look like when we think about the heart of God? Does God disconnect himself from his children? Or is he with them? Does he leave them or go to them? Does he send his kids to their room? Think about Luke 15 and the Father running out to meet his son, the search for the lost sheep, the lost coin. Many of our kids fit those descriptions, and yet the heart of our parenting is nowhere near the heart of God as seen in Luke 15.

I have a hard time picturing God telling us to go work it out in our room, landing the boom on us or letting us “cry it out.” (As a caveat, there is a big difference between a child asking for space to process something they did and you making them have space in their room for something they did.) Instead, I see a God who pursues relationship and connecting. God is there in the muck, doing the hard work of loving a broken person, pursuing, taking the first step, not waiting on a child.

Your parenting reveals something about God; you are communicating to your children and to those around you what they should believe about God from your parenting.

So the questions every Christian parent needs to ask are not what is easiest for me or what works for my schedule. I understand those questions and desires, but those aren’t questions that should enter our heads. Instead, we have to ask: Is my parenting a true picture of the heart of God?

Your goal for parenting will influence how you parent.

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I don’t think this question gets asked enough about parenting. We look for tips and tricks and I’m all for those. At the end of the day, your goal (at least one of them) as a follower of Jesus with kids is to reflect the love of God to your kids and show them a true picture (as best as you can through the power of the Holy Spirit) of what God is like.

Why Parents Struggle with Connection

Let me take another step back, because I believe every parent wants to be connected to their child. We struggle to do it, it is difficult, we often don’t know what to say, but deep down there is something else happening.

Many of us don’t feel connected. We have skeletons in our past that whisper lies to us that keep us from engaging with our kids, that keep us from sharing our hurts, that keep us from being alive in Christ. And because we aren’t sure what the heart of God is like, we don’t know how to communicate that to our kids as a parent.

All we remember from childhood is abuse, broken promises, absent parents or parents who hovered and put us in bubble wrap. Connecting wasn’t a goal, authority and discipline were. Keeping things in line, looking and acting a certain way, projecting a certain persona.

And since we’re being honest, connection takes time and effort. When I need to discipline my kids, I want to shout and tell them to go to their room instead of taking a deep breath, sitting on the ground and hearing why they did something and talking with them about the power of sin and the power of Jesus over sin. I want to push them away in my sinfulness so they’ll go to sleep at night and I can have some down time. But my down time and my comfort are not the goal of parenting.

My down time and my comfort are not the goal of parenting.

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But many parents (and I fall into this trap more than I like to admit) have their comfort, ease and down time as a goal.

I know what you’ll say: “I don’t have any adopted kids. My kids don’t come from a hard background.”

The truth is, because of sin, all our kids come from a hard background. Whether that is being in a foster care system, experiencing abuse, struggling to meet standards at a suburban school, hard backgrounds are everywhere. The background of a child isn’t even the point because the heart cry of your child and every child is connection. How do I know? Because it is the cry of my heart with my heavenly Father, and it is the cry of your heart. 

We are just good at being adults and suppressing it.

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18 Things Every Husband Should Know about His Wife

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Create a Strong Marriage

Being a husband as a follower of Jesus has a high bar attached to it. It isn’t harder than the calling or role of the wife; it is just different. The image is given in Ephesians 5 of loving your wife as Christ loved the church is a hard, almost impossible task (I say impossible because nothing is impossible with God and you have the Holy Spirit in you as a follower of Jesus).

It is easy to feel like a failure around this verse as you look at your own life as a husband. Do I show my wife that kind of love? Am I that kind of servant?

Here’s a simple question that I’ve used to evaluate my own heart and how I’m doing as a husband towards Katie: Is your wife more alive in her identity in Jesus because she’s married to you? That’s what Ephesians 5 is all about, coming alive to your identity in Jesus. Your wife is a gift from God that you will present to God and give an account for. So, Is she more alive in her identity in Jesus because she’s married to you?

Is your wife more alive in her identity in Jesus because she’s married to you?

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Many husbands struggle because they try to do things for their wife that they think she wants or needs but aren’t actually in the same neighborhood. Below are some questions that I think every husband should know the answer to at any point about his wife (note: your wife is not a static object so the answer will change yearly, monthly and maybe daily!).

If you don’t know the answer to these, ask, she would love to tell you.

While these questions are focused on a husband towards his wife, here some questions I think a couple should ask each other regularly (perfect for your next date night).

18 questions every husband should know about his wife.

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Know Your Wife

A husband should know his wife better than anyone else. Her likes, dislikes, what excites her and disappoints her, her story, hopes, and dreams. He should know what she likes in terms of romance, affection and the bedroom and strive to serve her in those areas, not for what he can get but because of what God calls him to.

Here are some questions to help with this:

  1. What food does she like, what are her hobbies, how does she relieve stress?
  2. What hopes and dreams does she have? How can you help her accomplish them?
  3. How is your wife doing right now?
  4. What romances your wife?
  5. What gets your wife in the mood? What turns her off sexually?
  6. What does your wife like in the bedroom? What does she dislike?
Do you know your wife better than anyone else?

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Understand Your Wife

1 Peter 3:7 calls husbands to live with their wife in an understanding way, but to do that, you have to understand your wife. This goes closely with knowing your wife, but as her life changes, kids age and move out, this will change regularly. A husband’s job is to stay on top of these things and know what is happening in his wife’s heart, mind, and soul.

Here are some questions to help with this:

  1. Is your wife flourishing in her life right now?
  2. When is she most productive?
  3. How much sleep does she need?
  4. What does she need right now in the stage of life you are in to alleviate stress?
  5. How is she doing on cultivating friendships with other women?
  6. What areas is she hoping to grow in spiritually (i.e. prayer, theology, doctrine)? How can you help her? What books can you buy her to read (hint women read more than men do)? Here are a few you can start with that Katie liked.
Ever feel confused by your wife. Here are six ways to understand your wife.

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Honor Your Wife

Many men speak about their wife, to their wife and treat her like one of the guys. She is not; she is special, more special than any car, boat, possession or your child or career. She is your most precious relationship, a gift from God. Treat her as such. Honor is basic manhood. Let me say that another way if you don’t honor your wife, you are a child, not a man.

6 ways to know if you are honoring your wife.

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Here are some questions to help with this:

  1. Are you respectful to your wife in private and public when you talk to her and about her?
  2. Do you allow your kids to speak disrespectfully to your wife?
  3. Does the way you talk about your wife demand that others look at her in a positive light?
  4. Do you talk about her and look at her so that others will look up to her?
  5. If I spent 10 minutes listening to you talk about your wife would I know that she is the most important human relationship you have?
  6. Do you pursue her daily, weekly and yearly? Do you plan weekly date nights that show your love and attention to her?
18 ways to communicate love to your wife.

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Why You Parent the Way You Do

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Recently I made a comment on Facebook about babywise and quickly learned that discussing parenting styles on Facebook is akin to talking about global warming and vaccines.

But I learned something in the process, something I didn’t expect.

I learned two things about Christian parents that day and I think it can be incredibly dangerous.

The first, when it comes to parenting, Christians are very relative.

In fact, let me make a bold statement. By and large, most Christian parents care very little about what the Bible says about parenting and what science says about parenting.

Most Christian parents care very little about what the Bible says about parenting.

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Parenting styles aside for a minute.

There were almost 50 comments on the thread (which I deleted because it hurt my heart and made too angry), but almost every comment started with, “Well for my kid…”

No one ever started a sentence with, “The Bible or scientific research says…” Or, “my goal as a Christian parent because of the Bible is…”

It largely boiled down to what is easiest as a parent.

Now, we couch that in language about how its working for our kids, but I know for years I fell into the parenting trap of what is easiest and most convenient for me.

No Christian would ever say they don’t care what the Bible says about parenting, but many of the ways we parent say otherwise. It doesn’t matter what your parenting style is, how you communicate with your child or how you discipline them. If you are a follower of Jesus, what the Bible says about those things is way more important than what you think works for your child. For the most part, you are guessing at what you think works for your child because you don’t know until it’s over and they’ve moved out. That’s why what the Bible says and what scientific research says is so important.

When it comes to scientific research, I realize some Christians can get weird about that and start to wonder if God was taken out of the picture. While that happens, at the same time, there are incredible discoveries being made about our brains, how we are created and wired and all of that comes from God, whether a Christian discovers that or not. While this might be another blog topic, I think Christians needs to stop fearing science and start seeing how it confirms our Creator and his great plan for us.

The second thing I learned about parents is, we don’t really want to learn anything new. 

Almost no one in the over 50 comments asked, “How did you come to that conclusion? What do you know that I don’t? What books have you read that led you to that?”

Not wanting to learn or be stretched is an incredibly dangerous place to live, but many Christians stay in that zone when it comes to a lot of issues.

Are there things that Christians should reject out of hand without researching? Yes. This is why it matters so much to know what the Bible says about parenting (stay tuned for another post on that).

Now, like the first, no Christian parent would ever say they don’t want to learn. In fact, most feel incredibly inadequate as a parent (I know I do more times than not), but I think in an effort to feel better about ourselves as parents and what we are doing as parents, we shut down anything that might be new because we don’t want to be told we may have been doing the wrong thing.

I know a couple of years ago when we were going through our adoption classes and reading The Connected Child: Bring Hope and Healing to Your Adoptive Family and The Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child’s Developing Mind, all I could think of was “how did we mess this up as parents?” What I learned in those resources and classes had way more to do with how I and Katie parented all of our kids than just how to relate to the kids we adopted.

As a parent who claims to be a follower of Jesus, don’t settle for “this worked for me or my friend.” We have way more wisdom than that out there. What does the bible say about parenting? What are you called to be and do as a parent? That’s where we should start.

Next week I’ll share what I think is the most important question for any parent to answer as it relates to your child. It is the question that shapes our parenting style, the books we read, how we communicate, discipline and teach our kids. It is that big of a deal and most parents never even think about it.

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How to be a Better Communicator

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I watched the Preach Better Sermons conference yesterday. So much great stuff when it comes to preaching and growing as a communicator.

Here are some things I learned that are dynamite for preachers:

  • 90% of unchurched people choose a church based on the lead pastor & the preaching.

The First 5 Minutes of a Sermon – Jeff Henderson

  • If you don’t engage people in the first 5 minutes, it is very difficult to grab their attention again.
  • When you start a sermon, you have to assume the worst. You can’t assume that people are already are listening.
  • In the first 5 minutes, great communicators are shrinking the gap: the physical and emotional gap between the person speaking and the audience.
  • Connect with the audience first, then bring on the content.
  • Connection is the most important thing in the first 5 minutes, not content.
  • Communicate that you are there to help people, not impress them.
  • 5 tips for the first 5 minutes: be like able (smile), tell a story, create tension (make them wonder what the solution is), ask, “Have you ever felt like this?” (this creates understanding), and tease the solution (say, “there’s a way to get ahead in ____”).

Jud Wilhite

  • Preaching is a gift. Ask God to steward his gift in you.

The Pain of Preparation – Jeff Henderson

  • If we aren’t careful, we skimp on preparation.
  • If we don’t get ahead on our preparation, our preaching suffers and our church suffers.
  • The better you prepare, the better you preach.
  • Preparation starts with empathy. You have to be empathetic towards the people you are preaching to.
  • When you have empathy, it causes you to make sure you are prepared.
  • Questions to ask for preparation:
    1. What does my audience currently think about this topic? Where is the pain point?
    2. What do I want my audience to think about this topic?
    3. What is my single most persuasive idea?
    4. What do you want them to do?
  • Until you can say “because of that, this is what I want you to do” your sermon prep is not done.

Transformational Preaching – Derwin Gray

  • Consecrate yourself.
  • You preach out of the overflow of your time with God.
  • Always preach the good news. People need good news, not advice.
  • Be compelling and clear.
  • Too many pastors are not overwhelmed by Jesus so they look for other things to be compelling.
  • Preach convicting sermons.
  • At the end of the sermon, people should want to join Jesus’ cause.

Feedback:

  • What was working?
  • What could have made this better?

Crafting Memorable Phrases 

  • A sticky statement is one that someone can memorize and utilize in their life.
  • One sticky statement repeated several times.
  • Sticky statement is your big idea, it is your elevator pitch of your sermon.
  • Can people take your sermon and remember it?
  • To create sticky statements, you must P.R.E.A.C.H.
    • Give people a word picture.
    • Rhyming is key to a sticky statement.
    • Use an echo in your statement: Nobody expected no body.
    • Use alliteration (contrasting): your soul is more important than your stuff.
    • Contrast different things.
    • The hook is what makes it memorable and tells them what you want them to do.

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