The danger of relying on talent

Posted on April 22, 2012 Written by Mark McIntyre 1 Comment

If there is one sad story that we’ve seen too often repeated in the church, it is the story of gifted leaders getting off track. The result is a train wreck. Some of the most famous examples have been those who had large radio and television followings.

It may be a great over simplification to say that the story of Jeroboam explains this phenomenon, but perhaps it does give us a clue.

In 1 Kings 11:28 tells us:

Now the man Jeroboam was a valiant warrior, and when Solomon saw that the young man was industrious, he appointed him over all the forced labor of the house of Joseph.

Jeroboam had talent. He was a mighty warrior and a good manager. He was a man that men would follow. Solomon recognized this and rewarded it.

Jeroboam also had opportunity. A few verses later we are told that the prophet Ahijah came to Jeroboam to inform him that God was giving ten of the tribes of Israel to Jeroboam to lead. Not only would he lead them, but if he led well and followed God’s commands, Jeroboam would have an enduring kingdom like that promised to David.

It was at this point that Jeroboam had a choice to make. He had to choose between living in dependence upon God or relying on his wit and talent. As we can see from the following chapters, Jeroboam chose the latter and Israel suffered. 1 Kings 13:33 tells us that Jeroboam “did not return from his evil way.”

In reality, all of us have this same choice to make on a moment-by-moment, daily basis. In Luke 9:23, Jesus tells us to take up our cross daily. We have to constantly choose the path of self denial and reliance upon God. This is true not only for our Salvation but for our very existence as believers in Jesus Christ.

For those of us who are not in official positions of responsibility in the church, this choice seems like it would have small impact. Yet this is not the case. For the Body of Christ to be healthy, all of the members of the body must be in harmony with the head, Jesus Christ. We cannot be in harmony with the head unless we acknowledge our dependence upon him. Small rebellions can have a big impact.

For those, like Jeroboam, who have been given the responsibility to lead, small rebellions will always have huge impact. I believe this is why James 3:1 tells warns us that teachers will incur a stricter judgment. It is one thing to move yourself out of God’s blessing, it is another to lead a group toward chaos.

For all of us, small or great in the workings of the church, we need to learn the lesson of Jeroboam. Self reliance and self will have no place in the Kingdom of God. We rely on our own talent to our own peril and to the peril of those we lead.

We need to be reminded of the words Jesus spoke to Paul as recorded in 2 Corinthians 12:9, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.”

Reliance upon God-given talent, no matter how great that talent is, will always end in brokenness and failure. It’s not worth it; depend upon God and God alone.

Quality vs. quantity – thoughts on building the church

Posted on April 10, 2012 Written by Mark McIntyre 4 Comments

According to The Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20), we are called to make disciples. In those churches which are concerned about making disciples, I have observed that many of them gauge their success based on numbers of people in attendance. When this happens the emphasis is on quantity and not quality of the disciples.

Do we act as if there a quality component to making disciples? What does it really mean to make a disciple? Is it enough to get them to pray a prayer, give them a Bible and get them baptized?

The words of Paul in 1 Corinthians 3:10-15 come to mind:

10 According to the grace of God which was given to me, like a wise master builder I laid a foundation, and another is building on it. But each man must be careful how he builds on it. 11 For no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if any man builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, 13 each man’s work will become evident; for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man’s work. 14 If any man’s work which he has built on it remains, he will receive a reward. 15 If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.

I notice that Paul is making reference to the quality of the construction, not the quantity. A small amount of gold is worth more than a large amount of hay. The focus is on the inherent properties of the material, not on how much building was accomplished.

Jesus tells us in Matthew 7:23, that the only thing of ultimate value that we build into other people is a relationship with Jesus. Furthermore, Jesus teaches us in Matthew 22:38-39 that the two great commands are to love God with our entire being and to love our neighbor as ourselves. It’s all about relationships, both vertical and horizontal.

The work that equates to gold, silver and precious stones would be that work which builds in men and women the drive and the skills to fulfill these two great commands. The ability of the disciple to fulfill these two commands is the test by which good or bad workmanship is determined.

I have been in large churches where people were loving and relational. I have been in small churches that were cold and aloof. I have been in churches where a great preacher drew large crowds but there was little interaction between the people who attended the church. What makes the difference?

The difference is a leader and leadership team that works to put the two commands into practice and actively seeks to build relationships with people in the congregation. If the leadership team is functioning in fellowship and then each leader functions in fellowship with others outside the leadership team, then the fellowship radiates through the church like spokes on a wheel.

One hour of one-on-one or small group interaction over a passage of Scripture does more good than ten hours of instruction from the pulpit. In that small group or one-on-one interaction, the emphasis is on quality, on building well. In the large group setting the emphasis is on numbers, on drawing more people in.

Leaders: in your quest to build your congregations, please do not get enamored with quantity and sacrifice quality. Build relationships which facilitate growth and spiritual maturity.

Your final grade depends on it.

Toward being a peacemaker

Posted on February 28, 2012 Written by Mark McIntyre Leave a Comment

Toward being a peacemaker – #11 in the Sermon on the Mount Series

Blessed are the peacemakers

According to the Bible, human history began in peace and will end in peace. The middle part has been a little rough.

John Lennon asked us to give peace a chance, but how can we do this? Even if you define peace as the absence of war, humanity does not have a very good track record. According to Will Durant, out of 3421 years of documented history, there were only 268 years without war at the time of his writing. That means that roughly 92.2% of the time, some part of the globe was in open hostility. With the rise of Islamic unrest in the Middle East, this percentage is likely to rise rather than fall. Human history cannot bear out any assertion that man is capable of producing peace, John Lennon notwithstanding.

To be a peacemaker first requires that one be at peace. Even Muddy Waters knows that you can’t give away “what you ain’t never had.” Man has not been at peace since our initial rebellion against God as recorded in Genesis 3. Beginning with that initial rebellion, man has been at war with God, his neighbors, his world and himself. The external conflict is a product of the conflict within. Until that internal conflict is resolved, there is no chance of anything better than a superficial peace.

Paul tells us in Romans 5:1 that the path to peace with God is through Jesus Christ. It is by being justified by faith in Jesus that peace can be obtained. This is the first step to being a peacemaker in the sense that Jesus presents in Matthew 5:9.

In 2 Corinthians 13:11 Paul tells us to “rejoice, be made complete, be comforted, be like-minded, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you.” Elsewhere Paul tells us to live in peace with one another (1 Thess. 5:13).

If we accept God’s provision in Jesus Christ for fixing the vertical relationship with God, it will then allow us to work on the horizontal relationships with our neighbors. I do not think that it is possible to over emphasize the two Great Commands that Jesus catalogs in Matthew 22:37-40. Love God; love your neighbor. They must be done in that order.

It seems obvious, in light of these verses that a peacemaker cannot be self-focused. I am not at peace with God or my neighbor when I am focused on my wants, my needs or even my rights. A true peacemaker is one who surrenders to God and trusts in him.

A peacemaker is one who is redeemed and justified by faith in Jesus Christ, who is actively developing his relationship with God and who is actively seeking to share that relationship with those around him. A peacemaker is one who takes seriously the call of Jesus to make disciples in Matthew 28:19-20. For it is only as a disciple that I can begin to know peace.

They will be called children of God

Paul tells us in Romans 8:14 that all who are being led by the Spirit of God, are sons of God. The author of Hebrews tells us that God disciplines us as sons (Hebrews 12:7).

By being in relationship with God through Jesus Christ, we are adopted into God’s family. We have become sons and daughters and will be treated as such. This verse emphasizes that one of the hallmarks of a son or daughter of God is that he or she will have a legacy of peacemaking. When we are at the end and stand before Jesus, we should be able to hear him point to that legacy as evidence of our relationship with him.

A call to action

Even as I write this, I am convicted that I do not take every opportunity to be a peacemaker that is presented to me. I am often self-focused, insensitive or insecure. To be a peacemaker, I should have a strong desire to share the good news of Jesus Christ with anyone who hasn’t heard it.

Not only does our peacemaking have a passive component, it should have an active component also. Let’s make it active and see what happens to our churches and our communities.

The rejection of a made-up God

Posted on February 26, 2012 Written by Mark McIntyre 1 Comment

If you are going to reject God, please be sure that you have an accurate understanding of who you are rejecting. Carol Hoenig’s article in the Huffington Post entitled Santorum Reminds Me Why I Wrote ‘Of Little Faith’, is an example of the rejection of a caricature of Christianity.

The God that Mrs. Hoenig has rejected appears to be a genie-in-a-bottle god who is supposed to do what we want if we display enough faith. This type of belief does not stand up because it will eventually be disappointed. God does not exist to do what I want; it is the other way round. This genie-in-a-bottle god is not the God of the Bible.

Whether they were taught to me or I misunderstood what was being taught, I absorbed many wrong ideas about God and Christianity while growing up in the Church. I do not think that I am alone in this and apparently Mrs. Hoenig’s experience is similar. The question I would ask of Mrs. Hoenig is that when she was studying the Bible on a regular basis, was she doing so to hear from God or was she studying to support her beliefs? There is a big difference between the two.

The Apostle Paul tells us in Romans 12:1-2 that we come to Scripture in need of transformation. Our minds and thinking are not aligned with reality about God and who we are before him. We have to make a choice when approaching Scripture to be open to what it is really saying or to only hear what supports our preconceptions. The theological words describing these two positions are exegesis (ex – out of) or eisegesis (eis – into). In other words, we can draw from Scripture what it means or we can read into it what we want it to say.

This is not a new problem. In his epistles, the Apostle Paul was dealing with those who distorted what he was saying. The Old Testament prophets offered correction to Israel’s misunderstanding and misapplication of the law. Jesus contended with the Pharisees who misinterpreted Scripture to the point that they did not recognize their Messiah when he appeared.

I am not shocked at Mrs. Hoenig’s reaction to what appears to be a feeble, man-centered pseudo-Christianity. When we want to prevent a disease, we inoculate a person with a weakened form of the disease so that immunity can be formed. Our Enemy is aware of this tactic and uses it in a spiritual sense all the time. What better way to prevent belief than to expose people to an inadequate, uninformed, feeble Christianity? Sadly, there are many in “ministry” that are willing accomplices in this tactic of Satan. As a result, the “Christianity” that many reject has very little to do with Jesus Christ.

G. K. Chesterton wrote, “The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and left untried.” Jesus tells us in Matthew 7:22-23 that many who purported to be speaking for God will be found to have been operating with no relationship with Jesus Christ. It is not surprising therefore that many who operate under the banner of Christianity are deceived and deceive others.

It is incumbent upon anyone who rejects Christianity to first understand who it is that he is rejecting. Sadly, most reject a caricature such as that presented by Carol Hoenig in the Huffington Post.

Please make an informed choice.