Perseverance in Pastoral Ministry:

It’s common wisdom among pastors that no important decision should be made on a Monday. Especially a Monday morning. The nature of pastoral work causes the Lord’s Day to be a day that typically requires a great expenditure of physical, emotional and spiritual energy for a man who gives himself to regular pastoral preaching. Standing before a church that is gathered together with unbelievers, knowing that they expect and need to hear the Word of God accurately and helpfully proclaimed is a weighty responsibility. Preaching is spiritual warfare and it is a rare Lord’s Day that I do not go home painfully aware of the attacks of our enemy that have come before, during and after my efforts in preaching. I suspect that most preachers know something of what I am talking about.

The result is that most pastors are not at their fighting best on Mondays. I have probably resigned my pastorate a hundred times in my mind…on Mondays. Fortunately, it only takes a little experience to recognize this pattern and to guard against putting too much stock in Monday-morning contemplations of life-decisions.

But trying to decide whether to stay or to leave at other times can be just as emotionally and spiritually taxing on a pastor–especially during times of conflict in the church. When the conflict in any way centers on him, the trial is compounded all-the-more. It is not unusual from time-to-time for there to be people in the church who want the pastor to leave. Perhaps as a result of a difference of opinion or a doctrinal disagreement, although too often the reasons are not nearly that noble.

While no one can authoritatively say that it is never right for a pastor to leave a church as a result of opposition, my own opinion is that too many pastors tend to leave too quickly when tensions arise in among the congregation. I understand the temptation and even the rationale that often enters into the pastor’s thinking. “I don’t want the church to be split.” “I don’t want to be the cause of such fighting.” “If I leave, then fewer people will be hurt.” These and other motives can be humble and testimony to great love for the people.

However, if the issues at stake are not moral or doctrinal—that is, if the pastor is not guilty of violating his pastoral vows—then the fact that the Lord called him to serve the church for that particular time should also weigh heavily on any decision that he might take. In fact, I believe that it is extremely valuable, if not essential, for a pastor to accept a call to serve a church with a willingness and desire to spend his life in that place. This is not to say that the Lord will never move him to another place, but such an attitude will always put the burden of proof on the move. And controversy in and of itself, is rarely a sufficient reason for a pastor to move on.

When Paul told to the Corinthians that he was planning to stay in Ephesus a while, he explained it like this: “for a wide door for effective work has opened to me, and there are many adversaries” (1 Corinthians 16:9). He gave them two reasons. He had a wide open door for ministry there. And he had many adversaries there. It seems that Paul was of the mind that God’s ministers should be willing to “ride toward the sound of the guns.”

Again, I do not want to suggest that a man should never leave his church nor that he should never leave during times of controversy. But the burden of proof should be on side that says, “go.”

I love the spirit that Charles Spurgeon had about this in his own life and ministry. He once expressed his intentions stay to his church during a worship service at the Metropolitan Tabernacle.

I do not think that anything but death would get me to go away from this spot. I hardly agree with ministers, when they get beaten, showing the white feather, and resigning their charge. I feel that I am captain of a vessel; and if there should be a Jonah in the ship, I shall, as gently and in as Christian a spirit as possible, pitch him out; I shall not think, because Jonah is there, that therefore I ought to leave, but I will stand by the ship in ill weather as well as in sunshine.

I love his pastoral resolve. No doubt it comforted the church as much as it troubled the would-be “Jonahs” among the congregation. Such determination is essential for persevering in pastoral ministry. And often it is only by persevering through severe trials that divine blessings come to rest on a pastor’s labors.

Are Mormons Heretics?:

The young man shifted nervously on my doorstep, his cheerful face belying his anxiety. He wore the customary white short-sleeved shirt and black tie and carried a backpack. He had just knocked on my door and just discovered that I was a pastor.

“Oh good!” he said. “It’s always great to meet fellow Christians.”

He was a young man on his requisite mission, the rite of passage of sorts for the LDS Church.

This is new, I thought. I had not heard Mormons call themselves Christians before.

“Why do you call yourself a Christian?” I asked.

“Because we follow Jesus Christ, the son of the heavenly Father.”

“Have any of the Mormon beliefs changed in the last several years?”

“No,” he said, “not really.”

“Then I don’t think you’re any more Christian than you used to be.”

“Well, we believe the same things other Christians believe.”

He began to list out some bullet points of the Christian faith, things nearly every evangelical would agree with—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are all real persons, for instance. That Jesus died on the cross to atone for sins and rose again and ascended to heaven.

For a moment, I was sort of shocked. Maybe things actually were changing in the Mormon church. The desire to be considered evangelical seemed new, but maybe it brought with it some theological reforms, as in the apparent turnaround in the formerly heterodox Worldwide Church of God.

You may be inclined to think so too. Today in the evangelical marketplace, Mormon figures sometimes play subtle yet significant roles. Christians share videos of Mormon singers and teaching on social media. Mormon families participate in local Christian organizations (there are several Mormon kids in the “Christian youth theater” with which my daughter used to perform shows). And many Mormons, of course, stand side by side with Roman Catholics and evangelical Protestants in opposing many social ills like abortion and pornography, etc.

The push to be considered evangelical is a real push. But it comes at the cost of some doctrinal obfuscation. So are Mormons becoming evangelical Christians? What do we make of those sweet folks across the street with the awesome kids and neighborly spirit? If anybody is a Christian, wouldn’t they be?

I decided to go deeper with my LDS visitor, asking him pointed questions about distinct beliefs that have historically defined evangelical Christianity. Here are significant things Mormons have always and still believe:

1. Jesus isn’t God.

Mormons call Jesus the Son of God and say lots of things about him that the Bible says – that he was born of a virgin, that he died to atone for sins and rose again, etc. – but they also say he is a created being, directly contradicting biblical orthodoxy. They also say that he “inherited divine powers” from the Father. Mormons deny the historically Christian teaching that Jesus Christ is equal with the Father in essence and substance. On that note . . .

2. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit aren’t equally one God.

Mormons affirm a conception of the Trinity – what they typically call the Godhead, interestingly enough – but deny the traditional understanding of God’s triune nature. They say that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit share one purpose or will but do not share the same essence or substance. They say the three persons of the trinity are “separate personages” that share divine attributes, but deny that they are co-equally and simultaneously distinct persons who are together one God. Mormons believe God literally birthed the “spirit-children” Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

3. God was created.

You have to dig a bit deeper into their doctrine to get to some of the stuff they don’t widely publicize, like this key teaching for instance: the God we worship as our heavenly Father is not an eternal, uncreated being. Mormons believe God was once a man of flesh and blood, a created being, who ascended to divinity. Joseph Smith taught that there was even a “God” above the God we know as God the Father, who created the man who eventually became the God we know as Father. This is obviously in direct opposition to historical Christian orthodoxy, which affirms the Bible’s claim that there is no God but God and that before anything else ever existed, the great I AM existed.

4. Christ’s atonement redeems everyone and grace is a reward for those who obey him.

In a kind of strange two-part confusion about Christ’s atoning work on the cross, Mormons believe in a kind of universalism in which everyone who dies will be “saved” by Christ’s work, although they do teach that there are also four different eternal destinies for resurrected persons—godhood for faithful Mormons, a kind of lower heaven for unfaithful Mormons and people who only accept God after they die, a temporary place of suffering for wicked people who reject Mormonism, and an eternal place of suffering for the devil and people who received the Holy Spirit but then denied it. If you find that difficult to follow, you should consider what they teach about salvation. Mormons superficially affirm salvation by grace but how they define grace (and faith) muddles the biblical and evangelical understanding. 2 Nephi 25 (in the Book of Mormon) says that “we are saved by grace, after all we can do.”

In other words, for the Mormon, grace is a reward for faithful effort. For the biblical Christian, however, grace that is deserved is not grace at all. Grace is given to the undeserving, those who could never earn God’s favor or rewards. Grace empowers faithful obedience, yes, but grace also precedes it. Mormons get the gospel/law distinction wrong.

There are other interesting departures from orthodoxy to be found in LDS teaching—what they believe about the Bible and ongoing revelation, what they believe about pre-existing human beings, about Jesus coming to North America to minister to the Native Americans, etc.—and lots of questions to suss out about Mormonism’s prophetic and historiographical claims. (The historical record is not kind to the former, when you begin to honestly appraise the character of Joseph  Smith in particular, and the archaeological record is not kind to the latter.) But the bottom line is that on four very key points of Christian orthodoxy, Mormonism utterly fails the test.

After I quizzed my new missionary friend on these key tenets and finding that we believed some very, very different things about them, he still wasn't willing to admit Mormonism should not be considered Christianity in any theologically meaningful sense of the word. He wanted to call his companion (who was stationed at the front porch of the house next door) for backup. I encouraged him to do so. Because I knew if these Mormons were to be considered Christian, they'd need to believe the biblical gospel, and I was eager to share it with them both.

I know too many Christians are prone to throwing around the "heresy" word in a willy-nilly fashion at anyone who disagrees with them. Preachers who talk about social justice or have rock-and-roll worship on stage are called "heretics." But the word has an historical legitimacy. It does apply to some beliefs that depart from the faith once delivered. And the historical record of creeds and councils of the Christian church is clear, as is the word of God from which they are deriving their theological guardrails: if you deny the traditional doctrines of the deity of Christ and of the triune Godhead and mess with salvation by grace, you are indeed a heretic.

Love Your Wife:

Ten Christlike Loves

As I have scoured the Scriptures, year after year, looking for ways that Jesus loves the church, ways that he calls me to echo his love for me in my love for my wife, I have found ten great loves. As a husband, God calls you to love your wife like Jesus loves her, so meditate on his deep, complex, and unparalleled love.

1. Stubborn Love

Jesus won’t ever leave his bride. He says to her, “Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). His love for your wife is based not on her performance, but on his covenant love for her. When we keep our marriage covenants through all of the challenges and changes over years of married life, we reflect his kind of stubborn, delight-filled love. May our wives know the comfort of love that says, “I will never leave you nor forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5).

2. Hopeful Love

When Jesus looks at your bride, he sees her as already sanctified. This hope is anchored in the power and promise of the gospel. Paul writes to believers, “You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Corinthians 6:11). In fact, he sees her not only as already sanctified, but as already glorified (Romans 8:30). How often would your wife say that your love for her “hopes all things” (1 Corinthians 13:7)? By keeping eternity in mind, you can have patience with your wife, just as Jesus does with her — and you.

3. Pursuing Love

Jesus never takes a break from pursuing your wife’s heart, not romantically but persistently. In fact, he cares not only about her devotion, but also her affection (Psalm 37:4). He is the tireless Shepherd who leaves the ninety-nine to seek after the one (Luke 15:4–7). In a similar way, God is glorified when a husband continually seeks a deeper relationship with his wife. A husband who has been captured by Jesus’s love is an incurable romantic toward his wife.

4. Forgiving Love

Jesus gives your wife grace when she doesn’t deserve it. It may be that the most Christlike thing you can do is offer your wife forgiveness on a daily basis, remembering that you too are in need of forgiveness. The picture of forgiving love that every husband should seek to emulate is Jesus making breakfast for Peter, who had sinned against him, denying him three times at his crucifixion (John 21:12–15). Is it you or your wife who is usually the first to begin to move toward reconciliation when it’s needed? 

5. Joyful Love

Jesus doesn’t just put up with your wife or grudgingly but persistently love her — Jesus loves to love her. He delights to be with his bride. He receives joy by giving us joy (Hebrews 12:2). Wives who are loved this deeply, who know their husbands love to love them, are often an even greater blessing to others. Love your wife so joyfully that it’s obvious to her and others.

6. Serving Love

Jesus served her in life and death. There is nothing — nothing — that God can call you to do for your wife that would be too much! Jesus “gave himself up for her” (Ephesians 5:25). Many husbands think of themselves as kings to be served, but you and I are called by God to be the chief servants in our homes. The way to Christlikeness in our marriages is through joining Jesus in taking up the towel and the basin (John 13:12–17).

7. Sanctifying Love

Jesus loves your wife by helping her to grow in holiness and by being her advocate before the Father (1 John 2:1). Do you encourage your wife to go to Bible study, even if it means you have to care for the kids by yourself for the evening? Do you regularly bring your wife before the Father in prayer? Work hard to help your wife blossom spiritually.

8. Leading Love

Jesus leads us to what is good for us. Jesus not only loves your wife with a leading rather than a passive love, but he also leads her toward what is good (Psalm 23:2). It is impossible to lead our wives spiritually if we ourselves are not being led by God through the word and prayer. One way you can lead her well is by seeking her input and then making big decisions (and accepting the consequences), rather than allowing the decisions and consequences to fall to her.

9. Providing Love

Jesus provides your wife with all that she needs. Do you notice your wife’s needs, even beyond physical provision, and do something about it? Christ nourishes her, providing an environment for growth and flourishing. The apostle Paul explains to us that “in the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies” (Ephesians 5:28). It made a marked difference in my marriage when I realized that it was my responsibility to do what I could to fill my wife’s sails.

10. Knowing Love

Jesus knows your wife better than she knows herself. He has an informed love for her. He knows her strengths, her weaknesses, and he acts on her behalf (Ephesians 5:29–30). While we will never know our wives like God knows them, he wants us to know them as well as we can. Our prayers for them will always be hindered if we fail to know them (1 Peter 3:7). Our wives know they are cherished when we make an effort to really know them.

Beware of Sin:

Don’t coddle it.

Don’t tell your conscience, “It’s not that big of a deal. Confessing it openly is turning something small into something major.”

Don’t tell yourself, “I’ve got this under control. I’ll simply stop; no need to confess.”

Don’t tell yourself, “They don’t need an apology, that’s too dramatic.”

Don’t tell yourself, “OK, from this moment on, I’ll be real and thorough; the next time I commit this sin I’ll confess.”

This bargaining will not do, and it betrays a view of sin that is far too naïve and a view of God that is far too tame. That unconfessed sin is what lies between you and the joy of fully wrapping your arms around the gospel you know to be true.

Many of us find ourselves in spiritual ruts. You may feel a complete lack of zeal for the things of God that once marked your Christian life. Among the plethora of possible reasons that one finds oneself in a season of spiritual dryness, unconfessed sin is often the culprit.I will not presume to tell every rut-constrained Christian how to climb out of the pit to feel the warm rays of God’s presence on your face again. It’s not so simple as that.

But, I can promise you this: there is no climbing out for the one who refuses to let go habitual, unconfessed sin. You can try as hard as you may, clawing at the mud and gravel and tree roots with a free hand—as long as the other hand clutches onto that sin, the ditch is your home. You can’t have both. You can protect your image and refuse to confess your sins openly if you wish, but it comes at the cost of deep and abiding communion with God. That is what you have to sacrifice on the altar of pride in order to “save face.”

Not only that, but unconfessed sin will not behave itself or content itself with the margins of your life. We cannot tame unconfessed sin, and we’re fools for thinking we can. Like a blackhole, it will suck every bit of you into nothingness until there is nothing left. All too often, we believe the lie that the damage of confessing sin will be greater than simply trying to keep it under control; as if we have any ability whatsoever to control its blast radius to only hurt a “small part of our souls.” What lunacy!

To change the metaphor in a slightly more gross direction, unconfessed sin resembles the properties of a leech: rather than shrinking overtime or simply “going away,” it gets fatter and deadlier. Our lifeblood is its food—the one diminishes as the other grows. The Puritan pastor, Ralph Venning, said it well when he said, “To be merciful to sin is to be cruel to yourself; to save the one alive is to put the other to death. Therefore do not spare it, but repent unfeignedly from the bottom of your heart.”[1] Don’t soften the blow of conviction you receive when you read God’s word and feel convicted—when the Law acts as a mirror to show you all of your blemishes and stains. Don’t look away. Take note of what you see: those sins are the sins you grieve over and confess to God in prayer. Those are the ones the Son of God took on flesh to deal with. Let him.

“For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God” (Hebrews 9:13-14).

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:9-10).

5 Resolutions for Pastoral Ministry:

Around the age of nineteen, perhaps the greatest American theologian who has ever lived began recording what would eventually amount to seventy resolutions that would define the rest of his ministerial career. Indeed, the “Resolutions” of Jonathan Edwards are among the most intrepid personal intentions ever written and were merely the prologue to Edwards’ future foray into doctrinal and ecclesiastical writing. Though I will never equate the theological prowess or eloquence Edwards displays throughout his evangelistic life, I am, nonetheless, determined to resolve myself to the Lord’s Spirit and grace for the duration of my ministry. As I embark upon the calling to which God has given me, I am, therefore, personally proposing and publicly proclaiming the following resolutions, which, under the grace and faithfulness of God, I hope to maintain and execute for the sake of his name.

I resolve to zealously resist the temptation to resort to a gimmicky presentation of God’s good news.
There are a lot of aphoristic sermons tendered nowadays that do nothing but demean and debase “the glorious gospel of the blessed God,” with which the church is entrusted. (1 Tim. 1:11) By diminishing the glory and grandeur of God’s news of deliverance with a mawkish and saccharine approximation of its implications, the gospel is robbed of its severity and urgency. It is no light matter to preach God’s Word. There is no occasion in the pulpit for cutesy presentations of the only news that can rescue men’s souls. Scottish divine Patrick Fairbairn, in his Pastoral Theology, asserts that the pastoral office “has to do with the oversight and care of souls” (39). Everlasting life is at stake. This does not mean that the delivery of sermons must be inundated with verbose exposition and pietistic jargon. However, it does mean that I am not at liberty to play with the message of redemption and reconciliation through Jesus’s blood by being cute or quaint or pithy in its proclamation when the eternity’s of men and women are in the balance.

I resolve to intentionally construct my ministry on the metrics of grace, which are difficult, impossible even, to measure, but are nonetheless the grounds for all true and lasting spiritual and ministerial growth.
Coupled with the syrupy presentations of the gospel is the felt need to “bulk up the numbers” of those attending church each week. Laconic preaching and blatant marketing hold hands to lead many into the shallows of biblical discipleship and have them stay there. In a growing number of venues, the church service has become a production — and I’m not even referring to the Hillsong-Bethel-entertainment-style of production. There is a burgeoning pastoral sense that every weekend at church has to be memorable, has to be experienced, has to be sold. I get the feeling that many ministers across these United States have been misled into believing that the “old pathways” of “sound doctrine” aren’t good enough to build a church around, especially if you want to not only attract but keep the millennial visitors. Glancing at the modern landscape of church growth philosophy and church-planting methodology would likely make you believe that in order to grow your church, you should operate all its functions more businesslike. However, the longer you run your church like a business, the sooner you will find yourself running a business and not a church. Policies and procedures are good to have; an attitude of excellence should, indeed, define all the activities the church governs. But God’s rubric for ministry efficiency doesn’t always follow our affinity for metrics. This is precisely because the metrics of grace aren’t always seen, they’re felt — which makes them terribly hard to quantify.

I resolve to determinately fight the urge to define the success or failure of my ministry on the amount of congregants or “Amens” in each service.
I pray that my soul would not be so fickle as to rely on man’s acclaim or applause or attendance as validation of my ministerial efforts. There is, perhaps, no more slippery or more seductive slope on which a minister can find himself than that of chasing the approval of his peers and identifying the quality of his ministry on the measure of his influence. Preachers are no more immune than anyone else to the fallacy of equating one’s identity with accomplishments. A pastor can all too easily succumb to the deceptive and degenerative behavior of quantifying his worth on the scale of his achievements. Ministers, young ones especially, quickly drown themselves in schedules and calendars and meetings and appointments all in the pursuit of making sure their résumé of doing bolsters their identity. But Jesus preaches a different message. In him, I am made to see that the significance of my life has no bearing on who I am. In the final analysis, the only title that carries weight in the courtroom of identity is not the one I make for myself but is the one that’s given to me by Christ himself. Jared Wilson, nearly echoing Dr. Fairbairn, writes in The Prodigal Church that “pastoral ministry is about souls, not stats.” As a minister of the gospel, I am not called to please people, usher in a realized utopia, or fix everyone’s lives. (Gal. 1:10) I am called to point people to their only true salvation in the bloodied hands and side of the Savior. My commission is to “hold on to the pattern of sound teaching” and “guard the good deposit” (2 Tim. 1:13–14) regardless of the results. And though I will struggle and strive for the sake of the gospel with my life, God is always sovereign over the results. (1 Cor. 15:10) The fruits are in his hands. Though my flesh might desire to incessantly look at the numbers and the stats to ensure I’m getting a good ROI on my ministry investment, it is the grace of God alone that precisely liberates me from worrying and stressing over the outcomes, giving me the ability to be faithful in the moment. The energy I expel for the sake of the gospel is reward enough in itself.

I resolve to stubbornly exposit the Scriptures with an ethic of the gospel in which the sinner is utterly exposed and the Savior is forever exalted.
As not only a believer of the Word but a student of its message, and a student of the art of proclaiming its truth, I affirm the seminal need for the right interpretation and propagation of “sound doctrine.” That is, it is undeniably necessary for the passion and death of the Lord Jesus to be the sum and substance of every sermon — for it is in that passion and death that all life, hope, and peace are found. To uphold the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ as exceedingly expedient and necessary is to exalt all that encompasses the name of the Lord Jesus, the one who “will save his people from their sins.” (Matt. 1:21) He is the reason. The rationale for laboring after the work of the ministry is found in Jesus’s scars. The lashes which heal are those that support, sustain, and strengthen also. (Isa. 53:5) If I am not speaking the words of Jesus’s life and death then I am merely wasting everyone’s time. I’m giving them platitudes that can be heard elsewhere, and probably more eloquently and professionally at that.

I resolve to faithfully and fervently unfold the Word of Jesus’s pardon for sinners because sinners are all that there are. And I am chief among them. (1 Tim. 1:15)
 I cannot lose sight of who I am amid all the biblical and theological vocabulary I intake. At the end of the day, notwithstanding the doctrinal insights I have made, I am still just as desperate as everyone else, perhaps even more so, for the glad tidings of God’s deliverance. I am such a sinner who has been exposed and who, indeed, is in dire need for the grace which he himself tenders. The passionate proclamation of God’s message of redemption only results from a heart that is cognizant of his own need for redemption. As Paul Tripp writes in his book, Dangerous Calling, “You simply cannot be a good ambassador of the grace of the King without recognizing your need for the King in your own life. Public ministry is meant to be fueled and propelled by private devotion.” (197) It is, therefore, unequivocally necessary that I never forget who I am: a sinner saved by grace. I am my own most desperate congregation. And so it is that in every venue, regardless of audience, my aim ought to be to exalt the bloodied God by whose stripes I am healed, I am exonerated, I am saved.

I am not naïve enough or brash enough to believe that the foregoing resolutions will be executed in their entirety at all times. I know my heart and I know for certain that I will break these intentions at some point. I pray to God along with the psalmist, “I have gone astray like a lost sheep; seek thy servant.” (Ps. 119:176) I pray for God’s Spirit to empower and embolden me to live in them longer than those made at the turn of every new year. It is my chiefest desire to resolve my life to these ends, that the power of Christ may rest upon me and flow through me, and shine onto those around me.

God Can Restore Your Lost Years:

Money can be restored. Property can be restored—broken-down cars, stripped painting, old houses. Relationships can be restored. But one thing that can never be restored is time. Time flies and it does not return. Years pass and we never get them back.

Yet God promises the impossible: “I will restore the years that the locust has eaten” (Joel 2:25). The immediate meaning of this promise is clear. God’s people had suffered the complete destruction of their entire harvest through swarms of locusts that marched like an insect army through the fields, destroying the crops, multiplying their number as they went.

For four consecutive years, the harvest was completely wiped out. God’s people were brought to their knees in more ways than one. But “the Lord became jealous for his land and had pity on his people.” God said, “Behold I am sending to you grain, wine and oil, and you will be satisfied (Joel 2:18-19).

In the coming years, God said, their fields would yield an abundance that would make up for what had been lost: “The threshing floor shall be full of grain; the vats shall overflow with wine and oil. . . . You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied” (Joel 2:24, 26).

This wonderful promise for those people meant that years of abundant harvests would follow the years of desolation brought about by the locusts.

But God has also put this promise in the Bible for us today.

Lost Years of Our Lives

What do “lost years” look like for us? Lost years (or locust years) are years that you can’t get back, and they come in many varieties.

Lost years are fruitless years. A lot of hard work was done in the years the locusts had eaten. After everything was destroyed, the people must have thought, All this work and what do I have to show for it? Some of you know this pain in the world of business—a failed venture, a bad investment, a misguided policy, and all the effort that you put in day-by-day, month-by-month, year-by-year led only to massive disappointment. You think, What has come of all my time and all my effort?

Lost years are painful years. I’m thinking of those who have lost a loved one. You had plans for the future, but now you fear the coming years may be empty. I’m thinking also of those who live with illness in the body or the mind. You assumed that you would always be able to do what you used to do. You have to find a way to live with the disappointment that you cannot.

Lost years are selfish years. Here’s a story that’s been repeated thousands of times. There’s a person (let’s call him Jim) who made a commitment to Christ, but it didn’t run deep. Faith in Jesus was a slice of the big pie of his busy life, filled with all the things that Jim wanted to pursue. Then one day, God gets hold of Jim. He is spiritually awakened. He says to himself, What in the world have I been doing? There’s no substance in my life. I really want it to count for Christ. I want to live in the power of the Spirit. I want to make a difference in the world, but the locusts have eaten half my life! I’ve wasted my years on myself.

Lost years are loveless years. A division comes to a family, alienating loved ones. Children grow up, and those years cannot be recovered. A marriage quietly endures in which love has been burning low for many years. You see a couple who are really in love, and you say, “I wish I could be loved like that.” Or you have not yet met the person you would like to meet. It feels like the years are moving on. You can never get them back. The locusts have eaten them.

Lost years are rebellious years. Perhaps you grew up with many blessings, but in your heart you wanted to rebel. You didn’t fully understand this urge, but you gave yourself to it. Instead of bringing you pleasure, rebellion brought you pain. Now you look back on those years with regret, the years that the locusts have eaten.

Lost years are misdirected years. The path you chose in your career or at college was a dead end. You just didn’t fit. Often in your mind, and sometimes in your conversation, you say, “How did I end up here? If only. . . . If only I had made that move. . . . If only I had taken that opportunity. . . . If only I had chosen a different path.” But the moment has passed. It’s gone. You can’t go back to it. You’re left with locust years.

Lost years are Christ-less years. All Christ-less years are locust years. This point is worth thinking about if you have not yet made a commitment to Christ. Ask anyone who came to faith in Christ later in life, and they will tell you that they wish they’d come to Christ sooner than they did: “How much foolishness I would have avoided. How much more good might have been done through my life.”

How God Restores Lost Years

Take heart! There is hope, because God can restore your lost, locust years. He does so in three ways.

God can restore lost years by deepening your communion with Christ. “You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lord your God” (Joel 2:27). These people, who have endured so much, enjoy a communion with the Lord that is far greater than anything they had ever known before in their religious lives. Christ can restore lost years by deepening your fellowship with him.

Why not ask him for this? Tell him, “Lord, I have spent too many years without you, too many years at a distance from you. Fill my heart with love and gratitude for Christ. Let the loss of these years make my love for Christ greater than it would ever have been. Restore to me the years the locusts have eaten. “

God can restore lost years by multiplying your fruitfulness. The harvests for these people had been wiped out for four years, but God restored the years that the locusts had eaten by giving bumper harvests.

This provision makes me think about the parable where Jesus spoke about a harvest that could be 30-, 60-, or 100-fold. There’s a huge difference between these three harvests. Three years at 100-fold is as much fruit as a decade at 30-fold.

Why not ask him for this? “Lord, the locusts have eaten too many years of our lives. You have called us as your disciples to bear fruit that will last. Too many fruitless years have passed. Now Lord, we ask of you, give us some years now in which more lasting fruit will be born than in all of our years of small harvests.”

God can restore lost years by bringing long-term gain from short-term loss. The effect of these great trials in your life will be that “the tested genuineness of your faith . . . may result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7). The praise, glory, and honor go to Christ because his power guarded you and kept you through the hardest years of your life.

Thinking about “years that the locust has eaten,” years that have been taken, I think of something Isaiah said about our Lord Jesus: “He was cut off out of the land of the living” (Isaiah 53:8).

Here was the Lord Jesus in the prime of life. He was three years into his ministry at 33 years old. You would think that a man launching a new enterprise at the age of 33 has everything in front of him. But Isaiah says, “He was cut off.” He was cut off because he came under the judgment of God, not for his own sins—because he had none—but for ours.

Our sins, our grief, our sorrows, were laid on him. Our judgment fell on him. Our locusts swarmed all over him. The life of God’s tender shoot was “cut off.” Then, on the third day, the Son of God rose in the power of an eternal life. He offers himself to you, and he says what no one else can ever say: “I will restore the years that the locusts have eaten.”

3 Principles for Evangelism I'm Trying To Embrace:

The gospel is a message meant to be shared. We know this; Christians have always known this. Long before the first tracts were published, before there was the first class that met about how to share your faith, before the first diagram was ever drawn a napkin, Christians knew the gospel was meant to be shared and shared liberally.

I remember in particular a moment when Peter and John, the two big dogs of the early church movement, were arrested and questioned because of their involvement in a miraculous healing that had taken place. Peter left no doubt about the source of the power they seemed to have at their disposal: “Let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified and whom God raised from the dead—by him this man is standing here before you healthy” (Acts 4:10).

And though the authorities couldn’t punish them because of their popularity with the people, they threatened them. Alot. In response to the orders of the religious elite to cease proclaiming the good news of Jesus, Peter and John responded with boldness: “Whether it’s right in the sight of God for us to listen to you rather than to God, you decide; for we are unable to stop speaking about what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:19-20).

The gospel is a message meant to be shared, and it had taken hold of Peter and John. So should it be with us. We should both desire to and discipline ourselves to share the gospel, and do so liberally. Perhaps you’ve been through some training mechanism for doing so. Maybe you resonate with a particular methodology in evangelism, whether it involves drawing a picture, distributing literature, or using an acrostic. These methods are valuable in their helpfulness; they take something which can be intimidating and break it down into manageable form. What I’d like to offer in this post is not an alternative methodology, but instead a few principles that I’m trying to embrace about evangelism. These principles are less about the specific “how” you share the gospel and more about the posture we assume when seeking to share. Maybe they’ll be helpful to you as well:

1. Listen before speaking.

We meet someone who is not a Christian. We begin to pray for the opportunity to speak to that person about Jesus. And when the opportunity finally comes, our tendency many times is start talking, and keep talking, until we get the whole thing out. Of course, there are times when that’s all you can do – you might only have 5 minutes with a person and the most important thing is to share what you can while you can. But if this person is someone you will encounter regularly, someone that you might actually build a friendship with, then I’d encourage you to embrace the principle of listening before speaking. Ask questions. Learn about the person’s background. Try and understand not only what their perspective is about God and Jesus, but try and understand what from their past has formed that experience. This won’t only help us know the right way to share with them – it will actually help us be genuine friends. Real people. With a real message of hope.

2. Relationship before formula.

Once again, there is tremendous value in evangelistic tools and formulas. They can be very, very helpful. And yet they can also be a hindrance to the message when we put our faith in the formula rather than God. If we move too quickly into a formulaic presentation of the gospel, then we are subtly communicating to another person that they are just the next project for us. We come off as people trying to sell them something rather than as a person who genuinely cares about them and their future. It’s okay to take some time. It’s okay to form a relationship. It’s okay to be an actual friend of sinners. There was, after all, Someone who was criticized using that very title.

3. Demonstration before argumentation.

Sometimes conversations about religious matters get contentious. And they can get there fast. We find ourselves defending our position to the extent that we won’t even let someone else get a full sentence out of their mouths. If we’re not careful, a chance to share the gospel can morph into an opportunity to prove someone else wrong. Our pride can creep in quickly and suddenly the gospel conversation is about winning an argument rather than sharing a message of grace. We should be careful here, and one way to do that is to prioritize gospel demonstration before argumentation. Kindness, civility, and service – these, too, are actions that can and should be centered on the gospel and serve to validate the message we eventually have the chance to share.

We should be people who share the gospel, for the gospel is a message meant to be shared. As we share, though, let’s remember the people we are sharing with are not just “targets” or “hot prospects.” These are human beings, made in God’s image, who have not formed their beliefs in a vacuum. The more we can do to understand the people in our lives the more we will have the chance to share with them about this gospel that has changed us.

Be the Church that Embraces Children:

There are two kinds of restaurants. Those that embrace children, and those that tolerate children. If you’re a parent, especially if you have multiple small children, then you know this reality. When my family of five storms a restaurant, I can tell immediately whether the establishment will embrace my children or tolerate them.

In a recent occurrence, the host looked at my brood with eyes wide: “Oh, my. You have . . .  a lot of kids.” I was not offended. Serving large families at a restaurant is tough. Odds are at least one of my kids will have a meltdown before the food arrives, and a one hundred percent probability exists that large portions of something will fall to the floor.

Rarely are we treated rudely, but I can tell which restaurants merely tolerate my children. I understand the tension. Feeding my kids is hard work. It’s why we pay money to have someone else do it! My wife and I don’t get angry; we just don’t return to the places where my kids are a burden. When we discover a restaurant that embraces children, we go back.

There are two kinds of churches. Those that embrace children, and those that tolerate children. Most churches are not rude towards kids, and I’ve never seen a church sign stating “No Kids Allowed.” However, the families visiting your church will know whether you embrace their kids or not. The churches who welcome children have a higher likelihood of families returning—not just once but often!

Embracing children means understanding that messy is healthy. Children do not learn to eat cleanly. They turn dining room tables into abstract impressionist works. More food ends up in the hair than in the mouth. You’ll need a hazmat suit to serve spaghetti. Children learning to take in God’s Word, learning to worship, learning to love Jesus are just as messy. The line of dirt on walls about two feet high is there because little hands are dragging as kids walk the halls. Messy is healthy.

Embracing children means valuing noise over perfection. Children make noises in worship. Children make noises in classes. Children make noises in the parking lot. They cry. They laugh loud. They scream and yell. Some churches tolerate the noise. Other churches value the noise. I’ve heard of churches not allowing children below a certain age in the worship service. Try to bring an infant into the worship space, and they’ll stop you like an irate Pharisee with bad case of the Mondays.

Embracing children means protection at all costs. Child security is a discipleship issue—and one of the most important! If you believe in the Great Commission, then you will create robust security measures for children. Jesus says, “I am with you always.” A low-security church teaches children “I am with you sometimes.”

Embracing children means consistent promotion in multiple venues. Check your worship guide. What is in there about children? Check your social media feeds, your email newsletter, and your worship service announcements. If kids are not there, then you are not embracing children.

Embracing children means investing in KidMin. Is your children’s minister the lowest paid ministry team member? Does your children’s budget match your worship budget? A church that embraces children will invest in the ministries supporting children. A church that tolerates children will give the monetary leftovers to them. If it is easier to cut your children’s budget than your technology budget, then you likely are not embracing children in your church.

Embracing children means understanding church at their level. A lot of churches will seek out the perspective of parents. You should! Helping parents create God-centered homes and not child-centered homes is one of the core elements of family discipleship. However, you should not neglect the perspective of a child. Ask about their experiences, their feelings, and their opinions. When you understand church at the level of a child, you are better positioned to guide the child towards Christ.

In Luke 18, Jesus invited the children. In Mark 10, Jesus embraced the children. Churches that welcome and embrace children are like Jesus. In fact, Jesus becomes angry at the disciples for discounting the value of children. The next time a child cries out in church, don’t get angry at the child. Get angry at the person who is angry at the child. Children are a blessing, so churches should make them a priority. Be the church that embraces children, not just tolerates them.