Page 783 – Christianity Today (2024)

Interview by Andrea Ramirez

Our church family served as a support and bridge for my family and helped us feel welcome in a new community.

Page 783 – Christianity Today (1)

Christianity TodayDecember 8, 2016

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Dr. Andrea Ramirez, Executive Director of the Faith and Education Coalition, recently interviewed Elda Rojas, an education consultant who has worked for more than two decades to improve education equity and access for all students but especially for Newcomers/English language learners. Their conversation highlights how Christians can support English Language Learners. As of 2014, more than 9 percent of US public school students do not speak English as their first language—and that number is growing.

I’m delighted to talk with Elda Rojas today about student success for those who are learning English as a second language. Your story is unique Elda. Your family emigrated from Mexico when you were very young, and you eventually attended Harvard University. That is an extraordinary and inspiring accomplishment!

My family emigrated from Mexico when I was six years old and we settled in Michigan. In those years, the bilingual program was not so extensive. We went through an immersion process at first. It was very difficult trying to learn English and also learn the content in the classes at the same time. At home, we only spoke Spanish. The Lord helped us through our development. We later moved to another area in Michigan where they offered bilingual education, so we did receive those services then.

Our church also played a powerful role—they became our extended family. Many times when people emigrate from another country, they're not only acclimating to a new land, they're learning a new culture as well. Our church family served as a support and bridge for my family and helped us feel welcome in a new community.

I believe preparation and opportunity are key factors in achieving an education. When I was in high school, I was given an opportunity to work part-time as an intern at the state capitol, and that job really inspired me to pursue a higher level of education. It's important for young people to not only work on their academic achievement, but also to be exposed to real-world connections beyond the classroom.

I was very fortunate to be able to pursue my Bachelor's degree at Harvard and my Master's degree at Texas State. These have been wonderful doors the Lord opened. I know that through Him, all things are possible.

You are living proof that English Language Learners can excel alongside native speakers. I know you are an advocate for holding all students to high standards and not measuring English Language Learners with a set of lower academic standards. If all students are held to the same high level standards, what recommendations do you have for educators and parents supporting English Language students?

The practice of lowering standards must come to an end if we want to close the gap in academic achievement. The fact that English learners have not been held to rigorous standards does not mean they aren’t capable! Lower standards are a disservice and can deny students equal access to more advanced classwork. English learners will only be ready for college-level courses if they are held to high standards during their K-12 education.

The United States has the opportunity to tap into the brainpower, energy and creativity of English learners by raising the standards for all students, regardless of ethnicity, income or zip code. My recommendations would be for districts to offer comprehensive services that include initial and on-going language proficiency assessments, appropriate placement in rigorous courses, teacher professional development training opportunities geared for working with language learners, student engagement opportunities and a strong parent network.

Can you speak a little bit about how Christians and churches can minister to English Language Learners and their families?

One thing I learned during my years as a student was that I wasn’t the only one adjusting to a new land, language and culture. The Lord positioned me to prepare me, so I’ve been able to help others along the way.

The church has a wonderful opportunity for ministry because we're told in the great commission to go and make disciples throughout the nations. And right here in the United States there are many different nations represented. In Texas, where I live, according to the last census count, there are more than 164 languages spoken. In Dallas alone, 42 percent of the population is composed of English language learners. For the church, there's a great opportunity to reach out to others. In regards to the parents, it's great to have the opportunity to reach out to the newcomer students, help our own children understand that it's fine to reach out to these new students, to invite them in, to help them acclimate, to help them understand the new process here in this land.

You mentioned earlier that the church family can play a role, student to student and parent to parent, as they encourage one another. We often hear from Spanish-only parents that they may be hesitant to ask a question because they don’t understand English or the American school culture. So relationships in the church offer safe and trusted opportunities for asking questions about school and the community. This is a unique support the family of faith brings to education.

As the number of English Language Learners has tripled in our schools, the need for community support is increasing as well. Nationally, a little less than 10 percent of public school students are English language learners. In Texas, of the 23.7 million people who are five years of age or older, more than a third speak a language other than English. That's about 14 percent of the population that is learning English as a second language. And in California it is 27 percent of the student population.

Wherever we live, in America, we have the opportunity to meet English language learners and to minister to them, to help their families feel welcome. It’s a great opportunity for churches to lead the way in reaching out to families and to help them learn a new system. Everything about the education system here is different for them.

Beyond community support, what other resources are available for English language learners?

We're very fortunate that our country provides resources at the national level as well as the state level. There are bilingual programs or dual-language programs for students. And parents can also access ESL (English as a Second Language) classes, which helps them acquire the English language along with their students.

The first place to discover resources and support is at the local school level. There are opportunities for college readiness, literacy development, and language acquisition. I encourage parents to visit their schools and request ELL (English Language Learner) resources for students and adults. Churches can also collect information for ELL classes and resources to share with immigrant families.

All students have the opportunity to succeed when expectations are high and support is offered along the way. Churches are uniquely positioned to provide encouragement and help for students and families. May we see and seize the ministry opportunities all around us!

Four Tips for Parents (and grandparents):

  1. Be engaged at school: Seek out information and resources available at your local schools. Attend parent meetings as often as possible, both to help your student succeed and to expand your own understanding of the educational system. When teachers and school administrators see a family member at school, they see that they are important and what they do in the classroom is valuable.

  2. Keep expectations high at home: Communicate high expectations for learning. Be clear that each child complete his/her school work daily. Help them create a routine for homework and preparing for the next school day. Prioritize reading together and getting to bed early enough to do well in the classroom. Make school attendance a top priority and monitor the number of days they are absent since this can cause them to fall behind in the classroom.

  3. Pray together about school: Pray with your children about their education and for their teachers and school. Thank God for the opportunity they have to practice loving the Lord with all their minds!

  4. Ask for help: When you have concerns and questions about the education system, do not hesitate to ask for help. Reach out to those in your church community who can explain the process and offer guidance. Ask a church member to go with you to visit your child’s school. Or ask for a translator when you visit the school—teachers and administrators are eager to have you involved. And once you find help, offer help to other parents who are new to the process!

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Pastors

Daniel Darling

Crafting a message for your—yes your—congregation.

Page 783 – Christianity Today (2)

CT PastorsDecember 8, 2016

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In this series: Finding the Right Applications for Your Audience

The hardest part of preaching, by far, is the application. It's one thing to say, "Love God and love your neighbor." Its another to show people what that looks like. But the more specific you try to be, the more likely you are to say things that God never intended.

How do we wisely bridge from the Bible text to today's situations? Sometimes the biblical context comes straight over into modern situations. For example, Jesus says, Love your enemies. So we can preach: Do you have enemies? Love them. But then, turning the page, Jesus says, Sell all that you have, give to the poor, and follow me. Try applying that straight up. Below you will find articles on the application of Scripture. They will give you tools to preach with greater fidelity.

Page 783 – Christianity Today (3)

Who Exactly Am I Preaching To?

Daniel Darling

Killer Applications

David Mains

The Heresy of Application

An interview with Haddon Robinson

Preaching to Everyone in Particular

Haddon Robinson

“Um, so, did someone tell you about Dave’s job?” an anxious member told me, as she shook my hand on the way out of the auditorium one Sunday morning. “Because it seemed like you were talking to us.”

I told her this was the first I had heard of their fragile employment situation. The sermon was on fear, and we were in uncertain economic times. I had offered, in passing, an example of someone who might be nervous about his or her job. But I wasn’t specifically targeting this family.

It’s difficult to know how to take this kind of comment. One the one hand, I never want people to think I am using the pulpit to preach at one specific person. On the other hand, I want to preach messages that the people in attendance can experience in a personal way. I think about this conversation and several like it often as I reflect on what we do when we preach.

When we stand in the pulpit and open the Word of God, we are doing two things. We are declaring, first of all, what God has already said. Pastors, therefore, have to get the text right. They have to know the text so well that they can get out of the way and let the Holy Spirit speak to the people of God.

But we’re also doing something else. We are preaching to a people. Our weekly declarations are contextualized to an audience in a place and time in the history of the world. Preaching, then, is also taking what God has already said and directing it toward those he has called us to faithfully serve.

In my experience as a pastor, the first part of my mission in preaching seemed to come naturally. I enjoyed studying and praying and reading. But in the second aspect I often struggled. There are dangerous temptations in crafting applications. I’d like to address a few of those temptations and offer some lessons on what I’ve learned.

Preaching to the Podcast

I love to listen to sermons from other pastors around the country who are far better at this than me. Today there are thousands of resources available, online, on our phone, at conferences. This is a gift of grace in this era of history, but if we are not careful, we can pick up the habits of our favorite expositors and preach to their congregations instead of our own.

Early in my ministry, I regularly listened to a handful of well-known pastors. I’m so grateful for the way these men shaped my preaching in those early days and gave me confidence that, like them, I too could feed my people from the Word. But I found myself, at times, preaching messages aimed beyond the men and women sitting in the pews at Gages Lake Bible Church and toward the churches served by my preaching heroes.

I once had a breakfast conversation with a longtime elder in my church. This was a man whom I deeply respected, who had a great love for the church and for Jesus. A few minutes in, he gently said, “I didn’t quite understand what you were saying on Sunday.” He identified a particular theological phrase I had used.

This came as a shock to me. All the preachers I listened to used this phrase. The journals I read and the books I studies used it as well. I assumed the people in my church knew what it meant.

But they didn’t. Not even close. I had been preaching to the podcast, so all the smart evangelical leaders I respected would download my sermon and think I was smart. I wasn’t preaching to the people I was called to serve.

First Peter 5:2 reminds us to be shepherds of our flocks that are among us. We aren’t called to pastor the podcast listeners or the folks on Twitter. We’re not called to engage the latest conversations on Facebook—though some of those conversations might inform our understanding of our people. We are called to shepherd and apply the Scripture to our actual community.

Some pastors I know do this well. One gathers an informal focus group of members to see if his application of the biblical text is connecting. Another has lunch with a regular group of members and has them read his message draft. A third pastor has stopped listening to sermon podcasts for a season to get his head out of other people’s congregations and into his own. I also know preachers who use social media—Facebook especially—to get a sense of what the people in their congregations are wrestling with. The key is to make sure we are preaching messages aimed less at the Twitterati or the podcast listener and more toward the people we serve in our faith communities.

Preaching to the Amen Chorus

Every year the calendar in January presents two opportunities for cultural reflection: Sanctity of Human Life Sunday and the observation of Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday. For most of my life growing up in church, we observed the first one. As a conservative, white, evangelical church, we lamented the sad legacy of Roe v. Wade and recommitted ourselves to speaking up for justice for the unborn. But I don’t remember ever commemorating the birthday of MLK. We never used that opportunity to challenge ourselves to think about race or helping to reconcile a divided country.

I must admit that for my first couple of years as a pastor I hesitated to talk about MLK. As a pro-life church, the sanctity of life issue was an easy message to preach. My audience largely agreed with me that abortion is a moral outrage, and they were eager to partner with our local pregnancy resource center to help counsel women who had abortions and to pray for a day when the unborn would be protected by law.

I grew deeply convicted, however, of my failure to address the issue of race, to apply the Scriptures to the vexing problem of racial unrest in the country. But the issue was risky. If thinking and preaching on race uncovered sinful attitudes in my own heart, I knew it would provoke the same wrestling in the hearts of my people. I would be stepping on toes.

So I decided to preach on both the sanctity of unborn life and on race in the same message, grounding it in a high view of human dignity based on Genesis 1:26. I was surprised by the reaction. Many of my people told me later that they were not thrilled to hear a message on race, but that my words helped them recognize that perhaps they had been blind to the hurts and pains of those in minority communities. Others said they were wary of a “political message” on abortion and came away with a freshly awakened conscience on human dignity.

The calendar provided an opportunity for this discussion, but we can do more than simply mark out one time a year to talk about difficult issues. We should contextualize our application to make sure we are not simply preaching about issues our congregations already agree on, but are hitting pathologies and attitudes with which they struggle.

For instance, in my nearly four decades of church life, I’ve heard hundreds of messages on the Great Commission text in Matthew 28, but very rarely have I heard pastors explain how the gospel brings together disparate ethnicities. For the Jewish audience, the idea that the gospel should go to “all nations” came as a shock. It meant that Jesus was not simply for the Jewish people of God, but for the world.

As I’m preaching that passage, if I do not challenge my people about their own temptation toward prejudice, I will not be delivering to them the full weight of Jesus’ words. The gospel is for all nations. When the nations come to our doorstep, into our neighborhoods, and into our workplaces, if we are not loving and listening to them, we will not be ready in that moment when God directs us to share the gospel with them.

In fact, you can hardly go through the New Testament without seeing, over and over again, the imperative that gospel work is reconciliation work, that in Christ we are “one new man” (Eph. 2:15) or that the kingdom of God is made up of every nation, tribe, and tongue (Rev. 5, 7).

This is just one issue in which, if we are only preaching to the biases of our people, we’ll miss opportunities for the Spirit to use us in revival and repentance in our congregations. We are tempted to preach against the evils “out there” in the world, to never challenge our people toward sanctification in areas where they really struggle.

Preaching to Our People

I’ve learned to contextualize my applications in several ways. First, I ask myself with every message, “In what specific ways does this text address this community and these people?”

Second, I endeavor to live in and among my people in such a way that I hear their conversations, listen to their pain, and understand their struggles. I cannot simply preach from the ivory pulpit; I must seed my preaching with the blood, sweat, and tears of those whom I serve.

Third, I try to model for them what it looks like to live out the Scriptures in my own life. It is tempting to avoid difficult issues, but it is just as tempting to shame people from the pulpit rather than provide them with on-ramps to help them understand what God is trying to do in them. Preachers must personalize the Scriptures, showing ways in which the gospel is working its way through our own hearts. We should be transparent about ways in which we have failed and sinned and sought forgiveness. We should talk about areas where God has helped us grow.

I’m not sure I’ve seen these principles embodied better than in the pastor of the church I now attend. As an associate pastor, I have the opportunity to step into the shoes of someone in the congregation, to listen and learn and hear preaching. I’ve realized the value of patient, faithful shepherding. Daryl, who leads our congregation, does this with a firm gentleness that I’ve rarely seen elsewhere, both speaking from the Scriptures prophetically and with compassion.

I’ve even found myself in the same position as the lady from my previous congregation, shaking hands at the door, saying to my pastor those words I heard said to me: “Did you know about my situation? Your sermon seemed directed at me.”

Those words, I’ve come to understand, just might be the best compliment a preacher can receive.

Daniel Darling is the vice president for communications for the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention (ERLC). Previously, he served as senior pastor of Gages Lake Bible Church in the northwest suburbs of Chicago.

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Kate Shellnutt

It worked in Utah. But national effort by the CCCU and NAE will be more complicated.

Page 783 – Christianity Today (7)

Christianity TodayDecember 8, 2016

Biola University

Among the many unanswered questions going into a new year and new government led by Donald Trump, American evangelicals await the prospects for the tense back-and-forth between religious liberty and LGBT rights.

The conflict took on new urgency in 2016, with a wave of state-level religious freedom and antidiscrimination bills amid the ongoing fallout from the US Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage.

In one case, panic over an earlier version of California’s antidiscrimination law, then known as Senate Bill 1146, woke up evangelical leaders to worst-case fears: that faith-based colleges could be targeted and penalized for standard practices like hiring faculty within their faith tradition or requiring students to agree to a moral behavior code.

“SB 1146 gained national attention and media interest because it was unprecedented and because California is seen by many as a bellwether state that often inspires similar legislation elsewhere,” wrote Biola University president Barry H. Corey in a letter to fellow members of the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities (CCCU). “This is not the last bill but just the first one, and future legislation could reach beyond California and beyond higher education institutions.”

In recent months, the CCCU and the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) have discreetly led the charge to get evangelical institutions to think through potential legal options to safeguard their Christian distinctives as they look ahead to 2017. They met with more than 200 leaders in 9 cities to discuss Fairness for All, an approach that would bring together religious liberty defenders and LGBT activists to lay out federal legislation to secure rights for both.

Currently, when those rights conflict, Americans are evenly split over who wins. For example, the Pew Research Center found this fall that 48 percent of Americans believe that owners of wedding-related businesses should be able to refuse services to same-sex couples if they have religious objections, while 49 percent of Americans believe those owners should be required to serve same-sex couples.

“What we’re looking at here is potentially a paradigm-shifting option,” said Shapri D. LoMaglio, the CCCU’s vice president for government and external relations. “The way that these two sets of rights have been talked about most often has been that they must compete. If something like this was to go forward, what might that mean about how we differently or better understand rights? Rights need not always be secured by one group at the expense of another group.”

[Note: Evangelical leaders including pastor and author Tim Keller, legal scholar John Inazu, and CT’s Mark Galli have similarly argued that civil rights are not a zero-sum equation, while CT has examined evangelicals’ favorite same-sex marriage laws.]

Fairness for All proponents have one state-level precedent on their side: the curious case of how conservative Utah was able to pass a comprehensive antidiscrimination measure endorsed by Mormon leaders and cheered on by LGBT groups like the Human Rights Campaign.

The 2015 Utah Compromise suggests that both sides of the debate actually get more of their priorities put into law when they work together than when legislated on their own or litigated in the courts.

“Rather than trying to replicate the exact jots and tittles of what Utah did, we’re looking at the idea that if you try to address both concerns on the front end, you can actually get a more comprehensive set of religious liberties than if LGBT rights moves forward on its own and you try to come in later in the game and attach religious liberties,” said LoMaglio.

It’s too early to tell the likelihood of a federal Fairness for All proposal. “This is a long shot, but so is basically everything in this space,” said Michael Wear, a former White House staffer and political consultant.

The recent elections ushered in an opportune moment to address religious liberty, he said, especially while the Equality Act—a congressional proposal to extend LGBT freedoms that could have advanced under a Hillary Clinton administration—will likely remain on hold under a Republican-led government.

The CCCU continues to follow the formation of the Trump administration, as it considers Fairness for All legislation along with other options.

“We’re obviously hopeful that they’ll be very empathetic to and supportive of religious liberty protections, that they’ll be strong on the First Amendment, and we’re going to wait and see what their appointments are,” said LoMaglio. “In the election, Donald Trump also offered support for LGBT persons and rights, so I think it’s too early to know exactly what their position will be and exactly what that means for the legislative landscape.”

During the campaign, the Pew Research Center found that white evangelicals who believe it’s become more difficult to be a Christian in America today were more likely to support Trump.

While only about a third of American evangelical leaders said they currently experience persecution for their faith, more than twice as many believe they will experience persecution in the form of social, financial, and political pressure in the years ahead, according to an NAE survey conducted in October. (Most agreed that online ridicule and legal backlash are cause for concern, though they don’t compare to the persecution faced by Christians abroad.)

Over the past two years, states like Indiana, North Carolina, and Georgia have watched religious freedom and antidiscrimination bills turn into lightning-rod issues. “In some way, I think they will need to address these challenges on a national level,” said Galen Carey, NAE vice president of government relations. “Because otherwise you have a patchwork of regulations in the states. Some of which could be quite harmful.”

As director of the Fairness for All Initiative, Robin Fretwell Wilson—the University of Illinois law professor who helped pass the Utah Compromise—advocates for what she sees as a common-sense, collaborative approach between religious liberty and LGBT groups. She said that since major lobbies on both sides would probably block a national-level compromise at this point, America is more likely to see more states try to pass Fairness for All legislation before the US Congress does.

“I think what we’re going to see is states, one by one, saying, ‘We’re tired of this,’” said Wilson, who has recently been involved in conversations over antidiscrimination proposals in states like Ohio and Pennsylvania. As legislators grow weary of culture wars along with their constituents, “you’re going to see the states respond to it whether the feds are going to or not.”

It also remains unclear whether both sides would back this kind of national compromise. The CCCU, NAE, and the ministry leaders they’ve invited into conversation thus far have yet to get into the specifics of what kinds of protections would be included in a potential federal Fairness for All proposal.

Still, several prominent religious liberty advocates—including the Alliance Defending Freedom and the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC) of the Southern Baptist Convention—that opposed the Utah compromise model aren’t on board with Fairness for All either.

Spokeswoman Elizabeth Bristow noted the ERLC’s “longstanding policy that we do not support elevating sexual orientation and gender identity to a protected class.”

Wilson warned against comparing potential Fairness for All legislation to existing policies that have led to high-profile “bakers and bathrooms” cases, most of which were enacted prior to the legalization of same-sex marriage and without input from both sides.

“To look at these older data points and rules only shows us that legislation did not take into account religious freedom,” she said. “They weren’t Fairness for All. They were sexual orientation and gender identity antidiscrimination statutes that did not answer the hardest questions.”

Still, much of the momentum around LGBT advocacy also resists such compromise. In a speech in October, Brookings Institution senior fellow Jonathan Rauch described his pluralistic perspective as an outlier among the LGBT community:

I said reasonable religious accommodations are something we should embrace as a cause, not resent as a concession. At the time, I got hearing. But that door, which was never more than just ajar, has closed. The strong consensus today in the LGBT world is that religious accommodations are a license to discriminate and are by their very nature a concession.

Even without a specific proposal to parse, evangelical leaders are doubling down on the need for deeper discussion, as well as outreach to government partners and LGBT groups. As Wear put it: “We need to have this conversation now, and not when we’re forced to.”

While the Fairness for All legislation gets explored as a national option, state-level antidiscrimination bills are likely to reemerge in California and other states.

Several elected officials visited Biola this semester to meet with administrators and students—an unusual sight on the private university’s Los Angeles campus. In the wake of SB 1146, the school formed a government relations team to improve its outreach. Such relationships allow lawmakers to see that faith-based schools are more than the caricatures in the headlines.

“It’s been really healthy, but it’s been long overdue,” said university spokesman Lee Wilhite.

Now that they’re playing catchup, Biola and fellow CCCU schools like Azusa Pacific University (APU) realize the importance of such proactive policy discussions. They’re partnering together “practically and prayerfully” to address potential legal challenges ahead, said Jennifer Walsh, a dean and political science professor at APU.

In the university context, CCCU schools aim to secure their rights to hire Christian faculty, require chapel attendance, and incorporate their faith into campus policies and curricula. They anticipate how other organizations, from adoption agencies to churches, could risk similar legal threats.

Biola was among the Christian organizations that hosted a CCCU discussion on the possible Fairness for All proposal. “I’m not sure if, in the end, it’s something we’re going to agree to or not,” said Wilhite. “But you have to try to applaud their effort to try to protect both groups.

“We’ll know more on that in the months to come.”

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Pastors

J. R. Briggs and Bob Hyatt

3 ministry proverbs to quell competition and cultivate humility.

Page 783 – Christianity Today (8)

CT PastorsDecember 8, 2016

“Slay the Beast of Ambition before It Slays You”

J. R. Briggs

As a type-A oldest child and driven leader, I find that my RPMs are in the red zone much of the time. Sometimes this can be beneficial, but when left unchecked it can be incredibly detrimental to my soul—and also the souls of those I am called to lead.

I’ve had to repeat this phrase to myself and many other ministry leaders I’ve connected with. Ambition isn’t inherently a bad thing. Drive and motivation can be helpful. Paul was quite an ambitious leader. Paul was careful to qualify his instruction to the Philippian church by telling them to do nothing out of selfish ambition (see Philippians 2:3).

Ambitious leaders attract other ambitious leaders. Sadly, my identity as a male in a North American context is determined way too easily by what I do and how well I do it. This runs counter to my gospel identity that tells me that, because of God’s immense grace, I am not defined by what I do or how well I do it; I am defined by who I am and, most importantly, to whom I belong. Dallas Willard once said, “It turns out that what you really think about Jesus is revealed by what you do after you find out that you don’t have to do anything.” Read that last sentence again slowly. It gets to the heart of motivation and ambition.

So, how do we slay the beast? It starts in the form of a question: “What’s my motive?” Without proactive, careful, direct, and frequent attention, ambition can add fuel to a dangerous fire. “What’s driving me? Why? What’s behind all of this ambition?” If I can get to the root of my motivations, I can, by God’s grace, eliminate the detrimental effects of cancerous selfish ambition. This oftentimes-painful process leads to a much-needed realignment.

In my own life, the most ridiculously practical discipline that helps slay the beast is to practice Sabbath religiously. Many pastors tell me they just can’t bring themselves to do it. I’m too busy. I have too much going on. People will think I am lazy. I wouldn’t be able to think straight if I were just sitting around doing nothing for an entire day. I fear that the lack of progress and attention to my church will lead to its demise.

All of these answers reveal to me even more how much they need to practice Sabbath. I’ve practiced Sabbath since the beginning of my pastoral calling, and admittedly, it hasn’t been easy. Embarrassingly, it’s oftentimes the most difficult day of my week to trust God. Deep down, some weeks I actually believe that our church will fall apart or that people truly need me today—or worse, that God needs me to keep the church together.

We often forget that Sabbath participation is one of the Ten Commandments. At times when I’m asked to speak on the topic, I title my talk “Nice Commandments and One Suggestion.” Speaking of the “ten big ones,” our friend A. J. Swoboda said, “If I have an affair, as a pastor I lose my job. But when I don’t Sabbath, I get a raise.” Our values are screwed up, and our theology is revealed in our schedules.

It requires a lot of work to rest. There was a distinct moment on a restless Sabbath Monday that revealed my deep-seated self-reliance. I had justified to myself that I needed to check my voicemail messages and respond to emails. The Spirit whispered to me, “You think the church will fall apart? I made the entire universe and called you to this church. You may be the pastor of the church, but I am the head of the church. Trust me by resting.” We much embed shalom into our schedules. Rest. Sleep. Trust.

Ruthlessly eliminating comparison from my life helps slay the beast, too. Not only does comparison rob me of joy, drain me of gratitude, and fuel my insecurities, it tells me to push the gas pedal to do more, lead more, serve more, and accomplish more.

Asking regularly what my motivation is, religiously practicing Sabbath, and ruthlessly eliminating comparison out of my life help to address my racehorse tendencies and slay the ambition beast.

God longs to put to death our ministry ambitions in order to resurrect intimacy with him.

Slay the beast before it slays you.

“It’s Kingdom, Not Competition”

Bob Hyatt

When we first decided to plant a church in 2003, I did what many aspiring church planters do: I called and emailed as many other pastors and church planters as I could in an effort to sit down with them, introduce myself, and learn from them. I expected a warm welcome to the club, words of encouragement, prayers, and heartfelt offers of help. I received some encouragement, but the majority of what I got was suspicion and discouragement. I was shocked. It was disheartening to be seen as a competitor when my desire was to link arms in partnership. I learned that not everyone sees a new church as a sign that God is at work.

A few years after we planted, I began to receive those same calls and emails from other church planters. I then understood what those pastors I had contacted felt. I knew I needed to begin guarding my heart. I knew what it was like to be seen as the competition. Now on the other side, I never wanted to feel that way toward other pastors, even though that was the inclination of my own heart.

I began to repeat to myself, “It’s kingdom, not competition.” When I heard of a new church, I said it to myself and prayed for them. When I read an article about an innovative ministry initiative that was met with great results, I repeated the mantra to myself; I would pause and thank God for what he was doing in that local church. I repeated it to our church on those occasions when we prayed for other communities together. And hardest of all, I continue to say it to myself when people leave our church to attend another one.

Praying for other church communities, celebrating their successes, and doing everything we can to partner with, support, and cheer on what they are doing in our city has formed in our leadership and in our community a beautiful, unifying kingdom spirit.

Sadly, I know of one church that kept a list of “competitors.” All the churches in the surrounding area and what they were doing were on the list, regularly updated so the leadership would know what the “competition” was up to. I can honestly say I have yet to come across a more dysfunctional church, and I believe their “competitors list” and the heart behind it were a big part of what was behind the dysfunction.

Tell your church often about what God is doing elsewhere. Help them to cheer on what is happening in and being done by other communities. Pray for other communities, and welcome them into your neighborhood or city with open arms and hearts. Continually tell yourself and everyone in your church, “It’s kingdom, not competition.”

“Whatever Is Happening Now Will Not Keep Happening Forever”

Bob Hyatt

One of the main tricks in life, I believe, is not to extrapolate current conditions and circumstances off into the future. However, that’s exactly the tendency we have as humans, and especially, I’ve discovered, as ministry leaders. We look at things now and think they will always be that way.

We long to see landmarks in the road, mileposts that tell us either we have now reached the pinnacle, the place we always dreamed of being (even if that place is only “stability”), or conversely, that the bottom has fallen out and now is the time to bail. But the mileposts are merely markers on the journey, telling us where we are now, promising nothing of the journey ahead.

And so, when things are good, we see nothing but success and good times stretching out in front of us. In the depths of despair, during the most challenging times of life and ministry, we feel as though the darkness has become the new normal. The reality is much more complex: there are always better times ahead, and worse ones as well.

During those dark times, when ministry becomes more of a weight than a joy, I tell myself, “Whatever is happening now will not keep happening forever.” Those words have kept me through relational breaks in our staff that seemed unfixable, through budget woes when we didn’t think we were going to meet payroll, through even a time when our community lost a third of its members because we had let a beloved pastor go. In this way I have found hope.

In the same way, during the successful times when we were growing, budget was bigger than ever and new people were engaging with the church seemingly every week, I continued to tell myself, “What is happening now will not keep happening forever.” In this way I have found a measure of humility.

There’s another way to read this mantra as well, one that encourages us not to miss what is happening right now as we overly focus on where we’d like to be or what we’d like to see happen.

The challenge of ministry, like the challenge of life in general, is to be present to what’s happening now. Too many single people miss the joys of singleness by longing to be married. Too many young married couples miss the joys of the early years without children because they long to be parents. Too many parents of young children miss the joys of the infant years, longing for the days when their children are more independent, less dependent on them for everything. And on it goes.

In the same way we in ministry can miss the joys of a small, close community by looking at larger communities and wishing we had their resources and influence. We can miss the inherent learning and even joy of being shoulder to shoulder in community with others through challenging times because the difficulties and pain we are experiencing mask the ways in which we are being brought together, the ways in which we are being formed, and the invaluable things we are learning.

In life, and in ministry, remember: how it is now is not how it will always be. Learn to appreciate how things are now, but also take comfort in the fact that if things are difficult, there are better days ahead. Stay humble because no success is forever. Stay hopeful because, in Christ, no failure is permanent.

Taken from Ministry Mantras by J.R. Briggs and Bob Hyatt. Copyright (c) 2016 by James R. Briggs and Robert W. Hyatt. Used by permission of InterVarsity Press, P.O. Box 1400, Downers Grove, IL 60515-1426. www.ivpress.com

J. R. Briggs is the founder of Kairos Partnerships and pastor of The Renew Community, in the greater Philadelphia area. Find him on Twitter at @jr_briggs.

Bob Hyatt is pastor of The Evergreen Community in Portland, Oregon.

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  • Temptation

Theology

Lisa Sharon Harper

Christianity TodayDecember 8, 2016

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“O LORD, you have examined my heart and know everything about me. You know when I sit down or stand up. You know my thoughts even when I’m far away. You see me when I travel and when I rest at home. You know everything I do. You know what I am going to say even before I say it, LORD.”

Psalm 139:1- 4

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Today’s Verse

In Psalm 139, we read that God knows us and still calls us beloved. God knows our thoughts and still holds on to the same divine dream for our lives, unchanging since we were created. Even with all of our weaknesses, God doesn’t run from us. Because of God’s nearness, we are never alone. And why does David write that such knowledge is too wonderful for him? He was the king of Israel, but consider what David was. He was an unlikely leader, not the one others would have chosen. He was a confessed adulterer. He was a rapist and a confessed murderer. He had multiple wives, a far cry from the picture of shalom painted in the garden. Yet God still called him and chose him and even called him a man after God’s own heart. I understand how David could struggle to believe that God smiled whenever God thought of him.

Reflect:
Read all of Psalm 139 reflecting on how it speak to David’s personal struggles with sin and shame. How can this speak to your own reaction to sin, shame, or other struggles in your life?

Pray:
Select portions of Psalm 139 to speak aloud to God as your own personal prayer.

Lisa Sharon Harper is the author of The Very Good Gospel: How Everything Wrong Can Be Made Right along with several other books. A sought-after speaker, she is also the chief church engagement officer at Sojourners. Content excerpted from The Very Good Gospel by Lisa Sharon Harper Copyright © 2016 by Lisa Sharon Harper. Excerpted by permission of WaterBrook, a division of Penguin Random House, LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

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John Wilson

Plus the Book of the Year.

Page 783 – Christianity Today (9)

Books & CultureDecember 8, 2016

A few of you may have followed this annual list ever since I started posting it more than 15 years ago. Many of you have been tuning in long enough to know the ground rules. This isn't a systematic reckoning with "the year in books," nor does it presume to identify the year's "best" books. Rather, these are the books that came most readily to mind when I entered a semi-trance and thought back, jotting down titles on the back of an envelope. (Sound track for this list: Advent at Ephesus (Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles); You Want It Darker (Leonard Cohen); A Star in the East: Medieval Hungarian Christmas Music (Anonymous 4); and Ther Is No Rose: Renaissance Music for the Christmas Season (Virelai).)

Page 783 – Christianity Today (10)

The Thing Itself

Adam Roberts (Author)

368 pages

$7.00

Generally this procedure has worked pretty well. This year, I have to admit, the results are noticeably lopsided. All of the titles included are "literary," and the list is particularly heavy on fiction. What about all the books I read this year in other categories—some of them quite excellent books—that are completely unrepresented here? On top of that, the list is too long.

But I was disinclined to fiddle with results. As usual, the books are (mostly) listed in alphabetical order by title (but keep an eye out for a RUSSIAN SPECIAL highlighting several noteworthy books by various authors), followed at the end by the Book of the Year. (The titles aren't linked—you will have to copy & paste if you want to search.) I hope you'll find a title or two here that catches your eye, to add to your own bookshelves or to give to someone else—or both!

The Big Book of Science Fiction. Edited by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer (Vintage). + The History of Science Fiction, 2nd Ed. Adam Roberts (Palgrave Macmillan). If you want to understand the history of "our time," you should read these two big books, whether or not you are a fan of sci-fi (as I usually call it) or "SF" (as the purists insist). Of course it helps if (like me) you actually quite enjoy some of the stuff. (To whet your appetite: Roberts argues that "science fiction begins not with Gernsback, Wells, Verne, or Shelley, but rather with the Protestant Reformation.")

The Billy Collins Experience. A M. Juster (Kelsay Books/Aldrich Press). + Sleaze & Slander. A. M. Juster (Measure Press). Wit in poetry (not to mention flat-out comedy in multiple registers) is out fashion. Ditto what some people call "formalism" (a term I ardently dislike). Juster majors in both. Don't miss (in Sleaze & Slander, pp. 55-56) his translation of a poem from the Middle Welsh of Gwerful Mechain, unexpectedly relevant to current events on the American scene.

Do We Not Bleed? Daniel Taylor (Slant/Wipf & Stock). A sequel to Death Comes for the Deconstructionist (reviewed by David Lyle Jeffrey in Books & Culture), this novel again features the reluctant amateur detective (and even more reluctant amateur metaphysician) Jon Mote and his sister, Judy, a resident in a group home for developmentally disabled adults, where Jon himself has taken a job. Taylor's wickedly keen ear for the evasive language of political correctness places him in the Christopher Buckley class as a satirist, but this is satire that doesn't allow to us to stop with easy laughs at someone else's expense—satire unexpectedly yoked with tenderness and humility.

The First Modern Japanese: The Life of Ishikawa Takuboku. Donald Keene (Columbia Univ. Press). + Silence and Beauty: Hidden Faith Born of Suffering. Makoto Fujimura (IVP). These two books offer very different perspectives and are, at first glance, pitched to audiences that hardly overlap at all. But I think if you read them together, they will be even more interesting than they are read alone. Fujimura's book, which takes Shusaku Endo's novel Silence as a point of departure, is particularly timely with the release of the Scorsese film. (Jessica Hooten Wilson reviewed the book for B&C.) Keene's book is the work of one of the most distinguished Western scholars of Japanese literature (and one of my first guides), now in his nineties. His subject is a poet who is famous in Japan but little known here, a willful prodigy whose life (1886-1912) was cut short by illness. The book suffers from a lack of adequate editing (there are typos, confusions with chronology, etc.), but I found it deeply absorbing nonetheless, especially with Fujimura and Endo in mind.

The Fox Was Ever the Hunter. Herta Muller. Translated by Philip Boehm (Metropolitan Books). A friend wrote to me after reading this novel: "I have never had an experience quite like this while reading a book. She carries you to a place that feels strangely familiar and the flow of nature seamlessly woven into the psychological states is amazing." That captures something distinctive about Muller's work: an uneasy intensity in which a childlike experience of the world is channeled to express the harrowing nature of everyday life in a country ruled by a narcissistic dictator with a vast security apparatus at his disposal. She accomplishes this with an almost violent aversion to clichés, prefabricated scenarios, and the like. Since Muller won the 2009 Nobel Prize in Literature, only two of her novels not previously translated have appeared in English (this is the second). I want more!

Good as Gone. Amy Gentry (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt). Here's part of what I wrote about this superb first novel a couple of months ago: "It's fair to say (as Gentry herself has acknowledged) that the story was inspired by the case of Elizabeth Smart, who (as a fourteen-year-old in 2002) was abducted from her bedroom in Salt Lake City. But it is not a fictionalized retelling of Smart's experience.

"What is it, then? It is, among other things, a book animated by anger—especially anger against sexual abuse of women, but not only that. Anger at hypocrisy, too, and in particular against bent Christianity. (The book is set in Houston, and one of the characters is the slick pastor of a quasi-evangelical megachurch.) The novel includes a brief travesty of one of my favorite books of the Bible….

"[T]he suspense in this book derives not only from the twists and turns of the story and its sinewy sentences but also from the reader's own changing perceptions of the author's intention, her ‘point of view’ not just as a storyteller within the frame of the book but as the human being who told this story that adds up (as all novels do) to a little model of the world we all share. You might suppose, early on, that you know pretty well what that model will look like (whether or not you feel that she's a kindred spirit); you will probably be wrong."

The Great Good Thing: A Secular Jew Comes to Faith in Christ. Andrew Klavan (Thomas Nelson). Here's a bit from my review of this memoir: "If you have been reading Books & Culture for any length of time, you know that Klavan is a writer I greatly admire. Stephen King has called him "the most original American novelist of suspense since Cornell Woolrich," and his most recent novel, Werewolf Cop, is (so I think) his best yet.

"When I started reading Klavan about ten years ago, devouring his books, I had no idea that he had recently been baptized (nor did I know that he had grown up in a secular Jewish family). Gradually, as new books appeared, I began to think that this writer might be a Christian, until finally I was convinced that it must be so. The Great Good Thing tells the story of his conversion with candor, wit, and humility (no preening, no cant). It is a memoir, he emphasizes, focused on that story, not a full-fledged autobiography, but it encompasses the whole arc of his life, and especially his childhood and growing-up years before he left home at the age of seventeen. (In my favorite part of the book, he tells of meeting and pursuing his wife-to-be, Ellen, when he was a student at Berkeley.)"

The Hidden Letters of Velta B. Gina Ochsner (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt). If the International Court of Justice at the Hague ever begins to treat "cultural appropriation" as a crime against humanity, you can be sure that Gina Ochsner will be in the dock before long. In her new novel, she brazenly appropriates the Latvian experience over decades of upheaval, making use of her own homegrown magic realism. She's a serial offender, too—she's currently at work on a novel about Gypsies in the Pacific Northwest. You might enjoy her conversation with fellow-writer Paula Huston, published this summer in B&C.

House of Lords and Commons. Ishion Hutchinson (FSG). This is one of the strongest collections by a new poet I've seen in the last several years. Dan Chiasson's piece in The New Yorker is perceptive, and all the more valuable for praising without gushing. What Chiasson doesn't spell out (though he hints at it, referring to Hutchinson's "hyperkinetic ear") is how rich the sound of Hutchinson's poems is, in contrast to so much contemporary poetry from so many different factions. A poem titled "Sibelius and Marley" begins thus: "History is dismantled music; slant, / bleak on gravel." I can't wait for Hutchinson's next book.

In the Café of Lost Dreams. Patrick Modiano. Translated by Chris Clarke (NYRB Classics). This is my favorite among several Modiano novels (all welcome) newly arrived on our shores in 2016. Mentioning it also gives me a chance to say how grateful I am to the various imprints of NYRB; I could easily have done a whole list like this featuring nothing but selections of theirs from this single year!

It's All One Case: The Illustrated Ross Macdonald Archives. Paul Nelson & Kevin Avery with Jeff Wong (Fantagraphics Books). + Raymond Chandler: The Detection of Totality. Fredric Jameson (Verso). + The Wrong Side of Goodbye. Michael Connelly (Little, Brown). The Macdonald compendium is an absolute feast, with long interviews, covers of various editions of his books, photos, all superbly reproduced and laid out. Macdonald/ Millar was exceptionally precise in his speech, and I think he would wince at many passages in these interviews, conducted when his powers were waning though before the marked onset of Alzheimer's. Nevertheless, anyone passionate about his work will want to have this collection, clearly a labor of love. (I should also mention that the second Library of America volume devoted to Macdonald appeared this year, Three Novels of the Early 1960s: The Zebra-Striped Hearse, The Chill, and The Far Side of the Dollar. Pure gold. Also, Syndicate Books and Soho Crime issued the first two volumes of a wonderfully timed project, Collected Millar, which will reissue Margaret Millar's complete works in seven volumes.) The Jameson book is slim but tasty, "synthesiz[ing]" several pieces he has done on Chandler over the years. As usual with Jameson, it's loaded with insights useful for readers who don't necessarily share his Marxist perspective. And The Wrong Side of Goodbye is the most recent Harry Bosch novel (in which Bosch's half-brother, Mickey Haller, also figures prominently). In a conversation with Gregory Cowles of the New York Times Book Review ("Inside the List," Nov. 20, 2016), Michael Connelly said, "I really wanted to go back to my elders with this book… . The title, the opening in Pasadena, the missing-heir case, much of the book is a tip of the hat to writers like Chandler and Ross Macdonald." Characteristically generous of Connelly. "Quite early in the book," I wrote when I reviewed it, "we're told that in San Fernando, nine out of ten citizens are Latino. This turns out to be not simply another bit of information but rather a pointer to one of the key themes of the story, emphasized in different ways in both plot-strands. This theme—the long history of Latinos in California, the discrimination they've suffered, their changing status—isn't new at all in Connelly's work, but it's foregrounded here."

Moonglow. Michael Chabon (Harper). I've read this novel twice now—first as an e-galley, then in the hardback with the striking cover designed by Adalis Martinez, a name new to me—and my copy is full of Post-it Notes, many of them with scribbled comments, others with striking sentences copied out (as always in a book by Michael Chabon, there are a lot of those). I'm still chewing on it: it's a book that rewards sustained attention, the kind of book that you want (or I want, anyway) to hold in your head (my head), complete. I'm not there yet. But that simply means I'll need to read it one more time.

My Radio Radio. Jessie van Eerden (Vandalia Press/West Virginian Univ. Press). Here's what I wrote for CT magazine: "This second novel (following Glorybound) by an exceptional young writer is narrated by a girl named Omi (Naomi) Ruth Wincott, who has grown up in a Christian commune (a cult, some call it). Omi has the instincts of an artist, though no one is putting such ideas in her head. She pores over old issues of National Geographic and a missionary magazine called The Macedonian Call, cutting out photos to make collages, and she undergoes some haphazard 'homeschooling.' Scenarios like this have furnished dozens of contemporary novels, but never (in my reading) as freshly and winsomely as here."

News of the World. Paulette Jiles (William Morrow). I had never read Paulette Jiles until I opened this book (a pleasing size, not bloated) and took a gander at the first two sentences of Chapter 1, under the heading Wichita Falls, Texas, Winter 1870. Those sentences were enough to convince me that I wanted to read on. Here they are: "Captain Kidd laid out the Boston Morning Journal on the lectern and began to read from the article on the Fifteenth Amendment. He had been born in 1798 and the third war of his lifetime had ended five years ago and he hoped never to see another but now the news of the world aged him more than time itself." The story—but I won't sketch it here, won't tell you about the girl whose parents and sister were killed by raiding Kiowas, who took the girl with her, and all the rest, because if those two sentences aren't enough, what would it avail?

RUSSIAN SPECIAL!!!! Four books to celebrate. (1) Novels, Tales, Journeys: The Complete Prose of Alexander Pushkin. Translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (Knopf), with a delicious dust jacket by Oliver Munday. (2) Odessa Stories. Isaac Babel. Translated and introduced (brilliantly) by Boris Dralyuk (Pushkin Press), in the same appealing format as Babel's Red Cavalry, also translated by Dralyuk and reviewed in Books & Culture by Emily Raboteau. (3) Strolls with Pushkin. Andrei Sinyaksky. Translated by Catherine Theimer Nepomnyashchy & Slava Yastremski, with an afterword by Michael M. Naydan (Columbia Univ. Press), with gorgeous cover design by Roberto de Vicq and interior design by Lisa Hamm, one of the first set of three books in Columbia's Russian Library. Note that this is not merely a reissue of the volume published by Yale University Press in 1994; this new edition also includes Sinyavsky's long Pushkinian essay "A Journey to the River Black." (4) Viktor Shklovsky: A Reader. Edited & translated by Alexandra Berlina (Bloomsbury Academic). The appearance of these four books within a few weeks of one another is comparable to one of those rare conjunctions of the planets that excite skywatchers to a frenzy.

The Sampo. Peter O'Leary (The Cultural Society). In an afterword, Peter O'Leary describes this book-length poem based on five sections of the Finnish national epic, The Kalevala, as his attempt to write a "magic song," an "imagist epic" (he cites Christopher Logue and Thomas Meyer as guiding influences in this respect), and a "fantasy." O'Leary (who has Finnish ancestry himself) has succeeded on all three fronts. His book is a delight, casting a welcome spell.

Shine on Me. A. G. Mojtabai (TriQuarterly Books/Northwestern Univ. Press). Mojtabai's slim but potent new novel is based on a contest held by an auto dealer in Longworth, Texas, a competition in which the last contestant to keep hands on a brand-new pickup truck would win it. The contest inspired a 1998 documentary, Hands on a Hard Body, a musical, and now a novel—but, as Mojtabai emphasizes, she is writing fiction. To get a sense of why you might want to give this book a try, here is a piece I wrote when her previous novel appeared. She is a writer I greatly admire.

BOOK OF THE YEAR

The Thing Itself. Adam Roberts (Gollancz). Adam Roberts has dual citizenship. On the one hand, he is a scholar, a professor at Royal Holloway, University of London. On the other hand, he is a novelist. In both capacities he is quite productive. Then again, each of these identities is doubled in turn. Roberts is both a scholar of Nineteenth Century Literature (Browning, Tennyson, and so on) and a scholar of science fiction. Roberts the novelist writes science fiction as ambitious as anyone now at work; at the same time, he dashes off spoofs, parodies. He relishes puns. It wouldn't at all surprise me to learn that he was writing MORE books of yet a different kind under a pseudonym or two. For some reason, though he is certainly not unknown in the US, his books mostly don't get discussed as they should—as among the most interesting works of fiction now being written in any genre.

On the acknowledgements page at the end of his novel The Thing Itself—published in Britain in 2015, and in the US, more or less invisibly, this fall—he says, "As an atheist writing a novel about why you should believe in God, I have taken more than I can say from the eloquent and persuasive devotional writing of my friends Alan Jacobs and Francis Spufford, Christians both."

I'm hoping that will rouse your curiosity sufficiently for you to investigate further. You might also take a look at this piece by Kevin Power at Strange Horizons.

Happy reading.

John Wilson is the editor of Books & Culture.

Copyright © 2016 Books & Culture. Click for reprint information.

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Theology

Lisa Sharon Harper

Christianity TodayDecember 7, 2016

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“Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love. Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the Spirit, binding yourselves together with peace. For there is one body and one Spirit, just as you have been called to one glorious hope for the future.”

Ephesians 4:2–4

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Today’s Verse

In the beginning, God declared all of creation to be very good. If God declares that overwhelming goodness looks like the abundant wellness of all relationships, then sin is anything that breaks relationships. The counteroffer is sin, which brings separation, distrust of God, and a reliance on human protection rather than dependence on God.

Shalom says we are all connected. Every relationship created by God is strung together in a web of intimate relationships. To affect one is to affect all. So when our distrust of God leads us to separate ourselves from God, we are all separated from ourselves. We govern ourselves in our own ways, not in God’s ways. We don’t trust ourselves. We don’t choose ourselves. Even the narcissist, who seems to choose only himself, does it because of his fear that his inherent unworthiness will be exposed. He places the barrier of the appearance of perfection between himself and everyone else as protection from exposure.

Reflect:
Meditate on Ephesians 4:2–4. How have you experienced disconnection with others as a result of shame or sin?

Pray:
Pray about specific experiences of disconnection, disunity, or other sin-related damage to relationships in your life. Ask God to show you how you can work toward true shalom in those relationships.

Lisa Sharon Harper is the author of The Very Good Gospel: How Everything Wrong Can Be Made Right along with several other books. A sought-after speaker, she is also the chief church engagement officer at Sojourners. Content excerpted from The Very Good Gospel by Lisa Sharon Harper Copyright © 2016 by Lisa Sharon Harper. Excerpted by permission of WaterBrook, a division of Penguin Random House, LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

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Church Life

Interview by Kelli B. Trujillo

Why she’s passionate about empowering female leaders.

Page 783 – Christianity Today (11)

Christianity TodayDecember 7, 2016

stephanie bloom photography

Jo Saxton is passionate about leadership. A Londoner of Nigerian descent who now lives in the Twin Cities, Saxton is a church planter, leadership coach, and the author of More Than Enchanting. A sought-after speaker, Saxton also serves as chair of the board for 3DM, a global discipleship ministry. Saxton’s latest endeavor is “Lead Stories,” a podcast with co-host Steph Williams, in which they discuss themes like soul care; the “behind the scenes” life of leaders; and assessing leaders’ physical, relational, and mental health. We connected with Saxton to get her take on the unique experiences of women in leadership.

Why are you so devoted to equipping women for leadership?

In the Great Commission, we are all called, as men and as women, to be involved in what God is doing. He designed us to know him and make him known in the world around us. We need to be equipped and empowered to do that, and I don’t think we can do that with just 50 percent of the global population. We want to see 100 percent—both men and women—empowered to play our part in what God is doing in the world.

What do you see as some of the most common barriers that may be holding women back from taking on leadership opportunities?

The internal barriers women battle are huge. Most women leaders I know are quite skilled, but they may still lack confidence. They may wonder, Is this okay? Do I have permission to do this? Marian Wright Edelman said, “It’s hard to be what you can’t see.” When you don’t see people like you—who act like you, who have a life like you—you’ll tend to second guess and doubt yourself. That can create an internal barrier: a lack of confidence.

Another barrier that’s unique to women is simply the reality that what it looks like for women to lead is different than what it is often like for men. I’m a mother. When my husband and I had children, it impacted us differently. His body wasn’t impacted; as a woman, my body definitely was. The realities of motherhood affected how I led as well as what I wanted the opportunity and freedom to do during certain stages of life. The pathway to leadership for women is simply different—it tends to not be as linear as it is for men, yet many of our leadership structures default to pathways that are quite linear and may accommodate men more easily.

Our cultural expectations of women and leadership can also play a role. For example, I’m from a country that has paid maternity leave. That reality impacts how a woman can lead during that season of her life. There’s more time and space to physically heal, to reassess, to build new rhythms for a new family, and a job to return to. I was able to choose to take unpaid leave when I had my children here in the US, but what happens if a woman cannot afford to and her body is still healing? I’m also from a country that has seen women leading—that has had a queen for over 60 years and has had women in the highest positions of political office. Seeing women in leadership roles like that impacts the perspectives of younger women growing up.

Another critical barrier for women is a lack of mentoring. It’s really understandable that male leaders often don’t want to mentor female leaders because they want to draw an appropriate boundary. But if that doesn’t happen, how is mentoring going to take place? In my experience, mentoring happened in a group context with men and women together. Because we were mentored together, it ensured that there was an environment in which I was receiving the same leadership training and opportunities that the other guys received. That team-mentoring culture produced multiple leaders as a result.

In addition to mentoring, what other factors formed you as a leader? How did your own “lead story” start?

I was never really ambitious for positions of leadership, but I was always hungry to see justice. I would look at the world and think, This isn’t right. The poverty, the broken lives, the broken communities—it isn’t right. Even as a young child, I thought, Why is this happening? I think that leadership sometimes begins in that way, with that “why” question. It may be a passion that develops out of that question “Why is this happening?”

And over time, there was a nudging I began to feel toward leadership. It was absolutely contrary to how I felt about myself. I didn’t feel confident, I didn’t feel secure. I felt very broken—but I couldn’t get away from an internal hunger to see God’s name glorified and to see a broken world restored.

When I was 17, I studied A-Level history [in England]. One of the things we learned about was the role of Christians in the abolition of slavery and in transforming society. I think I was one of the only Christians in my class and I remember sitting there feeling so proud to be a Christian—seeing in the history books the legacy of what people had done in the name of Jesus. I went from there thinking, God, if there is any way I can be involved in doing something that changes the shape of history for generations, I want in. I saw a glimpse of the same power that raised Christ from the dead, living in people and birthing incredible things.

I didn’t often see many leaders who were like me, who were in my environment and who were women of color like me. I didn’t have a frame of reference for what my leadership could look like—but I did have a youth leader who really encouraged me. For someone to look at you and say, “I’m going to invest in you because I think God has placed something in you”—that sort of encouragement is so important. Over and over, others helped create an environment that encouraged me to lead.

The key moment was while I was in my 20s and I was working as a youth and college pastor at our church. There was an important conference, and my senior pastor had been invited to speak. But then he invited me to speak in his place. He basically stepped down so that I could step in. He sacrificed his own opportunity so that I could have an opportunity. He really believed that I was called to lead, and so he stepped aside for me. He invested in me and encouraged me, but he also sacrificed to make it possible. Those choices have shaped how I view leadership today.

You mentioned that early on you didn’t see many others like you, leaders who were women of color, in your particular church environment. How might that be an ongoing challenge in evangelicalism today?

This issue is heavy on my heart. As Christians, we all must ask ourselves, if our conferences and events don’t reflect the wider church, how will we reach the wider world? Do the books we read and the theologians we listen to reflect the ethnically and socio-economically diverse culture we’re living in? Are we inviting leaders from various ethnic and cultural groups to speak into our context? Doing so only enriches the body of Christ, but way too often, people of color tend to be overlooked.

It doesn’t make sense from a missional standpoint to want to reach the nation and the world in a transforming way, and yet not go to our African American brothers and sisters, our Latino brothers and sisters, our Native American, or Asian American, or immigrant communities and say, “What are you learning? What is God teaching you? What can we learn from you?” It just doesn’t make strategic sense, theological sense, or missional sense to focus primarily on one voice and one experience. If we’re not hearing the stories, the church is weakened as a result.

Yes, this is a justice issue, but it is also quite simply a gospel issue. The Great Commission tells us that God’s plan is about all nations, all people groups. For the sake of the gospel and the honor of his name—recognizing that all of us are made in the image of God—I think we need to look again.

What are some of the most common struggles women in leadership face?

One key struggle for most women leaders is loneliness. The loneliness of leadership is sometimes palpable and tangible. The isolation I’ve felt particularly as a woman of color in leadership has been physically painful at times. Earlier this year I said to God, I can’t be this lonely. I can’t keep second-guessing what you’re asking me to do. I need to build a sisterhood. I realized I needed to just reach out to people and say, “Hey, let’s be friends.” So I’ve invested time and effort into building and deepening those relationships.

What else have you done to work through leadership struggles in your own life?

I’m a firm believer that we lead from the inside out, so I’ve made it a practice to deal with my “junk.” I deal with my brokenness, my past, my failures, and try to come before the Lord and face them head-on.

Seeking out mentors, building strong friendships, and seeking our prayer are key to my rhythm of leadership now. I don’t walk alone in leadership. I need to make sure I have people around me who will ask me ugly questions. Scripture tells us that Jonathan strengthened David’s hand in God (1 Sam. 23:16). To anyone who is serious about leadership, I’d say, “Who in your life strengthens your hand in God? Who is it that will weep with you, will fight for you, will ask you really difficult questions?”

There is a proverb which says “It takes a village to raise a child.” I believe it takes a village to raise a leader—and it also takes a village to sustain one.

What would you most want to say to readers who are navigating their own “lead story”?

I want to tell women that they may not feel seen, but God sees them. God has given them gifts, abilities, passions, and dreams. They have a contribution to make in this time, in this moment. Take the next step that God is asking you to take in order to make this world a better place. The world needs the Great Commission, the world needs the gospel, the world needs the love of Jesus. We are each designed to play our part.

And I’d also like to say this to men and women who are already in positions of leadership is this: What it could look like to invest in women leaders? What could it look like to invest in women leaders of color? How could we listen to them, encourage them, share our spaces, or even sacrifice our opportunities when needed in order to see them realize their God-given potential? And what might we see happen for God’s glory in our communities and cities as a result?

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Vishal Arora - World Watch Monitor

Court frees grief counselors charged under former Hindu kingdom’s new constitution.

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Three of the released Christians show the booklet that led to charges against them.

Christianity TodayDecember 6, 2016

Giulio Paletta / Christian Solidarity Worldwide

A court in Nepal has dropped a case against eight Christians, the first religious freedom dispute since the country's new constitution was implemented last year.

The seven men and one woman had been charged with proselytizing after giving out a pamphlet about Jesus in a Christian school while helping children through the trauma following the 2015 earthquake. Anything perceived as evangelism is outlawed under the new constitution.

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Five are staff of the Christian teacher-training program Teach Nepal, while two others are school principals. They were arrested in June, and the pastor of Charikot Christian Church, Shakti Pakhrin, was detained a few days later. Nepali Christian leaders have welcomed their acquittal.

Barnabas Shrestha, chairman of Teach Nepal, says they were "invited by a pastor to do the counseling in the school.” While it is a Christian school, not all pupils are Christians.

Shrestha denies the counselors were trying to convert children. The police making the arrests "wanted our people to say yes, they have preached the gospel… which is not true.”

The freedom of Nepal’s Christians is increasingly under threat. Last week, according to one missionary, the government announced to leaders of Christian orphanages and boarding schools in Kathmandu that it would impose huge fines, close them down, and confiscate possessions should they find just one Christian booklet in their institution.

The government also announced that praying with children or letting them attend a Bible club is prohibited.

Another Christian Nepali contact, who wants to remain anonymous, told World Watch Monitor that the social welfare council, which approves foreign aid used to conduct programs, has stopped granting approval for Christian activities.

When Nepal decided to remain a secular state, rather than become a Hindu nation, it was a disappointment to Hindu nationalist groups. In September 2015, pamphlets promoting Hindu nationalism were found at each of the churches and nationalist group, Hindu Morcha Nepal, issued a press statement calling for Christian leaders to leave the country and for converts to Christianity to return to Hinduism.

“We thought with the secular state status, we have much freedom,” said Bishop Narayan Sharma of Believers Church. “But the incident and the attitude and the approach from the state, it shows they want to be more strict and they want to just keep the limitation on Christianity, and they don’t want it to grow further.”

Sharma and other Christian leaders discussed the impact of the new constitution on churches and Christian organizations in the video below.

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The eight suspects had been released on bail earlier this year.

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Most Americans, including 4 in 10 evangelicals, want doctors to help terminally ill patients end their lives.

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Christianity TodayDecember 6, 2016

The American Medical Association has described physician-assisted suicide as a serious risk to society and “fundamentally incompatible with a physician’s role as healer.”

Millions of Americans disagree.

Two-thirds say it is morally acceptable for terminally ill patients to ask their doctors for help in ending their lives, according to a new survey from Nashville-based LifeWay Research. A similar number says doctors should be able to help terminally ill patients die.

Scott McConnell, executive director of LifeWay Research, says Americans want more say over how they die. That’s especially true if facing a painful, terminal illness, he says.

“If they are facing a slow, painful death, Americans want options,” he says. “Many believe that asking for help in dying is a moral option. They don’t believe that suffering until they die of natural causes is the only way out.”

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Widespread support

Physician-assisted suicide first became legal in the US in 1997 under Oregon’s “Death with Dignity” law. Since then, 991 patients in Oregon have ended their lives using medications prescribed by a doctor under the law, according to that state’s reports.

Today six states allow physician-assisted suicide. The latest is Colorado, where voters approved Proposition 106, which allows a terminally ill patient to request a fatal dose of sleeping medication, by a two-to-one margin in November. Washington, California, Vermont, and Montana also allow physician-assisted suicide. The city council in the District of Columbia recently approved a measure allowing the practice—a decision that must be reviewed by Congress.

In LifeWay Research’s survey, 67 percent of Americans agree with the statement, “When a person is facing a painful terminal disease, it is morally acceptable to ask for a physician’s aid in taking his or her own life.” Thirty-three percent disagree.

Where there are differences among demographic groups, most still agree. For example, Americans age 18 to 24 (77 percent) and those 35 to 44 (63 percent) and 55 to 64 (64 percent) agree. So do white Americans (71 percent) and Hispanic Americans (69 percent). Those with some college education (71 percent) or with graduate degrees (73 percent) and those with high school diplomas or less (61 percent) also agree.

Among faith groups, more than half of all Christians (59 percent), Catholics (70 percent), Protestants (53 percent), Nones (84 percent) and those of other religions (70 percent) agree. Most of those who attend religious services less than once a month (76 percent) also agree.

A few demographic groups are skeptical. Fewer than half of those with evangelical beliefs (38 percent), African-Americans (47 percent) or those who attend religious services at least once a month (49 percent) say physician-assisted suicide is morally acceptable.

“Traditional Christian teaching says God holds the keys to life and death,” says McConnell. “Those who go to church or hold more traditional beliefs are less likely to see assisted suicide as morally acceptable. Still, a surprising number do.”

Few want restrictions on doctors

Researchers also found widespread support for removing restrictions on physician-assisted suicide.

Many Americans (69 percent) say physicians should be allowed to assist terminally ill patients in ending their lives. Thirty-one percent disagree.

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Those in the Northeast (73 percent), Catholics (70 percent), white Americans (73 percent), those with graduate degrees (77 percent), Nones (88 percent) and those who skip religious services (78 percent) are among those most likely to agree.

More than half of Southerners (64 percent), African-Americans (53 percent), Protestants (53 percent), those with a high school diploma or less (64 percent) and those who attend services at least once a month (52 percent) also agree.

Again, those with evangelical beliefs (42 percent) do not.

LifeWay Research’s findings echo those of other studies. A 2015 Gallup survey found 68 percent of Americans said physician-assisted suicide should be legal, up from 53 percent in 2013. Gallup also found that support for legalized physician-assisted suicide has wavered over the past 20 years. It previously peaked at 68 percent in 2001 before declining to 53 percent.

The debate over physician-assisted suicide is unlikely to go away, says McConnell, and it raises troublesome questions.

“Such requests are asking doctors to betray one of their most sacred oaths—which admits, ‘It may also be within my power to take a life,’ but concludes, ‘I must not play at God,’” says McConnell. “To ask physicians to turn from their task of healing is not a decision to make lightly.”

Bob Smietana is senior writer for

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Opposition to Assisted Suicide Dies Out

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