Category archive - challenge

Let It Snow!

I was asked by my Director of Missions to write a letter to my fellow pastors in the Frisco Baptist Association about our church’s involvement in the Christmas in August emphasis. Below is the text of my letter.

Dear Pastor,

I’m writing to ask you to consider putting a critical need before your people: the budget shortfall at the International Mission Board. The 2008 Lottie Moon Christmas Offering fell some $30 million short of the goal, and according to a friend who is a trustee, the immediate shortfall they’re facing stands at $13 million. SBC President Johnny Hunt has called on churches to celebrate “Christmas in August,” and Trinity Baptist in Valliant will be participating. I plan to preach mission-themed messages each Sunday of the month, I’m working on lining up a guest speaker from the IMB for one of those Sundays, and we’re even going to have Christmas dinner on August 30, the fifth Sunday of the month. We’re not planning to set a goal for this special offering; we’re simply emphasizing the need and trusting God to lead us in how we can contribute.

Will you consider leading your church to participate in this very special emphasis? Dr. Thomas White, Vice-President for Communications at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Forth Worth, is leading an effort there to provide participating churches with materials to aid in its promotion. In addition to the logo you see on this page, there will be promotional videos and other materials available for use by churches. They’ve established a web page where these materials can be accessed: http://www.swbts.edu/christmasinaugust. If you don’t have internet access, or aren’t sure how to access these resources in a way that’s usable in your congregation, don’t hesitate to contact me and I’ll be glad to help.

This is the first time in the history of the International Mission Board that otherwise qualified missionaries could not be deployed to the field due to a lack of resources. Let’s join together in Frisco Baptist Association to contribute to the meeting of this need, so that no one else who has committed their lives to missionary service will have to be told that we don’t have the money to send them.
God bless,

Wes Kenney

To Sunnyvale

Tonight I will be taking a group of my church members to a commissioning service for new IMB missionaries. This service is being held at the First Baptist Church in Sunnyvale, Texas, a suburb on the east side of the DFW metroplex.

I’ve been closely following events in our convention, and specifically related to the IMB, for more than two years now. There have been great friendships built, there have been challenging and difficult moments, and there have been some great times as well. Without question, one of the greatest of these great times was when I was able to attend a commissioning service in Albuquerque, New Mexico in May of 2006. There can not be many experiences more humbling and challenging than to hear from those who are leaving all that they know in order to take the Gospel to the ends of the earth, simply because God said, “Go!”

I’m looking forward to hearing these testimonies, and to hearing a challenging message from Dr. Jerry Rankin. And I’m excited about being able to share these experiences with some of the people of my church this evening.

Can You Hear the Whisper?

The following devotional was written by my stepmother* for a publication at her church, a Christian Reformed Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

The LORD said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by.”

Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.

- 1 Kings 19:11-13a (NIV)

This Elijah story was the focus of our youth group’s spiritual growth retreat this spring. It’s a great story—one that’s a little unexpected. We’re quite used to hearing Old Testament Scripture speak of our great and powerful God, the almighty God of Israel. In this passage though, God was not in the loud, spectacular events of nature. When he came to find Elijah, he was in the “gentle whisper.”

As we are on our Emmaus walk between two of the most powerful acts of God in the New Testament– Christ’s resurrection and his ascension–let’s not miss the quiet “whisper” times as well. The Bible’s stories of the appearances of Jesus between these two great events seem to indicate both the spectacular (the catch of fish) and the quieter times: a shared meal, a conversation while walking along the road.

In all the times of our lives–the dramatic events of an illness, death or crisis, or the mundane, everyday “who needs to be where at what time” routine–God speaks to us. Sometimes he speaks loudly and gets our attention. Other times, he whispers.

The only way to hear a whisper, of course, is to be quiet. To quiet our souls in a time of Bible reading, meditation or prayer. To be still enough to hear a bird or watch a sunset or marvel at the stars. To watch a child sleep and to imagine all that God has in mind for him. To sit quietly with a friend who needs not all the answers to her questions, just the presence of someone who cares and is listening alongside of her. Maybe it’s even as simple as a walk without a cell phone or an iPod.

In the midst of the busyness of my life, I’m trying to be more open to hearing God in the gentle breeze.
Can you hear the whisper?

Linda Kenney

“Let us be silent that we may hear the whisper of God”
Ralph Waldo Emerson

*Though I suspect that they’re all, in fact, made of straw, we’ve been hearing lately about “some Southern Baptists” who believe that there is never any context in which a woman may teach a man anything, ever. If you’re one of these (I suspect mythical) Southern Baptists, please discontinue reading.

Pray for Caelan

I’ve been too busy with church, school, and SBC Today to do any posting here lately, but I’m grateful that so many still stop by every day, just in case. I want to urge my readers to pray for the Cross family.

I’ve gotten to know Alan the way many of you have, through blog comments. But I also had the privilege of hanging out with him during the convention in Greensboro, North Carolina in 2006. In spite of the theological disagreements we have, I’m glad he’s my brother in Christ, and he is a true joy to be around.

Today, Alan posted on his blog that his son, Caelan, may be experiencing a relapse of his cancer. Many of you joined me in praying for Caelan during his treatments more than a year ago, and we rejoiced together at news of clear scans. Today, that rejoicing has been turned to anguish.

There are no words for a time such as this, there is only the strength that comes from trusting in the sovereign purpose of a loving God. Please join me in bringing this family before Him, and asking that His love, His grace, and yes, His healing will be real, tangible experiences in their lives in the days ahead.

Play it, Sam

Of all the programming on all the channels on all of Dish Network, I had to stumble across Casablanca. I’m a bit bleary-eyed this morning, as I began watching a little after 11:00 PM last night, and stayed with it until the very beginning of a beautiful friendship.

What a great movie. I didn’t much care for it when I saw it for the first time as a teenager, but I find that I appreciate it more and more as time goes by. What a wonderful story of a man, Rick Blain, putting his preference and his happiness aside in order to serve a greater cause.

But as a depiction of selflessness, it is but a pale shadow of the selflessness displayed by our Savior,

…who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

Ilsa had told Rick to “do the thinking for both of us,” and the result was that he, at great personal risk, put her on the plane with her husband instead of leaving with her himself. I watch this, and I can relate, and because I can, I cry like a schoolgirl.

And yet as I read in Philippians of what Christ voluntarily gave up in order that we might be restored to a right relationship with our God, I realize that I cannot relate at all. I cannot equate any of my experiences with the act of voluntarily letting go of equality with God. And so rather than responding with silly tears over a drama on the screen, I must rather respond with awe and worship of for the One I cannot begin to understand, yet long to know, and to make known, more fully.

With all of the things for which we are appropriately thankful, may our thanksgiving begin and end with a spirit of gratitude for a Creator who, because of His love for you and me, volunteered for servanthood.

Exactly Backwards

I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people—not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler—not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? God judges those outside. “Purge the evil person from among you.”

- 1 Corinthians 5:9-13

I have been preaching through 1 Corinthians on Sunday mornings, and have for the last two weeks dealt with the very challenging topic of church discipline. The passage above really struck me as I prepared and preached this message.

It struck me because I came to realize that we take this very clear teaching of scripture and implement it exactly backwards. That is to say, we are often very harsh and judgmental toward those who are “of this world,” tending to avoid even talking to them or acknowledging them, much less engaging them in the kind of meaningful relationship that might lead to an opportunity for the sharing of our faith.

Yet when it comes to thise inside the church, we are reluctant to say or do anything that might come across as judgmental. We ignore the plain application of this verse (“Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?”), preferring instead to misapply those passage that warn against passing judgment.

Clearly, this is judgment is not meant to be carried out on an individual level, but rather, “when you are assembled in the name of the Lord Jesus,” that is, as a church exercising the authority of Christ in disciplining an erring brother. But our distaste for the discipline called for in this passage, which I wrote about in a previous post, often makes us far too harsh toward the behavior of the lost (which is, after all, in accord with their nature), and far too tolerant of the behavior of those who are a part of the church and who desparately need the church’s loving discipline.

For the sake of the witness of the church, this backwardness needs to be turned around.

The Fear of Man

Dr. Bart Barber has recently published on his blog an outline of what he calls The Fifth Century Initiative. It is a document that outlines doctrines and practices that are biblical and have historically distinguished those who call themselves Baptist from other Christian groups, and calls for a renewal of emphasis on these distinctives. I am excited to see such a document, and will do all I can to promote the concepts it contains.

I want to highlight two of the items in Dr. Barber’s (despite his characteristic modesty, he did pull all this together) list which are very much interrelated, and which, taken together, amount to the Baptist church equivalent of the third rail. They are “The Recovery of Regenerate Church Membership” and “The Renewed Exercise of Biblical Church Discipline.”

I don’t intend to define these points here; if you’re reading this blog, chances are you know what is meant by these phrases. Instead, I want to consider why it is that it is taken for granted that “recovery” and “renewal” are needed, rather than, say, “continuation” or “maintenance.”

I remember looking through the minutes from business meetings at the first church where I served on staff, a little church in Thackerville, Oklahoma. The minutes went back to around 1900, and it was not at all uncommon to find records of folks having been excluded from the membership of the church. One man in particular that I remember was “churched” for the ghastly public sin of having “played the fiddle at a dance.” Some weeks later, the man came before the membership, repented, and was restored to full fellowship.

This might seem like a silly thing over which to exclude someone, but the community of saints in Thackerville in 190? apparently viewed it as a matter serious enough for serious action. The point is that today, we would never think of doing such a thing over something like that. Perhaps that is good, but I fear that we have also come to the place where we likely wouldn’t consider such action even if, say, “a man [had] his father’s wife.” We (all of us) have folks on our membership roll who are involved in behavior just as sinful, and just as detrimental to the witness of the church in the community, as the man called out by the Apostle in 1 Corinthians 5, yet we do nothing. In 100 years, we have gone from being very serious about sin in the life of the church to being very serious about not offending anyone in the church, to the extent that we will overlook all manner of sinfulness in order to get along. Space does not permit me to explore all that is in my brain regarding the cause of this shift, but that it has happened is undeniable.  We are where we are.

So what must we do? We must touch, and even embrace, that third rail. We who are called by God to stand before His people every week must cease being concerned with what people will say about us, and start showing concern for what our Lord will say to us at the judgment seat of Christ. We must follow the example of Paul, who said, “I do not write these things to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children.” We must love our people enough to warn them of danger, even when they don’t want to be warned, and even when they lash out at us for doing so.

Yesterday, I was listening to The Albert Mohler Program on satellite radio. His topic was the failure of preachers to address the subject of divorce from the pulpit, and his ultimate conclusion was that it was the fear of man that was to blame. It is easy to say, but until we trust God more than we fear men, many of these issues will go unresolved.

Wonder

But Peter put them all outside, and knelt down and prayed; and turning to the body he said, “Tabitha, arise.” And she opened her eyes, and when she saw Peter she sat up.

- Acts 9:40 (ESV)

I wonder if there are people in our lives, perhaps people we see every day, who are spiritually dead, and for whom God would have us to get alone and pray. I wonder if He would be pleased by us pleading to Him on their behalf. I wonder if, were we to spend enough time, alone, pleading, He might reveal to us that it is His will that they live. That as we invest our lives in them that He might then lead us to speak to them the words of life, the gospel of Jesus Christ, and that it would be used by God to open their eyes, to give them the gift of faith, to bring them to eternal life.

I’m sure that there are, for me at least. How about for you?

Malnourished Babies

In my research for a sermon last week (the picture is of my daughter’s notes taken during said sermon), I came across a news story about a vegan couple who were sentenced recently to life in prison for the death of their six week old son. Apparently, the child had been fed a diet of soy milk and apple juice, and weighed just 3 1/2 pounds at his death.

This misguided couple apparently had no understanding of their child’s nutritional needs. If you believe their statements, they intended no harm, and only wanted to adhere to their vegan convictions in the raising of their child, whom they named “Crown.” They claimed that they wanted to care for their son, and they had no idea he was not healthy until moments before his death.

While this is undeniably a very sad story, what I find in some ways to be even more sad is the parallell I see in many churches today. We are surrounded by spiritually malnourished baby Christians, who have never grown beyond spiritual infancy because of the lack of proper spiritual food. The reason I say this is more sad than the terrible death of little Crown is that the mature Christians responsible (myself included) repeatedly show by our actions that we don’t really value the health and growth of these newborn Christians.

When someone comes to faith in Christ, we are more than happy to rejoice with them. We’ll even stand in line to shake their hands after the church service where they make their public profession of faith. “I’ll be praying for you,” are the words most often spoken in these lines. It is not enough.

Well-meaning leaders (like myself) are quick to put resources in their hands. “Read through John’s Gospel,” we might say, or “Read one of the Psalms each day.”

“Read this book, then answer the questions at the end of each chapter.” It is not enough.

Imagine the parallell to the care of an actual newborn baby. It is as if we’re telling that helpless infant that we’ll be thinking about them. That we’ll stack the boxes of formula in the corner of their room, enough for a whole year. “Good luck!” we tell them. Ridiculous, isn’t it?

So Ananias departed and entered the house. And laying his hands on him he said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.”

- Acts 9:17 (ESV)

At this point, Saul was a baby Christian. Sure, he would become the great Apostle to the Gentiles, but right then, he was a shattered, frightened man, brand new in his faith and crying out to God for someone to come alongside him and show him the way.

Ananias answered that call. He entered the house. He laid his hands on Saul. He called him “brother.” Can you imagine the impact of that word on Saul at that moment? His life had been dedicated to the destruction of the “Way,” until Jesus showed up and turned the world he thought he knew upside-down. And now, here was a Christian, someone whom Saul had set out for Damascus with the intention of imprisoning, and he was calling him “brother.”

New Christians need folks like Ananias. More to the point, new Christians need for us to become folks like Ananias. They don’t need us to give them books, tell them what verses to read, or promise to pray for them. They need us to embrace them, to invest our lives in them, and to treat them not just as acquaintances, but as family. They need us to feed them, not just point them toward the food.

Crown’s parents are responsible for his malnourishment, regardless of their intentions toward him. We as the church are responsible for the malnourishment of the baby Christians all around us, and for our intentions toward them.

God help us.

Reformed Crumminess

Every so often I feel the need to remind you of the great work being done by Joel Bezaire on his blog, Crummy Church Signs. It’s not easy being subjected to so much bad theology and so many lame attempts to be cute, but Joel does it so you don’t have to.

The sign in this picture (submitted by Micah Larsen of Minnesota) is a great example of the useful service Joel provides. The average person on the street might not think twice about such a message; after all, we hear it all the time from the world, right?

But this is a Christian Reformed Church! If you were to walk into their building and pick up a hymnal, it would likely be the Psalter Hymnal. You could turn to the back of this hymnal and read Article 13 of the Belgic Confession. And if you had done so, it is hard to imagine that you would come up with a message like this one for your church’s sign. Joel’s comment on this particular example of crumminess: “Nice to see this Reformed church has relaxed their denomination’s theology a little bit. And by “relaxed,” I of course mean “completely disregarded.”

Make Crummy Church Signs a regular stop on your internet travels – it is occasionally a bit edgy, but it’s always good for a hearty laugh. And, there is so much cruminess in the world that one blog cannot hold it all. So be sure to visit the archive at crummychurchsigns.com, where everything is categorized for your convenience. And if you come across an actual example of crumminess on a church sign, and happen to have a camera along, you can become a contributor and Joel will apply his rapier-like wit to your submissions. Simply click here to join the fun.

And please, if you’re responsible your church’s sign, avoid crumminess at all costs. This message does matter.