Tonight I'm meeting by phone with the 12 pastors who have joined me for my Spiritual Formation Tele-Class. I've assigned everyone to pray 30-60 minutes/day, for these past three months. Tonight we'll share what God has been saying to us and doing within us throughout these times.
Plus, I'll lead a discussion on Ruth Haley Barton's excellent Pursuing God's Will Together: A Discernment Practice for Leadership Groups.
Here are some notes I'll share from.
HOW I’M LEADING OUR CHURCH (May I add, "imperfectly.")
1. I
have a personal prayer life and Christ-abiding life
2. Our
staff – prayer & abiding in Christ
a. We individually
pray
b. We come
together and share what God is saying and doing
c. Barton
– “When we began this venture, we were all leaders in a variety of ministry
settings where we were achieving some level of effectiveness and success. But
we were missing something. We were missing a place where we could be with other
leaders—not just to work together, socialize and network, or even to be
inspired to be better leaders—but to attend to our ongoing process of spiritual
transformation in relative anonymity.” (94)
3. We teach
this to our people
a. In
our Ministry School
b. Youth
and children learn how to do this
c. Special
events focusing on spiritual formation
d. Home
Groups
4. Mission
Emerges From This Kind of Togetherness
a. “The
idea that we could gather first of all to be together around the presence of
Christ in life-transforming ways was a truly winsome thought. We sensed that
eventually a mission would emerge from our togetherness.” (95)
b. Our “doing”
comes from our corporate “being.”
5. Spiritual
transformation leads to discernment.
a. “As
we studied and reflected on the dynamics of spiritual transformation, we also
discovered that spiritual transformation is not an end in itself—it leads to
the ability to discern and do the will of God.” (p. 96)
b. “What
we do flows out of who we are in Christ.” (96)
6. Hear
from God first; then move.
a. “A
defining characteristic of any truly spiritual community [is] the shared
commitment to move forward as we are led by the Spirit, not by our own thinking
and planning. We are not opposed to planning; in fact, it is an important
second step. But we are committed to discernment—listening deeply for God’s
direction—as the precursor to any plans we make.” (99)
7. Experience,
not theory, breeds conviction.
a. “Early
on we agreed that we would not teach theories or concepts we merely wished were
true. In fact, we actually wanted to experience transformation in community
even more than we wanted to teach it! When it came time for us to teach, we
agreed to follow Jesus’ example in his conversation with Nicodemus: “We speak
of what we know and testify to what we have seen” (Jn 3:5).” (100)
8. We share
how God is breaking us.
a. “Growing
self-knowledge is a crucial aspect of engaging fruitfully in a discernment
process because it reduces the risk of the community falling apart due to
people not being willing or able to own their negative patterns and sins.”
(101)
1.
“Discernment” Is a Fruit of a Presence-Driven Church
Barton writes that some
pastors have the "vague sense that our approach to decision making should
be different from secular models—particularly when we are leading a church or
an organization with a spiritual purpose. The problem is that we’re not quite
sure what that difference is. In the absence of a clear consensus, that
difference often gets reduced to an obligatory devotional (often viewed as
irrelevant to the business portion of the meeting) or the perfunctory prayers
that bookend the meeting. Sometimes even these well-meaning attempts at a
spiritual focus get lost in the shuffle!" (Barton,
Pursuing God's Will Together: A Discernment Practice for
Leadership Groups, Kindle Locations 180-185)
This difference is: God. God's presence. God, doing the
leading. God, doing the building. Because unless God builds the house, we are
laboring in vain.
What's needed is: discernment.
"Discernment," writes Barton, "in a most
general sense, is the capacity to recognize and respond to the presence and the
activity of God—both in the ordinary moments and in the larger decisions of our
lives. The apostle Paul says that we are to be transformed by the renewing of
our minds so that we can discern what the will of God is, that which is good,
acceptable and perfect (Rom 12:2). This includes not only the mind of each individual
but also the corporate mind." (Ib., Kindle
Locations 186-189)
What's fundamentally needed is mind-renewing transformation.
Pastors and church leaders must therefore themselves be living in the rivers of
constant spiritual formation and transformation, in order to discern what the
will of God is. This is what the whole "church" thing is about.
Barton writes:
"It is hard to imagine that spiritual leadership could
be about anything but seeking to know and do the will of God, and yet many
leadership groups do not have this as their clear mandate and reason for
existence. This raises a serious question: If we are not pursuing the will of
God together in fairly intentional ways, what are we doing? Our own will? What
seems best according to our own thinking and planning? That which is merely
strategic or expedient or good for the ego?" (Ib., Kindle Locations 201-205)
Ch. 5 – Community
Be converted to community.
Be
committed to being a “transforming community.” (90)
“The more genuine and the deeper our community becomes,
the more will everything else between us recede, the more clearly and purely
will Jesus Christ and his work become the one and only thing that is vital
between us. We have one another only through Christ, but through Christ we do
have one another, wholly, and for all eternity.”
- - Dietrich
Bonhoeffer (86)
Is the way we are doing life together in ministry
transforming or deforming?
Gordon Cosby writes about his experience founding Church
of the Savior in Washington, D.C.
"Our written commitment has
grown out of our life together. The life occurred first and then it was put
down in a written commitment. To make a formal commitment without having drunk
deeply of the life of the group is simply to take a husk that can mock us. Only
in commitment can there be real belonging.” (91)
This happens FROM THE INSIDE OUT.
Individuals are encouraged
to become very clear about what values they need to know are in place in order
for them to lean into the group as a trustworthy community. (91)
1.
The Language of the Presence-Driven Church
Language
Shapes Reality
“Our commitment to being a community has
been and continues to be the most essential thing about us. We knew that if we
called ourselves a leadership team, a management team, a board or a cabinet,
that might be all we would get—a method of governing that is basically secular
in its orientation, with a few spiritual elements thrown in. At the very least
we would have to work hard not to let that terminology define us according to
whatever expectations normally go along with it. Language really does shape
reality.” (97)
a. “Connectedness” and “obedience” (rather than “success” – or: “success” is
defined in terms of connectedness to God and obedience; “faith” rather than
“success” – without faith it is
impossible to please God)
i. Qualitative
rather than quantitative
b. “Disciple” rather than “decider”
c. “Influence” rather than “numbers” (attendance; budget)
d. “Discernment” rather than “decision-making”
e. “Listening” comes before “speaking”
f. “Relationship” (with God and one another) replaces “rules of order”
g. To change a way of speaking is to change the culture. (Wittgensteinian
language-games; the Whorffian hypothesis; see Kenyan scholar Ngugi wa Thiong’o)
h.
When a way of speaking
has changed a culture has changed. A church’s culture will change from
Program-Driven to Presence-Driven as Presence-Driven Leaders (PDLs): 1) live
the Christ-abiding life themselves, foundationally and continuously; 2) lead
their people into God’s empowering presence; and 3) nurture and champion the
God-produced fruit-bearing. As this happens, over time, the “language-game” of
the church will change. When the language has changed the reality has happened.
