The Presence-less Church (The Presence-Driven Church)

“We can’t dispense with the formalities, George—there’d be nothing left.”

From the New Yorker, 10/31/16

A month ago Linda and I went to P.F. Chang's in Ann Arbor. I ordered a meal that I mostly get when I'm at this restaurant. After completing my order the waiter said, "I am sorry, sir. We are out of rice."

I was stunned. I thought of logical impossibilities like square circles and married bachelors. An Asian restaurant with no rice? 

I saw the manager walking from table to table, confessing ricelessness to the patrons. When he got to us I had to ask, "How is this possible?" He said, "They are having trouble in the kitchen."

My thought was, "Then you had better get in that kitchen and fix this barren situation!"

On a sunny morning in the 1980s, when Linda and I lived in East Lansing, we went to breakfast at International House of Pancakes. I ordered pancakes. There was no maple syrup on the table.

When it comes to pancakes I am a purist. I don't want the strawberry syrup or the blueberry syrup or the fruity syrup. So, desiring maple syrup, I asked:

"May I have some maple syrup please?"

"Sorry," said the waitress. "We're out of maple syrup."

My response was:

The Big Absence happened two summer ago.

Linda and I were driving from Monroe to Chicago. We were on the Indiana Tollway, and stopped at one of the rest areas for lunch. Linda went to one of the fast food places and got a burger. I got in line at Kentucky Fried Chicken.

I can see the scene as if it were happening now. Three of us were in line. There was a man in front of me at the counter, I was behind him, with a third man behind me.

"I want a three piece chicken dinner," said the first man.

Often, in life, we view events through the framework of what we are currently immersed in. At Redeemer I was in the thick of preaching through the book of Revelation. I was thinking about Revelation all the time! I was reading and re-reading the text, looking at it in the Greek language, and studying the very best commentaries on the subject. The Greek title of this book is The Apocalypse. Apocalypto means "an uncovering," an "unveiling." Like someone who lifts the lid on a simmering pot of stew to see and smell the ingredients, in The Apocalypse God lifts the lid of what is to happen, and John the Apostle is allowed to look inside.

"I am sorry, sir," said the hostess at the KFC on the Indiana Tollway in the summer of 2015. "But we are out of chicken."

With those words the lid was lifted, and a fiery abyss appeared to my right. I heard the hoofbeats of Four Horsemen thundering to my left. The man at the counter did respond. He just walked away, like a floating, drifting planet that just lost its sun, or perhaps his faith.

Then I felt a tap on my shoulder, and a voice spoke to me. I did not turn around as the voice said, "Did you hear what I heard?" Speechless, I nodded my head up and down.

My expectation, when going to Kentucky Fried Chicken, is to be served chicken. Anything less than this is unacceptable. It is the same with God's presence.

When I am with the Church I need to encounter God. I need to experience God's presence. I am like Moses, who despaired at the thought of God withdrawing His presence from the people. Moses pleaded with God, saying,

“If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here.  How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?” (Exodus 33:15-16)

Every Sunday morning at Redeemer people are there who are desperate for God. They long and hunger and pant, like deer in the Judean wilderness thirst for water, for an experiential encounter with God. Anything less than this is unacceptable. 

Philosophy of Religion - Oral Exam #2

To: My MCCC Philosophy of Religion Students:

Last evening I passed around the sign-up sheet for the second oral exam.

The exam review is this coming Tuesday, Nov. 1. Students who have missed no more than once may attend the exam review.

The oral exams will be on Thursday, Nov. 3, and Tuesday, Nov. 8.

The exam questions are:

Mackie's Logical Argument from Evil Against the Existence of God

Buddhism's Idea that Evil Is an Illusion

Plantinga's Refutation of Mackie's Argument

Rowe's Evidential Argument from Evil Against the Existence of God

Wyckstra's Critique of Rowe's Argument

A Consumer Church Is an Antichrist Church

I was a Eugene Peterson fan before he translated the Bible into The Message. In his book The Jesus Way: Conversations on the Ways That Jesus Is the Way Peterson writes about the Real Jesus, and the distinction between the Real Jesus and the American Jesus. Peterson is correct about this. He is one of God's prophets for such a time as this. 

• “The ways Jesus goes about loving and saving the world are personal…; …The ways employed in our North American culture are conspicuously impersonal.”
• In churches today “the vocabulary of numbers is preferred over names…” A "number" is an impersonal abstract object; a person is flesh-blood-and spirit real.
• “Jesus is an alternative to the dominant ways of the world, not a supplement to them.” The Real Jesus cannot and will not be used to build kingdoms alternative to his kingdom.
• “The North American church at present is conspicuous for replacing the Jesus way with the American way.” Which is the Consumer Church.
• In America “we are the world’s champion consumers, so why shouldn’t we have state-of-the-art consumer churches?… [T]his is the best and most effective way for gathering large and prosperous congregations. Americans lead the world in showing how to do it. There is only one thing wrong: this is not the way in which… we become less and Jesus becomes more.” The American consumer mentality runs so deep that many churches unreflectively replicate it.
• Is this bad? Yes. How bad? Peterson writes: “A consumer church is an antichrist church.... We can’t gather a God-fearing, God-worshiping congregation by cultivating a consumer-pleasing, commodity-oriented congregation.”
• “North American Christians are conspicuous for going along with whatever culture decides is charismatic, successful, influential - whatever gets things done, whatever can gather a crowd of followers - hardly noticing that these ways and means are at odds with the clearly marked way that Jesus walked and called us to follow.” To verify this simply read the four Gospels and use them as a lens through which to evaluate American churches. American churches are largely dictated to by American culture. Here is where "relevant" becomes a bad idea.
• “Jesus’ metaphor, kingdom of God, defines the world in which we live. We live in a world where Christ is King. If Christ is King, everything, quite literally, everything, every thing and every one, has to be re-imagined, re-configured, re-oriented to a way of life that consists in an obedient following of Jesus.” (To re-orient our people at Redeemer I preached through the four Gospels, chronologically. This took us seven years.)
• “The ways and means promoted and practiced in the world are a systematic attempt to substitute human sovereignty for God’s rule. The world as such has no interest in following the crucified King.”
• “Once we start paying attention to Jesus’ ways, it doesn’t take us long to realize that following Jesus is radically different from following anyone else.” 

Follow Jesus, not our schizophrenic culture. Influence culture, via Jesus.

Language Is Constitutive of Reality - The Presence-Driven Church

Detroit

In my doctoral work on metaphor theory and my long interest in philosophy of language (Wittgenstein, J.L. Austin, John Searle, et. al.) I became familiar with the Sapir-Whorff hypothesis. The idea is that the language we use affects the ways we think and shapes our perception of the world. One's language changes one's view of reality.

Take, for example, the term "marriage equality." This term was virtually nonexistent a few years ago. Now, it is commonly heard, and it changes our way of looking at marriage. The term itself covertly redefines "marriage," without justification. It has become acceptable, thoughtlessly. This is the power of words as propaganda, the intent of which is to get people to see reality differently.

The Sapir-Whorff hypothesis is not only about how terms shape experience. The semantic structure of a language shapes or limits the ways in which we form conceptions of the world. More recently, Stanford neo-Whorffian cognitive scientist Lera Boroditsky has been arguing for the effects of language on cognitive processes. (She does not believe, as Noam Chomsky does, that all languages share the same deep structure of thought.) 

The semantic structures and the words we use frame how we see things. Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor, in his recent book The Language Animal: The Full Shape of the Human Linguistic Capacity, argues for language as constitutive of reality. He writes: This "gives us a picture of language as making possible new purposes, new levels of behavior, new meanings, and hence is not explicable within a framework picture of human life conceived without language." (The "framework picture" of language holds that words enframe or capture reality as it is, rather than constitute reality.)

Language, writes Taylor, is constitutive of the reality, is essential to its being the kind of reality that it is. Thus, the language we speak is important. To understand a culture's language is to understand how that culture sees and experiences reality.

This applies to church culture; e.g., the Entertainment Church. Words like "program" and "stage" are lifted from the theater and employed in church. "Church" then becomes an event that is timed and predetermined. The controlling metaphor is Sunday morning is a production, and the terms that fit within this language game are utilized. When the words and phrases generated by the controlling metaphor become the deep, embedded social imaginary of the people, the people become an audience, and say things like, "The service went too long," "I didn't like the music," "I did like the music," "I like his preaching," and so on.

In transitioning from an Entertainment Church to a Presence-Driven Church the language must change. The vocabulary of the Presence-Driven Church is different from the Entertainment Church.

Instead of the word “success,” speak words like “connectedness” and “obedience.” If “success” is used at all, redefine it in terms of connectedness and obedience, not in terms of numbers, size, and finances.

In the Presence-Driven Church use...

“disciple” rather than “decider,"

“influence” rather than “numbers” (of attendees) and “size” (of the church budget and building), 

“abiding” before you use “doing,” 

“being instruments of righteousness” rather than “getting tools for ministry,” 

“discernment,” not “decision-making” (“What is God saying to us?” rather than “What do we think we should do?” and “Let’s vote on this”),

“God-seeking” rather than “brainstorming”), 

“listening” before you use “speaking,” and “relationship” (with God), not “rules of order.” 

Words create. (See my post "God's Commands are Authoritative Words That Have Illocutionary Force.")

(To be further developed in my book Leading the Presence-Driven Church.)

***

My new book is Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God.

"Passion Pursuit: Intimacy in Marriage"

Nicole Griffith

INTIMACY IN MARRIAGE GROUP TO BEGIN:

A group for married women, led by Nicole Griffith, will begin Wed., Nov. 3, 7 PM, at Redeemer in the Orange Room.

The group is called "Passion Pursuit: Intimacy in Marriage."

Child care will be provided.

This group will meet every other week.

Contact Nicole for more information - 734-344-8802.

The Pursuit of Happiness Is Making Us Miserable

Trees in my backyard

Happiness is a lousy goal but a wonderful byproduct.

American are so anxious, reasons British author Ruth Whippman, because they are pursuing happiness. See Whippman's America the Anxious: How the Pursuit of Happiness Is Creating a Nation of Nervous Wrecks, and a review in the nytimes of her book, "Why Are Americans So Anxious?" 

The problem with our pursuit of happiness is that it is making us miserable. Studies by psychologists at the University of California, Berkeley, show that "paradoxically, the more people valued and were encouraged to value happiness as a separate life goal, the less happy they were." (nytimes)

I agree, as I have written elsewhere.

What to do about this? My answer, and what I have been doing for forty-six years: Pursue Christ, and experience blessedness (Matthew 5:1-12)

***
***
My new book is Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God. 

I'm now writing my book Leading the Presence-Driven Church. 


johnpiippo@msn.com

Pastors - The Grass Is Not Greener on the Other Side (The Presence-Driven Church)

Groundbreaking at Redeemer

My friend Jim Hunter says that a leader is either "green and growing" or "ripe and rotting." University of Michigan professor Robert Quinn told us that organizations are either experiencing "deep change" or "slow death." 

This implies that pastors, as leaders, should not be thinking that the "grass is greener on the other side." As leaders, they should be themselves green and growing, involved in deep ongoing transformational change, and grow grass and bring change into the churches they have been called to serve.

Growing a beautiful lawn takes time. The soil must be worked up. Seeds of the the Kingdom, the Real Jesus, and Real Church must be planted in the hearts of the people. All this must be watered and nurtured. And we must trust God. Seeds that are growing secretly are out of our control.

In the meantime, the pastor must focus on his or her own connectedness to God. This will keep them in ongoing renewal and transformation. When the pastor and the leaders (which, in the church, are everyone) are green and growing, and changing deep in their hearts, grass is growing around them.

This will give the pastor staying power. 

Pastors - stay and grow where God has planted you. If you can't grow grass there, don't assume you can elsewhere.

***
I'm now writing my book Leading the Presence-Driven Church. 

My new book is Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God.

johnpiippo@msn.com

The Presence-Driven Church & the Lost Art of Worship

Chicago restaurant

You can't program or predict how the Holy Spirit will lead. On Sunday mornings, for example, we have some things in place: an opening worship song, we pray for our children, announcements (if any), praise & worship, preaching, then a time of ministry. But all this can change.

Recently, during the opening song, I was drawn to a person in our sanctuary. I did not know them, but sensed God's presence doing a good thing in them. I felt led to share this with them. At that point the worship meeting was changing before my eyes.

We begin with a simple, basic structure. That's OK and, I think, good. God has led us to prepare this way for his manifesting presence. But within this structure there is room for the Spirit to do his thing. And He does. Always, in our context.

In that sense we do not have an "order of service," or a "program" to be followed. The reason is, while God can and does pre-order what happens in our corporate gatherings, it is God, not me or a committee, doing the pre-ordering. We can't order or program God.

A.W. Tozer looked at the "Program-Driven Church" in dismay. Tozer wrote:

"Thanks to our splendid Bible societies and to other effective agencies for the dissemination of the Word, there are today many millions of people who hold ‘right opinions,’ probably more than ever before in the history of the Church.Yet I wonder if there was ever a time when true spiritual worship was at a lower ebb. To great sections of the Church the art of worship has been lost entirely, and in its place has come that strange and foreign thing called the ‘program.’ This word has been borrowed from the stage and applied with sad wisdom to the type of public service which now passes for worship among us." (A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God, Kindle Locations 46-51)

Tozer wrote that in 1948.

Needed: some modern-day Tozers.

Oregon Church Bans Overweight People from Their Worship Team

See "Church Apologizes, Asks Forgiveness for Banning Fat People from Worship Team."

This is another example of the non-Jesus, Performance-Driven Church. In Performance-Driven churches appearance is more important than God's presence. (The significance of "the stage," the ambiance, the mood, etc. etc.)

How absurd to think God won't show up unless we shed those extra pounds and look good. And by the word "good" here is meant, according to current cultural valuations. Because "looking good" varies. My "looking good" in the early 70s meant paisley bell bottoms. 

(Thanks, Lora, for the heads-up on this.)

Pastors - Better a Slave of Christ than a Slave of Culture

Uh-oh! Someone caught Linda and I having fun in Times Square on Monday.

There was once a woman in my church who saw me on a Wednesday afternoon in the grocery store. Uh-oh, I thought. I've been caught shopping for food! She had an angry sneer on her face. She hustled out of the store and immediately reported me to one of our church's Elders. "I saw John in the grocery store in the middle of the day when he should have been in his office at the church building!" She didn't have a clue.

Most people in the church who write job descriptions for the pastor have never read and immersed themselves in the Scriptures. They don't understand what "pastor" is really about, and write the job out in terms of this world's power structures, or from a secular business model. They don't have a clue. Inadvertently, these job descriptions shape us into this world's mold.

I don't have a formal job description (yay and hallelujah!). Yes, I do things, and these doings come out of my being-with-Jesus. Some of the things I do are... 

• I pray.
• I study.
• I preach.
• I teach classes in our church.
• I meet with people in our church family and disciple them.
• I (along with Linda) help people in our church family.

I do these things within my church family. I don't shepherd other flocks. (This is different from speaking and teaching at different churches, which I am called to do and love to do. But I am not the shepherd of those congregations.)

Eugene Peterson writes:

"Pastors have an extremely difficult job to do, and it's no surprise that so many are discouraged and ready to quit. Though it may not seem like it at face value, pastors are persecuted in North America, and I don't believe I am exaggerating when I say that it is far worse than in seemingly more hostile countries. Our culture doesn't lock us up; it simply and nicely castrates us, neuters us, and replaces our vital parts with a nice and smiling face. And then we are imprisoned in a mesh of "necessities" that keep us from being pastors." (Peterson and Marva J. Dawn, The Unnecessary Pastor: Rediscovering the Call, Kindle Locations 2175-2178)

Some of these "necessities" are laid on emasculated pastors by church boards (not my leaders!). These things are burning pastors out.

Peterson's mission is to set pastors free from these pseudo-necessities. Because "being a slave of Christ is far better than being a slave of culture." (Ib.)

Narcissistic Pastors and Christian Leaders Refuse to Accept Where God Has Called Them

Times Square, New York City

Years ago (1979) I read Christopher Lasch's The Culture of Narcissism. Lasch said that bureaucratic structures fuel narcissism. He writes:

“The narcissist has many traits that make for success in bureaucratic institutions, which put a premium on the manipulation of interpersonal relations, discourage the formation of deep personal attachments, and at the same time provide the narcissist with the approval he needs in order to validate his self-esteem. Although he may resort to therapies that promise to give meaning to life and to overcome his sense of emptiness, in his professional career the narcissist often enjoys considerable success." (Quoted in Ruth Haley Barton, Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership: Seeking God in the Crucible of Ministry, pp. 110-111)

Ruth Haley Barton says our churches function like bureaucracies, and therefore "it is not surprising that clergy are sometimes rewarded, not punished for their narcissistic behaviors." (Op. cit., 111) Barton writes: "There is a lot of narcissism among leaders—even Christian ones—and the truth is that we are driven by our grandiosity more than we think." (Ib., 110)

Narcissistic pastors and leaders view themselves as worthy of deserving something "greater" than where they are. Barton writes:

"One of the ways to recognize narcissism within ourselves is to notice when we have not yet accepted the field, the sphere of action, that God has given us—the opportunities and the limits of life in this body, this community, this set of relationships, this financial situation, this place where we have been called by God to serve. Narcissistic leaders are always looking longingly at someone else’s field as somehow being more worthy or more indicative of success. They are always pushing the limits of their situation rather than lovingly working the field they have been given." (Ib., 111; emphasis mine)

Over the years God has purged me of many narcissistic attitudes and behaviors. I don't know if it's all out of me yet. But I do know that, in my extended praying times over the years, God has labored to defeat the self-idolatry that constructs a throne in my mind.

I am a pastor at Redeemer Church in Monroe, Michigan. This is my twenty-fifth year here. How thankful I am for this. This is good news for me! As Barton says, "The good news is that there is something deeply spiritual about living and working within our God-ordained limits—or to put it another way, living fully and acceptingly within our own set of realities." (Ib., 112)

Presence-Driven Pastors Don't View People Functionally

Linda and I were in Times Square on Monday

Program-Driven Churches and Entertainment-Driven Churches view people more according to their doing, not their being. They are more concerned with using people than with spiritually discipling them. For example, she is seen as a "teacher," and he is seen as a "drummer." These kind of churches tend to see a person as "another warm body" to fill a slot in the Kids Ministry or on the Worship Team. 

This is bad. Eugene Peterson writes:

"If we identify people functionally, they turn into functions. We need to know our people for who they are, not for what they can do. Building community is not an organizational task; it is relational - understanding who people are in relation to one another and to Jesus and working on the virtues and habits that release love and forgiveness and hope and grace." (Eugene Peterson, The Unnecessary Pastor: Rediscovering the Call, Kindle Locations 2376-2378)

In the Presence-Driven Church relationship is more important than function. Presence-Driven pastors are concerned to deepen peoples' relationship with God (abiding in Christ) and with one another (community).

***
I'm now writing my book Leading the Presence-Driven Church. (I signed with Thomas Nelson/Westbow yesterday.)

My new book is Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God.

johnpiippo@msn.com

God Doesn't Mind Long Church Services (The Presence-Driven Church)

My back yard

Linda and I are in Queens, New York City, this morning. We just spent two days at the 23inMe Conference, where I was sharing my materials on spiritual formation, abiding in Christ, and "Leading the Presence-Driven Church."

This morning I'll preach on The Presence-Driven Church at Hollis Presbyterian Church in Queens.

Redeemer, my church family, is a Presence-Driven Church. Not all churches are. Some churches are McChurches, where high priority is placed on getting people in and out because, hey, a lot of people don't like long services.

God, on the other hand, doesn't mind long services. God doesn't mind being worshiped for looooong periods of time. Actually, from God's POV, he is willing to be worshiped for an eternity.

McChurches suppress the Vertical. James McDonald writes:

“Church leaders raised on rationalism lead ministries where the supernatural, the Vertical, is suppressed and where God Himself is at best an observer and certainly seldom, if ever, an obvious participant in church.” (MacDonald, Vertical Church: What Every Heart Longs for. What Every Church Can Be., Kindle Locations 533-535)

A pastor who suppresses God? Been there, done that, myself. It is the worst place to be, pastorally. Remember that Jesus shut down the Temple because the religious temple leaders "shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to." (Matthew 23:13)

This whole thing called "church" is really about God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Not just theoretically, but experientially. What people need is Emmanuel, God with us, existentially. And not just for a few pre-set, programmed moments.

The Horizontal Church is the godless church; Vertical Church is the Presence-Driven Church. It's all about "entering in." The word is Christ in you, not as some epistemically distant object. When the real thing happens, and people enter in, it is common for them to stop looking at their watches, because this is precisely what they came for. These are the people of God who are panting, like deer in a waterless world, for transcendence.

John Calvin, who is often inaccurately portrayed as being spiritually cold and aloof (don't mistake Calvinists for Calvin himself), had as his emblem a flaming heart with an outstretched hand. On it was the motto: Cor meum quasi immolatum tibi offero, Domine ("I give my flaming heart to you, Lord, eagerly and honestly.") Calvin had these words carved over the pulpit in Geneva where he preached. Alvin Plantinga writes:

Of the Holy Spirit, [Calvin] says that “persistently boiling away and burning up our vicious and inordinate desires, he enflames our hearts with the love of God and with zealous devotion.” The Institutes [written by Calvin] are throughout aimed at the practice of the Christian life (which essentially involves the affections), not at theological theory; the latter enters only in the service of the former. (Plantinga,Knowledge and Christian Belief, p. 72)

Jonathan Edwards wrote:

"There is a distinction to be made between a mere notional understanding, wherein the mind only beholds things in the exercise of a speculative faculty; and the sense of the heart, wherein the mind doesn’t only speculate and behold, but relishes and feels. That sort of knowledge, by which a man has a sensible perception of amiableness and loathsomeness, or of sweetness and nauseousness, is not just the same sort of knowledge with that, by which he knows what a triangle is, and what a square is. The one is mere speculative knowledge; the other sensible knowledge, in which more than the mere intellect is concerned; the heart is the proper subject of it, or the soul as a being that not only beholds, but has inclination, and is pleased or displeased." (Quoted in Ib., p. 73.)

There is a great longing in the human heart for something more. For something beyond us, that will complete us. We see this in the Psalms.

My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the Lord;

my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.

Psalm 84:1

 O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; 

my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you. 

Psalm 63: 1 

 One thing have I desired of the Lord, that I will seek after; 

that I . . . behold the beauty of the Lord. 

Psalm 27: 4

As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. 

My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. 

Ps. 42: 1-2

 I open my mouth and pant, longing for your commands. 

Ps. 119: 131

Plantinga writes:

"This love for God isn’t like, say, an inclination to spend the afternoon organizing your stamp collection. It is longing, filled with desire and yearning; and it is physical as well as spiritual: “my body longs for you, my soul pants for you.” Although eros is broader than sexual love, it is analogous to the latter. There is a powerful desire for union with God, the oneness Christ refers to in John 17." (Ib., 75)

In The Weight of Glory C.S. Lewis wrote:

“We do not want merely to see beauty, though, God knows, even that is bounty enough. We want something else which can hardly be put into words — to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it.” (Lewis, The Weight of Glory, p. 8)

Presence-Driven leaders understand this and cultivate this, in themselves and in their people. Presence-Driven leaders have met Emmanuel, and introduce others to him. Presence-Driven Churches are slow-cooking, simmering crock pots; McChurches are microwaves. Just as food always tastes better slow cooked, people who are panting for the presence and experiential knowledge of God have staying power, because they understand that real relationships take time. (See, e.g., Slow Church: Cultivating Community in the Patient Way of Jesus.)

For those of us who are yearning, fainting, thirsting, and panting for something more than the McKingdom, knowing about God is not enough; knowing God is. When God's presence manifests, we are not wanting to leave, and our God is wanting to stay.

***
I'm now writing my book Leading the Presence-Driven Church. In the P-DC the "services" are not planned out to the minute. That's the Program-Driven Church, even the Entertainment-Driven Church. These latter do not allow for unexpected moves of God. The goal is to entertain, and then get the people in and out. The Welsh Revival could break out in a Microwave Church and it would be quenched, seen as a hindrance, because "the service is going on too long."

My new book is: Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God.

A Move of God at the 23inMe Conference (The Presence-Driven Church)

Star Lake Conference Center outside of New York City

Linda and I are at a beautiful conference center outside of New York City today. We arrived Thursday. The conference is called 23inMe, meaning, Psalm 23, inside of me.

We've met many new friends. And, God really gave us a great day yesterday.

After breakfast I explained my Psalm 23 exercise to the attendees, and sent them out to pray for forty-five minutes. The fall morning was stunning, and we were all talking about the glory of God reflected in his creation.

When the praying people returned to our class session I broke them into groups of four to five, and there was sharing around the question: What did God say to you while you were praying? The sharing was profound and electric. God was doing great things in us!

Last evening I gave my presentation "Leading the Presence-Driven Church." Plus, there was more sharing around what God was doing. And some beautiful worship led by a very gifted pianist/vocalist.

The highlight for me was a beautiful, non-programmable move of God. This illustrated my teaching in ways I could never have planned. God began doing inner healing in people, especially in one pastor. Linda and I saw the people do something we've never seen in all our years of ministry. This woman was restored spiritually. She, and we, will never be the same again.

***

I'm now writing my book Leading the Presence-Driven Church. In the P-DC the "services" are not planned out to the minute. That's the Program-Driven Church, even the Entertainment-Driven Church. These latter do not allow for unexpected moves of God. The goal is to entertain, and then get the people in and out. The Welsh Revival could break out in an Entertainment Church and it would be quenched, even seen as a hindrance, perhaps because "the service went on too long."

My new book is: Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God.

Utlimately, Face-to-Face Is Superior to Facebook and Texting

Do not try to resolve conflicts via texting, Facebook, or email. Face-to face is better. 

The Internet is a wonderful tool for research, discovery, and communication. It is, however, a profoundly inferior tool for relationship building.

Here are some reasons why.

An Internet relationship with someone is devoid of nonverbal cues. We can't "read" a person the way we do when we are physically with them. We gain an enormous amount of information about someone when in their presence, observing their face, hearing their tone of voice, the little laugh they give when they finished that phrase, and so on. The following textual clues don't come close to sufficing - :); LOL; *sigh; etc. Yes, there are many emojis to choose from, but an emoji remains inferior to a face-to-face emotion. The bazillion metamessages that are there when face to face are missing on Facebook, chat rooms, e-mail, etc.

In Internet communication it is easy to misinterpret meaning. It's hard enough when face to face; non-physical communication compounds the difficulties multifold. It becomes the equivalent of trying to interpret ancient manuscripts. (When they wrote this and added these three emojis do you think they meant...   ???)

An Internet-only relationship allows people to create a fantasy self. For example, I knew of a local chat-room "philosopher" who refused to meet face to face with his interlocutors, who saw him as "brilliant" based on his emojis. He once challenged me in his chat room. I responded by sending him an emoji (not really), and then writing, "Let's get together, face to face, and discuss." He refused, because that would blow his cover.

There's a lot of persona-creating in Internet relationships. On the Internet you can tell people whatever you want and people have no way of telling whether or not you are speaking the truth. For example - I tell someone "My name is John, but people call me 'Lebron' because I'm 6'8" and an intimidating force on the basketball court," but in reality I am barely 5'10", barely made my high school b-ball team (in the 11th grade only), and am 67 years old. (That's true, but how would you know?)

In cyber-meetings we control what we want other people to know. For example, here's a photo of me, taken yesterday, in my office at church - note the books behind me, to include one I have written:

In physical, real-world relationships, we have many cues and tools to help us distinguish whether a person is being honest or not. The Internet takes these away from us; in cyber-relationships these tools are not at our disposal. We are handicapped in making good judgments about people.

Internet relationships are not truly intimate. I like the idea of "intimacy" as, "Into me, see." That cannot happen on the Internet. True intimacy is cultivated over much time and space and intepersonal real-world contact. Obviously. An "Internet marriage" would be absurd and dissatisfying. There canot be true intimacy without physical connection.

Ending cyber-relationships is easy. One simply clicks the "unfriend" button. The ease with which this is done signifies the shallowness of the net-relationship. Internet relationships require no responsibility. Click the mouse, and it's over.

Missionary Dating Is a Clash of Civilizations

Linda and me, in Boston

The best marriages I have seen have two people sharing the core beliefs of the same worldview. The husband and wife can disagree about whether or not to get hot peppers on the pizza. But if they disagree about the meaning and purpose of their lives life will be hard. Two ships will be sailing in different directions. 

For the real (not nominal) Christian the foundational idea is: follow after Jesus as his disciple. Linda and I may disagree about whether the winter snow is beautiful, but we do not disagree about the absolute importance of following Jesus. In this we are on board the same ship. Marriages that work have two people on the same profound ship, sailing in one direction.

If you date and marry someone who has similar tastes in food and music and cars but has a different worldview, then you will fundamentally oppose each other in regard to life's most important things. Therefore, do not do this. Do not be "unequally yoked." Yes, this is a biblical idea. It is also common sense. If his great love is the ocean and her's is the land, they will constantly be waving farewell to one another.

"Missionary dating" won't solve this. Missionary dating is when a follower of Jesus dates a non-follower or nominal follower out of their own need for relationship, in hopes that the non-follower or nominal follower with become a real follower like they are. This never works. OK, maybe it's worked once or twice. I'm trying to think of an example, and am coming up empty.

Missionary dating is a "clash of civilizations." If missionary dating grows into marriage the underlying ideological distinctions remain. Marriage doesn't change this. Ultimately, worldviews mix like oil and water. 

I know there are exceptions to this. My experience is, however, that this is normal. So, don't flirt to convert. If you haven't reduced yourself to this, take a moment to give thanks to God for not being in the excruciating loneliness of a lifetime living with someone who doesn't share the greatest passion of your heart.

Transforming Our Trauma Into Triumph - 2016 Pastors and Leaders Retreat (Plus: Preaching in Queens, NYC, Oct. 16)

I'll be speaking and teaching on The Presence-Driven Church at this conference. Plus - I will be preaching at Hollis Presbyterian Church in Queens, NYC - Sunday morning, October 16.  2016 Pastors and Leaders Retreat Join Civil Rights Activist Rev. Dr. C. Vernon Mason, this year's honoree, Rev. Dr. Johnny Youngblood, Bishop Terri Smith, Dr. Celina Shemo, Veronica Holcomb, Garnet Walters, Dr. Rhon Deluz, Dr. John Piippo, Dr. Dean Trulear and many more as we address these critical issues. DON'T MISS OUT! Register NOW!! Space is LIMITED!! 12 (TWELVE) DAYS REMAINING!! Click Here to Register Now! Healing Dialogues Ministries  |  Rev. Carol Dougherty-Steptoe  |  revsteptoe@healingdialogues.org STAY CONNECTED:

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My new book is Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God.