Leaving the 99 to find my iPhone

by admin on April 30, 2012

Lost iPhone Reward

Did you ever lose something really important and really freak out until you found it? I’m talking about a serious melt down similar to what I experience every time I misplace my iPhone. I’m not talking about the instant palpitations I get when I put my hand in my pocket and it’s missing and I find it 30 seconds later on a different pocket. I’m talking about pulling the sofa cushions off and dumping drawers upside down in a frenzied, cat burglar style rampage of my house experience when I really can’t find it. Fortunately it is attached to my person 24/7 so that rarely happens. But when it does, my life lurches to a halt, because everything I do in life is in that device. A little over-the-edge? Maybe. Perhaps I have a little iPhone-OCD going on. After all, you say, it’s just a phone, right?

NO IT’S NOT! IT’S MY LIFE!!

Sorry for that outburst. I’m OK now. I just had a flashback to the time I was leading a trip to Africa and as soon as I got 21 people and 48 bags of supplies across the world and settled into their bungalows I reached into my pocket and it was gone! Palpitations turned to sheer terror and after a few minutes of turning my pockets inside out I was on a harrowing ride across rutted, dirt roads to the airport where I had to bribe the guards (I’m not proud of that but it was for my phone!) just to let me search the baggage area for my precious, darling device. As I searched I started imagining what the next 10 days would be like with no way to communicate with my team members or the outside world. No phone. No internet. No texting. No emails. Nothing! Life would lose its meaning. I didn’t know how life was going to go on. After an hour or so of questioning how a loving God could allow such suffering in life as losing my phone (kidding), I found it and life was good again. But the memory of the terror I felt is still stressful (not kidding).

Bottom line: losing something you love really, really sucks.

So, then I came across this old worn out parable of the lost sheep. I say it’s old and worn out not because it is, but because I’ve been a Christian so long sometimes you hear the same old stories and you think, “Lost it, found it, blah, blah blah” and it’s you that is worn out not the story. But anyway I came across Luke 15:1-7 in my daily reading and suddenly it was alive and new:

“Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, ‘This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.’”

So, Christ was talking to self-righteous people (like me).

“Then Jesus told them this parable: “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them.”

I’m sure I have at least a hundred electric devices…

“Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it?”

Yes! Especially if he’s trying to survive in Africa!

“And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’”

Ok, I didn’t put it on my shoulders or hold a party, but I definitely did the happy dance. I jumped up and down shouting “Praise Gods!” and pumping my fists in the air. All stuff that’s pretty unusual for my usually refined controlled self. And especially surrounded by Africans thinking I was some crazy white guy!

“I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents…”

I know it might seem stupid because it was just my beloved phone and not a beloved lost sinner, but in a weird, twisted, electronic-addicted way, I understand that rejoicing a little better now, because I really value my phone and missed it tremendously and truly rejoiced when it was found.

“… than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.”

Hmmm…I had to rethink the 99 here, too. After all, I did basically run out on my entire team and rush back to the airport, not really caring what happened to them, at least for the moment, as long as I got my phone. And that’s pretty much what Jesus does. He likes the 99 but leaves them for the one. That has always sounded mean or neglectful to me. “How could God forsake 99 faithful, good, righteous people like me and stop the whole progress of the flock and go after the one,” I remember thinking.

And honestly, I kinda like hangin’ out at church with the people who don’t have to repent. And not the self-righteous ones that think they don’t have to repent, which is who we usually assume Christ was talking about. But I like hanging around the ones who don’t have to repent because they already have. They’re in the fold. They’re chilling with the flock, enjoying green pastures and still waters and all that. They’re nice clean, well shepherded livestock.

But I don’t think that way anymore. Now I get it. God gets really excited about finding something – someone – that he really cherishes. Probably at least as much as I was excited about finding my iPhone! And it’s not unfair to the 99, either. Remember, each one of those 99 got to be the one that Christ chased after at one time. Now they’re in the flock and he’s chasing another. And we have to be excited about chasing that one, also. Because even though we’re in the 99 now, we were the lost one once.

We have to be that excited about getting out of the nice comfy sheepfold and tracking down the lost. It’s dirty and scary out there amongst the cliffs and ravines that the lost sheep fall into but that’s our calling. As a missional church our goal is to leave the church building and get out into the world to find the lost. And if we want to be like Christ we really should be as excited about finding them as I was about finding my phone. That’s a really high standard. I’m not always as excited about finding dirty, smelly broken people as I was about finding my phone, but I need to be. And I’m determined to be and I challenge you to be so excited about the lost that you’ll leave your comfy church friends behind in a moment’s notice to rush after the One.

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Greetings From Clark Gerhart!

by admin on April 27, 2011

Calling All Volunteers

Recently our church ministry team has been discussing the ministry at EBC-Hazleton. We review what’s good and what’s not so good in an attempt to keep more things in the good column and less in the not so good.  We talk about supplies and goals and all sorts of important things, but more than any other comments the one most consistently made is a cry for more volunteers. It’s coming from every ministry team leader. I love what is going on at EBC but it could be so much more awesome if we just had more people joining the team and helping out. I’ve been dreaming of the day we have a big church and plentiful volunteers!

But then it happened…

I re-read an article given to us by Pastor Scott called Leadership And Church Size Dynamics: How Strategy Changes With Growth, by  Dr. Timothy Keller . The article talks about how churches make transitions from smaller to larger congregations and one of the sections was on volunteers. “Great!” I thought, “This will help us find out how to get volunteers!” Actually, if I am going to be honest, and I guess I might as well be (wink), I was looking to see how we could become a big church as soon as possible so we could then have the volunteers we need. And fortunately the article spoke right to our problem and said…Oh, wait a minute…shoot! It said…

BIG CHURCHES HAVE A HARDER TIME GETTING VOLUNTEERS!

Crap! There went my whole plan!

As it turns out, there are two reasons:

  1. In large churches everyone feels there are lots of other people to do the work so they don’t volunteer. It’s the same thing that happens when the left fielder, center fielder, short stop and third baseman all run to catch a fly ball and then stand their looking at each other as the ball hits the grass between them. Everyone thinks someone else is doing it. In church, we drop the ball too when we all stand around saying, “Well, I thought he had it!”
  2. Also, most people don’t know each other in large churches, which means when people are asked to help out it is usually coming from someone they don’t know and it is much easier to say “no” to someone you don’t know. Consider the kitchen at work with the stupid sign that says, “Clean up. Your Mom doesn’t work here,” versus your Mom’s kitchen with your Mom standing there with the wooden spoon in her hand tapping against her palm. Which is more motivating? Yeah, I thought you’d get that one. So, being the church with the stupid sign asking for volunteers doesn’t work very well.

So, we are in a bit of a quandary. We need more people to do ministry, so we can get more people to do ministry. It’s almost like getting turned down on a job application because you don’t have enough experience. Where do we get the experience, or in this case volunteers, to get started? Here’s a few suggestions:

Step 1. Pray.

 It sounds so cliché I almost hesitate to write it here but I am resisting my natural urge to be a Doer first and I am starting with prayer first. I have made the personal commitment to pray every weekday for the ministry that goes on at EBC and so far I have accomplished a solid 3 out of 5 days (Not 5 for 5 yet, sorry, but I said I was being honest.) I’d like each of the ministry team leaders to commit to praying for their area of ministry and that God would draw out the workers to the harvest as in  Luke 10:2 “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.” God told us His answer to our dilemma was prayer, so why rush to do something else? Let’s rush to prayer.

 Step 2. Make the Ask.

It is amazing what people will do if they are just asked. Many volunteers and donors never offer their time or resources because we are simply too timid to ask. Identify people that might be right for your area of ministry and simply ask them. Make sure they have some indication of gifting in your area of ministry. We don’t want to coerce anyone into doing something they are not ready for. That will fail in the end. Ask them because you, the church and God will benefit from their service. But also ask them to volunteer because it will benefit them.  You don’t have to feel like you’re selling someone a pyramid sales scheme. Getting involved in ministry is the best way to grow spiritually and it really will benefit the people you ask to get involved. So ask.

 Step 3. Lead your Ministry Passionately. 

It has been said that a leader is someone who leads so passionately that others naturally follow. If you are excited about ministry others will be too. Put your entire mind, soul and strength into your service to the Lord (Mark 12:30) and it will be contagious. You will actually do less asking as people spontaneously come along to be part of something that inspires passion.

So we’re throwing out the old plan of getting volunteers by waiting until we’re a bigger church and we’re replacing it with a new plan. If you’re already in ministry, ask God to call people and then keep your eyes open for them to arrive, and when they do simply ask them to help. In the meantime keep serving passionately! If you are not involved in ministry, be ready for God to stir your heart toward an area of service. He’s going to do it, we’re praying, so you might as well not resist! When you feel His nudge inside, or outside when a ministry leader asks for your help, respond by saying “Yes!” and watch what God will do in your life spiritually  and in other’s lives through you.

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Hope for all of us Hell’s Angels

April 5, 2011

A Statement of Faith  by Clark Gerhart *** Growing up as a Christian I was always amazed at people who had what I liked to call a Hell’s Angels’ testimony. You didn’t have to actually be a member of a motorcycle gang to have a Hell’s Angel testimony. Some were drug addicts, prostitutes or criminals. [...]

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