Yesterday began another season of Track and Field. For me that means getting the great opportunity to work within my passion. Not that working in the realm of "church" isn't working within my passion, but working with young athletes in the sport that is my first love is always an amazing experience for me. The sights, the sounds, the atmosphere of the track makes my brain create a rush of endorphins which in turn gives this small town pastor/coach a sense of well being and purpose.
So today, after demonstrating a bunch of jumping drills, my legs and gluts are sore.. . but it is the best feeling in the world- that soreness that comes from working the body. It is the best feeling in the world to be teaching and coaching the sport that I competed in myself for over 10 years.
In the church, why do we fill ministry positions with people who have no interest or calling to serve in those capacities? We are simply asking for burn out, frustration and anxiety. When we think about how the Holy Spirit calls us into ministry through the waters of baptism, that means the Spirit calls us to work within our passions and giftedness. (Okay God did call Moses to speak and he wasn't such a good orator but God gave him the words eventually!) What I mean is that as the church we might want to help folks discover their giftedness and point them in the direction of serving in those areas. Along the way they will find other places that they are gifted, their confidence will grow, they will be more willing to take a risk at something new but it is a process that I think needs to start in their area of comfort. If we thrust them into an uncomfortable position then we risk eliciting emotions of fear, insecurity, even anger. (They might even get so frustrated that they disappear for awhile!)
There is something for everyone to "do" in this ministry of the kingdom. How can we help disciples embrace their "discipleship" in meaningful ways? When the baptized are working within their passions they are sensing a greater fulfillment, a deeper sense of purpose and meaning. And I for one believe that with that spark will come greater opportunities to serve that they never imagined they would be engaged in! But the path of discipleship is trod one step at a time and that first step is often the most difficult one to take.
So what is your passion?
Cooking? Then help in the kitchen with the next meal or figure out a creative way to use your cooking skills to serve the kingdom.
Handy-man kinda stuff? There are many possibilities here for service- inside and outside of the church building. (Our goal is to get outside you know.)
A sport? Do something similar to what I do. . . coach your kid's team and do it in the name of Christ Jesus.
An art or craft? Create something that helps others connect to the heart of God.
Get the idea? But first, your passion has to be uncovered! Once you identify it, then it's time to share and we do this in the name of and for the sake of our Lord and Savior!
Image credit: joecrazy.com
Showing posts with label Discipleship. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Discipleship. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Walking in His Footsteps
As we went along I found myself walking in the footsteps of the person who had traveled the trail hours earlier. I thought to myself who this person must have been about my height because my shoes fit perfectly in the tracks and it was a comfortable stride from step to step. Whose footsteps were these? Any shorter or longer and it would have been uncomfortable for me to match. I will never know whose those tracks belonged to, most likely someone I pass out there often, someone I nod and greet as they turn back and I continue on. It doesn't really matter I suppose. . . what matters is that it got me to thinking about whose footsteps we follow on this Christian life.
Jesus has paved the way for us, he has gone before us on this journey of faith and life. He has walked, worked, taught, nurtured, loved, lost, been betrayed, been left alone, been anointed, been fed, has fed others. . . and he has left his tracks for us to match stride for stride like the ones I walked in the fallen snow. For each one of us, no matter how long or short our gait is, no matter how big or small our feet are, the path is mapped out perfectly for each of us according to who we are and whose we are. When we get in a groove, a rhythm, of following Christ we may not even realize that we are walking in his footsteps but as our lives are transformed by his love we begin to do what he did. . . we are drawn to caring for others, to looking out for our neighbors and friends and yes, even strangers.
Jesus promised (Matthew 28) to always be with us, even to the end of the age. Do you see his footsteps in front of you? Do you see the prints he has made in your life? You are safe walking this way. . . well as safe as any disciple who radically and obediently follows the One who was crucified and rose again! The promise really wasn't about safety and security, was it? It was about companionship, partnership and a never ending, incredible love. You are loved! Now be bold and walk in His footsteps!
Thanks be to God!
amy
lmage credit: loveforliana.com
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
The depth of discipleship
Yesterday I was grocery shopping and ran into a fellow who plays music at two different churches in the area. (The grocery store is such a great place to chat with people-- some very real and meaningful conversations happen in the mustard aisle!)
Just looking at his face I could see the Holy Spirit radiating through him. His love for Christ was evident in his passion for leading worship. . . he spoke of God's call on his life, an undeniable call that had been emerging from the depths of a difficult period in his life. . . he reveled in the mystery of how life turns out for us vocationally, sending us places we never dreamed we would be.
It is truly amazing and a wonderful blessing to stop and chat with someone who simply radiates the love of Christ from their pores. The joy of the Lord exudes from their very being and you can't help but feel warm inside just looking at them. When I see a person like this and have the great opportunity to engage with them in conversation about faith and life, the word "disciple" continually runs through my thoughts as we speak. So, Daniel Patrick Ryan, musician, artist, calligrapher, re-enacter of John Muir and John Appleseed, lover of Christ, Irish by blood, saved by baptism-- this one's for you, sir.
Discipleship is a way of life. Being a disciple of Christ reveals the fullness of who we are and it is lived out in grocery store shopping, worship, work, play and everywhere else that we find ourselves. It is not simply a nod at the One who hanged on the cross, saying in passing, "Yes I believe" or checking the box on a form that asks about religion, "Christian," and then failing to live that out in any meaningful or even intentional way. It is ALL about intentionality. A person cannot say "I believe" and then put that so-called faith on a shelf for safe keeping, taking it down only when it is convenient or PC. Faith is to be lived. Faith is to be active and alive and prominent in our lives. Faith is not relying cheaply on God's willingness to forgive, it is living at the foot of the cross, begging for forgiveness daily, loving and serving Jesus by loving and serving the neighbor, listening for the call on our lives, giving generously of our resources and more.
It is obvious.
It is oozes out.
It cannot be contained.
Something other than that is not discipleship. I don't know what it is. . . but I know what it isn't.
I have written and preached a lot about our Christian vocation and how God calls each of us to share our gifts and talents with the world. I rely on Luther here who lifts up ordinary, everyday work as being holy. From the trash collector to the brain surgeon and every job imaginable, to work is to do honor to God, to work is to fulfill a calling on our lives, to work is to do something holy. But it occurs to me that I haven't gone deep enough on this vocation thing. . . it's not JUST about working or serving (esp. if you work in the service industry) but it is about an awareness of what you are doing and how that serves the kingdom. You see, I used to work in toxicology research (histology to be exact) and I never, ever realized that what I was doing was useful or holy in any way. It was a job and I needed a job. Now I can see that it was useful and helpful for the kingdom. Drugs had to go to market to cure illness, to save lives and those pharmaceuticals had to be tested and approved for use. I had no clue as to how my Christian life played a part in that vocation. The daily dissecting of lab animals, the making and staining of slides for the pathologist to read had no meaning for my life. But it could have!! If I had had an awareness of it, an intentionality about it!! Instead off I went to seminary looking for some way to meaningfully serve the Lord that I love.
It is holy to serve and to work in a vocation but when we do it with intentionality, with sacrifice, with discipline for the sake of others and in the name of Christ THEN we are living the life of discipleship. When we bring in our faith in the incarnate Word of God THEN we are living the life of a disciple. We are no longer slogging away at something simply to be employed or to put food on the table- which is of course noble to be sure-- but we are recognizing God's call on our lives and we are living it out with intentionality! That's discipleship! And sometimes we hear God calling us to do something else for the sake of the Kingdom! That's part of the journey too but we have to be listening! And with intentionality comes a greater ability to listen. When the call comes we put our fishing nets down, or lab equipment as the case may be, and we follow Jesus. And it costs us something. Discipleship costs us something, but we get so much more out of it than we put into it! We get a living, breathing, changing, deepening, loving relationship with our Lord Jesus.
Through our baptism we are called to be disciples. We cannot be disciples without being obedient to Christ and being disciplined in that calling. Awareness is key. And awareness can create an intentionality that was not there before and soon everything we do becomes part of obeying Christ in this discipleship journey. We cannot say we believe in Christ's saving love and sit around doing nothing with our lives. . . we have to do what disciples do-- follow, obey, live fully. This is what grace is all about! Recognizing God's activity in our lives and then wanting to please the One who loves us most. This is not about shoulds and have tos-- it is about get tos!!
Allow me to offer a metaphor about this from my world of coaching track and field. Sometimes I will have an athlete on my team who might be less than motivated to work hard or to win. I should say, they like to win for sure, but putting in the hard work is less than desirable. When they lose a big race they shrug it off saying, "I don't care, it didn't matter to me anyway!" On the contrary, the dedicated athlete who is the last to leave practice everyday, who desires to be coached and critiqued so they can become better goes into that big race ready to give it their all. If they fail to win they may be disappointed that they lost but they are still happy with their performance because they gave it all they had! They may even have a new PR out of it and that means a lot. They never dismiss the race or the competition and say, "It was no big deal, I didn't care about it anyway."
Discipleship has its own rewards-- a closer relationship to the Good Shepherd. But there is cheap discipleship and there is costly discipleship. We are not saved by our works, however, we despise the gospel if we fail to take our walk with Christ seriously. It is something completely different when an athlete who has worked their proverbial tail off to get better loses by a lean at the tape and when a lazy athlete loses and says it doesn't matter. We deceive ourselves when we think that the life of discipleship doesn't matter and we fail to truly know what grace is all about! Only when we give it 110% can we truly embrace what Christ has done for us- otherwise it doesn't really matter all that much because we have not felt the deep need for salvation. Discipleship is more than mere words-- it is a deep abiding commitment to the One who saved us by dying on the cross, whom God raised from the dead so that we might have new life. It cost Jesus big time. And it ain't cheap for us either!
Image credit: pviactrack.com
Just looking at his face I could see the Holy Spirit radiating through him. His love for Christ was evident in his passion for leading worship. . . he spoke of God's call on his life, an undeniable call that had been emerging from the depths of a difficult period in his life. . . he reveled in the mystery of how life turns out for us vocationally, sending us places we never dreamed we would be.
It is truly amazing and a wonderful blessing to stop and chat with someone who simply radiates the love of Christ from their pores. The joy of the Lord exudes from their very being and you can't help but feel warm inside just looking at them. When I see a person like this and have the great opportunity to engage with them in conversation about faith and life, the word "disciple" continually runs through my thoughts as we speak. So, Daniel Patrick Ryan, musician, artist, calligrapher, re-enacter of John Muir and John Appleseed, lover of Christ, Irish by blood, saved by baptism-- this one's for you, sir.
Discipleship is a way of life. Being a disciple of Christ reveals the fullness of who we are and it is lived out in grocery store shopping, worship, work, play and everywhere else that we find ourselves. It is not simply a nod at the One who hanged on the cross, saying in passing, "Yes I believe" or checking the box on a form that asks about religion, "Christian," and then failing to live that out in any meaningful or even intentional way. It is ALL about intentionality. A person cannot say "I believe" and then put that so-called faith on a shelf for safe keeping, taking it down only when it is convenient or PC. Faith is to be lived. Faith is to be active and alive and prominent in our lives. Faith is not relying cheaply on God's willingness to forgive, it is living at the foot of the cross, begging for forgiveness daily, loving and serving Jesus by loving and serving the neighbor, listening for the call on our lives, giving generously of our resources and more.
It is obvious.
It is oozes out.
It cannot be contained.
Something other than that is not discipleship. I don't know what it is. . . but I know what it isn't.
I have written and preached a lot about our Christian vocation and how God calls each of us to share our gifts and talents with the world. I rely on Luther here who lifts up ordinary, everyday work as being holy. From the trash collector to the brain surgeon and every job imaginable, to work is to do honor to God, to work is to fulfill a calling on our lives, to work is to do something holy. But it occurs to me that I haven't gone deep enough on this vocation thing. . . it's not JUST about working or serving (esp. if you work in the service industry) but it is about an awareness of what you are doing and how that serves the kingdom. You see, I used to work in toxicology research (histology to be exact) and I never, ever realized that what I was doing was useful or holy in any way. It was a job and I needed a job. Now I can see that it was useful and helpful for the kingdom. Drugs had to go to market to cure illness, to save lives and those pharmaceuticals had to be tested and approved for use. I had no clue as to how my Christian life played a part in that vocation. The daily dissecting of lab animals, the making and staining of slides for the pathologist to read had no meaning for my life. But it could have!! If I had had an awareness of it, an intentionality about it!! Instead off I went to seminary looking for some way to meaningfully serve the Lord that I love.
It is holy to serve and to work in a vocation but when we do it with intentionality, with sacrifice, with discipline for the sake of others and in the name of Christ THEN we are living the life of discipleship. When we bring in our faith in the incarnate Word of God THEN we are living the life of a disciple. We are no longer slogging away at something simply to be employed or to put food on the table- which is of course noble to be sure-- but we are recognizing God's call on our lives and we are living it out with intentionality! That's discipleship! And sometimes we hear God calling us to do something else for the sake of the Kingdom! That's part of the journey too but we have to be listening! And with intentionality comes a greater ability to listen. When the call comes we put our fishing nets down, or lab equipment as the case may be, and we follow Jesus. And it costs us something. Discipleship costs us something, but we get so much more out of it than we put into it! We get a living, breathing, changing, deepening, loving relationship with our Lord Jesus.
Allow me to offer a metaphor about this from my world of coaching track and field. Sometimes I will have an athlete on my team who might be less than motivated to work hard or to win. I should say, they like to win for sure, but putting in the hard work is less than desirable. When they lose a big race they shrug it off saying, "I don't care, it didn't matter to me anyway!" On the contrary, the dedicated athlete who is the last to leave practice everyday, who desires to be coached and critiqued so they can become better goes into that big race ready to give it their all. If they fail to win they may be disappointed that they lost but they are still happy with their performance because they gave it all they had! They may even have a new PR out of it and that means a lot. They never dismiss the race or the competition and say, "It was no big deal, I didn't care about it anyway."
Discipleship has its own rewards-- a closer relationship to the Good Shepherd. But there is cheap discipleship and there is costly discipleship. We are not saved by our works, however, we despise the gospel if we fail to take our walk with Christ seriously. It is something completely different when an athlete who has worked their proverbial tail off to get better loses by a lean at the tape and when a lazy athlete loses and says it doesn't matter. We deceive ourselves when we think that the life of discipleship doesn't matter and we fail to truly know what grace is all about! Only when we give it 110% can we truly embrace what Christ has done for us- otherwise it doesn't really matter all that much because we have not felt the deep need for salvation. Discipleship is more than mere words-- it is a deep abiding commitment to the One who saved us by dying on the cross, whom God raised from the dead so that we might have new life. It cost Jesus big time. And it ain't cheap for us either!
Image credit: pviactrack.com
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