Posts by Josh
Two followup questions from last night…
I’m getting tons of feedback on last night’s “EQUIP: Personal Discipleship” session today. While the presenters did an incredible job, there are some other things that we’ll tweak in the future to improve those nights. We could’ve done better from a planning and preparation standpoint and will in the future… but HUGE THANKS to the 100+ of you that were there.
Here are two recurring questions I’ve gotten today following last night’s session (copied and pasted from emails)…
What about introverts? All of the presenters were extroverted people so relationships will come more naturally to them. Can an introvert enter into a relationship that “deep”?
Introverts, let me encourage you. YOU, not the extroverts, have the best personalities suited for personal discipleship. While someone who leads larger group discipleship (a church, a ministry, a House Group) needs to be able to maintain relational quantity by having lots of relationships, someone who’s investing in someone for personal discipleship needs to be able to maintain relational quality by having a few deep, meaningful relationships with the people they’re investing in.
This is where most introverts I’ve known thrive. They’re not going to walk into a party and “own the room”, but they’re going to find someone in the room and own their heart. THAT is the foundation for personal discipleship. I know initiating the relationship at the beginning will be more intimidating for introverts, but in the long haul they’re built for the deeper relationships of personal discipleship. Introverts, God created your personality for a reason. The Kingdom needs you!
I’m afraid if I ask someone if I can disciple them they’ll jump to a defensive stance – “So you think YOU can disciple ME?!” How can I avoid that?
Here’s why this is tough: the less spiritually mature someone is, the easier it is to offend them and your probably going to be looking for newer Christians to disciple. A few things…
- Rule 1: PRAY. Seriously, pray that God will move someone to ask you to disciple them. You already know that this prayer is in line with God’s will so He’s going to answer eventually.
- The people you should consider discipling need to be people who respect you tremendously. If you’re afraid someone will respond like this, you probably haven’t paid the relational rent necessary to earn their trust and respect yet. Focus on relationship building right now.
- Look for God to open the door for discipleship by someone coming to you with their problems. I’ve only asked someone one time if I could disciple them. What usually happens is a friend comes to me with their problems and I’ll say, “Hey man, I’ve struggled through this before too. You want to meet before work on Tuesdays for the next few weeks to talk about what you’re going through?” Then we’ll start reading or memorizing portions of Scripture together and it turns into a discipleship relationship without them even knowing!
Hope this is helpful. Keep the questions coming! If anyone wants to get in touch with any of the presenters from last night here’s some contact info…
Josh Howerton – josh.howerton@bridgesh.com
Rick Howerton – rick.howerton@lifeway.com
John Howard – john.howard@bridgesh.com
Eva Howard – johnevahoward@bellsouth.net
Read MoreMaybe our Kids’ Ministry could launch a 2nd campus…
Few things have made me laugh this hard in a long time. The following picture was posted to facebook by Shelley Stedman, one of our Bridge members. This is a picture of the Stedman kids “playing church”…
Things that are awesome about this picture…
- The “Kids are dismissed to Kids’ Ministry” sign complete with an accurately drawn Bridge logo
- Jimi Williams is here represented by a guitar-carrying penguin
- The furry monkey on the right is using what appears to be a spoon for a drumstick
- I choose to believe that monkey is representing Jeff Hollandsworth
- The teddy bear on the left reminds me so much of Scott Shoopman doing the announcements that it makes me wanna slap my mama
- If you’re going by seating position, I’m being represented by a horse wearing a pink and blue blouse
Quotable Quotes: John Piper on the relationship between missions and worship
From Sunday…
Read MoreMissions is not the ultimate goal of the Church. Worship is. Missions exists because worship doesn’t. Worship is ultimate, not missions, because God is ultimate, not man. When this age is over, and the countless millions of the redeemed fall on their faces before the throne of God, missions will be no more. It is a temporary necessity. But worship abides forever.
Worship, therefore, is the fuel and goal of missions. It’s the goal of missions because in missions we simply aim to bring the nations into the white hot enjoyment of God’s glory. The goal of missions is the gladness of the peoples in the greatness of God. “The Lord reigns; let the earth rejoice; let the many coastlands be glad!” (Ps 97:1). “Let the peoples praise thee, O God; let all the peoples praise thee! Let the nations be glad and sing for joy!” (Ps 67:3-4).
But worship is also the fuel of missions. Passion for God in worship precedes the offer of God in preaching. You can’t commend what you don’t cherish. Missionaries will never call out, “Let the nations be glad!” who cannot say from the heart, “I rejoice in the Lord…I will be glad and exult in thee, I will sing praise to thy name, O Most High” (Ps 104:34, 9:2). Missions begins and ends in worship.
– John Piper, Let the Nations Be Glad
Why we’re changing how we talk about our offerings
If you’re a Bridger there are two things you may have noticed that changed recently (besides Alan Hood’s toenails).
- On the “New Here?” tab of the website we removed a section called “A note about guests and tithing” that discouraged guests and non-members from giving.
- During our worship gatherings we’ve stopped giving that same disclaimer before our offerings and started communicating that the offering is a continuation of the worship we’ve already begun through singing.
It’s a really high value to our church leadership that we never try and do something “under the radar” and are forthright with the church body at all times so I wanted to take a post to explain this. Now before you get all “SEE, HE’S JUST ANOTHER MONEY-HUNGRY PASTOR” on me, let me say a couple things…
- Though we’re still a fairly small church The Bridge has grown dramatically this year and isn’t remotely close to a financial emergency.
- I think my track record will show that I’m anything but a money-pastor (Can I get an “amen” from a Finance Team Member… or my wife?)
- I cut my own hair, don’t have cable, and drive an ‘02 Sentra with the paint chipping off. I’m not climbing into a church-funded G5 at the end of the day.
- These two changes literally had nothing to do with our financial status as a church… because we’re doing well!
We made these changes because we were convicted about portraying generosity for Jesus’ mission as an unfortunate obligation rather than the source of worshipful joy the Bible describes. Consider this statement from 2 Corinthians 8…
We want you to know, brothers, about the grace of God that has been given among the churches of Macedonia, for in a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part. For they gave according to their means, as I can testify, and beyond their means, of their own accord, begging us earnestly for the favor of taking part in the relief of the saints—and this, not as we expected, but they gave themselves first to the Lord and then by the will of God to us.
These people were in “extreme poverty” and literally BEGGED to give because they saw it as an act of worship and knew it came with blessing. Listen, this will probably make some people nervous but The Bridge doesn’t need your money. God has provided for us in silly awesome ways in the past and will do so again. We wanted to change how we talked about giving because giving is Biblical worship and if you’re not giving you’re missing out both on the deep joy of sacrificial worship and on God’s provision in response. I know many people will read this post and roll their eyes… I just don’t know how to say it any other way that “Biblically, you’re missing out!”
Bottom line: we’re not making these changes because we want more of your money. We’re making these changes because we want to be a church that richly worships and want you to experience the joy of generosity. We want our communication about giving to be an extension of Scripture’s communication about giving.
Love you, Bridge Family… now I’m off to the Lamborghini dealership 
Profiles of the religious, irreligious, and gospel-person
First, I need to say that I’m forever indebted to pastor/author/church planter Tim Keller for exegeting the following concept for me from the gospels. This has given me Biblical insight into human nature that was missing for a long, long time. Thanks, Tim (who’ll never read this post!)
Studying the Sermon on the Mount has highlighted to me that Jesus spent his entire ministry not critiquing one way to live (“there’s the right way and the wrong way!”), but critiquing two ways to live that both miss the gospel by being to the right or to the left. Religion is embodied by the “pharisees and scribes” in the gospels and irreligion is embodied by the “tax collectors and sinners” in the gospels.
While we need to be sensitive to the fact that no profile ever fits across the board, here are general sketches of religious and irreligious people:
Irreligious people…
…are often theologically and politically liberal, usually speak in terms of self-acceptance, tend to label sinful attitudes and actions only as mental or physical disorders that people are victim to, and either downplay or deny that people are guilty before God because of their sin. ”Sin-talk” often angers irreligious people because “you don’t need to change who you are, you need to accept who you are.” They are enablers. Their motto: “I accept myself.”
Religious people…
…are often theologically and politically conservative, usually frame conversations in terms of morality and “doing the right thing”, and tend to either downplay or deny in practice the fact that we are accepted by God because of faith in Jesus and not on the basis of our moral or religious performance. Forgiveness and acceptance-talk often anger religious people because they feel the guilty party “has not paid his due.” Religious people are angry, judgmental, and love to divide the world into two categories with themselves on the “right side” of the division. Their motto: “I obey, therefore I am accepted.”
Gospel people…
It’s notoriously hard to discern what The Beatitudes (see here) are. The best way to understand The Beatitudes is simply by saying that they are Jesus’ “profile of a gospel person”, much like I’ve provided for religious and irreligious people above. To summarize Jesus’ teaching about gospel people, their motto is “I am accepted because of Jesus, therefore I obey.”
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