Abundant Life Is Relational

Church / Ministry, Developing Mature Believers, The Life Church Difference, Uncategorized No Responses »
Apr 042012
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Abundant Life

In John 10:7-10 Jesus makes a powerful statement about life:

  Therefore Jesus said again, “I tell you the truth, I am the gate for the sheep.  All who ever came before me were thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them.  I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. He will come in and go out, and find pasture.  The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. 

The phrase "to the full" has also been translated "more abundantly" and this leads to the important understanding that Jesus has come to give us abundant life. As we examine Jesus' lifestyle it also becomes apparent that he expected his followers to be a  community – praying for them to be one just as he and the Father are one (John 17:20-23). In other words, the abundant life we have in Jesus includes our relationships with other believers.  If our lifestyles diminish our relationships then we won't experience life as abundantly as we ought to.

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Posted by pastor.rocklyn at 9:56 pm Tagged with: , ,

Rethinking Grace

Church / Ministry, Developing Mature Believers No Responses »
Feb 102012
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Old Word – New Meaning

Several years ago (probably sometime in 2006), while attending a meeting for local clergy, I heard the keynote speaker make a statement that I have never forgotten:

"Grace is the empowering presence of God enabling you to be who God created you to be, and to do what God has called you to do – right where you are."

The speaker was Pastor James Ryle; he had been invited to address the monthly meeting of the Black Ministerial Alliance of Greater Boston (BMA) by then BMA President Bishop Gideon Thompson. Later that year Pastor Ryle (again at Bishop Thompson's invitation) taught several sessions at the 2006 Jubilee Christian Church annual convention. He elaborated on this same truth. Up until this time I had always thought of grace as "God's unmerited (i.e. undeserved) favor" or "God's Riches At Christ's Expense", but on that day Pastor Ryle gave me a new and extremely helpful way to understand this critical concept. It blessed me so much that I wanted to share it with others; I began looking for Pastor Ryle's teaching in written form.

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Posted by pastor.rocklyn at 8:46 pm Tagged with: ,

Pay Attention (If You Can)

Church / Ministry No Responses »
Oct 022011
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Several years ago a friend of mine discovered that he had ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder). The diagnosis and the medication that he took as a result had a profound effect on him. For the first time in his life he was able to focus. This included actually hearing what people were telling him and remembering it. He was a changed man!

My friend had also recommended to me a book on ADD that I hadn't taken the time to read. Some years later, when I was told about a ministry colleague with ADD, I remembered the book. It was written by Dr. Edward M. Hallowell and Dr. John J. Ratey, two psychiatrists who themselves have ADD. This time I read the book and discovered a world of new information and a number of resources:

One especially helpful resource is the film ADD and Loving It starring comedian Patrick McKenna. You can access it in the following ways:

If you're reading this blog post, you're probably interested in ADD. I hope you find these resources to be helpful.

Posted by pastor.rocklyn at 12:19 am Tagged with: , ,

Elizabeth Warren On 'Class Warfare"

Justice, Politics, The Issues No Responses »
Sep 272011
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I first saw it on Facebook: a link to "The Elizabeth Warren Quote Every American Needs To See" on MoveOn.org. A Google search revealed that this quote from the newly announced Massachusetts senate candidate was rapidly spreading across the internet. I eventually traced it to a video and transcription on the rumproast blog. Eventually Talking Points Memo picked up the story.

The Quote

“I hear all this, you know, ‘Well, this is class warfare, this is whatever,’” Warren said. “No. There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own — nobody.

“You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear. You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police-forces and fire-forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory — and hire someone to protect against this — because of the work the rest of us did.

“Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea. God bless — keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is, you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along.” – Elizabeth Warren on or before 9/18/2011

The Video

What The Bible Says

This was a very concise and straightforward presentation of a truth that should be obvious to any follower of Jesus Christ. It brings to mind some very striking Bible passages:

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Posted by pastor.rocklyn at 3:02 pm Tagged with: , ,

Be Careful Out There!

Church / Ministry No Responses »
Sep 212011
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In "Hill Street Blues", Steven Bochco's 1981 television series about an urban police precinct, there was character named Sgt. Phil Esterhaus (played by actor Michael Conrad) who was the desk sergeant. Sgt. Esterhaus would typically wrap up his daily message to the patrol officers with the words: "Be careful out there!"

In 1 John 4:1 the Apostle John warns us:

Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.

Ever since Jesus established it, the Church has faced competition from false prophets preaching strange gospels. Like the owner's servants in Matthew 13:24-30 who found weeds growing up right next to the wheat, we believers face the challenge of distinguishing between truth and error in the "field" of modern Christianity. Since I became a believer in 1979 I, like many of you, have come across various problems and failures in Christian ministry. You have probably noticed however that things are different today. Ministry failures and excesses that would once have circulated mainly as rumors are now recorded as video and viewable by anyone on the internet. Of course the internet doesn't just facilitate viewing of ministry failures. It also provides a platform for the bloggers who want to comment on it and I want to share some of their comments with you. Of course I don't agree with all of the posts on these blogs, but I have found a number of them to be helpful:

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Posted by pastor.rocklyn at 9:45 pm Tagged with: , , , ,

John Wimber and the Ministry Of The Holy Spirit

Developing Mature Believers, Pastoral Ministry No Responses »
Aug 192011
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In 1985 John Wimber gave a presentation on spirit-led ministry at the Signs and Wonders Conference. Here are a few key facts about John Wimber:

  • John was a musician who brought Bobby Hatfield and Bill Medley together to form the Paramours. They went on to become "The Righteous Brothers".
  • He founded the Anaheim Vineyard Christian Fellowship
  • John helped to found and went on to lead the international Vineyard Movement.
  • He went home to be with the Lord in 1997.

You can read more about John in his Wikipedia article. The 4 videos in this post show John demonstrating a very relaxed and trusting way of following the Holy Spirit's leading during times of congregational ministry. I find it to be very freeing. Hopefully you will too.

You can also view the embedded videos right from this blog post:

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Posted by pastor.rocklyn at 1:49 pm Tagged with: , ,

Blue Ocean Summit 2011

Expanding God's Kingdom No Responses »
Aug 062011
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This week I attended the 2011 Blue Ocean Summit at the Vineyard Christian Fellowship of Greater Boston. From Monday (8/1) night through Wednesday (8/3) afternoon I joined dozens of pastors in a series of presentations and discussion about creating safe space for secular people to talk about God and connect with him. This is the 3rd year that the conference has taken place. Valerie Johnson, our associate pastor, attended last year, but this is the 1st time I've been able to participate. I plan to go back next year and bring more of our Life Church Leadership Team.

I'm excited about this gathering of churches exploring ways to engage the secular world. Although I love Jesus, I'm actually "not the religious type" (see Dave Schmelzer's blog). The world needs Jesus and I want to tell them about him without "religion" getting in the way. I realize that God has been moving me in this direction for quite some time and the 2011 Blue Ocean Summit is yet another step in the complete reorganization of the way I express the good news about Jesus.

Posted by pastor.rocklyn at 12:58 am

If You Can't Measure It, Why Should I Pay For It?

Organizational Issues 1 Response »
Mar 192011
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SpeedometerHere's a thought:

Not for profit organizations can greatly improve both their outcomes and their fundability by moving from the mere reporting of program activity to real performance management.

This is the message I took away from a recent presentation by David Hunter of Hunter Consulting LLC to the Oversight Committee of the Boston Capacity Tank (BCT) (a program of the Black Ministerial Alliance of Greater Boston). After David's presentation I searched the web for more information about his organization and the work they do. I've written this blog entry to share what I learned.

Performance Measurement Issues

One of the items I found on the web was David Hunter's paper "Yes We Can! Performance Management in Nonprofit Human Services". In it he makes the following points:

  • In response to pressure from funders, donors, and the general public, nonprofits often collect large quantities of dubious data at great cost to themselves and the people they serve.
  • Many funders and nonprofits are stuck between two bad habits:
    • "Know-nothing optimism" – the persistent pursuit of admirable goals without any objective evidence that the organization is actually achieving them.
    • "Mind-numbing over-measurement" – collecting and reporting mountains of data without any clear understanding of how the measurements advance the organization's goals.
  • "Turnstile numbers" (reports of everyone "touched" by an organization) are a poor measure of effectiveness since they combine people who receive extensive services with those who may have only glanced at a web page.
  • Outcomes are a poor measure of effectiveness since they rarely provide any comparison with a "control group" of people who receive no services whatsoever from the organization.
  • "Performance management" is the proper way for organizations to achieve maximal effectiveness.

Hunter defines performance as "intentional action dedicated to reaching one or more measurable objectives". He defines performance management, as,  "a multi-step, self-correcting  process that focuses on:

  • driving an organization with intentionality toward explicit, clear, measurable objectives,
  • instituting ways to learn from front-line and managerial experience along the way,
  • clarifying what it is doing and achieving,
  • adjusting activities as needed,
  • and even revising the original objectives if indicated."

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Posted by pastor.rocklyn at 11:11 pm Tagged with: ,

Microfinance With Marie and Andy

Expanding God's Kingdom No Responses »
Dec 172010
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My wife Eva and I currently volunteer with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship (IVCF). We work primarily with their Black Scholars and Professionals (BSAP) ministry and in partnership with their Boston area Graduate and Faculty Ministries (GFM).  Marie Williams is a former InterVarsity GFM colleague of ours who recently left InterVarsity to join her husband Andy at Hope International. Marie and Andy are now doing Christian microfinance work in the Dominican Republic.  After reading their latest update I thought I would share the following links with you:

Gad wants all of us to share his love in very practical ways with people in need. Marie and Andy are sharing God's love in the Dominican Republic. Where and how is God calling you to serve?

Posted by pastor.rocklyn at 7:25 pm Tagged with: ,

Some Thoughts On Evangelism and Discipleship

Developing Mature Believers, Expanding God's Kingdom 2 Responses »
Apr 232007
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The following observations are drawn from a discussion I facilitated during the April 22, 2007 Christian Musicians Fellowship (CMF) at the home of George and Emily Russell. The topic for the discussion was:

"How can we as musicians present our faith in our respective spheres of influence without going over the top?"

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Posted by pastor.rocklyn at 10:10 pm
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