Achuckallen

Instigating Better

SLU

That One Thing!

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one-thing

I believe that everybody has that one thing that they know, or eventually figure out that motivates them, inspires them and pushes them through tough times. Everybody has at least ONE THING that the Divine has called and equipped them to do.

I remember it like it was last night. I was at Youth Camp in the summer of 1975. Somewhere between Lubbock and Amarillo, Texas I was neck deep in puppy love with DeAnna Johnson and knowing deep in my soul that the Divine was prompting me to respond to His nudging to surrender my life to the ministry of the Gospel. I didn’t yet know that pastoring a local church was what the Divine was preparing me for, but I did know that He was done prompting, and was now shoving me toward a decision that would rock my world, and the lives of the family I couldn’t yet imagine.

I responded to a call for any young men or women that felt God calling them to vocational ministry. Before I knew it, I was praying with my youth pastor and promising the Lord that I would give my life to preparing for the work of ministry. WOW! It seemed like such a passionate respond to the Divine and truly it was. But I didn’t act on it. I ran from it.

After years of watching my Dad surrender everything he had to serve the local church, including being my dad, I determined, NO THANKS to that life. I had seen my Dad give and serve and sacrifice his all, only to watch the same men and women he was serving, backstab, gossip and berate him. That’s why I put my ministry calling on the shelf until 1988, twelve years later.

My early days in ministry were some of my best. I discovered that I enjoyed building programs, facilities, and followers. I loved serving children and their families. I was then “promoted” to the Family Pastor over all the discipleship ministries of a large and rapidly growing mega-church. And then a few months later to the role of Executive Pastor. That’s when things started going awry. I stepped into a role that was way out of my league and capacity. I allowed pride and power to rule my thinking and I lost sight of the ONE THING that I was confident in – I was called to serve and shepherd folks, not administrate them.

But having come out of a business background, it seemed natural that I would be comfortable in that role. And I was, so much so that I left that church to join one of the world’s largest mission organizations, only to become their Chief Operating Officer. I was now, deeper into administration and more frustrated as I was getting further and further away from the one thing that I knew the Divine was lassoing me for – shepherding and serving people. The money and perks were great, but I never, not one single day, in that role felt a sense of peace or contentment. I was an ugly, angry bull in a dainty little china shop. MY BAD!!

I knew what my ONE THING was, but I was convinced that I could just simply be around what I was called to. I somehow believed that I could give in to 50% of the call to my ONE THING and God would say atta boy! But I was miserable and growing further and further from my ONE THING.

In 2011, Sugar Hill Church took a chance on a then 50-year-old pastor that had yet to serve anyone, anywhere as a lead shepherd. I’ll never forget the joy I sensed in stepping into my ONE THING. It’s been a fast-paced, bumpy ride over the past six years. I’ve had some awesome seasons and a few terrible seasons, but I’ve never lacked the knowledge that I was living out my ONE THING. As a result, I’ve never been more grateful, more fulfilled, or more contented than I am today. This is what it feels like to live, breathe, and serve in the ONE THING the Divine calls us to.

  • So, what is your ONE THING? 
  • Are you serving and leading in your ONE THING?
  • Is there a sense of wonder in you as you see God work in and through your daily life?
  • Can you name and claim your ONE THING?

If not, I want to encourage you to do three things.

  1. Simply ask the Divine to make it clear to you what His ONE THING is for your life.
  2. Start writing down the things you know that you are blessed and gifted with, including the joy you sense when functioning within them.
  3. Let friends and family pray for and with you as you search for your ONE THING.

I’ll promise you that God is not playing games with you. He promised that he has plans for you to prosper, so why wouldn’t you want to know your ONE THING. He wants you to surrender to serve in the ONE WAY, for your ONE GOD, in your ONE THING! Don’t throw away all the years that I did before you act on your ONE THING! Don’t look back and have to state the saddest words that any Christ-follower could ever utter; I wish I would have. Allow the Divine to show you your ONE THING and then act on it. You can take it to the bank – You’ll be blessed and grateful you did, I promise!

Find Peace in Your ONE THING,
AChuck

 

Saturday Share-Judge Not

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mother

Each Saturday, I share with you a BLOG that has been an encouragement to me, and will hopefully be an encouragement to you as well. My friend, Jay Strack taught me years ago, that “the best thing a friend can do is share their friends.” This BLOG is from
Carey Nieuwhof, one of the greatest guys on the planet!

Here You Go, AChuck
___________________________________________

Judged anyone lately?
Sadly, the answer for most of us (including me) is…yes.

From the guy who cut you off in traffic, to the off-beat person who’s not picking up the social cues you’re sending, to your weed-smoking neighbor…it’s so easy to judge. And judgment just gets worse from there. It’s the basis of racism, sexism and almost every other ‘ism’ you can think of.

It’s also fundamentally incompatible with authentic Christian faith.

Jesus said Christians should be known for how deeply we love. Yet studies show that in the eyes of many non-Christians, we’re known for how deeply we judge, not for how deeply we love.

The problem in many cases is not that unchurched people don’t know any Christians. The problem is that they do. And they don’t like us—for a good reason. Christians will argue: Well, who’s going to stand up for truth? Understood.

Yet in Jesus, grace and truth are perfectly fused.

Remove grace from the truth and you don’t actually have truth at all, but a cold, steely imitation. (This is the shadow side of conservatism.) The opposite is also true, of course. Remove truth from grace and you don’t have grace, but a spineless imitation. (As you’ve already figured out, this is the shadow side of liberalism.)

Fusing grace and truth is an exceptionally difficult venture and is usually only successful when you spend significant amounts of time on your knees and when the source of your attempt is actually Christ himself. I am rarely good at it, flipping from one side to the other too quickly.

But when you see grace and truth fused, it takes your breath away. Why did people travel for days on foot in extreme conditions to meet Jesus? Grace fused to truth is what our hearts most deeply long for. But in the evangelical church today (and I’m an evangelical), the hard edge of truth has crushed many. And one of the most frequent expressions of loveless truth is found in judgment.

Judgmentalism is incompatible with at least five wonderful things. Keep judging, and your church will miss all five of these Christian virtues that can advance your church’s mission.

1. Love

The presence of judgment almost always guarantees an absence of love.

Think about it through the lens of your marriage, friendship or even someone you work with: It is virtually impossible to love someone and judge someone at the same time. But wait, you ask: What if they’re making a mistake and I need to correct them?

First of all, look at your mistakes and the depth of your sin, and deal with your issues first. In the process, you’ll encounter a loving God who forgives you despite your rather egregious sin. And having been loved, you can love others. I try to remember this rule: If I’m judging someone, I’m not loving them. You can’t judge someone and love them at the same time.

2. Help

Ever notice that people who judge almost never help and people who help almost never judge?

That’s because judgment creates a line. The line is labeled “better than” or “smarter than” or “more righteous than” the person who needs help. Help knows no such line. It just knows how to help.

When Jesus taught on judgment, not only did he tell us not to judge, and to remove the massive timber from our own eye before trying to find the speck of dust in someone else’s eye first, but he then showed us the purpose of removing the speck from someone else’s eye: It’s to help them. The Christian purpose of stepping into someone else’s world is not to judge someone, but to help them.

If you’re not trying to help, don’t bother. You’ll probably only make it worse. And if you are trying to help, you’ll likely notice something else has disappeared: any sense of judgment you once carried.

3. Humility

Judgment is never grounded in humility. (As in Oh my, I’m also a mess. Let’s figure this out together.) Judgment is grounded in arrogance. That’s because a judgmental person almost always carries with them a sense of condescension (I never get into this kind of situation myself…you should be as good as I am) or a sense of pity (poor, stupid you).

Judgment always says I’m better than you, I know more than you and I’m also superior to you. No wonder people run from it.

Very few people get judged into life change. Many people get loved into it. Humility, by contrast, fosters empathy. It says, “I’m like you. I get that. Maybe we can help each other.” Many people would run to that.

4. Prayer

There’s also a connection between judgment and prayer. Judging someone and praying for someone are pretty much mutually exclusive.

You can’t pray for someone you judge because you’re actually not for them. Sure, you can pray about them, but again, your prayer won’t be grounded in humility. It might be grounded in anger, or in arrogance, or superiority, but it won’t be grounded in love.

You never truly pray for someone you judge. Conversely, if you want to stop judging someone, pray for them. It’s impossible to judge someone and truly pray for them at the same time.

5. Evangelism

If you want to kill evangelism at your church, fill your church with judgmental Christians.

People run from people who judge them. They run to people who love them. Think about it; that’s what you do: You run from people who judge you.

When grace and truth are fused, people usually run toward it because the combination of truth and grace describes a reality they’re facing and brings actual hope that things can get better.

God never asked you to judge the world. He did ask you to love it.

A Giant Hypocrite?

But wait, you say, isn’t this entire article just one big piece of judgment? You are a complete hypocrite, you say. First of all, you’re totally right. You could completely read this as a judgmental invective. And I definitely write it as someone who is part of the problem.

But when it comes to judgment, Paul makes it clear we are NOT to judge the world, but we are to practice discernment in the church. There is also a distinction (at least in my mind) between judgment and discernment.

This is a very fine line, and I don’t stand on it well at all. This article could be a complete failure in what it sets out to accomplish. One of the things I struggle with in the church today is that we rush to judge outsiders and rarely look in the mirror. That’s the exact opposite of what Paul instructed us to do.

The reality is that people’s lives are plagued by problems. There is an epic battle raging in this life, and people get taken down every day over addictions, failed relationships, misguided beliefs and things that we think will give life, but, in the end, only destroy.

We need to help outsiders because we have been helped. We need to help each other on the inside and thereby better realize our mission. True judgment is reserved for God. Discernment seeks to help.

Discernment says there is a problem, but lovingly, humbly, prayerfully, empathetically I’d love to help with that. And guess what? The person on the receiving end of the help senses it. They know when they’re being judged. And they know when they’re being loved and helped.

That’s what I hope to do. And that’s what I hope, in the end, this article does. Because I, too, am a “judger” who is seeking to become a loving helper.

And if this article still strikes you as harsh, remember that Jesus’ harshest words were reserved for arrogant, judgemental leaders inside the faith. At times, we’ve likely all been that insider. I have been anyway. Conversely, Jesus was pretty much never harsh to people outside the faith.

We’d be so much better as a church if we did the same.

From Chuck:
I trust this encourages you. That it frees you from a critical, judgmental spirit, and wells up within you (as it did me) the passionate desire to replace a haughty, critical spirit with a loving, compassionate spirit.

See you tomorrow at Sugar Hill Church for Worship Gatherings at 9:30a, 11:00a and streaming live HERE AND GUYS – Our f.irst MAN CHURCH is Sunday at 5:00p.eet me behind the church in the Underground for a Chilli/Brunswick Stew Cookoff, firepit, Dude Games and Bible Study!

Peace, Chuck