Borrowing a Post from a Friend....Definitely Worth Reading!!

I would love to say that this was my post, but it is not. A wonderful pastor and friend wrote this article that is so appropriate for our day. He put it much more eloquently than I ever could so below you will find a post from his blog. Thank you Bro. Mike for this post!




Pragmatism in its Finest Hour
Pragmatism is absolutely invading the churches of our Southern Baptist Convention. For those unfamiliar with the term, pragmatism is simply the belief that if it works it must be right and if it doesn’t work it must be wrong. Let me share a few brief thoughts on the rising tide of this dangerous philosophical ideology.

The fundamental danger in pragatism is that it determines "truth" on the basis of experience, emotion, and effects. If it works it is true, or worse yet, if it works it is TRUTH. If it does not produce results it should be discarded as flawed, failed, and foolish.
Of course what "works" in one location may not "work" in another. Truth itself, therefore becomes relative and ends up looking more like situational ethics and moral relativism than an adherence to the sufficiency of Jesus Christ and the Word of God.

There is nothing wrong with pragmatism as long as you have the right definition of success. For example, if you have a bad experience with Brand A of dish detergent, pragmatism says, “Stop buying that brand. It’s not working for you.” If your car battery will not crank your car, pragmatism says, “Get a new battery. Your current one isn’t working so discard it.”

But when it comes to the issue of the Great Commission and Scriptural fidelity, there is much more at stake than dish-pan hands and dead batteries. What is at stake is nothing short of the eternal plan of God redemption, the salvation of the lost, and the glory of our God. To that end it appears to me that many of our SBC pastors and leaders have seemingly lost a Biblical definition of success.

Success for the believer is measured by one standard and one standard alone; Obedience to Christ and His Word.

When obedience to Christ becomes our standard of success then we will realize we have been "successful" even if our message sends more people away than it draws so long as the message has been consistent with the character and Word of God. Of course in our flesh we would rather people be drawn than be deterred. But we must realize that our ultimate goal is the pleasure of Christ not the growth of the church.
Christ knew how to divide and disperse a crowd. Considering His hard words in Luke 14it seems the Savior would not be invited to many of our evangelism training events. He obviously was not a very successful evangelist.
In our prideful and egocentric world, we have essentially equated success with numerical growth. We applaud and award high baptism numbers. The pastors of these burgeoning churches are paraded across our state and national conferences. Our churches are challenged to emulate and duplicate these fast-growing congregations, often without ever stopping to ask, “Is their growth Biblically-based or is it being generated by the power of the flesh?”

Here are a few examples:

1. A website touts an opportunity to win a car if you will watch a 3-minute video presentation of the gospel. Over 10,000 watched and over 3,000 click the “right” box. When hundreds are “saved” through this method, it makes the religious press as some well-intentioned writer popishly declares over 3,000 people have made “professions of faith.” After all, it got numerical results so it must be right.

2. A motorcyclist event gives bikers a chance to register to win a new Harley. Out of 4,200 who registered to win the Harley (of course they are obligated to watch another 3-minute video presentation of the gospel) over 800 are “saved.” Once again, it makes the headlines of the denominational press. It must have been a Biblically-successful event because it got numerical results.

NOTE: Do we really believe that about 20%-30% of people who are not being drawn by the Spirit of God but by a chance to win a car or a motorcycle genuinely received Christ as Lord? I have no doubt they may have “prayed a prayer” or “checked a box.”

3. The new church plant utilizes secular music, crude humor, and sensual ads touting the new teaching series on sex. It draws a crowd so it must be OK. Not only is it OK, it is the new standard…and nobody should say anything about it or we will lose this next generation of “young leaders.” Besides, they baptized more people last Sunday than your church did all year.

So what their “worship service” used the latest country song that touts beer-drinking, casual sex, and prostitutes. So what that the video clips were from filthy R-rated movies. How can you criticize that? They are reaching people! They are growing! They are getting results!
OK, so the pastor “mooned” the congregation Sunday and on Monday blogged about drinking beer and smoking cigars in order to reach people. They are about to open a 2nd campus. How dare you question their methodology?!?!

(For the record: This scenario is a composite of multiple and actual events in Georgia).

4. The bodybuilders’ ministry packs a bunch of teenagers into the local high school gym. Grown men in spandex and ponytails rip phone books, break concrete blocks, and burst hot water bottles. The music is deafening, the lights entrancing, and the gospel is LITE. But after a 4-minute testimony, every head is bowed and every eye is closed. No one is looking around because we would not dare want to embarrass anyone as hundreds of “decisions for Christ” are made.

By the way, 12 months later the youth pastor is fired because he can’t “close the back door” of the youth ministry. The Jujitsu for Jesus team handed him 185 card-checking hand-raising converts from the let’s-break-a-cinderblock-for-Jesus rally. But the poor guy couldn’t hang onto them. We need a youth pastor who can get results!

5. Evangelist Jones is brought in to do the big evangelistic event. He is a “gifted harvester.” Why every pastor around knows this brother has the ability to “draw the net.” Never mind the fact that neither “evangelism” nor “drawing the net” is listed as a spiritual gift in the Holy Scripture. What we really mean is…and let’s be honest enough to admit it…this guy can get people to make public decisions. I mean he can get people down the aisle and through the baptistery.

That old boy you’ve been preaching to for months won’t respond to your invitation. But if you’ll invite Brother Jones to preach he can get him down the aisle. Brother Jones’ preaching and techniques must be pleasing to God because they get results. And that gets you in the state paper.

I mentioned this 5th scenario in a recent evangelism training session I was leading. An attendee said, “Now Pastor Mike, I know 'drawing the net' isn’t in the Bible but you know what we mean when we use that phrase.” And the truth is, I do know what we mean. And therein is the problem.

Simply put, if Brother Smith preaches the gospel and no one is saved…then Brother Jones preaches the same gospel and half the crowd responds, something is desperately wrong. In our church culture we would say “Brother Jones is an evangelist and Brother Smith needs to learn how to give an invitation.” And that assessment may be as far from the truth as it could possibly be.

By that standard some of the great evangelistic failures in history include Noah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Amos.

I recently preached a strong evangelistic sermon in the pulpit at the church God lets me pastor. Discerning believers understood there was a strong move of the Holy Spirit in that service. At the public invitation, no one responded for salvation. I closed the invitation with this prayer, “Lord, I have done Your work. But I cannot get anyone to respond that You cannot get to respond. So I close this invitation with a broken heart…”

Later it hit me. The intent of my prayer was correct but the content of my prayer was as wrong as wrong could be. What I meant to say was this:

“Lord, I have done Your work. And I’ve been at this long enough that I can get people down the aisle. But if simple gospel preaching and a passionate call to salvation will not get the job done then it will go undone. I can get people to respond that You, Lord cannot get to respond. I just do not want to.”

No doubt, some wondered if that sermon and that service were “successful.” How could it be successful? There were no results! Numerical results = God is honored. No numerical results = God is displeased.

That mindset is pragmatism at its finest hour. And that, my friends, is running rampant in our convention.

Welcome to Bro. Brad and Elicia Walker!

When Bro. Jeff Phillips came to me (I believe within my first week here) and shared with me that his heart and passion was for Vancouver, Canada, I knew there would be a day very soon I would have to look for a Student Pastor. This staff position is really no different than any other staff position today - it is very difficult to find the right men to fill any staff positions. However, when I came to Trinity and spoke with our staff members I knew some of them were already making plans to serve in other areas. So I began to pray and ask God for wisdom as I searched to fill these different vacancies. I touched on this when Bro. Jon Rushing came, but I have discovered (after much trial and error, and then more error) that the best way to call a staff member is not to really look for a specific “specialized” staff person at all… Now of course it was important the Bro. Jon could sing better than me or we would all be in trouble but as I stated on a scale of 1 to 10, the importance of musical talent for our Music Minister was about a “5”. That is very high considering for every other Pastor it would be a zero or less! Now, it just so happened that Bro. Jon is the most talented Worship Pastor I have ever seen at any church, but that was just as they say in the south - “gravy.” Too often Pastors first look for someone who has increased numbers in their last couple of student ministries, or men who have a lot of talent, or men who are great organizers. Now certainly all of these things can be looked at, but I submit to you they are not and should not be determining factors in hiring any type of Pastor. So where do we start? Well, I know this is a revolutionary idea, certainly not the norm, and in many circles “waaay out there” but why don’t we begin in 1st Timothy 3:1-7? So I began to look for men who were blameless (this doesn’t mean that no one could say anything bad about them, in fact I am very leery of any minister who has not had to take a biblical stand that someone didn’t get upset or angry)… but an individual who had even more than integrity, but also had a boldness in their testimony. I just walked through each area in this passage. I won’t go through all of them here, but I certainly only wanted men who were consistent in their life, their loyalty, their love and their doctrine. They have to be able to teach, this means they know doctrine and can articulate the truth of the Word of God to other believers.

All of this to say that Trinity needs men who understand the Gospel (I know this seems like a no-brainer but it certainly can’t be assumed in churches today), who understands what it means to be part of a church, who will serve her, give to her, minister to her, and who believes that arrogance is not proclaiming truth clearly, but arrogance is bending to my way of doing things rather than God’s way. I guess in short I knew we needed MEN of God who would hold to the Word of God in their life, in their ministry, in their stand, and could teach this by their words and actions. The result is a Children’s Minister who gives our children and parents Biblical truths, a Worship Pastor who comes in and explains the theology the choir is singing and both handle the Word of God accurately and completely. This seems so simple but so often the names we are given are men who may be fine men, who may have integrity but too often they are not dedicated to the Word. All that to say, the same thing that knitted my heart with our new Student Pastor wasn’t how nice he was, the numbers in his last youth group… but rather, his dedication and love for the Word of God! I am flabbergasted at the idea that we, as a Church, actually believe we can have staff that loves doctrine and desires to teach it (sarcasm)! Funny, but excitedly this is exactly what we have and this is what we are getting in Bro. Brad Walker!!! I am thrilled and anxiously anticipating YEARS of wonderful service alongside these men of God!

As We Meet our Prospective Youth Pastor

Over the last several months I have had the sobering task of bringing in potential staff members. God blessed us beyond measure when He sent us Bro. Jeff Summers and Bro. Jon Rushing - but I knew even when Bro. Jon came that the work was not over. As I have said before, we are shuffling some staff members and bringing in some new ones. This is always an exciting time and a nervous time. You pray for unity, you pray that everyone is who they appear to be, you pray for God’s wisdom and rely on God’s providence and sovereignty. We are now in the process of bringing on a Youth Pastor. Overall, our modern day church culture has greatly strayed in their view of youth ministry. What should youth ministry be? What should we expect our youth ministry to produce? Is this nothing more than a teen social club? A while ago on my blog I mentioned Paul Tripp - he did a question and answer time at John Piper’s Church and they posted some of this interaction on Piper’s blog. I want to give you a view of where I believe our youth ministry must be biblically… but, leading into a blog or two about our students, I found this article interesting:

The (Non)Difference Between Youth and Adult Ministry
May 7, 2009 | By: Abraham Piper
Category: Commentary
Recently, Tyler Kenney and I were able to get a quick interview with Paul Tripp. We'll be blogging it over the next few days.
Our first question was, "What differences do you see between ministering to youth and ministering to adults?"
For his full answer, you can listen to the audio. (Please forgive how rough it is.)
Here is my summary of his thoughts:
There are ways in which there's no difference. There's only one gospel, not a different one for children, young people, and adults.
And there's a way the struggles of the heart are the same. These struggles play out differently depending on our stage in life, but when it comes down to it, we all want to be sovereign over our own lives.
If you understand that about your heart, and you're humble about it, you'll get what a kid or teenager is going through. You'll understand that it isn't first a problem of misbehavior; it's first a problem in the heart.

This is our desire in everything we do at Trinity - we want to get the gospel right, allow the Word of God to work in our lives, and allow it to examine the heart! We ask the Spirit of God to control us and illuminate us, and in all we do our primary goal, whether children, teens or adults, is to glorify God!

To Our Trinity Students (and everyone else)

TURN THE WORLD UPSIDE DOWN!
Some names have been changed to protect the guilty:

Religious Randy: (aka. The Jews in Acts 17:6) “But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some brethren to the rulers of the city, crying out, “These who have turned the world upside down have come here too.”

Soured Sue: “The problem you have is you are too focused on the Bible”

Devilish Doug: “You guys are just fanatics”

Loose Lipped Lynn: “He knows his Bible and uses it like a sword to defend every decision he makes”

Wow, these are real quotes, made by real people, about real believers and to be honest, I had a few more but couldn’t come up with anymore clever names. :) This is the first blog that I have explicitly called out to our students, but I want you to understand what I am writing to you. As you begin school this year, it is crucial that you understand that as a believer you are called to be different. If in fact there is no difference in you, if the world does not understand why you stand the way you stand, why you dress the way you dress, why you talk differently than they talk, then there is something wrong with you. Look at the above quotes - are these really negatives? I mean, is it a bad thing to turn a lost world upside down? Is it a bad thing to be focused on the Bible? I have often heard that a fanatic is someone who loves Jesus more than you do. Is it wrong to use your Bible like a sword? Isn’t this what It calls Itself? Rather than getting defensive or minimizing your stand for the cause of Christ this year, take joy that the world sees you as different - take joy that you have to endure even a little persecution for your stand. Wasn’t it Christ who said in Luke 6:22-23:
Blessed are you when men hate you,
And when they exclude you,
And revile you, and cast out your name as evil,
For the Son of Man’s sake.
Rejoice in that day and leap for joy!
For indeed your reward is great in heaven,
For in like manner their fathers did to the prophets.

He closes this thought out in Luke 6:26 “Woe to you when all men speak well of you, For so did their fathers to the false prophets.” It is not a bad thing to lose the applause of men for taking a stand - in love for Christ. The world will seldom see it as love - they will see your stand as judgmental, as being “better than us” or trying to be harsh, but God knows your heart, and you must do all for His glory. He calls us to live a holy, separated life and we must live it out to the best of our ability and to His glory! This year don’t get caught up in the fear of man - stand strong and be courageous! A couple of weeks ago you, as students, blessed us as you led our worship on a Sunday night… you have worshipped God even when the music may not have been your style in previous weeks, and did so with the same passion as you sang and worshipped the Sunday that you led. Thank you for your love, thank you for your passion – We should thank God for our parents, leaders and workers who serve you along side of Bro. Jeff and Bro. Bubba! In the coming days Bro. Brad Walker (whom I will write about next week) will be coming in to meet you. He will take the reigns from Bro. Jeff Phillips and continue to equip you, your parents and your workers to glorify God. But in the mean time, I want you to know I love you, and I value you as part of Trinity Baptist Church, a part of our Church family, and this year I challenge you to TURN YOUR WORLD UPSIDE DOWN FOR THE GLORY OF GOD!

NOTES FROM THE EVERSON FAMILY REFRIGERATOR:

In the coming days I am sure I will have several blog entries on The Peace Maker. The main reason for this is that it is so needed today not only in our society, but in our churches and homes. The way most “Christians” deal with conflict in home, church or the workplace is no different than an atheist will deal with it, in fact sometimes “church people” deal with it worse! (Notice I said “church people” not believers). However, true believers should have a passion for peace; they should have a desire to want the best, hope the best, and believe the best. As we have seen in Jude, we should not have peace at all costs - we should not have peace at the expense of compromise with sin and doctrine! But even when dealing with those issues we should handle them differently than the world deals with conflict or opposing viewpoints. As I passed by our refrigerator the other day (or as we tend to call it in the south: “fridge”) I once again stopped to take notice of something I had printed and put up for all to see (especially our family). It is something that is found in Ken Sande’s The Peace Maker, and I wanted to highlight it for you today. Write these down, cut and past them from this blog, but do something with this to enable your family to remember these truths when apologizing - and just so you know, if you have other people in your house, you are going to need to apologize quite often, and it can only help us when done properly. Below you will see what is printed out for our family:

The Seven A’s Of Confession:1. Address Everyone Involved
2. Avoid If, But and Maybe—Is this how we would confess to Christ?
3. Admit Specifically--- “ “ “ “
4. Accept the Consequences
5. Alter Your Behavior—Ephesians 4:31-32
6. Ask Forgiveness
7. Allow Time

I have found when this is practiced correctly, forgiveness is available from those who love Christ. This is so crucial in a world today – a world that refuses to accept responsibility for anything and will not only blame others for their wickedness, rebellion or hard heart, but bring God into the equation to justify what they do or how they feel. We serve a God who has not called us to be hateful, vengeful, or to return evil for evil - this is the life of a lost man. We should always be ready to overlook an offense and when we wrong someone else, we should be ready to live out these “Seven A’s”! If we would just take this seriously and apply these principles, they will enable us to glorify God even during conflict.

Love Offering For Jesus:

In this my final blog in explaining our Love Offering for Jesus, I want to encourage you again to involve your family in this. We need to make sure our children understand that the Kingdom of God is made up of all kinds of people, some who do not look or talk like us. We are many nationalities, languages, and races with a common King. We have been blessed to live in a country that holds around 80% of the world’s wealth and we must remember that “to whom much is given much is required.” We have been blessed in incredible ways, and we need to use this time to express to our children the many blessings we have because of God’s amazing grace! Below you will see the remainder of the areas this offering will be given towards:

1% Margaret Lackey
1% Farrow Manor Children’s Village
1% Gideon’s
57% Missions Operations

The Margaret Lackey Offering is our state offering. This will go to carry forth the Gospel throughout the state of Mississippi: it will aid the planting of churches, it will help evangelistic causes and will enable the gospel to be carried out effectively. Portions of this offering have been given to some of our people in the past who were going on mission trips. The Farrow Manor Children’s Village, is one of the greatest endeavors we give toward. This offering will help fund emergency and extended residential care for children and, at times even family members. This allows children (many going through very difficult situations) to get counseling and more importantly the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ. There is probably no endeavor in Baptist life that will see more people come to Christ per capita that our Baptist Children’s Homes. We also give to our Gideons, one of the greatest things we can do as people of God is simply place the Word of God in the hands of people. If we believe that the Word of God is powerful and sufficient for all things, there is nothing we can do that is more important than giving people the Word of God and allowing the Spirit of God to do a work in their heart as it is read.

Last, but certainly not least, is our Missions Operations. This is the part of the offering that will allow us to put feet to our prayers. This will allow us to not only give, but to go! This offering does several things: (1) It will help support ministries like Bro. Jeff Phillips as he is being led to plant a church in Vancouver, Canada (2) It will allow us to begin a partnership in the coming days with Bro. Harold Peasley, as we will partner in the coming years with a church in the South Africa area (3) It will help supplement some of the mission endeavors that our Trinity members will go on. Many this the projects we focus on this year will consist of local missions and North American missions. It would be quite hypocritical to be people who give to support missionaries (many of whom we have never met), and yet allow those we know and have relationship with to go without any of our support. As we face this opportunity, let me encourage you to pray and then give out of a joyful heart knowing that this is an investment with eternal rewards. Come ready to pledge on August 23rd , and expect God to do a great work!

A Thank You, A Praise and An Encouragement from Pastor Chad Everson

Merely by accident I came across this website that lists the top 50 blogs in Memphis (ok, I was truthfully surfing Memphis sites for restaurant evaluations!) http://www.networkedblogs.com/network/memphis_tn from the information I could find, the listings were in no particular order, but if listed by “present followers” it would put our blog in the top 12 to 15. Now, this is a THANK YOU! Obviously there is no money that this blog produces for Trinity or for me, but if you would like to send a donation to Trinity Baptist Church I know for a fact it wouldn’t be turned away :) No, if you will go back to my very first blog you will find my motivation for blogging, we average about 40 hits a day - which our stats show to be primarily Trinity membership. The encouragement that you give, the posts that you have made and even the corrections some of you have made have been greatly appreciated. This is a wonderful way to communicate to my Trinity family and I pray that it serves not only as a way to share my heart, vision and even announcements to you…but that it also serves as a challenge to you in your walk with Christ. So thank you for reading and thank you for your input!

Now here is a PRAISE! I am so exited to tell you one of the ways the Lord has blessed Trinity that tends to go unnoticed by me and most of you. As I was preparing for our staff retreat I began to do what we have to every year - look at our figures. Now, being in the midst of summer I certainly expected no surprises (the summer slump doesn’t get its name because it is so good for churches) – but let me just share with you what I found to Praise God about! Last year from January-July in 2008 our average Worship attendance was in the high 900’s…this year from January to July our average Worship attendance was over 1000. It is growth, but what excited me most is that the growth has been continuous and steady - we averaged more every single month from April through July. In fact, in the month of June we had 87 more people attending Trinity! Now the praise we give for this belongs to Christ alone: He is growing our body and He is working among us! I was unaware of these signs of growth simply because I do what you probably do - look only from week to week. I have shared with you that I do not believe that numbers are the primary indicator of growth. In fact I don’t believe it is even a secondary indicator. What I tend to look at more carefully is the number of people we have in growing in grace and truth, the number of men we have leading their families in family worship, the number of people we have reading gospel centered books, and various other indicators that are happening right now that we don’t take any kind of inventory on (but we should and, as time goes I hope we will). In fact I have been much more excited by the fact that our attendance on Sunday evening has almost doubled and that I greatly rejoice in! Not for numbers sake but because it is a good thing when God’s people look for opportunities to be under the Word of God. Again, I praise God for this but numbers can not and will not be our “scoreboard,” - the scoreboard is if we are becoming the type of Church the Word of God has called us to be. That type of Church is outlined in a blog entitled “My Vision for Trinity” on this site.

Last but not least I want to encourage you to do two things: (1) Get active in Bible Fellowship Groups (aka Sunday School). Unfortunately, we have not seen any growth here and in some places decline. This area has been a consistent decline for Trinity over the last couple of years and, when I came this was one area of concern for me and many of you. This is the place where accountability is built, Bible discussion takes place, a place where the church can minister to one another. Especially as we face our new “Peace Maker” material, make a commitment to be active in our Bible Fellowship Groups. (2) Give: Many Pastor’s in today’s economic climate would cut out the missions offering - I think we would be less than what God has called us to be if we focus only on what goes on inside the walls at Trinity. In May we had an amazing month financially, but June and July, like every other church I know, money gets low. I want to encourage you to pray about what you should give to our Love Offering for Jesus, and use that as a catalyst to be a tither and a giver. We do not serve the God of America’s economy, we serve a God who owns it all! So, as in all of our lives individually, we have a reason to be thankful for wonderful people around us and we have many reasons to praise the great God we serve! In saying that, let’s remember that we have room for improvement because “He’s still workin’ on me”…and you…and Trinity!