day no. 15,690: charity requires someone to work

"If the comer is a traveler, assist him, so far as ye are able; but he shall not stay with you more than two or three days, if it be necessary. But if he wishes to settle with you, being a craftsman, let him work for and eat his bread. But if he has no craft, according to your wisdom provide how he shall live as a Christian among you, but not in idleness. If he will not do this, he is trafficking upon Christ. Beware of such men. But every time prophet desiring to settle among you is worthy of his food. In like manner a true teacher is also worthy, like the workman, of his food. Every firstfruit then of the produce of the wine-vat and of the threshing-floor, of thy oxen and of thy sheep, thou shalt take and give as the firstfruit to the prophets; for they are your chief-priests" -- The Didache, J.B. Lightfoot translation

A traveling minister shall be given room and board, but not indefinitely. Within 2-3 days, he needs to either become part of the community or move on. He must either get to work and earn the bread that was previously provided to him as a guest or get to stepping to where he wants to end up. But if he becomes part of the community, he must begin to contribute to it. He belongs to the family so he helps with the dishes. He is no longer a stranger in need of hospitality, but a member in need of contributing something back.

Charity requires someone to work. In order to have something to give, someone must have extra. A Christian is one who receives God's work on their behalf as their only hope of salvation and right standing before God. This faith is then demonstrated by doing for others what God has done for them. Along with a new heart and the help of His Spirit, the Christian discovers an impulse from God to provide for others. The Christian becomes like Christ in working for the benefit of others.

No Christian would seek to make his living off of merely being a Christian. Christians in vocational ministry understand their calling as work. They are paid to disciple, study the Scriptures, preach, counsel, etc... but they don't expect a paycheck for simply being a part of the body. Being a Christian isn't a job, it is a delight. We obey God because we want to and His commandments are not burdensome. Expecting someone to pay you for being a Christian is what the Didache calls trafficking upon Christ. Beware of those who would do this and the temptation to become like this.

day no. 15,423: Acts 6-7 at 30,000 ft.

ACTS 6:1
Now in these days when the disciples were increasing in number, a complaint by the Hellenists arose

Mo people, mo problems!

It's not surprising that as the number of saved sinners increased that trouble at some point increased as well. Everyone is a sinner. Christians are saved sinners, but they're still sinners, so it's not surprising that even in a community like this where they are loving each other, sharing bread, homes, money, etc... that they still have problems. If they couldn't pull off a perfect church back then in that world, we shouldn't expect to do so in ours.

So, good news! if you're a sinner, you are welcome to join. You won't ruin it, you will just be joining the rest of us sinners. But don't join thinking being part of a church will solve all of our problems. It won't and you'll be disappointed!

ACTS 6:2-4
“It is not right that we should give up preaching the word of God to serve tables. Therefore, brothers, pick out from among you seven men of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we will appoint to this duty. But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.” 

Many of us read this and are offended. Our natural response is to say, "Why don't they care more about justice and widows?"

But notice, no one in their town reacted to it that way. They didn't respond by accusing the apostles of shirking their responsibilities. They were happy that the apostles took this seriously enough to appoint a group of good and godly men to address it.

This WAS the apostles caring about it. So we get it exactly backwards. We accuse them of not caring when in fact this is the height of their concern.... it just wasn't their role. 

They took RESPONSIBILITY for it by appointing others who were more imminently qualified and gifted to address it so that they could focus on what they alone were most imminently qualified and gifted to do.

And the result?

Acts 6:7
And the word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith.

When God's people use their gifts to serve the body, everyone wins, everyone grows and more are added and disciples are multiplied in number and in maturity. This is a model of lay leaders and regular church members getting after it and going work. Too many churches expect their vocational pastor staff to do everything, but here we see that that is NOT Healthy and the church actually grows (wider and deeper) when pastors get other people into the game (Eph 4:11-12)

This would require a transition to an emphasis on lay leaders, committed members, and faithful Christians in every corner, not just on stage or in the back office.

Acts 6:8-15

This lay leader is a living representative of Jesus and an ambassador for Him out in places where only lay people go (to work, to their homes, to their neighborhoods, etc..)

Acts 7:1-53

Stephen is not a vocational minister, but he is NO SLOUCH! Preach! Brother read his Bible, understood theology, cared about it and remembered it and if you pricked him, he bled it. He wasn't afraid to call sin out and He was not afraid to lift Jesus up as our only hope.

Acts 7:54-60

And so the first recorded martyr for the Christian faith is an ordinary man filled by an extraordinary Spirit, a regular church attender who waited tables while reading His Bible. He has the HIGH privilege of being the first to shed blood in Jesus' name. He is the first fruits of many more who would come after. 

What the church needs more than anything is not more superstar celebrity pastors, but more regular, committed members who celebrate, connect, and contribute at the local level faithfully for God's glory, their neighbor's good and their own personal growth.

day no. 15,030: narwhal

I feel two intense and often competing calls upon my life from God.

(1) The call to preach

I love preaching. I love laboring with God's Word to understand, craft, edit, execute, etc...  I feel it deep inside my bones. I resonate with the sentiments I see in Scripture of those who feel a fire in their chest and a compulsion to study, conform to and speak from the Bible.

(2) The call to lay ministry

I love serving the church for free, or as one has said, "being good for nothing." I love being able to provide the example of what it looks like to love the Lord and not get paid vocationally to do so. Too many have only the two categories of someone who does not take the Bible all that seriously and attends church at best and the one who takes God at His Word and thus enters into vocational ministry because of their commitment to it. Being a lay leader emphasizes the intense call upon all to be disciples that make disciples wherever you may go, including your work, your community, and your home.

But these two desires produce conflict.

To be able to preach more would require laying aside my laity and joining the rank and file of those in vocational ministry. To pursue laity is to set aside opportunities to preach.

I feel like I'm sometimes stuck in a "not double awesome" situation. 

Lay ministry? awesome!
Preaching? awesome!
Lay ministry and preaching? NOT double awesome.

I feel like a narwhal.

A unicorn is awesome. Obviously majestic and respected and no one wonders why little girls want them to be the theme of their birthday parties. They're awesome! Obviously.

Whales are awesome. Obviously majestic and respected and no one wonders why everyone wants to save them or sight one from the safety of a boat. They're awesome. Obviously.

A narwhal is essentially a whalicorn. It is not double awesome! It is pretty intriguing, but it hasn't caught on. I don't know why not. I mean, it's a whale with a unicorn horn. How has this not become a bigger deal. They aren't exactly secret at this point either. People know about narwhals. And yet, they haven't gained the traction that either unicorns or whales have. 

I think when people discover I am intensely drawn to lay ministry and preaching they respond they way they respond to narwhals... interesting? I'm intrigued. But the intrigue soon wears off. One or the other is a clear trajectory, but both is a confused mess... like a narwhal.

So pray for me as I navigate the tension of feeling pulled intensely by God to both and attempting to discover what it looks like to pursue preaching from a lay leader's seat.

day no. 14,877: lay leaders do it for free

2 Thessalonians 3:6-12
Now we command you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you keep away from any brother who is walking in idleness and not in accord with the tradition that you received from us. 7 For you yourselves know how you ought to imitate us, because we were not idle when we were with you, 8 nor did we eat anyone's bread without paying for it, but with toil and labor we worked night and day, that we might not be a burden to any of you. 9 It was not because we do not have that right, but to give you in ourselves an example to imitate. 10 For even when we were with you, we would give you this command: If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. 11 For we hear that some among you walk in idleness, not busy at work, but busybodies. 12 Now such persons we command and encourage in the Lord Jesus Christ to do their work quietly and to earn their own living.

Lay leaders lead for free. They work hard in order to provide their services without a fee. This is an example laid down for us at the foundation of all church planting. The church needs more men to serve God for free - to use their time to build, produce, sell and provide for themselves in order to give their free time to serve their God and their local church for free. More men need to devote themselves to providing for first things: their wife, their children, and their neighbors. And after that, they could then use the left over gas in the tank to serve their local church in a lay capacity. Few and far between should be those employed entirely for the Gospel. That said, there should be provision made for those who make their entire living by the Gospel, but theirs should be the rare breed of those gifted to equip others to serve. The Scriptural pre-requisite for being paid to "do ministry" is being good at getting others in the game and equipping them for acts of service. The goal is that everyone would be involved in ministry, not just those on salary.

Ephesians 4:11-12
And He gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ

Too many see "doing ministry" as an "all or nothing" vocational proposition. Either you get paid to do it and devote your life to it or you don't get paid to do it and leave most of the heavy lifting to the "professionals."