Admitting you were wrong,
or made a mistake,
or changed your mind on a topic
are signs of emotional and spiritual maturity and should be celebrated rather than ridiculed.
Growth is good.
My theology 20 years ago was different than it is now. I’ve read and learned a great deal.
I have lived and learned through countless mistakes in ministry and leadership.
I am, often painfully, still learning through many more today.
This is how maturity comes about.
One of the reasons evangelicals have seen so many pastors and leaders fall is that they have anointed someone as a genius in his/her 20s and given them little room to mature.
Hard to have room to change when everyone is celebrating you—before you’ve learned from mistakes.
There’s something to be said for the people who have lived and walked with Jesus for a long time.
They are acutely aware of who they once were.
And that they likely are not yet who they are supposed to be.
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After 20+ years of pastoring, a thread of some thoughts for you youngsters and seminarians:
First, theology is important, but probably not in the way that you think it is.
Bottom line: theology—when pastoring—must be relentlessly tied to helping your church live out the faith.
In seminary, theology can serve primarily as an intellectual exercise, as the ultimate mind games. So we ask Qs like:
Does God predestine souls to an eternal destination before birth?
How do we reconcile the existence of God/evil?
How to make sense of certain Scriptures?
Etc.
These are good and even helpful—if we are constructing a pastoral framework with them. It is helpful to remember that many questions/situations have a *theological* response and a separate *pastoral* response. While the pastoral response may be informed by theology, it is unique.
Yesterday one of my college buddies came to town and asked to meet. We sat in lawn chairs outside the church building and talked for quite a while.
He and his family have had quite the time of it.
Without going into too many details, there has been employment drama, kid issues, family stress, financial worry, and a few other sensitive things mixed in.
And yet…there has been an inescapable sense that the Lord is walking with them every step of the way.
That’s what I'm driving at when I talk about brokenness—spiritual brokenness leading to humility—the Presence of God in the midst of the valley.
This is something unique--something that marks people who I greatly admire.
Lately I've been trying to ponder and circumvent the way (predominantly evangelical) church economics unintentionally hinder our effectiveness. Below are some observations. Would love any suggestions you may come up with.
I am on the board of an organization that works to start new churches in the city of Houston. I love the organization and believe it is one of the best things going in my city. Over the last five or so years, we have started several dozen churches. But, a problem arose.
We began to notice that it was very difficult to start new churches in economically depressed areas of the city. This is not because people didn't believe in the mission. Quite the opposite. It was because there was not enough funding in the neighborhood to support it.
Enjoyed this interview of Camille Paglia by @clairlemon. I've long appreciated Paglia's insight and wit. Money quote from Paglia: "As an atheist, I have argued that if religion is erased, something must be put in its place." quillette.com/2018/11/10/cam…
In the same question from @clairelemon, Paglia argues that "secular humanism has failed." The fascinating thing to someone like myself (clergy/semi-academic) is the thought that any form of humanism ever *could* replace religion.
Western culture is so formed by Judeo-Christian ethics and sensibilities that it literally could not imagine a way of being in the world the wouldn't import copious amounts of Christian assumptions. Simply put: humanism doesn't have the inherent goods to create such a framework.