Last month Christians around the country were outraged when a local church pastor in California was told by a government agency that he had to discontinue meeting or go through process and get an expensive permit. The county backed down but it has raised some very interesting issues. [Read more here>>>]

The video response below is from Richard Hammar is an attorney, CPA, and best-selling author specializing in legal and tax issues for churches and clergy. A graduate of Harvard Law School, he is the author of more than 100 books, including Pastor, Church & Law and the annual Church and Clergy Tax Guide . He also writes the Church Law & Tax Report newsletter, has contributed articles to numerous journals and publications, is a frequent speaker at legal and tax conferences, and has taught church law at a number of seminaries.

direction2Leadership often requires saying hard and truthful things to people who don’t always want to be confronted with the truth.  I learned a long time ago that if someone turns on a light and expose what is going on in the darkness, the person exposed will likely point to the person turning on the light as if they are the problem.  The person turning on the light is never the problem.  The problem is the problem.  As leaders we are called by God to turn on the light and expose sin, call people to repentance and judge the fruit (or lack their of) in peoples lives.  

If I had a nickel for every time I heard Christians say that, “God said we shouldn’t judge.”  I would be a very rich man.  Where did that nonsense come from?  The idea that we can’t/shouldn’t judge is an extremely popular idea these days.  Christians and non-believers both use this statement often to try to avoid exposure of wrongdoing in their lives, and yes, the Bible does say for us not to judge, but although it does say this what does it really mean?  In oder to  understand Jesus’ teaching where He said: “Judge not, that ye be not judged…” (Luke 7:1-5) we need to read IN CONTEXT.  Then it’s understood that God will hold us to a standard as strict as that which we demand of others. All judgment must be tempered with mercy.  

Calling people to live in alignment with the scripture and congruent with their faith requires judgement.  That is why there are so many scriptures that provide leaders with both a clear mandate and the tool (God’s Word) to do it well:

Zechariah 3:7 (KJV)  ”Thus saith the LORD of hosts; If thou wilt walk in my ways, and if thou wilt keep my charge, then thou shalt also judge my house, and shalt also keep my courts, and I will give thee places to walk among these that stand by.”

2 Timothy 3:16-17 (NIV)  “All scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

2 Timothy 4:2 (NIV)  “Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage- with great patience and careful instruction.”  

Titus 2:15 (NIV) “These, then, are the things you should teach.  Encourage and rebuke with all authority.  Do not let anyone despise you.”

Ephesians 5:11 (NIV) “Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them.”

1 Corinthians 2:15-16 (NIV) The spiritual man makes judgments about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man’s judgment: For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him?  But we have the mind of Christ.”

I know there are a lot of people running around wondering how to handle how disappointed they feel towards God. If you have ever felt that way you will love this link:

Disappointed (With God) from Central Christian on Vimeo.

1. The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it. Theodore Roosevelt

2. The very essence of leadership is that you have to have vision. You can’t blow an uncertain trumpet. Theodore M. Hesburgh

3. Delegating work works, provided the one delegating works, too. Robert Half

4. Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results. George S. Patton

5. Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things. Peter F. Drucker

I have been thinking and reading a lot about leadership lately. What makes a self_leadershipgreat leader? Why do people follow one person and not another? Is leadership innate or learned? Bill Hybels has said that if you have the spiritual gift of leadership it is your responsibility to develop that gift for the sake of the church to the zenith of the gifts potential.

Most of us who lead have to lead followers and that is easy to understand. But we also need to be mindful of leading peers (those who walk along side of us). It would be easy to stop there but if you have someone over you, you should be mindful of learning how to effectively lead up. For most people the hardest person they will ever lead though is their own self.

Self Leadership seems to be a missing link far too often. It is the issue of integrity that we see missing in more than a few leaders today. So, my personal quest in this season of learning is to first and foremost focus on mastering the art of my own self leadership. Self Leadership can be defined as “the process” of influencing oneself to establish the self-direction and self-motivation needed to perform in a God honoring way.

Acts 24:16 (New International Version) “So I strive always to keep my conscience clear before God and man.”

The Disappearance of God
More faulty information about God swirls around us today than ever before. No wonder so many followers of Christ -1are unsure of what they really believe in the face of the new spiritual openness attempting to alter unchanging truth.

For centuries the church has taught and guarded the core Christian beliefs that make up the essential foundations of the faith. But in our postmodern age, sloppy teaching and outright lies create rampant confusion, and many Christians are free-falling for “feel-good” theology.

We need to know the truth to save ourselves from errors that will derail our faith.

As biblical scholar, author, and president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Dr. Albert Mohler, writes, “The entire structure of Christian truth is now under attack.” With wit and wisdom he tackles the most important aspects of these modern issues:
Is God changing His mind about sin?
Why is hell off limits for many pastors?
What’s good or bad about the “dangerous” emergent movement?
Have Christians stopped seeing God as God?
Is the social justice movement misguided?
Could the role of beauty be critical to our theology?
Is liberal faith any less destructive than atheism?
Are churches pandering to their members to survive?

In the age-old battle to preserve the foundations of faith, it’s up to a new generation to confront and disarm the contemporary shams and fight for the truth. Dr. Mohler provides the scriptural answers to show you how.

Eyes Wide Open-2

I had it all backwards. The main thing was not my love for God, but his love for me. And from that love I respond to God as one deeply flawed, yet loved. I’m not looking to prove my worth. I’m not searching for acceptance. I’m living out of the worth God already declares I have. I’m embracing his view of me and in the process discovering the person he created me to be.

In Eyes Wide Open, Jud Wilhite invites you to discover the real you. Not the you who pretends to be perfect to satisfy everyone’s expectations. Not the you who always feels guilty before God. Not the you who secretly feels God forgives everyone else but only tolerates you. Not the you who looks in the mirror and sees a failure. The real you, loved and forgiven by God, living out of your identity in Christ.

A travel guide through real spirituality from one incomplete person to another, Eyes Wide Open is a book of stories about following God in the messes of life, about broken pasts and our lifelong need for grace. It is a book about seeing ourselves and God with new eyes–eyes wide open to a God of love.

Sir Dalton and the Shadow Heart-3

Sir Dalton, a knight in training, seems to have everything going for him. Young, well-liked, and a natural leader, he has earned the respect and admiration of his fellow knights, and especially the beautiful Lady Brynn.

But something is amiss at the training camp. Their new trainer is popular but lacks the passion to inspire them to true service to the King and the Prince. Besides this, the knights are too busy enjoying a season of good times to be concerned with a disturbing report that many of their fellow Knights have mysteriously vanished.

When Sir Dalton is sent on a mission, he encounters strange attacks, especially when he is alone. As his commitment wanes, the attacks grow in intensity until he is captured by Lord Drox, a massive Shadow Warrior. Bruised and beaten, Dalton refuses to submit to evil and initiates a daring escape with only one of two outcomes–life or death. But what will become of the hundreds of knights he’ll leave behind? In a kingdom of peril, Dalton thinks he is on his own, but two faithful friends have not abandoned him, and neither has a strange old hermit who seems to know much about the Prince. But can Dalton face the evil Shadow Warrior again and survive?

I just read this in “Out of UR“:  For a couple of years now, long-time pastor and theologian John MacArthur has been critical of Mark Driscoll’s use of crude language in the pulpit. In the end, MacArthur believes Driscoll has crossed a line, and it’s time for him to step down from ministry. MacArthur’s comments have ignited a heated debate in the blogosphere (as you might suspect).

driscoll_swears

At the 2009 Basics Conference last month, another long-time pastor and theologian, John Piper, fielded a question about this debate. Piper, who along with Driscoll, is a card carrying Calvinista, offered a measured and thoughtful response. While strongly disagreeing with Driscoll’s language and dismissing the necessity of swearing to be relevant, he does not believe the Mars Hill pastor needs to resign.

You canlisten to Piper’s response here.

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While I am the lead pastor at The Journey North Community Church, they are in no way responsible for what happens here. Its all my fault. You can expect thoughts about spiritual growth, leadership and church planting but you are just as likely to run into my completely random thoughts or finds. Consider yourself warned...
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