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Churches Boot Boy Scouts

Jun 3, 2013

Following the recent vote to lift the ban on open homosexual members in the Boy Scouts of America, a number of churches across the country have announced that they will be cutting ties with the organization.

Reports state that the majority of entities that charter with the Boy Scouts are either faith-based organizations or churches. However, some churches have now decided not to allow the Scouts to use their facilities any more as the organization no longer represents their moral values.

Pastor Mike Shaw of the First Baptist Church of Pelham, Alabama is among those ending his alliance with the Scouts. He recently explained that his church could not in good conscience support the acceptance of sinful behavior.

“We don’t hate anybody,” Shaw told reporters. “We’re not doing it out of hatred. The teachings of the Scripture are very clear on this. We’re doing it because it violates the clear teaching of Scripture.”

Continue reading.

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Superman Movie Marketed to Pastors

Jun 3, 2013

The upcoming Superman: Man of Steel movie has a website with free resources and free pastor’s screenings across the country:

ManofSteelResources.com

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Why Traditional Churches Should Stick With Traditional Worship

May 27, 2013

David Murrow: don’t try to be something you’re not:

I’m a member of Alaska’s largest church. It’s a lot like every other megachurch. We meet in a cavernous, windowless room with stage lighting and two huge projection screens. We’re led by a rock band and a casually dressed pastor. The service lasts exactly 75 minutes. Our church draws a large crowd that attends sporadically. There’s a relatively small, highly committed core of members that keeps the machine going.

I like my church. But it’s in Anchorage, 26 miles from my house. So my wife and I occasionally worship at a small traditional church in our little town of Chugiak. (Let’s call it St. Mark’s)

We’ve been enjoying our Sundays at St. Mark’s. The richness and rigor of the liturgy is refreshing after years of seeker-sensitive services. It’s an eight-course meal, carefully measured out for us by church fathers – confession, forgiveness, praise, instruction, communion, giving, fellowship and benediction. It’s like a spiritual multivitamin in an easy-to-swallow, hour-long pill.

St. Mark’s has a lot going for it. The people are friendly, but not overly so. There is a healthy number of kids and young adults. The facility is well kept. The sermons are insightful. We love the depth of the hymns – and the people sing robustly (as opposed to most megachurches where very few people sing). It takes my wife back to the 100-member churches of her youth.

But last Sunday was different. Once a month, this little church does a contemporary service. Gina and I were surprised – unpleasantly so. Continue reading.

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Why Aren’t People Singing?

May 27, 2013

Kimberly MacNeill offers practical tips for helping your congregation sing, and to understand why they don’t:

Worship leaders, week after week, pour their heart and soul into leading their congregation in a time of worship through music. They plan and they practice and they pray. A team of musicians shows up prepared and ready to lead people in singing praise to God. But, all to often, at the end of the day, it didn’t turn out as “good” as they hoped. In the evaluation time, it is noticeable once again, that the people just didn’t seem to be singing. It is disappointing. The worship leader wants so much for the people to sing out in passionate praise. “Why aren’t people singing?” they ask. And though some worship leaders are willing to admit that some songs just don’t work, the lion-share of the conversation finds the people at fault: they don’t really care about worship: they aren’t passionate about God. “Well, that’s on them,” says the worship leader. “I’m doing all I can.” No doubt, he or she is doing their best. But, there is something they might not know, and it would help if they did.

There was a time in American culture when people grew up with a foundational appreciation and understanding of music. In elementary school the class sang songs. In a later grade, everyone had a music class that explored all the instruments. In Junior High everyone was in the chorus one mandatory semester. Lots of teens chose to join the high school chorus. Most families did go to church and kids learned church songs; hymnals had the actual music score in it as generally speaking, people could read music! See, not all that long ago, people grew up singing out loud, in public; it was part of life. But when school budgets started getting cut, the Arts Department was the first to go. The music foundation went away. In addition, as Christian music expanded in influence, it took on a more “professional” edge and became more performance oriented. Bottom line: singing was now for the musically gifted. If I ask someone in today’s world, “Do you sing?” they almost instantly say, “only in the shower.” And if someone says they occasionally sing “karaoke” they almost always add, “you know….because I’m drinking and so is the audience!”

So now, here we are. Though we have a culture that loves music and has easy access to it, today’s music is mostly about listening to other people sing. So, the idea that when people come to church once a week and are expected to sing out loud in front of both family and strangers-well-they are looking for ways to get out of that! After all, they have never done that in their life! The good news is that many people think the worship music is good. In fact, for some people, it is the reason they come to church – they love the music. Listening to it ministers to them. But, that doesn’t mean they want to sing it with you.

So, what can the worship leader do? Continue reading.

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Low Cost In-ear Monitors

May 27, 2013

ChurchMediaDesigns.tv shows how to set up in-ear monitors for your entire band without breaking the bank.

12 Questions For Evaluating a Ministry

May 27, 2013

Take a look at your ministry with tips from Brian Howard:

Have you carefully thought through a new ministry that you want to start? Have you evaluated your current ministries? Here are 12 planning questions that will help you think through starting a new ministry or evaluating a current one. Consider planning a day away to write a plan based around these 12 questions:

1. What is the purpose of this ministry?

What are you hoping to accomplish with this ministry? What is the purpose and mission of the ministry? How does it fit into your overall vision? Is there a primary purpose? Is there a secondary purpose?

2. Who will this ministry serve?

Who is the target of this ministry? Who will it benefit? Is there a primary target? Is there a secondary target?

3. What are the needs of those who this ministry will serve?

What services will we offer in this ministry? What are the needs of the target group we are wanting to serve? What are their Spiritual needs, Physical needs, Emotional needs, Intellectual needs, Relational needs. Which of these needs should our ministry focus on?

4. How will we provide these services and meet these needs?

What will be our ministry strategy for providing services for the needs of our targeted group? What is our Step-by-Step process for making this ministry happen?

5. How will the ministry be led?

What type of leadership qualities and skills are required to lead this ministry?

6. What kind of team Is needed for this ministry?

Is a team needed for this ministry? How many people are needed? What are the various roles and ministry responsibilities that are needed to support this ministry? What are the skills and abilities needed for those who will make up the team?

Continue reading.

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Piper’s Tweet Stirs Up Controversy

May 27, 2013

Oklahoma’s devastating tornado stirred up a theological debate that was set off from a series of deleted tweets referencing the Book of Job.

Popular evangelical author and speaker John Piper regularly tweets Bible verses, but two verses tweeted after the tornado struck some as at best insensitive and at worst bad theology:

“Your sons and daughters were eating and a great wind struck the house, and it fell upon them, and they are dead” (Job 1:19).

“Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped” (Job 1:20).

In the Book of Job, God allows Satan to afflict “blameless” Job, killing his 10 children, livestock and servants. While Piper’s tweets didn’t mention the tornado by name, critics said it was too close, and inappropriate.

Piper, who recently retired from the pulpit of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, is a leading theologian of the neo-Calvinist movement that’s sweeping many evangelical churches. In essence, Desiring God staffer Tony Reinke wrote, Piper was highlighting God’s sovereignty and that he is still worthy of worship in the midst of suffering and tragedy.

In response, popular evangelical writer Rachel Held Evans blasted Piper’s “abusive theology of ‘deserved’ tragedy,” and said Christians have to stop the idea of responding to tragedy by suggesting God is inflicting his judgment.

“The only thing we need to tell them is, ‘I don’t know why this happened but God is good and God loves us,’” she said in an interview.

Continue reading.

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Does Your Church Steal Musicians?

Years ago when I was the worship leader at a church plant that set up weekly in a public school cafeteria, we paid a guitarist. What a relief to have this talented musician around who could play any chart I threw at him and switch between bass, electric and acoustic when needed. Often it was just me on keyboard, him on bass and a drummer. If the drummer decided to head for the beach Saturday afternoon (leaving me, of course, in the lurch) we could get by fine with a stripped-down keys and acoustic set.

Then the talented guitarist told me one Sunday after church that he was leaving. The local Willow Creek Church Clone was offering him more money.

I was livid. Not at him – he was a super-nice guy but really just a hired gun with no ties to the church. Did the big Willow Creek Clone really need yet another guitarist?

Ironically, the Clone hit a financial bump a few years later, stopped paying musicians, and every last one of them quit (including the guitarist.)

Fast forward ten years to a new era of stealing. A Ginormous Church has sprouted in town and has hired away a young 20ish guitar prodigy from a new church plant meeting in a movie theater.

The Ginormous Church isn’t being malicious. They are what they are: a big church who values quality music and believes a musician is worthy of his/her hire. More power to them – the world would be a better place if The Church supported the arts instead of letting Hollywood gobble up the talent, wouldn’t it?

And I don’t blame the young 20ish prodigy. The Ginormous Church pays each musician in their band $300 a week (can you imagine that budget!) His role will be much like an intern where he’ll play music he loves with top musicians while learning about recording (they have a recording studio,) loops and other technology. It’s almost like being paid to get a music education. He’ll probably make more part time at the church than he would at a full-time McDonald’s job.

But what happens if you’re on the losing end of this deal – a church plant who can’t compete with the big bucks? Pray.

When I lost our guitarist to the Willow Creek Clone I had dinner with one of our lay worship leaders. We decided to pray and ask God to send us another guitarist. After we prayed he suddenly said “Oh, I just thought of the perfect person!”

This perfect person turned out to be another talented guitarist – in fact, still to this day one of the best guitarists I’ve ever heard. He and his wife had been away from church for years, and his playing for us brought them both back to the Lord. He was more than merely a “hired gun” (we paid him what we paid the other guy) – he and his wife had an amazing spiritual transformation and eventually became members of the church. After I left that ministry he actually took over as the music director!

Bottom Line: Let the big churches steal your musicians – God will provide.

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