So, to be a cover family of a thriving family, this must be what people are looking for…
Dear Lord, I hope your portrait of a thriving family is much broader. Its my prayer that Heaven is full of people who aren’t like me yet thrived in their life with Jesus. Amen.
p.s. In fairness, the rest of the magazine exhibits plenty of diversity of race. Single, no-children, working class, or non-American… not so much.
Confession #1: I’ve gotten wrapped up in being called a leader. I fall into the mistake of thinking people want to know what I think. Instead, a true leader defers to the ultimate source of wisdom, thinking, and counsel. The most appropriate thing I can do as a leader is point someone to ultimate truth found in the Bible. And I recognize that sometimes I do that and sometimes I depend on my own talent, experiences, and personal preferences. I used to be so good at saying, “This is what the Bible says: _______. And this is what I would do if I were in your position: ______________.” It seems that the more people want to recognize me as a “leader” the more I want to emphasize the latter instead of the former. The result is that I’m not always the best leader I can be. Ironic, eh?
Confession #2: I get wrapped up in being called a pastor. I’ve never been comfortable with that title. But as the year’s have gone by I’ve gotten much less diligent in blushing it off when people call me “Pastor Adam.” I don’t know if it’s that I’ve gotten comfortable with what God has done and others recognize that in me or if I just like being called a pastor? Now, it’s true. That is what/who I am. And I am not ashamed of the title. I am not ashamed of my position. And I am not ashamed of my church. It’s not about shame. I recognize that its a sign of respect for my position yet I’ve always been uncomfortable with being labeled any title. Since I entered full-time ministry I’ve always self-reflected and laughed at God’s slapping me… ME… with the title of pastor. Sure… since I was little… even before I was a Christian… I always knew I’d be in ministry. But I also know who I am. I am biblically qualified to be a pastor and yet I know who I am.
- Above reproach? As far as I know
- A one woman man? Heck yes!
- Temperate? I do my very best to not lose it
- Self-controlled? To the best of my knowledge
- Respectable? You tell me
- Hospitable? Check
- Able to teach? Check
- Not given to drunkenness? Been good on that one since early teens
- Not violent but gentle? By the grace of God
- Not quarrelsome? Not my thing
- Not a lover of money? How could I be?
- Manage his family well? Could always do better
- Not a recent convert? Check
- Good reputation? Let me know, OK?
Confession #3: I want to get more wrapped up in my identity as a daddy and husband than as “Pastor Adam.” Closing in on 6 years of working in churches full time and I know well why some denominations don’t let their pastors marry. The demands on the position are over-the-top hard to balance with a family. People think nothing of about calling me late at night or early in the morning to talk to me or ask me to do something. And I’m always tempted to work every day and most nights for youth group, small groups, meetings, and other stuff that lands on my schedule. I really don’t think this is biblical and I should be more disciplined about saying “Can we talk or do this tomorrow?” In the past 6 years we’ve had countless family meals interrupted, countless dates disrupted, dozens of movies put on pause, play time put on pause for other people so many times my kids hate it when I take a call, times with daddy missed for this and that. Spending quality time with other people’s kids while missing the same with my own. Honestly, I hardly ever noticed. But my wife and kids did. It’s tough being married with kids and being married with kids to a church. Only recently have I been doing some studying in the New Testament and I realized… “Wait a minute! These guys weren’t nearly as available as I am and God still thought they rocked as pastors and leaders.”
This is one of those blogs posts that has stuck with me. For the last two years I’ve been unwinding myself from being “Pastor Adam” to going back to being “just Adam.”
I’m thankful for my new life and friendships. And I’m thankful that most of those people know me as Adam and not Pastor Adam. I still don’t know/think that I’m done with being on church staff… but I do know that if there is a next time, I won’t let people call me Pastor Adam. You can have a title with your job. But you can’t ever allow yourself to be that title more than you are yourself.
We are new gardeners. Our insane 2010 goal of either growing or buying 25% of our families food from a local farmers market has pushed us into a crash course in agriculture.
In March and April we planted our second season of vegetables as well as double the amount of property dedicated to veggies. It’s out-of-control in a very fun way!
Along the way we’ve been learning some valuable lessons. Interestingly, these lessons have fantastic spiritual significance as well.
Here are 5 spiritual lessons we’ve learned from gardening:
A former student of mine posed a question on the Fast Tuesday groups discussion board that I thought was pretty interesting. I think there are differing opinions about Jesus’ instructions. She said, “Aren’t you supposed to fast in private?”
While Kristen and I were shopping at Taget tonight, I suddenly became aware that 90% of the people shopping alone in the store were happily yacking away on their cell phones.
I thought to myself… how surreal is it that most of the people in this store are walking around telling people they are at Target? It reminds me of an observation a prophet [aka some guy on Dateline!] made a few years ago… he said “What would happen if someone from a past century were to show up in our culture and then report back to the past? He would tell everyone that we were completely nuts because we all walked around talking to ourselves!” Strange thought, but true, right?
In other news… the church is starting to see the results of long term prayer. Recently we’ve started to see a woman allow herself to get introduced to our church family. In my days of ministry I’ve never seen a woman run so far from Christ while a husband continued to grow in Christ and patiently love and pray for her. This breakthrough started with her helping with the church with our interior design. Next she started to get chatty with me and PB on her stays here. Then this week something crazy happened. She contacted Nathan, our Children’s Ministry director to see if he could help her out with some childcare. That is the miracle. 3 months ago and this woman literally would walk down a different aisle in the grocery store when she saw me… now she invites a staff member to her home? God’s doing something there through ordinary things. Amazing.