Your Presence is a Present

We’re a week away from the start of college football. Fans of teams with preseason injuries wait anxiously to see if all their starters will be healthy enough for the season openers.

What’s true for Saturday college football teams is true for Sunday church attendance, too: Missing players impact the whole team.

When you’re not attending, your church misses your involvement as much as a college football fan misses their favorite player.

You may say, “Who me? What’s so vital about someone like me showing up each Sunday? I’m not important.”

Think again. According to scripture you serve others in three ways. These are absolutely essential for the spiritual growth of others and the well-being of your church body.

First: You sing to your church. No, I’m not talking about singing in the choir. Colossians 3:16 says that “you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit.” When you’re not present, we don’t have your voice teaching and admonishing us through communal singing. Sure, we like to hear the trained voices on stage, but it’s your voice next to us in the pews that Colossians 3:16 says we need.

Second: You encourage your church. It’s not just the pastors and deacons who are responsible to keep the flock on the right path. In Hebrews 10:24-25 we are told that gathering with the church gives us a chance to “spur one another on toward love and good deeds.” Even a brief word to someone in the aisle following the worship program has a powerful impact. Sitting with your small group gives you even more time to perform this ministry.

Third: You support your church. Most members give their offering electronically regardless of their ability to attend. But a majority still base their giving on whether they’re present. If they’re not there, neither is their offering. This significantly impacts the ministry of your church.

You deny your fellow members what they need from you when you let other things replace involvement on Sunday morning. You’re a key player, and you’re missed when you’re missing! See you Sunday!

--Tom

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Sign up here to receive Tom Goodman’s weekly devotional in your email inbox. Tom serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter.

What Do You Do with Your Garbage?

David Chameides decided to keep his trash instead of throwing it out.

All of it.

Nothing went to the curb, and nothing got taken to the dump. Junk mail, food scraps, packaging material. He piled all of it in his basement. 

He’s a two-time Emmy award winner for camera work, but worldwide he’s better known as “Sustainable Dave.” And his decision to keep his trash was part of a demonstration.

The average American throws out 1700 pounds of trash annually. He figured the best way to demonstrate the impact of that was to keep his trash for a year and report on the project at his website called “365 Days of Trash.”

Chameides even lugged back trash he may have produced outside the home. So, when he was on business trips or vacation, he bagged all the garbage he would have thrown out and brought it back with him in his luggage to add to the piles in his house. Organic waste was put in a worm bed in his basement, while everything else was stacked together or put in tin bins.

It's given Chameides a chance to talk about our impact on the environment, which is a good thing to consider. But when I read the story, I wondered how many of us do the same thing with our sins and failures. They just pile up, month after month, year after year, in stacks around the house.

We don’t have to live that way. We can be free of our moral garbage. Paul declared that God “has taken it away, nailing it to the cross” (Colossians 2:13-14). What a vivid image. Jesus’s death was an atoning death that removed the record of sin that separated us from God. So, you don’t have to live surrounded by the accumulating debt of our moral failures. It can be taken away.

Let’s look at that great truth this Sunday! Join us at 10am on campus or online.

--Tom

“Meet Dave, the Man Who Never Takes Out the Trash,” by Bryan Walsh, Time, Sep. 22, 2008.

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Sign up here to receive Tom Goodman’s weekly devotional in your email inbox. Tom serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter.

Tending the Gardens of Childlike Faith

Note from Tom: At each Tuesday’s church staff meeting, a different staff member brings the devotional. I asked Denise Garza to send me the notes she prepared for her devotional. This is a good word for parents, grandparents, and all those who work with preschoolers and children in our church!

Tending the Gardens of Childlike Faith

By Denise Garza

“He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.” (Matthew 18:2-5).

I love teaching preschool, but it wears me out and I have quit several times. After I quit, I follow it up by sheepishly asking to come back because I realize that I’m addicted to the preschool life!

Children have an incredible capacity for fresh faith and teach us that learning about God can actually be FUN and lighthearted!

This past Sunday as we learned about Peter’s Miraculous Escape From Prison. This is what was presented:

• getting arrested for talking about Jesus

• being in chains

• friends thinking mere words can break chains

• an angel showing up and “striking” Peter to awaken him

• chains falling off with the guards right there asleep

• vision-questing until Peter realizes the escape is real

• Rhoda – hearing a voice that cannot be true…

We made prayer chains with personal prayers written on each one even though the chains in the story were ones that needed to be broken.

The children heard all of this, did not doubt, they believed and acted – no questions asked.

Did you get that? NO ONE challenged us with, “Wait – WHAT??? An ANGEL???” or “They broke out of prison  - HOW?” or “What did the angel look like? How did he know it was really an angel?” 

This whole account takes faith to absorb – and yes, children might have questions, but they still have the open mind and heart to take in the story “fresh” just as presented.

Years ago, when I was trying to build a business, I was often told that, when it came to business risk-taking, you had to be “too dumb to doubt.” How blessed it would be if like children we were “too dumb to doubt” God’s existence, love, and plan for us.

Children are not dumb, but we adults are often labeled “dumb” when we have the faith to accept accounts like Peter’s escape and also pray and hope for seemingly impossible things in our own lives. How blessed it would be if all adults could not only have childlike faith, but also foster children’s faith to keep growing with them!

I think about the parable of the Sower and the Seed and how it relates to my preschoolers. The seeds we plant in class each week fall on ALL of these soils at once within each child.

• It falls on the hard path – if we don’t teach the lesson on their level it will never reach them

• It falls on rocky ground – when they have pent up energy, or want snack or toys or if they get distracted, lessons will slip away as soon as presented.

• It falls among thorns – when we parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, mentors, teachers don’t follow up with what our children are learning in Sunday School, the seed gets choked out by neglect

• It falls on good soil - Luckily God starts off all our children with hearts and minds full of “good soil” ready to accept anything and grow what is consistently planted!

Depending on what we plant, children will believe in God, unicorns, Santa Claus, love, bigotry, gender identity, patience, kindness or whatever we choose to plant consistently into their precious minds. And the seeds that are planted when they are young take deepest root.

Orange Peel Mind

When my daughter was very young she asked why she could not see a movie that was not “A-PO-PRI-ATE.”

I said her mind was too young to scar with ideas that were not appropriate.

I explained that young minds are like fresh orange peels. If you take a toothpick and make a scratch on a fresh peel it is DEEP and it STAYS. Even when that peel ages, gets old and dry later that first mark is still there.

I went on to say that as we get older our minds mature and get a little tougher like a dry orange peel– and pretty soon a scratch like that doesn’t make or leave such a lasting mark.

She was not happy about my movie decision, but we did get to play with orange peels so she could hopefully see what I meant.

I wish I could say that I have always been a good steward to ensure that only Godly things are planted in my daughter’s life.

Parenthood is a road of imperfection and many times I fail to let God drive.

But as we get ready to begin a new school year, this is a great time to renew commitments to foster childlike faith. All of us who interact with children need to ensure we help tend the gardens of their hearts & minds daily…

• … so that the good tender soil God has given our little ones does not dry up in frustration, hate, or bitterness…

• … so that the good seed does not get over-taken by the weeds of media, social media and negative news reports…

• … and so that the good seed does not get buried under the rocky soil of modern apathy, hopelessness, and disbelief.

I sure need to make this recommitment. Please join me so we can help foster the growth of God’s good things in the good soil of our children’s hearts and minds!

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Finding Fulfillment

Newlyweds Doug and Sylvia Whitt were not impressed with their honeymoon accommodations.

Their wedding reception had gone late into the night, and it wasn’t until the wee hours of the morning that they made it to their hotel room.

They had booked what they thought was a fancy honeymoon suite. But when they walked in the door, all they saw was a sofa, a table, and some chairs. They found the sofa had a hide-a-bed with a lumpy mattress and sagging springs.

The next morning, the new husband went to the hotel desk and gave the management a tongue-lashing.

The clerk asked, “Why didn’t you open the door and see the rest of it?”

Doug went back to the room. He opened the door they had thought was a closet. There, complete with fruit baskets and chocolates, was a beautiful bedroom. 

Some of us might say our Christian experience has been a lot like that. We’ve been living in a cramped little room and we’re calling that Christianity. There is so much more to life with Jesus.

We open the door to more life with Jesus when we understand what it means to be “in Christ.” That phrase and close variations of it show up 164 times in the New Testament. We tend to use the word “Christian” to describe ourselves today. But while that word only shows up three times in Scripture, again and again Paul preferred to describes us simply as people who are “in Christ.”

Marinate your soul in this truth—and, yes, the word “marinate” is the right one. It’s not enough just to hear this truth once or twice every now and again. We have to soak in it. We have to sing songs about it and attend Bible studies about it and reflect on it in personal devotion times and remind each other about it.

This Sunday, we’ll begin a three-week study of this vital truth. We’ll camp out at Colossians 2:9-15 for all three weeks. Those seven verses serve as a good introduction to what it means to live in Christ. Join us at 10am on campus or online, and let’s open the door to a much wider experience of the Christian life!

--Tom

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Don’t Miss the Adventure!

In his book, Just Courage, Gary Haugen recalled a time as a little boy of ten. He and his dad and two older brothers had decided to hike Mount Rainier outside Seattle. But once they got to the visitor’s center, little Haugen didn’t want to go on. “Dad assured me I could make it, that he would help me and that the view and triumph would be more than worth the effort—and that it would be marvelous to do together.” But Gary told his dad he’d rather stay at the visitor’s center.

His dad and brothers finally went on without him. At first, he was pleased with his decision. “The visitor's center was warm and comfortable…. I explored every corner, and judging by the crowd, it was clearly the place to be.” But as the day dragged on, things got dull. “The inspiring loop videos about extraordinary people who climbed the mountain weren't as interesting the sixth and seventh times, and they made me wish I could be one of those actually climbing the mountain instead of reading about it. I felt bored, sleepy, and small—and I missed my dad.”

Finally, his family returned, and he noticed something about his brothers. “Their faces were red from the cold and their eyes clear with delight. They were wet from the snow, famished, dehydrated and nursing scrapes from the rocks and ice, but on the long drive home they had something else. They had stories of an unforgettable day with their dad on a great mountain.”

Haugen told of his childhood memory to make a point: “It is my sense that many Christians are starting to suspect that they are stuck at the visitor’s center.” But it doesn’t have to be that way. “In different times and in different ways, our heavenly Father offers us a simple proposition: Follow me beyond what you can control, beyond where your strength and competencies can take you, and beyond what is affirmed or risked by the crowd—and you will experience me and my power and my wisdom and my love.”

What a beautiful image! Is God beckoning you to join him on an adventure? Don’t miss out!

--Tom

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Why We Do What We Do

Sometimes we can be so busy “doing church” that we forget the reason for it all.

When the seventeenth-century ruler, the Shah Jahan, built the famous Taj Mahal, he intended it as an elaborate memorial for the Shah’s deceased wife. In fact, he ordered her coffin placed in the center of the site and the temple built around it.

As the work progressed, Jahan became obsessed with the project. One day while attending to the many details of construction, he stumbled over a wooden box covered with dust and workman’s tools. Angered at the inconvenience, he ordered the work site cleared of all the clutter. Later, to his horror, he realized he had ordered the disposal of the coffin of his beloved wife.

Imagine that: he accidentally cast out of the shrine the very reason for the construction of the shrine.

Leaders in churches do that with our own church projects sometimes. So, let’s recommit to focus on our aim. Playing football without an end zone or playing billiards without pockets wouldn’t be any fun. And church work without a target isn’t any fun either.

In Colossians 1:27-28 Paul set this as our goal: “We proclaim him…so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ.”

So, we present Christ to people now so that we can present people to Christ in eternity.

Imagine standing before the throne of God surrounded by the people we led and influenced and impacted. And we’re presenting them to Jesus saying, “Here they are, Lord. They are just as you hoped they would be.” That’s our goal.

What does a fully mature believer look like? At our church we use the acronym HILL to help us remember that: Honor God. Invite others to him. Love each other. Live the Word. For Hillcrest, that’s the HILL we crest.

Getting people up that HILL is why we do what we do as staff, teachers, musicians, deacons, Life Group leaders, and volunteers. That’s where we should be taking everyone so that they can be fully mature believers.

Pray for your church’s leaders and volunteers as we pursue that goal!

--Tom

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The Significant Sign

Of my mother’s nine siblings, two of her sisters are deaf, and each one married men who are hearing impaired. As a child, I was fascinated watching the hand signs that my mother used to communicate with her 2 sisters. Simple hand actions conveyed entire concepts.

She’d grasp the imaginary visor of a ball cap to signify “boy.” A rocking action of the arms meant “baby.” When they greeted each other in the morning, my mother would make her hands into fists and rotate the right fist over the left fist, and then point to one of my aunts with a questioning look, and that meant “Would you like some coffee?” By a simple action that simulated the cranking of an old coffee bean grinder, an entire question was asked without words.

One of the most powerful signs in hand language is the sign for “Jesus.” The middle finger of the right hand is place on the open palm of the left hand, and then the middle finger of the left hand is placed on the open palm of the right hand. When a communicator wants to talk about Jesus in the language of the deaf, she points to the places where the nails went into Jesus’s hands upon the cross.

With all the words we have at our command in the hearing world, many of us have missed the central act of the life of Christ. But without any words at all, when the Deaf communicate Jesus, they rivet attention to the cross.

The Bible says that the cross was God’s way of establishing peace with us. Our moral failures separate us from the one who created us, but Jesus took the record of those failures and died for them as our substitute. As Paul put it in Colossians 1:21-22, though we were “alienated from God…he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death.”

This is the message of Christianity. We become a Christian when we embrace this message, and we mature as a Christian when we reflect on this message. Everything else we’re told to believe and practice springs from the fundamental truth of God’s redeeming love.

--Tom

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The Bath of Baptism

At 61, Sam Houston became a believer and submitted to baptism in Rickey Creek. Cynical friends asked the dripping-wet Texas hero if he felt his sins had now been washed away. “Yes,” said Houston, “and God help the fish down below!”

Sins washed away. It’s interesting how we humans make a fundamental link between guilt and washing.

Psychological studies bear this out. Northwestern University’s Katie Liljenquist and her colleagues asked a group of 60 college students to concentrate on either something ethical or unethical that they had done in the past. Then the students were asked to complete the letters in two words: “W_SH” and “SO_P.” Students who reflected on an unethical memory were more likely to say that the unfinished words were “WASH” instead of “WISH,” and “SOAP” instead of “SOUP.”

In another experiment, after students were asked to remember some ethical or unethical action from their past, each student was given a choice of two parting gifts: a pencil, or an antiseptic wipe. Sixty-six percent of the students who said they had recalled an unethical memory took the antiseptic wipe. It was as if they wanted to wipe themselves clean of the recollection.

“Wash away all my iniquity,” King David called out to God in confession of his adultery, “and cleanse me from my sin.” (Psalm 51:2) It’s good to know God responds to that kind of heart cry.

In the New Testament, baptism symbolizes the cleansing power of Christ’s sacrifice. After Ananias explained the gospel to Paul, he said, “And now, what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized, and wash your sins away, calling on his name.” (Acts 22:16)

That’s a good question for us all: What are you waiting for?

We’ll gather for outdoor baptisms on Sunday, July 16, at 1:30pm at Twin Lakes YMCA. Let me know if you’re ready to take this step of Christian obedience.

--Tom

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Next-Level Living

You’ve probably heard someone say that an athlete who exceeded expectations took his game to “a whole ’nother level.”

Starting this Sunday, let’s commit to do that with how we understand and practice our faith.

God willing, across the next few months we’ll work verse by verse through Paul’s letter to the Colossians. It’s a little book—just four short chapters. But in his quick note, the Apostle Paul takes us to… 

…a whole ’nother level of just how glorious Christ is,

… a whole ’nother level of how united our lives are with that glorious Christ, and

… a whole ’nother level of how we ought to live since we’re in union with that glorious Christ!

We begin this Sunday with Colossians 1:1-14. Here Paul demonstrates for us how to pray for those we love.

In his book on prayer, Richard Foster wrote:

“People desperately need the ministry of prayer. Marriages are being shattered. Children are being destroyed. People are living in dark depression and misery. And we can make a difference if we will learn to pray. If we genuinely love people, we will desire for them far more than is within our power to give them, and that will lead us to prayer.”

So, what should we pray when we pray for others? In Colossians 1:10, Paul wrote, “We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives. We pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord, pleasing him in every way.”

But what does a life worthy of the Lord look like? Paul describes a life worthy of Jesus in four parallel phrases. It is a life that is fruitful in good works, intimate with God, resilient in hard times and, exultant in salvation.

Fruitful. Intimate. Resilient. Exultant. Do those you love burn with that kind of fire?Do you?

Let’s take our faith to the next level this summer. See you Sunday at 10am!

--Tom

P.S., in my June 9 devotional newsletter, "Seal of Approval," I told y'all about a handheld embosser I once had that was lost on one of my moves. Well, guess what I got in the mail today! Steve and Marissa Ladd sent me a new handheld embosser. Thank you so much!

My next devotional will be about a fly rod I lost in a move...

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Sign up here to receive Tom Goodman’s weekly devotional in your email inbox. Tom serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter.

Don’t Hit the Snooze Button

Sometimes Anna Sumner would go to bed in the evening and wake up a full day later. Her longest single stint of sleep was fifty-three hours.

At first, she didn’t recognize this as abnormal. In college, she just assumed her exhaustion was due to the stress of academic life. After graduation, Sumner moved to Bangkok to teach English. Napping between every class wasn’t odd, she thought, because she was adjusting to a warm climate. Then she spent a winter working in London. There, her excuse for long spells in bed was the dark and dreary sky.

Her craving for sleep impacted everything. She chose sleep over working out, eating lunch, or being with friends.

When she finally sought help, she found she had a rare condition: hypersomnolence. Anna’s brain had a “bioactive component” that shut the body down like it had been given anesthesia. Doctors began to give her a drug normally given for benzodiazepine overdoses, and for the first time in a long time she felt truly awake. It changed her life.

There’s such a thing as spiritual hypersomnolence. Like Anna’s condition, it’s impacting us in all kinds of negative ways. Yet, like Anna's condition, it takes a while for us to finally say, “This isn’t right.”

In the book of Revelation, Jesus dictated a letter to Christians in Sardis who were filled with compromise and complacency. “Wake up! Strengthen what remains and is about to die,” he told his people. “If you do not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what time I will come to you” (Revelation 3:2-3).

Notice how Jesus commanded us to awaken before faith dies.

We might think that spiritual complacency is some sort of neutral spot between passionate commitment or bitter rebellion. But no. In The Shawshank Redemption, Andy lives by a slogan that Red comes to accept by the end: Get busy living or get busy dying. Those are your only two options, too: If you’re not busy living what you say you believe, Jesus says you’re dying.

If this is your wake-up call, don’t hit the snooze button!

--Tom

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Sign up here to receive Tom Goodman’s weekly devotional in your email inbox. Tom serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter.

Seal of Approval

I once had a handheld embosser for the books in my personal library. With it I could impress a raised seal on the title page of a book. The page would then forever bear my initials encircled with the words, “From the Library of Tom Goodman.” I lost the embosser on one of my moves, but many of my older books still have that personalized mark.

The relation of that tool to my books illustrates the relation of God’s truth to our lives. Having faith in certain doctrines and convictions is essential and yet incomplete.

On the one hand, being a Christian means having faith in the enduring truth of God’s word. God’s character and promises and expectations are found in the Bible. Read it, study it, discuss it, and believe it.

And yet there’s more to Christianity. What we believe has to make an impression in our attitudes and behavior. In Ephesians 1:18-19, Paul wrote, “I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe.” Paul wanted believers to move beyond mere mental agreement with certain facts. He wanted those facts to show up in their priorities and passions.

This will help you, but it will also help those around you who are unfamiliar with Christianity. They will have an easier time understanding it by first “reading” God’s truth in the imprint it makes in our lives. I mean, have you tried to read the wording on an embosser? The letters and the sentences are backwards. You can eventually work out what it says, but it’s easier to read the results the stamp makes into a page. Likewise, those who are unfamiliar with Christianity will find it easier to understand our faith by starting with the impression it makes in our lives.

Along with Paul, I pray that the eyes of our heart may be enlightened so we may actually experience the hope and the riches and the power that are ours in Christ!

--Tom

I wrote about one of the issues our convention will face next week. Read my blog post “Men and Women and Ministry” here.

Sign up here to receive Tom Goodman’s weekly devotional in your email inbox. Tom serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter.

Men and Women and Ministry

How can we employ the gifts and calling of women and men in alignment with God-breathed scripture?

Here’s our church’s answer: “While both men and women are gifted for service in the church, the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.” That’s from our statement of faith on our website.

There are two points in that sentence.

First, we believe “the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.” While our church worked verse-by-verse through 1 Corinthians a few years ago, I addressed this conviction in a sermon called “Vive La Différence!” You can review that message here. You should also read Kathy Keller’s book, Jesus, Justice, and Gender Roles: A Case for Gender Roles in Ministry. There are many books I could recommend on this subject, but what makes her little volume distinctive is that she was on her way to ordination in the United Presbyterian denomination when her study of scripture changed her mind. She and her famous husband, Tim, decided to serve in another Presbyterian denomination, the PCA (the Presbyterian Church in America) and, in part, it was over this change of mind. The PCA, like our Southern Baptist Convention, believes that the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.

I said our statement of faith on this issue has two points. Here’s the second: We believe “both men and women are gifted for service in the church.” This means that, other than the office of pastor, both men and women should be encouraged to lead and teach and contribute in all kinds of ways. So, at Hillcrest we have women and men serving as Life Group leaders, Bible study teachers, committee members, team leaders, and staff positions.

So, a two-point sentence: “While both men and women are gifted for service in the church, the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.” What are the implications of believing that statement completely?

First: We deny any egalitarianism from the left side of our culture and any chauvinism from the right side of our culture. Some voices from the cultural left erase all gender distinctions, including in marriage and ministry. Some voices from the cultural right belittle a woman’s competency to serve in roles traditionally occupied by men, and they mock any commitment to better gender representation. But since we’re guided by scripture, we’ll celebrate God’s design for the sexes while also celebrating God’s gifting in all his sons and daughters.

Second: We will use the title of “pastor” appropriately. For at least a decade, a trend has developed in our churches to give the title “pastor” to any staff position. Student Pastor … Worship Pastor … Children’s Pastor. There’s no biblical justification for this. In the Bible, the words “pastor” and “elder” and “overseer” are all used interchangeably to speak about those responsible for leading and teaching the entire church. So, if someone leads in one area of ministry but doesn’t also serve on the team that oversees the teaching and direction of the entire church, “pastor” is not the right title for the role. This is why we’ve resisted that trend at Hillcrest. I depend on our ministry staff, our deacons, and our committees to help me set the direction and teaching of our church. But Hillcrest has one person with the biblical title of pastor. One day we should have a conversation about whether to form a team of elders. But neither our staff members nor our deacons nor our committee members are meant to occupy the role of elders as the Bible defines the term.

Third: We will work to ensure our partner organizations share our convictions on this subject. We are an independent church that partners with other like-minded churches at the local, state, and national level. One of the issues facing our national Southern Baptist Convention is whether to disfellowship churches that no longer believe that “the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.”

Sadly, this includes Saddleback Church, our convention’s most famous church.

I’ve learned so much from Rick Warren over the years. But Saddleback has recently ordained women as pastors and, as Warren retired, he announced his replacements would be co-pastors, Andy and Stacie Wood. At first, some of us hoped this was simply a loose and informal use of the title of “pastor.” As I said, some churches have trended toward using the title “pastor” for any ministry staff position. Even some churches that would limit the office of what they call “senior pastor” to men might do this. But in an interview with Christianity Today, Warren said women and men should be eligible for all roles in the church without distinction.

Russell Moore: So, you would…support men and women as elders, as senior pastor, as everything within the church

Rick Warren: I would.

We believe Scripture steers us between the shoals of egalitarianism and chauvinism. So, for Saddleback to veer so deeply into egalitarianism requires a response. With grief, I will vote next week to disfellowship Saddleback.

Why?

Our partnership with other churches at the convention level ultimately impacts a lot of things. What kind of literature our convention creates for small-group lessons. What kind of churches our convention plants. What kind of training our convention provides for ministers in our schools. What our missionaries teach on the mission field. We want to be sure that, in all these areas, our convention participation results in joyfully promoting our conviction that “both men and women are gifted for service in the church,” and “the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.”

For further study:

“What Did Paul Mean by ‘I Do Not Permit a Woman to Teach’?” 6-minute discussion between Don Carson and Tim Keller.

“How Should We Think About Disfellowshipping Churches in the SBC That Have Women as Pastors?” Podcast by JD Greear

“A Time for Clear Complementarianism & Wise Cooperation.” Blog post by Baptist 21.

“A Conversation about the SBC and Confessionalism, Cooperation, and Complementarianism with Nathan Finn.” Podcast by Baptist 21

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Prayers that Ache

Even when we don’t feel effective at talking with lost people about God, let’s at least talk with God about lost people.

The nineteenth-century English Baptist pastor, Charles Spurgeon, said:

 Like Jeremiah, we can make it our resolve, “If ye will not hear it, my soul shall weep in secret places for your pride, and mine eye shall weep sore and run down with tears.” To such pathetic appeals the Lord’s heart can never be indifferent; in due time the weeping intercessor will become the rejoicing winner of souls. There is a distinct connection between importunate agonizing and true success, even as between the travail and the birth, the sowing in tears and the reaping in joy.

He was referencing Psalm 126 there.

The poem is divided into two stanzas. In verses 1-3, we see the people laughing, but in verses 4-6 we see the people weeping. After seventy years of Babylonian captivity, they laughed in astonishment when they were suddenly allowed to return home. But they also wept because only a portion of the Israelites returned with them. To those who stayed, Babylon felt like home.

This is where our emotions need to be, too. You and I need to rejoice over God’s saving grace and at the same time grieve over those who are still lost and in captivity.

Why has God arranged things so that prayer precedes effective evangelism and church growth? I like how Bryan Chapell put it in his book on prayer:

Much as an old-fashioned steam engine uses coal shoveled into a boiler to power a train, God uses our prayers to empower the engine of divine transformation. Of course he could transform our world without our prayers, just as he could make trains go without natural resources, but he has chosen otherwise. Knowledge of his choices keeps us mining coal and offering prayer.

Are we passionate over the fact that we have God’s salvation? Are we equally passionate about the need others still have for it? Are we as fired up about this as we are over our politics or our team or our stuff?

Read Psalm 126 and ask God to get to you the same level of passion you see in those verses!

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Laughter and Tears

When Star Trek first appeared on television in the late 1960s, it featured a character known as Mr. Spock. From the planet Vulcan, he was rational, logical, and unemotional. He always regarded humans a curious species. He found us racked with such irrational emotions as fear and sadness and physical attraction.

Thirty years after the original Star Trek series had been introduced to TV, a new series began called Star Trek: The Next Generation. The leading non-human character on The Next Generation wasn’t a Vulcan but an android named Lt. Commander Data.

Emotions were a curiosity to Data, just as to Spock.

But while Spock avoided emotions as beneath his rational dignity, Lt. Commander Data longed for the experience of human emotions. He wanted to be human and so he wanted to feel.

I might disappoint Star Trek purists, but Lt Commander Data intrigued me more than Spock.

Unfortunately, some of us are Christian Spocks. We have the mistaken notion that the advanced Christian is someone who’s risen above the mess of human emotions.

Now, no doubt the Bible has much to say about being led by the Spirit instead of being led by your passions and appetites. But we’re not told to obliterate our emotions. God expects us to be passionate people.

For example, consider Psalm 126. The poem is divided into two stanzas. In verses 1-3, we see the people laughing; in verses 4-6 we see the people weeping.

After seventy years of Babylonian captivity, they laughed in astonishment when they were suddenly allowed to return home. But they also wept because only a portion of the Israelites returned with them. To those who stayed, Babylon felt like home.

You and I need to rejoice over God’s saving grace and grieve over those who are still lost and in captivity. Until our passions for these matters flare up as much as they flare up over politics or sports or stuff, we’re not where God wants us to be.

Let’s go deep into Psalm 126 this Sunday. See you at 10am!

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Calling Dad

When I was looking for work one summer between college semesters, a friend persuaded his father to hire me for his construction company. Brad and I worked on separate crews, but one day I heard my friend’s voice crackling on the radio as he called back to his father at home base:

“KPX-222-4-9er to KPY-432-5.”

I was impressed at how professional Brad sounded. But there was no response, and I heard him try again:

“KPX-222-4-9er to KPY-432-5.”

Again, there was no response in the long hiss of dead air.

Finally, my friend dropped his on-air professionalism and said, “Brad to Dad. Come in, Dad.”

Then I heard, “What is it, son?”

That incident came to mind while I was reading Jesus’ instructions about prayer. In Matthew 6:5-8, Jesus cautioned us against two temptations: praying to impress others and praying to manipulate God.

First, Jesus spoke of hypocrites who “love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by people” (verse 5). He was speaking about Pharisees who aimed to impress others with their piety.

Then he turned from the prayer habits of Jewish insiders to the practices of Gentile outsiders who “imagine they’ll be heard for their many words” (verse 7). He was referring to pagans who felt they could get the gods to do what they wanted if they used the right rituals and incantations.

So, Jesus said we should not use prayer to impress others or to manipulate God. Instead, we should come to God as we’d come to a loving father who is so attentive to our needs that he already knows what we’re going to talk about before we begin praying.

When I was small, my friends and I would giggle uncontrollably at the offertory prayer of one particular deacon. Trying to sound like the King James Version of the Bible, he would solemnly close his prayers with, “We thank thee thou knowest whatest we need.”

Come to God like Brad calling out to his dad. He already knowest whatest you need.

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Sweet Iced Tea for the Soul

People from the South measure distance in “tads” and measure time in “directlys.” As in, “Scoot over a tad,” or, “I’ll be over to your house directly.”

People from the South know that a state of readiness is required to enter any action, so we’ll let you know when we’re “fixin’” to do something.

Southerners know that it makes no sense for the plural of “you” to be “you.” Every other language differentiates between the second-person singular and the second-person plural, so English should, too. “Y’all” solves the deficiency here. (By the way, the best indicator that a Hollywood actor has no idea how to imitate a Southerner is when he uses “y’all” to refer to only one person. Yankee, please.)

But there’s one Southern word that can help you grow in holiness: “Reckon.”

On a pretty day, a Southern man might ask his friend, “You reckon we can take off early today and go fishing?” It’s an invitation to imagine a scenario worth responding to. Likewise, Paul wrote, “Reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:11, NKJV).

Here’s how this word can develop you as a disciple: When we’re tempted to let the old sinful impulses take over, we must “reckon” life as if it were otherwise. In Romans 6:11, Paul was saying, “Imagine what you would do if your old sinful life was really dead—consider that scenario and then live accordingly.”

The pursuit of holiness is not a self-improvement process. If you think in these terms, it will lead either to pride or despair, depending on our success or failure. It’s better to think of the pursuit of holiness as getting aligned with the status Christ has achieved for us. United to him, we’ve already died to sin. Spiritual growth means acting in consistency with that mental image.

Embrace this great truth. You’ll find it like sweet iced tea for your soul.

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Thus Far

We raise children. We raise toasts. We raise buildings.

We also need to raise Ebenezers from time to time.

After God rescued Israel from a threatened invasion, the prophet Samuel set up a stone and named it “Ebenezer.” That’s a combination of two Hebrew words: eben, which means “stone,” and ezer, which means “help.” So “Ebenezer” means “stone of help.” He explained the marker to the people, saying, “Thus far has the Lord helped us” (1 Samuel 7:7-13).

That’s the story behind the odd line in the eighteenth-century hymn “Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing.”

Here I raise mine Ebenezer

Hither by thy help I’m come.

But look carefully at Samuel’s explanation for raising the stone: “Thus far has the Lord helped us.”

Thus far.

Samuel wanted the people to celebrate what God had done, but he didn’t want them to presume that nothing else lay ahead.

It’s right to take a walk down Memory Lane; it’s wrong to make that our permanent address. Thus far has the Lord helped us, but there’s more to come.

Someone once said, “Don’t ever get to the point where you have more memories than dreams.” I think there’s a lot of wisdom in that warning. God doesn’t want us to run out of dreams.

I’ve been thinking about this as we prepare for this Sunday’s Jubilee. We’ll celebrate the 50 years Hillcrest has served at the Steck Avenue location, and the Personnel Committee wants to recognize my 20 years as Hillcrest’s pastor. (I’ve been given strict orders to stay out of that part of the planning, of course.)

A Sunday like this is a time for memories and dreams. It’s a time to thank God for all he’s done, and then ask him, “What’s next?”

This is true for an individual life, too, not just a congregation. Are you still on pilgrimage with God, or have you set up camp on Memory Lane? We look back on God’s work in the past to gain the inspiration to follow him into the future.

See you at 10am this Sunday!

Tom

Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

What Angels Desire

This Sunday we wrap up a four-week series about angels. I wanted to “open a door” for you, so to speak. I wanted you to get a glimpse of a supernatural world we hardly think about as we go through daily life.

But when we draw near that door to look in on angels, we discover that they’re crowding around that door to look in on us!

We read in 1 Peter 1:12 that all the things God does to save his people “command the interest” of angels. That’s how JB Phillips paraphrased two Greek words. The first word literally means “boiling over.” It was used to speak of “longing” or “desire.” The second word has the idea of bending over an object for close inspection. So, the angels never stop gazing in fascination at what God does to save his people.

During the late 1500s, the Italian Renaissance artist Jacopo Tintoretto completed a painting called “The Last Supper.” I’ll include an image of the painting in this post. In the scene, Jesus is gathered with his disciples for their last meal. But notice that above the table, in the wisps of smoke from an oil lamp, angels appear. They’re bending low to the scene, curiosity on their faces, as they marvel at what God the Son is about to do.

Angels saw the saving death and resurrection of Jesus. They see the Holy Spirit draw people to that salvation through the witness of ordinary people like us. They gasp in amazement at how God preserves and develops the faith of the people he’s saving. Angels look at all that and they say, “Wow God! You’re amazing!”

This Sunday, I want to give you three practical things you should do with this knowledge.

So, would you forward this email newsletter to someone? Maybe someone you used to see at Hillcrest but you haven’t seen in a while. Or maybe someone you think might be interested in joining you for our last Sunday in this fascinating study of angels.

See you at 10am this Sunday!

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Someone to Watch Over Me

Back in 2014, during the war in Afghanistan, a U.S. military vehicle broke down in the desert in the Helmand province, a Taliban stronghold. The rest of the convoy was ordered back to base and the stranded soldiers had to await a repair crew’s arrival that couldn’t come until the morning. But in the air above them, Colonel Dale Fridley watched over them throughout the night by means of an armed aerial drone. And so, the stranded soldiers slept in peace that night even in enemy territory.

David Zucchino told that story in a Los Angeles Times article about the work of drone pilots. When I read it, I thought how it perfectly illustrates the situation you and I are in spiritually. Until Jesus comes, we’re in enemy-occupied territory, but angels guard us from above.

Angels loyal to God’s people protect us from angels hostile to God’s people. That should make you more alert and more confident at the same time.

Some go through life oblivious to malevolent forces that want to bring them down. They need to be reminded of what Simon Peter wrote: “Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8, NLT).

But others go through life crippled with anxiety over this threat. They need to be reminded of innumerable “ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation” (Hebrews 1:14 ESV).

God expects us to live both alert and confident.

Two weeks ago, on Easter, we began a series about angels. In this four-week study, we’ll look at four things: what angels do, what angels are, whom angels fight, and whom angels worship. We’ve already looked at the first two subjects, and you can find those sermons on our website. This Sunday, we’ll look at whom angels fight.

Would you forward this email newsletter to someone? Maybe someone you used to see at Hillcrest but you haven’t seen in a while. Or maybe someone you think might be interested in joining you in a study of this fascinating subject.

See you at 10am this Sunday!

Tom

Image Credit

Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

What Angels Are

Everyone knows what angels are, right?

They are pleasant-looking women in wings and flowing white robes and glimmering halos.

Wait. No. They are chubby little preschoolers who float around plucking mandolins, like the cherubs in the Renaissance paintings of Raphael.

Hold on. They are human beings who have died but return to earth to earn their wings. You know, like the sweet and simple Clarence in the old Christmas film, It’s a Wonderful Life.

No, that’s not it. They look like any one of us and have come to earth to experience what it’s like to be human. Like John Travolta’s angel in Michael or Nicholas Cage in City of Angels.

Hang on. That’s not it. They are muscular male warriors in an unseen army, like the angels of Milton’s Paradise or the angel Tal and his forces in Frank Peretti’s popular Christian fiction, This Present Darkness.

So…maybe this job of describing angels isn’t so easy.

It’s always helpful to compare our imagination to the Bible and see if it measures up. The Bible mentions angels over 300 times, and from those references we can draw some conclusions about what angels are. This Sunday, we’ll look at five characteristics of angels according to the Bible.

Why should we take the time to study about angels?

For one, it’s a point of connection to our secular world. Even people who aren’t religious find the subject of angels intriguing. Maybe that’s you. If so, I hope you’ll join us each Sunday this April as we discuss this topic.

And if you’re a believer, there’s a greater reason to study about angels. We’re told in 2 Timothy 3:16 that all scripture is inspired of God and profitable. And if Scripture gives us picture after picture after picture of angel encounters, there’s something profitable there. Let’s find out what that is.

Would you forward this email newsletter to someone? Maybe someone you used to see at Hillcrest but you haven’t seen in a while. Or maybe someone you think might be interested in joining you in a study of this fascinating subject.

See you at 10am this Sunday!

Tom

Image Credit

Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.