Stories, videos, photos, and audio from the field
via Pioneers Media Archive – Imagination.
What might happen if you dared to imagine problems solved, the poor served, beggar children rescued, and neighbors being loved into the kingdom of God? When I dare to meditate on these things, I rarely sleep well, and neither will you. But be assured. A bold imagination accelerates our creativity, and launches static faith into motion.
In his blog, Pastor Tullian Tchividjian wrote this,
The only way to musically communicate God’s timeless activity in the life of the church is to blend the best of the past with the best of the present. In other words, we must remember in our worship that while “contemporary only” people operate with their heads fixed frontwards, never looking over their shoulder at the stock from which they have come, and “traditional only” people operate with their heads on backwards, romanticizing about the past and always wanting to go back, the Church, in contrast from both extremes, is called upon to be a people with swiveling heads: learning from the past, living in the present, and looking to the future. That’s the only way to avoid in worship what C.S. Lewis called “chronological snobbery.”
The following is an edited transcript of the audio.
Is it possible to glorify God through the enjoyment of music, movies, literature, etc. produced by secular artists?
Yes. I assume the computer you are holding there was probably not built by Christians, and I hope that you are glorifying God as you tap away at it. And of course out from there, there are a 1000 things that we use all day long, and God says, ‘whatever you do, whether you eat or drink, do all to the glory of God.’ And he knows that you are eating this meat that may have been sacrificed to idols, so that means it was probably butchered by an unbeliever, or handled by an unbeliever, shipped by an unbeliever, it may have been cooked by an unbelieving cook. And here you are savoring the product of all those unbelievers’ work because you are in that moment giving thanks to God for it, recognizing that the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof and taking the strength and the joy that comes from it to render back to him.
Now with the arts and with media it is more morally complex than with food. But it is the same principle. The complexity of it is, in those moments what do you do with the moral elements of it that are so contrary to your faith?
I’ll just point out one principle because we can talk about this forever. What concerns me is the distinction between entertainment and cultural analysis. To watch something, to study the culture, learn from the culture, be more able to interact with unbelievers for the sake of the glory of Christ is one thing. To just sit and bask in nudity, or bask in fifty f-words, or bask in a world view that is shot through with arrogance to the core, and enjoy it? Hmm. That seems to point to something going on in the heart. And frankly, I have tasted it big time. I think today we are going to have to work at not being shaped by the world because the world has made its world view so scintillatingly attractive.
Movie after movie after movie has come out and most young reformed people are, I would say, indiscriminate. “Let’s go to a movie tonight.” OK, and then we just choose the best. None of the movies in that theater at that night are any good, probably. But you are just going to do it, because that is what you do. You go to the movies on Friday night, or whatever. And then of course you think, we’ve got to Christianize this thing somehow.
I just think we need to test our hearts big time. Big time. Why are we able to enjoy hell bound, God ignoring, Christ dishonoring, false world views because we can give it a little twist at the end that it taught us this or that about the world? So, I think the main thing I’m saying there is, test your heart as to whether entertainment is defaulting to the world, or to something more wholesome. We live in an age where we tend to default to the world for entertainment.
The following is an edited transcript of the audio.
Where would you say the place for gifts like tongues, healing and prophecy is in the life of the church today?
I will tell you what I do, whether it is the right thing or not. I’m not going to die on this hill, but I will tell you what I do.
I think that these kind of gifts are most effectively and appropriately ministered in smaller groups rather than on Sunday morning. Sunday morning meaning the large gathered body of lots of people with lots of strangers and the need for some kind of movement in the service, rather than the whole thing being devoted to individual expressions.
So when I think of trying to do whatever elements of 1 Corinthians 12:13-14 are appropriate for today, I would want my people to know that I believe in those things and that I want them to flourish in those things.
I think that we should, spontaneously in relationships and especially in smaller groups, take the time to ask people, “Did you bring anything from the Lord tonight that you think we need to hear?” You could use whatever language you want. You could say, “Do you have a word of knowledge for us. Do you have a word of prophecy?” And If you are scared to use that kind of language you could say, “Has God impressed upon you in some way something that you think another person in this room, or all of us, need to hear from your walk with God?” And open yourself up to that.
Someone might say something that just penetrates right through to the core of another person. Or maybe they will minister a healing, or whatever. So, that is my answer.
Now I know that there are groups today—reformed groups—that try to fold certain prophetic elements into Sunday morning. They have a little microphone at the front where people can come up, and they have an elder or two standing there. The words that people want to share are first tested by one of the elders who judge whether the Scripture they are going to read or the poem they are going to read or the word they are going to deliver is appropriate. And while there is music playing in the background, during the interlude in between songs, the person can give whatever they are going to give at the microphone in front. And where this is done I’ve seen it done with decency and order the way Paul would like. But we’ve never gone that route at Bethlehem.
Copyright Desiring God, 2010 (desiringgod.org)
If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry (Martin Luther King, Jr.)
Whatever our role, our position, our organization, or our lot in life, we should strive for the best. The measure of our success should not be attached to our particular career or what we earn but on our character and what we give.
Excellence does not mean being the best but being your best, understanding that variation makes all the difference in the world. Excellence is being better than you were yesterday. Excellence means matching your practice with your potential.
Some people have fame thrust upon them. Very few have excellence thrust upon them. Excellence is achieved. What will you do to have people say, like they said of Jesus, “Everything he does is wonderful”?
They were completely amazed and said again and again, “Everything he does is wonderful. He even makes the deaf to hear and gives speech to those who cannot speak.”
Mark 7:37
Taken from New Living Translation Leadership Devotioal (C) New Living Translation
Questions of the day:
What can you give the best today for God?
What can you give the best today for your family?
What can you give the best today for your community?
What can you give the best today for your country?