Do you remember at camp or youth group when everyone would go around the room and share what their life verse was? Aren't those some of the worst times ever?
When I was a young chap, probably around six months old my parents made the long treck from Casper, Wyoming to St. Louis so that all of my relatives could see how amazing I was. Of course all of the relatvies were amazed not only with how cute I was, but with the skills that I possessed that most babies didn't (which is a whole other blog post).
While we were in St. Louis we went to the church that my dad grew up at with my grandparents and aunt and uncle. Sometime during the worship time my aunt wrote down "Andy's Life Verse: 1 Tim 4.12-14" and gave it to my mom.
Don't let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity. 13Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching. 14Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid their hands on you.
I remember all through middle school and high school thinking about how awesome it was that my life verse told me to never be discouraged by the fact that I was young and that I didn't have to wait until I was grown up to "do ministry". That it didn't matter how old I was God could use me to accomplish what it was that was important to Him. It was always such an encouragement.
A couple of weeks ago I heard someone talking, maybe even joking about life verses and I remembered what a big deal that verse was for me in middle school and high school. How it encouraged me to be bold and stand up for what I was called to. Then I said to myself, "I guess that verse really doesn't have much to do with me now that I'm all grownsed up."
So tonight I'm hanging out with people from a bunch of different LifeGroups at a big cookout and I was sharing some of my dreams for what is that I thought church could/should look like and my friend Emily said "then do it." I said, "sure, sure, that's what I want to do. It's just really….," and then I just got honest with her, "it's just that sometimes I don't think I've got what it takes to do it. I mean I know that it could happen, I just wonder if I can do it."
Then Emily looked me right in the eyes and said, "1 Timothy isn't just for middle schoolers."
I was stunned, she had me on the ropes. To be real honest I haven't thought about Life Verses as anything important, and I'm still not sure that they are, but all of a sudden I realized something that I had let be true about me for the last couple of years. I had let people look down on me because I was young. I haven't been devoted to public reading of scriptures, preaching or teaching.
This must change.
These are the kind of things that community is meant to do. Speak truth into your life in ways you would never expect and you could never have seen yourself. Isn't that the best? Out of no where she says a funny one liner that could cut right to the heart.
Man it's good to be a part of the family of God.
Filed under: Life in General
- 90 degrees
- A 13 mile bike ride
- A 5 mile run
- Watching x-Men 3
- Grilling out at Wilkins'
subcatagory:: why I hate memorial day.
Freaking Indians give up tons of runs. Wait, that's everyday.
It's interesting to think through the idea of burnout. I remember attending a youth specialties conference in my first year of ministry and they defined burnout as being forced to give more than you have. At the time I didn't understand what that meant. I do now.
I was doing some reading tonight through some of the blogs that I frequent and I came across one by Mark Driscoll (who's been added to my blogroll). He shared some pretty eye opening statistics in his "Death by Ministry" post. Here they are for you to read…
Pastors
- Fifteen hundred pastors leave the ministry each month due to moral failure, spiritual burnout, or contention in their churches.
- Fifty percent of pastors' marriages will end in divorce.
- Eighty percent of pastors and eighty-four percent of their spouses feel unqualified and discouraged in their role as pastors.
- Fifty percent of pastors are so discouraged that they would leave the ministry if they could, but have no other way of making a living.
- Eighty percent of seminary and Bible school graduates who enter the ministry will leave the ministry within the first five years.
- Seventy percent of pastors constantly fight depression.
- Almost forty percent polled said they have had an extra-marital affair since beginning their ministry.
- Seventy percent said the only time they spend studying the Word is when they are preparing their sermons.
Pastors' Wives
- Eighty percent of pastors' spouses feel their spouse is overworked.
- Eighty percent of pastors' spouses wish their spouse would choose another profession.
- The majority of pastor's wives surveyed said that the most destructive event that has occurred in their marriage and family was the day they entered the ministry.
So many of those stats are alarming but they aren't too far fetched. I can't identify with all of them personally, but I know someone who could identify with each one of them. You probably do too.
I often talk with friends of mine who are doing ministry full time and I ask them if they feel called to do ministry for life or just for a season. Almost everyone of them will say that they feel called for life. I then ask them, "then what good would it do for you to burn out right now? Would that accomplish all that God has called you to?"
It's interesting because many of the reasons that people "burn out" have nothing to do with them personally. It's normally the situations that they find themselves in or the expectations that others put on them. I think that most pastors who are on the verge of burning out think they have no choice. There is no reason that one would work to a point of destroying their calling/relationship with spouse/realtionship with God, unless they thought that it was the only choice they had.
The truth is there is a choice. There is a way out under it. You don't have to sacrifice your calling, marriage or relationship with God for the ministry.
As for me… I'll plant and I'll water, but if we're honest, only God can make things grow (for real) and if there's any percieved growth apart from God it's not real anyway.
This past Wednesday night Taylor Hicks won the fifth installment of American Idol. I don't know if you realize this or not, but on March 14th I predicted that he would win after his first performance of "Taking It To The Streets!"
In the midst of my prediction I made a promise to America that I now have to keep. What's the promise?
Please oh please oh please America, do this one thing for me and I will never ask you for another thing… please vote for Taylor to be the American Idol. If you don't I don't know if I could ever believe in America again.
Filed under: Blogging
So… Things have really changed around andrewsikora.com. There's a new template and I'm using wordpress now as opposed to blogger. I've always been jealous of people who could categorize their posts and that's really why I decided to move everything over. The more I checked into WordPress the more I liked it. If you're not good at html (which I am not) then it gives you a lot of options that are easy to edit and use not to mention the fact that you can add pages off the homepage. All in all it's a lot of fun and really easy to use.
So settle in and enjoy. It seems pretty nice around here.
Filed under: Following Jesus
If you’ve ever seen the movie I Heart Huckabees you know that this question plays a central role in the way that the main characters discover what is actually real about the lives that they live. Every now and then I’ll throw this question into a conversation with a wink and a nod and those in the room who have seen the movie will laugh for a second, but the conversation continues because obviously it’s not a real question, it’s not like I’m looking for a real answer.
Tonight I want to tell you how I’m not myself.
I lead this really complicated life that finds me being at least 3 different people in different situations. If you’re reading this you probably know that I work for a church, and if there’s anywhere that you would expect someone to be 100% it would be church, but the thing that you aren’t factoring in when you think that way is how a church actually works. Depending on the type of church most of the time you only really know about 50% of the people who are in leadership. Why?
Because if you really got to know us you’d run.
Well, that’s probably not true, if you got to know us you’d probably stop beating yourself up and we’d probably all be able to finally speak freely.
You see when I’m at work I have to tow the company line. Support ideas and only give feedback when I’m asked directly so as to not upset all that God is “doing”. When I am with my other associate staff members I’m not really able to be myself because if I really let what I thought or how I felt come through there’s a chance that I’d cause some sort of division, and if that’s what happens when I talk to the people on staff there’s no way I can ever talk to those in the church about these things because the fall out would only be worse.
Here’s the really sad part, when you’re not really yourself in 80% of your life it makes it extremely difficult to be honest in the other 20% of your life. If you spend most of your week trying to figure out what you can and can’t say, what emotions you can and can’t express it makes it difficult to really just cut loose when you’re with someone you can trust, like your wife or friends from out of town for instance (just for instance, I’m not talking from personal experience or anything…)
If you ask me this is really bad news.
Why? Because I don’t think we were meant to live divided lives.
I’ve been reading this great book called The Gospel According to Moses, and in the second or third chapter the author talks about a prayer called the shema that the Jews would pray every day, the start of which comes from Deut 6. I haven’t been able to get much passed the beginning of the prayer either which starts like this…
Hear, Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.
I think it’s important for us to realize that the Lord is One. He’s not two or three. He’s not different things in different circumstances. He is one.
Now the author goes much deeper with this idea and what it means theologically, but I think I’ve figured out how I am not myself through the beginning of the shema. If I am made in God’s image and I spend my entire life split. If who I am over here is not who I am over there then I am divided. I am not one, and this is not good, it causes much distress.
And why do I allow myself to be split? To protect myself? To protect another’s wrong doing? To give people what they want? There is no freedom in that. There is no abundance in that kind of living.
Hear, Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.
Blessed be the Name of His glorious kingdom for ever and ever.
