Distinguishing Marks of a Quarrelsome Person
Hot-headed, divisive Christians are not pleasing to God (Proverbs 6:19). We are told to drive them out (22:10) and avoid such people (Rom. 16:17). This doesn’t mean we only huddle with the people we like. We are not talking about awkward folks or those who disagree with us. We are talking about quarrelsome Christians–habitually disagreeable, divisive, hot-headed church people.
This is an important issue for churches today. Seems we have a lot of churches unable to break out because of relational difficulty. Maybe partly because our generation doesn’t do well with anything that’s hard and requires commitment, like relationships that delve below the surface. And that’s what God desires. It’s easier to just go somewhere else. But discerning when someone is being divisive and quarrelsome is something we must do and determining whether I am the quarrelsome person who is hurting the cause of Christ. I thought this list by Kevin DeYoung was helpful. Read the whole post here.
So what does a quarrelsome person look like? What are his (or her) distinguishing marks?
- You defend every conviction with the same degree of intensity. You don’t talk about secondary issues, because there are no secondary issues.
- You are quick to speak and slow to listen. You rarely ask questions and when you do it is to accuse or to continue prosecuting your case. You are not looking to learn, you are looking to defend, dominate, and destroy.
- You are incapable of seeing nuances and you do not believe in qualifying statements.
- You never give the benefit of the doubt. You do not try to read arguments in context. You put the worst possible construct on other’s motives and the meaning of their words.
- You have no unarticulated opinions.
- You are unable to sympathize with your opponents.
- Your first instinct is to criticize. Your last is to encourage.
- You have a small grid and everything fits in it. Everything is a social justice issue; everything relates to the regulative principle, everything is Obama’s fault; everything is wrong because of patriarchy; everything comes down to one thing–my thing.
- You derive a sense of satisfaction and spiritual safety in being rejected and marginalized. You are constitutionally unable to be demonstrably fruitful in ministry and you will never affirm those who appear to be. You only know how to relate to God as a remnant.
- You are always in the trenches with hand grenades strapped to your chest, never in the mess hall with ice cream and ping pong.
- You have never changed your mind on an important matter.
Doing the opposite of this list will help us go deeper with God and others in the body of Christ and reproduce less people who don’t go to church anymore, because of how Christians treat each other.
Painful Realities of life in Africa
This is a picture of a Widows seminar at a friend and partners church is Harrare, Zimabwe. Over 400 widows responded to the seminar. The picture tells of the devastation of AIDS, poverty, poor governance, etc. Imagining the pain of losing loved ones, caring for orphans, and more. Praying for relief, comfort, hope through the Gospel, laborers for their good.
Here’s a statement from the pastor:
The poverty gripping our country could be seen with all its viciousness on the faces of many of these women some of who are having to look after many children with no visible form of support. Some are also maintaining children of relatives who would have died from the AIDS pandemic. It was such a moving sight seeing these ladies receiving the word of God for spiritual empowerment as well as some clothing donations soap and lotions.
Let me know if you’d like to help meet needs in Zimbabwe.
The Sin of Dabbling
Can your spiritual life be defined by a lot of starts and stops? Do you find it hard to follow through past the new sermon series at church, new years resolution, or recommitment after a season of pressure? In the book, You See Bones, I See An Army, Floyd McLung defines Dabbling as having a casual or superficial interest in something, to paddle, play, or splash in the water. Never diving in with all our hearts, we get stuck in a state of paralysis and failure. Jesus calls us to a radical life of wholehearted obedience and focused faith, not a shallow, wading around in unbelief and doubt that God could actually be more real and fulfilling than the stuff that I actually follow. The solution: Dive in deep. “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” Luke 9:23.
And have we as church leaders encouraged the sin of dabbling by making discipleship easy and programmable instead of risky and faith-driven? Do we enjoy creating dependence upon our teaching and ideas instead of releasing people to experience the deep water for themselves? How can we lead people beyond superficial splashing in the wading pool to deep diving, abundant life in Christ? Do I as a leader DABBLE from commentary to commentary or is my preaching and teaching out of an overflow of what God is doing deep inside of me?
Worth Reading: The Next Christians
The religious landscape of America is changing and with it the attitudes and beliefs of the next generation of Christians are changing. Without a doubt the church in the future will look much different. In the book, The Next Christians: The Good News About the End of Christian America, Gabe Lyons gives us a glimpse of what that church might look like as he describes the new generation of Christians. Using quotes from the book, here’s a list of questions to see if you fit into their number:
- Do you wish to separate from or blend into the world; or thoughtfully engage?
- Are you OFFENDED by the world, or PROVOKED to engage and transform?
- Do you wish to run from the problems of the world or run to them as an agent of change?
- Are you bent toward CRITICIZING and throwing rocks at people in the world, or CREATING a new cultures through transformation?
- Are you CALLED or EMPLOYED? Do you separate your work from your identity as a Christian? Are you simply working a job, or serving in a vocation?
- Are you easily DISTRACTED by the goods and gadgets in the world or are you GROUNDED and disciplined in a growing relationship with God as you engage the world?
- Do you enjoy being ALONE and hiding from close relationships or are you defined by intentional relationships and COMMUNITY?
- Do you hang out with your own kind or do you engage the diverse community around you?
- Are you striving for RELEVANCE and popularity or to COUNTER the culture through transformed living?
- Do you feel called to restore the brokenness of the world?
The Next Christians are not separatists but restorers and transformers, provoked to engage the problems in the world as change agents and creators of beauty. Their vocations serve as a launching pad for living out God’s calling on every Christian to make disicples. They don’t allow the world to distract them, but desire to be deeply GROUNDED in the faith and engaged in intentional COMMUNITY with others. They understand that relevance is not leadership, but countering culture with the values of Christ.
If you’re a Christian leader I encourage you to read this book and ask if you are seeing this in your current ministry context and how your church may need to adjust as a new generation moves into leadership roles. We know the numbers, 80% of teens leave home after high school, and leave the church. This book will help you understand how they are thinking about the world and how we may can provide a path for involvement for them.
Here’s a few more of my favorite quotes:
- when the faithful saturate their schedules with Christian events at Christian venues with Christian people, the world has a hard time believing we hold the rest of the world in high esteem.
- The Gospel is a radical call to a stark existence, not a shallow assimilation.
- Christ death and resurrection were not only meant to save people from something. He wanted to save Christians to something.
- Provoked Christians know that Christian faithfulness often means living dangerously on the front edges of pain in the world.
- Where your talents and your heart come together, this is where God has called you to be.
- Understanding Scripture is difficult. Passively watching television or quickly clicking through Internet links and Facebook updates is much easier.
- Serving others together is the key ingredient in creating community.
- the Christian has a calling and a responsibility to think, work, and live in terms of how the world ought to be…
Consumer Christianity
Attitudes that show we are relating to our church as consumers:
- Consistently dwelling on the thought, “Is this church the right fit for me?”
- Having an attitude that says, “If the leadership would just do ______________ better, then I would be happier.”
- Comparing the offerings of your church to another church.
- Seeing things that need to be improved in your church but taking no responsibility to do anything about them yourself.
A church operates more like a family than a store. If we miss this, then we will always have dissatisfaction towards those who are trying to love and help us.
Read the whole article here.
National Porn Sunday
Along with the Superbowl, this weekend, 300+ churches are celebrating Porn Sunday to draw attention and bring help to those caught in the literal web of addiction. Here’s a few links about the event and a few extras:
- “The Elephant in the Pew” – NPR article on the event – “48 percent of Christian families are dealing with the issue of pornography in their home”
- The National Porn Sunday Intro Video – Involving two NFL players discussing their battle with pornography and sex addiction.
- The Social Costs of Pornography – Academic findings about the issue.
- XXX Church Event Page – Two churches here in Louisiana will be hosting the event.
- Covenant Eyes – The tool I use for accountability
Recent Q and A:
“What are three hopes that you have for the future of your current ministry?” – I was recently asked this for the Q and A section of our state newspaper. Looking back through my answers frightened me and challenged me. What the heck are we thinking!?!?
1. Responsiveness to the needs of people – One of the filter questions we are using for decisions in our church is, “Will this allow us to stay close and be responsive to the needs of people in our community?” I’m hoping that our church can stay outward focused and unselfishly give ourselves away for years to come. I’ve been convicted as a church leader by this question about personal debt – “Do you think about living generously and then remember something you have or want?” Responsiveness and generosity must be a priority if it’s going to be a reality. Anything that keeps us from responsiveness and radical generosity must be eyed with great caution.
2. Reproducible. I hope that more disciples, leaders, ministries, and churches will result. Insisting on reproducibility forces us to keep things ultra simple and stretches our faith. We’re already planning for new expressions of Bridge Church in 2011, in surrounding communities. I’ve been wrecked by Ralph Moore’s question in How to Multiply Your Church – What’s better, a church of 400 taking on overhead, or 5 churches of 80 that can be responsive to the community and quickly reproduce itself?
3. Transformation. A question that I’m constantly asking myself as a leader: “What good is it if our church grows, but the community continues to deteriorate?” Disciples transform the world by responding to the needs and shaping the culture around them. I hope that we won’t settle for anything less than transformed lives and community. One of the things I’m most excited about is multiple dysfunctional family systems that we’re engaged in restoring around our community. Families that for generations have battled addiction, abuse, disease, etc. It’s hard, messy, discouraging at times, but when transformation is your goal, seeing someone sitting in the pew every Sunday isn’t enough. We insist on seeing God glorified in the daily and seeing a new road paved for future generations.
What are your most challenging hopes and dreams?
Worth Reading: Cracking Your Church’s Culture Code
“Culture – not vision and strategy – is the most powerful factor in any organization.”
Samuel Chand brings a much needed perspective to the hype over mission statements and strategy with the book Cracking Your Church’s Culture Code. Why do great strategies not produce results? “culture eats strategy for lunch. You can have a good strategy in place, but if you don’t have the culture and enabling systems, the negative culture of the organization will defeat the strategy.” As a leader who is tasked with helping churches strategize and revitalize for effective ministry this book has been very helpful to me and will be for anyone in church or secular leadership. Dr. Chand defines culture as “the personality of the church or nonprofit” and in the book he gives you insight on how to identify problem cultures, how to influence culture positively and negatively, and how to change a negative/defective culture. The author uses many personal stories and real life examples from his work as a leadership consultant, making the book easy to read. Well worth reading for any leader interested in organizational effectiveness.
Here are a few of my favorite quotes:
- Culture – not vision and strategy – is the most powerful factor in any organization.
- Toxic culture is like carbon monoxide: you don’t see it or smell it, but you wake up dead!
- Healthy teams are pipelines of leadership development. …an organization is only as healthy as the pool of rising leaders.
- developing people is far more essential in creating a healthy culture than training people in specific skills.
- Managers get the most out of themselves. Leaders get the most out of others.
- Healthy teams foster the perspective that failure isn’t a tragedy and conflict isn’t the end of the world.
- We can rearrange boxes on an org chart in a moment, but changing culture is heart surgery.
- Loyalty earned is a beautiful thing, but loyalty demanded is toxic.
- Our ability to connect with people, earn their trust, invite their opinions, and inspire them is the most important trait we bring – even more important than our experiences and skills.
- the sickest cultures are those that close their doors to new ideas.
- How do we know if a vision is from God? One of the measures is that it has to be something so big that it requires God’s wisdom and power to pull it off.
- Most church leaders use their vision statements to say yes, but they rarely us it to say no and eliminate options.
- The conundrum of leadership is this: people want improvement, but they resist change.
Think 10 Conversations
Influence seldom happens with just one conversation. Bad news if your aim is positional and not relational influence. Influence takes multiple conversations and investment in someone’s life. Think 10 conversations and you won’t feel insecure or like you’ve failed when at first someone seems uninterested or unavailable. After each conversation, pray, invest, and keep planting seeds of influence.
Lane Corley 