Barnabas File

When I was a member of ROTC (Reserve Officers Training Corps) in college, I was a member of a drill team called the Pershing Rifles.   The national organization was named for General of the Armies John J. Pershing.   I read the brief history of the organization and knew that Pershing was commander of U. S. forces during World War One, but I knew little else.   In this readable volume , John Perry gives an overview of a man we can identify as the first modern military commander along with the forces that shaped him. Pershing’s life story parallels the story of America.  Born during the Civil War, his journey from a middle class American upbringing to service on the western frontier and then in Cuba and the Philippines is tied to the growth of the United States from a frontier society to a colonial power and world influence.  Along the way, Pershing learned many lessons that molded his view of military strategy and national service. Perry does a good jo...

Note:   This is the sesquicentennial of the Battle of Stones River.   In memory of those who fought and died there, my blog today is an updated repeat of an earlier blog posting about a visit to the battlefield. One Saturday about five years ago, Rita and I took our eight-year-old grandson, Noah, to visit Stones River National Battlefield here in Murfreesboro. This is the site of the Battle of Stones River, an engagement that lasted from December 31, 1862, to January 2, 1863. The battle is characterized by historians as having the largest percentage of casualties on both sides, a total of 23,515--some 13,600 on the Union side and about 10,600 on the Confederate side. Once inside the Visitors Center, we found ourselves in front of a map showing the initial deployment of forces. This produced Noah's first question: "Which one is our side?" This led to some discussion. His mother's family grew up in the South--Mississippi and Alabama--and she was born in Tenness...

“But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son,  but only the Father. ”—Matthew 24:36 The fact that this is my 666 th blog posting on Barnabas File seems appropriate since so many Christian associate that number—“the number of the Beast”—with the end times, and some  people expected that the world would end today based on some interpretations of the Mayan calendar.  As of this writing, the world has not ended. This type of thing comes along regularly.  Christians have been anticipating the end of this present world since the time of Christ.  Various millennialists, chiliastics, prophets, and seers arise from time to time to proclaim “the end of days.” Some modern Christian sects have been founded on such calculations and then their leaders have done some fancy interpretation when the date arrived and everyone was still here.  The predictions continue, however. In connection with the present prediction,...

I f you read my last post, you will remember that I talked about making yourself indispensable.  Here is the other side of the coin.  How do you go about making yourself dispensable? At one point in my denominational career, I was looking for a person who would become my associate.  The executive director of the state Baptist convention had one word of advice: “You need to find someone who could step in and take your place if you were hit by a truck tomorrow!”  Not very subtle, but his comments make sense.  There are certain things that you have learned how to do that you can pass on to others.  This not only calls out new talent but makes a smooth transition to new leadership more likely. Andy Stanley provides a similar challenge when he tells his staff members, “You should always be training someone who could step into your position.”  So how do you make yourself dispensable? How can you prepare someone to take your place? First, you nee...

Several years ago, I made this challenge to the ministers with whom I worked:  “How can you make yourself indispensable this year?”  My challenge was predicated on the idea that they should discover something that they offered to students, churches, and other stakeholders that would be missed if it were no longer present.  Was I asking them to seek ways to assure their job security?  Probably. As I think about this now, I would still ask the same question but my motivation would be different.  I would be more interested in these individuals identifying the ministry, service, or relationship that each one could offer that was unique to each of them as an individuals. I have often thought about this quote:  “What are the things that you should do, what are the things someone else should do, and what are things no one should do?” I would add to this, “What is the thing that only you can do?”  In other words, if you don’t do it, it won’t get don...

Every year our church’s Denominational Relations Committee leads a month-long emphasis on Baptist heritage. The approach each year is different, but the point is to remind us of who we are as a Baptist congregation.   Someone asked this year, “Why talk about denominations in a post-denominational age?   Aren’t we beyond all that?”   The answer would be “Yes” and “No.” To understand what we mean by post-denominational, we must consider how we use the term “denomination.”  If you are talking about judicatories, conventions, and bureaucracies when you use the term “denomination,” then we are well on our way to being post-denominational in the United States.  Even in churches that embrace a connectional or hierarchical approach to church government (Roman Catholics, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, etc.), less attention is being paid to what the “denomination” (read national leadership and governing bodies) decides and what a church as a local expression of that...

Earlier this week, I visited with a friend who has publicly declared that he is no longer a part of his Southern Baptist-related state convention.   After many disappointing experiences, he has come to see that the denomination is no longer relevant in a world with significant spiritual and physical needs.   It has forsaken the sacred trust given to it by devoted Christians over the years. My friend is going through period of grief and a sense of loss.  He will always be a Baptist in his heart but he feels estranged from the faith tradition that literally gave him birth.  His experience certainly reflects my own.  Twenty years ago I was struggling with my own role within a denomination that had invested much in me and which I had attempted to serve and support for all of my life as a minster.  I had been faithful to that faith community but found it going in a direction I perceived as destructive and irrelevant. During that time I shared my con...

As I read through a list of seminary students involved in a preaching event, I noted that where their faith traditions were listed that a number indicated that they were “non-denominational” or “interdenominational.”  I don’t remember anyone putting “none.”  I would love to hear their definitions of these terms, but let’s just assume for a minute that by using either of these terms the student is saying one of two things:  “I belong to a church that is not related to a particular denomination” or “I am not committed to a particular faith tradition.” This seems to be a growing trend for some students in theological institutions.  Many schools have diverse student bodies and enroll students from a number of denominational backgrounds, but some students indicate that they are not part of any particular denomination.  My friend Dick Olsen at Central Seminary comments that he often asks students in a particular course to read fifty pages about their denominati...

I touched off a heated conversation one time when I said to a friend, “I don’t treat my children equally.”  My friend was troubled by my statement, so I tried to explain.  Each of my children is a unique person.  Each has been gifted by God in a special way.  Their placement in sequence of birth assured that there would be a difference in the environment in which each of them grew up—whether you are first, second, or third in birth order does make a difference.  I do want to treat my children fairly and I have attempted to do so, but I don’t have one standard approach in the way that I deal with them individually. This concept also applies in the area of leadership.  Each person on your staff or in your church or organization is a unique individual.  If you come up with a policy that you will treat everyone of them in exactly the same way, you show a lack of awareness for their abilities, circumstances, and needs.  You are not being fair to...

Rita and I had lunch this week with a young couple who ministry in a predominantly Islamic South Asian country.  They do not work for a denomination, but they affiliate with a Christian organization.  They have a clear vision of what God has called them to do in that particular setting and are investing their lives there. I always learn something new when we visit, and I came away from this meeting with a fresh understanding about the key values of their work.  These values could well apply to other ministries as well. First, their work is Kingdom-oriented.  This could be expressed in a number of ways, but the primary purpose of this ministry is to share the gospel of Jesus Christ and his reign.  Through the death and resurrection of Christ, the Kingdom of God is already breaking through.  Their mission and ours is to tell people about this incursion and invite them to follow Christ in this movement.  Second, this ministry is contextual....

Several years ago I attended an ordination service where I heard McAfee professor Loyd Allen say something like this to the candidate:  “Love the church but don't worship it .” His admonition has stayed with me.  We worship God but we love the church that God’s Son established. Darrell Gwaltney, dean of the School of Religion at Belmont University, convened a lunch meeting yesterday with six ministers, seven including him.  Most are “retired” but still involved in some type of ongoing ministry.  It was quickly determined that this group represented over 300 years in combined ministerial experience.  As we talked about matters of mutual concern, it was very clear that each of these individuals loves the church. Now these are not neophytes nor are they naive.  As pastors, staff ministers, members, and interim pastors, they have seen the church at its worst as well as its best.  They have seen the church when one rejoices at its ability to love ...

As readers of this blog have observed, I believe that ministry entrepreneurs are serving a significant role in Kingdom work today and will continue to do so in the future.   I have had the chance to meet such creative people and to learn from them.   These gifted men and women have cast many of the old paradigms aside and are taking advantage of the new resources in our evolving context.   They learn not only from traditional Christian sources but from the marketplace as well.   In a recent blog , Claire Diaz-Ortiz shared some insights she learned from her involvement in the startup of Twitter that might be helpful to social entrepreneurs.  Let’s consider how these might apply to ministry entrepreneurs. First, take risks.  Diaz-Ortiz comments that “big risks bring big rewards.”  Every ministry entrepreneur must assess risk from his or her own perspective, but it is certain to involve some sense of skepticism and even rejection from religious...

The story goes that a politician was once asked where he stood on an issue.  He responded, “Some of my friends are for it. Some of my friends are against it.  I’m for my friends.”  I thought about this story when I read the news reports about the latest annual meeting of the Tennessee Baptist Convention held in Memphis.   Many of my friends still find their place of denominational service through the state Baptist convention, so I am always interested in learning how they are getting along. The report in the Baptist and Reflector , the TBC paper, stated that the meeting had “the lowest messenger count in decades”—926 registered messengers from 419 churches.  (There are 3200 churches affiliated with the state convention in Tennessee.) This is even more surprising when one considers that about one-tenth of those registered were probably denominational employees (including directors of missions from 66 district associations). Editor Lonnie Wilkey su...

The decline in traditional denominations continues.  This is not limited to mainline Protestants.  Catholics, Jews, and some conservative or evangelical groups are experiencing declines in membership and attendance as well.  In many cases, this decline started decades ago, but various groups are only now admitting the impact on their ministries and programs.  Endowments and financial reserves have helped to maintain the status quo, but these are not as robust as they once were and may even be depleted. We might identify any number of factors behind this decline—demographic (including ethnic shifts and birthrates), social, economic, and theological—but that is not the point of this blog.  I will leave that assessment to others. As denominations have declined, the structures they developed and supported have declined as well These bureaucracies (and I do not use that word in a pejorative way) once provided many services to local congregations—the coor...

Every time I visit my son and his family in the San Francisco area, I come back profoundly impacted by the diversity of the people I encounter—Japanese, Korean, Chinese, various East Asian and South Asian people, and Hispanics.   Sometimes the situation is almost surrealistic as one sees a Japanese family touring the USS Hornet, an aircraft carrier whose planes inflicted major damage on Japanese planes, ships, and facilities during World War Two! The fact that we are becoming a nation of minorities in which Euro-Americans will soon be one was emphasized by the recent Presidential elections.  Mr. Romney was not just defeated by President Obama and a well-run organization but by demographics—a country that is increasingly Hispanic and Asian, a country of diversity.  This is a trend that is not going to change. I have often commented on the growing ethnic diversity in our little part of Tennessee, but we have only begun to experience what will be a tidal wave of c...

Suffering is a part of life.   I don't say that lightly.  We are now walking with a family member, someone in the prime of life, who is undergoing treatment for cancer.   The prognosis is encouraging, but this is one of those situations where one is often moved to ask, “Why, God?   Why now and to this person?” Believers have struggled with the reality and mystery of suffering for ages.  Job and his friends in the Hebrew Scriptures, the Apostle Paul in his letters, theologians through the ages, and pastors in hospital waiting rooms have all attempted to deal with the problem of pain and suffering.  We know the classic statement of the problem:  “If God is good and all powerful, why does God allow suffering in the world?”  The failure to do so brands God as either evil or impotent in the eyes of many.  Some reject God because they cannot figure it all out.  Their argument goes something like this:  “If I can’t understan...

During the election season (which seems to grow longer every time it comes around), the focus is mostly on convincing rather than informing.  Ads, speakers, phone calls, e-mails and direct mail campaigns usually try to tell us where one candidate is wrong and another right. Even so, I have often found in this election that occasionally I AM informed and learn something from a candidate or one of their supporters that raises a significant question or makes me reassess one of my assumptions on an issue.  I have also realized that there are things that I can agree with another person about even if I do not buy into everything they say. This has been my approach in much of my reading, viewing, and listening.  Though I may differ with a person on some matters, I can learn from him or her.  I try to be aware of what people from a variety of perspectives—business, culture, religion—have to say and glean what is helpful for me.  I may have some theological di...

Most of my early years in ministry were invested in college students on three campuses—Middle Tennessee State University, Mississippi State University, and Carson Newman College. I learned very soon that if you want to build an organization on student leadership, you have to work quickly.  They come in as freshman or transfer students and before you know it, they are gone!  You have to recognize potential and gifts in these young adults and find places for them to use those abilities while providing coaching and support.  And they are volunteers, so you have to know how to motivate and encourage them in meaningful ways. Even though most churches don’t have the kind of turnover that one experiences in a collegiate ministry (some may argue with me about that!), the challenges are similar: recognize a person’s potential, find a place for him or her to serve, support their service, and provide reinforcement and appreciation. With tighter budgets, many churches are ...

In a recent blog , Matthew May tells the story of Clarence “Kelly” Johnson who was given the job of creating the first United States jet plane in 180 days.  When Germany’s first jet fighter planes appeared in the skies over Europe in 1943, the U.S. War Department hired Lockheed Aircraft Corporation, Johnson’s company, to do the job.  Lockheed’s chief engineer, Johnson ran the company’s Lockheed’s innovative Advanced Development Programs for nearly 45 years, from its inception in 1943 to 1975.   This division became known as the “skunk works” and operated under its own rules. The blog post is based on May’s book, The Laws of Subtraction , in which he defines subtraction as “removing anything excessive, confusing, wasteful, unnatural, hazardous, hard to use or ugly . . . or the discipline to refrain from adding it in the first place.”   The result is a more creative and productive workplace. Every church needs a “skunk works,” its own research and dev...