Living the gospel every day

So often we forget: The gospel is not only that which brought us to Jesus but it is that which sustains us on a daily basis. We have two daily needs - to preach the gospel to ourselves and to live out the gospel - every day.

What do we need to preach to ourselves daily? That the Father forgives our sin, accepts us fully, loves us unconditionally, empowers us with His Spirit and that we can rest in His presence as ones who He sees through Jesus as holy in His sight. We have no need to prove ourselves to God or to win his favor. We have His favor and all the benefits of our redemption - Ephesians 1 and 2 are a great reminder. 

Why do we need to be reminded to live out the Gospel daily? Because there is no arena of life that is exempt from being lived in light of the Gospel that has changed us. Every relationship, thought, decision, relationship, interaction, conversation, choice - all of life is to be lived in light of the Gospel and the new life we have been called to in the Kingdom.

Try praying this simple prayer each morning. "Jesus, remind me constantly of your love, presence, forgiveness and empowerment. And help me today to live out the Gospel in all that I do and say and think."

How different our world would be if all of His people lived out the Gospel daily in all the circles of people and influence they have. The Gospel is meant to touch all of our life and it is meant to touch all those we come into contact with. To say it another way, we are to be Jesus to all those we come into contact with. 

All of T.J. Addington's books including his latest, Deep Influence,  are available from the author for the lowest prices and a $2.00 per book discount on orders of ten or more.

Never Forget

Every December 4 through January 14 since 2007 I daily read the blog www.reachtj.blogspot.com as a remembrance to the hope we have in Jesus and the grace that he extends so freely to us. The blog is the account of my 42 day hospital stay from which I never should have survived - but God gave my family hope and He extended to me  the grace of an extension of life for which I am eternally grateful. 

The battle between life and death started on December 4 when I entered the hospital unable to breath. They quickly determined that I was in congestive heart failure and had massive pneumonia and a huge pleural effusion (a collection of fluid in the wall of the lung-like having a liter of pop stuck inside your lung wall). What they would not know for a week was that it was MRSA  or Methicyllin resistant staphylococcus aureas- a "super bug" pneumonia. This would lead to septic shock, Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome, a failed mitral valve in my heart, high fevers that required ice cooling jackets, the shutting down of some of my organs, heartbeats of 220 or higher without the ability to shock my heart back into rhythm - all this while I was in a coma and on a ventilator. On a number of occasions the doctors gathered the family to prepare them for my imminent death.

Amazingly God gave my wife, Mary Ann, hope two days into this ordeal. Two days later was the day that I told her I believed I was going to die. It was the day that they would put me on a ventilator from which I should not have woken up alive. It was the day that I could barely breath as I felt I was drowning in my own fluids. But two days before that day as she sat by me bed she asked Jesus, "How should I pray?" And God replied in an audible voice (to her), "It will be very close, but T.J. will live." A voice of hope when there was no human hope. A voice of hope that she clung to during the next weeks of a life and death struggle. When the doctors gently told the family there was no hope she stood on the hope God had given her. She was a rock of faith as were my sons Jon and Chip who walked through the dark days with her and became men in the process. I owe a deep debt of gratitude to the love and perseverance of Mary Ann, Jon and Chip!

Our family experienced amazing grace during and after those days. Our prayer partners came to pray and love on the family. Friends gathered around and sheltered them in their love. And time and again, God gave His grace when it was needed. One night as my youngest sister was standing by my bed angry with God tired and discouraged, she felt a hand on her shoulder. Immediately she knew that it was going to be OK whether I lived or I died. She turned to see who was there but there was no one. She knew she had been touched by God or an angelic being. On another day, a nurse came in tears to Mary Ann and said through tears, "I was just in T.J.'s room and God gave me a vision of him alive and well!"

People often ask me what I remember from my coma. Only one thing. I knew that my lungs were ruined but that God had a set of perfectly healthy lungs for me. That was the Spirit's encouragement to me when I was deeply sick and unable to process what was going on. Another blessing!

Most of all we were blessed through the thousands who prayed for God to do something miraculous and extraordinary. It is the faith and prayers of thousands around the world whom God answered in His sovereignty in choosing to heal my broken heart, clear my lungs, defeat MRSA, septic shock, cool the fevers until the day I walked out of the hospital on January 14, a product of His grace.

God gives us hope in all situations and His grace is with us always. Think back to the situations you have been in where He has shown you His hope and His grace and never forget. Never forget! It is His grace that sustains us day to day, it is His hope that walks with us through the dark nights of the soul that we all experience. Someone asked me, "How do you remember?" One of the ways I remember is to read the blog put up for me daily from December 4 to January 14. It is a month of remembrance for me.  I will follow that practice until I see Jesus face to face and can thank Him in person. 

I am a walking billboard of God's hope and grace. So are you. Never forget. Always live in thanks for His hope and grace. 

http://www.reachtj.blogspot.com/

When elephants fight the grass gets trampled

It is a saying from Congo, and it is about what happens when leaders get into disputes with one another. Who gets hurt when leaders fight? The people they are supposed to be leading are nowhere more evident than when there is conflict among leaders in the local church.

Divided congregations almost always reflect split boards and/or staff. Fractures in leadership will spill over into the church body. It may take time, but it will happen. And it can be from dysfunction among staff or boards.

In one situation where I provided counsel, a large church exploded when the senior staff's fractures became public. It was hidden for years, but when it finally came into the light, sides were taken, offenses were taken on, and the result was a competing church started, others leaving in discouragement and what will be years of healing ahead. When elephants fight, the grass gets trampled.

It is no different when there is ongoing tension between the senior pastor and the board, and it can be the fault of either party. Those tensions do not go unnoticed in the congregation because people can read attitudes, words spoken, and words not spoken. Given enough time, those divides become more extensive and more challenging to heal, and eventually, the conflict escalates, and who gets hurt in the process? Members of the congregation who had nothing to do with the issues, who have little context for what happened but who got trampled in the process. When elephants fight, the grass gets trampled.

This is why it is so critical in the local church to have unity, clarity, alignment, and healthy relationships between leaders. It does not mean that they cannot disagree, but it does mean that they know how to disagree agreeably and guard the spiritual climate of the congregation. When leaders fight, someone gets hurt. It is also essential to have a board and staff covenant that spells out how members work together in health rather than dishealth. 

Don't allow the grass to be trampled in your church!

Ambition and ministry

Ambition is a truly delicate issue for those of us who are in full time professional ministry. In fact, I believe it can be perilous and at the root of much ministry dysfunction, but more about that later. First, by ambition I am not speaking about:

• Wanting to use our gifts to their fullest. After all they were given to us by God to be used fully for him.
• Wanting to have the greatest influence for God that we can within the arenas He has given us. Of course that is the catch - within the arenas He has given rather than the ones we try to manufacture for ourselves.
• Being available to God for any assignment He may have for us. But they are His assignments not ours.

Given that caveat I would suggest that ambition as the world uses the term - to get ahead, achieve success, grow something big, make a name for ourselves and grasp the gold ring are incompatible with those in ministry. In fact, I can give story after story of ministry leaders driven by the their personal ambition and ego that have ended up not only hurting themselves but their ministries and the people they leave in the wake of their own ambitions. 

At its worst, ambition becomes narcissism and there are plenty of narcissistic leaders in the Christian arena: more so I suspect than in the secular arena. I have seen any number of Christian leaders create carnage in the wake of their ambition and then go on to do it again and again. Using a veneer of spirituality it is possible to really about furthering our own life ambitions and advancement.

Why are these incompatible with leading ministry? Because they are far more about us than they are about Him. In fact, it is possible to use ministry as a means of self advancement rather than for the advancement of His kingdom. Any of us in full time ministry know that and deal with the internal struggle on an ongoing basis. If we don't we should!

Contrast that kind of ambition that has self very much at the center with the words of Jesus in the Gospel of John that he simply does and says what the Father has told him to do and to say. Certainly Jesus was not out to make a name for himself (even being God)  but was only concerned about the name of the Father and glorifying His Father. 

Or think about Paul whose ambition was to know Christ and to make Him known (Philippians). In fact, contrast Paul's lack of personal ambition with the ambition of the pseudo apostles in 1 Corinthians who held themselves up against Paul. Their concern was their reputation, lifestyle and standing while Paul says in his defense that he came with trembling and trepidation to preach of Christ and Him crucified. 

These are perhaps important correctives to the celebrity leadership culture we find in the Christian church today. We celebrate superstars and public Christian leaders who lead large ministries as if that is kingdom success. It is no more kingdom success than the pastor who serves his church of 150 with humility and faithfulness. It is all a question of motivation as well as how we define success. And whether our driving ambition is for ourselves or for Jesus and His reputation.

I believe all of us in full time ministry need to grapple with the following questions on an ongoing basis.

• Am I comfortable and OK with the role He has called me to play in His service today? If he were to have me play this role for the rest of my life would I be OK with that?
• Do I believe that it is He who elevates us to larger ministry platforms or do I need to seek that elevation myself?
• Am I maximizing my gifts and influence today with the platform He has given me or am I longing for something different?
• Is my ministry more about me or more about Him? 
• What is my definition of ministry success and does that definition square with the Scriptures?
• How much of my personal definition of success and self worth is driven by the definitions of success around me in my culture?

I am always struck by the life of Moses. When he was forty and thought he was something God could not use him. When he was eighty and didn't think he was qualified God chose Him for the one of the greatest leadership assignments in redemptive history. Moses got it right. Do we?

In loving memory

Our most faithful dog Starbucks passed from this earth this past week after eleven years of faithful friendship at the Addington home. God send her to us at just the right time and she was bar none the best pet one could have.

We often take for granted the richness of God's gifts to us. Starbucks was one of those gifts. No matter how stressful our day, she was always there wagging her tail (I love you), giving small licks (give me some love) and wanting to be with us wherever we were (please let me snuggle with you). Every day she would welcome me home at the same place at the top of the stairs and if I had been gone for weeks it did not seem to matter in the least. Ever forgiving for all slights she waited for another chance to wag her tail and express her love. Many early morning blogs were written with her next to me on the couch.

Today there is a strange emptiness in the home and in a corner of our bedroom where she kept faithful watch over her "charges." She walked with our family through a decade of life and change: kids going to college, two near fatal illnesses, a job change and all the mundane stuff that makes up life but which she brought greater richness to.

Ironically, given what I blog on she was a very self defined dog. She knew what she wanted and was never shy to seek to get it. If she wanted something she would sit and give one an intent stare for as long as it took for us to figure out what we were supposed to know and do. If we got it wrong she moved not an inch. I suspect she felt we were hard to train. And like her owners she did not easily change her mind. We will forever remember her and appreciate what she brought to our lives. Another gift from a loving God whose creation is amazing.

I am so very thankful

Dear Father:

I have so much to be thankful for this year. Every perfect gift comes from you. You are the source of my hope, the ever present help in trouble, the One who has walked with me through every joy and sorrow I have experienced. You are my rock, my salvation, my savior, my hope, my forgiver and everything I have. You are the great I am!

I thank you my family - all of them and how they enrich my life and challenge me.

I thank you for my Christian family who walk through life with me - fellow pilgrims on the journey.

I thank you for my friends for life who know me for who I am and still love me deeply. Examples of You and Your love.

I thank you for the friends I have seen leave this earth this year who I will one day see again with You. They are examples to me and were Jesus to me.

I thank you for meeting the needs I have. My daily bread is your gift. All that I have is from You and is Your provision.

I thank you for being with me through difficult times. The pain is often real but your presence is even more real.

I am thankful for the disappointments I have encountered this year for they give me the opportunity to trust You.

I thank you for hope. Hope for tomorrow, next week, next month and next year and hope for eternity with You and experience your grace and provision in their midst.

I thank you for the incarnation so that I can know you through Jesus in so real a way. Your visitation to this earth changed my life forever.

I thank you for grace and forgiveness. I need it so very much every day and You are always there and always faithful.

On this Thanksgiving day I simply thank You. You are my greatest gift on every day. 

What keeps you awake at night?

What keeps you up at night or wakes you up and prevents you from going back to sleep?

Often the Holy Spirit wants us to pray for a specific issue in our lives or in the lives of others. It is amazing how often God wakes us up at a specific time to pray for a specific need for someone we may know. During one long hospitalization of my own, people reported on the blog that the Holy Spirit kept waking them up at 3:00am in the morning. Because those came in from around the globe, God literally raised up a 24 hour prayer covering at 3:00am in the morning.

There is another reason we may wake up.

My experience is that we can avoid issues that the Holy Spirit wants to get our attention on with our schedules and busyness. But one cannot avoid the night. When He chooses to get our attention at night, when we wake up, there is no place to hide and we face ourselves more candidly than we sometimes want to.

Most of us are very good at avoiding areas of life where we need spiritual renovation. It is not comfortable to peel away layers of our lives that we know deep down are not healthy. It is far easier to ignore areas of dishealth than to admit that they exist and that we need to deal with them. But the Holy Spirit does not let us off that easy because He wants us to be whole, healthy and spiritually alive. And one of His strategies is to gently encourage us to face ourselves - often in the middle of the night when our distractions are at a minimum - and we have nowhere to hide.

Often our busyness is a strategy to hide from issues and closets in our life that need urgent attention but we would rather not face.

Whether it is a situation we struggle with or an area of our lives that needs attention, those issues that wake us up and keep us up are areas that we need to press into with intentionality.

If it keeps you awake, pay attention. It will help you get to sleep!