The Pastor's Desk

The persecuted church is the place of God’s blessing.  That is what Jesus says in Matthew 5:10-12.  This passage tears down the strongholds of easy believism, prosperity gospels and American values.  It replaces them with something eternally meaningful and delightful – the privilege of suffering for the gospel.  I hope we will all listen to Jesus as He tells us about the blessings and joys of persecution.

 

 Happy Are the Persecuted: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download
 Happy Are the Persecuted: Download

This Sunday was a blessed service of rejoicing in God’s grace at Berry Road Baptist.  We ordained two new deacons this week – Jim Manry and Jimmy Fletcher.  It was a great privilege, both for us and them, to testify about the grace of God among us as He has raised up these men to serve as officers in our church.  Praise be to God!

The message comes from Acts 6:1-7 and deals with how God uses deacons to advance the ministry of the gospel in the context of the local church.  I pray that both these men will look deeply on God’s Word and faithfully keep their charge to be me of selfless service among God’s people.

 

 Deacon Ministry for the Advancement of the Gospel: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download
 Deacon Ministry for the Advancement of the Gospel: Download

DugDownDeep_Carnahan.mov from Covenant Life Church on Vimeo.

Amen.  Thanks John.

Studies show that less than 1% of evangelical church members are involved in one-on-one discipleship.  Therefore, it should not startle us that so many church members can come to church for ten, twenty or thirty years and never really grow.  It should not surprise us that sin is so easily tolerated and overlooked by a people called by God to be holy.  Where is the accountability?  Where is the zeal for spiritual growth?  Billy Graham once said, “Mass crusades in which I believe and to which I have committed my life, will never finish the Great Commission; but a one-by-one ministry will.”  We need solid preaching, but we need more than that.  We need Sunday School classes and home bible studies and small groups, but we need more than that.  For discipleship to be balanced and healthy, every Christian and every church must have an intentional one-on-one discipleship plan so that every individual Christian is challenged and encouraged in their personal walk with God.  I hope you will follow Christ in the Great Commission charge to “make disciples of all nations.”  What better place to start than in your own local church through a one-on-one relationship?

In addition to some theology on discipleship, this message is intensely personal for me.  I am nothing apart from the grace of God and the labor of godly men in my life.  I have been taught, instructed, encouraged, rebuked, grounded and made joyful by the diligent labor of other men who invested themselves in me personally.  This message is also the story of how God took a rebellious soldier and molded him into a passionate preacher and a loving shepherd.  You will hear about the legacy of great men in my life – men like my father, Max Barnett, Dave Edwards, Ronnie Rogers and many others.  You will understand your pastor much better when you have understood the difference that one-on-one discipleship has made (and is still making) in my life.  In fact, there is so much of my testimony that I had to leave out part of my message!  Check the manuscript for the theology and the mp3 for the testimony.  I pray you will be convicted and will join me in the labor of making disciples, one person at a time.  Soli Deo Gloria!

 

 One-on-one Discipleship: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download
 One-on-one Discipleship: Download

“Here the reformation must begin.”  Those were the words of Matthew Henry on April 16, 1704 when he preached an abundantly practical sermon entitled, “A Church in the House, A Sermon Concerning Family-Religion,” as an encouragement to fathers to develop the spiritual life of their families in their homes. Henry exhorted that “every house should be a little church.” His point was not that the home should replace the church, but that the home should become a fountain of blessing for both the local church and the community at large.

His precedence is thoroughly biblical:

“These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up.” (Deuteronomy 6:6-7)

For He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which He commanded our fathers that they should teach them to their children, that the generation to come might know, even the children yet to be born, that they may arise and tell them to their children, that they should put their confidence in God and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments (Psalm 78:5-7).

Train up a child in the way he should go, Even when he is old he will not depart from it. (Proverbs 22:6)

Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. (Ephesians 6:4)

It’s time that modern fathers listened to the ancient words of Scripture and the wisdom of godly men of old who raised their children in the ways of Jesus Christ.  Let’s stop pointing fingers at the public schools, the fractured government, and weak youth ministries.  Parents -  God has called YOU to be the primary disciplemakers in your home!  I urge you to look at the attached document, Family Worship Resources, and begin the journey on leading your own wife and children in the worship of Jesus Christ.  Let’s band together and encourage one another to live and lead worship in our own homes.  Let’s make “every house a little church.”  Soli Deo Gloria!

 Family Worship Resources: Download

This passage in Mark 10:35-45 should humble us daily as we seek to serve God.  It commands that we put every other person ahead of ourselves.  It demands a resolute and steadfast commitment to self-sacrificing service.  It calls us to follow in the footsteps of Jesus in abject humility.  In short, it tells us that we are last.  Join me in the daily struggle to put God first, others second, and ourselves last in humble service to God’s kingdom.  Oh how desperately we need churches filled with saints who become “slaves of all.”

 

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 I Am Last: Download

And He was saying to them all, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he and take up his cross daily and follow Me. 24 “For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it.”  Luke 9:23-24

The great irony of the Christian life is that real life – abundant life, joyful, fulfilling, eternal life – is gained in personal death.  If we are to experience eternal life in Christ, we must die to self and live for God.  This is the gospel.  These words of Jesus will transform your life a thousand times before you ever approach a full understanding of it.

 

 Lose Your Life: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download
 Lose Your Life: Download

Structure is an essential part of any institution.  This is no different in the church.  Church structure is what brings order and provides security to the ebb and flow of ministry.  However, as the world is rapidly changing around us, we are discovering that structures that were created years ago to fulfill the Great Commission are not as effective today as they once were.  Traditionally, churches have been structured in a way which put vocational ministers (pastors, worship leaders, youth pastors) front-and-center so that they could exercise their spiritual gifts in a way that benefited the church.  Over the years, almost imperceptibly, the laity of the church has largely become content with coming to church and hearing their ministers preach and teach.  In fact, most of the current structures of the traditional church are designed in such a way that forces the clergy to lead and the laity to listen.  Think about it.  Sunday School – one teacher, many listeners (sometimes with discussion, but overall little lay participation).  Worship – a worship leader and the pastor are central.  Sunday night – pastor teaches, laity listens.  Wednesday night – pastor teaches, laity listens.  Do you see a pattern here?  The traditional structures of many churches is set up so that the pastor does the majority of the ministry when the church is gathered.  This is not to say that the laity are not doing anything – that is certainly not true!  However, it is to say that when the church is assembled, the ministry of the pastor is prominent and the ministry of the laity is marginalized, particularly in smaller churches.  Furthermore, it emphasizes the teaching role of the pastor so much that it overwhelms the serving ministry of the saints.  We must have BOTH to have healthy churches – solid, biblical teaching (from gifted pastors and teachers) and loving, diligent service (from gifted saints).

Let’s go to the premier passage in the New Testament on church growth to see how God’s Word should shape our thinking about church structure.

Eph 4:11-16 – 11 And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. 14 As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; 15 but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

Notice that Christ has given pastor-teachers (one group in the original Greek) FOR the equipping of the saints FOR the work of ministry. In other words, the ministry of the pastors is to equip (train, disciple, teach, etc.) SO THAT the saints can do the rest of the “work of service.”  That word “service” can be translated “ministry”.  This results in “the building up of the body of Christ” – i.e. church growth!  True church growth happens as God calls gifted men into ministry who then devote their lives “to equip the saints” so that the entire body is grown toward the fullness of Christ’s maturity.  Given this theological foundation, it is essential that our church structures are organized in such a way that allow BOTH the ministry of pastor-teachers in equipping and the ministry of the laity in working.  In Liberating the Laity, R. Paul Stevens describes how he tried to equip the people in his church for doing the church’s ministry but failed because the structure of the church required him to do the ministry.  He writes, “Structure, I discovered, is important; there is no point in saying that every member is a minister if the structure of the fellowship ‘says’ the exact opposite – by making it hard for people to discover their gifts or to exercise loving service.”  We must organize our churches in such a way that allow everyone to minister – not just vocational leaders.  Hence, structural changes are necessary for the survival of the church and vital for the growth of the church.

These are the reasons that we have ended our adult Bible study on Sunday night and Wednesday night, replacing those structures with service ministries (Awana, encouragement ministry, visitation ministry, etc.) on Wednesday night and small groups on Sunday night.  There will still be Bible study, but it will be more effective Bible study because more saints are participating in it and leading it.

Berry Road – I encourage you all to remember that the main goal of our church is to glorify Jesus Christ by making faithful disciples of all nations.  This is an institution for fulfilling the Great Commission.  The structural changes we are experiencing are biblical, Spirit-led and will help us fulfill the Great Commission BETTER than we ever have before.  That doesn’t mean that discipleship will happen automatically because these changes have been made, but that we now have a greater opportunity for lay ministry to operate within the structures of the church, which in turn will “cause the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.”  I am confident that God will use these new structures to conform all of us more into the image of His Son.  More lost people will be saved, more saved people will be sanctified, and more sanctified people will serve at Berry  Road now than ever before.  Let’s remember our roots, and at the same time rejoice in the renewed vision He has given us!

Wonderful insights from R.C. Sproul and Al Mohler on the theological and practical perils of the seeker sensitive movement, which applies largely to the emergent church as well.  Enjoy.