“So, what’s shaken’ down there?” Gabe asked Raphael, a seasoned guardian of an American church. 

“Looks like they’ve gathered to worship,” Raphael said as he squinted down at the entrance. 

“What’s that lady carrying in? Looks like some kind of package,” Gabe asked

“Probably a casserole,” came the matter-of-fact response.

“A casserole?”

“Must be having a special ‘something-or-other’ after worship.”

Gabe tilted his head, confused. “So, this is what they call worship?” Gabe had been assigned to the churches in Asia, where they worship secretively. So, it was a little startling to see that big cross and that sign out there in front of God and everybody. 

“No pastors getting whisked away to sketchy tribunals? No believers getting disappeared?” He paused, taking in the half-empty parking lot. “So, you mean to tell me they’re free to worship? No restrictions? Crowd seems a little on the lighter side.”

“Well, they have more options over here. They can stream, listen to other pastors, or get the highlights on TikTok. Plus, YouTube is full of pastors that are, according to them, more viral. I think they’re just used to worship. They’re comfortable with it all, and they just want to come whenever it fits into their plan.”

“Really?”

“I’m not kidding. I’ve been watching over this church for years. Lots of churches in North America are like this. It’s more of a social thing.”

Their conversation was interrupted by raised voices from the church steps. “Hey, look over there! That guy looks pretty upset.”

Raphael sighed. “I expected this. It’s been boiling for quite some time now.”

“What’s been boiling?”

“This feud. It started on X. Those two guys have been egging each other on for weeks. They’re all in a fuss over the church finances.” 

Gabe’s eyes widened. “That church has money?”

“Of course. This is America, the richest nation in the world. The church even pays its leaders.”

“Wow!”

But it’s deeper than that. This church is filled with people who are all focused on all the MAGA controversies, still arguing about Covid, where it came from, lots of other stuff too, Epstein files, whatever…”

As they watched the congregation settle into their cushioned chairs, Gabe grew restless. “I can’t wait to see what worship is like. When does it start?”

“It already has.”

Gabe observed the scene below with growing bewilderment. “That’s worship? Everyone’s watching. Nobody’s doing anything!”

“They’re tired. They’re a very busy group: travel ball, fellowships, their jobs, their hobbies and Netflix rolled out three new limited series. It’s a lot,” Raphael explained with practiced patience.

“Are they just going to sit there?”

“No, they’ll stand a time or two. With those padded chairs, I can’t say I’d blame them for sitting.”

The singing began, and Gabe listened intently. “Who’s the guy with the mic?”

“That’s the band leader. He leads them in a kind of group karaoke. They follow along on the screens.”

Gabe squinted down at the stage. “Nice wings on his tattoo, though. Quite impressive artwork.”

The service continued, and when someone came to the microphone, Gabe leaned forward expectantly. “Finally, they’re praying!”

“Enjoy it while it lasts, they don’t really pray much. Hardly ever in private… Prayer closets are rare and prayer meetings are filled with lots of medical jargon. This is the extent of being ‘prayed up’ for most of them”

As the service wound down, Gabe looked at the empty tank behind the stage. “I guess that’s the baptistry.”

“Right. It broke a couple of years ago. Something with the plumbing went haywire but they don’t really miss it anyway.”

Raphael studied his companion’s troubled face and asked, “What do you think happened to them?”

“Kind of a Laodicea situation?” Gabe observed.”

“Right. No passion. No change. Just check the box and get back home before the game.”

“If only they could have seen what we saw in the first few centuries of the church.”

“Or even the Christians across the ocean who face persecution right now .”

As the service concluded and people began filtering out, chatting casually about weekend plans and rating the sermon, Raphael yawned and said, “Gabe, I miss the days when things were cookin’ in America and I’m not talking casseroles.”

“Sorry, bud. You’ve got a tough assignment,” Gabe said empathetically. “Well, I’d better head to our division staff meeting. We just got prayed into some new assignments from believers in Nepal, Bangkok, Tehran, and Bogota.”

“You always get to go to where the action is. I’m stuck with Americans impressing each other on Instagram.”

“Hang in there, Raphy. Things could turn on a dime here. All it takes is a remnant.” Gabe said as he patted Raphael on the back.

“I hope so. It’s been a while,” Raphael said to himself gravely as he watched Gabe disappeared into the evening sky. 

There’s a thought experiment that haunts me: What would happen if we took the Bible seriously? Not just as a collection of inspiring stories or moral guidelines, but as the actual Word of God that should fundamentally reshape how we live, love, and engage with the world around us.

The primary foundation of any authentic faith movement should be “Believing the Bible as the Word of God.” But here’s the radical part—what if we actually lived like we believed it?

Love Without Borders

When Jesus said “love your enemies,” He wasn’t speaking metaphorically or offering a gentle suggestion for our consideration. He was laying down a revolutionary principle that should make the church the most confounding institution on earth. Imagine if we actually loved everybody—even our enemies—to such an extent that our enemies would look at the church and say, “Wow, those crazy people love me!”

This isn’t the sanitized, comfortable love we often practice within our church walls. This is the kind of love that crosses political lines, racial boundaries, and ideological divides. It’s the love that makes people scratch their heads and wonder what on earth has gotten into us.

A Consistent Respect for Life

If we truly held a radical respect for life, our witness would become beautifully consistent. We’d fight as vehemently against the death penalty as we do against abortion. We’d recognize that being pro-life means protecting life at every stage, in every circumstance, without the convenient exceptions that align with our political preferences.

This consistent ethic of life would make us uncomfortable allies to many and perfect allies to none—which is exactly where the church should be when it’s truly following Christ rather than partisan politics.

Listening Like Jesus

Too often, we have become known more for winning debates than for loving people. But what if we listened to people the way Jesus listened to them? Instead of feeling compelled to win arguments and exclude those with opposing viewpoints, what if we created spaces where people felt heard, valued, and welcomed?

Jesus had this remarkable ability to make people feel seen and understood, even when He disagreed with their choices. He listened first, loved always, and let transformation happen naturally through relationship rather than through rhetorical conquest.

Seeing Christ in the Poor

The Bible is crystal clear about how we should treat poor people—as human representations of Christ Himself. Yet somehow we’ve managed to create elaborate theological justifications for why this doesn’t apply to our economic policies or personal generosity.

What if we actually believed that when we encounter someone in need, we’re encountering Jesus? How would that change our budget priorities, our voting patterns, our daily interactions with those society has pushed to the margins?

Going Instead of Staying

We’ve become remarkably comfortable with staying put, building bigger buildings, and creating more programs for ourselves. But Jesus called His followers to “go.” We should be more compelled to move toward the world’s pain than to retreat into our sanctuaries.

This doesn’t mean everyone needs to become a missionary, but it does mean the church should be fundamentally oriented outward rather than inward. We should be known more for what we’re bringing to the world than for what we’re protecting ourselves from.

Cleansing the Temple

Jesus didn’t just teach about spiritual purity—He grabbed a whip and drove the money changers out of the temple. Maybe it’s time for some serious temple self-cleansing programs to purge the church of widespread commercialism and politics.

What would it look like if our denominational leaders were seen more often with mops and wrenches than with microphones and marketing materials? What if they were known for their service rather than their strategies, their humility rather than their platforms?

New Heroes

Our heroes should once again be found in mud huts and rice fields half a world away instead of in corner offices and television studios. The people we celebrate should be those who are sacrificially loving the world rather than those who are successfully managing religious enterprises.

This isn’t to diminish the importance of leadership and organization, but rather to remember what we’re organizing toward and who we’re leading people to become.

A Little Holy Rebellion

And here’s where things get fun: for every preacher who tries to turn the church into a political organization, they should be fair game for wedgies. (Okay, maybe that’s taking it too far, but you get the point.)

The church loses its prophetic voice when it becomes an extension of any political party. We’re called to be a peculiar people, not a predictable voting bloc.

The Challenge

This vision might sound impossible, naive, or even dangerous to some. Good. The gospel has always been a little dangerous to the status quo. It’s always challenged comfortable arrangements and safe assumptions.

The question isn’t whether this kind of radical faith is practical or politically expedient. The question is whether it’s biblical. And if it is—if this is what it actually means to believe the Bible as the Word of God—then maybe it’s time to stop making excuses and start making changes.

What would your church look like if it actually believed? What would your life look like? What would the world think of a church that loved this radically, served this consistently, and believed this authentically?

Maybe it’s time to find out.

Welcome to life as a deacon! Always exciting, inspiring, fulfilling and self-satisfying. Wait… that’s not exactly true.  Let’s start over.

Welcome to life as a deacon! Much different than you expected (that’s a little closer to the truth).

As you begin your ministry as a deacon, here are a few common errors to avoid for the sake of your ministry, your marriage and maybe even your sanity. The last thing that anyone wants to see happen here is for you to flame out in the first year. I’ve known a number of men that did and the following exhortations are the result. And by the way, I’m flamed out early on but found my stride a few months later. I wish I would have known about three of these errors back then. 

1. Listening to Pastor Bashers.  Once you become a deacon you enter a different perceived role. It is the role of sounding board for everyone who thinks your pastor in obtuse, lazy, overbearing, driven, long-winded, shallow, manipulative, disorganized, carnal, pharisaical, aloof, nosey, trite, over-analytical, under-educated, simple, complex, late, early, egregious, spineless, stubborn and/or incompetent. Do not listen to any of them. Ever. 

2. Beast Mode. When I became a deacon I was uninformed of my physical, emotional, and spiritual limitations. I actually believed I could be on “beast mode.” Beast mode, a term my kids used a few years ago, is that extra gear you have that let’s you become insanely fast and unstoppable. It’s a video game term. But you can only survive on beast mode for a day or two before you completely wear yourself out. Pace yourself in this first year. In the words of Spiderman’s aunt: “You aren’t Superman, you know.”

3. Desire for “Pixie Dust.” There is no pixie dust that you can sprinkle over some messes that will make them look or smell better. You are going to have to get your hands dirty in other people’s wreckage and there will be no “microwave” or “just add water” solutions. Usually it’s a lot of hard, awkward, ugly work in ministry. There are times in ministry when all the axioms fall short.

4. Becoming a Solo-mission Specialist. A deacon is never a one man wrecking crew. It takes a tribe to do it. Going alone could have various consequences including:

• Gossip from a neighbor who sees you entering a widow’s home by yourself.
• Anxiety from trying to accomplish tasks both great and small alone.
• Embarrassment from trying to fold that Lord’s Supper table cloth alone in front of the congregation (impossible!). 
• Danger from the generator as you try to reboot the church septic system.

Being a deacon without a wingman is a frustrating and lonely undertaking. 

5.  Going Full-On Gladiator.  Deacons, avoid the temptation to be consumed in conflict. There will be conflict in church. Conflict is actually healthy, but left unchecked it grows like kudzu on a hot Georgia night. It will smother everything good that’s happening in the church. Steve Davis, my pastor, reminded me that all deacons carry around two buckets. One filled with gas and the other with water. In every conflict deacons will throw one or the other at the flames. Choose the water please. 

6. “Fake it ‘til ya Make it.” You can get away with this strategy from time to time but it’s a whole lot easier to learn how to do the work and ask questions when you’re confused. 

7. Anticipating the Ticker Tape Parade. It’s an honor to serve but don’t expected to be honored. Most of the important stuff you do will be things that only your Father in Heaven will see. There are also some exasperating moments. I often think about one phrase when I think about pastoring and being a deacon, “It’s an early to rise, pride-swallowing onslaught!” Some days are like that and nobody gets a purple heart for those days. 

8. Underestimating the Power of a 40-Year Member. They are out there and you might want to spend a little extra time getting to know them. Political move? Sometimes. Wise? More often than not. Listening and relating to them often makes connections and builds bridges that will reap benefits. They have a lot of experience and are often more open to change than you would imagine.

9.  Trying to Speak When You Have No Words.   Sometime I forget that listening and silence can be much more powerful and constructive that wagging my uninformed and mystified tongue. A deacon’s presence at a funeral is more powerful than words. Trying to answer a question because you are embarrassed that you don’t know the answer is downright dangerous.

10.  And Finally … Forgetting the Pianist in the Lord’s Supper Element Distribution. It’s so easy to do! She isn’t on a row. She’s out in left field. She’s busy doing something important and she’s in full view of the congregation. Tie a string around your finger and then place the juice and wafer on the piano for her. Everybody watching will be glad you did!  

If you have to use a remote to ring the Sunday School bell because you are keeping the preschoolers and teaching the Ladies Senior Adult class on closed circuit TV, you might need to delegate.

If you come home from work one day only to discover that your son left for college, entered med school, and set up a practice before you realized he was gone, you might need to delegate.

If your teammates base can all fit in your Smart Car, you might need to delegate.

If the Deacon’s decide to attend worship on a rotating basis, once every quarter, you might need to delegate.

If “Hello, I can’t help you I’m snowed under,” becomes your standard phone greeting, you might need to delegate.

If your wife has to set up an appointment 3 weeks in advance in order to schedule an meal together for her birthday.

If you have over fifty-five “…. for Dummies” books in your study, you might need to delegate.

If you go back to school to learn how to play the bass and the basics of interpretive dance because your church is going contemporary, you might need to delegate.

If you develop an involutary twitch everytime somebady says “can you..”, you might need to delegate.

If the Church schedules an intervention for you with Dr. Phil, You might need to delegate.

If you find that you have become the chairman of the deacons and the WMU, You might need to delegate.

What is the church?

In all of it’s glory and shame

What is the future of this beautiful wreck

And what will we do when we realize that the Church is a Bride not a business

How will we explain our constant desire to hoard all we can

and keep inside a building made by hands of men

Some call it logic but God calls it sin.

How will we stand when his hand is seen

And the holy messiah who was born as a babe

Whose heart is wide open to the sick and the lame

How will we feel if he finds the church inactive

More attracted to the culture than those who needed us most

From the hurting across the street

To the poor surviving on some foreign coast

To the missionaries on foreign fields

The penniless less than an hour away

How will we stand on that day

When we realize that we were amused to death

We stuffed our bellies on selfish pursuits

Ignoring the riches of God

Realizing that Jesus was at our door

But we were too busy, too tired, to distracted to listen

So filled with excuses, conflict and cynicism

Content with the models of others

We neglected the savior, his sisters and brothers

The struggling fathers and the heartbroken mothers.

But for our church, the hour is late.

Will we become God’s grand twist of fate.

It might be the hardest thing we’ve ever done

To leverage our lives to the plan of the Son.

Some might call it impossible

Others might call it irrelevant

Still others might call it foolish.

But when our church stands in the halls of eternity

Standing there before presence of God

Every other pursuit will seem rather odd.

Of course we’ll be saved by God’s grace

Absolutely we’ll be redeemed in that place

But what legacy will we lay at the feet of our Savior.

How will we explain our thoughtless behavior?

That day is coming as sure as the sea

As real as the sun, as certain as sand

But here we are.  We have this amazing chance to step up and serve

To leave everything on this field of destiny

To say it’s all about them.  It’s not about me.