Handled

Over on the what you think matters blog I recently ran a series of posts on how we should respond when the way others treat us is somewhat less than we would desire it to be. I thought it might be helpful to have all these posts in one place (for me at least, if for no one else!), so here it is:

Part 1: Calling out pride

“That wasn’t handled very well…” Anyone who has been in church leadership for longer than a week will have had this said to them.

It can be disheartening when someone says this to you (assuming they you really do have peoples best interests at heart and are not just lazy or indifferent) but it goes with the territory I’m afraid. A large part of being a leader is disappointing people. I’m not sure anyone explained this to me before I entered church leadership, but I have found it to be consistently true. People get disappointed because you do not promote them, or because you promote someone else. People get disappointed because you do not share their enthusiasm for a particular pet project. People get disappointed because they feel you haven’t given them enough attention. The list goes on. Sometimes people get disappointed simply because you are disappointing; which is a disappointing reality!

And of course, often the boot is on the other foot – when those who have leadership over us don’t handle things very well, which also happens on a routine basis.

Another thing I have learned, however, is that it is usually not so much how things were handled that counts, as how we respond. There is not much I can do about how someone has handled an issue, but there is an awful lot I can do about how I respond to it.

Because of my pride (Adam’s root sin that has infected us all) my perception automatically tends to be that if someone does something with which I disagree then they have “handled it badly.” Conversely (and still because of my pride) when someone does something with which I agree I tend to think they have “handled it well.”

Actually, there are four possible scenarios in how this might play out:

1.      A situation is handled well, and I agree with it

2.      A situation is handled badly, and I disagree with it

3.      A situation is handled well, and I disagree with it

4.      A situation is handled badly, and I agree with it

So, perversely, my natural, prideful, response will be to be happy (and feel that something has been handled well) in both scenarios 1 and 4, and I will be unhappy (and feel that something has been handled badly) in scenarios 2 and 3. Which simply illustrates that it is my response that needs attention more than how the thing was handled.

Getting this right requires real maturity, but I have seen even very senior church leaders responding badly. And it requires constant vigilance – just this week I was on the end of a “handling” to which my first (prideful) response was, “that wasn’t handled well,” until I pulled myself back to reality and saw that it was actually my response that needed working on, rather than the way the thing had been handled.

Of course, this is not to say that we should be casual about how we handle things. As pastors our aim should be to handle people and their issues with grace and wisdom – but even the most gifted leader never gets it right all the time, and this should be acknowledged.

So whether you are the one who has disappointed someone else, or is feeling disappointed by someone else, the key thing is how you are handling it.

Repentance and forgiveness in Christ seem to me to be the only appropriate response!

Part 2: The battle for the heart

I have had the enormous privilege of spending the past few days with PJ Smyth and the Godfirst posse in Johannesburg. Being with PJ is always an experience of ‘data dump’ – watching how he leads, and chatting with him, and the actual tangible information download of a bunch of files passed over on a memory stick.

One of the initiatives that PJ has been running with since returning to action post-cancer is the excellent 3DL leadership course. While in Johannesburg I have been looking through some of this material and found particularly juicy the module on gospel-centric counseling. In this material PJ puts the emphasis upon how we respond to the stuff life throws at us – it is about winning the battle for our hearts:

Even in situations where external pressures (such as sickness, bereavement, abuse, abandonment etc.) come to bear on us, God holds us responsible for how our heart responds during the experience (e.g. anger towards God, harbouring fear etc.) and for how our heart responds after the experience (e.g. withdrawal, resentment, self-pity, greed etc.).

This battle for the heart is very practical. It means that we are not excused responsibility when something bad happens to us, but are held responsible for how we respond.

For example, a person may act angry or grumpy in response to lack of sleep. Even if the lack of sleep was external (e.g. side effect of a medication, a crying baby, inconsiderate neighbours etc.) God still holds us accountable for our heart response and any sin that occurs through that anger or grumpiness. While empathy is given and the plans made for the external pressures to be minimized, the responsibility rests firmly at our feet and the person must be counselled to take responsibility for their response to the external pressure.

Of course, this message is easier to take from someone who has demonstrated it with integrity in their own life – and this PJ has certainly done. PJ’s response to cancer (during and after) has been exemplary. He has come through it stronger and more grace-filled, and with a keener edge to his ministry. (If you have not heard it, PJ’s message about his experience of cancer at this year’s TOAM conference is a must listen).


If I am handled badly, or if something bad happens to me, what do I do? My natural response is to fight back, or get into self-pity. A godly response is to lean into Jesus and in him find the grace I need – to win the battle for the heart.
  


Sometimes this heart battle is huge – when someone you thought you could trust does something terribly betraying, or when cancer is suddenly diagnosed. But all of us face multiple smaller-issue scenarios every week. And every time, the question is the same – not so much “Why did this happen?” That question is often unanswerable, and usually un-fixable – but, “How am I going to respond?” Or, put another way, how are you going to handle your heart?

Part 3: Grumbling isn’t the answer!

At a recent Newfrontiers wider leaders gathering the brilliant Phil Moore spoke compellingly about lessons from the life of William Booth. A couple of biblical illustrations Phil used really caught my attention, chiming as they did with things I have been focussing on in terms of the way we handle difficult circumstances.

One example Phil used was what happened to Miriam when she complained to Aaron about their brother Moses (see Numbers 12). This is a familiar story, but the point Phil brought home with fresh clarity was the mundane nature of the incident – Aaron and Miriam were having a family moan, apparently in private, and yet God’s anger was kindled against them. How many of us have had behind-closed-doors moans about those God has set in leadership over us? Or, to drive the point home, are there any of us who haven’t? We might not think these conversations are particularly serious – “We’re just letting off steam” – but God takes them very seriously indeed.

The next example was about Peter getting out of the boat to walk to Jesus (Matthew 14). This is a great story of faith – and of failing faith after Peter took a few steps and then began to sink. The question Phil posed was this: If it hadn’t been stormy would Peter have got out of the boat in first place? Probably not. A tiny boat battered by the storm might not have seemed to offer as much security as walking to Jesus. Or, if it had been calm, perhaps Peter would have simply jumped out of the boat to swim to Jesus, as he did following Jesus’ intervention in a later fishing trip (John 21).

These examples got me thinking again about how I respond to things that happen to me. Maybe there are times when Jesus allows uncomfortable things in our lives in order to compel us to respond in faith and walk towards him. Maybe if everything was plain sailing we would never get out of the boat. And maybe God really does care about the gossipy, negative things we say (even in private, with close friends) about those he has set in spiritual authority over us.

Maybe the way we should respond – even when we feel we have been handled badly – is by trusting Jesus and honouring our leaders. Doing this can be difficult and costly; but on balance I think it is less difficult and costly than getting leprosy or drowning.

Part 4: When right is wrong

When it comes to interpersonal conflict we tend to be quick to apportion blame, say “that wasn’t handled well” and feel a measure of resentment towards the other person. As we have seen already, the key thing is how we respond to the inevitable experience of being badly handled. What happens to us is often of less significance than how we respond. Will we win the battle for the heart, or give into the idol of pride and fight back?

The reality is that in any conflict there is often blame on both sides. An instructive biblical example of this is the encounter between Jacob and Laban recorded in Genesis 31. Let’s work through it verse by verse and see how this plays out, in terms of who was “right” and who “wrong”:

Verses 1-2 Laban is in the wrong as he is resentful towards Jacob.

Verse 3 Jacob is in the right, because he hears God’s voice commanding him to return to Canaan.

Verses 4-16 Jacob is in the wrong because he badmouths Laban, and encourages Rachel and Leah to do the same.

Verses 17-21 Jacob is in the wrong because he lives up to his name and ‘tricks’ Laban, by running away from the situation, with Rachel stealing Laban’s household gods to boot. (Whether or not Jacob knew Rachel had done this is not made clear. And we needn’t get into the details here of all concerned being wrong in having household gods in the first place!)

Verses 22-30 Laban is in the right this time. He sets off in pursuit of Jacob, but then heeds God’s warning about how he should speak to Jacob.

Verses 31-32 Jacob is in the right when he admits his error and says he acted out of fear.

Verses 33-35 Rachel is in the wrong this time as she lies to her father about ‘having her period’ and hides his gods in the saddlebag on which she sits.

Verses 36-42 Jacob is in the wrong – because Laban does not find what he has accused Jacob of stealing, Jacob sees the opportunity to get things off his chest and lets Laban have it with both barrels. There is truth in his argument, but his approach is wrong!

Verses 43-54 Laban is in the right as he recognizes he has to let Jacob go, and initiates a covenant between them. Jacob also then gets things right as he responds to Laban’s initiative, and breaks bread with him.

Verse 55 Laban is in the right as he blesses his children and grandchildren and takes his leave.

Neither Jacob nor Laban come out of this encounter particularly well. To a degree, they are both right, but the overall picture is of them both being wrong. Neither of them handle things very well, and it is only by the grace of God that the story concludes with them having dinner together rather than rolling in the dust punching each others lights out. (Which makes it all the more poignant that in the next chapter we find Jacob wrestling with God.)

I think the big lesson from this episode is to be alert to the fact that we might not be as right as we think we are. I’m sure that both Jacob and Laban felt themselves completely justified in their thoughts and actions (Jacob: “Twenty years I’ve worked for you, and got nothing but grief.” Laban: “You’re loaded man – and it’s all my stuff that you’re loaded with!”).

The thing is, they were both right, and both wrong, and fighting about it wasn’t going to achieve anything. Both of them could have handled the situation – and responded to it – a whole lot better. And in that, there must be a lesson for us all.

Part 5: Don’t handle it like a fool

I recently heard Malcolm Kayes speak from 1 Samuel 25 about David, Nabal and Abigail as models of how we respond to events, and found it so helpful I want to recap it here:

“I don’t suffer fools gladly…”

Rather sadly, Nabal’s parents had named him ‘fool’, for that is what Nabal means. Even more sadly, Nabal lived up to his name. He clearly had ability, as he had managed to accumulate considerable wealth, but he was not a popular or pleasant man. David and his men had kept guard over Nabal’s shepherds when they were out in the wilds with their flocks, but Nabal had no interest in showing reciprocal respect towards David. Nabal was the kind of man who says, “I’m not going to help him – I’ve worked for what I’ve got. Why should I help that waster? Let him go and get a proper job.”

When David’s request for help came, Nabal told him to get lost.

“I don’t deserve to be treated like that…”

David was not the kind of man to take an insult lying down. He tells his men to strap on their swords, and marches off to slit Nabal’s throat. David felt complete justification about this – Nabal had it coming.

It is interesting that this story comes immediately after the account of David sparing Saul’s life. When David had Saul at his mercy he did not lay a finger on him, and was even consumed with guilt at cutting off a corner of Saul’s robe. But an insult from Nabal and David is ready to start a slaughter.

Sometimes it is easier to respond righteously in the face of the big test than it is to a smaller test. We might behave with nobility when something huge happens to us, but then fly off the handle at the smaller stuff. This is like the man who handles redundancy with dignity, but then gets into a fury when another driver cuts him up. What it reveals is that there is some heart work that still needs to be done.

“I’ll respond with grace…”

In contrast to the foolish Nabal and the hot-heated David, Abigail is a model of gracious action. She compensates for her husbands arrogant folly by making arrangements for David to receive a generous gift; she prevents David from taking the law into his own hands and becoming guilty of shedding blood by flattering and charming him.

Not only does Abigail respond to a very difficult situation with incredible wisdom, but she acts selflessly. It is easy to imagine that the prospect of David chopping off Nabal’s head might be attractive to Abigail. It could be her way out of what was probably a pretty ugly marriage. But she doesn’t do this. Even when she gets back home from placating David, Abigail finds things worse rather than better with Nabal drunk and disorderly. But rather than look for a way out of a difficult situation Abigail remains faithful.

How do you handle it?

Each of us has the potential to act like Nabal – to be selfish and thoughtless and foolish. In our different ways we can find ourselves looking down on other people and making wrong judgements about them.

Each of us also has the potential to act like David – taking hot-headed exception to the sleights (real or imagined) that others throw our way.

Abigail is a better model of godly response here. Rather than fighting her own corner or running away in fear, she faces a difficult situation head on and makes wise choices that result in a good outcome. Abigail is a wonderful example of how to handle a handling. May we go and do likewise.

Lessons Learnt

After ten days in South Africa I am shortly to head for Johannesburg airport, and the long flight home. I came to learn, and I’ve learnt a lot. Here are my ‘big five’ observations…

1. I still love South Africa! It is always a joy to come here – the people, the landscapes, the sunshine – this is a remarkable country.

2. It is good to remain optimistic. There are a lot of potential threats to the future stability and prosperity of South Africa, from global economics, to HIV-Aids, to firebrand politicians, yet the nation as a whole seems to be getting on pretty well and there are many encouraging things happening. In the UK we tend to hear about the high crime levels and other problems of South Africa, but the generosity of South Africans can be remarkable. An example: the many streets still named after, and statues still standing in commemoration of, Afrikaner heroes of old. That’s just not how things are in most ‘liberated’ nations.

3. PJ Smyth is a remarkable leader. There’s no news there, but it has been fascinating being at Godfirst Church and seeing the outworking of PJ’s leadership gift.

4. The multisite model is working exceptionally well here. The things I like about it are:

·       The benefits of ‘localization’ and ‘centralization’ are plain. Individual site leaders really do lead and pastor their churches, with a team of elders working together in the mission. There is genuine empowerment of these leaders, and they have genuine freedom to contextualise for their setting and significant autonomy in much of how they run their sites – including some of the biggies such as finance. Yet at the same time the benefits of being one team, with big team resources means that each site and its leaders packs a far greater punch and has far greater momentum at their backs than they would if they were out on their own.

·       There is a real ‘band of brothers’ feel to the site leaders team here. The sense of commitment to one another and the overall mission of Godfirst is tangible. Respect for and willingness to follow PJ is clear. But these are not yes men – they are ready to disagree with one another, and push back on areas that need to be debated. This robust camaraderie is very impressive.

·       The commitment to mission as being the sine qua non of Godfirst is very clarifying. This is made explicit in the Godfirst site leaders handbook: I believe that the primary role of church is mission. Without a biblical clarity of the primary purpose of the church, the measure of ‘true church’ becomes the aspect of church that a person is most passionate about. I am certain that biblically there is only one contender for the top spot – mission.

·       Multisite means that Godfirst is incredibly diverse, yet able to focus on reaching culturally distinct communities. For example, yesterday morning I preached at Rosebank, which felt very much like being at home in Gateway – a range of ages, and some ethnic diversity. In the evening, I preached at Wits, which was almost entirely composed of young, black, students. The vibe between the two sites was very different, yet the fact that they are both expressions of the same church rather than of different churches was clear. I love that!

·       This unity in diversity also means that Godfirst is able to work out something of an Acts 2:42-47 dynamic, with wealthier communities blessing and serving poorer ones. Working out how to handle finance in a nation with the inequalities and history of South Africa is a challenge that should not be underestimated – multisite is providing a good vehicle for Godfirst to navigate these complicated issues.

·       The resources generated by a big church allow PJ and team to set an expectation of high standards and to release specialised gifting, but to work this out at a local level so that the church doesn’t feel in anyway impersonal, or out of touch.

·       All of the above points put together mean that the concerns many have about multisite (and which I share) do not seem to be an issue here. That is quite an achievement.

5. God is faithful! I spoke on the faithfulness of God while at Jubilee Community Church and I have really felt the faithfulness of God on this trip. Last night at Wits I was completely undone as soon as we began to worship. In 1988 I landed in Swaziland, a rebellious and gauche 18 year-old. I would never have dreamt that 23 years later I would get to worship with – and preach to – 250 fantastic, passionate students in a democratic and exciting South Africa. God has been very faithful to me.

Keep on Learning

When I was about six years old my school diagnosed me as being ‘educationally sub-normal’ (a less politically correct term for what is now labelled ‘special needs’). After a few one-on-one lessons with the headmistress (during which I demonstrated a technique for observing the way that snails propel themselves and created an elaborate full-size painting of a native American chief, complete with headdress made from real feathers), they realized I was not ESN, but simply bored.

Not that they did much to alleviate my boredom.

A year or so later I remember ‘sneaky-reading’ a book about a grizzly bear. It was a more difficult book than I was supposed to be able to read and I imagined that I would get into trouble if caught reading it; so I would sneak it out of a friends tray when no-one was looking and read a chapter or two before sneaking it back again.

Madness.

I was interested in snails and red indians and bears. I wasn’t interested in most of what school was attempting to teach me – and would probably have learnt more (and certainly been happier) had I been allowed to stay at home and collect lizards and build dens in the patch of waste ground at the top of our road.

Despite these early educational frustrations, I have always been interested in learning, just so long as it is something that I have an interest in.

Today I travel to South Africa and to two churches that have been formative in my learning about Jesus and his plan for his Church. Jubilee Church in Cape Town is where I came back to faith after two years of teenage wandering, and where I began to learn about ministry to the poor and to observe church leadership in a different way from how I had previously. I’m looking forward to being back there, and preaching there for the first time. Godfirst Church in Johannesburg is the only megachurch where I personally know the lead elder, and PJ Smyth is someone who knows more about leadership than I will ever be able to grasp. As well as teaching and preaching in a number of settings while there I’m excited about the opportunity to pick PJ’s brains again.

I’m looking forward to learning lots on this trip – I don’t want to be spiritually ESN!

Nothing Doing

Sometimes deliberate inaction is a leaders best policy, and one that I can't help thinking David Cameron should have followed over yesterdays vote on a European referendum. By making the vote (which wouldn't in any case have bound the Government to holding a referendum) a three line whip, the Prime Minister provoked a confrontation with his backbenchers that he needn't have had. He may claim that, "There's no, on my part, no bad blood, no rancour, no bitterness," but this is difficult to believe when prior to the vote all MPs were warned that defying the whip would mean an end to any hopes of promotion. A wiser course for the Government might have been to ignore the debate and underplay it as much as possible - rather than exacerbate the entrenched Euro-tensions in the Conservative Party.


Sometimes it's best to walk away from a fight, rather than face it up. But choosing when to do so is tricky. 


Church leaders often face these kind of dilemmas too. Inaction and passivity are fatal to a leaders credibility and authority, but picking the wrong battle can be equally undermining. David Cameron is weaker rather than stronger today because of how yesterday played out. That's a mistake not to make.

Preacher/Politician?

It’s party conference season in the UK – Lib-Dems this week, Labour next, and the Tories the week after that. Only the most devoted political junkie can actively enjoy these events. For most of the rest of us they pass by with a mixture of indifference and embarrassment. For me, it is largely embarrassment.

Footage from the conferences seem largely to reveal an audience who do not contain many people I would willingly choose to be trapped in a lift with; and the speeches themselves are often toe-curling. It is difficult to hear anything beyond cliché and self-satisfaction. And the big speeches are now so tightly scripted and choreographed that the attempts at humour and the common touch feel patronizing and contrived.

I think my embarrassment is heightened by the fact that I am a preacher, and regularly stand up and speak in front of a crowd of people. My worst nightmare is to end up sounding like a politician at a party conference.

This Sunday is ‘Vision Sunday’ at Gateway, when I give some review of the past year, and try to paint a picture of what we are working towards over the next twelve months. The worst thing I could do on Sunday is make a politicians speech – but that is all too easy for a preacher to do, and I’ve heard enough preachers do it. Part of the problem is that politicians tend to borrow preachers language, because what politicians are attempting to persuade their hearers is that they offer the way to salvation. This means that most politicians are Pelagians, saying that if only everything was a little bit better, if only everything was done a little more as they liked it, then everyone would live in the promised land.

In order to not end up as a preacher who sounds like a politician aping a preacher, the preacher of the gospel mustn’t be a Pelagian!

The chasm-wide difference between the gospel preacher and the politician is the gospel. Rather than offering salvation through a particular program, the gospel preacher is charged with opening up and applying the Word of God. What we must preach is that apart from Christ there is no salvation, and that without him even the best programs – no matter how worthy – will never bring us to utopia. As preachers, we must have a vision, but that vision is founded in Christ, not in ourselves. And that means the message we preach is very different from a politicians speech.

A LITTLE LEAVEN

Have you seen this clip of Mark Dever, Matt Chandler and James MacDonald talking about some of their preaching gaffs?


Preaching Goofs from The Gospel Coalition on Vimeo.


It's interesting that the guys say illustrations about sport often come off badly. This is certainly my experience - in the UK there can be an assumption by football fans that everyone likes football and will relate to a football illustration. But most people (in absolute terms) are actually not that interested in football, and tend to be immediately alienated by footballing illustrations.


Illustrations, period, are fraught with danger.


I tend not to use many illustrations in my preaching. Partly this is because it is just not a style that comes naturally to me, but it also reflects a concern expressed by Martyn Lloyd-Jones in 'Preaching and Preachers' - that illustrations can be merely distracting. Often we can come away from a sermon thinking, 'that was an amazing sermon' when in fact it was a talk with some very captivating illustrations. If I then remember only the illustration, and not the point of the sermon, well, I may as well have stayed home and watched TV.


It is interesting that when Jesus used illustrations it was always in the form of a story, which helped to cement the point in his hearers thinking. For example, this morning I was reading Luke 7, in which Jesus tells the story of two debtors:


"A certain moneylender had two debtors. One owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they could not pay, he cancelled the debt of both. Now which of them will love him more?" Simon answered, "The one, I suppose, for whom he cancelled the larger debt." And he said to him, "You have judged rightly."


Now that is an illustration, but it is one that completely underscores the point, and ensures the point is memorable. Which is very different from the kinds of illustrations I have heard which tell me a lot more about the preacher than they do about Jesus. 


Preachers can spend a long time thinking of the perfect illustration. Or - worse - build their whole sermon around an illustration they have found that is such a good illustration it just has to be told. Better, I think, to worry less about whether the congregation considers us entertaining, and more about whether we are actually preaching Christ. If we're not doing that, even the best illustration is simply a preachers gaff. 

Christian Cliché

An amusing post (HT: Justin Taylor) from the her.meneutics blog on the use of Christian clichés – with particular ire towards the word “bride” used to describe one’s wife. (I think this is probably an example of Driscoll-ese seeping into Christian linguistics, and one that I, too, find highly irritating.)

But the use of cliché is hard to avoid. In the just finished series of The Apprentice there was a beautiful moment when cliché user par excellence Jim was asked to describe himself without using a cliché. Check out his response…

Finding ways to communicate that have the pith of a cliché, but are not themselves clichéd is a skill that the best communicators have. As this years epic (there it is) Tour de France draws to a close in the Alps, there has been much talk about how, “to win, you must suffer.” That is true, and it is a cliché. Those riders really do suffer, and the ones who suffer most are the ones who win. One who knows how to suffer as well as anyone is Jens Voigt. The oldest man in the race (an ancient 40) Voigt throws his body on the line again and again (there it is). In one Pyrenean stage last week he crashed twice, but still scraped himself off the tarmac and fought his way to the front of the peloton in order to help his team leader in the fight up the hill. The man is a legend (there it is), and talks about suffering in a way that is humorous, and avoids cliché.

When I am back from holiday in August one of my tasks will be looking at our preaching calendar for the next twelve months; as I guess many preachers will be doing. What a joy, and what a responsibility. Let’s make it our aim to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ clearly and pithily, and not to get lazy and fall back into cliché. The gospel is worth more than that.