We had an awesome Sunday at Harvest. Good crowd! Good spirit! Good response! I'm looking forward to a great week. I visited Scott Hanes at Kaiser today and he's doing a little better. Keep him in your prayers. I feel a little guilty, just a little, for picking this beautiful flower at Kaiser on my way out today. There were hundreds of them though and I'm sure my picking this one will encourage that plant to produce more.

I have the greatest pastor's wife ever. Probably because she understands her job description very well. It's really not that complicated. It is...but it isn't. Her role as given to her by God is to be my wife. That's it! I have to say that she does an excellent job of it.

Last night at dinner she asked me about my last blog post. She asked me if I really loved being a pastor. She knows like nobody else the ups and downs I face. She is my best friend. She's the one that I go crying to when things don't go well, and she's always quick to point me back to God. She knows when I'm discouraged, defeated, hurt, lonely. She knows. I think that's what made her ask me if I really loved being a pastor.

My response was, "absolutely, probably more now than ever before." I'm 20+ years into this journey and I'm still learning every day. It may very well take a pastor his entire ministry to finally become good at pastoring. Yes, there are times when you get hurt but that only happens when you have opened yourself up to people. In order to experience the great joys of ministry you have to be exposed to the pains of ministry.

I was writing in my journal this week and sorting some things out. A pastor's heart...

• A pastor starts by loving God and following Him into the ministry. I still stand amazed that God would call me and use me. I mentioned in my last post that the pastorate is not a job or career, it is a calling by God. Fall in love with God and let Him do whatever He wants with your life.
• A pastor falls in love with the church, which is not a bad thing as long as he loves God more. The church is such an amazing thing! It is so exciting to study it, watch it, and participate in it. Some pastors have loved God but despised the church. When you fall in love with the church you would do anything for the church.
• A pastor falls in love with his people. I am amazed at how much I love my people today. There is a danger here however, of loving your people more than God, which will mess everything up. Loving your people is what exposes you to the greatest joys and greatest hurts imaginable.

There may be another phase beyond these, I'm not sure. This is my journey so far. I think that tremendous pain often comes with growing and transitioning into each of these phases. I've had my share and I'm sure that I've not always handled it well. Here are a few thoughts about pain in ministry.

• Originally, my pain was based on my being goal oriented. If I didn't hit a goal it hurt. If my attendance dropped it hurt. If someone left the church it hurt. I was on a quest for God and I wanted to please Him so much that when things didn't go right I was hurt. These things still sting and maybe more so, but for different reasons.
• Then my pain became based on how things affected the church. I still struggle with this. I love the church so much that it really hurts me when something affects the church. I have to constantly remind myself that it is His church, not mine. I think there have been times when I hurt more for the church as an institution than I did for the individuals that make up the church.
• As you fall in love with your people the pain sometimes seems unbearable. People that you genuinely love are able to hurt you far more than people you don't care that much about. I've said many times, "I wish I didn't care, that way it wouldn't hurt so bad". Here's the deal though, in order to be a good pastor you must care for your people.

Here's how this pain breaks down. Here are three phases of hurt. (I know, I'm going crazy with the bullet points tonight)...

• I hurt for me... It's painful to me personally. They attacked me. They don't like me. We must grow beyond the "It hurts me" level.
• I hurt the church... They are hurting the church. We'll not reach our goals. Our numbers are going down. We must grow beyond the "It hurts the church" level.
• I hurt for them... We hurt because we understand how destructive sin is to our people. We see the needless pain they are experiencing. We know the toll it will take on their marriage. We know the damage it will inflict on their children.
• I hurt for Christ... We hurt because we know the heart of God is breaking.  

I don't know why I'm sharing any of this tonight, but there it is. It's what was on my heart. Maybe there is someone God wanted me to share these thoughts with. Yes, I love being a pastor! I think I'm getting better at it each and every year. At this rate I'll be pretty good by the time the Lord takes me home.  :)

I did an interview this morning about the efficacy of "door-to-door outreach" and will link to the story as soon as it's available. Much of what I shared came from some research we did at the Center for Missional Research on whether or not door-to-door is an effective tool.
Here is what we published last year:
Every Saturday morning at First Church, dedicated church members meet to do something both their parents and grandparents did before them--door-to-door visitation. They visit people in the neighborhood who might be new church prospects with the hope they'll begin personal relationships with Christ either that morning or the next Sunday at church. Recently there has been a growing debate among those assembling for outreach as to how to approach their task. Some on the team want to share the gospel with every person they come in contact with--or they believe they're putting the person's eternal destiny at risk. Others suggest that the team should simply invite people to hear their biblically faithful, gospel-preaching pastor tell them about Jesus during his Sunday message.

Who's right?
We (the North American Mission Board's Center for Missional Research) decided to find out. By partnering with a polling firm1 to ask 1,200 random Americans we discovered that the answer just might be--"both."
When you knock on a stranger's door, more people are open to a church invitation than a gospel presentation--but a significant minority are open to both. According to the survey, Americans are far more open to people coming to their door with that simple invitation than trying to tell them how to get into heaven (53 to 35%). The only exception to this trend is among African Americans, nearly half of whom are okay with someone coming to their door with an evangelistic message--15 percent more than any other ethnic group surveyed.

These stats tell an important story--many people are open to an invitation to your church and some are open to hearing about heaven. Even 40 percent of the most unchurched are open to an invitation to your church, which is something that the whole church can do-- something that's much less scary for the typical believer and takes less training. It is helpful to know that many people are open to a church event invitation where, perhaps, they can hear the gospel in an understandable way. Imagine how many more houses your church group could visit if every person could be convinced to make one visit and one simple invitation.
Many people, including me, were surprised that the negative reaction was not more pronounced. But, the numbers are here and, surprisingly, more people are open than we think--particularly if they are approached in a respectful manner.
This survey also contradicts the long-held belief that young people would outright reject church groups coming to their door. In fact, despite being known as one of the most difficult to reach demographics in the country, people between the ages of 25 to 34 were virtually just as likely as their next elders (ages 35 to 54) and considerably more likely than the 70+ crowd to appreciate someone coming to the door and inviting them to church.
As you'll see in the chart below, it's only those on the low and high ends of the age spectrum that will generally shun a door-to-door invitation to church more often than not.

Ideological and socio-economic factors also play a part in how open people are to door- to-door church invitations. More than two-thirds of those who call themselves conservative would likely listen to your church invitation, should you come to the door. But churches in "blue states" should take note--only a little more than half of self-described liberals would do so.
In fact, as you put together different components of the research, you begin to see a clear picture of the type of community where door-to-door church invitations could be most successful. If you were picking such a place, you'd probably settle on a poor to working class community that's ideologically conservative with a high number of Protestants. All three of these demographic groups recorded higher than average openness to church invitations through the door-to-door method--all were above 60 percent. Conversely, it's not as well received in a liberal, well-to-do or middle class, non-Protestant community.
Yet any good news about door-to-door church invitations can only be limited as we look at the study. The fact remains the unchurched are far less interested in being invited to church by someone they don't know knocking on their door. Only 39 percent of those surveyed who attend church rarely, on holidays, or never would be okay with someone coming to their door and inviting them to church, according to the survey. The numbers are consistently worse when asked about "counseling" for "heaven," or what we would call personal witnessing. In other words, the very people we say we want to get into our churches the most are the people least likely to be impacted by one of our favorite outreach strategies.

Now more than ever, we need to look toward new methods to get the unchurched into our churches. Some people will be reached through door-to-door methods. Others will not. While more than half of Americans would listen cordially as a stranger at their door invited them to church, more than 60 percent of the unchurched might tune us out before the invitation left our mouths. Now, the cross is always a stumbling block, but we also want to be sure that our methods are less so.
The message of the gospel is too important to be spread through just one strategy--and if God leads you and your church to a certain strategy, you should use it. Door-to-door methods can be and are used to reach people. At my own church plant, we went door-to- door passing out flyers and free popcorn to invite people to our preview service. This method can still be an important part of our evangelism strategies, but our study shows that not everyone is open to such an approach. Let us ask God to show us additional ways to reach the unchurched--through relationships, service, ministry, and invitations to visit. Remember, God wants to see the unchurched connected to a family of faith even more than we do.

At Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon in a dream by night, and God said, "Ask what I shall give you." 1 Kings 3:5

The Path To Greatness, originally uploaded by CalPastor.

Our worship service this past Sunday was very special. I spoke from John 13:1-17 where Jesus took time after supper to wash the disciples' feet and set an example of humility and service for the church.

At the close of the service I washed one of our men's feet and prayed for him. I started to wash a second man's feet when another man interrupted and asked if he could wash the second man's feet. He washed his feet and prayed for the man. A father stepped forward and washed his teenage daughter's feet telling her how much he loved her and how blessed he was to have her as his daughter. I had intended to wash feet but was blessed when one of our men came forward and asked to wash my feet and pray for me. This was a very touching and emotional service.

As Free Will Baptists, we follow Christ's example and accept the 'Washing Of The Saints Feet' as an ordinance just like Baptism and The Lord's Supper. It is very important that we don't just 'wash feet' though in a church service but that we live in a way consistent with the symbolic act. I have challenged our church to go out and practice acts of service this week, to humble ourselves and take on the role of servants.

I can't wait to hear testimonies this week of all that God has done in our hearts as we took on the role of servant.