July 12-18 - DM818 - The Spirituality of Leading with Dr. Steve Martyn

Howdy, friends and neighbors. Meet Dr. Steve Martyn. And he is a wild and crazy guy who is leading the spiritual formation dimension of our time here.

Steve will be working with us on our retreat to Gethsemani Monastery in September. It will be a silent retreat so you know how much I'll LOVE that. Yet I have no doubt it will be a time of blessing a growth.

Mainly in the course we talked about five key things:

1. Keeping a postures of Repentance, Dependence and Humility in the midst of living out our call to full time Christian service. Everyone needs this, ministers especially. Sometimes people idolize their pastors. It is easy to slip into modes of thinking that leave God out and encourage us to put ourselves on His throne. Also, if we are on God's throne in our hearts, upon who are we dependent? God or ourselves? That is a dangerous trap for any Christian, let alone a pastor to fall into. Yet it happens.

The cure for these ills is humility. Not the "dona-nobis-requiem-smack your-foreheard-with-a-plank-Monty-Python humility, but true Christ centered humility that returns God to the throne of our hearts and follows a discipline of devotion in a community of accountability. One of the things that we worked on this time is our "seven deadly sins." My wost was pride, the idea that I can do it all myself and God sometimes goes to the back seat. I hope that if you are struggling with this then you'll commit to seeking the face of God more.

2. Developing dispositions toward daily devotional living. One can't have a relationship with God if one doesn't talk with Him. And one's relationship will be pretty poor if one just talks AT Him. Do you know how many hours I have spent babbling to the Almighty? Do you know how many months and years that I have spent not speaking with God? I pray that you will listen to the still quiet voice. Seek it. Hear it. Draw it into your self like like a fine dinner. Talk if necessary. Just don't talk with your mouth full! ;) Hey! That'll preach!

3. Discerning vocational direction in the midst of busy-ness and the unbiblical demand of hyper-performance. There's a million things that people think that a minister "should do." If you line them all up, you get something that is a cross between Jesus, Superman, Bill Clinton after a national disaster, and Dr. Phil. Uh ... NO!!! That's SuperPastor. If that's who you want for your pastor, then either don't hold your breath or, as a friend of mine said, "take a ride on the clue-wagon."

Some pastors are better preachers than care-givers; some are better administrators than preachers. You won't ever get the pastor that you want. Just pray for the one you've got and hold on tight, if you let her play the game the way that God is calling her to play, then you just might be surprised where you'll go in God's walk of faith both individually and as a part of a community.

4. Cultivating a disposition for appreciative living and praise; are you alive? Then praise God. What are you going to do with it? This is the day that the Lord has made, let us go forward and take advantage of it. Do you know how many hours of my life that I have spent whining?! What a waste! As a friend of mine said about cost estimation for the government: no whining; no sissies. Thanks, Andy!

5. Seeking deliverance from isolationist tendencies and embracing covenant accountability community. No one can be a Christian alone. That's probably the big mistake that I have made in my life, for all the talk I do about community and church involvement and other such stuff. I don't know if I have been as effective as God called me to be as a part of a Christian community. No, I know, "no one is." But that doesn't mean we sit around wallowing in a stinking vat of our own mediocrity. God has given us the grace to not just "do better", but absolutely spank evil and send it home to it's little wuss-demonic papa. One of the most challenging scriptures is not "Love thy neighbor" (although that is a BIG challenge), but it could be John 14:12 (NRSV) -- "Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father." So what works are you doing? What works is your community doing? What grace have you been given? A lot, my friend, you've been given a lot of grace. Seek and love the One Who Is. Seek and love one another. Give yourself up and find and love yourself again. You are not alone. We are not alone. You have been given more than you know or realize.

DM818 ... cool class.

Grace and peace,

Trav Wilson