When Jesus is not at the center -

From my friend Nick Davis ; a summary of thoughts by Os Guinness -

Os Guinness poses that where Christ is not the central gaze, church leaders and ministers become one of the following:

1. Pundit – the one for whom everything can be known; everything can be pronounced on, centred professionally on the importance of information. Knowledge is more powerful than Christ’s Humility.
2. Engineer – the one for whom everything can be designed, everything can be produced, centred professionally on production. Production and administration are more important than Christ’s Love.
3. Marketer – the one for whom everything can be positioned, everything can be sold, centred professionally on consumer satisfaction. Impact is more important than Christ’s Truth.
4. Consultant – everything can be better organized, everything can be better delivered, centred professionally on management. Efficiency and workflow are more important than Christ’s Life.
5. Therapist – everything can be gotten in touch with, everything can be adjusted or healed, centred professionally on healing. Human need is more important than Christ’s Mission.
6. Impresario – everything can be conveyed to advantage through the presentation of images regardless of any reality, centred professionally on public relations. Sensation and Corporate Experience are more important than Imitating Christ.
   

Guinness states that these pathologies arise as a result of “church growth’s uncritical engagement with modernity”. In other words, the focus is on audience and church growth, no matter how rousing and noble the public ministry appears. “Sovereign Audience” has eclipsed “Sovereign Word” (“Dining with the Devil”, pp 69-70).

A Prince has fallen

I received the second most dreaded call on Sunday. The first is someone close has died. The second is someone close has fallen. The absolute shock and disbelief flooded my mind as a distraught wife accounted the story that had just unfolded.

This is a most traumatic of stories. A son, a Jesus lover, a prince in our world had stumbled. Why? Noone can know for sure. Even speculating cannot be helpful as we simply do not know. We know the enemy is on the prowl - if he can't get us in our weakness, he will go after our strengths.

We know that ministry carries massive emotional expenditure, so we need to have dear friends around us who will speak honestly to us when they see the signs of wear and tear beginning to show - and we need to be humble enough to listen to them.

But this blog is not about possible causes and consequences. It is about respect, honor and love. Our dear friends need our highest value response. They need us to say little and pray much. They need our highest hopes, greatest faith, largest forgiveness, whilst we honor their privacy and space to take the needed steps forward.

We must say little. Knowing some of the details, I have been deeply disappointed by the misinformation that is swirling around. Please dear reader, say little. A prince has fallen, his wife is finding Jesus in the most traumatic of times, his kids are confused and hurting deeply. Now is the time to show true brotherhood, sisterhood, communitas. This needs to be Christian Community at her best. Our speech needs to be laden with hope and comments limited to what builds faith. Details are not important now. Please do not be inquisitive to create an information feeding frenzy - much of which is incorrect anyway. Rather let it be a time of "information humility" - I choose to hold my info and thoughts. God will bring all things to the light in His time.

A Prince has fallen. A wife is finding Jesus. Kids are hurting - please let this be our finest hour as we uphold them in our arms of prayer.

A Prophet's Call - Excuses

"I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth" Jer 1:6

I am not sure there is a deeper spiritual wrestle than a prophet with their gift.

Rarely is there an experienced prophet who has journeyed over many years, who responds like Isaiah did - when the Lord said 'whom shall I send... here am I send me."

Jeremiah seeks to distance himself from the stirrings of the prophets mantle that the Father is putting on him. His excuse was : Cant speak... too young. Moses tried the they won't listen, cant speak, have no eloquence, no miracles...

A true prophet of weighty gifting is a very reluctant prophesier. Unlike the word brought by a teacher, who does their study, their prep and then can deliver it with some passion, the prophet carries it differently. They get the seed of a word. The true prophet rarely simply gives it. This seed then incubates inside of them, Not dissimilar to pregnancy. They mull, meditate and muscle with it, often for months before they deliver it. When they feel like the word has come full term and the time is 'now', the waters break. As with giving birth, it is rarely quiet and sweet.

We non-prophets expect the delivery to be pleasant and acceptable - but it is like saying to a mother - 'please deliver your baby quietly, without screaming, sweating and passion. We do not want to embarrass the visitor...' The mother will probably look at you, cuss you out or slap your raw foolishness. No husband will ever say that to his wife in the delivery room... his life will be in danger.

I am obviously not condoning prophetic silliness nor excess. What I am trying to do is bring greater clarity between leaders and prophets. It may well be that there are more 'prophets and teachers moments'; 'apostles and prophets convos'; 'prophets with prophets gatherings' I am not sure but I am absolutely persuaded that the church dearly needs prophets.

We need their eyes and ears [1 Cor 12]. We need them to reveal the heart of the Father to us as we tend to drift toward mediocrity and compromise way too quickly. We need them to blow the wells of God life that get blocked up by sin, distraction, confusion, legalism all too quickly. We need them to point us to places beyond the horizon, beyond the rainbows of empty promises but into the spaces of divine inheritance. We need them to keep our hearts ever tender, soft and worship laden.

Their excuses are often to protect them from us - the very people who dearly need them.

A Prophet's Call - Set Apart

"Before you were born I consecrated you, I appointed you a prophet to the nations..." Jer 1:5b.

These are massive words. The prophet knows! I am yet to meet a true prophet who does not know that they are one. The prophet awareness often does not start somewhere in year 10 of their spiritual journey. Many would say that, looking back, there were some of these stirrings in place even before they officially came to faith. They may have struggled to make sense of them, but this is a gifting that was seeded in them even before they were born.

The prophet knows! They may not want their gift, like their gift or even operate in their gift, but they know that they have this gift.

The prophet knows! We are not talking about being prophetic, the spirit of prophecy or the grace manifestation of prophecy of 1 Cor 12 that many may step into from time to time. I am taking about the full "doma" of prophecy - the Jesus ascension gift [its all about him isn't it?]

The challenge that begins to emerge, is that these prophets find it very difficult to work with or supposedly be accountable to some who are uncertain about their gifting, unclear about their calling and mediocre in their journey. They are often told to be accountable to their elders [of the local church] but they find this extremely difficult. As believers , ordinary men and women, these prophets have a very good God gift in local community and its leadership, where they are accountable for who they are as people, to leaders who see them on a daily basis.

However, as far as the gift goes, I am not sure that the local elders / pastors are the correct biblically empowered leaders who can or should provide prophet partnerships. In older models, elders tend to be business types who are concerned with the business affairs of the church or pastors who are more concerned with the peace of the sheep than with the "now word" from heaven. True pastors will recognize the weight of this gift, will provide a safe shepherding enviroment for their wrestles, will love them deeply, and pray with and for them often, caring, trusting, encouraging them consistently.

Scripture seems to offer this matrix for prophetic co-journeys:

• Prophets and apostles journey together, each needing the other - Eph 2:20, Acts 11:27 - 30,
• Prophets and Teachers - Acts 13:1 - 3,
• Prophets with prophets - 1 Cor 14.

I hope this helps and does not confuse. We are wanting to learn from our mistakes so that the next generation of prophets, elders, pastors and apostles do not have to painfully learn the lessons that we can pass onto them easily.

A Prophet's Call - DNA

"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you" Jer 1:5a

One of the most amazing things about prophets is that it is in every pore of their being. It is something that those around them don't always understand, and they themselves want to switch off.

Jeremiah is told that God knew him before his was formed in the womb. That little window is very powerful to get a glimpse into a number of prophet realities:

• The prophet is formed in intimacy and thrives there,
• The prophet begins to dry up when the community times are great in friendship, word and even good hymn singing but lack divine intimacy,
• They simply cannot live without eternal intimacy,
• Their whole DNA is wired to this end - the way they eat, sleep, think, see and feel even the way they relate to people, generally they are not able to cope with compromise or mediocrity - anything that reflects God poorly,
• Their gift does not switch off as it is the central essence of their existence - they can do no other,
• This level of intimacy knows the heart of the Father in a very deep and honest way - that is why they get into trouble sometimes because they speak the Father's heart [it may be in a very clumsy awkward even accusatory way] and it is rarely well received,
• They grieve consistently because they can feel the Father's heart for the well being of the church...

I hope this conversation helps...

A Prophet's Call - the Word

"Now the word of the Lord came to me..." Jer 1:4

Recently I had meals with two prophets in about a twelve hour window of each other.

Well, I did not know that God had so much to say. Hardly anything that happened did not

have a "And the Lord spoke to me about..." in there. Sheesh, I felt quite awed by the number

of "God spoke" moments in our conversations.

I love prophets. They are so black and white, so persuaded that God speaks and they hear

him consistently, continuously and correctly. That is both inspiring as well as dangerous. We

know that none of us hear God perfectly all the time and even if we did, we only ever prophecy

in part, we hear in part and we understand in part.

Joseph believed he got the right interpretation of his dreams that he shared with such

pride, joy and naked ambition. May I suggest he missed the whole point? At the end of his life

if one was to ask him what the big 'google' picture was of his life, [did he still interpret the

dreams in the same way?]I think he would not have said that it was that his brothers bowed

down to him. Rather I suspect he would have said that the big picture / whole story of

his life was that he would always serve another man's story... first his dad, then Potiphar, then

the jailer, then the cupbearer, and then Pharoah. Joseph took a small part of the puzzle of his

life and made it the whole story with tragic consequences. Prophets are passionate to hear God

speak, but they must be reminded he never gives one person the whole story.

A Prophet's friend's longing...

I am not a prophet. So why write a blog series about prophets? There is something very beautiful about those who reside in the Father's presence. The radiance that emanated from Moses' face when he had been with the Father, was striking. Of all the gifts that Moses may have commented on it was only of this one that he said: "I would that all God's people would prophecy".

The prophets transcend both Old and New Covenants, with various roles and contributions throughout the scriptures. I guess that means it is a gift that the church simply cannot live without.

Yet prophets limp so often as they feel their gift is not celebrated, honored and validated. While pastors and other leaders have had such bad experiences with real or pseudo prophets that the only true victor in this story is the enemy who loves to silence the prophet — at all costs!

I think there is a way forward. Through the width of the prophetic journey, we can with humility and honor find a God solution... here is my longing:

• To see prophets spoken of with love, honor and gratitude,
• To rediscover the collaborative partnership between apostles and prophets — they really do need each other,
• To see the office of the prophet given fresh conversation as to their New Testament "job description" and the role they play translocally into communities,
• To find creative ways that can father / disciple / train up the emerging prophets, that they don't have to stumble and stutter their way forward as their forebears had to — what is the modern 'school of the prophets'?
• To discover the right ways that they can be used as "impact players" to break open new contexts or to go in and blow open the wells of churches that have faltered and fallen in the heat of the battle,
• To find ways forward to empower prophets to be released to be given to His presence and the courage to salary them to do just that,
• To explore the way forward for prophets to be truly accountable with the words they bring — to make sure they are well weighed, they are revisited to see if they did happen, forums for correction where error occurs [but in a context of honor and celebration],
• To be courageous enough to discipline a prophet if and when needed, so the sheep can truly feel secure with this great gift, knowing it can be trusted, for when it errs there are consequences,
• To create forums where prophets and pastors can iron out their differences and see in each the value that they themselves do not carry - can we get rid of the suspicion that sometimes enters these relationships?

These are some of my reasons to reenter the conversation... maybe I am an incurable romantic but I naively believe this can happen.