Thoughts on John Wesley, UMC, life, faith, and anything else!
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False Significance
Here’s a quote from Susan Muto’s work “Where Lovers Meet: Inside the Interior Castle.” This work is a companion or commentary to St. Teresa of Avila’s “Interior Castle” classic on the spiritual life. Here Muto is discussing St. Teresa’s ‘vipers’ that one encounters as he or she seeks to draw near to God: The viper’s…
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Pastors and Expectations
Someone once told me that a pastor is the only person who has two hundred bosses. That is…if you serve a church with two hundred members. The larger the church, the more ‘bosses’ you have. Of course I chuckled at that. It isn’t nearly that bad, but one of the pressures of being of pastor…
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Imprisoned
Our life may be imprisoned in functional dispositions. They dim the vision of the spirit. Most harmful in this regard are those of ascendancy over others. To prove our functional potency, we may strive vigorously to outshine other people. This competitive attitude engenders inordinate strife and self-exertion. As a result our bloodstream may be polluted…
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On Pastoral Work
Okay. I’ll admit it. I’m a pastor. It is what I do. It is who I am. I can’t get away from it. Every Monday morning I get up and I start the week doing the work of a pastor. I know I’m not alone. There are a lot of pastors out there. Perhaps you…
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Cluster Headaches
Anyone who knows me knows that I am not a fan of the new cluster model being introduced in my conference. On the surface it seems a positive move, but I believe in practice it will not be as beneficial as believed. Why? Geography. The idea is that United Methodist churches will ‘cluster’ together to…
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Getting More Done by Doing Less
This is a Google Tech Talk by Marc Lesser. Even though he comes from a Zen background, there are still some excellent points, especially for those of us called to lead churches in this culture. One of the things he talks about (especially at the end of this) is about chaos/innovation. It makes sense but…