Should Christians still confess their sins?

May 17, 2010  David Murray   0 comments

Kevin DeYoung’s conclusion:

Some of us become Christians and just go on our merry way, never thinking of sin, while others fixate on our failings and suffer from despair. One person feels no conviction of sin; the other person feels no relief from sin. Neither of these habits should mark the Christian. The Christian should often feel conviction, confess, and be cleansed.

 

The cleansing, mind you, is not like the expunging of a guilty record before the judge. That’s already been accomplished. This cleansing is more like the scraping of barnacles off the hull of a ship so it can move freely again. We need confession of sin before God like a child needs to own up to her mistakes before Mom and Dad, not to earn God’s love, but to rest in it and know it more fully.

 

1 John 1:9, then, is not just about getting saved. It’s also about living as a saved person and enjoying it.

Read whole article here.

How can I compete with Internet sermons?

May 17, 2010  David Murray   10 comments

How can “ordinary” pastors compete with the vast range of well-known and greatly gifted preachers who are just one mouse-click away from everyone in their congregation? I know this is a sore point for many discouraged pastors. They visit their flock and all they hear are comments about the latest Internet sermon by Pastor Faimus and Dr Bigname. The only sermons that people seem to get excited about are ones preached hundreds of miles away!

However, I want to remind pastors of a huge advantage they have over the “popular” preachers of our own day. That advantage is, simply, personal relationship.

I was reminded of this recently when I was asked which preachers I would choose to sit under for a year of teaching. As I reflected on this question, I realized that the men I would chose are the men I know best, both in Scotland and in Grand Rapids. Most of whom you will probably never have heard of.

Of course, I deeply appreciate and frequently benefit from the sermons of the well-known preachers of our day. But I don’t know them and they don’t know me. I don’t know their lives and characters, and they have no involvement in my life. We have no relationship. That significantly limits the long-term spiritual impact of their sermons.

But when I have a relationship with a preacher; when I know him and he knows me; when we have wept together and rejoiced together; when I know he loves me and prays for me, then there is an added dimension to his words. They may not be as impressive words, or as well-organized words, or as well-said words. But they are empathetic words, and so they are powerful words.

A recent study of the “placebo effect” by Harvard Medical School’s Ted Kaptchuk has demonstrated the power of empathetic doctor-patient relationships in medicine. 62% of patients receiving an intentionally fake treatment from friendly, empathetic doctors reported relief from their irritable bowel syndrome, compared with 44% of a group that got the same fake treatment from impersonal, businesslike doctors. “It’s amazing,” said Kaptchuk, “Connecting with the patient, rapport, empathy . . . that few extra minutes is not just icing on the cake. It has biology.”

Researchers say it’s unclear whether the health care system can harness the biological power of physician empathy. But preachers can harness the spiritual power of pastoral empathy. Maybe, instead of spending a further ten hours on perfecting your blockbuster sermon, you should spend ten hours visiting your flock. That could give your sermons new power in your hearer’s lives. And remember, though we are blessed to live in a time with wonderful conferences and 24/7 Internet sermons, God primarily saves and sanctifies sinners through long-term pastoral relationships in the local church.

And let’s encourage our pastors. Let’s tell them that we deeply appreciate their transparent integrity, their sincere empathy, and their sacrificial investment in our lives. Let’s value and cultivate our relationships with them. And let’s tell them how much we’ve enjoyed their sermons rather than everyone else’s!

Screenwriting and preaching

May 14, 2010  David Murray   0 comments

“Screenwriting is one of the world’s most notoriously elite and inaccessible industries.” But, as Cal Newport notes in How to become a star screenwriter, that doesn’t stop thousands of wannabes making their way to Los Angeles every year. Most of them are following the standard career advice of:

1. Learn the basic techniques (by reading, conferences, etc.)
2. Persevere: get your head down and keep writing and re-writing your blockbuster.

As thousands of wannabes do this every year, and most remain wannabes, Newport adds this further advice:

3. “Immerse yourself in the world of screenwriting, getting as close as possible to scripts people like, and the people who like them. Furthermore, continually extract lessons from your exposure to apply to your own writing.”

Read Newport’s exposition of this advice below and apply it to preaching:

People don’t like this advice because it discounts their dream of writing the next Lethal Weapon during their lunch break. It requires, instead, a complete change of lifestyle and a risky dedication to mastering a tricky craft.

In short, screenwriting requires an apprenticeship, and this is why most working writers have stories that start, like Thomas, with an entry-level industry job — not the writing shelf at Barnes & Noble.

I had lunch earlier today with some executives from Ford. (I’m penning these words from the Detroit airport, after giving a talk at Ford’s Center for Innovation and Research.) Listening to their insider take on the automotive industry, a curious fact caught my attention: It can take 15 years to master the skills necessary to work the equipment in the tool and die industry.

I think this little piece of trivia provides an elegant way of thinking about becoming excellent in competitive industries, such as screenwriting: It’s not just hard work combined with some easily learned tips — “show, don’t tell!;” “use a three act structure!” — it’s a craft. And learning crafts takes not only time, but exposure to master craftsman.

The more I encounter examples of people building remarkable lives by becoming excellent, the more I discover that this model of craftsmanship is alive and well in our modern age. This offers interesting food for thought. When contemplating your own field, ask yourself: are you the wannabe screenwriter reading how-to guides on the subway, or are you, like Thomas, throwing yourself among the masters, and proclaiming: I know nothing, but you do, and I’m not going anywhere until I do too?

A leader’s mic is always on

May 13, 2010  David Murray   0 comments

Brown

Shortly before the British General Election, Prime Minister Gordon Brown was filmed in conversation with 65-year-old Gillian Duffy who expressed concern about the number of foreign workers entering the UK. Brown remained calm and polite throughout, complimented Duffy and her family, finished with “Very nice to meet you,” then jumped in his car to be whisked off to the next photo-opp.

And that’s when he utterly destroyed his already-fading chances of re-election.

Because, forgetting that he was still wearing a microphone from a previous Sky News interview, he complained to an aide about having had to speak to such “a bigoted woman.” Sky News recorded the comments and promptly broadcast them. No amount of apologies or spin could rescue the situation for Brown. His ashen face spelled “political death.”

Reflecting on this, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, at the Harvard Business Review, urges leaders to “act as if the audio is always on…There is no ‘off’ switch for leaders.” She concludes:

Leaders are wise to behave with a consciousness of how other people might view what they do — and the awareness that people probably will view it. That requires truly authentic leaders whose characters are not mental constructions faked for the job but run deeply in their hearts and souls. In the age of social media, instant video feeds via cell phones, and hidden surveillance cameras, this advice about authenticity increasingly applies to everyone who aspires to leadership.

Fellow pastors and elders, read these challenging words again:

That requires truly authentic leaders whose characters are not mental constructions faked for the job but run deeply in their hearts and souls.

And let’s look and aim even higher than the earth-bound and man-centered focus of business leaders and politicians. Because the audio (and video) channels of our lives are feeding into heaven 24/7/365.

Top 10 Motivation Boosters and Procrastination Killers

May 12, 2010  David Murray   1 comment

Lifehacker helps us to obey Ecclesiastes 9:10:

1. Understand and overcome your fear of failure
2. Have a status board
3. Move quickly on new skills and great ideas
4. Create a fake constraint
5. Don’t check email for the first hour of work
6. Make your to-do list do-able
7. Move and breathe like your excited
8. Set a timer and crank until it beeps
9. Use minor distractions to fend off big distractions
10. Pick good sounds

Read Lifehacker’s full exposition here.