I don’t think the Denver airport is that hard to navigate for a relatively large facility. The public has access to levels 4, 5, and 6. You drop people off to fly out on Level 6. You pick them up on Level 4. Level 5 coming and going is reserved for commercial vehicles, and that’s also where baggage claim is. When I’m picking someone up, I tell them: get your bags, go down one level, walk outside, and call me with the door number and color. The color tells me whether to come to the east or west side of the terminal. That’s all.
So I was surprised to see a post on NextDoor recently from someone who said he’s flown in and out of Denver for over 20 years and just figured out what’s going on by going on-line and engaging with a map.
There have to be lessons there. First, never assume that just because people have similar experiences to yours that they know what you know or think the way you think. Second, as I wrote a few days ago, pay attention! Yogi Berra said:
You can observe a lot by just watching.
Finally, if you’re a teacher, and we all teach someone something, it’s a good reminder that
Telling is not teaching
Listening is not learning
(And now we can add) Looking is not seeing
Jesus saw a man… (Matthew 9.9, John 9.1)
I passed by the field of a sluggard, by the vineyard of a man lacking sense, and behold, it was all overgrown with thorns; the ground was covered with nettles, and its stone wall was broken down. Then I saw and considered it; I looked and received instruction… (Proverbs 24.30 – 32, ESV, emphasis mine)
Yesterday I wrote about the new director of The Navigators’ Military Ministry affirming what the “main thing” is for that ministry. I hope it’s clear to readers of this blog that I’m advocating we all have a main thing and that main thing should revolve around following Jesus wherever we are: neighborhood, work, school, church, clubs, etc., just as Jesus himself learned to be “about his Father’s business” even in Nazareth.
I wrote earlier that I was inspired by an obituary in which the deceased was described as one who “lived the great adventure of seeking God and loving people…” I have since refined my adaptation of that to seek God, love people, teach others to do the same. Here is a current version of “My Main Thing:”
There is a war going on, and I am engaged under Jesus’ banner. My joy is to advance his Kingdom. And how does the Kingdom advance? “Not with swords loud clashing nor roll of stirring drums. With deeds of love and mercy, the heavenly kingdom comes.” (From stanza two of Lead on O King Eternal)
Therefore, I will be SaLTy:
Seek God
Love people
Teach others to do the same
For Ezra had set his heart to study the Law of the LORD, and to do it and to teach his statutes and rules in Israel. (Ezra 7.10, ESV)
You are the salt of the earth…You are the light of the world…Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven. (Matthew 5.13 – 16, NIV)
I have been around The Navigators since 1967, and I am forever grateful that they taught me:
The priority of daily time with God in the word and prayer
The power of personal attention in one-to-one disciple-making
The privilege of passing on what I am learning to others
In other words, as our motto says, “To know Christ, make him known, and help others do the same.”
June and I came on staff formally in 2001, and here’s what I’ve observed. A strength of The Navigators is that we are always assessing how we’re doing and thinking about how to do our ministry better. A weakness of The Navigators is that we are always assessing how we’re doing and thinking about how to do our ministry better! (This is my unofficial observation!)
The result has been a seemingly ever-increasing list of emphases, goals, areas of concern, etc. Therefore, I really appreciate what fellow-Navigator Terry Wichert, newly installed director of The Navigators’ Military Ministry, wrote to those serving in the Military Ministry. Here’s a sample:
Where will we focus? If you have had your ear to the ground these past many months, you have heard and sensed some things that are receiving increased attention throughout our Navigator work. [He lists a few of those things.] All of these are right and necessary, and we will indeed aggressively pursue these things, and others, at the appropriate time and in mission appropriate ways.
Still, that hardly answers the question—Where will we focus?
Let me state plainly and unapologetically that our main thing will be what it has always been: raising up, training, developing, resourcing, empowering, and releasing passionate, committed, reproducing, military, first responder, and ROTC disciple-makers who will do the same for others. – Terry Wichert, Director of Military Ministry for The Navigators (emphasis his)
Amen. With leadership like that The Navigators organization is still headed in the right direction! I will close with the scriptures that Terry opened and closed his letter with.
Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matthew 28.18 – 20, NIV)
The things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others. (2 Timothy 2.2, NIV)
We always seem to be looking for reasons to exclude someone from our fellowship or judge whether or not they’re really “Christian.”
I just heard of two brothers in their 70s. The older brother was worried about the younger’s faith, maybe because the younger didn’t attend “the right kind of church.” Until the younger one died and the older one went to his memorial. There he found out a lot of things about his brother he didn’t know: mission trips, for example; people he had helped, causes he supported. In short, the younger brother was a strong believer, just different from the older brother.
How often have you heard something like, “I’m worried about whether that person is a “real Christian” because:
I’ve had two people question whether or not Pope Francis is a “true Christian” and one of them is Catholic! There’s no end.
A reviewer of the movie The Two Popes captures the issue well:
[Pope Benedict and Cardinal Bergoglio’s] debate is one that is raging inside every faith community on Earth: Is religion a tent that expands and adapts, allowing more and more seekers under its protective folds? Or is religion a mighty bulwark that the righteous run into for safety against the buffeting storm of modernity?https://www.primetimer.com/barnhart/two-popes
The Jewish believers in Acts 15 were clearly on the side of a bulwark, as are others I’ve written about before.
But some believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees rose up and said, “It is necessary to circumcise them and to order them to keep the law of Moses.” (Acts 15.5, ESV)
But that view did not win the day. It makes one wonder why we still hang on to it. Here are other snippets of the Acts 15 discussion:
[Peter said, ] “Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will.” (Acts 15.10, 11, ESV)
[James said, ] “And so my judgment is that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God.” (Acts 15.19, NLT)
Paul wraps it up.
So don’t put up with anyone pressuring you in details of diet, worship services, or holy days. (Colossians 2.16, MSG)
P.S. Right after I wrote this I read a news report of crazy stuff going on with a particular denomination with respect to some serious issues. I’m not talking about those here. And remember, Dr. Howard Hendricks said, We must be able to discriminate between what cannot change and what must be changed.
Last week this time June and I were staying in a cabin at the YMCA of the Rockies in Estes Park. This was the view from our front porch:
Sunset in Estes Park, Colorado, July 5, 2020
1 The heavens declare the glory of God, And the firmament shows His handiwork. 2 Day unto day utters speech, And night unto night reveals knowledge. 3 There is no speech nor language Where their voice is not heard. 4 Their line has gone out through all the earth, And their words to the end of the world. In them He has set a tabernacle for the sun, 5 Which is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, And rejoices like a strong man to run its race. 6 Its rising is from one end of heaven, And its circuit to the other end; And there is nothing hidden from its heat. (Psalm 19.1 – 6)
To conclude our little series on discipline in which we’ve observed:
There really is no growth in anything, even spiritual growth without discipline
Discipline requires step-by-step instruction, not just motivation
If people don’t act on my attempts to motivate them, it’s not motivation – it’s just words.
Finally, let’s remind ourselves that discipline isn’t a dirty word. The disciplined life is the joy-filled life!
I love this picture a friend of mine posted soon after the COVID lockdowns started. Notice her comment: “Our new normal. Looks a lot like everyone else’s.” And there are her three kids, sitting at simple desks doing their schoolwork. Except it’s not “a lot like everyone else’s” normal. It’s disciplined. Contrast comments from her friends. “My house is not that clean nor my kids that productive.”
Question: in which house is there likely to be more joy?
For lack of discipline they will die, led astray by their own great folly. (Proverbs 5.23, NIV)
The fruit of the spirit is…joy…and self-discipline. (Galatians 5.23, 24)
For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline. (2 Timothy 1.7, NASB)
Based on your blog, it occurs to me that what I think to be “motivation” is really only “words” if a person never takes “a step of action.” Common definitions for “motivate” are “incite, impel” – training for action. – Ray Bandi, New Hampshire, July 2020
It reminds me a bit of the physics definition of “work.”
Work, in physics, is the measure of energy transfer that occurs when an object is moved over a distance by an external force at least part of which is applied in the direction of the displacement…Work = force x distance. – Encyclopaedia Britannica
In other words, in physics, if there’s no movement, there’s no work. According to Ray, if there’s no action, there was no motivation – only words. It’s all another way of stating my last sentence from yesterday:
I’m just trying to remember that any time I encourage someone to do something, that I provide them with enough specifics that they can at least take the first step. – The Ewellogy, July 11, 2019
My measure of success when I attempt to motivate or encourage someone is whether or not the person actually takes that first step. That’s why Ray and I work at making our discipleship instruction accessible. He and I have discussed, and I’ve written, about instant participation, instant success.
Yes, I keep circling back to the same concepts, don’t I?
Dear friends, this is now my second letter to you. I have written both of them as reminders to stimulate you to wholesome thinking. (2 Peter 3.1, NIV)
For you know that our coming to you was not in vain…For you became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea. (1 Thessalonians 2.1, 14, ESV)
But the word of the LORD was to them, “Precept upon precept, precept upon precept, Line upon line, line upon line, Here a little, there a little.” (Isaiah 28.13, NKJV)
The title is not a misprint: we usually say that training requires discipline, which is true. However, discipline requires training!
I wrote yesterday about the importance of discipline for growth of any kind, even spiritual growth. But it’s not enough to talk about discipline: we must carefully show how to perform the discipline we’re talking about. After all,
Practice doesn’t make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect.
I’m sometimes guilty of thinking that motivation is a substitute for training. But it’s difficult to motivate someone to do something they don’t know how to do! That’s why every time I encourage you to have daily time with God, I provide a link to the instruction for that.
But when I write often that the church’s job is to equip people to make disciples, I don’t always provide a how-to. And that’s a problem. Here’s why.
Paul instructed Timothy to teach others relationally as Paul had taught him:
“The things you have heard from me…commit to reliable people who shall teach others also.” (2 Timothy 2.2, NIV)
And Timothy could do that because he had been through Paul’s process! “The things you heard from me….” Timothy knew what Paul was talking about, but most pastors today do not. They were trained through a classroom model at seminary.
So what’s the solution? Fortunately, the bridge has been built. There are disciple-making tools out there that anyone, even a pastor(!) could use to make disciples. I mention them here from time to time. My primary go-to tools after initial follow up are
There are other materials out there, of course. These are the ones that have worked for me. Disciple-making pastor Greg Ogden, about whom I wrote a 3-part series, has a tool he has developed.
I’m just trying to remember that any time I encourage someone to do something, that I provide them with enough specifics that they can at least take the first step.
Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” (John 20.21, NIV, emphasis mine)
So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. (Colossians 2.6, 7, NIV, emphasis mine)
You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose… (2 Timothy 3.10, NIV)
Do I agree with this snippet from the book? Yes, by and large. My friend said, “I agree with it overall. I just took a little exception to the ‘discipline alone’ phrase. Even discipline is accompanied by grace.”
And I responded to him the way I always respond when this question comes up:
Of course we need grace. Grace is God’s department. And I’m not worried about God doing his part. I am worried about you doing your part.
Then I referred him to the perspective of the Apostle Paul:
But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. (1 Corinthians 15.10, ESV)
Paul said, “Yes, it’s grace, but yes, I worked very hard!” I’m listening to When the Game Was Ours by Larry Bird and Earvin Magic Johnson. These two gifted basketball players had tools the rest of us don’t have…BUT, they worked very hard. Once, the day after Larry Bird’s Boston Celtics won the NBA championship, a teammate called on him at his home to continue the celebration. But Larry wasn’t there. He had already started his morning workout, getting ready for the next season. When he developed a new shot, Larry practiced it 800 times/day in addition to whatever else he was doing to train.
So, yes, there’s no substitute for discipline.
Train yourself for godliness. (1 Timothy 4.7, ESV)
Sometimes we need to give thanks for what we have. We have the highest standard of living in the world and yet our measures of life satisfaction keep dropping. Here are some snippets from a US News and World Report article from 2019:
Residents in the United States are becoming unhappier. The U.S. ranks at No. 19 in the 2019 [Happiness] report, dropping one position from 2018 and five from 2017… Happiness and life satisfaction among United States adolescents, which increased between 1991 and 2011, suddenly declined after 2012…Thus, by 2016-17, both adults and adolescents were reporting significantly less happiness than they had in the 2000s. In addition, depression, suicidal ideation, and self-harm reported levels have increased sharply among adolescents since 2010 and it affected girls and young women in particular. -US News and World Report, March 19, 2019
I was motivated to look up the happiness data, knowing that Americans are consistently dropping in their satisfaction measures because I received an update from my friend Eva DeHart who runs a humanitarian ministry in Haiti, For Haiti with Love. This is how she opens the web site:
Do you want to know what it is like to live in Haiti? I mean really, do they have it THAT bad there? Picture your house, mentally remove EVERYTHING that uses either electricity or running water. Now, remove all carpeting and stuffed furniture, including the bed. Replace this with a straw mat. No floors, no slab, just bare earth and a thatched roof. Take out all the screens in your house. While you’re at it remove the windows and the doors. No grass around the house. Got a good picture? Good. Now picture yourself with no car, or bike, or shoes for that matter. No job, no unemployment or welfare checks. You have no money, no bank accounts, no credit cards, no refrigerator, no ice and no food. You are hungry, and to make matters worse, your children are hungry. On top of that they are sick, full of worms and usually naked. This is the AVERAGE Haitian!! God’s people, just like you and me, just born farther south and east.
Here is part of her current description of daily life today:
Nothing in Haiti is closed except Churches, schools, and airports (cargo yes, people no). Since everything is so expensive parents simply cannot provide for their children and without school—they are on the streets. Some will try to get money by washing vehicles or at least your windshield if you are stopped. If this doesn’t work then looting and stealing. There has been no rain, they get no power and there has been no trash pickup so streets are near impassible. Not only makes driving difficult, but that standing water isn’t rain water. With all that is going on with corona just getting started… this is bad.
A Haitian street with overflowing garbage
I’ve been there. It’s unimaginable. But as I’ve written before, my friends Vilmer Paul and Lucner love God and serve people in this environment… with joy.
Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me. (Philippians 4.11 – 13, ESV)
Do everything readily and cheerfully—no bickering, no second-guessing allowed! Go out into the world uncorrupted, a breath of fresh air in this squalid and polluted society. Provide people with a glimpse of good living and of the living God. Carry the light-giving Message into the night. (Philippians 2.14, 15, MSG)
