A Pure Heart

Matthew 5: Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.

“Pure” as it is used here in the original Greek is katharos. Katharos is pronounced Kath-ar-os. It means of uncertain Affinity; clean (literally or figuratively): clean, clear, pure.

Jesus declared to the people that day that if someone was capable of having, keeping or obtaining a pure heart, that they would see God someday.

It is the desire of every believer that, one day, they would see God.

However, the enemy of our souls has a desire too. His desire is to keep us from seeing God. Both in this world and in the next. His attempt is to cause us to lose our pure hearts.

One thing that I have found to be universal amongst new converts/believers is the pure heart that the Lord gives to them.

As newborn babes in Christ, their hearts are open to receive anything that the church has to offer them. They trust the ministry and they trust their newfound church family.

Their hearts are pure. Their motives are pure. Their intensions are pure. They are simply thankful to be saved and are happy and content to be a part of the Family of God.

These people are the source of revival in the church. They are usually the ones who bring new people to the church. They tell all their family and friends about what the Lord has done for them. They are not afraid or ashamed to declare their Love for God or what He has done for them.

What makes these people so important to a community’s infiltration of the Gospel?

What makes these people so valuable to the growth and continuance of a church in a given city?

Their pure heart.

• A heart that is pure is capable of loving someone who is unlovable.
• A heart that is pure is able to look beyond a person’s faults and see their potential greatness.
• A heart that is pure has no selfish motives. It only wants to bless those around it.

It labors for the Lord because it loves the Lord and the people who surround their life.

This person is not perfect. They are still human. They still make mistakes. They still sin. But Jesus said that because their motives were correct and their heart was pure, that they shall see God.

So it seems paramount that a believer in Jesus Christ should seek to have and maintain a pure heart.

Jesus said in Matthew 11:29, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest for your souls.”

Time Management

Today I yield the floor to one of my mentors. Dr. Fred Childs is a leading church consultant, organizational development expert, and leadership authority. He and Monica reside in Pearland, Texas. Dr. Childs ministry of leadership development within the church has transformed my ministry through the years.

His books and training material have revolutionized hundreds of churches and ministries. His personal testimony is one of many miracles with a very powerful pulpit ministry.

In the last decade, Microsoft introduced its Windows 95 operating system. As one of the many who utilized this software, I would routinely sit and wait the few minutes for my computer to boot up. I never pondered the immense importance of these wasted daily minutes until I participated in a corporate time management seminar in 1996. I was shocked to discover that the cumulative total of the time wasted as individuals waited the few minutes for Windows 95 to boot up exceeded ten thousand man years per day!

Time is valuable. In training and facilitating several thousand professional and corporate teams, I have documented millions of dollars in bottom-line savings and multiplied productivity simply by eliminating the wasted time from the operating processes used to manufacture goods and produce services. The root cause of the rise or fall of many organizations is their ability to manage time efficiently and effectively.

Time is life, and it is perhaps our most precious resource. It can be a tremendous friend or foe, and it is ours to do with as we please. Every moment should be cherished, for it is a commodity that can never be replenished. It is used once and then it is gone forever.

One of the greatest keys to effective leadership is the proper utilization of time resources. There is no greater example of time mastery than the life and ministry of Jesus Christ. Scriptural study cannot reveal a single wasted minute in the life, ministry and actions of Jesus! A tremendous example of His personal mastery over time and priorities was in the account of Lazarus. John 11:6 says, “When he had heard therefore that he was sick, he abode two days still in the same place where he was.”

Just Don't Quit!

The story goes like this...

The guy wakes up on Sunday morning and say's, "I'm not going to church today!" "Why not?" The good wife asks. "I just don't feel like it and besides, I'm not sure everyone there likes me. In fact, I'm sure that Sister Jones outright hates me!" The man retorts. "Well you have to go." Responds his wife. "Why's that?" He asks. "Because", she says, "You're the Pastor!"

Ever been there? Don't answer that. I can't find much scripture on this, but I honestly feel a spirit of Defeat attack me at least one day out of the week. This little guy must keep a tight schedule, since he always comes on the exact same day. Hardly ever does he come around on an off day. It's always the same day, Monday!

You may not understand this unless you've Pastored or been in ministry for a while. I've heard other ministers say this Imp who I will call Defeat, attacks them on Mondays too. So I suppose I am not alone on this one.

I'm not much of a quitter. Quitting is just not in me. Sometimes I wonder if I'm too stubborn to quit, or too stupid to realize it's time to quit. Like old Shammah. Defending a field of lintels against a whole troop of Philistines. Just him and an dead donkey's jawbone.

Was that guy tough or just not smart enough to get out of the way? We've preached him tough, but I really worry for the man. He didn't have much to work with there. Why didn't he just fall back (quit) and regroup? You know, get some help. I believe I have the answer...He was neither stubborn or dumb. He knew his purpose!

Lead More Manage Less

Causing growth in a church and leading God’s people is a challenge.  Looking through the scripture one quickly notices that no leader of God’s people found his role easy.

It often seems that our job as ministers is more reactive than proactive.  It’s important to understand that while there will always be a needed degree of reactive management, there also needs to be a healthy measure of proactive leadership. 

One doesn’t need to pastor long before he/she finds themselves becoming bogged down with the daily routine of managing a congregation.  Your own list of duties preformed regularly would be very comparable to many other Pastors and church leaders.   As I communicate more and more with church leaders around the globe, I am surprised to find that even though regions and languages may differ, there are often, very similar “People Problems” that Pastors have to deal with.

Managers organize. They report on what is. Their role is to assign and control people.  Leaders on the other hand cast vision.  They offer what could be.  Their role is to align and motivate people.  Notice the difference between these two leadership styles.  One is managing what already exists and the other is moving the church forward into new growth and greater increase.

Nearly all pastors and church leaders perform both management and leadership roles.  An imbalanced church is often one whose Pastor and leadership team has succumbed to one role or the other.  It is the Pastor who has lost his zeal for growth so he simply manages what is already happening.  Or it is the Pastor who constantly promotes growth and new programs, but does not provide constant management for the growth that happens.

Have I lost you?  Are you already saying, “Now wait a minute.  I can’t do it all!”  You are right.  You can’t.  As much as you are talented, gifted, anointed and blessed, you are not Solomon.  Moses couldn’t do it all and neither can you.  In fact, the church leader that attempts to do all the management themselves will be overridden with the load of caring for God’s people. 

This is why our Lord brings us other people into the church.  Many Pastors overlook the people resources in their congregation.  Since they lack the ability to trust others to a task, many Pastors fail to allow the talents of their congregation to become invested. 

Moses had his captains of fifties and thousands.  You too have been given certain individuals who can come beside your ministry to assist you in maintaining the growth from the vision you cast. 

Do you find yourself routinely doing the job of the church janitor?  Did you fix or repair something around the church lately?  Are you the office manager?  Are you the one who adds ink to the printer?  Are you the only one visiting and praying for the sick?  Who does the computing and tallying of numbers to record progress?

Be A Man!

 "A good man leaveth an inheritance to his children's children: and the wealth of the sinner is laid up for the just" (Proverbs 13:22).

"Behold, the third time I am ready to come to you; and I will not be burdensome to you: for I seek not yours, but you: for the children ought not to lay up for the parents, but the parents for the children" (II Corinthians 12:14).

When we were boys, my brother Rick would say this to me after he slugged me and made cry.
Brothers can be the best of friends and they can also be very cruel to one another. Rick was 6 years older than I was and without a father in our home at the time, he was the only male role-model in our home and at times, quite the bully.

Be a man. Wow! What volumes of pain and suffering in this world would be avoided if the husbands, fathers and leaders of our world would truly be men. To be a man, has been my personal quest since I was very young. I wasn't quite sure as a boy, what a man was, but something in my heart and mind told me that to be a man was something honorable and good.

Coming from a dysfunctional family, my understanding of the role of a man has been blurred to say the least. Looking back at my childhood, I realize that the example of a good man was never shown to me. In my early years of being a father, I realized this when I began feeling and expressing a father's love to my children. It was then that I realized that I had never truly been the benefactor of such caring, protective love. Painful memories flooded my mind often as I would compare the careful love my children received from my wife and I, with the careless and even abusive treatment my bothers, sisters and I received at the hands of our parents.

It was at this point in my life, that I realized I was more a true man than anyone in my family had ever modeled before me. No parent, grandparent, or uncle had shown me what it was to be a man. Their own dysfunctional upbringings had so marred their lives that they were incapable of it. I also realized that I had a Heavenly Father who had been and was my example.

Reducing Organizational Costs

The fundamental purpose for organization is to coordinate a system of talents, resources, and operating structure toward the purpose of attaining a shared corporate vision.

It must be understood that in the pursuit of a vision an organization can be either a benefit or a detriment. In its purest form organization is merely a tool to achieve a specified purpose. Since it is merely a tool the organization can be changed or modified at any time. If it is achieving its purpose then simply improve it as needed along the journey. If it is hindering the purpose one must always remember that as a tool it can be modified or redesigned at any time in order to fulfill its essential role in vision attainment. Simply stated, organization can be a blessing or a curse, an enabler or a hindrance.

One of the stark contrasts between God and man is that God always organizes by creating organisms, and man organizes to create organizations. Since an organization is a tool and is organized by man it can never be allowed to take on the form of a holy thing.

The perfect Biblical illustration occurs when the children of Israel were being plagued and bitten by fiery serpents and dying. Numbers 21:7-9 says:

7 Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, "We have sinned, for we have spoken against the LORD and against you; pray to the LORD that He take away the serpents from us." So Moses prayed for the people. 8 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole; and it shall be that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live." 9 So Moses made a bronze serpent, and put it on a pole; and so it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.

NKJV

God allowed the structure of the brass serpent to fulfill a designated purpose. However, after the purpose was fulfilled, the people should have destroyed the brass serpent, but they did not. Later it became a curse to them, because when Hezekiah began to purge the kingdom of idolatry the Bible says in 2 Kings 18:4:

KJV4 He removed the high places, and brake the images, and cut down the groves, and brake in pieces the brasen serpent that Moses had made: for unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it: and he called it Nehushtan.

Anytime an organizational tool becomes elevated to the role of a holy thing it then becomes an idol. Organizational idolatry is as real as any other form of idolatry. Once the tool has fulfilled its useful purpose and intent and is no longer relevant it must be discarded. Otherwise the tendency of people is to elevate it and reverence it beyond its original intent. 

Normally an organization begins when a small group of people unite around a common and shared vision. As success occurs, support positions and processes are put in place to forward the progress and maintain momentum. However there is a great risk in growing the organization, because there can come a point in which it cost more time and resources to maintain the organizational system than is expended on pressing toward its vision and purpose. At this point the organization begins to atrophy. At best it becomes stagnant and unresponsive to change as a slow but inevitable death begins to overtake it.

The only way to offset this is to keep the organization relevant, fresh and flexible. One way of doing this is to continually focus on minimizing absolutely all non-essential operating costs of the organization. There are several layers that must be considered when reducing operating costs.

Guard the Gates - Part 1

Early on in my days as an RN, I greatly enjoyed working with patients who had come through multiple trauma situations. Even when I was in nursing school, I would frequently spend my evenings at work as a patient care tech, in the Emergency Department or in the Surgical Intensive Care Unit. The reason was because these areas were generally the hubs for patients who had multiple trauma insults to contend with. Then when I graduated from nursing school, I went to work in the SICU and it was there that I found a niche specifically with neuro-trauma and the other injuries associated with the brain and the spinal cord.

There have been numerous times that I have seen patients that hardly had a mark on their body but had been dealt a massive blow to the head to the extent that they never recovered. In fact, far more than I would like to have liked, we would send them to long-term care facilities basically in a very obtunded or comatose state. Never again would they function normally and be able to assume even the most basic of daily functions of living. A perfectly healthy body but with horrific brain injury that disabled them.

John Bunyan wrote another classic besides Pilgrim’s Progress. It was a book called The Holy War. The focus of the story was the capture of a city called Mansoul. In it Diabolus (the devil) has taken it and the battle rages as the Prince Emmanuel works to recapture it. The way it was overcome was because the gates of the city had been compromised. Diabolus and his wicked imps had traversed it by taking advantage of the Eye Gate and Eye Gate which are symbolic of the use of the senses to cause the capture of the city.

It is imperative that a minister guards the gates of his mind. He is constantly under the assault and duress of the devil and because of this, our mind must be worked on very diligently to prevent the capture of it. Don’t be surprised at the tares, which may loom among the wheat because this is the way it has to be. In fact Paul cautioned the ever-vigilant servant when he expressed the fact that there must be heresies to grow like clover in a pasture. The reason is for the church to be approved by God (1 Cor. 11:19).

Momentum - Leading the song service

Don't slow it down to fit your expectation of what the service should be doing. 

It doesn't have to be a fast song, just don't let it be a dead one. 

Borrowing Comfort From The Past

So many times we are told to step out of our past when it seems to hold us hostage with details of failure, mistakes, and setbacks. I have often had to challenge my past with various Truths and dismantle the Structure Of Defeat it had erected in my heart and mind. It is so easy to look back to whatever you see and feel, and build our future out of those things. Today, I want to do something much better with our past: Look deeply at it and Borrow Comfort And Help.

When David had to face the man Goliath, he had to reach into yesterday and vividly recall just how good God had been to him regarding a lion and bear. Knowing in himself it was not his ability alone that won the victory, but the Lord had been with him. The God who had worked in and for him would show Himself the very same now, showing us he had received comfort and strength from his past. Getting the good from our past, I think, requires a greater deal of effort than recalling bad things, for the negative just seems to show up, but good has to be reached for. Of course our enemy loves to flash our past errors on the screen of our soul, but the Holy Ghost delights to use our past to bring honor to God.

Samson also used the past to get some help from when he had killed a lion and, after awhile, Bees had used the animal to build a place for some fresh honey. By taking time to taste honey from a past victory, he, too, had been helped by his past. I just wonder how many dead lions and honey spots are all over our yesterdays just waiting for us to both visit and extract help from?