C3 Day Two, Part 2

Getting right into it, following Ed Young Jr. that Thursday was Bil Cornelius, founding pastor of Bay Area Fellowship in Corpus Cristi, Texas. He only spoke during one session of the conference but boy, was it awesome. He spoke on the lack of pastoral prayer in our churches and how we need to burden ourselves with the desire to pray so much more than we do. He through out a statitistic that 50% of all seminary grads are out of ministry in 5 years. One of the hardships that many pastors face is the feeling of not having many confidants but he said that we need to learn to encourage ourselves in the Lord, which is absolutely true.

One of the ideas that came up often is that pastors are called to be modern-day prophets. While they may not all have prophetic spiritual gifts, they all (should) have an encounter with God where they recieved their calling to pastoral ministry. Additionally, God uses them as His instrument to teach and speak to His people, through the teaching of the living Word. God gives the vision to the pastor who in turn gives it to the people. Perhaps one of the most interesting things he said was that because the pastor is the prophet for the church, lay people should not be praying for the vision of the church. That is the pastor's job. They should be praying instead for the pastor.

But in order to hear from God we must get alone with God, something too many pastors neglect. Another trap pastors fall into is forgetting that not everything God tells them is for the church. We spend so much time seeking answers to God's will that we forget that seeking God is God's will. In the hustle and bustle of pastoral life, many pastors neglect their first love. Great pastors teach what God has personally told them. Pastors also get so busy wanting people to show up that they forget to carry the people to God in prayer. "We forget the people and focus on the numbers." As a remedy he suggested going to the mall and people-watching and simply praying for the people you see. You should try it, it's pretty great.

Next up was Jentezen Franklin again and his message was awesome. Using 1 Corinthians 16:15 he talked about how the church needs to become addicted to Christ. In the KJV it says in v. 15-16 "I beseech you, brethren, (ye know the house of Stephanas, that it is the firstfruits of Achaia, and that they have addicted themselves to the ministry of the saints,) that ye submit yourselves unto such, and to every one that helpeth with us, and laboureth." According to dictionary.com, to be addicted is defined as "compulsively or physiologically dependent on something habit-forming; devoted or given up to a practice or habit or to something psychologically or physically habit-forming." When you are fully addicted to something, you simply can't stay away.

In order to be successful in ministry, we must become addicted to the ministry and to God. It has to be a voluntary addiction but we should be doved such that we become compulsively and physiologically dependent on it and on God. That is how the early church survived and it is how we today will thrive in ministry. Jentezen said that if we ever hope to become addicted, we just have to get started.

Jesus fished with a net. Fishing with a net is completely different to fishing with a pole because when you fish with a net, you never know what type of fish you'll get. When you fish with a pole you can be picky... when you're addicted, you're not picky. So, the big question we must ask is, are we addicted to what Jesus died for? Jesus said to go out into all the world (that's where) to preach the gospel (that's what) to all the people (that's who), but nowhere did He tell us how. We live in an age where we have more freedom than ever to reach people in whatever way we see fit, which is great, but are we putting it to good use?

That night we came back for a session led by Ed Young and Craig Groeschel. Ed talked about the importance of reaching people and putting our attention not on all of the things that beg for it as pastors, but instead remembering that it's all about the chair. He pointed out that when the bride (the church) and the bridegroom (Jesus) get together, and when they are truly spiritually mature, there will be babies. He suggested that if your church is fully spiritually mature then about 1/3 of your congregation will be spiritual babies. Another large chunk will be made up of spiritual teenagers, people that believe themselves to be mature but aren't. The spiritual teenagers will complain all the time about how the church is too big (or small), the church is full of hyopcrites, their friends aren't there, or that the messages aren't deep enough (they're not getting fed). He said that that is the greatest compliment a pastor can make because it means that they are making the Bible understandable. Additionally, he said that when someone complains about not being fed that his response is always "I'm sorry, I thought you were old enough to feed yourself."

The last speaker of the night was Craig Groeschel he spoke about the "disease to please." He struggles with the desire to please people but you can't please both people and God. He points to Galatians 1:10 which says "Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ." He points out that people-pleasing is a form of idolatry when you are more worried about what people think than what Christ thinks. Proverbs 29:25 says that "Fear of man will prove to be a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is kept safe." The word used for snare is "mowqesh" which is a noose for catching an animal, or as it is used here, a hook for the nose. If you fear man it is as if someone has stuck their finger in your nose and is leading you around by it.

There are several traps that people-pleasers fall into:

"I will compromise for you" trap
"I will over-commit for you" trap
"I will let you limit my success" trap

Groeschel says that the fear of Gos is the best antidote for the fear of people. He points to Psalm 34:9 and 1 Thessalonians 2:4, 6 for support. The higher God takes you, the more people are going to hate you and you need to be OK with that. He used a great illustration of a kid in school with a hall pass. If you have a hall pass it doesn't matter if teachers or administrators stop you in the hall, you just hold of your hall pass and you're untouchable. Well, those who have been called by God for His purpose have a Holy hall pass. Ultimately, it doesn't matter what you think about what God has called me to do because I have God's approval... your dissaproval doesn't even compare.

So, that is the full summary of C3 day 2. Hurray,just one day left!