V GENUINE MOTIV TION NOV
2010
SOUL HYDRATION Been Techno Lost? HOW TO OUTSMART GPS THE RELIGION OF MASCULINITY:
WHY MEN HATE CHURCH The Method to God’s Madness
YOUNG CHRISTIAN MAN
YOUNG CHRISTIAN MAN 04
Feature Article: Why Men Hate Church
06
On The Couch: Cyclical Sadness
08
Can You Relate: Soul Hydration
10
May God Bless the Hell Out of You: The Method to God’s Madness
14
Press On: Paradigm Shift
16
The Recap: Ten Percent Can Change Your Life
16
The Toolbox: Been Techno-Lost? How to Outsmart GPS …
DAVID MURROW
Randy kosloski
thom mollohan
The Merry Monk will dole
Kimberly Schluterman Jeffrey Bridgman
a publication of On My Own now Ministries
www.onmyownnow.com
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NOVEMBER2010 Editor In Chief / Rob Beames Art + Creative Director / MIKE MURO & DANIELA BERMĂšDEZ
WHY MEN
HATE CHURCH « BY DAVID MURROW »
C
liff is a man’s man. On the job he’s known as a go-getter and a very hard worker. He’s a good provider who loves his wife and kids. He’s well respected by his neighbors. Cliff drives a humongous four-wheel-drive pickup. He loves the outdoors and takes every opportunity for a little hunting and fishing. He enjoys a cold beer and a dirty joke. He does not go to church. Ask him why he doesn’t go to church, and he’ll offer up words like boring, irrelevant and hypocrite. But the real reason Cliff doesn’t go to church is that he’s already practicing another religion. That religion is masculinity. The ideology of masculinity has replaced Christianity as the true religion of men. We live in a society with a female religion and a male religion: Christianity, of various sorts, for women and non-masculine men; and masculinity . . . for men. Cliff practices his religion with a single-mindedness the Pharisees would envy. His work, his hobbies, his entertainment, his follies, his addictions, everything he does is designed to prove to the world he is a man. His religion also demands that he avoid anything that might call his manhood into question. This includes church, because Cliff believes deep in his heart that church is something for women and children, not men. Cliff is not alone. Men have believed this for centuries. In the 1800s, Charles Spurgeon said, “There has got abroad a notion, somehow, that if you become a Christian you must sink your manliness and turn milksop.” Cliff sees Christianity as incongruous with his manhood. It’s a women’s thing.
GM : 04
With so much female presence and participation, the church has gained a reputation as a ladies’ club in the minds of men.
CHURCH ...A WOMEN’S THING? I can just imagine what you’re thinking: Church is not a women’s thing—it’s a men’s thing! It certainly looks that way, doesn’t it? After all, a man and His male disciples founded Christianity, most of its major saints and heroes were men, men penned all of the New Testament books, all of the popes were men, all of the Catholic priests are men, and 95 percent of the senior pastors in America are men. Feminists have been telling us for years that the church is male dominated and patriarchal. Are they right? The answer is yes and no. The pastorate is a men’s club. But almost every other area of church life is dominated by women. Whenever large numbers of Christians gather, men are never in the majority. Not at revivals. Not at crusades. Not at conferences. Not at retreats. Not at concerts. With the exception of men’s events and pastoral conferences, can you think of any large gathering of Christians that attracts more men than women? Visit the church during the week, and you’ll find most of the people working there are female. Drop in on a committee meeting, and you’ll find a majority of the volunteers are women—unless it’s that small bastion of male presence, the building committee. Look over the leadership roster: the pastor is likely to be a man, but at least two-thirds of the ministry leaders will be women. Examine the sign-up sheets for volunteer work, prayer, Sunday school, and nursery duty. You’ll be lucky to see more than a couple of men’s names on these lists. One pastor recently told me, “If it weren’t for the postman, every visitor to the church during the week would be a woman.”
Male pastors come and go, but faithful women provide a matriarchal continuity in our congregations. Women are the devoted ones who build their lives around their commitments to Christ and His church. Women are more likely to teach and volunteer in church and are the greatest participants in Christian culture. The sad reality in many churches today is this: the only man who actually practices his faith is the pastor. With so much female presence and participation, the church has gained a reputation as a ladies’ club in the minds of men. Cliff does not attend church for the same reason he does not wear pink: neither is proper to his gender. Does Cliff know why he hates going to church? No. Can he offer a detailed explanation of his feelings? Of course not. He’s a guy, remember? Cliff knows one thing: he hates going to church.
HOW THE GENDER GAP AFFECTS WOMEN Connie is a lifelong Episcopalian, a fifty-six-year-old mother of four boys. She says, “None of my sons goes to church anymore. Two of them are divorced, and now all four are living with their lady friends. It’s sad.” Bernice from Connecticut says, “I have a large extended family. Not one of the men goes to Mass, let alone confession.” Vicki’s husband, Ron, attends their local Baptist church. “But he’s a total hypocrite,” she states. “He screams all the way to church. Once he’s inside the sanctuary, he puts on a smile and plays ‘Mr. Charming.’ Why won’t he let God change him?” Caroline is a twenty-nine-year-old single woman who
GM : 05
won’t date non-Christian men. “But I’m beginning to rethink that,” she admits. “I go to a small Pentecostal church. There are no single guys my age. This man at work was pursuing me, so I told him our first date would have to be church. He came, but I think it freaked him out. He never called again.” Connie, Bernice, Vicki, and Caroline know from personal experience: the modern church is having trouble reaching men. Women comprise more than 60 percent of the typical adult congregation on any given Sunday. At least one-fifth of married women regularly worship without their husbands. There are quite a few single women but hardly any single men in church today. Every day it gets harder for single Christian women to find men for romance or marriage. Step into any church parking lot, and you’re likely to see an attractive young mother and her brightly scrubbed children scurrying to Sunday school. Mom may be wearing an impressive diamond ring on her left hand, but the man who gave it to her is nowhere to be seen.
WHERE ARE THE MANLY MEN? Although males have not completely abandoned the church, manly men like Cliff have all but disappeared. Tough, earthy, working guys rarely come to church. High achievers, alpha males, risk takers, and visionaries are in short supply. Fun-lovers and adventurers are also underrepresented in church. These rough-and-tumble men don’t fit in with the quiet, introspective gentlemen who populate the church today. The truth is, most men in the pews grew up in church. Many of these lifers come not because they desire to be transformed by Christ but because they enjoy participating in comforting rituals that have changed little since their childhood. There are also millions of men who attend services under duress, dragged by a mother, wife, or girlfriend. Today’s churchgoing man is humble, tidy, dutiful, and above all, nice. What a contrast to the men of the Bible! Think of Moses and Elijah, David and Daniel, Peter and Paul. They were lions, not lambs—take-charge men who risked everything in service to God. They fought valiantly and spilled blood. They spoke their minds and stepped on the toes of religious people. They were true leaders, tough guys who were feared and respected by the community. All of these men had two things in common: they had an intense commitment to God, and they weren’t what you’d call saintly. Such men seldom go to church today. Furthermore, of the men who do attend church, most decline to invest themselves in the Christian life as their wives and mothers do. The majority of men attend services and nothing more. Jay is such a man. He’s in church most Sundays, but he’s not very excited about it. “I go mainly for my kids and my wife,” he says. “Church is okay, but it really
GM : 06
doesn’t enthrall me like it does her.” Who is being touched by the gospel today? Women. Women’s ministries, women’s conferences, women’s Bible studies, and women’s retreats are ubiquitous in the modern church. Men’s ministry, if it even exists, might consist of an occasional pancake breakfast and an annual retreat. How did a faith founded by a Man and His twelve male disciples become so popular with women, but anathema to men? The church of the first century was a magnet to males. Jesus’ strong leadership, blunt honesty, and bold action mesmerized men. A five-minute sermon by Peter resulted in the conversions of three thousand men. Today’s church does not mesmerize men; it repels them. Just 35 percent of the men in the United States say they attend church weekly. In Europe male participation rates are much worse, in the neighborhood of 5 percent. This hardly sounds like a male-dominated, patriarchal institution to me. What’s worse, nobody seems to care about the absence of men. Have you ever heard a sermon on the church’s gender gap? I’ve never heard a pastor or church leader bring it up. Heck, I’ve never heard anybody bring it up. It’s just one of those things Christians don’t talk about.
WHO’S TO BLAME FOR THE GENDER GAP? For decades those few people who noticed the gender gap have assumed that men are to blame for it. Sometimes they are. Many men intentionally reject the Christian faith. Some men are proud and want to be their own God. Men hate to admit weakness or neediness. Millions are captive to sin, unbelief, and other religions that preclude commitment to Christ. Men get distracted by the concerns of this world and lose interest in spiritual matters. Men suffer abuse at the hands of church people and fall away. But let’s be honest—women grapple with these same issues. Women are just as susceptible to sin, atheism, other religions, and pride. There’s nothing in the Bible to suggest that women are more virtuous or less sinful than men. Women are just as likely to have father issues or be victims of abuse. So why do women seem drawn to the church when men are not? What’s the difference? Let me be blunt: today’s church has developed a culture that is driving men away. Almost every man in America has tried church, but two-thirds find it unworthy of a couple of hours once a week.
A wise Texan once told me, “Men don’t go to church ’cuz they’ve been.”
When men need spiritual sustenance, they go to the wilderness, the workplace, the garage, or the corner bar. They watch their heroes in the stadium or on the racetrack. They plunge into a novel or sneak off to a movie. Church is one of the last places men look for God. More than 90 percent of American men believe in God, and five out of six call themselves Christians. But only two out of six attend church on a given Sunday. The average man accepts the reality of Jesus Christ, but fails to see any value in going to church. Men’s disinterest in Christianity is so consistent around the world, it can’t be explained by pride, father issues, sin or distraction. Neither can we say, “Well, men are just less religious,” because this is untrue. Male and female participation are roughly equal in Judaism, Buddhism and Hinduism. In the Islamic world men are publicly and unashamedly religious—often more so than women. Of the world’s great religions, only Christianity has a consistent, nagging shortage of male practitioners. What is it about modern Christianity that is driving men away?
NOW FOR SOME GOOD NEWS Can the church turn the tide with men? Yes! It not only can, but it must. Jesus built His church on twelve Spirit-filled men who changed the world. We must do the same: you cannot have a thriving church without a core of men who are true followers of Christ. If the men are dead, the church is dead. Fortunately, pioneering churches and parachurch organizations are enjoying remarkable success in reaching men for Christ. New forms of worship and ministry tailored to the needs of men are springing up in the unlikeliest places. Some of the fastest-growing churches in America are also those most successful in reaching men. To learn more about these ministries, visit my Web site, www. churchformen.com. Can your church turn the tide with men? Yes! Many of the needed changes cannot be imposed from above, but must bubble up from the congregation itself. Too often it’s not what the leadership imposes but what the laity demands that causes the church to repel men. If your church has a large gender gap, it’s probably not the pastor’s fault. The people in the pews hold the steering wheel on this one. In my book, Why Men Hate Going to Church, I suggest dozens of ways to make your congregation more attractive to men. Your job is to read, pray, and take action wherever you can. Individual churchgoers have more influence than they think.
ABOVE ALL, DON’T DESPAIR! As you read the dire statistics on male participation, don’t panic! This low ebb may be part of the church’s natural cycle. Over time the church tends to get out of balance and lose its masculine spirit. Then God raises a lion—a Martin Luther, John Wesley, Charles Finney, or Billy Sunday—to drag the church back into balance. The men return. The great revivals of the past three centuries always transformed large numbers of men.
God has balanced His church many times before. He will do so again. Our job is to confront the current gender gap for what it is: a strategy of the evil one to weaken the church. We need to understand what causes the gap and have the courage to remove the barriers that discourage and demoralize men. God will call men back to Himself. Will the church be ready? Dream for a moment. What would church be like if the majority of the worshippers were men? Not just males taking up pew space, but strong, earthy men who were truly alive in Christ. Men who were there not just to please their wives, to fulfill religious tradition, or to go on a power trip, but men who were there to rock their world. Can you even imagine what that would feel like? Imagine what such a church could accomplish for the kingdom of God! Impossible you say? Just read the book of Acts. The church was like this once; it can be so again. Here’s how I see it: imagine a ship leaving England for New York. If that ship is just a couple of degrees off course for the entire journey, it will land in Boston instead of the Big Apple. This is where most churches are today—a couple of degrees off course. We’re doing the things Jesus told us to do. Great things are happening in many areas of the world. But we need a few gentle course corrections to bring men back. Only then will we reach the goal Christ laid out for us. The longer we wait, the more drastic the corrections will need to be.
Excerpted with permission of the author from the book entitled Why Men Hate Going to Church copyright © 2005 by David Murrow. All rights reserved.
GM : 07
on the couch Cyclical Sadness by Randy Kosloski
FOR I KNOW THE PLANS I HAVE FOR YOU ... PLANS TO PROSPER YOU AND NOT HARM YOU, PLANS TO GIVE YOU HOPE AND A FUTURE. JEREMIAH 29:11
I once knew a man, Don, who was having a mid-life crisis at the age of 21. Don had a liberal amount of disposable income, a lot of time on his hands, good friends and a close family. Nonetheless, he was unfulfilled, but didn’t even realize it. All he knew was that he was depressed. Generally speaking, men often seem to be “emotionally constipated.” Many men feel emotions they dislike, and at some level they know the root cause of those emotions, but they are often too invested in the issue to appropriately address it. The root of the problem can easily cause them to question their values, beliefs and fundamental life choices. As men, we typically have too much pride to accept that we may be wrong about such elemental parts of ourselves. So, we frequently contort our emotions to make it easier for us to believe that the root cause stems from other people and not something within us. This seems to make sense, but since we haven’t directly dealt with what is actually causing the particular emotion, it returns again and again. This process makes it simple for us to justify, for example, getting angry at others. In Don’s case, the emotion that kept surfacing was sadness. Don was smart enough to understand that there was something wrong in his life. He could not explain his sadness since he had everything a person usually wants in life. So he hoped a counselor could solve all his problems, and right all his plans. In Jeremiah 29:11, the Lord declares, “For I know the plans I have for you...plans to prosper you and not harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” When we make our plans, however, they often look more like Don’s plans than what the Lord has in store for us. Don’s plans were selfish, designed for comfort and void of challenge. His plans did not give him hope or a future, but left him feeling depressed, dissatisfied and alone. For example, Don felt it would be a waste of time to achieve a post secondary education, so he took a job immediately out of high school. Since he did not really have any aspirations, he didn’t waste any time pursuing them. Later, he was able to buy a house in a strong market. When Don came to see me, he was already making good money and well on his way to paying off his house—but he was miserable. He provided many examples to describe his life, such as, while constantly watching NBA games from the front row, he only wanted to go home and sleep. How is it possible that a young man with
ample freedom, money, and time could be so unhappy? He must have understood at some level that he was wasting away his gifts along with his life. Life is precious. At some level I think that everyone understands this. But we often lose sight of this fact: Life involves everyone around us, so if we isolate ourselves, it is not life anymore. If it’s anything at all, perhaps it’s just a slow comfortable death. Don probably could have been a good father, a good career man, a good missionary, but he chose to live life by taking as much out of it as he could while putting as little of himself back into it as possible.
“Life is precious. At some level I think that everyone understands this. But we often lose sight of this fact: Life involves everyone around us, so if we isolate ourselves, it is not life anymore. In his book, Submerge: Living Deep in a Shallow World: Service, Justice and Contemplation Among the World’s Poor, John Hayes writes about the importance of completely investing in our calling. He advises that if we stick only a toe in the pool of life while drawing out as much as possible, our reward will be a lonely life full of regret and sadness. For men, we will likely convince ourselves that our sadness is actually anger and that we are angry because of something someone else has done to us. Then we can allow ourselves to feel anger toward that person making things seem safe and uncomplicated. Unfortunately, in only a short time, we’ll end up again in sadness. Jesus tells us that with the faith the size of a mustard seed, we can move mountains. Maybe if we lack the faith to believe Jesus, Dr. Seuss can help. In his book, Oh, The Places You’ll Go, Dr. Seuss encourages us saying, “Your mountain is waiting, so...get on your way.” Seriously, we know that Jesus is the only one who can help us fully invest in our calling, and since He promises us a future full of hope, what’s stopping us from taking that promise to the bank? Trusting in His plans, we can avoid the hopeless cycle of a self-centered life, and get on our way.
GM : 09
CAN YOU RELATE
SOUL HYDRATION BY THOM MOLLOHAN In some places in the world, good drinking water is taken for granted (I say as I clear my throat and nod subtly in the direction of the closest drinking fountain.) In many South American, African and Asian countries, drinkable water is a rare commodity—if water is available at all, mud and disease are tolerated along with it. Most of us would be would be appalled by the water some are forced to drink. I have friends who have been called by God to serve in some of those places. In the midst of poverty and spiritual oppression, these friends dig wells for communities suffering from drought conditions, where agriculture is nearly impossible. As they help those in want of physical water, they often find that the Holy Spirit provides them opportunities to lead some to the ultimate wellspring of “spiritual water”—healthy, wholesome, and pure (see John 7:37-38). In places where water is not taken for granted, the analogy of Living Water captures the attention. As water is vital to the human body, relationships are essential to the human soul. And just as the water quality has direct bearing on our overall physical health, so too the quality of our relationships influences the health of our soul.
GM : 10
There is no relationship as important as the one for which we were actually made: an ongoing loving relationship with God through Jesus Christ. If that relationship is not what it was intended to be, then none of our relationships will be fully satisfying. Jesus Christ needs to be first in our plans, our hopes and our dreams. While this is true, we have also been designed to need one another: “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Gen 2:18). We need the company of others, and we crave their good opinion of us. We depend on one another in both social and physical endeavors. Nothing underscores the importance of our relationships more than the fact that nearly the entire Bible deals with it in some fashion. From the Ten Commandments to the work of Jesus, God delineates how we should relate to Him, as well as how we should relate to others. Through the atoning work on the cross, Jesus has given us a relationship with Him and fellowship with each another. As 1 John 1:3 tells us, “We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ.” Relationships are great sources of encouragement and empowerment to us. But like bad water, they can also leech our health and wholesomeness, and in some cases, they can completely destroy our lives. What was said of the little girl with the little curl can aptly be applied to relationships: “When they are good, they are very good. And when they are bad, they are horrid.” Healthy relationships take time, trust, honesty and old-fashioned hard work. Neglect them, and they can deteriorate into acid pools of frustration which can ruin us and damage others. With the help of Christ, our relationships can truly bring honor to God. This can be said of friendships, courtships and family relationships. Even business associations should be avenues of grace for God’s love and power to flow through us and into the lives of others. But what do we do when, in spite of all our efforts, a relationship breaks down and turns frustrating? What can be done when the yeast of discontentedness and miscommunication filter into the dough of the relationship from the broken world around us? Sometimes it seems relationships can become only capable of producing pain and sadness. Thousands of books still have not thoroughly addressed this topic, but here are a couple ways to approach relationships which have turned sour.
When we find ourselves in such uncomfortable social situations, it helps to keep in mind that we are not alone. The world around us has been reeling from the horror of such brokenness from its infancy. It all began with Adam and Eve’s broken fellowship with God, it continued through the first murder of Abel, and is rapid among us today. No matter who shares the majority of the fault, we shouldn’t feel like our situation is unique to us. We all hurt other people from time to time, and we all get hurt by someone else. It’s also beneficial in these times to make sure that we humbly seek God and ask Him to help us reconcile to the other party, as much as it depends on us. This most likely will mean that we apologize for our part in the rift, and that we make right what we can. God is even more interested than we are in bridging our broken relationships. Sometimes, however, others are not interested in fixing the relationship. Sometimes we can be a victim of unwarranted attacks by those who should love and support us. Again, we can be reassured that we are not the only ones to have experienced this kind of injustice. Psalm 55:13 captures this common occurrence: “If an enemy were insulting me, I could endure it; if a foe were raising himself against me, I could hide from him. But it is you, my close friend, with whom I once enjoyed sweet fellowship as we walked with the throng at the house of God.” As common as it may be, it still can hurt deeply. While it is true, that we have been designed for relationships, the one relationship that sustains us when all others have been drowned in the raging waters of disaster is our relationship with God. So, take heart. Jesus loves us too much to abandon us although those very dear to us may do so. He will remain faithful to us, even if our friends or family desert us. Fortunately, it is the one relationship that is not founded on our efforts, our successes, or even our own personal worth. It is based on the love and righteousness of Jesus Christ Himself. We can let the healing water of His love soothe our weary souls as we trust His promise to love us and keep His own forever. Even through the driest times in our lives, Jesus can keep our souls well hydrated.
Relationships are great sources of encouragement and empowerment to us. But like bad water, they can also leech our health and wholesomeness, and in some cases, they can completely destroy our lives. GM : 11
THE METHOD TO GOD’S
MADNESS
MAY GOD BLESS THE HELL OUT OF YOU BY THE MERRY MONK God is not fair, as we understand fair. If He was, everyone would get what they really deserve. Instead, He’s bend-over-backward generous. He even seems to shove His generosity in our faces. Sometimes this divine version of reality seems devoid of common sense. Compared to our methods, the kingdom of God could be called, “Crazy Upside Down Jesus World.” Here’s what I mean. Let’s say I need some landscaping done, so I go to the local day laborer center and hire anyone standing around. We agree to $100 for a day’s work. After couple hours of hard work, it doesn’t look like we’ll get everything done by quitting time, so I go back to the same place to get more workers. After a couple more hours, I realize those aren’t enough, so I get more. After a couple more hours, my yard begins to look like an ant colony with workers swarming all over pulling bushes, planting trees, laying sod, hauling decorative rocks, building planters, etc. Finally, it looks like we are going to finish by the end of the day, so I run out to get the guys some chicken and beers to show my appreciation. With about an hour of daylight left, I’m returning home with the eats and happen to pass the day laborer center. I’m surprised to see a group of men who are just arriving. What slackers, showing up at the end of the day looking for work probably after partying all night. I wonder if they are even looking for work, or just want to hook up with their friends, who actually did get their butts out of bed. I pull over and ask them why they’re standing around. They say, “Look man, we’ve been standing here all day and nobody hired us.” I know they’re full of it, but I have plenty of cash and they look like they could use a break. So, I hire them and we haul back home. After another hour of work, everything is done, so they all line up for their money. Of course, the “slackers” are first in line with beers in hand licking their fingers clean of fried chicken. I hand them each $100
GM : 12
as promised. They’re happy. The same transaction is completed with the next guys, and the next. About now, the last group is thinking they’ll get more since they worked all day. They walk right up to me with their hands out, but they each get $100. They look at me like townspeople ready to attack Frankenstein with shovels and pitchforks. “Hey, you agreed to $100 for a day’s work,” I reply. “That’s a good wage. If I want to give the last group that came to work the same as I gave you...it’s a free country. Can’t I do what I want with my own money? Jesus tells a similar story in Matthew 20:1-16. He concludes by saying that in the kingdom of heaven, the last are first and the first are last. What! You’re kidding! That’s not fair! Who would pay good money to guys who don’t deserve it and then shove that fact in the faces of the guys who worked the hardest? That’s only one example of God’s generosity. There’s also the rebellious son who squanders all his dad’s money on hookers and booze. What does he get when he comes home: new clothes and a party, while his brother works in the field. It seems the religious folks always get a tongue lashing from Jesus while the drunks, outcasts and whores get the kingdom. The meek inherit the earth. The persecuted are blessed. It’s all scandalous! In the real world, we work, so we get paid. We study hard, so we get an “A.” If we do bad stuff, we get punished. If we do good, we get rewarded. However, God’s ways are certainly not our ways.
“IF HE WERE INTERESTED IN PUNISHING US FOR THE EVIL IN OUR HEARTS,
DEATH AND DESTRUCTION WOULD BE IN ORDER.”
So, why does all of this insane kindness go to the worst of us? This may sound strange, but it’s a way of correcting us. Romans 2:4 says, “Or do you show contempt for the riches of His kindness, tolerance, and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness leads you toward repentance?” Clearly, God isn’t “out to get us” by using cancer or earthquakes, getting us fired, wrecking our cars, or taking away family members. That’s how the pagan gods do it, but not Yahweh.
If He were interested in punishing us for the evil in our hearts, death and destruction would be in order. It seems God did that kind of thing in the Old Testament as He set the stage to receive the punishment humanity deserved. That’s done, so He’s not mad at us anymore. He spent all His anger on Jesus; there’s none left for us. God was never interested in wiping us out, but rather in steering us toward home. He wants us to repent, so He blesses us. If that doesn’t work, He continues to bless—even more. We might say God will bless the hell out of us, if that’s what it takes. Charles Spurgeon once wrote: “When I thought God was hard, I found it easy to sin; but when I found God so kind, so good, so overflowing with compassion, I smote upon my breast to think that I could ever have rebelled against One who loved me so, and sought my good.” So, while it’s not what we expect, Jesus continually taught that it’s the way of the kingdom of heaven. Although we can’t work so hard that it puts God in our debt, we also can’t be bad enough to cause Him to punish us—He’s already punished Christ. Romans 4:4-5 says, “Now when a man works, his wages are not credited to him as a gift, but as an obligation. However, to the man who does not work but trusts God who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness.” This doesn’t mean there aren’t consequences for the stupid things we do. We also all live in a fallen world. But we don’t want to confuse that stuff with God’s eternal punishment. There’s no punishment left after the cross, for those who have accepted Christ. However, He does want to bless the hell out of us. This is obviously great news for the slackers who show up hung over for an hour of work, for they’ll get paid just as much as those who worked all day. It’s great news for the prodigals who return home to a party after spending dad’s money on sinful living. But, for the older brother and the guys working in the field all day, it’s a tough pill to swallow. It’s doesn’t seem fair, but that’s how the kingdom of heaven works. As He loves us, we become more loving. As He indiscriminately accepts us, we become more indiscriminately accepting. As He blesses us, we become a blessing to others. May God bless the hell out of us all!
N GM : 13
THE RECAP
on THE TOTAL MONEY MAKEOVER
10% can change your life By Kimberly Schluterman
Can I brag? My husband and I are both really good with money management. So good, in fact, that in our premarital counseling, we had no issues to work through whatsoever. We both practiced good habits as individuals and we have no problems practicing them together. This is what we said to my friend-mentors as we stood in their dining room one evening. They listened happily, congratulated us on our smart choices, and then did what mentors do best: challenged us to be even better. Dr. Bob asked if we had ever read a book called The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. No, we hadn’t and we didn’t want to read it either, especially not six weeks before our wedding! We hemmed and hawed but finally, they talked us into reading just the first chapter. If we weren’t hooked after the first chapter, we were off the hook for having to read it. So that’s what we did. And that’s all we did for about 12 weeks. It wasn’t so easy to dismiss, however. Some of the concepts lingered in our minds, and we ended up wanting to read the rest together. And the result was surprising. For two people who consider themselves advanced personal money managers, that
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book nonetheless kicked our butts. Although almost 90 percent of the book was stuff we already knew, the 10 percent that wasn’t has changed our lives. Below is an overview of the principles in the book, and I would encourage you to consider its wisdom. Ramsey is a Christian, but this book is not about Christian finances, per se. His wisdom is, however, old-fashioned and sensible. The program he lays out is simple and straight-forward, but for the person of average self-discipline, kind of tough to follow. The Dave Ramsey financial plan is broken down into seven “baby steps.” Steps 4, 5, and 6 include saving for college, quickly paying off your home mortgage, and investing for retirement. Since those are way down the road for both you and me, I’ll let you read the book and learn about those yourself. I want to talk about 1-3 and 7. In general, the book assumes the reader is the average American, meaning you have debt (car, students loans, credit cards). If you’re not in debt, then you’re ahead of the game and the Dave plan will teach you how to never be a slave to money.
Baby Step 1.
Baby Step 3.
Quickly save $1,000. I was surprised by this because I thought he’d want us to pay down debt before saving money, but his reasoning is reasonable. Essentially, if you don’t have some money stashed away for emergencies—which are as certain as death and taxes—then you will go into debt again in order to pay for them. The quick $1000 is the first step in breaking the debt cycle. Ramsey gives specific rules about where to keep the money, but to summarize, he wants it onhand but tucked away. It needs to be something you can put your fingers on today if necessary, but also something that you’re not going to lay your fingers on unless it is absolutely imperative. A Certificate of Deposit that has an early withdrawal fee is not the place for your $1,000, but neither is your wallet.
Finish building your emergency fund. Right now, you have $1,000 stashed away and no debt. That same amount that you were paying toward your debt each month will now be added to your Emergency Fund. If you had been paying a car payment, credit cards and maybe a student loan, all of those payments you no longer have to make and can now apply toward saving will build your emergency fund quickly. Most financial advisors recommend having 3-6 months of life expenses in the bank. Personally, in this economy, I feel more comfortable with 9-12, but it’s your decision.
If you are reading this and thinking, “Ha—a thousand dollars might as well be a million!” then I beg you to read just the first chapter like I was “forced” to do. It’ll change your outlook and your life. The key is to get the money quick, like within a month or two. Sell things, and unplug everything that uses electricity if you must, but save that $1,000!
Baby Step 2. Pay down what Ramsey calls the “debt snowball.” Whereas, I would have thought that if you have multiple creditors, the smart thing to do would be to start with the highest interest rate, pay it aggressively, and then move to the next highest interest rate, Ramsey suggests otherwise. He says to start with the lowest balance, pay it aggressively while paying minimum balances on all other debt, and then move to the next lowest. Similar to the $1,000 quick cash, the goal is to change your behavior. It’s a baby step. If you aggressively pay off your lowest-balance debt, then it should pay off quickly. Then you’re motivated and encouraged to keep going! Take everything that you were paying on your lowest balance, which is now paid in full, and apply it to the second lowest balance. It snowballs from there until your debt is paid off quicker than you ever thought.
I’m going to skip Steps 4-6, but I’m going to be a plot spoiler and let you in on Baby Step 7: Build wealth and give! One of the best parts of wealth, besides peace of mind and security, is being able to give it away. Have you noticed that poor people can’t help poor people much? Although the Lord loves a sacrificial giver, he has no problem with wealth. Remember: the love of money is the root of evil—not money itself. The Total Money Makeover spends a lot of time teaching you about myths and not-so-secret secrets about money management. He rants about bad money habits—and he should know, he had a bunch—and why they will leave you a slave to debt forever. Ramsey provides information on where to invest, how much to invest and strategies for success. It is not a get-richquick scheme, rather it is a get-rich-slowly plan. As you become financially independent and rely less on your parents for financial support, you will probably run across all kinds of “financial advice.” A lot of what you hear may be really, really bad advice—and certainly not grounded in God’s word. Although, I wouldn’t say that the Dave Ramsey plan is the only smart plan out there, I would encourage you to read the book and decide for yourself. Who knows? It might completely change your financial outlook, like it did mine.
Depending on your debt, it might take a couple years to make it through Baby Step 2. But once you have, you’ve accomplished something major. Yes, it is difficult to sacrifice for so long, but Ramsey’s motto is, “If today you will live like no one else, later you can live like no one else.”
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R Paradigm Shift PRESS ON BY WILL DOLE Have you ever been around an extreme attention magnet? You know, the type of person who sucks in attention like a black hole consumes anything in the universe falling within its intense gravitational pull? Maybe it’s the loud person who never uses an inside voice, or the flamboyant dresser, or someone cruising with car stereo blasting such that it rattles our bones. Most of us know an attention magnet; perhaps some of us even fit this description.
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To some extent we are all self absorbed. Some demonstrate this by demanding attention; others exhibit selfishness by extreme isolation. Most of us are somewhere between these two extremes with a human nature that is bent on its own pleasure, happiness, gain and fulfillment. Yet, we don’t like to think of ourselves as selfish. Perhaps what’s needed is a paradigm shift. If you aren’t familiar with this term, Dictionary.com defines it as “a radical change in underlying beliefs or theory.” We may need a radical change in the arena of our faith. Maybe we’ve bought in to the errant message of the “Prosperity Gospel” that teaches Jesus as the way to health, wealth and happiness. That one’s a hot topic, but there are many other subtle errant beliefs that lead right back to selfishness. For example, a popular pastor recently talked about reaching the world for Jesus, hammering repeatedly that Jesus is the only hope for a better life. This is an accurate statement when placed in the proper context, i.e. Jesus is our only way to God, and therefore, He is our only hope (John 14:6). Not only does Jesus offer life, but He offers a full one (John 10:10). But is a better life a solid reason to evangelize? Is it even a good reason to worship Jesus? Consider the Great Commission, found in Matthew 28:18b-20:
“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.” Jesus’ appeal is not based on hope for better lives. He does not say, “You better go tell people that life’s tough and I’ll fix it for them.” Rather He says in verse 18 that all authority in heaven and earth belongs to Him—because He is God. He follows this in verse 19 with “Therefore go and make disciples...” Notice the word, “therefore.” To paraphrase what He is saying, Jesus tells us: “I am God. Therefore, as my followers, go and teach the world to follow Me.” The reason that Jesus starts with His authority is because we do not simply worship a nice guy who died for us. We worship the Almighty God who, in a display of His love, came and willingly sacrificed Himself in our place for our sins. He did this of His own free will and in accordance with the plan He laid out before the foundations of the world (Ephesians 1:4).
It is no mistake to say God is extremely passionate about us as individuals. He cares enough about us to have planned our salvation thousands of years before our existence. After the fall of mankind,we immediately read in Genesis about the prophecy that a Savior will conquer Satan. So it would seem logical to conclude that God’s main purpose in sending Jesus was to save us. And indeed it was. But if God’s only purpose was to save us, then what motivates us to struggle against our sin? Chapter six of Romans talks continually about the incredible grace we are given, while also pounding on the necessity of remaining free from the bondage of sin. Wouldn’t it make sense for us to think, as did some believers in Rome, that we should sin all the more so that grace may abound? God’s purpose in our salvation is not only our personal eternal destination, but also His glory. God purposefully brings glory to Himself and He alone is worthy of our obedience. As we hold fast the truth that God did everything for us out of love, it’s easy to forget that God did it all to glorify Himself, as well. So, what if the Gospel is not about us? What if the Gospel is about a loving, holy and perfect God who created mankind in His image in order to bring glory to the Creator? What if mankind later rebelled against God alienating himself through sin? And what if God responded in love, although He had every right to wipe out mankind from existence? What if, instead, He chose to lovingly save mankind from a sinful state by sending His Son to die on a cross while providing freedom from sin so that God might again be glorified? In the midst of basking in the love and grace God has shown to us, it’s important to remember it’s still all about God. Author Steve Brown points out that if the whole world reached tAhe agreement that God is a liar, He would not cease to be God. He would continue to be truth itself. He would continue His perfect existence, and it would all be for His glory in the end. If He had not saved us at all, but left us in our sin, He would still be worthy of all praise. Nothing can change His holy essence—not even us. He doesn’t actually need us at all, which proves His love all the more amazing, considering the means He took to save us. The continuing storyline of the Bible is really fairly simple: God creates man to worship Him. Mankind rebels, so God saves. And when God saved us, He didn’t merely save us from death and hell. He also saved us from the sin separating us from Him, in order that we may glorify Him with our lives. We can easily become so intently focused on ourselves that we miss the grandeur and the splendor of the amazing God who gave up so much to call us His own. We certainly weren’t created to focus on ourselves. It’s best if we let God do the focusing on us—for He does it so well—while we keep our focus on Him.
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THE TOOL BOX
BEEN TECHNO LOST?
BY JEFFREY BRIDGMAN
HOW TO OUTSMART GPS AND MAPQUEST
Is there anyone who can honestly say he’s never been lost? Even the best of us get turned around once in a while. But now with GPS, MapQuest and the like, getting lost should be a thing of the past, right? Maybe not; sometimes the tools we rely on lead us astray. Once on a road trip with some friends, we wanted to eat lunch in a town I’d driven through several times before. I remembered seeing a Quizno’s, but couldn’t remember exactly where it was. No problem. My friends had GPS! So we pulled it out, told it we wanted to go to Quizno’s, and started following its directions. Ten minutes later it gently announced: “You have reached your destination.” We looked around and we saw nothing but factories, so we keep on driving. It seemed irritated with our lack of direction-following-skills as it politely announced “Recalculating...”
they recommend might not hold up to common sense. And the devices often don’t take into account things like traffic conditions and road construction projects. The same is true for paper maps, but since they don’t have as much information, they aren’t out of date as quickly— when’s the last time you heard of an interstate getting shut down for good? Avoid being late or lost by combining two navigation mediums and don’t forget to apply common sense. I try to determine which highways to take ahead of time and make a simple list of the interchanges. MapQuest and other step-by-step directions can be overly complex. Usually we only need to take a handful of highways that can easily be remembered or written down.
And GPS isn’t the only fallible technology. Have you ever gotten bum directions from MapQuest or Google? A friend of mine used MapQuest to find the airport in Northwest Arkansas and was directed down two miles of dirt road and across a one-lane bridge. Experiences like these can tempt us to give up on modern amenities and go back to a reliable hard copy map.
I always try to keep paper maps on hand as a back-up. Do you have a map in your car of your city or county? Often phone books have them in the center. This year when you get your new phone book, instead of throwing away the old one, put it under the driver’s seat of your car. If you’re travelling between states, stretch your legs at the first welcome center/rest stop when you enter a new state. Many states provide free maps at their welcome centers. But that won’t do you much good if you need directions to a specific place within a city. This is where the various online map services earn their money. Those turn-by-turn directions to our final destination can sure come in handy—when they’re correct. Back up these directions with a phone number for your destination, so if you get lost, you can call and have someone at your destination talk you in the rest of the way. Visiting the boonies where you might not get cell phone service? Then be sure to confirm the online directions with someone at your final destination before you leave home.
Although online directions and GPS’s can be very handy, they do have their limitations. Sometimes, information can be wrong or out of date. Or we can easily input the wrong destination. Although GPS’s come with beneficial information such as the locations of businesses, these can change fairly quickly. The routes
Mapping technologies are cool and convenient, but don’t rely on them as your only recourse or you may find yourself in a 2001 Space Odyssey moment, Hal. As always, a little preparation and common sense can go a long way in helping to make smart navigation choices while on a trip.
On another adventure, a GPS took us on the shortest route to see the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. We figured the arch was downtown, so we just told it to take us to St. Louis. After a while we realized something was wrong, but we continued to follow the directions. Eventually we “arrived at our destination.” Apparently, we had arrived at the geographical center of St. Louis, which happened to be in the slums. A more reliable way to find the Arch would have been to look and head in the general direction of the towering landmark.
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