Experiencing a Prayer Drought?

I’ll go ahead and say it: My prayer life is not where I want it to be. This is something with which I constantly struggle. On the one hand, I have these high ideals of intentional, sustained (read: lengthy), daily prayer. On the other hand, I have the reality, which is . . . not that. So I strive, with varying degrees of success, to make my reality live up to my ideals. How very much like every other aspect of my spiritual life!

I believe this tension between ideal and reality in our spiritual lives is a healthy one. It ensures that we will never stop growing. Still, it can be unsettling to find ourselves so far from our goals, especially with our spiritual practices. This is particularly troubling during those times when I find myself unusually far from where I want to be.

I Am How I Pray

For years, my grandfather used a phrase when describing parts of his spiritual journey: I am how I pray. I loved that phrase from the moment I first heard it, although I really didn’t appreciate its meaning until much later.

Over the course of my ministry, I have seen many examples of people who ‘lived as they prayed’—both from positive and negative definitions. And just as my grandfather insisted, the condition of their prayer lives dictated so much of what would become of their life’s journey.

What Lights You Up?: Staying Alive In Ministry

Staying alive in ministry involves knowing what we mean by “alive” and what we mean by “ministry.” There is a pollution of words and confusion of roles that has to be managed before anything else can be managed.

One clergywoman said to me, “The biggest task at my church is keeping me from burning out. I am the chief asset here.” We know what she means. Ask any search committee: they know that the clergy leader is the chief asset of the organization. They may forget that over time. Since churches don’t think they are supposed to care for pastors-in fact they think the opposite-the matter of caring for the pastor is up to the pastor. Start there: if you don’t take care of yourself, no one else will. Care of yourself is your job. “Self-care” is the new buzzword. I prefer to get at the word pollution in “burn out.” Clergy roles are to care for the congregation. The congregation is not to care for the clergy. So the clergy must care for him or herself.

Does Your Pastor Feel the Love?

In case you haven’t heard, the second Sunday in October (the 11^th this year), is designated as Clergy Appreciation Sunday. According to whom? That gets a little fuzzy, but no matter its origin, the date has made its way onto many churches’ yearly calendars. If you don’t have anything planned for the day, or you missed celebrating on the 11^th, don’t worry; the entire month of October is Clergy Appreciation Month, so you still have time to say, “Thanks.”

The Best Clergy Appreciation Gift Ever

October is Clergy Appreciation Month. This is a great time for congregations to show their love, appreciation, and support to their pastors. Having been a pastor for over a decade, I’ve been on the receiving end of so many wonderful gifts: a handwritten note, a home-cooked meal, a gift card for a nice place to eat, a kind word after a hard week. In all of these gifts it was the sentiment and love behind them that really stayed with me and made me feel appreciated.

I asked a group of seasoned pastors to tell me stories of times when they felt most appreciated by their church, either during the month of October or at other times of the year. You may be surprised by how simple it is to convey your love and support. Here are some ideas for you based on the stories they shared.

Plain Talk

Have you ever tried to talk to someone who doesn’t speak your language? Several years ago, I was on a crowded train in southern Spain. The man standing six inches from me had something pressing to say.

“Sprechen Sie Deutsch?” he asked.

I said, “No. English?”

“No,” he responded. “Parlez-vous français?”

“No,” I replied. I speak a little bit of Spanish, so I took one more shot. “¿Hablas español?”

“No,” he answered. “Italiano?”

“No.”

In a matter of seconds, we riffled through five languages, searching for a common channel to communicate, but it wasn’t on the dial. Finally, with great frustration in his eyes, he shrugged his shoulders and gave up. For the rest of the ride, we stood next to each other in silence. I still wonder what he so urgently wanted to tell me. (I was probably standing on his foot.)

Maybe you know what it’s like to have something vitally important to say, but the other person simply doesn’t speak your language. If you are a Christian in America, you know this experience all too well. The moment you introduce the topic of faith, you will likely be standing next to someone who has no vocabulary for the conversation.

In recent years, we have entered a new era in the West. Christians are now missionaries in their own backyard. Those of us who follow Christ must assume that people in our office, school, worksite, neighborhood, and even our home don’t speak the language of faith. If we want to communicate with them, the good news must be reborn in the everyday words of twenty-first-century culture.

Christians sometimes forget that when Jesus spoke, the common people heard him gladly.¹ He knew how to speak their language. Not everyone does.

It certainly didn’t come naturally to John Wesley. John grew up a pastor’s kid. Both his father Samuel and mother Susanna were bright, well-educated, and insatiable learners. From a tender age, John absorbed the vocabulary of faith. He later became an Oxford scholar deeply steeped in the Christian tradition and a priest in the Church of England. Yet his burning passion over six decades of ministry was to communicate the gospel to the masses—most of whom were illiterate. To do so, he left behind the language of the academy. “I design plain truth for plain people,” he said. “I labour to avoid all words which are not easy to be understood, all which are not used in common life.”²

Although Wesley’s ability to connect with everyday people became legendary, it was the result of a concerted effort. Tired of confused looks when he preached, one day he read one of his sermons to a maidservant and asked her to interrupt him each time she didn’t understand. Wesley was shocked by the number of times Betsy said, “Stop, sir.” All his education had created a barrier to sharing Christ with ordinary people. He resolved at that point to replace long words with short ones until people could understand his every word.³

Maybe Wesley was on to something. How do you learn the language of the people these days? Watch some TV. Listen to the number one radio station in your area. Go to the movie everyone’s talking about. Read some magazines at the grocery store checkout. Talk to a teenager. My seventeen-year-old daughter is more than happy to tell me when I am using words she doesn’t understand or phrases that have passed their expiration date. (“Dad, really?!”) If you don’t have a teenager in your house, rent one. Take two or three of them out to eat and let them tell you what life looks like through their eyes. As you listen, you may discover the best way to speak their language.

Of course, this sounds a bit simplistic, and some may wonder if it’s really that important to use the everyday words of our culture when sharing our faith. It was for Jesus. He left behind the language of heaven to learn common Aramaic and Hebrew. He wanted to meet people where they were and share the good news of God’s love in the language they dreamed in. We can do that, too. Our message is far too urgent to be lost in translation.

 

An Excerpt from the book: Meet The Goodpeople: Wesley’s 7 Ways to Share Faith

Roger Ross has served local churches from Texas to the British Channel Island of Guernsey to his home state of Illinois, where he’s been involved in starting two new churches. Ross currently serves as senior pastor of First United Methodist Church, a large and vibrant congregation in Springfield, Illinois. He has contributed to several publications and journals.

About the Book:

Meet the Goodpeople helps church leaders reach the growing number of “nones” in their communities. Roger Ross offers seven practical strategies that church leaders can immediately grasp and implement. These strategies are shown to work, equipping congregants to share their faith, leading others into a transforming relationship with Jesus and his church. Ross derives these strategies from John Wesley’s own ministry. A free downloadable guide for leadership teams and small groups is available at http://www.MeetTheGoodpeople.com.

Notes:

1. Mark 12:37 KJV.
2. John Wesley, Preface to Sermons on Several Occasions (1746), in Sermons I: 1–33, ed. Albert C. Outler, vol. 1 of The Bicentennial Edition of the Works of John Wesley (Nashville: Abingdon, 1984), 104.
3. John Bishop, “John Wesley: Plain Truth for Plain People,” Preaching, May 1, 1987, http://www.preaching.com/resources/past-masters/11566916/.