It’s just as important to walk through with the trashbag as it is to walk through with the drinks and peanuts.

Once the plane reaches “cruising altitude,” the flight attendants come through the cabin with complimentary drinks and (hopefully) some sort of snack. They get their little cart ready and wheel it through to serve you with your soft drink of choice and a small bag of airline peanuts or pretzels (Sidebar: Unless the recession has kicked in and they’re charging you 5 bucks for a bag of trail mix). Several minutes after they have served you, they realize that their work isn’t done as it pertains to your complimentary snack. They’re already prepared to come back through again with a bag for your trash. You see, service will always bring about garbage.

Ministry is messy. Just as garbage is a regular part of a flight, it is also a regular part of ministry. The same people you serve well will also be the same people who bring you their garbage and expect you to do something about it. The best thing you can do is come to the situation prepared to deal with people’s problems & issues. Just as the flight attendants have their latex gloves, protect yourself so that other’s problems don’t adversely affect you. Like the flight attendants, consider it a privilege to help them through their trash. Look at it like a flight attendant; the more garbage you deal with now, the less you have to clean up later. And don’t be surprised that you’ll have to come through several times with the trash bag. People produce and discard their garbage at differing rates.

Garbage comes with the territory of effective ministry.

*******

From: Brittany
Sent: Sunday, October 25, 2009
To: FBCG Info
Subject: question

Hello,

I am doing a school assignment that requires me to interview people of different faiths. It would be greatly appreciated if you could respond to the question:

What information would you provide parents of a newborn child with a disability when they ask what God’s reason was for bringing a child with a disability into the world.

Thank you for your time

Brittany

*******

From: FBCG Info
Sent: Tuesday, October 27, 2009
To: Brittany
Subject: Re: question

Brittany,

Excellent question! Thank you for giving us the opportunity to address this delicate issue.

As Christians we believe that all life is equally valuable and all children are gifts from God. We believe that children who are born with disabilities provide a unique opportunity for them, their parents and those around them to experience the love and power of God to overcome such obstacles.

Jesus speaks directly to this issue in the Bible (John 9:1-3) when his disciples find a man who was born blind. They asked him the reason for this, to which he responded that this happened so “that the works of God might be displayed in him.” Although children with disabilities can be a great burden, it can also bring with it a great opportunity to trust God’s power and provision… and an even better opportunity to see God work a miracle in the child’s life and in the parent’s heart.

I offer this viewpoint not only as a believer in Christ, but also as the parent of a 1 year-old son who was born with a massive peri-natal stroke on the left side of his brain. My wife and I have experienced God’s power in ways that we cannot explain, and are more convinced of His power today than ever.

I hope this response is helpful for your assignment, as well as for your own spiritual journey. God bless.

Minister Bobby Manning
Special Assistant to the Pastor; Young Adult Pastor
First Baptist Church of Glenarden

Most people need a personal invitation.

At the beginning of every flight, the flight attendant gives the instruction over the intercom for all passengers to turn off their mobile phones. Then the captain comes on the same intercom a few minutes later and makes the same announcement. Then the flight attendant will take the intercom a few minutes later and make the same announcement. And WITHOUT FAIL, they’ll have to come through and personally ask someone to turn off his or her mobile phone. Apparently this person thought that the first 3 announcements over the intercom were mild suggestions and needed an engraved invitation to turn off their mobile phone!

Don’t allow this to frustrate you in ministry. Most people just don’t get it the first time. Many people just don’t get it the second time. Some people just don’t get it the third time. Making the mass announcement doesn’t always work when trying to recruit someone to complete a task or step up their commitment level. Most people are not so self-motivated. You’ll have to ask them specifically so they know that you’re really talking to them, and you’ll be surprised how well they respond!

Ministry often will take a personal touch.

Preach it, even if they’re not listening

At the beginning of every flight, flight attendants make several announcements… The same announcements that they made the last flight you were on. In these announcements, they give the most basic of instructions: how to work your seatbelt (as if you’ve never used one); where the exits are (as if you didn’t see them on your way on the plane); how to use your seat as a flotation device (although you wish it were a parachute because you’re not flying over water). Because you’ve heard these basic instructions a thousand times, you’re probably not listening.

In ministry, you’ll find yourself telling people the same things over and over again. You’ll give the same counsel: Make sure you pray; Read your Bible; Love your neighbor; repent from sin. After having heard the same thing over and over, people will stop listening. Even if you switch it up and tell funny jokes like Southwest Airlines, they’ll still develop olfactory fatigue and stop listening.

But don’t let this stop you from teaching. It’s not the flight attendants responsibility to control the passengers’ attention. At the end of the day, they will be held accountable to whether they made the announcement or not. If something were to go wrong, the passenger can’t say that they weren’t told what to do.  Allow God to worry about the message sinking in… you just keep telling them what they need to know!

I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. ~2 Timothy 4:1-2

Secure your mask before assisting others around you.

Even flight attendants understand that you cannot effectively help someone acquire their life source if you are not adequately connected to your own life source. It doesn’t make sense for me to secure my neighbors oxygen mask so that they can breathe well and I suffocate to death in the process. It’s the same thing with ministry leadership. It’s critically important for a ministry leader to help others secure their relationship with God. This is a matter of life and death for them, and God put you there for the expressed purpose to help them.

However, slightly more important than that persons relationship with God is your own relationship with God. You cannot be effective in shepherding others having not spent time allowing God’s Word to correct, encourage, and sharpen you. You will minister to others out of the reservoir of God first ministering to you. The more energy you exert helping others with their oxygen, the more oxygen you will need for yourself.

Be sure to set aside that time in communion with God (prayer, study of Scripture, accountability) so that you will have plenty to invest in others.

Therefore I run in such a way, as not without aim; I box in such a way, as not beating the air; but I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified. ~2 Corinthians 9:26-27

The Jehovah’s Witness that you have invited into your home is hopefully agitated by now. When they knocked on your door, they didn’t expect you to answer. When you answered the door, they didn’t expect you to invite them in. When you invited them in, they likely didn’t expect you to be so Biblically literate and historically knowledgeable. They were hoping simply for the opportunity to give you a copy of The Watchtower.

The Watchtower is the official document of the Jehovah’s Witness movement. It is a periodical that outlines the basic doctrines and interpretations of their religion. Inside the front cover, the Watchtower claims that the Bible is its authority… but demands that its followers ONLY read the Bible in light of the teachings of the Watchtower society. It seems, then, that it’s the other way around… that the Watchtower is the authority of the Bible.

They’re ready to go. As they hand you a Watchtower on the way out, I would ask them a hypothetical question… “What if the Watchtower gave an instruction that was clearly opposite what the Bible teaches? What would you do?” Hopefully by this time, you have pointed out how some of their foundational doctrines (outlined in the Watchtower document they just handed you), do not line up with what the Bible clearly teaches. I wonder what their response would be. Hopefully it will at least cause them to think about what comes first.

By this time, one of two things is going through your mind. Either you’re getting more confident in your ability to hold your own with your Jehovah’s Witness visitor, or you’re trying to think of ways to get them up from their chair and out the door. Maybe both. In attempt to end the conversation, you might slip up and say something like, “Well, all I know is that I’m going to heaven when I die!” Bad move. Your new friend also parts from Christian doctrine in regards to both Jesus’ resurrection, as well as our own.

They will claim that Christ’s resurrection was “in spirit” rather than bodily, and that Jehovah “disposed of” Jesus’ body at the resurrection. This stance is impossible to reconcile with Jesus’ prediction in John 2:18-22, and His post-resurrection interaction with his disciples in which his body was not in the tomb, he was touched by Stephen, and he ate food. After sharing these important points, I would show them 1 Corinthians 15 in their own Bible where Paul speaks of the necessity of Jesus’ resurrection to our faith. “And if Christ has not been raised,” he says, “then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain.”

Along with the resurrection of Jesus, the Jehovah’s Witnesses have different views as it regards the end times. While there are several differing viewpoints on end times within Christian circles, Jehovah’s Witnesses differ from orthodox Christianity on some of the more foundational issues.  They believe that there is no literal “Hell” (Matthew 25, Luke 16, as well as Revelation 20-21), that only 144,000 righteous people will make it to heaven (Revelation 7), and that the earth will not be destroyed by fire (Revelation 21:1-2). I encourage you to search the Scriptures healthy understanding of these Biblical passages and Christian theology. Familiarity with your Bible is your only weapon in this battle.

Being unfamiliar with your Bible will get you picked apart in this convo.

You’ve finished your breakfast, and cleared the table of everything… well, except for your houseguest. You’re talking to a Jehovah’s Witness who you have invited into your home and engaged in conversation with. While talking about Who Jesus is, they turn the focus on the conversation to how He died, claiming that he died on a “stake” rather than a cross. They will argue that the Greek word used in the Bible (stauros) is more often translated stake than cross in Greek literature. While this is true, completely reliable historical documents (both Biblical and extra-Biblical) record that Jesus died on a two-beam cross. Not to mention the historical proof of the normal Roman method of capital punishment, the fact that the earliest Christians treasured the symbol of the cross, and reports from 1^st century historians. There is little valid argument that Jesus died on a stake rather than a cross. This will likely end up yet another losing battle in discussing semantics.

What’s more important is the purpose and accomplishment of Jesus’ death & resurrection. As Christians, we believe that Jesus’ sacrifice accomplished “penal substitutionary atonement.” This means that the sins of humanity deserved punishment of death (Romans 6:23), so Jesus took that punishment on behalf of sinful humans in order to restore our relationship with the Father (2 Corinthians 5:21).  Witnesses will argue that Jesus died as a ransom for “obedient humans.” The danger of this stance is that it causes me to trust myself rather than placing my faith in the finished work of Jesus. If humans were “obedient” outside of what Jesus did on the cross, there would be no need for the cross! This is why the Witnesses are at your door on Saturday morning… because they are trying to pay for what they haven’t the capacity to pay for… what Jesus gave us freely.

This message is central to the gospel. That there is nothing that we can do to “earn” God’s favor. Romans 3 illustrates that our sinfulness makes this impossible. There is no obedience outside placing our faith in Jesus’ act of obedience. You may or may not be able to sell this your houseguest; especially since this belief is the reason they’re at your door on a Saturday morning. However, you MUST be convinced of this in your own understanding of the Bible.

So you’ve thrown on some sweats and answered the door to a couple of Jehovah’s Witnesses (If there are two, the second person is likely “in training” and won’t speak much). Don’t bother offering them any of your Frosted Flakes… they’ll refuse and begin firing scripted questions at you… challenging what you know.

Most of the time, they’ll start off with the most basic issue, God’s “proper name.” They’ll tell you that God’s name is Jehovah, and begin to show you several verses in their KJV Bible that refer to God as Jehovah. They won’t expect you to know Hebrew, so you COULD surprise them by explaining that the term they are referring to is actually “Yahweh,” not Jehovah. The Jewish scribes refused to say “Yahweh” out of reverence and rather used the generic term for God, “Adonai.” “Jehovah” is a fusion of the two terms (the consonants from Yahweh + the vowels from Adonai) that was introduced by Christian scholars in the 12th century. That will probably turn out to be a prolonged discussion of semantics, and it’s in your best interest to move on to a much more important issue… like who Jesus is.

This is the major separation point between Jehovah’s Witnesses and Christians. While we believe in a Triune God and that Jesus is co-equal to the Father, Witnesses believe Jesus is inferior to the Father… and thus, not God. They’ll say that Jesus never claimed to be God (despite John 1:1-5, 4:25-26; 10:30 and several passages from the prophets and epistles that display Christ as God), and that because he was “begotten” of the Father, that must mean he is inferior. Philippians 2 teaches us that while Jesus was the “same essence” as the Father, he humbled himself. Jesus subjugated himself to the Father for a season in order to accomplish redemption for us.

This is why Jehovah’s Witnesses are not considered Christians, despite the fact that we read the same Bible. Essential to our belief in God is WHAT we believe about God. We believe in the supremacy of a Triune God. We also believe in Jesus’ sacrifice to atone for our sinfulness. We’ll talk next about how we differ from Jehovah’s Witnesses on that issue…

You’re waking up to your “body clock” on Saturday morning… glad to have slept in today. You’re still in your pajamas, trying to determine if you feel like making a hot breakfast or just breaking open the Frosted Flakes when the doorbell rings.

Before you complete your first step toward the door, you realize… you’re not expecting company… and it’s Saturday morning… most sane people (i.e. yourself) are just waking up… except for the Jehovah’s Witnesses. At this point, you have a choice:

A.    Turn off all the lights and pretend not to be home.
B.    Go to the door and begin yelling all the Spanish words you can think of.
C.    Open the door and take the bait.

I wouldn’t be mad at you if you chose letter A. Can’t say I’ve never done it. I would caution you against letter B… because many of them are trained to speak other languages fluently. The purpose of the next few blogs is to prepare you for letter C… should you be up to the challenge.

Before you open the door, you must realize… they’re ready! They already know what they’re going to say. They already have all the verses memorized from their King James Version Bible. They are very skilled at “proof-texting.” This is when someone finds a verse and molds it to prove what they’re saying is true (normally outside of its context). If you believe the Bible (which I expect that you do), it’s hard to argue with a Bible verse that you’ve probably never considered that seems like it proves their point.

It’s important for you to be confident in what you believe, and to be able to also discuss your viewpoint from Scripture. They can smell uncertainty a mile away and will pounce on the first hint of hesitation on your part. I encourage you to be prepared, assertive, and control the conversation. Over the next couple of days, I hope to equip you with some info that will help give you that confidence.