I’m going to write a lot more about this some day and I envision it will be a parable-type story I might want to create… (like a Patrick Lencioni book)
I would call it The Three Temptations of an American Pastor (I know, Lencioni wrote one very similar to this…)
The Three Temptations
- Building
- Bodies
- Bucks
I sometimes wonder how much our kingdom mindset is skewed by our devotion to these three measurements. In my experience, most people (especially pastors!) judge a church’s success based on these three temptations.
Church Success
- How big is your building?
- How many people attend on Sunday?
- How sizable are your offerings?
Of course, this doesn’t exactly match the Jesus model…
- Not only did He not have a building, He didn’t have a home.
- More people left His ministry than stuck with Him. (He eventually became so unpopular, they killed Him)
- The biggest offering His followers ever took up was the bribe Judas received for betraying Him.
Maybe instead of these temptations we should be teaching our people to be hospitable, missional, and generous?
–> These ideas are a methodological snack for us to chew on. I’d love to get your thoughts in the comments.
SERMON|GEEK 