Acts 29 North America Conference 2015 | Building Healthy Leaders
Pastor Stephen Um and Pastor Matt Chandler
All of the 2015 North America Main Session Videos are available now for viewing. And here are the previous notes posts from the 2015 Acts 29 North America Conference:
2015 Acts 29 North America Conference | Worship Sets Songs and Lyrics
2015 Acts 29 North America Conference | Building Healthy Leaders by Being an Engaged Leader and Cultivating a Culture of Rest and Renewal
2015 Acts 29 North America Conference | Building Healthy Leaders by Being an Immersed Leader and Finding Your Voice as a Preacher
And now here are Main Sessions 3 and 4 featuring
Dr. Stephen Um and Pastor Matt Chandler.
Dr. Stephen Um and Pastor Matt Chandler.
2015 Acts 29 North America Conference | Main Session 3: Being a Secure Leader with Dr. Stephen Um Video and Audio
Pastor Stephen Um
Citylife Presbyterian Church
Boston, MA
1 Corinthians
What do we value most in life?
Where do we find our identity?
This is often shaped by the culture we live and breathe in.
Honor | shame are given and often cherished in a communal culture.
Dignity | guilt are received and often cherished in an individual culture.
As we think about value and identity, we have to think about the deep struggles we have and why. And too often we want to ignore and pass blame rather than own our responsibility and need as individuals and as a community. We want control. And trying to control leads to struggle, which leads to fear, which leads to anxiety, which leads to insecurity, which leads to depression.
God has His good timing for working these issues of guilt, shame, and control out in our lives if we look to Him. But can we admire God's wisdom or do we want to be right? For example, look at how He brought His people out of Egypt. Why didn't He do it more quickly? He was forming the identity of His people through His actions for them against every rejection of them by Pharaoh.
(1) God relates to us covenantally, not commercially.
Religious people want to be made right through their obedience.
Irreligious people want to be made right through their skill and effort. However, both fear they will receive judgment, one if they fail morally, the other if they fail in their skills.
Both involve a commercial view of the world and they bleed into our view of God. For example, do you fear that God will abandon you based on your merit with what He's given you?
(2) God gives us righteousness and takes our judgment.
We desire righteousness, but we cannot earn it.
We fear judgment, but cannot avoid it.
What do you think about Jesus today?
Do you see the righteousness of God given in Him to you?
Do you see the judgment of God absorbed by Him for you?
In the ancient world, the marginalized and the criminals were not supposed to be named. But we know Bartimaeus and Barabbas by name in God's Kingdom because of what Jesus did for them. Don't let your identity rise and fall based on your morals or skills. You will fail yourself. Let your pride fall and Jesus will raise your identity up with Him.
If we are loved but not known, it's superficial.
If we are known but not loved, it's frightening.
If we are fully known and loved,
this can only be the love of God in Christ for us.
In response to His love, don't just thank God. Adore Him. Find Him beautiful, not merely useful to your thoughts or emotions, and you will be changed from a commercial view of the world to a Gospel view of life.
Irreligious people want to be made right through their skill and effort. However, both fear they will receive judgment, one if they fail morally, the other if they fail in their skills.
Both involve a commercial view of the world and they bleed into our view of God. For example, do you fear that God will abandon you based on your merit with what He's given you?
(2) God gives us righteousness and takes our judgment.
We desire righteousness, but we cannot earn it.
We fear judgment, but cannot avoid it.
What do you think about Jesus today?
Do you see the righteousness of God given in Him to you?
Do you see the judgment of God absorbed by Him for you?
In the ancient world, the marginalized and the criminals were not supposed to be named. But we know Bartimaeus and Barabbas by name in God's Kingdom because of what Jesus did for them. Don't let your identity rise and fall based on your morals or skills. You will fail yourself. Let your pride fall and Jesus will raise your identity up with Him.
If we are loved but not known, it's superficial.
If we are known but not loved, it's frightening.
If we are fully known and loved,
this can only be the love of God in Christ for us.
In response to His love, don't just thank God. Adore Him. Find Him beautiful, not merely useful to your thoughts or emotions, and you will be changed from a commercial view of the world to a Gospel view of life.
We are investing our lives in the One and only, and in His plan that will not fail. Because He lives, we live. Because He is faithful, we can faithfully follow Him to the end.
Networks don't plant churches. Churches plant churches. We want to be churches that stay grimy in where we are and who we are with, but we are to be growing in godliness along the way, which means:
We need to be serious about God's Word.
We need to be supernatural in the Holy Spirit's power.
We need to hit the floor with tears of brokenness
for our neighborhoods, towns, and cities.
We need to fight the urge to live with contentment.
We need to grow the urge for more to meet the King of glory and introduce them to Him.
And when we make new disciples and plant new churches, we need to remember that they are babies. And the reality is that babies are dirty. They fill the diaper, and often leak. They cry. They're selfish. And they don't know how to walk. We need to be grimy, remember our first love, and do the work of the mission of God. When the church in Ephesus stopped being grimy and doing the work of the mission in calling others and themselves to repentance and faith, they lost their first love (Revelation 2:4-5).
(1) We need to get smaller as networks we get bigger as a network
so we can be stronger in mission locally and globally.
(2) We need to hear, fear, and adhere to the whole counsel of God's Word.
(3) We need to pay attention to the churches God has given us to lead in our contexts; God knew what your city needed when He sent them you.
Don't belittle God. He knows what's best. He thinks that what's best for your city is Him in you there. Be perplexed when things are hard and bad, but not crushed, because God is good. God's Word should challenge you to see that you have been invited into His great family reconciliation accomplishment.
– Sully
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