Archive for Why Church?
Lessons from NorthwayChurch.tv, Pt.4
Posted by: | CommentsRecently, my wife, Dawn and I had the privilege of traveling to Northway Church (www.northwaychurch.tv) in Albany, NY to spend some time with Lead Pastor Buddy Cremeans and his amazing staff. I am still trying to process all that I learned from this trip, but let me try and unload some here:
3. HONOR THE PASTOR & HIS STAFF:
The Bible says that a pastor his worthy of “double honor”. Now this particular piece of Scripture is referring to “financial wages”; a pastor that works hard to deliver the teachings of the Bible is worthy of “double salary”. If this is true financially then it is most definitely true in every other area.
As a pastor it may be difficult for me to elevate this kind of teaching, but if I don’t I am being disloyal to Jesus and what He has called our church to be. Some people may not like you if you work hard to create this culture of honor toward the pastor and his staff. Like the deacon Stephen in the book of Acts “leaders must be willing to be disliked by the many in order to loyal to Jesus!”
Some pastors are scared of “appearing prideful” if they talk about these things (including me), but in all reality it is PRIDE that keeps me from being true to the biblical text in this area. It is prideful not to speak of these things because I actually think that this “teaching is about me”, when it is not. Lifting up the pastor is about Jesus, who is the GREAT SHEPHERD (or the ULTIMATE PASTOR). Jesus is the Senior Pastor, and He appointed me to be His under shepherd. When we honor the pastor, we honor Jesus and His decision to appoint shepherds over His flock.
When we honor the pastor, we are honoring Jesus, the Great Shepherd (pastor comes from the Greek word “poimen”, which literally means “shepherd”).
By honoring the pastor we are positioning the church to become all that Jesus’ dreams. God always raises up a man/woman to lead the way for His church. Honor the man that God raises up!
Just like Moses had Aaron and Hur to hold up his arms during the great battle against the Amalekites (Ex.17:12) every pastor must have an exceptional “staff” to hold him up. Just like behind every great man there is an even greater woman, behind every great leader is a team of great leaders.
Just like Moses had a staff to “lean on”, the pastor’s staff is there for him to “lean on”. (www.tdjakes.com)
Honor your pastor and his staff and God will honor you! We honor God by honoring what is honorable!
God Honors Honor, Pt.3 [guest blogger: Buddy Cremeans]
Posted by: | CommentsRecently, I had the privilege of learning from an amazing team from NorthwayChurch.tv just outside Albany, NY. Lead Pastor, Buddy Cremeans is an explosive leader, church planter, and biblical communicator. Pastor Buddy planted his church just over 6 years ago and now has close to 2,000 people gathering every Sunday.
Here is BuddyCremeans.com discussing the importance of creating a culture of honor:
Recently, I had the honor of doing the funeral ceremonies of several people that were close to me. It was difficult, however, I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. Why? Because I wanted to be the vocal box to bring honor to their lives. I wanted to highlight the difference that their lives had made to all of us.
I remember the smiles, the tears, and the laughter. I was amazed as I watched God use those services. And I’ll never forget what God impressed me with…
Honor Brings Healing.
Then God hit me up the side of the head with the obvious.
Why do we wait until someone is dead to honor them?
ALL of us know it’s the right thing to do at a funeral. Clearly, we want to make sure we communicate a heart of gratitude to the deceased regardless of their issues (btw, we all have them.)
Honor brings healing at the funeral services, but, News flash – the dead can’t hear us! They can’t receive honor. The truth is that funerals are more for the living than the dead. Why? Its makes us feel better. Now I understand that it’s part of the grieving process, but here is my question. Why wait? Why procrastinate?
Life is too short not to honor NOW!
Why not honor the people in your life now while they can still hear it?
While they can still receive it?
You may be surprised to experience…
Honor Brings Healing.
WHO do you need to honor NOW??? TODAY???
A spouse? A sibling? A parent? A child? A boss? An employee? A Pastor? A teacher? A Coach? A Mentor? Send an email, write a letter, send that text, send that tweet, make a video, be creative, be thoughtful, send a gift…do something!
Life is way too short and you will be glad you did.
Lessons from NorthwayChurch.tv, Pt.2
Posted by: | CommentsRecently, my wife, Dawn and I had the privilege of traveling to Northway Church (www.northwaychurch.tv) in Albany, NY to spend some time with Lead Pastor Buddy Cremeans and his amazing staff. I am still trying to process all that I learned from this trip, but let me try and unload some here:
HONOR
The number one thing I picked up from the culture of Northway Church was HONOR. WOW! They have created such an amazing culture of honor in their faith community. Let me try and break that down for you.
Brian Howe (the Campus Pastor at their Colonie location) truly modeled honor for us. The staff reserved front row seats during the worship experience for us, they brought us into their Green Room to help review the worship experience immediately afterwards; and then they took us out for dinner. That is called honoring your guests. I was overwhelmed with their hospitality! Thank you!
And if you give even a cup of cold water to one of the least of My followers, you will surely be rewarded.” (Mat 10:42 NLT)
1. HONOR GUESTS
I want to create a culture of honor like northwaychurch.tv. I want the guests at TheDC.tv to be treated with such amazing honor. I want guests at TheDC.tv to feel the love of God oozing through our faith community because we speak to them with honor, we treat them with honor, and we appreciate them as people made in the image of God. I want us to honor our guests by following up with them in genuine and caring ways. I want to shower our guests with honor when they visit our worship experience on Sundays.
We can show people how special they are in the eyes of God when we honor them appropriately. What better way to display the love and sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross than to honor every guest who comes to TheDC.tv to experience God!
Thank you Buddy Cremeans, Brian Howe, Kevin Murrell, Chad, Kevin, and Jeremy, and the rest of the NorthwayChurch.tv staff for showing us how to honor our guests. I am praying we can emulate the spirit of Jesus in this same way.
To be continued…
