Michael's Notes - Thoughts On Worship, Leadership & Fitness

Sabbatical from Leadership: history of radical church leadership

On June 4 my family and I landed in Newark, New Jersey from whirlwind tour of England and Scotland.  The focus of the trip was church history, but it really was a history of men being radical followers of Christ who lead others to do the same.

The trip was billed and outlined to give an overview of the formations of the Baptist church. Yes there were the visits to the large cathedrals, but that was not the most thrilling part. The best part was being reminded that the motivation behind the beginnings of the Baptist movement was men wanting to be radical followers of Jesus Christ. “Surrendering to a call to be radical followers of Jesus Christ.” For these men it was all about making their relationship with God personal and not ritual. Their desire for this type of relationship was contagious and their challenge to others to do the same started a movement.

Our worship and walk with Christ is personal and when we follow Christ we are often seen as radical.

The challenge for me is to remember that church can easily slip into ritual when we make it about the ‘church’ and not about God and a relationship with Him. ‘Church’ can easily be transformed into programs that become sacred instead of the sacred being the ‘awe’ of God. ‘Church’ can easily be consumed by honoring the buildings of honoring God in the buildings.

The guard against ritual in processes or pride in things is to remember the mission: ‘glorifying God and making radical disciples.’

Sabbatical from Leadership: England & Scotland

For the last eleven years I have had the privilege of serving and leading as Worship Pastor at ClearView Baptist Church Franklin, Tennessee. And I guess they want me to stay around for a while, because this summer they have allowed me to take a seven week sabbatical to refresh, renew and relax.  This sabbatical is a welcomed blessing, however, I must say it has been very difficult to disconnect. I am working on that and will probably have it down just about the time the sabbatical comes to an end.

The sabbatical is divided into two sections: study and relaxation.  For the relaxation part we have planned some family trips and down time around our house. The study part has and continues to proceed down two paths. The first comes in the form of studying leaders and their actions of leadership. The main avenue of this study is personal interviews with leaders of non-profit and for-profit organizations. To date I have conducted 10 interviews with more to come.  I plan to post more info about these interviews at a later date.

The second part of study came as my family and I got to experience portions of England and Scotland.

In some ways it seems like months ago that my family and I made a trip to England and Scotland. The reality is just a few days ago. It began roughly as we were delayed in our departure by weather and missed an overnight flight to London. However, the trip was something we will look to as a ‘marker’ in our family, something we will remember and talk about for years to come.

The trip was title: Our Christian and Baptist Heritage. During our travels we visited typical tourist locations with stops at the Oxford and Cambridge Universities and the home of  C.S. Lewis. Throughout the trip there were stops at locations of significance to ‘dissenters’ (persons who dissented against the Church of England) that lead to the formation of the Baptist, Presbyterian, Methodist and other protestant traditions.  The trip was lead by Dr. David Dockery, President of Union University and Dr. Timothy George, Dean of Beeson Divinity School and Samford University. Before each stop we were given a history lesson about the persons and events that related to each site. Places we visited were related to such noted figures as: John Bunyan, John Knox, William Carey, John Wesley and Charles Spurgeon.

The sites were amazing but what will stick with us more is the desire of the men just mentioned to be a follower of Christ and that they were willing to do so at all cost.