“Really what we’re asking people to consider is for our churches to be places where the healing presence of Jesus is part of our felt reality.”
“Jesus has made it safe for God to know the worst things about me. And one outworking of that should be that among us as Christian disciples, church should be the place where we most feel safe to share what’s really going on in our lives.”
“We’re still very fleshly as people. The gospel is so counterintuitive.”
“So often in church, it can feel like church is where I’ve got to be ‘Christian enough.’ Which is why we find we’re sometimes hesitant to share struggles, sins, burdens, that kind of thing.”
“Jesus himself says, ‘By this will all people know you are my disciples, not by your doctrinal statement, not by the quality of your music, not by the rhetorical gifts of your pastor, but by your love for one another.’ That’s going to be one of the things that Jesus says will move the needle in terms of how the world sees us.”
“What we’ve received from Jesus vertically, we are to embody and express horizontally.”
“We need to lead by example as pastors, which means finding appropriate ways to be honest about our own continued need for progress in the Christian life.”
“If we can’t embody it ourselves as pastoral leaders, then we probably shouldn’t expect to see it in our congregation. So our unwritten rule here at Immanuel, whenever we do a Q &A as one of our meetings or there’s a time of confession, the pastor goes first. We have to lead by example in that.”
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“It’s not treating the pulpit as the confessional, but it’s how can I set the scene to make it easier for other people to share what they’re dealing with?”
“We want our churches to be places where it’s safe to confess any kind of sin. And so when it comes to an issue like same-sex attraction, we want to not be so treating that issue as if it’s a sin entirely of its own kind of category…But we do want people to know it is a sin. It’s something to be confessed.”
“I would make a distinction because I think the New Testament does between temptation and sin. And so if someone is experiencing temptation and choosing to respond in obedience to Jesus to resist that temptation, then I want to honor that.”
