The Ted Haggard story is heart-breaking. It’s probably over now as a news story, and didn’t get the attention it might have received had we not been consumed with midterm elections. Haggard’s contrite, honest statement to the church yesterday (with another statement from his wife to the women of the church) are wonderful examples (download statements in PDF).

A lot has been written already in the blogosphere about this. Much more will come. Here are two I found exemplary:

• Gordon MacDonald, who himself was caught in adultery 20 years ago, addresses many issues regarding this situation. This is an excellent, excellent piece of writing. He also talks about Christians in politics and the role/future of the NAE, and wonders if the NAE can (or should) recover.
• Mark Driscoll, pastor of the Seattle Mars Hill church, gives some practical suggestions to young leaders.

I highly recommend those articles, especially the one by MacDonald.

On Friday and Saturday I attended a meeting with some United Brethren church planters. A fellow named Tim Roehl, from the Evangelical Church, was brought in as the resource person. Altogether, this was a group of about ten guys who sat around in a living room setting learning and discussing. An intimate setting.

I liked Roehl. He had a lot of good stuff for the guys, and I wrote down some neat insights. Here’s one.

Roehl said church planters often go into an area thinking, “We’re gonna win this place for Christ.” But really, he said, what we’re doing is coming to be part of a team God has already assembled to reach that area–that town, that neighborhood, that city. Church planters need to start by getting acquainted with the other team members already there–the other pastors, churches, and Christian organizations working to extend the Kingdom. And then, as they become acquainted with the other pieces already in place, they can determine what their unique contribution to the team will be. What essential ministries they will develop.

I like that. A lot.

In starting Anchor in 1998, we certainly didn’t take this approach. We were one church coming to impact a neighborhood, and it all came about rapidly; a month after the core team came together, we were on the ground running full speed. But there were already churches–“partners”–ministering in that neighborhood: Wesleyan, Mennonite, Church of God, Presbyterian, others. And we properly need to view them as teammates. I guess it’s not too late.

I stopped by Tony Morgan’s blog this afternoon and saw an interview with Guy Kawasaki, the original “Apple evangelist.” I’ve read several of Guy’s books and regularly check his blog, Signal Without Noise, which mostly deals with issues related to technology, marketing, and business in general.

Here is an exchange between Tony and Guy that cracked me up.

Tony: I don’t own an Apple computer. I feel like I’m missing out. Am I?
Guy: This is like me asking you, “I don’t believe in God. Am I missing out?”

Later, Tony asked Guy what makes a good evangelist. Guy responded, “90% is having a good cause. It’s very easy to evangelize a good cause. It’s hard to evangelize crap.”

It’s easy to evangelize the Macintosh, because it is so obviously superior to anything else on the market, except to the unfortunate lemming masses. The Mac is most definitely a good–yes, noble–cause, which is why I’ve been evangelizing it since 1988, when I joined the Enlightened Minority.

Evangelizing for Christ is certainly a good cause (not to mention a requirement of disciples). If we could just point people to Christ, that would be fine. But Christ is all wrapped up in Christianity, Christians, and the church, and that muddies the cause with, uh, crap. When you talk about Christ with people, sometimes all they see is condemning attitudes, boring services, legalism, Sunday Christians who engage in office lewd jokes during the week, the Bush Administration, and Trinity Broadcasting Network idiots with big hair and makeup so thick it requires a putty knife and chisel to remove.

Here’s a quote from Kawasaki’s wonderful book Selling the Dream. “Evangelists are usually ordinary people. Their passion for a cause makes them special. Gifted people can make good evangelists, but they often fail because they concentrate on selling themselves and not the cause.”

I guess in the church we often err by selling ourselves–our church, our music, our okayness with bluejeans, our friendliness, our pastor–rather than selling Christ.

Pam and I have been listening to sermons by Pete Hise, pastor of a highly-evangelistic church in Lexington, Kent. We became aware of this church through someone we met at the ChurchMedia.net conference in June. I wrote earlier about this church, how they’ve had 1300 conversions during the past seven years. Anyway, we really enjoy Pete Hise’s messages. He’s very humorous, very informal, very engaging. He seems to have a lot of fun when he preaches.

We listened to three of his sermons a few weeks ago as we returned from vacationing in Michigan. In one message, Hise told about his annual month-long getaway…to a monastery! He eats and worships with the monks, while planning the coming year at his church–vision, sermons, etc. He mentioned one monk whom he described as the Simon Cowell of the monastery, the guy who decides whether or not a prospective monk gets in. Hise asked him, “What are some of the reasons you would not accept a person who applied to become a monk?”

The monk told about one young guy who seemed like a perfect fit for the monastic life. But before becoming a full-fledged monk, you spend several years as a novice (with a different colored robe). You see if the monastic life suits you, and other monks watch you.

As time passed, this novice kept dropping ideas about how to do things a little better. They could turn down the temperature a bit to save some money. During singing, they could bunch of a little to make it sound better. He had a number of such ideas. And when he came to the end of his novice period, he was told, “We’re sorry, but we don’t think this life is for you.”

This puzzled Pete Hise. “You mean you turned him down for offering suggestions?”

“No,” the monk told Hise. “He simply cared too much about this world.”

The monastic life is a life of denial–of possessions, of ambition, of sex. The monks live not for this world, but for the next world. That is what they set their minds on. This fellow so much wanted to improve the here-and-now. And that disqualified him. Now, you can argue why it’s not a bad thing to improve this world. But it does give something to think about.