This week, though, I read a quote from Dallas Willard in his book The Spirit of the Disciplines that grabbed my attention. In speaking about some main disciplines for spiritual life Willard writes about the discipline of secrecy:

Secrecy rightly practiced enables us to place our public relations department entirely in the hands of God… …We allow Him to decide when our deeds will be known and when our light will be noticed.

WOW! Conviction. In this age when it is perhaps easier than ever to blog every victory, retweet each complement, and carefully craft our public images, it’s important to consider the questionDr. Willard’s point begs:

Am I confident with God running my PR, or do I feel the constant need to help Him out?

“When seminaries stress academic training in lieu of spiritual formation, the position of the pastor becomes a profession… and not a calling.”

- Roger Finke (professor, Pennsylvania State University)

Now these are the nations that the Lord left, to test Israel by them, that is, all in Israel who had not experienced all the wars in Canaan. It was only in order that the generations of the people of Israel might know war, to teach war to those who had not known it before.

(Judges 3:1, 2 ESV)

When Israel entered Canaan, God immediately gave them victory over armies and nations that were much larger and much more powerful than them. It was undeniable that God was with them, and the people all knew it. But He did not allow them to go to war against every nation; He allowed some battles to remain unfought… In Judges 3 we find out why.

God’s purpose behind allowing some of their enemies to remain, we learn, was specifically so that the generation who hadn’t crossed the Jordan or seen God’s provision in the desert, would have to fight some battles of their own. God knew that this generation also needed their own war stories.

God knew it would not be enough for them to only hear about how God had provided for and mightily used their fathers and grandfathers. He knew they needed their own, first-hand experience. They needed their own stories.

I’m thankful that the generations before mine left some battles for us to fight. It’s often through facing these kinds of impossible situations that faith and character are forged.

I needed to also be okay knowing that God is not going to allow me & my generation to fight every battle. He’s not going allow us to solve every problem.

There has to be some battles for the next generation to fight.

I was looking back over some notes I took last year at the C3 Conference in Grapevine, Texas, and found some pretty cool stuff I’d forgotten about.  The notes below came from a Q&A session where Pastor Judah Smith was asked about how he goes about preparing to speak to a group of people.

Here are Pastor Judah’s 8 steps to delivering a message:

1. Greeting: Honor the audience, make a good first impression.
2. Read the Bible: Pastor Judah reads the bible story word for word to the crowd. He says no matter who is there or how the message is received, at least the Word was proclaimed. His dad taught him to do that.
3. Pray: Bless the service, and to announce that he is being used by God.
4. Introduction: Capture the audience with a story, or ask a question “have you ever?” Bring the audience with you on the journey.
5. Illustration: Tell the bible story creatively with passion. Infuse your Holy Spirit inspired ideas into the story.
6. Transition text: Connect the dots. Connect your illustrations to the word.
7. Conclusion: Tie in the introduction and main point of the message.
8. Call the people to something.

These, of course, were given spontaneously and as suggestions, but I found them to be very useful.  If you’re a pastor, teacher, or occasionally talk to groups of people, maybe you will too.

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