The Tortoise and The Hare

You know the story. Hare brags. Tortoise challenges. Crowds gather. Hare becomes bored and distracted. Tortoise wins!

We had our annual business meeting last night and I shared a few thoughts about getting where we want to go and being what we want to be as a church. We have a great church, with a lot of great people, and we do a lot of things right. That's the easy part. The hard part is examining what's not so great about Englewood.

Exams (educational, spiritual, and esp. physical!) are no fun. Read this: This Church Is Not Perfect. Most pastors do not like admitting shortcomings about themselves or their churches. But, in order to be what God has called us to be, we have to re-examine the way we do ministry both inside and outside our walls. This is necessary to moving forward.

Ahhh...moving forward. Is it me, or does it seem like some things just take a long time at Englewood? It's easy for me to get frustrated with myself, God, finances, people, facilities, etc. All of these things faced day after day can bog me down. I want things to happen yesterday. I encouraged those at the meeting to stick with us, keep pressing on, get in the game and make a difference in areas that need enhancing.

Remember a few weeks ago I preached a series of messages around finding your call and place. In that series, I said that many times the very thing God is calling us to starts when we become frustrated or burdened for an area or a group of people. Maybe what we are needing as a church to enable us to move forward is found in your area of "Holy Discontent."

A good friend sent me a great encouraging and wise e-mail relating to my frustrations. In summary, they said, "Pastor don't get frustrated. Direction is more important than speed." Whoa. That spoke to me. If we can just keep moving in the right direction, then we'll be in the right place when God's timing kicks in. We've got to reign in our frustrations from getting ahead of God.

It's the Tortoise and The Hare principle: "Don't brag about your lightning pace, for Slow and Steady won the race."