Finding Your Slot

Recently I made the extremely difficult decision to withdraw from the music ministry at Grace Church Roseville.

The Mattson brothers started with
music early in life.
That's me posing with the trumpet.

I've been in music non-stop since childhood. Were my late father, Donn Mattson, still around, he might be disappointed.

Why did I do it?

Ten reasons. I'll name one. Perhaps you will find this instructive for your own ministry life:

Ability: I do fine as a weekend guitarist, but nothing extraordinary. Rather, my main abilities lie in teaching.

So I've moved into the teaching ministry at GCR, and it seems to suite me. It is, as they say, a "good fit."

What's your main thing? For what has God gifted you?

Serve there, if you can. Find your sweet spot. If everyone did, many problems in the local church would be eliminated.

Quality would go up. Burn-out would go down.

And satisfaction would go way up -- both for the servant and the served.

* * * * *

Next week: barriers to landing in your sweet spot.

P.S.: Our fine music minister, Will Lopes, still allows me to join the band on occasion. I trust my dad is watching.

Elevator Apologetics last post: Miracles

I'm writing a book on apologetics.

It's a book that offers to lay people (and professionals) images and illustrations for use in everyday conversations. No special training required.

This current series of blog posts is taken from the book.

A publisher has a proposal from me in its que, at present.

A final image, then, in this series:  Miracles are like a hole in one.

Atheists often invoke Enlightenment philosopher David Hume's argument against miracles: that their probability is so low that they are virtually impossible.

Much more likely than the occurrence of actual miracles are false reports of miracles due to human error, wishful thinking or fabrication.

So let's say that Joe is an ardent skeptic of God and of miracles, and his nine-year old daughter Ashley comes home after her very first round of golf and reports making an ace on a difficult 175 yard hole.

Ashley is sincere, earnest and joyful. She even praises God for her good fortune.

Lisa, the neighbor girl next store, corroborates the story.

What is Joe to believe?

You see, the trouble with the Humean dismissal of miracles is that if a real one came along, it would be missed.

Poor Joe misses a milestone moment of triumph with Ashley. He smiles and nods and encourages her like any good father would. But in his heart of hearts he does not believe her.

I've never had a hole in one. With my luck, my
own daughter Kelli (pictured left) will get one first!

Elevator Apologetics part 9: An Empty Pub

When I'm on the road visiting college campuses, students often ask me about hell.

Some say they'd rather live in hell than sit around in heaven, suffering the torture of perpetual, saintly dull.

In response, I've been offering up this image: 

Hell is like an empty pub. 

The promise of partying with one's friends in hell evaporates in the illusions of godless living. 

Maybe the self-made (or spiritually lazy) person thinks they've beat the system -- that hell, which is the maximal extension of life without God, is a great alternative to godly living (and dying).

Surprise.

In hell, the Author of true community is no longer available to provide the gifts of love and friendship. 

Rather hell-dwellers sit in empty pubs, drinking alone, addicted to the liquors of autonomy, independence and sloth that defined their earthly lives.

Hell is probably more than this, as several passages in Matthew and elsewhere seem to indicate. But it is not less. It is not less than the "absence of God." 

So when you need a quick image to use in an apologetics conversation, the empty pub is a good place to start. 

Of course, depending on your theology, you can always lay down another image for hell that has endured for ages:

A lake of fire. 

Now that's memorable.