Nate and Tara Ariel left town last fall. They packed as much as the airlines allow, boarded a plane with their seven children, and moved to Bocachica. That’s an island off the coast of Cartagena, a beautiful port city in Colombia, South America. The Ariels don’t live in the beautiful port city; they live on an island that is a 30-minute boat ride off the coast. There’s no running water on the island, so bucket showers are the order of the day. Drinking water for non-natives, like the Ariels, has to be brought by boat from the mainland. There is electricity there. Sometimes. Most of the houses have dirt floors and no bathrooms. That’s why the early morning trek to “the hill” is necessary. You either do your business behind the hill or out in the ocean. One of the main reasons missionaries come to the Proyecto Libertad mission is to build latrines and pour concrete floors for as many as they can. The Ariel family went to Bocachica to serve the Lord for the rest of their lives. It’s just been a few months, but the impact one family has had there is astounding.
Their children already have dozens of friends. Spanish is quickly becoming their second language, with love being their first. Besides playing soccer and kickball with the children, they chase iguanas, work hard at serving the mission, and keep visiting missionaries entertained with their giggles and pranks.
Tara picked up right where she left off, already earning a reputation on the island as a woman who loves her husband and is ready to help him accomplish his calling. She loves to bake and has won the hearts of many Bocachican ladies with her sweet gifts. Tara is also an encourager of the young ladies who come from Germany to serve in the mission.
Nate was known around Burlington as a hard worker and a straight shooter. You didn’t ask Nate what he thought unless you wanted to hear the truth. He also made no empty promises; he simply delivered. In the Bocachica community, Nate has risen quickly to earn the respect of the men, especially the day laborers. They admire his skill; Nate can do nearly anything with his hands, especially if he is working with brick or block. They also appreciate his acceptance: Nate could not care less about skin color or socioeconomic status. He just wants to know if you are willing to work hard and if you are teachable. Those qualities are rare everywhere, and Bocachica is no exception. Jobs are hard to come by on the island, so men who have a good work ethic have found a friend and an employer in Nate Ariel.
Not only that, Nate is teaching the men how to be good fathers. One of his employees sells ice cream on the island when he is not working with Nate. Nate said to him recently, “Why don’t you take your son with you, and let him help you in your business?” That thought had never occurred to the man, nor to anyone else on the island. Relationships between fathers and sons are strained there with much neglect and sometimes abusive. This man took Nate’s advice and found a working partner and a friend in his son that he never knew he could have.
Jesus said, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations.” How do you do that? One child at a time. One wife and mother at a time. One husband and father at a time. The Ariels are discipling a nation. How about you?
Archive for February, 2012
The greatest struggle of the average pastor in America is with discouragement and sometimes flat-out depression. The source of his discouragement may be the stress of the ministry and the absence of elders who are walking with him in it. Or the feeling that he is not equipped to take care of a flock. Or that he or his wife or children are struggling with their own sins that they believe they have to keep hidden in order to maintain the facade of a “nearly perfect family.” Or the source may be financial stress.
Alistair Begg gave a talk at a pastors’ conference years ago entitled, “Dealing With the Blues.” His subject was ministerial depression, and the auditorium was packed with discouraged pastors and elders. After the session, elders from one church asked to talk with Alistair in private. “Our problem is not with the pastor, but his wife,” they said. “She is deeply depressed and we have tried everything, but nothing has helped. What should we do?” Pastor Begg said, “Increase your pastor’s annual salary by $5,000.” The elders were shocked and had no response. Later, one of the members of the church who had heard about this conversation found Alistair and said, “You don’t know how right on target you were. Our pastor’s wife has never been able to buy new shoes for her children, and the elders wear it as a badge of honor that the pastor’s family has to scrape together pennies to make ends meet. They believe they are helping them trust God. They think they are helping the pastor never to become a lover of money by making sure he doesn’t have any money to love.”
I heard about another pastor who was thrilled when a couple of families in his country church started giving him milk and eggs every week. Until he found out that the cost of the gifts was being deducted from his salary.
Paul addressed this issue of remuneration for pastors a number of times. He said to the church in Corinth, “If we have sown spiritual things for you, is it a great thing if we reap your material things?” To the church in Galatia, Paul wrote, “Let him who is taught the word share in all good things with him who teaches.”
Part of the problem is disobedience to the Scriptures with regard to providing for pastors. But there is a deeper problem with disobedience to the Word with regard to giving to the church. The average church in America operates on a 10/90 basis. Ten percent of the people give 90 percent of the money so the church can operate, the pastor and the elders can feed and equip the people (100 percent of them), the lights can stay on, and the missionaries can do their work. Let me ask you something: What percentage of people in churches in America make the payment on their car, which provides them with physical transportation, in the same way they give to the church, which provides them with spiritual nourishment and development? I would guess that most do not.
The few who do pay their bills that way end up losing their cars or their homes. Now, if we pay our bills 100 percent of the time because we feel an obligation to do so and we want to continue to enjoy the material things that those bills represent, how much more should we cheerfully give to the church where we are fed spiritual truth?
Does your pastor or his wife have the blues?
Who says the Bible does not help us deal with every issue of life? Those who deny this truth simply have not read the Bible themselves or have rejected the book, hoping this will somehow make them less accountable to it and its Author.
The Bible speaks clearly on the question “Who is to care for widows?” which is a practical concern for every generation in every place. The widow has always been one of the most vulnerable in society. It may be true that the American widow has the safety net of the government and its programs to help provide for her, and it is certainly true that the American widow has more disposable income than nearly all of her global counterparts. That doesn’t change the truth of Scripture, however, which clearly lays the responsibility for widows at the feet of the family, first, and then the church.
The family is responsible to care for its own widows. It is the children and grandchildren who are to provide for their elderly relatives, not the government. This was so ingrained in the cultures of the first century that Greek law demanded that sons and daughters were not only morally, but also legally, bound to support their parents. Aristotle had written three centuries before, “Anyone who refused that duty lost his civil rights.” He said, “It is more honorable to help the authors of our being, even before ourselves.” William Barclay writes, “As Aristotle saw it, a man must himself starve before he would see his parents starve.” Maybe this helps us understand why the Apostle Paul would say that anyone who does not provide for his own “has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” Even the pagans took care of their parents in their old age.
It is interesting to me that when Jesus is confronted by a weeping widow who has lost her only son in Nain, he did not simply comfort her and then tell the government or the local gathering of believers to take care of this lady. Instead, Jesus raised her dead son to life. He “awoke” the one who could care for his widowed mother. Jesus stopped the funeral procession and said, “Young man, I say to you, arise.” May I suggest that is what needs to happen in families all across our land that are dead to their responsibility to care for their aging parents and grandparents? They need to be resurrected, brought back to life, have their eyes opened to see their charge to care for the “authors of their being.” What if our parents provide for themselves financially, like many in this generation have done? We still must honor them by keeping in touch and caring for them emotionally.
When does the church step in, then? The Bible teaches us that the church provides for “widows indeed,” those who have been left all alone, without family or financial provision from any other source. They also must be “godly widows,” those who trust in God alone. The widow who lives for pleasure and “is dead while she lives,” Paul says, is not the responsibility of the church. Paul suggests that this widow be left to her sin in hopes that she will repent.
The Bible speaks to every issue of life, including the question of who cares for widows. The family and the church that follow this clear instruction will be blessed. So will a nation that is racing headlong toward involuntary euthanasia and other “final solutions” for the elderly. May God help us.
So, you want to be a leader? There’s no better leadership checkup than what Paul wrote to Timothy: “Let no one despise your youth, but be an example to the believers in word, in conduct, in love, in spirit, in faith, in purity.” Leadership is not a function of age or ability, according to the Scriptures, but a function of character. You want to be a leader? Don’t tell me about your SAT score or your internships or the offices you have held and the influence you have wielded. Tell me about your character. Better yet, show it to me. Be an example.
In your speech. Remember, Paul is writing this letter to a young pastor, a man who speaks every day as part of his job. I feel Timothy’s pain, and yours as well, if you are one of those who only opens his mouth to switch feet. Those who lead must be good examples with their tongues, whether they are running for office, leading a church or business, or doing anything else that puts them out front.
In your conduct. You can fool some of the people some of the time, Lincoln famously said. That’s true with speech. But your conduct, how you behave, will eventually show who you really are. Good leaders don’t say one thing in public and do the opposite in private. Not if they want to be useful to God and man.
In your love. It is possible to say all the right things and do all the right things … for the wrong reason. That’s why the Bible teaches that even if I give all my goods to feed the poor and my body to be burned as a martyr, but I do it to somehow win favor with God, not because I love God and mankind, “I am nothing.” Sobering words those who lead must heed.
In your spirit. This word in Paul’s instruction may refer to the Holy Spirit or to man’s spirit, or even to the way we say someone “has a good spirit about him,” a genuine fellow. I consider those three intertwined like a threefold cord.
In faith. This is the missing ingredient for many leaders whose hope and confidence is in their own intellect or ability. Chris runs a family conference center in New Hampshire. Once, someone gave them a few packages of English muffins, and with 11 children in the family, they disappeared quickly. One child complained, saying she wished they had more. So, Chris said to his children, “The muffins came from God, right? Let’s stop right now and ask the Lord for English muffins.” They stopped the meal and prayed. Within a week, a miracle occurred: Six hundred packages of English muffins arrived at their door. “We gave them away,” Chris said. The English muffins really started pouring in then; some weeks there were 1,200 packages delivered. Chris said, “It was great to see God provide for us so we could share with others. We have to have the God-factor with our finances.”
In purity. Paul started with the tongue, and ended with the thought life and the heart motives. The sins of lust, greed, and pride are much harder to see, and we can become masters at keeping them covered up. That’s why we each need people who are willing to ask us the hard questions so we cannot hide in the darkness. How many “good leaders” have been derailed by their hidden sins brought into the light?
You want to be a leader? Do a check-up with these truths from God’s Word.
