{"id":24858,"date":"2012-01-29T15:13:16","date_gmt":"2012-01-29T21:13:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/?p=24858"},"modified":"2012-01-29T17:13:32","modified_gmt":"2012-01-29T23:13:32","slug":"pastors-time-alone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2012\/01\/29\/pastors-time-alone\/","title":{"rendered":"Pastors, Time Alone …"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

From Matt Woodley, at Out of Ur<\/a><\/strong>:<\/p>\n

How have you learned to get away? To find time alone?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I just watched the Pentecostal<\/a> preacher Jim Cymbala give an altar call and about 400 Baptist pastors came forward for prayer. Here\u2019s what happened.<\/p>\n

Cymbala told a moving story about his young grandson, an adopted child from Ethiopia named Levi. When Levi was two-years old, Cymbala loved holding him in his lap. They didn\u2019t have to do anything; they just sat together. Sometimes they rocked in a chair and watched SpongeBob Squarepants. But the point wasn\u2019t to do something with Levi; the point was to be with Levi.<\/p>\n

Cymbala used this story (and his preaching text) to make a simple point: Jesus invites us to be with him\u2013and sometimes that\u2019s the only \u201cagenda\u201d for our spiritual lives. Cymbala called it \u201csitting in his presence and listening to him.\u201d There\u2019s a big implications to this for pastoral leaders: we can\u2019t give to people what we haven\u2019t received from Jesus. So if we\u2019re not regularly listening to Jesus, just being with Jesus, receiving from Jesus, then we won\u2019t have much to give away to others.<\/p>\n

Then Cymbala invited pastors and anyone else to come forward if we need to start spending more time being with and listening to Jesus. And that\u2019s when about half of the 800 people started streaming forward. Cymbala didn\u2019t have to cajole anyone; people came quickly and willingly. Based on this experience I\u2019d conclude that evangelicals\u2013especially leaders and pastors\u2013are hungry to be with Jesus.<\/p>\n

I wonder, though, if we can actually sustain this practice\u2013this commitment to carve out time and space to be with Jesus on a regular basis\u2014in the midst of our present evangelical milieu. I\u2019ve been to two large, important evangelical conferences lately and they were very different but they had something in common: they were both stuffed with busyness, noise, and information\u2013lots of information. Both conferences had so many incredible speakers on the schedule, so many new books to read, so many products to check out, and so much noise in the worship times that we just didn\u2019t have time to be with Jesus (although we did have time to talk about being with Jesus).<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t get me wrong. I liked the content. I thought the messages were spectacular. But after awhile I felt like I need to detox from the noise and hype by checking into a Benedictine monastery for a few days? It\u2019s almost like we can\u2019t believe that God can actually do something unless we\u2019re talking about God doing something. Do we have such great faith in the power of words and information that we can\u2019t trust God to speak in our silence?<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From Matt Woodley, at Out of Ur: How have you learned to get away? To find time alone? I just watched the Pentecostal preacher Jim Cymbala give an altar call and about 400 Baptist pastors came forward for prayer. Here\u2019s what happened. Cymbala told a moving story about his young grandson, an adopted child from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1733],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24858","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prayer-and-formation"],"yoast_head":"\nPastors, Time Alone ...<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"From Matt Woodley, at Out of Ur: How have you learned to get away? To find time alone? 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