Francis Chan Interview

Yesterday was an interesting day.

First, I woke up not feeling too great, only to find out I've got an ear infection and a sinus infection - but luckily its not all that bad. However, I guess its time to come clean and admit that when I get sick, I'm really whiny. I've had several girls tell me that they think all guys get really whiny when they get sick, including my fiance Ashley (who has a blog now by the way, you should check it out!)

However, I don't think that all guys are simply wimps about being sick the way girls want to make us sound. I've got a couple of theories on guys and sickness that might further explain why we become whiny. First, most of us have grown up with mothers who have taken care of us when we were sick as kids. Now that we've grown up, what's the next best substitute to a guy's mom taking care of him when he's sick? You guessed it - his wife or girlfriend!

The next theory I have for why guys are really whiny and kind of shut down for a day or two when they're sick is because we're always going and working hard. Now before I go any further, let me qualify this previous statement by saying that I'm not insinuating that women don't work hard. In fact, some of the hardest working people I know are females.

However, men tend to take on more of a role of a provider in their work. We also tend to let down our guard a lot less often. So when we get sick, its a chance to change our roles around, if only for a day. Instead of being the provider, we are being provided for. Instead of having our guard up, we let it down and allow our feelings and emotions to show a bit more.

While these theories are not completely exhaustive in explaining whininess among the male species when sick - and I'm sure there are plenty of women out there who can poke plenty of holes in these explanations - they're the best I have come up with so far. So women, take note - when a guy is sick, let him have a day or two and then things will get back to normal!

Back to my interesting day yesterday. Instead of staying home from work, I decided to suck it up and go in. I'm glad I did because not only did I get a lot of work done, but I had the opportunity to be challenged by a video that I watched and a blog that I read.

First, the video that I watch was an interview with Francis Chan. This interview is around 25 minutes long and is definitely worth checking out if you get the chance.

Next, my friend Charlie Landis wrote a great blog on the "What Ifs" of life. Essentially, it challenged me to take a look at my life and ask a lot of "what if" questions that I'm not sure I know the answer to.

In his interview, Francis Chan said something that really resonated with me. Chan said "When we do church in the corporate model we have right now...we find ourselves doing a lot of things other than discipleship and ministry." Chan reasoned that the biggest calling of Christ followers is to stay consistent with Mathew 28:19- 20 by going and making disciples. He went on to say that in ministry, in its traditional sense, there are a lot of activities that take place that are not consistent with going and making disciples. He said that he was finding that, in his life, ministry was actually beginning to mean spending less time in prayer, in the Word and in discipleship. This was something with which he was not pleased.

Now I don't work in ministry in the traditional sense of the word, but it really got me asking a lot of "What If" questions about the activities I do have to partake in as part of my work I do at the Y.  I find myself identifying with Chan in a lot of areas because, while some of the stuff I do is important, I'm finding more and more areas where I'm focusing too much energy on the wrong endeavors.

What if I spent less time trying to write life changing lessons and more time in authentic relationships with students that will change their lives?

What if I spent less time worrying and complaining about decisions our leadership makes and more time praying?

What if I spent less time reading sociology and psychology studies of youth development and more time in the Word?

What if I spent less time playing the political games that exist within our organization and more time in just being an authentic follower of Christ?

What if I had less conversations with students about going to college and more conversations about what it means to be a Christ follower?

As he said in his interview, Francis Chan noted that there's a lot of other stuff mixed into ministry that simply does not follow along with the model set forth in the Bible. Personally, I identify with him when he said that he has the desire to be liked. I find in my life, sometimes the desire to be liked in the work that I do can get in the way of doing the right thing for students. However, as Chan noted, "I don't know any popular prophets (in the Bible)."

The last contrast that Chan makes is between the church in America and the underground house churches in China. When some of Chan's friends who are pastors of underground churches in China came to the US, they made the following comparison:

In America, a lot of pastors feel they need to be famous in order to have influence and be effective.

In China, its exactly the opposite. The more influential Christians need to be more hidden and more underground. In essence, the more they are making disciples, the less famous they become.

However, I'm not sure this comparison is limited to just pastors in the US, but possibly Christ followers in all walks of life. In a lot of ways, many people place the desire to be known for something as a prerequisite to their contributions in following Christ. I know I find this tendency in myself more often than I'd like to admit. However, in His calling to us to take up our crosses and follow Him, Jesus is asking us to die to ourselves in order to bring more recognition to Him. Essentially, the less we are known, the more He becomes known.

This leads me to my final "What If" questions. What if I set all of my dreams, desires to be liked, need to be known and everything else aside? What if I gave everything I am to everything that Christ is? What if I allowed God to use me in every capacity that he originally intended to use me?