Page 3110 – Christianity Today (2025)

Relations between the Muslim world and the West dominate the international news. The events of 9/11, ongoing war in Iraq, developments in Afghanistan, the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, the Danish cartoon crisis, Pope Benedict's remarks on Islam, countless other lower-profile events—all reflect the fact that Muslim-Christian and Muslim-Western relations stand among the defining issues of our age. This situation compels serious followers of Jesus to consider precisely what Christ is calling us to concerning our Muslim neighbors—and our Muslim enemies.

Christians today are not the first to face this challenge. Since the sudden emergence of a vigorous and growing Muslim community in the Arabian Peninsula in the early seventh century, Christians and Muslims have been forced to negotiate the realities of face-to-face interactions in everyday life, in political relations between Christian and Muslim nations, and in all-too-common violent conflicts.

Unfortunately, violence has shaped Muslims' and Christians' views of each other and generated shame and anger on both sides. Marching under the banner of the cross, medieval Crusaders slaughtered thousands of Muslims, justifying their behavior in part as a response to Islamic aggression against Christians in the East. During the 14th and 15th centuries, Mongol warlord Tamerlane and his armies left great heaps of skulls across Asia as a symbol of their grisly ventures in the cause of holy war. More recently, European colonial powers have pilfered Muslim lands and subjugated their peoples in Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and beyond. And today, murmurings of an impending "clash of civilizations" mingle with the din of violent confrontations involving Muslims and Christians on several continents.

While these painful realities must be reckoned with, there are brighter points in our shared history as well. Among the many past Christians who engaged Muslims in more constructive ways, three stand out: Christian apologist John of Damascus, Nestorian Patriarch Timothy I, and Protestant missionary to Arabia, Samuel Zwemer. These three men inhabited different times and places and had different callings, but they display to varying degrees certain critical features of constructive Christian-Muslim engagement: a commitment to Christian orthodoxy, to intentional, non-violent engagement of Muslims, and to the respectful accommodation of their words and deeds to Muslim experience.

John of Damascus: Defender of Orthodoxy

Born to a prominent Arab Christian family in 655, John of Damascus (Yahya al-Dimashqi in Arabic) spent the first years of his career as the chief financial officer to the Muslim caliph Abd al-Malik. He was later elevated to the position of chief councilor of Damascus. John was well educated, gifted in rhetorical skills, and fluent in Arabic, Syriac, and Greek. With his thoroughly multicultural upbringing he undoubtedly moved among Syriac-speaking Christians, Arabic-speaking Muslims, and other local groups with ease.

John was apparently not always in favor with his Muslim employers or with the broader Christian community. He found himself on the wrong side of an increasingly acrimonious political and theological divide when he challenged the iconoclastic edicts of Byzantine Emperor Leo III, defending instead the role of images in Christian worship.

Leo III retaliated by sabotaging John's reputation among his Muslim patrons: He arranged for someone to forge a letter in John's handwriting offering to deliver the city of Damascus into Byzantine hands. John left the service of the caliph and spent the remainder of his life in the monastery of St. Sabas, less than 20 miles from Jerusalem.

At St. Sabas, John devoted his time to anti-heretical writing. Given his firsthand knowledge of Islam, it is not surprising that he turned his attention to defending the Christian faith against Muslim teaching, which he considered to be a kind of Christian heresy. His polemical work for Christians, "Against the Ishmaelite Heresy," was, in keeping with the genre, intentionally derogatory in tone—a sort of "anti-creed" that explained, "This is what we do not believe, and here's why … "

John's familiarity with Islam is evident throughout the work; he cites numerous details of Muslim faith and practice and quotes ten different Qur'anic verses. But his tone is not conciliatory, and he makes statements such as "Mohammed wrote many ridiculous books" and "Mohammed said: 'Oh by the way, God has commanded me to take your wife'"—clearly not an approach that promotes constructive engagement with Muslims.

But John was a product of his times, and he reflects a noble, if not always nuanced, commitment to Christian orthodoxy. His words represent the first substantive Christian engagement with the Muslim community in writing. In both good and bad ways, he set the tone for future Christian-Muslim interactions.

Patriarch Timothy I: Respectful Debater

Like John of Damascus, Patriarch Timothy I grew up as a Christian under Muslim rule. Born 50 years after John and 500 miles from Damascus, he came of age under the second great Muslim dynasty, the Abbasids of Baghdad. Timothy succeeded his uncle as bishop of the Assyrian Church, sometimes referred to as the Nestorian Church. In this role, he oversaw churches and missionaries as far away as China. (The rest of Christendom considered the Assyrian Christians heretical at that time, though this may have had more to do with politics than theology.)

As a Syriac-speaking Christian leader educated in the Greek classics and living among Arab Muslims, Timothy was ideally situated to be a bridge between the cultures and ideas of the classical West, the Assyrian Church, and the Muslim community. He developed the intellectual and diplomatic skills that would later distinguish him as the most nuanced of the early Christian leaders in his interactions with Muslims.

In 781, Timothy participated in a celebrated debate with the third Abbasid caliph, al-Mahdi. Given the respectful tone of both men, it is perhaps more appropriate to call the exchange a dialogue. Timothy's words are a model of how to maintain Christian orthodoxy while accommodating the message to Muslim perspectives and experiences.

Timothy later wrote of their exchange: "After I had paid to him my usual respects as King of Kings [the appropriate title of address to the caliph at the time] he began to address me and converse with me not in a harsh and haughty tone, since harshness and haughtiness are remote from his soul, but in a sweet and benevolent way." The caliph inquired about the Trinity, "If He is one, He is not three; and if He is three, He is not one; what is this contradiction?"

Speaking of the king as "his exalted Majesty," and addressing him with affection and respect, Timothy replied: "The sun is also one, O our victorious King, in its spheric globe, its light and its heat, and the very same sun is also three, one sun in three powers. In the same way the soul has the powers of reason and intelligence, and the very same soul is one in one thing and three in another thing. In the same way also a piece of three gold denarii, is called one and three, one in its gold that is to say in its nature, and three in its persons that is to say in the number of denarii. The fact that the above objects are one does not contradict and annul the other fact—that they are also three, and the fact that they are three does not contradict and annul the fact that they are also one."

The dialogue, in the form of a question and answer session between the caliph and Timothy, extended over two days and covered a broad range of practical and theological concerns. The conversation was always cordial, as seen in their closing remarks: "And our victorious King said: 'We have hope in God that we are the possessors of this pearl (the pearl of true faith), and that we hold it in our hands.' —And I replied: 'Amen, O King. But may God grant us that we too may share it with you, and rejoice in the shining and beaming lustre of the pearl! God has placed the pearl of His faith before all of us like the shining rays of the sun, and every one who wishes can enjoy the light of the sun.'"

More than 1200 years after his famous discussions with Caliph al-Mahdi, Patriarch Timothy I still stands as a shining example of a man deeply committed not only to Christian orthodoxy, but also to reflecting the mercy of his Lord in the way he related to the Muslims among whom he lived.

Samuel Zwemer: Apostle to Islam

In 1867, nearly 1100 years after Timothy's dialogue with Caliph al-Mahdi, Samuel Marinus Zwemer was born in the small Dutch community of Vriesland, Michigan. Sensing a call to Christian mission during his studies at Hope College, Samuel was swept up by the momentum of the Student Volunteer Movement. He continued his theological education at a Reformed seminary and went on to receive practical medical training under a physician in New York. After deciding with a classmate to "get something definite underway," Samuel departed for Arabia in June 1890. The motto of his new Arabian Mission was Abraham's prayer for his son in Genesis 17:18: "Oh, that Ishmael might live before thee."

His kingdom is without frontiers. —Samuel Zwemer

Little did he know then that this prayer would absorb the rest of his life—nearly 62 years. Zwemer saw his life's work not as a struggle "against the Ishmaelites" (a term often used in the past to refer to the Muslim community), but as a struggle for them. Like Patriarch Timothy I, Zwemer viewed his call to engage Muslims not as an adversarial enterprise, but as an undertaking whose goal was to secure the blessings of God upon Muslims wherever they may be found.

Zwemer's approach focused on language, literature, and scholarship. Taught early on that "the learning of Arabic is a seven-day-a-week job," Zwemer devoted himself to the task, and he was later called upon to lecture and preach not only in his native English and Dutch, but also in the language of the Muslims to whom he was called. He founded the respected journal The Muslim World (still published today), wrote and distributed numerous books and articles aimed at bridging gaps of understanding between Christians and Muslims, and labored tirelessly to mobilize a generation of Christians to engage Muslims peacefully.

Living and traveling throughout the Arabian Peninsula and the entire Muslim world for decades, often under the worst of circumstances, Zwemer modeled the qualities of persistence and personal sacrifice (he buried three of his children in Arabia) that led eminent historian Kenneth Scott Latourette to state, "No one through all the centuries of Christian mission to Muslims has deserved better than Dr. Zwemer the designation of Apostle to Islam."

Though Samuel Zwemer was separated from John of Damascus and Timothy I by more than a millennium, he shared with them a deep commitment to orthodoxy and to intentional, peaceful engagement with Muslims. All three men possessed the cultural and linguistic skills as well as the willingness to engage in intelligent dialogue with Muslims. In the case of John and Timothy, these Muslims were their immediate neighbors; in the case of Zwemer, they lived on the other side of the world. Timothy and Zwemer accommodated their unwaveringly orthodox message to Muslims in ways that were both relevant and respectful, and their example calls us to do the same as we engage Muslims today in our own and distant lands.

Andrew Saperstein is associate director of the Reconciliation Program at Yale Divinity School's Center for Faith and Culture.

Copyright © 2007 by the author or Christianity Today/Christian History & Biography magazine.Click here for reprint information on Christian History & Biography.

In 1977, Festo Kivengere, an Anglican bishop from Uganda, published a short book entitled I Love Idi Amin. Amin was the African dictator routinely referred to as Africa’s Hitler. Huge, hulking, alternating between charming buffoon and nightmarish thug, Amin murdered hundreds of thousands of his fellow citizens. In February 1977, he arrested and killed Anglican Archbishop Janani Luwum, simply because the Anglican bishops had dared to speak up against illegal executions.

Kivengere was one of the last people to see Luwum alive. He waited outside the building where Luwum was interrogated until guards forced him to leave at gunpoint. Expecting arrest, Kivengere escaped Uganda on foot. Within the year he had published his book.

A living church cannot be destroyed by fire or by guns.

I love Idi Amin? It was almost a reckless statement—as though, to put it in contemporary terms, someone standing in the smoke from the Twin Towers erected a sign saying, “I love Osama.”

“The Holy Spirit showed me,” Kivengere wrote, “that I was getting hard in my spirit, and that my hardness and bitterness toward those who were persecuting us could only bring spiritual loss … So I had to ask for forgiveness from the Lord, and for grace to love President Amin more.”

Kivengere’s testimony goes beyond extraordinary forgiveness. He was an evangelist, sometimes called “the African Billy Graham.” His book details outbreaks of revival as, in the same year as Amin’s terror, Ugandans celebrate the 100th anniversary of the first missionaries’ bringing the gospel. Imprisoned church leaders sing and share their testimonies. People come to Christ in vast rallies. Groups of lay people go from one diocese to another to share the gospel. Catholic and Protestant clergy, long estranged, unite to celebrate together. And all the time, terror reigns and many Christians are murdered. “I knew many homes where the family was living in supernatural peace, in spite of the fact that when the husband and father left home in the morning, they had no idea whether he would return that day or not.” “A living church,” Kivengere wrote, “cannot be destroyed by fire or by guns.”

That statement echoes Augustine of Hippo. In The City of God, Augustine described two kingdoms, one temporal and one eternal. The eternal city of God could not be destroyed by invading barbarians, Augustine claimed, for its foundation was the faithful love of God. How should Christians respond to terrorism? To love your enemy and forgive him even as he crucifies you is the essence of the eternal city, as seen through Jesus’ cross.

Kivengere did not pluck such a response from thin air. Ugandans knew their history. In 1885 a new king began to target Christians. His first victims were three of his court pages, ages 11 to 15, who resisted his homosexual advances due to their faith. Offered the opportunity of recanting, they refused and were burned alive in a public execution. Just before their deaths they sent a message to the king: “Tell His Majesty that he has put our bodies in the fire, but we won’t be long in the fire. Soon we shall be with Jesus, which is much better. But ask him to repent and change his mind, or he will land in a place of eternal fire and desolation.”

Stories like that were famous among Ugandan Christians. So Idi Amin was a familiar type to them. They knew about monsters and how Christians were to respond. Thus, “I love Idi Amin.”

Kivengere survived Idi Amin’s reign, and after Amin’s ouster was able to return to Uganda for years of fruitful ministry. He died of cancer in 1988.

Tim Stafford is a senior writer for Christianity Today. His latest book is Surprised by Jesus.

Copyright © 2007 by the author or Christianity Today/Christian History & Biography magazine.Click here for reprint information on Christian History & Biography.

Sounds like … rootsy reggae with elements of pop, dancehall, and jazz incorporated throughout to give it a modern flair.

At a glance … while devout reggae fans might balk at Christafari’s modern, multi-faceted approach, Christafari crafts enjoyable songs that uniquely and boldly proclaim their Christ-centered message.

Though it’s probably not exactly what pioneers of reggae had in mind when they first crafted their laidback, peace-oriented grooves years ago, the genre has experienced a revival (at least in part) thanks to Top 40 radio singles from the likes of Shaggy, Black Eyed Peas, and Gwen Stefani. But back in the early ’90s, long before those acts were household names, Christafari was on the scene, making reggae accessible to the masses by combining their bass-heavy sounds with pop, dance, and even some jazz. The fact that their artistry stems from purposeful ministry to Caribbean audiences is all the more impressive, considering that Mark Mohr and company do it so well.

Following in the tradition of previous outings, the songs on To The Foundation are as eclectic as ever, serving up just enough reggae to be labeled as such without alienating fans of pop music in the process. While a little more rootsy than more slickly produced counterparts, To the Foundation kicks the celebration off in fine fashion with the joyful opener “Freedom Step,” driven by a gorgeous array of horns and a melody with that timeless Bob Marley quality, yet all delivered with a decidedly redemptive spin.

And the fun’s just starting with a total of 15 tracks. “Hunger & Starvation/Satisfy My Soul” is buoyant and thoughtful, offering an always-pertinent reminder that emptiness is inevitable if we’re not living to serve God. And atypical for the reggae genre, solid biblical teaching abounds throughout, particularly “The Prodigal,” “My Defender” and “Be True,” three of the album’s best tracks not just sonically, but also lyrically as Christafari boldly proclaims its beliefs without resorting to clichés.

An album as long as this is bound to drag in spots (see “Nairobi” and “Too Many Cannibals”), but overall To The Foundation manages to offer consistent style and substance. Considering that there’s usually at least three years between their albums, it goes to show that some things are worth waiting for, Christafari included.

Copyright © 2007 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

Sounds like … an amalgam of gospel, blues, and rock ‘n’ roll that recalls the Staple Singers, Bob Dylan, the Blind Boys of Alabama, T-Bone Burnett, and Johnny Cash

At a glance … We’ll Never Turn Back is gospel music for those who don’t typically like gospel—not to mention the boldest artistic expression in Mavis Staples’ career.

“If Dr. Martin Luther can preach it, then we can sing it.” That was the motto of Pops Staples and his inimitable Staple Singers, one of the most influential gospel groups in the history of music—and we’re not just talking gospel. It’s a line that his daughter Mavis Staples sings with harrowing conviction in “My Own Eyes,” the autobiographical centerpiece of We’ll Never Turn Back, her first album of new material since 2004’s Have a Little Faith.

Unlike the last album, We’ll Never Turn Back isn’t a collection of hymns and church standards. Instead, it’s a reverent homage to her late father and the cause of racial equality—a calling they heeded faithfully since the early ’60s. From then on, the Staple Singers’ willingness to perform at civil-rights rallies and to record message songs earned them their share of detractors in the gospel community. However, today they remain the only gospel group ever to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

For sure, gospel this ain’t, at least not by the typical definition of it. Produced by guitar great Ry Cooder (Buena Vista Social Club, Steve Vai), the disc is dusty traditional gospel as informed by the blues rather than the church—a dark yet incredibly hopeful collection of freedom songs and spirituals. The soundtrack is both ominous and menacing, commanded by a gifted band of renegades that’s more empowering than obtrusive. And Staples’ soulful, gravelly alto is never eclipsed in the process.

Together, they give an exceptional rock ‘n’ roll swagger to “We Shall Not Be Moved” and “This Little Light of Mine,” two Sunday-school classics as you’ve never heard them before. That’s only a small sampling, with every track on We’ll Never Turn Back a history lesson in its own right. Each is a solemn and moving reminder that ethnic conciliation on earth, not as a civil duty but as creatures of the same God. is a preamble to the biggest unity rally yet—the one we’ll celebrate in the life to come. Pops would be proud.

Copyright © Christian Music Today. Click for reprint information.

Sounds like … a mesmerizing, quartet-styled vocal blend reminiscent of classic groups like the Caravans and the Clara Ward Singers, though more sophisticated and sassy in technique.

At a glance … a flawless concert recording, Live – One Last Time only ratifies The Clark Sisters’ “legend” status in contemporary gospel music.

Gospel music has had its fair share of vocal quartets over the years, but none quite compares to The Clark Sisters. Growing up, their mother—church-music pioneer Mattie Moss Clark—subjected them to arduous practice schedules, at times even waking them up in the wee hours of the night to rehearse parts she said the Lord had given her. This vocal boot camp eventually paid off, as the foursome developed such a tight ear for harmony and blend that their subsequent stint as The Clark Sisters was almost second nature.

Church girls through and through, sisters Jacky, Dorinda, Karen, and Twinkie always had a soft spot for gospel, but their musical tendencies extended in every which way, pushing them to flirt with R&B, blues, jazz, funk, disco, pop, or some combination of all the above. This helped them find an audience beyond the sanctuary, earning hits in both gospel and mainstream circles, including their signature smash, the dance anthem “You Brought the Sunshine.”

But that was over 25 years ago, and after their glory days, their career ebbed and flowed until The Clark Sisters eventually stopped recording altogether. The ladies instead set their sights on solo careers throughout the ’90s. It’s taken more than a decade for them to reunite for their big comeback, Live — One Last Time. EMI Gospel pulled all the stops to make it happen, hiring mega-producer Donald Lawrence to helm the project and a live band second to none.

The results show—this is one of the most stunning contemporary gospel recordings in recent memory. From the first downbeat to the last lingering note, Live – One Last Time is vintage Clark Sisters: elaborate vocalization, breathtaking harmonies, classic gospel songwriting, and a diverse musical palette as only the girls can pull off. Lawrence gives them the royal treatment they deserve, and he’s so painstaking in his efforts, there’s not a bum note or misplaced vocal to be found. Dr. Moss Clark would be proud.

During their solo days, it seemed as if each sister felt the need to overcompensate for their siblings’ absence. Here, though, the balance between them is striking, whether they’re doing a breezy, joyous disco-pop number (“Livin'”) or an old-school favorite (“Tried Him and I Know Him”), the show equally belongs to all four of them.

There is one unspoken show stealer among them, but you wouldn’t know it unless you’re an ardent fan. Twinkie Clark remains the star songwriter of the family, and the bulk of the material on Live comes from her. From oldies to newbies, the set is a genuine crowd pleaser, and she makes sure her writing approach remains inspirational, devotional, and uncomplicated—never more evident in the contagious “Something New” and the heartfelt “You Heard My Cry.”

Not to say that the other sisters aren’t also capable songwriters. Dorinda brings on the funk with “Looking to Get There (Heaven),” a festive anticipation of life in the streets of gold awash in horns, while Karen astounds with the album’s first single “Blessed & Highly Favored,” a haunting and slow-burning multi-part masterpiece of gratitude to God—the harmonies must be heard to be believed. All of these fit so well within the Sisters’ classic repertoire, they’re almost anachronistic, and that’s a good thing.

Of course, no one really buys reunion albums for the new songs. People want to hear the hits, and Live delivers them in spades. Yes, “You Brought the Sunshine” is here in all its splendor, but the rest outclasses it. “Holy Will” is captivating in its sweetness, “My Redeemer Liveth” is straight Earth Wind & Fire, and “Jesus Is a Love Song” couldn’t get any more gripping. It’s a hit parade in every sense, even if a favorite song or two still didn’t make it—I guess I can overlook the omission of “Is My Living in Vain?”

There’s one flaw, and that’s the album’s apparent flawlessness. Everything is so polished—rebuffed, rerecorded, overdubbed to perfection—you can’t help but wonder what really went down the night of the recording. It gets to the point where even crowd noises sound like post-production effects, going up and down in volume mid-song for no apparent reason.

Those are just technicalities though. Since we’re dealing with living legends here, it’s easy to overlook the small details. And with most of their historical catalog hard to find, it makes this project all the more special. The label isn’t saying whether this is a one-album deal or not. Most would say an overproduced, unblemished Clark Sisters keepsake is better than nothing at all. As well they should.

Copyright © 2007 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

When I first started preaching, I assumed that becoming a preacher/teacher/pastor would confer spiritual maturity because you get to study the Bible, talk about it each week, and get paid for it. In actuality, preaching can make spiritual health much harder. Here are a few of things that ensnare those of us who preach.

1. Being inauthentic. How often have you heard (or said), “I don’t watch much TV, but I saw something recently … ” Now why do we say, “I don’t watch much TV”? Because we don’t want people thinking we just sit in the La-Z-Boy every night. It’s so tempting to project an image that we want people to see, and it leaks out in our words, our tone of voice, even our posture and gestures.

2. Fear. When I was starting out in ministry, I remember reading a news story about a pastor who was preaching the book of Revelation when somebody in his congregation shot him. That scared me.

I’ve not had that kind of opposition. So far. But I have had the fears of how I am doing, and how people think I’m doing, and how I get a group of people who are resistant to turn in a different direction. It’s easy to live in fear.

3. Comparison. The first church where I preached was in Southern California. One Sunday a visitor met me and told me he attended Hollywood Presbyterian Church, where the legendary Lloyd Ogilvie was preaching at that time. Have you ever heard Lloyd Ogilvie’s rich, deep, resonant voice? He sounds like what I think God would sound like on a really good day.

So this visitor hands me his business card. He’s a speech instructor. He said, “Give me a call sometime.” All I could think was that to someone who listens to Lloyd Ogilvie, I must sound like Mickey Mouse saying, “Okay now, let’s repent.”

We face this temptation like no generation of preachers has ever faced before. At least in the 1500s, nobody came up to a preacher and said: “I hear Calvin on the radio and get CDs from Luther. How come you don’t preach like they do?”

We live in an era of comparison, but if we give in to it, it can destroy us.

4. Pride. Researchers surveyed 800,000 high school students, asking them to rate themselves on their social skills. How many acknowledged they were below average in social skills? Zero! And 25 percent ranked themselves in the top one percent. Psychologists call this “a self-serving bias.” A spiritual director would call it pride.

When preachers have been surveyed, almost 90 percent rated themselves as above average in preaching skills. Then we have to preach on texts like “Do not think of yourselves more highly than you ought.”

5. Manipulation. Some of us have been in churches where you hear, “Every head bowed, every eye closed. Thank you. I see that hand. Yes. And that hand. Thank you,” even though no hands may have been raised.

I can remember sitting through four consecutive services in a large church, and the speaker cried at the same point in the message four consecutive times.

And we’ve all heard stories told as if they happened to the speaker when we read about them elsewhere.

We’re all tempted to manipulate the facts and the feelings.

6. Anger. Henri Nouwen put this best in his book, The Way of the Heart:

“Anger in particular seems close to a professional vice in the contemporary ministry. Pastors are angry at their leaders for not leading and at their followers for not following. They are angry at those who do not come to church for not coming, and angry at those who do come for coming without enthusiasm. They are angry at their families who make them feel guilty, and angry at themselves for not being who they want to be.

“This is not an open, blatant, roaring anger but an anger hidden behind the smooth word, the smiling face, the polite handshake. It is a frozen anger, and anger which settles into a biting resentment and slowly paralyzes a generous heart. If there is anything that makes the ministry look grim and dull it is this dark, insidious anger in the servants of Christ.”

7. Whatever God brought to your mind while reading the first six.—John Ortberg

Copyright © 2007 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information onLeadership Journal.

Six years ago, Phil Vischer revolutionized Christian family entertainment by selling 30 million Veggie Tales videos. He was running the largest animation studio between the coasts, and had dreams that his empire, known as Big Idea Productions, would become the next Disney.

But by 2003 his dream was over. After a heartbreaking court decision, later overturned on appeal, Big Idea declared bankruptcy, and Vischer sold the company’s assets, including his computer animated characters Bob the Tomato and Larry the Cucumber. His new book, Me, Myself, and Bob (Nelson, 2007) tells the story of Big Idea’s rise and fall. We sat down with Vischer to talk about what he’s learned.

What did you do after losing Big Idea?

About six months of rolling around and moaning, which is what you do when you wipe out. I also did a lot of reading and praying, asking God to sort through the wreckage and show me what I needed to learn.

Looking back, when did Big Idea get off course? Was there a turning point?

Big Idea was growing, but I didn’t know how to manage it. It felt out of control. So, I turned to a popular business book, Built to Last by Jim Collins. I read through it like I had found Scripture. The book suggests a “big, hairy, audacious goal.” I didn’t think God had given me one, but the book said I should have one. So I made one up—one I thought God would like.

What was the BHAG?

I thought God would be pleased if Big Idea became one of the top four family media companies in the world. The goal came from my evangelical upbringing that said more impact is better. Better to impact millions at once than one at a time. Big Idea’s aggressive growth, which came from the big, hairy, audacious goal, was ultimately its undoing.

When did you begin to sense something was wrong?

We were selling a gazillion videos and I was getting 400 fan letters a day, but one day I was reading my Bible and came across the fruit of the Spirit. It occurred to me that none of those things was present in my life. It didn’t say the fruit of the Spirit is impact, large numbers, or selling lots of videos. I realized something was not right.

Where did you turn?

As everything was falling apart, I started reading a weekly study by Henry Blackaby. On the first page Blackaby more or less said, If what you are trying to do for God is not working, it may be because it came from your own head and not God. You may want to do something significant for him, but he just wants you to be obedient. That skewered my false gospel of impact.

How has your understanding of success changed?

I used to think people like Mother Teresa and Henri Nouwen were guilty of poor stewardship. God has given us limited time and resources and we have to help as many people as possible—not just one or two at a time. Mother Teresa should have franchised a system for feeding the poor on a massive scale. She needed an MBA.

Now I understand God has a unique journey for each of us with unique measures of success. Now I ask myself, Have I done what God has asked me to do? Am I walking with him daily? Success has very little to do with where I end up. It’s not about measurable impact.

What advice do you have for pastors trapped in a false gospel of impact?

First, there is a danger in applying business principles to ministry. Businesses use numbers to measure success and ministries shouldn’t. Using numbers to convince ourselves that we are doing God’s will is dangerous. Second, remember that nothing is scripture except Scripture. We shouldn’t look at a model another church is using and simply adopt it. Because God has uniquely led someone doesn’t mean he is leading you into the same thing.

How are you employing these new ideas in your ministry now?

My new company is called Jellyfish Labs because jellyfish cannot choose their own course; their direction is derived from currents. As a Christian I should be thinking of myself more as a jellyfish than as a big studly tuna. I have a wall full of new ideas. But the moment I pick one and call it my dream—my big, hairy, audacious goal—I’m holding onto it too tightly. And that’s a big change. God is now my dream, my deep desire, not what I can do for him.

Copyright © 2007 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information onLeadership Journal.

I scanned the congregation as we finished our third song extolling the wonders of God and our joy for all God has done. As we started the fourth song with the same spirit of energetic celebration, I glimpsed a friend, sitting in the back, who had told me that week that his wife had cheated on him and wanted a divorce.

At that moment the lyrics kicked in, and we started singing joyful thanks for God’s abundant blessings. The words I was singing suddenly felt forced, false, and even mocking. I had to spend the rest of the song looking away from my friend, who stood with his mouth shut, staring out the window.

After the service I approached him and said, “I was thinking about you the entire service; it must have been painful sitting through some of the songs.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I’m not sure this is a good time for me to attend church. It is painful to observe celebration and not be able to join. It accentuates my loneliness.”

I left thinking there was something very wrong with this situation.

Worship is often equated with joy and celebration. It’s a kind of pep rally to inspire thanksgiving and excitement about who God is. While this is a legitimate aspect of worship, it is incomplete.

This comes into full relief when we consider the experience of my friend and even more so when we read the book of Psalms as a record of ancient worship and a rich resource for our worship today.

An important pattern in the psalms is that they repeatedly employ a narrative arc, a movement from grief and lamentation to celebration and joy. This pattern is strikingly absent in many worship services today. We tend to deny our suffering in favor of celebration.

Perhaps this is because we mistakenly believe that to acknowledge suffering might mean we are ungrateful or lacking in faith. More likely it is because grief is an inefficient and unpleasant emotion that conflicts with the efficient and entertaining biases of today’s culture.

This repression of our heaviest emotions is tragic, and over time it leads to an inauthentic and unhealthy spiritual life.

Authenticity and integrity in worship means expressing both lament and praise. Each element completes the other. Without lament, praise is little more than shallow sentimentality and a denial of life’s struggles and sin. Without praise, lament is a denial of hope and grace, both of which are central to our life of faith and to God’s promises.

To value one over the other is like suggesting that breathing in is more important than breathing out.

This is not only an issue of authenticity and integrity. It cuts to the heart of hospitality and pastoral sensitivity. For those coming to a worship service immersed in pain, celebratory praise takes on a mocking tone that excludes them. They are unable to join honestly in these choruses.

By incorporating expressions of sorrow, pain, and grief into our worship, as the psalms do, the hurting are ushered into God’s presence with honesty. At the same time, the rest of the congregation is reminded of the suffering community gathered in their midst. They are invited to weep with those who are weeping. By honoring their pain, we acknowledge those who are suffering and affirm them in their grief.

Yet worship is not complete without turning to praise. When pain has been acknowledged, those who suffer are invited beyond their pain to consider God’s faithfulness in the midst of suffering and even to rejoice with those who are rejoicing.

These opportunities for lament and praise are not simply about meeting personal needs. They are missional practices of authenticity, hospitality, and pastoral care.

Shane Hipps is lead pastor of Trinity Mennonite Church in Phoenix, Arizona.

Reprinted by permission from The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture by Shane Hipps (Zondervan, 2006).

Copyright © 2007 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information onLeadership Journal.

A good friend from the Pentecostal tradition, in which people will often stand up and speak very authoritatively to the congregation, told me a glorious story. According to my friend, a man once stood up and declared, “Thus saith the Lord: Even as I was with Abraham when he led the children of Israel through the wilderness, so I will be with you.” Then he sat down.

His wife nudged him and whispered something. He quickly stood back up and said, “Thus saith the Lord: I was mistaken. It was Moses.”

That story captures the mystery of preaching, illustrating both the Word part and the flesh part: “Thus saith the Lord, I was mistaken.”

The very words of God coming through human instruments, which would be you and me.

What an odd combination that is!

How do we prepare our souls for this task? We are very fallible people and yet we are to speak for God. Our preparation is not just getting our spiritual life “amped up” for a weekend service. It is much more a way of life: “What kind of person am I becoming so that preaching is the outflow of a certain kind of life, and it comes out of me in a way that God wants it to come out?”

This means not preparing your soul for a week of preaching, but how to prepare your soul for a life of preaching.

You speak in the Presence of God

When you look at Jesus, the line between when he’s teaching, when he’s praying, and when he’s just having conversations gets really blurry. Whereas for me, the lines are often very distinct. I tend to compartmentalize.

When you speak in relation to another person, you have three categories: (1) you speak directly to the person, (2) you speak in front of the person, or (3) you speak in the absence of that person. In the third category, I might be talking about you or I might be talking about something else, but your presence is not impacting what I say. We all recognize that we usually speak differently about a person in their absence than we do in their presence.

When it comes to God, we can speak to God, and we can speak in the presence of God, but we can never actually speak in the absence of God. But for some reason, God makes it possible for us to feel as if we can.

I recently visited the Christian college I attended, and I was remembering the odd game we played in the cafeteria. As we sat down to eat, we would all surreptitiously put our thumbs up, and whoever was the last one at the table to get his thumb up had to offer the prayer over the food.

Now, think about that! God is watching this the whole time. But we’re sticking our thumbs up, and the loser has to pray. Then we bow our heads and say, “Dear God, thanks for this food and we love you so much.”

God is present the whole time, but we were acting as if he’s not paying attention until we bow our heads and close our eyes; then he picks up the phone and we’re connected. But we act as if the thumb stuff escapes his notice.

We live differently when we’re aware of his presence. How many of us drive differently when we see a squad car than we do when we think the police aren’t around?

Why does God make it possible for us to live as if he’s absent? I think it’s because he wants us heart and soul, not just when we’re aware of being monitored.

Maybe that’s why Jesus, whether he is formally teaching or just having conversations, is always bringing people to God. Because he lives his whole life in the presence of God.

What causes incongruence in my life is spending so much of my life unaware of his presence. I allow myself to act and talk in ways that are not shaped or influenced by God’s constant presence.

The root of getting our souls ready to preach is to become people who are consciously always speaking either to God or in the presence of God, but never in the absence of God. As Psalm 16:8 says: “I have set the Lord always before me.”

Constant conversation

With Jesus, the line between prayer and just talking often gets real blurry. A great example of this is in Mark 9, when a father brings his demon-possessed son to Jesus and says, “If you can, please help us.”

Jesus responds, “Why do you say ‘if’? All things are possible for one who believes.”

The boy’s father says, “I believe; help my unbelief.”

Then Jesus speaks to the spirit and demands that he come out.

Then the disciples go to Jesus and ask, “Why couldn’t we cast that demon out?”

“This kind can come out only by prayer,” Jesus replies.

What’s odd here is that Jesus doesn’t pray, at least not in this account. He speaks directly to the demon and it comes out.

What does that indicate about Jesus and prayer? It suggests Jesus was the kind of person whose whole life was lived in the presence of God. All his speaking and listening and acting were with God in mind.

Hidden curriculum

Educators often refer to a concept called the hidden curriculum. This concept suggests that in a classroom, there is a formal curriculum that includes things like math problems, writing assignments, or science experiments. But there’s also the hidden curriculum, which involves issues like who wants to sit next to whom, and who does the teacher look at, and who does the teacher tend to call on?

The hidden curriculum teaches students who matters and who does not, who’s bright and who’s left out.

If there is an inconsistency between the hidden curriculum and the formal curriculum, research shows that students always believe the hidden curriculum.

Jesus gets at this idea of a hidden curriculum when he tells the religious leaders in Matthew 12:37: “Your idle words will condemn you.” I always assumed that meant, “Don’t speak casually; you’re always supposed to say something important.”

But I don’t think that’s what Jesus means. He’s saying, “It’s what you say when you’re not trying to be spiritual, and when you’re not behind the microphone, that reveals the state of your heart.”

So, trying to preach great sermons without seeking to become the kind of person who’s always in the presence of Jesus is ultimately defeating.

If I preach and say the most profound truths in Scripture, my “idle words,” the words I say “off the clock” can undo all the good I tried to do with my sermon.

Far more important than putting together a great sermon is training yourself to become the kind of person who speaks all of your words in front of God.

Houses of the Holy

The theologian Abraham Kuyper likened the human soul to the tabernacle in the Old Testament.

You have an outer court, which is the public domain. That’s where you work, where you shop, and where you go to school.

Preaching is often done as an outer court activity. I prepare the words ahead of time. I think through what I want to say. I’m very aware of the fact that I’m doing this as a public activity.

You also have an inner court. This is the place where you invite family, friends, and people that you love deeply. You share a deeper level of your life in the inner court. Not everybody gets to the inner court, certainly not your whole church.

But then inside the tabernacle, way inside, is the Holy of Holies. The Holy of Holies is a deeply private space that is shared only by you and God. No other human being can ever enter your Holy of Holies, but you are never alone there. That is the space for you and God.

One thing I didn’t understand about preaching when I first started, because it was such a public, outer court activity, is that it will drain you spiritually if the Holy of Holies is not rich and full.

The task of preaching tempts me to think that who I am in the outer court is who I am deep inside. And one of the problems is that we can dress things up really well in the outer court, while things may actually be neglected or dying in the Holy of Holies.

The most important question is, How is my life in the Holy of Holies? Is the life that I’m inviting other people to live, the life that I’m living myself? Because if it’s not, then none of the rest of it matters.

Let go of your words

Few people live that kind of life, and I try to learn from them as much as I can. For me, one of those people is Dallas Willard. As both a writer and as a person, he lives in light of the kingdom.

About a year and a half ago, we had a weekend at our church where we explored spiritual formation, and Dallas was one of the people who spoke to a group of our leaders.

After he was done, we walked out to the car, and he was just shuffling along, singing to himself a hymn.

What struck me as I watched him was how different he was than what I’m like after I speak. There was nothing inside of Dallas that was asking the questions I tend to gnaw on: “How did I do? What went well? What didn’t? Did people like that?” Why do I dwell on such things? Because if they liked it, I can feel good about myself, and I can feed off of that. And if they didn’t like it, then that’s bad, and I’m kind of sad.

But with Dallas, it was like watching a kid let go of a helium balloon. He wanted to be helpful to folks, but he offered his words and let them go. Neither his words nor people’s reactions to them had any power over his well-being. That part was hidden with Christ in God.

I see that and realize that’s the kind of person I want to become.

Do you ever watch people at a bowling alley? What happens when they let go of the ball? It’s out of their hand and they are watching it roll down the lane, but they’re worried it’s not going to end up in the right place. So they start moving to the left or to the right, twisting their bodies, waving their arms, or talking to the ball.

But the secret to joyful bowling is when you let it go, let it go. And one of the soul secrets to preaching is when you let it go, let it go.

Soul dissatisfaction and complete freedom

We were made for soul satisfaction, so we cannot live with chronically dissatisfied souls for long. If we do not find satisfaction in God’s goodness to us, we will look for satisfaction someplace else.

It’s soul dissatisfaction that always has the effect of making sin look good. Any time you see somebody in ministry who has fallen, you can be sure that person was living with a chronically dissatisfied soul. What’s really sad isn’t just the ditch he or she ends up in; what’s really sad is the months and years they were living with a dissatisfied soul. It eventually has the effect if making bad look good.

When someone asked Dallas Willard, “How many times have you seen a person in ministry fail morally where it was not caused by a dissatisfied soul?” he replied, “Never.”

What always drives us, at the soul level, is that if I believe that I cannot trust God to care for the satisfaction of my soul, then I will take my soul’s satisfaction into my own hands. I may not acknowledge that even to myself.

Carving out a satisfying and joyful life with God is a fundamental discipline for all of us who preach.

Jesus exhibited this kind of total freedom. He was free to help people, and he was free to confront where they needed confrontation, and he was free to comfort when they needed comfort.

This is fundamentally crucial in preparation of the soul. If I’m to preach to people effectively, I must be freed from my need for their approval and applause. As long as I am chained to that need, then my preaching will really be trying to fill up something in me that I can never fill.

Life in the kingdom means living in freedom and in the reality of truths like “The Lord is my Shepherd.” If the Lord really is my Shepherd, than I shall not want. And then I won’t have to be driven by the desire for more applause or more approval. I’ve got someplace else to stand.

Standing in the presence of God.

John Ortberg is pastor of Menlo Park Presbyterian Church in Menlo Park, California.

Copyright © 2007 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information onLeadership Journal.

Some pastors observe sabbath well. Their day away from work is markedly different from the other six, and there is something special and holy about what they do—and don’t do—on that day. For others, the sabbath feels like another work day, another day of handling holy things that—even with the best of intentions—seems to have nothing particularly holy about it. It isn’t set apart. It isn’t even restful.

When you work with holy things all week long, what is it you are resting from when sabbath finally arrives?

Ben, the pastor of a small urban congregation in Seattle, keeps a Sunday sabbath. He is alone quite a bit during the week, so he relishes his time with people on Sunday mornings at church and with his wife’s extended family in the afternoon.

For Ben, the heart of the sabbath is appreciating what God has given him. He makes an effort to walk slowly around the church building on Sundays in order to be present to the gift of the moment and the place. At coffee hour, he tries not to talk church business with parishioners. Instead, he tries to enjoy them. He does the same with his children. He figures six days a week is enough to try to shape his children and teach them. On Sundays, he simply enjoys who they are and how they are growing. He tries to do small household tasks like emptying the dishwasher so his wife can also have a sabbath.

Marva Dawn, a Christian theologian, writer and speaker, has described a Sunday sabbath pattern similar to Ben’s. She is willing to engage in ministry on Sundays in the form of speaking or preaching, but she will not do any work of preparation. A Sunday sabbath affirms the connection between corporate worship and resting in God, but for many pastors, Sunday morning is such hard work that it doesn’t provide the rest God intends.

Those of us in ministry should rest from our partnership with God in redeeming the world by relishing God as creator of the world.

Ann, another pastor of a church in the Seattle area, keeps a Friday sabbath. She has been a faithful sabbath keeper for more than 30 years. She found as she entered her fifties that she needed longer than 24 hours in order to feel rested. So she begins her sabbath at dinnertime on Thursday and usually continues her sabbath until bedtime on Friday.

For Ann, the heart of the sabbath is taking off all the roles she wears during the week: pastor, teacher, building administrator, worship planner, etc. On the sabbath, she slides gratefully into the role of beloved child of God—and nothing else. She describes it as comfortable clothes that she looks forward to wearing each week. She spends the time largely alone, reading fiction, walking on a beach, riding a ferry.

Over the years, Ann has negotiated sabbath practices with several roommates and vacation partners. Ann doesn’t want questions or comments about work on her sabbath day. Abraham Heschel, in The Sabbath, suggests that we should cease from work and also from thoughts of work on this day of rest. Ann would agree.

Ann’s sabbath is similar to the pattern Eugene Peterson describes in several of his books, a day of rest not connected to a Sunday worship service. When Peterson was a pastor, he and his wife, Jan, spent Mondays hiking. On the first half of the hike, they kept silence, and on the way back, they talked with each other.

Two sabbath commands

Ben and Ann have adopted practices that dovetail with the two versions of the sabbath command in the Ten Commandments. The nine other commands are very similar in the two versions of the commandments in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5, but the fourth commandment differs significantly, beginning with the opening imperative verb. “Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy” (Ex. 20:8, NRSV). The second version begins with “observe” (Deut. 5:12). These two verbs capture significant aspects of the sabbath challenge. A healthy, obedient, and life-giving sabbath involves habits of observance as well as a commitment to remember.

The pastors mentioned earlier have built patterns of observance into their lives, as well as the spiritual discipline of remembering. Ben remembers God’s blessings and abundance by taking the time to notice them. By stepping out of her many roles, Ann remembers that she is God’s child, loved quite apart from what she does.

The two sabbath commands give different reasons for keeping the sabbath. In the Exodus version, sabbath is commanded because “in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day” (Ex. 20:11). In the second version, God wants the Israelites to remember that they were slaves in Egypt and “the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm” (Deut. 5:15).

These two commands reflect the two central acts of God in human history: God as Creator and God as Redeemer. A helpful reflection for sabbath observance begins here.

What practices help you experience God as Creator? Perhaps walking, hiking, biking, gardening, painting, or reading poetry? What practices help you experience the freedom God has given us in Christ, our redemption from slavery? Turning off the computer, the phone, or the TV? Putting away the Blackberry or calendar? Turning off worry or the temptation to obsess with ministry issues? These are practices to consider for a sabbath observance.

For people whose life revolves around ministry, these two reasons for sabbath observance can be helpful in another way too. Christians are called to partner with God in sustaining the creation and redeeming the world. Our profession is heavily weighted on the redemption side. We spend our days creating structures and working with individuals to help people grasp the great gift of redemption and eternal life we have in Jesus Christ.

On the sabbath, then, those of us in ministry professions may benefit most and honor God most by engaging with God as Creator. We rest from our partnership with God in redeeming the world by acknowledging God is Creator as well as Redeemer.

One pastor spends the first few hours after the Sunday worship service riding his bike or gardening. Another man who works in student ministry enjoys working out at the gym on Sundays, exercising his body, a part of the physical creation. Ann walks on the beach on her sabbath. When I drive somewhere on my sabbath, I drive more slowly and try to notice clouds, trees, and flowers. When I cook on the sabbath, I pay attention to the color and texture of the vegetables as I cut them, and I pause to enjoy the smells coming from the pans.

In Jewish tradition, prayers of intercession are too much work for the sabbath, and prayers of gratitude are encouraged. Thankfulness prayers help us remember God our Creator.

One of my favorite sabbath activities is to sit on the sofa in our living room staring into space, idly watching the big tree outside the window. I find myself expressing wordless thanks to God for the beauty of the tree and the squirrels that run along its branches, and for the warmth and comfort of the room.

Sometimes those prayers of thanks grow larger, and I remember people I love and the joys of the work I do, and I thank God for them as well. But often the prayers of thanks remain focused on the tree, the squirrels, and my contentment at that moment. God made them, and I rest in gratitude for those gifts.

In the same way that Ann relishes her role as God’s beloved child on the sabbath day, so I relish my place as a creature lovingly made by my Creator. The tree and the squirrels were wondrously and beautifully fashioned by God. As I rest in my role as creature, I remember that I too receive the same careful attention from my Creator.

I am beloved as God’s creature.

Resting from our families?

One of the challenges for people in ministry involves family members. If our ministry leaves us fatigued from contact with people, how can we then embrace time with family members on our sabbath?

A husband and wife who both work with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship take a two-day sabbath if at all possible. They spend Sunday with their young children doing family activities. Then on Monday they take turns spending time with the kids and time alone. In the morning, one of them will pray, journal, read, and think while the other takes care of the children. In the afternoon, they switch.

Two keys to happy sabbaths with young children are to eliminate multi-tasking and to reduce expectations of a profound spiritual experience with the children. Simply enjoying them, without trying to get something else done at the same time, can be quite refreshing and honors the gift from God that comes to us in children. A short Bible story, an easy craft activity, or a brief prayer time can help to keep the focus on God, but too much stress on those activities can turn the day of rest into work.

Time with a spouse also needs to be considered. In my early years as an associate pastor, before the congregation added a Sunday evening service, I considered my sabbath to be 2 p.m. Sunday until 2 p.m. Monday. I spent Sunday afternoon in a vegetative state, reading or napping after the demands of Sunday morning. My husband would usually do something physical with our sons, who were then in their late teens. We would have a simple dinner, soup or a casserole that I had prepared the day before.

In those years, my husband didn’t work on Mondays, so we spent Monday mornings together, usually walking in a park. We ate lunch together, often in a restaurant, and by mid-afternoon I would re-enter my work world, checking e-mail and planning the events of the week. The time alone and with my husband had given a sense of balance.

Single people in ministry also need to consider the place of time alone and time with others on the sabbath day. Adam, an associate pastor who is single, keeps a Monday sabbath. He likes to spend time alone during the day, reading and going for a long run. Then in the evening he usually has dinner with friends, enjoying relaxed conversation.

Another key to healthy sabbaths for people in ministry comes from the root meaning of the word sabbath: stop, pause, cease, desist, or rest. The heart of sabbath is stopping, not finding more things to do. Several ministers I know observe a sabbath discipline of journaling, and they record prayers and thoughts, using journaling as a way to listen to God. The center of this discipline is stopping long enough to listen and pray.

Vital to the “success” of such sabbath devotion is, frankly, keeping expectations low and the activities quite simple. When we expect our sabbath to be highly “spiritual,” it becomes one more thing to do, continuing the addiction to productivity that is so common in our culture.

Be still

Contemporary Jewish observances of the sabbath offer insight through their simplicity. The symbols of candles and braided bread on Friday evening are reminders of God as light and God’s presence entwined in our lives. A glass of wine and a box of spices at the end of the sabbath evoke the desire to bring the sweetness of the sabbath into the rest of the week. Married couples are encouraged to make love on the sabbath. Families often go for long walks. Many Jews attend synagogue.

My husband and I came to appreciate this simplicity while living in Israel. As a person who has kept the sabbath for more than 25 years, first as a stay-at-home mom, later as a writer and editor, and then as a pastor, I can say that some sabbath days are very spiritual, others are peaceful, while yet others are discouraging because stopping productivity reveals a deep fatigue.

Over time, though, the sabbath inscribes important truths on our hearts. Primarily, God is the Creator and Redeemer. Those of us called to full-time ministry are invited to partner with God in sustaining creation and bringing redemption. We spend six days a week focusing on our partnership in this ministry.

But the work is God’s.

Sabbath reveals that redemption comes through Jesus Christ, not through our hard labor. The Holy Spirit is the source of power. We are God’s beloved children, utterly dependent on God, receiving everything good from the hand of God. Because we are so easily addicted to taking ourselves too seriously, because we so easily fall into patterns of idolatry that elevate our own significance, we need the sabbath, stopping productivity, so we can remember that God is God and we are not.

For people in ministry, stopping on the sabbath is a gift of rhythm, like a heart-beat, that keeps our hearts in the right place.

Lynne M. Baab is the author of six books, including Sabbath Keeping and Fasting: Spiritual Freedom Beyond Our Appetites (InterVarsity Press). www.lynnebaab.com

Copyright © 2007 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information onLeadership Journal.