Lighthouse Church | Silver Springs NV | Lighting Up Our Community with the Love of Jesus

Pastor's Corner

These are not theological principles just an exploration:

Presence or Influence?

If I wrote a book it would have to address our (and my own) obsession with greatness.

I want to pop the big inflatable gorilla advertisement for pursuing greatness or at least get people to see it for what it is, mostly empty and a resource hog.

When I was younger the greatest leadership voices were writing, "Leadership is influence."

What if it's not?

What if influence is a natural result of presence?

Influence certainly is a currency of leadership but the foundation of leadership is presence, which often comes out of genuine curiosity and humility.

You don't try to influence people.

You care about people and walk with them, but you also continue your own cross-carrying journey and eventually they are doing their cross walk and walking with others all in the same direction after Christ.

If holy leadership is influence why are there so many fake and bad influencers right now? Influence itself is a resource that we have to steward and like money, the love of influence corrupts.

When some people worship influence like it's an idol, is it not partly a result of us subtly saying for forty years or so that influence is king?

Jesus said service begets authority. In Matthew 23:11 He said, "The greatest among you shall be your servant."

Humility is king.

Walking With God

Recently I've seen a completely different picture of my journey with Jesus. What if I'm the one lost sheep and He has left the other 99 sheep of his flock to come find me, not just theoretically in general, but right now?

I keep trying to figure out how to be the best dad, husband, pastor, and community member and feel like I'm stumbling in partial darkness, and feeling hungry and alone. Jesus showed up in the middle of me trying to find my own way and He has ever so gently been trying to tell me, "It's ok, you are just lost."

I'm not sure about that, but He has His way of captivating my attention and we start working our way along a trail that I don't really see, but there's His footsteps. I keep wanting to get back to whatever I thought was important before I got stuck down here, and we just keep walking in this inescapable slot canyon.

That's why every part of my flesh wants to say, "When do we get to leave this place?" (Wherever you feel stuck right now.)

But God keeps helping me see what a privilege it is to walk with Him in His garden.

I think that's where everything changes.

Not when fruit trees start magically growing around you like Jack's beanstalk, but when you gain supernatural perspective you begin to see the desert, the valley as God's garden.

As Jesus said, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven."

He might be saying, "Sam, let's walk together in this desert as I walked with Adam and Eve in the garden and as we will walk together in the new earth and new heaven."

The idea is that we shift from "Why am I here?" to "Surely He is in this place."

I get to walk with God!

From Doing to Being

My hope is to share with you permission for you to take a detour on the journey of how do I become a better leader, dad, manager, Christian, wife, person. If you dare come along with me on this lost sheep journey of being led by the Shepherd and being His sheep.

From becoming a better doer to a better being.

Presence is not really an action, something we can do.

It is a noun and a state of being.

You can be present by doing a number of things, but in the effort to focus on doing those things—meditating, listening, serving—you can easily lose the focus on presence and try to achieve it through action and fall into the self-improvement mode in order to level up again.

The answer can't be to get better at self-awareness or self-actualization or even minding what you are thinking.

All of those endeavors are so easily corrupted if we are off by one degree and begin aiming for so I can be a better mom and then the other moms will notice me.

Ecclesiastes plainly declares it's all a dead end.

It's not that nothing helps or nothing works.

It's that nothing helps or works until you admit that nothing helps or works and you are helpless to become what you need to be and totally depend on God for His goodness. That's when I hope we might discover that just belonging is truly great.

Want to Come Along?

I'm writing this to be present to the Spirit that is always with me, to myself, to my family and my church, my community and everyone who is asking how can I be present right now, not to master presence and a new life hack but love people and God and myself.

Not the embrace your inner dragon love of yourself, but the "hey if I were my best friend I would help, encourage, and sacrifice to make my life better and be honest about where I need to grow" kind of love.