Maintaining Focus
8/29/02  

        "There are two great moments in life. The first is when you were born.
The second is when you know why you were born." (Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell)

Maintaining focus on transformation is important and hard. The sheer weight of phone calls, administration, pastoral visitation, sermon preparation and meetings, ad infinitem are more than enough to keep us in survival mode full time. So, what are we to do?
 
I am convinced the answer lies in how we respond to the above quote. Let me explain.
 
During seminary, you and I probably heard a great deal about "God's calling." We were supposed to feel a special call to the pastoral ministry. I hope you still feel that way! But, what is it exactly that God has called you to accomplish? Do you envision fulfilling your call by hospital visitation, working on the budget, preaching, shoveling snow off the church sidewalk? All this is part of what you do, but is it your primary calling?
 
The Jesus Connection invites all clergy to participate in its process. However, in a sense The Jesus Connection is looking only for those who believe they are called to bring transformation to their congregations. There is a difference, a big difference between the two.
 
One person sees what TJC offers as a helpful program, or a solution to a problem. If it doesn't work, there is always another seminar, or least the response, "Well, we tried." The other person is convinced transformation is the only possibility. It grips the person, drives the person, even pursues the person. There will be failure, but the person will not give up. She can not give up! The vision of what could be propels the person forward.
 
How do you maintain focus? By investing your life in a ministry to which God has called you above all else. For The Jesus Connection, it is the ministry of transformation.
 
What is it that makes you cry when you picture what might be?
 
Answer the quote above and you will maintain focus.
 
Cliff Jones, Country Club Christian Church, Kansas City, MO