the question is // are you

Last week offered the privilege of sitting under some great teaching of many leaders in the church planting/multi-site/missional/discipleship movements at the Exponential conference in Orlando. I’m not a huge fan of conferences as there is often a great deal of puffed up chests with “our church is doing great, we’re really growing, we saw this or that, etc.” As opposed to some real transparency of, “we can see God in our midst at work, but we are really wrestling with these things right now, and I’m personally struggling with this.” I suppose you didn’t need that part, but that’s why I don’t like conferences. There can often be much more talk than there is doing.

Overall, I was quite challenged by many of the speakers. However, Friday morning made the week as we were afforded the opportunity to hear Matt Chandler of the Village Church in Texas speak. I’ve enjoyed following Chandler for a few years now. He is an excellent communicator of the gospel and challenges me frequently. I would encourage you to follow his podcast.

He said many great things, but one thing he said has been working my spirit over since Friday morning. I’m not exactly sure of the entire quote, but of the the many things he said on Friday, this stuck out to me the most (paraphrase, though the last question is word for word):

It’s not about how famous you are. It’s not about how important you are. It’s not about how big or successful your church plant is. The question is, ‘Are you godly?’

Don’t know why it hit so hard, but it did. I’ve evaluated almost everything I’ve done the past few days based on that question. I’ve begun to purge my life of those things that are entangling me that I’ve chosen to ignore for a while now that I know do not characterize godliness. I prayed this morning: “Father, let that question continue to haunt my spirit!”

The question will continue to be, are you godly.