So. Yesterday I went to a conference called Death To Performance, and I am going to hereto set forth some of that which I received. The one day conference had four speakers and I had heard of it through Ray Ortlund Jr.’s blog. Also speaking were Jamie George, Ed Stetzer, and Scott Thomas.
The first session was by Ed Stetzer. Ed speaks so fast that you must really use your energy to keep up with him… and that is not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes, I hear very quickly and my mind has plenty of time to think other thoughts (or use it to digest what is being said)… but in the case of Ed, there is no extra time, as one must focus because his connected thoughts are coming quickly. Very quickly. He spoke on the difference between moralism and the Gospel and how moralism is a universal problem that we deal with in differing degrees in different areas. Example, everyone in the South thinks they are saved or Christian… so, as Ed put it, they need to get saved from their idea of salvation and they need to get saved from their idea of Christian. His text was Philippians 1:3-6, focusing on verse 6, “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.” He expounded on God beginning the work in the believer, God continuing the work (in “the middle”), and God completing the work.
Next.
Session two was by Jamie George. Jaime is a storyteller. I appreciated his way to speak the truth through his own experience and be authentic. I can see myself, and my walk with the Lord, when I hear him speak of the faith and trust and growth and tests that the Lord has brought into his life. His text was John 12:24, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” He spoke of how God brings death about in our life through the process of sanctification by the power of His Spirit. One thing he said really stood out to me: Don’t be a terrible receiver. We have to receive grace. He gave examples of pastors or childrens workers who serve and serve and serve, but who do not receive. He spoke of how we become performance oriented but never receive truth.
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The third session was led by Ray Ortlund Jr. His text was Luke 18:9-14, verse 9: “He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt:”. He spoke on the deceitfulness of sin and pride… and how “those who trusted in themselves that they were righteous” didn’t believe that they were trusting in themselves… they were thanking God for their righteousness. One of the most profound things that he said, for me anyway, was that we read this passage and we see how the pharisee was self righteous and thanking God that he is not like the tax collector. Then we think to ourselves “I don’t do that, I am not like that pharisee” and BOOM, we are undone. Pride is so subtle. Humility in the believer is so stunned at one’s own guilt and sin, that one is not comparing themselves to others anymore. God gives grace to the humble. God opposes the proud… we do not want God as our opponent.
Next.
Session four was by Scott Thomas. I took a lot of notes in this session and I thought Scott did an excellent job of summing up the day and purpose of the conference. He gave visual representation of a performance based lifestyle and mission versus a gospel centered lifestyle and mission. Being performance centered has its goal as success (which has goals), it is based in abilities in order to achieve productivity and predictable outcomes. The difference is that being gospel centered has its goal in exaltation of Christ, it is based on the incarnation (and incarnational living), which causes risk and generosity. The picture was more involved than that, and he expounded it better than that, but that is the basic framework. A couple bits of wisdom: 1) measures of success in your life feed your ego and the desire to be performance centered and it is a fight to reject that model. 2) Our culture is saturated with us only accepting others if we feel they are successful and thereby feeling that we must be successful in order to be accepted, which causes us to be performance based and produce for our own recognition and acceptance and pride. We can accomplish nothing and God get glorified… that is, we can go out to fight a battle, God fights it, and He gets all the glory and we did squat. Point: how many elder boards can a pastor say to them “we didn’t do anything but God was glorified” and it be ok? Slim.
That was my recap. The next post has some of my thoughts and thinkings and whys I wents.