The personal site of Jonathan Hayashi
The last year or so has perhaps been the most disruptive and draining time for any church leader. This perhaps is not only for pastors or church leaders but was the most difficult year to survive navigating through making very difficult decisions.
Leaders can be effective by giving room and not pidgin-holding in a box and limiting others.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer puts it this way in his book Life Together, “Those who remain alone with their evil are left utterly alone.”
Pastors today have a lot on their plates and the stresses of leadership, burnout, and moral failures are all too real.
Over the past decade or so, I have been in the second chair and now in the first chair and can see from both perspectives. Without the proper three C’s, teams can be frustrated, apathetic, or even chaotic at times.
Hiring can be such a challenging task for churches. Why? For hiring the wrong person that does not fit the culture of the church can often cause so much heartache and havoc.
People from all walks of life will often ask one or more of the following metaphysical questions: Why should I believe the Bible? Is there salvation outside of Christianity? How do we know that God exists? Given evil, how can one justify God?
What were bits of information that would have been helpful to known before entering into ministry? Here are five things that bible college/seminary did not teach us but has been helpful knowing serving in the local church.
When we look deep down in the soul, what do we find? What part of our self are we supposed to be, “true to”?
Lately, I have had an opportunity to pull back from all the busy activities of ministry and to simply stop, reflect, and think. Here are three lessons I’ve learned about leadership over the past 10 years.
Could someone who struggles with past sin be disqualified from preaching? At what point does a man who struggles with pornography be disqualified from ministry altogether? Can a man who is divorced or remarried be a leader in a church? Can he ever be restored again?
Here are the five important biblical solution to creating a healthy church that becomes more a singing church.
“How was your worship service?” That’s the question I often hear. Over the lunch table, after service, in restaurants…. What is the basis of determining the effectiveness of the worship service?
So, for the church NOT to disappear, what should we do? That is the fundamental question that daunts us on a day to day basis.
Powlison’s wisdom and his love for the Word transformed every way I approach pastoral care and counseling.
If you are in church ministry, you are going to face inevitable criticism. The questions is, how do we deal with all sort of different types of criticism?
What’s the strangest criticism you’ve received?
Here are the 10 weirdest criticism I have received in the past 10 years of ministry.
“I love Jesus, but not the church. So, I ditched the church.” Have you heard statement made by Christians? Is this a big deal?
The joy of ministry outweighs the hardship of ministry.
Abuse is sickening and is wrong. Any tricked, forced, manipulated or coerced activity for the pleasure of the abuser is satanic.
“The mission of the Church is to seek and to save them that are lost.” – James H. Aughey
The Bible reminds believers to avoid worthless foolish empty chatter, but instead to be thoroughly equipped and qualified with careful study of scripture. (2 Tim. 2:16; 3:17).
Is worship simply singing? Is worship the music in the background? Or is it something we do only Sunday morning?
I begin to ask these fundamental questions; What is a Christian? What does discipleship mean? How does one live this out if they are not a pastor?