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Consecration 2002 Roundtable—Part II
January 27, 2003 Intelligent discussion is
always at a premium, so Consecration 2002's session featuring a panel of
fascinating, candid Apostolics was greatly anticipated. Candid it was. It's not
often you hear Bible school staff advocate secular education, or a youth pastor
declaring their teens the very key to revival, or a PK fess up to the special
situations and pressures others can't understand or even an Apostolic wondering
why we don't minister to the multi-cultural world around us—is it because we
insist on not seeing it? This
was a panel across denomination lines, across age groups, and across racial
backgrounds, but it was a panel believing Christians can change the world around
them. Consecration 2002
was held on November 1-2, 2002 at Calvary Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. Part One
explored the secrets of Bible school and how to survive afterward. Part Two
discusses secular education, the dynamics of a youth group, and the roles of men
and women in worship. Finally, Part Three will delve into the lively world of
Christian music and the diverse world of ministry. Throw your thoughts into the discussion by writing a letter to the editor. The Panel
1. Bill Zink, pastor of
Faith Tabernacle, Greenville, OH 2. Wayne Francis, Indiana
Bible College (IBC) dean of students 3. Paul Pamer, youth pastor
of Apostolic Church of Barberton, OH 4. Lisa Lindner, pastor's
wife, Heavenview Tabernacle, Winston-Salem, NC 5. Brooke Williams,
Preacher's Kid, Pentecostals of Apopka, FL 6. Kent d Curry, executive
editor of ninetyandnine.com, St. Louis, MO 7. Jeremy Hoffee, choral
director, Gateway College of Evangelism, St. Louis, MO 8. Russ Strange, youth
president of Ohio District, UPC A very special thanks to
vivacious Beth Wallis who spent most of the last three months transcribing this
90 minute discussion. We are indebted to you for sharing the thoughts of this
panel with the world. Any possible misquotes are
the results of the editors and not her transcription. Jonathan Walker:
Brooke, I’m going to ask you to grab a microphone. We need to represent the
other side of the fence real quick, which there is another side. We chose
secular school didn’t we? Just say yes for the record. Brooke Williams:
Yes for the record. Jonathan Walker:
Talk about how strong the relationship in God has to be when a young person is
walking around at a secular campus, and just that aspect of the other side of
the fence and how to succeed in that environment. Brooke Williams:
I think it’s definitely a challenge like Bro. Francis said, you’re
surrounded constantly; you’re soaked in it. I’ll be very honest, when I
graduated high school I wanted to go to Bible school and thought that it would
be good for me. I wanted to go because my friends were going. But I stayed home
and went to the University of Central Florida and I’m really glad I did. I
really feel like it was the right path, but I definitely have had to work
harder. One of the things my Dad told me,
and this, like you said, is just the other side. We have a wonderful church,
that he felt that I could gain just as much by putting all of my energy and all
of my desires into that and helping build something there. He wanted to feel,
four years down the road, like I had contributed to something and help build it.
I would say that definitely I have had to work harder, as far as making sure
that my personal relationship with God was where it needed to be so that when I
walked into a campus where I wasn’t surrounded by people who were soaked in
that Holy Ghost atmosphere. I definitely think that it was more of a challenge.
You just have to make sure that you’re prayed up. Jonathan Walker:
Right, it’s vital. I’m not on the panel, I’d just throw this out to them
that, especially if you’re sitting out there and you’re in secular school.
Professors—and maybe Bro. Kent you could comment on this—professors these
days just have non-biblical concepts. We just sat in my office this morning
talking about Knowing in Whom We Have Believed; we’ll get to that in a
second. But just talk about for just a couple of seconds, professor throws a
very humanistic, which most colleges are going to now a days where you choose,
you decide, you control your destiny, how to match that with the book and
what’s not in the book. Kent Curry:
Well, first of all I think that, unless you’re called to the ministry, I found
my secular degree helped me in the secular workplace. Because college is just a
big microcosm of the whole world, and in some ways the workplace can be worse.
Not because somebody is beating you over the head with humanistic philosophy,
but because people just don’t believe it and they don’t care. Where at least
at college, let’s give them credit, every little faction is represented,
usually vocally, and you get acclimated to that quickly. As far as professors
and the like, it’s not so much that they’re out to attack you; they’re
just out to push their viewpoint. Jonathan Walker:
They have an agenda. Kent Curry:
They have an agenda on what is right; just like we have an agenda that we think
is right. Personally, I was warned off from living in the dorms because
evidentially there was going to be girls with drugs waiting for me at every
turn, to seduce and bring me down. That’s what I was warned against. (Pause) I
waited in the hallways for hours—it just never happened. Jonathan Walker:
This week on ninetyandnine.com … Kent Curry:
Dorm life was very disappointing for me, terribly dull, terribly dull. Jonathan Walker:
Simmer down now, simmer down. Kent Curry:
That’s the last time I’ll be on this panel! That’s the challenge and I
think part of it is you’re going to have to know going in, where you are
[spiritually]. I think our biggest is thinking, because we went to church, we
know what we believe. I think just going to church doesn’t mean you know what
you believe. Jonathan Walker:
Hold your horses on that we’ll let you fire from both barrels in a second.
Moving on. Bro. Pamer, youth pastor, Apostolic Church of Barberton. We kind of
touched on this from Bro. Zink’s perspective as pastor, but from our level,
which is youth pastor, which is not the office of pastor, but still an important
facet of the church. You have a passionate youth group that loves God, and
you’re doing something right up there. So talk about, from a youth-level
standpoint, that as a facet of the church, some ways that you have found success
in dealing with your youth group and the church and being an aid to the church.
Then also on the other side, maybe, if you could be honest [about] some
attitudes in the youth group that negatively affect the church as a whole. Paul Pamer:
Certainly we have touched on some spiritual things, but I think that there is
some real value to be made for positive attitudes in the youth group that have
had nothing to do with what you would think of as spiritual things. What I mean
by this is, for instance, one of the things that we have found to be one of our
pillars in our youth department—sometimes people come up and sometimes our
youth choir goes somewhere and the kids will go somewhere—people will come up
and be like: “MAN! You’ve done a great job. How have you done this?” Well
the youth department at our church was awesome way before I got there. My Dad
was a pretty good youth pastor; we had another man, my uncle, who was a pretty
good youth pastor. When I came, I just inherited
this great group and I was just there. But one of the things that we have found,
in looking back over our youth department was, one of the most beneficial things
for us, is the youth group is a tight-knit youth group. We promote a lot of things
in our church that have nothing to do with spiritual things, per say, but
benefit us spiritually. For instance, a typical Monday night at the Apostolic
Church of Barberton we have youth choir at six o’clock, if I miss someone
somebody say something. We have youth choir at six o’clock; at seven o’clock
we have ATA’s, which is the Apostolic Teenage Association for high school
girls. Missionettes, which is for junior high, Apostolic Angels which is under
that, Boy Scouts, Cub Scouts, Tiger Cubs, and did I miss anything else? That’s
just the youth department. Then, of course, we have cell ministry which we have
at our church, which is just a supplemental thing at our youth group level that
we have broken up our youth group into small groups and we have our facilitator
right over here. All of these groups, we encourage them, to spend spiritual and
social time just in your groups. And we tell each other and we tell the groups,
don’t, try not to let kids from other cell groups come, but just y’all. Have
a Bible study, go to the mall, go to the batting cages, just hang out. Every
Friday night we have youth service. We cancel for very important things like
Consecration, but after every Friday night we always go out to eat, and we go
out to eat together. I encourage the kids—ride in the van, go to the place, we
all go together. We’ve run those three vans into the ground, we got three up
and three up and we’ve gone through some vans. My point is, one of the most
powerful things that a youth group can have is being unified and spending time
with one another. You may be able to say,” Well I can make it to Heaven if I
hang out by myself or with my school friends and I…” Yeah that’s true. But
you know what? There might be a thirteen-year-old young person that really needs
you and you thought you could make it by yourself. So, what I would say is a
powerful thing is being unified and spending time with the family. You really
need to do that, the group needs you and you need the group. The old adage says,
“The strength of the pack is the wolf, and the strength of the wolf is the
pack.” and so you’ve got to understand that, yeah, what makes the group
strong is all these individuals, but what makes you strong is that group.
Don’t ever underestimate that you need to be around the group and spend time
with the group. You need to pray with the group, you need to be there early,
stay there late, because the group needs you. Second part of the question was
negative attitudes. I think that on the flip side of that you can make the
transition that disunity causes problems, non-spiritual activity causes
problems. Any time anyone involves themselves in, and I wish that when we have
people that do bad things in our youth group, you know, they go somewhere they
shouldn’t go or whatever. I wish that they’d do that by themselves, but they
always take like six of the most— Jonathan Walker:
They have to have a partner. Paul Pamer:
Yeah, six of the most impressionable young people in the entire world and take
them with them. That’s a bad thing, that’s a bad thing. Jonathan Walker:
If I’m going down, you’re going down with me. Paul Pamer:
Right, right, right, yeah. If I’m going to spit in the youth pastor’s face
I…” Jonathan Walker:
I get both eyes then. Paul Pamer:
I like that, I like that a lot. Jonathan Walker:
That’s my man. Paul Pamer:
Right. What I would say is, you need to really pay attention. Again, those are
some things that maybe you think, well…I don’t want to get into any
debatable issues, but maybe you think, “Well, the youth pastor encourages us
not to go here, but Sunday night’s sermon wasn’t about it so I’m going to
go here.” You need to really understand the power of that, because what I’ve
seen is that a lot of people feel that, “Well I’m only sixteen, seventeen,
and I’m not the youth pastor, I’m not a cell leader, I’m not a youth
leader, I’ll do whatever I want.” You don’t understand; if you’re
sixteen, seventeen years old, people are looking up to you. You’ve got a
stronger voice than I do, and I’ve got a microphone and a big expensive sound
system. You’ve got to understand that you affect people and you influence
people and if you deviate from anything the church teaches about where you go,
how you dress, how you talk, how you act…If you deviate from that you’re
preaching a sermon that’s more powerful that anything that me, or the pastor
could preach. They’re saying, “Man it’s cool to go the other way.” So
that would be a negative attitude that would harm the youth group. Jonathan Walker:
Bro. Strange would you comment? At one time you were a very successful youth
pastor, the three words that are on the sign in the very back of the sanctuary
here I know are close to you heart. Talk about those three words from a kid in
your youth group that’s twelve years old, to fourteen, to sixteen, to
eighteen, how important those three words are. Russ Strange:
Well those three words are “Everyone A Minister,” and I believe that,
preached it, taught it to our youth group in Grove Port when we were there and
we’ve seen great results, the Lord helped us. I felt a burden the last year I
was there to start teaching that every young person can win somebody, and then
we could have revival and didn’t have to depend on somebody else to bring
revival to the church. The youth group could have revival. So we just started
preaching and teaching to our young people about soul winning, about laying
hands on the sick and I believe that year, last year, there were 38 young people
that received the baptism of the Holy Ghost in that youth group. I just try to
instill in our young people that everyone was a minister, when you walked out of
that church on Wednesday night or Sunday night or Friday night, you walked into
the world—you were a preacher of the gospel. It didn’t matter to me if you
were carrying a card or you boo-hood and snotted on the altar Sunday night and
felt a calling. You left the house of the Lord, you were full of the Holy Ghost,
you were a preacher, and you’re walking into a world that needs God. We’ve
all said it before and I’ll say it again just to strengthen it, but if this
generation ever gets the opinion or the notion that they’re the church of
tomorrow then we’ve lost every one of them. I always try to tell young people
that you’re not the church of tomorrow, you’re the church right now.
You don’t have to wait until your hairline is receding and your waistline is
out of control to start being used of God. Amen? You can be anointed right now.
I just want to encourage our young people to be ministers. When you leave your
youth service, you leave Sunday night, take that worship, take that spirit, take
that anointing into your schools and into your job places. Lay hands on the sick
in your school; don’t wait to have to bring them to the next youth service.
Pray somebody through to the Holy Ghost in your cafeteria. You’re a minister
when you leave this house, you got the Holy Ghost, you’re a preacher of the
gospel as far as I’m concerned. That’s my opinion. Jonathan Walker:
Awesome, I agree great perspective. Sis. Lisa Lindner is now a pastor’s wife
in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. I’ve asked her simply, and I don’t know
how even to phrase this, just to talk to us for just a few minutes from her
heart on the power, especially with young ladies more than young men who face an
extreme challenge in today’s world with just the lack of holiness and decency
that most young ladies display in our world today. Just talk about the power of
holiness in a young person’s life. Lisa Linder:
Well, I think that one of the main misconceptions is that we think that we have
to look a part, and that is definitely a part of holiness, but let me explain.
Holiness, when you take the root words, there’s three elements of holiness.
There’s separation, there’s purity, and there’s perfection. So the goal
is—how do I become holy? We serve a holy God, and there’s more than 50
references in the Bible about God being holy, and when we become Christians we
want to become Christ-like, that means we want to be holy. Of course, the first
step through that is repenting of our sins, emptying ourselves out of ourselves
and of sin, having God forgive us, and then realizing that He shed His blood for
us, that we can be clean, so that we could become holy. We get baptized in Jesus
name; the old man has died so the new man is holy. We have to remember that
there are two aspects to holiness, an inward holiness or an inward purity, and
an outward holiness or an outward purity. I think that sometimes we get a little
confused that we have to play a part, and that’s not really true. Now in
Matthew, Jesus talked about where the cup has to be cleaned on the inside and
the outside. Do you want to drink out of a cup that’s nasty on the inside, but
clean on the outside? Of course not. Would you even want to drink out of a cup
that’s really clean inside, but nasty on the outside? Of course not, you want
to drink out of a clean cup. That’s the same with our bodies. The Bible tells
us that we need to present ourselves holy and acceptable. In order to be holy
what we need to do is really be Christ-like. If we start following those steps
and start attaining those attributes you’ll find that if you can start inward,
then the outward is going to follow. Now I went to secular public school and I
went to secular college, so I don’t want you to think that holiness was never
an issue, but I can tell you this—as a young person, if you would be sold-out
completely to God, and really start trying to line up with what God wants us to
be and how God wants us to live and how to be holy. I can tell you right now
that if you tell someone that my Mom says I have to do this or my church says I
have to do this, then yeah, you are going to have problems. But if you, for
yourself, take the word of God and say, but the Lord wants me to live this way.
I live this way because of such-and-such; start telling them what God has done
for you. He saved me from my sins and I want to live separate and I want to live
holy. All of a sudden that person is like, “Wow! This person has a dynamic
walk with God.” That’s why outward holiness is as important as inward
holiness. We are separate from this world. Now we don’t live in our own
communes, we don’t hole ourselves up in our home. No, we go among this world;
our job, our commission is to preach the gospel. We do that by living the
gospel, inwardly and outwardly. Jonathan Walker:
Any other comments before I ask a follow up question? Any comments? Yes, Bro.
Zink. Bill Zink:
A lot of the times men can walk into a restaurant this afternoon or into an
airport and nobody would look at us any different than anyone else walking
through the airport. However, when Paul wrote to his son the gospel Timothy, he
said, “ I therefore that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands.” In my
experience traveling, there are a lot of ladies, and I don’t want our ladies
to stop worshiping, but there are a lot of ladies leading in worship and I think
that our young men have a responsibility. Part of our responsibility in holiness
is to worship the Lord, when we come to the house of the Lord. That doesn’t
mean that the ladies can’t worship, don’t worship, but I’d like to see
some of our young men step up. Paul told Timothy that, "In like manner also
that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, shamefacedness and sobriety; not
with braided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array.” And we like that
scripture, but right before that he said that I want our men to lift up holy
hands in prayer and worship. I think our men should lead in worship sometimes, I
think our young men ought to get to the front rows and lead in worship. We’ve
asked our ladies to carry holiness and we’ve asked our ladies to carry, what
Sis. Linder said, a look of what we’re supposed to be a part of. But I think
our men ought to step up to the plate and say, yeah I may look like the next man
walking down the mall and nobody may pick me out and make fun of me at school.
But I’d better be a man that knows how to pray and a man that knows how get a
hold of the Lord. Jonathan Walker:
Yes, Bro. Kent. Kent Curry:
Let me just also say that that’s in the home. A lot of times, the more I know,
the more I’m disappointed with our men in the home ministry. They don’t lead
their wives, they don’t lead their kids, and sometimes it’s easy to do at
church because everybody is there, but it’s the day to day. That’s where the
real leadership comes in. Jonathan Walker:
One thing I’ll just throw out and again, you guys are the panel and I’m just
asking the questions, but hopefully you would agree with this, especially the
youth pastors and the pastors. I was taught in my home, and I’ll take it to
the grave of how appreciative I am of my parents and what they instilled in me,
as a young man honor a young lady that’s trying to live holy and respect them.
From opening a door for them to even encouraging them. The young ladies that we
have in our youth group I love so much because they represent holiness inward
and outwardly. We don’t have everyone perfect, but I think that it’s also a
young man’s responsibility to honor a young lady and even be an encourager of
them that can help them and be a support to them, if that’s appropriate to
say. Once
again, I’m so glad Brooke Williams made it a part of her busy schedule to be
at Consecration. Brooke has a very interesting perspective on this panel in that
she’s not a youth pastor, but she has a great influence in her church and in
her youth group. Partly some of her influence is because she is a prominent
preacher’s kid in our fellowship. I’m a preacher’s kid and this subject is
close to my heart. I’ve never been to a conference or any form where entire
youth groups are there where the subject of a preacher’s kid’s relationship
is discussed. So Brooke Williams has a tall task, we’re not saying we’re
more special or are different than anyone else, because some other kids have
circumstances and situations on their life that we’ll never know about that
are argues more for them even maybe to go through than us. But, from your
perspective, and I know it’s something close to your heart, but, sometimes we
can be misunderstood or even looked at in a different way with unfair
expectations, in dealing with this subject like we have for so many years. How
can you just talk to us from your heart about the dynamic of a preacher’s
kid’s relationship to the youth group, to their parents, and the entire
church? Brooke Williams:
How many of you watch the news or read the newspaper? Okay, you know George
Bush, President Bush has twins right? And they recently were arrested, for was
it drinking, or something like that? I was reading an article on it and they
were talking about how the media handled it differently with these two girls
than they ever would have handled it with any other just normal every day…a
Doctor’s kids, it got a lot more press. It did because their Dad had been
elected president. Now these two girls didn’t get elected president and they
didn’t get to make a choice about whether their father was elected president
or not, but at the same (time) they are seen by our country as an extension of
who is. They can’t make the separation no matter how much they would like to
or wouldn’t like to. And while there’s no denying that they got a world of
benefits from the new position that he’s acquired, they also are put into the
spotlight in a way that a lot of other people will never be. And I think that
you can take that and apply it to the church environment and a pastor’s kid. A
pastor’s kid is special by no means, but their circumstances are different
within a church environment. Jonathan Walker:
That’s awesome. I’m just going
to tell on you, you can just get mad at me later.
This is coming from a young lady that received a fairly new car when you
were sixteen; correct me if I’m wrong, seventeen, eighteen, and actually I was
there when this happened. Her car
was keyed by another person in her church simply because they were envious of
her position. That’s all we’re
trying to say is that an understanding is created to where even though we have
different dynamics in our relationship with the church, an understanding needs
to be shared and I think you did a great job answering that.
Now here’s another question that’s a little broader Brooke, that you
have a great perspective in. (Everyone
else on the panel) kind of has titles that come with influence. Brooke, I want you to talk about from a seventeen,
sixteen-year-old that’s in this audience that doesn’t have a title.
Which you don’t technically have a “title” in your church, but talk
about a young person that can have just as much influence as we can without
titles. That gets so overblown out
of proportion just because I have an office, another kid in my youth group can
be a leader just as much as me, talk about that. Brooke Williams:
To prove that that perspective is actually applicable to me, my parents really
did a good job making everyone realize that I really was a normal kid and on the
same plain. So I actually did have to make a place for myself.
I didn’t get to do anything because I was the pastor’s kid, maybe the
door was opened up a little wider, I don’t know, but I didn’t do anything
earlier than anyone else did. And I
didn’t do anything better, I had to work to carve out a place for myself, but
I think that so many times we think that we have to have this seat on the
platform or the plaque on the door and know that we have a place.
And not only have a place, but that everyone else knows that we have a
place, which believe me, I’ve felt that.
You feel like you’re not validated in doing what you feel to do or what
you have been burdened to do. Because
everyone else doesn’t know and there’s not something at the end of your
name, but I think that’s the biggest fallacy ever.
A youth pastor can’t run a youth group by himself, but Paul said
earlier that one of the staples of his youth group are the people that get in
there and help him do everything that he does.
It’s the same everywhere when you look at a successful youth group, a
successful church. A pastor can’t
do everything by himself. There has
got to be people there that are willing to connect, and go out to eat, and go to
Taco Bell. Teach Bible studies to
two or three people and it doesn’t take a title to do that.
The scripture that I always like for that is, the Bible says, “Let this
mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus” and it goes on and it says,
“He made himself of no reputation” He set the ultimate example.
Even Jesus didn’t need a reputation.
Then it gets topped when it says, “Wherever God has exalted him and
given him a name where is above every name.”
The Bible says that, “promotion cometh from the Lord.” God will give
you your place if you do what you know to do, God will give you your position. Next week:
Part Three delves into what makes Christian music Christian music, examines the
composition of today’s church, and relates the urgency of ministry today. ninetyandnine.com © 2003,
ninetyandnine.com ---------
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