I’m not sure who coined this phrase, though it sounds like something Spurgeon would have said.  I do know that there is great truth and a little irony in it.

Simply put, pastors and preachers and ministers work all week long to serve and shepherd their flock, and the whole week they prepare for and anticipate Sunday.  As a pastor and minister, I can relate to this feeling; reading and praying and studying for the message, trying to hear from God, ready to deliver a fresh word all the while serving your wife and family and trying to maintain spiritual and physical health and hoping that when you lay your head on the pillow, you can go to sleep.  Or in my case, praying that once you fall asleep, you will stay asleep.

The weekend can come on like a hurricane.  The energy it requires to deal with and pastor people, put out fires, patiently pray and lead the hurting and confused in your church…is simply enormous.  And the mental and spiritual focus demanded of us to stand on that stage and deliver the word God gave us is difficult to say the least.  Adrenaline levels soar.  Then they deplete.  It’s like the ocean’s tide, coming in and going out.  Preachers are often left feeling spent, fatigued, and hungover on Mondays.

So the old saying goes…”Every preacher quits on Monday.”  Oversimplification?  Perhaps.  But I know I have experienced this countless times.  I will continue to, and you will too, at times.  Just remember that if you are spent and worn out and depleted on Monday, you are not thinking straight, and if you do quit on Monday, it’s ok.  God understands.  He knows that some rest, prayer, worship, and another good night’s sleep will get you back to normal by Tuesday.  Ok, maybe Wednesday.

Your job will still be there when you decide you really didn’t want to quit after all.

I never saw The Stepford Wives. First, I didn’t want to.  Second, I didn’t need to because a quick movie review in the local paper told me everything I needed to know.  The plot was basic; wives are created to be perfect, just the way men want them to be, never having an opinion or voicing disagreement, always cooking and cleaning and being pretty much perfect in they eyes of men.

It is easy for me to make Jesus into a sort of Stepford God for myself.  It is my tendency as a fallen, sinful human to view Jesus in light of my selfishness, and my selfish nature always wants to create the easiest, most convenient scenario.  Therefore, I must fight the battle daily to not be overcome by worldliness and greed, materialism and shallownes, and in turn make Jesus my Stepford God who does what I want Him to when I snap my fingers or throw up a quick prayer with His name tagged on the end of it.

One of the most dangerous things about making God in our own image (imagining God in terms of a god we would prefer, one that we would like, or what we would be like if we were god) is that we are motivated, often times, by sin and sin alone.  This is what makes Jesus so unique.  He is not a Stepford God because HE CONTRADICTS US.  He tells us that we are NOT the big deal.

Jesus has the audacity to claim to be the greatest King of all the Kings in history and the mightiest Lord among the laundry list of rulers that spans time.  He doesn’t fit my mold.  He tells me when I am wrong, when I need to repent, and when I need to change my attitudes and actions to line up with His example and His expectations.

In other words, we don’t boss Jesus around.  We, instead, yield our ways to His commands.  When He contradicts us through His word or the Holy Spirit, He does it out of love for us in complete authority, with our best interest at heart.  Our best response is humble obedience.

I have a confession.  I hate witnessing.  I know I should love it.  After all, I am an ordained minister and an evangelist.  But I hate feeling like I need to share the gospel with every single human I lay my eyes on, or I will be held accountable if they die without Christ.  This comes from a legalistic understanding of God’s grace as well as an arrogant, secret need to save the world, of which I am not capable.

But I have another confession.  I have figured something out, and it came to me when reading 1 John 1:1-4.  Witnessing is not something I do.  It is who I am.

John says in that passage that he had heard the gospel, that he had seen Jesus with his own eyes, and that he had handled Jesus with his own hands.  It was so powerful an encounter that John had to talk about it.  He was compelled to naturally proclaim what a difference meeting and knowing Jesus had made in his life.

There are things I love, that have changed my life, and I talk about them.  It is not a job or a task, it comes naturally to talk about things that are important to me:

1.  My lovely, beautiful, Godly wife

2.  My cute, awesome, lovable boys

3.  The amazing ministry I serve at Crossroads

4.  My best friends; Matt, Perry, Steven, Burgess, Berger, Seth, Christopher, Jonathan

5.  Bear hunting

6.  The Dallas Cowboys and the Clemson Tigers

When we love something or have had our lives changed by it, we will become evangelists for whatever that thing may be.  No one has to prod us, manipulate us, or trick us into talking about what we have seen.  I have seen Jesus change my life and thousands more.  I cannot help it now; I have to proclaim it.

Wow.  That is really what comes to mind right now.  God has been so gracious and faithful to us.  Already in 2010 we have seen over 2,000 public professions of faith.  As I begin my 23rd year of ministry and Crossroads celebrates 15 years of God’s faithfulness, here are the things that we need you to pray about for us, and we even hope that you will come and join us in some of these awesome opportunities.

1.  WINTER CONFERENCES:  The best ever!  As we celebrated our 13th year, we saw 77 people saved, nearly 1,300 in total attendance, and students gave $16,000 to missions with over $13,000 going directly to relief efforts in Haiti through www.newmissions.com.  Videos from Winter Conference will be up on Facebook and YouTube soon and if you want to order any of the messages from Winter Conference, call Jeremy at our office.  704-434-2920

2.  CROSSROADS SUMMER CAMPS:  We will be celebrating 15 years this summer and our registration numbers are double what they were at this time last year.  We hope you and your youth group will join us, but you need to register soon before weeks are full.
Dates: June 28- July 2, July 5- July 9, July 12- July 16, July 18- July 22 (Sun-Thur)
$50 Deposit per person reserves your spot @ Gardner-Webb University in Boiling Springs, NC
Call 704-434-2920
Visit www.crossroadsworldwide.com

3. SUMMER CAMP STAFF: Applications are due March 1.  They’re piling in fast so don’t procrastinate!

4. COMMUNITY DISCIPLESHIP HOME:  Applications for CDH5 are due March 1.  If you are age 18-25 and want to dedicate a year of your life to living in intentional community, being discipled and prepared for ministry, this may be the right thing for you.

5.  FREE SERMONS:  We just put 25 new sermons on the internet for free right here at www.claytonking.com/media and on iTunes under “clayton king live”  and you can also download podcasts from our Ministry Director, Matt Orth, on iTunes at “Broad River Community Church”

6.  SCHEDULE:  Pray for me as a I preach pretty much non-stop over the next few months.  Here are the next few events you can pray for.
Jan 28-30 - CONCLAVE, Chattanooga TN
Feb 2 - Dimensions, Gardner-Webb University
Feb 3 - First Baptist Woodstock GA
Feb 5-6 - 20/20 Conference, Southeastern Seminary, Wake Forest NC

7.  TWITTER:  You can follow us at CRWorldwide or clayton_king to keep up with what’s happening daily in our ministry

As always, thank you for loving and supporting us at Crossroads.  We depend on your prayers for our strength and faithfulness!

I was reminded today of how vital prayer is for those God calls to lead His people and His church.  We are all equally loved by God, but we are not all equally called or equipped  (I am a preacher.  I would never be a church administrator.  That would be a bad dream).

I stood with my wife and two sons in the midst of 15,000 people today as we celebrated Jesus and His gospel at the 10 year anniversary of Newspring Church.  I wept and shouted and worshiped.  One of the most meaningful aspects of this time of rejoicing was seeing one of the very best friends I’ve ever had stand on the stage, proclaiming the gospel and pointing people to Jesus Christ.  As Perry preached, I prayed for him.  And God reminded me that we should all pray for one another, and particularly for those who lead us.  Here is what I pray daily for pastors and leaders:

1.  I pray that they would love Jesus with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength and that ministry would never become a mistress that steals them from their first love, Jesus Christ.

2.  I pray that they love and serve their wife and kids with gracious and glad hearts and that their family loves the church instead of hating it for stealing their daddy or husband away from them.

3.  I pray that they would be anointed by the Holy Spirit and filled with passion, conviction, and dedication to their calling, their own spiritual growth, and to Jesus Christ.

4.  I pray that for confidence and humility: that they would walk in power and authority to lead, all the while kneeling in humility as gentle shepherds who care for people’s souls.

5.  I pray for their encouragement in the faith and the ministry and against those who would attack, slander, harm, or speak evil against them.

6.  I pray that their sermons would be accurate, true, powerful, convicting, bold, encouraging, creative, anointed, and Christ-centered.

7.  I pray for their physical and emotional health, that God would guard them from burnout and depression.

8.  I pray they would always celebrate other ministers and their successes and never fall prey to envy, jealousy, insecurity, or comparison.

9.  I pray for their purity and holiness and against all sinful schemes, scandals, lust, affairs, the love of money, and pride.

10.  I pray that when they lay their heads down at night, they fall asleep and stay asleep, and rest both physically and spiritually, knowing that it’s not “their” church or ministry they are leading, but God’s.

11.  I pray that they set a pace and create daily habits and rituals that will allow them to have a faithful ministry and one day to finish better than they started.

12.  I pray that they take time to have fun, do things they enjoy, waste time investing in a hobby that has nothing to do wtih minsitry, date their wives and play with their kids, read good books and get away often to find peace in solitude.

13.  I pray that God raises up people around them to assist them, serve them, honor them, encourage them, pray for them, admonish them, and protect them.

14.  I pray that ministry, teaching, preaching, and leading will never become a chore for them, but that it would always be a joy and a blessing to serve the Lord and His people with gladness, and that they would enjoy every aspect of leading, whether easy or hard, for the glory of God.

I pray these things for you if you are a pastor or a leader.  I hope you will pray them for one another.

Do you think I could win some money on America’s Funniest Videos?  This happened to me last night, on stage, in front of 1,100 people at our Crossroads Winter Conference, compliments of my 4 year old.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nd74_315WF8

I have some good advice for you today, particularly if you are in a leadership position or if you serve in any sort of ministry.  Read this and by the power of the Holy Spirit, be liberated.

Here’s my advice:  Quit trying to say or do anything new.  There it is.  Pretty simple.  Here is what I mean.

The overwhelming trend today in pastoral ministry, student ministry, evangelism, discipleship, and para-church ministry is to be inventive and cutting edge.  Everyone wants to be extreme and creative and invent the next big thing, like a Christian Facebook or Twitter or even the internet.  There is a time and place to be inventive and the church needs artistic, creative, fresh ideas from intelligent and open-minded leaders to be relevant to our cultural context with the gospel.    But there is also a time and place to be old school, simple, and dare I say, ancient.

I rejoice and support and emmulate the creative minds of leaders of yesterday and today.  Billy Graham was a creative genius in the 1950s.  Today there are men like Mark Driscoll, Erwin McManus, Craig Groeschel, Steven Furtick, Perry Noble, Andy Stanley, and Rick Warren who create new ways and utilize existing systems and technologies to reach the lost and disciple the church.  I admire these men and covet their intellect and work ethic.

But for you, you need to know that there are innumerable creative ways to share and live the gospel but there is NO NEW GOSPEL.  We may take our liberties, so long as we don’t deviate from the Man and the message of  the gospel.  The Man is the Lord, Jesus Christ.  The message, handed down from Jesus to His disciples and the church, is to repent of your sins, believe in Christ, and trust Him for forgiveness, salvation, and life present and eternal.

There is nothing new.  Stop trying to create something cool and trendy and dive head first into what God has entrusted to you; serving others by living and proclaiming the good news.  Then be as crazy, wild, out of the box, creative, inventive, and cutting edge as you can possibly be (without sin or compromising the integrity of the gospel you proclaim).  But in the name of Jesus, give up on the hopeless dream of creating the next big thing or being the next big thing. 

You will never be the next big thing because there is only one Star in the Kingdom we serve in, and it ain’t you.

It’s difficult for pastors and leaders to add one more thing to their already crammed schedule, I know.  And I would never dare encourage you to be a part of something unless it was absolutely practical, helpful, Christ-focused, essential for your ministry, and excellent in every respect.  With that said, you simply MUST come to UNLEASH at Newspring Church March 4 in Anderson, SC.

It is, hands down, the most effective and efficient one day church conference you can attend.  There’s amazing worship, the preaching is fantastic, there’s fellowship with 3,ooo+ church leaders from all over the globe, and you get it all in one day!  I always leave UNLEASH feeling renewed, encouraged, empowered for ministry, and my vision is clarified, not only practically but spiritually.

My lifelong best friend Perry Noble will be preaching, along with tons of other breakout sessions and workshops, and this year I will be preaching a main session called “Protecting Your Pastor” that every church leader and volunteer needs to hear.  I would love to see you there.  Prioritize this event and put it on your calendar.  All the info is below along with the link to register.

• It is a one day church leadership conference, March 4, 2010.
• It is priced DIRT cheap - the $59 early bird rate ends January 31.
• Registration is filling up FAST
• It is put together for church staff and volunteers
• Here is the link to the site -http://www.newspring.cc/unleash/2010/

Dear last decade, please consider this my nostalgiac and heart felt good-bye.  You were good to me in so many ways, offering me new experiences and answered prayers.  I can only hope the next 10 years will be as eventful and fulfilling as you were, oh noble first decade of the new millenium!

10.  All Things Crossroads - This should actually be a category all by itself.  In the past 10 years, God assembled an amazing staff of Matt Orth, Jeremy Berger, Justin Brock, and Micah and Aubree Martin.  We began our Community Discipleship Home and had a family in Florida pay off the house for the program ($160,000).  Our Summer Camps and Winter Conferences have grown and expanded and students gave over $500,000 in missions offering.  Overall, in the last decade we have seen God save over 25,000 people.

9.  4 New Books - In the last decade, I wrote a devotional book with my wife called The Beauty and The Mystery, co-authored a book with Pastor Steven Furtick called Love, Dating, and Other Insanities, and wrote my first book for national release called Surrounded By The Sacred.  I also finished a book for Harvest House called Dying To Live, which releases nationwide in June 2010.

8.  Bear Hunting - I discovered a new favorite hobby that is frightening, exhausting, and exhillerating, and have legally and ethically killed several, including a 400 pounder on my wall, which we ate.  Additionally, I have become close friends with a community of good men in Cashiers, NC and have seen places deep in the Appalachian Mountains that only Cherokee Indians have ever seen.

7.  Visiting Greece and Turkey - Under the leadership of Dr. Todd Still and Dr. Wayne Stacy, I spent 2 weeks visiting Corinth, Ephesus, Thessoloniki, and the cities where Paul the Apostle worked and planted churches during the early days of the church.  My eyes were opened to a whole new world and it changed the way I read the Bible and how I preached.  I also got to go with my lifelong friend, Brian Bugess.

6.  Visiting The Holy Land - Charie and I, along with 50 other seminarians led by Dr. Robert Canoy, spent 2 weeks walking where Jesus walked and tracing the steps of Christ as we studied the gospels where they happened, prayed at the Western Wall, and stood on top of the Temple Mount worshiping the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob.

5.  Being Escorted Off the Mormon Temple Grounds - What an honor to have one of the 70 Elders of the Mormon church take me by the elbow and insist that I stop preaching the gospel and debating their missionaries in front of 100 tourists in downtown Salt Lake City, declaring that Mormonism is a cult and not a part of Orthodox historical Christianity.  At least he was nice about it.  I have not been back since.

4.  Seeing U2 in Concert - After almost 20 years, I finally got to see the greatest rock and roll band ever (sorry Beatles, Zepellin and Nirvana fans), the Elevation Tour came to Charlotte and I cried like a baby when Bono prayed to God as the band began “Where The Streets Have No Name, ” perhaps the greatest song written in the last 100 years.

3.  Western Adventure - In the summer of 2000, my wife and I embarked on a month long adventure that took us to San Diego, San Francisco, Salt Lake City, Mexico, Yosemite, Yellowstonge, Glacier, Seattle, Alcatraz, Vancouver, The Redwood Forest, a hippie Bible college commune, and the highlight of rafting the Colorado River through Grand Canyon.

2.  Meeting Billy Graham - After 18 years of prayer, phone calls, letters, calling in favors, being turned down and ignored, God finally allowed me to spend an entire afternoon in the home of Billy Graham, my hero and the greatest evangelist in history.  It was indeed one of the greatest days of my life as I sat at his feet, asking questions and sharing fellowship and conversation with a holy and humble servant of God.

1.  Becoming a Daddy! Without a doubt, witnessing the birth of my two sons and entering into the challenging and fulfilling world of parenthood has opened my eyes to the character of God, His love for us, and the amazing abilities of my wife, like no other event of the past decade.  Then in 2008, I had the honor of leading my oldest son Jacob to faith in Christ and baptizing him on our property in the Broad River.

Honorable Mention - Peter Jackson makes “The Lord Of The Rings” movie trilogy,  “24″ and Jack Bauer, NeedToBreathe, going backstage at WWE with Perry Noble and having my picture made with Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat, preaching the gospel in Malaysia, going to Alaska with my wife and kids, preaching at Liberty University, preaching at Elevation Church, becoming Teaching Pastor at Newspring Church, preaching at Biltmore Baptist, joining Twitter and Facebook and the world wide web, entering my late 30’s, watching the Boston Celtics beat the LA Lakers for the NBA Championship, seeing UNC win the NCAA Championship again.

Here it is.  Read and enjoy and stay tuned for my Top 10 of the Decade coming up next!

10.  Receiving a property donation from a very generous and kind supporter of Crossroads Ministries.

9.  Being named “Campus Pastor” and preaching at Liberty University for the 5th year in a row for Spiritual Emphasis week, serving as Teaching Pastor at Newspring Church, and serving as President of Crossroads Worldwide.

8.  Killing a bear and a deer, both on opening day, and both before 9 AM.

7.  Taking my entire family to Alaska, 4 wheeling 60 miles to a glacier in one day, seeing Grizzlies in the wild, and salmon fishing with my wife and boys.

6.  Releasing my 4th book with CLC Publications entitled “Surrounded By The Sacred.”

5.  Celebrating 10 years of marriage to my lovely wife, Charie.

4.  Finishing my first book for national release for Harvest House Publishers, entitled “Dying To Live.”

3.  Being completely surprised when some friends handed us the keys and the title to their 2005 BMW-X5 and told us that God told them to give it to us so we would have a dependable car to drive.

2.  Seeing 1,700 students and adults repent of their sins and trust Christ publicly in January in Beaumont TX.

1.  Seeing 2,000 students and adults repent of their sins and trust Christ publicly in March in Nashville TN in one night.

HONORABLE MENTION:

*Watching Jack Bauer save the world again in a great season of “24″

*Seeing “Need To Breathe” live in concert.

*Seeing “Stryper” live in concert for the 5th time.

*Seeing over 100 people saved at Newspring without ever preaching the sermon (you should watch it sometime).

*Seeing 404 people saved at Winterfest in one service.

*Playing Lego Indiana Jones with my son on the wii.

*Discovering Twitter.

*Becoming friends with Tony Nolan and Wil Graham.