The Challenges of Trying to Live an Integrated Life w/ Tim Mackie

just before we jumped on you shared with me just how you've been reflecting on the sermon on the mount and this idea of integration um an integrated life and i just would love to hear some of those reflections before we sign off for today yeah yeah thank you um i know i'm not alone in this um through years of pastoral ministry one of the main roles whether it's a teaching role mainly or some teaching but then also just a lot of personal spiritual guidance and shepherding the scriptures are are a key ingredient their main vehicle of helping guide and shape people and that's a very sacred and important role to be a mediator of the scriptures into the lives of people it also puts that person um uh it puts that communicator uh in a delicate and vulnerable position um because when i become a purveyor of biblical ideas um it happens very quickly that i outpace my actual personal growth and development what i'm teaching is way over my skis so to speak of what i'm actually embodying in my own life and so it's just it's inevitable and the issue will come up and so the question is will i be aware of it um will i be aware that what i'm calling my community to and this is still happening with me i'm creating helping create all the stuff that's telling the story and you know trying to lift our vision to the what it means to live as the new humanity and followers of jesus and so i'll write a video where you teach a class or you give a sermon or you meet with somebody and you share with them something from scripture and then if you allow yourself the moment of vulnerability you'll realize that um yeah that's i totally have not integrated that into my own life very much or at all um so i i what i realized a few years ago was i had reached that point yet again but had but also developed all of these um justifications sure why i didn't need to pay attention to that sense of disintegration and so uh it's happened on multiple fronts um with regard to i have lots of hang-ups about scarcity mentalities especially around time uh already just in my temperament um but i realized that i had developed habits of extreme scarcity and selfishness about my time and i just had to it was one of these moments where i'm like my life doesn't actually reflect values that i see jesus calling me to and uh i am not the person that i want to be um uh the current events you know in 2020 in america both the pandemic and um uh the spotlight uh on racial inequities that are woven in to western culture in particular to american culture uh these have put spotlights on new areas of disintegration in my life that are really uncomfortable for me um uh but they're good uh and they're they're forcing me to recognize um some of my own life patterns and habits in how i operate and live in my own city um how i relate to the houseless people uh who are around me how i conceive of them and think about them in my heart and how i relate to them i've had some pretty um humbling and revealing moments that god's humbled me and uh you know that kind of stuff yeah and it's really not fun um but what uh what i've come to uh again this is probably it's not going to be brand new to any of your listeners probably is just when you have those moments where you realize like part this part of my life i'm kind of propping up the an illusion of the kind of person i think i am and then i realize like oh my gosh i'm not that person but i'm telling other people to be like that uh those are not proud moments um but uh yeah you know we all have you have just a couple responses you either let down your guard and you invite other people in and say like i need help with this area of disintegration and i need to form new habits that will make me and to form lead me to become the kind of person that really embodies um love of god and love of neighbor and so um yeah there you go that's in a nutshell it's a perennial issue for anyone in pastoral ministry it seems to me and so i think the biggest takeaway for me was uh in the last year i've developed more intentionally a small network of people outside of my ministry work context and i have not just given them permission but like made them um uh be involved and more in in interrogating in my life yeah i just i need them i need their eyes on my life uh because living that disintegrated kind of life for me it's so draining and guilt-ridden and i know it it's not the the way jesus uh what what he has in store for us so yeah there you go that that's kind of that's why i'm sharing that time yeah absolutely

Channel: Canadian Church Leaders Network

Views: 10,299

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Keywords: church, church leaders, pastors, pandemic, evangelical church, canada, alpha, evangelism, learning from, leadership, christian, jesus, jason ballard, network, vancouver, church leaders network, pastor, Catholic church, Portland, USA, Bible, bible project

Id: -5iWGf1lSjI

Length: 6min 11sec (371 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 15 2021