What's the Evidence of Changed Lives?

Teaching to change lives is our mission. What kind of change are we looking for? The general answer is "growth in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ."

What does that specifically look like?

Our friends at the Sunday School Revolutionary have a terrific list, which I've reproduced here for you:

• willingness to think,
• understanding how learning applies to life today,
• understanding how learning applies to my life,
• good questions during and after class,
• seeking more information on a subject or idea,
• healthy discussion,
• testimonies,
• changed conversation,
• changed thinking,
• changed desires and attitudes,
• changed behavior,
• changed focus and goals,
• fewer poor decisions,
• knowledge of God's Word,
• growth in the fruit of the Spirit,
• unity,
• desire to build up the body of Christ,
• willingness to sacrifice,
• better relationships,
• healthy marriage,
• desire to give,
• desire to help,
• desire to serve,
• willingness to shepherd/lead/teach His sheep,
• passion about God and living for Him,
• recognition of God at work in and around me,
• free-flowing praise and thanks to God,
• appreciation for others,
• acts of love and grace,
• hunger for God and His Word,
• desire for prayer and spiritual disciplines,
• choosing obedience even when it is inconvenient,
• courage to go where He sends,
• desire to worship Him with other believers

(If you're teaching adults in Sunday School, be sure to follow their excellent blog.)

Teaching About the Prayer Shawl

Here is some excellent information about the Jewish prayer shawl. This would make for a nice devotional or short lesson.

David Wilkerson on Anguish

Over-Prepare, but Don't Over-Teach

I strongly advocate teaching less material well, rather than teaching too much content poorly.

To do this, you need to over-prepare. By this, I mean, you need to study more deeply than what you will end up sharing in your lesson.

I know you've read the commentaries, looked at the archeological pictures, cross-referenced this passage to other parts of Scripture, and listened to two sermons on it by your favorite pastor. That's all good, really it is.

But don't dump all that on your audience. Don't over-teach it. Don't even tell them you did all that.

Four reasons for this approach:

1. You're not trying to impress anyone with your exhaustive knowledge or work. Keep the attention on the most important elements of what you learned that match what your class or group need to know at this point in time. (You've been praying for this discernment, right?) This also protects you against pride.

2. You're likely to bore people, or overwhelm them. Either way, they stopped listening before you finished sharing. You just killed the learning process.

3. As questions and dialogue proceeds, you can draw on your preparation to provide helpful information. Then bringing these things out matches the conversation, and aren't over-kill.

4. If you've done some homework and good preparation, you'll be confident.

Again, focus on teaching less content really well. You'll see more changed lives.

Filthy Sponge

Eye-opening explanation the sponge (see Luke 23:36)

The Why of Marking Up Your Bible

I'm a big believer in marking up your Bible -- make lots of notes, interact with it! Make it yours! Over time you create something much more valuable. I advocate using wide-margin Bibles to give you more room to write notes. People ask me for specific tips on how to mark up their Bibles, and my answer is "How you do it is much less important than why you're doing it. Start with underlining and making notes in the margins, and go from there."

Now that I have you thinking about your Bible, check out this quote from Mortimer Adler's excellent book, "How to Read a Book" :

"There are two ways in which one can own a book. The first is the property right you establish by paying for it, just as you pay for clothes and furniture. But this act of purchase is only the prelude to possession. Full ownership comes only when you have made it a part of yourself, and the best way to make yourself a part of it is by writing in it. An illustration may make the point clear. You buy a beefsteak and transfer it from the butcher's icebox to your own. But you do not own the beefsteak in the most important sense until you consume it and get it into your bloodstream. I am arguing that books, too, must be absorbed in your blood stream to do you any good.

Confusion about what it means to "own" a book leads people to a false reverence for paper, binding, and type -- a respect for the physical thing -- the craft of the printer rather than the genius of the author. They forget that it is possible for a man to acquire the idea, to possess the beauty, which a great book contains, without staking his claim by pasting his bookplate inside the cover. Having a fine library doesn't prove that its owner has a mind enriched by books; it proves nothing more than that he, his father, or his wife, was rich enough to buy them.

There are three kinds of book owners. The first has all the standard sets and best sellers -- unread, untouched. (This deluded individual owns woodpulp and ink, not books.) The second has a great many books -- a few of them read through, most of them dipped into, but all of them as clean and shiny as the day they were bought. (This person would probably like to make books his own, but is restrained by a false respect for their physical appearance.) The third has a few books or many -- every one of them dog-eared and dilapidated, shaken and loosened by continual use, marked and scribbled in from front to back. (This man owns books.) ...

But the soul of a book "can" be separate from its body. A book is more like the score of a piece of music than it is like a painting. No great musician confuses a symphony with the printed sheets of music. Arturo Toscanini reveres Brahms, but Toscanini's score of the G minor Symphony is so thoroughly marked up that no one but the maestro himself can read it. The reason why a great conductor makes notations on his musical scores -- marks them up again and again each time he returns to study them--is the reason why you should mark your books. If your respect for magnificent binding or typography gets in the way, buy yourself a cheap edition and pay your respects to the author."

HT: Tim Challies

Strive to make the Bible part of you!

How to Approach Apparent Bible Contradictions

If you haven't come across apparent contradictions in the Bible yourself, you've probably had them shoved into your face by skeptics and concerned students.

My friend Kevin Nelstead has an excellent post about dealing with apparent Bible contradictions on his GeoChristian blog.

I'm summarizing his principles here:

• My starting assumption is that I assume the Bible is right. This is not because I have a blind faith, but because my experience has been that once I understand the text, culture, and historical context, the Bible turns out to be accurate.
• Another principle is to assume that the authors of the Bible knew their world, with its culture and history. Skeptics often assume that the authors of the Bible were idiots. They weren’t.
  
• We don’t know everything. For example, skeptics have charged that the lengths of reigns of the kings of Judah in the Old Testament make no sense. This went unanswered for quite some time. It has been shown, however, that the numbers make perfect sense once one considers that sons often served as co-regents with their fathers, so there was often considerable overlap in their listed reigns.
  
• We cannot force our cultural concept of what is acceptable in narrative literature to match that of Biblical cultures. For example, there are a number of places in the Old Testament where stories are arranged in a non-chronological order. There was nothing dishonest about this, and only our own cultural biases would cause one to call this a contradiction.
• Differences in wording are not contradictions.
  
• Parallel passages are often written in different literary genres.
  

Read the whole post for more details.

Remember This If You're Teaching to Change Lives

There's an old saying amongst preachers:

"Preach against sin, people will nod in agreement and smile. Talk about change, and you'll tick them off every time."

Welcome to human behavior 201.

People resist change where they perceive a loss. And almost any change will create a loss. Transformational change must be a work of the Holy Spirit, because human psychology alone just doesn't get people through major changes.

Much has been written about facilitating change, leading change, and promoting change. Do some internet searching if you're interested. There are certainly some good articles and books.

But, as a Bible teacher desiring to see transformational change in people's hearts and minds, you must pray. This is the work of the Holy Spirit. Invite God to work. Plead for God to work. Pray consistently. When you see God moving, give thanks and keep praying!

Glenn Gets Grilled!

Here's the replay of the hour-long interview I did with David Fournier last night.

We had a wide-ranging conversation that covered:

The story of how I got started (as a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology)
The key elements of a great Bible lesson
What I see as a the limiting factors for Bible teaching today
What people remember more than what you say
How best to teach topics (it's the reverse of what most people think)
The 400,000 Bible teacher initiative
The best thing you can do for children
And more!

Listen here:



I also recommend you check out David Fournier's other interviews (there are some really interesting guests!).

A Memorization Strategy for Verbatim Text

If you'd like to improve your ability to memorize Bible texts, or any texts, try out this very powerful strategy: take a long text and produce a memorization aid of just the first letter of each word.

Let's say you want to memorize Mark 1:1-8

1The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

2It is written in Isaiah the prophet:
"I will send my messenger ahead of you,
who will prepare your way"—
3"a voice of one calling in the desert,
'Prepare the way for the Lord,
make straight paths for him.' " 4And so John came, baptizing in the desert region and preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River. 6John wore clothing made of camel's hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. 7And this was his message: "After me will come one more powerful than I, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. 8I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit."

You study the text, and then use this to help train your brain to recall it:

1 b o t g a J C, t S o G.

2 i w i I t p:
"I w s m m a o y,
w w p y w"—
3"a v o o c i t d,
'P t w f t L,
m s p f h.' " 4 s J c, b i t d r a p a b o r f t f o s. 5 w J c a a t p o J w o t h. C t s, t w b b h i t J R. 6 w c m o c's h, w a l b a h w, a h a l a w h. 7 t w h m: "A m w c o m p t I, t t o w s I a n w t s d a u. 8 b y w w, b h w b y w t H S."

I know this probably sounds wacky, but it works.

There is a nice online tool to make this simpler available here. Paste in the original text, hit the "convert" button and you get the memorization string instantly.

If you're memorizing individual verses, flash cards are still probably the most powerful way to go. But I recommend this strategy for longer passages.

Is Social Media the New Normal?

Here's a stunning set of facts, cleverly presented in this video:



How can we use social media more in teaching ministry?

Improving Your Between Class-time Communication

I'm a big advocate of contacting people in your regular class or group outside of your "scheduled" meeting time. It keeps momentum going, builds relationships, gives you insights into how well people are understanding what you've been teaching, and lets you dribble out extras and related information that you didn't have time to cover when you met. You can also be giving people previews about what's coming, to build their expectations.

(Candidly, I write about this strategy better than I've been doing it lately, so I'm planning to sharpen my serve in the future.)

Now, how do you do this?

First, you need to commit yourself to doing it. Public commitment is even better. I find it helps a great deal when I tell a class "I will send you more information on this by Wednesday night."

Second, you need to decide which communication medium you will use.

Telephoning people is an inefficient process, but you will have good opportunities for in-depth conversation if you do this. But if your group is more than a handful, it's hard.

Email works fairly well, even for large classes.

Twitter and text messaging are limited to 140 characters. That's just not enough to convey much information beyond a few encouraging words, or a link to a website.

I used to advise people to create blogs, but few people seemed willing to try this strategy.

I know some people have created closed community sites with tools like Ning.

I think the most interesting new tool is Facebook.

I'm not using Facebook myself, but have many family and friends who do. Bob Mayfield gives some excellent tips for using Facebook this way in this article.

You can also look at this excellent free ebook, Facebook for Pastors, by Chris Forbes.

One of the big challenges is that everyone in the group or class needs to be versant with the communication tool. If not everyone is now, perhaps you can create incentives to help them get going. Line up your youth to help the "techno-dunces" and laggards.

Does your teaching ministry suffer if you don't have all these communication tools? Not necessarily. Remember, that it is the Holy Spirit who must be at work in people's hearts and minds to transform their lives. No amount of technology makes up for the answers to our fervent prayer!


P.S. If you're using Facebook, in ministry, comment below to let us all know how well it's working, and any tips you have.

Marks of a Teaching Leader

John Piper outlines the characteristics of a good teacher in his excellent article, "Marks of a Spiritual Leader":

• A good teacher asks himself the hardest questions, works through to answers, and then frames provocative questions for his learners to stimulate their thinking.
• A good teacher analyzes his subject matter into parts and sees relationships and discovers the unity of the whole.
• A good teacher knows the problems learners will have with his subject matter and encourages them and gets them over the humps of discouragement.
• A good teacher foresees objections and thinks them through so that he can
  answer them intelligently.
• A good teacher can put himself in the place of a variety of learners and therefore explain hard things in terms that are clear from their standpoint.
• A good teacher is concrete, not abstract, specific, not general, precise, not vague, vulnerable, not evasive.
• A good teacher always asks, "So what?" and tries to see how discoveries shape our whole system of thought. He tries to relate discoveries to life and tries to avoid compartmentalizing.
• The goal of a good teacher is the transformation of all of life and thought into a Christ-honoring unity.

I like the mix of characteristics of thinking/analysis, preparation, and concern for souls and life change. This is a good list for self-assessment.

The whole article is worth reading, by the way. Print it off, mark it up for yourself, share with others. The larger world, your church, your neighborhood, and your family are crying out for strong spiritual leaders.

Teaching Through a Translator

You need a translator to get your message across if you aren't fluent in a language. In this article you'll learn strategies and tactics that will help you be more effective. I'm basing this on my own experiences and on what I've learned from others as we seek to glorify God as we teach and preach across language and cultural gaps.

Before You Teach

Find out as much as you can about the people you'll be teaching. Prayerfully consider how to shape your message to their needs.

Be clear about how much time you have. Because everything you say will be translated, or at least paraphrased, plan for half the content in the same amount of time. This works to your advantage because (a) it helps you stay focused and (b) helps your audience stay attentive. It's more difficult to listen to the rhythm of two people speaking.

Use simple words. You need to think through your vocabulary and select words and phrases that are easier to translate and understand.

Avoid culturally different illustrations that your translator or audience will not understand. Neighborhood block parties, shopping malls, and football game tailgating aren't worldwide phenomenon. Not every country has free speech and political elections with candidates. TV ads and commercial jingles vary by country or region of the world. If you are telling a story, it will be more important to explain about the people in the story and less important to explain the place.

Avoid colloquialisms. Colloquialisms are words, phrases, or expressions characteristic of ordinary or familiar conversation rather than formal speech or writing, as "She's out" for "She is not at home." Every region of the world and every people group has them, and they make little or no sense to others in the world. They're extremely difficult to translate well.

Example of what NOT to do: Once when I was teaching in Venezuela I described how Jesus astounded his disciples when he called them friends. "Jesus knocked their socks off," I said. My puzzled translator looked at me, and I repeated, "Jesus knocked their socks off" a little louder. I suspected a problem when she took a lot of words to translate this and there were more puzzled looks in the crowd. Later I learned that my translator has explained it this way: "I don't see this in the Bible passage, but apparently the disciples were wearing socks and Jesus didn't like it so he knocked the socks off their feet."


Practice teaching with pauses. When we teach without a translator, we are used to our own rhythm of speech. We have our distinct personal styles for building up to a key point, asking questions, pausing dramatically, looking around for body language feedback. All these are significantly different when you teach through a translator! So you can practice this a little bit on your own. Say a sentence or two, then pause and count to 10. Say another couple of sentences, and count to ten. You'll find it feels odd and strained at first, but stick with it. This practice will help you feel much better about the rhythms when you actually are teaching. You'll also spot some places in your lesson where there are natural breaks that work better for translators than others.

Review the basic plan of your teaching with your translator. Show them which Bible passage or verses you will be using, so they can mark them in their Bible, or produce a translation in advance. Your translator will be much more comfortable helping you if he or she has some idea of where you are going. (One translator I know explained that it's much more difficult to translate from your first language to your second language than vice versa. This means much grace, more review time up front is necessary!)

Check key questions with your translator first. Questions are powerful and effective foundations for great Bible teaching. But your translator needs to understand the questions and their purpose in order to translate well. Are you asking rhetorical questions? Make sure your translator understands that you don't expect the group to respond. If you are looking for a response, make sure your translator understands that you'll wait for an appropriate time.

Pray with your translator. They need your prayers. The people needs your prayers. The power to transform lives is in the Word and in the Holy Spirit. I like to pray that my translator and I will be small obstacles to God doing His work in people's hearts and minds.


While You Are Teaching


Pray! Quick silent prayers for your hearers and your translator are important and effective. We're relying upon the power of the Holy Spirit to change lives.

Look at your audience when you are speaking. Listen to people in the audience when they are speaking. I've occasionally seen teachers fixate on their translator, even unconsciously, rather on the person who is speaking.

Look mostly at your translator when he or she is speaking, and remain still. This will help the audience stay directed at the translator as well. If you're looking around too much, they'll be watching you. If you're fidgeting or rustling your note papers, you'll become a distraction.

Use the power of body language. Facial expressions work well across cultures and languages. Don't strive for fake smiles and laughs, for example, but don't suppress them either. Amplify key points with hand gestures. (Watch out for finger signs, though; some things that are fine in the US, for example, are extremely rude in other countries.)

Keep in mind that your audience may understand some of what you say. It's not uncommon for people to understand more of a foreign language than they can speak. Americans are often surprised - sometimes very embarrassed - to learn that people in many countries can understand them fairly well, even if they aren't fluent in English. So as you teach or preach, some of your audience may be picking up part of the meaning even before the translation.


After You Teach

Be available to your audience to answer questions or for follow-up dialogue. This is always appropriate, no matter what language or culture barriers exist. Be sure your translator knows that you will need help during this time.

Express your appreciation to your translator. Translation is hard work, and good work for the service of the Lord. Be warm and kind in your appreciation. I like to do this at the end of the lesson, too, for public recognition.


If you keep these things in mind, practice, and pray, you'll be much more effective as a Bible teacher working across language and cultural gaps. If you have suggestions, please let me know!

How to Avoid Being Part of a Horrible Statistic

Survey responses from over 400 teachers gave me this horrible statistic: 72% were quitting after two years. Watch the video to learn about why, and how you can avoid this in your own teaching ministry.


Go this this page to get the "Inner Bible Teacher" information.

Publishing Devotions or Lessons

If you'd like to develop further as a Bible teacher, I strongly encourage you to publish devotions and lessons to a broader audience.

OK, before you suck in your breath with fear, hear me out :-)

First, writing is an important discipline for you. Writing forces you to work harder on choice of words and phrases, how to order ideas, using illustrations -- which carries over into your teaching ministry.

Second, publishing means others benefit -- even others who you do not personally know, or perhaps a generation from now.

There are many options for publishing. You can set up a free blog. Your church may have space in the bulletin, or on their web site. There may be a community newspaper that would accept your devotion as a regular column. I'm aware of a teacher who has a weekly spot on the local radio station and their web site.

Let me share from my own experience.

I don't publish much from my lessons, because of the highly interactive nature of my usual teaching. (I could probably publish more of the questions and key themes I develop from passages.)

I write a monthly devotion for our church web site. (I also publish these on my blog for men, Be Bold, Be Gentle.) You can see these examples:

"To Whom Has God Chained You?"
Improving Your Devotional Times
The Question

They're not long. They're not heavy (though I pray they are useful and helpful). It's curious to see over time how people far from Iowa connect with me because I've published these devotions.

The discipline of writing these is very good for me, and the result helps build up the body of Christ. Try this!

Ad -- Start Your Own Religion

This ad appeared on my daughter's Facebook page recently. (It was heartening to see her outrage :-)

If you click through you go to an Amazon sales page for a 40 page self-published book titled "How to Build a God in Your Garage" that is categorized in both Humor and Religion.

I haven't read the book, so can't comment on its humor potential. The Bible uses humor effectively to ridicule the idea of idols and home-fashioned 'gods.'

"So who even comes close to being like God?
To whom or what can you compare him?
Some no-god idol? Ridiculous!
It's made in a workshop, cast in bronze,
Given a thin veneer of gold,
and draped with silver filigree.
Or, perhaps someone will select a fine wood—
olive wood, say—that won't rot,
Then hire a woodcarver to make a no-god,
giving special care to its base so it won't tip over!" (Isaiah 40:18-20)

"Don't take the godless nations as your models.
Don't be impressed by their glamour and glitz,
no matter how much they're impressed.
The religion of these peoples
is nothing but smoke.
An idol is nothing but a tree chopped down,
then shaped by a woodsman's ax.
They trim it with tinsel and balls,
use hammer and nails to keep it upright.
It's like a scarecrow in a cabbage patch—can't talk!
Dead wood that has to be carried—can't walk!
Don't be impressed by such stuff.
It's useless for either good or evil." (Jeremiah 10:1-5)

And when deprecating humor is inadequate, God sends judgment.

Now most readers of this blog aren't crafting idols in their garage. We're far too sophisticated for that! No, our modern idols are subtle and invisible most of the time. Out idols are crafty, stealthy, and deadly dangerous to our hearts and our families' hearts.

John's counsel remains for us: "Dear children, keep yourselves from idols." (1 John 5:21)

Helping Conversational Prayer in Small Groups

One of the skills you should develop is the capability to foster conversational prayer in a group. I say 'skill' because there is some tactic to it, and you can foster it among others. Josh Hunt's explanation is as useful as anything I've seen:

"Conversational prayer is, well, like a conversation. Like a conversation. . .

* You don't go around the room and pray; you just pray one person at a time, in random order.
* You can pray as often as you like or not at all.
* Like a good conversation, there is balance but not symmetry in the participation. In other words, everyone is participating in a more or less balance way, but it is not like everyone is praying for exactly two minutes each.
* Some won't pray at all. That is fine. Just like in a conversation, some people prefer to listen more than talk. I have never been one of those people.
* If two people start praying at the same time, you do what you do in a conversation. One of you backs off. It is slightly awkward, but you get through it--just like in a conversation.
* The prayer tends to stay on topic, and then gradually shift to another. Say we start praying about an upcoming marriage retreat. Two or three or four people pray about that. Then there is a pause. People sense that we are finished talking (praying) about that. So, someone shifts the conversation to something else. Perhaps a couple more offer a sentence or two about that. Then the conversation with God moves on to something else.
* Just like a conversation, there is often short periods of silence. I usually warn people about that: "Don't be afraid of the silence. Just talk to God. Or just be still and know that He is God." We are so seldom still. We are so seldom quiet. Don't you love the verse that says, "Let all the earth keep silent before Him." We seldom obey that command.
* One person is assigned to wrap things up. This could be the group leader, or could be someone else.
* Try to minimize the time you spend sharing prayer requests. (If I remember right, Rinker suggests you don't spend ANY time in sharing prayer requests; just dive in to praying. Don't tell each other about the requests, just tell God, and let others listen.) As in many areas of life, balance is a good thing. I say, "minimize" the time you spend in prayer requests. Many groups spend far more time talking about prayer than they spend actually praying. Better to just dive into prayer, as Rinker suggests. But, I think there are some times when a prayer requests requires a little explanation. So, you might want to spend some time explaining things that need explaining."

Check out this article by Josh Hunt for more on conversational prayer.

Modeling this conversational prayer in a group will help everyone involved strengthen their prayer life. Prayer is 'more caught than taught.' Once people get a taste of interactive, plain spoken prayer as conversation with God, then it will carry over to other areas in their life.

Bible Teaching Flows Out of Who God Has Designed Us To Be

Matt Chandler nails it: Bible preaching and teaching needs to be out of who we are. We need to feel the text. Let us be diligent students of the Word, and faithful, passionate teachers!

Free Ebook from Josh Hunt on Using Questions in Teaching

I've learned a lot from Josh Hunt over the years, and now would like to steer you to his free ebook titled "Good Questions Have Groups Talking." Here is the message Josh sent out about this:

"This is a full book -- approximately 170 pages.
This book will help the teacher ask good questions as a means of teaching adults. It describes in detail the kinds of questions I use each week as I write Good Questions That Have Groups talking.
One caveat: this book is still in review and will be evolving as I get feedback from readers.
Feel free to pass this link along."

I took some time to work through the book and think you'll find a lot of value in it.

I really like the closing words of the book:

"At the micro-church level, you are the pastor.
Just as your pastor spends part of his time in content
preparation and delivery, you need to spend part of your
time in content preparation and delivery. But, that is not
you are called to do. You are called to pastor that microchurch.
You are called to make the group of people into
microcosm of the church.
The heart of a teacher, then, is the heart of a pastor."

Get the book here. You don't even need to give Josh an email address or anything.

I'm sure Josh would love to hear your feedback as well!

P.S. If you know other Bible teachers, steer them to this terrific resource as well.

World History Chart

After my earlier post about studying the Bible chronologically, the Agards contacted me and asked me to review their world history chart. So I ordered a copy from their easy-to-use website. The chart arrived here in 3 days and I shot this video review with the chart spread out on our living room floor. (The video is a little fuzzier than I'd like; I used a Flip cam.)


Key points:

• This is world history up to the year 2000, not only the biblical timeline. So you get church history and key events throughout the world.
  
• The circular layout, color coding for people groups/nations descended from Adam, and the index are outstanding.
• The quality of the work is excellent.
• There is so much information packed on this chart that you have to be up close to read the small print. So it's an excellent reference tool, or for use with a family or small group around a table, but you can't put this in front of a larger group and expect them to see more than the sweep of colors.
• The provided PDF copy is your best avenue for enlarging a subset of the chart in order to make slides or handouts. Open the PDF, zoom in, then make a screenshot of that to paste into another document for your handout or slide.

You can order your copy from http://agards-bible-timeline.com