Making and Maturing

Disciples of Jesus

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Ryan serves as the Lead Pastor of Green Pond Bible Chapel in Rockaway, New Jersey. He is married with four children.
  • An Invitation for the Hurting

    An Invitation for the Hurting

    This Sunday at Green Pond Bible Chapel we begin our summer series on Psalms- Worship in Real Life. Our first Psalm for this year is Psalm 13. This Psalm is an honest expression of faith in the midst of anxiety, hurt, despair, and depression.

    Most estimates are that at least 40 million American adults struggle with major anxiety and/or depression. Drugs designed to alter moods specifically targeting anxiety consistently rank in the top ten prescribed drugs year to year.

    If you are struggling with anxiety, despair, or depression, I want to invite you to come and worship with us this Sunday at Green Pond Bible Chapel. Not only does God know your hurt and pain, he has provided a model for how we should respond when we face despair of any kind.

    If you’re not struggling at the moment, it’s very likely that you personally know someone fighting this battle. Please extend this invitation to them. There is lasting hope for every person struggling with anxiety, and that hope comes from the gospel of Jesus Christ.

    We have two worship services on Sundays- 8:30 & 11 am. Both are at 1083 Green Pond Rd., Newfoundland, NJ, 07435. For more information check out our website.

    Psa. 13:1 ¶ How long, LORD? Will you forget me forever?

    How long will you hide your face from me?

    Psa. 13:2 How long will I store up anxious concerns within me,

    agony in my mind every day?

    How long will my enemy dominate me?

    Psa. 13:3 ¶ Consider me and answer, LORD my God.

    Restore brightness to my eyes;

    otherwise, I will sleep in death.

    Psa. 13:4 My enemy will say, “I have triumphed over him,”

    and my foes will rejoice because I am shaken.

    Psa. 13:5 ¶ But I have trusted in your faithful love;

    my heart will rejoice in your deliverance.

    Psa. 13:6 I will sing to the LORD

    because he has treated me generously.

  • Back in the Saddle

    Back in the Saddle

    Seven weeks and tens of thousands of miles later, I’m back in the saddle at Green Pond Bible Chapel. Our sabbatical was a smashing success. We have been blessed by our church body, elders, and pastoral staff who made it possible. Here are some highlights of what God showed us during our time of renewal:

    1. Receiving Ministry from the Church. During our time in Colorado the recurring theme in our reading was the need for pastors and their families to receive as well as give in ministry. We reflected on how thankful we are for our Care Group, as we feel loved not only by our church in general, but also by those with whom we have deeper relationships. We are so thankful for Green Pond Bible Chapel!
    2. Biblical Theology Highlight. An outstanding paper at the Tyndale Fellowship Conference by Desi Alexander dealt with the ways the Exodus is a paradigm of divine salvation throughout the Bible. A highlight for me from this paper was the way the Exodus looks forward to a greater salvation… rescue from Pharaoh was just the start. Consider Exodus 15:17, “You will bring them in and plant them on the mountain of your possession; LORD, you have prepared the place for your dwelling; Lord, your hands have established the sanctuary.” This dwelling with God has never been fully realized. No doubt the New Jerusalem is the ultimate fulfillment of this promise, facilitated by Jesus who rescued us from sin through his sacrifice. In this way the Exodus fostered anticipation of the greater glorious restoration of God’s people.
    3. Faith Stands Out. Our visit to the Ark Encounter was powerful. I could not escape Hebrews 11:7, “By faith Noah, after he was warned about what was not yet seen and motivated by godly fear, built an ark to deliver his family. By faith he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.” Recent events in our own nation have reminded me that genuine faith will stand out in our culture. By virtue of its existence, faith condemns unbelief around it. I am praying for courageous faith.
    4. The Pilgrim’s Progress. As a family we’ve enjoyed reading John Bunyan’s classic, The Pilgrim’s Progress. One memorable quote comes from chapter seven, where Christian affirms, “You cannot expect to travel too long on your pilgrimage without suffering tribulation.” This journey of the Christian life necessarily includes trials.

    We want to thank everyone who made our sabbatical possible, especially the members, elders, and pastors at GPBC. We look back with gratefulness to God for his faithfulness and we look forward with faith-driven anticipation of what he will do.

  • The Theology Behind a Ministry Sabbatical

    The Theology Behind a Ministry Sabbatical

    “Pay close attention to your life and your teaching; persevere in these things, for in doing this you will save both yourself and your hearers.” -1 Tim. 4:16

    As I head into a second ministry sabbatical, I am all the more aware that pastors struggle to truly rest. Like small business owners, we have our hands in most if not all aspects of our churches.

    As I’ve tried to prepare spiritually for this season of rest and renewal, I have found these three theological truths foundational to embracing this ministry sabbatical:

    Sabbath Rest Is Based on Faith in God to Provide

    In Leviticus 25 God gave the Israelites instructions to give the land itself a sabbath. Every seventh year Israel was to let the land lay fallow. This required remarkable faith in God, as they essentially had to sit back and wait for God to provide. In an agricultural economy with minimal food imports, this would have been very hard. As if that year wasn’t a faith challenge, every 50th year they would observe a second sabbath year, the year of Jubilee. That meant two years back to back without working the land.

    The obvious objection is, “How will the crops survive without our help? How will we survive?” Or, to quote Leviticus 25:20, “What will we eat in the seventh year if we don’t sow or gather our produce?” The Lord answered,

    “I will appoint my blessing for you in the sixth year, so that it will produce a crop sufficient for three years.” -Leviticus 25:21

    In short, God reminds us that he’s the ultimate source of all produce and productiveness. He will provide, and provide abundantly. It’s not a stretch to say that any sabbath is designed to force us to trust God to provide. Sabbath is about faith.

    Sabbath Rest Proves that I’m Expendable

    One of the key lessons any pastor needs to learn is that we aren’t essential to the advancement of God’s kingdom. Yes, I can take an extended time of rest with full confidence that God is still at work.

    Moses and Aaron learned this in Numbers 20 when they went beyond God’s instruction in providing water from the rock. God told Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust me to demonstrate my holiness in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this assembly into the land I have given them.” Moses, the man whom God used to lead his people out of slavery in Egypt, was not essential to their arrival into the promised land. Once again it’s a faith issue: they didn’t trust God.

    This truth stings at first, but after reflection it actually alleviates pride and placing undue pressure on myself for the “success” of ministry. Thankfully, Green Pond Bible Chapel doesn’t need me to get to the promised land. They have Jesus.

    Sabbath Rest Reminds Me that I Need to Receive, Not Only Give

    Pastors tend to give way more than we receive. While this is a natural byproduct of our gifting and calling, it doesn’t mean we don’t need spiritual input. Whether it’s listening to a sermon during the week, or heading to a conference every so often, pastors need to hear the Word of God preached to them.

    No surprise here, but once again the issue is faith. It takes faith in God to put down the trowel and listen to the Holy Spirit using the Word to teach, rebuke, guide, and instruct us. I think this is what Paul is talking about in his instruction to Timothy in 1 Timothy 4:16, “Pay close attention to your life and your teaching; persevere in these things, for in doing this you will save both yourself and your hearers.”

    Paying attention to your life means stopping every once in a while and asking, “How am I doing spiritually? Am I growing? Where am I struggling?” These questions come easily when I’m thinking of others, but the sabbatical is designed to provide time to ask these questions of myself.

    So What?

    In the end, a ministry sabbatical is a reminder of the heart of the gospel. My identity isn’t in what I do, or how I perform as a preacher, or how many churches we’ve planted. My identity is found in Jesus Christ, who died for my sins and rose from the dead. Sabbath rest is about receiving God’s grace through faith.

  • What If My Sins Were Made Public?

    What If My Sins Were Made Public?

    We’ve all had that nightmare when we showed up to some public place “inadequately dressed.” The shame! The horror! The embarrassment! Then we wake up. Whew. It’s a common nightmare because the idea of the general public seeing us at our most vulnerable is very scary. One of the unfortunate side effects of social media is that now we have the opportunity to not only be made aware of others’ failings, but also comment on them.

    This is where we can quickly get caught up in the tide of judging others. By “judging” I mean condemning people with an attitude of superiority. When we sinfully judge others, we take God’s place and pronounce a verdict.

    What if your sin was made public? It wouldn’t be much different than the nightmare. Shame. Horror. Embarrassment. What would people think of you? The current trend on social media is that people will tell you exactly what they think, mock you, and maybe even threaten you.

    The truth is our sin is that bad. But often as participants in the court of public opinion we are quick to pass down guilty verdicts and scoff at the sin of others. Maybe we feel better about ourselves by casting stones at others. Maybe it’s just the mob mentality. Whatever the reasons we participate in public floggings, it isn’t right.

    When we take part in these social media tar and featherings, we are acting as if we are better. But if it was our sin that was made public, we’d quickly realize that we have plenty to be ashamed of and embarrassed about.

    All this boils down to a fundamental failure to understand the gospel. The good news of Jesus Christ isn’t that God will forgive those who have nothing to hide. The good news of Jesus Christ is that God forgives sinners of their shameful sin by taking their place on the cross. The church isn’t filled with better people, it’s filled with forgiven people.

    Sadly, our Christian social media presence doesn’t reflect how much grace we have received. This reminds me of Jesus’ parable of the unforgiving servant. A servant was forgiven a huge debt by his master, then on the way home demanded payment of a small debt from someone who owed him. When the master found out, he confronted this hypocrisy,

    “You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me. Shouldn’t you also have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?”  -Matthew 18:32-33

    How about that? How about instead of heaping condemnation on the person, we treat them with grace and mercy? This doesn’t mean we condone sin, it means we pursue people with the gospel, offering them hope and forgiveness. Yes we confront sin, but following Jesus’ instruction in the context of the church (Matthew 18:15-17). The goal is always restoration, not public shaming.

    It’s time for us to start speaking (and commenting) like we believe we’re people who’ve been forgiven an eternal debt. It’s time for us to show the world what grace looks like and sounds like. Who knows? next time, it could be your sin in the headlines.

  • Find Yourself by Getting Lost in God’s Glory

    Find Yourself by Getting Lost in God’s Glory

    For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen.

    -Romans 11:36

    One of the most revolutionary ideas in the Bible is that in order to find out who you really are, you have to lose yourself in God’s glory. We were not made to find our worth in ourselves; God created us to be captivated by his glory and greatness. Every day we are tempted to find meaning in anyone or anything else, and when we do we are missing the point of our existence.

    In his classic treatise The End for Which God Created the World, my friend Jonathan Edwards develops a long running analogy of God as a fountain (this is a biblical analogy, check out Jeremiah 2:11-13). His point is that God’s glory—the sum of all of his greatness and worth—flows out of him like streams from a fountain. The streams are not the fountain, but they flow out of the fountain.

    He maintains that God is disposed to not only be glorious, but to communicate his glory. The streams, for Edwards, represent the communication of God’s character. But to whom will he communicate his glory? Enter the creation of humanity.

    God created us to drink from the fountain. He created us to comprehend who he is… but that’s not all. Edwards posited that when we drink of the fountain, we also must affirm the goodness of the fountain. We know of God’s power, and see that it is good. We learn of God’s love, and we marvel at its goodness. We experience God’s grace, and we praise him for it.

    In this sense God is glorified not only when we discern his greatness, but also when we value him supremely. When we marvel at God’s greatness, we return it back to him in worship. Edwards said it this way,

    In the creature’s knowing, esteeming, loving, rejoicing in, and praising God, the glory of God is both exhibited and acknowledged; his fulness is received and returned.

    To use another analogy, think of people as satellite dishes. We were made not only to receive communication from God, but to send back to him our response to his greatness in worship. We were designed to participate in an endless reciprocal loop of glory—beholding his glory and rejoicing in it.

    This glory-loop is described by the apostle Paul in 2 Thessalonians 1:11-12. There Paul prays that God will make us worthy of his calling, “so that the name of our Lord Jesus will be glorified by you, and you by him…” Do you see it? God makes us worthy so that we will glorify Jesus’ name, and thus we also will be glorified by Jesus.

    Because God is the source and recipient of praise, he is at the center of it all. This doesn’t rob us of value; on the contrary, it enhances it. For us to act and think as if we are the center of everything is not only ridiculous, it’s disingenuous. We know we’re not. But when we see and value God rightly, we are finally living as he created us to live. Edwards wrote,

    So that the whole is of God, and in God, and to God; and he is the beginning, and the middle, and the end.