Submitted by admin on Mon, 11/15/2010 - 10:10am
MP3 File:
Matthew 13:24-30 (NIV)
Why Church?
If the church were in an election—even in this country, in so-called Christian America—it would lose the popular vote. Even though the vast majority of Americans (something like 90%) believe in God, they don't necessarily believe in the church. They vote for God, but not the church.
Statistics: According to a Gallup poll, 41.6% of all Americans said they attended church (or mosque or synagogue) nearly every week in 2009. In many elections 41% of the vote won't win. Only 10 states had 50% attendance or higher (Mississippi was highest at 63%; Minnesota was 44%). See the Gallup poll chart.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/125999/mississippians-go-church-most-vermonters-least.aspx
Accusations: Over the years critics have leveled serious accusations against the church. The church has often been compromised and corrupted by human beings—leaving black marks on its history (e.g. the Inquisition, burning reformers at the stake, the Crusades of the Middle Ages, anti-semitism, the witch-hunts of Europe and colonial America, the sex-abuse scandals, and many examples of hypocrisy).
The church and faith have also been attacked in books like "The God Delusion" by Richard Dawkins or other strident atheists such as Christopher Hitchens. They are fervant in their beliefs that the church is not merely a benign distraction in society; they believe the church has harmed society.
Even many within the church question how it performs. They say things such as: it's too institutional, has too many programs, pushes the wrong priorities, spends too much money on wrong things.
So Why church? With so many dissenting voices, I want to say something positive about the church.
First, for all its flaws and shortcomings, the church has a very important fan: Jesus. The church is God's idea; Jesus is its greatest supporter, strongest advocate. Jesus loves the church. He said, "I will build my church" (Matt 16:18).
But the question remains. Considering its many problems, why should the church be a regular part of our lives? Is it really necessary to gather together regularly with other people who, to one degree or another, want to know God better? Can't we get just as close to God while sitting alone on a deer stand somewhere out in the woods?
Or, to put it another way: Are we affected in any way—are our souls affected—when we don't connect with others in worshiping God? When we don't fellowship together? When we don't learn from and challenge each other?
Why Church? Over the next few weeks, I'd like to look at some of the answers to these questions. I'd like you to learn how the church must be a life-giving community; that it offers ancient relevance; and that it defies conventional thinking—it's inside out and upside down.
The church is a life-giving community. The church is a place to live again.
People need a place to connect with others in community. The world seems to have gone crazy over social networking. There are now an estimated 666 million people who are members on Facebook. If it were a nation, it would be the 3rd largest country in the world behind only China and India. In the US 45% of women and 40% of men use some kind of social networking. Reference: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/pda/2010/nov/04/facebook-mobile-moissinac
And yet, for all the networking, Facebook is hardly a "community." Human beings need a place to meet face to face, to connect with real people, to interact and engage with living, breathing souls.
People join all kinds of clubs and activities to experience that—book clubs, quilting clubs, business clubs. They hang out in bars to watch the Vikings with other people because it's easier to handle a loss when you share your misery with others...and if they win, the feeling is more exhilarating when it's shared.
The church, however, goes way beyond that. First, it's not just about enjoying life. It's about finding REAL LIFE—eternal, everlasting, spiritual life. Second, the church is a place where you not only receive life, but it's a place where you can give life. It's a place where supernatural life is shared. We are to be Jesus to others—and Jesus laid down his life so he could give life to others. Characteristics:
1. A life-giving community is an organism, not an organization.
A healthy church will have structure. We need infrastructure and programs if people are going to live and work together.
Structure, however, is like a skeleton, and you need more than bones! Your body has bones to hang everything else on. Without bones, you'd be like a jellyfish, just kind of a big glob of ooze. Not good. We need a skeleton to have a body! But we need more than that! A pile of bones does not make a living, breathing person. (Remember Ezekiel's valley of bones?)
So we must guard against a "skeleton" church—lots of structure, programs, activities—but bones without life. We must stand guard so the organism doesn't morph into a lifeless organization.
The church cannot become impersonal. Institutional. It must remain vibrant and alive—a living, breathing, moving organism.
2. A life-giving community cares for others.
Our focus should not be on what "others can do for us," but on what "we can do for others."
Many come to church thinking, "what's in it for me?" They're looking for the benefits. They're interested in the take-home value.
But what if we all came thinking, "What can I put in it? How can I make a difference in someone else's life today?"
I know it's easy to take the comfortable route—where you grab your cookie and coffee and then start yakking with your friends. But let me challenge you: What if today you left your comfort zone? What if you left your friends and started looking for people who stand on the edges, alone?
If you have the life of Jesus in you, then you've got something to give to others. Your whole perspective can focus outward rather than inward.
The Special Olympics has a slogan: "Caring is more important than winning." The events at the Special Olympics are like any other track meet with one major difference. At the finish line is a group of volunteers the Olympic Committee calls "huggers." Their job, in addition to calling out the winners, is to encourage the competitors throughout the race and to greet them at the finish line with a big hug.
You can be that kind of encourager too. Make those around you feel like winners.
What if you were to keep on the lookout for someone with more troubles than you do? Could you go out of your way to hug someone? To pray for someone? To say an encouraging word to someone who needs a lift?
Joni Eareckson Tada, the paraplegic whose name many of you will remember, tells of going with her husband, Ken, to the Los Angeles Special Olympics several years ago, where he was the track and field coordinator.
Band music, colorful banners and flags were everywhere. Scattered across the infield were teams of mentally-handicapped young people with their friends and families. Everyone was on tiptoe with excitement, waiting for the games to begin. After a few minutes, it was time for the fifty-yard dash to begin.
Ken blew his whistle to signal for the contestants to line up at their starting blocks. A Down's syndrome girl with thick glasses and a big smile jumped up and down clapping her hands. A short, stocky, mentally-handicapped boy in baggy gray shorts kept kicking the dirt. A tall, gangly young man waved to his family in the stands.
They could barely contain their excitement, but Ken quieted them down. At the bang of the starting gun, off they sprinted—six contestants headed down the track. The crowd cheered wildly. Some skipped, a few stumbled, but each one raced, as best as he could, toward the other end of the track.
Suddenly, one of the runners—a Down's syndrome boy in a blue T-shirt—skipped the curb of the track and began running toward his friends in the middle. Ken blew his whistle, waved and called to the boy, trying to direct him back to the track. It was no use—he was determined to race away from the finish line.
At that point one of the other runners, the girl with thick glasses, noticed the boy's detour. She stopped a few yards from the finish line while the other contestants raced past her. She called to her fellow runner in the infield and shouted, "Hey, come this way!" When the boy in the blue T-shirt heard his friend's voice, he stopped and turned around.
The girl with glasses waved and called again, "This is the right way..come back!" He stood there and looked around, somewhat confused and exasperated, but with a smile on her face, she ran toward him and gave him a big hug when she caught up with him. They linked elbows and together got back on the track, finishing the race arm-in-arm. They cross the finish line last, but together. The others, who had finished long before them, met them at the finish line and hugged them.
Joni Eareckson Tada writes: "The entire crowd was standing at that point, enraptured by the poignancy of the scene. Some clapped, many cheered, but most like me, sat in wonder... We knew we had witnessed something special."
Joni went on to explain: that girl set aside her personal goal to win in order to help a confused friend reach the finish line. Romans 15 says: "We who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak and not to please ourselves. Each of us should please his neighbor for his good, to build him up..."
We all know people who are unsure of themselves. They've gotten off the right track and are uncertain where to go. Maybe they're spiritually confused. Do we stop? Do we set aside our personal schedules and goals to help the one who needs it?
We are called to run a race, but the way to win it is to please the Lord, not ourselves. That girl came in last because she helped a friend who needed direction. But though she was last, that girl was a winner.
Jesus said, "The last shall be first." —Adapted from The Greatest Lesson I've Ever Learned, edited by Vonette Zachary Bright.
Real winners think of others more than they do themselves. If you compete to come in first, you'll come in last. But if you care instead of competing, you'll be a winner in the eyes of Jesus.
3. A life-giving community is a place of healing.
The church is a place where fractured, broken lives can be mended. Where people give themselves and their time to bandage, touch, and restore others to health.
Some churches attack others more than heal. They're quick to condemn and judge. Jesus doesn't heal by condemning or judging. He doesn't put down; he picks up. He doesn't push away; he embraces.
If you slip on the ice and break your leg, how do they treat you when you get to the hospital? Do they say, "How terrible! Tsk! Tsk! You should have been more careful out there! Don't you know it's slippery? What were you thinking? You weren't thinking, were you? Shame on you! If you would have been more responsible, this never would have happened!"
Is that what they say? No, they don't say those things, because that doesn't help the healing process. Instead the doctor will take your broken leg and...
- Make it straight. (This is like confronting truth in a life-giving community. It might be painful, but the truth is given in love so things can be made right.)
- Make it stable. A splint or cast will immobilize the leg so it won't be hurt worse. (This is like the support and encouragement that can come from being surrounded by a life-giving community.)
- Give it time. You'll need to stay off the broken leg for six weeks or so, so it can have the time to mend. You may need to use a crutch or a wheel chair to compensate for its weakened condition. (A loving, life-giving community will be patient and not rush a person beyond his strength or ability. To give life means to be tolerant of each other's imperfections and flaws.)
- Make it strong. When the time is right, the cast comes off. That's when exercise and rehab are called for so the leg can gain strength. (A life-giving community does not enable people indefinitely. We help each other mature and grow strong.)
Gal 6:1 Brethren, even if anyone is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness; each one looking to yourself, so that you too will not be tempted.
This word restore is the exact same word used in the gospels to describe the disciples mending their nets (Mt 4:21; Mk 1:19). They were restoring the net to good condition; restoring the net so it could be useful again and fulfill its purpose. They were restoring broken cords, holes and tears, and removing debris that got tangled in their fishing nets.
It's exactly what the church is supposed to do! We are to mend and restore lives that have frayed and broken; we're to heal the holes and tears in the fabric of families; we're to remove debris that tangles each others' lives. ...you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness.
A life-giving community heals, mends, and restores each other. It does not tear each other apart through criticism, judgment, or gossip.
Gal 5:15 If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.
A life-giving community is a place of healing—it's like a hospital; a place to get healthy.
Rom 15:7 Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you...
Each of us should be like Jesus to everyone else—and treat each other as Jesus has treated us. Your part in a life-giving community is to extend the life of Jesus to others. To let grace flow through you. To let forgiveness, kindness, love, and patience flow from Jesus through you to others.
EnVision Retreat: 8 characteristics of church health. What do you think would be the first area we need to address?
At the retreat we were stretched to see the possibilities of what God wants to do through us as a church. Challenged to raise the vision to be more than what we've been and to do more than what we've done!
Follow-up: a team of people will be meeting with one of the speakers (Mike Harder) to gain his perspective and help in finding strategies and recommendations to pass along to the church leaders (pastors and elders). Some specific ideas will be implemented as practical tools for 2011.
4. A life-giving community can live with weeds.
We should be more concerned for the wheat than we are worried about the weeds. A life-giving community doesn't obsess about what is wrong as much as it celebrates what is right. We want to encourage and protect the wheat (especially the fragile, immature wheat) more than we want to pull weeds.
Human nature wants to "weed out" those who are different from us. We don't want to be tainted or compromised by getting too close to people who have different ideas or who think differently than we do. We don't want their style or their behavior to rub off on us.
So what does human nature do? We pull them out by the roots! We react. We weed the garden. But Jesus says, "Don't pull out the weeds. Let them grow together with the wheat."
Human nature tries to distinguish between people, between wheat and weeds. But there is danger in doing that. The weeds in Jesus' story, with similar stalks and grain, looked a lot like wheat. They were hard to tell apart. If you tried to pull out the weeds, you couldn't help but pull out some of the wheat as well.
Man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks on the heart! God is the only one who can tell the difference between weeds and wheat.
And if we're honest, I think we'd all have to admit that there are times when we are distressed to find some "weed-like" characteristics lurking in our own hearts. Right? There are times when we're not all that far from being weeds ourselves.
One day there will be a sorting out and a separation, but that doesn't happen until the end of the age at the harvest. If we try to do any sorting prematurely, we can end up damaging good wheat.
I think that's one reason why the church has been criticized. The world has often seen the church doing more harm than good.
Some of you have friends or family who have been damaged by those who love to pull weeds. Some of you know people who hear condemning words or feel the stares of self-righteous people who know more about judging than extending grace.
Some of you know people who have dropped out of church. Some have even walked away from God, all because they were in a place that sucked the life out of them.
The church is a life-giving community; it should not suck life out of people!
And if we're going to be a life-giving community living among the weeds, then we'd better understand what our relationship is supposed to be with the weeds.
God has planted us in his field to bring life to those who are dead in their sins. We're in the weed business! We should welcome them, love them, serve them. What we should NOT do is worry about what weeds will do to wheat.
Jesus said, "Let them both grow together so you don't damage the wheat."
A life-giving community...
- can live with weeds.
- is a place of healing.
- cares for others.
- is an organism, not an organization.
RESPONSE: Be part of the church. Be involved. Share the life!