Further Reflections on a Sunday Sermon

Yesterday I had the pleasure of kicking off our Advent series at MCC entitled Advent Conspiracy.  Some may recognize the name for the simple reason that – if truth be told – we stole it.  Well, not really…it was there for the taking.  Check out my previous post for a description of what it’s all about.

Because we also had a baptism in the service there were a number of visitors in church – some of whom were vocally open about their atheism and/or agnosticism.  This was the first time I’ve ever knowinly preached in front of non-Christians.  I’d like to say that I converted everyone and instead of one baptism we had an inpromptu mass baptism rght them and there.  But that didn’t happen.

I made a few tweaks to my sermon, mostly in the way of few additional stupid jokes and self-deprecating humor (you have to be able to laugh at yourself if your going to take your job seriously ) and trusted God to take care of the rest.

When talking with non-believers, I typically try to make a point of defying the stereotypes.  For example, when someone tells me all the reasons they hate Christians and would become one themselves (they usually point out hypocrisy, greed, legalism, division, hate/racism, intollerance, etc), I like to respond nonchalantly by saying “Ya, I don’t want to be a Christian either.”  That almost always through people for a loop because all of a sudden I – as a follower of Jesus – am agreeing with everything their saying.  I then get into some wonderful conversations about what I think it means to be a Christian and it usually looks quite different from what most non-beleivers think it looks like (different from a lot of Christians too).

But when you’re preaching, you can’t really do that; the walls/stereotypes need to be torn down in a different way.  And so, just minutes before I stood up to preach I was racking my brain trying to answer the question: “Why is someone an atheist?”  And when I lined that up with a sermon that somewhat suggested that Christians should buy less stuff this year and resist the powers of materialism and consumerism (it doesn’t get much more stereotypical than that in our churches this time of year in America), I realized that this was going to be a really hard sermon to preach “evangelistically.”  I didn’t get a chance to connect with all the visitors before the service so I had no idea who believed and who didn’t.  And for the atheists in church, I didn’t know if they had any exposure to church before that day or how much; What did they know about the Bible?  What did they know about Christmas?  What did they know about Jesus?  What did they know about baptism?  What did they know about church?  I had absolutely nothing to work off of except to know that there were people sitting in the crowd that thought we were all a bunch of superstitious fools.

(As I write this I keep laughing about the fact that so many of the unchurched think the only thing ministers ever talk about is money [thanks to the televangelists] and I basically preached a “money sermon” of sorts)

So best I could, I confronted the expectations head-on.  When I talked about buying one less gift, I made sure to emphasize the fact that I wasn’t asking people to not buy anything.  When I talked about taking the money we save from not buying as many gifts and the offering we’ll be taking for clean water projects and books for a local elementary school, I cracked a joke (one of my better ones of the day) about the staff Christmas bonus (I assumed that non-Christians think all the money goes into our pockets – don’t freak out, it wen’t over exactly the way it needed to).  When I talked about replacing that “missing” gift with a  relationship gift, I gave concrete examples of what that looks like and appealed to a common desire we all have to simply know that someone else cares – that often times fresh-baked cookies, a hug, and good conversation over a cup of coffee can mean more than the Nintendo Wii.  And I talked about how we, as followers of Jesus, do these things simply because of the example that Jesus gave us when he was with us in person.

The difficult thing about being a minister that most people don’t realize is that so much of what we do goes unacknowledged.  I’m not fishing for compliments.  It’s the nature of the calling.  I have no idea – and most likely never will – what kind of impact I had on the non-believers who were in church on Sunday.  I can’t give a pop-quiz at the end of the service or call everyone up and find out how my “performance” was.  Ultimately, I ahve to just trust that the right words came out of my mouth and that some good was done.  And that’s what I keep praying happened: I pray that through something in the service, the Spirit worked a little on those who needed it and that they saw a Christian community that defied expectations, a group of broken followers who look nothing like what our visitors think they should.  I hope Jesus was glorified and worshipped and I hope that God was revealed in a new way…

Filed under: Christian Living, Church, Faith, Ministry, Preaching

Matthew 1.18-25 (“The Conspiracy”)

Ya, it really is time to start putting together Advent/Christmas sermons.  This week, MCC is starting their Advent series.  We decided to participate in the Advent Conspiracy this year.  Check out the website for more information.  Since I was the one to bring it up I was nominated to kick the series off by introducing the whole thing.  I decided to play off an underlying desire for Advent to become more relational and less materialistic (I explain that in the sermon).  So I chose Matthew 1:18-25 as the text, focusing on verses 21-23 which talk about Jesus as Immanuel, God with us.  The relational aspect is very strong there.

I apologize in advance for a few things; I allude to sermons preached by other staff members that you as a reader have no familiarity with and make heavy use of power point.  Try to bear with that and I’ll include some notes in brackets to help make a little more sense out of it.  Enjoy…

I know what you’re thinking…”It’s too early to talk about Christmas!“  True, it is – but only by a week.  The season of Advent starts next Sunday, but we’re kicking off our Advent series today – a series we’re calling “Advent Conspiracy…”

This year I had the pleasure of spending a wonderful hot, humid Michigan summer outside…I was working as a landscaper for our apartment complex.  While the summer was – overall – a fairly mild summer, there were a few days when the temperatures did cross the 90-degree mark and – with the wonderful sense of humor that he has – God saw fit to bless us with humidity to match.  On one of these particularly hot days, I was working just outside the building Mishaela and I live in.

Filed under: Bible Study, Christian Living, Church, Ministry, Preaching, Sermon

Mission Drift or Shift?

I borrowed the title from an article I came across at leadershipjournal.net.  This is the result of a survey conducted of North American pastors regarding their understanding of “Gospel.”  The results show a shift that I’ve been talking about on here for a year or so now.  It’s pretty long, but well worth the read.  Take a look…

In the summer of 2000, Mike Lueken had every reason to be proud as a pastor of Oak Hills Church in Folsom, California. Every Sunday, thousands of people flocked to Oak Hill’s sixteen acre campus with its 35,000-square-foot facility, and the church was doing everything that a thriving, suburban megachurch with a $2 million budget was supposed to do. But then Lueken took a class at Fuller Seminary taught by Dallas Willard. The experience led to a complete change of course for him and Oak Hills Church.

“[Willard] was teaching on the Sermon on the Mount and conveying the heart of the gospel through Jesus’ teaching, and I felt I was sitting there listening to something I’d never heard before,” Lueken recalls. “We realized that we had to rethink what the gospel was about. Does the Bible teach only the gospel of heaven and forgiveness of sins? Or is it about a new way of living that involves the power of God, the peace of God, along with your sins being forgiven and going to heaven when you die?”

Filed under: Christian Living, Christianity, Church, Church Planting, Culture, Evangelism, Leadership, Ministry, Theology

One a Year…

I’ve talked about this before, but I think it’s worth mentioning again.

I met a couple men from my church for breakfast this morning and the oldest – yet wisest – asked the rest of (two of us were on staff, so we had some inside knowledge), “How can we be praying for the church this week?”  Great question…I love it when non-staff/non-council members ask questions like this!  The major issue on the table the past several weeks has been next year’s budget – and things always get messy when money comes up.

The Vision Team held an emergency meeting this past Sunday in order to try to bring about some resolution.  THe good thing that came out of it was an agreement that vision should come first and, as a church, we’re just sort of wandering around right now; we need to figure out what God is calling us to do in this next year and then develop a budget, trusting in God to provide.

Several things have been thrown on the table as possible solutions to the “budget crunch,” but none have been overly convincing.  From my viewpoint, I see several things happening, not the least of which is what I perceive as a lack of faith.  Perhaps there’s a lack of faith because the church is currently struggling to figure out its vision for the coming year…

So as we were sitting around the table this morning talking about the needs and what our vision is for the future, we agreed that an important point to keep in mind is the commissioning which the church planters were initially given.  Our pastors were commissioned to go into an area of GR and reach out to those who currently lack a church home.  That includes both unchurched Christians and non-Christians.  The difficulty is that when you reach out to that particular group, the principle of sacrificial giving is a bit foreign.  Just look around at our current economic crisis and how big a role self-centered materialism played in getting us into this position.  But then, if Monroe Community is commissioned to reach the unchurched, then doesn’t it follow logically (from a Christian perspective) that if we’re doing what God has called us to do, then God will provide?

I can’t say this for sure because I’m simply not intimately tied to the history of this church like the church planters are, but it seems to me that MCC has never experienced a “growth boom” (with the exception of when they merged with another dying church plant).  Is it possible that the cause of the financial woes is that we are failing to carry out the mission that we have been entrusted with?

This comes back to vision and being first and foremost concerned with carrying out that vision.  In our conversation this morning I brought up an idea that I’ve written about on here before: “One a Year.”

One/Year is simply the idea of reaching out to ONE unchurched person per year.  So often churches simply talk about the need/desire/call to minister to the lost and to lead them to Christ.  When churches talk about this need from the pulpit, the people in the pews get nervous/up-tight/anxious about the possibility of going out and converting as many people as they possibly can.  Evangelism becomes a numbers game.  But if we were all to out, pray about, and be aware of those whom God is bringing into our lives, and we focus on one person in which to build a relationship with, pray for, and invite to church, the church doubles in size.  Not only does it double in size, but everyone can take ownership of the effectiveness of the ministry and shares in the burden, rather than expecting a select few to do all the work.

I supposed that’s my encouragement to everyone who reads this: Reach out to ONE new person this year and invite them to church. Pray for that person, listen to them, be there for them, invite them, and God-willing they’ll accept Christ as join the church.  Then sleep easy at night knowing that you have been an obedient servant in the mission given to all of us by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ…

Filed under: Christian Living, Church, Church Planting, Evangelism, Faith, Leadership, Ministry

Church Politics Run Amock

I just got home from an emergency Sunday afternoon Vision Team meeting.  Things have been a bit tense the past couple meetings and some feelings have been hurt.  So in honor of the stress of leading an adolescent church plant, I humbly submit the below article for your reading enjoyment.  To the Vision Team’s credit, we haven’t gotten this bad, but who knows, anything’s possible, eh…

JERUSALEM – Israeli police rushed into one of Christianity’s holiest churches Sunday and arrested two clergyman after an argument between monks erupted into a brawl next to the site of Jesus’ tomb.

The clash between Armenian and Greek Orthodox monks broke out in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, revered as the site of Jesus’ crucifixion, burial and resurrection.

The brawling began during a procession of Armenian clergymen commemorating the 4th-century discovery of the cross believed to have been used to crucify Jesus.

The Greeks objected to the march without one of their monks present, fearing that otherwise, the procession would subvert their own claim to the Edicule — the ancient structure built on what is believed to be the tomb of Jesus — and give the Armenians a claim to the site.

The Armenians refused, and when they tried to march the Greek Orthodox monks blocked their way, sparking the brawl.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said police were forced to intervene after fighting was reported. They arrested two monks, one from each side, he said.

A bearded Armenian monk in a red-and-pink robe and a black-clad Greek Orthodox monk with a bloody gash on his forehead were both taken away in handcuffs after scuffling with dozens of riot police.

Six Christian sects divide control of the ancient church. They regularly fight over turf and influence, and Israeli police are occasionally forced to intervene.

“We were keeping resistance so that the procession could not pass through … and establish a right that they don’t have,” said a young Greek Orthodox monk with a cut next to his left eye.

The monk, who gave his name as Serafim, said he sustained the wound when an Armenian punched him from behind and broke his glasses.

Father Pakrat of the Armenian Patriarchate said the Greek demand was “against the status quo arrangement and against the internal arrangement of the Holy Sepulcher.” He said the Greeks attacked first.

Archbishop Aristarchos, the chief secretary of the Greek Orthodox patriarchate, denied his monks initiated the violence.

After the brawl, the church was crowded with Israeli riot police holding assault rifles, standing beside Golgotha, where Jesus is believed to have been crucified, and the long smooth stone marking the place where tradition holds his body was laid out.

The feud is only one of a bewildering array of rivalries among churchmen in the Holy Sepulcher.

The Israeli government has long wanted to build a fire exit in the church, which regularly fills with thousands of pilgrims and has only one main door, but the sects cannot agree where the exit will be built.

A ladder placed on a ledge over the entrance sometime in the 19th century has remained there ever since because of a dispute over who has the authority to take it down.

More recently, a spat between Ethiopian and Coptic Christians is delaying badly needed renovations to a rooftop monastery that engineers say could collapse.

Filed under: Church, Humor