Saved Unto

Evangelical churches today do a very good job of offering the gift of salvation to sinners. But is your personal salvation why Jesus went to the cross? Certainly, we are saved as individuals, by personally putting our trust in Christ’s death and resurrection. But Ephesians 5 says that Jesus died for the church.

So, what about the church? Is God’s plan for the church that all of His people would fight their children every Sunday morning, while they are putting on clothes that they would never dream of wearing any other time of the week, so that they can go to a building, watch an hour-long show, and then bug out as quickly as possible in order to beat the crowd to the buffet? Session 3 of UG looks at the church and how we are expected to connect, grow, and serve.

BTW, this is the entire reason for the CONNECT ministry of Grace Church. Our commission from the Lord is not to “make converts of all peoples” but to “make disciples of all peoples.” The mission of CONNECT is to connect people closer to God, to His people in order to create the church, and to His mission in the world. If you attend Grace Church, CONNECT is where you learn and practice faithfulness.

OK, enough of the cheap, shameless plug. Come back tomorrow for a preview of Session 4, Saved For.

Saved From

Ever heard the gospel? You say “Sure, lots of times.” But do you really understand the gospel? You’re a sinner. Does that just mean that you do some bad things? And why is God so ticked by a couple minor indiscretions? It’s not like you did anything really awful, right? Death penalty for a few little white lies? Come on now! How about Christ? How does He fit in? Is He just available to save you from your sin problem? If so, what happens after that?

Are we just bad or are we broken also? Why do bad things happen? And what does this God really intend to do about it all???

In Session 2 of UG, you’ll dive into an incredible story. There’s a rebel, a usurper to the throne of the king. But this rebel was just a small child. As his nanny fled with him to save his life, he was dropped and left a cripple. So he grew to manhood in hiding, expecting that the king would hunt him down and put him to death. One day, the king found him…

Come back Wednesday and find out what God expects of His saints…..

Meeting & Moving

So, our Mission statement is “Meeting & Moving.” Specifically, it is “Meeting people where they are and Moving them to where God wants them to be.” But that is really vague. That makes it a memorable Mission statement, which is great. But it could be a little too vague for unifying a church. And where does it come from? Is it an idea someone dreamed up? Is there biblical justification for it?

Session 1 of UG looks at our Meeting & Moving Mission statement. You get to read and discuss two key passages in Matthew’s gospel, passages which have defined Christian faithfulness since they were written by a wretched tax-collector turned Apostle and evangelist to the Jews. Beyond that, you will look at how we believe we are called to pursue faithfulness by looking at two biblical examples, Paul and Christ Himself.

There’s a woman looking to draw water from a well. She doesn’t go to the well during the cool morning hours of the day. That’s when most of the women from the town are found in that spot. No, she battles the heat to avoid the crowd. It’s strange that she should avoid others since that’s her heart’s deepest desire. She wants to be known. She wants to be accepted. She wants to be appreciated. She wants to be loved. But therein lies the problem. She has gone about intimacy the wrong way. And her promiscuous ways have resulted in driving her further away from significant relationships. Their stares pierce through her soul and their words tear at her flesh. So she goes to the well during the heat of the day knowing she will be alone… But not on this day. Today, there’s a prophet at the well, one whose eyes don’t pierce her soul, but search her heart. He could have stayed far away from the mess of her life, even from the mess of this world. But He chose to step out of eternity and enter into suffering so that He could show a desperate, lonely woman that He can offer her rest for her soul. And He doesn’t start by telling her that she has made a disaster of her life. He will eventually get there, but He starts by talking about cool water on a brutally hot day.

Tomorrow, we’ll look at how messed up her life really was…

Understanding Grace

Coming out of the holiday season, many of our groups have decided to follow our advice and do the Understanding Grace (UG) group curriculum. While this material fulfills the Membership requirement of a Pastor’s class, it is so much more important to the health of our groups and our church. UG is five sessions, each one dealing with a critical component of our ministry at Grace Church. However, unlike a typical Membership class, this material is formatted for deep group discussion. In fact, while set up for five meetings, some groups are already telling us that they are choosing to slow down a bit and take multiple meetings for some of the sections because the discussion has been so rich.

UG is something that we will be asking our groups to revisit on a periodic basis. By understanding the foundations of our ministry at Grace, we can stay true to our calling. What that frequency is, only the Lord knows. Likely, we will ask groups to cover the material every other year. That repetition, along with our annual Vision Month preaching series, will provide for us the standards against which we can test our goals and our plans. Frankly, we are only about 16 months into our transition to being a church of groups. We are beginning to gather people and help them to learn why groups are important and how to love one another as God desires. But we haven’t seen even a third of what groups will be and do in the future. So, if we’re going to arrive at the correct destination, we are going to need to check our course periodically. UG is part of that process.

Over the next week, I will be posting daily about the UG content, one session each weekday. Most of our groups are in or finishing Session 2 by now. One has made it thru Session 3. As I’m able, I will share some of the feedback I’ve been getting also.

See you Monday. We’ll look at our Mission…..

Stilled and Quieted Soul

Wow! Time slides by way too fast. For those of us in ministry, we move from one "situation" to the next, hoping to find a little time for planning and implementation related to our ministry. But it was like that for me long before being called to the pastorate. Life seems to spiral out of control most of the time. The demands of the day/week/month pile up and you frantically try to meet all your obligations. Then, on Sunday morning, you hear that you need a day off, a Sabbath. You need to create margin in your life. You need to spend quality and quantity time with your family. Oh yeah, and you need to volunteer in the dozens of spots where we have need at the church. It seems like you're being called to conflicting lifestyles. What does God really expect of you?

This post is a week late because I had a crazy, out of control week during the time when I was trying to share a relevant psalm with you. Isn't that the way it works? Whenever I want to explain something from God's Word, He shows me that I need to allow that principle to work in my own life first. So, here's the psalm I wanted to share with you last week, but I was too busy...

Psalm 131 A song of ascents.

My heart is not proud, O LORD, my eyes are not haughty; I do not concern myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me.
But I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me.
O Israel, put your hope in the LORD both now and forevermore.

A psalm of ascents was a song sung by Jews as they climbed the mountain to Jerusalem to worship God. And look at the message, so short, but so direct:

I don’t value myself too highly in comparison with other people; I don’t consider myself up to challenges that surpass me.

Instead, I find my peace in You and You alone. Like a child who once cried out for a mother’s breast to quench his hunger, but now is satisfied with a mother’s loving embrace, I find satisfaction in You, my God. In You, I have contentment.

Is God your greatest desire? Is the rule and reign of Christ in your own life, in your small group, in our church, in the world the longing of your soul? This is the psalm which the Lord continually places before my eyes and my thoughts. Is He sufficient for us? Is He our heart’s desire? Is He our greatest treasure? Then, tell Him so… pray.

Teach Us to Pray

Are you in a prayer rut? Do you always pray in the same place, at the same time, in the same manner? There are volumes galore on the shelves of Christian bookstores advocating this method or that. What intrigues me is that Jesus gave us a model for prayer, yet we ignore it.

"This, then, is how you should pray:
"'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.'
Matthew 6:9-13

Comments on what has become known as the Lord’s Prayer:

Notice that the pronouns that refer to the prayer-offerer are all plural, “we,” “us,” and “our,” not “I,” “me,” and “mine.” Jesus taught us to pray together. Certainly, there is a place for private prayer. Jesus even modeled that Himself. But His instruction to us is for praying as community. We see that practiced in the Acts record of the church, "When this had dawned on him, he went to the house of Mary the mother of John, also called Mark, where many people had gathered and were praying" (Acts 12:12).

Notice also that prayer begins with God:

God is our heavenly Father.

His name is holy. [The “name” of God has nothing to do with what He’s called (i.e., “Joe”) and everything to do with who He is, especially indicating His position or authority. While we can freely come into His presence, He is the Holy One and it is right to fear Him.]

His Kingdom is breaking through and becoming a new reality.

Finally, after approaching God according to His majesty, do we bring ourselves into the prayer:

Give us today our daily bread. This is for daily sustenance. Think back to the Israelites wandering in the wilderness. God provided them with manna to eat, but they were to only take enough for one day, except before the Sabbath when they were to collect enough for two days. This is not a prayer of want, but need.

Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. The “debts” are “sins” or “transgressions.” We are forgiven because we have released others of their transgressions against us. Read Mt. 6:14-15. It is clear that God will not forgive us if we don’t forgive others. But this isn’t a works-based salvation scheme. This is simply fruit of our understanding and appreciation of our own sin, the ransom paid by Christ, and that God alone has the right to punish sinners.

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. God is not the one who tempts us; it is our enemy, Satan. By the grace of God, we can stand up to his attacks.

So, want to deepen your prayer life? Start by approaching God as He has asked us to approach Him. You’re entering the presence of the Most High King. But He’s also your loving Father.

Next week, I’ll share one of my favorite Psalms. It’s an amazing picture of how God wants to relate to us, His children.

Pray '10

So, 2010 at Grace Church will be a Year of Prayer. That’s exciting! I think that the church, especially in America, doesn’t pray as it should. In fact, I wonder if we even really know what prayer is.

Can you recall a time in your life when prayer was something that you did ritualistically? If someone asked you if you pray, you would say “Sure!” But, if they asked you when you pray, you’d find that it happened before your meals, especially dinner, maybe the others too but probably not snacks. Maybe you also prayed before going to sleep at night. Maybe your nighttime prayers even put you to sleep. I’ve even found myself saying, “Well, it’s morning and that’s the time I’ve set aside to pray so here it goes…”

How about the content of your prayers? Are they a list of things you need or want changed by God? Maybe your prayer life looked very little like the Christian view of prayer and more like the Muslim story of Aladdin and his magic lamp. If you need something, rub the lamp and ask the djinni to grant your wish. Maybe you have moved beyond that phase of prayer and now have a swell acrostic to help you to remember steps of prayer, Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication.

Probably one of the things that I appreciate the most about 2010 being the Year of Prayer at Grace Church is that it has forced me to go back and consider what prayer is. And, if I consider what prayer is, maybe, just maybe I’ll find that I’ll begin to do it more often, even “without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17), and that my prayers will be radically different. And how might I be changed through that process?

My prayer for all of us is that God would use 2010 to Move us all closer to where He wants us to be.

More in the weeks to come…