My Blog

We started with Ignite. We just completed Inspire. E N G A G E is coming this fall! Have a Spirit-filled summer.

A few days ago I listened to a sermon entitled “Six Hours That Changed The World”. It was a good sermon – driving home the sense of power, sacrifice, grace and passion that were embodied in Jesus as He hung on the cross for the final six hours of His human life. Sometimes, I fear, we lose sight of the humanity of Jesus. Much of our artwork is unhelpful in this area. Jesus often looks mildly bored or only superficially discomforted as He hangs on the cross. The reality would have been a far, far different experience.

I have thought about this sermon a great deal since listening to it – always the mark of a good sermon! While I think the sermon is helpful in many aspects, its central theme, I believe is misplayed. Good Friday is a necessary prerequisite in God’s salvation plan, but it is not the death of Jesus that changed the world. I would suggest that it is the resurrection of Jesus that changed the world. Jesus experienced death – as we experience death.  Jesus, the perfect atoning sacrifice, experienced condemnation –as we rightly experience condemnation. But God raised Jesus from the dead! As Paul says in Romans 6: 4, “We were therefore buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dad through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.”

It is in Christ’s resurrection that God’s salvation plan is finalized. It is in     Christ’s resurrection that condemnation and sin are defeated. It is in Christ’s resurrection that we experience new life. That’s an event that changes the    world – our world! Now let’s not be afraid to go out and tell the world about it!

All the signs were in place. Palm branches, symbolic of national triumph and often used to honor returning heroes were in play. The crowds were shouting hosanna, a Hebrew words that meant please save, or save now.  Royal Psalms (Psalm 118) were quoted and Messianic texts were employed (Zech. 9: 9) as Jesus entered Jerusalem.

The crowds were clearly excited. Word had spread that Jesus from Nazareth had arrived. This Jesus seemed to be a miracle worker – changing water into wine, feeding thousands with a schoolboy’s lunch, a number of miraculous healings. Why, just a few days ago he had even raised Lazarus from the dead. He may seem to run with a questionable crowd, but clearly Jesus was doing things that only a messiah could be expected to do. The crowd was willing to overlook some less than desirable personal relationships if Jesus could fulfill their messianic longing.

The Pharisees are beside themselves! One translation (The Message) has them saying, “It’s out of control! The whole world is in a stampede after Him.” Putting aside the hyperbole for a moment, it is clear that the Pharisees see Jesus as a threat to their beloved religious system. He is such a threat, that in a few days, they will conspire to have Jesus killed. The maintenance of a system, over the revelation and will of God. Who says change isn’t hard!

The crowds surrounding Jesus on Palm Sunday are no better. Filled with Messianic fervor on Palm Sunday, they think their time has come. Finally the Messiah has arrived. They were right, but this Messiah was not what they had expected. They wanted Jesus to restore the nation of Israel – to cast out the Romans and to restore Israel to its Davidic glory. When they don’t get what they want, the shouts of “Hosanna” on Sunday turn to “Crucify” on Friday. Jesus offered a different kind of Messiah – a change from what the crowd expected. The change was too much. The joy and expectation of Sunday turned into bitterness and rejection on Friday.

Change. Change for the Pharisees and change for the crowds. Change that is of God, but it is still hard! What is it in us that fights change – even when that change is of God? Our nation is filled with churches (a little hyperbole of my own to match the biblical example!) that would rather close down than change. Oh, no one says that, but at the core, isn’t that what is going?

Change. We will go to almost any length to avoid it. Are we really that different from the Pharisees and the crowd that had gathered on Palm Sunday?

I wonder.

Opposition to Christianity seems to be growing these days. In fact, in some parts of the media world they are even talking about a “war on religion.” It has become increasingly permissible to sneer and mock at those who deeply hold positions of faith. The position of the church as an authoritative and respected voice in our society is seemingly threatened. Sadly, sometimes we bring those attacks upon ourselves by foolish and misguided behavior. Other times, it seems as though the church is a convenient “piñata” for those who delight in pointing out the flaws.

Church historians have identified what is known as the “three great church disestablishments” whereby the church in America has moved from its previously privileged in Europe to the place it holds today in American culture. No longer are faith positions welcome in civic discourse. If one wants to offer a spiritual rationale for a political position, that individual is often told to come up with a secular argument or to not participate in the conversation.

This should come as no surprise to us. Do you remember what happened when the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost? Some were convicted and believed. Some were perplexed and confused. Others however, sneered and mocked – daring to suggest that believers experiencing the Holy Spirit were “drunk with wine.”

Paul, after his conversion on the road to Damascus, took refuge in the home of Ananias. After regaining his sight and his strength, he immediately began preaching Jesus Christ as Lord. The opposition grew so great that he had to  escape Damascus through the help of friends.

My point is that there has always been opposition to the truth of Jesus Christ. Folks like Bill Maher and Richard Dawkins, when confronted with the truth of the gospel, have always sneered, mocked, and made fun of those who believe.

We shouldn’t be surprised. Most importantly, we shouldn’t let their attacks silence us. Scripture tells us that we are opposed by the forces of darkness. Satan wants nothing more than for us to silence our testimony; to swallow our faith; and, in the name of cultural sophistication, to not offer a Christian worldview or Jesus as the answer to the brokenness that ails us.

We are going to face opposition. Some will believe. Some will be confused. Some will sneer. But remember this:

• It is not about us. God brings home the results.
• We have each other. In the church we pray for, encourage, and equip each other.
• We have the Holy Spirit. The Spirit brings words and power when we fail.

So let the mockers sneer. Let the rebellious tell their jokes and offer us up for ridicule. We are armed with Jesus Christ and we are dangerous to their self-centered and self-glorifying sophistication. With Christ for us, who can defeat us?

It is certainly sad to watch the decline of the church in the West. While the Christian Church thrives in Korea, explodes in Africa, and barely hangs on in the Middle East, we in America – even with all of our protections – are slowly sliding into irrelevancy. There may be great individual exceptions – local megachurches come to mind – but over all, the Christian Church is sliding slowly into irrelevancy.

Contrary to many in the church, I believe that the Church has a tremendous opportunity in front of it; an opportunity to address our culture in a way that we haven’t seen since the first century. No longer limited to being a chaplain to the status quo, we have the opportunity to speak truth in changing times, to offer transformation when people are desperately unhappy with who they are, to offer meaning and significance in a culture that offers no lasting sense of who we are or what we can be. We may have become night lights, but we have the opportunity to be lighthouses.

It won’t be easy – change never is. To grow into our new opportunities we will have to do the following.

1. Maintaining our love and care for one another, we must turn our primary orientation and ministry concern outward.
2. Our primary evaluation for ministries needs to be related to the amount of transformation realized – not the “quality” of the program.
3. We must be more concerned with spiritual development than we are with institutional maintenance.

God is calling us into a new age – an age of tremendous opportunity. People are looking for answers. People are looking for safe places to ask questions. People are looking for Lighthouses, not nightlights. What will we be?

The most important part of sharing faith is building relationships with people outside the church and praying for the people in our lives.  Today the challenge of trust and authenticity lies before us as we consider how to build these relationships!

The mystery of the Gospel has been entrusted to us, and it is our privilege to share that the Message is for everyone.  In Ephesians 3 Paul explained that this mystery is how God reconciles people of every nation to Himself through Christ (vv.2–6), a mystery worked out through the Church (vv. 9–10).^[1]

He revealed and explained God’s arrangements for the incorporation of the Gentiles in the Church without law or circumcision:

1. The Gentiles should be blessed without having to become Jews,

2. God would introduce a new thing, the body of Christ.

The Gentiles now share the inheritance, are equally members of Christ’s body the Church, and the promise of salvation and blessing is now extended to them also (Gal. 3: 29).

“How shall we deliver that message to a culture in which the unchurched describe us as: judgmental; hypocritical…old-fashioned; boring; and irrelevant.”   – www.barna.org. How do we overcome our own cultural roadblocks to become authentic Christians?

“Cultivating intergenerational relationships is one of the most important ways in which effective faith communities are developing flourishing faith in both young  and old.”  – You Lost Me, David Kinnaman

How can we follow Jesus—and help young people faithfully follow Jesus—in a dramatically changing culture?

The best thing that can happen to a person who does not know God’s love is to be in a relationship with a Christian who is both loving and accepting.

With whom is God calling you to build a relationship?  Struggling to figure it out?

God will send people to you.

God will synchronize your path

God will send you to people.

God will put people on your heart.

Jesus and His disciples are standing together on the Mount of Olives – a “Sabbath day’s walk” (1/2 mile) from Jerusalem. Jesus has appeared to them over a period of 40 days; a set of experiences that has confirmed His resurrection.

The disciples have been waiting – as commanded – in Jerusalem for the gift (the Holy Spirit) that Jesus has promised them. The disciples are still somewhat confused. They ask Jesus if now is the time that God will restore the nation of Israel. The disciples are still caught in their Old Testament view of the work of the Messiah. Jesus re-orients their thinking. In an echo of the Great Commission he turns them outwards.

Jesus promises and commissions the Disciples. You will:

•  Receive the Holy Spirit – The Comforter, Spirit of Truth
•  You will receive power - The Holy Spirit will provide power
• You will be my witnesses - Testifiers to the truth

Moving from the known and comfortable – Jerusalem, Jesus promises that when they move to the uncomfortable and unknown – Samaria and to the ends of the earth – the Holy Spirit will be with them. They will constitute a spiritual tsunami that will change the world.

That promise is both frightening and thrilling.

• What power will we live in?
• How far will we go?
• Are we willing to take the first step?