Shifts

It is football season, in case any of you need to be reminded.  Some teams have started well and are (for now) staying the course.  Some teams have struggled "our of the gate" and need to make adjustments if they are to have a successful season.  Jeff Greenway, in a book subtitled A Bold Witness of Wesleyan Faith at the Dawn of the Global Methodist Church, identifies some necessary adjustments that must be made if we are to live into a thriving and Biblical future.  Over the next 9 weeks, I will be focusing my messages on the shifts identified in this forward-looking book about the future of our church.

This Sunday we will look at the first "shift" ... the shift from infancy to maturity.  The Bible has a lot to say about this.  Hebrews 12:12 says, "In fact, by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths about God's Word.  You need milk, not solid food."  When my children were first born, they needed milk and formula, not solid food.  This is natural for humans and other mammals.  What is not natural is for adolescents and adults to continue to need milk, when they should be progressing to solid food.  If an adult can't tolerate solid food, we would all know something is wrong.  But what about the food of God's Word?  Do we still seek and rely on milk when we should be seeking and craving the meat of God's Word?  Sure, it is harder to digest!  Sure it requires the effort of chewing!  But for those growing in God's Word, God's plan and God's kingdom, this is the expected behavior.

Ephesians 4:14 amplifies this point by telling us the benefits of growing into spiritual maturity.  "Then you will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching, and by the cunning and craftiness of people and their deceitful scheming." Paul's points?

1. Infancy is something to grow out of ... not live in.  It should pass quickly for those who are hungry and thirsty for God's "bread of life."

2. Infants are confused and drawn in by the glitter, movement, sound, and passion of the waves.  Eloquent speakers ... music that has a good beat (but no substance) ... online prophets (you can add volumes to this) can all become clanging cymbals and loud voices.  But if they do not have love for Christ and His teaching, they are just noise to be avoided.

3. Infants are easily duped by clever schemes and street-side prophets.  Paul reminds us that there is an evil and intention behind those who teach a gospel that is not from Jesus.  These teachings are masked and veiled in enough truth to draw you in ... but they are "craftiness and deceitful scheming."  We have an enemy that works through willing people.  Some of them are clever and bought-into the work Satan is doing in the world.

There is a current stream of nonsense happening in my Facebook feed that is disturbing.  A woman has published a prophetic look at current events that point to what she says is "The Rapture."  While Rapture-Theology didn't appear till the 1800's (sorry for that true but disturbing fact) I will reserve that discussion for another time.  But the woman's post claimed (now past-tense) that the Rapture should have happened yesterday.  If it did, it seems no one was "taken up." And let's remember, "No one knows the day or the hour (except the Father) [Matthew 24]."  Yet people, claiming to be mature Christians, bought into this clearly non-Scriptural (and now untrue) prediction.

Don't accept living in spiritual infancy.  Don't believe everything you hear and see on the internet.  Do fill your heart, soul and mind with God's Word, so that you will be strong when the wind, waves and schemes come your way.  Live in Christ today, and you will have peace and sufficiency.  AMEN

Cords and Chains

The Bible has a lot to say about cords, chains and binding and loosing.  We might think of cords and chains as ways of tying things/people up.  But in Scripture, these two things are treated very differently.

Chains are usually spoken of in terms of holding and confining someone.  The demon-possessed man in Mark 5 was bound with chains, though it didn't work.  Peter was bound with chains in Acts 12.  Paul and Silas were bound with chains in Acts 16.  Chains were used to confine and imprison.

Cords are different.  In Ecclesiastes 4:12 we find that cords bind things together in a unity of strength.  "Though one may be overpowered by another, two can withstand him.  And a threefold cord is not quickly broken."

Chains confine us.  Cords hold us in a unity that is hard to break.  So, how is this relevant in the Church?

During recovery month, I want us all to pray and practice binding and loosing.  In Matthew 16:19 Jesus tells Peter (and the Church) "I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven."  Jesus describes a church with powers beyond our sight ... powers that transcend from the seen realm to the unseen realm.  Read carefully what this says ... through Christ's gift and authority, we have the power to bind and loose.

Here are a few observations about these passages and about chains and cords.

1. We, the Church, can bind things.  I think (this is purely my take) we bind things mostly with cords.  Why?  Because we, God, Jesus aren't into confining and conscription as a method of operation.  I think Ecclesiastes 4 uses cords because cords hold things and people with gentleness.  A threefold cord is hard to break, but if we work hard enough we can break it.  And a threefold cord can be untied.  You are not confined!  You have free will to follow or not.  You have our love and our support, but if you try hard enough you can either break or untie cords.  But remember ... God put those cords in place.  So let's bind up the wounded, unite with our fellow workers and allow God to "bind us together with cords that cannot be broken."

2. We, the Church, can be agents of release, freedom and loosing people from bondage.  Let's pray, practice and persevere so that chains are broken, bonds are loosed and people can live in the freedom God has graciously given.  The Tasha Cobb song says, "There is power, in the name of Jesus ... to break every chain, break every chain, break every chain."  Let's become chain breakers that loose people from the bondage of culture, possessions, control, drugs, alcohol and pride (yes, pride is an addictive behavior).

Let us bind each other up in the love of Christ and the nurture of the Church, on earth as it is in heaven.  Let us loose each other from all those things that chain our souls, our potential and our witness so we are able to do what Paul said in Ephesians 5:8 ... "For you were once in darkness.  But now you have light from the Lord.  So live as people of light!"  Worship passionately ... love extravagantly ... witness boldly! Jesus said, when we appropriate His gift of the "keys to the kingdom of heaven" the very gates of hell will not prevail against us (the Church)." AMEN

Trying Harder or Letting Go?

Our culture says, "Try harder!" ... "Believe in yourself!" ... "Be determined!"  Our culture loves self-help gurus and self-focused ways of dealing with our problems.  But anyone who has been in recovery and has emerged from the process with success, sings a different tune.  "I admit that I am powerless over my addictions and compulsive behaviors and my life has become unmanageable ... I know that nothing good lives in me!"  Paul said it this way ... "For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.  For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do, I keep on doing (Romans 17:18b-19)!"  So, I want to ask some questions.

1. Do you repeat behaviors that keep placing you in troubling situations?  Every addicted person will answer "yes" but many of us are unwilling to see and admit our addictive patterns, so we miss the first step of leaving them behind.

2. Do you find yourself saying, "I've seen this before ... why does this keep happening to me?"  See question 1 and reread it!

3. Do you believe Scripture?  If the answer is yes, Paul is right and he might be addressing something universally true, both in his congregations and over history!  God/Scripture is accurate and applicable!

4. What can we learn from Paul here?  Glad you asked!

J.D. Watt, in Still Day One has the crazy idea that the repeated practice of trying harder and believing in yourself is a certain entry into a repeated pattern of behavior that has no end.  It doesn't work.  What works is what always works ... applying God's word:

1. "But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away (2 Cor. 3:16)."  Turn to the Lord and you will begin to see clearly.  Which means you must turn away from YOU/SELF.

2. "Now the Lord is spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom (2 Cor. 3:17)." Freedom from our patterns and addictions comes from getting out of your will and your spirit and allowing God's Spirit to fill you.

Bishop Scott Jones, at Annual Conference and in other conversations, told us we must be willing to leave our previous connection by forgetting many of the ways of thinking we have been practicing over the last 50 years.  He says if we fail here we will become a different version of the institution we left.  Dr. Jeff Greenway, this past Friday evening, said we must leave our addictive patterns behind, especially those that were focused on building a denomination ... for if God desires the denomination, it will build itself!

"Kicked out and fired!"  That was the story from my buddy in West Alabama.  "What can we do?"  I sent the message all the way up the line to Rev. Keith Boyette and Rev. Angela Pleasants.  They said, "We will do whatever it takes to get them planted in a new location, and get my friend on board as a GMC pastor."  6 months later, that new church is planted in West Alabama with hymnals from Abbeville Methodist, administrative help from another GMC church, resources from the River Network, and lots of faithful prayers from all over.  Angela Pleasants and I have been there.  I served their 1st communion.  And (Andy and Tina) they have a 12 member choir!  Yesterday, my friend was ordained as a Deacon in the GMC.  That same story is being played out all over America, Asia, Africa, Europe and the whole world.  As many as 15 new congregations are in their infancy, just in the Alabama, Emerald Coast Conference.  I will begin work with a church plant (this coming week to a town near you) that already bursting at the seams!!! How is this happening?  Because we are part of a movement that says, "What is Jesus doing?"  and then says, "How can we help?"

Twila Paris writes (from Romans 10:15) "How beautiful, are the hands that serve, the wine and the bread and the sons of the earth, how beautiful are the feet that walked, the long dusty roads and the hill to the cross."  When we let go and allow God's Spirit to run the show we find healing from our patterns, freedom from our intuitional bonds, flight from the cages we have built around ourselves, and freedom in Christ.  That little church in West Alabama thanks you for beautiful feet!  May God's Good News be proclaimed over the whole world!  AMEN

Influenced or Influencer?

As we begin our journey together as an official part of the Alabama Emerald Coast Conference of the Global Methodist Church, I remember a statement I read in "Still Day One."  The statement quotes E. Stanley Jones on the subject of faith.  Jones says our faith isn't about an "it" (denomination, rites, our traditions, any 'trappings' of our history) ... it is about a person named Jesus.

I have a friend that often talks about each of us being leaders that are here to influence people toward faith, belief and religion.  This is not a bad thought on the surface.  But I believe I would disagree about the primacy of our being agents of influence.  Here's why:

1. The Holy Spirit (God in us) is always directing us to/toward Jesus.  When I become the influencer, I view the influence through MY lens.  MY lens is clouded by so many things, I can't write them all down!

2. When I become the influencer, my human reaction is to plan my direction and head that way.  This is fine if MY direction and God's direction are the same.  But I am human and flawed.  My direction/plan flows from my understanding and from my needs/desires/fears/situation.  While my intentions may be noble, my application isn't always what it should be.  Persuasion can become ego-driven and prideful.  I can use ultimatums/titles/organizations as devices for controlling and steering others.  For me, these are why I cannot (and should not) become the great influencer my friend teaches about.

Here's a better way.  Become one who is "influenced" by Jesus.  Ask, "What is Jesus doing?"  Here is how Paul words this in Philippians 2:

"Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from His love, if any common sharing from His Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind.  Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.  Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests, but each of you to the interests of the others.  [and here is the secret!!] In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus ... " (Philippians 2:1-5).

Paul says the key is for each of us to be influenced by Jesus ... not to become "great leaders" or "great influencers."  We are not followers of an "it."  We are followers of a "Him."  So follow!  Randy