The Face of Christ

I had an epiphany this morning. I had a series of dreams last night and every single one of them involved what has been going on in our church. For those of you in the dark, let me shed some light. In short, we have made it our mission to not give up on loving the people of Wintersville Community Chapel, despite the few hang nails and speed bumps we have encountered.

Back to what I was saying before...I realized how complex the role of a pastor has become in the church today. Massive changes in cultural and societal environments of the church in the twentieth century seem to call into question everything the church has always believed about herself. It is the mission of the pastor to see that those in the midst of those changes, do not feel like "sheep without a shepherd". He or she must present the gospel of Christ and the cross to a "lost and dying world." Simply put: Ministry is people.

It also hit me that God is not napping during this hour of opportunity and harvest. He is watching and waiting for His bride to get herself ready. Some churches have become unbearable activity traps. How can we be effective in reaching other people if we are constantly involved in ministry (with other Christians) that never leave the church? There are other churches that have become steeped in a sense of purposelessness. They blame their complacency on the changing times, younger leadership, or lack of heart. Personally, I think the church has reached a crossroads. I've heard it said that this next generation, may be the last generation of Christians.

Jesus was a shepherd. He cared for the flock and was moved with compassion for them. He wanted what was in their best interest, and He went out of His way to make Himself uncomfortable and available for other people. He traveled long distances and had no place to lay His head. He sacrificed. Seeing this type of outreach without personal gain, is rare in the church today. People want to help the homeless for the "experience", to make them feel better about themselves, rather than stooping down and looking someone in the eye to understand why they are in the situation they are in. At one time, I was actively involved in a church ministry that would travel by van every Sunday evening to the streets in downtown Columbus and feed the homeless people there. Some of the people had shelter provided by the local faith missions, and some slept under the bridges night after night. Truth be told, the people didn't really need food. In fact, more often than not, by the time we arrived they had already been fed by the faith mission. Most of them had clothes that were in decent shape. We brought them food and clothes anyway, even though our mission was not to feed the homeless "food", but to feed them the Word of God. Our purpose was not to focus on converting them or to get them to join our church, but to give them hope in Jesus. It is not realistic to believe that a homeless person is going to get off drugs, leave the streets, and become an active participant in church once he or she accepts the Lord into their life. It's more realistic to believe that they may need ministered to a number of times, or that they will fall back into the same trap because they can't get out. It's easier to give up than to have hope in something and be let down. Only they are not let down by God, they are let down by us; the ones that go in the name of Jesus.

My husband has said numerous times that if he could do anything else for a living, he would. It's his job to aid in developing the hearts and minds of the people in his congregation to effectively go out into the community and represent Jesus. He must teach them to apply the gospel to their everyday lives. Jesus washed the feet of His disciples. I can imagine how dirty and gross their feet must have been after traveling such long distances through the deserts surrounding them. And yet, He got down in their dirtiness and sin, and washed them anyway. He left us an example to live by in the way we are to treat others.

"How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how will they believe in whom they have not heard of? And how will they hear without a preacher? And how will they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: how beautiful are the feet of those who come in the name of the LORD, who preach the gospel of peace. Who bring glad tidings of good things!" Matthew 10:14,15

Welcome to Our World

Brace yourself for ecclesiastical carnage.
Programs have been dumped, traditional music trashed, preaching styles and topics revolutionized, symbols of reverence (appropriate clothing, crosses, communion tables, and pulpits come to mind) thrust aside.
The anger begins with a young pastor and his family, who have been appointed with a challenge from the small church's leadership to stir things up and inspire new vision. They were given a mandate to bring the people in, make the church grow, and most important, evangelize the youth of the surrounding neighborhoods to encourage them back into the church. Most of the church members (average age: 50+) had no idea what they were getting themselves into when all the growth talk began. Most thought that the new face in the pulpit would be a clone of the recently retired pastor, even though there was a significant age difference. They did not expect a reshuffling of the churches priorities, so the lost and broken people rather than the found and supposedly fixed people, became the primary target audience. Fighting tradition, unwritten rules, and change-resistant people.
In summary, virtually everything in the life of the church under this new leadership has become focused on reaching people that are not yet in the church. The older people in the congregation are left feeling as if the church they love has been hijacked by an intruder (one that they hired as an agent for change) and that no one understands that everything they are familiar and comfortable with has been done away with.
A disappointing fact: churches tend to hire a pastor and tell him that they are in the mood for change. They want more up-to-date equipment, they want more outreach-oriented programs, and they want to be more open to young people. Then, if any of that begins to happen, it's not unusual for some of those same people who hired the pastor to grow resistive as they feel things slipping out of their control and migrating into the hands of others, usually much younger, who may be more energetic and hungry for innovative ways of doing church.

On a more positive note: these common issues can be overcome with prayer and persistence, honesty, and love. It's not easy, but it can be done.

This has been our life for the past eight months. We're not giving up.

Ever Let Us Pray...

My Michael is a psalmist. He loves Jesus and because of his deep love, his prayers are like love songs. For me, it hasn't come so easily. There have been times in the past where I found prayer to be boring, and even strenuous and scary. Real prayer is serious business.
When I pray, I do not often pray out of worry because I honestly trust in the Lord and His plan for my life. I also know that He knows what I need before I can even ask for it. Please don't misunderstand me, I do pray and I do it fervently, I just don't often bring to Him my "greeds". And during those times when I can't find the words, I know that my heart is heard just as loud as my words could be. Prayer is very evident in our lives and the lives of those around us on a daily basis. When we meet people that are not involved in church, or even when we spend time with our own families, we often find ourselves praying them through certain situations in their lives. This has helped me a great deal in learning just how powerful prayer can be in the lives of believers and non-believers alike, and in doing so, I continue to rediscover it's importance.
Mike has been involved with ministry nearly all of his life, in one way or another. It comes very naturally and easy for him to pray publicly amidst a large assembly of people, where I am usually the introverted one that prays silently. I have often admired those who are called to be intercessors because they can pray for hours and hours on end and have no knowledge of time passed, watchmen pounding on the doors of heaven for answers on behalf of God's children. The truth is, we often think of prayer as preparation for battle, but Christ showed us that it is the battle itself. Prayer is the heart of His work.

What is the Immutability of God?

The immutability of God (that He does not change) is clearly taught throughout Scripture in countless passages. For example, in Malachi 3:6 God affirms, "I, the Lord, do not change." (See also Numbers 23:19; 1 Samuel 15:29; Isaiah 46:9-11; Ezekiel 24:14.)
James 1:17 tells us, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness nor shadow of turning.” The shadow of turning refers to the sun which eclipses, and turns, and casts its shadow. It rises and sets, appears and disappears every day; and it comes out of one tropic, and enters into another at certain seasons of the year. But with God, who is light, there is no darkness at all, there is no change, nor anything like it. He is unchangeable in His nature, perfections, purposes, promises, and gifts. He being Holy, cannot turn to that which is evil; nor can He, who is the fountain of light, be the cause of darkness, and since every good and perfect gift comes from Him, evil cannot proceed from Him, nor does He tempt anyone to evil. The Bible is very clear that God does not change, neither His mind, His will, nor His nature.
Seen from a logical viewpoint, there are several reasons why it is impossible for God to change. First, if anything changes it must do so in some chronological order. There must be a point in time before the change and a point in time after the change. Therefore, for change to take place it must happen within the constraints of time; however, God is eternal and exists outside of the constraints of time (Psalm 33:11; Psalm 41:13; Psalm 90:2-4; John 17:5; 2 Timothy 1:9).
Second, if anything changes it must change for the better or the worse, because a change that makes no difference is not a change. For change to take place, either something that is needed is added, which is a change for the better, or something that is needed is lost, which is a change for the worse. But since God is perfect, He does not need anything. Therefore, He cannot change for the better. If God were to lose something, He would not be perfect; therefore, He cannot change for the worse.
Third, when someone changes his/her mind, it is often because new information has come to light that was not previously known, or the circumstances have changed that require a different kind of attitude or action. Because God is omniscient, He cannot learn something new that He did not already know. So, when the Bible speaks of God changing His mind, it must be understood that the circumstance or situation has changed, not God. So when Exodus 32:14 and 1 Samuel 15:11-29 talk about God changing His mind, it is simply describing a change of dispensation, and outward dealings, toward man.
Numbers 23:19 is very clear, “God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should change His mind. Does He speak and then not act? Does He promise and not fulfill?” No, God does not change His mind. These verses affirm the doctrine of God’s immutability: He is unchanging and unchangeable.

What Do You Think?

My husband Michael, is the pastor of a non-denominational church. When our family was invited to come to Wintersville to shepherd this congregation, I was excited because of that. I grew up in a Baptist church, and chose to worship the Lord at a Nazarene church as an adult, all the while, not really concerned with what either one of those terms meant. I have wondered for a long time whether it really mattered what denomination you were affiliated with, after all, doesn't separating the body of Christ coerce us into remaining divided? Is this really a betterment for edification? From my understanding, denominations started with disagreements among people who argued about right and wrong and it's relationship to scripture. Excuse my assumption, but to me, that in itself means that practices have the tendency to be based on human standards, though I am sure it's not that way in all cases.

In Christianity, the term non-denominational refers to those churches which have not formally aligned themselves with an established denomination, or remain otherwise officially autonomous. This, however, does not preclude an identifiable standard among such congregations. Non-denominational congregations may establish a functional denomination by means of mutual recognition of or accountability to other congregations and leaders with commonly held doctrine, policy and worship, without formalizing external direction or oversight in such matters. Some non-denominational churches explicitly reject the idea of a formalized denominational structure as a matter of principle, holding that each congregation must be autonomous.
Members of non-denominational churches often consider themselves simply "Christians", yet the acceptance of any particular stance on a doctrine or practice for which there is not general unanimity among churches or professing Christians, establishes a de facto credal identity. In essence, it can be said that each non-denominational church forms its own unofficial "denomination" with a specific set of tenets as defined by the beliefs and practices of their own congregation.

I personally believe that belonging to a Christian denomination can pull focus off Christ and onto certain principles of that particular denomination. Like I said before, it is not that way in all cases. I have found that in our church, growth occurs because of the people who want to focus on Christ Jesus, rather than denominational principles. Sometimes people get hung up on their own viewpoints and certain principles that they may have been taught in the past or are being taught in the present, but isn't the point of Christ's church for the benefit of the glory of God and not to showcase our differences? If I grew up in a Baptist church and you yourself are a Nazarene, does that give you a preconceived notion about me?

Because they do not look to any human organization for doctrine, non-denominational churches generally claim that the Bible alone is the source of doctrinal authority. The Bible tells us of many of those who were so religious in their mindsets, that their hearts were far from Him. If we become trapped by our dispensational mindsets, how will we allow room for the Holy Spirit to move in us?