Do you remember when we were growing up as kids? Sometimes we would experience aches and pains, not because we were sick, reckless with our bodies, or that we neglected our bodies. It was for a good reason and a healthy reason: were were growing up! Our bodies were doing what God created them to do naturally.
We too are experiencing growing pains as a church. Consider the following as we seek to partner together to advance His kingdom in The Colony, and around the world.
Pray for us to remember why we exist and remember how infinitely more valuable God and His glory is, and that His Word, His mission, His gospel and His Son are worth dying for and living for.
Pursuing these are painful, but all pain is not bad.
God's Word is Supreme
We do not want anyone to miss out on the life-giving, bondage-breaking,power-infusing, devil-fleeing dynamics of God's Word.
Consequently, we seek savory biblical, nutritional food for the body - meat and potatoes that are foundational to a healthy growing church.
Many churches are going dangerously light in their diet, by dishing out cotton-candy preaching that looks good, tastes good, feels good, but it has no nutritional values whatsoever. They have no biblical standards for their people and they do not expect biblical standards from their people.
And the people love it.
They love it because it does not call them to take themselves off the throne of their lives. They love it because they can have a form of godliness but reject the power and authority of God over their lives. They enjoy a church that will cater to their religious affections without a bloody cross and the King who hangs upon it. This is the functional, unspoken first order principle of many mega churches.
But we're not going that way as a church.
We seek to be a meta church, not a mega church. This path is founded and grounded in the contextual understanding of God's Word to the degree that it makes a functional difference in every area and ministry of the church.
Only God's word grows us and has the power to change our lives. To neglect His Word is to neglect God. We must continue to seek God's Word first in whatever we are discussing in the church.
Space Issue in the Second Service
The second service continues to grow. The pews are getting full. Space is becoming a problem. Praise God for growing pains!
As a faithful greeter who greets people outside the church building on Sunday mornings, Mike Reneau tells us that we have a parking problem. This too is a good sign of growing pains.
In fact, recently some people drove away because they could not find parking. This should trouble us, should it not?
Here are some options:
1. Turn the first service into a contemporary service. Since there is much more room in the first service, this move would make use of the space for the sake of accomodating more people. (Do not fret first service people, I am not in favor of doing this - but it is an option).
2. Add a third service on Sunday mornings. This would require an adjustment of service times, bible study groups, and more teachers. It would also require more from those in the music ministry. I would have to preach three times on Sunday morning, and Monica is not enthusiastic about that (but I am). :)
3. Replace the pews with chairs. I believe this would create 20-30% more room to accomodate growth. Since the pews are bolted through the carpet into the cement floor, and since the carpet is original with the building (19 yrs), this would probably also mean we would need to replace the carpet. In addition, doing so would also enable us to use the worship center in other ways.
In anticipating the responses from the different demographics in the church consider this before you shoot me an email or shoot me otherwise, or call for an appoitment:
Do we love pews more than people?
Do we love carpet more than converts?
Do we love a specific starting time for worship more than souls?
Do we love buildings more than building people?
Do we love our view of ministry more than our mission?
Growing pains! What are we to do? Should we stop praying for the lost? Should we take the easy way and stop reaching out to the community? Should we be satisfied with a certain number of people being reached?
Growing pains! It hurts but it is a sign of health and growth. And for that we praise God. Only let us continue to pursue love with one another, and speaking the truth in love.
An Appeal Regarding Signing the Covenant
Isn't it troubling that a few leaders and members would disqualify themselves from serving in the youth ministry because they refuse to sign a document.
Silly, right?
Our youth pastor requires potential workers to read and sign documents before they are allowed to serve.
Something to think about.
A Word on the Bulletin to the Fussin' Few
I love you. Please stop complaining about it. Come to church with an attitude that glorifies God, and how can grumbling as you hand it out to people who are coming to worship glorify Him?
There are more important things to fuss over.
I'm not forming a bulletin committee. That's small church, little minded stuff and we're bigger than that...I think.
Growing pains!
Praying for God-called Men
I met with a man whose family is new to our church. They visited fifteen (15) different churches in our area before they joined our fellowship. They felt they were not being fed God's Word in the other churches.
It feels good and is an encouragement to us when people sense God is at work in and through our church, and it leads them to formally join us.
This particular man wrestles with the conviction that God has called him to preach. He's licensed to preach the gospel and has preached as a lay preacher in his former church, and has served as chairman of deacons. He has eagerly agreed to be trained in how to develop and deliver an expository message.
During our meeting I expressed to him that 75% of seminary graduates are no longer in the ministry after 10 years. I told him that 1400 pastors leave the ministry every month in America. He was as shocked as you probably are now. The traditional route of vocational ministry will look different in the next 10 to 20 years in our country. I see the local church as the global missionary-sending, preacher-equipping, minister-making center of God's kingdom plan.
I've been praying for God to raise up men of God's Word in our church more and more, and that He would send us men of the Word. He is doing that, and we should praise Him for it.
Growing pains!
Growing in Our Harmatology (Doctrine of Sin)
Harmatology is the study of the beginning, nature, effects, and characteristics of sin.
A common biblical Greek word for sin is transliterated hamartia. This is where we get the English word harmatology, or you may see the word spelled as harmotology or hamartiology.
There are 33 words for sin in the Bible, which reveal that God hates both the sin and the sinner.
An example of how we have drifted from the biblical doctrine of sin is how quickly you hear a quote from a Hindu's autobiography rather than the Bible when the subject of sin comes up.
Maybe you have heard it. It goes like this: "God hates the sin but loves the sinner."
This statement is based on a reference from Ghandhi's autobiography.
But is it true? Consider these words from God:
Psalm 5:5 - "You hate all who do iniquity."
Psalm 11:5 - "And the one who loves violence His soul hates."
John 3:36 - "He who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him."
So in one sense, God does hate the sinner because the sinner sins. The angels of God are not going to cast sins into hell, but rather sinners because they sin. God does not love the devil does he? Why? Because the devil sins and those that continue in sin are of his seed. If God did not hate sin or the sinner, he would not be just, holy, and good. Yet in another sense, God "loves" sinners because He allows them to contine to breathe, enjoy a spouse and job and kids and home.
These truths form the black background to see the great facets of the diamond of the gospel much better. For we have all sinned, and do sin, and deserve rightly the just anger, wrath, and hatred of God.
But God, in His rich mercy, loved us in that while we were still sinners and made us alive in Christ. What a mystery!
So let us continue to pursue holiness together. Consider and meditate on these reasons why we should not sin. They are from a mentor from my seminary days, a pastor named Jim Elliff. Use them in your Bible studies, for conversation and personal devotions this week. Feel free to print them out and distribute them as God leads you.
1. Because a 'little' sin leads to more sin.
2. Because my sin invites the discipline of God.
3. Because the time spent in my sin is forever wasted.
4. Because my sin never pleases but always grieves God who loves me.
5. Because my sin places a greater burden on my spiritual leaders.
6. Because in time my sin always brings heaviness to my heart.
7. Because I am doing what I do not have to do.
8. Because my sin always makes me less than what I could be.
9. Because others, including my family, suffer consequences due to my sin.
10. Because my sin saddens the godly.
11. Because my sin makes the enemies of God rejoice.
12. Because sin deceives me into believing I have gained when in reality I have lost.
13. Because sin may keep me from qualifying for spiritual leadership.
14. Because the supposed benefits of my sin will never outweigh the consequences of disobedience.
15. Because repenting of my sin is such a painful process, yet I must repent.
Yours for Fulfilling Our Mission,
Mark
