The Thriving Church part 2
The Church That Thrives • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 4 viewsGod called Abraham to "get out of the box"... Jesus called Peter to "get out of the box"... and God is calling us to "get out of our box"! The question is, "Will we?" Will we step out of the box we have built that defines our lives and into the life God has called us to? The Church that thrives gets out of it's box!
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If I were to ask you, What is the #1 cause of church decline today, what would you say?
The answer… Apathy!
When we moved here to Bonham, the most common statement we heard from people around the community about the churches here was: “It’s like they don’t want to do anything. It’s like they don’t care...”
(expound - current statistics)
Let me tell you: satan doesn’t have to destroy us… he just has to make us apathetic!
1. What is Apathy?
(Yes, We start here again today…)
According to dictionary.com, Apathy is “absence or suppression of passion, emotion, or excitement, lack of interest in or concern for things that others find moving or exciting.”
In other words, you just don’t care.
When I think about apathy in the church, I have to ask…
2. What is the Church?
(people, right?)
— The Church is NOT the building, or an organization/a business.
Merriam-Webster defines it as: “a body or organization of religious believers.”
So… If the Church is the people, the body of believers, then what does Apathy look like within her body?
There is a story told about a man who got lost in his travels, and inadvertently wandered into a bed of quicksand…
Confucius saw the man’s predicament and said, “It is evident that men should stay out of places such as this.”
Then, Buddha observed the situation and said, “Let that man’s plight be a lesson to the rest of the world.”
Mohammed came by and told the man, “Alas, it is the will of God.”
Finally, Jesus appeared and said, “Take my hand, brother. I will save you.
Jesus tells a similar story in response to the “Scribe” (or Lawyer) when questioned about the “Greatest Commandment”…
(Parable of the Good Samaritan)
Why do we act this way?
Why do we tend to respond like the Priest or the Levite?
Or Confucius… or Buddha… or Mohammed?
Perspective — Worldview!
People’s perspectives color they way they react to situations in the world.
Christians are no different.
What we learn, how we are raised, what we believe to be true… all color the way we react to things, and the things we do.
Think about it…
— How we were raised… what our parents taught us about — respecting others… serving others… giving…
— Conservative vs Liberal views…
— Even denominational differences…
ALL PLAY A ROLE!!!
They shape how we view the world and how we treat others… even what we do, or don’t, involve ourselves with…
Apathy in our lives reveals itself as indifference… indifference to what is important to others, unless it directly effects us!
What is that called?
— Selfishness!
Apathy ALWAYS ends in SELFISHNESS!
When we get apathetic, Our world… our actions… our deeds… even our giving… stops being about what Christ desires, and starts being all about US!!!
— what makes us FEEL good…
— what makes our HEART warm…
— what allows us to brag about our “WORKS”…
But that’s not what it’s all about!!!!
1 “Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.
2 “So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full.
I want you to see how Jesus feels about apathy…
14 “To the angel of the church in Laodicea write: These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God’s creation.
15 I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other!
16 So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.
17 You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.
The church in Laodicea was apathetic! That’s why Jesus calls them “lukewarm”. They had reached a point where they just didn’t care one way or another…
And Jesus says that He will “Spit them out!!!!”
Jesus despises apathy!!!
That’s why He tells His disciples to “Open their eyes… and… Look at the fields!” (John 4:35)
Jesus commands us to…
… to expand our horizons… To look at things from a fresh perspective… To find out a new agenda or develop a new plan… to…
“Get out of the box!”
The box is how we see things… How we have always seen things… It refers to how you have always tended to think and do your whole life…
“Get out of the box” means “think beyond what you normally think.”
Shift your paradigm.
God is constantly trying to get us “out of our boxes!”
Turn with me to Acts 10:9-17. (read passage)
We talked last week about “getting real about prayer,” and how Cornelius’ part of this story shows us what that means.
We have already discussed that this story is a major turning point in Peter’s life, but why?
To understand… we need to take a step back and look at Peter’s life up to this point.
You see, God was doing more than simply sending Peter to the Gentiles. He was doing more than simply answering Cornelius’s prayer…
There are only a few stories that have made it into all Four Gospels.
- The Birth.
- The Death.
- The Resurrection.
- The Feeding of The Five Thousand.
- and the calling of Peter.
The first three gospels simply say that Jesus was walking on the edge of the sea, and he saw Peter, and called to him, but John goes into greater detail.
John tells us that Jesus was walking along the shore of the sea of Galilee when He saw some fishermen working on their nets.
So, He got into Simon Peter’s boat, while they were working on the shore, and asked him to put out into the water.
And, Peter did. Jesus taught the people from there.
Then He told Peter to put out into the deep water and put out the nets. Peter, was skeptical because they had been working all day, and hadn’t caught anything. But, he did what Jesus asked,…
And they experienced an amazing catch!
It was after this… after that amazing catch… that Jesus invites Peter to come with Him…
It was in that moment… When Peter had experienced Christ’s powerful presence… That Jesus told him that He will make him a fisher of men.
This was not a simple call.
It was a call to leave everything he knew behind… all his security… all his pride… all these things that “puffed him up”…
And follow Jesus.
It was a call to look at the world differently, from a new perspective.
It was an invitation to get out of his box!
Fast forward a little further into Peter’s life...
We find Jesus changing Peter’s name from Simon, to Peter.
Not only did Jesus invite him to become a new person — to take on a new perspective, but He gave him a new name as well.
Jesus wanted Peter to redefine who he was, and how he viewed life.
Peter’s restoration is further evidence of this.
15 When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” “Yes, Lord,” he said, “you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.”
16 Again Jesus said, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” He answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Take care of my sheep.”
17 The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my sheep.
I want you to understand 2 words here: agapao and phileo.
Agapao refers to the action of God’s love.
It is a deep spiritual love that pours itself out unconditionally on people. For men it is a response to the understanding of what God has done for us.
Phileo, which means “fond of.”
It is a friendship type of love.
It’s “brotherly love”… the kind of love we have for our family and close friends…
Why is that important? Why do we need to look at these words?
2 times, Jesus asks Peter, “Do you agapao me?”
And, 2 times Peter responds, “Yes Lord, I phileo you.”
Now, listen closely to this.
The third time, Jesus says, “Peter, do you really phileo me?”
Scripture says this cut Peter to the core… that his heart was grieved…
WHY???
Because Jesus said the word phileo.
See Peter wanted Jesus to love Him unconditionally, but wanted to hold back from committing completely to Him.
Jesus doesn’t ask “Are you fond of me because of what I have done?”
He asks, “Will you give your life completely to me as I have done for you?”
Peter needed to get out of his box.
Think about this…
Up to this point, Peter has experienced all this.
He has experienced the teachings of Jesus, which always challenged the viewpoints of the people.
He has heard the Great Commission.
He has received the command from Jesus in Acts 1:8 that they were to wait for the Holy Spirit, and that when it came “[they would] receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on [them]; and [they would] be [Christ’s] witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
And they had received it! This story happens AFTER pentecost…
Yet, Peter is still stuck in his box!
He is still sitting in Judea… still not carrying the message to “the ends of the earth.”
Jesus is still telling him to “get out of his box!”
— Sometimes God speaks to us in an audible voice.
— Sometimes He uses visions or dreams.
— Sometimes He speaks through His Word, the Bible.
BUT, we often do not understand what God intends until we see/experience it physically.
Look at Acts 10:17
17 While Peter was wondering about the meaning of the vision, the men sent by Cornelius found out where Simon’s house was and stopped at the gate.
Peter was perplexed, he did not understand what God was telling him until the Gentile men showed up at his door.
But… he immediately got up… got out of his box… and went with them!
Now, we have to ask,
“What is Peter’s box?”
We can look at Peter’s vision for a clue.
11 He saw heaven opened and something like a large sheet being let down to earth by its four corners.
12 It contained all kinds of four-footed animals, as well as reptiles and birds.
13 Then a voice told him, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.”
14 “Surely not, Lord!” Peter replied. “I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.”
I want you to hear verse 14-15 in a direct transliteration of the Greek:
“By no means Lord, because never did I eat all things common and unclean, and the voice again, for a second time, came to him, what God made clean, you do not declare unclean.”
Look closely at the word “common”.
The Greek word is koinos.
Koinos has the same root word as koinonia which refers to Christian fellowship — that regular, common fellowship that we are supposed to enjoy as brothers and sisters in Christ.
Peter’s use of it here is a key to understanding his box.
— Peter was a good Jewish man… raised to see the world through “Jewish” eyes.
— The animals on the cloth were linked to the Gentile world in Jewish thought. Jews did not eat them, not just because Mosaic law forbade it, but because they were linked to the “common” people, the Gentiles.
— In Jewish thought, Gentiles were referred to as “dogs.” It was beneath a good Jewish man to have fellowship with a Gentile, after all, they were God’s chosen people, and to enter into koinonia with a Gentile meant making yourself unclean.
— Peter may have been thinking that taking the message to the Gentiles was someone else’s job.
Peter’s view of God… His view of the religious responsibilities of a good Jewish man… his view of the church… his view of Gentiles… was his box.
It shaped how he responded to God’s commands in his life.
Peter allowed the fallacies of pharisaical thinking/teaching and the prejudices of his upbringing to color how he operated… what he did… even how he followed God’s commands.
Our “box” is not any different.
How we think about God, the church, our Christian responsibilities, shapes our obedience to God’s Word.
To understand our box, we have to look at some of the thoughts about God’s Word that shape our thinking about how we “do church,” or handle our personal walks.
(use cardboard box to illustrate)
Tithing. This is a touchy subject in America.
In the church we teach a 10% tithe.
This is based on Abraham, who after rescuing Lot from the kings who had conquered Sodom and Gomorrah, gave a tenth of the loot to the priest Melchizedek.
Many people teach that this means we give out of our abundance, the amount that is over and above what we need to pay our bills…
In other words, what is left over?!?
But… if we say this, what do we do with the widow in Luke 21, that gave her last few cents?
— Look at Cain and Abel… God rejected Cain’s offering, because it was simply a little bit of what was left…
— We do not tithe out of the “left overs”… We give of our “First Fruits”…
— The tithe was never about “paying the bills” and “hiring staff”… It was/is about taking care of… providing for the Priest.
— the Temple Tax was for the bills…
Service/missions. In the Western Church, because of how difficult it is to raise funds for missions, church budgets, etc… it is often taught that your giving to a missions fund, financially, is your service.
This is false.
It is important that we help support those things, but God calls us to a life spent in service to others.
James 2:26, “As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.”
Our service is meant to flow out of our faith. We are not called to simply sit in a pew and give our money. We are called to serve.
Giftings. In my time in the church, I have heard many people say, God has gifted you for certain works. That is what your talents are for, so figure out what your talents are, and work within them.
This is certainly true, but God does not call us to only work within those talents. Sometimes He calls us to get out of our comfort zones.
Think about it…
— Moses had debilitating stage fright, and a speech impediment, yet God sent him to speak to pharaoh.
— David was just a shepherd with pride and lust issues, yet God called him to be king.
— Abraham was a fearful man with trust issues, yet God called him to be the father of a nation.
— The apostles were fisherman, accountants, men of trade, not preachers, yet God called them to build His church.
And, we already talked about Peter who is being called out of his comfort zone to go to the Gentiles.
Purpose of the worship service. Two schools of thought seem to dominate here: 1) worship is to feed me, (2) worship services should be “seeker services.” While both of these thoughts are important
Why are we really here?
Are we here to be fed?
Is it all about us?
Or, Is the worship service about worship?
This is why we have so many arguments about song styles, music selections, etc….
Worship is meant to be an offering to God in response to His love for us. It is an expression of our love for and need of Him.
Church models. We have modeled much of what we do in church after the business world.
We want to expand our ministries, so we hire someone to do it so we don’t have to.
The business world says you retire at 65-70 years old. Your work is done. Where does it say that in scripture?
If we take a serious look in scripture we will find one thing to be true.
If you are still here on this earth and breathing, God still has work for you.
We are never called to sit in a pew.
God’s call. Yes, God calls some people to special work, pastors, missionaries, prophets, etc…, but their purpose is misunderstood.
God did not call them to do all the work, he called them to equip the people for the work.
11 So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers,
12 to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up
13 until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.
It is the work of all Christians to spread the Gospel.
… And that is done by encouraging … supporting… AND working alongside each other… Even in things that don’t touch our hearts!
Are you seeing how our mis-thinking works?
Just like the early church, we have created a way of thinking about church… about God… that allows us to remain in our comfort zone.
We have built a comfortable little box that we can place God in…
That allows us to only get Him out when we want to…
That allows us to make excuses, or ignore what we know God is telling us to do.
Our box limits and/or prohibits God from working through our lives!
God is calling, and He will always call us to get out of our box!
Look at Peter’s life.
When the storm was raging, and the disciples were safe in their boat, Jesus came to them, walking on the water.
What did he do?
He called Peter out of the boat!
He called Peter to get out of his comfort zone… to get out of the safety of his box… to let go of control and trust Him.
And, for a moment, Peter did!
… and he experienced the power of God in his life.
But what happened when he looked back?
When he looked back at his own talents… his own gifts… his own strengths and ideas… his box?
He sank!
We have got to get out of the box!
But, how do we do that?
How do we get out of this box we have created?
1. Recognize the problem.
— Rom. 12:2. We have to learn to think differently. We have to acknowledge our box and be willing to give it up.
3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
— When we are baptized, we die to our old selves, our old lives, our old way of thinking. Paul asks “So, do we keep on sinning? NO!”
— We need to embrace that baptism and become willing to allow God to move us in new directions.
— We must become pliable, moldable, and changeable by committing our entire lives to His calling and purpose, even if that means getting uncomfortable!
2. We must listen and look for God.
— God’s word can be confusing. Peter was perplexed. Had he not been looking for the answer, he would have missed what God was telling him to do.
— We often miss what God is trying to get us to do because we are to busy looking at our box instead of looking around to see what God is doing.
— All to often, God is telling us to listen to someone else. But we don’t like them… we don’t like their message… we think we know better then them…
How often do we not understand God because we do not think the messenger is reliable?
3. We must be obedient to God’s direction.
— James 1:22 “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.”
— All to often, we deceive ourselves by thinking our box is obedience… IT IS NOT!!!!!
— Obedience is Holiness.
— We cannot live holy lives in disobedience to God’s Word and direction.
If you want to live a holy life, which is pleasing to God, you must get out of your box!!!!
4. We have to do what God tells us to do.
— God is calling us to let go of ALL other things, to grab hold of Jesus, and GO!!!!!
16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
— What has God been telling you to do?
— Is there something that keeps coming up in your life over and over again… some thing that seems urgent to do… some thing that you feel needs to be done?
— Perhaps God is trying to tell you He needs you to do it.
Like Peter, God is calling us out of our box.
If we want to see God move in our families, we have to get out of the box.
If we want to see revival in this church, we have got to get out of our box!
If we want to see change in our people, in our communities, in our city, in our denomination, we have got to get out of the box!!!
God is asking… God is calling… Will you get out of your box?
I want to urge you today to go home… to sit down and spend some time thinking about your life.
What is your box?
What is it that you really believe?
What is it that drives you?
Are you completely open to God moving you?
Are you really willing to do anything, anything that God tells you to do?
Or, are there areas that you believe God won’t call you to?
Do you believe that what you are currently doing is enough?!?
So did Peter!!!
Like him… Is God calling you to more???
I know there are people here today that need to hear this:
God will NEVER call you to serve within your comfort zone.
Because… It is in our weakness that He is made strong.
Bow your heads with me.