The Day is Coming
Notes
Transcript
Prayer
Good morning!
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Christmas Party
Advent Giving
Budget Presentation
Every year we take time to review where we are financially as a church.
So if you’re here and Gateway is not your home church, you’re like the friend who gets invited for dinner when the family goes over the budget and you can just enjoy the coffee and listen in even though this doesn’t affect you yet, we’re still glad you’re here.
But this really is a family budget meeting. As a church we are the family of God, we have aspects of church that are like a business in that we have status with the government, we have a budget, we have staff, we have a building, but at our core, what makes us who we are is we are the family of God, brothers and sisters in Christ who have a Father who loves us and has called us to represent him to the world.
And how we use our money as a tool to live for Jesus is important. So just like families need to be wise with money and have integrity with money and talk about money, we want to do the same as a church.
And so the purpose of these next 10 minutes or so is for us as church leaders - myself and the elder team, to be above board with you of where we are financially, and for you to get a sense of where we are, where we’ve been and where we’re going.
So we’ll go over several slides and hopefully at the end you’ll have a better sense of our financial state as a church family.
If we go along and you have questions, grab me after the service, or direct any questions to the elder team via that email.
We’d love to hear from you. Some of you may like a more detailed picture of the budget, we can send that to you as well.
Before we begin I want to say a special thanks to Theda Nguyen for making these slides.
And to Sam Michel and Anne Poppino. Each month Sam, Anne, and I go over the churches finances and make sure we’re keeping track of expenses, credit card payments, bank account, online giving.
Our monthly finance meetings are one of the healthiest parts of our church family.
As some of you know, we’ve had issues with online giving this year, and Anne Poppino is a gift from God to save us from disaster. Make sure you thank Anne and thank Sam for their work to keep us on track as a church family.
2022 Giving vs 2023 Giving
Giving is up this year. December isn’t finished yet, but if we have an average month, and typically in December we have an above average month, we will finish about 16% higher than last year. Amazing!
If you were here for this presentation last year, we were predicting to lose money in 2023, and that has hardly been the case. We were unsure about resigning the lease, but now today we are about ready to resign the lease! Praise God. Thank you for your generosity.
2022 Expenses vs 2023 Expenses
Expenses this year have only slightly increased. Again, December isn’t in the books but assuming I don’t take you all out for dinner at OxBow we are on pace to finish at about $21k.
Our main expenses at Gateway are staff which includes myself and the Rays, it includes paying for visiting preachers, it includes payroll taxes, it includes our accounting service Finch we pay for. And the building. The building is such a gift. Guess how much our landlord is increasing our rent? 1%.
How many of you who rent would like a 1% increase in rent? How many of us would like a 1% increase in property taxes? We’ve got a great thing going on here and it would be hard to find something cheaper elsewhere.
We tend to keep expenses very low at Gateway. I would love to see us be able to increase our ministry capacity in the future but I also love that we don’t have a million programs and we have organic ministry that happens in community groups and outside of Sunday mornings.
So here is the breakdown of expenses and giving this year.
As you can see, we are so close to breaking even in 2023. If we have an average month in December - and usually we have an above average month, we’ll fall about $5k short. So if we have a normal December and about $2k more…we could break even. Which, considering where we were at this time last year, praise God!
So if in three years we’re in another tough spot financially, you can remind me - Chris, we’ve been here before. God has gotten us through!
Based on expenses for next year, our anticipated need for 2024 is just over $230,664
And compared to this year’s giving, there is a gap which amounts to about $1,700/month.
So why would we be okay with keeping expenses that high if there is a gap?
Well, typically we stay under budget, and if giving continues to grow, we could exceed that need for next year, and we’ve got about $80,000 in the bank which gives us a great cushion.
So please give!
We will need to increase giving going forward to meet next year’s expenses.
This space is a really good fit for us to come and worship, for the kids to learn about Jesus, and for us to have a presence in the community to represent Jesus.
So two asks - if you are able to give above and beyond before the end of the year so we can break even for 2023, we are so close and that would be incredible.
Second, we have a gap to meet our need next year and so please give. If each of our families gave even $50/month more next year, that would just about cover it.
Finally, thank you!
It’s awesome to share positives on the financial side, but it’s a pleasure just to be your pastor. I enjoy being a part of this family. Please let us know if you have any questions.
Scripture
Intro
Advent Update
Good to be back sharing God’s word with you today. Thank you Gene for an amazing message last week on Habakkuk. If you missed it please go back and listen.
We are in week 4 of our 5 week Advent Series we’re calling “Prophets of Advent” where we are letting the Minor Prophets - and their not minor because they’re unimportant or sad but because their texts are just shorter - teach us about finding hope in Jesus this Advent season.
Advent means arrival or coming and it’s the time of year that the church around the world remembers Christ’s arrival two thousand years ago and we anticipate his promised arrival that is yet to come.
If you’re keeping track on your Advent calendar at home we are 8 days from Christmas and 15 days from 2024.
And, not to be a Debby Downer, but just to remind you what’s coming in 2024, another presidential election year. Cue the collective groan.
Yes, I know you are all so excited for another year of division, mud slinging, donkeys vs elephants, red vs blue mayhem.
Perhaps there are some here who follow politics closely and you find your blood boiling a little bit even thinking of the year to come. You’re opinionated, ready to debate, and maybe you even know when that infamous Iowa caucus is coming.
But perhaps there are many others here who are just about done with the whole thing. You’re sick of it. The whole thing is so messy and divisive that you’ve checked out. You’ve traded in anger about politics for cynicism, apathy, and disillusionment. And maybe it’s not just the way you see politics but our world in general. What’s there to do? It’s all going down the drain.
It’s no small secret that many people feel this sense of disillusionment, resignation, apathy, and cynicism towards the church.
I would imagine many of us here know friends and family who during COVID have walked away from church. There are many reasons for this many of these folks are saying, “I’m done.” I love Jesus, but church has too much baggage.
I wonder if you’ve felt that sense of disillusionment - that sense of losing hope in the future - not just in your view of our American society, or the church, but in your own life.
Maybe the same problem keeps coming back over and over again. The same habits, the same anxiety, or shame, the same relational dysfunction, the same worries and fears. Maybe the same health problem or an impending health issue that makes you feel powerless and afraid. You feel like giving up.
So where do we find hope?
Zephaniah points us to the coming day of the LORD.
How can we sing when we feel meh? How can we rejoice when we feel fed up, done with it all, and hopeless?
Zephaniah 3:14-17 teaches the people of God - who are similarly in a state where it seems all hope had gone out the window - to sing for joy because of the coming day of the LORD.
Let’s read verse 14 together…
14 Shout for joy, O daughter of Zion!
Shout in triumph, O Israel!
Rejoice and exult with all your heart,
O daughter of Jerusalem!
I’ve only heard one sermon on it…and it was here!
Zephaniah is largely uncharted territory in my Bible.
If we read only Zephaniah 3:14-17 we may think, wow! What a happy book.
But then we go back to the start…
2 “I will completely remove all things
From the face of the earth,” declares the Lord.
3 “I will remove man and beast;
I will remove the birds of the sky
And the fish of the sea,
And the ruins along with the wicked;
And I will cut off man from the face of the earth,” declares the Lord.
Whoa! So how did we get from 1:2 to 3:14?
Let’s look at the historical context of Zephaniah and his message in order to understand how these verses connect.
When reading the Bible, context is essential.
No one likes their words being taken out of context, God included!
Let’s read the beginning of Zephaniah.
1 The word of the Lord which came to Zephaniah son of Cushi, son of Gedaliah, son of Amariah, son of Hezekiah, in the days of Josiah son of Amon, king of Judah:
Hear we learn God gives a message to the great grandson of Hezekiah.
Hezekiah was a good king in the southern kingdom of Israel.
Saul was the first king of Israel, then David, then Solomon, and then after Solomon the kingdom split into two - the northern kingdom of ten tribes and the southern kingdom of two tribes.
And both kingdoms had a list of good and bad kings and the prophets speak to both the north and the south kingdoms and speak to both good and bad kings.
Hezekiah had another great grandson named Josiah who became the king of Judah.
And Josiah was a good king, too! So we may think, great! 4 generations of good kings.
Not the case…verse 1 says Josiah was the son of Amon…and Amon was a bad king.
And by bad we don’t mean incompetent or trashed the economy or lost all his battles…but bad in the sense of didn’t give a thought or prayer about God.
Hezekiah :)
Manasseh :( :( :( :(
Amon :( :(
Josiah :) :)
Josiah was a good king because he repented of sin and helped turn people away from false gods and back to the true God.
Josiah banned pagan practices…horrible things like child sacrifice. But as we know, just because you make something illegal doesn’t stop it from happening.
After generations of people worshiping false gods, sin was rampant. Josiah’s reforms helped, but we hear multiple prophets speaking at this time - Zephaniah, Habbakuk, Nahum, Jeremiah - warning Judah that even know Josiah has made changes, the day of judgment is coming.
And for Judah that looks like the coming exile at the hands of Babylon in 586 BC.
So imagine being a loyal follower of God at this time.
You’re heartbroken that friends and neighbors are still worshiping false gods. Bowing down to star gods and gods promising wealth and a good harvest and more children…but in order to please those gods your fellow countrymen are literally murdering their children, oppressing the poor, and completely disregarding the God who saved them.
Imagine being a widow...
An orphan. Someone with a disease or handicap whom society has disregarded and under a corrupt government you are cast off with no one to help you. Where do you find hope?
After literally hundreds of years of disobedience and generation after generation of oppression and injustice and corrupt government…where do you find hope?
Maybe it’s not hard for some of us to imagine such a hopeless scenario.
Maybe you’ve been there or you’re there now where you look at your circumstances and you become apathetic, cynical, or disillusioned with the world.
Where do you find hope?
This leads us to the message of Zephaniah which is the coming day of the Lord.
The main thrust of all three chapters of Zephaniah is the day of the LORD.
When I say the day of the LORD, what comes to mind?
For many of us who have been in church, really scary end-times images come to mind.
I remember going to an evangelistic night at a friend’s youth group where they played some dramatized movie about the end times. It was horrifying. I’m easily scared, but I remember hiding behind my chair, I don’t know if I was terrified or just double checking on my salvation so I didn’t have to face the crazy spiders and gargoyle demon things the movie was showing. It was nuts.
So is that the day of the LORD? How would that bring hope to anyone’s mind?
What is the day of the LORD?
The day of the LORD is a concept referred to throughout Scripture used to refer to when God intervenes to save and judge.
It’s a day of both terror and celebration. Destruction and renewal. Sadness and happiness…weeping and singing! All depending on where you sit with God.
If we want an illustration, the ultimate day of the LORD in the Old Testament is the Exodus story.
Israel has been enslaved by Egypt for 400 years.
If you want to know apathy, cynicism and dillusionment with life, try being a slave for generations.
But God intervenes.
He sends Moses to bring about the great day of the LORD after giving Pharoah ten warnings or plagues to let his people go. In these plagues God allows creation to descend to chaos and disorder, all the while protecting his people.
And so on that day when Israel finally escaped from Egypt, it was a terrible day for the Egyptians. In his judgment against the evil gods of Egypt, God struck down the firstborn son of every man and beast in all of Egypt, but passed over Israel because he provided the passover lamb.
So for the Egyptians, it was a day of terror, destruction, and weeping. But for Israel, what do they do after they cross the Red Sea?
1 Then Moses and the sons of Israel sang this song to the Lord, and said,
“I will sing to the Lord, for He is highly exalted;
The horse and its rider He has hurled into the sea.
2 “The Lord is my strength and song,
And He has become my salvation;
This is my God, and I will praise Him;
My father’s God, and I will extol Him.
They sing!
So we see that when the Bible talks about the day of the LORD, for those who trust God it is a day worth singing about.
But what happens to those who pridefully oppose God? Pharoah and his army are destroyed.
One way to look at the day of the LORD is it’s a day when God acts to give us what we want.
For those who want nothing to do with the author of life - God gives them over to death.
For those who humbly submit to God’s rule and reign - God gives them life forever with him.
So today we ask ourselves, what do we want?
Do we hunger and thirst for righteousness? Or simply for our own personal comfort?
Do we care deeply for the needs of others, or just the people in my own circle?
Do we long for more of God, or for more money?
The day of the LORD is coming when God gives us what we want, and for those who want HIM, it is a day worth singing about.
Let’s look back at our passage.
14 Shout for joy, O daughter of Zion!
Shout in triumph, O Israel!
Rejoice and exult with all your heart,
O daughter of Jerusalem!
In a word, sing!
I like other translations that just say SING!
When I read shout for joy I think of the Howard Dean Scream in 2004 about that guy who ran for president forever ago…we’re going to the white house “BEYA!!”…
Zephaniah is all about the day of the LORD which is a coming day worth singing about.
Like someone stuck out a sea who sees a distant coast guard ship in the horizon coming their way…sing! Rescue is coming!
Like the Israelites who sang in Exodus 15 after God saved them…rejoice! God is coming to free you!
Like Paul instructs the church of Colossae……
16 Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God.
My parents were just in Spokane and went on a carriage ride in the snow…they got on with a bunch of strangers and you know what they did? They sang! We don’t do that in August. If a group of people came to your house in March singing, you’d be like, what is going on? But in December we sing! Why? Christmas was a great day of the LORD worth singing about and it’s hard wired into our world that we sing.
So here’s what we’re going to do right now…we’re going to sing!
I’m not done with the sermon, but I’d like to invite you to stand with me and sing the first verse of Come Thou Fount as a way to engage more of ourselves this morning.
When we sing, we’re not just enjoying music, we’re reminding each other of who we are and who God is.
Now…let’s be honest…we’re not loud singers. And that’s okay, and also consider just for now, singing like you really mean it. And as you sing, think about these words…
Come, thou Fount of every blessing;
tune my heart to sing thy grace;
streams of mercy, never ceasing,
call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
sung by flaming tongues above;
praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,
mount of God’s unchanging love!
Now…we all just sang that, did anything change in your life? Did a cease fire happen in Gaza? Did the food bank shut its doors because there’s no longer a need? Did all your problems go away?
So why do we sing?
15 The Lord has taken away His judgments against you,
He has cleared away your enemies.
The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst;
You will fear disaster no more.
16 In that day it will be said to Jerusalem:
“Do not be afraid, O Zion;
Do not let your hands fall limp.
17 “The Lord your God is in your midst,
A victorious warrior.
He will exult over you with joy,
He will be quiet in His love,
He will rejoice over you with shouts of joy.
Who God Is
Who God Is
Zephaniah gives hope by reminding us who God is. The coming day of the LORD is worth singing about because we will see God for who He is.
And who is he?
The LORD
The King of Israel
The One who is with us
A Victorious Warrior
A Lover who sings over us with joy
THE LORD -
YHWH! The God who revealed himself to Moses in the burning bush and came to save his people from slavery.
The creator of all who loved his creation enough to not let it fall into destruction because of sin but chose the family of Abraham to restore blessing to the world.
The God who gives us his name so he can be in relationship with us.
The King of Israel
Israel had many human kings, but God was their true king. Israel’s leaders had failed, but God will not fail.
5 The Lord is righteous within her;
He will do no injustice.
Every morning He brings His justice to light;
He does not fail.
But the unjust knows no shame.
We live in a day when authority is a 4 letter word and Israel in this time knew this feeling well. Zephaniah reminds us that God is the true King.
The One who is with us
On the coming day of the LORD, God will be with you. He can’t keep himself from his people but wants to be in the midst of them.
A Victorious Warrior
Our champion! Israel lived in the middle of vast armies capable of destroying them in a day. But God was their victorious warrior in their midst. On the coming day of the LORD he will win the battle against the real enemy.
A lover who sings over us with joy
What would change in our life if we meditated on this each day? God is not just a mighty warrior, he’s not some distant deity, he’s not a grumpy old man in the sky who sees when you are sleeping and knows when you’ve been bad or good so be good for goodness sakes…he’s a lover.
Has anyone song just for you before? That’s a very intimate thing. God takes so much delight in you that he just can’t keep from singing. We sing because he sings over us first!
God loves singing. Is it any wonder so much of the Bible is poetry? God is romantic in love with his people.
We can sing because of WHO GOD IS and
What He Has Done
What He Has Done
When Zephaniah refers to “the LORD” it’s a direct reminder of the Exodus story.
You can sing, Israel, because the LORD is the same God who saved you from Egypt! And he’ll do it again.
You can sing, Christian, because Jesus is the same King who saved you from sin and he’ll do it again. The day is coming.
WHO GOD IS and WHAT HE HAS DONE and……
What He Will Do
What He Will Do
Taken away his judgments against you and cleared away all your enemies
Takes away our fear
Exult over us with joy
Be quiet in his love
Sing over us
Taken away his judgments against you and cleared away all your enemies
Judah would fall to Babylon and be exiled. Babylon was the judgment tool of God for the sin of his people.
But a day was coming when God would save them from exile and defeat their enemies. Babylon did fall to Persia in 538 BC.
Takes away our fear
We can hardly imagine living in a tiny country surrounded by global super powers when any day your life is in danger. Sure there are threats today with China and Russia…but we’ve got nukes! They had nothing. I can’t imagine the trauma of thinking tomorrow my house could be burned down and my family killed and me being carted off to another country to work for a foreign government. It’s fear.
But God says the day is coming when I will save you and you will sing…and I will take away your fear…
And this is a reminder for us in our fears today that a day is coming when we won’t be afraid of how are we going to make ends meet, how are we going to get through this season of life, how are we going to pay for life after retirement, how are we going to care for our sick relative, how are we going to hold it together…God is coming to take away our fear
Exult over us with joy
Zephaniah reminds the people that a day is coming when God will no longer send judgments their way but will instead rejoice over his people.
Be quiet in his love…
Interpreted a lot of ways…
17 The Lord your God is in the midst of you, a Mighty One, a Savior [Who saves]! He will rejoice over you with joy; He will rest [in silent satisfaction] and in His love He will be silent and make no mention [of past sins, or even recall them]; He will exult over you with singing.
Oh Israel, in the past God has been loud in his accusations against you, pleading with you to change! But now his voice will be quiet and he won’t even make a sound to mention your past sins. No, like a husband and wife who can just sit in silence with each other, God will quietly be with you because he loves you.
He will sing over you
God loves to sing! It’s why we love to sing. A day is coming, Zephaniah says, when God will sing over you and free you from your enemies.
The day of the LORD is a day worth singing about.
We sing because of who god is, what he has done, and what he will do.
So how does this connect with today?
Three questions…what does this teach us about putting our hope in Jesus?
Zephaniah 3:14-17 teaches us that singing the right response to who Jesus is, what he has done, and what he will do.
Zephaniah 3:14-17 teaches us that singing the right response to who Jesus is, what he has done, and what he will do.
When we’re all too aware of the brokenness of the world, the conflict in Gaza, the upcoming election, the seemingly unchanging difficult circumstances of our lives and we read Zeph 3:14 and feel meh…we sing…
When Mary, the mother of Jesus, found out she was going to have a child. This wasn’t good news on paper…she was only engaged not yet married and an angel tells her you’re going to have to explain to your husband that you’re pregnant and he’s not the Father…but here’s the good news, the baby inside you is the King of Israel, God come to be with you…a victorious warrior who will save…
Mary could have grumbled. She could have descended into apathy cynicism and self-pity for the difficult road that lay ahead, but instead…she sang…her famous song in Luke 1 is called the Magnificat.
The day of the LORD had come…and Mary knew it was a day worth singing about…
For you and I, we have many reasons to grumble and complain.
It’s really dark outside. The economy is probably going to tank at some point. Another election year next year who knows what’s going to happen.
And yet if we are people who have been saved by Jesus, the response that lifts us out of our circumstances and reminds us of who Jesus is, what he has done, and what he will do, is singing.
How does Zephaniah teach us to see the world?
Zephaniah teaches us to put our hope in God and not in fallible human leaders.
Zephaniah teaches us to put our hope in God and not in fallible human leaders.
Not a week goes by as I read Christianity Today that there isn’t news about some church leader who admits to a disastrous moral failure.
The puget sound will feel the spiritual affects of the collapse of Mars Hill for a while.
And this passage reminds us that God is King. He’s the mighty warrior. Even when human leaders fail, God doesn’t. Pastors are under shepherds, Jesus is the chief shepherd.
Whoever wins the election next year, God is still in charge. Kingdoms come and go but the king remains forever.
How do we give hope to others?
Zephaniah teaches us to encourage each other by reminding one another of the coming day of the LORD.
Zephaniah teaches us to encourage each other by reminding one another of the coming day of the LORD.
Paul says to the Thessalonians……
1 Now, brothers and sisters, about times and dates we do not need to write to you, 2 for you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. 3 While people are saying, “Peace and safety,” destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will not escape.
4 But you, brothers and sisters, are not in darkness so that this day should surprise you like a thief. 5 You are all children of the light and children of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness. 6 So then, let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be awake and sober. 7 For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, get drunk at night. 8 But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet. 9 For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. 10 He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him. 11 Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.
A great way to do that is by singing…
And you may say, Chris, today I don’t feel like singing.
And that may be, but also, I need to hear your voice.
I need you to sing. I need to hear your voice to remind me that I’m not always going experience fear and shame, that I won’t fear failure for all eternity or worry about worst case scenarios…
Some days I don’t want to sing. But you need my voice.
We need each other to sing the truths of God to each other so we can remember that it’s not always going to be like this. The day of the LORD is coming and it’s a day worth singing about, even now as we await his salvation.
Communion
Benediction
13 Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.