We Have Fun

Hello Dream Team! Thank you for tuning in, I am so excited for 2025. Last year was an amazing year full of so many reasons to praise God. Over 200 Salvations, many baptized in the Holy Spirit, we launched over 30 Purple Book Mentor relationships; What’s not to praise God for.

As we move into all that God has planned for us this year, I believe a it is vital that we begin by clarifying vision. Now I believe that many of us know exactly how to word the statement that describes the vision of LFC. Take just a moment really quick and see if you can remember it. If you know it repeat it out loud? Got it? If you said “The Gospel In Every Home” you are exactly right! Give yourself a hand.

Organizational Behavior

And what we mean by that is exactly what it says. We desire that every home in the greater Hermiston area would be filled with the message of the Gospel. That every home would be filled with the Spirit of God, with the message of Gods forgiveness, with peace only He provides. That the Word of God would living and active in every home, every coffee shop, every restaurant, every place of employment.

Now, usually when talking about vision, we jump from why we exist right into what we do. And, we could do that, but the truth of the matter is, what you do, and how you behave are two different things, and I can do a lot of good things with a bad attitude. This is the heart of what Jesus was getting at when He told the crowd in Matthew chapter 5 these words.

Matthew 5:28 (NASB95)

28 but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

So, God considers the motivations and spirit of the heart as equal to the behavior and actions of our flesh.

A while back I was on the phone with a pastor friend of mine who attended a midweek church service in a town near where he lived. His wife and kids stayed home that night. When he walked into the church building, as is customary, greeters were standing at the door. However, upon entering the building, the greeter recognized him and asked, where is your wife. This man replied, she stayed home with the kids tonight. Upon hearing this, the greeter replied, sounds like you need get a handle on your wife.

Now, this is insane! This is a true story, and I have never heard anything more crazy in my life. But this story does serve as a reminder to each of us that culture eats strategy for lunch all day! How you act makes all the difference. So, before we ever even talk about what we are doing, or are going to do, let’s begin by talking about how we behave.

Culture: - How We Behave

The Vision Leadership Team has taken some time to begin to bring to attention the four most important behavioral traits that impact the vision and culture of Living Faith Church. These four behaviors are:

We Create Irresistible Environments

We Remain Open To Change

We Run Toward The Messes

We Have Fun

We Have Fun

These four statements define the attitude, motivation and behavioral traits that drive everything that we do as a Dream Team. So, we could look at anyone of these today, but I am going to pick number four: We Have Fun! Did you know that fun is Biblical? Did you also know that fun is a choice? It is so easy for us to become task driven, and deadline driven that we loose sight of the fact that God wants the church to be a fun place.

Matthew 22:2 (NASB95)

2 “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son.

Quick question- Have you ever been to sad, mournful, un-fun wedding? I hope not! Because weddings should be exciting, thrilling, full of celebration! And Jesus told this crowd that this is what the kingdom of heaven is like. The kingdom of heaven is like a joyous, celebratory, fun party! But the Church, capital “C” church, the global church, is not known for this. We are know for tradition, religion, silence, reverence that could more accurately defined as boredom. But, this is not what we see with Jesus.

Jesus fed 5000 on a hillside as He preached His sermon

Jesus, after Simon had given up after not catching any fish, took him out and Simon caught so many fish it nearly sunk two boats!

Jesus, while preaching, said - let the little children come to me

What Jesus taught us is that where He is, there is joy. Where the spirit of the Lord is, sins are forgiven, peace triumphs, victory is certain. But here is the trick; we have to choose joy.

Colossians 3:17 (NASB95)

17 Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father.

Why would Paul take the time to remind us to do this, unless it is all too natural for us to forget it?

Philippians 4:4 (NASB95)

4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!

Again, we are reminded to rejoice, but rejoice “Always”! I’m not just rejoicing when I think about it, or when I feel like it, or when it feels natural. But Paul says to rejoice always.

Galatians 5:22 (NASB95)

22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,

Again, another reminder from our friend Paul; but this time Paul is telling us that not only is Joy something we choose, but now, joy is a fruit of the Spirit. In other words, it is a manifestation of being filled with the Holy Spirit. Just like every other fruit of the spirit, Joy is something that must be evident as a visible representation that Christ is in us. Just like you are working on your patience, just like you are working on gentleness, just like you are working on peace, so you should also be working on joy.

So, we are going to hit 2025 hard with this thought. Is my team fun? Do the people on my team look forward to coming and serving;? Do people ask in anticipation; when is our next meeting?

The truth is, more often than not, people don’t like meetings because they take up time out of their already busy schedule. But, I bet that with a bit of creativity, collaboration, and investment, you could make your meetings something that people can’t wait to get to! I bet, that with a bit of feedback from the members of your team, that coming a few minutes early to your service assignment could be something people want to do.

Several years ago Stella and pastored a portable church. Every Sunday we had to haul several hundreds of pounds of equipment into our rented space. Speakers, signage, coffee pots, rugs. We had to move 50 plus, chairs into place- it was a lot of work. At first, it was just plain work, and people treated it like work. But one day, I found out that we were going to be short handed, and I called a guy to come early and 6:30 am on Sunday and help us out. I told him, if you come early, I’ll bring the donuts and coffee. He replied- It’s a deal. So I did! He came early, we shared donuts and coffee, and then he turned on some up beat christian music -and to my amazement, we started having a blast. Not long after that, we made a change. I put this guy Nick in charge of setting up the main auditorium space, and people loved being a part of that team. After we left that church and moved here to Hermiston, one of my kids told me, dad, I miss setup and tear down- that was so much fun.

But, we had to intentionally choose to work on this. And the same is true for your team, for your life group. Just as hard as you work on preparing for your serve day, for your teaching, for your life group, prepare for fun! Each of you have a list of things you do each week, add “Have Fun” to that list a make it something you work on. Maybe you have a drawing for a free coffee weekly or monthly. Maybe you have a team member of the month raffle. Maybe you develop with your team a team slogan that you work on together. What I want you to do right now is this. In just a moment I’m going to turn this over to your pastor and you are going to think of, and write down some unique ways that you can make your teams more FUN!

And then, you are going to end your time by- Having Fun! And it’s going to be amazing. But before I do, I want you to remember this. Nehemiah 8:10 says:

Nehemiah 8:10 (NASB95)

10 Then he said to them, “Go, eat of the fat, drink of the sweet, and send portions to him who has nothing prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”

This passage was written to the nation of Israel during a season of hard work- Israel had finished rebuilding the walls, and Israel was becoming re-established. For many of us, we would say “rest is your strength”, or “a nap is in order”, “Go eat a corn-dog”. And none of these things are wrong, but none of these things are our source. Nehemiah hits the nail on the head when he says “The joy of the Lord is your strength”. So, what ever has your discouraged, worried, tired, running behind, stressed, or any other emotion we could add to the list, remember this- Joy is of the Lord. And when you don’t feel like you have any to share- run to Jesus and pray for the fruit of the spirit- because He has more than you can even handle- and it is His delight to give Joy to you to sustain you in your season. There are dozens, even hundreds of people coming to Living Faith Church who need the joy- the celebration to lift them out of a season- and God is calling you, Living Faith to be the instrument that fulfills that work.

Let’s Go Lead- and Let’s Have Fun!