Our journey as a church
John 14:2-6
2 In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. 4 You know the way to the place where I am going." 5 Thomas said to him, "Lord, we don't know where you are going, so how can we know the way?" 6 Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. (NIV)
Ø How do you get to my house from your house Ivan?
You leave your house and walk to the bus stop and get on a bus to the metro station, then you take the metro to museum metro stop and then you change lines to the green line and you get off at Dejvicka and then you get on a bus that takes you to my city and then you walk from the bus stop to my house. Is that about right?
Well what if you found a good seat on the first Bus and it was so comfortable, it is cold outside and the heater is so warm that you decide you don’t want to get off? Would you get to my house? NO!
Ø Our journey as God’s people is like this also. Many get saved and go to a church and find a good seat. They come because they find something that they like! For example the music, the hugging or something else.
Ø That by itself is not wrong! What makes it unhealthy for you is if you do not realize that we are on a journey with many changes and when (not if) we make a turn in the road or we change buses and are required to get off your favorite bus and get on another where you might have to stand or sit next to someone you don’t like etc..
Phil 2:12-15
12 Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed-- not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence-- continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose. 14 Do everything without complaining or arguing, 15 so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe (NIV)
Ø Our destination as a church may require many changes to get to our final destination too. So if we become comfortable and say “I like it here I don’t want to change lines, we will never get to where we want and need to be!
o *** The result: We may find ourselves wandering from one bus to another checking the quality of the seats more than the destination of the Buses! Never arriving anywhere just traveling on a pointless journey.
In our service last week we talked about the different phases of spiritual growth that we must go through to become all that we are supposed to be. Like my example we become comfortable at some levels and we do not want to go on because it means we have to change how we do things.
o Going from being a spiritual baby, to a child, a teenager, an adult and then a wise older Christian is a journey with many stops, and changes. Some more enjoyable than others.
Ø What is the goal that we have? To see that all of us become like Christ and arrive at the final destination “The Father”! Not that we have a ministry or do great things for God.
o You see the more I BECOME like Christ the more I will ACT like Christ!
o The fact is, who I am now will determine the changes and different roads that I will have to take to get to the destination of Christ likeness. I.e. Jana and Alan would have to take a totally different path to get to my house than Ivan. But the destination is the same. *Interesting is the closer we get to Christ the closer we will get to each other and our destination.
o What I know does not change the direction of the journey but WHO I BECOME!
o The journey is first an internal one more than an external one. Character is more important than external conformity.
§ What is your destination and where are you now? There are many of you in your hearts you want to go to God. But like our example has shown. You may never have begun the journey or maybe you have and somewhere stopped and gotten comfortable in the journey and never continued on.
· This journey is more important than the ones that we have talked about till now. This is your life.
o Every time there is a need for a change we will get uncomfortable. We will have to put something away.
1 Cor 13:11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. (NIV)
Eph 4:11-24
11 It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, 12 to prepare God's 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. 14 Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. 15 Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. 16 From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. 17 So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. 18 They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. 19 Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more. 20 You, however, did not come to know Christ that way. 21 Surely you heard of him and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. 22 You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23 to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24 and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. (NIV)
Ø In New Beginnings we have many things to help you grow up.
o Feeding for the babies, teaching and fun for the children, work and practice for the teenager, responsibility and opportunities to reproduce for the adult, and the need for wisdom to be shared with all, from the older ones in the Lord.
Ø We want to train you, prepare you, helping you to mature. One of the most important ways that we do this is to get the body parts together. Unless you bring the parts together it is never a body!
Ø This is where the New Home groups will come in. This is the next part of the journey for this church. As we continue to build our relationships with one another we need a way to get you together so we can give you the personal care that each one of you deserves. So that you can learn to build one another up. Each part needs to be able to express itself. Every part has a purpose. Learning is a part of it, but BECOMING is the real Journey!
Ø In closing think about this. The Family! How old is the family? That’s right in the Beginning. There is nothing else except God that has remained the same. People still get married, and have children, raise families and it starts all over again. We cannot go wrong as a church if we will build the family of God in the model that God gives us. Love, commitment, reproduction, development….
PRAY. Have you begun the right journey? Have you stopped along the way? Let us pray for you to begin this journey again to become like Christ and go toward the Father.