Always Reforming

CENTRAL TRUTH EXPRESSED (MAIN POINT):

To always reform is to return to the foundation

To always reform is to be continually be made into the image of the founder

GOD'S HEART REVEALED:

That we would remember and be made into the image of His Son

OUR RIGHT RESPONSE:

Repent and believe

_______________

ME:

Yall, it's October 31st! You know what day it is? Yes that’s right it’s Reformation Day! It’s also Eddie’s Birthday… And of course it is also Halloween :)

Tonight I will be mixing two metaphors…

Last week, Renaut was up here sharing his story of what God is doing in his life during a difficult season of life and Ministry.

He used the metaphor that God used from Jeremiah 18…

Read Jeremiah 18:1-4

Jeremiah 18:1–4 ESV

The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: “Arise, and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will let you hear my words.” So I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was working at his wheel. And the vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter’s hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to do.

How beautiful is the example of a potter living in his craft, forming and reforming the vessel… but how easy is that for the clay?

Renaut shared that as the clay he has felt like God has in this season went splat, and began to reform him.

Have you ever felt like that? We will come back to this divine metaphor…

There is another story I wanted to share with you, and I think between these two stories there is a lesson that I believe God desires for us to learn as individuals and as a church…

Once upon a time there was a house, put together by a master craftsman. The home he built was not large. In fact, it was quite small, more like a one bedroom flat with a kitchenette and small bathroom. Still, everything from the foundation to the crown molding in the room was done with care and intention. The building had just begun. That one bedroom flat was actually just a livable model to be replicated as the home would become a mansion.

However, moments after the tile was laid in the kitchenette the craftsman left and left the beautiful home in the care of his apprentices…

His apprentices were given both the example of the home to analyze and some readings on the philosophy of architecture that they should follow to ensure the house was built consistently and excellently. However, these apprentices were not master craftsmen. Regardless of their efforts, they would always remain inconsistent. Sometimes building with the same precision as their master, sometimes they took pieces of cardboard and used them to build an expansion room and decorated it so that it looked as beautiful as the rest of the house, sometimes they got the style and asthetic all wrong to the point it was unclear if they had ever even looked at the readings of the craftsman.

The craftsmen apprentices were indeed inconsistent. Room by room they continued to add on for the decades to come, eventually passing on the care of the building to the next generation and the one after that.

Every few generations there came one or two hurricanes that would soak and blow away the rooms made of cardboard that looked authentic but were all just a facade the whole time.

Every few generations there was a waking up moment seeing all the shoddy craftsmanship that had been passable for years but was clearly not a reflection of the center bedroom resting in the middle of this inconsistent mansion.

When this waking up moment arrives, and the realization of inconsistency and facades are pointed out, how would you respond?

YOU:

You can attempt to tear it all down. Where brick by brick tile by tile you go into a space of demolition.

Tearing up each room, moving ever closer with a sledgehammer to the heart of the mansion until not even the Craftsman's Room is left intact.

As we look back at the history of the church, this has often been the temptation. Because we humans are broken in our sinfulness and forgetful of God’s goodness, there has always been a constant tension between the life, teachings, and ethics of Jesus versus the life, teachings, and ethics of those who either claim to or genuinely DO follow Him.

What happens when we fallible, imperfect, broken image bearers of the master craftsman are called to represent, embody, and emulate the infallible master craftsman to the world around us?

Deconstructing faith has become a much discussed concept over the last decade  Especially among millennials and Gen Z.

We have seen the polarization of our country and seen what seem like facade walls begin to be exposed in various aspects of church life, culture, politics, and more.

For many this has led to a journey to discover a faith that is well examined, authentic, real, and raw.

I realize that even in this room there may be individuals who are currently on a deconstruction journey. I have no desire to stereotype what that has looked like for you or what your posture has been in that journey.

As I have heard various deconstruction journeys though there has been one unfortunate side effect for many… the personal destruction of the room at the center, the one bedroom flat built by the Master Craftsman, which is The Gospel.

I have not shared this from a stage before but this was the trajectory of my deconstruction journey.

When I was 18 years old, raised in the church, saw the brokenness of my childhood church, saw the facades of some of Christian culture, and I began to ask many of the deconstruction questions… Why do I believe what I believe?

I remember literally crying out to God at night, wondering if he was real. If he actually loved at all. Why did he let such broken people represent him?

As I took a sledgehammer to each room of the facades, I was getting very close to the Center Room.

I sensed my motivation was rooted in trying to prove everyone wrong, trying to undo everything I was taught, trying to deconstruct for the sake of demolition, not genuinely for the pursuit of truth.

As I tossed and turn at night with my sledgehammer held high, I began to ask a question I hadn’t asked before… is there a better way?

GOD:

504 years ago today, a Catholic Priest named Martin Luther posted 95 concerns that he had discovered as inconsistencies between the teachings of the Scriptures and the teachings of the Catholic Church at the time. These were 95 facade walls and shoddy building projects that had accumulated rarely questioned for generations.

This was the result of a personal journey in the spiritual life of Luther. As he began studying the book of Psalms and the book of Romans in the Bible. He saw the true beauty of the Gospel, he discovered the beauty of the room at the center and he wanted in.

Luther was the clay on the potter’s wheel and the POTTER was reforming him so that through the ministry of Luther the community of God would be literally REFORMED.

God began to do a mighty work in his heart, reforming him, reshaping him, making him new!

What Luther experienced was not simply deconstruction for the sake of itself but deconstruction for the sake of Reformation.

The work of reformation is not to tear the building down. It is literally to expose what is facade and return back to the foundation.

When the Protestant reformation was launched it was not out of the desire to destroy the Catholic Church but to tear down any of the walls that were facades, and return back to the writings of the Master Craftsman and His example in the Center Room.

Our temptation as humans is to simply evaluate a system of belief based on the current generation or last few generations of followers. The heart of reforming is to evaluate based on the Center Room of the belief.

This reminds me of a central passage of the Protestant Reformation that came from Paul’s writing to the church in Ephesus..

Read Ephesians 2:19-22

Ephesians 2:19–22 ESV

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

Now you know where I got my metaphor from. We stand in a long line of tradition in the history of the church. While there are sometimes facade and shoddy rooms built, the true house has continued to be built by the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus was the cornerstone, laid down first to give direction and structure for the foundation, which is the early church and the apostles… so that now we can continue the building

The only problem is WE aren’t perfect. That while we are made saints through the blood of Jesus, our every action and intention is not consistently saint-like. Sometimes we are deceived. Sometimes we are selfish. Sometimes we want glory. Sometimes we are prideful.

Our deep desire to define good and bad on our own terms.

We can look at the actions and legalism within the church and use that as a cause to redefine good and bad on our own terms, paying more attention to what “feels authentic” than what we discover God calls good and bad within the Scriptures.

The title of today’s message is Semper Reformanda… This comes from a writing from an earlier reformer which means “always reforming” or “always being reformed”

A full translation of his sentence though is, “The church is Reformed and always [in need of] being reformed according to the Word of God”

The church is Reformed = at its core, the true church, as a collection of believers, is meant to be rooted in the Craftsman's Room, being built in its example, being built with his writings in mind.

Always in need of being reformed = the journey of sanctification is an ongoing journey with Jesus. Being ever made in his likeness both individually and as a collective. So we need to have the humility to not believe we have no room to grow in Intimacy with Jesus, in becoming more like him, in understanding all there is to know about God, his desires, or ethics.

It also means that we need to see ourselves as both part of the problem and part of the solution.

That like Luther who experienced personal reformation into the true Gospel and then helped lead the church into reformation back into the true Gospel, we need to be careful to not just throw stones but instead continually be reformed personally, and see what God does through us collectively.

The potter is constantly forming and reforming us. It’s not so easy when you are the clay.

I have felt that over the last 18 months, God’s hands continue to reform me. Teaching me how to depend on him, teaching me the heart of the shepherd Jesus, teaching me to pursue unity for His church, teaching me to refuse to believe that the church has to live DEFORMED and polarized, teaching me about what it looks like to love my family in this hectic season.

How do I know that it is by the potter’s hand and not my own?

Because ideally it is not according to my wisdom but HIS.

According to the word of God = this is the most important distinction between deconstruction for the sake of itself and deconstruction for the sake of truth. Within the  Scriptures we discover objective absolute truth. We discover how God defines good and bad. We discover the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. We discover hope. We discover the Kingdom of God.

Never stop reforming. Always be reforming.

But as we are reforming, it is absolutely vital that we reform back to the Word of God, otherwise we risk DEFORMING into what is subjective to us rather than what is objective to God.

We deform when we try to do the formation on our own terms. We take charge of the formation and instead of trusting the hands and wisdom of

For some of us, maybe what you are questioning most are the Scriptures. I am not going to come at you with quick answers. Just know you are in a safe community to wrestle with those concerns and questions. I am always available for coffee and so are many others in this community.

Why does REFORMING matter?

Because we are forgetful people. We forget what God has done. We even forget to love. And when we begin to forget, we begin to DEFORM.

Read Revelation 2:2-5

Revelation 2:2–5 ESV

“ ‘I know your works, your toil and your patient endurance, and how you cannot bear with those who are evil, but have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and found them to be false. I know you are enduring patiently and bearing up for my name’s sake, and you have not grown weary. But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent.

God’s desire for us is to fall deeper in love with the Master Craftsman, the builder of the center room, the pursuer of our hearts. We need to always be reforming because we are naturally forgetful. We are naturally always prone to wander. So we need to intentionally continually, day after day, return back to Him.

Otherwise we begin putting up facade walls and embark on destined to fail building projects of our own making.

To always be reforming is the entire journey of discipleship.

This is why as a church our discipleship process focuses on Christian Belief, Biblical Story, and Christian Practice.

None of these are revolutionary… Learn the Bible, believe what it teaches, live out what it teaches. These are not revolutionary, but that is the point.

Like a coach in sports who continually focuses on the fundamentals or a voice coach who runs you through the basics.

Not because we want a church of people who know more, but because as we grow as deep disciples of Jesus we are always reforming…

As we learn about God’s character we are being reformed.

As we learn God’s story we are being reformed.

As we discover and live in the WAY OF JESUS through Spiritual Rhythms like engaging the Scripture, prayer, fasting, serving, and more WE are being reformed.

Discipleship is not about knowing the right answers, but about becoming more and more of who God has created you to become!

So what is the end goal? What is the result of always reforming?

It is not just about you. It is about what God is doing through all of us.

Read 2 Corinthians 3:18

2 Corinthians 3:18 ESV

And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

The goal of being always reformed is to become more and more like Jesus.

Seeing ourselves as simply vessels that God is shaping and forming and reforming us. He is doing the work in us, through us, for us. He is shaping our beliefs, he is shaping our worldview, he is shaping our hopes, he is shaping our udnerstanding of our rights, he is shaping our affections And loves, he is shaping our character, he is shaping our future, he is shaping our present.

All we are called to do is surrender to his reformation power at work in us.

To be formed into the image of the Master Craftsman. So that as you go build new rooms, raise up new apprentices of the Craftsman, and discover the beauty of his writings, you are doing so a little less inconsistently than you did the day before.

YOU:

I know the frustration toward Christians who are really bad at representing Jesus. But as I continue my journey of always reforming I have discovered more and more that I AM one of those Christians. Yet bit by bit day by day I am imperfectly learning to follow the writings and example of our Master Craftsman.

After countless sleepless nights filled with research, frustration, and tears I dropped by sledgehammer.

I came to the center room of Jesus, and my heart was transformed. I became more than reformed, I became resurrected.

It was by God’s grace that I discovered the beauty of the Gospel, and realized it was never my journey. It was the Father’s journey for me.

This was only the beginning of my reformation journey. As I hear His voice in the Scriptures, I am constantly challenged to grow, to reconsider the things that I was either taught or naturally believe, to engage deeper with Jesus.

I understand the facades and shoddy building projects of the Apprentices because I am one of them.

But as we mark tonight, 504 years of the Reformation, that we would journey both personally and collectively on a journey to continue to reform back to the Scriptures, back to the examples of Jesus’ life, teachings and ethics and be transformed by who and what we discover.

US:

As each of us continue to reform our hearts and minds into the image of Jesus, I cannot help but dream of what Cast Members in our breakrooms, what neighbors, what our families might see in us and through us.

Could it be that we will be reformed into a vessel by the potter, to display his creativity, hope, and love to a deformed world?

Let’s pray.