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Our Preaching theme for 2022 is “Begin Again”
Begin again means to go back to doing the things that we know we ought to do.
It’s not starting over as much as starting again.
So this year we are going to be revisiting and refocusing on some foundational things.
Lets begin with our values.
I spent my first year as your pastor listening and discussing who we are as a church and what God has done in the past with an advisory group made up of those serving in various capacities as leaders.
The purpose was to discover our unique calling, vision and mission as a church.
All of that was put together in a vision statement that was released early last year.
Most of this information is included in our welcome packets and on our website.
Our membership packet includes the entire document and I have printed out some extras this morning for those who would like to have it.
When we began to formulate a vision for the church, we began with values.
Vision comes from values.
What is really important to us?
What are our priorities?
Our vision must reflect our values, so we begin with values.
There was a lot that we discussed over the course of a year.
But looking back over our meeting minutes, I distilled it down to seven statements.
Later, I went back and put scriptures with those statements so that future readers would be able to search and find biblical support for the items that we found most important.
I also planned to highlight these values in a sermon series and these teachings are being recorded.
You may be listening to this teaching sometime in the future and thinking -2022, that was a long time ago!
(That was a really good year!)
Our theme will change every year and even our vision statement may have to be revisited and revised after several years (maybe 5-10),
But I hope that our values are still pretty much the same years or decades later.
That’s why we begin with values, because values are foundational.
Our first value begins with worship.
1.
We value true worship, not just going through the motions or giving lip service.
We want to be passionate worshipers that are fully engaged and following the leading of the Holy Spirit.
Whether through planning or spontaneity, we want to be a Spirit-led church.
(John 4:21-24, Rom.12:1, Psalm 100:1-5, Psalm 150:1-6)
Why begin with worship?
Well - because that’s what we believe we are here to do, before anything else.
Worship is glorifying God - that is our ultimate purpose.
Keep in mind that worship is not just singing - although we love to do that.
Worship is the heart attitude and motivation behind our singing, praying preaching and our fellowship.
It’s like I said last Sunday that the goal is to love God and love others but you can’t do the second well until you do the first.
Loving God is at the heart of what it means to worship.
But our value is not just to worship, but to cultivate “true worship”.
I’ve have told the story before, but I think it needs to be told again to illustrate this point.
My first experience with Hopewell was as a young person, probably around the age of 12.
I attended a Bible study across the street at the home of Jim and Bobbi Evans with my sister Jeanette.
It was that Bible study that became this church and some of you were there.
Was was special to me about that Bible study was not just the singing, although there was some great singing!
There was also some great discussion and teaching, but that wasn’t what impressed me.
I think we had food too, but that wasn’t what I came for.
If you remember the story… I was impressed that these people were having a Bible study and nobody was making them do it!
What does that have to do with worship?
It has everything to do with worship and true worship!
There was a spiritual hunger to know God and to be part of what God is doing.
These people could be doing anything else, but they chose to be there because they sensed God’s presence and wanted to be part of it.
That’s worship!
True worship is real, it requires sacrifice and it brings us to a place of surrendering ourselves to God even more.
True worship is real.
What do I mean by real?
Is there a kind of worship that is not real?
The statement clarifies by saying “not just going through the motions or giving lip service.”
The main reason I was impressed with the Spring City Bible Study was because I had to go to church.
Bible study and worship were things I did because it was expected of me.
Most Sundays I was just going “through the motions”
I was there to do my religious duty so that I would be acceptable to God and to others of my religious community.
Church didn’t have to mean anything to me, I just had to show up and do what is expected of me.
That’s what it means to give “lip service” - you say what you are supposed to say and meaning it is optional.
If there were just one place in the Bible that defines true worship, it would be Jesus’ conversation with the Samaritan woman in John 4.
Real worship is not about what you can see but what you can’t see.
In case you didn’t know, the Samaritans are what’s left of the lost tribes of Northern Israel.
When Assyria took the northern kingdom of Israel captive in 722 BC they resettled people from other countries in the region just north of Jerusalem.
They maintained the Torah and worshipped on Mt Gerizim - the mountain from which the blessing was pronounced upon entering the land.
When the temple was being rebuilt, they offered to help, but their offer was refused, presumably because they would have mixed pagan worship with that of Yahweh.
That is supported by accounts that when Antiochus Epiphanies was persecuting the Jews and desecrating the Temple, they offered no help or resistance.
When the Jews came to power briefly (Hasmoneans), they responded by knocking down the Samaritans temple on Mt Gerizim.
At the time of Jesus, a Samaritan sect had recently made another attempt at desecrating the Temple by spreading bones in the outer court (6 AD).
At that time, Samaritans were regarded lower than the heathen because they were engaged in an active rivalry.
The Samaritan woman that Jesus is talking to tries to put him right in the middle of the argument by asking who is right?
Is Jerusalem the holy mountain or is it Mount Gerazim?
Both groups claim the moral high ground having been attacked by the other.
Are the Jews God’s people or is it the Samaritans?
Who are the real keepers of the Torah? - That is what Samaritan means!
You wouldn’t think that Jesus would have any difficulty taking sides?
I’m already inclined to an opinion, aren’t you?
You could say that Jesus takes a swipe when he says that the Samaritans don’t know who they are worshipping.
2 Kings 17 tells us that the King of Assyria appointed priests to continue the practice of Judaism as part of a universal religion which had all of the gods of the nations represented.
So when you put the Creator of the universe along side created deities who are you really honoring?
Do you even know who you are worshipping if you worship everything?
But his main point is that God is beyond representation by any human temple or physical location.
People want something that they can see to worship.
Give me a building with a steeple and stained glass windows.
Give me a cross or a picture of Jesus or a statue.
Give me something that I can look at and focus on while I meditate.
I realize that this is important for a lot of people - for me growing up Mennonite, we tended to not have a lot of visual aids, but I have learned to appreciate having them.
Or at least give me a place, sacred space which is set apart for worship.
Give me a grand cathedral with a magnificent altar of gold.
Give me a mountain top with a view.
Or a beach house.
Or a prayer closet.
For me, I met with God while walking through the woods, and I still like to go for prayer walks.
It’s not that there is anything wrong with these things, it just that if we are limited to a place or a picture or any kind of physical representation, we may be limited in our worship.
But those things help us feel like we are worshipping.
And therein lies the problem - it’s not about the feeling.
It not about what you can see, or feel or experience.
Not that there is anything wrong with seeing, feeling or experiencing something.
True worship is knowing and encountering God.
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