Your 30 Days are Up

A man once said, “Any man’s death diminishes me”?

The closer the relationship, the more of you is taken away.

Max Lucado tells this story,

Carlos Andres Baisdon-Niño lay down with his favorite Bible storybook. He began with the first chapter and turned every page until the end. When he finished, he blew his good-night kisses to Mami and Papi, to his three “niñas,” and then, as always, he blew one to Papa Dios.

He closed his eyes, drifted off to sleep, and awoke in heaven.

Carlos was three years old.

When Tim and Betsa, his parents, and I met to plan the funeral, they wanted me to watch a video of Carlos.

“You’ve got to see him dancing,”

Tim told me.

One look and I could see why. What little Carlos did to the rhythm of a Latin song can’t be described with words.

He shook from top to bottom.

His feet moved,

his hands bounced,

his head swayed.

You got the impression that his heart rate had switched over to his native Colombian beat.

We laughed,

the three of us did.

And in the laughter,

for just a moment, Carlos was with us.

For just a moment there was no leukemia, syringes, blankets, or chemotherapy.

There was no stone to carve or grave to dig. There was just Carlos.

And Carlos was just dancing.

But then the video stopped, and so did the laughter.

And this mom and dad resumed their slow walk through the valley of the shadow of death.

Death is hard. It often comes unexpected and nearly always stops us in our tracks.

We need to cry,

we need to grieve,

we need to hurt,

and sometimes we simply need to stop and mediate on the memories, the past.

Mourning is good, when we have a loved one die.

However, today we are not talking about death. Today we are talking about our church.

Let's read from Deuteronomy 34.

In this story Moses has led Israel out of Egypt, almost to the point of leading them into the land which had been promised.

Then God takes Moses onto a mountain, shows him the beautiful land.

He says Moses, I will keep my promise to your people, but you are not going to cross over into this land.

There on Mount Moab, Moses dies. He is buried, and the Israelities grieved. Vs. 8 says, they grieved for 30 days, until the time of weeping and mourning was over.

Today, I want to tell you that our 30 days are up. We have mourned long enough.

We have meditated on the past for far too long.

Maybe our church was bigger 10-15 years ago, maybe the giving was better, maybe we gave a bigger percentage to missions or to the Synod. Maybe in your opinion things were simply better.

Guess what? What our church was long then doesn't really matter today.

At the last church I worked at, the Pastor used to like talking about how his dad's generation was so much better. Things were slower, and people were more moral.

The truth is that things were really better, they were just different.

Thats where we are today. The past doesn't matter today. We are a different church, and Rock Hill is a different community. The world is a different world.

Things that worked 15 years ago, may not work today. The answer for our church is not moving back to how things once were. The answer is to move forward.

Vs. 10-12 says this 10 “Since then, no prophet has risen in Israel like Moses, whom the LORD knew face to face, 11 who did all those miraculous signs and wonders the LORD sent him to do in Egypt—to Pharaoh and to all his officials and to his whole land. 12 For no one has ever shown the mighty power or performed the awesome deeds that Moses did in the sight of all Israel.”

Moses was the greatest prophet that Israel had ever known, and no prophet had risen again who was like Moses, but guess what?

God still commanded Israel to move on. Vs. 9 says, “Now Joshua son of Nun was filled with the spirit of wisdom because Moses had laid his hands on him. So the Israelites listened to him and did what the LORD had commanded Moses.”

A little bit over a year ago, we had some vision meetings, and we had a vision retreat.

The leadership of our church came together and talked about who we are and where we would like to go as a church. We discussed mission, purpose, vision.

Then some bad things happened with our pastor, and then we stopped.

We've cried,

we've mourned,

and with remembered the past,

and how good things once were.

One thing we haven't done though is moved forward.

30 days came and went, and we continued to stand still. God has sent people here to preach to us the word of God, to convict our hearts and to move our spirits, yet we put our brakes on.

We can't go anywhere until God sends us His man.

Now church, God is sending us a man. He's not perfect. He will make mistakes.

But, he is a man that I believe is filled with the Spirit, just as Moses and Joshua were.

He is a man who is called to lead us where God want us.

The problem is, over this past year we have forgotten where we are going.

We are much like Israel and the beginning of the journey, saying:

“Why have you taken us out of Egypt? Sure we were slaves and persecuted and tortured, but at least we had food and drink, lets go back.”

God takes Moses up to the top of the mountain. He shows Moses the beautiful land. He says, I will keep my promise to your people. I will take them into that land. Here Israel knows exactly where they are going.

Then in chapter 1 of Joshua, God says, now get ready, you and all your people get ready to cross the Jordan into the land I am about to give you.

The truth is we really don't know what God has in store for us. We don't really know where we are going. However, we better get ready to go.

Vs. 9 says, because Joshua was filled with the Spirit. So the Israelites listened to him and did what the LORD had commanded Moses.

Today this is my challenge to you.

In a few weeks, our new pastor is coming.

The Lord has called Him to us, and He is called primarily to speak God's words to us.

My challenge to you is simple.

Listen and do what the Lord commands.

I can tell you from experience, one of the most frustrating things for a pastor,

is to stand before his people,

and to preach the words that He feels God has spoken to Him,

then to hear compliments,

then to discover that for all practical purposes the sermon fell on deaf ears, because nothing changed.

No one does anything.

No body lives out the message.

Today our 30 days are up, lets move on, and look forward to what God has in store for us.