PURPOSE
Notes
Transcript
INTRO
INTRO
Good morning! My name is Ryan, I’m one of the pastors here at Georgianna.
It’s so good to be with you in worship today…
[MENTION LIVE STREAM AT 9:45]
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Pastor Corky and Deedie are away this weekend celebrating a certain milestone birthday...
We won’t talk about which one, but I hear it is the new 50… so…
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Today we’re starting a new sermon series on “Oneness.”
I know we’ve mentioned this before, but it is amazing just how divided things feel right now.
It just seems like the smallest thing can come between us.
This reminds me of an old story that I heard… you may be familiar with this.
ME
ME
There was a guy walking across the Golden Gate Bridge when he comes upon another guy who’s about to jump.
And of course, he yells to him, "Don't do it!"
The guy about jump said, "Nobody loves me."
The first guy says, "God loves you. Do you believe in God?"
He said, "Yes."
The first guys says, "Oh good… so what religion are you… Christian, Jewish???"
He said, "I’m a Christian."
The first guy says, "Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?"
He said, "Protestant."
The other guy says, "Me, too! What denomination?"
He said, "Baptist."
The other guy says, "Me, too!
And back and forth it goes…
The first guys says, “Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?"
He said, "Northern Baptist."
"Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?"
"Northern Conservative Baptist."
"Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region, or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?"
"Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region."
"Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879, or Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?"
The guy about to jump says, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912."
The first guy says, "Die you heretic!" and pushed him over.
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Emo Phillips… an obscure 80s comedian wrote that joke… and preachers have stolen it ever since.
But honestly, what makes some jokes so funny is how much truth there is in them.
You laugh and you cringe at the same time.
We live in a world right now that defaults toward division.
Just like in the story, there can be so much on which people or groups agree...but it’s like the arrangement seems fragile...
Like yes, we’ve come this far… but we might be one false move from parting ways.
WE
WE
Let me put it a different way…
I’m a visual person and because they’re basically visual jokes… I love memes on social media.
You can ask Allison… I’ll lay in bed next to her just scrolling… and then showing her how hilarious something is… just to watch her roll her eyes over it.
But some of my favorites are pie chart memes.
Here are some examples:
***Reasons why I update my apps
To get the various new interface tweaks, stability improvements and so on...
OR… to make the little red notification go away.
***Or NETFLIX
Time spent looking for a movie
Time spent watching a movie
Or maybe my personal favorite....
*****Things I do not understand… PIE CHARTS
Now, with the exception of that last one… the joke normally is about how small the thing is that we think is so BIG.
I want you to remember that today… how small the thing is that we think is so BIG.
So we like to THINK we update our phones for improvements and bug fixes… but the real BIG reason is to get rid of the red dot… right?
how small the thing is that we think is so BIG.
With this in mind I made my own pie chart for us today…
***What we think we disagree on
***What we actually disagree on
You see… We flip these things ALL THE TIME...
When there is ONE little thing we can’t come together on… it can look enormous.... and worth dividing over.
But sometimes we need a reminder of how small the thing is that we think is SO BIG.
OPENING PRAYER
OPENING PRAYER
Proper perspective.
Keep the big things big and the small things small.
GOD
GOD
Can I honest with you about something?
When we talked about a series on Unity and Oneness I was happy to volunteer and preach.
I had this great scripture I wanted to talk about and I thought it would be a slam dunk.
It’s Luke 9:49-50 if you want to go there with me...
And I read it and I read it… and I read it… and I just couldn’t let it go… I thought there’s really more going on here that we’re going to need to talk about.
Let’s look at it together:
49 “Master,” said John, “we saw someone driving out demons in your name and we tried to stop him, because he is not one of us.”
50 “Do not stop him,” Jesus said, “for whoever is not against you is for you.”
THAT’S IT. Slam dunk right?
John is getting his pie chart wrong… He is forgetting that what unites them is far bigger than what divides them.
He doesn’t realize how small the thing is that he thinks is SO BIG.
So… Georgianna… whoever is not against you is for you… so let’s just BE unified OK?
See you next week.
NO… there’s more going on here that we need to talk about… it’s just not that easy.
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In your Bible Luke is one of 4 books that really tell the story of the life and ministry of Jesus… Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
And if you read these stories very much there may be times when you get really frustrated at Jesus’ disciples.
There are just times when they seem really thick and are just not coming up with it.
And it’s so funny because we often think of the disciples like this… but we rarely think of ourselves like this…
Often times it’s like the disciples need to keep hearing the same stuff again and again.... not unlike other humans that I know…
And maybe this is why I couldn’t let this story go… why aren’t they getting it?
And why do we come up short pretty often too?
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And so I began to look around the story...
This is the type of stuff we talk about at Vineyard Bible study. It’s really important to not just read a verse here and there… but to read all around it to see what is going on.
And when you read all around this passage you notice that it’s several stories in a row of the disciples missing the mark…
...because they’re missing one thing in particular.
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Stay in Luke 9 for a few minutes and let’s go back to verse 46
46 An argument started among the disciples as to which of them would be the greatest. 47 Jesus, knowing their thoughts, took a little child and had him stand beside him. 48 Then he said to them, “Whoever welcomes this little child in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. For it is the one who is least among you all who is the greatest.”
SWING AND A MISS DISCIPLES… STRIKE ONE.
Moving on back to our original story…
Luke 9:49–50 (NIV)
49 “Master,” said John, “we saw someone driving out demons in your name and we tried to stop him, because he is not one of us.”
NOW SPEAKING OF READING AROUND THE TEXT… JUST A FEW VERSES BEFORE THIS THE DISCIPLES ACTUALLY FAIL AT CASTING A DEMON OUT OF A LITTLE BOY.
SO THIS GUY IS DOING EXACTLY THE THING THAT THEY ARE UNABLE TO DO.
50 “Do not stop him,” Jesus said, “for whoever is not against you is for you.”
WHIFF… STRIKE TWO.
Luke 9:51–56 (NIV)
51 As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. 52 And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; 53 but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem.
[NOW SOMETHING IS GOING ON HERE THAT WE MIGHT NEED TO TALK ABOUT...
SAMARITANS AND JEWS DIDN’T LIKE EACH OTHER… FOR A NUMBER OF REASONS, AND JERUSALEM WAS A BIG PART OF THAT DISLIKE.
THEY WERE BOTH FROM THE GREATER FAMILY OF THE ISRAELITES, BUT THEY HAD SEPARATED OVER TIME.
BECAUSE OF THAT SEPARATION, EACH HAD THEIR OWN PLACE OF WORSHIP AND CONSIDERED THE OTHER ONE ILLEGITIMATE.
FOR THE SAMARITANS IT WAS A PLACE CALLED MOUNT GERIZIM.
FOR THE JEWS IT WAS JERUSALEM.
SO THIS LACK OF HOSPITALITY IS ACTUALLY NOT SURPRISING OR UNEXPECTED… AND IT’S REALLY EVIDENCE OF AN UNDERLYING PREJUDICE THEY HAD FOR ONE ANOTHER.
54 When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?”
THIS WOULD BE LIKE ME GOING ON A RIDE ALONG WITH MIKE HELMS… AND AFTER ABOUT AN HOUR IN THE CAR… TURNING TO MIKE AND BEING LIKE, “YOU KNOW WHAT, WHY DON’T YOU STAY HERE… I’LL GET THIS NEXT GUY.”
[AND........ AREN’T THESE THE GUYS WHO JUST A FEW VERSES AGO COULDN’T CAST A DEMON OUT OF A CHILD…
NOW THEY’RE GOING TO DESTROY A WHOLE TOWN?!
55 But Jesus turned and rebuked them.
AND… STRIKE THREE.
REFLECTIONS
REFLECTIONS
So I’m reading these stories and I’m realizing that in each case the disciples are coming up short because they’re missing this one thing in particular.
It’s this foundational piece … and no organized group of people is going to get anywhere without it.
THE DISCIPLES DON’T UNDERSTAND THE MISSION.
THEY’RE COMING UP SHORT ON THEIR PURPOSE.
There is a reason why the disciples have to be told the same things over and over.
And there’s a reason why we can’t just say “Be unified” and have it happen… like magically.
These things don’t happen unless we are clear on the purpose.
Church, we will never have Oneness… we will never have unity… we will never end up on the same page … without a shared PURPOSE.
Here’s the reality… You can’t rally together… you can’t bring people together if you’re not rallying around SOMETHING.
You can’t just wish for everyone to suddenly start living together in unity and harmony…
That’s idealistic… that’s naive.
But we CAN rally around a SHARED PURPOSE.
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A shared purpose centers us and pulls us in...
It’s almost like gravity. There’s a reason we all don’t float off into space… just getting further and further away from each other.
Our planet has a force that pulls us back in… it’s keeps us together on the ground.
In fact, even if you WANT to go off floating in space by yourself… because of this pull, you have to put some serious effort and serious money behind that endeavor.
And even then… your engines might leak.
A shared purpose and shared vision is like gravity… it’s captivating… it pulls you in. And its hard to leave.
And we will never have Oneness… without a shared PURPOSE.
APPLICATIONS
APPLICATIONS
Let me take another moment of honesty with you...
I still couldn’t let these stories go.
I just started circling these stories and reading them again and again because I knew there was more here.
If the disciples are consistently missing the mark because they’re not clear on the true purpose and mission of Jesus… then what is getting in the way for them?
What gets in the way for us?
And here’s what I realized:
I’m sure there are a number of things that can distract us from our purpose… but these 3 stories show me 3 things in particular:
***3 things that can distract us from our Shared Purpose
POWER
PRIVILEGE
PREFERENCE
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In the first story you have the disciples arguing over who is going to be greater.
Now this seems really odd to us because our culture is a little bit different now.
Oh our desire for power is still definitely there, make no mistake.
But now we live in a culture where it pays to, at least, appear humble.
This wasn’t always the case. In those days honor was everything and humility as a virtue was not really widespread.
But hear me… I don’t know that our desire for power has changed… the way we go about it just looks different.
But the Kingdom of Jesus… the mission of Jesus is one of humility…
***AND OUR PURPOSE MUST TRUMP OUR DESIRE FOR POWER EVERY TIME.
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Too often we see other churches like they’re competitors… as if we can’t afford to highlight other great things that are happening because we need to make sure we don’t lose OUR people.
I’ve worked for too many Methodist churches that couldn’t see beyond their Methodist blinders.
We had to work with Methodist churches for Methodist causes… and use Methodist curriculums and go to Methodist conferences.
Everything else is viewed as suspect or competition and a threat to your power.
In this environment it makes no sense for Corky to be friends with Pastor Titus up the road… or Scott Wilson down in Melbourne.
These are Baptists.
But they’re not our competition and they’re not threats to power because PURPOSE MUST TRUMP OUR DESIRE FOR POWER EVERY TIME.
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In that second story the disciples tried to stop someone doing the Kingdom work that they were unable to do… “because he is not one of us.”
Did you catch that in the story? “Because he is not one of us.”
But the Kingdom of Jesus… the mission of Jesus is NOT one of position...
***AND OUR PURPOSE MUST TRUMP OUR DESIRE FOR PRIVILEGE EVERY TIME.
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The church might be one of the only organizations on the planet where members lose privileges.
If you want to become a MEMBER of Georgianna then we will assume that you are ALL IN for the purpose of what is happening here...
And we will assume that you know that it’s not for your gain… that you are willing to SACRIFICE to make that happen.
When you’re a member you don’t get reserved seating or a close parking spot.
In fact we might be so bold as to ask you to park down the street… so that others can be close.... or to sit in the back!
No wait… those fill up first… you might have to sit on the front row and listen to Corky sing if you’re a member.
Members lose privileges because OUR PURPOSE MUST TRUMP OUR DESIRE FOR PRIVILEGE EVERY TIME.
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You might think that you’re off the hook for this last story… If those guys had prejudices… well that’s not me, right?
And I certainly hope it isn’t… cause that’s a whole other message series.
But really someone’s prejudice is kind of a worst case scenario of someone’s preference.
And in the church… especially as a former Worship Leader… I can assure you… we all have preferences.
And so this last one might be the hardest of them all.
OUR PURPOSE MUST TRUMP OUR PREFERENCES EVERY TIME.
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I was recently emailing back and forth with someone who was interested in Georgianna… and I was sharing all about the church.
I told him that we are always doing something for the community...
I told him that we give tons of money and time away...
I told him that we are not unclear about how we view scripture… whether it’s popular or not.
And I actually knew this particular person already and I knew that we checked a number of boxes for him.
But because I knew him well I also told him, hey you just need to know that we don’t have a traditional worship service here.
I knew that he liked that style in particular.
And so he responded nicely… but let me know that they were really stuck on the music and probably would not attend.
And I was honestly so deflated… because us fulfilling our PURPOSE as a church didn’t seem to matter.
I’m not sure it would matter how many hundreds of thousands of dollars we gave away.
How many orphans we provided shelter for.
How many Vineyard Bible studies we led.
How many meals we provided for teachers at Cambridge… or hams for families at Thanksgiving...
We didn’t meet his musical preferences.
OUR PURPOSE MUST TRUMP OUR PREFERENCES EVERY TIME.
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Hang with me, just for a minute… I want to sit with this preference thing, because I feel like the church sometimes can really struggle with this.
***Let’s try this pie chart thing again.
So if we’re understanding Jesus correctly our purpose is the red part… Our preferences would probably be the blue.
And let me be really specific… because I’ve seen people break unity… break oneness because they fail to see the purpose… they fail to see what is actually important
***Let’s see that next slide… take a second and really look through this.
This is not exhaustive… I just put down what I could think through at the time…
But I did make sure to include the PIE AUCTION in the PIE CHART :) so there’s that.
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Our purpose… all of those things in the red part are really what make us One… I have seen us truly come together every one of these things.
But in my history with different churches I have also seen all of those little things in blue really set people off… some to the point of walking out the door.
Truly people leave churches based on carpet color or drums or whether the coffee is good or not (luckily we don’t have to worry about that)…
But they’ll leave because of these preferences, without ANY thought of what that church does or does not do for the Kingdom!
NO thought about our PURPOSE
They don’t realize how small that thing is that they think is SO BIG!
And this is why a shared purpose is so important.
It’s like that gravitational pull… so when every single one of your preferences aren’t met… (and they won’t be)
But when that happens… when your feelings are hurt… when your cause isn’t supported… when it’s not your favorite music...
All of that stuff in red pulls you back like gravity. A shared purpose keeps us from walking out the door… because when you leave because of the stuff in the sliver… you leave the entire thing.
And in this church we strive to make our purpose trump our preferences every single time.
WE
WE
We will never have Oneness… without a shared PURPOSE.
AND PURPOSE TRUMPS POWER, PRIVILEGE, AND PREFERENCE EVERY SINGLE TIME.
We have to be willing to lay these things down to get to a Shared Purpose… We have to be willing to lay these things down to get to Oneness.
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If you’re REALLY familiar with Luke you may be aware that just a couple of chapters later Jesus seems to say the opposite of what He said in chapter 9.
***In chapter 9 he says, “whoever is not against you is for you.”
***But in chapter 11 he says, “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.”
So which is it?
I think there’s a key difference at the end of the second verse… where Jesus talks about people who are scattering…
And so is it possible that these two sayings are not contradictory… but complementary?
A bit later at the end of Romans Paul writes this:
17 I urge you, brothers and sisters, to watch out for those who cause divisions and put obstacles in your way that are contrary to the teaching you have learned. Keep away from them.
And so… I think it’s worth saying today that there ARE things worth dividing over. Paul writes about two.
You can divide from a divider. To use Jesus’ language you can divide from someone who is just out to scatter people...
You’ve heard Corky talk about how we will work hard to keep a spirit of divisiveness out of this church. And so pursuing Oneness means being willing to divide from someone who is just out to cause division.
One more thing Paul mentions… You should probably divide from someone or something that is putting obstacles in your way that are contrary to the teaching we have heard.
And so, I don’t know who needs to hear this, but you can divide from an institution who is teaching things contrary to scripture............
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***Can I try one more pie chart?
Here’s the deal Georgianna… both Jesus and Paul acknowledge that there may be places where you just need to say… You know what… I need to get off here.
I need to go a different way than where you’re going.
Divide from a divider… ..... and divide from someone teaching things contrary to scripture.
But realize that that is a sliver in this chart.
And right now we’re surrounded by a world that is division happy… we are cancel happy. One false move and we’re done.
And they don’t realize how small the thing is that they think is so BIG.
BUT the next time YOU disagree with someone… the next time the church does something that you don’t love… or hurts your feelings… and I don’t mean to sound petty… it really happens… because we are not perfect. We’re not always going to nail it.
But the next time these things happen, I want you to picture this chart… and realize that you might be focused on the sliver.
Realize that what you’re focused on might actually be a small thing that seems really big in the moment.
And that there is something much bigger that is bringing us together… making us ONE.
And it is my hope that our Shared Purpose… PURSUING GOD’S KINGDOM… will win out every single time.
CLOSING PRAYER
CLOSING PRAYER
Who You are, who we are, who You’ve called us to be…
BENEDICTION
BENEDICTION
A few weeks ago as we wrapped up our Long Story Short series I mentioned that our purpose as the church is to get ready for the King. We believe that, in the end, God wins and Jesus is coming.
So our purpose is to get ready for the King.
So my prayer for all of us is that this is our barometer… that we can lay down power, privilege, preference… or whatever else may distract us...
And that this can be our one standard… ARE WE GETTING READY FOR THE KING?
I may not love the music… but ARE WE GETTING READY FOR THE KING?
We may not be able to take on everyone’s favorite cause… BUT ARE WE GETTING READY FOR THE KING?
I might get outbid at the Pie Auction… BUT ARE WE GETTING READY FOR THE KING?
Church, members lose privileges… and we would love to have you join :)
9:45!!!!!! Pastor Appreciation Announcement
