"Taking Inventory"
Sermon Transcript for June 22, 2003Scripture Reading: Numbers 1:1-4; 17-19
By Rev. Mike Beck
I think it was January of 1987, it was about 40,000 feet over the Atlantic Ocean on my first trip to the Holy Land; Al and Nancy Reynolds from my church in Greensburg were on the trip with me. Al owned the Buick-Oldsmobile dealership there in Greensburg; and I turned to him and asked this question, “Al, what makes a successful business person?” I expected a long drawn-out answer. The answer was very brief. He said, “It’s simple, you have to know how to count!”
I never forgot that. And as I pondered what I was to say, what he was saying was that in business you constantly need to be on top of what is going on—your inventory, your cost, your profit margin, the efficiency of your employees, your customer satisfaction. In business, just hoping that everything will turn out alright or guessing about what is taking place, or imagining that things are better than what they really are is a recipe for disaster. The success of Weight Watchers is very simple. They insist that you take inventory consistently of what you eat and then when you come to the group meetings you have to take inventory again. You have to get on the scale, no guessing. You know just exactly where you stand.
Today’s scripture, some of you are probably wondering, where in the world is Reverend Mike going to go with that boring passage from the Book of Numbers? But last week’s message and today’s sermon are kind of interrelated. They both have to do with the essential ingredient of being intentional if we want to bring about growth and progress forward. As we said last week, if we don’t become intentional in our approach to life, we’ll simply drift wherever the winds of life take us. We’ll simply end up reacting to one situation after another. And, as we mentioned last week, we’ll continually look back with regret.
The first Sunday of summer is kind of a good time to preach on this topic. For many persons, summer becomes a change of pace, a break from the routine. And thus it becomes a natural time for us to stop and take inventory of our life. I want you to notice an important word in what I just said. It’s the word “stop”. It’s an essential ingredient in the process of taking inventory. You cannot take a good inventory on the run! Some of you probably chuckle at the number of sermon illustrations I get down at the Big Foot convenience store, which I visit about four times a day to refill my diet coke. But I’ll go in there often and notice employees taking inventory. But there is one thing I notice when they are taking inventory. They are never asked to work the cash register and take inventory at the same time. They’ll get distracted. If you’re going to do the inventory that’s got to be the focus of what you are doing. Jesus gave us a marvelous example of this for He certainly lived a busy, active life of ministry. But when you read the Gospel, how often do you read the words, “And Jesus withdrew and went up to the hills to be alone and to pray”? And I think in doing so He was taking inventory.
I’m convinced that one of the enemy’s most effective tools in fighting against God’s people is to get us so busy doing God’s work that we never have time to pause and reflect. Satan wants to convince you and me that we are so indispensable to the work of God’s Kingdom that somehow the commandment about Sabbath doesn’t apply to us! When the enemy fails to entrap us with evil, I’m convinced he will always revert to finding something good and urging us to push it to excess with a slow damage inflicted on our soul.
In our scripture today from Numbers, it had been 14 months since the Israelites had left Egypt. A lot of things had happened in 14 months. Some people died, others were born. They are in a new location. So God instructs Moses and Aaron and He says, “Get others to help you to stop and count the people”. Because God knew that for the Israelites to continue to move forward, they needed a very accurate picture of who they were at that moment in time.
Right now here at Grace there are several groups that are pausing to take inventory. You need to be very much in prayer for your Building Committee, for you Finance Committee, for your Board of Trustees as they work in tandem. We know we are going to add parking, we know we are going to add to our facilities, we know we’ve got this much money coming in over the next three years. But I told them when they met this last week; I used two railroad analogies with them. I said, “We’re always told when we pull up to a railroad crossing--stop, look, listen. Now’s the time for us to do that! The other analogy was this: The train called Grace Church is solidly on the track. It is moving forward. It has momentum. Let’s make sure what decisions we make do not risk derailing the train. Pray for them. They’ve stopped to take inventory. The staff this week will be gathering in retreat to look at our ministry related to our mission statement as to how we can do it better. This past week I spent several hours simply reviewing our roster to try and see persons who may have become inactive, persons whose health may be declining that we don’t want to slip through the cracks.
Taking inventory is not exciting work but it is critically important to producing the desired outcome. There’s a lot I could say this morning. I’ve just chosen to touch on three things.
Our Commitment to Christ: First of all, I want to invite each of us to stop and take inventory of our commitment to Christ. We’ve had some anniversaries we’ve been celebrating—Bill and Opal Early who were here the first service today, today’s their 55th wedding anniversary. In any committed relationship you’ll always have three things:
1) There has to be a point of beginning. Sixty year’s ago this coming Friday, George and Dorothy made some promises to each other. They began their married life.
2) There has to be an investment of time to strengthen the relationship. Those retired pastors know when you see marriages break up more often than not, they didn’t spend time with one another.
3) In committed relationships, there will always need to be mid-course corrections to help keep the relationship healthy and strong.
And when we stop to take inventory we get a good picture of what is going on. We get a measure of our health that is just as important in our spiritual lives as it is in business. So I invite you this morning to take inventory of your commitment to Christ. You may not want to hear it, but there are two little books that will probably reveal more about the strength of that commitment than any other thing in your life. They are your date book and your checkbook. How much would I find God in those two books?
Our Ministry for Christ: Secondly, I’d like to invite us to be willing to take inventory of our ministry for Christ here at Grace Church. You know one of the most interesting rooms in the church to visit? It will tell you a lot. It’s the storage rooms. Now I told Rose in the first service I give Grace pretty high marks if you walk in to our storage rooms. They are in pretty good shape. But if you walk in to the storage rooms of a lot of churches it will be a disaster. And you wonder how in the world did that room ever look like that? Over time stuff just got hurriedly put in there and no one ever bothered to stop and see what needed to stay, what needed to be repaired or cleaned, and what needed to be thrown away. It just got hurriedly thrown in there and nobody ever stopped. So in terms of taking inventory of our ministry for Christ, let me ask you these questions:
1) Do I have an area of ministry here at Grace Church? Our stewardship emphasis this fall will be much more on every member in ministry then it will be on dollars. We talked enough about that lately. Faye Petro, don’t you dare look for another area of ministry. You’ve got enough! But I’m looking at a bunch of folks out there that don’t have any area of ministry here at Grace. The church moves forward not on the committed doing more, but on every member being in ministry.
2) If you are in ministry, this second question is one we often don’t ask enough. It’s this: Why do I do what I do? That’s an important question so that our ministry is not just superficial, so that we truly find why we do and rekindle the passion for our ministry.
3) In evaluating our ministry we need to ask, “Is what I am doing still effective?” I’m convinced that one of the reasons many churches do not embrace the future very well is they never ask that question. They just keep doing the same question year after year. They never ask, “Does this still meet a need?” Because if it doesn’t address a genuine need, we ought to stop doing it so there’s room on the plate to address something that is needed!
4) Look at your ministry and ask the question, “How can I do it better?” In our new membership classes I have urged those folks to do three things. And I would like to invite every one of you to put a little book in front of you and see how many of these three you can check. I urge them 1) Be faithful in your attendance at worship; 2) Find a small group to be a part of; and 3) Find an area of ministry that matches your spiritual gifts. Can you check all three this morning? If not, take inventory and then do something about where corrections need to be made.
Our Relationships Within the Body of Christ: And then, finally, I want to invite each of us to take inventory of our relationships within the body of Christ. And when I say the body of Christ I’m talking about the church. To look at our relationships within this body of Christ we call Grace Church. For isn’t it true, the bottom line of what is really important in life is always found in relationships. When I’ve called at the funeral home when there’s been a death, I never hear people talking about the person’s bank account. I never hear them talking about great accomplishments. I hear them talking about three things all of which begin with the letter “F”. They talk about family; they talk about friends; they talk about faith.
So here at Grace Church let us stop and take inventory of relationships that have been neglected One of the things I did this week as I went through the church roster, is to develop a list (and it’s a pretty long list) of persons who have become inactive. Inactive I would call if they were only here maybe once every two months. You know, none of those persons intended to be on that list. They started with the best of intentions. But you know what? Something came up and they missed a couple of Sundays and no one seemed to miss them. And then two Sundays became four Sundays and four Sundays became eight Sundays and still nobody in the church said, “We miss you.” But I’ll tell you, that list is too long for me to call all of them myself. I welcome some of you calling me this week and saying, “Reverend Mike, give me a couple of names on that list.” Because most of the time all it takes is an intentional invitation—take them to breakfast, take them to lunch—help them to get back in the habit.
So are there relationships that have been neglected? Are there relationships that need to be mended? One of the things that saddens me most in Christ’s church, because it is filled with very imperfect people, imperfect people make mistakes, they say things they wish they hadn’t said. But what makes me sad is I see God’s people holding on to those things years later. Are there some things that need to be let go of? Is there some forgiveness that needs to be expressed? Is there more of a willingness to give people the benefit of the doubt instead of casting judgment? Are there attitudes that need to be changed? For we are the body of Christ together, relationships are what it is all about. Are there some of those that need to be mended?
And then I’d like to invite us to stop and take inventory of new relationships that need to be built. It’s so easy just to come to church and shake the hands of people you always shake. I know many of you won’t do this, but you know a neat thing that would happen for just two months time come to church and sit on the other side. If you normally sit in the back, sit in the front. You’ll start to look at things very differently. We can become so engrained. Get out of your comfort zone and sign up for Friendship Eight. Here’s what I see happen when people do that. Or be a part of a Bible Study group this fall. Those people will say, “It was so hard for me to do that. But gosh I discovered it wasn’t bad at all. In fact, I’m so glad I did it!” We need in the church continually to be developing new relationships.
The quote I shared last week is so relevant. If we keep doing what we’ve been doing, we’ll keep getting what we’ve been getting. I need before I close to tell you how to do that so it’s more than just theory. Whenever you practice the spiritual disciplines you will grow. Meditation is designed to get you off the merry-go-round so you can take inventory. That happens when you pray. That happens if I take a day to fast. I stop so that I can take inventory. Every time you come to worship as Dan said in the beginning you get off for a moment of the treadmill of your life to stop and take inventory. When you have your daily quiet time. When you go on retreat—individually or corporately. When you share in a Bible Study group. By the way, men, I hope you are keeping those challenges in front of you. Last Sunday morning at the end of both the 9:30 a.m. and the 11:00 a.m. services a young man came up to me and said, “Mike, count me in on your Disciple group this fall. I don’t know the Word like I should.” I’ve also had some ladies come up to me and said, “Where is my group?” We’ll find a leader so husband and wife can come together.
Don’t minimize, friends, the importance of the simple matter of stopping to take inventory of those things in life that have eternal significance. For if we don’t learn to stop and take inventory, this poem with which I close will become reality for you.
He was going to be all a mortal could be, tomorrow….
No one would be kinder or braver than he, tomorrow….
The greatest of workers this man would have been, tomorrow.
But the fact is, he died and faded from view,
And all he had left when the living was through…
Was a mountain of things he intended to do…tomorrow!
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