"A New Year, A New Level"
Sermon Transcript for January 23, 2005
Scripture Reading: Philippians 3:12-14
By Rev. Mike Beck
CASSETTE TAPE: “I think what happens in churches, because we hold services every week and because after a church matures it has a whole array of ministries that people come to expect—youth ministry and small groups ministry and choirs and these kinds of things. I think what happens is once churches get to a place where most of their organization is up and functioning, they go on autopilot and think, “Well, we’ll just keep all of this stuff running this year and then maybe we can run it a little better next year and we can run it a little better the next year.” But they fail at some point to think outside the box and say, “What shall we launch? What new need could we meet somewhere in society if we were again to open up our minds and think creative thoughts and really meet needs and maybe attract a whole bunch of people who have never been attracted to the church? How could we start something that would have exponential growth potential?”
I was driving in the car this week and Grace Church is a member of the Willow Creek Association of Churches. We get a monthly audiotape called, “Defining Moments”. And those comments by Bill Hybels, who is the Pastor of that large church west of Chicago, I thought set the stage so well for what I want to share with you today. We listened this past week to our new governor, Governor Mitch Daniels, share his “State of the State” address. And I think it is important for us as a church and as individuals at the beginning of the new year to pause for a moment to review our mission, to see where we are, and to reflect on what steps are needed to move to a “new level” that God has for us as a church, that God has for us as an individual Christian in 2005.
Most of you know that I was an educator for ten years before God called me to ministry. So every now and then I get this urge to give people a test. So I want you to grab a hymnal; you need something to write on. I want you to take out your bulletin insert that looks like this. One side has our Philosophy of Ministry, our Mission Statement at the top. I want you to grab a pen or a pencil and as Sarai replays the offertory, fill in as many of the blanks as you can. For this is who we are. Go! Well, would the ushers please collect the test? And those of you who didn’t score 70% will be notified as to when your remedial class will be held. No, just joking!
The mission of Grace Church is to WORSHIP God; proclaim Christ as SAVIOR; (We must never assume that everybody who walks through those doors has entered in to a saving relationship with Christ.); encourage growth in Christ as LORD; FELLOWSHIP together; and CARE for those in need. And then the next twelve statements guide our decision-making. They are our Philosophy of Ministry.
· PRAYER is the underlying foundation for all of our ministries.
· Worship should be CULTURALLY RELEVANT while remaining biblically sound. Culturally relevant—which means if somebody that has never gone to church walks through these doors, we don’t want them to feel like they are totally lost as to what is going on.
· The church exists to minister to the needs of our congregation and to reach out to persons who are NOT YET A PART OF OUR FELLOWSHIP. In fact, if you were not a part of Grace Church a year ago, would you just hold up your hands? That’s all you have to do—look around at the hands that are going up. We are here for them!
· We are sensitive to the needs of “SEEKERS” in all of our activities and decisions.
· Quality and EXCELLENCE honor God and inspire people.
· The proclamation of the gospel must be linked with opportunities for persons to RESPOND in significant and meaningful ways.
· Acceptance of Christ as Savior must be followed by involvement in DISCIPLESHIP ministries where persons learn to honor Jesus as Lord in all areas of their lives.
· Lives are best transformed in SMALL GROUPS.
· Church leaders are to train, enable, empower, and motivate people to be in ministry that utilizes their SPIRITUAL GIFTS. Spiritual gifts—you all have some.
· Caregiving is the responsibility of the ENTIRE CHURCH FAMILY and is best accomplished through networks of loving, caring relationships. Those of you who haven’t been a part of a Friendship Eight group, let me give you an incentive to join. If you get sick or have a crisis in your family, you’ll probably get cards from those people. They will probably be praying for you—people who you don’t now even know but you got to know through a Friendship Eight group.
· Involvement in MISSION outreach, both locally and around the world, is imperative to our calling as individual Christians and as the church.
· TIME is a valuable resource for people today, and it must be respected.
And, then, as this is kind of a “State of the Church” message, turn to the other side. It has the sermon title, “A New Year, A New Level”. And I want us to take a moment to look at some numbers. Notice in 1997 we averaged 368 in worship. By the year 2002 we had moved to 492. Thanks be to God; the glory is His! But then I want you to write-in, fill-in-the-blanks. 2003—483. 2004—474. Now part of that is due to our Capital Campaign. When you do a Capital Campaign people discover whoops it costs something to belong to this church. And a few of them quietly slip out the door and go to a low-maintenance church where nothing is asked of them. So I’m not panicking on those numbers. But by the same token, in the second fastest growing county in Indiana, blessed as we are, surely I’m thinking in the year 2006 God wants that number to be approaching 600.
When you look at the Total Giving column, you realize why last week the message was tricky because there is no way I can scold people of Grace for their giving when their total giving in 1997 was $438,000 and in 2004, just seven years later, it was $1,047,000. In fact, if you weren’t here last week, pick up a copy of the message. They are in the literature racks over here; they are on the table in front of the office. But here is the challenge, in the blank under General Fund giving, even though our total giving went up $100,000 last year, giving to the General Fund (a number you can write in) is $554,000. And now do you see the challenge that is before us? But I discovered whenever you let people of Grace know what the challenge is, they always meet it so I’m not worried about that one. We are a healthy church and that is more important than numbers. But as we look at those numbers, we need to be asking ourselves, “What new growth engines (that’s what Bill Hybels talked about in his tape) do we need to launch to move us to a new level?” And I think you can see the challenge before us. In the General Fund—that’s the engine that pulls all the train cars of our ministry.
So I want to quickly suggest five things, and you’ve got an outline there, that I think are needed to move our church to a new level in 2005.
1. Increased support of the GENERAL FUND. Many of you have already received your letter. Prayerfully reflect on that challenge that is before us.
2. We need to do a better job of ASSIMILATION of our newcomers. Kathy Little, Nancy Brewer, Pat Burton, Sandy and myself are currently working on that. And as we are making phone calls, assimilation simply means when newcomers begin to attend your church, you try to get them involved in a small group and give them a chance to be involved in ministry that uses their spiritual gifts. Bishop Coyner will be with us two weeks from today. We discovered a wonderful book that he has co-authored entitled, The Race to Reach Out: Connecting Newcomers to Christ in a New Century. We are working on that; pray for us in that endeavor.
3. We need to get more persons involved in MINISTRY. The committee on lay leadership met this past week. There are about five new ministry teams that we are going to launch this year. Some of you will get a letter late this week inviting you to be a part of one of those ministry teams. Some of you are going to be surprised when you get that letter because you are going to say, “I’ve only been here at Grace for six months or a year. Why are they inviting me to serve?” Very intentionally; newcomers see things that those of us who have been a part of a church for a long time can’t see. We can’t see the forest for the trees sometimes but newcomers see the forest. So more people involved in ministry.
4. New SMALL GROUPS—places where people can get plugged in. We’ve got to get something going for men in this church. We’ve got to reactivate our hands-on mission team. We have nothing here at Grace Church for singles. And although we have the finest United Methodist Women’s organization in the South Indiana Conference, for those of you on the UMW Executive Committee here is your challenge for this year. We’ve got eight great circles but we need nine because if you are a lady in your 30 or early 40’s you are too old for the Mary Circle and, Liz, they are too young for the Friendship Circle. We’ve got a gap there between that big group of younger ladies and what I call the “Fun Bunch”—the Friendship Circle that we’ve got to meet with a new circle because there is no place to steer them where they fit. Healthy churches are always creating new small groups.
5. We need to become more INTENTIONAL and INVITATIONAL. I’m going to speak to those things next week.
But now as we begin to close, I want to talk just a second about how we move to a new level as individual Christians.
· The first step is this--we have to admit that we haven’t arrived yet. The minute you think that you have arrived spiritually you are in dangerous territory. You are farther away from God than you have ever been because whether you are 18 or 48 or 88, God is still working on us. In fact, fill in the blank, “I’m not yet ________.” I’ll tell you, I can put a lot of things in that blank where God is still working. Hear these words. Paul said it is so important he said it twice, “Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of.” And then he goes on and says, “not that I have already obtained all this or have already been made perfect.” So if you want to move to a new level in 2005, admit that you haven’t arrived yet.
· Secondly, narrow your focus. The last part of verse 13, Paul says, “but one thing I do.” Where does God want you to narrow your focus? What does He want you to work on this year? Does the name Matt Emmons ring a bell for any of you? Hold up your hands if it does. Matt Emmons is a great athlete but I bet you’ve never heard of him. I got on Google; man what a company! And here’s a headline in an article for USA Today, March 17, 2004, “Shooters Mentality—Emmons Keeps Focus on the Target”. Matt Emmons is one of the greatest rifle shooters in the world. In fact, he competed in the Olympic games this year. He came to the final round safely in the lead. He didn’t even have to hit a bulls eye; all he had to do was hit the target and the gold medal was his. Headline in the Washington Post, August 23, “Emmons Loses Gold Medal After Aiming at the Wrong Target”. He was in his final shot; he was in lane three and the greatest shooter in the world shot the target in lane two. He scored zero points; he dropped to eighth. But he had the gold medal in his hand. Narrow your focus; keep your eyes on Christ, “Seek first the Kingdom of God and all these other things will be added to you.”
· And then, finally, pursue God’s purposes for your life. Here what Paul has to say about that in the last part of Verse 12. He says, “I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.” But then as Paul is prone to do, he repeats himself again in verse 14, “I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward through Christ Jesus.” Friends, don’t forget this book. We spent seven weeks last year discovering God’s purposes for our lives. In fact, if you had seen Rick Warren recently on TV, he still wears his flower shirts but he has a new hairstyle. Have any of you seen his new hairstyle? He’s got a little goatee; he looks a little bit different. But when we talk about God’s purposes for your life, we are talking about the five principles Rick Warren introduced in his book, 40 Days of Purpose.
You were planned for God’s pleasure, which is worship.
You were formed for God’s family, which is fellowship.
You were created to be like Christ, which is discipleship.
You were shaped for serving God, which is ministry.
You were made for a mission, which is evangelism.
There was a Paris artist painting on a street and on a bench before him was a scruffy, homeless man. And he started painting the man. And the man realized that he was painting him. And so, about a half an hour later, he walked over to look at his portrait. And he said to the artist, “Who in the world is that?” because the painting was of a nice looking, secure young man. And the artist said, “That’s you.” And the man said, “No way, I don’t look like that.” And the artist said, “No, I painted you as you could become.” And that’s kind of what God says to us as a church and individual. It’s what the Gaither’s said in their little chorus. “Something beautiful; something good. All my confusion; God understood. All I had to offer Him was brokenness and strife. But He made something beautiful of my life.” He wants to make something even more beautiful at Grace Church if our prayer will be, “Lord, move us, move me to a new level in 2005.
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