Diaries of a Missional Church

A Tip On How God Uses Us.

p4cs — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 23:09:00 +0000

Something occurred to me as I was preparing my sermon this week. God’s mission is accomplished (saving people from their sins) largely through our time, talents, and treasure. God uses us as His instruments with the time, talent, (skills, abilities, and gifts) and treasure that He has given us. We do not have the ability to do any of this apart from Christ. He is the one who gives us all this according to our abilities and expects us to multiple them accordingly.

These gifts that He gives us are bigger than we can imagine or think. In the parable of the talents (Matthew 25:14-30), Jesus uses the talent (a unit of money in those days worth about $400,000) to make a point that He is far more generous than we can think or imagine. He gives one fellow 5 talents ($2M), another 2 talents ($800k) and the last one, one talent ($400K). Metaphorically, He is communicating that He give us an amazing amount of stuff (desires, intelligence, gifts, abilities, skills, critical thinking, etc.) far more than what we think we have to do His work.

He expects us to increase what He has given to us through effort, perseverance, and passion for what we are doing, anything less doesn’t cut the mustard. For there will come a day when He will ask each of us what we did with all the stuff He that has given us. How will you answer Him?

God the Multi-Tasker

p4cs — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 18:51:00 +0000

As we go through life, we often get sucked into it so deeply through our circumstances, that we lose sight of the overall picture of what God is trying to do. Many times we don’t even see how God’s overall mission (to redeem His people from their sins) is applicable to our lives. In times like these Psalm 91 is a great reminder of how God comforts us in our time need even while He is accomplishing His mission. God is the ultimate multi-tasker. Nothing is too great for Him to do, nor is anything too insignificant for Him to do either…including assuring you that you are going to be O.K. despite the circumstance that you find yourself in.

The Psalmist writes in Psalm 91 if we trust God, he will deliver us from destruction. Notice that he doesn’t write that God will deliver from your trials, but He will deliver you from the catastrophic effects of those trials. He will shield you and protect you and not allow them to consume you.

God will use your life’s stories as inspiration for others who are going through similar trials to encourage and inspire them….and possibly save them. How cool is that! God will use your trials to redeem His people from their sins. God will use catastrophic events in your life to advance His mission while comforting and encouraging you.

Working Together for the Common Good

p4cs — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 08:37:00 +0000

It seems to us that if you want to get anything done on a large scale, it requires a bunch of people coming together for a common cause. We have a real heart to support the local high school in ways that would be meaningful to them. The Principal is a committed follower of Christ and welcomes us with open arms to help the students at his high school.

One of the projects that we are currently working on is with the Athletic department. Many of their student athletes are sidelined because of academic eligibility issues. We are reaching out to other churches in the area as well as Young Life to form a tutoring program to help these kids stay eligible and to start a Young Life club on campus.

Today I had lunch with three local student ministries pastors to discuss our idea and to gauge interest on their part. All of them had buy in and were excited that we were working on this.

Who knows where this is headed, but it is tremendously encouraging that there are folks out there wiling to partner with us to impact the lives of kids today…with an eye of impacting them eternally.

How God’s Plan Works Out When No One is Looking

p4cs — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 05:31:00 +0000

After worship service this morning I was stopped by one of the elderly women who attend our church. She told me that see visits with a neighbor a couple hours of week and this last week the discussion turned toward the spiritual realm.

Her neighbor began to challenge the Christian faith and labeled us “narrow minded”. She didn’t know quite how to respond to the charge so she asked me this morning. I suggested a way or two for her to gently challenge her neighbor to see just how open minded he really is.

She said she would try the approaches that I suggested. I imagine that this happens countless times everyday in every city and town. This is one of the quiet ways that God advances His mission…one person at a time, whether young or old, standing firm in the faith and offering a better way to those who are willing to have a discussion.

After our discussion my heart just lept for joy, knowing that an 80 year old woman was dialoging with a person 25 to 30 years her junior about our Lord. May we have the same zeal when we are in our 80′s.

Meditating on Mission

p4cs — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 15:13:00 +0000

One of the things that endears me to the Psalms is the deep meditation and reflection of who God is what He has done by the Psalmists. It’s remembering and reinforcing God’s mission. Not only do many of them look back on the history of what God has done, but often times asks direct and very powerful rhetorical questions like in Psalm 77 that describe the anguish that all of us feel in our hearts at one time or another.

Questions like will the Lord reject forever? (v. 7) or has God forgotten to be merciful? (v. 9) There are seasons in our lives when many of us emotional feel as if the Lord has abandon us though Scripture and our head knowledge knows otherwise. The Psalms, and Psalm 77 is just one example, are a wonderful place to wrestle with God and then ultimately to receive mercy in our time of need during those seasons of life when we feel a bit lost and uncertain. Not only do they comfort us, but they help us regain much needed perspective that God is on a mission and nothing, not even our doubts, will stop Him.

Shooting Ourselves in the Foot

p4cs — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:40:00 +0000

We can learn a great deal from the latter stages of Solomon’s life. Solomon was David’s son who was one of the richest and wisest men in the world. He built God’s temple and ruled Israel during a time of unprecedented peace and wealth creation. It was common during that period of time that when nations traded goods and services, they also offered their women as part of the deal. Solomon received hundreds of foreign women and loved about 1000 of them.

Knowing the softness of a man’s heart for a woman, God specifically instructed the Israelites not to marry or be with foreign women because they will “surely” turn the Israelite men’s hearts after their gods. As many of us know, men have a difficult time not being unduly influenced by women. Soon Solomon began building temples in honor of these “gods” to please his women despite God commanding him to discontinue these relationships.

God finally had enough and ripped Solomon’s kingdom away from him by raising up adversaries. God eventually divided the kingdom into two…10 tribes to the north and 2 tribes to the south after Solomon’s death.

As we look at this in the context of God’s mission, we see that God expects us to finish as we started. If we don’t because we moved away from him, he will simply let us go our own way and he will raise someone else to do his will. God’s plan will not be held captive by any human being. If we become obstinate to His will for our lives, He will find someone else to carry out His plan and we lose out on the blessing that He freely gives to those who obey Him.

Power Over Fear

p4cs — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 13:48:00 +0000

Can even the most unfortunate situations serve to advance the mission of God? Philippians 1 gives us evidence that it can. Paul was writing from a Roman jail to the church in Philippi when he writes this: “I want you to know brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel, so that it has been known throughout the entire imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ. And most of the brothers having become confident in the Lord by my imprisonment are much more bold to speak the word without fear.” (1:12-14)

Paul didn’t let his circumstances stop him from proclaiming the gospel and being a cog in God’s wheel as God fulfills his mission. In fact, he saw his circumstances as a way to advance God’s mission to groups of people that would otherwise may not hear the gospel…the prison guards.

Not only that, but his boldness in difficult circumstances gives others courage to be bold as well. Prison is used as a deterrent to modify behavior. If Paul was thrown into prison for preaching, he was demonstrating that the threat of prison is no match for God and His gospel. The gospel would advance regardless even to those administrating his sentence.

The power of the gospel remains the same today as in Paul’s time…so the question becomes what deters us from advancing God’s mission? Examine yourself, give your fears to God and let God work through you to advance His mission. There is nothing powerful enough on earth to deter God, even your fears and anxieties.

Opportunities Unfolding Beneath our Eyes

p4cs — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 15:02:00 +0000

As we seek to transform the city of Phoenix through Christ, we are discovering lots of “little ways” that God is giving us to serve others (though it makes a huge impact on others lives).

For instance, we have committed to bring food for three months and other support on an as needed basis to a family in dire need whose daughter attends a local school. The father is a self-employed electrician who was diagnosed with cancer and is unable to work, so we are standing in the gap as best we can to assist this family in their time of need.

Another teacher from that local school needs assistance with one of her students from another country.

We are getting involved with the group of refugee students from Somolia who lack the basic life skills to survive in America.

We are beginning to put together a tutoring group for the student athletes at Camelback High in in conjunction with Young Life and hope that will turn into a Young Life group for that campus.

All of these things are happening because we have taken a vested interest in the community. We have let it be known to everyone who will listen that we are here to work with the community on things that we share in common. (i.e. we want improved literacy among high school students as does the community, we want to care for those who are in a difficult spot in life as does the community, etc.) and God is bringing these type of opportunities to us.

We imagine the same is true in your community…let it be known how you want to serve and then watch as God opens the doors of the community to serve.

The Big Timeout

p4cs — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 07:35:00 +0000

Boy, it has been a good long while since we posted anything. This is due partly to a personal move and partly due to a vacation. It never ceases to amaze me how disruptive a move is to a family. Our stuff fit perfectly into our old house, but our new one which is bigger is drastically configured differently and has presented us with unique and interesting challenges. Can anyone relate?

Well, we are on the tale end of it and life is returning to normalcy. So here we are.

Through the ebbing and flowing of life each one of us reaches a point of despair. It’s a place of agony and blues because we sense that God is not working in our lives. Even as God marches on to fulfill His mission, we feel somehow that we have missed the bus and that we are on our own. This is why the book of Lamentations is so important. Jeremiah, the weeping prophet, chronicles through beautiful poetry the anguish of his heart and it reflects the anguish of ours too.

Many of us spend much time, at least in our own eyes, waiting on the Lord and Jeremiah expresses this so well in chapter 3…”the Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him. It is good that one should wait quitely for the salvation of the Lord…the Lord will not cast off forever, but though he cause grief, he will have compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love.”

So there will be times in each of our lives that as we are marching down the road being used as God’s instrument that He will put us in “timeout” for a season so that we may draw nearer to Him. When you find yourself in this season may Lamentations 3 comfort you in your time of need.

Instruments in the Redeemer’s Hands

p4cs — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 13:41:00 +0000

So is the title of Paul David Tripp’s book on helping others through difficult times in life. It is also used in Acts 9 – albeit in a different way. God tells Ananias that Paul is His chosen instrument “to carry my name before the Gentiles” (v. 15)

God continues to march on to accomplish His mission of bringing salvation to the ends of the earth. At the time Paul was just the latest human that He was going to use to to accomplish His mission. As we will see in the the coming days, God used Paul in the a variety of contexts crossing national boundaries and cultures to redeem His people.

God uses us in a similar way today. We are all ambassadors of Him who have relationships with others across many different segments of society. This is most readily seen for those of us who work in large offices or institutions like hospitals. In work places like this we see the economic and ethnic diversity from the support staff to the executives and everyone in between.

God puts us in places with our co-workers, neighbors, friends, and family so that He can accomplish His mission through us…for we are instruments in the Redeemer’s hands.