Waking up from the American Dream; God’s Mission and Our Resources

Cultivating Missional Living Sermon 8

Waking up from the American Dream; God’s Mission and Our Resources

Our Lord has provided a plan for a sustainable and vibrant society. But, it doesn't just happen. God’s plan as revealed to us through the Bible portrays a caring community of Jesus followers who are both sympathetic and sacrificial in their approach to their possessions and financial resources. If we hope to bear fruit for the Kingdom of God, our eyes and hearts must be fixed on people and things beyond ourselves. Our hearts must be open in order for our hands to be open.

So, ? How should the concept of a caring community change the way a local church thinks and functions in its local setting?

 How should the concept of a caring community change the way we think and act on a daily basis?

What areas of our lifestyle may need to change?

Read Mark 4:18-19… In this passage Jesus says that three things-the cares of the world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things-make the Word of God unfruitful in people’s lives. A good question for each of us is to ask how this applies to our lives.

Read 1 John 2:15-17….In what ways have you been tempted by “love of the things of the world.” …How does this relate to your life, …how important are things and what does your life look like in regard to resources that you consume.

Read Acts 2:44-45….Other than money at church, how do you currently, not how you want to, but do you currently practice, sharing your resources. …..Now a good question might be, how do you imagine yourself sharing the resources God has given you?

Read Matthew 6:24-34….Reflecting on this passage, does worry affect you frequently in regard to your own daily needs?

Open Hearts, Open Hands

In spite of the recent economic recession, the US remains the wealthiest nation on earth. We have more than enough to go around. Our biggest problem is not so much having enough. It is more likely that we are not sharing enough. As the Body of Christ, the core values of the church embody the only viable answer to the issue of enough. However,….the so called American Dream crashes against God’s dream for His Kingdom to manifest on earth as it is in heaven. The values of God’s Kingdom clash with the values of this world on most every front. And in one of the most familiar of Jesus’ parables, we are confronted with the key to God’s Word taking root in our lives, in order that we may bear fruit and give a taste of the Kingdom.

Mark 4:18-19

The importance of this passage cannot be emphasized enough. Jesus says this parable is the key to understanding all of his other parables (V13). It is the master key. Tens of thousands of sermons are preached every year across America. Millions of books are sold every year. And a great many Christians read this scripture every day. Yet, our culture remains unchanged by it. Our neighborhoods remain unchanged by it. Our City remains unchanged by it. Why? How can this be? Might the truth be that we, the body of Jesus Christ, remain for the most part unchanged? And in order for us to be change agents, salt, light, we must first be changed ourselves?

The “isms” Thorns

If you have ever got yourself tangled up in a thorn bush, you know how aggravating and even painful it can be to get out. And thorn bushes in gardens or flower beds can literally wrap around plants and squeeze the very life from them, leaving them fruitless and eventually lifeless. Jesus says this is exactly what happens when our lives become wrapped up in the values and agendas of the present age. We can spend endless hours of Bible Study and church activities with no visible fruit produced in our lives on account of our entanglement with worldly pursuits and concerns.

 Let me share a few “isms” that effectively choke out not only our ability to live on mission with God, but also our imagination of what we could possibly do missionally.

One of the critical admissions for Christians is that consumerism, the theory that an increasing consumption of goods is economically desirable; also : a preoccupation with and an inclination toward the buying of consumer goods, has the propensity to shape and dictate our very identity. When our identification is one of a consumer our true identity as citizens of the Kingdom of God-which is supposed to be, strangers and aliens to this earthly Kingdom-fades away. We can’t then even begin to conceive of a Kingdom life in Biblical terms of Risk, Time, Finance and Energy. We just can’t get our heads around how we could possibly afford to be missional. And this is exactly what the apostle John warned us against.

1 John 2:15-17

The very essence of the church, the fragrance it emits to a world watching so closely, lies in its living as an authentic community. ….In other words, the church doesn’t have a social strategy; the church is the social strategy. We have an unmatched opportunity to show the world the type of life that can never be achieved through social programs or our governments’ intervention. But, authentic biblical community can never be practiced alongside the American lifestyle of individualism. (a doctrine that the interests of the individual are or ought to be ethically supreme)

Risky People

Even the hastiest reading of the Book of Acts paints a picture of an open-hearted and open-handed Christian people who are fueled by an unrelenting, risk-it-all resolve. To become this type of people, we will have to make some serious choices that most likely will necessitate significant lifestyle changes. Just like an out of shape athlete, we must get our lives into missional shape. …Some people may want to run a marathon. Some, like me, would just like to be able to run a few times around the block. But we love Blue-bell too much. We like our cookies and brownies and tortillas. And in the same way most Christians really do want to have an impact on the world, or even just their block, but they have never shaped their lives to be able to keep pace.

Currently, the average American family lives in a home that is over three times the size of the average American house from 1950. This is despite the fact that family units are smaller now than they were fifty years ago. A sign I often use to define our over consumption is the phenomenon of this past few decades of the use of self-storage units. It is now reported to be a 23 billion dollar industry that rakes in more than the entire entertainment industry. 

Our Lord is pleased when we enjoy the fruits of our labor, but our appetites need to remain in check. God has carved out an economic design for the Body of Christ that is full of life for us as well as others.

How to Inherit the Earth

Those who are meek and who are submitted to the government of God will seek for His Kingdom to come before everything else in this life. Why, because they treasure His Kingdom more than they treasure personal wealth. They are attentive to those who are weak and who are trampled on by those more powerful. They turn into great filters of wealth, sending out possessions to those in need and stretching arms out to those on the margins of society.

This isn’t trickle-down economics where a few at the top might spill some of what they have accumulated over the years down to the masses at the bottom. No Kingdom economics is pictured in the poor widow who was so insanely generous that she gave away the little bit that she had to live on. In Kingdom economics the followers of Jesus pool their resources and then dole them out to each one as they have need, Widows and orphans are cared for in their distress. Homes are opened for the homeless and clothing is given away to those who need it. The economic blueprint in God’s kingdom works against personal increase and selfish accumulation and works toward distribution out to the extremities. Maybe that’s why Jesus said it was impossible to serve both God and money; people can’t submit to the desire for personal accumulation and submit to the desire for God at the same time!

See, for our lives to genuinely be fruitful for the Kingdom of God, most of us must change our habits and lifestyles. You know, junk food and fluffy sofas don’t pump out many marathon runners. And the church in the book of Acts had a habit of producing changed lifestyles for the sake of the community. A return to that mindset would certainly go a long way toward our forming a missional community. Towards our cultivating a Missional Lifestyle.

Cultivating Missional Living Renewing and Refreshing for the Long Haul

American culture is the most medicated and therapeutic on the face of the earth. Stress is killing us physically, emotionally, and spiritually. As God’s people, it does not have to and should not be this way. If we will look to God’s Word, we will discover a pattern for living-in any area of our lives- that God has prescribed to set his people free from stressful lifestyles. It is not possible for any of us to find the strength to carry out life on our own. The Lord never intended us to do so. He wants to be our strength for living.

So, the ?, do you consider your life to be stressful?...Does the idea of a stress-free lifestyle seem realistic?.... Lk. 24:49 And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.” I think it is very significant that after 3 years of walking alongside our Lord, and witnessing His atoning work on the cross and His resurrection, Jesus say’s you are still not ready so “stay” until I return in power. I believe this should cause us to ask, in what ways is Jesus still instructing us to do this today.

But, it’s hard, someone wrote a song once called the waiting is the hardest part. But in Isaiah 40:31, a personal favorite piece of scripture for me,

but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength;

   they shall mount up with wings like eagles;

   they shall run and not be weary;

   they shall walk and not faint.

What is most difficult for you? In what area of life is it most difficult to wait for The Lord? Are you praying about it, are you laying it before the feet of our Lord?

This is not so much a message on the Sabbath, “God’s Sabbath Rest”, as it is a message about Renewal and Refreshing for the long haul ahead. But, what has the Sabbath meant to you in your walk with Christ. In what ways do you observe it or keep it? It is an often misunderstood word, but in Mark 2:27, Jesus says, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. Here is a clue, the key, to understanding the Sabbath.

Hitting the Pause Button

Maybe you remember playing Red Light, Green Light as a child. The game as you might remember is a combination of running, stopping, moving, and freezing. To win, you must listen closely to whoever is calling out the commands for stopping or going. ….And in the Body today, I truly believe we are seeing a renewed obedience to our Jesus’ command to Go! Green light …..But, Jesus’ last words when he appeared to the disciples after the resurrection were “Wait (stop) in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high” ….Red Light!

So here in the middle of this series I want to reflect on the much neglected doctrine of “The Red Light” and its aspect of missional living. It is imperative that we take time to focus on the habit of pausing, refreshing and renewing ourselves in the Lord!

Why is this so difficult? Because ours is a culture that values production to such a degree that the idea of “wasting time” for just about any reason is considered a curse. ….But if we want to truly spend time with God, we must intentionally, make a concentrated and regular effort to create space for God….. But everyone and everything around us wants to fill up every bit of the space in our lives and then make us an occupied people, more than that a preoccupied people. This has a negative effect on our time with God. We approach it as simply a task to be completed. So we try and make our time with God useful, we view it from kind of a what will this do for me perspective. What wisdom can I get? Will I feel God’s presence? What answer will God give to my questions? Then it becomes a chore.

The world says if you are not making good use of your time, you are useless. Jesus says hey, come spend some useless time with me. See, if we can separate ourselves from the idea of “the usefulness” of spending time with God and “the results” of spending time with God, it frees us to “Waste” a precious hour or two with God. Then gradually, we may find, our useless time will transform us, and then everything in our life will be different. See, our Sabbath, spending time in God’s Rest, is our being unbusy, instead of being busy with other things. …To not be useful is to remind ourselves that if anything important or even fruitful happens through time spent with God, it is God who achieves the result. ….So when we go into the day, we go with the conviction that God is the one who brings forth fruit in my work, and I don’t have to act as though I’m in control of things. I have to work hard, I have to do my job, I have to offer my best. But I can let go of the illusion of control and be detached from the result. At the end of the day I can prayerfully say that if something good has happened, God Be praised, God be glorified!

So as we set aside time for God to share His inward thoughts with us, we open our ears and minds and the doors of our heart to receive His most intimate affection and dreams for our lives and for those with whom we are in relationships with. We hope in the Lord and He will renew our strength!

We Sabbath!

So, correctly understood, our Sabbath becomes both a joy and a gift from God to us. It becomes something we get to enjoy instead of a have to endure. Why because, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath”

I read that 37% of Americans take fewer than seven days off per year. Only 14% of Americans take vacations of more than two weeks. Americans take the shortest paid vacations in the world, and 20% of those who take vacation stay in direct contact with the office or those on the job. So I guess I’m trying to help us become a little less American. Because to Sabbath, to spend time in God’s rest means to schedule time to do nothing but rest in God.

It has been written, so many times by so many that I think people think it’s a verse, that “The purpose of man is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.”  I think this is true and an accurate reflection of God’s eternal plan. … Well, for the Christian …forever has begun. Forever is here and now.

Our God is more than capable of keeping this universe going without us helping him for a few hours a day. And for a day a week, to be spent in His rest! Again our time with God, should be a daily and weekly event we look forward to with anticipation. And on your Day of rest, …What brings you joy? What gives you delight? If it’s reading a book, then kick back and do it. If it’s playing with your children, do it, if it’s loving on your spouse, then do it. Whatever you do, remember it’s not a time to get things done, it is for joy and delight!

Our Daily Office

Let me share this with you as I close, the word Office comes from the Latin word opus or work. For the early church, the daily office was always the work of God. Nothing was to interfere with that priority. The basic goal of the daily office is to maintain a conscious connection with the Lord throughout our day. The Monk St. Benedict structured eight prayer times called offices for monks. Every three hours the monks of the Benedictine order, even to this day stop everything they are doing, this includes sleeping, and observe the office.

Well, few people other than monks observe offices today. Most ‘office’ so to speak three or four times a day with very small doses of prayer, reading a psalm or proverb maybe. A devotion or small amount of scripture. But the wisest man in the world at the time he lived, Solomon wrote a proverb we know it as Proverbs 4:23, Above all things, guard your heart, for everything flows from it” He believed everything concerning our life comes from our heart, so the best thing we can do is to keep proper maintenance on our inner life. So attending to our heart, our attitudes, and a listening ear is essential as we move in missional ways. Good works will quickly become dead works if we are not drawing both our wisdom and strength from the power of the Holy Spirit on a very frequent basis.  

Cultivating Missional Living

Exiles in a Foreign Land

Jeremiah 29:1-9

Original Meaning

Jeremiah writes a letter to the Judean community in Babylonian exile, and they are instructed to settle down in Babylon and to pray for the city. The exiles are to “seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper” (29:7).

This letter contains a shocking truth, but it points to good news to come. God is the subject of the phrase “all the exiles whom I have sent into exile.” Of course, the previous verses noted that Nebuchadnezzar was the historical person God used who took the people into exile, but in verse 4 the point is made that it is actually the work of God himself. The affirmation is followed by the commands to settle down in exile and to carry out such functions as building, planting, and marriage. Exile is not the end of existence as God’s people, but is the beginning of a new phase of relating to God. The people are not to rebel against the authority of Babylon because, in effect, it is the authority of God over them for a prescribed time. More positively, the people are to seek the prosperity of Babylon because it will affect them as well. Most important, they are to pray for their captors.

Bridging Context

GOD’S PEOPLE AS ALIENS.

Jeremiah’s prophetic ministry extends even to God’s people taken into exile. While his influence was profound in the decades after the final destruction of Jerusalem. The book of Jeremiah exhibits concern for the exiles in a variety of ways, since a very obvious goal is to demonstrate that Jeremiah is a true prophet to the nations (including the exiles and Babylon itself). This chapter also finds itself as a part of the scriptural witness to God’s people who are addressed as pilgrims, as wandering people, even as aliens, whose true home is with the Lord…… From the perspective of the New Testament, God’s people are both “at home” as members of the body of the risen Christ (regardless of their geographical location) and are “in transit” as they live out their witness in this age (regardless of their geographical location). The exiles in Babylon have not been ejected from their place among God’s people; rather, they have been called to reconsider their place in God’s family in light of new circumstances. Here I think maybe is a bridge to any generation of God’s people.

When we think about the decline of Christianity from a biblical perspective, many people turn to the metaphor of exile. It is popular to think about Christians living as exiles, very similar to the nation of Israel when they were taken into Babylonian captivity in 586 BC. And, there are certainly parallels between our current Christian experience of displacement, uncertainty and irrelevance, and the struggles of the Jews in Babylon. However, this may not be the best metaphor. The idea of exile presupposes a desire to be restored to a previous way of life. The exiled Jews hoped for a time when their lost kingdom would be reestablished. When applied to our world today, it may lead some to place their hope in the return of the way things were. This is not what we, or the world for that matter, needs today.

Instead, the church would be better served by looking at the words of Jeremiah. Jeremiah challenged the Jews who had been taken into exile to withstand the desire to return to a restored Israel. He urged them to accept the new situation as the will of God and to seek God’s blessing for those they perceived as their enemies. Jeremiah called on them to seek the welfare of the city where God had sent them into exile.

So, while we today may fell a sense of exile, brought to a place of uncertainly and unfamiliarity, let’s not desire to return to another time. God is not calling us to return to the things of old, but to participate in something completely new.

We’re Not in Kansas Anymore

Do you remember the famous line from the 1939 film Wizard of Oz, when Dorothy first arrives in Oz and realizes she is now in a world that is strangely different? “Toto” she says to her little dog, “I have a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.” Dorothy’s surroundings were now unfamiliar. The people and places she was used to seeing no longer existed. She had no idea where she was, but one thing was certain-everything around her had drastically changed.

A place that is strangely different describes the setting for us today. The world has seemingly changed so quickly and radically that many Christians feel like exiles in a foreign land. Like Dorothy, many Christians no longer recognize their surroundings. They don’t completely understand the changes that have taken place; they only know that things are not like they used to be.

Now, there are in fact numerous factors that have influenced the change we see today in Western culture. Issues such as globalization, urbanization, post-modernism, and the rise of the information age have all had significant influence on the church.

In this new era we in many places once again return to the margins of society. We have lost our position of prominence and control. While once the majority, in this time we are once again the minority. We have shifted from being marginalized, to in control, and now back again.

What Difference Does It Make?

So you might ask, pastor what difference does it make. The problem is that at a time when the church is less and less effective at reaching a changing world, many if not most members in most churches continue to believe that the church maintains a central role in the life of the community around it. So instead of leaning toward a missionary vision of the church, which we began talking about in the first sermon, we default to our old traditional ways, where church is a place where certain things happen, and we assume, we wrongly assume that those outside these walls will be interested in what we are doing if we just create the right atmosphere and find the events that will attract them. Every single statistic relevant to the church tells us they are not.

So, back to Oz, there is a scene later in the film where Dorothy reaches up to pick an apple from a tree, and the tree grabs the apple and slaps her hand. Ouch! Dorothy cries out. What d’ya think you’re doing? Says the tree. We have been walking a long way and I was hungry, replies Dorothy. The tree responds well, how would you like to have someone come along and pick something off you? Dorothy answers, Oh dear, I keep forgetting I’m not in Kansas!

My friends, I want to say this to you with love and in all sincerity. We must stop forgetting that the landscape around us has drastically changed. We are in a new land. At times we are going to feel like exiles in an unknown foreign land but, unlike many exiles, let’s not yearn for what once was. Instead, let’s seek to bring life and vitality to the land where God has placed us. Let us pray and work for God’s Kingdom to come to the city and neighborhoods in which we live.

Like in the days of Jeremiah, many people do not want to hear this. But the reality is everything has changed. And the sooner we come to grips with this reality, the sooner we can return to the radical, revolutionary, missional movement that is demonstrated for us in the early church!

Response:

As part of our grasping this world we live in and making the changes we can:

This week, be mindful of examples you see of a changed culture. What do you hear in people’s conversation? On Television. In Movies? In social media?

Then think of changes that you need to make in your life to live as a missionary in a foreign land. What steps will you take to incorporate the first change?

And, think of what needs to change about the way you think of church. How can we connect with those who are no longer interested in things of the church? What can change about the way you live out being part of the body of Christ.

And lastly, most important… Know that prayer is the foundation of our confidence in God. It was in Jeremiah’s day, and it remains a key to seeking God with all one’s heart. God’s promises are freely given, but not all of them can be freely accepted—that is, they have little relevancy to an uncaring, uninterested people. For many though, it should come as good news that God knows the future and is committed to the redemption of His people. “Seek and you will find” is our Lord’s gracious command!

Amen

CULTIVATING A PEOPLE OF “THE WAY”

The early followers of Jesus were not called people of “the experience,” or the people of “right doctrine,” or the people of “moral values,” or even the people of “the church.” They were called the people of “the Way.” They were known for the way they lived, not only for what they believed or valued. Christians were associated with a particular and discernible way of living and relating that both grew out of their faith and gave testimony to that faith. More than just individuals who had a changed religious position, they were now a new people, a new community embarking on a new way of life — a life worthy of their calling. Their proclamation that in Jesus the reconciling and transforming reign of God had become a historical reality was more than an intriguing idea, it had become visible in a people whose life together was the first fruit of the new social order intended by God for the whole of creation. ~ Inagrace T. Dietterich in “Cultivating Missional Communities”

“I beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” Eph 4:1-2

Hear O Church, One Lord, One Life

Cultivating Missional Living

Hear O Church, One Lord, One Life

Theme: Committing Our Whole Lives to God

Deut. 6:1-9, Mark 12:29-31, Romans 12:1-2

Response: Seeing and Responding to Gods Missional Work

Lord Over All

Ours is a culture totally different from the audience that sat at the feet of our Jesus. His listeners were not comprised of twenty-first century Westerners who are mostly a reasoning and scientifically- minded society. The ancient Near East people were deeply spiritual and consciously aware of sacred, mystical, and even magical realms. Theirs was a culture that was filled with a number of gods and demigods. They were pluralists. Virtually every sphere of life had a god that was seen as ruling over it. There was a god of the forest, family, river, sun, moon, and harvest and so on.

So it is within this culture that one of the local scribes approached our Jesus to ask Him what the most important commandment was, (Mark 12:29-31). Can you imagine that? Out of all the commandments in the Old Testament, this guy wanted Jesus to narrow them down to the one. How could this be possible? I mean, God Himself issued each and every one of the commandments. Aren’t they all important? Every single one came from the lips of God! How could one commandment stand above all the rest?

And typically, in the Gospels when Jesus was asked a question, He answered it with another question, or sometimes even a parable. This as we have seen often in our Wednesday night Bible study was a very typical rabbinic method of teaching. But, on this occasion, departing from His normal way of responding, Jesus not only answered the question posed to him; He did so quickly and plainly.

It would not have been unreasonable to expect Jesus to respond. As He so typically did, by asking another thought provoking question. It is easy to imagine Jesus saying something like, look around you, look to the field and mountains, look to the sea. Which of all these creations of God is the most important. Our Jesus could have said, every commandment is God breathed and not one is more or less important than the other. But immediately Jesus answered without hesitation. And He went even further, he gave the guys a two for one deal. Jesus told the scribe the number one most important commandment plus the number two most important commandment.

‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.

Listen Up

The commandment that Jesus proclaims as the most important is known as the Shema, which means “hear.” What we are to hear is that there are not a multitude of gods (polytheism). The implication is that one God is Lord over every part of our lives, no exceptions. Nothing lies outside of His claim or His power. So, this idea destroys the concept of there being sacred and secular places in our lives. (Dualism) Our God is God from the bedroom to the boardroom, from the work place to the play place, from our living room to the school room, and everyplace in between.

The Shema (“ Hear, O Israel . . .”) in Deuteronomy 6: 4 is the claim of Yahweh over against the competing claim of the many other gods in the polytheistic religious environment of the day. It is a call for the loyalty of the people. The claim has direct and concrete implications: It is a call for the Israelites to live their lives under the Lordship of one God and not under the oppression of the many gods. In other words, it is a practical call not to live one’s life as if there were a different god for every sphere of life— a god of the field, a god of the river, a god of fertility, a god of the sun, and so forth.

The Word of our God loudly proclaims that there is only one God and He is Lord of every aspect of life. Again, here the concrete and practical nature of Hebraic thinking comes to the forefront. Polytheists can compartmentalize life and distribute it among many powers. But the man or women in the Israelite world who has faith is not distinguished from the pagan worldview by a mere spiritual view of the Godhead, but by the exclusiveness of his relationship to God, and by his reference of all things to him. So, Biblical believers have only one reference point. This is the biblical mode of thinking— concrete and practical. The implications are far reaching, not as simple theology, but as practical missiology. A re-Hebraizing of Christianity is so vital for the emergence of the missional-incarnational church.

This claim to unify our lives under the one God has truly radical implications for us today as we struggle to find new ground on which to base our discipleship. Biblical monotheism means that we cannot live like there is one “god” for the church and another for politics and another in economics or still another for the home. No, all of life, every aspect of it, every dimension, is to be brought under and unified under the ONE God, Yahweh. Seen in this light, the Shema is a claim of God’s exclusivity and a direct challenge from God about the role of idols in the believer’s life.

So, especially, in a culture like ours, where a lack of integration in every sphere of our lives is the norm, the importance of understanding and acting on the truth of the Shema cannot be overstated. Our society is one that lacks connection between the people and the places that make up our lifestyle patterns. The people we work with are not the same people we see in our favorite coffee house. The folks that we see in the park are not the same people we see in our grocery stores. And for the most part, none of these people are members of our own local church.

There are only one or two types of places most people, Christian or not consider to be sacred. These spots are official places of worship, a church, a synagogue, or a mosque and the home. The remaining places are called secular territory. If you ask most Christians, they consider their places of work, recreation, education, commerce, and the marketplace to all be secular places.

Lord of All

Secular, by definition means “non-sacred” or “apart from God” Theologians call this idea dualism, a terribly dangerous precept that not only limits God, but limits missions. The subconscious result of the dualistic divisions means that most Christians compartmentalize spirituality into two sacred boxes of church and home. So, we consider the people we encounter in differing territories the same way. Especially in Evangelical circles, the people that occupy “non-sacred” spaces often become categorized as “them” within the them vs. us delusion that has become part of the sacred-secular divide.

With the Shema, Jesus is saying that all dimensions of our lives are under His care, joy, and rule. God gets out of the stained glass box of church and moves into every sphere of society. We-those filled with His Spirit-can (should) begin to understand all of life as ministry and worship. This idea was echoed in the legendary movie, Chariots of Fire, in which Eric Liddell says, “I believe God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast, And when I run I feel His pleasure.”

So as we seek to Shema (to hear) we aim to recognize God’s activity throughout our daily routines. By understanding that God is everywhere and that He is seeking to restore and redeem broken people and the brokenness throughout all of creation, our lives take on new meaning-spiritual meaning. …. See, there is this real tendency to think of the spiritual life as a life that will begin when we have certain feelings, think certain thoughts, and gain certain insights. …. The problem, though, is not how to make the spiritual life happen, but to see where it actually is happening. We will then work on this premise… that our God acts in this world and in the lives of individuals and communities. That God is doing something right now. So this work, this chipping away and sculpting by God is taking place whether we are aware of it or not. Our task is to recognize that, yes, it is God who is acting and we are involved already in that spiritual life.

This sacred-secular divide as a mindset, or a paradigm, has enormous implications for the life of a Christian. And when one lives under this misguided belief, we leave God out of the equation of the majority of our actual daily living. But when we seek to hear God in our daily routines, believing that the Lord is bringing His Kingdom to earth, we hear and see things we might have never observed beforehand.

For you who are Christian business men and women this means that the phrase, “This is a business” is no longer an acceptable term. Understanding the Shema means that we understand that God is just as much in on a business deal as He is on the Sunday Morning Praise and Worship.

Understanding God is one Lord over all things and beings keeps us tuned in to-hearing-His voice in every situation. He is Lord of the restaurant, Starbucks, where you work, play, and the neighborhood.

Romans 12:1-2

On the basis of the fact that God is overall and in every situation, Paul appeals to us to offer our whole world up to God in worship. He is Lord over every dimension of life. Since God is One we have the obligation to “bring every aspect of our lives, communal and individual, under this One God.

The Shema is one of the most practical and catalytic passages in all of Scripture. It is no wonder that Jesus calls it the most important commandment of all. It calls us to bring our minds, hearts, and bodies under the complete lordship of Jesus. God is no longer understood as involved in just the “spiritual” dimensions of our lives, because we have eliminated the sacred-secular divide from our concept of God and life in general.

This is the cornerstone precept of a Biblical Wordview. …We commit our whole life to God. Nothing is off limits. And, ..If the entire world, including our immediate world, and all that is within it is truly under the ownership of God, then there can be no part of my life that is not open to His rule.

But, honestly it is very easy to profess belief in one God, but in practice, live as though there are many. To confess Jesus is Lord, means we are loyal to Him throughout every sphere of our life, as consumers, as neighbors, workers, and friends. We live one life, under one Lord!

Response:

This week, decide how you can demonstrate your love for the Lord with your heart, (inner passion), soul (Mind and spirit) and your strength (Body). Give yourself an assignment every day. Prayer for your heart, reading for you mind, and serving someone for your strength. 

Turning His Way; Living a Kingdom of God Agenda Sunday May 11th

Turning His Way; Living a Kingdom of God Agenda

Matthew 6:25-33; 3:1-2; 4:17

A Different Way of Living

Jesus invites us to live our lives very differently from the non-Christ-following world around us. I have called this the upside-down nature of the Kingdom of God, and it is within this kind of counterintuitive nature that Jesus so often spoke. He told us that if we want to be first we must be last. If we want to be greatest we must choose to be least. These concepts look great on Bible pages where we read them but become very difficult to actualize in the realities that make up our own day-to-day living. There is something different about this way of living. A Recalculating of sorts has happened.

Recalculating

At times in my life I have been driving down a road and noticed I had already passed where I was going. Have you ever done that? Sometimes it was because I was sleepy, sometimes I simply found myself day dreaming. I think probably there have been times I was simply listening to a good song and got lost in it. But for whatever reason I suddenly discovered I was going the wrong way. I was going toward my destination and then all of the sudden realized I was going away from it. You know, you see an exit sign or building and you realize you have gone too far.

Or today, I have done this maybe you have had it happen. While using a GPS, all of the sudden you miss the exit. And it immediately says “Turn around when possible”, then the screen says “Recalculating.” You know this may surprise you, but if the GPS would have said Repent, you’re going in the wrong direction, it would have been correct. Repent means turn around.

Repent!

The word comes across as a rather stern, kind of austere word-one that is not used very often in today’s language. You rarely ever see it in print unless you are following someone on the road and see it on a bumper sticker, they will also have others warning about the fires of hell…right. But as we look at the Gospels, we see that of all of the words the writers could have used, both Jesus and John the Baptist chose to use the word repent as the first commandment regarding the arrival of the Kingdom of God. Both men issued a stark warning to the entire region of Galilee that its citizens were going in the wrong direction and that they needed to turn around immediately.

The Kingdom of God is not something we build or establish. It is a realm, it is God’s realm of rule-which we can enter into, that we receive. Just about every area of the Kingdom of God that we want, or should want, to enter into requires us to repent, to turn around. So, ….what is it that we are turning from? And, then, what are we turning toward? Well, the first thing is from our own ways and means of command and control. We are turning from our own demands to have our way and to accumulate all that we can for our own selfish stockpiles. We are turning to God and saying you are in control of my life. Your supply is sufficient for me. Lord if you want me noticed, or promoted, you can make that happen. If we want to experience the realm of God’s peace, we must become peacemakers. If we want to inherit the earth, we don’t fight for it. We learn meekness. If we want to live in the realm of God’s mercy, we become merciful ourselves. 

So in direct contrast to the kingdom of men, which are established and sustained through accumulating more and more by way of force and power, Jesus’ Kingdom is authenticated and perpetuated by the authority of love. The Jesus kind of love lays down its rights and privileges every day. This is what it means to pick up our cross daily.

Love is not merely a stepping back or a pacifistic stance. It does not stop at, “Don’t return evil for evil.” Rather, it moves forward, proactively we might say. It says, Return good for evil.” We could say the silver rule is “Do not do unto others what you do not want them to do to you.” But, The Golden Rule, Jesus’ rule is “Do unto others what you would have them do unto you.” So Jesus tells his Jewish listeners that when a Roman solder acts upon his legal (but oppressively and morally wrong) right to have them carry his gear for one mile, to smile and carry it two miles.

The ongoing effect of the Kingdom of God is that it constantly brings a holy disruption to our lives. It messes with our plans and definitions of both what is needed in life as well as who is worthy of our attention and devotion. This is the essence of servant hood in the Kingdom. 

In our case, we have signed our lives over to Jesus as Lord and Master. The glorious irony of it all is that rather than going into bondage, we move into the deepest essence of freedom we could have ever have imagined. We are free,…. free… from the never ending loop of always trying to get ahead.

So what it is not, is, that it is not a freedom from powerlessness, but instead is a freedom from our own form of predominance. What do I mean…I mean

It frees us, not from the state of being dominated, but from being dominating;

not from our sufferings, but from our apathy, our indifference towards suffering;

not from our guilt, but from our innocence, or maybe from the delusion of innocence which the life of domination has long ago spread throughout our very souls.

We do not have to read very far into the Gospels to see that Jesus clearly expects His followers to remain fully active within all aspects of culture but to do so from a different set of values and motivations. ..Right?!... I mean Jesus never wants us to leave our worlds. But, He wants us to live in them, but to live firmly grounded in the center of all things. Jesus never talks about a change of activities, a change in friends, or even a change of pace. He always talks about a change of heart. And this change of heart changes everything. Even when everything else in our life appears to remain the same. This is the meaning of “Set your hearts, “Minds” on His Kingdom first….and all these things will be given as well. What counts is where our minds are!

See, it is the redemptive nature of the Kingdom of God that shapes our values and motives. God wants us to possess and exercise power, but power from Him, not worldly power. This is demonstrated in a very powerful way in Mathew 4:1-11. Matthew records the motives and means of Jesus and the Kingdom in deep contrast to the motive and means of the kingdom of darkness. Satan temps Jesus in three ways.

Food- that which sustains life itself.

Satan attempts to bring the focus upon us as the only trusted provider for our livelihood. Jesus models the posture of the follower of God. It is the word of God that is the overarching sustainer of life. By feeding on and obeying the Word, we will be fulfilled and sustained in all aspects of life.

Safety and Security-who and what controls our life.

Fear and anxiety are at the top of the list of tactics that minions from the kingdom of darkness use to control us. Jesus was firm in His faith, radically trusting the Heavenly Father. He looked to God as the one who was in charge of His life and destiny.

Glory- our source of meaning.

Satan offered Jesus the Kingdom of the world if…if…He would only fall down and worship him. Hear me….that offer is still on the table for all of us. The truth about worship is that what or who we worship shapes our identity. Some people worship fashion, cars, a lifestyle, a home. They want to identify with a certain brand or status. Often the obsession becomes idolatrous. ….True Worship of God means that we derive our identity from Him.

The wilderness experience that Jesus overcame provides us with an idea of what to expect on a very consistent basis during the power encounters between two very powerful but opposing kingdoms. But we as children of The Kingdom live by a different set of values. We are guided by a different set of expectations. We live out of a different source of power. And, this confirms the character of the Kingdom of God. Those who follow Jesus must realize they are entering into a cosmic sized conflict with the enemy, a conflict they can only win by the power of The Spirit.

There is no doubt that most of us fail to maintain a conscious awareness of the spiritual battle we are in as children of the Light. The kingdom of darkness is as real as the chairs you are sitting in right now. It is unrelenting. So, drawing our strength from the Lord is not our only hope for victory; it is a sure hope for victory. You know, think about it, our only fight is that of faith. The rest of the battle is up to God. Living a lifestyle whereby we seek God’s agenda first and foremost is the initial and ongoing step toward the missional journey. If we are serious about entering the kingdom of God here and now, then we agree to God’s terms and God’s turns. What counts is where our minds are.

Response

This week I ask you to do your best to keep these two questions in mind:

First, what areas do I need to concentrate my repentance on in order to lay hold of the Kingdom of God?

Second, how can I assume the posture of a servant today? How can I serve in the situation at hand?

God’s Mission Has a Church!

John 3:16-17; 5:24; 14:26; 16:7; 17:18; 20:21

A third very key element in our desire towards Cultivating Missional Living is our understanding of the concept of missio dei. Our English rendering of this Latin term is, the Mission of God. It is God who has a mission to set things right in a broken, sinful world-to redeem and restore it to what he has always intended. This language emphasizes that mission is not primarily an activity of the church, but rather the activity of God. The church is God’s instrument sent into the world to participate in His mission. So, the church exists because of God’s mission, and not the other way around.

So mission is not the invention, responsibility, or a program of the church. Instead…it flows directly from the character and purposes of our missionary God. So….it is not the church that undertakes mission; it is the mission of God that establishes the church. Or, it is not so much that God has a mission for His church in the world, but that God has a church for His mission in the world.

It is not only crucial that we understand that our God has a mission, but equally important is it that we understand that His mission is larger than the church. We in the church often, wrongly, assume that the primary activity of God is in the church, rather than recognizing that God’s primary activity is in the world, and the church is God’s instrument sent into the world to participate in His redemptive mission. Instead of thinking of the church as an entity that simply sends missionaries, we should instead view the church as the missionary. Among other things, this shift in perspective will bring about radical changes in two particular areas.

First, a mission of God perspective will shape our thinking about the form and function of the church.

Typically, churches view missions as simply one program or activity among many other equally important functions of the church. So, the missions “program” is seen alongside other programs such as music, Bible Study, men’s and women’s ministry, youth, and children’s ministry and so on. When missions is viewed in this way, the main business of missions is to determine how to spend the mission budget rather than to view the entire work of the church as an exercise in mission. But, when a church begins to define itself as an agent of God’s mission, it will begin to organize every activity of the church around the mission of God….So, missions as the organizing principle means that missions goes beyond being some sort of optional activity or program for our church.

Actually it is the organizing axis of the church. (missions) The life of the church revolves around it. This is not to say that we do not have worship, develop community, and make disciples, but that these are catalyzed by and organized around the mission function. Only in this way can we be truly missional. Merely adding events or special outreach days to our church schedules will not develop missional people nor make us a missional church.

So to help clarify this issue of God’s Mission as the organizing principle for all other activities of the church, I again say I do not want to minimize the need and importance of the other functions of the church. But I’m simply stating that no other function of the church can rightly be the organizing principle, or the reason we come together in the first place. Worship should not be the reason. Fellowship, what I tend to call community these days, should not be the reason. Even, discipleship and evangelism should not be the reason.

Instead, worship, community, discipleship and evangelism. And every other important activity of the church are properly understood and initiated only when viewed through the lens of mission. And, please hear me, this is my passion in this life, it is what I beg God for, God help me give them the vision you have given me for Your Mission. 

I wish there was a pair of glasses I could buy for you that, would give you the vision God has given me of Worship, and Small Groups and Bibles Study and Discipleship, when seen through Missional Glasses. Without them everything is blurred.

The Second significant shift that occurs with a mission of God perspective deals with our starting point for missional activity.

When we begin to see the church (individually and collectively) as the sent, missionary people of God, we no longer view the church as the jumping-off point when thinking about mission. Instead, we look for God’s activity in our local setting as the place to begin our missional engagement.

Among other things, what this means is that the nature and shape of mission cannot be decided beforehand, but must be discerned in relation to God’s participation in a local context. Instead of front-loading mission plans and strategies with what we think the people in the community need, we begin by listening and learning to what God is already doing. Then, and only then after our discerning what God is doing in our particular setting do we then ask how God wants us to participate with Him.

Our Response

Consider these four D’s of Missional engagement.

Discover-If it is truly God’s Mission and not ours, then we must discover where God is at work.

The first step in discovering what God is doing is through listening. Individually and collectively we must cultivate our ability to listen well on three fronts-to God, the local community, and each other.

It is simply impossible to ascertain the movement of God without carving out significant time to listen to his voice through prayer and scripture as well as the voices of those we desire to serve.

Discern- In addition to listening, participating in God’s mission will involve the very difficult task of discernment. Not only will we need to discern what God is already doing, but we will need to ask the follow up question, In light of our gifts and resources, how does God want me to participate in what he is doing? The fact is we can’t do it all, which is true for both individual followers of Jesus as well as local church members. But it is also true that God has gifted us all to do something! The point of discernment is to determine where and how to participate in God’s mission.

Do-This may seem obvious, but the process of discernment is useless if we do not obey what God is calling us to do. When God prompts us to participate in what he is doing in the lives of others, we must be obedient to respond.

Why is that, because no matter how great our plans for a community might be, it may not be what the community really needs? We can’t assume we know. Instead, we must listen-listen to God and listen to the community. Then we must act.

Debrief- Throughout this process of engaging God’s mission we must create opportunities to reflect on our missional involvement. Sometime this may simply mean individual down time to reflect upon our activities. We may need to ask God to affirm our involvement, or to ask for clarity of direction. But it will also mean we must carve out time to reflect with others in our faith community. We need to hear what others are seeing and sensing concerning God’s activities and to hear the stories of how others are engaging God’s mission. In this way it is important for us to be in the position to offer feedback.

See to participate in the mission of God is to play a personal and vital role in the movement of God’s redemptive mission. Ridgecrest our God is moving us into His missionary adventure.