Hope In Grace
How do you weather the storms of this life? There are lots of things that we do mentally an emotionally to get through them and they amazingly look like the same things that people do when a regular storm is coming. Lets look at a few.
Evacuation.
Often when a big storm is on the way the authorities tell us to evacuate. Get out of the path of the storm. It makes a lot of sense because the storm can’t hurt you if you are not in its path. It also makes sense when you consider that stuff is just not as important as your life. You can rebuild even after a devastating loss of your home and possessions. Run away is a good battle plan when it comes to dealing with sin, but most of the time evacuation is a bad battle plan in most of life’s difficulties. You see that is because the things you would abandon are too important. What would happen if you quit your job every time the boss said something you didn’t like or criticized your work? How would it work out in any of the key relationships in your life if you bail when the going gets tough?
Board Up the Windows
Another thing that people often do when a storm is coming is to board up the windows. This is a good plan in a physical storm because one of the things that happens is that stuff flies around and it can blow right through your windows. When the windows break then the rain and wind can get right to the interior of your house ruining everything it touches. Once again, those in a storm in their personal lives often employ this strategy. They put up boards over any way that people can impact them and they don’t let anyone in. It does work. It keeps everything out from the vulnerable middle. No hurts can get in and in isolation feel like you are safe. There is a problem with not letting anything in. Not only is the bad stuff kept out but the good stuff is too. The reality is you are not just protected but you are trapped inside. In addition, no one can see in. So while everything looks normal from the outside usually the storm is raging on the inside. You don’t have any help and often no one even knows you are in trouble.
While evacuating and boarding up the windows might be wise when it comes to physical storms, a completely different strategy is called for in the middle of most of our life difficulties. Rather than run away or bunker up, we should hold onto hope. Not just any hope will do either; our hope must be in Christ. Hope in Christ keeps us in place rather than run away. We know that every storm can be conquered with Christ. He is the one who calls to the weary and those without hope and gives us rest. Hope in Christ speaks to attitudes that can change and forgiveness that can be delivered. In Christ any pain can be healed. In physical storms there are places you can run away to where the storms are not. In life storms there is no place like that. The evacuation centers from life storms are usually just band aids disguising as solutions.
Hope in Christ also keeps us away from the self-defeating strategy of boarding up. If our hope is in Christ then we don’t have to fear things coming in because our core will be secure no matter what. Yes bad things get in but we can deal with them and we can allow the good things in too. We also don’t have to fear transparency because in Christ there is no condemnation rather there is forgiveness and restoration. With our hope in Christ we can let the wind blow.
Peter was writing to a people for whom stroms were coming, and this week we will look at how we can put our hope in the grace of Jesus Christ.
See you at church.
Pastor Chris
Step In – 5-4-2018
Step In
The Jordan River was in spring flood and there was no easy way to get across. God did not tell Joshua to hold up Moses’ staff so they could go across on dry land. Just the opposite, they had to Step In. When they did God worked a miracle and the people of God were able to cross over into the Promised Land. Acting on faith is difficult. We don’t do it out of blind trust but rather the informed trust of relationship. God has demonstrated his faithfulness over and over so we are willing to act in in faith, willing to Step In.
We as a church are being given an incredible opportunity and an incredible responsibility. God is calling us into a neighborhood where there isn’t a church. We do not have a reputation there, and we are not known to the vast majority of the folks who live there. How will they know us? What is the reputation we will build in this neighborhood? What impact will we make on their lives?
For us to get to the important task of answering those questions we have to cross over a river in flood to get there. Gone is the era where the neighbors all come together and raise up a church. The planning, permits, studies, drawings, and the entire process is complicated and daunting. God is already at work in providing some great friends to walk with us on this journey in the engineering, design, and construction fields. Praise the Lord! And when the time comes, it will take a lot of hard work as we will all have a part in digging, building, painting, etc. But before we can get there we will have to raise the funds.
“Step In” means that we are going forward. We don’t yet know how we will accomplish it. We can’t see how God is going to work it all out. But we are confident that he will not leave us standing in the middle of the Jordan. This week we launch our capital campaign. We begin the process of seeking the funds we need to accomplish what God is calling us to.
God does not have a cash flow problem. Our God has the resources to accomplish this and much more! Our part is to go out and invite people to participate in the blessing of joining in an effort of God. We are going to make our need known to the community, our friends, and our fellow laborers in the gospel. Our hope is that people who have a heart for children, a heart for the lost, a heart for a community, a heart for being a neighborhood church will see our heart for these as well and be drawn by the Spirit to join with our efforts. Is that your heart? Are you ready to Step In?
See you at church,
Pastor Chris
Outstanding
I will admit it, even though I know it is a country song, camo is my favorite color. I love camouflage because I love to hunt, and it makes me so much more effective in pursuit of game when they look but can’t see me. I loved camouflage even before I was old enough to hunt. It used to be my modus operandi. Stay in the background and don’t be noticed. Hide in plain sight. Don’t do anything to draw attention to yourself.
We often like to do that in our lives. Blend in with everyone else. When they laugh we laugh, when they are upset we are upset. We become steeple to our coworkers, our peers, and all of those we allow to influence us. Blending in is safer. You don’t get picked on. You don’t attract criticism or invite comment into your life. But look out if you start to stand out.
When we have Jesus our lives will stand out. He changes everything, and everything is changed in our life saving encounter with Him. This change comes about because we are transformed at the core of our identity. So much so that Jesus describes it as being born again. Where once our identity was built on things of this world, we are transformed and those elemental and core aspects of our very self become centered on Jesus. What is at the core of your identity? Is it made up of things from this world or has it been transformed by Jesus?
In the next few weeks we will look at that very question, and explore how we are being called to be… outstanding.
See you at church,
Pastor Chris