Altar-ology

I had athoughts recently about Christian altars in the Sanctuary.  As a pastor, I wonder if anything of supernatural value actually takes place at them as part of worship service.  I also wonder if they are a fad that has been passed by, after all, they don’t seem to make same impact that the mourner’s bench did. 

Many fight coming to the altar today.  Christians and church-goers alike do not want to go because of fear.  Yet, it is not a right fear; if there is one.  It seems that people do not go because they are afraid of what they will look like in front of others in the church.  They are afraid that people will know that they have work to do in their spiritual lives.  Hey, we all do. 

Some have a healthy fear of the altar.  The altar should represent death to us.  It should be a place where people come to die to selves.  In other words, this is where we come to put our inner-man to death.  Yet, some might be afraid that the pastor is going to find out something or ask them to do something that is too personal.  Well, that is what God does. 

A problem I see with is that real work is may not be happening there anymore.  When people finally respond, some might be there to “help” the pastor because they do not want him to become discouraged.  When they arrive, some may think the pastor is taking too long in prayer.  Some may be there because someone shamed them.  Some may go down there because their friends are there.  They do not want to be left out.

Here is the challenge of the altar we Christians need to consider again.  As I mentioned earlier, the altar should be a place where someone goes to die.  This is a harsh act.  We do not want to put our egos to death.  We should not see Christians who were moved to come down, simply get up from the altar because the pastor said Amen.  Instead, people should be distraught and broken while at the altar.  I find it amazing that God works on people just before lunch and accomplishes what He wants to just in time to go to lunch.   

At the altar, people should be praying through; not simply going to say sorry without having the intention to change. Praying through means that we need to stay at the altar earnestly pleading that God change us from who we want to be into who He wants us to be.  This is why the altar is a place of great work that can only be performed by the Holy Spirit.  It should be an emotional moment in our lives.  It is at the altar that we go to be transformed; not to clear our consciences, but to cleanse them. 

Spurgeon saidonce  that the altar was a place where you and I can feel the sting of sin which helps us to get away from sin.  Many today simply want to stand up or raise their hand when the sermon is over so that the pastor will dismiss them in a timely manner.  Yet, I believe that God has more that He wants to accomplish with them and bids them to come and die in front of the church so that they can be transformed. 

I realize that God can work on us anywhere, but the altar still seems to be a place, when rightly used, to accomplish His tasks.  Laying broken at the altar is when the Spirit begins to recreate that which is distorted in us.  Where else are we going to have the best chance to die with our brothers and sisters in Christ?

Christian classification

One of the characteristics that I see in the American Christian Church is the way Christians, both Lay and Clergy, blow off certain churches.  The thinking seems to go along these lines: That church will not change.  That church is too old. That church is out of touch with reality.  Nothing happens at the church.  That church has bad music.  That church has a bad preacher.  That church has a bad doctrine.  I think you get the picture, some churches get classified by people because they have a different organic make-up than others. 

Another reason for the blow off could be money.  After all, we living our Christian lives in the era of the mega-church.  This means that there is not enough money to do the ministry the way it should be done.  Well, the way it should be done according to different groups of people.  Yet, should we classify a church according to her wealth?  I think not.  The problem with money is that it has the tendency to focus on the new fad of Christianity.  Moreover, it has the power to hinder pray between a church and her Groom. 

If the church is really the Lord’s, then there is not a money issue.  Yet, if a church is not the Lord’s, but has money, it may take a while to know how that church should be classified. 

Another way we classify churches is through leadership.  Pastors are continually competing with each other so that we can attract people.  Church leaders look for certain types of men and women in hopes of trying to find the next Rob Bell, Perry Noble, Rick Warren, and etc.  I don’t know the stats, but I wonder how many books are being written to teach pastors how to be like these guys as leaders, compared to how many books are being written with the purpose to teach pastors how to be Spirit led.  You know, Spirit led instead of CEO leading. 

Some churches seem more likely to be used by God because it makes sense to most Christians.  Yet, if unlikely churches preach the Cross, then church classification could be dangerous.  After all, doesn’t it just seem like a wise choice that some churches cannot be effective and others can?  Maybe the Bible had some of this mind when it addressed the way we tend to think.  “Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe” (1 Corinthians 1:20-21).

Ultimately, God can work through any church He pleases.  The moment Christians start classifying a church is the moment that God is no longer trusted to be God. 

If you, no matter who you are, have written off a church because you have classified it, then you need to examine whether or not you are using the wisdom of the world or the foolishness of God to make your judgments. 

God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him (1 Corinthians 1:27b-29). 

Christians, stop the classification.  I have been part of a church that was down to 8 people and witnessed what God did those who believed that He could.  Christians if you want a challenge, go where it seems unlikely for God to work.  You will be surprised at what He can do. 

Right Worship

While at Family Camp this week I have enjoyed the worship and preaching.  This year our district had The Difference from Southern Wesleyan University come to lead our worship in music segment of the nightly service.  It is great!  I’m blown away with the amount of talent that God has given to the SWU; it is like that every year.  Let me tell you, those young guys and gals, I guess I can say that since I am 40 now, really give it up to Jesus.  Hey, isn’t that awesome!  I say yes!

I have sensed that not everyone is excited about allowing a different style of music to be played during our Holiness    camp setting.  It is possible that some think it is the world being mixed in with the church.  I confess, as a person who was young in the Lord, I entertained those types of thoughts some time ago too.  I think God brought me out of that by showing me that He is not limited in the ways that He chooses to connect with people.  Besides, what is right worship?  Jesus said that it is in spirit and truth.  In the OT God desired obedience over sacrifice and noted that His people worshiped Him with  their lips but their hearts were far from Him. 

One thing that I come back to time after time is the thought that people who are lost (those who are not trusting in Christ as their Savior) are not having heated debates about what style of music should be played during church service.  American Christianity is something else sometimes.  We continuously find ways to focus on everything but what matters.  Jesus forgive us!  Listen, I can worship traditionally, or worship with older tradition like chants, or contemporary.  You get the picture. 

Without going into a long story about an experience I had with Christ I will tell you that the outcome of it was that I sent an email to my pastor and his wife and asked them if they wanted to come over to my house to worship with me.  It was in the middle of the day and everyone else was at work or I would have called them too.  Now this was a lot like a child calling another up and asking the child to come over and play games for the day.  I didn’t have any special music in mind, I only knew that the Presence of Christ was with me and that I wanted my friends to worship Him with me. 

Wouldn’t we Christians do better to focus on bringing the lost to the Presence of Christ so that they could make a decision to accept Him or reject Him?  I think so.  But, most of us believe that before we can invite someone to church that the music has to be a certain way or that the pastor has to be a certain way.  We Christians are wasting precious time that some who are lost do not have debating over whether or not modern music is better than traditional music and vice versa. 

It is funny how many are in a continuous search for the right ministry or church to be part of.  Can we ever be honest admit that it is ultimately about us instead of Christ?  It tires me.  The path that leads to the Presence of Christ is to truly seek Him and only Him through humbleness and Holiness.  Good, or bad, music has less to do with it than we would like to admit.  It is a tool that the Spirit uses to help put me into the right attitude.  Seeking Him is about thirsting for Him and when you find Him you bring others to the drinking hole where you found refreshing. 

So what is right worship?  Is it seeking Christ with the heart?  Or is about finding the right pastor, the right type of music, and making sure things are done the way they have always been done?  Then if everything meets our standards then we will give approval and consider that to be our worship for the day.  Let me tell you that giving our approval is missing the bulls-eye by a mile.  Meaningless.  It is about us coming in to His house so that we can receive His mercy.  Then we adore Him because of who He is.   

So I say let’s not burn up our energies on this issue.  Instead, let’s use our energies to seek Him and bring the lost to Him.  This is right worship to me.

What do you want by Kerry Willis

Here are some hi-lights from a sermon by Rev. Willis on Wednesday night.  He used many different Scriptures but here are most of them.  1 Samuel 13:14, Psalm 37:4, Matthew 5:6, Psalm 139:23-24, Psalm 84:1-12

Matthew 5:6; desire God and He will give Himself to you; this should not be a verse used by us to seek worldly gain. 

Psalm 139:23-24; our thoughts matter to God.  This should be something to think about.

Jesus does not want 1st place in your life.  Instead, He wants to be your life!  The Rich Young Ruler’s story is baffling because of how it ends.  Consider, all those who were in this ruler’s life were only around him because of what he had in wealth.  They wanted to be his friend because of what he could do for them.  Yet, Jesus told him to sell everything and follow Him and you (the ruler) will still have Him (Christ) near.

We should be convicted when we let intercessary prayer be about the people getting what they want instead of it being about God getting what He wants.  This is because we want to please people instead of God. 

Rev. Willis’ advice is not choose silver over gold.  Christ is the Gold.  Here are some things that are silver: Prosperity, Possessions, and Pleasure.  These are at least 3 pieces of silver that we want more than Gold (Christ). 

Application

We need to get over doing something great for God too because we should be content with His Presence.  Be delivered and desire to know God.  After David’s sin with Bathsheba he wrote Psalm 51 and begged God to take away His Spirit. 

Definition of evil according to the Bible in Sermon on the Mount is those who do not know Christ.  Many Christians busy themselves with things, and even God’s work, but never take the time to know Christ.  This will be bad when we stand before Christ. 

In John 1:37-38; these two disciples sought the Presence of Christ.  After John the Baptist noted who Jesus was they promptly followed Jesus.  Paraphrase: Jesus said what do you want, they answered to know where you are staying. 

A thought I had

The problem with Christians is that we want to run the discussion about following Christ into the ground.  We want to talk theology and theory, but we do not want to get down to the real business of dying to ourselves.  Stop being busy looking and trying to do something great and be satisfied with His Presence.

Sunday Recap

We are in the middle of our series “Survey Says . . .”  As I think I have mentioned earlier, we handed out a list of topics that the church was able to vote on so that they could hear a sermon about it.  Last week was The Difference Between Wesleyans and Baptists.  That sermon was a very hard topic to preach.  I think that it should have been a topic for Sunday school; but not everyone will come to Sunday school.  So it seems that the pulpit has had to take on some of the Sunday school responsibilities of teaching.  I think that is good in some ways, but I am still a supporter of Sunday school.  So here is last Sundays recap.

• The topic was Why don’t I get along with others.  The sermon was Harmony with Others.
• The main point in the message was that our relationship with others reflects the health of our relationship with Jesus Christ. 
• Scripture was Ephesians 4:15-32; yet, all of Ephesians 4 and The Sermon on the Mount give direction on this topic. 
• The first point was change brings harmony.  In other words, we must dies to ourselves so that we can truly repent.  Repent means to be sorry enough to make a 180 degree change.  Paul said “Put off the old man.”  Change from who we were before we met Jesus Christ.  That old person was influenced by the way the world sees things.  As Christians we know that the world is against Jesus Christ.  So we cannot please God by allowing ourselves to be influence by a fallen world.  We must die to that way of life.  If we allow ourselves to be influenced by the world, then there will always be conflicts between us and others. 
• The second point was that we must sacrifice for harmony.  In the world, when there is a conflict between us and others, and if we are not able to find peace, someone will suggest that we sacrifice for the sake of peace.  Yet, when the world suggests that we sacrifice this means that we compromise.  So that type of sacrifice is out of the question.  Paul points out in Romans that we are to present our “bodies as living sacrifices to God.”  This is not a compromise that says, “Okay God, to have peace with You, I will give You this much of Me.”  Instead, sacrifice in Paul’s mind was that we give ALL OF OURSELVES to Christ.  This is “putting on the new man.”  This is how we allow Christ to change that worldly influence in us so that the Holy Spirit can dwell in us which means that He will guide us in what is right and wrong.  This is where most Christians fall short in their relationship with Christ, which reflects poor relationships with others.
• Some commentary that I gave was that there should be a time in our walk with the Lord that we know that we have died to ourselves.  After this, there should be an experience that demonstrates that we are full of the Spirit.  I don’t mean spiritual gifts, but spiritual fruit.  Before our church can, as our mission statement says, “Transform our community and world with the Gospel of Jesus Christ,” we must be full of the Spirit.  Everything that we do flows from this central point.  We cannot care for others until we are surrendered to Christ and transformed ourselves by the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
• The last point was the Paul showed the way to harmony by giving direction about what a Christian life should like after “putting off and putting on.”  After being transformed by Christ, on the inside, we will desire not to do sinful things against our neighbor.  As a matter of fact, other people can do things that would anger others, but because of the love in our hearts for others, we will not want to do wrong to them when they do us wrong. 
• We discussed Holiness, a.k.a Sanctification, in our Sunday night Wesleyan Men’s group.  I shared what my experience was as well as failures since my experience. 
• The Wesleyan Women went to a lady’s house who has recently become a shut-in, hopefully not for long, and this is what I think it means to be part of a Christian community.  I endorse this.  We don’t have to always be at our church for a Sunday night service.  We should be in each others homes. 
• We had 41 in attendance for our AM service. 
• 31 for Sunday school.
• 31 for Sunday night. 
• Could these numbers indicate our relationship with Christ as a church?  We minister to approx. 70 different people.  And these people all come on different Sundays but we never get over 55 in attendance.  And, it was 74 degrees Sunday, very suspicious looking.  I have to say, I was tempted to call in sick .

The bottom-line is that we are in tough times as a nation.  It is imperative that each Christian be sold-out completely to Jesus Christ.  This means that He is first all of the time.  Every comes after Him.  It is time to quit being luke warm.  He will spit us out of His mouth if we remain this way.

Struggles that small Wesleyan Churches face in SC

I am living dangerously now.  Yep, you saw the title and know that this is going to be a debatable opinion.  Remember, it is my opinion.  I am not a researcher and I am not a big name.  So read it and know that these are my thoughts.

First, let me acknowledge that we serve a powerful God who can accomplish anything through those whom He desires.  If He is able to work through our small Wesleyan church too. 

Here are some possible problems.

• South Carolina is Baptist and Presbyterian country.  Yes, it is true!  We serve the same God, Jesus Christ.  Can we say it?  There is church competition.  What I mean is that there are other churches who are financially well off that can offer many different ministries to their attendees.  Child care is huge.  Professional musicians.  Great speakers.  Many different specialized ministries.  Unlike our earlier Wesleyans, when these churches build a church, they mean it!  Their facilities are beautiful and useful.  They can accomadate large amounts of people and hold community services.  In other words, they can be of a huge service to the community.  Yes, that is important. 
• There are only 48-50 Wesleyan churches in the entire state.  The good news is that we are working to fix this by planting churches.  Our brothers and sisters in other denominations have understood this for a long time.  They have been able to acheive a partnership with each other that is really awesome and this is how they take care of each other.  This is what we must do too.  Some Wesleyan churches are doing this already.  Yet again, we are small in number and time is what we will also have to work with. 
• We have had bad press in the past.  Some have called us a cult.  Pleeeezze.  People are shocked when we talk about Sanctification and when we acknowledge that we do not believe that once you are saved that you cannot lose your salvation.  Sorry.  Free will overrides that.  Now, listen.  Okay, the last is a non-issue.  Really it is.  Holiness is, and it is in the other denominations too. 
• It seems that some of our churches have hidden themselves away from the communities.  We did not want to be around sin.  Big mistake!  As a result, a lot of people that I talk to have not heard of Wesleyans and do not know where our churches are.  This is tough on advertisement. 
• Most of our facilities are outdated.  This leaves most pastors and laymen to choose between being missional or contemporary.  I would like to be both. 
• A lot of our churches are missing several generations.  This makes it tough to build strong children’s and youth ministries.  When this happens finances tend to go toward building needs and upkeep. 
• I think all churches are facing this next problem.  Because we live in the Bible belt it is a tougher assignment to get people to attend church and serve.  Consider, it is more of a social statement to attend church than to come out of a passion for Christ.  God and Sundays are those things that many take part in only on Sundays and then leave what was heard at church.   People have gotten used to the idea that God has chosen them and gives them finances which confirms that He has chosen them.  People get used to this.  Then there  really isn’t a need for God because we have the resources to take care of whatever problems might arise.  This leads to entitlement.  Yet, those who don’t have anything, anyone, or realize that God cares will come to Jesus.  But, they never hear because we are always entertaining ourselves. 
• The really most frustrating problem that we struggle with is that we cannot hire full-time youth pastors to minister to children and teens.  This is really hard to stomach because here is our future.  Man!  We can have all of the best intentions in the world.  We can dream.  We can talk.  But, nothing is going to happen until we have faith in God and sacrifice.  To get to the next step on the ladder we have to believe in God and give to God.  It has to be a united effort. 
• Southern Wesleyan helps us by being here.  This school helps us to get our name out there and put everyone at ease that we are not a cult. 

Listen, Baptists, Wesleyans, and etc.  We are all in this together.  To my fellow Wesleyans.  We have got to be more involved in our communities.  We especially have to be stepping out into the waters that only God can get us through.  We cannot please Him until we allow God to lead us into waters that we cannot navigate which will cause us to turn to Him by faith.  We must begin giving our resources to the next generations because they do not know Christ yet.  He is pursuing them in a big way.  If we do not join Him in His pursuit, then some might say that we are committing spiritual abortion.

Missional Small Church

How does a small church become missional?  This is a question many small church pastors might ask.  This is also a question that many witnesses for Christ might ask also.  While at New Life Wesleyan Church, we were missional in the late 90′s, and they still are.  This is where we focused on a ministry called the ROCK, Reclaiming Our Community’s Kids.  Our goal was to be Jesus, otherwise known as be Incarnational, to children. 

What each church should know is that each church is different.  We are different because God sets every mission up.  In other words, he creates the opportunities while preparing the church that already exists and while sending new lay people in to take part in the mission.  God goes before because He prepares the way, and God’s people must respond to His lead.  Duh!  We have heard that before.  Yet, what does it look like when God is leading you to a specific mission?

God uses frustration over injustices.  He breaks hearts.  Here is what frustrated our church and broke our hearts which brought us to action and this is what our mission looked like. 

Our community’s kids were not recieving proper love from the adults in their lives.  These kids were struggling with school, social skills, and having adequate clothing and a home.  Our kids did not have any adult in their life to create the sense of being valued.  They were not being heard.  Some were staying in multiple houses and where they stayed depended on where the party was the night before.  Some kids’ parents were working multiple jobs which meant they were too worn out to do things with them, or even cook supper at night.  In other words, our kids were too worried about what they needed to live in this life to learn another Vacation Bible School story about Jesus in the next. 

Notice that I said, “Our kids.”  You have to look at God’s children that way.  You have to own or take responsibility for the mission.  Plus, our goal was to let them know that Jesus wants to be part of their lives in this life.  Lordship now is what they needed too, on top of the sinner’s prayer to escape hell when they die.  Jesus wants to  be known now as the God who is with us. 

To other churches, mission may start to take root from frustration that some in the church might feel about any type of injustice that they see in the community.  This becomes the seed of something great.  Think about it.  If Christ’s people are frustrated about any type of injustice, then there is a huge chance that the Spirit of God is spurring that frustration so that we will get burdened enough to move. 

Next, someone needs to talk about a practical Jesus way of dealing with the injustice.  Practical means finding a way to be the hands and feet of Christ while sharing the Gospel.  One without the other won’t do.  They must be happen jointly.  This ministry must not be one that is duplicated from what someone else is doing.  A better way to say that is the ministry or mission should not be developed because someone else, who seems successful from doing that type of ministry, is doing it.  It is a ministry that should meet two requirements.  One is that the ministry fits the community, or situation, like a glove.  Two is that the ministry will have to be accomplished by faith.  This is important for God to demonstrate His awesome power to individuals.  Why?  He wants to show those who are lost that Jesus Christ is the answer.  But . . . He also wants to demonstrate His power to the individuals in the church too!  This is faith education 101. 

You will know that you are on the right track when the needs to run this ministry are being met continuously, by those outside of the church, those who did not know that there was a need, and from people inside the church who are willing to do without luxuries, like never before, and give their money or time.   This is when you are able to see God working.  This is when the church is supposed to join Him.  Joining God in His work is the only way to success.  God is missional and this is why His Church is led to be missional. 

Finally, for small churches, the mission might consume the entire focus of the church.  It may be all that the church will do.  Being missional is not necessarily a way to achieve growth.  Instead, it is how we introduce others to Christ.  When we expect to grow numerically from this mission or ministry, this is when we begin to get discouraged.  Pastors and lay people listen to me, “It is not about receiving, it is about sacrificing.”  Being missional will have a heavy work load for pastors and the men and women who attend church with a light pay off.  In other words, the pay off may be something different than what one might expect.  There will be a huge pay off in Heaven because people will receive Christ as their Savior, but it may not have anything to do with building a mega-church here on earth.

Sunday Recap

We had another good turnout Sunday.   We had 50 show up.  However, we were missing over 10-12 regulars.  When you are a small congregation, people missing from service has a way of deflating a good day. 

What is troubling is that we had such a good Sunday service last week and young families showed up.  The good news is that these young families want to learn about Jesus.  The bad news is that there were 67 people at our church which caused us to struggle to accomadate these people.  Plus, we found that we struggled to provide services to these young people such as kid’s ministry, kid’s Sunday school, and enough people to take care of the nursery. 

So, if you attend my church, or, if you attend another small church.  If it is possible, your pastor and church needs you.  The only way that we can provide services in a small, but growing church, is with our regular attendees.  Do not allow yourself to have the philosophy that the pastors will take care of everything.  Realize that God calls all to be involved in serving.  In a small church, everyone has to chip in and sacrifice.  Sacrifice may simply start with giving up every Sunday for God’s Kingdom.  Now, this does not mean vacations too.    

God has been sending us steady visitors.  Plus, it looks like some are hear to stay.  Praise the Lord! 

Pastor Jon has a good young adult group coming to our church too.  I am so happy. 

One of our newer Christians has been praying for God to send people to our church.  They have been coming.  Awesome!

We joined other churches at the Thanksgiving Community Service Sunday night.  This was a good experience.  It was good to mingle with other Christians and worship together.  Pastor Larry Burke of Golden Grove Wesleyan delivered a good sermon.  The choir, made up of different churches, sounded great! 

I believe that God is growing our church.  Likely, He is shaping all of us to be usable by Him for His purposes.  There is hope; we all have to hang in there and not lose sight of Jesus and His mission.

Can Churches and People be taught how to be Missional?

First of all, I want to clarify that I desire to be missional.  As a matter of fact, if I was looking for a church to attend with my family,  I would attend the missional church that is was capable of teaching the Word of God while striving to be missional.  In other words, there needs to be a good balance between missional and teaching God’s Word.  This means that one should not exist without the other.   

I am a Wesleyan pastor.  So if you are reading this article you should be aware that I am coming from a Wesleyan point of view.  Although, I do not claim that we Wesleyans have a lock on theology and are the only people who are right, I do, personally, feel more comfortable with the Wesleyan point of view.  Here is web site that you can see what we believe theologically compared to our Calvinist brothers. 

Anyway, theology between the camps is not really what I want to discuss.  I would rather hear both views  about whether or not we can teach churches and people to be missional or if we must be surrendered completely to Christ to be missional.  In other words, do we have to be full of the Spirit in such a way that we cannot help but be missional? 

1. From a Wesleyan theological point of view if we are Sanctified (Full of the Spirit and God’s love), do we need to be taught how to be missional?  If we have surrendered to Jesus Christ and asked HIm to come into our hearts so that He can be Lord of our life, and sought victory over our sinful nature, then He has filled us with the Spirit.  This would mean that we now have the nature of Christ in us and that our motives and desires have truly been changed.  If this is so, then we would instinctively know to be those who are sent to take the Gospel of Christ into the world. 
2. If we are Sanctified, then we have a natural love for God, others, and ourselves now.  This would mean that we are free from the bondage of selfishness so that we can give with great joy in our hearts to those who have needs.  We would not have to check the Sermon on the Mount because we would be living it.  It seems that if there are people and churches who are not living this way that there might be a spiritual problem.  If there is a spiritual problem, then are we really doing any good to teach people how to be missional? 
3. I hope this is wrong, but is the desire to be missional driven by the fact this type of Christ-living grows churches numerically and financially?  The danger in teaching others to be missional, and in people seeking to learn to be missional, is that we are only trying to appear to be something that we truly are not inwardly.  Again, if we have the nature of Christ now, then we are going to be missional because that is what we are now.  Why?  Because Jesus is. 
4.  To me, being missional is finding what upsets you in your community.  Once you find it, because of the love that you have for God and others, you will decide if it is something that only Jesus can fix.  If it is, then that is when His people spring into action.  If it is a church body, then they will all know what is expected of them if most are truly sold out to Jesus Christ. 
5. If we are not really Spirit led, of full of the Spirit, then when we seek to be missional can it just be classified as a social gospel?  Frankly, if we are not really surrendered to Christ, then we are merely taking part in community action that mirrors the governments purpose for community action. 

To my Wesleyan brothers and sisters: if you are trying to learn how to be missional, then have you forgotten your first love?  Our denomination was a movement first before it was a denomination.  When we were a movement, we were missional!  We were a movement because of our love for God and others.  We saw the world as a realm that needed delivered from the bondage of sin by our Savior.  Freedom was always at the forefront when it came to slavery and sin.  We helped to stop slavery, and for a while, we were used by the Holy Spirit to preach deliverance from sin ruling over us.  Now, we go to seminars and buy books to learn how to used by God.  It is time for us to surrender again to God’s will and seek to join Him in the work He is taking part in.  Yet, to see God’s work taking place would mean that we have to go out into the lowly places to help Him.  We can’t go until we love Him and others. 

One last word, I do not wish to say that we should not buy books and go to seminars.  My wish is that everyone would see that we must be sold-out to Christ to be truly missional.  I have been accused of being unteachable in the past because I was not gushing over reading books by those who are current.  Wow!  I do read some.  Yet, knowledge is knowledge.  But, love is what spurs us.

Another minister illustrates the sacrifice of clergy and laity

I have been reading the Padre’s blog for a while now.  Today I came across this post that I think all ministers and laity should consider.  There is tremendous sacrifice and dependency that accompanies giving.  I was thinking about the possibility of preaching about this subject before Christmas at our church.  I generally preach about stewardship in January; and still may.

I think this article is good because it is not me saying it.  So if you know me you will understand that I am always uneasy about teaching or preaching this subject.  I would much rather someone else do it. 

Here is my struggle.  I love our people enough that I want them to know God’s power and will for giving freely.  Yet, I don’t want anyone to think that I am pushing them to do something that appears to benefit me or the church.  Giving benefits the giver for eternity while receiving benefits the recipient for the time being.  Yet, both are taken care of by God.  Both receive from God when people give.  

It is hard to really know the Lord if you do not take part in giving.  I know I may have a comment come in and tell me that I have a poor understanding of God’s love.  Well, I disagree.  God is a Giver.  Giving is the heart of God.  We are  to be imitators of Christ who freely gave.   

Now, everyone can see from this article what type of faith some of us live by.  I have had to live by faith in God first, and in God’s people being obedient second.  This is where the rubber meets the road as a Christian as far as I am concerned.  Faith in God who can supply our needs grows and matures us when we must rely upon Him.  Yet, many who are financially comfortable and don’t give much struggle to learn about God’s heart of giving and sacrifice. 

I will be writing soon about sacrifice too.  Because sacrifice is not just for the missionary or the third world person.  God calls us all to sacrifice.  I would invite you to meditate about sacrifice and giving during this time of the year that spend money upon those who already have it and neglect those who don’t. 

God bless.