Stepping Out in Faith

This past week I was having a conversation with a friend and he made a good observation.  When comfort and familiarity guide our decisions in our spiritual lives it says a lot about our theology.   If the greatest good in our church experience is familiarity and feelings we end up missing out on the place where Jesus wants to lead us.

The book of Exodus tells the story of the journey of God’s children as they left slavery in Egypt and headed into the wilderness in pursuit of something better that God has promised them.  The children of Israel had cried out to God in their desperate situation in Egypt.  Exodus 3:24 says that “God heard their groaning.”  God’s response was to send Moses as a leader to deliver them from their captivity.

The children of Israel watched God do amazing things as he sent them into the wilderness.  Yet, while they were in the wilderness they continually longed to return to the comfort of their slavery in Egypt.  The wilderness was different, difficult, and scary.  The wilderness required them to depend on God alone.  The wilderness was preparation for what was to come. 

In our minds, we think about how crazy it was for the Israelites to desire the slavery of Egypt over the Promised Land where God desired to lead them.  Then in our own lives we seek out the comfort of what we have known in the past.  We stick to the familiar as the greatest good in our lives.  When God asks us to step forward in faith and it starts to get uncomfortable we start to look for our own way “back to Egypt.”  Jesus has not called us to pursue the way things used to be for our comfort and a sense of peace and contentment.  Scripture is clear that as we follow in faith we will face adversity but we are to cast our anxiety upon Jesus allowing him to guard our hearts and minds (Philippians 4:4-7).  May God bless you as you follow him by stepping forward in faith.

Ashkum Campus... Awesome!

The first meeting of our Ashkum campus happened this past Sunday.  Our church had more than 100 people upstairs and more than 90 people downstairs worshiping simultaneously.  Over the next two months we will be preparing for our Easter official launch day as one church meeting in two different locations.  There are lots of things to be done but it is great to see our core team forming.  This was a great first Sunday and a huge reminder that the location doesn’t make us one church.  It is the mission of Jesus that makes us one church.

It is exciting to see people who have embraced the mission to go into the world and make an impact for Jesus.  Throughout this journey we have witnessed God open doors and the fact that we are on track at this point to launch this Easter is only because God continues to open doors.  I am thankful for everyone who has given up the comfort of church as usual to make an eternal impact for the Kingdom.

Thank you for your continued prayers in seeing this campus take the good news of Jesus to the communities in the Western portion of Iroquois County.

Equipped

As we prepare for our first ONE Conference tomorrow I am reminded of just how important people partnering together in ministry is.  This conference is one way that we will equip our church family even though we will be meeting together in two separate locations.

The Bible provides a model for ministry that exists for the church to be united and growing in maturity so that it builds itself up in love (Eph. 4:13-16).  As a church we have embraced something we call an Ephesians 4 ministry model.  The focus of this ministry model is not in doing ministry for people, but instead equipping people for the work of ministry.  As a church family made up of people from many different denominational backgrounds it is important that we all fully understand and embrace this biblical concept.  This model is based upon what the apostle Paul wrote to the believers in Ephesus:

“And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, ” (Ephesians 4:11–13, ESV)

We talk about equipping people for ministry a lot as a church staff because it is the driving motivation behind everything we do.   My heart for each of you is to grow in depth and love for Christ (Eph. 2:19).  Our part in growing in Christ is to actively engage in the ministry he has prepared in advance for us to do (Eph. 2:10). 

By actively engaging the gifts God has given to each of us we grow both individually and as a church body.  While there is nothing we can do to gain more of God’s love or favor, there is a need for us to grow up (Col. 1:28).  The goal of participating in ministry is that we would be people who look more and more like Jesus.  Serving in ministry both inside and outside the local church is the practical way that we love others.

When we are focused on investing our lives in loving others we have little time to be overwhelmed or discouraged by our personal circumstance or failed expectations of others.  When we engage our lives in loving others in ministry we grow, looking more and more like Jesus.