Last Sunday, in the intro talk to our message series "Focus", we talked about the parable of the talents from Matthew 25. We talked about how Jesus was teaching about the kingdom of Heaven, but the real issue that He was teaching everyone about was how to live and maintain in uncertain times...in situations where there is limited info and visibility is hampered.
In that parable, we learned that that zeroing in on the small things...the moment by moment decisions and honoring God with each one, keeps us in focus (which, is all about zeroing in on the small things and that's why they are so big.)
In that context, we talked about the guy with the 5 talents, 2 talents and the 1 talent...interesting bit of knowledge on those guys that I forgot to bring out. A talent was the largest single unit of money back then in Jerusalem. It was equal to 10,000 denari. Interestingly enough, a denari was basically looked upon as one days wage....or 10,000 days of work. If you worked somewhere for around 40 years, you'd probably hit 10,000 days of work or somewhere thereabouts...which in our culture is basically your working lifespan as an adult, give or take a few years. In a sense, the talent was a life or a life's work.
When you begin to look at the parable of the talents as basically a "life" producing other "lives" and multiplying themselves in the Christian context...you begin to see the picture even more clear, as the layers of this teaching story really play out. It spoke to me as in "what am I doing to multiply life with the life that I've been given?" Or in other words, with this life-giving gospel that God has charged us all to take to masses and masses of spiritually dead people...am I hiding it in a hole in the ground or am I working smartly to allow God to use me to increase what He has?
Please pray for us at Bay West Church as we attempt to be the Church of Jesus to the people in West Palm Bay, Florida.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Monday, August 9, 2010
The way...
1 “Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me.
2 There is more than enough room in my Father’s home. If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?
3 When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am.
4 And you know the way to where I am going.”
5 “No, we don’t know, Lord,” Thomas said. “We have no idea where you are going, so how can we know the way?”
6 Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me.”
John 14:1-6 (NLT)
These verses are pretty familiar to those around church...but in these verses, we zoom by wisdom every day. I think that all of us that follow Christ, at one time or another, have felt Thomas' pain..."God, I have no idea where you are going with this." We've all sought direction. We fall into a trap of thought that paralyzes us. It says "If I can't picture the end result or know the exact end destination, then how can I know which way to go today?" We all feel as though we need to see the end result to know how to proceed., but that's just not true.
We treat life like Google maps. We have to know the ending address and we want to plug that in to let our personal Google app generate the map...then we want to choose the options of the roads we want to take to get to the end destination. One problem is that God doesn't work that way.
He's already generated the map...and He's not giving it to us to manage. He's in full possession of that. If He handed it to us, the complexity of the plan would probably blow our minds and we'd be filled with thoughts of "no way THAT'S going to work." So what He does is give us, not the whole enchilada, but one decision at a time. He calls out the instruction and we move. That's the point of this Scripture.
Jesus said "I am the way"...I will be your momentary guide. Don't look for the end, look for Me..just go where I go and do what I do.
"I am the truth"...I will never steer you wrong.
"I am the life"...do not look for life's fulfillment and purpose outside of me. Anything you find to fulfill those roles will break like plastic when you lean on them...only I can handle them.
"No man comes to the Father but through Me." I'm all you need to know.
That's about it. It's really about that simple. Need direction? Make the next decision you make be the most God-honoring one you can. One after one, one breath at a time...from the little to the big...
2 There is more than enough room in my Father’s home. If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?
3 When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am.
4 And you know the way to where I am going.”
5 “No, we don’t know, Lord,” Thomas said. “We have no idea where you are going, so how can we know the way?”
6 Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me.”
John 14:1-6 (NLT)
These verses are pretty familiar to those around church...but in these verses, we zoom by wisdom every day. I think that all of us that follow Christ, at one time or another, have felt Thomas' pain..."God, I have no idea where you are going with this." We've all sought direction. We fall into a trap of thought that paralyzes us. It says "If I can't picture the end result or know the exact end destination, then how can I know which way to go today?" We all feel as though we need to see the end result to know how to proceed., but that's just not true.
We treat life like Google maps. We have to know the ending address and we want to plug that in to let our personal Google app generate the map...then we want to choose the options of the roads we want to take to get to the end destination. One problem is that God doesn't work that way.
He's already generated the map...and He's not giving it to us to manage. He's in full possession of that. If He handed it to us, the complexity of the plan would probably blow our minds and we'd be filled with thoughts of "no way THAT'S going to work." So what He does is give us, not the whole enchilada, but one decision at a time. He calls out the instruction and we move. That's the point of this Scripture.
Jesus said "I am the way"...I will be your momentary guide. Don't look for the end, look for Me..just go where I go and do what I do.
"I am the truth"...I will never steer you wrong.
"I am the life"...do not look for life's fulfillment and purpose outside of me. Anything you find to fulfill those roles will break like plastic when you lean on them...only I can handle them.
"No man comes to the Father but through Me." I'm all you need to know.
That's about it. It's really about that simple. Need direction? Make the next decision you make be the most God-honoring one you can. One after one, one breath at a time...from the little to the big...
Monday, August 2, 2010
One old adage debunked...
"You can tell how popular the pastor is by how many people show up on Sunday morning.
You can tell how popular the church is by how many people show up on Sunday night.
You can tell how popular Jesus is by how many people show up at prayer meeting."
This is an old adage from church leadership from a while back. Someone should be due this quote and usually it holds true...BUT...not at Bay West last Sunday. Why? Because we experienced our largest total in the worship service for 2010, but there was one thing missing...the campus pastor, ME!
Some guys might be a little sad and while I guess I was disappointed that I couldn't experience it with you, the first thing for me was to let out a "YES!"...on the inside, because Matt texted me the total while I was in church in Arlington, TX. (and yes, I checked the text message...couldn't wait so I did it during the "welcome" time at the Church on Rush Creek, where Katye and I attended on Sunday). That's exactly what I want to see in our campus and church, a body that comes because of a love for Christ and not a love for a particular leader or anything.
Some accepted thoughts that I've enjoyed seeing fall so far as well...
"You can't grow a church in Palm Bay, for some reason." - God's proving that wrong.
"You can't grow a church without the cherry location." - While we love our school, we are out on the outskirts of east buddha..as we say in Bama)
"You need a lot of experience to get it done." campus pastor - 1st timer, worship leader - 1st timer, children's leader - 1st timer and MANY of our leaders are taking on their first shot at both their responsibilities AND being a portable church. God has brought the wisdom.
"People over a certain age won't attend a portable church..." - WRONG
"People over a certain age won't attend if you don't ________ {insert church tradition here}" - God proves that wrong every Sunday.
What I've enjoyed seeing is that our services at Bay West are LARGELY ageless...one of the most diverse churches generationally I've been around.
Some popular stereotypes about church I'd like to continue to see broken...
"Americans are too lazy and self-absorbed to give and serve sacrificially."
"Churches only care more about what goes on inside their walls than what goes on outside their walls."
Please don't see this as "pride", because our people only go as far as our God moves us and sustains us and guides us. If we give in to God and His leading, all these things and many more restrictions can be broken because God is limitless...He does whatever He wishes.
That's the lesson here...if you submit to God, the limits that you thought were there, probably won't be and you'll live a life that is bound only by the limits that God, not man, puts on it.
Please pray for us as we continue to try to submit to God's leading and be the church in Palm Bay for Christ that He wants at Bay West Church.
You can tell how popular the church is by how many people show up on Sunday night.
You can tell how popular Jesus is by how many people show up at prayer meeting."
This is an old adage from church leadership from a while back. Someone should be due this quote and usually it holds true...BUT...not at Bay West last Sunday. Why? Because we experienced our largest total in the worship service for 2010, but there was one thing missing...the campus pastor, ME!
Some guys might be a little sad and while I guess I was disappointed that I couldn't experience it with you, the first thing for me was to let out a "YES!"...on the inside, because Matt texted me the total while I was in church in Arlington, TX. (and yes, I checked the text message...couldn't wait so I did it during the "welcome" time at the Church on Rush Creek, where Katye and I attended on Sunday). That's exactly what I want to see in our campus and church, a body that comes because of a love for Christ and not a love for a particular leader or anything.
Some accepted thoughts that I've enjoyed seeing fall so far as well...
"You can't grow a church in Palm Bay, for some reason." - God's proving that wrong.
"You can't grow a church without the cherry location." - While we love our school, we are out on the outskirts of east buddha..as we say in Bama)
"You need a lot of experience to get it done." campus pastor - 1st timer, worship leader - 1st timer, children's leader - 1st timer and MANY of our leaders are taking on their first shot at both their responsibilities AND being a portable church. God has brought the wisdom.
"People over a certain age won't attend a portable church..." - WRONG
"People over a certain age won't attend if you don't ________ {insert church tradition here}" - God proves that wrong every Sunday.
What I've enjoyed seeing is that our services at Bay West are LARGELY ageless...one of the most diverse churches generationally I've been around.
Some popular stereotypes about church I'd like to continue to see broken...
"Americans are too lazy and self-absorbed to give and serve sacrificially."
"Churches only care more about what goes on inside their walls than what goes on outside their walls."
Please don't see this as "pride", because our people only go as far as our God moves us and sustains us and guides us. If we give in to God and His leading, all these things and many more restrictions can be broken because God is limitless...He does whatever He wishes.
That's the lesson here...if you submit to God, the limits that you thought were there, probably won't be and you'll live a life that is bound only by the limits that God, not man, puts on it.
Please pray for us as we continue to try to submit to God's leading and be the church in Palm Bay for Christ that He wants at Bay West Church.
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