MY HUMANITY HAS FRAYED ENDS

Nine years into retirement from formal day-job and career commitments seems hardly possible for me. I officially retired from ‘formal’ Christian service in summer of 2008. That statement is not to be understood as retirement from Christian service or ministry. The key is the word ‘formal.’ I am a follower of Christ. Easter Sunday has now come and gone. The resurrection of Jesus Christ remains the essential element of Christian faith. ‘Gospel’ is good news. There is no gospel without the resurrection. If the resurrection did not happen for Jesus Christ, then nothing that he told humanity can be believed and further there is no divine forgiveness of human sin and there is no hope for life beyond the grave. However, I am convinced that the Bible concentrated upon personal testimonies that affirmed Jesus revealed himself demonstrably alive after his violent execution and further, that all that pertained to him had been prophecied hundreds of years earlier. His arrival on earth, his death and his resurrection was a divine plan. In the act of dying, he who was sinless through three decades of living, sustained punishment for all of human sin, and he could do this because of who he is. He is the one included in the conversation in the garden of Eden as God spoke as a plurality, “Let ‘us' make man in ‘our’ image, according to ‘our’ likeness. He is the one about whom the apostle John wrote when he said, “all things were made by him and without him nothing was made that was made.” Jesus has been invested in human spiritual and moral wellbeing from the beginning of our human race. Sin so soon tarnished the reflection of God in humanity. Jesus’ death makes possible the restoration of the image and likeness of God in each person who trusts the good news summed up so memorably in the words, “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.” In these retirement years that rush me forward to my completion, my service is confined, no longer speaking weekly to several hundred people, but rather to the few I randomly meet in our housing community, and at the golf course where I marshall and play, and through my contacts with artists and clients. Occasionally I am given the privilege of preaching from scripture as I once did regularly. Interestingly, almost cruelly, I remember as a young inexperienced pastor preparing and preaching twice on Sundays, teaching two or three times each week, and yet now I have doctoral level knowledge, the wisdom of years, acquired communication skills, the confidence of experience, and the understanding that I can accomplish nothing of significance without God. What’s missing is the sustainable energy for a full-time ministry commitment. Everything about a three score plus ten plus five human has frayed ends. What is important is for me to be faithful to my vows, my promises to God. Ultimately, that is the commendation for which I am waiting. 

In keeping with the Easter and resurrection theme here is a painting of interest to me. 

Ron DiCianni is an American illustrator/artist specializing in Christian themes. His ‘Resurrection’ mural measures 12X40 feet and commissioned for the Museum of Biblical Arts in Dallas, it is the largest depiction of this theme in the world. This size permits the viewer to look into Christ’s eyes. It required two years to complete. Definitive scenes are identified with some great artists, like Michelangelo and his “Creation of Adam” in the Sistine Chapel; Rembrandt, and his “The Prodigal Son.” DiCianni sees “The Resurrection”, as his definitive piece particularly because this act in history distinguishes Christianity from every other religion, philosophy and dogma. It authenticates The Nativity, The Crucifixion of Christ, and legitimizes every word Jesus said concerning Himself and His relationship to God. Blessed Easter to you. (If you care to hear him describe how and why he painted this cast of characters, here is the link,https://youtu.be/-yABivU-AKQ )

EVEN SINCERE CHRISTIANS ATTEND CHURCH LESS OFTEN

Even sincere Christians are attending church less often in our North American culture? This is a statement of fact rather than approval.

As we entered church yesterday I said to Christine, "it feels like we've been gone for six months." Really, it's been a few weeks when we have had commitments, preferences and holiday elsewhere. We are not the only absentees. This compelled me to read and to think about why good Christians are attending church less frequently than before. (Here is what I thought.)

Susan Mattinson, 2012-2016. Reproduction permitted with permission of creator

CHRISTIANS ARE RUNNING WEARY

So many Christians are running weary. I am thinking primarily now of adults, young parents who responsibly raise children and teens with team sports, chauffeuring to school and church activities, volunteer to teach, lead, govern, and exhaust all their discretionary time. They have no time for themselves. They have carved no time in a day, maybe in the week for personal debriefing, assessment, reflection, time alone with the LORD. They feel busy but dissatisfied. They have cheated themselves. And then comes Sunday. They have to show up again.

Your bum on a seat at Sunday church is not a good measure of your spirituality. Being there does not insure you are being fueled. It may be just one more event that eats up your time. Being seen at Sunday worship should not be equated with worshipping. You and scores of others will actually worship corporately when each person has met with God in earnest relationship before the meeting. Intimacy with God does not begin at the formal meeting with a call to worship, with a rousing song. A heart tug and a stung conscience from a stirring sermon will not ensure behavioral change.

Too soon, you may conclude as so many have, that the church is not meeting your needs. The pastor's material is not connecting with you. Perhaps another alternative can be found, another church, larger perhaps, some place to get lost, a place to take the kids off your hands for a couple of hours, a place where when you say "no thanks" to an invitation to participate, no one will care. And some time later, your children lose interest because your own experience is not encouraging them. And you drop off and drop out.

It will be preferable that you take responsibility for yourself. Your personal spiritual development is your concern. Ultimately it is a relationship with the living, loving God in which you are interested. No one can give that to you or nurture it for you. Some people can be a resource, that's all. You yourself must take control of your schedule and your priorities to know God and talk over life with him, and become excited about what he is doing in your and around you each hour of each day. As the amazement increases and the enthusiasm mounts, you may want to find other believers with a vital walk with God, and together worship with a passion you thought was possible but never knew.

EXPERIENCING CHURCH - SMALL GROUP / LARGE CONGREGATION

I spoke separately with two people yesterday, each of whom expressed an opinion about church. One attends Sunday church, and he also meets with a group of eleven people from diverse Christian traditions. It is in the smaller group that he experiences true church, mutual trust, love and care.  These people respond to one another's needs. A second opinion came from someone who acknowledges there is a place for the larger Sunday gathering but admits that he attends intermittently, finding that the teaching seldom relates to his needs. He does have one individual in whom he can confide and whose influence perfects him spiritually.

During century one, Christianity had not formalized into structured subgroups located in church buildings. Christianity experienced rapid growth and within days and weeks after Pentecost, about 5,000 Jewish believers in Jesus Christ[i] were located throughout the Jerusalem area. Affinity clusters congregated freely in homes. Friends invited friends to debrief, recount their recent experiences, talk about the risks inherent in their new allegiance, and pray for one another. Interestingly there were occasional larger public gatherings of believers and this show of numbers encouraged the believers, impressed the city and angered the authorities. The designated location was Solomon's Colonnade.[ii]

No wonder they chose to meet there. Solomon's Colonnade was one of the last places that Jesus ministered publically. It was there that Peter and John had recently healed a crippled man. The Colonnade was also called a porch or portico, first built by Solomon and retained during the rebuild of the second temple on the temple mount. On a cold winter evening during the "Feast of Dedication” (Hanukah), Jesus walked into the Colonnade. Jesus had already told listeners about the sheep and claimed he was the good shepherd and that he would lay down his life for the sheep. Then people demanded to know whether he was claiming to be the Christ/Messiah. He asserted that he had already told them, and further, all his miracles done in his Father's name declare his identity with God. He boldly stated that he was God's son, and that they didn't believe because they were not his sheep. They said they would see him put to death because he was a blasphemer, claiming to be God when he was a mere man. Now here were thousands of followers living in the power of the risen Christ and defying the prohibition to talk about Jesus, because they would rather obey God than humans.

Where are you best experiencing Christ’s body life? Would you find it easier to do anything, give anything, for the large gathering, or for the smaller group? What’s your experience?

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[i] Acts 4:4

[ii] Acts 5:12

A 24/7 COMMUNITY CREATED BY THE SPIRIT

The Church is a community created by the Spirit. The church is people, the called and redeemed people of God. As a spiritual community, the church uniquely delivers the presence of God to the world. The lives of redeemed people that are empowered by God's Spirit are missional wherever they are lived and at all times. We forget that church is "us" 24-7 when we constantly think and speak about church as place and time, or organization and ministries.

Spirit-filled 24-7 people exhibit the presence of God in profound ways in diverse situations among countless networks of other people. That's the God-plan.

The plan allows for community to gather in one location for brief periods to exalt God together and to experience Body life, and presumes that the saints, that is, followers of Christ will then disperse to live life in a Spirit-filled 24-7 manner among people who are not of the community called church. While the church formally commissions specific persons to full-time missional investment in their own neighbourhoods and overseas, every believer must know and live a commissioned life as salt and light. Character and calling and giftedness are prerequisites for every child of God, not just a few. We are all missionaries - full-time. One hour on Sunday out of 168 hours of each week, is not enough.

The church is so much more than a human organization with well-managed functions or a massive property with a large budget. It's a community created by the Spirit to deliver God's presence in the world.

WORSHIP IN THE TRUEST SENSE

Worship, within the culture of the present church, comes down to, how well did certain performers do during a specific period of time on Sunday. Worship in the minds of many churchgoers is understood as that which certain people with certain skills do, even when what they do is designed to involve churchgoers. Worship is then evaluated in terms of how well the worship time was planned, how singable and intelligible were the songs that were chosen, how well the musicians played and sang and appeared, and how well the preacher communicated.

Worship is different from that and so much more than that when scripture is the resource for a definition. When scripture describes angels in heaven worshipping and when ancient patriarchs and peoples worshipped, and when early New Testament saints worshipped, that worship clearly related to the person who is the object of the worship rather than to the quality of human performance. Worship in this scriptural sense, has to do with the worth of the object of worship, to be worshipped. God is worthy of worship. Inherent to who God is, is this obligatory response from every created being. There is a natural relationship between God and all that he has created, between the Creator and creation, creatures, mortals, individuals. This normal relationship should naturally compel the created to worship the Creator. The requisite response to worship God has been suppressed and repressed in some of creation, blocked and inhibited, confused and misdirected, intellectualized and redefined or ignored altogether. When something so right as worship, goes so wrong, the only explanation is sin as scripture defines and describes and condemns it. When sin is eradicated from the human through human faith in the reality of Christ's atonement, which issues in divine pardon and renovation of human loyalty, then the Creator once again receives the worship suitable to him, the worship God deserves, the worship the creature yearns to give. Such worship is not prescribed by specific days and times. It is relevant always and constantly appropriate. All that we think, say, do, see, and imagine, shall be to the glory and praise of God. Such concentration insures purity of thought and action.