Doing God's work, one step at a time

I have a few things on my mind as service rolls around for Good Friday. Within the church here at Lima, the wider church in our country, and the Church worldwide, I'm noticing more recently a lot of division, dissention and discord among believers. Particularly because I just got done with "History of the Christian Church", which opened my eyes to the division we truly do have in Christianity. Not just of different sects such as Eastern Orthodox and Catholicism or the Church of England and Baptist, but within denominations too. Not only that, but within particular groups of believers. It grieves me so much that people argue and fight over things that, in the grand scheme of things, don't matter to a hill of beans. The trouble is, we all agree on the one thing necessary...that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, and our Personal Lord and Savior. That is what matters...not the direction of a church, the policies adopted by a denomination or even the days w...

In Bingham’s book, chapter 7 starts out by posing this statement, “Another major issue in the reformation was the doctrine of the church” (pg. 121). This stirred my thinking because Bingham continues on to discuss how the early church fathers recognized that the church was the people and not a building as such, but that it had gotten lost in the institution (pg. 121). As the Reformation began, re-emphasizing the believers being the church was one of the greatest importances. However, as time has passed since the Reformation, it seems the same problem is happening again. Let me explain. A while back, there was some emphasis being done about maintaining the church and how vital it is to do. In addition, there were arguments about a movie being shown in the Men’s group. Discussions followed about the ‘church building’ and respecting the church property and of course, the other side of the argument, that the people are the building and if there is an issue, we need to do it personally, b...

So....the first two weeks were a bit challenging...even for me. Stretching our thinking, stretching our actions. Have you been inspired to do something about your walk? How has this sermon series changed the way you view worship and discipleship? Perhaps it has confirmed what you always thought. The key, however, is that we here in Lima must face up to truth. We have a reputation of being divisive...things aren't nearly as divisive as they used to be, but still, this is the way we are seen. Where do we stand about our worship? Praise, Prayer, Communion, Offering, Proclaiming the Word...are you authentic in your worship? If not, why? What's holding you back? On that note, how about your discipleship? Are you coming to church to visit, be seen or to 'do the right thing'? Are you applying the Scriptures being taught or do they fall flat at the door? We have great people here in Lima...but it's time we start doing more than just coming to church, helping with church d...

For those of you who were not with us last week, we were going through “The Life of Christ” and we had our course corrected by God. We started looking through this idea of “Why do YOU go to church?” What is it that brings you to church service on Sunday morning? We went through some various reasons why, but we came to the conclusion that we are supposed to be here first and foremost to Worship God only. That’s why we’re here. Today we are looking at the 2nd reason why. This week was my final week of Intro to the Pauline Epistles. I had to do a research paper on a certain passage from one of the letters of Paul. As I started to dig into the passage, 1 Timothy 3, which is the leadership passages, I discovered that Timothy was located in the church at Ephesus. We also have Paul’s letter to the Ephesian church in our Bible as well. The Ephesian church was being warned by Paul to repent otherwise there will be some dire consequences from their actions. This Ephesian church was extremely div...

Is everyone ready to be thrown off today, because I am preaching from the pulpit this morning? It is not something I normally do, but it is something that I felt I needed to start doing. Before I begin, the past week and a half for me has been extremely difficult, but extremely spiritual. I have come across some things and made some discoveries that I believe everyone needs to hear. On Monday, I was in my office and I was very depressed. I wasn’t feeling the spirituality. I was just very down. I was talking with a colleague of mine that day and he is having trouble in his ministry too, so we were just patting each other on the back, trying to give another look on the situation. It can be very helpful to have another opinion. While we were talking, we decided we needed to go back to the basics and reexamine what “The Reproductive Church” looks like. So, we sat down and came up with this model of the “Acts 2 church”. I know I’ve said it before, but it is the church described in Acts 2 th...

This week for the blog, I am going to post an answer I gave for one of my assignment questions this week. After this post, I will make a few more comments. Now, if you are unfamiliar with the word 'cruciformity', it merely means 'crosslike'. So, if I were to state that we should live a 'cruciform' lifestyle, that means that we need to live a 'crosslike' lifestyle, in other words 'formed to the image of Christ'. 2. Which of Paul's big ideas (chapter 6 in Gorman) do you find most compelling for the church to grasp or grapple with at this time? Choosing between two of these is going to be difficult. The reason being is that two of these, in my mind, go hand in hand. Gorman lists #9 as “Cruciformity, or The Law of Christ” on page 140, and #11 as “The Church as Alternative Community” on page 141. The way I see our culture is that we are self-centered, pied-piper following groupies. Most people go to church on Sunday to get their “get out of he...

God is good. God is faithful. Just when we are having issues with certain things, He prompts us with beckonings of the Holy Spirit to guide us in our thinking, walk and lifestyle. I was having lots of issues this week with direction for the church when I listened to a sermon today on "Confusion". Ooooooh goodness...basically it stated that "oneness" can be a good thing, and it can be a bad thing too...Just because we unite together in a church, doesn't necessarily mean we are doing God's Will. Only by seeking His face through the disciplines will we see the direction He is calling us. Unity is a good thing...we just have to be sure we are all united on God's path, not our own particular desires. So, what's the direction for our church? Well, it's gonna start with prayer, fasting, solitude and sacrifice. We will then realize the goal for our little church in due time. I can guarantee it doesn't involve only sustaining the church. It involved g...