The Divine Crash

WOW! What a Sunday. I really felt like God was moving in this service.  It was hard sermon.  I was nervous because I wasn’t sure how it would be received but I gave it to God and we got something amazing out of it.  Feel free to leave a comment and listen to the audio at the bottom or on iTunes.

Scripture: Matthew 28:16-20

This sermon is a little different than what you are used to.  I take one week every January and talk about the state of the church.  The best way to understand it is to compare it to the president’s state of the union address.

We look at what the past year covered and where we stand as a church and then we look forward to the next year and see where we are going.  We will look at the past and cast a vision for the future. This brings all of you to the same page and if you don’t like what we did it gives you the opportunity to repent of it. It also gives you the ability to hope for the future and understand where we are going together as a community of believers.

One statement though.  This will only be for the last six months.  I will not comment or critique on any previous pastor.  When I meet Jesus he will not ask me what Pastor Bill did with HUMC.  Jesus will look at me and say “These are my people I gave you to shepherd, what did you do with it?”

For the last six months we have averaged 95 people in worship.  This is a steady decline from 2006 where we had our best year with an average of 133. we have lost 38 people representing nearly 29% of our congregation. Given that math at our current rate of decline the church will have no people left in approximately 16 years. of that 29%, 20% have left within 2 years.  Some have gone on to glory and eternity with Jesus but some of them have just left.

We received an average of 2,142 dollars in offering each week.  To meet our budget we needed approximately 2600 dollars.

For the first time anyone knows 2011 we did not pay 100% of mission share we paid approximately 75%

We did not take in a single new member in the last six months.

We saw the end of TNT, ornament exchange , and the upper room devotionals.  , Saturday Bible studies.

Many of you may be sitting there wondering, how did we end up here? How did we loose 20% of our congregation in 2 years? How did we go from always paying our mission share at 100% to paying 75% in under a year?

I would argue that these things have happened because we have stopped making disciples.  Jesus calls us to make disciples. Not make our pews warm.   Jesus told everyone to make disciples.  recent Barna study says Christians invite a new person to church every two years.

I would further suggest that the way we define disciples has brought us to this point.  We have defined disciples as someone who learns about Jesus. we have been taught that a disciple knows a lot about Jesus and can quote Lamentations 6, mark 27, or the whole book of Hezekiah.

But this is an incorrect definition of Disciple.  A disciple is someone who does what Jesus did. What did Jesus do? Jesus made disciples.  The mark of a disciple of Jesus is someone who makes more disciples of Jesus.

The church is not about making well-educated christians. The church is about making disciples who make disciples who make disciples…

In fact, our inability to make disciples is cause for alarm. Because either you do not have the skills, which is my fault, or it is because you are refusing to do what God has called you to do, which brings into question your entire salvation.  You cannot live in blatant opposition to God and expect to receive eternal life.

1 Peter 2:9 says you are a royal priesthood.  You are a chosen race.  You are God’s people so that you may speak of God’s wonderful acts.

Did you see the “So That?” we are God’s people  SO THAT we may speak of God’s wonderful acts.

So, the failing numbers, lower offering, loss of groups, events, committees, etc….they are because we are not speaking of God’s wonderful acts.

There is no excuse.  If we are not telling people about the wonderful acts of God then we are not doing what Jesus has called you to do.

- You cannot stand before God and say “That was the pastors job” or “I was afraid” or “what if they reject me?” None of that will fly with Jesus who was rejected, crucified, and abandoned by God and still made disciples.

In Revelation 2 Jesus says that lukewarm will be vomited out of his mouth.  This isn’t about non-christians.  This is about people who call themselves Christian and do nothing.

You are called to make disciples.  Regardless of your spiritual gifts.  Regardless if you are introvert or extrovert you are called to make disciples. Gender, age, race, or ability, does not disqualify you from making disciples.

Recently I ran in to a woman who knew I was the pastor of this church and she said “I came to visit your church but I didn’t feel very welcomed” I smiled, apologized, and said we were working on that.  Yet inside I was dying because it is your duty as christians to make sure all people are welcomed in the household of God.

Someday when we stand before God and you are asked “Why didn’t you welcome this person?” there is no acceptable answer.

it is our duty as humans and as Christians to see the people no one else sees.

You are the primary source of evangelism in the world today.

You are the primary source of welcoming people into the life of faith in this church. that is on me too. if you came here as a non-Christian and I didn’t welcome you I apologize and I ask your forgiveness and ask that you give us a second chance  if you’re a Christian here and I didn’t welcome you that is because our priority is for those who have not heard of gods grace.

Steve Cordle writes that “If a Church allows evangelism to slip from the primary focus to a secondary activity, not only will the church’s numerical growth slow down, but the church will also decrease in spiritual vitality.”

when we stop telling people about God’s wonderful acts we begin to forget about the grace of god and we say things like spiritually dead or lifeless. we begin to wonder if god still loves us.

I had a youth ask me if god still loves him after all the bad he did. this happens when we stop telling others of gods grace.

This internal attitude that we have that we are here to take from the church and make ourselves feel better once a week can not continue to exist.  If it does then this church will not continue to exist.

Too often churches have settled for making attenders and listening. Instead of making disciples who make disciples who make disciples.  We have settled for butts in the pews instead of hearts in the mission field.

I REFUSE TO SETTLE. We will become a church that produces disciples who make disciples.

I REFUSE TO SERVE A DYING CHURCH. there are too many people who are dying without Jesus for me to serve a church that claims to know Jesus but ignores his commandments.  Too many people are dying who have not heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For the sake of their eternity we must tell them of the God who saved them too.

It is not about numbers, offering, budgets, committees, or anything else like that.  It is about introducing people to the wonderful and amazing grace of God and then equipping them to do the same thing.

It is about making disciples who make disciples who make disciples who make disciples who make disciples.

For you to make disciples you need 4 things that, currently, we are lacking but if we are going to make disciples we must have them.

1. The passion

- Romans 9:2-3 Paul writes that he wants to save his brothers and sisters so badly that he would be willing to be cut off from Christ if that is what would save them.

- Are you that passionate? That you would be willing to give up Jesus if it meant someone else could find Jesus?

- Are you passionate enough to bring in drums and an electric guitar if it meant that someone could find Jesus?

- Are you passionate enough to change the time we meet for worship if it meant that someone could find Jesus for the first time?

- If there is anything you aren’t willing to lose for the sake of the Gospel then you are not passionate enough.

2. The training

- 1 Peter 3:15 your goal is to be able to talk about Jesus when people ask about the hope within you.

- You may have sat in your Sunday School class for 50 years but if you cannot tell people about the grace of Jesus in your own life then you have missed the entire point of the gospel of Jesus.

- You may have the Bible memorized and be able to speak for hours about the finer points of sanctification vs. justification but if you cannot articulate what it means to follow Jesus then you do not know what the Bible means.

- We are called to be a witness of Jesus. A witness simply tells what they saw and experienced. You need to learn how to do that and I am going to teach you.

- With our membership class we are going to begin talking about intentional outreach.

3. The determination

- This is hard work. If it were easy churches in America would be exploding at the seams. but it isn’t. Making disciples who make disciples is very different than making smart pew warmers However, biblically it is what we are called to do. Therefore we must do it.

- We must persevere in this. Results may not be seen right away..

- Malachi was the last old testament prophet. It was 500 years until Jesus arrived. There were no new revelations from God, no words of prophesy or miracles for 500 years. But look at the church since then.

4. The prayer life to sustain these efforts. 

- James 5:16 the fervent prayer of the righteous is powerful and effective.

- In Greek the word for Fervent is Engergeo….we also get the word energy and energetic.

- The energetic prayer of the righteous is effective. .

- You must pray.  You must be praying.

- No revival in the history of the world ever started without people praying.

- It is proven that the most vital and growing churches are the churches who people pray the most.

- How much time do you spend praying? 5 minutes? 5 seconds before each meal? What would it look like if it were hours? !

If we are going to do this then we must kill our selfish ambitions of being a cruise liner in this sea of chaos and instead become a rescue boat to those who are drowning in sea of sin.

If you are with me, then pray with me. Because we as a church must do this if we want to be faithful to what God has called us.  To make disciples.

We are going to pause now, to pray for repentance and forgiveness and we are going to keep going.

Prayer. God forgive us for all the times we didn’t share our hope.  For all the times we made church about us. Forgive us for not showing grace and for not telling others about your grace.  Restore us to right standing with you and show us how to go forward. all gods people said amen.

Now, As we learned, death always brings life and as much as some things were not accomplished we are seeing new life and a spiritual awakening happening in this church.  We also know that it is impossible to reach for anything new when our hands are full of yesterday’s junk.

We have seen approximately 10% of people in this church are brand new to the church. 18 New people have become regular attenders in this church.  regular attendance is 3 or more per month one a month is not an attender  it is a guest.

We have also seen approximately 25 new people who have come at least once in the last six months.

We baptized 3 youth.

We began Cell Groups which currently have 20 people involved.  This represents 12% of our congregation is involved in community outside of Sunday Morning.

We launched our second cell group in under six months.  This is amazing. We now have two options for everyone to attend Cell Group.  Mondays at 7pm at the Pratt House and Thursdays at 7pm at the parsonage.

We completely redesigned Kid’s Club and now average approximately 8-10 kids on Sunday nights between the ages of kindergarten and 5th grade. Over Christmas they made cards for the residents at Autumn Grove.

Youth Group is continuing to grow and expand.  We see kids from 5 school districts. With a regular attendance of 30 youth.

Our made to crave Bible study meets Monday Nights at 7pm here at the church and sees 8-10 people stepping out to learn that Jesus is more important than food.

We recently trained 6 people for Safe Sanctuaries.

We launched Children’s Worship which is meeting downstairs right now.  The first week we had 8 kids and we continue to grow last week was 19!!

Our concert series continues to function and grow with the next season of shows starting in April.

We have a new budget that shows us needing 2,589 dollars per week, but at current giving we will be short 300 dollars a week. That means if every person in this church increased their weekly giving by 4 dollars we would have more money than we know what to do with.

Currently 94 percent of budget keeps the lights on. only 6 goes to outreach. no wonder the church isn’t reaching our priorities are backwards. we would rather keep lights on than make disciples.

However, I will say it again. Money does not run this church and does not determine the effectiveness of the gospel.  IN FACT Jesus told his disciples not to take money with them.

Cell group costs zero dollars and is the number one way we are reaching non Christians.

What does mater is making disciples.  This is our commandment from Jesus and it is the only way we are faithful to God and it is the only way people find salvation is by us making disciples.

So then, in your bulletin is the 16 Key Ministry Strategies. These are the 16 things that United Methodist churches around the country have found that when these are in place churches are vital, healthy, and as a result making disciples who make disciples. These are where we need to be focusing our energy and in the last six months you can see how we have begun to shape our ministry into these areas.  .

Some of these things are things I have to work on like developing leaders and increasing participation.

Some of these are things we have no control over, like me staying longer.  I want to be here for as long as I can but neither you nor I have control over it. But if we do well at making disciples the likelyhood that I will stay longer increases.

Some of these are things that YOU must be doing. Like having a vital personal faith, rotating in leadership, more leaders, contemporary worship.

Look at this list and see where God wants you to be involved.

Jesus has called all of us to make disciples who make disciples who make disciples. We are on our way and we are going to become the kind of church God has called us too be but only if we are willing to do it.  but it means we have to be willing to be intentional, determined, trained, and praying.

God won’t gives us with his sheep until we can be trusted to take good care of them.

this is where Cell Groups come in.  We have 2 cell groups meeting right now.  One on Mondays at the Pratt House and another on Thursdays at my house.

If you aren’t familiar with Cell Groups it is a group of people who get together with 2 objectives.  To mentor each other and to multiply.

- We mentor by being each others first line of pastoral care. Everyone in the group is capable of being a leader. Of helping each other in the life of faith. One week we were sitting in cell group and we mentioned a prayer request for our kids. Another member of the cell group said “I’ve been there, let me tell you what we did…” We mentor when we say “We are struggling with this…..” and other members are able to help.  We mentor by studying the scriptures together in an intimate group of people who are all trying to figure out this journey of faith together.

- We multiply like a natural Cell.  We don’t force it but when our group gets too big we split into another cell with a different leader. We multiply by telling others about what we are doing.  We invite our friends and family to the group.  Whether they attend our church or not they are welcome in our cell group.  Whether they are Christian or not they are welcome in Cell Group.

Cell Groups become how we make disciples who make disciples who make disciples.

Any church that is vital and growing will have some form of Cell Groups.  We are transitioning to a complete cell group model and I want all of you to join me in this.  Find your way to a cell group on Monday or Thursday. or even start another one.

this is where the church is headed, into cell groups that mentor and multiply each other so that we are making disciples who make disciples.  This is hard work.  If it were easy more churches would be doing it.

Some of you are probably thinking “I can’t do this.” or “I’m not gifted for this” or just generally doubting your ability to make disciples.

In our scripture today we see one of my favorite verses in the Bible. Verse 17 “When they saw him, the disciples worshipped him, but some doubted.”

The disciples doubted.  They were terrified, they had no clue what to do. They didn’t have a plan, a theology, or a set of ideas.  The only thing they had were these doubts.

So it is okay to doubt.  God doesn’t call you to get rid of your doubts.  He simply says “Go and make disciples.”

Reggie McNeal writes “Just because we don’t know how to do something doesn’t mean we should try and do it.”

In your doubt you are still called to move

We have all that we need, we have hope and we have a Christ who has called us to so much more than pew warmers. May we fulfill John 14:12 that says we will do greater things than Jesus did.

we can’t stay here. we gotta go. we can’t stay here we gotta go make disciples.

are you with me? if you are let’s pray. 

Sermon Audio

 

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