Text: Ephesians 3:14-21, Matthew 14:3-21<\/p>\n
Friends\u2026 do you know how much potential you have?
\nI\u2019m not talking about the potential for worldly success\u2026 although you have that.
\nI\u2019m not talking about the potential for raising funds as a church\u2026 although I know its there.
\nI\u2019m talking about your potential in Jesus Christ.
\nI\u2019m talking about the untapped depths and lengths and height and breath of Christ\u2019s love in your life.<\/p>\n
Oh friends\u2026
\nI\u2019m going to take a few minutes to be honest this morning.
\nHonest about the discouragement and frustration and heartburn that some of us as your leaders here at the church have been feeling.
\nOur worship attendance has been down, but so has participation on Wednesday nights.
\nI had one gentleman stop me the other day in the hallway and say, \u201cPastor, I think you are doing a great job\u2026 but where is everyone?\u201d
\nAnd it is hard not to take it personally.
\nAnd I know that our families and our members are busy.
\nYou are engaged in your community and sports.
\nYou are working more hours than you want.
\nYou are traveling to visit family out of town.
\nYou want a morning to sleep in.
\nIt\u2019s hard to get your tired bones moving as fast you could before.
\nI get it.
\nI\u2019m right there with you.<\/p>\n
But, if you are anything like me, when you take a moment to catch your breath in the midst of the rushing too and fro, do you ever wonder if there is something else you are missing?
\nDo you stop and notice that perhaps there is something… some power… some spirit that is lacking in your heart?
\nDo you ever feel like you are going through the motions instead of tapping into the incredible love and power and promise of Jesus?<\/p>\n
For many, and this isn’t only Immanuel… this is the state of the church in the U.S…. church has become just another item on a long list of activities and social commitments. As your schedules ebb and flow, it might be something that falls off the calendar for a season.
\nAnd as at least one person recently shared with me, when they stopped coming, nothing much in their life really changed.<\/p>\n
In my head, I thought \u2013 surely that can\u2019t be the case.
\nBut in my heart, I started to fear that maybe this was true.<\/p>\n
Does church actually make a difference in your life?<\/p>\n
If it is simply a collection of activities and social commitments \u2013 maybe not.
\nYou can join other clubs.
\nYou can busy yourself with other volunteering opportunities.
\nIf you aren\u2019t happy about a decision either locally or in the denomination, you can step away to find a place that is a better fit.<\/p>\n
But to be honest, that\u2019s not how most of you describe Immanuel.<\/p>\n
At the start of this series on the Feeding of the 5000, I asked what drew you here.
\nWhat was it that compelled you to join the crowds of people here on 49th Street?
\nAnd you talked about the people.
\nYou talked about the relationships.
\nYou talked about family.
\nAnd something we are all learning in the midst of our incredibly busy lives is that you have to make time for family.
\nYou have to guard your time with your family.
\nYou have to set it as a priority, or something else will come in and decide it is more important.<\/p>\n
Starting in Lent, eight of us began gathering at 6:30 in the morning at Java Joes for a Covenant Discipleship Group.
\nIt was dark and none of us wanted to be up that early, but we decided to make time and carve out this little window, because it was important.
\nWe were initially only going to meet for eight weeks, but those relationships became so important that we have continued to meet once a month at 6:30 am, just to maintain them.<\/p>\n
Our Wednesday Night Ladies give their time every single week to be here and to prepare meals for our Immanuel family.
\nIt is not just a service opportunity, it is a community, a small group. They watch out for one another and check-in when one is struggling.<\/p>\n
The same could be said for the Monday night group at Java Joes.
\nOr Wednesday afternoon Bible study.
\nOr Re:Ignite.
\nOr Chancel Choir.
\nOr the Sunday morning Women\u2019s group.
\nOr Praise Ringers.
\nOr the list goes on\u2026<\/p>\n
When you set aside time for your family and make it a priority every single week, you solidify relationships that will sustain you for the long haul, through thick and thin, good times and bad.
\nYou learn how to be present in the midst of disagreement and work through it.
\nYou discover what it means to be served, but also to serve.
\nYou get to know someone\u2019s beautiful quirks and annoying habits and what it means to love them anyways.
\nTHAT\u2019s what it means to be family\u2026 and it is why so many of you show up here week after week.
\nAnd let me tell you\u2026 if you haven\u2019t connected with one of these opportunities, you actually are missing something that will change your life and I or any other staff member would love to have a conversation with you about how to get involved.<\/p>\n
But I would be lying if I said that after that first Sunday of this series I went home encouraged and energized.
\nI didn’t.
\nI actually felt a little bit frustrated.
\nBecause I think that church is about far more than family.
\nWhat it means to be church is not just about the relationships that we have with one another \u2013 as beautiful and holy as they are.<\/p>\n
Being church is about being caretakers of an incredible message that this world is hungry to hear and experience.
\nThat is why thousands of people left their work and picked up their families and traveled to the countryside to catch a glimpse of Jesus.
\nThere was something about his message and his actions that tapped into this yearning in their souls. A hunger to be healed, to be known, to be empowered.<\/p>\n
I think about those first disciples.
\nThey were kind of like a small group in the church.
\nThey spent a lot of time together and traveled and ate.
\nThey became like a little family and they cared for one another.
\nThey provided for one another.<\/p>\n
But in this miraculous event, Jesus invited them to not just look to their own needs, but to look outward at the crowds all around them.
\nIt was an invitation to not just be a part of Jesus\u2019 church, but to BE the church. To themselves be the hands and feet of God in the world.<\/p>\n
And so he took their meager gifts and transformed them and the result was this amazing abundance of food and relationship and ministry.
\nI\u2019m not just talking about their five loaves and two fish on that day in the countryside.
\nI\u2019m talking about their very lives.
\nHe transformed them from a faithful little family group into a world-changing movement that has turned everything upside down.
\nHe directed their eyes and their hearts outward.
\nJesus put his Spirit within them and strengthened them for the work ahead.
\nAnd they traveled the world with this message.
\nThey faced controversy and conflict.
\nSome were killed for the good news they proclaimed.
\nBut even persecutors like Saul were transformed by the power of Christ and became leaders in sharing the gospel.
\nIt couldn\u2019t be stopped!
\nIt couldn\u2019t be tamed!
\nEverywhere they went, people were hungry to hear and experience it\u2026
\nand people were afraid and challenged because they really did challenge the powers of this world that are hellbent on sin and death.<\/p>\n
We are here today, this morning, because the power of God poured out upon those disciples and their gifts. It filled them up and it spilled over to everyone they encountered.
\nWe are like those twelve baskets of leftovers gathered on that holy, miraculous, evening\u2026 the outpouring of God\u2019s abundant spirit of love that has no end and cannot be stopped.<\/p>\n
And thank God for that\u2026 because that good news is still desperately needed!
\nI asked you in worship two weeks ago to lift up what kind of ministry you would do if you had incredible resources at your finger tips.
\nYou lifted up the need for daycare and rent relief, homeless youth and a clothing closet, hungry children and adult language classes for immigrants and refugees.
\nYou named the potential for ministry with troubled teens and mental health needs, for warm coats and temporary housing, scholarships and pay it forward opportunities.
\nYou see the needs of veterans and teachers, families at the Ronald McDonald house, single parents who struggle, and the potential for a garden. You named the opportunity to buy back guns or create a soup kitchen or help the underemployed.<\/p>\n
Oh friends\u2026 imagine our church doing all of that?
\nCan you imagine the difference we would make in the lives of our neighbors?
\nCan you picture how the love of Jesus would become real to so many people?<\/p>\n
But also… I imagine just thinking about it you will first become incredibly tired, because we can\u2019t do all of those things \u2013 at least not all at once.<\/p>\n
But I also think about what might happen if we don\u2019t.
\nIf we didn’t even try.
\nIf we keep thinking of ourselves just as a family\u2026 simply as a social club\u2026 merely as a place to stop by a few times a month and make ourselves feel better\u2026<\/p>\n
Peace Lutheran Church in a suburb of the Twin Cities was about to close.
\nThe congregation experienced conflict. And then greying… which literally means the hair in the congregation was getting whiter. Young people weren\u2019t showing up. The decline of U.S. Christianity was partly to blame, but so was the internal focus of the church members.
\nThey only had twenty folks left in worship and when their new pastor arrived they had 18 months worth of funding before they would be done.
\nSo Pastor Greenlund asked if they wanted to go out with a whimper\u2026 or with a bang.
\nThey said if we are going to die, lets die well.
\nSo they sent fliers to their entire neighborhood saying that they would fix anything in homes \u2013 free of charge \u2013 no expectations or qualifications.
\nThey fixed roofs and furnaces, made kitchens accessible, cleaned homes for shut ins, rewired houses.
\nAnd you know what\u2026 people noticed.
\nThey thought the church might have died already, but neighbors began to believe and trust that the little church on the corner actually, really cared.<\/p>\n
This church was on the verge of giving up\u2026 but they tapped into something beyond themselves. When I think about you\u2026 this congregation\u2026 this family\u2026 I see incredible potential. I ask God to strengthen you by the Spirit.<\/strong> Text: Ephesians 3:14-21, Matthew 14:3-21 Friends\u2026 do you know how much potential you have? I\u2019m not talking about the potential for worldly success\u2026 although you have that. I\u2019m not talking about the potential for raising funds as a church\u2026 although I know its there. I\u2019m talking about your potential in Jesus Christ. I\u2019m talking about…<\/span><\/p>\n
\nThey let go of what they wanted and started to ask what God wanted.
\nThey let themselves and their gifts be transformed.
\nPeople from the community are throwing in their own money to keep the amazing work of this little church going.
\nTheir membership has quadrupled.
\nAbundant miracles are taking place all around them.\u00a0 (Read more here!<\/a>)<\/p>\n
\nNot because of anything that you already possess, but because I know and trust in the God who has called us together.
\nRight here in this time and in this place.
\nGod didn’t do that by accident.
\nAnd the prayer that Paul got on his knees to pray for the Ephesians, I am praying now\u2026 daily\u2026 for you:<\/p>\n
\n Not with a brute strength, but a glorious inner strength.<\/strong>
\n I pray that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in.<\/strong>
\n And I ask Christ that with both feet firmly planted on love, you\u2019ll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ\u2019s love.<\/strong>
\n Friends, I pray that you would reach out and experience the breadth!<\/strong>
\n Test its length!<\/strong>
\n Plumb the depths!<\/strong>
\n Rise to the heights!<\/strong>
\n Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.<\/strong>
\n God can do anything\u2026 far more than we could ever ask or imagine, by working within us\u2026 deeply and gently within us.<\/strong>
\n Glory to God in Christ.<\/strong>
\n Glory to God in the church.<\/strong>
\nAmen.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"