Monday, August 6, 2012

By Him I see everything

I began a four-part series on Biblical leadership yesterday. I thought it went well. Truthfully, I never know. Sometimes what I find fabulously interesting, others do not. Sometimes when I am sure I have if not failed at least not succeeded much, someone will tell me how much that sermon meant to them.

At our church, Eunice, it seems God's movement is real. I mean REAL. We've been there six weeks, and I've never been apart of a church with such a wide-range of ages, with so many youth, so many children. It is exhilarating -- at worst -- life-changing at best.

We've talked about in the past week the beginning of three new Sunday School "Small Groups," we've talked about having a Sunday coffee hutch that we're going to call "The Well." We're off to get new furniture and supplies (TV and such) for all this. God is so good.

Then I ran across a C.S. Lewis quote and suddenly I wonder if even that is enough.

He said, "“I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.” 

Do you see the passion? Do you see the, uh, everything that was Christianity to him?

Is that the way we see Christianity? Or is Christianity what we check on the box at the hospital rather than Sikh or Mormon or Muslim or such?

Is Christ really our all-in-all?

I pray that is true, because that is how things change in small churches. That is what makes them vibrant more than statistics and such. That is what brings them back from the brink and pumps rich spiritual goblin into them, I think.

I believe in the end (of the day as every athlete in America now says instead of "you know"), that our churches will only progress as we begin to put Jesus first. Don't tell me we have or that we're already doing so, for I know that not to be the case in some churches. I know. When you have to push and shove and plead and beg to get volunteers for anything, that's simply not a church that has placed Jesus first. Jesus has his place, but he rests among trophies for sports and ballet and music lessons and such.

 I believe that the percentage of people who put Jesus first in the church is the measure we should take for vital churches. If someone can check that as a criteria, and mean it, that is a real measure, isn't it?

Is Jesus your sunshine? Is Jesus your delightful full moon? Is Jesus your pleasure and your pain and your numbingly wonderful love? Do you miss Him when you're gone, as you know you leave on occasion? Is He with you through it all? Is this all real and no fantasy?

I believe if the answer to all those is yes, you're part and parcel to priming the pump at a church near you. I believe all the rest is just committee meetings and failed programs.

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