What Church Should Look Like: A Place Where “Sinners” Can Come

             Several years ago, a movie was released called VOYAGE OF THE DAMNED. It was based on a true story. In 1939, several hundred German-Jewish refugees were fleeing Nazi Germany. They boarded a ship bound for Cuba and asylum. Before reaching Cuba, the ship was refused permission to dock and all visas were revoked.

            After being told they could not dock anywhere else, the ship was forced to turn around and head back to Germany. To many on board, that was tantamount to death.

            No one wanted to receive those Jews. Likewise, there are people today, who the church does not want to receive.

            Jesus cuts at the heart of this mindset when he says, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid.

            “But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous” (Luke 14:12b-14).

            Jesus knows that the human instinct is to invite friends, invite folks like you. Too many times, Christians don’t want to invite people they perceive as being much more sinful.

            Of course, the irony here is that Jesus was putting most of us in the category of the “crippled, the lame…,” because most of us are Gentiles. Jesus’ Jewish audience placed us in this category.

            To be like Jesus, we Gentiles, who were extended grace long ago, must welcome the sinner. Granted, this is easier to say than to practice.

            I will never forget in January of 2007, a young man in his 20s visited our worship service. Another guest had brought him. I found out, the young man was from a halfway house. Having recently been released from federal prison, he was staying in that residence, until he could more fully integrate into society.

            Getting to know him, I found out that he had been convicted by the federal government for transporting child photography, on his computer, across state lines. This crime had placed him on the sexual offenders list maintained by the state of Texas.

            I also found out that this young man had been converted to Christ, while in federal prison in North Carolina. Thankfully, the Shiloh Church, where I preach, had loved him sufficiently that he wanted to become part of our church–but only if we would have him.

            What I want you to know is this: our elders almost immediately concluded that, unequivocally, Jesus would have us welcome this young man. That would be a given. Our job was to offer him reconciliation, community, and discipleship. We were to offer forgiveness AND accountability.

            What followed was a process of trying to implement the will of God. (I blogged about that story a couple of years ago, if you desire to know the details:

http://markedgeremarks.blogspot.com/2009/06/what-do-you-do-when-convicted-sex.html )

            I am pleased to say that through our elders’ wisdom and leadership, Shiloh did not lose a single family or member. Moreover, we were blessed later to baptize the young man’s future wife into Christ; she has a marvelous testimony as well. Today, both of them serve on my sermon advisory group.

            I tell this story because it illustrates the challenge churches face today in living out Luke 14. I know of no other member of society more marginalized than one who carries the label “sex offender.” (Our Shiloh family member has had a TV station film the outside of his and his young wife’s apartment—a random act given as background for a news story on sex offenders’ in Tyler.)

            On the other hand, the blessings our church has received for this leap of faith have been incalculable.

            I hold no illusions. Tension will always be present. I suspect the act of offering welcome to those who feel genetically predisposed toward homosexuality will provide the tensest test for churches. Churches will experience a fluctuating “comfort zone.” (“Is he dating him, or are they just friends?”)

         Still, we must find a way to navigate this. We must offer a call for healing and holiness.

            I know we, at Shiloh, must leap out in faith even more. We must pursue, with deep intention, the creation of this type of atmosphere, where one who has strayed from God can come and feel welcomed. After all, all of us were there once. If you don’t believe me, just ask a first-century Jew. Better yet, ask the first-century Jesus. 

Five Things I Think I Think (with a nod to Peter King for this idea)

            

1. I started watching the movie INCEPTION Saturday night. Couldn’t finish it because I got sleepy. I will see the rest soon. All I could think of was, “This proves you don’t have to understand all of the REVELATION to get something out of it.

2. I’m pulling for TRUE GRIT and its stars in Sunday’s Academy Awards.

3. Spring training had started. I pay little attention to baseball until the season begins. Between spring training and baseball season, we have the Final Four for NCAA college basketball.

4. According to TIME, we are on the verge of being able to leave our wallets at home in favor of our smart phones.

5. Congratulations ETCA girls basketball team. Your beat Hill Country Christian 65-30, last week. Good luck tomorrow in your Area game vs. Wichita Falls Notre Dame.

Leadership

Last year was one of the most important in Shiloh's history. I say so for various reasons; one of which is, the decision of our elders to re-organize their ministry structure. Shiloh’s elders have formed three teams based upon their gifts.

             One team is the Administrative team. J. B. Berry, Leonard Kent, and John Thompson serve on this team. Looking to Jesus, the great administrator in the household of faith, (see Hebrews chapter 3), they seek to serve as overseers of the Lord's church. That does not mean they will not serve in other ways, but administration oversight will be a priority for them.

             A second team is the Pastoral team. Don Faubus, Travis Hunt, David Smith, and John Eastland serve on this team. As you might imagine, the priority for this team is to assure that the pastoral needs of the church are being met. They, too, serve in the line of Jesus, the great Shepherd.

             The third and final team is the Vision team. Mike Warner and David Litton serve on this team. What greater visionary is found in Scripture than Jesus? He is the one who anticipated the future and saw ahead for the disciples. Likewise, the leadership of the church should be the ones to supply the vision.

             Who leads the church? In some churches, it is one man. Many times this man is called the Pastor. He is responsible for setting the vision, administrating, and supplying the network for pastorally caring for the church. I, personally, do not think this is biblical. It usually destroys something in the Pastor’s life as well: his family, his marriage, his health… something.

             In some churches, the staff supplies the leadership. It is easier to grow a church when the staff leads, as opposed to when one man leads. Typically, one man can provide very little pastoral care. If he does not delegate well, up to 150 is all you can expect the church to reach. With a staff, you can reach more, but again, I question how biblical this is.

             The ultimate biblical model is the eldership. This is a group of men, not one. They model for the community—community. They serve according to their gifts. They're not cookie cutters. Ideally, they work hand-in-hand with staff, who serve under their oversight. Shiloh follows this model.

             Our elders have formed pastoral groups in order to care at the more individual level for the flock. Roughly, each elder cares for about 60 members. Is this ideal? No, but it is an improvement.

             This new structure, I believe, will allow us to bring in people and care for them, which will help us to grow. One of the reasons we've consistently hit the ceiling of 500 or 600 members, is because of administrative and organizational structure. Never forget, God is an administrator and an organizer. 

             You see this going back to the book of Genesis. Administration and organization are not dirty words. Think about where your human body would be without organization and administration.

             Working hand-in-hand with staff, our elders are helping us meet the needs of members, new Christians, and new members, in a more holistic way. Biblically put, we’re able to more effectively partner with God in making disciples of people in his church.

             I am excited about the future of Shiloh.

Five Things I Think I Think (with a nod to Peter King for this idea)

1. I'm sticking with Green Bay and New York.
2. How does Ted Thompson look as a GM now?
3. Read an incredible stat in a book last week. I need to confirm this with another source. The stat? The Dallas Cowboys' defense gave up only two rushing TDs in 1968. That is staggering.

4. I saw TRUE GRIT over the weekend--and really enjoyed it. The star of this edition is the girl, not Rooster Cogburn.
5. Today, I am playing injured. I am prepping for my first colonoscopy tomorrow. Before I finish, I want to say that I unequivocally believe... excuse me... I've got to go....

Rush to Judgment

I remember, in Argentina, our church normally held a "business" meeting the last Sunday of the month. Usually, we planned to have it at a member’s house.

One month, I wasn't sure who was to host our monthly meeting. The Sunday before we were to meet, we were in a worship service. At the end of the service, I was making the announcements.

I reminded people that we were to meet the following Sunday. I asked if we had decided where we were to meet. (I knew we needed to decide.)

A teammate of mine raised his hand and said that we would decide next Sunday. I thought that sounded strange. Perhaps he didn't understand, so I said, "But we're holding our meeting next Sunday."

He replied, "I know, and we'll decide next Sunday."

Now, I was irritated. His attitude put me off. All afternoon, I thought about calling him and saying, "Look buster, just who do you think you are. Do you want to run things?"

Fortunately, before I called him, he called me to explain what happened. He said, "I was concerned you might have thought what happened this morning sounded weird, so I wanted to explain."

Come to find out, it had been agreed upon the previous month that we would meet in the house of a poorer couple, because the wife had offered their home. The husband had been so embarrassed—since they did not have enough chairs to seat everyone--he didn't want to host the meeting.

My teammate was simply trying to stall for time so we could solve the problem behind the scenes without embarrassing the couple. His explanation made perfect sense.

It was a noble thing my teammate did. I had thought he was being so “horsy”, but he was simply trying to protect someone else.

Things aren't always what they seem. That's why we need to be careful to rush to judgment.

This is one application of what Jesus said in Matt. 7:1-2:

1 "Don't judge others, or you will be judged. 2 You will be judged in the same way that you judge others, and the amount you give to others will be given to you….”

Herding Books

How did I spend my vacation? Well, among other things, doing what Larry McMurtry calls herding books.

Our son, Timothy, was quarantined for a couple of days due to strep. I recently purchased the software for organizing one’s possessions called DELICIOUS LIBRARY. Don’t let the name fool you. It organizes CDs, DVDs, closets—and books.

Anyway, my OC kicked in. Rather than totally relaxing, I spent a lot of time reorganizing my library and cataloguing books. 

I know I am Obsessive/ Compulsive because my adrenaline was running so fast, I woke up some mornings at 4:30 or 5. One night, I even dreamed of ways of categorizing the books in my library. I’m not kidding.

That dream did help me overcome a software quirk of DELICIOUS LIBRARY. You cannot force your books to go in the order you want, if it is contrary to the built in guidelines. I wanted my presidential books shelved in the order of their place in history: Washington, first, then John Adams… It wasn’t going to happen with DL. Because of my dream, I figured out that I could list each president in NUMERICAL order, followed by the name. For example: 1. Washington, 2. Adams...

Voila! Problem solved.

I hope this solution makes the Google Alerts feature, a bunch of DL people read it, and DL pays me a consultation fee.

Wait, that’s my next dream.

Five Things I Think I Think (with a nod to Peter King for this idea)

1. I wrote the following at 5:30 PM, yesterday, during the Cowboy-Eagles game, “There is still a lot of talk that there may be an NFL players stoppage in 2011. Funny, I think the Cowboys got a year’s head start. Their players stopped playing a long time ago.”

Boy, was I funny.

I’ve got to take back my words. Sure, the Eagles were playing with more reserves than the Cowboys. Still, I saw the highlights. Winning in the last minute in Philly shows guts. The Cowboys have played hard under Jason Garrett. They may not be as talented as other teams, but I look for Garrett to return next year (if there is a next year!) and for the Cowboys to make the playoffs.

2. The latest KIPLINGER LETTER is on Generation Y. A lot of good data there; maybe the two most interesting items are these:

            (1) Only 24% read the newspapers.

            (2) 25% send more than 50 text messages a day.

3. I wanted to see TRUE GRIT during my vacation. That did not work out. I hear it is good, though.

4. My family and I did see TUCK EVERLASTING. Profound movie. The story takes your imagination and helps you contemplate whether or not life would be good—lived forever on this earth. Hmmm. Maybe God knows what he is doing.

5. I loved watching TCU defeat Wisconsin in the Rose Bowl. My understanding is the ratings were through the roof. And what good press TCU got! Between baseball and football, TCU is hot.