This post follows up Sunday’s special message. If you haven’t heard the “Ready For A Miracle” sermon, get it on iTunes, or on our feed site.
God has called The Church to something huge. He was really clear about it in his Word.
Loving God, Loving Others, and Making Disciples that Make Disciples
Matthew 22:27-40, Matthew 28:18-20
He calls us, like he called Simon and his brothers, to become fishers of men, as we partner with Him to build His church. (Luke 5) And He is clearly already at work doing so all around us in some serious ways. Who would have thought that The Orchard Church, started just over 3 years ago, would have blossomed to the point that it is? Who would have thought we’d be able to meet in the Ellijay Elementary School Auditorium? Who would have thought we would see people baptized as we have? BUT, God has brought us all here together so we can “do the good things he planned for us long ago.” (Ephesians 2:10 NLT) Through our continued submission to His will and plan, God is going before us, building the Body of Christ right here in Ellijay.
But there are barriers… Big ones. Church in America is broken, isn’t it? We have manipulated and abused it over the generations. Older people are mad about it, and younger people just don’t get the whole “church thing” at all. The media assaults us on a daily basis, and the public agenda is more and more against us. Churches all over the country are giving in to the increasingly new-age teachings that water down the Gospel, and many Christians find their walk with Christ to be embarrassingly shallow.
We have a GIANT task to reach this and the next generation for Christ with the light of the GOSPEL right here where God has planted us. We have to be light and salt. We have to be that city on the hill. That’s why our mission statement is this:
Making the GOSPEL RELEVANT to our COMMUNITY
This is our heartbeat. It is what we are placed here to do. To connect people deeper and deeper into the Gospel by making it relevant to where they are right now. As we grow and more fully function as the body of Christ, we each take part as we “build up the church,” growing into maturity. What does the result look like?
Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won’t be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth. 15 Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church. 16 He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love. -Ephesians 4:14-16 NLT
But this task is what He is already up to. Like in Luke 5, He has already been all around the region healing people. He is already sitting in the boat with us, while people gather around to hear his voice. He has begun the good work.
In the story, it was WELL INTO the work that He called Simon and the boys out into the DEEP WATER for a life-altering miracle. He challenged them to get in over their heads… To do something crazy… Something that seemed out of bounds. That is when the miracle came. And the miracle caught them totally off-guard. Why? Because they were IN MAINTENANCE MODE. They were WASHING their nets, when they should have been STRENGTHENING their nets. They only half-heartedly obeyed.
May this never be the case with us! I believe that God may just be getting ready to call us out into the deep water. I’m not sure what that means… I’m not sure where that is. But I know I don’t want to get caught flat-footed like they did. I want to be ready, obedient, equipped, and prepared to handle whatever blessing he wants to throw our way.
Over the next several weeks, I’ll be posting a series of blog posts to try to articulate what this means for us as a church. These are letters from my heart to yours. Will you walk this road with me a little bit? Subscribe to our RSS feed to get these updated to you each time they post. Share them with others. Facebook ’em. Tweet ’em. Talk back to me via email. Let me know how you’re thinking, too.
Start this week. I’m inviting everyone to join us in prayer on Sunday morning at 9AM in the Music Room at the Elementary School. As always, we will pray for needs represented in the room, and for the morning worship service… But please join us to pray that our church will be prepared as God begins to do the work that He wants to do in and through us.
You can also join us in prayer by subscribing to our Orchard Prayer Twitter. Honestly, we haven’t been using this powerful tool nearly enough. Now is a good time to start.
Please join me in praying for The Orchard Church.