Antioch Bible Church - Pastor's Point

Pastor's Point

May 4, 2008

Too Legit to Join

Ask me if I can detect whether the RIM is a legitimate youth ministry and I will tell you that I think I can. How? I do it just by observing you caring about one another. 1 John 4:20 says that you can love God and hate your brother at the same time. You say, "What's that got to do with me? I don't hate anybody."

Last week, we did a short evaluation of our group. Great job. Thanks for your honesty. It helped a lot. I promised that we would make the appropriate changes to our ministry to help it become what it needs to be. So here we go.

The results revealed that we had high marks in our body having a loving atmosphere. Also, we hold our leadership and our teaching in high regard. Cool. Now, the areas where we need help were in our ability to connect with people who are not "in the group."

Conclusion: how good can our leadership, loving group atmosphere and teaching be if we cannot relate to those who are new or who do not know Christ? We have an awesome youth group, but we are guilty of "clique-it is." If we don't overcome this fatal flaw we will never fulfill our purpose and never grow.

Up till now our method has been one of proactive indifference. Meaning, we assume that because our group is so good any new person will automatically be attracted to us and join us in what we are doing. Unfortunately, that method doesn't work.

Many of us in the RIM haven't been new to a group in a long time. We need to take a moment and remember at time where you felt like an outsider or the new guy. You probably felt that it was cool but were never going to break into the group and just wanted to get back to your own people. Not good. Being partial to your own group of friends on Sundays or Wednesdays is not a quality trait. It alienates. Blaming new people for not coming up to you is just lame. Harboring bitterness, holding grudges and refusing to forgive only teach you how to be a small person. Superficiality may be good for a sorority, but not the RIM. These are all group killers.

So, RIM its time to change. We want to GROW. That means we need to work extra hard at breaking down the old habits which can keep people from becoming a part of the Body of Christ.

The challenge to you is to personally evaluate your own relationships and make necessary changes. If you need to forgive somebody? Do it. Do you need to make a mid-week phone call to a friend you haven't seen at church in a while. You do know how to use a phone, right? There are no assigned seats in the RIM so try sitting by someone you don't know. You may just find out something really cool about each other. Are you going to the movies, paintballing or diva shopping soon? Invite a non-RIM or new-RIM kid. Hey, leaders, you saw that kid bring his friend, right? Why not take that kid and his friend to lunch after church?

In other words, RIM, get over yourself and live up to your name! Go make a radical impact in someone else's life. Enough
spectating! Its time to act!

In the book of James it says that if you're not being intentional in your relationships by including people who are not like you then you are actually being partial; and partiality is sin. See how that works? I know. Ouch.

Pastor J

February 10, 2008

God Thriller or Faith Killer, Part 2

OK last time the gauntlet was thrown down. Are you a God thriller or a faith killer? Four areas were brought up where we face defeat and make our faith fall flat: idolatry, immorality, testing God, and complaining. Let me include part of the last paragraph of GTFK part 1:

How could anyone possibly have a productive, joyful, victorious Christian life with these vices prevalent in their life? He would be a floundering faithless mess. Nobody, Christian or non-Christian would ever want to be around such a conflicted individual. Why? Because this person is useless. He can't please the world because he's owned by God and the Holy Sprit convicts him. He can't please God because sin has dominated him.

Ah, such wise words...Anyway, there is a contrast developed here between a mature believer and a less mature one. The immature believer, though he is free to please God, lives with his life entangled by sin. The mature one pleases God with all areas of his life by making sure his freedoms do not become a stumbling block to others. The man or woman who thrills God is the one who doesn't just play defense and avoid "bad things." A God thriller is one who also consistently seeks the advancement of other believers.

One of the most mature ways to be a God thriller is by not taking advantage of every freedom available. These believers understand that there are times when their freedoms in the Lord are not always exercised to the betterment of those watching. It's a delicate balance, because who wants to spend all their time looking over their shoulder wondering if someone is going to stumble because of their actions? It's tough, but the mature believer is willing to make sacrifices to honor their weaker brother or sister in their journey. He seeks to please God in all respects personally and indirectly. He knows that he is being watched and people are making judgments about Christ according to what they see in them. That doesn't mean that one person's legalism can become binding to another. That is a yoke of slavery. But the mature Christian knows how to represent Christ in all areas of his life public and private. Think about it.

January 27, 2008

Faith Killer or God Thriller

How’s your walk going? Hopefully solid. Hopefully you are walking like someone who knows God, like one who runs strong and uses his gifts to build His kingdom. You are walking in a way that inspires and motivates your brothers and sisters in Christ. Your life shows resolve, discipline and passion. Why? Because you’ve been a Christian for a long time and you’ve got this thing down pat, right? You’re a God thriller. At least that’s what your walk should be. So how’s it going? Are you moving in the right direction? Or maybe you feel just the opposite. Feel like you’re wandering or that you’re faith is close to dead. Keep reading, this article is for you.

Paul takes time in 1 Corinthians 10 to point out the nation of Israel and challenges the church to learn from her mistakes. They spent years with God up close and personal. God lead them out of slavery by utterly smashing her taskmasters and then leading them through the wilderness with angels, fire and clouds of his presence. But even so, they still lived in a way that was not pleasing to God. Can you relate? Ever have a friend who said something like, “if God came down and was right in front of me, then I’d....” Well the Israelites had that. But instead of becoming this awesome people, they wandered and died in the dessert. Why? Four problems that you and I still have today: idolatry, immorality, testing God and complaining. Those four vices are killers today of Christians everywhere. Let me explain.

To God, idolatry is flat out rebellion, its setting up a “system of affection” that is apart from God. That is, you replace your motivation to please God with a motivation to please yourself. All sorts of things can fit that bill for Christians: boyfriends, girlfriends, money, ambition, even your own internal emotions of pride or independence from God. God rejects that ways of thinking from his people because it’s empty and disappointing and, oh yeah, besides that he’s righteously jealous. Hundreds of examples are in the Word but the one that hits hardest in 1John 2:15. It says that the world you love so much and all it has to offer is passing away. All the worldly stuff you have and all the bragging about what you’ve done and where you’ve been is like nothing. Like the old beer commercial motto. “Taste Great, Less Filling”. It won’t be here forever. It warns of the disappointment that I will have when I set up a system of affection apart from God.

To say that human beings have a strong sexual desire is the understatement of history. God placed in us an almost insatiable passion for sexual expression and in His wisdom he set parameters on how to “release that beast”. However, we, in our lack of wisdom, have thousands ways of walking outside of God’s will for this area of our lives. Christians at all levels of maturity struggle to keep this issue under control but still get beat up a lot; some from footholds that were acquired fromour past before we were saved. Some of us acquired habits afterwards. But immorality is a faith killer because the design of human sexuality is so pure, so complex and so involved that walking outside of God’s design for it carries huge natural and supernatural consequences. Live immorally and you can put yourself on the bench with God and like they say in baseball, ‘nobody likes ridin’ the pine”. The Word takes a lot of time to show us how to live right in this area and remain a first stringer.

If you took your mom’s new Benz out a midnight spin and crashed it, you may get away with it once. And after being grounded for a year, you would recover. But if you took it out again when it got back from the shop, well… you’d be dead. That’s called testing your parents. You already know not to do that but Christians test God all the time. Yes he is long suffering but there is a limit to his grace. If you live a life of habitual sin, you are taking your life into your own hands. If you are really a child of God, he just may open up a can of jack rabbit on you to straighten you out.

Nobody likes a whiner. Theeey haaave theeeese looong draawwwn ooouut cooomplaaaiiints thaaat gooooo oooon aaaand oooon. You know the type. Complainers are deflaters. The only person who likes being around complainers and whiners are those like them. Complainers and whiners always forget what has been done for them and focus of what they don’t have. They are ingrates, people who are not thankful for anything. And when you’re God and you pretty much do everything for your kids and they still are griping about wanting the latest and greatest and how what they have isn’t good enough…. Well, let’s just say that He gets tired of that. In fact, in Numbers chapter 16-17 He sent the angel of death to get rid of them and 45,000 were gone like that.

How could anyone possibly have a productive, joyful, victorious Christian life with these vices prevalent in his life? He would be a floundering faithless mess. Nobody, Christian or non would ever want to be around such a conflicted individual. Why? Because this person is useless. He can’t please the world because he’s owned by God and the Holy Sprit convicts him. He can’t please God because sin has dominated him. The solution? That’s next week. For now, take some inventory and see if one of these issues is kicking your butt. Repent and ask God what He wants to add to your life next.