Together We
GNLCC 24th Anniversary 3/4/13 Nehemiah 2:11-18 1 Corinthians 12:1-11
Today we celebrate having served here as your pastors for the past 24 years. We entitled our sermon “Together We”, because our journey has not been about us as pastors, but about what God has done, is doing, and will continue to do through us as a congregation and its leaders. Anniversaries are kind of a funny thing when you look at years. We know that Presidents look a lot older at the end of 4 years than they did while running for election. We guess in terms of presidents, we will have run and been reelected for office six times. How does the aging process work for pastor-church anniversary?
A famous comedian was asked, what he would like people to say about him in 100 years and he answered, “I’d like them to say, “He still looks pretty good for his age.” As we look back over the past 24 years of ministry that together we have done in this community, we hope the community can still say, “we still look pretty good for our age.”
In our Old Testament reading, Nehemiah arrived on a scene in Jerusalem at a time period over 80 years after it had been destroyed. The walls of the city were still torn down, and it looked pretty depressing. But God was stirring in Nehemiah’s heart to do something, but he knew he needed the will and the help of the people to make it happen. When he shared a future of what could be the people responded “Let us start rebuilding.” The scriptures then state: “So they began this good work.”
Looking back to the year 1989, when we arrived here, our church, Glenville, was making a major decision concerning its future. Would we fold as a church or would we open our hearts and minds to a new move of the Spirit of God? We knew that change was going to have to happen? We knew that our journey would not always be easy. We knew that we would have to give up who we had been, in order to become what God wanted us to be.
Jesus put it this way, 24 Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. What has made Glenville unique has been a willingness on the part of the church and of the pastors to be willing to die, in order to further the kingdom of God. Together we have died in order that others might experience Jesus Christ. As a consequence, together we can look back and see how the hand of God has moved over the past 24 years.
God placed you in this church at different points along the 24 year journey with the gifts, talents, abilities and resources that we were going to need as a congregation to make a difference in moving our church forward. God gave us different abilities according to God’s plan for each one of our lives. Each of us was given a role to play regardless of our age, our education, our profession, or our economic standing. Together we decided to believe that God wanted to do a work in and through us.
If you look around today you will see a lot of wonderful people who have served us so faithfully down through the years. But you also would have to look up to see some of them because many of the great saints that served with us so well are now surrounding us in the heaven.
We see in Hebrews Hebrews 12:1 (NIV) 1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. We can all think of the name of some of those witnesses, some are in heaven, some are in nursing homes, and some are in other cities and states still doing ministry for God in other churches. Call out the name of one of them right now.
As we look back over 24 years, we can the spiritual victories that have been won all around this place . There have been prayers up front after the sermon for years. There have been tears that have flowed from our hearts as we have been convicted by the Spirit of God of our sins. There have been burdens that have been lifted as we cried out to God for help because of the struggles we were going through. There have been moments in which we found a new strength in God as we looked into the faces of our loved ones one final time as they lay in coffins down below the pulpit. We didn’t know how we would make it, but God has made a way.
Together we prayed for one another. We prayed with the pastors, we prayed with the elders, we prayed with the lay pastors, we prayed with the prayer warriors and sometimes we paired off in small groups and prayed for each other. Together we were able to meet and pray throughout this building either in worship, in Life-sharing or Pioneers, in the fellowship hall or even in the parking lot. We learned that together we can pray wherever and whenever the need arises. If you prayed with somebody or for somebody, say “pray church pray.”
Together we have celebrated joys in this building. From Baptisms and new members, to weddings and Black History moments. Together we have sung praises, we have done dances, we have been ministered to by choirs, soloists and groups. We have done plays, we have done skits, and we have shown our own movies.
Together we worked to transform our building. Just like the prophet Haggai had a vision for rebuilding the temple and Nehemiah had a vision for rebuilding the walls, we had a vision to make our place of worship, one that glorified the Lord. Our church appearance has gone through many transformations. At one time this building was black outside, but when we sand blasted, we found a beautiful brown sandstone that brought a sense of pride to us and our community.
In those early days when we didn’t have a lot of money, but we did have a lot of each other. In our first transformation of the sanctuary, the men and boys came in and worked on the ceilings, and the women brought us in food to eat. Together we all sanded pews, pulpits and communion tables and together we stained them. Together we painted throughout this building.
We then wanted to take things to another level, so Together we launched several Campaigns. The first campaign was the desire to purchase the vans which we did and they became known as Priscilla and Aquilla. The next campaign was Vision 2000 which led to painting the outside of the church green, putting green padding on our pews, and green tiles and carpet in the sanctuary as well as resurfacing the parking lot and new fence.
Our next campaign was the Air Conditioning. We stood up and said it would cost $13,000 to do it, and asked you to turn in what you would give. That Sunday you put in on pieces of paper, more than what we needed.
That was followed by the New Life Campaign Pt.1 and Pt2. Those Campaigns redid our bathrooms, classrooms, and sanctuary. They built a New Life Center in Haiti. They helped us launch New Life Fellowship. We went from pews to chairs and the modern look in the sanctuary. We added the wall and replaced the doors. We painted the outside to our present brown look and replaced the roof again.
The next was the campaign was for the Access Chair Lift To the Basement. We needed $18,000 and received that amount in pledges the- day it was announced. It was our first major project of the “Least Of These.” We wanted everyone to be able to participate in our celebrations in the fellowship hall and not be limited by being unable to do stairs.
Then There was the Excellence In Giving Campaign. This campaign upgraded our projectors, sound system, drums, keyboard, cameras, parking lot, fence, ac/in the fellowship hall and upstairs. These campaigns were all done because together we shared a vision to present the best that we could to a God who had given us the best that He could in Jesus Christ.
Together we came up with the words, “our purpose is to enter into a right relationship with God and to be equipped for the ministry of Jesus Christ, to make a difference in the lives of others.” We use the word active words “enter into a right relationship with God” because we know it is not a one time process and its over with. We have been entering into a right relationship with God over and over and over again.
As a result thanks to what we have done together as a church, we can see marriages that have been saved, we can see prodigal children and prodigal parents that have come home. We can see bad habits that have been broken by the power of Christ. We can see lives that faced defeat and depression that have been restored because Jesus gives us a second, a third , a fourth and fifth chance. We don’t have failures at Glenville. We have people who are waiting to get back on track and people who have gotten back on track.
Together we have tried to make a difference in the lives of others. One thing about Glenville is that we are willing to meet you where you are, and give you chance after chance to get back on track. You can leave us for whatever reason and come back years later and discover we still want to love you because Jesus still loves you.
Together we have provided ministries to help us grow in a knowledge of who God is and what God wants to do in and through us. Whether we were in 40 Days Of Purpose, 40 Days of Love, 49 Days Of Insanity For Christ, or in one of a host of sermon series on relationships, money, evangelism or commitment, the goal has been to learn how to love God, how to love each other, and how to serve the purposes of the kingdom of God.
Our desire to make a difference is based on Acts 1:8 (NIV) which states 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." We have touched people in our church. We have touched hundreds of youth in our community. Our radio and tv broadcasts went and throughout greater Cleveland week after week. Our partnership with Calvary allowed us to help build our sister church in another part of the city. Our Roku and web ministry have given us an impact throughout the world. From a phone call in China, to e-mails from Germany and South Africa, we have received feedback that lets us know together we have taken the message of Christ to the ends of the earth.
Together we became a church of compassion. We have fed and clothed the orphans in Nigeria and in Haiti. We have fed and clothes those who needed it here in our church and in our community. We still feed and clothe today. We have given prescription funds to a pastor’s wife in India who had no means to pay for medical care and we have paid for prescription medicine for some of you here today who could not afford what you needed. We still do it today.
We have remembered those in prison while they were there and we have helped others once they were released. We have provided a home for an aging poor pastor and his wife in India in the midst of persecution from the Hindu’s around them. We have helped some of us with rent payments, with eviction notices and with utility bills. Our loan program has gotten many of us through some tough times financially.
Our compassion for others led us to adopt the Least Of These as a mission strategy. We brought wheelchairs for those in third world countries giving them a mobility they had never known before. We purchased bicycles for girls to get them safely to school, and as late as last week we began our freedom movement by providing freedom for slaves in the Sudan. Our prayer shawls have been a source of comfort and healing for some who were in the final moments of their lives. We wanted them to know that Jesus cared about them.
Together in the past 24 years, we have learned it’s not about us as pastors or even about us as a church. It’s all about Jesus and the kingdom of God. Together we, through the power of the Holy Spirit, we have been able to do some incredible ministry in touching the lives of people. In the process, we have found ourselves being touched back by the power of God. Because we have been willing to die to ourselves, we have found God has blessed us with life in ways we could not have imagined. Even in the midst of our severe trials, God has been there for us.
Together we have been a light on what God can do with a group of people who are willing to say yes to the will of God for their lives. We have been a light to presbytery, synod and GA. When a book was written about revitalized churches in our denomination, one of the authors wrote, when he came into our church, he realized there was something different taking place here. We believe that difference has been the love we have shared as a community of believers that is firmly rooted in a relationship with Jesus Christ. God anointed us and empowered us to receive anybody who comes through our doors and make them our equal.
Together we should simply thank God for the gift of one another, for the presence of the Holy Spirit, and for the privilege of being a part of a wonderful congregation that meets in a building called Glenville.
