Way of Jesus Mark # 7 - October 21, 2018
This are notes, a detailed outline of this sermon.
Intro: Did you ever win a participation award when you were young?
When I was a boy they didn’t have those. They had these instead (meme of bruised arm)
I think participation trophies started somewhere in the 90’s when they wanted to give kids something not for winning, but for being there. Elia received some of those.
Illustration:
When our daughter Elia was 8 she was competing in gymnastics, aiming for the city gymnastics finals.
At one point she was playing with some friends on the old wooden balance beams on the playground at Spruce court.
She fell and cracked 2 ribs. Not a good day.
Her grandmother came to the city finals. She knew Elia wasn’t going to place on the podium because she hadn’t been able to train much due to her ribs that broke.
Grandmother brought a beanie baby stuffed dog.
Elia placed after 4th, which meant she didn’t receive a ribbon, which is all she wanted.
Grandmother gave her the beanie baby as a consolation prize.
The girl who placed 1st in that competition and every other competition, literally covered in medals, clearly wanted and would have preferred Elia’s beanie baby.
Elia’s ‘participation’ award that year, a very personal gift from a loving grandmother, was the envy of the other 9 year olds.
Participation matters. Participation makes all the difference.
Our last marker or anchor in the Way of Jesus series we’ve been looking at is:
# 7 - I am participating in a community of followers of Jesus on mission in the world
This is the final marker of the Way of Jesus.
All the markers happen all the time and the WoJ intentionally revisits each marker so we stay on track.
Let’s break it down
1. Participating
2. Community of followers of Jesus - The Church
3. On mission in the world
Let’s look at what we are first:
The Church=
Eklessia - Called out
Called out of what?
Darkness 1 Peter 2:9
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
1 Peter 2:9-10
Sin
The world (participating in the sin of the world)
Bondage
Into what:
The glorious inheritance of the children of God
I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe.
Ephesians 1:17-19
Who here is called out?
Let me ask another way: who here is part of the church?
Everyone who believes that Jesus Christ died for their sins, who has relented if their sins and turned to follow Jesus.
So that’s #2. That’s what we are: a community of followers of Jesus
What’s #1?
I’m participating. As with all the markers of the way of Jesus, we take responsibility. We actively, personally engage to be followers of Jesus. It is not something done to us. We are doing it.
What does participating start with?
Showing up. That’s half the battle. Being here.
What else does participating look like?
Let me do a favourite thing of mine and talk about you guys.
Go to
William
Marjorie
Faith/Rodney/Denis etc
Florence
Hazel
Paul and Shirley (Birthday recognition, Resetting classrooms, organizing church greeter schedule, Sunday Resource (YSM and Other) Ministry
Seasonal Banquet Gym Volunteer Oversight)
Others
That’s just a tiny bit of insight as to how we work together as a community of followers of Jesus on mission in the world.
We see:
• Care for this congregation
• We see care for the mission’s community
• We see leadership offered, gifts offered
• We see visitation of those who are shut in happening, those in prison
• We see hands-on practical service
• We see leadership in worship, teaching.
Why do we do all this?
On mission in the world
We likely all have different nuances of responses to this question,
but I believe the one thing in common that we have is a desire
to serve Jesus,
a desire to serve the living God.
That is our mission. To serve God, embracing everyone, enfolding all into the love of God in Christ Jesus.
To be an expression of Jesus’ own mission - the reason He was sent.
Do you remember when Jesus talked about why He was sent?
14 Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and … was teaching in (the) synagogues… He stood up to read, 17 and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:
18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free,
19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
20 Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him.21 He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”
And Jesus ultimately gave His life as a sacrifice for our sin to accomplish His mission.
And then Jesus spoke to the first disciples as he speaks to us today
John 20
19 On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together…Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” 20 After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.
21 Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” 22 And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.
That is what the mission of Jesus is that we are participating in as a community of followers of Jesus.
To
A couple final but very important words:
Jesus prayer for us to serve in unity
20 “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one,Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
And then the Apostle Paul (ID Paul) tells us how to serve in unity:
Eph. 4:1 As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 2 Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit — just as you were called to one hope when you were called — 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
Those I mentioned earlier, who are participating, serving, are doing so in this manner.
The rest of us can learn to love and serve in this way, and the best way to do that is to just do it.
If you’re not involved, if in your own judgment. you are more on the sidelines than you are really participating, just start.
Ask us how to become involved. There are a huge amount of opportunities how to get involved at the church and at the mission.
[[And if you’re here and you are a part of this community and you like it, but you don’t really understand faith,
or you don’t know where you are at, or if you’re completely skeptical about what we believe but you just like hanging out here,
you need to know that Jesus’ response to skeptics is gentle and invitational - it’s simply “come follow me”.
So think about that. Think about starting your own journey with Jesus, and doing that arm in arm with us.]]
So may we be counted among those who are participating in a community of followers of Jesus on mission in the world.
And may we grow in our passion to love God, to love one another, and to serve God, to serve one another, and to bless the community that God has planted us in.
