“WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED?”
Sunday, June 6, 2004
You can raise your hand because you can be proud of this, who read all forty of the readings during the 40 Days of Purpose? How many of you can say I read all 40 of them? If you did, congratulations, I congratulate you, and if you didn’t, that’s okay. If you did some of them, something is better than nothing. God will use it anyway.
Believe it or not, I don’t have a whole lot to say this morning. I know that’s a shock. Today, we are going to conclude with a party, a breakfast downstairs, because it is raining outside. What I decided to do today was let you write the sermon, so you have written it. I emailed everyone in the congregation. If you didn’t get an email, it means we don’t have your email address, so if you have one and you didn’t get the information, give us your email so we can send you direct information. If you are worried and saying, oh no I didn’t know my email was going to be broadcast over the pulpit, the names have been changed to protect the guilty, so your name has been changed. I tried to go with ones that I received a lot of emails on, some general things. We are going to look at what we have learned over the last 40 days. What we learned about God’s purposes in our lives and what we learned about God. Know one will know that it was you, but you may find some of your emails reflected in the message.
If you missed the opportunity, its okay, we are going to do it again sometime. Probably during a mid-week service type format or on Sunday night but we will redo this series to give others an opportunity, who because of their work or the situation at the time were just unable to be part of the series. Before we delve in, let’s pause for a word of prayer, then we will to talk about what we have learned in the last 40 days as a church. Let’s pray.
What have we learned? Deuteronomy 11:2 says this: “Remember today what you have learned about the Lord through your experiences with him.” That is what we are going to do. Before the children of Israel crossed the Jordan, God caused them to pause and reflect upon their journey so that they would remember what God had brought them through to get to that place, and it is fitting that we should talk about remembrances because today is a day of remembrance.
Today is the 60th anniversary of D-Day. It was on this day that the alliances stormed Normandy. It was this decision that ultimately led to the downfall of the third Reich and ultimately to the victory of the alliance. Today it is fitting because we remember a decision we made 40 days ago. Forty days ago some of you made the decision to do 40 Days of Purpose and it has lead ultimately to a change in your life. It has put you on a path that ultimately will lead to your victory. We celebrate that together!
I wasn’t kidding 40 days ago when I said that these 40 days may be, in your life, the most important 40 days, and for some of you that has been true. They have been the most important 40 days because they have been days of transformation, days of change, and days of enlightenment. You have been set on a new course and you are not going back.
What have we learned? What have we discovered? The first lesson we’ve learned is that we are here for God’s purposes. The key to satisfaction, the key to life, the key to joy, the key to contentment and real happiness is that it is not about us, it is about God. If you want to really enjoy satisfaction in life, the starting point is not you, but it is God. That is why Genesis 1:1 says: “In the beginning God. . . .” Ephesians 1:11 says: “It is in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for.” Long before we heard of Christ he had his eye on us. He had designs on us for glorious living - part of his overall purpose he is working out in everything and everyone. Proverbs 16:4 says this: “The Lord has made everything for his own purpose.”
I find it odd that the key to my personal fulfillment begins with humility. It begins with realizing that I am not the center of the universe, that God is. That self-centeredness actually ends in self-destruction. But a life centered on God is a fountain of life and one person wrote:
“Pastor Richard, through the 40 Days of Purpose life has become clearer. I finally get it. The Christian life has always seemed confusing, a kind of montage, a lot of scripture passages that I never put together. Now I see the big picture and I understand it. As a result of living with purpose, I am able to let go of a lot of stuff that has caused a lot of stress in my life. It really is true; the purpose-driven life does lead to a simpler life and a saner schedule. Thank you.”
That email reminded me that there are benefits. There are benefits when you live your life purposely for God and not for yourself. For one, it gives you direction. Renee and I, of all the things we gleaned from the series, realized how important it is that we live purposefully, especially at this point in our lives, parenting with purpose. Being very purposeful in what we do because, as a family, there are a lot of options, there are a lot of things to do, aren’t there? The question is: but what should we do? There are a lot of options, but what should we do?
Well, what is our purpose? Why did God entrust us with these four precious souls? The number one reason why God gave you children (if God gave you children, and note you are a steward, you do not own these children, they are not yours, they are God’s. God has loaned them to you and you know one day, if you are a good parent, you need to give them up, you need to let them go. It’s a reminder that we are stewards of our children), the number one reason God gave you children is so that you can take these precious lives and lead them back to the arms of their creator and instill the five purposes in their lives, that they would grow up to love God and to love others, that they become people of character, people of conviction, that you would help them discover their shape for ministry and have them embrace the faith of Jesus Christ in their own life and pass it on to others as well.
That is your task as parents, and as you look at your options, it helps to make it very clear, it makes choices very easy when you say, you know what, does this option, does this thing to which I commit my time to, will it enable me to fulfill this purpose in my life, God’s purpose for my life for having children? There are other benefits. There is meaning in life, focus, motivation, knowing there is an end in mind, and the purposes prepare us for eternity.
What is the second thing we learned? As a congregation, we have learned that we are no accident. We were created by God. Now I am going to talk to those who have been adopted or those who in the back of their mind are wondering, because they never really received a nurturing atmosphere from their parents or ever heard their parents say I love you, and in the back of your mind, this question haunts you: Was I really wanted? If that is you - if you understand that God created you- that question, now is immaterial.
Why? Because it doesn’t matter if your parents wanted you. God wanted you. God wanted you so badly that no matter what your parents thought, no matter what your parents wanted, he made sure that you were born, because he had a purpose for you. He has a plan for your life. God loves you and God has designed some good purpose in your life, so stop asking the question am I wanted? The answer is yes because God wanted you. God wanted you and he created you for a purpose. A lot of you got this. It sounds like a direct television commercial- you know the one with Laurence Fishburn going “Jumping Jehosaphat! Hee, ha!”-you know that commercial? Just pretend you do. One person wrote, “the most powerful thing I have experienced today and what I feel welling up in my being is the fact that God created me to be the way that I am. The fact that he planned to make me this way amazes me. For all of my life I have suffered with inferiority, but no more! There really is nothing to feel inferior about when you realize God wanted you to be just the way you are” and they end with yippee!
Another person wrote, in fact a lot of people, I discovered, wrote about being part of alcoholic families. A lot of you have come from alcoholic families; I mean a lot of you. One person wrote “your greatest ministry will become your deepest wound. This has been the theme of my life. After reading The Purpose Driven Life I am convinced now more than ever that God put me into my family so I could learn and heal from my own experience and pain and to help others in similar situations. It is difficult to put into words how grateful I am for the healing I have experienced and the peace I live with today because of my relationship with God and Jesus Christ.”
This is another thing we learned. We learned that God gave us peace. I was reminded of this not too long ago. I was talking about a man who searched for peace his entire life and this search for peace led him down roads that isolated him from his family and it was when he put his faith in Christ, which seemed to be so simple, when he put his faith in Jesus Christ he discovered the peace he had been looking for decades. I wondered about that because I would have hoped that any block in this country you can discover the message that leads to peace because there is a church just about in every block of our country. How is it that with so many churches people aren’t discovering that there is peace in knowing and having God in their life? How is that possible?
I was talking with one gentleman after the service and his experience was the same as mine. He had grown up in a Lutheran church and it was his experience with the church that pushed him away from God because he experienced church as sterile and dead and irrelevant to life, absolutely boring, uninspiring, and it became a wedge. He decided that God was irrelevant for his life so he left, but he has been visiting, someone invited his daughter to Sunday School, the daughter has enjoyed it so much that she came home, Mom and Dad, I want to go to that church every Sunday. That perked his interest because that wasn’t his experience as a child or as an adult. So he decided what is this church like that my daughter would want to go every Sunday? So he started to come. He came during the 40 Days of Purpose and it was through you and through the 40 Days of Purpose that God began to stir in his life. He discovered that Jesus really is real and that he really is relevant to his life, and then he decided to give God and Christ and the church a second chance. Something else we learned is that God is alive and well. God is relevant to our lives and to our day.
I received a letter just the other day from a former church member. Actually that is not right, a member of my former church in New Brighton. The first Sunday that I got to meet her she came up to me and said I am a pro-choice feminist and I want you to know it and I want to know where you stand on this issue. She freaked me out so I decided to freak her out as well, I said I am a right-wing Reagan republican – it is fitting that I should say that today – I am a right-wing Reagan republican - she was aghast that her pastor is a right-wing Reagan republican. Anyway I did that just to shock her though. Of all people, I thought now, here is a person who doesn’t get it, in that her life was all about her. It was all about her and she lived the quintessential American busy life.
I got a letter on Friday and she wrote me because she was wanting some money to go on a mission trip. She is now on her third mission trip to Romania. She works with the ghetto children of Bucharist. It was these very children she said at one time in my pastorate that they were better off aborted, that their life is meaningless and has a lack of purpose. Over time she had a transformation in her life by getting in touch with God’s Word. It is these children now that she is seeking to rescue because she discovered that she was made for a mission, and she writes with such joy and such gratitude.
I discovered that people are spiritually hungry. I was amazed and I am so proud of you. When I decided to do the 40 Days of Purpose, I was worried. A 300-page book, asking your congregation to read a 300-page book in 40 days, you have to be nuts. I know you are busy, but 215 of you took books, and I praise God for that. 185 of you joined a small group, whether it was a covenant group, a host home, a Sunday school group or a pastor’s bible study. I got a lot of emails about just how it fed you. One person wrote an email before and an email after. In fact, a lot of you wrote an email before and one after.
I got a sense of this growth and I will express it this way. I got this email before and here is what it says, “Eternity, I have to admit I have never ever thought about it, at least not to this great detail. Surrender, I had never thought about that before. I think I need more work on this one. I am not quite sure on it though. I will check with you later, lots of questions.” At the end of the series I got this email. “I loved the series, but there was so much information that I couldn’t digest it, and not only quantity, but quality of material. I think you need to do two to three weeks worth on each purpose at the very least. I followed this series on CD, [wow this person is radical], I rewind it constantly to hear the message over and over again and then I read the book and then I read the journal. Wow! I still feel that there is so much to hear, to grasp, and to internalize. You mentioned that you want to redo the series but slower. I totally agree.” The email ends with the phrase, “overwhelmed”, which is another thing I think we learned.
We were overwhelmed! I was overwhelmed by the response and I am proud of you. I was overwhelmed by the fact that there were 225 cards that were taken for those who wanted to volunteer in some form of ministry during the ministry fair. I was overwhelmed by the mission fair and the great job that Deb Martin did and the great job the celebration Sunday people are doing today. There was a great sense of being overwhelmed and you know what? There is a reason why you were overwhelmed because what you didn’t know is that what we did in 40 days was we took the entire Bible and all of its teaching and condensed it into 40 days and solidified it into 5 simple but profound, memorable statements.
If you followed it and really lived out the entire Bible, there is so much to say, in fact every sermon ever said from here on will somewhere fit under one of those purposes. There will be an unpacking, an explaining, and a teaching on how to live out one of these purposes. What we have done really is taken the Bible in book form and shoved it into a DVD. When you do that what happens? When you move from a CD to a DVD what happens to the information? Well, I am not an expert but John Woomer tells me that you compress the information. That is what we have done. We have DVD’d the Bible. We have compressed the information into 40 days, so it is fitting that you should be overwhelmed. So you are normal, don’t worry about it.
What are those purposes? We talked about the five purposes and what are those purposes? Can you remember them? We are going to go over them and see how well you do. We were planned for God’s pleasure and the biblical word for that is worship. Alright try this one then. We were formed for God’s family and the biblical word for that is fellowship. We were created to become like Christ and the biblical word for that is discipleship. We were shaped to serve God and the biblical word for that is ministry. We were made for a mission and the biblical word for that is evangelism.
Very good. What do we do now? John 13:17 says this: “Now that you know these things you will be blessed to do them.” That is where a lot of people have asked the question what next? What are we doing next? Isn’t this bad timing, because now we are going to hit the summer and kind of lose the momentum? Actually, it is not bad timing. Actually, it is very good timing because having got all this information and just being overwhelmed, it is now important to slow down. The summer time is a great way to slow down. In fact, the whole church slows down and it is good for us to slow down. I encourage you to slow down. One thing you can do to begin to practice what you have already learned is to reread the book, but reread it slower. Now you have 80 days. During the summer you have a whole 80 days. Isn’t that wonderful? You can read one chapter every other day and be able to get through the book. I encourage you to do that- just read it slowly and digest it. It will help you, because none of us can remember it all.
I have studied it for six months. I have read it three or four times and I can’t remember half the stuff in the book, so I encourage you to reread it. You may want to study it in a group and I encourage you to do that. If that is your desire, put that on the information form, on that green form. I encourage you to fill that out and put it in he offering plate so we can collect those and make sure you get in a group if you want to study it with someone throughout the summertime. Some groups are going to study it two to three chapters per week, some are going to do one chapter a week, and some are going to do a totally different curriculum and that’s okay. There is curriculum downstairs if you want to check it out. You can use the questions in the back of the book as a way of studying the book. You may want to use the journal. Maybe you missed out on the entire series and that’s okay because we have tapes to loan. You can read the book and get the tapes on loan and study it yourself, or you can study it with a group.
I encourage you also that some of you may have been struck by the message on fellowship. It may be that the next step for you is you are ready to be a member. You say you know what this is my church. This is the church I want to belong to. I encourage you to call the church office or put it on the attendance pad, and join the church. If we have enough people, we will do a class in July and have you join during the summertime.
If you are a small group leader, and this is your first experience, or if you have been a small group leader for a while, your next step may be to further develop your skills- you discovered that you are shaped for this and this is right for you. You are shaped for small group ministry and to be a small group ministry leader. Then I encourage you to take the small group leader’s class. I am going to offer it during the summertime. I will let you know more information on it, but I encourage you to further develop your skills. If this is your calling, then further develop your skills.
I was called as a pastor 22 years ago. I spent eight years in college and I spent 14 years after that honing my skills. Just because you are called doesn’t mean you are not called to continue to develop your skills. In fact, if God does call you, you are called also then to develop your skills better and better, so I encourage you to come to the training.
Where are we going from here? Well we are going to offer the series again probably on a Wednesday or a Sunday night. I also encourage you to pass it on. Tell others and give others the book and maybe get someone a set of tapes or give them one of the tapes we have from our Sunday school class. During the fall we are going to do – I hate the phrase because we use it so– I may just skip that phrase but - 40 days of community. I am going to highlight one thing that caught my attention, the theme on fellowship and the need to protect the church and its unity, and I think we haven’t done that very well in the past so what I would like to do is go over how we are to live together. How do church people live together? What is the model for unity? Your next step may be to fill out the life purpose statement and if you want to write out a life purpose statement, if that is meaningful to you, there are sample copies downstairs.
Your next step may be ministry. One person wrote “You know what? We need to take our ministry, and make it known to our community so it becomes a mission,” and I think they are right. I know there are some small groups who have been studying the Bible a long time, and this may seem irreligious coming from your Pastor, but you know what, you may need to stop studying the Bible for a little while. You may need to do some ministry. Why? Because Bible study without an outlet will lead to spiritual stagnation in your life. You may need to spend some time doing some ministry and reaching out to others.
To close the service, before we celebrate communion together, I want you to take out the insert on the Purpose Driven Life and let’s read it together. I hope that it becomes your covenant for life and that you intend from this day forward to do these things. We are going to read it straight through together. Are you ready?
Since life is preparation for eternity,
I want to use my time on earth fulfilling God’s five purposes for me.
I was planned for God’s pleasure which is worship
so I will use this day to get to know and love God better.
I was formed for God’s family –fellowship-
so I will use this day to show love to others.
I was created to become like Christ which is discipleship
so I will use this day to make choices that grow my character.
I was shaped to serve God which is ministry
so I will use this day to serve God by serving others.
I was made for a mission - evangelism -
so I will use this day to share the good news.
