Something Old, Something New, What To Do When Change Makes You Blue Series

1. Title: Something Old, Something New, What To Do When Change Makes You Blue

2. Text: several

3. Audience: Villa Heights Christian Church, AM crowd, October 22, 2006, last in a series on worship, leading up to our 10th anniversary the next week

4. Objectives:

-for the people to understand that change is inevitable, even necessary in the Church, and that there are ways to approach it that are biblically sound

-for the people to feel confronted regarding any bad attitudes they have toward change in general, and to feel challenged to approach change with a better attitude

-for the people to accept necessary change with a good heart and an unselfish attitude that ultimately allows God to do whatever He is desiring to do through the Church

5. When I finish my sermon I want my audience to laugh at themselves for the way they sometimes resist change, examine whether or not they have had a wrong attitude about change, and adjust any areas of their thinking toward change in the Church that need to be adjusted

6. Type: topical

7. Dominant Thought: The Church has always been changing and always will be changing because the world around it is always changing

8. Outline:

Intro -

Scene 1 - Adam and Eve at home.

Adam: (watching out the window) I just don’t get it. You raise your kids right, then one goes and murders his brother and it all falls apart from there. You’d think that by the time Cain’s great, great, great, great, grandson Jubal was born, some of that would have worn off.

Eve: What ever are you talking about, dear?

Adam: Oh, you know it’s these sounds, this…this…music!

Eve: Oh, right, you mean the flute and harp that Jubal invented.

Adam: Yeah, whatever he calls them. He looks like he’s going off to hunt turkeys. That harp thing…Please! What good is a bow if you can’t shoot an arrow with it?

Eve: They’re for helping singing, dear. He’s teaching it to all his kids.

Adam: I know – singing! What’s that all about?

Eve: Honey, it’s OK. Seems like the animals have been doing it since we were first here. I think it might be another way to honor God.

Adam: Honor God? Who needs all that stuff to worship? When we were younger, whatever age that was, worship was simple. You brought your sacrifice, you talked to God. That was it. Now there’s this music…

Eve: Now, Adam, we’ve seen a lot of change these past couple hundred years. I doubt music is going to create any kind of problems for worshiping God.

Adam: You’re probably right, dear. You’re usually right. I knew there was some reason I picked you! (end of scene 1)

Blimpies closed. You say, “It’s no big deal.” Yes it is a big deal! I ate a 6” chicken salad sandwich from Blimpies at least 1-2X a week. They gave me a Blimpies VIP punch card – double punches on Wednesdays. 7 punches, get a free sandwich. You know how many free sandwiches I ate from Blimpies? I’d go in to order. They’d look at me. “Usual?” “Yeah.” Then, Tuesday, I pull up to Blimpies, walk up to the door, and when I go to open it, there’s a note, hand-scrawled, taped inside the door: “As of Monday, October 16, Blimpies will be closed. Thanks for 7 years of good business!” And I was going to use one of my free sandwich cards! No warning. No “Goodbye, Sherm, we’ll miss you!”

They changed on me. It used to be easy. I didn’t have to think about lunch. I didn’t have to worry about if I would like it or not, if it was going to cost me too much, or what to order when I got there. I could just get in my car, without thinking, drive there, without thinking, walk in and order without thinking, and eat lunch without thinking! Not anymore. Blimpies was a hand-crocheted afghan of security, and now it’s stripped away. If you should happen to see me some early afternoon, wandering around outside my car with a bewildered look on my face outside the former Blimpies door, understand why.

Change comes hard. I don’t care who you are. It doesn’t matter if you’re an older person or a just-settled baby, having a predictable routine in certain areas of life is easier. It permits you to proceed with less effort – without having to think about what you’re doing, without fear of the unknown, without the challenge of decision-making, without the discomfort of unfamiliarity.

Do you suppose we’re the 1st generation ever to struggle with changes? Or, do you suppose, that even people in Israel, say around 1050 BC, struggled with change too?

Scene 2 – Around 1,050 BC.