Make the Vision Plain: Becoming, by 2017
(Isaiah 65:17-20, 24-25; Luke 21:5-19)
10:30 am, Sun, Nov 17 2013, Windsor UBC, J G White
Yesterday was a big day for Christmas craft sales - and Santa parades - and I did see advertized a “Christmas Party” yesterday, and other such things. So the “visions of sugar plums” are dancing in people’s heads already, and it is only mid November! We can see that the “Holiday Season” is becoming longer, arriving earlier. Have patience, dear people.
The sugar plum of our own vision, as believers here, is to reach with the Gospel of Jesus people of our communities. And we want to face the particular challenges of ministry to people who are, well, younger than me, 43.
Sharon and I got this in the mail during the week. “There is Hope” a tract from Western Tract Mission. Has bunch of personal stories, and then a brief explanation of trusting Jesus as your Saviour. Has a “Romans Road” on the back cover. Not exactly the best method to reach younger people. Other ways than a tract - a pamphlet, other ways than a list of scripture verses explained are needed. New conversations and new approaches are needed to impact people today.
How we get to this new place is a process. We have given ourselves until 2017 - four years - to become focused on this ministry. We are in a season of becoming. We are just discovering how we can come together under a shared vision of a preferred future.
Our scriptures today paint visions of the future. The visions of what we call Isaiah 65 look ahead to the restoration of the Hebrews and their capital city. The words also looked farther ahead to the arrival of their Messiah - who turns out to be Jesus, the guy arriving at what we call Christmas. And that poetic picture of a new creation of peace is also looking ever farther ahead - beyond where we are today, in 2013 - to the second coming of Christ, and the completion of this hope. So, many of the Bible prophecies shared by those ancient sages happened sort-of as predicted, and yet we still wait for everything to happen in a deeper way.
This phrase caught my attention during the week: Isaiah 65:24 “Before they call I will answer, while they are yet speaking I will hear.” God answers before we speak.
Natalie, our secretary, this week bemoaned the state of the failing computer in the office. It’s no longer slow as molasses, it’s starting to enter the final stages. It’s a dear computer in palliative care. On Thursday, Natalie wondered if someone could get that donated computer working to replace the old one. “It’s already happening,” I told her, “In fact, it’s better than you hoped. The Trustees can decide tonight to procure a new computer for the office.” And I quoted to her the old theological hope that God knows what we need before we even ask for it, and provides. “Before they call, I will answer” preached Isaiah.
So God provides. According to His schedule. And our Lord provides better things than we asked or imagined. So it is with a good vision. It must be big enough that we need God to achieve it. At my pastor’s retreat ten days ago, I found myself urged to explore “how much am I desperate and longing for the Lord.” In the days since, I know I am quite desperate, thirsty, needy. And God will satisfy me.
If we make a plan according to what we can do, it’s just our plan. God’s plan for us is bigger than us - it can happen only with God. It requires His grace for our lives. And this He provides.
We are works in progress. So ‘becoming’ is a good place to be. To say we “will be” means we are on a journey, we are still in training, there is still hope for us greater than we have seen in the past!
Look back with me now to a sentence a bit earlier in Isaiah 65 (18). Words of the Lord: “But be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating; for I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy, and its people as a delight.”
I believe in Divine intervention. And this is what our vision is about. God taking us on this training mission to know and love and understand and reach people, with good news for them about Jesus.
Thousands of years ago God’s message was: I will create Jerusalem as a joy. This is a place, a city. And, I will create its people as a delight. This is the people.
I claim this poetry for today. God will create Windsor as a joy. God will made this people a delight! This is the loving work of the Lord among us. Building our skills and confidence about witnessing. Training us in the languages and worldviews of younger people today. Challenging us to become free from serving ourselves and our Church. Calling us to try and try again to rely upon the grace that is all sufficient to transform our lives and others.
We can become what God is creating! That’s my point today. We can become what God is creating. We shall be changed. We are not the ones doing it.
But we must cooperate with God the Holy Spirit.
Like the poetry of Isaiah 65, similar to Isaiah 11, we have hopeful visions of a congregation that has its eyes on the next generations, and its heart there, upon them. We visualize a constellation of communities in this area that are safe and prosperous, good to call home, good for raising a family, good to retire in, and making a difference even beyond West Hants.
We are at the early, early stages of becoming missional: a mission minded people. I know it is an early stage because all our language is still about dreams for more people in the pews, with us, in our classrooms, being ministered to in this facility. Later stages will have our vision on being the Church more and more when we are not here, not all in one heap. Scatter our lives, serving and interacting for Christ in our communities, and Jesus will use us there.
The ole proverb about money can be said about believers: we are like manure. If you spread Christians around they do a lot of good. But if you pile them up in one place all the time they stink! There are times to pile up the organic fertilizer, but the real activity happens when it’s spread all around.
Chris read for us about Jesus in Luke 21 - another future vision. “Look at the beautiful worship centre!” Jesus apprentices say to Him. “Look at the arches, the ornaments; see the woodwork. Even the simple hymn-boards - they were made by Havelock Redden. And the brass cross - in memory of our Pastor, Mr. Churchill. Ahhh.”
“It’s all coming down” says Jesus. “Not one beam will be left standing.”
“When?! When?” The followers ask.
And today I ask the same thing. When will our vision for the younger generations - and every generation out there - go beyond simply getting them to be Baptists who gather here?
In God’s time and will. We can become what God is creating! So it is OK to be at the stage we are at - if we are relying upon our Saviour to lead us along in good directions. Our Jesus continues to instruct and train us, by the presence of God, the Holy Spirit.
God uses our own experiences to give us wisdom. We grow in spiritual maturity as we walk with God, make our mistakes, discover where blessings grow, and keep going.
Our small group - we have been having some very good in-depth conversation - sharing - with one another. We are learning about each other’s brokenness and the healing the Lord has done already. And when one person speaks of what’s troubling, someone else can admit the same thing. One person testified about how big an issue it is to avoid embarrassment. A light went on inside me: that’s what I do too, deep inside. I’m terrified of being embarrassed. The Lord teaches another step, heals, transforms.
Our little group has become a safe place for faith and fear to be shared. From the hard times the Spirit of God heals and develops character. Our experience gives wisdom.
Cory Somers, Lead Pastor of Immanuel Baptist Truro, was recently interviewed by Sharon White about Church leadership, for a course she is taking. “Where have you learned the most about leadership?” Somers said, from his own mistakes. “The more you fail the more you learn. Failure is the best teacher.”
Mr. Somers is becoming the leader God envisions him to be. And he is being used by the Lord today, as he is now. Just like me, just like some of you.
Philippians 1:6 “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.” The “day of Jesus Christ” is the day of His return. Everything will be completed then. We can be incomplete now - sinners saved by grace - but we are on the way, we are becoming, day by day, we and our own personal missions are being completed.
Jeremiah 29:11 “For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.”
Our God wills to create Windsor as a joy, Windsor Baptist people as a delight. We are becoming the people God envisions us to be. And when we are becoming, we are who we need to be this day!
“But be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating; for I am about to create Windsor as a joy, and its people as a delight.” Isaiah 65:18.
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