God’s Amazing Church

God knows what He is doing.

God builds His church.

I’ve been alive on this earth for 48 years and have always been aware of the presence of God in this world. I’ve had a confidence in Him from a young age. He was the God who was bigger than the monsters in my room, and then the God of some of my favorite stories, then the God of young teen life committed to Him and then the God who oversaw every part of my life… even my vocation. I have had little trouble trusting Him (most of the time…)

I saw the inside of a church building before I saw my own nursery. My parents stopped by my home church on a Sunday morning on the way home from the hospital after my birth. They wanted to show me off. The church has always been a part of my life. I love the church.

I have great confidence in the ability of God. God knows what He is doing.

I have great confidence in the church… not because of us, but because the church was built by God.

In this society it is much more likely that people are in love with God than they are with the church. And yet as Jesus described the church, He described what His followers would look like. As we read in Acts of how the followers of God interacted with the world, we see a beautiful image of what God was building.

It was a gathering of disciples taught by the foundation of the truth – Christ himself. It is a gathering a people who are called by His name. It is a mission of people reaching out to meet the needs of the world around us. The church is the Body of Christ. The church is the Bride of Christ. The church is God-created out of God’s people existing for God’s pleasure to accomplish God’s mission in God’s world. It cannot exist without God at the heart of it.

When God designed the church, He designed a place where every one of us would have a place to belong, live, serve and give. Through the church, we would be named, taught, empowered, included, loved and sent.

We are the church.

Today, the church is an eclectic group of people from all walks of life, but walking the same walk; with lots of different ideas, but the same ideals. We have different styles, wear different clothes, like different music. Across this world we speak different languages, worship in different ways, preach different lengths, and some cultures dance for hours at each service. (Just to be clear, this white man don’t dance…) But we’re united around one thing. We didn’t create the church:

God builds the church.

Over the past 12 months, we have seen some incredible things happen in our church. We moved into the whole new facility. We’ve had three huge outreach events. The contact list in our church database has doubled. We’ve had 68 baptisms; we had 18 people through our new member class in just the last 30 days. Or giving is up 20% over last year at this time. We just passed $750,000 in our special giving toward our new addition. God is building his church.

God designed the church.

Over the next month, we are going to talk about how God designed the different parts of the church. The Anatomy of a Church. Every part has a purpose. Every part has a place. We all share the same mission; we all do it in different ways. It’s God’s amazing church.

We do our part…

Between now and the end of the year, we will challenge each of us to serve in some simple and maybe new ways. We all need to appreciate what the different parts of the body contribute to the whole of what we do. God made us different and we may serve in different ways, but every part is needed.

God builds the church. (And God knows what He is doing.) And that is why we can trust the church with Him. He designed her.

On November 9th, we will elect some additional leaders to come join with us leading the church. In the next few weeks we will introduce our new leadership over our Children's ministry. For some leaders, this marks the end of their time of ministry in an area. For others, it marks the beginning of their time leading. Whether that is in Children’s ministry, our new elders, or our new deacons, we know that God works through leaders. We trust his ways. When we carefully select and pray over our leaders... God grows our capacity.

As we get closer to Christmas, we are going to have some fun with the season. December is an inviting month. And we are creating events and fun ways to remind people of some of the best of Christmas. We are convinced that God builds his church, and if we can get people her and introduce them to God, God can do some amazing things. Whether at a Chili Cook Off or a nice sit down dinner or a community Christmas Eve service, wherever we lift Him up, he will draw people to Himself. God builds His church.

So... I am desperately in love with God and still greatly in love with God’s Amazing Church. Whatever God builds is never hopeless, helpless or junk. What He designs is beautiful, creative, purposeful and a wonder to behold.

See you Sunday,

Andy