Monday Rewind: God’s Unyielding Grace – Is. 42:18-43:21
This is one highlight from a sermon I preached at Mission Fellowship Church on June 6, 2009, entitled, “You’re the One Not Listening!” The idea of this sermon was formulated by the the dispute from Is 42:18-23. The Israelites believed that God was not hearing them or their cries for help. God responds to his people that they were the ones not listening to him. He was disciplining them for their sins. Yet he had not forgotten them. In fact, he was about to bring relief.
In 43:1-5, God tells the people that, in fact, he was on his way with relief. What brought the relief that God promised? The people haven’t changed. Their sins and attitudes showed little change during their time of captivity. It is not a change in them so much as it was the grace and devotion of God. God had such an unyielding love and commitment to Israel that he repositioned them and their life in the world.
God tells Israel “Do Not Fear”. The basis for this claim is that God has redeemed the nation. Redemption can carry the idea of a family intervention where a stronger member of the family intervenes to assure the well being of the a weaker member. In addition to “do not fear”, God reminds the people that he has “called [them] by name”. This may be an adoption formula. Regardless, Israel is identified with, belongs to, and is cherished by God. John Calvin states, “God refuses to be deprived of his rightful possession”
God invested a great of love into his children. In 43:1-5 he reminds them that he:
Created them
Formed them
Redeemed them
Called them by name
He will be with them
God loves deeply his children and though he disciplines them, he does not abandon them. He seeks to woo them back into a blessed relationship with them. It is not based on our merit or our goodness. It is based on God’s unyielding grace poured out upon his children.
Ultimately, what matters most about you is not what you deserve but whose you are. Whatever life throws at you, including God’s tough love, he will go with you into it.
I want to state right up front that this is a personal post. I also want to state that this may be considered an illustration of a previous post where I discussed success as investment. Now that the disclaimers are out of the way, let’s get busy.
Last Thursday (June 4, 2009) I turned 40 years old. On Sunday, my wife surprised me with a party for both my birthday and graduation with my doctorate. There were about 35 people there. It was a blast and I was truly overwhelmed by her actions and the turnout.
The husband of one family who came was on the pastor search team that brought me here to Delaware five years ago. He was a difficult guy to read during those initial phone conversations. I remember during one conversation, he asked a hypothetical question that I was able to talk my way through, though I’m not sure it made any sense. When he asked the question, I could hear on the other end of the line phrases such as, “What?” and “Are you serious?”. We all got a good laugh after my answer when another member asked him what he was thinking by asking such an odd question. His response was “I don’t know, I just made it up!” He is the supreme jokester and we had a lot of fun together with he and his family. Unfortunately, less than a year after I arrived, they had to move due to a job change. While they only moved an hour away, it was just too far to drive to be a part of our community of faith.
In the five years I have been in Delaware, we have had to say goodbye to a lot of people because of transitions in the marketplace. In fact, if my calculations are correct, we have sent almost 100 missionaries in the past five years. When I got here we had less than 80 people. (Please don’t do the math…If you’re a numbers person, it’s not pretty).
Because he and his family arrived late for the party, they ended up staying after everyone else had left and we got a chance to talk. It was the first time we had been together in over four years, but you would never know it.
I asked the family how they were enjoying the church they were attending. I know the pastor there and he’s a great guy. I mentioned something about the building during our conversation and he told me they had two large parcels of land and were trying to figure which parcel of land to build on. The church was going to build a large new campus. He said (and I’m paraphrasing), “I don’t know why they want to do that. They want to build up. We should be building wide, like you were talking about when you came here.” He and his family are waiting for the opportunity to help plant a church in their own area. In fact, he has stopped going to meetings where decisions are being made because he’s frustrated that the church wants to buy land or build big buildings. I sat there stunned that a man whom I had roughly one year to invest in was still trumpeting my words and mission four years later.
After they left, I came into my office and downloaded Nicole Nordeman’s song Legacy (album: Recollection: The Best of Nichole Nordeman) off of iTunes. I searched Youtube to see if the video was there. And I sat down with my wife and we talked about what he had said. And we started listing all the people who had moved to another part of the country or world, or who was still in the area but involved in a church plant. In most every case, the last update we heard from those missionaries were that they were investing themselves in ministry to church plants, small churches, or were pushing their churches to start churches. We sent out our first church planter one year after we came. He was a 73 year old retired Asian pastor who had been in our church less than a year and was compelled, according to him, to help start an Asian church out near the University of Delaware through our weekly discussions and the prompting of God (which is far more important). He and his wife are still involved in that plant four years later. Another family moved away in 2006. They joined a small church intending to planting churches as well as wanting to their skills, gifts and talents to serve, love, and invest in their community. They were intentional in that. I could tell story after story of people who were sent out with that mindset.
We need to consider our legacy as we minister, realizing all of us are ministers. How was Jesus known after the resurrection? Through those in whom he had invested himself. They were a reflection of Jesus, “little Christ’s”. The legacy of Jesus was not found in the masses but in the individuals AND the communities of faith that reflected a deep investment by Jesus and His Spirit. Jesus’ legacy is not found in the masses. It was found in the reflections. Your legacy is not found in the masses, but in those who reflect your life. We all need to realize that while we teach what we know, we reproduce who we are. Those in whom you invest will reflect who you are. That is a sobering thought.
We have not seen the masses come to Christ while we have been in Delaware. We have baptized 13 these past five years and led a few more to Christ that we didn’t baptize. My legacy will not be that I led a thriving, bustling, busy and large church. My legacy will be that since I arrived five years ago, we have sent out people seeking to make investments in the lives of others through church planting and church multiplication as well as living the Gospel as a message of wholeness, ministering to the whole person through investment, not just seeing them get out of hell and into heaven or coming to our particular church. (The irony: I’m not a church planter but I have a passion to see the church multiply, not grow big.) My legacy will be found in the people I invested in, not in the numbers I obtained, which really aren’t mine anyway.
I’ve listened to Legacy (album: Recollection: The Best of Nichole Nordeman) several times since Sunday night. I’ve wept each time. The reason: at least one family in whom I invested a short period of my life in still lives that investment four years later. That never, ever gets old!
Lest you don’t know the song I speak of, here are the words:
I don’t mind if you’ve got something nice to say about me
And I enjoy an accolade like the rest
You could take my picture and hang it in a gallery
Of all the who’s who and so-n-so’s that used to be the best
At such ‘n such…it wouldn’t matter much
I won’t lie, it feels alright to see your name in lights
We all need an “Atta boy” or “Atta girl”
But in the end I’d like to hang my hat on more besides
the temporary trappings of this world
Chorus:
I want to leave a legacy
How will they remember me?
Did I choose to love?
Did I point to you enough to make a mark on things?
I want to leave an offering
A child of mercy and grace who blessed Your name unapologetically
And leave that kind of legacy
I don’t have to look too far or too long awhile
To make a lengthy list of all that I enjoy
It’s an accumulating trinket and a treasure pile
Where moth and rust, thieves and such will soon enough destroy
Chorus
Not well traveled, not well read, not well-to-do or well bred
Just want to hear instead, “Well done” good and faithful one
Dan and I were in the same doctoral cohort together at George Fox Seminary. We were even roomate for a week at Timberline Lodge on Mt. Hood outside of Portland.(Dan, I’m still sorry for snoring that night!) He’s a great guy!
Dan’s coming to speak at an event hosted by the Baptist Convention of Maryland/Delaware. He’ll be in Columbia, MD on May 12. You can still come and registration is only $50. It will be an interactive seminar withDan, in which he shares some of what he’s learned about the cultural scene in our world today and how it impacts church as we know it (or it should be). He’ll also dialogue about why so many people have strongly adverse reactions to the church even though they are favorable about Jesus Himself.
You can register here where there is more info, including more details about time, location, etc.
Here is an interview that Dan has done recently with David Jackson. It’s a good interview and provides a way to get Dan a question to be answered during the dialog.
Today my wife and my parents are in Portland, OR for a few days. For the past three years, I have been working on my Doctor of Ministry, Leadership in the Emerging Culture at George Fox Seminary. I was in a cohort led by Dr. Len Sweet which ended with 18 students from various denominations and various parts of the world. It has been a transforming journey.
My work focused on understanding behavioral change through the integration of emerging sciences and theology. I looked at emotional intelligence, neuroplasticity (how the brain functsion and changes), identity, and socialization to understand how we were created, how behavior is formed, how behavior is changed, and the role of the Gospel, the Godhead, and the Church works in it all. It was extremely enlightening.
Tonight, about half of our cohort gets hooded and tomorrow night we graduate.
Out of this work, I’m almost finished with a manuscript for a book that will come out of this research. It’s going to be entitled, Wholly Rewired: Science, the Gospel and the Journey towards Wholeness. I’ve shared parts of this work on this blog over the past couple of years. It will finally be all in one place. I’m extremely happy of the work that I have done.
People call this point in the education process either graduation or commencement. But I have chosen to call it the End of the Beginning. I am finishing one part of my life but beginning another.
I want to thank you for following me on this journey. I hope we’re together for many more years to come. When I return, you can call me Dr. Phillips or just David or Dave. But please don’t call me Dr. Phil!
