Stay on mission

This past Sunday, we talked about what it means to give our hands to Jesus. Jesus wants our hearts, he wants our minds, but he also wants our hands: we are called to actually do good as Christians. Hands require reaching out and touching that which needs to be raised up, greeted, celebrated with, comforted, and healed. Giving our hands to Jesus means he will use them as he used his own: with them, he touched the leper, made mud to heal the blind man, comforted the woman caught in adultery, raised up the lame, and, ultimately, let them be nailed to a cross. In short, Jesus’ hands got dirty because love requires it. 

As we move into the next sermon series, we will be talking about what it means to “be the church.” The basis for this comes from Acts 2:42, where Luke gives a description of what the early church did as a community: 

“They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to prayer.” 

We will talk about these four aspects of the Christian life. How are they essential? What does it mean to build our church on this foundation? These discussions will lead up to our All-church celebration on November 21st. I’m excited to see how looking at these four things the early church did to grow helps us grow!

Looking at these four things, however, it does seem to me that something is missing. There is nothing in this list about serving the poor, reaching out to people, helping those in need, etc. At face value, this list looks like it is internally focused. These things appear to be things the church does for each other or looking vertically to God. Was the early church mainly focused inwardly on itself like many churches I’ve been part of? Where is the outer focus like so much of what we have talked about and emphasized? 

Here’s the thing: I read it that way because my concept of church is much more attuned to our culture than it is tuned to their reality. For the church in America, doing acts of charity, outreach, and connecting with those outside our walls are often viewed as components of the church. In other words, doing those kinds of actions are optional pieces in the broader scope of being a Christian. As part of God’s church, we may gather on Sunday mornings, sing songs of worship, spend time reading the Bible or praying. We may reach out to our neighbors, care for the poor, or do any other number of things that Christians might do. Or we may choose to not do some, or even all, of those. Often, we see the Christian experience as a buffet where we pick the items we like the best and leave behind the items we don’t.

But we need to realize that for the church in its infancy when Luke was writing Acts, doing outreach, caring for the poor, giving generously, and serving others were not just aspects of the faith; they were the foundations of the faith. That Christians had this outward-focused, get-your-hands-dirty approach to faith was simply assumed. They were the things that Jesus did, and it didn’t make sense to call yourself a follower of Jesus if you didn’t do those things, too. So, for example, if you ask me what I do as a person, I would list many things, but I probably would not list breathing. Not because breathing isn’t essential but because it is so essential and assumed to be a given; there is no need to list it. Same for the early church: if you didn’t get your hands dirty, you just weren’t a Christian.

Interestingly, though, as the churches became more established as organizations, that gradually began to be forgotten. Christians started to become good at “doing church.” It became possible to be part of the church without actually doing the same work Jesus did. It became possible for church members to become respected members of the church community by just being “good at church.” They could worship and pray. They could lead, enjoy fellowship, and influence others. They could do all these things without needing to actually care for the world “out there.” As the Christian community got farther away from Jesus’s life, they didn’t have to do the things Jesus did as much. Within about 15 years of the early church being formed, James is writing his book and needing to remind Christians that “faith without works is dead.” What a shift!

We need to be aware as Christians that this shift can happen in us, too. It is as all-too-easy for us to treat faith like a buffet where being the hands of Jesus is one of the options instead of being like breathing. We need to remember faith doesn’t work that way. We need to get our hands dirty. We are called to follow Jesus in what he did and let him transform who we are. Anything else just doesn’t make sense.

Looking forward, I’m excited to study with you what it means to “be the church.” I’m also really excited to celebrate the many ways we have done that together over the past year at our all-church conference. And I’m even more excited to be the hands of Jesus for our community as we move forward. Let’s continue to strive to be the hands of Jesus all the more as we celebrate being the church. It only makes sense!

Thank you for being on this journey with us and breathing with me. I’ll see you around the church and out there.

Stay on mission!

--Trevor Owen, Pastor of Spiritual Formation

“Want to talk? I’ll buy you coffee!”