Apostles Journey: A Wonderful Day Together

Friday was a great day together at Legion Park in Austell. Not everyone on staff was able to attend, but those who did enjoyed themselves tremendously. The weather cleared just in time for the picnic and although it was a bit hot at times, an occasional breeze would pick up at just the right time. Wisely, everyone drank lots of water and when our water supply was running low, Willy made a quick run into Austell to buy us a couple of additional cases of cold water.

I'd love to have you comment on your favorite part of the day. I think mine was a toss up between Bocce Ball (pardon the pun) and the REAL Treasure Hunt (the combo geocaching/prayer walk after lunch). Many people played a role in making the day a success. I won't try to list everyone here for fear of forgetting soImeone, but I am grateful for all those who contributed.

I've included some pictures and videos I took on Friday as well as a copy of my closing devotional for those who were unable to attend. I'd appreciate your reading it as a prelude to our upcoming meetings on Thursday, September 18 and Wednesday, September 24. If you have some pix to share with everyone, please email them to me and I'll load them here.

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I Will Build My Church

Matt 16:13-20

When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, "Who do people say the Son of Man is?" They replied, "Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets." "But what about you?" he asked. "Who do you say I am?" Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Jesus replied, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven." Then he warned his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Christ.

Those of us who work in the church instinctively know that we are in a unique place. The things we do and the way we do them have eternal implications for we work in the arena of the care of human souls. It doesn’t matter if you preach the sermon, set up tables, wash children’s hands, teach a lesson or serve food; what each one of us does contributes to some degree to drawing people closer to Christ.

Not only do we have tremendous opportunities, but we have tremendous responsibilities. Over the course of a ministry career literally millions of dollars is entrusted to us. People listen to us when making critical life decisions and they allow us to care for them when they are in deepest distress. They call us to the hospital when tragedy strikes, they place their infants in our arms for consecration, they call us to stand beside a family member’s casket in their time of grief and they invite us to stand between a bride and groom and lead them through sacred vows.

If this level of sacred opportunity and responsibility doesn’t frighten you from time to time, you should probably find another line of work. There have been times as a worship leader when I have been filled with a sense of holy fear to recall that God calls his people together into congregation on the Lord’s Day and that he has entrusted to me the design of the sacred conversation he desires to have with them. They can say to him corporately only the words found in the hymns and prayers that I select and they hear him speak to them in the scriptures I prepare for the day. Mt. Sinai is a great place to work if you can handle the earthquakes, fire, lightning and smoke.

Throughout my career there is one word of Jesus that I have gone to time and time again as I wrestle with the sheer enormity of what I’ve been called to do. Matthew records Jesus saying, “I will build my church.” I don’t use those words as a cop-out, as if to say, “It doesn’t matter what I do or what decisions I make because ultimately Jesus said, ‘I will build my church.’” However, I take great comfort in the knowledge that ultimately my weakness of heart, dullness of mind and disobedience of spirit can never thwart the sovereign purposes of the one who said, “I will build my church.”

These words of Christ were spoken in the region of Caesarea Philippi, a city renamed after Caesar a few years prior to Christ’s birth. The city sat at the base of Mt Hermon, a sacred place for the Jews and had originally been the site of a pagan temple during Alexander’s day. This was a city named for a superstar and the people of the region were accustomed to a parade of political and military superstars. Matthew records that Jesus had engaged in several difficult confrontations with the Pharisees and perhaps it was with a growing sense of frustration that Jesus asked his disciples, “Who do people say I am?” Of course, he already knew the answer to the question and the asking of the question was designed to make the disciples contemplate their own personal response. Not surprisingly, the disciples conveyed the responses of a people accustomed to following superstars: “Some say you are John the Baptist.” That’s an odd answer given that John and Jesus were contemporaries, but some apparently believed that God had raised John from the dead. “Elijah,” claimed another; a fascinating answer. Elijah prayed to God and rain ceased for three years, and then he prayed again and the rains returned. He saturated an altar with a flood of water and then saw God rain fire from heaven in response to his prayer. Some believed that Jesus was Jeremiah, the prophet who suffered terrible abuse at the hands of religious and political rulers because he wouldn’t back down from God’s truth. Jesus and Jeremiah certainly had much in common. Others were less clear but believed that Jesus must be “One of the prophets;” Perhaps some thought he was Daniel because of the power of his prayers. Some may have believed him to be Isaiah, because he also shared a soaring view of God. Some thought of Hosea when they experienced Jesus’ unquenchable love and endless forgiveness. Any of these answers represents a tremendous personal compliment to Jesus and an understanding that Jesus had received a special anointing from God.

But as good as they were, they were all wrong answers.

If Peter was following the pattern established by nearly every other time he speaks in scripture, he blurted out an answer before really thinking it through. “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” he said. Peter probably didn’t know that he knew that until he heard the words coming out of his mouth. He probably thought to himself, “Did I just say that? Yeah, I did and I believe it!” Jesus understood that the sovereign God had put those words in Peter’s mouth and summoned them forth at his command because Jesus immediately said, “Simon…this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven.”

Then Christ spoke these words: “I will build my church.”

We are a part of a two thousand year tradition, the church of Jesus, the family of the elect who have called on the name of the Lord for salvation. You can draw a direct line from us here today back to Jesus’ promise to his first disciples, “I will build my church.”

Through times of victory and defeat; prosperity and adversity, He was building his church.
When the disciples gathered in the upper room to share the last supper…
When he agonized in the garden and they nailed him to the cross…
When he rose from the dead and appeared to the Twelve…
When he fed them breakfast at Galilee Beach and then ascended to the Father…
When he poured out the Holy Spirit on them and the church grew like wildfire…
When the apostles were jailed and the believers dispersed to Judea and Samaria…
When Paul persecuted believers and was later gloriously converted…
When Peter was crucified upside down and John was exiled to Patmos…
When our first brothers and sisters were burned alive and fed to lions…
When the church fathers defined orthodox theology and wrestled against false teachers who led people astray…
Through seasons of glorious revival and in times of nearly universal apostasy…
In times of persecution and reformation…
Through seasons of missionary zeal and church development…
And when a handful of people had a vision for reaching north Atlanta for Christ…
When those people dreamed and sacrificed to build…
When lines of conscience and theological conviction had to be drawn and difficult decisions made…
When buildings were erected, ministries formed and staff hired…
When the router gave birth to the internet and satellite technology was born…
When words spoken from a pulpit in Atlanta are heard instantaneously around the world…
When you joined this staff…
When you were playing kickball and eating fried chicken…
When we honor Jesus by the way we love each other or grieve him by our disunity…
When we humble ourselves, repent and seek his face…
Because Jesus rose from the dead and lives among us here today, his words are as true now as when they were first spoken. He himself has promised, “I will build my church.”

Brothers and sisters, when the church is growing by leaps and bounds and we are tempted to take some of the credit we must remember Jesus’ promise, “I will build my church.” When we are hurt, frustrated, confused and ineffective and think there is no hope we must remember Jesus’ promise, “I will build my church.” We have before us a daunting challenge, a profound responsibility and boundless potential. The Lord Jesus himself has assembled this team and we are sitting on top of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. It is not solely up to us to build The Church of the Apostles because this is Jesus’ church and Jesus said “I will build my church.” However, the Lord has entrusted to us the care of his flock and calls us individually to surrender to his lordship and the authority of his Holy Spirit. Amazingly, he wants to use us to do his work of church-building.

We are a spiritual organization with a spiritual product. To a great degree our success is determined by our own personal spiritual health. What we have shared together today has been an important part in restoring our health, but kickball and fried chicken is just a start. We have spiritual work to do before we address our organizational issues and I pray that each of us will begin a process of spiritual examination so that we can be servants fit for the master’s use.