Gathering and Going Out Together
Yesterday, we met with the church like we normally do on Sunday mornings. Someone led us in singing some songs. Someone read a chapter from the Bible. Someone taught. Several people shared exhortations. This happens every week, and God often uses this weekly meeting to encourage, convict, rebuke, admonish, teach, train, comfort me – and hopefully others.
Also, yesterday, we shared the Lord’s Supper. After our meeting we set out some tables and put some chairs around them. Someone talked about the significance of the bread and the cup as we took the elements. Then, we ate lunch together. We eat together every week, and specifically share the bread and the cup about once per month.
But, after our church meeting and after eating lunch together, we did something different. We had already been meeting together for just over four hours. But, the most exciting part of our church meeting was just about to begin.
Several of us changed clothes, and drove about a mile to a nearby government assisted housing project to rake leaves. As my regular readers know, my family and some other friends spend time in this neighborhood every Saturday. When Margaret (my wife) found out that no one raked leaves for this housing development, she asked if we could all go over on Sunday afternoon and rake leaves for them. Many of the residents are elderly, or in poor health, or single moms.
So, for a little over two hours – until it got dark – we raked leaves for the people that we knew in the neighborhood and for a few neighbors that we do not know… yet. We were able to talk to many of the neighbors while we were raking. We even sang “Amazing Grace” with one of the elderly ladies. Some of the children who lived in the neighborhood asked if they could help rake leaves. We also enjoyed piling up the leaves so the youngest children could jump in the piles!
At one point, a man who lives across the road from this government assisted housing development walked up. I met him, and he introduced himself. He asked if we were “a church group”. I explained that we were part of a church, and that we were raking leaves to help out some of our friends who live in this neighborhood.
He told me that he “goes to church”. He told me the name of the church. I know this church and many of the leaders. I’ve asked those leaders if they would like to do a service project together with us so that we could show the unity of Christ and the love of Christ together. They said that they would get back to me about it. I’m sure that they’ll get back to me one day.
Anyway, this man said that he was glad that we were doing something to help “those people”. He said that he often thought about doing something to help them, but he never seemed to have time. I told him that we were in the neighborhood every Saturday morning and that he was always welcomed to join us. He said, “ok” and went back into his house. How I wish he had come back with a rake to help us. But, he didn’t.
By the way, we ended up raking leaves for six different housing units (nine families).
While our group was raking leaves, another group from the church was also serving someone. One of our friends has a coworker who was trying to move out of her boyfriend’s house because she decided she was in a bad situation. My friend asked the church for help during our church meeting, and at least eight people helped this young lady move. Of those eight people, only one of them knew this young lady.
It is so exciting to be part of a church that actually serves people! And, we don’t just serve people that we know, or people who are part of the church, or people who can serve us back. We serve people who we may never see again, who we have never seen before. But, we serve people because we love them. And, we love people because God first loved us.
(If you would like to see some pictures of us raking leaves, I’ve posted some on our family blog in a post called “Raking Leaves With Friends For Friends“.)
Short visit today
Today, we visited with the neighbors in the government assisted housing development. We’ve been visiting this neighborhood almost every Saturday since the start of Summer.
Our visit was short today. One lady is in the hospital. Please pray for Tina. We’re planning to go see her in the hospital this afternoon. Another lady had family visiting, so we only talked to her for a few minutes. A third family was not at home. So, we visited with other people in the neighborhood. I’ve been able to meet a few new neighbors during the last few weeks.
I’m really looking forward to tomorrow and raking leaves in that neighborhood. Its going to be big job! But, some young friends who went with us today are very excited as well. I hope their excitement and enthusiasm spread!
I’ll let you know how things go tomorrow.
Bread, Cup, and Leaves
On Sundays, when we meet with the church, we often eat lunch together. This lunch is very informal – each family brings food for themselves and usually enough to share with one or two others so we can invite others to stay with us. Then, once per month, we have a larger lunch together – more of a “pot luck” – during which more people usually stay and eat together. During this larger lunch, we also specifically share the bread and the cup. We call this “larger lunch” our “Lord’s Supper Fellowship”.
This Sunday we’re planning to have one of our Lord’s Supper Fellowships. So, we’ll be sharing the bread and cup and lunch together with the church. But, this Sunday, something else special is going to happen as well.
Last Saturday, we found out that no one rakes the leaves for the residents at the government assisted housing development where we spend time. Many of these neighbors are older, in poor health, or are single moms. So, it is very difficult for them to rake leaves for themselves.
We’ve invited the church to join us in raking leaves for this neighborhood this Sunday. So, after our weekly church meetings, and after we eat lunch and have time to talk, some of us will change into work clothes and go over to the neighborhood to start raking leaves.
I can’t think of a better way to celebrate the Lord’s Supper and to meet together with the church than by serving other people – especially those who can’t serve us in return.
A picture of the church
Dave Black recently posted this on his blog:
When we first moved from southern California to the tobacco fields of North Carolina 10 years ago I learned that the Special Olympics are held in Raleigh. I recall watching one of the races on TV — Down’s Syndrome children running around a track full out. As they neared the finish line all of a sudden one of them fell down. Know what happened next? All of the other children stopped and picked up the fallen runner so that they could finish the race together.
When I saw that I said, “That’s the church!”
I agree. That’s the church.
But I gave at church
About a year ago, I wrote the post “But I gave at church” as part of a synchroblog. Our church had just decided on a novel budget (at least, it was novel to me). We decided to only included corporate responsibilities (such as rent) in our budget. We encouraged people to give specifically to other ministries, causes, and needy people. We’re still learning to work this budget for our corporate responsibilities, but people have been very excited about the freedom that they have to give as God directs.
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This post is part of a synchroblog concerning “Money and the Church”. I recently wrote a blog series on paying a salary to elders/pastors ,which would also go along with this synchroblog (see my post “Summary – Should elders/pastors be paid a salary?” for a summary of my argument and links to the argument details). However, for this synchroblog, I decided to go in a different direction. For this post I want to think about this question: How does a church – that is a group of believers – balance the corporate and individual responsibility of being good stewards of money? Also, I want to share an idea that some in the church came up with as a way to balance corporate and individual responsibilities of stewardship.
First, stewardship is a recognition that we – as God’s people – do not actually own anything that we possess. Instead, God is the owner, and we are stewards. Thus, we are responsible for using everything that we have in a manner worthy of and pleasing to God.
Second, stewardship is primarily a personal responsibility, as are other aspects of obedience. I cannot obey God for someone else, and someone else cannot obey God on my behalf. In the same way, I cannot be a steward of something that God has given to someone else, and other people are not responsible for stewarding those things that God has given to me. Of course, if someone gives me something – money, property, time, etc. – it is then my responsibility to be a good steward of those things that have been given to me.
Finally, if a group of people agree together to certain financial commitments, then they are corporately responsible – that is, responsible together – to meet those commitments. This is where most churches find themselves. They have corporate responsibilities to pay for buildings and other capital expenses, literature, salaries, benefits, etc. These types of expenses are rarely questioned and are usually considered to be necessary for a church – that is, a group of believers. In fact, many believers are taught that giving toward these corporate commitments is the way or at least the primary way of fulfilling financial stewardship.
However, there is a danger when considering corporate commitments. All corporate commitments are not biblical responsibilities. In fact, many church organizations have attempted to take personal responsibilities away from individuals and place them under the umbrella of the organization. Thus, many church organizations now take on benevolence and hospitality and service, such that the organization feels that the individual is obedient to God when the individual gives to the church organization. The church organization becomes a service middleman, obeying God as a representative of the individual. Is this a valid function of a church? If a person gives all of her money to a church organization is she actually obeying God?
As we examine the issues of corporate and personal responsibilities, let’s recognize that Scripture rarely – if ever – deals with the corporate aspect of stewardship. We only see instances in Scripture where people pool their money or possessions together for specific purposes, such as helping those who are in need (Acts 4:34-35; 1 Cor 16:1-3; etc.) or those who are travelling away from home to spread the gospel (Phil 4:14-17). We do not see instances of churches pooling together their money for their own benefit, in order to store the money in a bank account, or in order to provide for future needs.
However, we do see several instances where individuals are given the responsibility to personally provide for the needs of others. Here are a couple of passages in particular:
What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. (James 2:14-17 ESV)
By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. (1 John 3:16-18 ESV)
There are other passages which deal with giving, doing charitable deeds, showing mercy, offering hospitality, providing food and drink – all of these are the personal responsibility of each follower of Jesus Christ. No one can obey for someone else. No group or church can obey on behalf of the individual Christian.
In many churches and in the minds of many Christians, the biblical concept of “use your money to provide for the needs of those around you” has been replaced with the concept of “put all of your money in the offering plate and let us decide how best to use it”. However, we should understand that putting all of our money into an offering plate is not a biblical teaching, and neither does it remove the responsibility from the individual for taking care of the needs of people that God brings into their lives.
I think that James might deal with this concept as follows: “If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘I put all of my money in the offering plate. Go talk to the benevolence committee and see if you are worthy of help,’ without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?” Perhaps, John would respond to this concept as follow: “But if anyone has the world’s goods and puts it all in an offering plate without considering his brother in need, and so closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him?”
Recently, our church struggled with the balance between the corporate responsibilities and individual responsibilities of stewardship. The church had selected a few people to discuss these ideas and suggest a budget to help us meet corporate responsibilities as well as provide individuals with the means of meeting their personal stewardship responsibilities.
The group came up with a budget that was very different from anything that I have seen before – although, perhaps others have done something similar. I don’t think any of the people came into their meetings with this budget in mind. In fact, I know there were some differences of opinion in how to handle the money and the budget. I was not part of this group, but I was excited to see these people work together to come up with this concept.
According to this new budget – which was just approved by the church – we will take care of corporate responsibilities through our corporate offering. They removed everything from the budget that should be considered a personal responsibility. Since we have very little overhead and very few corporate expenses, the budget came to under $40 per person per month. This is the extent of our budget. Everyone knows that this amount is all that they are responsible for giving toward the “corporate budget”.
However, we all also understand that this is not the extent of our stewardship. We are individually responsible for giving to people and ministries as God leads us. Some of us are involved in ministries to children, and it makes sense that God would want them to use their money in those ministries. Others are involved in ministries overseas, and again it would make sense that God would want them to use their money in those endeavors. Some are involved in evangelistic or community service projects, and again it makes sense that God would want these people to use the money that he gives them to support these endeavors.
We also know that there will be times when there are special needs that we will want to contribute to together – much like the offering for the Jerusalem church during the famine, and the offering for Paul during his travels. When we know of these needs, we will take up contributions specifically to meet these needs, much like we see the church doing in Scripture.
I’m not putting this forward as the only possible option for how the church should deal with money. I’m not even saying that this is a good example. However, this is the way that we have decided to deal with these stewardship issues. I am excited that we are recognizing that we have both corporate and individual responsibilities when it comes to stewardship, and that according to Scripture, the individual responsibilities outweigh the corporate. We are moving away from a model where people feel they are being obedient stewards by simply placing a check in an offering plate. Now, we must consider the needs of people that God brings into our lives and how he would want us to meet those needs both individually and corporately.
Where do you hang out?
Mary at “One Thing is Needed” asks the question “Where Would Jesus Hang Out“? She found herself in a social club/bar listening to a friend’s performance. She saw the kinds of things you might expect to see in a bar. She said that she was not sad to leave, but then she had a thought:
Then I remembered that Jesus would most likely have been quite comfortable last night hanging out with people who were doing and saying things that no respectable church person would ever be caught doing. Why was I so uncomfortable if Jesus would likely have spent the entire evening there? I’m not sure. It seems that I can read about several times when Jesus intentionally hung out with those who made other people uncomfortable…
I may say that I want to be like Jesus, but do I realize that it means loving and being around people the “church” has often rejected, pitied, neglected, ignored, protested against, avoided, hurt, or demanded changed from? People that I’m uncomfortable around? I’m slow to learn, but hopefully I am.
Mary is asking important questions and coming to very important conclusions. If we are going to follow Jesus, then we will be following him into places and circumstances that might make us uncomfortable. But, following Jesus is NEVER about our comfort.
The teacher in teaching
I often write about spiritual gifts, like I did yesterday in my post “Charismatics“. Because I often write about spiritual gifts, people often reach my blog from search engines when they are seeking information about gifts.
The primary thing that people search for is something like “define the various spiritual gifts”. Thus, they want to know what it means to be a “teacher” or “prophet” or “exhorter” etc. They are probably disappointed if they read any of my blog posts, like a recent series that I published about “Spiritual Gifts“. Why? Because I do not try to define the various spiritual gifts. Why? Because, for the most part, Scripture does not define the various spiritual gifts. As I explained in that series, the authors of Scripture were not interested in defining the various gifts. Instead, they were more interested in HOW those gifts were used – whatever the gift happened to be.
For example, Paul exhorts the Romans to use their gifts which the Spirit has given them. If their gift is teaching, then they should use that gift by… guess what?… teaching. In whatever way the Spirit has gifted the individual, then the individual should exercise that gift (not trying to exercise some other gift) to the benefit of the other people in the church.
Interestingly, Paul does not limit the exercise of spiritual gifts to the leaders of the church – either the pastors/elders or the deacons or even the apostles. His exhortation is for all followers of Jesus Christ (indwelled by the Spirit) to exercise their spiritual gifts as the Spirit gives them.
Yesterday, Dave Black also wrote a very important essay called “Are You a Teacher?” He writes about the distinction between spiritual gifts and the responsibilities of all believers. Thus, the Spirit gifts some as teachers, but all are responsible to teach. The Spirit gifts some as givers, but all are responsible to give. The Spirit gifts some as pastors, but all are responsible to care for one another.
Dave writes:
Of course, all of us are to be teachers in one sense; we are to “teach … one another” (Col. 3:16). And in Hebrews we read, “By this time you ought to be teachers” (Heb. 5:11). We all have something to teach others – or should. I can’t tell you how much I delight in hearing my wife or some other member of our Sunday School class utter encouraging words of instruction during our lesson time, or in reading the Bible studies that Nathan has written, or in visiting websites written by “laypeople” that are chock full of good, practical Bible teaching. In fact, sometimes informal conversations around the Word can be more effective, more persuasive, more powerful, more life-changing than formal instruction. But this does not mean that all should be teachers in another sense. As James writes, “Let not many of you become teachers” (James 3:1).
Thus, even though some are gifted by the Spirit to teach, all are responsible to teach. It follows, then, that all of us – even those gifted by the Spirit to teach – can learn from (be taught by) others – even those NOT gifted by the Spirit to teach.
Dave also exhorts us not to leave teaching or other service only to those who have been recognized as elders or specially trained. He says:
Are you a teacher? Do you have something to contribute to the Body by way of “upbuilding, encouragement, or consolation” (1 Cor. 14:3)? I’m quite positive that you are, and that you do. Fear not then to express your spontaneous zeal in teaching others what the Lord Jesus has taught you. It matters not what level of formal academic training you may have had or not had. If we are members of the Body of Christ, we have the privilege and, yes, the responsibility of teaching one another. I emphasize this great truth everywhere I go. You do not need special training in a theological college to be a God-trained and God-taught teacher in the church. Just look at Paul’s use of theodidaktoi in 1 Thess. 4:9: “You yourselves have been God-taught.” Or read John’s instruction in 1 John 2:20, 27 about the chrisma (anointing) you have from God. Or see the promise in Jer. 31:33-34 that God would write His law on the hearts of His people and teach them directly as part of Jesus’ New Covenant ministry.
On the other hand, some of you are specially gifted in the area of teaching. Here is my advice to you: Do not think you need to be an elder or a pastor to teach! As Paul puts it in Eph. 4:11, all pastors are teachers, but not all teachers are pastors. I believe a healthy church will have both shepherd-teachers and sheep-teachers, working together in harmony for the building up of the entire Body of Christ. In other words, a New Testament church will have a host of teachers, not only ready to impart knowledge, but to receive it.
I believe that one of the main reasons that the church is weak today is that service – especially the exercise of spiritual gifts – has been relegated to church officials only. The church as a whole does not exercise their gifts for the benefit of the church as a whole. Thus, the church is not receiving all of the “upbuilding, encouragement, and consolation” that it should. One person – of even a group – of highly trained individuals cannot take the place of the working of the Spirit through the entire church.
How has the Spirit gifted you? Then it is your responsibility to serve other believers in that capacity. If the Spirit has gifted you in teaching, then teach. Are you a pastor? Then teach. Are you not a pastor? Then teach. Do you not have a formal environment in which to teach? So what? Teach anyway in whatever opportunities the Lord gives you.
Is your spiritual gift not teaching? You are still responsible to teach, but you are also responsible to exercise whatever spiritual gifting you have been given.
If all believers started serving one another and the world as God has gifted us, I think we would see a huge difference in the church and the world today. As long as we relinquish our God-given responsibilities to others because of position or training or apathy, then I think the church will continue to be ineffective in the lives of believers and in the lives of others.
Loving only from a distance
Last February, I published a poem by Jamey called “I am homeless” in a post called “God loves the homeless“. God used Jamey’s poem (among other things) to continue to move me out of an apathetic, loveless Christianity toward a life of demonstrating his love to others. I still have a long way to go, but I think I’m moving now.
I recently found out that Jamey now has her own blog called “A Life Transformed“. She recently published another poem called “Kept At A Distance“:
I was so lonely and needed your friendship
I really wanted to talk with you
But you didn’t have the time
You always kept me at a distanceYou were eager to give me food
But you would not sit with me at a meal
You did not want to sit with me for a while
You always kept me at a distanceYou spoke about the love of Jesus
but your actions spoke something else
Because the love of Jesus I know
Would not have kept me at a distance
Our family is learning to love people up close and personal, like I talked about recently in my post “No produce, just relationships“. We’re certainly not perfect. We make mistakes all the time. The difference now is that when we make mistakes, we’re already part of the people’s lives. We’re learning not to only love people from a distance.
Have you only been loving people from a distance? I don’t mean those people who are like you – act like you, live like you, look like you, smell like you, talk like you, believe like you, etc. I mean, other people – people who are different from you. Have you been keeping them at a distance?
Charismatics
This post is not about charismatic or pentecostal denominations. Instead, its about all of those who are indwelled by the Holy Spirit – that is, all Christians. You see, when the Spirit indwells and fills, He also gives gifts – the charismata.
In my recent reading of modern ecclesiologies, I ran into a couple of interesting quotes about believers serving through their spiritual gifts, meaning “charismatics”. First, in The Church in the Power of the Spirit: A Contribution to Messianic Ecclesiology (trans. by Margaret Kohl, New York: Harper & Row, 1977), Jurgen Moltmann writes:
The New Testament knows no technical term for what we call ‘the church’s ministry’. Paul talks about charismata, meaning the energies of the new life (I Cor. 12.6, 11), which is to say the powers of the Spirit. These are designations of what is, not of what ought to be. They are the gifts of grace springing from the creative grace of God. When he talks about the use of these new living energies, on the other hand, he evidently avoids all the words expressing conditions of rule. He does not talk about ‘holy rule’ (hierarchy) but chooses the expression diakonia [service].
There are a couple of interesting and important points in Moltmann’s statements. In Paul’s descriptions of the working of spiritual gifts, the apostle does not talk about hierarchy, or a rule associated with those gifts. Perhaps a case can be made that some gifts are more important than others (although an equal case can be made that we usually place importance on the wrong gifts), importance of gifts does not equate with importance of the individual, nor does it equate with a certain leadership. Instead, the Spirit works his gifts according to his own will – that is, through whom he desires and for the purpose he desires.
Also, instead of focusing on rule or control, Paul focuses on service. Thus, exercising spiritual gifts is not a function of leadership but of service – to service to other brothers and sisters in Christ and service to the world. These gifts exist (in reality, not in potential) for the benefit of other people, not primarily for the benefit of the ones exercising the gifts – although there may be some personal benefit as well.
This leads me to the second quote by Hans Kung in his book The Church (trans. by Ray and Rosaleen Ockenden, New York: Sheed and Ward, 1967). (I discusses another part of this book earlier in my post “Kung on the Church in Corinth“.) Again concerning the charismata, Kung says:
By linking his teaching about charismata with that about the body of Christ Paul at all events made clear that the Church is never – as some people in Corinth seem to have supposed – a gathering of charismatics enjoying their own private relationship with Christ independently of the community. According to Paul, all charismatics are part of the body of Christ, of the community. The fact that all charismatics are members of one body does not of course mean uniformity, but on the contrary a variety of gifts and callings. But fundamentally all individual members, having been baptized, are equal. But, by contrast with this fundamental equality all differences are ultimately without importance.
Here, Kung makes another couple of important distinctions about spiritual gifts which follow nicely from Moltmann’s observations. The body of Christ is not made of individuals who gather and exercise their gifts for the sake of the individuals and “their own private relationship with Christ”. Instead, because of the work of the Spirit, the individuals become part of the body of Christ together. Thus, the gifts are to be exercised for the good of the community, not primarily for the good of the individual.
But, this does not mean that there is uniformity within the community. On the contrary, as Paul points out, the Spirit works in many different way within the community. The variety works to strengthen the body in a way that uniformity could not. The teachers need the prophets who need the helpers who need the exhorters, etc. The difficulty comes when the individual must deny himself and the importance of his own gift and service in order to receive help from someone who is gifted in a different way.
When we gather together with other believers, we should be gathering with people who are different from us. We should expect and encourage people who are different from us to exercise their spiritual gifts. We should recognize that our gifts and giftedness (even teaching!) is neither less important nor more important than the gifts and giftedness of the other people around us. Why? Because the community benefits through the variety of gifts that the Spirit offers.
But, when some people or some gifts are considered more important, or when some people or gifts are not allowed to operate during the meeting of the church, or when we make the church about hierarchies instead of service, then the spiritual health of the community is weakened.
Monday Surprise!
On Monday afternoons, I teach a computer class. Yesterday, when I returned to my office, a friend of mine (Thanks, Paul!) had left several bags of cupcake brownies wrapped and tied bows. He left a note that said that when these were given to him, he thought about our friend Cathy and her neighbors. He asked if we would deliver them. (See my post from yesterday, “No produce, just relationships” for more information about Cathy and her neighborhood.)
Margaret was already cooking dinner for Tina, one of Cathy’s neighbors who is having health problems. So, when we took Tina’s dinner to her Monday night, we also delievered the brownies to the people in the neighborhood on behalf of our friend Paul.
It was a great surprise to receive the brownies from Paul. It was also a great surprise to read in his note that he was thinking about Cathy and her neighbors. Then, it was another surprise to be able to visit with Cathy and her neighbors for a few minutes Monday night.