Sunday Worship Service September 3, 2017 Rev. YoungMin Kim With Little Power Revelation 3:7-13

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1 Sunday Worship Service September 3, 2017 Rev. YoungMin Kim With Little Power Revelation 3:7-13 (1) Finally, September has started. Do you know how much I have waited for the coming of September? Of course, July and August are months of our annual cycle with physical and spiritual relaxation. I believe you have had a peaceful and restful summer with your family members. Are you ready for a new start? Preparing new and ongoing church ministries starting in September, two feelings have been on my mind: expectation and apprehension. I am excited when I think that a variety of ministries are performed in our church so that our congregation experiences spiritual vitality. On the other hand, I am worried what if nothing will change even though all church leaders and congregation members actively support and participate in the new and ongoing ministries? Are we capable of fulfilling new ministries with our current church members? What if our new ministries are the feat of only actively working members? Maybe my recent frequent headaches are derived from such apprehension. Do you have the same apprehension? Or have you ever had the experience that you actively participated but nothing changed within our church and within you? Probably, we will be able to find a resolution in the church of Philadelphia. Last Sunday, we shard the church of Smyrna. I hope you remember that the Smyrnean church was one of the two churches that received only compliments from Jesus Christ. (If you missed the worship service last Sunday or any Sunday, please visit our church 1

2 website, and watch the sermon videos, so that you are able to catch up with what was going on.) The reason that the church of Smyrna received compliments was to keep faith with patient endurance of economic and physical persecutions in spite of the double hardships emperor worship and the unbelieving Jews. In addition to the church of Smyrna, the other church that received only compliments from Christ was the church of Philadelphia. Today, I d like to talk about the church of Philadelphia. Especially, our Lord, Jesus Christ complimented the Philadelphian church because it had little power but had kept His words and had not denied His name (v. 8). Let us start from what had happened in the church of Philadelphia and how the church and its believers had kept their faith without betrayal. And through the church, we will determine the spiritual lessons. (2) The church of Philadelphia underwent triple hardships. First, just like the church of Smyrna, the Philadelphian church had to face emperor worship. In A.D. 17, a major earthquake occurred and ten cities, including Philadelphia, were nearly destroyed. Numerous people were dead or injured, and the survivors suffered from the hardships of life. After that, Emperor Tiberius allowed Philadelphia to be free of taxation and ordered the city to be rebuilt. 1 Regarding the emperor s favor, Philadelphian citizens were in favor of the emperor with great appreciation and respect and worshiped Emperor Tiberius and his successors. 1 Philadelphia, The Seven Churches of Revelation. 2

3 Second, the city of Philadelphia worshiped classic Greek deities and housed temples of Artemis, Helios, Zeus, Dionysus, and Aphrodite. 2 This idol worship had continued for centuries, and it was settled down as a type of culture. I believe it is almost impossible to find people who worship domestic gods in the United States, but in Japan, Nepal, and many other countries, especially Hindu countries, there are private altars in typical family homes to worship their domestic gods for blessing, protection, and many other reasons. Third, just like Smyrna, Philadelphian believers were totally excluded from the Jewish community. Non-believing Jews moving from Jerusalem after the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple in A.D. 70 did not consider the Jewish believers in the city and intentionally excluded them from their community. This was the reason that the Jewish believers were kind of troublemakers in the city against the Roman authorities. The non-believing Jews worried about being persecuted by the Roman authorities if they were the same sect as the Jewish believers. 3 As a result, Philadelphian believers were strictly restricted with economic activities by the non-believing Jewish guild and eventually suffered economic difficulties. To sum up, the Philadelphian believers rejected emperor worship, while its citizens truly worshiped their emperors. The Philadelphian believers rejected idol worship, while its citizens considered it as their cultural and religious legacy. The Philadelphian believers believed Jesus as their Messiah, while non-believing Jews who had economic power nailed Jesus on the cross. The believers must be troublemakers from the point of Jewish and Roman authorities view. 2 Craig S. Keener, IVP Bible Background Commentary (Inter Varsity Press: IL, 2014), pp

4 (3) In these circumstances, Jesus Christ complimented to the church of Philadelphia, You have LITTLE POWER, and yet you have kept my words and have not denied my name (v. 8). It is known that the church of Philadelphia was the smallest church among the seven churches in the Book of Revelation. It was a small church with a small congregation. They were actually weak and had little power. With these circumstances, how did the church of Philadelphia keep Jesus words and not deny the name of Jesus with little power against the major Roman authority, its citizens, and the Jewish community? Generally speaking, if a church is small with a small congregation, its members must be intimidated to do something other than a worship service. When I joined the lay supply orientation on August 18 th and 19 th, I met some lay supply pastors with three to fivepoint charges. Can you imagine a pastor who serves five churches all together? The pastors had many concerns about what they can do for the churches with financial and numerical restrictions. Contrary to our general expectation, the church of Philadelphia was not intimidated. Rather, it kept Jesus words even with little power. What did Jesus tell to His disciples and followers? With the great commission, he said, Go, therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you (Mt. 28:19-4

5 20); the church followed what Jesus taught during His public life, such as feeding, befriending, fellowship, healing, and other ministries. I believe the Philadelphian believers did their best to perform church ministries as long as their conditions allowed. For them, small size and little power did not matter. They just kept doing church ministries with faith. (4) Let us approach the small church with a small congregation through a lens of faith. Little power or weakness is the key to form, deepen, and mature our Christian faith and a challenge to test our faith. Once we recognize our weakness, we come to ask God to fill our shortage. It is important to come before God without exaggeration. It is important to give up our determination and ask what God s will is. In doing so, we come to follow God s will and experience God s grace. Second Corinthians 12:9 says, My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness. So I [Paul] will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. And Philippians 4:13 says, I can do all things through him who strengthens me. We can only do what we can do, and we can ask God for what we are lacking, and I believe God will strengthen us to do our church ministries. Let us not misunderstand that we are not the main agents to perform God s ministries. We are just joining God s ministries that God leads. The apostle Paul said, I planted, Apollo watered, but God gave the growth (1 Corinthians 3:6). Our roles for church ministries are to plant and water, and God will make them grow and ripen. Again, let us not misunderstand that we should not put all responsibilities and results of the church ministries on God. We should decide what we plant, where we plant, when we 5

6 water, how we water, and so on. The one who plants and the one who waters have a common purpose, and each will receive wages according to the labor of each (v. 8). For we are God s servants, working together; you are God s field, God s building (v. 9). Joining God s ministries is like planting and watering. It is beyond our authority to determine whether the ministries will be successful or not. It lies in God s hand. (5) We are planting new ministries. We are watering our ongoing ministries. Let us pray together that God makes them grow. In order to not burn out and in order to sustain our ministries, we need all of you to work together, encourage each other, laugh together, and weep together. Do you think we are a small church? Do you think we are a small congregation? Do you think we have little power? Our size does not matter to God; God only cares whether we keep Jesus words. Here is the list of our church ministries: church choir, usher, acolyte, altar attendant, scripture reading, breakfast with the pastor, church dinner, community event, food pantry, back to school supplies, operation teddy bear, angel tree and Christmas gifts, golf, bowling, and softball ministries, and others. The secular job has retirement, but church ministries have no retirement. Just like the church of Philadelphia, let us join and continue the ministries that God leads as long as our conditions allow and let us experience spiritual vitality with God s grace and God s will. For this, as I wrote my pastoral letter on our church bulletin that I will start an early morning prayer every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at church from 6AM to 7AM. My prayer will continue until my pastoral ministry is over at Nokesville UMC. Our church will be open to every congregation member during the time. Feel free come and pray for yourself, your family, our church leaders including me, and our church ministries. Prayer is our breath! 6