When Milestones become Millstones September 20, 2015 Luke 10:1-4, 17-20; Proverbs 16:18 Pastor Vic Willis

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1 When Milestones become Millstones September 20, 2015 Luke 10:1-4, 17-20; Proverbs 16:18 Pastor Vic Willis 1 Luke 10:1-4, After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. 2 He told them, The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. 3 Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. 4 Do not take a purse or bag or sandals; and do not greet anyone on the road The seventy-two returned with joy and said, Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name. 18 He replied, I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. 19 I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you. 20 However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven. Proverbs 16:18 (MSG) 18 First pride, then the crash the bigger the ego, the harder the fall. Milestones. We all have them. Many of them happen before we reach the age of one! We roll over. We crawl. We pull up. We walk. Amazing Milestones! Then

2 there are the hundreds, maybe thousands of milestones that take place in life 2 first day of school, first love, first job, marriage, retirement. All milestones to be celebrated! But some of those milestones involve pain but pain with a purpose. I remember the milestone of taking our little boy Zachary to the doctor to get him inoculated when he was about a year old. He had never been through that before. I'll never forget holding his little body. The doctor came in, and there was this needle that looked huge to me. Zach was smiling and happy. Then that needle went into him, and he let out a scream. His face wrinkled up and got red and his eyes got really big and he looked at me as if he was saying, "How could you do this to me? Every moment up until now, you have just protected me from pain. You've never hurt me. Why did you hurt me now?" I looked at him and whispered in his ear, "Buddy-boy, this was mommy's idea. I would never hurt you like this!" When our church started 100 years ago we started out with many growing pains there was the issue of keeping the doors open, paying the meager mortgage which was big bucks in those days, and Lottie Lampp single-handedly kept our doors open with a summer of bake sales. Then there was the Great Depression which made it virtually impossible to pay the circuit-riding preacher during those

3 years. Yet the congregation came together and paid him in chicken eggs and 3 produce from their gardens. Then there were the growing pains of the 50s and 60s crowds got so big, larger facilities were needed. More and more people were coming, especially in the winter, so the decision was made to build the brick building on the corner of Magnolia and Green Street in beautiful downtown Englewood and move from the white wood frame building next door. Then in the 70s we outgrew those facilities which prompted the decision to move way out here, two whole miles from where we were originally located. Some people thought it would be too far out in the sticks for anyone to consider going to church out there. Others thought the cost and the size of the land and building were more than the church people could handle. But, thank God, there were several visionaries around who kept pushing for the move. Our outreach was on fire and the community was responding. People were being introduced to Jesus and the church was growing. There was a spirit of adventure and the desire to share the gospel that came naturally to this congregation early on. Those early growing pains produced a harvest that was hard to contain. This church, unlike most, has had wonderful growth that has charted (Slide#12) up and

4 to the right for most of it s 100 year existence. It s been phenomenal so many 4 milestones achieved along the way! Having a 100 th Birthday is another Milestone, and what might be a temptation during a centennial is to sit back and savor the wonderful results of our 100 years in ministry. What can happen is we can get complacent and think we ve done enough that we are large enough that we have enough ministries, we reach out enough what more can we do let someone else do it now It s important not to let this 100 year milestone become a millstone to us a stopping place, but rather, let it be a place to remember what motivated those pioneers 100 years ago as they established a place of worship here in Englewood. Truth is, when milestones like this are achieved, the temptation sometimes is to say our best days are behind us we ve had a good run, why not coast for a while? Well, I ll tell you why not. Because coasting when there s so much at stake out there is something faithful followers of Christ can t live with. We have the words of Life and Christ s Promise of new life that this world is starving for. The Bible says in Romans, Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame. 13 for, Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. 14 How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how

5 can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they 5 hear without someone telling them? 15 And how can anyone tell them unless they are sent? So there s a lot at stake! God has ordained the church to be His main vehicle of communicating His love to the world. Let s not let this 100-year milestone become a millstone. Churches are a lot like people each have a personality both churches and people have a few things they are good at and each of them have a beginning, middle and an end. The Lifecycle of churches is very similar to the life-cycle of people, too. As this graph shows, churches have a birth, like ours in Lottie Lampp s home as a Sunday School Class for several years. Then after a while that small beginning grows and develops as more people are introduced to the church as their spiritual home. Then there comes a period of maturity when the church is well established and continued growth and development is taking place then there is often a plateauing effect that takes place. In most churches, there begins a decline which can be long and slow and go on for many years. Yet, it s important to know things don t have to go this direction. And I don t believe they are going this direction! Here is where I think we are in our timeline at 100. We are at a strategic moment in our life as a church that we have a choice

6 to make to stay the normal life-cycle course and decline and die, or find new 6 life in Christ new ways to connect with people in our community new ways to express the old story! This can be a place of renewal and growth the likes of which we ve never seen before. Jesus said, The Harvest is Plentiful, but the workers are few How to keep this milestone from being a millstone 1. Take a cue from how they did it 100 years ago keep reaching out Jesus calls his church never to quit doing that we are always to keep our eyes on the harvest and pray for workers in the harvest. In Luke 10 we see Jesus empowering his disciples to be partners with Him in ministry. Jesus saw a tremendous need, a need so great that a great group of witnesses was needed. The harvest is plentiful, he said, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. Christ s words ring just as true in this generation as in that day long ago. The harvest is still plentiful. People today still need what Christ has to offer. People today are spiritually hungry. Many people in our community are lost... however you define that word. People have their lives as messed up as any generation has ever messed up their lives before. The world is crying out to us, We need a Savior more than we ever have! Jesus says, The harvest is plentiful.

7 7 Christ s call for laborers, by the way, is based on human need. It is not based on a desire to build the biggest church in town. It is not based on the desire to cram our values down someone else s throat. The world desperately needs what only the church can give it a Savior. People need the Lord. We continue as we began reaching out to our neighbors, friends to offer them Christ So that s the first way to keep this milestone from being a millstone keep reaching out! 2. Then, Find new ways to reach the people in our community. It s not 1915 any more. What worked then doesn t work now. What worked just a few years ago doesn t work either! When I was Pastor at Allendale UMC in St. Petersburg in the early 90s, we didn t yet have a Contemporary Service and several there wanted to start one. The big way of doing that back then was to rent out a large bank of phones for a few nights, man those phones with as many church members as possible and make 10,000 calls to the people who lived in the area all around our church. That s what we did, and the statistics said if we did that, we would end up with 200 brand new people at our first service. The stats were right! We had 200! That morphed down to 150 the next Sunday, but that service is still going strong at that church 25 years later.

8 Cold calls don t work anymore! Let me ask you, what do you do when you 8 get a call from a solicitor at dinner time. I ll tell you what you do click! It doesn t work anymore! Gotta try something new! The same could be said about cold-visits! There is a story about two young Mormon missionaries who were going door to door. They knocked on the door of one woman who was not at all happy to see them. The woman told them in no uncertain terms that she did not want to hear their message and slammed the door in their faces. To her surprise, however, the door did not close and, in fact, almost magically bounced back open. She tried again, really putting her back into it and slammed the door again with the same amazing result--the door bounced back open. Convinced that one of the young religious zealots was sticking their foot in the door, she reared back to give it a third slam. She felt this would really teach them a lesson. But before she could act, one of them stopped her and politely said, "Ma'am, before you do that again, you really should move your cat." (1) House to house is not only not effective, it s downright dangerous! You never know who is waiting for you on the other side of that door these days! Find new ways Going door to door is risky, not just to cats but to those who visit. We need to discover what the needs of people are in our community and then serve them by offering ways to get those needs met That s one of the ways Jesus

9 evangelized with the woman at the well he met her need of water first, and 9 then her need of forgiveness. What needs are we missing that are right here under our noses through which we could reach the unreached for Christ? 3. Another way to keep this milestone of 100 from becoming a millstone is to Look For the Harvest in the Right Places. Someone has said that the church is not a museum for the saints, but a hospital for the hurting. If you understand that the church, above all else, is a place for people who have problems, then you can easily see what Jesus meant when he said the harvest is plentiful. Pastor Jeremy Houck put it this way: The church is designed for the single mother who works two jobs to support her kids. The church is for the drug addict who can t stop his habit. The church is for the young person who struggles with self esteem. The church is for the young couple who lives together and has never been exposed to the best way to build a home. The church is for the man who does not respect his boss, so he steals from the company and from his coworkers. The church is for the housewife who goes out searching for some excitement in the arms of a man who belongs to someone else. The church is for the alcoholic who is ready to admit he needs help. (3) You do see, don t you, why many churches don t grow? They re seeking after the wrong audience. They re looking for people who have got it altogether,

10 10 not those who are falling apart. They re looking for the up-and-ins, not the downand-outs. They re looking for saints not for sinners. We re looking right over the great harvest and not even seeing it. What did Jesus say? Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous but sinners (Mark 2:15). How did we get it so wrong? The harvest is plentiful, if you know where to look. It s a real sad thing when our Milestones Become Millstones. When our great accomplishments become an end in themselves and we feel like there is nothing more to contribute. But I'm so glad we ve had pastors and people of vision back in the day and today who were able to help us see that with God's help unimaginable goals of new life and growth were always waiting for us. You see, we stand on the shoulders of courageous and faithful people who we need not let down today. They didn't listen to the nay-sayers but heard God's call to do great things for him. That is our heritage. That is in our DNA. So join me as we make this milestone of 100 years a stepping stone to God s best future for us, and let us Keep reaching out, Find new ways to share the Gospel and remember that the church is a hospital for the hurting, not a 5 star resort for saints.

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