Worship that Moves
Notes
Transcript
Intro
Intro
When go to restaurant and finish dinner, I check receipt—make sure I
The official reaon given for those nice people that stand at the door at Sam’s and won’t let you leave until they have chesked over your receipt and marked it with that pretty yellow hilighter? they want to make sure that you’ve gotten all the discounts and price breaks that you were supposed to get.
“Trust me, we’re not loss prevention, we have loss prevention in the store and that’s not us," writes one former Costco employee. "We’re literally just trying to make sure our cashiers do the job right, and when we do catch it, all the information gets stored. Who did it, what time, etc...and those cashiers get spoken to. This is not to benefit anyone but the member to improve the experience overall.”
… I reached out to Laura Ladd Poff, the senior manager of corporate communications for Sam's Club.
Michael Brochstein/SOPA Images—LightRocket/Getty Images
"Having an exit greeter is a great opportunity to have another chance to connect with the customer before they leave," Poff explains. "It's an opportunity to ask them if they found everything they were looking for, and if they have everything they need—but it's also a chance to make sure their transaction went smoothly, and the cashier didn't accidentally ring up anything twice."
...
This Consumerist article explains that Costco's set up is very similar, where receipt-checkers aren't even trained to watch for theft: “We weren’t trained to catch shoplifting, we were trained to make sure that people were not being overcharged. During the time I spent receipt checking I probably caught well over $1000 in overcharges," one former Costco source tells the publication.
(The Real Reason Sam's Club and Costco Check Your Receipts by Zee Krstic, Cooking right magazine)
Hard to believe, right? Something must be wrong with me because they dig through my buggy sometimes like a dog in the dumpster looking for a bone!
But I understand! I want to make sure I’m not paying for something I didn’t get, so I can imagine why they want to make sure I did pay. And if they are trying to save me more, all the better.
I finish a meal at a restaurant, and I check to make sure I didn’t pay for anything that I didn’t get!
My wife is better at it than I am: she watches those numbers flying across that screen and notices if that bottle of ketchup was 2.89 when it was on sale for 2.29. You don’t mess with her, and especially not with her coupons!
And then there are those times when you pay for teh thing and somehow get home and find out you’ve left something ath the grocery store check out. NO!
Maybe worst of all, teh moment you get on the road just after driving away from the fast food joint and find out they left your fries out of the bag! Wicked people. Messing with your dinner. the whoel reason you did that… now you have to turn around… or someone says “just give e your name...”—you’re in Kansas City MO on teh way to DEN to visit your wire’s grandmother—when are you going to be back there for susie that asst mgr to “make it rght?! PLEASE! JUST PUT THE FRIES IN THE BAG!”
No one wants to end up not getting all they paid for!
And this morning, I’m kind of here to check your receipts.
See, the same thing is often true spiritually. NOw I know that we must be freminded from time to time—life doesn’t suddenly become rainbows and roses just because you gave your heart to Jesus. Even the Savior cautioned his disciples, “in this world...” Still, the flip side of that is that He planned to give to them and you and me and every person who ever trusted HIm as savior—He made arrangenents for us to have a more substantial and more joyful, more peaceful and more fulfilling life that would have ever been possible without Him. Here is how He says it:
10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
10 The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.
10 A thief is only there to steal and kill and destroy. I came so they can have real and eternal life, more and better life than they ever dreamed of.
Passion translation-
But I have come to give you everything in abundance, [b] more than you expect[c]—life in its fullness until you overflow!
We started this series because I wanted to spend the summer remembering what this church has always been about—really, what I believe ever church should at least be concerned with—helping real people discover and live teh real life Jesus came to give us, in such a way that we make a real difference in our world for His Kingdom—real people, real life, real difference.
And when we talked about that real life, we saw that He was really saying two things—it’s a new and better kind of life experienced in a new and better kind of you.—better life, and better capacity for living it.
And in two simple words, it’s this—spiritual life.
Th emost famous Bible verse ever, I suppose- [Jn316]; in its context it’s something Jesus says to a man who is trying to understand how he can be part of this new Kingdom taht Jesus came to bring us into. Jesus had explained it this way--
3 Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” 4 Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” 5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
Jesus said that He came to give us spiritual life.
Later, teh writer Paul would explain to one of the firct churches-
45 Thus it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
that second Adam he was talking about was Jesus.
The point is this—Jesus came to give us fuller, richer, better life than we were able to have any other way—life where we gain freedom from addictions, from pain, from hatred and anger and hardness taht comes with deep hurt and disappointment—he came to give us joy and gladness and peace and hope that not only keeps goinhg in hard times, but actually equips us with the resource to cooperate with God in turning those hard times into growth times and coming out of them stronger and healthier than ever. He came to give us the kind of life where we are not striving to catch up but glad that we are living out. We aren’t living to fill up our buckets, we are living with an abundance of life overflowing out of them.
And while that may not be your everyday yet, it is the one He has for you.
But my concern is this—some of us didn’t get all that was paid for—not by you but by Jesus. See you have a right to that life because He purchased it for you by His death on the cross, and it’s just so good taht it’s hard tom imagine--
18 I pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope he has given to those he called—his holy people who are his rich and glorious inheritance.
That same writer, Paul, further talked about how he prayed for them-
16 I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. 17 Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. 18 And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. 19 May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.
WOW!
that’s spiritual life.
Ands it’s my conviction that some of us left some things at the checkout!
It’s our values sustem that in orderto do this 3-part mission, taht we will have to have four basic values always at work—teh bedrock ideals—Biblical integrity in everything we do, effective outreach driven by love, Spiritual Vitality as normal part of life, and true fellowship among all the members--
and we to make it simple, we will build the whole church on four basic avenues—providing answers that really say something, love that really does something, worship that really moves something, and relationships that really mean somethng.
TOday, in this series, we are taking about a church where we engage in worship that moves something so that our people truly experience spiritual vitality as a normal way of life.
THis is
IN the next chapter of JOhn, we find Jesus travelling with His disciples...
he talks...
she wonders aloud...
he offers...
she retorts...
he challenges—go call...
she blocks...
he pierces...
she deflects...
He digs in,
21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”
john 4:
This is really at the heart of spiritual life—how we connect with God, and how much He wants to connect with us—free and without any hindrance.
But talking about spiritual life and spiritual things in general can be a bit of a challenge for us as much as it was with this lady.
WHat does spiritual normally mean to you?
Casper the friendly ghosyt or maybe ghostbusters. these days there is quite a bit of attention given to paranormal activity, and it seems like every city I go to with any history at all, somebody wants to offer me a haunted tour of the place.
Maybe your spiritual is teh new age, yoga, zen meditation kind where you use relaxing frangarnces and hot rocks, and waterfall sounds and eastern monks hum in the background.
Maybe your spiritual is stained glass and towering cathedral spires, big crosses with Jesus hanging in the background and still more of those humming monks
Or maybe it’s just church on Sunday, baby Jesus at Christmas, and those horribly uncomfortable pews that squeak every time you shift your move a half inch.
But when Jesus talked about it, he wasn’t talking about these things. NO doubt every one of them is spiritual in some way—although not always spiritually helathy, they do not capture what spiritual life is all about.
Two things are striking in this story--
1- there is a definite link between spiritual realities and practical life issues...
when she brought it up, she was trying to change the subject
if there’s anything more uncomfortable to talk about than Bible answers you don’t know, it’s the failures in life you cant stand but can’t seem to do anything about
and the worst failure to experience for most of us is a failure to be good enough to love—6 times...
she thought she was deflecting… in fact without her knowing it, however, she had an appointment fro this very conversation—she wanted to get off the topic of her personal life… turned to religious things… in fact, the things she was searching for in life were ALL ABOUT the thing she was missing in her spiritual life—her spiritual life and her practical life were the same, singular life; and what she didn’t have spiritually was showing through boldly in what she kept falling into practically—she was never going to make her love life work when her spiritual life didn’t; and for all of us, whether it’s love life, health life, money life, mood life, or anything else—I boil it down this way—whether it’s about mood, food, or dudes (or dudettes), spiritual realities are driving your practicalities
2- religious experience is no substitute for spiritual life
what was this two mountain thing about anyway?...
IN reality ot’s very likely that she didn’t get to teh mountain so often, but even still...
religious practice is on the outside, spiritual life happens on the inside
religious practice is about behaviors, spiritual life is about what drives them
religious practice is about what you do for God, spiritual life is about what God does in you
religious practice is your way of climbing that hill toward heaven, but spiritual life is about heaven become a reality inside of you
and you will never behave good enough, teach good enough, smille big enough, give generously enough, … to earn your way into the good graces of God—but spiritual life happens when you finally give up your attempts and being a good enough person and you cry out to the Savior and the good grace of God comes into your life and makes you brand new
*** That’s spiritual life, and it comes to us simply by being born again when we truly turn our lives over to Jesus
10 And Christ lives within you, so even though your body will die because of sin, the Spirit gives you life because you have been made right with God.
We dream of a church where spiritual vitality is the normal reality for everyday followers of Jesus
We dream of a church where spiritual vitality is the normal reality for everyday followers of Jesus
But to help the topic along, let me cover a few things that spiritual is not:
1- spiritual is not emotional
2- spiritual is not sensational
3- spiritual is not personal / individual (it’s cosmic)
4- spiritual is not customizable (we don’t get to define it--”i’m just spiritual my way” (cf gathering teachers…; Timothy re always learning but never coming...
5- spiritual is not optional (“just sounds freaky—Holy Ghost—what do you do with ghosts?)… I think maybe we ought to get a menu like starbuks—:I want a methabaptist skinny, no ghost, light Jesu with a shot of happy and big squirt of easy peasy on top—communion wafers on the side! but not the dry ones, how about garlic butter? or maybe lemon-basil-sunflower oil?
BUt really, it’s not that you can’t have a “no spiritual” version of faith, it’s that there is no such thing as no-spiritual anything.
Everything is spiritual because teh entire world you can see is the result of a world you can’t see
And we can’t stay here long, but you must understand that there are two arenas that you must be concerned with—kind of two invisible realities—spiritual realities—that are affecting every aspect of your life:
1- the spiritual inside you
2- the spiritual all around you
Consider the spiritual inside you—in some sense you can talk about the spiritual you being that part deep inside you—kind of the invisible you. But it’s really more than that for the person who, but believing in Jesus, has been born again--
23 Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
It’s like three levels of you—your body is just carrying out the drivers in your soul—sometimes described as the place where your mind, will, and emotions are happening. But for the person who is born again, there is another part—the spirit, which is that new part of you that can connect to God and that can start to bring God’s power and love to work inside your soul—it’s God’s power to change you from the inside. Sometimes that soul and body are grouped together and simply called the “natural” person or just “flesh”.
5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 6 For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.
5 Those who think they can do it on their own end up obsessed with measuring their own moral muscle but never get around to exercising it in real life. Those who trust God’s action in them find that God’s Spirit is in them—living and breathing God! 6 Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life.
The passion trannslation paraphrases it like this:
4 So now every righteous requirement of the law can be fulfilled through the Anointed One living his life in us. And we are free to live, not according to our flesh, but by the dynamic power of the Holy Spirit!
5 Those who are motivated by the flesh only pursue what benefits themselves. But those who live by the impulses of the Holy Spirit are motivated to pursue spiritual realities. 6 For the mind-set of the flesh is death, but the mind-set controlled by the Spirit finds life and peace.
So the more you intentionally live according to the new spiritual reality inside, the more you experience that kind of life that Jesus offers. Spiritial life. and I know you are asking, “so how do I do that?” I’m going to get there. But there’s another part remember—there is the spiritual inside you and the spiritual around you.
Let’s talk about the spiritual around you.
13 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son,
** Sounds a bit like teh plot for Game of thrones or some sci fi game plot. What in the world is he talking about?
So do you emember getting transferred between kingdoms?
You may remember all the way back at the beginning of the human story—Adam and Eve...
When Satan convinced them to… something major changed—it invited Satan into the realm that was meant to only have humans in completely free connectedness with God, living out our destiny as God’s image in this material world. So now there are two basic spiritual domains, or kingdoms, if you will—God’s and Satan’s. they are not equal, but they are optional—that is, they are the only two options. And regrettably, because of Adam’s willingness to give Satan his way, humans start out in Satan’s domain.
1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.
And the way that worls out is going to sound really wierd, but th ewhole world is divided up into something like spiritual territories, like a spiritual government with divisions—it’s just that Jesus has ultimate authority over them all--
20 that raised Christ from the dead and seated him in the place of honor at God’s right hand in the heavenly realms. 21 Now he is far above any ruler or authority or power or leader or anything else—not only in this world but also in the world to come.
In case that seems like maybe we are talking about leaders of nations that you might name like QE or Saudi Prince… or…— he later explains to this same church--
11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
** In fact, although you don’t always feel very good about yourself—sometimes shame grips you down deep, and frustrations can leave you feeling so defeated—not to mention, frustrations with other people, God is showing you off to the spiritual world you can’t see. Even when you blow it, you still prove how great God is:
13 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
13 You were dead because of your sins and because your sinful nature was not yet cut away. Then God made you alive with Christ, for he forgave all our sins. 14 He canceled the record of the charges against us and took it away by nailing it to the cross. 15 In this way, he disarmed the spiritual rulers and authorities. He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross.
Here’s the point—there’s an invisible spiritual world that exists in and around the world you live in every day, and it’s being dominated in many places by the activity of spiritual authorities that are deceiving people and working out their scehmes through people.
I know, it sounds freaky. It does to me sometimes. And if you get too consumed with thinking about it it will mess with you.
I’m at this church conference this week… walking into teh bookstore there…get my coffee… lady walking… slow… move to right… left… rihght… just trying to get my coffee… NASCAR… started to tug her hair to see if Jeff Gordon in wig… thinking- “this lady works for the devil...
WAIT! ...
It’s not that every slow-poke lady that keeps you from your morning cup of Joe is an agent of Satan, or that you can go through life popping off at them, pulling their hair, making faces… and just say “the devil made me do it! rather it’s that between the broken, unhealed things inside people and the spiritual powers taking advantage of that stuff at every level—you are surrounded by a spiritual realm that means to make your life a mess.
How’s it working?
Remember—the good news is that Jesus has authority above it all, and he passed it on to you.
17 The seventy-two returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!” 18 And he said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. 19 Behold, I have given you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall hurt you.
Now let’s get back to that lady by the well
Jesus talked about worship that has two qualities—spirit and truth—why truth? because there are all sorts of false ideas about God and how to be right with God, just like the ideas that her people had—you can’t just make up your own spiritual rules, although it’s certainly popular these days. It was well before the internet. Now it’s just a wild west of ideas about God things and spiritual things. But Jesus says God is looking for people to come to him in spiritual response, and in truth. And it’s in that process of worship, with truth along with the spirit giving life to our souls that does this marvelous thing--
it connects the spirit inside of us with the spiritual kingdom taht we now belong to. And all that mess of life in between—that soul and body stuff—the more our spirit connects with God—using our minds, our thinking, our emotions, and even our bodies—singing, lifting our hands, bowing, smiling, crying…, the more we find it natural to carry that spiritual stuff into our daily lives. This is the new stuff Jesus said would bubble up from inside her.
And then what? the more those spiritual things are active in our lives, our thinking, our emotions, our decisions, and even our habits and daily activities, teh more our stuff gets worked out.
It’s that catalyst of connecting our spiritus with our spiritual Father Who loves us and made a way to work in us by sending His Holy Spirit to be life inside of us.
What we are after is what I cal Intentional Spirituality—and it includes a few simple things
intentional spiritual community
intentional
intentional
intentional
*** The more we practice these things the more we experience the results of having them at work.
8 For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.
the seed you plant determines the harvest you reap
and imagine what happens when this becomes teh way we really go about Sunday mornings together--
We experience spiritual saturation
we experience spiritual rejuvenation— when we take communion, not just piece… glass… we renew our declaration…relive the awareness…honor…; when we sing songs about our Savior, we remember… we honr… it’s the victory celebration… it’s the hero’s welcome…, when we sing our appeals to the Savior we so desperately need…, when we confess…, when we pray…, when we hear the Word… when we renew those commitments…, when we shout, amen, even when we ask Q’s… when we smile…, when we put those banners out front…, extend a hand… WAKING UP SPIRITUALLY< TELLING THE DEVIL THIS SPACE DOESNT BELONG TO HIM< FREEING UP THIS TERRITORY FOR A MIGHTY WORK OF THE HOLY SPIRIT< CREATING SPACE FOR OUR SPIRITS TO BREATHE NEW LIFE AGAIN...
when we take communion, not just piece… glass… we renew our declaration…relive the awareness…honor…; when we sing songs about our Savior, we remember… we honr… it’s the victory celebration… it’s the hero’s welcome…, when we sing our appeals to the Savior we so desperately need…, when we confess…, when we pray…, when we hear the Word… when we renew those commitments…, when we shout, amen, even when we ask Q’s… when we smile…, when we put those banners out front…, extend a hand… WAKING UP SPIRITUALLY< TELLING THE DEVIL THIS SPACE DOESNT BELONG TO HIM< FREEING UP THIS TERRITORY FOR A MIGHTY WORK OF THE HOLY SPIRIT< CREATING SPACE FOR OUR SPIRITS TO BREATHE NEW LIFE AGAIN...
we experience spiritual invitation- SCR re: spirit / heart ??
I’ve had enough...
I want to see...
I believe we have been given...
Make this our reality
Grow to walk in spiritual place
exercise spiritual authority
activate spiritual gifts
recognize spiritual adversary
practice spiritual nurture?
share spiritual space / communion
(spiritual activity, agency, ability, adversary)