Category: Sermons

Published July 20, 2020

The Purpose of the Church

Last week we began a conversation about the purpose of the church. With COVID-19 forcing us to make so many changes to how we do church and ministry over these last months, I think it’s important for us to remind ourselves why it is that the church exists.

We live in a rapidly changing world and it’s important that we be able to change and adapt how we do ministry to make sure that what we do is useful and effective – but at the same time, it’s even more important that we never lose sight of why we do that ministry in the first place.

In other words, our methods can change, but our mission must remain the same.

The purpose of the church never changes. The purpose of the church in Paul’s time is the same purpose of the church in our time. Of course, the activities of the those churches probably look very different – but their end goals are always exactly the same.

And so that’s what I want to look at for the next few weeks: What are the end goals of the church? Why do we exist? What is our purpose?

Because only when we understand our purpose can we effectively determine what activities will help us accomplish that purpose!

And so we started two weeks ago, first of all, by defining the church. Sometimes there is confusion even about that! What exactly is the church?

Well, we looked at three ways the Bible describes the church. First of all, it describes the church as a family – the family of God. The Bible teaches that from the moment we accept Christ as our Saviour, every believer is then adopted into God’s family. We read in Ephesians 1 that God loved us and chose to adopt us even before time began – and this gave him great pleasure! I always find it incredible to think that it filled God with joy to adopt me into his family. But that’s what the Bible says. We are adopted into His family and we are all now brothers and sisters in Christ.

So that’s one way that the Bible describes the church – as a family.

The second way that the Bible describes the church is as the body of Christ. Just like the human body has many different parts that all work together as one body – so it is with the body of Christ. We are all completely different from one another – we have different backgrounds, different ways of seeing the world, we have different interests and passions – different skills and abilities. And God has put us all together – united in Christ Jesus – to function together as one body. We are all necessary parts of God’s church.

So that’s the second way the Bible describes the church – as the body of Christ.

And then the third way the Bible describes the church is as an ekklesia. The New Testament was originally written in Greek – and in the Greek language, the word ‘ekklesia’ simply means “an assembly or gathering of people”. You could use that word to describe an angry mob or the crowd at a rock concert or any kind of gathering. But it’s that word “ekklesia” that gets translated in the Bible as ‘church’. So anytime you’re reading in the New Testament and you see the word ‘church’ – the original greek word that was written there is “ekklesia” – an assembly or gathering of people.

And of course, when he Bible talks about God’s ekklesia, it has a specific kind of gathering in mind – a gathering of God’s family – an assembly of the Body of Christ.

We read in Matthew 16:18 when Jesus said:

“On this rock I will build my church.”

Matthew 16:18

Christ is building his ekklesia. He is assembling his family. He is putting together the body of Christ.

And so that’s kinda the idea that we’ve latched onto for this series.

Ekklesia – the assembly of God’s family. The church is not a building. It’s is not a charitable organization. Church not an event that we attend each Sunday morning. The church is the gathering of God’s family – it is the assembly of the body of Christ. And Christ is building His church – he’s adding more and more people to the family – adding more and more parts to the body.

But the big question still remains: Why? What is the purpose of this assembly? Why is God building His church? If God has put us together as one united body of Christ – what exactly does He want this body to do?

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Published July 6, 2020

Ekklesia – The Assembly

Over the past several months, COVID-19 has radically changed our familiar ‘church’ experience.

The Sunday mornings we knew a year ago were very different from the online Sunday mornings we knew for the last three months – and they are very different from what we’re experiencing today!

Over these last months we’ve changed how we gather. We’ve changed how we worship. We’ve changed how we do preaching and teaching. We’ve changed how we do kids programming. We’ve changed how we fellowship. We’ve changed how we do Bible studies. We’ve changed how we connect with each other and with the community.

So many of our familiar church experiences have changed.

And so this whole process of changing how we do church has really led me to reevaluate what we do and why we do it!

- Just because we’ve always had a snacktime in the middle of our service doesn’t mean we have to… It doesn’t even mean we should!
- Just because we enjoy having some talented musicians lead our worship with piano, guitars, and drums – it doesn’t mean we have to… it doesn’t mean we should!
- Just because we’ve had great success in running our summer kids club or other kids programming – doesn’t mean we have to…. doesn’t mean we should!

It’s easy to get into the habit of just doing things because that’s what we’ve always done before. But it’s important to evaluate every once in a while to see if what we’re doing is still useful and effective and important.

It’s like the story of young lady who was newly married and she decided to bake a ham for their first Easter dinner. So she took the ham, sliced off both ends and placed it in the roasting pan. Her husband was watching all this and asked, “Honey, why did you slice off the ends of that ham? It’s all good ham – why not just bake the whole thing?”

The young wife thought about this and said “I’m not sure – that’s what mom always did when she baked a ham. I’ll ask her.”

So the young lady called up her mom and asked “Mom, when you’re roasting a ham, why do you always cut off the ends?” The Mom thought for a moment and said, “Well, that what your grandmother always did. Grandma’s ham was always delicious, and so I’ve always just done what she did.”

So the young lady then called up Grandma and asked, “Grandma, when you cook a ham, why do you always cut off the ends?” To this the Grandma replied, “I always cut off the ends because I didn’t have a roasting pan big enough to fit the whole ham.”

And I think this story illustrates what often happens in church. We just do things a certain way simply because that’s what we’ve always done – without considering if what we’re doing is still useful, effective, and important.

And so with all the changes that we’ve been forced to make because of COVID-19, I think now is a perfect opportunity for us to all reevaluate how we do church.

Why do we do the things that we do? What are some things that we should change? What are some things that we should never change?

But I guess, to answer those questions, we really need to take a look at the bigger picture. What exactly are we trying to accomplish as a church anyway? What’s the purpose of the church?

If we don’t have a clear picture of why we exist and what God wants us to accomplish – I think we’ll have a really hard time measuring the effectiveness of what we do.

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Published June 22, 2020

The Wicked, The Wrathful, and The Wise – Part 2

We did part 1 last week, and this morning we are going to look at part 2 of a story that I’ve dubbed “The Wicked, the wrathful, and the wise.”

It’s not the most famous story in the Bible – but it is a riveting tale and it’s found in 1 Samuel chapter 25. It’s the story of King David (before he was king) as he interacted with a sheep farmer named Nabal. Nabal, who was known for being crude and mean in all his dealings, was quite a contrast to his wife, Abigail, who was known for being sensible and beautiful! These two characters couldn’t be more different!

We haven’t seen much of Abigail in this story so far, but we’ve had a quite an introduction to Nabal!

You see, this story all begins at sheep-shearing time – a time of feasting and celebration. David, who has been on the run from Saul, has been camped near Nabal’s shepherds around Carmel. Now David had been very good to Nabal’s shepherds as they camped near each other – David’s men had kept them safe from the Philistines and nothing was ever stolen from them during their time together…

And so, when David hears that Nabal is sheering his sheep and is having a great celebration, he sends messengers to Nabal asking if Nabal could kindly share whatever provisions he could with his friend David and his men!

Nabal, however – true to his reputation, would do nothing of the sort and responded by heaping insults upon David and sent David’s messengers home empty-handed.

As you might imagine, this did not sit well with David who’s only recorded response to Nabal’s rude reply was to tell his men “Grab your swords” as he strapped on his own! In classic case of wild over-reaction, David sets out to murder Nabal in retaliation for his insults! This is quite out of character for David – a guy who is called “a man after God’s own heart” – but I guess it goes to show how even the best of us are aways susceptible to sin! We ought not think we’ve matured beyond the point of being able to mess up big time – cuz that’s just what David is about to do.

And that’s about where we left off last week – David and 400 of his men are armed and headed towards Nabal’s house with the intent to murder every man in Nabal’s household.

We pick up the story now as the scene shifts back to Nabal’s home. It says in verse 14…

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Published June 15, 2020

The Wicked, the Wrathful, and the Wise – Part 1

For the past few weeks we’ve been looking at some of the lesser-known stories of the Old Testament. And I’ll tell ya – it’s been quite a mixed bag of goodies! We’ve had talking donkeys, floating axeheads, human cannibalism, and more! They may be lesser known, but these have been some of the most sensational stories of the Bible! And all of them have been packed with important lessons about God and how He wants us live in this world!

Now the story I want to look at today isn’t quite as sensational, but it’s still an incredible story – one that I think would probably make a pretty fantastic movie! It’s got some great movie characters – a villain you love to hate, a band of blood-thirsty vigilantes eager for revenge, and a brave & beautiful leading lady who saves the day! It would be an Oscar winner for sure! And like those other stories we’ve looked at – it’s not the most well-known story in the Bible, but there is much that we can learn from it.

We find this particular story in the book of 1 Samuel – chapter 25. So let’s turn there now and the author will introduce us to all the main characters in the first few verses. It begins like this:

Then David moved down to the wilderness of Maon. 2 There was a wealthy man from Maon who owned property near the town of Carmel. He had 3,000 sheep and 1,000 goats, and it was sheep-shearing time. 3 This man’s name was Nabal, and his wife, Abigail, was a sensible and beautiful woman. But Nabal, a descendant of Caleb, was crude and mean in all his dealings.

1 Samuel 25:1b-3

So there is at least one familiar character in this story – I’m sure most of you have at least heard of King David. Although at this point, David has not yet become king. Saul is still the King of Israel, and he has been hunting David like a criminal – chasing him all around the wilderness – even though David has never done anything to harm him! Saul is consumed by his jealousy of David and is determined to kill him, but David continues to be loyal to Saul and is equally determined not to harm Saul in any way.

In fact, in just the chapter before this, David was hiding from Saul in a cave when Saul just happened to come into that very cave to go to the bathroom. David snuck up and quietly cut off the corner of Saul’s rob – showing Saul how He most certainly could have killed him if he wanted to – but he didn’t.

Of course, when Saul realized how David spared his life, he repented and left David alone for the time being and went back home – but David, knowing that Saul would soon change his mind, headed out further into the wilderness of Maon.

Now in Maon, we find our two other characters in this story. We have Nabal – who was a very rich sheep farmer and was known for being crude and mean in all his dealings. And then we have his wife, Abigail, who was known for being sensible and beautiful!

These two characters seem to be quite a contrast to each other. I guess it’s true that opposites attract – or it could be that this was an arranged marriage. We’re not really given that information – we’re just simply told that Nabal was known for being crude and mean while his wife, Abigail, was known for being beautiful and sensible.

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Published June 8, 2020

The Lepers and the Famine

This morning I want to continue on in our story of Elisha. We’ve been going through some of the incredible stories of the Bible and last week we looked at how God, through Elisha, caused an iron axehead to float in the Jordan River. The ax had been borrowed to cut down trees for a new building where Elisha could meet with some of his students – a group known as the ‘sons of the prophets’. Their existing building had grown too small and so they set out to build another. But as they were chopping down trees by the Jordan River, the axehead flew off the handle and landed in the water. Of course, iron tools back then would have been terribly expensive to replace – putting the young man who had borrowed the ax in quite a predicament with whoever loaned him the ax!

But mercifully, God bent the laws of nature so that the iron axehead floated to the surface where if could be retrieved! And we were reminded once again that our God is the God of compassion and mercy. As we read in Matthew 10:29, if God cares about even the little insignificant sparrow, we can know that he certainly cares for us.

So that was last week’s incredible story – not overly dramatic, but certainly a great illustration of God’s mercy and kindness.

Now today, our story is on the opposite end of the dramatic spectrum. While last week’s story was primarily about the mundane activities of life – this week’s story includes the siege of a city, assassins, deadly stampedes, human cannibalism, and lepers. It’s pretty much the opposite of mundane! And like last week’s story, today’s story is again, perhaps not the most well-known story in the Bible – in fact, when I was talking to Brian and described to him the story I had in mind, even he wasn’t overly familiar with it – so you know it must be obscure!

But this story is found in 2 Kings chapter 6 – it begins right in the same chapter as the story of the floating axehead. It’s a significantly longer story than last week, so I won’t read through the whole thing at once, I’ll just read a few verses at at time and point out a few things as we go along.

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Published June 1, 2020

Elisha and the Floating Axehead

This morning I want to continue on our theme of incredible stories! One of my favourite characters from the Old Testament is Elisha – and He certainly has his fair share of incredible stories! God did more miracles through Elisha than any other character in the Bible other than Jesus himself – so there are a lot of fantastic stories to choose from.

Over the years I’ve preached on several of Elisha’s miracles – in fact, I did a series back in 2016 called “The Exploits of Elisha” – some of you might remember. But there are still a few unique stories from Elisha’s life that I’ve never preached on and I’d like to share two of those with you over the next couple weeks.

Now before we get into the story itself, we should probably take some time to figure out where exactly we are in the larger story of the Bible and see how this particular story fits in everything else.

So first of all, who exactly is Elisha? Well, Elisha was a farmer turned prophet…. Not a farmer who turned a profit (there’s not many of those) – but a farmer who became a prophet.

Now for those who might not be familiar with the term ‘prophet’ – a prophet by most simple definitions is someone who proclaims the Word of the Lord.

In the Old Testament times, most of the Bible had not yet be written, and so when God wanted to communicate with people, He would use prophets. These prophets would receive a revelation of some sort from the Lord through the Holy Spirit – and then they would proclaim these things to their intended audience. 1 Peter 1:20 tells us…

20 Above all, you must realize that no prophecy in Scripture ever came from the prophet’s own understanding, 21 or from human initiative. No, those prophets were moved by the Holy Spirit, and they spoke from God.

2 Peter 1:20-21

So Elisha was a farmer that God choose to be his prophet to speak for him to the kings and the people of Israel.

When we first read about Elisha, he is out in his field, plowing with a team of oxen. He’s apparently getting his fields ready for seeding when Elijah (not to be confused with Elisha) meets Elisha out in his field. Now Elijah was the current prophet of God at that time – he had just finished his big confrontation with King Ahab on Mount Carmel – if you remember that story.

You see, King Ahab had led the Israelites to worship the false god, Baal, and so on Mount Carmel, they had contest to see which God was the true God. The prophets of Baal would pray to Baal and Elijah would pray to God – and they would see which god answered. And of course, Baal did nothing and God answered by sending fire from heaven! It wasn’t much of a contest! You can read about that in 1 Kings chapter 18.

So Elijah had been a very significant and influential prophet during his lifetime as He proclaimed the Word of the Lord to the kings and the people of Israel.

But now, God had just informed him that Elisha was to become his replacement. And so Elijah goes to meet Elisha as he’s out working on his farm. And to make a long story short, Elisha slaughters his oxen, sacrifices them on a fire build with the wood from his plow, leaves his family, and goes to become Elijah’s apprentice.

After some time of working with and learning from Elijah, there came a day when Elisha watched as God took Elijah to heaven in a whirlwind – leaving Elisha to take on the role of God’s prophet to Israel. This happens in 2 Kings chapter 2.

Over the next several chapters, we read several stories from the life of Elisha that clearly illustrate that God had truly chosen him as Elijah’s replacement. Just how God answered with fire when Elijah prayed, we see God answering the prayers of Elisha in some equally dramatic ways! We even see one story where Elisha prays and God raises a young boy who had died back to life!

And so the story that we are going to look at today is in this collection of stories – intended to illustrate how the Spirit of God that once worked through Elijah is now working through Elisha.

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