Five Postures for Transition

 Sunnyside is in the middle of transition as it looks for a new senior pastor. Transitions can be an adventure full of opportunities and possibilities, or it can be filled with anxiety and fear of the unknown. As people who follow Jesus, there are some ways to posture ourselves that allows God to do what he wants to do as we navigate the transition.

Be Prayerful

I seems obvious, but it is always good to be reminded. Praying for wisdom, and peace, and grace, and insight, and for a smooth transition is helpful. Praying for good hearts and discernment and knowledge is important. Pray especially for the search committee as they carry significant responsibility in the process. More than anything, pray for God's will to be done. As some of my friends would say, "bathe it all in prayer."

Be Open

Whether we like it or not, transition means change. Few of us like change. But with change comes the possibility of God doing something new and something great. Be open to what God wants to do even though it may require getting used to the new and different.

Be Informed

This church tries to be as open with information as it possibly can be. It is important to keep informed with what is happening around the search process. Read the emails that are sent. Listen to the announcements. If you want to know something that you don't know - ask questions. When it comes down to it, selecting a pastor comes down to a prayerful choice. Being informed is part of the equation for making a good choice.

Be Wise

Wisdom has many facets. Wise people choose their words carefully when they are dealing with awkward situations. Wise people choose to show more love when anything threatens unity. Wise people refuse to be purveyors of rumours. Wise people understand that process is important to good outcomes. Humility flows from wisdom. Sunnyside has been a peaceful church because it is full of wise people. Continue the tradition.

Have Faith

Trust God. He wants what is best for Sunnyside. He is good and He is strong. Choose trust Him in the face of the unknown.

Your posture matters. Not letting ourselves be governed by anxiety and fear matters. For as we pray we become open to what God wants to do. As we keep informed we know how to pray. As we walk in wisdom, we see some of what God is up to. As we walk by faith we will see God do what only he can do.

Serving At Sunnyside

 We are not all the same. The Bible says,

1 Corinthians 12:4–6 (NLT)
4 There are different kinds of spiritual gifts, but the same Spirit is the source of them all. 5 There are different kinds of service, but we serve the same Lord. 6 God works in different ways, but it is the same God who does the work in all of us.

I don't believe that anyone arrives at Sunnyside by chance. God was at work in helping you determine what community you would be a part of. We pray for people before they get here. We pray that "God will draw here the people He wants us to minister to and that God would send us to the people he wants us to minister to." You are not part of this community by chance. You are here because it is part of God's plan for you to be here. You are part of a team that is working on fulfilling God's mission.

The other reality is that you bring something to Sunnyside that no one else does. There are different kinds of spiritual gifts, and there are different kinds of service, and God works in different ways through each of us. We serve the same Lord, but we serve him in different ways. What that means is that God will work through you, in a way he will not work through anyone else at Sunnyside. You are important to the ministry of Sunnyside.

I don't believe that anyone arrives at Sunnyside by chance. You are here because it is part of God's plan for you to be here. You are part of a team that is working on fulfilling God's mission. So thank you for doing what you do. You are important and your service is important.

Mixed Motivations (And how they Don’t matter)

                I have been reflecting on Romans 8:5 “Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.” This passage of scripture is all about desires inside us. Some of those desires come from the flesh or the sinful nature. We can live out of a desire to foster our sinful pride, or hatred or envy. The desires of the sinful nature revolve around me and what is mine. Life is all about me - is what our sinful nature will tell us.

               There is another set of desires within those of us who are followers of Jesus. These desires come from the Holy Spirit. We can live out of (or set our minds) on what the Spirit desires. Love, joy, peace, etc. This scripture passage is about having real life. It is the Spirit’s desire that you live your life in a way that you really flourish. The Spirit gives you desires that reflect what God wants for you. 

                But sometimes it is hard to know where the desires we have are coming from. Is doing an act of love coming out of love, or am I doing this so that the person I am showing love to will think I am a nice guy? Am I being called to rest because I need it or because I am lazy? When it comes to mix motives we can get ourselves all twisted up in a knot.

I have come to the conclusion that it doesn’t really matter if we have mixed motivations. There is something deeper going on here. The key verse when it comes to those desires is verse 14.

Romans 8:14

For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God

                When we think about being led by the Spirit we tend to think about the big decisions in life like our career, or relationships, etc. But that is not what this verse is primarily talking about. It is talking about the little decisions on how we should live. It is talking about the learning to be led by the Spirit so we are living out what the Spirit desires. (Should we serve, or should we say no to a ministry that we are asked to do? Should we push ourselves or should we rest?) The question is not, “are my motivations mixed? The question is, “What is God leading me to do?” If you are doing what God is leading you to do, God will take care of your heart and your motivations. Learning to be led by the Spirit is one of the great lessons to be learned in the Christian life.

Jonah's Fear

I love the story of Jonah. He hears the voice of God calling him to preach in the city of Ninevah. His message is simple, repent and turn to God. Jonah runs from God, and finds that it almost kills him. He repents and turns to God, and does what God wants and then finds himself wishing to die.

His problem was that the goodness of God was directed towards people he saw as his enemies. Jonah prays,  says,  “Isn’t this what I said, Lord, when I was still at home? That is what I tried to forestall by fleeing to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity" (Jonah 4:2).

It seems to me that we live in an age where Christians hate the goodness of God, unless it is directed towards them. We certainly don't want to see it directed towards our perceived enemies. People with different values, or a different morality, or a different skin color, or now it seems even a difference of opinion, don't deserve to be shown the goodness of God. (and it seems we whisper in our hearts, I am not going to show them goodness either.)

The problems with this is threefold:
1) We don't deserve the goodness of God either. The bible says, "While we were yet sinners Christ died for us."
2) We don't get a say in whom God directs his goodness toward. God is God, and we are not.
3) If you read the book of Jonah, Jonah ends up in a bad place because of his attitude. Jonah's combination of pride and hatred landed him in a s spiritual and emotional prison.

It seems to me that so many Christians are ending up in that same self-made prison. It is sad to see. It can't be fun being them, and it isn't fun being around them.

The book of James says that "Every good and perfect gift gift comes from above" (James 1:17). If you see good thing happen to a person who is not good, even that comes from God. So don't be like Jonah - celebrate the goodness of God - even when it shown to people who are different, even opposed to you.

Wisdom and Scarcity

Ken was a man born so far back in the country that a town of 4000 looked like the big city to him. He was raised on camp meetings and revival meetings. "The old sawdust trail" was not a metaphor for him. They would literally walk up a sawdust covered aisle to go to the altar at the front of the "church" (read tent) to pray. The highest education he ever achieved was Grade 8. He spent much of his life working in the lumber camps, drawing logs out of the forest with teams of horses. To me, he was an "old timer" in the truest sense of the word.

Over the years I have had a number of opportunities to pray with Ken. A standard phrase in many of his prayers was "make us wise unto the things of God." That is not a prayer I hear very much these days. I hear prayers for wisdom when we are unsure of a decision we need make. That is an appropriate prayer, but it is a different prayer than, "make us wise unto the things of God."

My friend Ken was essentially praying Paul's prayer found in Ephesians 1:17-21

17 "I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him" (NRSV)

Paul says if God answers this prayer, four things will happen

• the eyes of your heart will be enlightened (vs 18)
• you will know the hope of your calling in Jesus (vs 18)
• you will know what riches that your inheritance in Christ brings (vs 18)
• you will know what the resurrection power looks like in your life (vs 19)

I know that I often live with a scarcity mindset. It often feels like I don't have what I need to meet the challenges of life. I often feel like I am scrounging to meet the demands of the stressors in my life. I often pray for God's help, and God's strength to meet the challenges. I often pray that God will change circumstances or meet the needs that I cannot meet. Those are appropriate prayers. Those are prayers that show my dependence on God.

But that kind of dependence while good may not be the best that God has for us. A dependence that comes out of our of scarcity is the poor step sister to the dependency that comes out of an enlightened heart, that is full of hope, that gets the full extent of our inheritance in Christ, and knows what resurrection power looks like. That kind of dependence acknowledges that we do not have what it take, but "Christ in us, the hope of glory" is more than sufficient for all our todays and our tomorrows. He is going to come through.

That kind of dependency comes when the prayer for the spirit of wisdom and revelation is answered. My friend had it right. A great prayer to pray is, "Make us wise unto the things of God."

The Blood Moon -"This is that."

There is a popular show on CBC radio called “This is That.” The program is laid out like a news program. When I first heard it, I was incredulous. The government can’t be thinking of doing that… It took me a while to figure out that I was being spoofed.  It is funny and entertaining program, the way good radio should be. It makes up plausible news stories that contain a few elements of truth. Of course, the whole show is fiction.

          That is a wonderful when it comes to entertainment, but not so good when it comes to how some people use the bible. Last night a fascinating astronomical event occurred. It is called the blood moon. It is a kind of lunar eclipse that cause the moon to appear a reddish brown.

          Pastor John Hagee in his book Four Blood Moons , which became a best seller on Amazon, connected this moon to the prophecy in Joel, that was repeated in Acts 2

Acts 2:20

The sun will become dark,

and the moon will turn blood red

before that great and glorious day of the Lord arrives.

(New Living Translation)

          What John Hagee and others do with prophecy is say, “This is that.” So what this blood moon means is that the coming of the Lord is close.

          The problem, of course, is that there are a few elements of truth. Jesus could come back at any time. The stage is set for the return of Christ. It could happen today, or it may not happen for another 500 years.

          However getting caught up in the “this is that” kind of prophecy often distracts us from life and the gospel. It promotes a fear based gospel rather than a love based gospel. It distracts us from the challenges of the gospel to love our neighbour, and leads us to a theology that is bad for the environment, bad for our neighbours and bad for the gospel.

          The people of God have important business to be about. Our mission is the mission of Jesus.

Luke 4:18 (NLT)

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released,

that the blind will see,

that the oppressed will be set free,

          In a time where the Ebola Crisis is growing, where human trafficking is proliferating, where the poor are hurting, the good news of the gospel is no longer being taken seriously because the people proclaiming it cannot be taken seriously. We need to stop playing the “this is that” game.

          When it comes to prophecy, be careful of the “This is that” kind of interpretations of scripture or you too might be spoofed.