To the saints in Cornelia, Georgia worshipping as First Baptist Church who are faithful in Christ Jesus: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I am writing to you today as a preacher and missionary of the Gospel of Jesus Christ for the last 26 years, serving as your pastor for the last 7 years. I am humbled and honored to bring this state of the church message to you this morning.
When I stood at this pulpit on the last Sunday of October 2016, I brought you this key message: The state of First Baptist Cornelia is strong, dynamic, and forward focused.
By 2016, we had spent 5 years envisioning God’s future together – working together to create a culture and organization as a church to love the world as God loves us. By October we were debt free and had stepped out in faith to hire our third full time staff member focusing on children’s ministry and outreach. We were positioned to see outward results after years of spiritual and internal growth and progress.
Then, we didn’t. We struggled with change. We lost our focus but we worked hard and kept ourselves together.
In these moments, I found myself frustrated and weary. The outward, attractional results which I-too-often use to measure my own and our church’s successes did not equal my expectations.
Maybe you have felt the same way.
As I have prayed and reflected on this moment in our history as a church, I am aware that the state of the church at large has changed greatly – even in the last 5 years. The playing field on which we do church is not the same. This passage from my friend Mark Tidsworth’s introduction to his book, SHIFT: Three Big Moves for the 21st Century Church, paints a picture of our moment in history.
“The church as-we-have-known-it is over. Even in the most culturally traditional and isolated places in the country, the culture which collaborated with Christian Churches is shifting. Many are fleeing the traditional denominationally based churches for 2 options:
1. The largest churches in their denomination. These faith communities still have resources to sustain church-as-we-have-known-it. Often they will collect church refugees from mid-size or small churches who cannot sustain their way of being church. This stream of recruits to a now older expression of Christianity grows ever smaller as people age, or walk away.
2. Mega-churches. Many mega churches are growing, along with their satellite locations, turning into a Christian franchise movement." This way of doing church – high energy worship and high impact environments and programs – has become the traditional form of church for many younger church members.
As pastor, I have led us on a journey of prayer and preparation for God’s future. We have read church future books together. We have prayed together. We have dreamed together. We worked to make many of the shifts Mark mentions in his book: focusing on missional culture, discipleship development and worship innovation.
Yet, we still feel the frustration that our changes are not enough and wonder if something else is missing.
As a pastoral leader, I find myself at a loss too. We have entered a place in the history of our church that no one could prepare me in seminary. We have come to a point where there is no clear direction – no secret sauce, no get-big-quick pill to take. All of our 130 years of Being the People of God in Cornelia has brought us to this point – but there is no clear road map even for the next 5 years – let alone the next 30 years. I am reminded of a key event event from history.
In 1804 the Lewis and Clark Expedition began their journey up the Missouri River to find an overland route across the new Louisiana Purchase to the Pacific Ocean. When they reached the headwaters of the Missouri River, they climbed the Rocky Mountains with the expectation of seeing the Columbia River on the other side. Instead of the Columbia River, though, they discovered MORE MOUNTAINS as far as they could see. This journey would be harder than they expected. There were no maps; they would have make their own, discover their own routes, listen and respond quickly.
As a church, I sense that we have climbed to the top of our Rocky Mountains. We have come as far as we know to come – depending on the information and resources we had at our disposal: new pastor, good facilities, re-engaged organization, strong fellowship, good staff, high-quality worship. And still - as we get to this point – we realize that the route ahead will be harder than we expected. There is no map forward. Instead, it will require us to dig deep into ourselves, our faith in God, and trust in this fellowship.
In this new world – we have several resources from our past to strengthen us for the journey ahead. We are a strong, committed congregation. We are not afraid of hard work. We have a strong foundation – we are debt free, we have a strong reserve fund, we have faithful givers. We have the provisions we need for the journey. We have a beautiful facility which is used every week to make our community better and to announce the Kingdom of God. We are a missional people who sacrificially give ourselves in doing and telling the Good News of Jesus. We are a praying people seeing God move in people’s lives all over the world.
With these resources, God has prepared us to cross into our unknown future. This new expedition will first require a different way of measuring our results. We will no longer be able to measure ourselves by the work of the other churches around us. Every church is making their own way through this moment – each one is different. God will measure our journey by our faithfulness more than our attendance records.
This expedition will also require a new way of praying for our future. God placed the powerful prayer of Paul to the Ephesians 3 on my heart months ago. I have been praying this prayer for us ever since. Ephesians 3:14-21 (NRSV) says:
14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father,[g] 15 from whom every family[h] in heaven and on earth takes its name. 16 I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, 17 and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. 18 I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
20 Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen
This is my Prayer for First Baptist Church, Cornelia, GA:
1. God to strengthen us internally as a church.
Paul prays that the Ephesians will be strengthened by the power of the Holy Spirit from the inside. We don’t need the brute strength of a powerful church to make it into this future. Instead, we need the glorious inner strength of God’s Spirit – pulling us together as one body, one church. We cannot make this journey on our own! Without the Holy Spirit working from the inside out – we will fail.
2. God to indwell each of us – rooting us deeply in God’s love.
This new future requires us to plant our feet firmly on love. In order to be a people rooted so deeply in love, God’s Spirit must indwell each of us. We can’t depend just on the pastor or staff. Our future needs each of us immersed in the glorious love of Jesus. Without this love, we will not be able to be open to the new people God will bring out way.
3. God to grow us in knowledge of God’s Word and the mysteries of God.
We might have entered into an expedition into a future and a land that feels uncertain and unfamiliar – yet, we do have a road map, don’t we? God’s Word is more needed today and every day. We need to immerse ourselves in reading, studying and discussing God’s Word and the mysteries of God. You see, while we don’t know where we are going, God does. We worship a wild, uncontrollable God – who is bigger and wider and larger than we ever can imagine. God invites us to test Him – and we will find our firm footing.
4. God’s love to surpass everything else that we do or say.
Nowhere in the Bible does Jesus say we as a church will be measured by the number of members we have or the amount of money we have. Instead, Jesus says, the world will know we are his followers by the amount of our love. Paul knows that in the end, what the world needs from churches is the Love of God. This love needs to surpass everything else that we do. So – while we tweak our ministries to visitors or preaching or music or children’s ministries or youth ministries or senior adult ministries – what God (and the world) ultimately, wants to see in us in His love surpassing everything else that we do.
This is my prayer for us as a church and as individuals. If we allow these 4 prayers to live in us – each of us – God’s future will be realized. God’s power will be at work among us accomplishing more in and through us that we can ever ask or imagine.
So – let me share with you how we get there. How do we continue a journey that just turned harder than we imagined? We start with ourselves.
You see, this church will not be able to reach her God-given future without the intentional, faithful work of you and me.
Imagine sitting here next year – in these pews. Who is here? What do you imagine happening within us as a church? What is God doing through our church in the community? What is happening around our campus? Where are we investing ourselves in the world? Where are we succeeding?
What does this success look like?
Did you imagine big enough? Guess what - God wants to accomplish more that even that!
“God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.” Eph. 3:20(MSG)
And it begins with you and me. You see, what God accomplishes in us as a church begins with the spiritual faithfulness of each of us – pastor, staff, deacons, lay leaders, and our whole congregation. God will only accomplish as much in us as a whole as we allow God to accomplish in each one of us as individuals.
So, now I want you to imagine what God is doing in your life on the last Sunday of October next year.
How are you loving God more this time next year? Are you attending or leading a Sunday school class or life group? Are you trusting more? Are you praying more? Are you speaking kinder words?
Now how are you loving other people more next year? Are you forgiving people who hurt you? Are you listening to people and sharing your faith? Are you hosting friends in your home?
Yes, there are many things we as a church leaders can do to help our church reach her future. But in the end, the lesson of the last year has been – that our future truly lives in the spiritual lives of each of our members.
You and I carry our church’s future in our hearts and lives.
The past has carried us to this point. The present seems hard and difficult. But the future is still to be written. Let us pray this prayer together and believe God’s word to us to be true. And together, let us see what God will do.
And in the words of Paul to the Ephesians:
Glory to God in the church!
Glory to God in the Messiah, in Jesus!
Glory down all the generations!
Glory through all millennia! Oh, yes! Eph 3:21(MSG)
With thanks for the opportunity to walk this expedition with each of you, I am, Your Pastor …
Eric
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