The Church - Pentecost

Welcome to the second week of our message series Half-Truth.  Our culture often has half-truths. Half-truths are beliefs that are kind of right, but not completely.  Just as if you get it half right when you put the right street address in your GPS, but the wrong town, you arrive at the wrong destination, if we buy into these half-truths of culture, then we wind up at a place we do not want to be.

Last week, we looked at the half-truth that says there are many ways to God.  We said that is true if you mean that there are many ways to experience God. We said it is true if you mean that many religions have insight into God, but that ultimately, if Jesus is who he says he is, if he is the Son of God, the Messiah, then he is the ONLY way to God.  As he described, he is the way, the truth and the life. This doesn’t necessarily mean people who don’t believe in Jesus are damned; it means that Jesus is our only way home to God and everyone who will be in heaven, will be there through the work of Jesus Christ.

Today is the feast of Pentecost, which is considered the birthday, or the launching, of the Church. So we want to confront the half –truth today that says this: I don’t need the Church to have a relationship with God or be a good person.  This is a growing phenomenon in our culture. More and more people are giving up on Church. Some give up on Church because they get tired of the hypocrisy or in fighting.  Others give up on Church simply because while they believe, they think they can experience God better on their own. They say things like, “Faith is personal. I have a relationship with God on my own.  I am a good person on my own, so I don’t need the Church to help me to be good or help me in my relationship with God.  I can commune with God out in nature. I can connect with God through prayer. I don’t need the Church to have a healthy spiritual life.  I connect with God by going on walks or reading my bible."

Others give up on Church because of the failures of some of its leaders or because of the injustices done by people in the name of Christ or his Church. And certainly there is truth to those statements.  Certainly, there is a big element of our faith that is personal.  We want everyone in our community to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.  And of course there are people in the church, high-ranking officials who have sinned and done things completely wrong – that data is irrefutable.  And yes, there is hypocrisy in the Church. No doubt about it, but those statements don’t take into account the whole truth.

So today, I want to tell you why we need the Church, why belonging and committing to a local Church is absolutely vital to a vibrant relationship with God, to spiritual growth and ultimately our success and satisfaction in life.

And if you are thinking, “Aren’t you preaching to the choir?”  Yes, I am, but the choir needs preaching to. Besides I hope it encourages you and builds you up in your attendance.  Some of you may be in church for the first time in a long time or the first time ever. My hope is that after today, you start to consider coming to Church regularly, or even weekly, a worthy investment of your time.  You need encouragement. What’s the tell-tail sign someone needs encouragement? They are breathing. Everyone needs encouragement from time to time.

So here are three reasons you absolutely need to come to Church and make Church a part of your life.  Now there are many more than three reasons you need the Church. Yes, you need the Church to receive the sacraments like Eucharist and Confession. You need the Church to learn about Jesus.  You need the Church to have the word of God broken open and explained. You need the Church to help you worship. And there are many other reasons but there are three reasons you need the Church which I feel compelled to share with you today because they are implicit in our readings today.

The first reason you need the Church: You need the Church to serve in such a way that you learn to understand your spiritual gifts.  IN our Second reading Saint Paul writes, “There are different kinds of spiritual gifts but the same Spirit; there are different forms of service but the same Lord.”

So Paul is saying that everyone who is in the Church has some kind of spiritual gift. God has given you some gift or some kind of service that he wants you to perform. You discover this gift through serving other people. God wants to use you and you gifts in some major way. He wants you to make an impact for eternity, and the way to discover that is by serving some way in the Church.  It is vital you serve in the Church for your spiritual maturity because your faith grows when you are given a ministry or work that you feel totally ill equipped to do. And during those times you are more likely to get on your knees and say, “God, I have no idea how I am going to do this.”  Having a ministry will drive you to prayer. So being of service helps you to grow in your spiritual maturity which is the first reason you need the Church.

The second reason you need the Church: You need the Church in order to benefit from the other members of the Church.  Paul uses this analogy for the Church. He says, “As a body is one, though it has many parts, and all the parts of the body, though many, are one body, so also Christ.  For in one spirit we were all baptized into one body.” St. Paul later goes on to explain that the different parts of the body need each other.  Your eyes need the ears to hear. Your Ears need your eyes to see and get where they need to go. Your eyes and ears need your legs to get anywhere. To be healthy, you need the faith and help and gifts of other believers.  You need the faith of other followers of Christ. You are not sufficient by yourself.  You are not meant to do life alone. You aren’t meant to try and lead your family all alone as a father or as a mother. You aren’t meant to try and deal with the temptations and struggles at work on your own.  You aren’t meant to figure out this faith thing and where God is leading you on your own. God wants you to benefit from the strength and abilities of other people.  He wants to use other people in the church as his delivery system for the emotional and spiritual support you need, to not only survive, but to thrive. I do think you can get a dose of it by coming on the weekend.  It is encouraging to have people who are bright and cheery and enthusiastic greet you at the door. It is encouraging to see people who sacrifice their time each week to teach children.  It is encouraging to see children run into Church each week excited to be here.

We need the Church because we need the momentum and movement of other people to help us go faster in your spiritual walk.  Geese can fly 70 percent further flying in V formation than they can on their own. In receiving the spiritual giftedness of others you are able to meet needs you could not meet on your own and go further, faster. You don’t have all you need to follow God.  You need help. The other members of Christ’s body, the Church, are God’s plan to help you grow. 

To discover the third reason you need the church let’s look at the reading from Acts of the Apostles, which tells us what the first followers of Jesus did after his resurrection and ascension into heaven.  We read: “When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled, they are all in one place together.”Notice, they, meaning the apostles, and other close followers of Jesus, gathered together as a community. Then look at what happened, We read: “And suddenly there came from the sky a noise like a strong driving wind, and it filled the entire house in which they were. Then there appeared to them tongues as of fire, which parted and came to rest on each of them.  And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak in different tongues as the Spirit enabled them to proclaim.” So it is when they were at prayer as a community, then the Holy Spirit came.

Then listen to what happened, “Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven staying in Jerusalem. At this sound, they gathered in a large crowd, but they were confused because each one heard them speaking in his own language…Are not all these people who are speaking Galileans?  Yet we hear them speaking in our tongues of the mighty acts of God.” So at Pentecost, the birth of the Church, all these different nationalities were in town for the feast. Pentecost was a feast held fifty days after Passover to thank God for the harvest and offer back to God a portion of their crop called, first fruits. All these different nationalities are in town and God brings them together so they can hear the Good News that Jesus’ life, death and resurrection has reconciled us to God.  While sin separates and brings disunity, the Holy Spirit brings unity. Whereas in the story of the Tower of Babel when people’s language became confused, the Spirit unifies language so they understand one another.

God’s vision for the world is one of unity.  He is bringing together people for his family.  

He doesn’t want the world divided, but unified under his love and care, unified by praising Jesus as Lord and Savior.

You need the Church in order to be a part of God’s vision for the world.  You need to come to Church as a reminder that God is bringing his people together and forming his family.  The Church is the visible sign that God invites everyone, everyone into a relationship with him.

He wants every occupation: doctors, educators, business men and women, entertainers, and lawyers. As we noted a few weeks ago, the church is the only organism that brings together all facets of society together on a regular basis. God wants every nationality to be a part of his family: red, yellow, black and white, all are precious in God’s sight.  We need to do better with this as a Church. We are a mostly white community, but we are blessed by Filipinos, African Americans, Hispanics, Eastern Europeans, Asians, Africans, Islanders, and other groups.

So we need to have you better represented through you serving in our greeters ministry.

God wants every person and every background, and the Church is to be a reminder that God is drawing all people to himself.  You need the Church to fulfill that mission. You need the Church to be your partner in bringing other people into a relationship with God. We have a large congregation.  Sometimes it is difficult to connect with others.  Small groups are one way to connect. One of the things I love about small groups at our Church is that they bring together people who would never have met each other, but they learn and grow from each other.

You need the Church.  I need the Church, and none of us will grow to a level of spiritual maturity where we can do faith on our own.  Now let me add one other thing. And this is something only some of you need to hear. You need to commit to a specific Church.  You need to commit to a community of believers.

There isn’t much value in drifting from Church to Church in search of sacraments.  God’s vision for the Church is not to be a sacrament station, or a place where you meet your obligation. I’m not saying it is wrong to go to another Church from time to time, but when drifting for Church to Church is your habit, which you use to avoid making a commitment anywhere, that is a sign of spiritual immaturity.  Commit to love a church in a specific community. A Church community becomes great because people love it and sacrifice for it.  The health of our Church depends upon people who love this particular community.  They love the Church right here in Fort Walton Beach and accept it warts and all. They love the Church despite its idiosyncrasies, despite some of the difficult people in it, and despite the inadequacies of her leaders.  I hope you come to love, or are growing in love, of this Church as I do.

My challenge to some of you who are drifters is to commit to this Church, if you think you can love it, or find a church where you do love it.

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