Where are we going?

1 Corinthians 1:10-18

State of the Church Address

January 27, 2008

Paul, in this first letter to the church at Corinth , is addressing a variety of specific issues within the young church.  In our reading today, he is addressing that issue which many churches face, even today—the problem of a divided sense of who they are, even whose they are, and of their purpose and vision for their future.

Paul is stressing the importance of a church having vision and a plan if they are to grow and to move forward.  One of the ways that Paul helps churches to do this is to remind them whose they are, and then to remind them of where they have come from, and where they currently are.  You see, when you connect the dots of your past and your present, it gives you a good idea of your future.

And so today we are going to do just that: as our “State of the Church Address,” we will be reminded of whose we are, and then we will take a look at our recent past, our present, and talk about God’s vision for our future.  So, let’s begin with a brief commentary on just whose we are.  If you have your Bibles with you, turn to First Corinthians chapter 1.

Take a look at verse 13.  Paul has just been stressing the need for a unified vision for the church, that there be no division, that everyone be on the “same page” regarding authority and leadership.  So Paul reminds them of whose they are, that they were not baptized into the name of Paul, and that it was not Paul who was crucified for their sins.  Indeed, it was Jesus who died not only for their sins, but for our sins as well.  And just as it was for the people in the Corinthian church, we, too have been baptized into the name of Jesus Christ.  That is whose we are, who we belong to.  Paul states later in chapter 6:19b-20a, “You are not your own; you were bought at a price.”  The price paid for our lives, so that we can worship in this sanctuary all warm and snuggly on a cold winter’s day, was death on a cross.  Jesus’ death on the cross. 

And worship is a verb.  We don’t come here to mark time, to passively wait for the 60 minutes to be over so we can check it off of our lists and get back to our lives.  We worship; we seek an encounter with the living Christ in order to transform us, to transform our lives, so that we can share his love and serve him in our communities.

That’s whose we are, and why we are here.  Now, with that in mind, we can take an honest look at where we’ve been, where we are, and where we are going in light of whose we are.

I arrived here in July of 2003.  At the time, our average worship attendance was 12 at the first service, and 33 at the second service, for a combined average attendance of 45.  Honestly, I was shocked.  I didn’t see how 45 people could support this beautiful church.  A week after my arrival, my fears were confirmed—the phones were shut off due to non-payment of the phone bill because we didn’t have the money.  Two days later I received a letter from the power company that the lights were next.  We were $30,000 behind in our annual budget, and it was only July.

Now, thanks be to God for His blessings, because in five years our average weekly attendance has grown to 84, almost double what it was in 2003.  And as our Finance Team reports, thanks to your response to our Consecration Sunday campaign, our budget and finances are the strongest they’ve been in recent memory.  But these advances did not happen over night.  There was a lot hard prayer and work over a period of time; there we some experiments and some trials and errors in our worship and in our budget-balancing.  In both areas, sadly, we lost some sisters and brothers while we have rejoiced in gaining others.

Even in the area of leadership, we have certainly grown.  Five years ago, there were six or seven people wearing five different leadership hats each, in an effort to keep St. Paul ’s afloat.  This was a tragedy, because that type of leadership structure will burn out your leaders very quickly, so that these persons who were responding to God’s love and call upon their lives would be in danger of becoming jaded and might eventually turn their backs on their church and their faith.

Another consequence is that having one small group of leaders who do everything tends to enable the rest of the congregation coast along, thinking “Someone else will do it,” and stunting their opportunity for spiritual growth through service to Christ, to the point where we can’t even get one person to teach a Sunday school class once a month.  But we’ll talk more about that later.

But again, thanks be to God’s faithfulness!  At last Saturday’s leadership gathering, we had close to 25 leaders here at the church to dream and to talk about where St. Paul ’s is headed in the future.  What a blessing it was as we celebrated some of the ways in which God has blessed our ministries here at St. Paul ’s.

Over the past five years, we’ve also grown from a small Tuesday evening adult Bible study to an exciting, vibrant Sunday morning Adult Education hour which averages over twenty participants each week.  And along with that, we have additional small groups meeting during the week for couples, men’s ministry and women’s ministry.  We even have a Prayer Partner’s Program, can you believe it?  People are praying for one another!  And get this: some of you even bring your Bible—yes, that’s right, your Bible to church with you!

In the area of missions, we have over the past few years re-focused our priorities and have become more efficient and effective in our missional giving and service.  This past year, for the first time in ten years, we have fulfilled our partnership commitment with our sister church in Kybartai , Lithuania .  God is good—all the time!  Yes, we have come a long way together over the past five years, and I think that, on the whole, we have grown in our faith walk with Christ.

But we have not arrived yet.  And there are still many areas of concern and areas that we need to work on.  This place should be filled both services, every Sunday.  As a congregation, we are not doing a very good job at inviting people to church.  I know that some of you as individuals are doing a great job at inviting folks, but do you recall our “Bring a friend Sunday” last spring?  Out of our 84 attenders, I believe that only two actually brought people to church.  What’s up with that? 

Imagine what a wonderful challenge we would have if everyone brought one.  It would be chaos!  People would have to park at the municipal lot, and we’d have to get a shuttle service; you’d see all kinds of people here, joining friends and having a wonderful time during service and fellowship time; someone would probably even be sitting in “your” seat—imagine the nerve!; and the ushers would have to make two trips with the offering!  But best of all, people who perhaps did not know Christ would be able to hear about the One who gave his life for them, and who loves them no matter what.  Don’t they deserve to hear that?

The other area of major concern right now is in our Sunday school and ministry to children and youth.  Not only do we have a challenge with Sunday school attendance, but as I said earlier, we can’t even get someone to teach on the days when kids do show up!  It’s a travesty!  Stop a minute and think about it: without children, youth and young families, and with no intentional outreach to the community to invite new folks to church, what is St. Paul ’s going to look like in 5 years?  In ten years?  Will we still be here?  Or will we be like the church building on the corner of Brick Blvd. and Church St. that is now a pest control company; or the church building in Aberdeen that is now a restaurant; or the one in Egg Harbor Township that’s a sub shop; or will we be a real estate office, or someone’s home like the former church right up the street from here? 

Without a vision, the people will perish.  Without God’s vision and a unified plan, churches disappear.  As Paul says in verse 17, we are to “preach the gospel—[but] not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.” 

We need God’s help.

But fear not.  God has b-i-i-i-g plans for St. Paul ’s.  God has brought us this far, and we know that He’s not done with us yet!  “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” (Jeremiah 29:11)  Your leaders and I have met a couple of times over the past week, and we are in the process of seeking God’s vision for St. Paul ’s, and we’re devising a plan.  I’m just going to give you a very brief overview of what we’ve talked about.  Again, I encourage you to come to the church family gathering this coming Saturday at 9:30am where we’ll be able to have dialogue and discuss in more detail what it will take to bring this plan about.

Simply stated, we are looking at two areas: our structure and our people.  As far as our structure, we need to revamp our administrative and ministry team format so that we will spend less time in meetings and more time doing ministry.  We need to give you, the members and Christians who attend this church, the freedom to be in ministry however God calls you.  It might be outreach to the homeless, a drama ministry, a Bible study with single moms, a surfing ministry—I don’t know.  But we want to equip and empower you to do it!  Your church council discussed this and voted on a new structure this past Monday night, effective immediately, in the hopes of making this happen. 

On your way out, you can pick up this booklet, “Ministry Team Reports, Year Ending 2007.”  Besides reports from various ministry teams in our church, which I hope you will read, on the first two pages you will find both our administrative teams and some of the ministry teams that we have envisioned.  The list is not exhaustive, and you’ll see that there are many blanks where names should be, which brings me to the second area of focus: people.

Our church council also voted and affirmed that St. Paul ’s is dedicated to being a disciple-making church.  This means that we will be intentionally encouraging everyone to take the responsibility to grow in their own faith through worship attendance, Bible study, prayer, and service to the church and to the community.  We will also be devising a plan for intentional outreach to the surrounding communities, to follow up on visitors, to raise the bar on baptism and membership, and to nurture and equip members of our congregation for “knowing, growing, and sowing” the love of Jesus Christ.

So, today we stand at a crossroads.  As we stand here, we need to ask ourselves, “Okay, we’ve come this far.  Now where are we going?”  Will we embrace the vision and plans that God has for us, and move St. Paul ’s forward as a disciple-making church along the road less traveled, which will require effort and perhaps inconvenience?  Or will we let this opportunity slip by, opting instead to go down the widely traveled road of passive indifference?  As the prophet Joshua said, “Choose for yourselves whom you will serve…But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” (Joshua 24:15)

Now, some of these plans have already been implemented, and some will take some time to develop.  But all of the plans depend on you, the members and friends of St. Paul ’s.  Your leaders can’t do it alone.  Leaders lead, which means that they bring others along with them.  So I invited you to come along for the journey.  There are going to be some exciting things happening here at St. Paul ’s starting right now!  Each of us is a part of God’s plans that we envision here at St. Paul’s, and as the Psalmist writes, “May [God] give you the desires of your heart and make all your plans succeed” (Psalm 20:4).

As Paul wrote in verse 18 of today’s scripture reading, “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”  Remember whose you are, saved by the blood of Christ, and by the power of God being brought into a wonderful future of an ever-deepening relationship with the Living Christ.