This Is NOT Called 2020 Vision Because That's What Every Other Church Is Doing Today

I’m calling today’s message “This is not called 2020 Vision Because That’s what every other Church is doing today.” I think it was ten years ago that I started wondering how sick of 2020 Vision puns I was gonna get this year—so I got a head start.  

But every new year starts the same. For the next few weeks the gyms will be full of very eager people in brand new spandex using all the equipment in creative ways—I’m not even sure what I’m looking at in some of these photos. They’re trying to get in shape, but it seems like the shape they’re aiming for is an upside down pretzel. They’re trying to get strong and fit but all they’re really gonna do is get mangled. If not by the machine, then by the regular gym goers who don’t want to put up with their nonsense.

Do you guys make new year resolutions? Some of you? Lose some weight, save some money, stop smoking, stop drinking, eat healthier, spend more time with family—new year, same old goals. Right? We all know that these kinds of resolutions aren’t gonna mean anything unless we make a plan and stick to it—otherwise they’re just New Year wishes. 

Resolutions I think it’s good to look at our life and make some big goals now and then. New Year’s as good a time as any. Personal goals are important—we all need to feel good about ourselves, be healthy, spend plenty of time with the people we love and manage our resources with wisdom. We’re extremely blessed and we need to be thankful for what God has given us and we need to be wise in how we manage all these blessings. 

It’s also good to set some goals for our church—this amazing little glimpse of heaven on earth, our spiritual family, this ministry that we get to do together—to look at NewChurch and think about where we’ve been and where we’re going. What are some resolutions we could make that relate to our church and our spiritual life?

Prayer: Father in heaven, thank You for another year and another opportunity to be the people You’ve called us to be. Help us see with Your eyes. Help us to love as You love. Free us from our misguided perceptions and lead us with Your Spirit and wisdom. In Christ’s name we pray.

What are we doing?

Let’s pretend for a moment that we don’t know anything about what a church is or what this is all about. Like we just walked in here with no preconceived ideas or baggage or preferences. Just see a group of people that got together here for some reason, and someone raised their hand and said, “Excuse me, what’s this meeting for?” 

Just as a thought experiment, let me try to answer that question from a NewChurch perspective to this person who must be from a strange planet or something. My answer would be something like this:

We’re a group of people who get together because Jesus rose from the dead. He made certain promises to us, so we get together to talk about Him, sing about Him, and remind each other of the things He said. He made some amazing promises and He also gave us instructions for how to live a life that matters—so we talk about the things He wants us to do and not to do, too. We’re Christians and we believe He’s saved us from sin and death, and He’s in the process of saving the world through us, too—just by the way we talk about Him with the people in lives, through the various things we do all week long, our jobs, our schools, our families, our roles as citizens of our city and country. We get together to pray for each other, to support each other, to help each other with our various callings and struggles. We’re a family. We’re friends. We’re a church. We get together to worship God by hearing His Word, thanking Him, praising Him, singing together, praying together. We get together to love each other, encourage each other, lift each other up, challenge each other to be more faithful with the rest of our lives. 

So what are we doing here? The idea is that we would come together to grow in our faith, to be transformed into the people that God has called us to be. To receive His grace and forgiveness—so we can be renewed and strengthened before we go back out there do the mission, the work, that He’s called us to do. What we do in here prepares us for what God is calling us to do out there.

Matthew 5:13-16 says

“You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet. “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”

Jesus has called us to be the salt of the earth, the light of the world. That we’re supposed to go out there and change the world. One relationship at a time. One conversation at a time. One act of kindness and love at a time. To live lives that make people ask about our hope in Jesus. To love people in surprising ways so they’re confused and ask us what the heck is going on? Why would we do that? Why would we love our neighbor as ourselves. Why would we love our enemies. We’re not supposed to be part of this angry divided hateful rhetoric. We’re supposed to be Christians, known by our love for people.

Why do we do that? What’s the reason? Because Jesus rose from the dead to save us. And to save the whole world. Because He gave us a mission to do—as a church and in our various lives. Because He said He’s gonna come back when we least expect it and when He does, we better be doing what He told us to be doing. We do all this because we know He wants us to share His love and grace with as many people as possible before that day comes.

2 Peter 3:9

“The Lord isn’t really being slow about his promise, as some people think. No, he is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent.”

So we’re supposed to be sharing our faith with the people who need it, but we’re not really good at it. It’s hard. That’s why we’re here. We’re getting ready to have those conversations, we’re making sure we know what it means to love people. We need to be reminded of the promises and commandments Jesus has given us. We’re making sure we don’t get distracted, and we want to make sure nobody falls through the cracks because they get discouraged or sad— we gotta keep our friends from wandering away. 

Hebrews 10:25

“And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.”

Is that the answer you were expecting? Is that how you would have answered the question? That we show up here to encourage each other and get ready for what God wants us to do out there?

We’re not here just to passively watch someone else talk about Jesus—like you’re doing right now— or watch other people sing about Jesus—like some of us were doing earlier—or to listen to other people pray to Jesus. We’re here to get in on the action. To be part of the conversation, to lift our own voice up in song and prayer. To be transformed. To encourage each other and get ready to go out there and make a difference in the world. What we do in here prepares us for what God is calling us to do out there.

You might be thinking that sounds scary; like, “I’m too shy. I don’t know enough about the Bible. I don’t like to talk about my faith.” I’m not saying you have to make cold calls for Jesus. I’m not saying you have to stand on the street corner with a megaphone and tell people they’re going to hell. But Jesus said we’re to be salt of the earth and the light of the world. So we have to always be ready to tell people about the hope we have because of Jesus when they ask. 

1 Peter 3:15

“Instead, you must worship Christ as Lord of your life. And if someone asks about your hope as a believer, always be ready to explain it.”

And the way we get ready is by coming together to grow in our faith before we’re sent back into our daily lives to live that faith out loud. To live a life that begs the question so people will actually ask us about our hope. To learn enough about our faith that we can give a reasonable answer when they do. I get excited about this. I think it’s a pretty amazing thing that God is calling us to be part of.

We don’t want to be like those doofusses who show up at the gym in January and use all the machines upside down until they get hurt. We can use the church wrong, too. 

Noobie Church Mistakes Like we look at it as a consumer. We look for a church that has the best religious goods and services, where we like the music, and the preacher, or the style of the architecture. We want to be spoon-fed baby Bible food, and turn our nose up at anything other than pureed bananas and applesauce. Try to feed us something green and we’ll just spit it out and not show up for a month. We’re doing it wrong when we show up late, leave immediately, don’t make friends, don’t encourage the other people in the church, aren’t part of the discipleship ministries like a Scattered Group or a Sunday school class or a men’s discipleship group or a women’s discipleship group. It’s like just sitting on the gym equipment for a few minutes every few weeks thinking about how we’d like to get in shape and get stronger. We all know it just doesn’t work like that. When we only see the church as an obligation, and begrudgingly show up halfheartedly—well, we’re like the swarm of noobies at the gym that will be back to their old habits before February.

I think this analogy is funny because we started NewChurch in a gym. Now we’re a popup church in an elementary school—we started small but we’ve been slowly growing. We averaged 122 per service in December, which is up from averaging 108 last December. That’s awesome, but the real growth I’ve seen over the last year is harder to measure. I’ve seen relationships get stronger, friendships grow deeper. I’ve seen our youth come together and really become friends, a community, they look forward to seeing each other. We have a lot of leaders in our youth that are eager to worship God and love people. I’ve seen men grow in their faith and their excitement to follow Jesus and help other men follow Jesus—getting into the Bible and letting it challenge and change them. I’ve seen women get together and study God’s Word and pray together and become sisters, caring for each other. Many of us are showing up to study God’s Word and discuss His truth before worship, and in our homes during the week. We’ve been more faithful in our giving and reversed the downward trend that was threatening to close our doors last year. Things are looking pretty good. When we had Rally Day several weeks ago, a bunch of you stepped up and said you wanted to help make this ministry happen—I’m so glad to be pastoring a church that gets it, that’s so excited about what God’s doing here that you want to bring your best gifts of time, talent and treasure. To do your part to make sure we continue to be a blessing to your family and to anyone else that God sends our way.

The Gospel for NewChurch So I’m glad you’re here. I’m glad God has called you to be part of this church. To worship here, to serve here, to love the people He brings through those doors. What He did for you, He wants you to help do for other people. He’s called you out of the darkness and meaninglessness of this world into His marvelous light and salvation. He’s given you hope. That longing for eternity that was built into your heart just like every other person on earth, has been granted to you in Jesus. God became man and gave His life for you. So that you can be forgiven, and healed, and whole—so you would have purpose and meaning and hope. Because of Jesus, His life and death and resurrection, you’ve been promised everything good. Your life is going somewhere good because of Jesus—we don’t always see that, but that’s what we’ve been promised in Jesus.

Ecclesiastes 3:1

“Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end.”

And our hope isn’t just about life after death, it’s also about life before death—Jesus promises you an abundant life here and now. A life with purpose and meaning. Which is only going to be found by joining in His mission and being an active part of the church that’s changing the world—by giving other people hope and meaning.

NewChurch Resolutions So I’m asking all of us to make three NewChurch resolutions. To pray everyday out loud, to read the Bible cover to cover this year, and to dedicate ourselves to encouraging the people in our church family.

I want you to promise that you will pray out loud everyday. Thank God for everything He’s given you. Pray the Lord’s Prayer. That in your life His name would be holy, that His kingdom would reign in your life and His will would be done in you on earth as it is in heaven, ask Him for your daily needs, for the needs of your friends and family, ask Him to lead you away from temptation and sin, and for Him to deliver you from evil and darkness and the enemy that wants to destroy your life and faith. Pray for NewChurch—which is all of us—in our mission to worship God and love people together. Pray that God will give us a permanent home, a third place, a place for the whole community to come together and meet Jesus—to hear about God’s love and grace. Pray these things out loud everyday.

Second, I want you to read through the Bible this year. The whole thing. And with every line, every phrase, I want you to ask the same question: what does this mean for me as a follower of Jesus? In how I treat my family, in how I do my job, in how I approach my studies and my friends, in how I vote and live as a citizen of my country. God’s Word will change us into who He wants us to be. Go to NewChurchTX.com/bible so we can read through the Bible together everyday. God promises to speak to us through His Word, that it’s alive and active, that it never returns without doing what He wants it to accomplish. 

Third, I want you to promise to encourage your church family. Keep in touch during the week, check in on each other, check in on me, like each other’s posts on Facebook, “heart” each other’s photos on Instagram, retweet the Twitters. Speak well of each other. Show up for worship on Sunday—it’s depressing to the rest of us when you’re not here. Pick a Sunday school class and never miss: Kemper’s Revolution class, my Foundations class, Peter and Ryan’s “how to stay Christian in school” class. Go to lunch after worship, discuss your faith, wrestle with the hard questions, encourage each other—iron sharpens iron. This is how we make each other stronger. Join a Scattered group, or a men’s discipleship group, or a women’s discipleship group. If you’re a youth, show up and support the youth group. Worship. Serve. Learn in a group. These are some of the ways we can encourage the people in our church.

We’ll call these NewChurch Resolutions—I want us all to make these to go along with our other big ideas of losing weight and whatever else we’d like to do better. Except, we need to help each other actually keep these NewChurch resolutions past the second week of January. Let’s grow in our faith and knowledge of the Lord. Let’s get closer to God, closer to each other, and more prepared for everything God is calling us to do in the world. Let’s pray out loud everyday, read the Bible cover to cover this year, and do whatever we can to encourage our church family. I promise, I’ll do everything I can to encourage you in all these things—to get better at doing these things.

God uses the time we spend together to prepare us to do the work He’s calling us to do. It’s like the gym—we don’t go to the gym so we can be better at going to the gym. We want to be stronger and healthier for the rest of our life. It’s the same with church, we’re here to learn how to worship Him, to be able to love and serve our neighbor. Let’s make the most of our time together so we’ll be ready for whatever happens when we’re out there in the rest of our lives. He promises to go with us, wherever we go. What we do in here prepares us for what God is calling us to do out there.

I love you, guys. I love what God has us doing together. I love this church. I’m so grateful that I get to be your pastor. Happy New Year NewChurch.