Awesome weekend.
This Scars series is tough to talk about, think about, and hear about. But it's definitely touching some spiritual nerve endings. I know it's bringing up some painful memories for people, but let me share my philosophy of church. It's simple: you should always walk out feeling better than you walked in. Sure, you'll experience some conviction. Especially on a weekend like this weekend when we're talking about sexual scars and sinful scars. But here's the deal: God never leaves us there. It's His grace that turns guilt into gratitude. We walk in feeling guilty about what we've done wrong. We walk out full of gratitude because of what He's done right.
By the way, one of the powerful dimensions of this series is having NCCers share their scar stories. Life-changing. This week's video is a deeply moving story about an NCCer who killed someone in a drunk driving incident as a teenager. Amazing story of redemption. By the way, I forget to show it after my message in our first service. I'm so sorry! I beat myself up all night over that. But you can watch when the webcast goes live this week.
This Scars series is tough to talk about, think about, and hear about. But it's definitely touching some spiritual nerve endings. I know it's bringing up some painful memories for people, but let me share my philosophy of church. It's simple: you should always walk out feeling better than you walked in. Sure, you'll experience some conviction. Especially on a weekend like this weekend when we're talking about sexual scars and sinful scars. But here's the deal: God never leaves us there. It's His grace that turns guilt into gratitude. We walk in feeling guilty about what we've done wrong. We walk out full of gratitude because of what He's done right.
By the way, one of the powerful dimensions of this series is having NCCers share their scar stories. Life-changing. This week's video is a deeply moving story about an NCCer who killed someone in a drunk driving incident as a teenager. Amazing story of redemption. By the way, I forget to show it after my message in our first service. I'm so sorry! I beat myself up all night over that. But you can watch when the webcast goes live this week.
10 Comments:
"By the way, I forget to show it after my message in our first service. I'm so sorry! I beat myself up all night over that. "
Maybe God was in control, maybe there was someone in that service who could have been very negatively impacted had you shown it, someone who would not have been able to take it at this point in time.
Just out of curiosity... if someone doesn't leave church feeling better than when they walked in, whose fault/failure/responsibility do you think it is?
Jenny,
The reality is that lots of people walk out of lots of churches NOT feeling better. And there are probably lots of reasons. Could be a bad sermon I suppose. Could be an unwillingness to receive God's grace or apply His truth. But what I know for sure is this: it's never a failure on God's part.
Great question.
Mark
Even though God's all-powerful? (sorry... playing a bit of devil's advocate)
He gave us free will :)
Suspected that was coming. :-)
I think it's just a hard concept because I know people who've left church that way (and I've left church that way) and they don't understand why... and they wish that it were different. And it's easy to wish that God would just make it different for them.
Fantastic sermon on Sunday!
Not sure I think this philosophy works in all instances, though. :o)
Maybe I'm just slow, but I've found for me that the conviction/repentance/resolution process often takes more than 30 minutes (or 45). :o)
God often takes me through seasons of conviction (as I increasingly grasp what I'm doing wrong) or repentance (as I increasingly implement the change he's called me to) and sermons will often play a role in that (helping to clarify the conviction I'm feeling, for instance), while not taking me through the whole process.
I often feel like my spiritual journey is a bit broader and longer term than a series of Sunday morning conviction/repentance/forgiveness events. Does that make sense?
That's not to say that combo DOESN'T all happen in a single Sunday morning, because it often does, but not all the time.
Totally agree Ryan. It's sort of like when you're at the hospital and you know "help is on the way" or "I'm on the mend." You don't get better right away, but you've moving in the right direction. That might be a better way of putting it :)
One of my goals is that God would "begin a good work" during a service, but then it can take years to "carry it to completion."
PM
My husband, daughter and I were visiting the area this weekend. We will be relocating this summer. I have been reading your blog, reading your books and was so excited about seeing the church in action.
We attended Kingstowne. It was incredible and now we will look for a home near one of the theater churches.
The message, the music, all of it was inspirational, uplifting! We left feeling better than when we walked in and having experienced conviction in the process!
Thank you for your being God's instrument in a starving world!
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