God and Church

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0:00 This morning, I want to wrap up this idea that we've been spending time on, this notion that the church developed its own culture and always has. Started this kind of way of this spending time on this idea, started for us in the season of Pentecost where after Jesus' ascension, He together with God the Father sends down

0:31 the Spirit and the Spirit is released on the people of God indiscriminately. Men and women, young and old, everybody gets this original life-giving Spirit of God. And right there, what it does in Jerusalem as people are gathered from all over the known world. It pulls them together from different languages, different countries, different cultures. It pulls them all together from North Africa, the islands of Crete and up into Asia Minor

1:05 and off over into Rome. It pulls people from all these cultures together and that Spirit of God unifies them as the church and they go so far in community that they begin to hold all their things together in common and they begin to cultivate their own culture among themselves. What we've been saying is that the church is people pulled out of the world, called out of the world to live under the reign and authority of Jesus Christ, animated by His Spirit.

1:41 And that these people, the people we call the church throughout faith and time in every iteration and country have had core characteristics of the culture that they cultivate among themselves. They interact with other cultures. So as the culture of the church interacts with North Africa, develops into Coptic Christianity, sees the Eastern Orthodox religions, as it interacts with Eastern cultures and then you

2:11 see it form into Roman Catholicism, as it interacts with Rome and then Protestantism, as it interacts with Western Europe and enlightenment and then off into America, it cultivates, becomes, looks like, evangelicalism and holiness movement. But there are core characteristics of the culture of the reign of God that we've been spending time on. If culture is created by values and language and rituals and symbols, then I think that

2:45 the place where the culture of the reign of God may be class is most with other cultures that's in the space of values. We can have our own rituals alongside the rituals of the cultures that we live in. We can have our own common language as we build up what it means to be things like called or created. We can build our own common language. But this bedrock of the values that the culture of the reign of God is built on will at times be in conflict with the cultures that we live in and that's where we've been spending time.

3:15 We've been thinking about what it means that, how the church values money. We talked about that the church has a value around money because money gives us the capability to be generous. We talked about how the church understands or values where its values are in relation to economies. We said that the culture of the reign of God has its own economy and the economy of the reign of God is built on this principle of blessing and serving so that people that live

3:51 under the reign of God engage in economies not to accumulate and forward but to bless and serve. Then we talked about that the culture of God has its own value around rest. It was a new idea for me to consider that the same creative energy that goes into spending the world into existence goes into inventing rest. That rest isn't the absence of work but it's the presence of faithful kind of contemplation

4:28 and rejuvenation. Creating space to be rejuvenated by the God. And so the church has a culture of rest and a culture of work. We said that the church values work because the world needs it. The compelling idea there for me was that God creates this whole garden, spins it out into existence and puts humanity there and then asks humanity to work the garden.

5:00 But this is a pristine original creation but it doesn't take care of itself. It's not like humanity is placed in the garden now, relaxed and a hammock and I've organized all the animals to bring you all the food that you need and that the rain will funnel down out of the plants directly into your mouth. Don't even get up. Just lays about. No, he steps humanity into the world and says the world needs you.

5:30 As my image bearers to mirror back to it my work. So God creates in humanity names. God plants and cultivates and humanity works the garden so that there is a culture of work in the rain of God that says we engage in meaningful substantive work because the world needs us. The world needs our creativity. The world needs our ingenuity. The world needs our hearts, our minds, our hands, our bodies, the product of our work.

6:06 Then we talked about this notion of justice. That the rain of God has its own culture of God values justice. Justice isn't there is right and wrong. There are consequences for wrong behavior and there are benefits of right behavior but right and wrong it's not arbitrary. It's not about a list of rules. It's not about getting on the right side of a line. It's not about lining up and looking appropriate. Right and wrong is built on this principle that there is a God and that God has made humanity

6:40 in his image so that all humanity are image bearers. So that appropriate action just action is built on this conviction that all humanity bears the image of God. And so we are called to love God with all our hearts hold minds, to recognize that God is God and we are not, and then to love our neighbors as fellow image bearers of the God. That just behavior under the rain of God follows this core principle. We love God with our hearts hold in mind and love our neighbor as ourselves.

7:12 And because of the great justice of God because God is the image of God in us is indelible. Cannot be marred or ruined. Then we have the capacity to face up to our failures. There is a high standard for justice under the rain of God but we are not afraid of falling short. We stare at our failures wholeheartedly. We take them all in. And as Paul said, we endure the consequences of our behavior.

7:44 We endure suffering because we know that suffering produces character. Character produces hope and hoping the Lord doesn't disappoint. And so the justice in the rain of God is a double edged sword that we stand for justice in the world even as we endure justice ourselves. We look at our suffering that we have caused. We endure the consequences of our own behavior. And we continue to call ourselves to the standard of the image bearers of God, loving God and loving our neighbors. There is justice. And then finally last week we talked about the idea of love.

8:18 And for me that love puts action to justice. It's justice moving out in the world. It involves self-sacrifice and solidarity. Farming and reaffirming the image of God and the people around us and acting on that behalf. Acting in that truth. That bear image, the image of God in them is worth affirming and standing for. And so the church of God throughout history and time has stood for and ought to still today stand for the justice that all people bear the image of God.

8:59 That's a love in like six weeks. Economy, money, rest, work, justice, love. And for me these are all non-negotiable. If we will be the church, we will embody these things. It's not like let me pick which ones of these I like. Well you can pick which ones of those who like, but then you are moving out of the church. When I say the church I mean that community of people that has existed unbroken since Pentecost.

9:30 Animated by the Spirit of God, which has been released by the crucified and risen Christ. And for the people that has existed unbroken throughout nations and rulers through just societies and tyrannical societies through famine and wealth. We have the potential to step into this culture of people, but these things, economy, money, rest, work, justice, love are non-negotiable if we will find ourselves as the church of God. And it is a high standard. So good luck.

10:00 I'll see you all next week. Right? It was that thought that pushed me into our text for this morning in Paul, one to the church in Philippi. If you have a paper copy of the scriptures, Philippians is a little book in his list of letters. It goes Romans 1 and 2 Corinthians, the Galatians, Philippians, Colossians 1 and 2 Thessalonians.

10:34 We grouped all of Paul's letters together in the New Testament in the back sort of third of the scriptures, back quarter of the scriptures made. And when I look at Philippians chapter 2, you know Paul's brilliant. We say that a lot. If we were, we could spend a month on this section as easily if we could spend five minutes on it. There's so dense and interrelated.

11:04 So we're going to miss some stuff. So I hope you'll be able to just come along with me and don't get bogged down in the particularities because we can't get all of it in this morning. But I want to look start in the beginning of chapter 2 as we're thinking about this call to embody a culture that the church has always embodied. Paul says, so if there's any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.

11:48 Paul is saying, if you'd experienced anything good from God, and he lists a couple of things maybe, and this might be as you gather around the people of God, you might have experienced some piece of good. In maybe perhaps in quiet conversations with the Lord, you've experienced some good things. Maybe in reviewing his story in scripture or looking back at your story and God's interaction, you've encountered pieces of what Paul calls joy or love.

12:22 He says, if there is any encouragement, you've been encouraged by the story of Christ. If there's any comfort than love, if there's any participation in the spirit, any affection or sympathy, if you've experienced any little semblance of goodness from the story of God, then he says, complete my joy. And come together with all of us. Let that be a symbol that we are all tied together and let's all decide to be of one mind here together. Meaning we don't have to all have the same pieces. Some of you may have had encouragement from God. Some of you may have experienced love.

12:54 Some of you may have experienced peace. Some of you may be conscious of the truth. But if we've got any encouragement from the story of God, then let's come together and be of one mind. If one mind impulses, we have one mind with me. Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility, count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Having this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped.

13:28 If you've experienced any good thing from God, then let's come together and be of one mind. And let's not assume that you have all the answers or you know the right way. Instead, let's approach each other with humility. Do nothing out of rivalry or conceit, but in humility, count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Having this mind among yourselves, which is in Christ Jesus, he says which, though he was in the image of God, did not count equality with God, something to be grasped.

14:06 It's unfathomable to me that I keep thinking I know better than God, and the incarnate God Jesus was able to reserve the assumption that he knew better than God. That Jesus was a better human, though he was part divine, than I am human, though I am all human. That Jesus did a better job at being human than me. It's fascinating and aspirational. It means there is a way for me to be better human, to be a better image bearer of the God, to recognize that there is a God.

14:40 I am not him. He is kind and I bear his image. And Paul says, if you have experienced any good thing of the gospel, then move in together. And the answer to live together. Culture is created not by one person, but by many bringing their aspects, their attitudes, their interests, their creativity together. And learning from one another, Paul says, if you have experienced any encouragement from Christ, then come towards each other and find ways to be of one mind.

15:18 I think the cross Orlando dispersed in little rooms, though we are for the last five months, has great potential to cultivate beautiful culture among it. Because there is so much varied creativity and ingenuity. There is deep heart for justice and action. There is capacity for contemplation and prayer. We have all the components in our little congregation to cultivate beautiful culture consistent with out of the church throughout generations.

15:57 One question will be, are do we have the patience and the humility to come together and be of one mind, to learn from each other, to be okay with the places where we disagree, but to not let that stop us from continuing to move towards each other and find the places where we are of one mind. Our thinking about economy, money, rest, work, justice, love. And then he says that this thing that Jesus goes before us in this thing, in its capacity for humility, being born and founded human, he humble himself there for God exalted him. Okay, that's okay.

16:38 Verse 12. Therefore my beloved, as you have always obeyed so now, not only as in my presence, but much more in my absence. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling. Work out your salvation and fear and trembling. He means, well, I'm not here. Keep growing in the realization that God has saved you from what? Well, first from yourself.

17:12 God has saved you from your own unwillingness to let God be God, from your recurring fatal flaw that God refusal to believe that God has your best interest at heart. God has saved you from yourself. And having saved you from yourself also from all the powers of evil in the world that would draw you down or pull you away. And ultimately God has saved you from the evil of death and preserved you for eternity with himself.

17:47 And policy, continue to work out your acceptance and believe that God has saved you. From yourself, from the evil of the world, and from the grave of death, God has saved you. And Paul says whether I'm watching or not, continue to work out your acceptance and believe that that is true.

18:18 4, verse 13. 4 is God who works in you, both to will and to work according to his good pleasure. This was one of my early, very favorite verses, especially in college, as I started to see the potential when I realized that the fruit of the spirit could be more than words embroidered on the wall, but could begin to characterize my experience of life. That I could experience life in a way that looked like a love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, that it wasn't just platitudes, but it was an opportunity for experience for life.

18:55 When I begin to understand that, then I saw the barriers in front of me that were blocking me from love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, general self-control. And it was all I had to do with my thoughts, my belief patterns with activated action. And if I could change those, then I would start to experience life. And then very quickly, I got overwhelmed. Perhaps you have this tendency to see money, not as generosity, but as safety.

19:27 Perhaps you have this tendency to think just this is someone else's problem, not yours. Perhaps you have this tendency to think that you do not have the capacity to love anyone other than yourself. You just are angry and frustrated at the world. Perhaps when we go over these values of the culture of the reign of God, all you see is work out in front of you. And work that wears you down and is in the long list of other things that you have to do.

19:59 What I want to say is that the church in Pentecost there, at the very beginning in Jerusalem, and as they spread, didn't set out and say, okay, now, what culture do we want to have amongst ourselves? What values? They didn't have a visioning session to determine all of their seven values and then put action next to their values. They didn't have to do that because they have the spirit of God in their midst, which erupted a culture out of them. They didn't have to decide what love looked like. They were loving from the inside out.

20:33 They didn't have to decide how to approach work because God had made them into people who saw that the world needed their work, and they were capable of serving each other with it. They didn't have to understand their notion of money because God had made them generous people who wanted to use money as a way to move out to the world in generosity. And the same is true for you. Just as it was in Jerusalem, the Spirit of God will animate you into the Church of God.

21:03 If there is any semblance of encouragement, move towards it. You glimpse a little window of generosity in your heart, lean into it and explore. If there are corners of justice, new places that you care about in these quarantine days, read and learn. Lean into your heart for justice.

21:33 If as the place is quiet, you have new ingenuity, new ideas building up in you about how to create things in the world, whether that be business or art, go down that road. Because that is evidence of the Spirit of God at work in you. The culture of God, the culture of the Church doesn't require you to manufacture it. It comes out of the Spirit of God. It is the work and will. What does it say?

22:04 God works in you both to will and to work according to His good pleasure. God will build in you the desire and the capacity to cultivate the culture of God, to live as the Church. I hope that you this morning can be encouraged with the reality that you have the original Spirit of God. That Spirit comes with the capacity to be the Church.

22:35 It doesn't have to be work or burden. It is bubbling up in you now. Move towards the places where it is bubbling up. Money, economy, rest, work, justice. Move towards the places where you see in yourself the semblance of the Church and ask God to amplify it. Then, as He does, bring it back to the rest of us. Together, in concert with the Church throughout ages, we build the culture of the reign of God in Orlando.

23:12 I'm excited to do that with you all. Quarantine or distance or pandemic or not. We will be the Church together in Orlando. Let me pray for us. Hey Lord, thanks for the chance to be your Church today. Empower us of your Spirit to live out the calling of being Church with you and for you and with each other in Jesus' name we pray.