Time flies…
It has been two months only for our family to come her in Contoocook but it has gone like two years. I have been busy with settling things down. Daniel went to Wanakee and had a great time and made ten good friends. Our family appreciate the scholarship money which was provided through this church and the conference level. As we heard from Grace last week, she has returned home safely and gracefully from a mission trip in Wales with her great, wonderful, and spiritually empowered experiences. I am so thankful for your prayers, cheers, and supports for Grace to was able to share what was on her heart during our worship service on August 26. While we have heard that this is a long stretch of humid weather in NH, this is weather which we experienced almost all year round in Singapore. Hannah, the children and I have been able to visit some of you in your homes. We look forward to getting to know all of you better in the months ahead. I have briefly outlined our worship topics from July and August and have provided a look into our topics for the month of September. I am available to discuss any of these topics with you at greater length if you are interested.
During July, we learned about the Church from the Bible. Basically the church is not a building, a system, or an organization, but a group of people who have accepted and confessed that Jesus is the Christ and the Son of the living God. In other words, a Christian is a person who accepts the Word of God as the ultimate authority, the standard, the life manual, and the final decision maker in one’s life. So our main concern as Christians is that we base our actions thinking about whether or not our decisions are, biblically founded and appropriate from God’s perspective, thus following what Jesus asked us to do in whatever we do.A Basic Understanding of the Church (July 2018)
The Church is an Organic Community (Mt 16:16).
The Church is One Living Body (Eph 4:11-16).
The Church is a Sacred Encountering Place (Exo 3:1-5).
We learned about the church as an Organic Community, One Living Body, and a Sacred Encountering Place. Organic means that we have the life of Jesus Christ, which is the Word of God. One means while we are all very different we can be and are one in Christ Jesus. Living means that we feel happiness and joy as well as, sadness and pain because we are not dead but alive as a part of the body of Christ. Sacred means that we are different from others because we accept Jesus Christ as our Savior and we believe that the Word of God is our top authority. Believing this makes a difference in our lives, so that we can then make a difference in the World. Encountering means we meet God everyday as we would a VIP. Our goal is to have a more intimate relationship with God. In order to accomplish this, it is important that we spend time alone with God in prayer and studying the Word of God to deepen our relationship with God. This is our life as a mobile church and a temple of God in this world.
Our focus for August, was to look deeper into the church as a worshipping, nurturing, caring, and serving community. Worshiping and Nurturing are our ways of eating (input) “spiritual food”, which is the Word of God. Speaking in terms of communication, worship is one way communication of the Word and nurturing is two-way communication because nurturing takes place in a small group or one on one environment. So Christian receives input primarily through worshiping and nurturing (Bible Studies). Just as we need to digest after eating, we need to digest (output) as well, after eating “spiritual food” through worship and nurture.
Therefore, what a Christian needs to do is to care and serve. Caring and serving someone is tough work. To be honest, this difficult work might seem impossible if we were not inspired by the Holy Spirit and if we didn’t believe in Jesus Christ. In other words, if we don’t eat spiritual food everyday, the tasks before us as Christians might seem insurmountable. Only when we partake of “spiritual food” can have spiritual energy enough to exercise spiritually, through caring and serving, thus saving us from becoming spiritually obese. The difference between caring and serving is the target we serve. Caring is taking care of our members in the church and serving is helping out the people or community outside of the church. When we don’t serve people outside of the church, a church can become focused only inward and becomes a small spiritual community. Therefore, we need the balance between inputs and outputs in Christian life to keep our spiritual health as the organic church of God.Christian Roadmap, Part A (August 2018)
The Church is a Worshipping Community (Zech 2:15).
The Church is a Nurturing Community (2 Tim 2:2).
The Church is a Caring Community (1 Cor 12:26).
The Church is a Serving Community (Mt 20:28).
There is one more thing we need to remember when understanding of the health of an organic community of God. The ultimate goal of all inputs (worship and nurture) and outputs (care and serve) is not just to do things themselves, but to allow for Transformation which must take place in the midst of our heart, mind, and soul. Transformation is a change in our way of thinking from a non-biblical to a biblical perspective. In other words, as we input spiritual food and output spiritual exercise, our spiritual mind, heart, and soul experience changes, which is allows for better spiritual health. Our spirituality changes into more God-centered, Bible-centered, and Kingdom-centered thoughts and practices. As we know and understand the heart of God through the Bible, our relationship with God grows deeper and more intimate so that we don’t misunderstand what God is doing in our life more and more. This process is known as Restoration. As we restore our relationship with God, we we will respond more His words, rather than our knowledge and experiences, because His Word is much better and greater than ours. So we use His Words more with “His copyright” This is called Wisdom. As we get more wisdom and we use His Words more, we naturally Witness to Him through our language, attitude, and behavior. Like this flow, our life keeps experiencing transformation, restoration, wisdom, and witness. This is the walk God wants us to walk with Jesus Christ on earth.
For September, we will learn about what must take place inside of us through spiritual inputs and outputs. I hope all of us can enjoy our journey with the spiritual happenings taking place inside of us together. Christian Roadmap, Part B (September 2018)
The Church is a Transforming Community (Rom 12:2).
The Church is a Restoring Community (Job 33:26).
The Church is a Wisening Community (Job 28:28).
The Church is a Witnessing Community (1 Pet 2:9).