Rev. Ron Sumners May 23, 1993
Ken Medema has written a song that has a great message for us today. Listen to these words:
“If this is not the place where tears are understood, where can I go to cry? And if this is not the place where my spirit can take wing, where can I go to fly? I don't need another place for trying to impress you with just how good and virtuous I am. I don't need another place for always being on top of things. Everybody knows that it's a sham. I don't need another place for always wearing smiles even when it's not the way I feel. I don't need another place to mouth the same old platitudes, you and I both know that it's not real. If this is not the place where my questions can be asked, where shall I go to seek? And if this is not the place where my heart cries can be heard, where shall I go to speak? Come with me...walk with me...run with me...fly with me. We will roam the father's land together . Living in his everyday love, guided by his everyday power, we will know the loveliness of every hour. A place to seek...a place to speak...a place to cry...a place to fly!!!...the church!”
Last week we examined the question, "Who am I"? Today I ask the question, "Who are we"? WE ARE THE CHURCH! We are the body of Christ. .The church, that's who we are, but is Meadow Brook Baptist Church a place where we can fly?
The Pittsburgh Pirates won the world series over a decade ago. It was a very emotional ·pennant year for the team and for their fans. The team played well together and seemed to have a real closeness. The fans caught the feeling too. Their theme song, which became the anthem of their success, was a song by Sister Sledge called, "WE ARE FAMILY." It was played over the public address system in Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh and the team and the fans sang it together. The idea that they were more than a baseball team gave them the inspiration to become better than most thought they could be that year. They were family and they became the best!
Paul writes in this last chapter of Colossians about people who had an experience that led to a new way of life. It was like discovering that they were members of a family whose ties had nothing to do with blood or marriage. Instead they were brought together in a unique relationship with Jesus Christ. They were FAMILY!
The people brought together were so diverse. Normally you wouldn't expect such a group to have anything in common. There was TYCHICUS, a kind of messenger boy. In sharp contrast stands LUKE, a master of the Greek language poet, historian and physician. ARISTARCHUS was a "fellow prisoner", which indicates that when Paul was sent to Rome to be tried, ARISTARCHUS signed on as his slave so that he might accompany him and serve him. ONESIMUS was a criminal whose conversion was doubted by many. MARK, who had at one time deserted Paul, was now reconciled by the same spirit that called the new family into being.
It was the Love of Christ that reconciled men with such diverse opinions and backgrounds. Here were people living as God intended. They did not lose their distinctive identity. They were not melted into one, dull, uninteresting sort of personality soup. Instead, they were people who were not afraid or ashamed of who they were. They recognized that the love of Christ has the power to overcome any earthly barrier. Together they had a bond of friendship and fellowship that was the product of a great common faith and cause. They had room in their hearts for each other because they had made room in their hearts for God! Is there room in your heart for your family members here? If not, maybe it's because you haven't made room for Jesus either!
No man is worthless and no life is useless if surrendered to Christ. In the church we can discover the infinite worth of every person because God has given us a magnificent task. The messenger boy, the physician, the converted criminal, the teacher, every kind of person you can think of, even the teen agers and children, all are needed to do what must be done. God does not intend to reconcile the world to Himself by pronouncements and Theological and Doctrinal statements from the pulpit. He will do it through Christ's Body, the family, the CHURCH! For too long churches have hired professionals to do their work by proxy. We hire golden tongued speakers to worship on us and hope we get hit by the fallout! What we must realize today, as never before, is that WE ARE THE CHURCH! We are the family. And if we are not busy providing for the welfare of our family, it will be a little weaker and more vulnerable to the world. While church members sit and pout because their particular cause or wording wasn't adopted by the church, while many sit daily finding new ways that their feelings can be hurt, Satan stalks the earth like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. He delights in our pettiness and small mindedness! This family is where people can achieve their fullest potential. You will never be all you could be if you are outside the family of the church.
In a public park some children were having a great time playing about a tree that had been cut down for its lumber. Its life as a tree had ended. The children saw it simply as a place to play. The lumber could become a piece of furniture, perhaps even ·a Communion Table, but it wouldn't be a tree anymore. Nearby stood a huge Sycamore. Its branches formed an umbrella 100 feet in diameter. It was much older than the first tree, yet its leaves had the freshness of a young sapling. Its great gnarled roots thrust themselves deep into the soil drinking from the earth that nourishment had kept it standing for generations.
The first tree is a parable of many of our generation. They have accepted the blessings of the Christian faith, but now they have cut themselves off from the church and the nurture it provides. How many people do you know who were active in their home church, but when they moved away they cut themselves off from the church. They spend the rest of their lives to fill the emptiness they have created. But it never gets filled because only fellowship with Christ and His church can fill up the "God Shaped" vacuum in your heart. Like the second tree, we must draw from the depths of God's Grace for the water of life. The church is like the second tree. The roots are gnarled and twisted with failure and sin but they are grounded in the being of God. God doesn't use perfect men and women, if He did He would not use any of us. He takes us with all our faults and imperfections. The church is not perfect. As long as it is made up of people it will never be perfect. But we and our family, the church, achieve our full potential when we ground ourselves in God. Those first members of the family became more than they ever throughout they would be.
Our text records the names of several of Paul's friends whose development in the faith was due to becoming all they could be in the family. They were not perfect. They were not great as the world counts greatness, but they built the church and two thousand years later their lives serve to inspire us.
TYCHICUS, whom I mentioned earlier, was from the Roman Province of Asia and probably helped carry the offering of the churches there to Jerusalem for the relief of the suffering Christians in that city. He carried the Letter to the Ephesians to the churches that Paul wanted to instruct in the faith. He was Paul's personal envoy; Paul's letter carrier; God's letter carrier. What a role to fill! The church must have those who can interpret its life and work. The written word can never give the whole story. Christians are living commercials for an experience with the Living Word. They come LIVE not taped or recorded . People up and down the streets of the world wait for a letter carrier LIKE YOU, with a word from God.
Paul mentions ONESIMUS . He was a runaway slave who came to Rome, met Paul and was converted . Paul does not call ONESIMUS a runaway slave. he calls him a faithful and beloved brother.
ARISTARCHUS became a slave to serve Paul. There was EPAPHRAS, the Evangelist, who had taken the Gospel to Colosse. Others are mentioned: JUSTUS, DEMAS, NYMPHAS, ARCHIPPUS. Each one had a different background, different talents, but serving together they were a family; the CHURCH. Unity in diversity, a true fellowship demands it! In the service of Christ, in His church, under its influence, through its inspiration, you can develop your richest potential. But, you must work at it. You must be willing to sweat and refuse to be discouraged by failure or doubt or intimidation. In the family, each of us grow as we give to God and to our brothers and sisters.
Who are we? We are people who look to the future. At this point so many of us fail. We fail for the simple reason that we live too closely to each day trying to squeeze out of each one a little juice of happiness . We think only of ourselves, so we say "NO" to the opportunities that would help us to grow into the future. We say "NO" to the demanding, the unpleasant, the unrewarding tasks; the very things that build the foundation for the future. We claim we are too tired or too busy, but the real trouble is that we care only about ourselves. We forget that we are members in a family and we build the strong foundation so these corning after us will have a firm place to stand. We live in a day that is too materialistic, which places too high a value on money, that spends more time getting than giving. We have gotten to the place that we really do believe that a man's worth is found in the abundance of his possessions. I have had pastor friends who remarked that some wealthy individual had visited their church and thought they would be good members. And my comment has always been, "Wealth can't manufacture character. He might be mean, nasty and cantankerous. And if he pledged your entire church budget it would not be worth having to deal with him as a member." My friends, I don't care what your occupation is nor what title you have on your letterhead ; God doesn't care. He looks in your heart. I know this is risky talk in an affluent community, but it is God's truth. "What good does it do a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul?" In this family we don't care what you have, what matters is who and whose you are.
We are a family that looks to the future. Because all loving families are concerned with where they have come from and where they are going. What is the future of Meadow Brook Baptist? It's so bright you gotta’ wear shades! The past is the past and we learn from our mistakes, but the future is in much bigger hands than ours! All we have to be is obedient!
We must be a family of closeness and love. There must be a genuine affection for one another and a true love for the head of our family; Christ Himself. We have an authority in our family. It isn't me, it isn't the deacons, it isn't any individual here, it isn't even the Southern Baptist Convention or Robert's Rules of Order! The Authority of this family is the One who holds all authority in Heaven and in Earth. He is the Head of this church because He is the only One who can handle it. Isn't it about time we stopped rebelling against Him, doing our own thing. We keep looking for a spiritual nevernever land that offers peace without struggle and satisfaction without sacrifice. IT DOES NOT EXIST! Come to the family and let Christ have authority in your life.
The words to a great old Gospel hymn say it best; "Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling, calling for you and for me. See on the portals He's waiting and watching, watching for you and for me. Come home, come home, ye who are weary come home. Earnestly, tenderly Jesus is calling, calling Oh sinner, come home!"
Home; family, we are the church: A place to speak....a place to seek....a place to cry and PRAISE GOD, a place to fly!
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