Do Over

This is the last week of the series; I’ll begin something new next week.
This series has worked from the idea that, on frequent occasions, the church of Jesus Christ has gotten things wrong.

Gotten OFF TRACK for lack of better words.
It’s missed its calling.

I think we’re in one of those times presently.

The church is failing and we need to get a sense as to why.

Hence the idea of DO OVERS.

We need one, here in this church, in the church more broadly, and we need one ourselves, personally.

To that end, I’ve told you stories of my personal failures in ministry as the means to open us up more broadly to this idea.

That pastors and priests don’t always have things, right?
That what more than anything else we need to grow a church, to grow the church, is people having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
So, let’s have a Do Over, shall we?

My Mistake – Misreading the Times

I was at my first Bible school at a church.

Somehow, I’d missed the one at Myers Park and this was my first ever time helping with VBS.

We had a lot of kids that year – over 60.

There were so many, we really cramped into the fellowship hall with all the tables out. We were really too cramped.
But they’d finally gotten the kids to settle down.

They needed to get them into their groups.

But I decided they needed to play a game with me, making a thunderstorm.

Anyway, long story short, I got this whole large group of children in an absolute frenzy just as the real leaders needed them to settle down and be focused.

I misread the room.
We all do it from time to time.

Look at data, form an opinion and then move on from there.
But, sometimes, we didn’t look closely enough or, worse still, we just assumed we knew what we were talking about at the time.
This surely happened in a great many churches during the Civil Rights Era in the USA.

The Church’s Failure – Segregation and Civil Rights

As I’ve been showing you, collectively, the church gets things wrong a lot of the time and people suffer.
One great incident of this occurred during the Civil Rights Era.

Yes, some churches did very robustly support this movement away from segregation.
But you know what, MANY did not.
Many stayed put with their previous assumptions that the way the world was working was perfectly all right.

Never mind that there were ample scriptures that could’ve shown that segregation was an utterly un-Christian concept.

But instead, some churches heard about the “Curse of Ham” and the need to stay separate from the uncleanliness of other races.

It was nutty times.

You see, we get things wrong.

The Prodigal Son

There’s someone in our story that gets things wrong, isn’t there?
Well, that’s for sure, two to be sure.

The first brother’s failure we all know and see played out for us.

This impudent young man goes to his dad and essentially says, “dad, you’re dead to me, give me my stuff.”

WRONG but, you know what, he comes to his senses.

The Younger Brother

Comes to his senses
Is embraced
Radical forgiveness

Great news of the story

God really forgives us.
God really embraces us back fully, there is no diminishment of our status because we’ve been sinners.

God LOVES us that much.
He really forgives us.

But there is also some bad news.

Some people will take this amazingly good reconciliation and feel somehow strangely BAD about it.

Like they’ve somehow lost out not doing freely what they want.

So, what’s the deal with this older brother.

He is works based righteousness, 100%.

Notice his words

This son (not my brother) and how it’s all about the good things he’s done.

He’s expecting more because he’s done more good.

We do that too, don’t we sometimes?

The elder brother

Is resentful that God is full of Grace?
Don’t we all get like that, sometimes?

I know I do, on occasion.

What the elder brother got wrong.

Even though he might have been doing better, he was still doing things wrong.

He is still a sinner.
But he’s still wanting his stuff more than relationship with his father.

How are we doing on that front?

Do we understand that even though we’re here, in church, that we ourselves are the ones out of whack with God?

That’s right? It isn’t about what other people are doing wrong, it’s about what’s wrong inside of our own hearts.

The first step in our relationship with Christ is us seeking a do over.

We go to God, confess our shortcomings, asking for Him to come into our lives.

Then, the next step is growing in His love and grace so that we can share it with others.

That’s right, our end, is to let other people know the good news.

That we’re forgiven. Loved by God, no matter what.