Change of Plans
I Thessalonians 1:1-3
We are approaching the beginning of a new church year. This is not a new liturgical year, but the time when our Sunday school begins new studies, our Sunday school teachers study new literature, and new church leaders are elected. I thought it would be appropriate to address qualities a church needs no matter what is happening in its life.
The community of Dawn, Texas, where I served
as pastor before coming here, celebrated its centennial in 1988. As the pastor of the only church in town, I
was invited to say a few words at the ceremony.
So, I did a little research. I
saw a copy of the original plans for “the city,” plans drawn in 1888. The community was to include parks, schools,
and a wide street through it called Grand Boulevard. When we left in 1992, Dawn’s streets still
had no names; you just don’t need them in a village of 88 people.
Someone has said, “Life is what happens when
you’re making other plans.” A somewhat
more cynical person said, “If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans.” We’ve all been victims of a change of plans.
The church in Thessalonica had other plans
as well. They expected things to work
out differently.
Somehow, these new Christians had concluded that Christ’s return would
occur during their lives. Some of these
folks were so confident Christ’s return was just around the corner they stopped
working, making them a burden on their more industrious fellow-believers. Others began to worry when some of their
fellow Christians died, wondering if their deceased loved ones had somehow
missed out on God’s plan for them.
Paul wrote to tell these Christians they would have to remain in a sometimes-hostile world longer than they planned.
Paul wrote to tell these Christians they would have to remain in a sometimes-hostile world longer than they planned.
Of course, Paul had to address some other
matters as well. Someone, either in the
church or on the outside, began to spread rumors that Paul wasn’t
trustworthy. Others in the church began
to fall back into the old pagan lifestyle.
And, others began to form cliques that led to division in the church.
This was truly a shame because the Thessalonian church had been a model of how
the gospel brought men and women of diverse backgrounds together in a common
commitment to Christ.
In a way, each of these problems could be
traced to the fact things hadn’t worked out the way the Thessalonians expected.
Even if Burns hadn’t said it, sometimes the
best laid plans of mice and men get plowed under. If you’ve seen plans changed by events over
which you’ve had no control, if you’ve had dreams die, what Paul tells the
Thessalonian Christians in these verses may be very relevant to you.
Keep in mind that even though the
Thessalonian church was wrestling with some problems, Paul had hope for its
future. That hope didn’t rest on the
church being in a wealthy community.
Thessalonica was a prosperous trading center and a provincial capital,
but Paul’s hope for the church rested on other things.
As he had seen in other places, Paul had
seen God at work creating a community that was diverse in its background and
make-up. The story is told in Acts
17. As you read the story you will find
that some of the Jews believed Paul and Silas and joined them. In the synagogue
there were many Greeks, known as “God-fearers” because they worshiped the true
God. Many of these believed. But the converts weren’t limited to “good”
people; there were rank pagans converted as well. Luke tells us there were also many important
women converted.
A rich background like this means you have
diverse insights that can help the church minister to all levels in a
community.
If the earliest members of this new
congregation believed they would be able go on unmolested, they would soon be
disappointed. Because some of the new
Christians had come from the synagogue, the Jewish leaders became jealous. This led to trouble for the church from
almost the beginning. After no more than
a few weeks, Paul and Silas had to flee the city, leaving behind an infant
church that was not fully grounded in the Faith.
Nonetheless, Paul had hope for this church
that was so disappointed that things hadn’t turned out according to plan. In what appears to be the conventional
beginning of a letter, Paul gave the Thessalonians (and us) insights on how to
survive a change of plans.
A church
can survive a change of plans by remembering there are still reasons to be
thankful for what God is doing in and through it.
Certainly Paul was thankful. Why?
We get a clue in Williams’ translation of
verse 3: “… for we can never for a
moment before our God forget your energizing faith, your toiling love, and your
enduring hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Paul was thankful for their “ energizing faith"--something
about their faith kept them going through the tough times. Such faith kept them busy working for the
Kingdom; nothing--not trial or difficulty--shut them down.
This was a faith that allowed God to work in
them and through them.
Paul was thankful for their “toiling love"--their love
revealed itself in hard work. The word
“work” suggests it was intense and exhausting.
Love is not merely felt; love is something
you do.
Paul was thankful for their "enduring hope in our Lord Jesus Christ"--the
passing of time and the increase of pressure did not change their hope, hope
focused on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Paul doesn’t specify the object of their
hope but it was in what Jesus had done and would do. It would have had a view toward a better
future.
The challenges the Thessalonians had to
endure probably included persecution, but not just that.
Thomas comments on this quality of
endurance: “This is an aggressive and
courageous Christian quality, excluding self-pity even when times are
hard. Difficulties endurance must cope
with consist of trials encountered specifically in living for Jesus
Christ. Endurance accepts the seemingly
dreary ‘blind alleys’ of Christian experience with a spirit of persistent
zeal…and goes forward no matter how hopeless the situation.”
So, Paul finds reason to be thankful for a
church where things weren’t ideal. What
does this say to us?
Shortly after I arrived here a woman
attending the church at that time explained that she never invited friends to
our church because she couldn’t see any good reason for them to come; we
weren’t doing some of the things other, bigger churches were doing.
Poor woman.
She didn’t see the great things our church had to offer. Her outlook was sad but was also dangerous
because it could be contagious. The Dispatch sometimes reports on new
churches in the area, large churches with multiple services and
state-of-the-art technology. That can
disturb folks in churches like ours. Do
we feel we have nothing to offer because we don’t have a Starbucks in the
Narthex or a brass band in the sanctuary?
That’s just wrong. Ours isn’t a perfect church but we can be
thankful for our strengths. And we can
pray that those strengths will enable us to work together to make a good church
better.
This brings me to another point.
A church
can have hope even when things don’t turn out the way it planned if it
remembers teamwork is crucial to a church’s health.
Even though Paul was a powerful leader, he
didn’t build the Thessalonian church on his own. He needed the help of others.
Teamwork breaks down when we begin to
believe each team member must think like us, agree with us. Teamwork breaks down when we insist that our
way is the only legitimate way to do music, to do outreach, to do service, to
do worship.
When church members refuse to work together,
inertia sets in. It becomes impossible
to move forward.
A church
can survive a change of plans by remembering to focus on its relationship with
God through Jesus Christ.
The word
Paul uses for church was ecclesia. We get ecclesiastical from it, a word
referring to things related to the church.
But ecclesia wasn’t a religious word.
It simply referred to an assembly of people who had come together for
a purpose. That’s important, they
hadn’t just come together; they had a purpose.
The Christian assembly at Thessalonica
wasn’t just any gathering of like-minded people. It was “in God the Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ.” Its unique character and
purpose was rooted in that relationship with God. That relationship defined who they were and
why they were there in Thessalonica.
Because we are also “in union with God the Father and the Lord Jesus,” we
have an identity and purpose as well.
They were God’s People in Thessalonica; we are God’s People in
Worthington.
For centuries theologians of all stripes
have sometimes quarreled over seemingly minute point of doctrine, yet they have
generally agreed the church has a fourfold purpose: Worship, proclamation, nurture, and service. If we don’t keep that in mind, we risk losing
our identity.
As we worship we give praise and thanks to
God for his nature and work. As we
proclaim we tell the story of what God has done to bring us into a relationship
with him and invites others into that relationship. As we nurture we help one another live in the
light of God’s character. As we serve we
show God’s love in God’s Name.
If we lose sight of these purposes, staying
together as a “church” becomes a burdensome task. Keep them in view and we can face all sorts
of challenges.
A church
can survive a change of plans by remembering, to foster the qualities of faith,
hope, and love.
We need a faith that will keep us going.
Let me be frank, this isn’t a faith which
says, it doesn’t matter what you believe as long as your sincere. It isn’t a faith which says, you believe one
thing, I believe another, who know who’s right or if anyone is right. Nor is it a faith that says there is only one
way to believe—mine.
It is a faith that unites us in common
agreement on the foundational elements of the Christian faith.
In an age when all human problems are
reduced to psychological, economic, or biological issues, we had better stand
ready to affirm the biblical teaching that the great human problem is spiritual—our
broken relationship with God.
In an age that denies the significance of
Jesus Christ, we had better make him the central feature of our message. We need to affirm his deity and his role as
the God-appointed way to salvation.
In an age that scoffs at the church, we had
better remember we are called to be salt and light in a dark and corrupt world,
to be world-changers, to be the heralds of good news, the best news humanity
has ever heard.
That kind of faith will bring us out on
Sundays. It will prompt us to ignore
censure and embarrassment to speak out for Jesus Christ. It will shape a world-view that will
challenge the culture around us.
We need a love that gives us an outward
vision.
Several years ago, I heard a retired pastor
tell about his experience as an interim pastor at a small church. Nothing he
said could prompt the church to think outside its four walls. There was no interest in bringing new people
into the church; new people, after all, might want to change things. He said that during his service there, the
only significant decision the church made was to cut a foot off the inside end
of each pew. The goal was to make it
easier to push a casket down the aisle.
He realized most people saw that church as
somewhere to wait until they died and then have a nice funeral. It was an ingrown community. Perhaps there was a time when that church had
a vision to share God’s love with the surrounding community but somehow that
vision dimmed. Perhaps they so treasured
their “special fellowship” they feared losing it if the church grew. So, the church didn’t grow and what it
treasured most. Almost certainly, it
exchanged nostalgia for vision; dreams of efficient funerals for dreams of
fruitfulness.
Love, the love Jesus Christ longs to inspire
within his people, will keep a church from being so self-centered it becomes
deaf to the cries of a lost world.
It’s a love that will keep a church going
when many say give up, quit; the people you’re trying to reach aren’t worth the
effort.
It isn’t really a tireless love; it’s a love
that keeps going despite being tired.
Do you remember The Man of La Mancha? It’s
the story of an aging, wandering knight whose skill-sets are less than stellar
but whose vision is clear. Its best-known song is called “The Quest.” It may not have been the author’s intention,
but the song expresses the vision of one motivated by a God-inspired love.
To dream the impossible dream, to fight the
unbeatable foe,
To bear with unbearable sorrow, to run where
the brave dare not go,
To try when your arms are too weary, To
reach the unreachable star:
This is my quest, to follow that star, No
matter how hopeless,
No matter how far, to fight for the right,
without question or pause,
To be willing to march into Hell for a
heavenly cause.
And the world will be better for this:
That one man scorned and covered with scars,
still strove with his last
Ounce of courage to reach the unreachable
star.
We need a hope that endures.
The Thessalonian church needed a hope that
would help those Christians endure in the face of persecution. It’s not as easy to be a Christian in America
as it once was, but right now most of our churches face more urgent problems
than hungry lions.
When a church realizes it has a problem,
whether that problem is caused by division, by indifference, by inertia, or
whatever, the caring members of that church wish the problem could be fixed in
a week or two. That doesn’t happen. Problems that are years in the making take a
while to fix.
We need a hope that will let us see beyond
the now.
Conclusion
When I first came to this church, this
building was new. Several people told me
how you had planned it to be just the first phase of the building program and that
you planned to build a bigger sanctuary in just a few years.
But something happened. The attendance at the end of the building
program no longer matched the attendance at beginning of the program. In a
few years it was clear the plan would not materialize.
Of course, you appreciate that numbers are
not the only—or even the best—way to define a church. You know the things Paul wrote about—faith,
hope, love, a relationship with Christ—are the real keys to being a church.
Still, as you stood on the threshold of that
new building—this building—you may have imagined things would be different than
they are today. You, like the
Thessalonians, may have pictured a different future.
For most of my life, I have studied the
church, especially the church in America.
I can tell you things have changed in the past few decades. Never in American history have the majority
of people been in church on Sunday mornings; indifference to the church is
nothing new. But, today, along with indifference
we do face something new: we face hostility and condemnation.
In 1888, when Dawn was being founded,
Washington Gladden was a few years into his thirty-two year tenure as pastor of
Columbus’ First Congregational Church.
Gladden is best known as one of the founders of the Social Gospel
Movement. This movement focused on the
social problems of the age—poverty, labor relations, racism. It did so almost to the exclusion of any
emphasis on conversion. The leaders of
the movement believed their efforts would bring heaven to earth. More than that, they planned for the day when
governments and society in general looked to the churches as the recognized
leaders in changing the world.
Things have changed. A century later many don’t see the church as
the solution to the culture’s problems, they see it as the cause of those
problems.
When the plans change, a church has to go
back to the beginning, back to the place when we trusted God for our very
existence, sought God for direction, allowed God to form our character, and
praised God for what he does in and through us.
