I like to photograph signs. I have amassed a bit of a collection from many different places. Some signs make so much sense that one wonders why someone even needed to place it, while other signs defy explanation. Some signs are informational; others, directional. Regardless of a sign’s position or purpose, most all of them hold one thing in common – people ignore them.

Many restaurants sport directional signs indicating which driveway is the entrance and which is the exit. One such restaurant in Tifton can lay claim to the most often ignored signs. In order to “cheat” their way into the drive-thru line, customers often enter through the exit portal, causing a logjam of traffic in the parking lot. I am sure they think it is quite OK for everyone else to wait so that they can save themselves 50 yards of driving around the building.

While I know that in the grand scheme of things, ignoring the directional signs at a restaurant (or any other sign for that matter) seems inconsequential, the practice reflects a deeper, more insidious attitude that pervades our modern cultures thinking. We have no regard for the “small things.” We pay little attention to the details, cutting corners and hoping to get away with neglecting the less obvious particulars of life.

We all have experienced diminished product quality, lax customer service, and empty promises. These stand as convicting proof of our inattention to details. The Bible, however, teaches us the importance of faithfulness to the “little things.”

His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ – Matthew 25:21, 23

“One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much.” – Luke 16:10

Let me encourage you to be careful to mind the minutiae in your life. While we wait for the grand events in life, we lose sight of the fact that how we manage our routines will determine our success or failure. A brick mason tediously lays one small single brick after another in the process of building a wall. Each individual brick may seem small and insignificant when compared to the completed wall, but the mason must take great care to lay each brick, one by one, with precision and care. If one brick is mislaid, the entire wall will be marred. So also, our lives consist of several and individual opportunities to the right things and to do things the right way each day. While each moment may seem small and insignificant when isolated, we must remember that one “mislaid” opportunity may prove to be difficult to overcome down the road.

Pay attention to your habits. Don’t allow bad attitudes to linger. Be careful not to cut corners. Don’t neglect time to pray and read your Bible. Don’t think because no one is looking that you are free to skimp on any good thing or to get away with some bad thing.

So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. – 1 Corinthians 10:31

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men… – Colossians 3:23

“Just follow your heart.”  Ever heard that?  Do you realize how dangerous that it?  Today’s vlog looks at some of the things that the Bible has to say about the human heart and what we need to do about it.

I think we started messing up when we began assigning postal addresses to churches, because that is when church became a place rather than a people. Church became somewhere we went rather than who we are.

Some would argue that the New Testament identifies churches by location. The books of the Bible written by Paul were addressed specific locations, but he addresses them to the CHURCH that is IN Corinth, Galatia, Ephesus, etc. In the New Testament the church was understood to be a geographical collection of PEOPLE, not a place. Somewhere in the past, however, we assigned an address to the church and it became a destination where people gathered rather than the gathered people themselves.

The first century concept of membership is radically different that our contemporary understanding of membership. Today, a member is someone who holds a vested interest in an organization, and as such is entitled to specific privileges and rights by virtue of that vested interest. The New Testament concept of membership is that of an integral part of a larger whole, a part responsible to the whole to carry out some function that serves the whole. In the New Testament mindset of church, a believer was considered a member of the body, a “body part” in today’s understanding.

My hand is responsible to do things for my feet that they cannot do for themselves. My feet cannot put on socks alone, but they need the hand to accomplish that task. Likewise, the hands cannot by themselves go to the drawer to retrieve a pair of socks, they need the feet to walk them over there. They BOTH need the eyes to help them see how to get there and to pick out the right pair of socks. Membership in the New Testament mindset always denotes function, responsibility, and partnership.

So then, the church is not a building, property, or address; but PEOPLE who, at least for a short time every week, gather at a specific location. The PEOPLE, not the PLACE, are the church.

So let me ask you three questions:

1. Do you belong to a local body of believers, a church?

2. Are you taking responsibility to function WITH the group, to serve each other and the community?

3. If the answer to either is no, what are you waiting for?

Your church is not where you go on Sunday morning. YOU are the church. You are the church at that address on Sunday morning, and YOU are the church while at your job, shopping, the kids’ ballgame, or even on vacation. You are the church. You are a hand, an eye, a foot, a brain, a heart of some spiritually organic collection of redeemed people known as a church. Forget the selfish, egocentric mindset of membership that expects to be served, but rather embrace the Biblical model of membership and become a functioning body part. You will be surprised how fulfilling your created purpose will add meaning and joy to life.

Our culture says, membership has it’s privileges; but for Jesus’ Church, membership comes with expectations.  We would do well to exchange our selfish understanding of “membership” with the more biblical concept of “partnership.  We can look at the very first church, found in Acts 2, and see what Jesus expects from His church.

Great Expectations from Jim Duggan on Vimeo.

1. To be SPIRITUALLY DISCIPLINED (vs 42)

•          Biblical Teaching
•          Participation in the Body
•          Celebratory Worship
•          Regular Praying

2. Anticipate the SUPERNATURAL (vs 43)

3. GATHER Together (vs 44)

4. SACRIFICE for others (vs 45)

5. Live Faith DAILY (vs 46)

6. Extend GRACE liberally (vs 47a)

7. Seek GROWTH of the Body (vs 47b)

Articles and Blogs

The New Tolerance Must Crumble – Desiring God interviews D.A. Carson

7 Ways to Fight Distraction During Prayer – Grant Ortland

The Enemy’s Primary Strategies Against the Church – Chuck Lawless

12 Reasons People Give Up on the Church – Chuck Lawless

Nine Things that Worked in the Church A Decade Ago that No Longer Work – Carey Nieuwhof

How to Spot a False Teacher – Nathan Finn

Worth Repeating

“The most glorious reason you exist is for the proclamation of the glory of God to the ends of the world.” – David Platt (Twitter – @Secret_Church)

“The nature of human beings is such that we tend not to drift into better behaviors.  We usually have to be asked by someone to consider taking it up a level.” – Bill Hybels in Axiom: Powerful Leadership Proverbs

“No one is more influential in your life than you are, because no one talks to you more than you do.  Whether you realize it or not, you are in an unending conversation with yourself, and the things you say to you about you are formative of the way that you live.” –Paul David Tripp in Dangerous Calling

“All things are difficult before they are easy.” – Thomas Fuller  from @RonEdmondson

“An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.” – Winston Churchill from @TomVann1

“Use your voice. You’re the only one who has it. ” @JonAcuff

Another Look

We are all familiar with Jesus’ story about the man who had two sons, one of whom took early possession of his inheritance and blew through it all in a short time. He had to return home, hat in hand, asking His dad for a job. The other son showed his wayward heart by his selfish and jealous reactions to his father’s gracious acceptance of his younger brother.

But Jesus told another story about another man with two sons. I like to call it The Parable of the Other Two Sons. You can read this parable in Matthew 21:28-32.

The man asked one son to go work in the field, but the son initially refused. Feeling remorse soon after that son then went into the field and did what his father asked him to do. In the meantime, the father asked the second son to go work in the field and the son readily agreed to do. The second son, even though he said he would, never actually made it out into the field.

Jesus then asked his hearers a simple question: which one of the sons did what the father wanted him to do? The answer obviously was the first son. The first son’s initial reaction was disrespectful and disobedience, but in the end his actions were obedient. The second son may have initially responded positively but for whatever reason never back up his words with his actions. He talked a good talk but he didn’t DO anything, and Jesus question was which one DID what his father wanted.

What about us? How often do we set out with good intentions, or make grand promises to God only to never follow up on them? Sometimes, procrastination may get the best of us or at other times we may have promised something knowing all the while we had no intention of carry it out. Make no mistake: obedience delayed is still disobedience.

Is there something you have promised God you would do that you have not yet done?

Is there something God has asked you to STOP doing that you are still doing?

It is never too late to start doing what is right. It is never too late to STOP doing what God has asked you to surrender.

When you vow a vow to God, do not delay paying it, for he has no pleasure in fools. Pay what you vow. It is better that you should not vow than that you should vow and not pay. – Ecclesiastes 5:4-5

The mission of Bellevue Baptist Church is to MAKE DISCIPLES.

We accomplish this mission when we

REACH those who do not yet believe with the good news of Jesus,
TEACH followers of Jesus to love, know, and experience God,
SERVE the church and the community through our Spiritual Gifts, and
SEND our members throughout the community and the world in Jesus’ name.

Here are some things I read and saw this week that were meaningful to me and I think they will bless you as well:

Articles and Blogs

10 Simple Steps to Deal with Temptation by Chuck Lawless

The Scandal of Biblical Illiteracy by Al Mohler

Six Steps to a Worshiping Church by David Murray at ChurchPastor.com

Become an Iceberg Pastor by Andrew Haslam at TheGospelCoalition.com

Quotes

“No one is more influential in your life than you are, because no one talks to you more than you do.” – Paul David Tripp in Dangerous Calling

“Any hope built on anything but Jesus, is no hope at all.” Kristal Weatherholt @Kristalzzv

“You can’t launch into new horizons—or even see them—until you get your eyes off of the old and start looking ahead.” @relevant

Humor (but seriously, really)