Category: Bruce’s Blogs

I hate exercising for the sake of exercising. Unfortunately, the majority of my day doesn’t include activities that cause me to use my body in such a way that burns calories effectively, and so I must purposefully add exercise to my schedule. Since “misery loves company,” we started dragging the kids to the gym with us, and they walk the track with me. Even though it’s usually a hassle to get everyone moving in the morning-myself included-it is getting easier every morning simply because we’re doing it together, and we’re starting to see results together.

It’s the same with the church. In Hebrews 11, the writer goes through a list of the people of God throughout history who, despite their sins, lived by faith. The writer’s purpose is to encourage the church to remain faithful despite the troubles of life, their sin, and the persecution they were facing. In Hebrews 12:1 we read: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.”

Even though each of us must “run the race” as an individual, we are running it together. Even though each of us has our individual sins with which we struggle, the writer of Hebrews wants us to be encouraged by the cloud of witnesses so that we can lose the weight of our sin.

Sometimes it’s discouraging that, while we are forgiven in Christ, we continue to struggle with sin. Just as when we make the conscious decision to eat better and to exercise more, we don’t automatically drop the weight we want to get rid of. It takes time and effort, and with the right encouragement, we continue in our health regimen, practically throwing the weight aside. As we all head toward the goal of life with God forever in heaven, we must encourage each other and find encouragement from the Scriptures as we study together. Then we can help each other to throw off the sin that trips us up, and we will run together toward the prize.

When Paul wrote in Philippians 2:5 that our “attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus,” what was he expecting us to do? We usually respond, “Be humble like Jesus,” but what does that mean? Too often we reduce humility to the idea of simply not taking credit for something we’ve done or to brush off compliments or the thanks that others want to give us. We know we’ve done something well, and it makes us feel just a bit better to say, “It was no big deal.” But that doesn’t seem like the response we would get from Jesus, considering the praise he receives in Revelation 5:12: “Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!”

In Philippians 2:6-8, Paul uses the words servant and obedient. To Jesus, humility is a matter of obedience. Although Jesus is God, he took himself out of his role as the supreme authority over all of creation and became a servant. This is a largely foreign concept to many of us, but servants take orders. Good servants obey orders. Someone once said, “The true test of a servant is how you react when someone treats you like one.” How do you respond to the appeals to help around the church? Are there needs you’d rather not meet? Do you step up to help out even when you really don’t want to? That kind of submission is true humility.

We are called to be servants. The Great Commission explains that part of the process of making disciples is to teach people to obey everything that Jesus commanded. Jesus himself said in John 14:15, “If you love me, you will obey what I command.” Jesus ties our love for God, our love for other people, and our purpose as his disciples to simple obedience.

As we work together as the body of Christ, as brothers and sisters in Christ, we must not forget that we are all servants of Christ. While our attitudes ought to be reflect “it was no big deal” whenever we serve, that attitude must come from a submissive, obedient spirit.

There’s nothing like the events of Jesus’ last week to put the Christian life into perspective. From the beginning of the week, when Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey, to the last supper, when Jesus washed his disciples feet, to the garden, when Jesus prayed for his disciples, Jesus shows us clearly that everything he did was for our benefit. While the events of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus were done to secure our salvation, it was done out of simple humility.

In Philippians 2:5, Paul wrote: “Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.” How do we exhibit the same kind of simple humility that Jesus showed? Paul had already explained it in verses 3 and 4: “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.” This is humility: that Jesus, who Paul tells us in verse 6 is God, considered our need for forgiveness, salvation, and transformation above his own need to be glorified, praised, and worshiped and took on the punishment for our sins by dying on the cross. We know that he didn’t necessarily want to face the physical torture, but he did it, for God’s sake and for our own.

To be honest, I think we’re getting it. We can praise God that he has given this body of believers the faith to pledge more than what has been budgeted for the missions we support-remember, those who haven’t yet made their pledges can continue to give! With the economy the way it is, with people losing jobs and worrying about losing jobs, it would make sense that we might fall short, but we didn’t. This is humility: that God’s people, who have been blessed with forgiveness in the here and now and with the hope of eternity, would consider the needs of others around the world to hear the Good News of forgiveness and salvation through Jesus and give, probably beyond what they know they can give.

Believe it or not, Easter is just around the corner. The traditions I remember growing up are among my favorite. From the sunrise service to the breakfast that followed to the amazing celebration in worship to the family get-togethers that lasted through the afternoon, Easter has always been an extended family reunion.

But it is so much more than that. Our family has had reunions over the years, but our focus for gathering was simply because we shared a common name. That’s not a bad place to start. Paul wrote in Philippians 2:1, “If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ”; that’s the common name we share within the church. Our simple unity within the church begins at the point where we share Christ’s name.

But it is so much more than that. The unity we have goes beyond our name. Paul continues: “If you have… any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion”; our unity in Christ includes our common condition in Christ. We share comfort from God’s love; we share fellowship with the Holy Spirit; and we share tenderness and compassion among ourselves. Our simple unity is a matter of sharing the same “spiritual DNA” because of our individual relationships with God through Jesus.

But it is so much more than that. Our simple unity gives us a common purpose. Paul ends verse two stating: “Make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose.” Our unity in Christ goes beyond the simple name “Christian.” Because of Jesus’ death and resurrection, we are united by being forgiven through Christ’s blood; we are united by being transformed daily by the Holy Spirit; and we are united in a common purpose: to bring others into that same unified, transformational relationship with God. That’s something to celebrate!

It’s cool to be a parent and to be able to say, “Because I said so.” Whether my kids do what I say is another story, but it’s a simple concept to grasp. There’s a benefit of being under that kind of authority as well. Whether you agree or not, you know immediately what you are expected to do. I know that it usually made my life easier simply to do what my parents told me to do.

Life within the church, would be easier if we would simply do what Jesus told us to do. The clearest example of this is the Great Commission in Matthew 28:18-20: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.”

If there’s ever a question about what we should be doing as the church, this is the one place where Jesus comes right out and says, “This is what you need to do, because I said so.” So when we begin to wonder what we ought to be doing, we need to remember that Jesus gave us a simple program: make disciples, that is, make more followers of Jesus.

How? First, he tells us to go. The church must be active, and we simply cannot be tied to the building we call “the church.” Second, he tells us to baptize. This is part of the process of evangelism. In Mark 16:15, 16, Jesus tells us that preaching the Good News about God’s forgiveness through Jesus and baptism go hand-in-hand. Third, he tells us to teach everything that he commanded. Being a Christian is more than doing what Jesus would have us do, but we cannot do even that if we don’t know what Jesus said and did; so we must teach.

Just as a parent is careful to help their child as they grow up, Jesus promises: “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” While the program is pretty simple, the job is pretty big, but Jesus promises to be with us. So let’s get to work!

In Luke 10:36, at the end of the parable about the Good Samaritan, Jesus asked, “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?” In verse 37 we find the reply: “‘The one who had mercy on him.’ Jesus told him, ‘Go and do likewise.'”

Why do we find mercy easy to accept but difficult to apply? How can we be grateful for God’s application of mercy to us but find it so difficult to show mercy to others? Even when we find opportunities to show mercy to another person, like when we distribute food each month or send a team on a mission trip, we often think of it as a tool to make the church grow in numbers, expecting those we help to respond by becoming Christians or at least by checking out our Sunday services. When we do that, we risk turning simple acts of mercy into down-payments on someone else’s salvation, and that cheapens Jesus’ sacrifice.

Remember, in this parable, Jesus was responding to the question “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” not “how do we grow the church?” We have to keep in mind that what we do as the body of Christ should not become mere tools for adding to the church membership but be our own natural responses to God’s mercy in our own lives. If we were to consider what God has forgiven in our own lives and to what lengths he went in order to forgive us, we would surely consider God’s mercy to be far from simple. However, because of that great mercy, we are compelled to praise God and respond by sharing that mercy with others.

Paul tells us in Romans 15:7-9 that the world will respond to God’s mercy in praise. In 1 Corinthians 3:7 Paul also reminds us that our task may be simply to plant seeds and that it is God who makes things grow. Our job, then, is simply to share God’s mercy and let God be praised.

As we work to become a simple church, one that focuses on a single purpose-to share the Good News of God’s love and forgiveness with the whole world-we ought to consider the simple nature of our relationship with God. While the church is a body with a corporate purpose and goals, it is made up of individuals who have individual relationships with God. And God explains the core of that relationship in two simple commands.

“On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he asked, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ ‘What is written in the Law?’ he replied. ‘How do you read it?’ He answered: ‘”Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind”; and, “Love your neighbor as yourself”‘ ‘You have answered correctly,’ Jesus replied. ‘Do this and you will live'” (Luke 10:25-28, NIV). The simple answer to the simple question “what must I do to be saved” is to love God and love people.

Obviously the simple answer will prompt further questions. Our job as the church is to answer those questions in the process of discipleship, helping individuals to connect to God and to other people, to grow in their faith and knowledge of Jesus, and to serve the world following Jesus’ example.

As we start to answer the simple question from the world that is asking it, we will find people who do not know how to love God. We need to model it, as we worship together. We need to teach it through our classes, to children through adults. We need to live it in our families and demonstrate it in our service. We need to share God’s love by leading people to his forgiveness, through the process of repentance to the point of acceptance in baptism and beyond, into a life of continued growth and service. When we begin to see the simplicity of God’s plan to restore a relationship with individuals, we can begin to work together.

As we face the new year, I have a single resolution: to help us become a simple church. The word simple, unfortunately, sounds like “easy” or even “dumb” to some, but that’s not where we need to go. If we go back to the word’s Latin roots, simple means “single-fold.” So a simple church is a single, unified church with a single, unified goal.

Our mission at Memorial has been to “love God and love people.” It’s a simple, single-minded mission, and it answers a simple question. In Luke 10:25-28, Jesus encounters an “expert in the law” who was there to test Jesus. The man asked, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” That simple question is the single most important question the world is asking, and our mission is the answer: “love God and love people.” Jesus told the man, “Do this and you will live.”

That’s what the world wants: to live. Whether they understand it the way God wants them to understand it or not, that’s what they want. The desperate scraping together of wealth, possessions, health, and relationships is the world’s attempt to find the abundant life Jesus promises in John 10:10. The world has a single-minded purpose-to live-but it will never find what it is looking for on its own.

Some people in the world stumble upon deeper meaning in life and look to spiritual things to find the life they are looking for, and so we have many religions and brands of spirituality. Even God’s chosen people, the nation of Israel, tried to take their special relationship with God and wrangle life out it on their own.

But God sent Jesus to bring us life. He simplified everything by giving it to us. It wasn’t easy; it cost him his life. The Good News of eternal life, the answer to the world’s question, is the simple mission of the church: “love God and love people.” Let’s work together in 2009 to become a simple church that shares the Good News with a world that desperately needs it.