The Joy of Participation

TRANSCRIPT:

Well, hi, good morning. I'm really glad that you are here. As you've already heard, it's a significant Sunday for us.

Anytime we get to come together as a community and celebrate a baptism, that is a really big deal.

I believe it's a really big deal anytime we get to come together as a community and worship God, that we get to come together as a community and hear from Him through His Word. So there's a lot ahead for us this morning.

I'm also particularly excited because this time of year, obviously getting ready for a congregational meeting and thinking through our budget for the coming fiscal year that starts in October, myself and John Michael, our elders, our leadership team,

we spend more and more time just thinking about what we sense God doing in our community and what we sense Him leading us to do in the year to come. And I genuinely believe that there are a lot of really good things ahead for us.

And the idea of the email that's going to come out this afternoon and of the congregational meeting next Sunday is to press into the specifics of that. But what I want to do today is to keep the conversation slightly bigger picture.

I'm not going to just stand up here and roll out a bunch of programs and initiatives and things like that.

All I want to do with our time today is simply to remind us of our vision as a church, to kind of answer that question of what is it that we are trying to accomplish as a community.

And after you walk us through that for just a minute, I want to remind us that we all are called to actively participate in accomplishing that vision. For many of us, this will feel a little bit like a review.

The longer you've been at the church, the more you should be like, yes, we're still pursuing the things that initially brought me to this community.

But if you happen to be joining us for the first time today, or you're relatively new to our congregation, this is a fantastic Sunday to kind of orient you to a lot of what we want to be about as a community.

And in some ways, there is no more foundational question that we could ask than what is our vision as a congregation? What are we after? What are we aiming for as a church?

Which depending on the background that you grew up in, even the fact that we are aiming for something might seem surprising. Like it is easy for churches to fall into a rhythm of doing certain things on a highly cyclical basis.

We come together for Sunday gatherings. We go to community groups. We offer kids ministry.

We do these things, and it can be easy to fall into the trap of like, look, we do them just because it's what churches do. Like we participate in them because it's just what good Christians do.

And we don't realize that if we're getting it right, every single thing we do as a church moves us in the direction of accomplishing the thing we believe God has asked us to be about.

And if you were to boil that down to the essence of what are we trying to do here, I would try to convince you that our church exists to make disciples of Jesus for the restoration of DC.

In many ways, that vision is not particularly original because it really shouldn't be particularly original. I believe that Jesus gave the church the vision that he intends for us to pursue right before he ascends into heaven.

So when it comes to the vision of a local congregation, I don't think this is the kind of thing that we need to go away for an extended weekend off-site retreat and kind of sit around and be like, I don't know, what do we want to be about?

Like, I don't think we need to whiteboard this thing to death and wordsmith it and come back over and over and over again because Jesus has really done the heavy lifting for us. He was like, look, I'm the head of the church.

I'm the one who's going to build the church. I'm the one who's going to die for the church. So I'll just go ahead and fill in the blanks and tell you what you're supposed to be about.

The end of Matthew's Gospel, Matthew chapter 28 verse 18 through 20. Jesus came near and said to them, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.

It's encouraging, but it's also his way of saying buckle up because I'm going to ask you to do something that is going to be impossible if I don't have all authority.

You're going to need to hold on to that promise that God has all authority because you're going to encounter storms, you're going to encounter trials. In this world, you're going to have trouble.

And in our lives, there are going to be moments when each one of us needs to cling to the fact that like, no, Jesus still has authority. But he's speaking congregationally. He's speaking to the church.

He's saying, I'm about to ask you something that is so bold. So audacious, so ridiculous, that if I'm not the living God, you are on a fool's errand. But because I do have all authority, go therefore, and make disciples.

There it is. We exist to make disciples. Make disciples of all nations, all people groups.

He starts with a global vision before humanity understood the concept of the globe. Jesus is like, no, no, we're going to go to all of the nations. You're going to baptize them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

There's something beautiful about the fact that 2,000 years later in Arlington, Virginia, John Michael's going to say, I baptize you now in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

We're following a stream that is thousands of years old here. And you're going to teach them to observe everything I have commanded you.

Not just to learn about it, not just to be able to identify it on the multiple choice test, but to practice it, to observe it, to build your life on it. And remember, I am with you always to the end of the age.

We don't need to conjure up the presence of God this morning like he's somehow going to forget about our church. We don't need to send up signal flares of desperation of like, hey, it's non-traditional.

We're in a middle school, but just don't forget about us. We want to make sure we're on the radar of heaven. He's like, no, no, no, no, no, no.

I'm with you always. I'm with you to the end of the age. Let's go do this thing.

We exist to make disciples. Disciples is a word that in the way it was used 2,000 years ago would have been translated student or learner, right? Somebody who's a student of Jesus, somebody who's learned the way of Jesus.

But we tend to hear that and we tend to think very academically. We tend to think about absorbing information. We tend to think through a lens of systematic theologies and Bible studies, which is not wrong.

But the kind of student, the kind of learner that Jesus has in mind, would maybe be better translated as a follower or as Dallas Willard and John Mark Homer and others have helpfully said, maybe in our world today, the word apprentice would make more

sense. Not just somebody that you're going to interact with Jesus like he is a distant college professor, but you're actually going to follow him, that you're going to become like him, that you're not just going to be a fanboy, but you're going to be

formed into the image of Jesus. It's a project of lifelong transformation. And from the beginning of this church, we have wanted to remind ourselves that we aim to become disciples who are living with a very particular end in mind.

We want to make a difference in this city, right? Which in some ways, we probably shouldn't even need to say as explicitly as we do, but we just find it helpful to remind ourselves that we want to make disciples for the restoration of DC.

But if we're serious about following Jesus, we're going to find ourselves doing the kinds of things that Jesus did. And if you are at all familiar with the stories of the Gospels, you realize that this is a God who moves to the sick.

This is the God who comes to seek and to save the lost. This is a God who gravitates to the hurting, to the broken, to the ashamed. This is a God who is comfortable among the outcasts of society.

He moves easily and lightly at the margins of what we might consider polite and comfortable company. He goes to the hardest places. He goes to the loneliest places.

He goes to the people that the world has overlooked, and he comes to communicate his love. He comes to communicate a sense that they have dignity and value. He comes to announce a message of grace and of mercy.

He comes to announce the forgiveness of sins, and he comes to offer his life on the wood of the cross so that that forgiveness could be made real. He comes to bring hope to Chirilagua, and he comes to bring purpose and meaning to Del Rey.

He could move comfortably through the streets of Old Town, and he could also go to some of the most impoverished neighborhoods in our city and feel right at home.

If you're going to be serious about following Jesus, you're not going to follow him into an ivory tower. You're going to find him moving towards places of brokenness. So yes, we should be about the restoration of this city.

We want to be the kind of people in our personal lives who influence others in such a way that they want to join us in living as disciples of Jesus.

We want to carry ourselves in this city in such a way that following Jesus looks like a good option, not a necessary burden to escape hell.

We want to live life in such a way that we not only have heard that Jesus came to offer life and to offer it in abundance, but that we are experiencing some version of that so that others might be inclined to say, hey, I would love to understand why

it is that you are living the way you do. I find your lifestyle beautiful. I find the things you believe captivating. Could I come along with you on the journey that you are on with God?

We want to be those kind of people who influence others so that they want to follow Jesus. We also want to be the kind of people who seek the welfare of our city.

We want to unapologetically pursue the aim of trying to make life here in DC just a little bit better for everyone. Right? Look at what God says to the nation of Israel through the prophet Jeremiah.

Jeremiah chapter 29, verse 7. This is when the people of God were living as exiles under Babylonian captivity. They had been carried out of the promised land.

They were living under an autocratic pagan regime that mocked them, mocked their faith, was doing everything they could to sort of eradicate Judaism and Hebrew culture from the face of the earth.

Yet God says, seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile. And pray to the Lord on its behalf. For in its welfare, you will find your welfare.

That God has never called His people to build little enclaves where we wall ourselves off from the problems of our cities.

But God has always called His people, even if they are living in exile, even when they're living in captivity, even in the worst of situations, He says yes, but the right answer is to still go seek the welfare of your city.

Go fight for the common good. Try to make things better because the Church of Jesus Christ was in the neighborhood. Try to make things better because the people of God showed up.

Only a God who would be willing to die for his enemies could send us to live for the welfare of a city that so often mocks the things that we hold most dear.

But that's the beauty of the gospel, that we are called to give our time, our treasure, our talent, our ability in the name of influencing others spiritually and in the name of improving life in this city.

Right, it's a vision that's incredibly personal to me.

I became a follower of Jesus in the second semester of my junior year of college, right over the river in Georgetown, and it happened because two people loved me enough to try to influence me over the course of years to become a follower of Jesus.

And so much of what I've wanted to be a part of in life since that moment was trying to influence others the same way that two people were kind enough and patient enough to influence me over a number of years. I want that for all of us.

I want the joy of being able to see family, friends, neighbors, colleagues, co-workers baptized. I think, wait a minute, I had the privilege of being one small part of what God was doing in her life to call her to himself for all eternity.

Once you experience that, it's borderline addictive. I got to be a part of what God was doing in his life to call him out of a life of rebellion and into a life of discipleship to Jesus. You won't get bored with it.

I promise you, you won't. It was why we planted this church nearly 10 years ago. We didn't come to Arlington or Alexandria believing that Christians inside the Beltway needed another option on the Sunday morning worship buffet.

It wasn't about sort of market analytics and like, oh, if we're a church that carries the DNA of a gospel-centric church, but it's heavily influenced by formation with a heart for mission and a holistic understanding of the God.

Yeah, if we eat that kind of church, man, that thing's gonna catch fire. Man, well, it'd be great. We'll do that.

Christians are, Christians are thirsting for this kind of church. Like, no, the idea was that this city was thirsting for Christians who would be willing to sacrifice and make a difference.

And if we could come and join with other churches that had that similar heartbeat, we could become a part of what God was doing in this city. And I believe that it's a vision that resonates with many of us that call this place home.

And I'm not just saying that because you're in the room today or listening online or gonna get caught up with the podcast at some point this week. But I hear the way you talk about life. I hear the way you talk about the church.

And I hear the things that you dream about. And I hear the things that you want to experience.

And I believe that one of the threads that holds us together as a community is this desire that we could together accomplish something significant to advance the kingdom of God in DC.

That yes, we are so aware of how much we need the work of God in our own lives. How much we need the transforming grace of God in our own lives.

But there's something in us that wants to rise to the occasion and wants to say whether you're going to be in this city for a year or 10 years, or you've been saying for the last 15 years that you're only here for one year, that you're like, this is

it. I'm not doing it. This is it. I've got to go home.

The cost of living. And I'm like, I know, but it's 15 years later and you're still here. Whatever the deal is, wouldn't it be great to say the season of life that you had in DC, you invested it in things that really mattered?

That we got to be a part of moving the needle in what is one of the most strategic global cities in the face of the earth? I mean, it's a hard place to live. Trust me, I get it.

We're raising three kids inside the Beltway. It's not easy. But it is also a privilege to be able to serve Christ together here, to be ambassadors of Jesus in this city.

It's maybe more of a blessing than we realize. And here's the deal.

If that resonates with you, I want you to know that God's plan all along has been for groups of Christians to come together to form local churches so that they could then work together in pursuit of this common vision of making disciples who make a

difference in the world. God's plan was never to raise up a couple of rock star Christians, get them a really big following on YouTube, explode a podcast, publish some books, and let them do all the heavy lifting while the rest of us just sit back

and click the like button on Instagram and are like, oh man, that's awesome and I'll be happy to Venmo you a contribution. God's original plan was always that local churches, bands of exceedingly ordinary people would come together and under the

grace and the power of the Spirit of God, be able to accomplish more than they would ever think possible, more than they could ever do in their own strength. So in order to accomplish our vision as a church, I just want to remind us that we all have

a role to play. And I want to do it by looking at what I think is an extraordinarily significant passage of Scripture.

I know that often when we talk about life in the local church, the go-to move is to look at Acts chapter 2, sort of this beautiful vision of the early days of the church where they're devoting themselves to the apostles' teaching, to the prayers, to

breaking of bread. I mean, it's just this, you know, borderline utopian vision of what the church should be. And I love that. I'm all for it.

I also want to suggest that Acts chapter 6 is as important as Acts chapter 2.

Because in Acts chapter 6, the church in Jerusalem begins to organize itself in such a way that they're able to have an impact on their city, that they're able to influence the culture of the region, that they're positioned to actually serve and love

other people. I think the sweet spot for the church in North America is to live at the intersection of Acts chapter 2 and Acts chapter 6.

We need to figure out how to live out the values and priorities of the Acts 2 church through the systems and structures of an Acts 6 church. If you have Acts 2 without Acts 6, you have heart, but you don't have legs.

Acts 6 without Acts 2 gives you legs, but no heart.

You bring them together, and you get a group of people who have a vision for what it looks like to live life, and a willingness to organize themselves in such a way that they're able to invite other people into it.

Let's walk through the passage really quickly. I want to show you the principle and then highlight really just one word that I think is going to serve us well today.

Acts 6 verse 1, In those days, as the disciples were increasing, so the church is growing already in number, there arose a complaint by the Hellenistic Jews against the Hebraic Jews that their widows were being overlooked in the Daily Distribution.

Hellenistic Jews, probably their native tongue was Greek. They were also very willing and desiring to assimilate into Greek culture.

It's probably the case that they would have lived in neighborhoods that looked and sounded and acted very Greek, where the Hebraic Jews would have spoken Hebrew.

They would have been very steeped in Old Testament Hebrew culture, and they would have very likely congregated into neighborhoods where everybody on the street corner was speaking Aramaic, or they were reading Hebrew, they were celebrating Sabbath,

they were doing all these different things. So you've got these two different groups, by the way, absolutely beautiful that the gospel has already started to bring about a unity between these two different groups that had been very elusive under the

Old Covenant. So they're already coming together in the church, but somehow one group of widows is being provided for and the other group is not being provided for.

They're being overlooked in the daily distribution and the church is noticing and they're complaining. Now here's what's interesting. They are grumbling against the apostles.

They're frustrated with the leaders. They're frustrated with the pastors, if we could say it that way. They're basically saying, you know, hey, I don't know if you noticed, there's a bunch of hungry old ladies here.

What are y'all doing about it? What kind of church are you running where you've got hungry old ladies and nobody's feeding them? I don't know if you've noticed, but y'all should get busy with that.

We would very much appreciate it, right? They're kind of murmuring. The idea of this is that there was a complaint against the leaders that kind of grumbling in the same way that Israel grumbled against Moses when he led them through the Exodus.

Kind of just like, man, what's going on around here? Maybe we were better in Egypt. Man, I don't know what's going on around here.

That was starting to set in in the church. Verse 2, the 12, the apostles summoned the whole company of the disciples. So they decided to have a church meeting, right?

It wasn't just for... it was for everybody. And they're like, all right, y'all, let's get together.

Time to have a conversation. And they said... there's a little bit of audacity here.

There's a little moxie in this one. They said, it would not be right for us to give up preaching the Word of God to wait on tables.

Brothers and sisters, select from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Spirit and wisdom, whom we can appoint to this duty. But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the Word. Fascinating what they do.

They're like, hey, we definitely have heard your complaint. We definitely know about the hungry ladies. We definitely know that you're expecting us to do a little something about that.

And we've really been thinking about it. We've been praying about it. We have come up with a great strategy.

Here's the plan. Y'all figure it out. We're going to go pray and get ready for the sermon.

By the way, they weren't just preaching one Sunday a week. They were going out regularly into the temple and probably doing it on a near daily basis. So this isn't really pastoral laziness here.

And this is not manipulating a congregation. But it is the apostles acting somewhat boldly. I mean, that that takes some nerve to be like, hey, I know you're all expecting us to solve the problem.

Y'all work on it. I mean, it's the apostles operating from a place of conviction. They say, it wouldn't be right.

They don't come together and say, hey, guys, would you be open to a different approach?

Hey, we'd like to talk to you about work-life balance, and we feel like we're moving towards burnout already, and we just need to try out some different systems and structures.

They don't come back and be like, hey, we've started listening to some leadership podcasts, and there's some really interesting theory out there about how it is that groups of people organize themselves based on different skill sets and personality

types. I mean, they don't sit back and be like, hey, we took this test called strengthsfinder. It hasn't come out yet, but we got an advanced copy of it a couple thousand years ago.

We just did our little Myers-Briggs thing, and we figured out what we're good at, and we're gonna do our sweet spot over here, and y'all are gonna do this, and it's gonna be beautiful. They're just like, no, no, guys, that's a, no, no, no, no, no.

We are gonna focus on what it is that God has called us to do, but we're gonna invite you into the joy of being an active participant in the ministry of this church. And you're like, well, how did that go? Well, seemingly, it went incredibly well.

Verse five and six, this proposal pleased the whole company. The church is like, great idea. Love it.

There's almost this sense that they're like, oh, we were hoping you would say that. To which every pastor in America steps away and is like, oh, shut up, because how in the world does that happen? Right?

I mean, right? Like, that's kind of crazy if I was like, hey, guys, kids' ministry is growing. We definitely need to add extra classrooms.

We need more volunteers. We can't use the school's smart boards anymore. We need to figure out how to get projection in there.

We got all this list of problems. And here it is, ready, set, y'all solve it. I'll be back behind the curtain praying.

And you're like, whoa, we love you, John. That's amazing. I love being a part of this church.

And that's not to put like guilt and shame on any of us. It really isn't. That is not, it may be unintentionally passive aggressive, but that's not really what's in my heart at all.

It's much more just trying to highlight this idea of like, whoa, that's interesting. That's interesting. They're stoked by the invitation to be a part of what God is doing, right?

They've picked these seven men filled with faith in the Holy Spirit. They come before the apostles, the apostles pray over them, lay their hands on them and are like, good luck, y'all go and do your thing.

And just to come full circle, verse seven says, so the word of God spread. The disciples in Jerusalem increased greatly in number, and a large group of priests became obedient to the faith.

That the willingness of the church to adopt an Act 6 mindset is what enabled them to bring the Acts 2 reality to so many more people.

So if our heart is stirred by the vision of an Acts 2 church, and our heart is stirred by the vision of making disciples for the restoration of DC, it seems like scripture is like, hey, Restoration City, continue. This is not a new thought.

This is not something we haven't been pursuing. This is just an opportunity to recommit ourselves to a church where we all play an active role. But I want to go back to this idea that it was pleasing to the congregation, that they loved it.

Because I think the reality is that we want to discover that joy, that sense, that like, well, what did the early church see that we often overlook? What was it that made them so excited?

And I think if you put it back into context, you're going to see three very different things that we can do relatively quickly.

Number one, what's happening here in Acts chapter 6 is that the apostles are clarifying what the church cared about as a community. Right? I don't want you to overlook the significance of the very basic set up of the story.

There is a group of Hellenistic Jewish widows who are not being provided for.

And the apostles, as the spiritual leaders of that community and as the architects of the New Testament church, make a profound statement that, hey, look, the church of Jesus is going to be the kind of community that cares about providing for the

physical needs of widows. Now, in some ways, we look at that and we're like, man, that's kind of a no-brainer, because who would want to be a part of a church that's like hungry old ladies?

Who cares, you know, go out and sit at an intersection and beg for money. I mean, nobody wants to be a part of that church. But it's all brand new.

Back in Acts 6, everybody's trying to figure out how do we operate? What are our values? What do we care about?

And the apostles don't decide to abdicate responsibility. They say, look, no, no, we want to be the kind of community that cares for these widows. We want them to be cared for well.

We want them to be cared for equitably. We're not going to outsource this. We're not going to ignore this.

This matters. And I'm making a big deal out of that because fundamentally, our budget, our ministry plan, the things we do as a church are a reflection of what we care about as a community. Right?

I don't want to just stand up here and say, okay, the Connect team, who wants to serve? We need more of the blue shirt people that are out there opening doors and getting people to fill out cards. And we need that.

Okay, kids ministry, we need some help over there. Okay, worship team, we need some help over there. Okay, production team, we need some help over there.

It's easy to think about the church in terms of a never ending series of needs that need to be met or problems that need to be solved or things that need to be funded. And there's some element of truth in that.

But all of those things are an actual expression of what we care about as a community. Why do we have a Connect team?

Because we care about people who show up here for the first time being welcomed and experiencing a sense of hospitality and knowing that they matter enough to us that we have people that are in the lobby specifically to ensure that somebody says hi.

It's a statement of our value that we put on first time guests. How much more so if those first time guests don't even know Jesus?

How much more so if we have the privilege of being in that lobby in a moment where somebody comes into the church for the first time in years or has happened more than once in this church, comes into this church, and it's the first time they've ever

been in a church in their life. And I think we care about that. I hope we do. If we don't, we need to get in our Bibles.

We care about raising up the next generation of the church. That's what's going on over there. It's not free babysitting with a little Jesus sprinkled in on top.

It's fighting for the next generation of men and women who are going to advance the kingdom of God. We care about worship. We care about this school thriving.

We care about GW Middle School. Seek the welfare of the city, for in its welfare you will find yours. We care about resettling refugee families in the city.

We care about extending community to those who live in apartment complexes, where it's at times very rare for people to say hi to their neighbors. We care about these things.

In some ways, the function of leadership is to highlight different things and say, hey, y'all, I think we care about this. I think we care about creating a worship experience. It's inviting and stirs our souls.

Hey, who cares about that enough that they want to get involved? Hey, who cares about that enough that they want to do a little Act 6 up here? Who cares about that with kids?

It isn't about meeting needs. It's about following the passion that God has put in your heart. You clarified their values as a community.

They were invited to make a meaningful contribution. And we do need to clarify this one. Because it seems like when you read Act 6, that the apostles don't come off all that great.

It seems a little bit like, look, y'all, we've got some more important things to do. We really can't be bothered with this. We're going to go off and play scholar.

Y'all can play waiter. It's not that hard. You wait on tables and we'll go off and do all the heavy lifting.

But that's actually the exact opposite of what the passage is trying to communicate.

Both verse one, where they talk about the ministry of distributing food to widows, and verse four, where he talks about the ministry of preaching and teaching the word, both of those verses use the exact same Greek word diakona, right?

Which some have said, hey, this is where the origin of deacons come and all of that.

But even more basically, what the New Testament Church is trying to say, what the apostles are trying to say in act six is there's just two different, there's these two different forms of ministry.

There is a diakona, there's a ministry, there's a service of providing for widows, and there's a ministry of studying scripture and preaching and teaching and praying.

And the reason that they use the exact same word is to indicate that they are of the same value. It's not a like, this is the varsity and hey, JV, you just get started with waiting some tables over there.

This is for the seminary people, and this is like, oh, you worked at Applebee's? Cool, yeah, okay, come on over here, we need that too. No, no, no, no, this is like, there's different ministries.

There is a ministry of preaching and teaching. There's a ministry of setting up a compelling website. There's a ministry of caring for kids.

There's a ministry of mobilizing people to reach schools. There's a ministry of leading worship.

And one isn't any more important than the other, because you take any one of them away, and you no longer have a church that communicates the values that Jesus communicates through the scriptures, right?

This isn't a like, hey, y'all, sign up sheet in the back, who's willing to help out? This is a like, come on, let's make a significant contribution together to the kingdom of God. All right, this is where you can get a little pragmatic.

The more we're willing to work together, the more we can accomplish our vision. That's true, not just in terms of an Acts 6 mentality, but that's true in terms of Restoration City Church.

Right, it's true of every church where people feel empowered to see needs, to see opportunities, to share ideas, and to become a part of leading all of us to change.

So many of the ministries that we do as a church, almost all of the external ministries that we do in our community come as a result of an individual member of this congregation seeing a need, seeing an opportunity, and saying, hey, if you'll let me,

I would love to lead a team of people in engaging this. Right, our pastors didn't come up with the idea of resettling refugee families. Sean and Kelsey Collins came up with that and have led a dedicated team of people in resettling now.

We've resettled two families, and we're about to start working with a third one in the coming fiscal year. We didn't sit back and dream about apartment life. Drew and Becca Gore came and said, hey, God's doing this thing in our life.

Would you like to be a part of it? Right, we didn't look at GW Middle School and say, oh man, somebody needs to do something there. No, Kristen and Johnny Gallette came and said, hey, we're here, we're in part of this community.

Would the church like to join us? Right, one of my prayers for our church is that it would be impossible to tell the story of our church without using specific names. Right, why do y'all do that?

Oh, well there's a name behind that. There's somebody in our church that stood up and said, wait, hang on, we should be doing something about this.

So if you have ideas, you have passions, you have things that are driving you crazy that we're not doing as a church, my only question is, would you be willing to lead others in engaging that ministry, right?

You don't get to just send an email and be like, hey, you know, act sick style, hey, I've noticed our church isn't doing anything about the foster care system. Y'all should get on that.

I'm just going to send you a reference back to act six and be like, that's awesome. Let me pray about it. You should do it.

It's very biblical, right? It's not manipulative. It's just me just trying to be biblical, right?

But that's exciting. The apostles delegate without abdicating responsibility. They're not just totally detached.

They knew that about a team of seven would be what would be required to get this done. So they're not aloof pastors floating around being like, I don't know, man. I don't have a clue what's going on back in kids ministry.

I just hope it's going well. They're like, no, I know what's happening. The congregation, by the way, selected these seven men.

Did you catch that? It wasn't seven people that nominated themselves, and it wasn't seven people that answered an email from the pastor. It was the whole assembly of the church getting together and being like, okay, you would be good at this.

Man, you'd be great at this. Yeah, you would. And there was a sense of like, wow, my community trusts me.

My community is empowering me. My community is asking me to do this, right? There's a sense that there was an honor to what they were doing.

And there was a way for people to serve in whatever gift mix they had. These seven guys were apparently responsible for architecting a system that was going to care for a lot of people. And some of you are built to architect systems.

When I said that, your heart skipped a beat because you're like, I love to architect systems. That's my deal. Let me architect.

Some of you are like, yeah, some not so much. Just tell me what to do. That's great.

Some of you are professional architects that just want to serve in a capacity on Sunday. One of my favorite volunteers, they've moved to another city now. But I remember a couple, he was a medical resident.

Such a smart guy. Just brilliant thinker in so many different ways. But he came to me in the church, he's like, look, man, all I do all day long is like diagnose, make decisions, like it's pretty high pressure.

It's all that. Could I just like unload the truck on a Sunday morning? If somebody would just tell me what to do, I would be so stoked.

I was like, yeah, deal. If somebody gets run over with a road case, will you fix them? He's like, yeah, I'll help him.

I'm like, all right, sold. Hippocratic oath, already had you. But right, he was like, yes, I'll do it.

You find the place where you're like, man, that's exciting for me. You want to architect? We got stuff to be architected.

You're like, I just want to show up and push boxes. We have boxes to be pushed. This is great.

But why would they? They're like, yeah, okay, I get it. Necessary evil, John.

They're willing to do it. But why are they so excited? Here's the real reason that they're so excited.

Because the way they were building the church reflected the reality of the gospel. You got to remember the religious system that these Jewish, in particular, followers of Jesus were coming out of.

For thousands of years, the dominant story in Jewish worship had been, get out of the way and let the professionals handle it. Your job is to show up when you're told to show up. Do what you're told to do.

Sacrifice what you're told to sacrifice. Give what you're told to give. But you don't have any ownership.

You don't have any control. You don't have any authority. You leave that to the pros.

You leave that to the holy people. You leave that to the priests who have been through ritual cleansing. Y'all are a dirty mess.

You got to let the pros, let the elites get in there and do all the important God stuff.

But then, Jesus comes and He dies on the wood of the cross and the veil on the temple is torn in two and there's now a new covenant where man and women can directly approach the throne room of God.

And if that's true, then men or women who can directly approach the throne of God can also now engage in the ministry that would have been reserved just for the elite, that would have been reserved for the professionals, that would have been reserved

for a certain religious class. The way that they were building the church was a demonstration that those who had direct access to God were now able to minister on behalf of God.

And I'll be honest with you guys, it's a idea that the church has wrestled to embrace over 2,000 years. Early days, people were thrilled. They're like, I can't believe this. We get to do more than just show up. They're loving it. And they held that flame for a while.

But there was a 1500 year drift towards abdicating more and more ministry and more and more responsibility and more and more ownership and more and more leadership to a professional clergy.

Where you get back around the 1500s, and there's a class of priests who control everything. And then enter the Protestant Reformation, one of the major ideas of which was the priesthood of believers. Where they're like, wait a minute!  Hang on, we're all royal priests! Hang on, we can read Scripture! Hang on, we can pray!

Hang on, we can share the gospel! Hang on, we can do it! And there's this resurgence of 500 years ago, in like, we get to do this. And then maybe we've drifted again, culturally towards, nah, we'll just hire some people. We'll just hire some people. We'll just hire some people.

That's not God's heart for the church. It's not the vision. The vision is we all get to be a part of it together.

We'll unfold some things in the coming weeks of ways for you to do that. But for today, I just wanted to encourage you with that thought. And I want to remind us of the gospel, the gospel that shapes the way we organize as a church and the gospel that we celebrate in the waters of baptism. So, Father in heaven, I just want to ask for your grace in our lives.

I want to ask that you would help us to taste and see that you are good. And God, I want to ask that you would help us to experience the joy not of being spectators in a church, but of being contributors to your work, being a part of what it is that you're doing in this city. God, would you fill us with your spirit? Would you give us grace and mercy? I pray. In Jesus' name. Amen.