How Prepared Are We - Lindon Risser

Lesson Transcript

How many of you are between the age of 25 and 45? All right, raise hands. All right. You own the airspace of this church. In fact, this church will be, 10 years from now, who you are. So I want this message to be encouraging this morning, and you know it can kind of feel discouraging living in today's world if you read the news. But as Christ followers, I think we have a lot to offer and should be even more attractive to the world. If you came expecting to hear an expository message, you got that already.

I will disappoint you. I didn't want to compete with Dave Brissot. I'm taking his Matthew course right now, and I have to confess I'm humbled by his in-depth knowledge of Scripture. Maybe a better question for you today would be, how prepared are we? What is our health score of our churches? How can we know? And what can we do intentionally to improve our health? And you know in the business world, that's one thing that's very important.

We're always talking about how we can be healthier, and sometimes I wonder if we take that as seriously in business as we do in church. You know, good questions lead to better answers, but what's the value of answers without action? And we are already challenged with that this morning. Is it possible that we have all the right answers, but we're asking all the wrong questions? That's something that always challenges me.

My objective today would be to leave us with questions that would lead us to more meaningful conversations, to inspire us as churches into action and to be better prepared. You know, I believe the health of every church can be measured by the conversations you're not having and the conversations you're having poorly. So I'll repeat that. If you forget everything I said today, if you remember that, you'll be able to measure the health of this church.

It's by the conversations you're not having and the conversations you're having poorly. We can think about this when we think about a marriage. You go into a marriage, that's all you have to ask. What aren't you talking about, right? And usually that is our issue. I would appreciate it if you wouldn't be talking to my wife afterwards, but just for a little example, kind of a side note, talking about meaningful conversations, have any of you heard about Dunbar's number? All right.

So how many people did Dunbar say creates a tribe? Do you remember? So Dunbar did extensive research, also with monkeys, which is very interesting, and he came up with a discovery that to have meaningful conversations with human beings has limitations of about 150. And after 150, what's something interesting happens? We start breaking up into more groups. All right. As conservative Anabaptist churches, we understand those as church splits.

Interesting reading uncovers his message about the whole myth of social media and how that creates relationships, but I'd like to open with a scripture to anchor the message, and if you turn with me to Matthew 24, I'm going to read starting in verse number four. In fact, maybe I'll start on this side of the church and those that are 25 to 40. I want you to read, how old are you? Anyway, Kevin. 49. Okay, you pass. All right. Your wife, she's probably 25 there, right? Okay.

So the first one on this side that's 25 to 45, read verse four, and then we'll go around the church this way. I saw some hands raised over here. 25? All right. Starting in verse four. Who wants to start us off? What's the passage? I'm sorry. Matthew 24, starting with verse four. I can start. Okay. How far do you want me to go? I think there's plenty here. Read verse four and then we'll continue around this side. And Jesus answered and said to them, "Take heed that no one deceives you.

For many will come in my name saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many. And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled, for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes of various quite a place. All these are the beginning of the time.

Then there will deliver you out of the tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. Anyone. Verse 10. And then many will be offended and will betray one another and will hate one another. Then many prophets will rise up and deceive many. And because all those who know about the love of many will grow cold. But he who endures to the end will shall be saved.

And verse 14, and this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached to all the world for a witness unto all nations, and then shall the end come. So what word jumped out at you in that passage? Did anything jump out at you or a word or a thought? Many. Many? Okay. The beginning. The beginning? Actually, verse three starts out, "When the disciples asked when the end of the world would be." So that's the prefaces of these verses, but what else?

What's another verse or another thought or word that might have jumped out at you there? Mentioned three times. Kingdom? Okay. Kingdom? Many. Someone said something? Many. Okay. Another word that jumped out at me was deceive. There's three times it mentioned the deception of this time. And as Jason mentioned, the deception of our era, thanks to Google, is rampant. So in case you didn't know, Google's not divinely inspired, but you can defend any point you have from that.

And you can read this and it can be kind of a discouraging message, but there's actually, being an optimistic person, I see a lot of positive in this. Like verse six, it says, "Be not troubled." You're going to hear all this stuff, but don't be troubled. And many will wax cold, but we don't have to. Many may be offended, but we don't have to.

And verse 14, it says, "And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached to all the world for a witness unto all nations, and then the end shall come." So what's the best way to combat deception? Be a witness. Good. Be a witness. I like that. What else? Know the truth. Know the truth. Jason was talking about the truth here this morning, and one thing I might disagree with a little bit is I believe that the preacher's the one that should feel foolish.

He's supposed to say it over and over and over again about the seventh time, people wake up and say, "Oh, this guy actually means what he's saying." The preacher actually believes it himself, and then the people say, "Maybe we should believe this too." So that's just maybe another way of looking at it, but it can be a very draining thing to see all the corruption at every level around us, but the trust of authority is at an all-time low.

What looked like a strong world economy now looks like a volatile cocktail that is on the cusp of meltdown, but we don't have to see those things in the negative light. We can actually focus on something very positive, but every disaster, there's an equally great opportunity for those that choose to see it that way. Did you ever hear, "Never waste a great disaster"?

Well, it's not said by godly men, and you may call me a Democrat, Mennonite, but I see our present church disaster as an opportunity for my children and their generation to seize the moment and come under spiritual authority and lead the charge. My generation was a passy bunch. We reacted by shying away from leadership, and I'm determined to pour my energy into my children's success and their generation. So now let's go into how prepared we are, and I would like to suggest three questions.

So to your point, I think human beings, I believe in the power of three. So if you minimize it down to three things, maybe we can remember that. So I want to suggest three questions that we struggle to answer and have meaningful conversations around as individuals and as churches, and it can render us weak and unprepared. So here's the three questions. How far will we go in our sacrifice for each other? How far will you go in your sacrifice for another brother or sister?

What does sacrificial living look like to you? How is our generosity reflected in our homes and our lifestyles? So what's more important in our nation and our church and our family and as individuals than preparedness than health? You really, they'd say, don't think about how your health and how much you appreciate it till you don't have it, but what health score would you give our present world? One thing I know is it's a lot lower than it was two years ago. What health score would you give our nation?

If you thought it was bad before, I'm sure you are certainly know how deceived we are about it if we did. The health score would you give our churches? Is this one that we can impact the most? Should we be concerned the most about this? I think that something that challenges me is when we face an issue in life, we oftentimes don't have a plan, and I really feel like a bad plan's better than no plan. At least you're doing something and you're moving something forward.

When someone comes up and makes a lot of accusations about somebody that's doing their mission work or how they're doing their church life or whatever it might be, or evangelistic work, I often think about or ask them, I say, "Well, I like what they're doing better than what you're not doing." Right? So healthy churches have healthy members, and healthy members are connected to the vine, and healthy vines commit to hard work, fasting, and prayer. And healthy members aren't co-dependent. They're contributors.

If you came here to church to get everything you got and sit on it, you're not a contributor. You're co-dependent. I think to a Christ follower, health equals sacrifice, and we have many verses to defend that. But for us to maintain a realistic outlook and guard against discouragement in church life, we need to remind ourselves that Jesus' self-denying message will never be a popular one.

For us to maintain that, I think we see this self-absorbed nation, a church that's lost its impact in our communities, and we see self-serving brotherhoods. And some of the questions that we can consider for our church health are, when a congregation returns to the vision of the early church, which I appreciated our teaching this morning, will their possessions be affected? When we return to the vision of the early church, will our possessions be affected?

Have we put our focus on raising brilliant hypocrisy spotters at the expense of discipling the next generation? And I appreciated Kevin told me that your church is focused on the next generation leaders and discipling them, and that was very encouraging to me. Can a church function as a body and not discuss its differences? Our church is somewhat of a diverse model.

We have about five different people groups in our church from all different backgrounds, and it really takes grace to come together and be willing to hear each other's stories and be able to respond in a way that's both gracious and church-building. But I think you have to be very purposeful, and you have to be intentional and do things in a way to make that a positive environment. Does unity happen if our desire for a greater good is not stronger than the love for our own opinion, preferences, and lifestyle?

I have a little suggestion here as far as what that could look like. I believe it's my way, your way, and the right way. Okay? So here's me, all right? Here's you, and then there's a middle ground. Now, we always struggle—I like contingents, and I'm a visual guy—so we always struggle for the middle, and that's where the battle is. So the battle's always in the middle. And the point is, this is me, this is you, and the way we move together is we each have to give a little bit. So when you give—I'm sorry.

Oh, that's all right. Okay. So when you give, then I give, we start moving toward the middle. But when we stop giving and we stop giving up our preferences, we stop moving toward the middle. Now, anybody have an idea what the center is? What would be the greatest level of community or the greatest level of a relationship with any individual? Love. If you'll what for them? Die. Die. So when I get to the point that I'm willing to die for you, we have reached the highest level of relationship.

My question is, is not that another indication of our church health is our willingness to die for each other? Now, there's a lot of ways to die without physically dying, all right? And that's what we're talking about. Will a church that avoids commitment and self-denying love required to blend lives ever be able to demonstrate sacrificial love to a self-centered, dysfunctional, twisted world? That's one of the things I think we have to offer. We have a community life to offer people that we've been given.

Is it essential to work in concert with those gifts, paths, and personalities that are different than ours and our churches and those we reach out to? How does a church survive, remain effective, and relevant? Do they develop more guidelines? Maybe. When we revise our guidelines, are we going to put the work to teach and discuss how these changes should be viewed in light of biblical principle? My great-grandfather made this statement that kind of stuck with me. I'm big on one-liners. He made this statement.

He said, "Methods are many. Principles are few. Methods always change, but principles never do." So every generation must own its methods, but they can never change the principle. Now, I'll give you a word of caution here. In my few years, 57 years, I would encourage you to consider if a tradition is ripped out of a culture, don't do it without replacing it with something better. If you don't, you're going to pay a price for generations. All right? If a tradition—if you rip something out of a tradition, be careful.

Generations after you will pay for that. What we know is if you leave this church and return in 10 years, you'll see change because change happens. The question is, will the people your church attracted while you were going have impacted and shaped their current culture in a healthy way? And I'll tell you the way to test this. It's simple. Just ask a return missionary. If we're apologetic about our heritage, our lifestyles, and our dress, will we present the gospel in a very compelling way?

How will our churches survive without counterculture agreements? I don't understand how you think that's possible. Every generation will be tempted to react to the inconsistencies of the former generation. Now, I believe the success of a generation can be measured by its ability not to react to the former, but to build on what the former had that was valuable.

So we see a lot of reaction going on in today's world today, and I'm just concerned that we don't—in fact, reaction has always been the major contributor to church drift. So the question is, and I think it was already mentioned, as a church, are we drifting or are we rowing? Okay? Because, oh yeah, Kevin, you made that comment. We're not just staying at one place. That's dead. There's nothing more sustainable than dead. You know that.

How much do you think the success of a generation is proportionally by avoiding that reacting to the former? I think that's something we need to ask ourselves a lot. Are we reacting to our former generation's failures? Will our sustainability be impacted by our ability to learn from their inconsistencies? Do we have the spines to hold each other accountable to minimize that reaction index or the pendulum swing, we call it sometimes? All right.

Let's move a little bit into business and financial health as it relates to the body. This is one that is often avoided or discussed poorly. Okay? If a man is a good businessman, has wealth, and employs a good proportion of the congregation, does this give him a disproportionate influence in our brotherhood?

If they are humble, honest, open for accountability, live simply, and model Christ to those they serve, they unarguably have a powerful opportunity to represent and contribute to the health of the brotherhood and attract those in his sphere of influence to serve Christ. How leverage should a prepared church be? Do you know your brotherhood's debt ratio? Financial transparency was one of the first responses of the early church. Did you know that? We've gotten away from that one.

If you want to demonstrate Jesus to the surrounding culture, is it essential to discuss financial transparency and accountability? I was in Gary Miller's class this year, and the Gary Miller that wrote the books, Church Matter and those books, and he made the statement in their church, and I thought it was interesting. It really jarred me.

He said, "Every year, they ask their members to report their debt ratio, and they've agreed as a brotherhood what that should be because the liability is among its members, right, if there would be something to happen." I just thought that was interesting.

If nothing else, it's one of those conversations that—and if they're asking, "Well, what happens if the debt ratio goes above the threshold?" He said, "Well, we talk to the top five brothers and ask them for a plan of how they're going to correct that." I just was reading in James 5 this morning. I'm going through James. I read this, and I thought, "Well, you know what? I'm just going to inject this." It says, "Come now, you rich people, weep and howl for your miseries which are coming upon you.

Your riches have rotten, and your garments have become moth-eaten. Your gold and your silver have corroded, and their corrosion will serve as a testament, Money, against you and will consume your flesh like fire. It is in the last days that you have stored up your treasure." Talking about the last days, if we're storing up our treasure, that's another indicator we're in the last days. "Behold the pay of the laborers who mow your fields and which has been withheld by you, cries out against you.

And the outcry of those who did the harvesting has reached the ears of the Lord of armies. You have lived for pleasure on earth and live luxuriously. You have fattened your hearts on the day of slaughter. You have condemned and put to death the righteous person. He offers you no resistance." All right. Let's move into outreach and how's our health in outreach? One thing I applaud you for is what you're doing here in the city. So God bless you on that. Outreach will always follow spiritual revival.

We see that in history. When men repent of lukewarm lives and pursue the heart of God, the result is always predictable. They must tell others, "Churches are planted and gospel spread." When it is tacked on, it makes us feel better about ourselves. But the church is rendered mechanical. I was reading about how loneliness is impacting our society today. It has been accelerated because of COVID. But I was reading an article about that, and it's phenomenal.

Some of the things that are actually—we've only seen the edge of it. But that's a tremendous opportunity for the church. Are we stepping up for that opportunity and showing friendship to others and inviting them into our lives? D&I, I'm not sure if you're familiar with that ministry in New York, but one thing that was interesting, they were able to start a Spanish church over COVID through the food box distribution.

They were never able to penetrate that group of people before, but they have been able to because of food distribution, and I've heard other stories like that. If you want to sabotage a great outreach conversation, bring up the importance of unity for effective outreach. Are we more concerned about preserving our heritage or integrating seekers into our brotherhood? That's probably another question that we struggle with.

Are you willing to make any adjustments in your church life to speak in the lives or show hospitality to people that weren't raised with our conservative values and may not understand all our interpretations? Is that what Jesus modeled for us, or was that the Pharisees? Outreach and diversity is messy. It's like raw milk. It has great food value, but boy, it spoils quick. Pasteurized milk is awesome. It lasts for a long time. It looks good. Then high-tempered, it goes to a whole new level.

But it's about maintenance and preservation. We take the life out of anything and we stuff it. It can look great for a long time until somebody brave enough to have a conversation around it. Now, here's my passion. It's you, youth, you between the age of 25 and 45 in this room. I'm passionate about you. I'm passionate about your success. I'm passionate about the importance and patience that you have to come under authority because if you're not under authority, you'll never be successful as a Christ follower.

Now, the leaders have a role to play in that. And I feel like that if leaders are promoting unity for the same reason that Jesus did, it'll make it a lot easier for our youth. Overzealous leaders unintentionally provide a platform for young men to justify their lack of submission. So leaders' unwillingness and inability to answer the honest questions of our youth, I think, around culture inconsistencies, contributing to the volatility and sustainabilities of our communities, I think it's very important.

Years ago, there was an anti-baptist identity conference in Ephrata. And one thing that stood out to me on the Saturday night, they had a youth night, and a teacher from a local school there came in. And back then, it was really hard to do this, but he set up an anonymous survey on the wall.

And he gave the youth the option, "What can't you talk about?" And one of the questions that was posted on the wall was, "How come our leaders can argue and fight, but when we do it, it's sin?" I thought, "Yeah, that's an inconsistency." So one thing that's interesting about this generation is their transparency. They're almost transparent to a fault. I really don't know what—it doesn't matter to me what your itch is today. But it has created a generation of transparency.

So we need to reflect that transparency as leaders. And we need to show them the transparency. We need to fall on the sword. We need to apologize. We need to be honest. And when you do that, you will win the hearts of the youth. Gary Miller says the main reason for church transfers, he suggests, is weary of restrictions and those that are looking for vibrance. Now, you could spend a lot of time talking about that, but he puts them in two different classes.

And then he has a couple of chapters about it, so you can read his books. "It is easy to hide. It is easy to hide my love for the world behind the faults I discover in church." That's a common excuse. If you are a leader with committed members that are longing for reform, are you, as a leader, approachable, teachable, and open to the idea that God uses our youth to speak God's heart? So my encouragement for a healthy church life is let's give our children a safe place to speak. So how prepared are we?

I believe life is extremely simple, and then we complicate it. Extremely simple. Our ability to take life down to the lowest common denominator. One of the lowest common denominators, how's the whole world going to know we love each other? How's the whole world going to know you love each other? Right? By your love for each other. That's the way the whole world's going to know. So I asked you three questions at the beginning. I'm going to ask them to you again. How far will you go to sacrifice for each other?

That's a test of your health. That's how people will see Jesus. It's the way the whole world will know by that simple answer to that question. Do we really understand the impact this has on the seeker? Community is a very powerful thing. People pay dear price to be part of a tribe. So what are you willing to give up for a healthy brotherhood? I think you can measure the health of a brotherhood by how much each member will sacrifice for each other. Your way, my way, and the right way.

What does sacrificial living look like to you? This is how people are going to know. First is how the people are going to see. The next question is how people are going to know. And the third question is how people are going to experience Jesus. So what does sacrificial look like to you? And you know what? I'd be the last one to stand up here and preach you a message on what it looks like in your life, but I could sure tell you what it looks like in mine. But that's going to be how people are going to know Jesus.

Everything we do communicates. Everything. Did you ever think about that? It does to your children. Every choice you make, every purchase you make, everything communicates. Depending on what kind of car you have, the world pegs you. Google that one. Google the car you drive and what it communicates. In the business world, dress has a big impact. And that's another one for you to Google. Google what dress means.

We like to minimize it on a church level, but the world's looking, and the world has a definition for what they think. Our children have more expendable income than ever before in history. Do you know that? There was never a time in history where young people had more dispensable income. You know that, 25 and 45-year-old men and girls? You have a lot of money. And that just calls the church a lot of health. But I just have a question, and I know this is really elementary, and it's really low profile.

But I just want to know that before you drop 20,000 for that four-wheeler, I just want to know that you drop, and then Sunday morning before that, you drop 20,000 in the offering. Just do that for me. Drop that 20 grand in the offering before you drop 20 grand for your four-wheeler. Please just do that. At least that. I think it should be a lot more. If you can own that. It's been a good health for me to think about that. Before I spend X on myself, am I willing to give that same amount to the Lord's work?

The third one was how people are going to experience Jesus. And that question was, how is our generosity reflected in our homes and our lifestyle? A brother already mentioned this morning about inviting this Honduras couple over, and I'm certain that everybody's going to be fighting to do that. So that's exciting. But how the whole world's going to experience Jesus is you know the verse very well. "I was naked, hungry, and prison." Were you there? Well, keep up the good work here in Chambersburg.

Do our neighbors see us as selfless and self-serving? And how do we communicate that? Are we stewards of all that we have been given? To me, life is all about stewardship. It's about stewardship of our time, stewardship of our money, stewardship of our resources, stewardship of—it's just a life of stewardship. Do you invite those in your home to show generosity? I think one book just recently—I think both Gary's books, Church Matters and Reaching America. Have you think about reading Reaching America yet?

Good book. Wouldn't you say so, Dave? A lot of practical—I thought it was very practical. He's a very practical writer. Do your neighbors and customers on the job know you as a generous person that goes out of your way? We are such a blessed people. We have so much to offer as a tribe with our heritage and what we've been given. And I think we'll be held accountable to the level that we have been given. I asked you over 50 questions this morning. I wanted to act a little bit like Jesus. Jesus asked 369 questions.

And then his genius went to a whole new level when he asked 180 questions to the question. But if you forget them all, as Jason warned us, we would, I want you to remember just one question. And that is, what are the conversations you're not having or the conversations you're having poorly here? Because that will determine the health of your church. In my humble opinion, it's where I think preparedness begins at a church is asking the hard questions.

So God bless you and what you're doing to share that love to the city here. And God give you wisdom to prepare your children and your children's children.