Unity - Our Church Insurance Policy 9th Jan 2005
PDL series (21 UNITY) Ephesians 4:1-16
Slide 1 PDL
1. Carlisle has been in the news again today with the gales and floods, but I was thinking about Carlisle a few weeks ago when I gave as the theme for today Our church insurance policy. I’ll tell you why.
There was one evening 9 years ago when at around midnight I was sitting on a roof with three or four other folks who lived in the street, and several firemen who had turned out to the scene in response to an emergency call.
Slide 2 St. Marks About half of the copper roof of the mission church on the council estate where we lived, had been torn off during a gale, and now I was up on the roof trying desperately to nail down whatever sections of copper the wind had left behind. It was sometime during the following week that the vicar told me that apparently the mission church was not insured for that particular risk. Building insurance of non-residential property is more complex than a home policy. The church faced a bill for over ten thousand pounds. We could have spent weeks blaming certain members of the congregation for failing to do what they should have done. You know, I can’t remember anyone getting angry, I can’t remember anyone pointing a finger and saying “it was all your fault.” The churchwardens didn’t resign, the treasurer wasn’t sacked. Everyone learned from that mistake… and this is the good bit… God provided for the financial needs of the church through the kindness of people who knew him - and although the company had no liability whatsoever because the premium hadn’t been paid, for this particular risk still they covered the entire cost of our repairs. Slide 2a unity
But the best gift of all that we received, was the gift of UNITY when faced with a major problem.
2. Since then, the question “Are we insured?” is one that I have heard asked many times… “What about the insurance?” was a question that quite properly was raised when I said that I wanted to put the Christmas tree up outside. And the churchwardens, and the PCC do have a clear responsibility to see that the buildings and activities of this church are properly insured.
But - all that sort of insurance can do is to provide money when something goes wrong. And there are many things that are more important than money.
The thing that will preserve the mission and ministry of this church, is the insurance that only God can provide.
And at the top of the list of what God can give to us to preserve us from disaster is his gift of unity…
Slide 2b always keep …
Always keep yourselves united in the Holy Spirit,
Let’s think about Unity for a moment…
Slide 3 On the day after Christmas, it seemed as if the world shrank. “Of course the people in South East Asia are our concern. Of course we ought to do something to help.” Just after Christmas… I think that there would not have been a lot of people who wanted to argue that the death of 150,000 people in the biggest tidal wave in living memory, is nothing to do with us, or that we have no need to be concerned in any way.
And so we responded. It can’t have been just the numbers of those who have lost their lives that moved us. I mean every week in Africa over 200,000 children die as a result of disasters that are largely man-made, and yet their plight does not attract the attention of the media in the way that this disaster did.
Maybe it was the suddenness of the tidal wave that stunned us, maybe it was also the realisation of how helpless we human beings are when confronted with a tremendous natural force like a Tsunami, or a flood, or a hurricane, or a tornado, or an earthquake, or a lighting strike.
Maybe the Tsunami reminded us of our shared humanity and vulnerability. And maybe what has been seen in this country over the last couple of weeks is a sort of instinctive response. “Of course we have to help one another, we are all in the same situation aren’t we?”
I want to suggest that maybe for a moment we have seen a glimpse of how God made us to be.
You see Human Beings were designed to live in relationship with each other.
We were designed to care for one another. We were designed to love one another. We were planned to consciously demonstrate the love and kindness of the God who made us. UNITY is built into creation.
The designer made us to live in Unity one with another. It’ s just that so often we don’t do it.
The self-centeredness and selfishness and conflict that causes disunity, that we are so used to, was not put there by God, it has grown in the human heart, and it is in opposition to the unity that is God’s intention for us. So now the media reports on the fact that people are moved to respond to the needs of others… but our failure to respond to the needs of so many millions who die every week, is usually not something that the media reports on.
Within just a few days we were told that 30 million pounds had been given. Now the figure is likely to be nearer 100 million, certainly the largest response ever seen to a national appeal. Some of that included big donations from companies, like Vodaphone, or the Football Premiership who offered a 1 million pound donations.. much of it came as smaller gifts from folk like us. It all sounds like a lot of money… and it is.. but the Bible says that we must always Be honest in your estimate of yourselves… So if we are honest about ourselves… well in the last two to three weeks of December the people of Britain spent 305 million pounds on Christmas turkeys. And according to the figures published by the British Retail Consortium, thirty BILLION pounds has been spent by British people in British shops during the month of December. That puts our giving to the needs of others into perspective. Yes we were moved to give… but we still have a lot to learn don’t we?
Slide 3b
The world does still have a lot to learn about unity…
It is Easy in some ways to feel a sense of unity with those you don’t know. Some people may find it easier to give money to a Muslim family in Indonesia, than to welcome that same family when they move in next door. It has been part of the history of this country that when families from the countries affected by the Tsunami have moved in to a neighbourhood, many other people have moved out.
Slide 4 hands
REAL unity comes when we are committed to living in relationship with other people. And that is where the church comes in.
But first… here is something completely different…
(Recite school song… in Latin!!)
Problem is I had learned the words, I could join in with all the other children singing it… I could make the right noises… but I never knew what it all meant.
We can be the same with the words and phrases that we learn as Christians.
Slide 5
We are the body of Christ a holy nation, joined together, a holy temple, the family of God, joined by the spirit, one in Christ Jesus, baptised by one spirit…
We can hear these words, speak these phrases, but not really grasp what it actually means.
As I said… God designed human beings to live together in love and unity with him and with one another.
Slide 6 the NT is very clear
The New Testament is very clear that within the church that we should expect to see some evidence of human beings gradually becoming what God designed us to be. The church - God’s new creation, his new community of people, his holy nation, his foretaste of his kingdom here on earth, the body of Christ… this is the place where we can once again learn what it is to live in unity with one another.
Scary. That requires a commitment. Maybe that’s one reason we have this Commitment Sunday.
God has given us the gift of unity by his Spirit… it is up to us to choose to receive and enjoy that gift… or whether to give it back to him and say, “Here you are God, I know you meant this gift for my Good but I don’t want it.” Believe it or not.. that is just what Christians sometimes do.
And when they do, they hurt themselves, and they hurt the church, the body of Christ.
Here are a couple of observations that Rick Warren makes in his book PDL.
Slide 7…
Unity in the Church is so important that the New Testament gives more attention to it than to either heaven or hell.
It is your job to protect the unity of your church.
Of course we will make mistakes. Of course we will get things wrong. Of course we will sometimes say things, think things do things that we should not do but…
Quote p. 162
Rather than being shocked and surprised, we must remember that the church is made up of real sinners, including ourselves. Because we’re sinners, we hurt each other, sometimes intentionally and sometimes unintentionally. But instead of leaving the church, we need to stay and work it out if at all possible.”
If you are not committed to preserving the unity of this church… then you are likely to be harming it.
How can you preserve unity. Here are four suggestions…
Slide 8
1. Focus on what we share
… forgiveness through Jesus, common inheritance as the children of our heavenly father, and we have received the same Holy Spirit of God. And we are all under the same command of Jesus… “Love one another as I have loved you.” If we focus on that then we are less likely to allow the differences in personalities or preferences become a source of division and disunity.
2. Be realistic
The Bible tells us to “Bear one another’s burdens, forgiving… “ If there was never going to be any needs of us to do this, then the Bible would not have told us to do it. Be realistic in any relationship there can be times when we let one another down or get something wrong. I am tired of meeting people who have walked away from the churches because something was said that they didn’t like, or more often something wasn’t done that they wanted to be done, or they didn’t receive some affirmation or approval or thanks that they wanted to get. The Bible tells us not to run away when someone upset us.. the bible tells us to forgive when someone upsets us. Why don’t we do it more often.. for the sake of the unity of the church.
3. Choose to encourage rather than criticise.
Too often we find it easier to talk about the things that we think someone else doing wrong.. than about the things that they might be doing right. Do You know one of the titles that the Bible gives to Satan is “the accuser”. It is his job to accuse, to criticise and blame, and complain about us. So don’t start doing his work for him.
4. Refuse to listen to Gossip.
If somebody starts to taking to you about another Christian…complaining about something that they have heard, they have said or done… try saying, “Please stop. I don’t want to listen to this. Have you talked to them about how you feel?”
5. Talk with one another !
Practice God’s method for conflict resolution.
If another believer sins against you, go privately and point out the fault… Matthew 18:15 that’s the first step. But always please ask yourself if what you want to say is likely to be hurtful. Be honest with yourself, are you motivated by anger, or jealousy, or some vague feeling that the other person is not living up to your expectations of them… or are you motivated by love and genuine compassion for that person. Are you committed to living in relationship with that person. Ask yourself is what you want to say what Jesus would want you to say?
Often in situations of conflict it is tempting to talk to a third party rather than talk to the person who has upset you. I know because I have done this - and I have on occasion needed to apologise to someone because I did not have the courage to tell them how much they had hurt me by what they had said and done. I am learning.
Before you go today... tell another member of the congregation what it is that you appreciate about them. Whatever it is… it is a special gift from Jesus, a gift to them, and to you, and to the body of Christ here at St. John’s.
Slide 9
And so…
Be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love. 3 Always keep yourselves united in the Holy Spirit, and bind yourselves together with peace.
4 We are all one body, we have the same Spirit, and we have all been called to the same glorious future.