NewLife Community Church

Above & Beyond

It's the holiday season... Thanksgiving (and the piles of delicious food) are only a few days away. And once that's done (and you've fallen asleep in front of a football game with a piece of pumpkin pie), we're just about 30 days away from celebrating Christmas.

It's also a time of year where you're asked to give - not just presents to family & friends, but donations to a wide variety of organizations & ministries. Here at NewLife, we'll be promoting:

• Operation: Christmas Child (today is the day to turn in your box... if you haven't done so already, you're welcome to drop it by the church office this afternoon/evening for delivery tomorrow)
• the Fresno Rescue Mission (our yearly Community Thanksgiving service offering goes to the Mission, along with donations of canned food and freshly made pies)
• Jews for Jesus (who will be bringing the message next week as they talk about the presence of Christ in the middle of the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah)
• the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering (as we help to fund missionaries sharing Jesus around the world)

With all those opportunities (and so many more), I want to offer you an important Biblical concept: your giving to those worthy ministries should be above & beyond your regular giving to the church (your tithe). This is not the time to "borrow Peter to pay Paul" - if you feel led to give, you need to add it to your normal giving rather than simply shuffle a smaller dollar number around.

OK, Pastor Mark, where do you get this biblically? Those of you who've been around church a while will probably anticipate an appeal to Malachi 3:10 (the "first fruits" passage)... and while that could apply here, I want to go another direction today. Let's look at Ephesians 5:25 (NLT):

Christ loved the church. He gave up his life for her.

This doesn't require a lot of textual criticism or commentary... and if Jesus loved the church enough to give His life up, then it ought to be the first & most important place for us to give.

I urge you to prayerfully & wisely consider how you give through these holiday seasons... to consider a level of generosity that goes "above & beyond" your normal level of giving. And while you do that, also take time to pray about how you choose to give year-round... when the Salvation Army folks aren't wringing bells & "the spirit of giving" isn't being celebrated in one TV commercial after another. Maybe, just maybe - God is using this time to jump start your generosity!

Quotes of the Week

At its best, giving is an act of worship.

     Cornelius J Dyck

As worship begins in holy expectancy, it ends in holy obedience. Holy obedience saves worship from becoming an opiate, an escape from the pressing needs of modern life.

     Richard Foster

Thoughts for You To Think About Some More

Elevate: Worship & Fear

As we've been using the three-fold "definition" of worship...

1. what/who do you submit to?
2. what/who do you honor?
3. what/who do you serve?

...a conversation with Shari about Neil T. Anderson's book, Overcoming Fear, got me thinking.

Fear can be an idol - I can so easily submit to my fears & make decisions based on them. I can honor my fears instead of honoring God. And I serve them by offering them gifts of time & energy & worry.

I'm praying about this & how it applies to me - and I encourage you to do the same. (It might be esp. applicable today as Rich talks about giving as worship.)

In the Red

We had our quarterly business meeting last night... and while giving is up in October compared to August & September, we are approx. $9,500 behind this year. That means our expenses are almost $10K greater than our income.

Maybe today is a good day for you to prayerfully consider your giving - to think about what God is calling you to spontaneously and/or strategically give.

Penn State

As I'm writing this Grapevine, the uproar about Joe Paterno's firing as head football coach at Penn State is swamping the Internet & the airwaves. There are lots of lessons we can learn here... and the president of Lifeway, Thom Rainer, did an excellent job of applying the lessons of this tragedy to church life:

In Coach Joe Paterno’s case, he reported the alleged abuse to his “chain of command,” and apparently absolved himself of responsibility.  But those to whom he reported apparently chose to protect their university and themselves rather than the child involved. If that is the case, it's wrong -- and something churches must avoid

It doesn’t take a football fanatic or a genius to figure out the right thing to do -- in all cases -- is to protect our children. It is inconceivable to me that someone could witness sexual abuse and then simply report it and leave it to their supervisors. The right response is to intervene by force at the moment, and with the police immediately thereafter

I write for church leaders, not ESPN. So let me say clearly that church leaders are responsible for protecting all the children who come into our places of worship. It’s our job to teach them about Jesus’ love for them, and we must also protect them from potential predators...

Pastors, youth leaders, lay leaders:  if you suspect, or if someone reports to you, the possibility that one of your workers or volunteers is or has abused a child in your care, stop reading this article and immediately contact your local police.  I understand how difficult that might be for you, for your church, for those involved, but your first concern sh ould not be for yourself or even your local church, but your charge is to protect our children. It's not your job to determine the validity of a claim of abuse. That's the job of the police. It's your job to call them. Immediately.

Here at NewLife, I want to clearly state that no amount of desire to give grace to a predator should ever allow us to put our kids in harm's way. I want to echo clearly as your pastor that I want you to report potential abuse to us & then to the police. We will NOT sweep this kind of thing under the rug. Ever.

I also want to encourage you to pray for all involved: the coaches, administrators, the board, students... and esp. the children & their families. Making sure we keep kids safe should never stop us from praying that God can use something this horrible to bring people out of the kingdom of darkness & into His kingdom of light.

Read Thom Rainer's whole post at http://www.thomrainer.com/2011/11/protect-our-children.php

Quote of the Week

There are very few words that transcend circumstances. There are very few words that go beyond social, economic and marital status. There are very few words that hit all of us in the same way, at the same time and with the same potential for impact and change. But these 4 words do:

“I am with you.”

God is with us. Not distant. Not removed, but close. Not uncaring, but empathetic. Not far off, but living inside us. He is with us.

     Justin & Trisha Davis

Read Justin & Trisha Davis' whole post at http://www.catalystspace.com/catablog/full/4_words_that_change_everything/

Healthy Church Update: Mission Statement

As part of following through with Mike McGuffee's recommendations from the Healthy Church evaluation, the Church Council (with the help of the folks who participated in our first Churchwide Town Hall) have worked to clarify our mission statement here at NewLife.

Now, this isn't a vanity project ("look how cool we are") or a marketing strategy ("come to our church - we've got a great slogan!")... Will Mancini says it best:

No, you don’t need a cooler mission statement so you can call it a mantra. No you don’t need a better sounding slogan. You need to know what the heck your church or ministry is ultimately supposed to be doing and you need to state in a clear, concise and compelling way. This is a leadership statement to direct and integrate all of your thinking, speaking and acting. Let me repeat- this is a leadership statement, not a marketing statement.

In other words, It's is a clear and concise statement that describes what our church is ultimately supposed to be doing.

And here it is:

connecting our community to a passionate new life in Christ

You're going to be hearing that a lot... the idea is that all of us will make it the "guiding light" as we decide how to do the ministry here in Easton God has called NewLife to do.

And you can be involved in the next step in the mission/values/vision process as we'll be having our next Churchwide Town Hall THIS Sunday, November 6th after the morning service. It'll be a potluck lunch with chances to give input & ask questions - don't miss it!