In our weekly COMPASS leadership prayer meeting, one brother prayed for a growing sense of community in our congregation. A strong sense of community is what characterized that first congregation described in Acts 2, a sense of community so strong that it was attractive to those outside the church. Their sense of community was not self-motivated but the evidence of their unity in the Spirit together with Christ through faith in His gospel. Because that same Spirit unites believers together in Christ today, that strong sense of community is possible in any gospel-believing congregation. A recent article in The Atlantic offers a less hopeful message.
Recently, our skies were the canvas for some spectacular natural phenomena – a solar eclipse and the northern lights. Despite having been born and raised in Canada, I cannot recall ever having seen the Northern Lights, yet people here in north Florida were posting stunning photos of them. My wife and I even doused the porchlight and stood in the driveway gazing into the northern night sky but saw not a glimmer. I woke up very early the next morning and decided to try again. It was raining. I still have not seen the Northern Lights.
I have a vivid imagination and have had it all my life. It is so vivid that I imagine myself to be six feet tall with brown wavy hair and sporting washboard abs. Others see a man whose hair has turned white, some of it turned loose, and who is sporting washtub abs. They just lack imagination!
I came to faith in Christ 40 years ago in a church in southeast Florida. The members of that small congregation embraced me as family, inviting me to their homes for dinners and cookouts. I marveled that such a loving group of people existed and even came to perceive them as being without fault. It wasn’t long before I realized that they, like me, though redeemed in Christ, were real human beings who had to deal with a sin nature.
After I finish one of my weekly columns, I have two women read it for comprehension, spelling and grammar. The first woman is my wife. The second “woman” is the voice in my software’s review function. My wife works during the day, this other “woman” is available to read whenever I call.
I did the “seminary thing” backward, serving in full time ministry at one church for 12 years – 8 as an ordained pastor – with no formal Bible education; then I went to seminary. Colleagues insisted that I would have an advantage over my classmates who would have just graduated from Bible college. After a few classes, I understood. What the fresh Bible college grads knew was yet untested theory. What I knew came from personal study, from experience, and from making a lot of mistakes.
“The times, they are a changin,’” Bob Dylan warned sixty years ago. Newsflash, Bob, they change every year, twice a year in fact. Last month, we honored the mnemonic “spring forward,” and will do the opposite come November when we “fall back.” It’s even more complicated for Floridians because we are one of the 13 states that sit in two time zones.
Like many, if not most churches today, COMPASS Church uses presentation software to display the songs and Scripture texts on a flat screen TV for worship services. That software is linked to several databases so that all we need to do is type in a song title or Scripture reference, and instantly we are provided with the words fully formatted for display. Those who use it know what a time-saver such software can be. I appreciate the available technology, but I also have a complaint – the song lyrics have no punctuation.
Last week, I celebrated my 40th birthday. One look at me and you might think I am someone who repeatedly celebrates 39th birthdays. No, I was celebrating the day 40 years ago when I was, in Jesus’ words, born again.
A few weeks ago, as I was preparing worship services and sermons this past Holy Week, my mind went back four years ago to when the coronavirus came to visit, the year the unthinkable happened.
