Risk Taking to Transform Lives

This is a great and exciting season at LFC and May will be a great month. I am excited about upcoming water baptisms (and our new water heating system) child dedications, collecting food items for our food pantry and most of all seeing lives transformed. As I met with our servants team, 'Team LFC' this past Sunday night, our worship team, communication time, teaching time and break-out sessions were graced with God's presence and power. In my message I challenged (with the help of four incredible video clips) our team, to risk, to invite and include others to use their gifts and to be willing to make room for people to serve on their team. Sometimes our fear speaks to us, doesn't it? It says, 'Do not go beyond this point!' You are locked in and cannot do more, serve, give, share your faith. It will be dangerous to you. But moving beyond the point we are at is not as risky or dangerous as we think. It can be very rewarding. It takes faith to move, to share, to tithe generously, to invite others. Faith is not only courageous but contagious. A dear friend of mine says: "People want to join to team when the team 'gets it' and has momentum and is excited about what they are doing." They went onto say: "What teaming does is provides an opportunity for people to discover their gifts and the joy of serving and impacting others." My friend is right, and they know what I have discovered. There is incredible joy in serving others and watching lives transformed. There is incredible joy in being a part of a compelling vision to personally and corporately become more than we have ever been.
This past Sunday, while Paul Hamlin was teaching, I had opportunity to visit all our children's classrooms following my time leading the worship. What I discovered is that we have a great group of dedicated servants, who 'get it' and see the value and joy in impacting others. What I also discovered is that we need an additional 27 servants each Sunday AM to cover Children's Ministries for our three services. This coupled with an additional 24 nursery workers will help us to bolster our Children's Ministries program. Is it too much to ask a church of our size for 51 additional servants? I don't think so. I am praying for a tenacious heart to be released in our people and a willingness to see the lost and hurting as a valuable investment. I pray that for any of you reading this.
This past Sunday night I encouraged our Team and I encourage you to "get after it." As the Psalmist shared:
Psalm 63:8 My soul followeth hard after thee: thy right hand upholdeth me. (KJV)
Since 1940, people coming to the then called, "Church by the Side of the Road", a small building, a small group of faith-filled, risk-takers, – pioneers, who prayed, gave, sacrificed, purchased our first piece of property and built the original sanctuary. They were following hard after God and His purposes for their lives and this church. Little did they know that we would one day tear the building they built and build the one we have now. Little did they fathom that we would be having three services. Little did they dream, that the building we would build would need to later be expanded. But what they did, and how they did it set the tone and culture for who we are today and we can never loose that. They were dreamers and visionaries, risk takers and servants. We serve a wonderful God who has been faithful to the people who gathered right on this property and additional properties we have purchased. From then to now, roll the clock forward, here we are and God has been faithful!
Go ahead and dream of LFC in ten years, twenty years, thirty years – I will be eighty-one years old, okay stop that dream. But what will be constant to our growth and impact will be prayer, giving, serving and dedication that all flow out of following hard after God and the commensurate risk-taking. How many lives will be changed with the passing of each decade and what are we willing to give, endure and sacrifice to see this happen? Those early pioneers gave it all, they prayed, believed, served. They were risk takers and innovators and we know that same heart has brought us to this place right now.Transformed lives: I think of Saul – one who hunted down Christians and then gives the rest of his life to the Church, planting churches and preaching the good news.I think of Peter, who denied the Lord in the most critical of moments and then later the Lord said, I will build my church with people that 'get it' and know who I am. It is the story of transformed children, youth, adults. It is the face of joy in a sad life and the heart of joy in someone who made a friend at LFC either after a service or through our very successful LFC Connection fellowships. The Church is the redemptive and transformational hope of the world. It is the God anointed means by which the lost are found, the hurting are healed and the marginalized are brought into fellowship, lonely and confused people – finding His love. It is the connection point for others to discover and use their gifts - gifts and talents that sometime have been dormant for years. Now is the time to connect deep to our roots and join in a heart and spirit that was possessed by the pioneers of this place. Jesus said it best.Luke 19:10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost."(New International Version)We need to keep on doing what Jesus did – seeking and saving the lost. Let's keep transforming lives whatever it takes.
Committed to transformation,
Pastor Bernie