The Kingdom, The Kids, & The Cowboys

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Category: Colossians (Page 8 of 13)

Vision Statement: Part One

March 2, 2015 / / 0 Comments

Remember the Russian comedian Yakov Smirnoff? Born and raised in Russia, Smirnoff lives in the U. S. now — Branson, I think. A lot of his comedy was based on comparing life in Russia to life in the United States. One of his funniest bits is about the first time he ever walked into an American grocery store. He says, “I walked in and one of the first things I saw was powdered milk. You just add water and, boom, you’ve got milk! A couple of aisles over I saw cans of powdered orange juice. You just add water and, boom, you’ve got orange juice. Then I saw a whole shelf of baby powder!”

“What a country!”

Wouldn’t it be great if we just added water to ourselves and became instantly just like Jesus? What if the waters of baptism didn’t only wash away our sins, fill us with God’s Holy Spirit, and connect us to the body of Christ? What if the moment we came up out of the water we were automatically perfect? We know it doesn’t work that way. Whatever you call it — sanctification, salvation, spiritual formation, transformation — it doesn’t happen overnight.

Becoming like Christ is a gradual thing. It’s a process. Scripture calls it “being saved.” The course of being made perfect, being changed into the image of Jesus is difficult and lengthy. But this is exactly what God is doing with those he’s calling and saving. He is forming us into the image of his Son.

“We all reflect the Lord’s glory and are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” ~2 Corinthians 3:18

Being saved means being changed: changed into the image of Jesus, shaped into his character, formed into his nature. It’s conducting ourselves every day in a manner worthy of the life, death, and resurrection of our Lord. Paul tells the Galatians he’s agonizing until Christ is formed in them. He writes in Romans that we’re predestined by God to be conformed to the image of his Son. He writes to the Colossians and says the goal of everything God is doing with Jews and Gentiles alike is “Christ in you, the hope of glory.”

But it’s slow. It takes time.

That’s why the very first word in our vision statement is “Becoming.” We want to constantly remind ourselves and proclaim as loud as we can to anyone who’s listening that nobody at Central Church of Christ has arrived. Nobody here is perfect. Nobody here has it all figured out. We are becoming like Christ. It’s a process. You know, some people won’t give life in Christ a chance because there are so many church people out there who think they’ve got all the answers. We want it to be known up front that we’re still pretty much a mess. Yes, we’re on our way. But nobody’s there yet. It’s a journey of ups and downs, of thrilling victories and devastating setbacks. We still have a lot to learn, we still make terrible mistakes. There’s a place in our church for anybody who has questions or doubts, for anybody who still says or does the wrong thing from time to time, for anybody who doesn’t feel perfect. Because we’re all in that little boat, fighting the storm, straining at the oars. But in the middle of all that, God is making us more like Jesus. It’s slow, but he’s doing it.

 

Happy Texas Independence Day!

Allan

Anticipating the Unexplainable

July 14, 2014 / / 0 Comments

I’ve been having lunch at least once a month with the other three downtown pastors for more than two years. We’ve become really good friends and partners in the Gospel. It’s been a year since the leadership groups from all four churches met at Polk Street Methodist to pray together about what God might do with us. Eleven months ago we collaborated for the first time by collecting and packing and delivering school supplies to four downtown area elementary schools. It was eight months ago when we all gathered at First Baptist for that historic combined worship assembly. I was so honored to preach that night. I was privileged to preach the Maundy Thursday service at First Presbyterian three months ago. I was blessed to preach both services at Polk Street on a Sunday morning in April. Burt and Howard have both preached at Central in the past year. We worked together every day this past week. The “4 Amarillo” churches refurbished a house and ran two Bible school block parties and volunteered at a food bank. Together. We ate ice-cream together Wednesday night.

We’re so much more connected now than we’ve ever been. Ever. We know each other now. There’s a familiarity, a trust. The fear all seems to be gone. I think we’re comfortable with this now.

Yet, as I walked into First Baptist last night to join the Presbyterians, the Methodists, the Baptists, and the Church of Christ-ers for a worship assembly to celebrate this first “4 Amarillo” week of service projects, I was almost overcome with a sense of the unexplainable. I was awed all over again by the fact that four standard-bearing churches in this city from four very distinct denominations were in the same room worshiping God together. Together.

I was reminded that not everybody gets to do this. And I was reminded that this is a very special and very powerful work of God.

It is our God who is doing these things in Amarillo. It’s not you. It’s not me. It’s not us. It is God who has brought us here. It’s not good timing, it’s not careful planning, it’s not marketing or location or good luck. It is God who works in us to will and to act according to his good purpose.

God is the power behind his Church. And it doesn’t matter if we believe it or not. It doesn’t matter if we acknowledge it or not. It’s the truth. We are instruments, willingly being used and used up by the Creator of Heaven and Earth to his glory for ever and ever.

Scripture is plain. The glorious riches of the mystery is “Christ in you.” Just like the apostle who wrote those words to the disciples in Colosse, we proclaim, we admonish, we teach, we labor, we struggle with all of his energy which so powerfully works within us.

The power of the Church is not in its activities or programs or talented people or leadership or money or numbers. And we’ve got more than our share of all those wonderful things. The power of the Church is God’s Holy Spirit living and moving inside us. And because of that reality, because of that fact, that living presence of God in us, we are learning to expect the impossible. More than we ever ask or imagine. It happens all the time around here. The unreal has become commonplace. The unexplainable is now anticipated.

I was humbled by the opportunity to speak for about five minutes at last night’s assembly. I was overwhelmed by the chance to be the one to introduce Ray Chavez, the gracious owner of the house on South Buchanan Street, to the overflow crowd of enthusiastic disciples who cheered him and showered him with the love of our Lord.

I’m having lunch with the other three preachers this Thursday, our regular monthly lunch at the Burger Bar on Polk Street. We’ll eat together and laugh, we’ll reflect on the week together and pray. And it will be a joy. It always is.

God, please help me to remember that not everybody gets to do this. God, thank you for making the unreal so commonplace around here. And, please, don’t ever let me take it for granted.

Peace,

Allan

Speaking Community

April 20, 2014 / / 0 Comments

“With great power the apostles continued to testify to the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus!” ~Acts 4:33

In Matthew 28, Jesus meets the women outside the empty tomb and says, “Go and tell my brothers!” Scripture says the women “ran to tell the disciples.” In Mark 16, the angel inside the tomb says, “Go and tell!” The risen Lord eats with his disciples that night and says, “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation!” Verse 20 says, “The disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them.” Same thing in Luke 24. “When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others.” When the two disciples met Jesus on the road to Emmaus, “they told what had happened.” While Jesus shares a meal with his followers that night he says, “The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations.”

Sure enough, the resurrection community can’t keep their mouths shut. In the earliest days of the Church, according to Acts, everybody was talking. Peter and John get thrown in jail for talking about the resurrection and protest to the authorities, “We cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard!”

When we are truly raised with Christ to walk in newness of eternal life, when we are formed and shaped by the Resurrection of Jesus, how are we not going to talk about it? The Resurrection community proclaims the good news of the resurrection and reign and return of our Lord. We can’t help it.

I would add that followers of Jesus are all about life, not death; we’re a people of hope, not despair; we’re a community of light, not darkness. And when we speak, our words should give resurrection life to others. Our speech should breathe new life into others.

In Colossians, Paul is talking about formation by resurrection when he says, “Let your conversation be always full of grace.” We’re told in Ephesians 4 to speak the truth in love. In Acts 20, we’re told that everywhere Paul went he spoke words of encouragement.

All the words that come out of our mouths should be words that restore and renew, never words that tear down or destroy. When we speak, our words should point others to the resurrection life that’s forming us.

Peace,

Allan

Jesus is Lord of All Things

December 18, 2013 / / 0 Comments

“In him all things hold together.” ~Colossians 1:17

By bridging the gap between God and creation in himself, Christ Jesus unites the whole universe. This beautiful section of Colossians 1 states it over and over again by his repetition of the word for “all things:”

Colossians 1:15 – the first born over all creation
v.16 – by him all things were created
v.16 – all things were created by him
v.17 – he is before all things
v.17 – in him all things hold together
v.18 – in everything he might have the supremacy
v.20 – through him to reconcile all things

I think sometimes we’re inclined to emphasize Christ’s work in redemption and salvation too individualistically. That’s between her and Jesus. It only involves me and my Lord. That’s going to be up to God and him. This is about Jesus and me. You ask me how I know he lives? He lives within my heart. Yes, he does. Of course. But it’s bigger than that. The reign of Christ Jesus is never ever confined to my own existence or to the property lines of my church parking lot or to the national borders of my nation. It’s universal and eternal! Christ reigns supreme over all, over all things. The whole universe. The whole world in his loving hand.

These verses are a  celebration of human impossibilities that have become God’s possibilities: reconciliation, renewal, salvation, peace. We always want to assume that the status is quo, that things will and must remain the way they are. A lot of the time we can’t even imagine there’s a way to really improve much of anything. Paul’s words in Colossians 1 affirm to us that wonders have not ceased! Possibilities not dreamed of can happen! And hope is an authentic position to take!

Peace,

Allan

Peace Through His Blood

December 17, 2013 / / 0 Comments

“God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.” ~Colossians 1:19-20

The creator and sustainer of the universe is our crucified Lord. We know our Savior as a human being. He became a man. Christ Jesus’ supremacy and lordship over all things is rooted in and finds its greatest expression in his salvation acts. His service. His sacrifice. His death. The head of the Church is the one who was shamefully crucified. And our Lord endured this, he obediently walked to the cross, not to judge or destroy, but to reconcile and renew. To make peace.

Jesus is proclaimed the eternal King of All when he takes up that cursed tree.

Shirley Guthrie wrote:

“He is not like a king who preserves his majesty and honor only by shutting himself up in the splendor of his palace, safely isolated from the misery of the poor peasants and the threat of his enemies outside the fortress. His majesty is a majesty of a love so great that he leaves the palace and the royal trappings to live among his subjects as one of them, sharing their condition even at the risk of vulnerability to the attack of his enemies. If we want to find this King, we will find him among the weak and lowly, his genuine majesty both revealed and hidden in his choosing to share their vulnerability, suffering, guilt, and powerlessness.”

God sends the creator of the universe not in fear and terror, but in gentleness and meekness. He sends him saving and persuading, not ordering and directing. Jesus comes to us calling, not commanding. Loving, not judging. And all of that is what saves us. His blessed birth, his wonderful life, his miraculous healings, his wise teachings, his compassionate care for others, his obedient suffering, his sacrificial death, his glorious resurrection, and his eternal exaltation — that is what saves us. It redeems us. It reconciles all of creation back to the one who created it and sustains it. And it’s beautiful.

He shared our life. He experienced our suffering. He bore our sin. Those of us who are members of Christ’s Body, the Church over which he is head, find our sins already canceled by his death. And we find the dominion of darkness and sin with all its power and authority already defeated.

“When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave all our sins, having canceled the written code with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” ~Colossians 2:13-15

Peace,

Allan

Raised with Christ

October 1, 2013 / / 2 Comments

“Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” ~Colossians 3:1-4

Our youngest daughter, Carley, was baptized into Christ Jesus on Sunday. She publicly renounced the ways of the world and confessed the ultimate lordship of Jesus and her commitment to him. She was buried with him — symbolically, sacramentally; she was raised with Christ — symbolically, sacramentally — to walk in newness of eternal life with our King. She has been forgiven by God of every sin she’s ever committed and will ever commit against his great holiness. She is now indwelled by God himself in the form of his Spirit — symbolized by the first huge breath she took after coming up out of the watery grave. And she belongs exclusively to our heavenly Father. She is his and he is hers. Forever. Amen.

As we talked and prayed with Carley this past week, she asked me almost every night, “Who’s going to do the ‘Since then…?'”

The “Since then…” is the congregational reading of Colossians 3:1-4. It’s a baptismal tradition/liturgy at the Legacy church we initiated with the opening of the new worship center there in 2008. As soon as the newly baptized follower came up out of the water, the congregation would recite those words of blessing and challenge, of affirmation and commission. It was — and still is — a powerful way for the church to participate in the baptism and for the wet Christian to feel the strength of belonging now to a baptized community.

Well, we don’t do that here at Central.

Yes, we clap and cheer and sometimes even stand and shout when someone is baptized. Several people are usually waiting backstage to pray with the newly baptized brother or sister afterward . For teenagers, as many as thirty or forty people will crowd back there to offer congratulations and prayers. But our worship center is built and our baptistry positioned in such a way that congregational participation in a baptism event itself is all but impossible. Our baptistry is some 25-feet up in the air, far removed from the church itself. People on the very front pews are still 75-feet away from the water and are forced to watch the baptisms on the giant screens. Folks scattered around the giant room are even farther away and have no choice but to watch it on the screens. I was dismayed Sunday to walk out into the water in front of our church with my wife and our youngest daughter, and look out into our loving congregation to see 99-percent of them not looking at us, but watching on the screens. And we’re in the same room! Our building has turned baptisms into a spectator event.

But I asked our brothers and sisters to read the “Since then…” to Carley when she came up out of the water. We put the words on the screen. And they did it. It was beautiful. It was powerful. It honored us as a family. And it meant the world to Carley.

 

 

 

 

 

Thank you, Central Church of Christ, for loving our daughter and our whole family the way you do. Not a day goes by that we don’t recognize how blessed we are to be with you. Thank you to our small group and Carley’s middle school Muddle families who blessed us so wonderfully at our home Sunday night. You poured truth into our daughter. You affirmed her; you challenged her; you read God’s Holy Word to her and promised to always love her. Thank you. Thank you to the Popes and the Marshalls who drove thirteen hours round trip from Legacy to rejoice with us this weekend. Your friendship is a testament to the faithfulness of our God. And thank you to Carrie-Anne’s mom and my parents who sacrificed a lot to be here this past weekend. You received the Christian faith from your parents, you passed it on to your children, and you are blessing us as we pass it on together to your grandchildren. Thank you.

Carley, you now belong to our God. Paul told the Christians in Galatia that you are a daughter of God by faith when you clothe yourself with Christ by baptism (Galatians 3:26-27). When you were baptized Sunday, you put to death the old Carley. You killed that girl; you buried her. And when you came up out of the water, you were a brand new creature. God has created something brand new inside you Carley, so that by his Spirit you will experience all of life in a brand new way. Death has nothing on you now, precious daughter. And neither does sin.

Our prayer for you, Carley, is that our God will bless you richly with his grace and peace, his protection and provision. Our great desire is to see you become more and more like our Lord. Our eternal hope is that you walk with him faithfully, all the way to the end.

We love you. And we are so proud of you. And we know your life in Christ is going to result in praise and glory to God. May his holy will be done in you and through you, Carley, just as it is in heaven.

Love, like you just can’t believe,

Dad

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