October 5, 2008 Message

Colossians 3:15-16a; John 15:5-8
“Cultivating Fruitfulness”

This morning we have started something out of the ordinary. Perhaps you have noticed we are doing a few things differently – not a lot, but enough so people might fill a different sort of energy or spirit during our worship time together. A few things that we’ve grown accustomed to are in different places or are missing altogether. The altar has been arranged differently – with different items to remind us of the essential things we do as a congregation. There may be songs that are not familiar, or prayers we haven’t prayed for a while, or even a different way of presenting the message – at least for me – with a bulletin now that is interactive, allowing you to “fill in the blanks” as I move from point to point. So, take out a pen or pencil and fill in the first blank – we have started today “something out of the ordinary.” All this is to help emphasize that today we are introducing the series, Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations.

Over the next five weeks, plus one day, our focus will be on learning more about the Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations: Radical Hospitality (the bread), Passionate Worship (the musical instruments), Intentional Faith Development (the Bible), Risk-Taking Mission and Service (the apron, tools, school bags), and Extravagant Generosity (the bushel baskets). Robert Schnase, Bishop of the Missouri Conference of the United Methodist Church, says, “These five practices capture the core ministries in our congregations… and help us understand our purpose and mission as disciples of Christ in the world.” He says, “people are looking for churches shaped and sustained by these qualities.”

We know, at least we should know, that the mission of the church is to make disciples of Jesus Christ, but sometimes we struggle with the question of how to fit this larger mission into the life of the local church in a practical way? How are we to make disciples here? Well, let me assure you this church has made disciples. You are that proof. So the series we’re going to be focusing on over the next few weeks isn’t about all new things, it’s about practicing the things people around here have always done so that we can become better at them.

Bishop Schnase writes (and I concer),
• “God uses congregations to make disciples when they offer the gracious invitation, welcome, and hospitality of Christ so people experience a sense of belonging;
• God shapes souls and changes minds through worship, creating a desire to grow closer to Christ;
• God’s Spirit nurtures people and matures faith through learning in community;
• with increased spiritual maturity, people discern God’s call to help others through mission and service; and
• God inspires people to be generous in giving of themselves so that others can receive the grace they have known.”

Practice of these fundamental qualities CAN bring revitalization and growth. It is through these activities God works to draw people into relationship and growth in personal discipleship. All of us want to grow in grace and in the knowledge and love of God, don’t we? We do so by repeating, learning, and deepening our personal practice of gracious hospitality, by placing ourselves regularly under the influence of God’s Spirit in worship, by intentionally seeking to grow in Christ-likeness through learning in community, and by practicing compassion and generosity in concrete ways. In these simple practices of Christian discipleship, the prevenient, justifying, and sanctifying grace of God become real and life changing. Bishop Schnase says, “Vibrant, fruitful, growing congregation are those that naturally practice these qualities and constantly seek ways to develop them further.”

These next thirty-five days will be about our “cultivating fruitfulness” – of being disciples or followers of Jesus the Christ. Jesus said, “Those who abide in me, and I in them, bear much fruit.” And he went on to say, “My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.” It sounds to me that our fruitfulness is a mark of our discipleship.

And with our fruitfulness comes a deeper relationship with God. This is good stuff. After all, isn’t this why many of us come to church every week and are involved in its programs – so we might enter into a deeper relationship with God?

Your involvement during this time of “cultivating fruitfulness” will require your thoughtful reading, along with everyone else, of each days Scripture verse and devotion, along with questions for reflection, a prayer the entire congregation will be praying, and a ‘challenge’ for the day. It will also require your presence here each Sunday morning to hear more about that week’s highlighted practice, which this coming week is hospitality.

Paul, in his instructions to the church at Colossus, essentially said, “each of us is part of the body of Christ; each of us has been chosen to “live” together in this place; and each of our lives is to be filled with the message of Christ as we wisely teach and instruct each other.” Then he added, “and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God.” Paul is encouraging the Colossians and us to a life of discipleship and, with these words today, defines what that life will mean.

Consider the imagery Jesus uses in John when he says to his followers, “I am the vine, you are the branches.”

Perhaps our focus on the five practices over the next 35 days plus one will cause us to ask some challenging questions about our own congregational practices. Effective congregations change, improve, learn, and adapt to fulfill their mission – they don’t do things as they did fifty years or even fifteen ago. Maybe it will even make us rethink our way of doing things.

Would you agree, we want the best for this church? We do want to accomplish our mission of making disciples, we really do! And yet we know we don’t change people to form them into the Body of Christ, God does.

There are people out there who hunger for someone to receive them graciously and invite them in, that connect them to God through authentic worship, that deepen their faith, and that stretch them to make a difference in the lives of others through service and generosity. We can do that! But it may require our full participation in learning how over these next 35 plus days and beyond.

Start reading “Cultivating Fruitfulness” today or tomorrow, join a study group this week, and come back next Sunday to find out more about “radical hospitality” and what we might do as a congregation. This is an exciting time for our church. I pray you will be a part of it.

In ending, let me share something our new Bishop Julius C. Trimble said to a gathering of United Methodist clergy in Des Moines ten days ago, when asked about his hope for the churches of the Iowa Annual Conference. He said, “We shall be at our best when the people on the inside can’t wait to get out, and those on the outside can’t wait to get in.” May the things we can’t wait to get outside to do be the very things needed to help those on the outside to want to come in.