What Church Looks Like

September 5, 2019 | Michael Foster

We had enjoyed such a great week in the Adirondacks. Meg’s family owns a cabin there near Piseco Lake in the southern part of the 6 million acre park (the largest publicly protected area in the lower 48 states). We had one more day to go and so we asked the kids, “what do you want to do tomorrow?” The answers were as different as the kids themselves: go to the water park, swim in the gorge, rock jump in the lake, hike another mountain, stay at the cabin and play games, sing more songs (that was Abram of course!). They had very different ideas about what our last day of vacation should look like. In a similar way, sometimes we can have very different ideas of what church should look like. And just as our kids were very passionate about their ideas for that last vacation day (that sure is a nice way of summarizing the arguments that unfolded!), we can be very zealous about our vision for the church.

Thankfully, in Acts 2:42-47, God gives us a snapshot of the early church. While there were some unique factors to the experience of those first followers of Jesus, we can discern from the description (and from the glimpses we get of the life of the church throughout the rest of Acts and the New Testament) quite a bit about what God intends church to look like. We see teaching, fellowship, worship, and prayer. We see people in the new community caring sacrificially and generously for one another. And we see the church including others as the gospel spreads to new people.

As we meditated on this picture of the early church, and as we come into our next season of life and ministry, we want to ask the question throughout our Forcey family: what if our gatherings looked more like their gatherings? Whether we are gathering for ABFs (Adult Bible Fellowships), Home Groups, Bible studies, or other ministry groups, are there ways we can be more intentional to prioritize some of what we observe in Acts 2? This will be the focus of our Ministry Workshop this month, and our pastoral staff is excited to share our hearts for what we envision God doing!

Well, we ended up swimming at the gorge that last day, and it was probably our best day of the week. It wasn’t everyone’s vision originally, but it was clearly God’s best for us. May God’s best prevail in our families and in our church as we look to live out the pictures we see in Scripture!

 

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What Church Looks Like

September 5, 2019 | Michael Foster