Readings for Sunday, February 22nd

This Sunday we'll be considering what the true purpose of the church is. That's a broad question and it's also one of those questions where the answer can probably be expressed in lots of different ways. But I hear more wrong answers than anything else. There is a lot of sloppy, complacent, sappy thinking out there among believers about the nature and purpose of the church.

And our fuzzy thinking about the purpose of the church leads to some pretty fuzzy participation in the church and fuzzy identification with the church. When we're unclear about the nature and purpose of the church we find ourselves apologizing for and distancing ourselves from those aspects of the church that dismay, confuse or upset our neighbors and friends.

I used to work for a company that specialized in what they called "disaster restoration," and I hated when we got called in on water jobs. Someone would have a pipe burst and unthinkable amounts of water would flood a portion of their house. As a less experienced member of the team I was initially horrified at the matter of fact way in which my colleagues would show up at someone's house and casually begin ripping things up and out, filling bag after bag with trash, tossing furniture around, knocking out drywall, pulling carpet. Because I feared the bad opinion of the home owners more than I did the destructive power of mold, and because I valued harmony more than I did the structural integrity of the house, I was a tentative and apologetic worker: little comfort to the homeowner and little help to my colleagues.

There are a lot of Christians like that.

Call to Repentance

Ephesians 4:17, 22-24 (page 1821)

Call to Worship

Psalm 114 (page 953)

OT Reading

Deuteronomy 32:7-12 (page 323)

NT Reading

Ephesians 5:8-21 (page 1822)

Message

Out of the Darkness, Into the Light

1 Peter 2:9 (page 1888)