Being The Church
Romans 12: 1-2 “And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.” – NLT
It was Pastor Todd Doxzon of Love Church in Omaha Nebraska that caught my attention. I was listening to him on a podcast a few months ago and the way that he laid out the vision for his church struck me. There were different pieces of the puzzle that he was putting together for me and as I went to their church website I realized what our church needed to do, what we needed to embrace, and what we should look like to each other and our community.
From everything that I have been learning and reading, I came up with the 5 S Method for being the church. The identity of the church from Acts 2 was one of family and community. They not only participated in this life with each other, they existed to help and serve each other, all while praying together and learning the disciples teaching together. The 5 S Method for me came from Romans 12. There are several different passages that I will translate all month long as we focus on these five Ss during the month and use this as our theme for the year.
Surrender from Romans 12: 1-2. How can we look different and live a life that does not look like the world? Surrounded from Romans 12: 9-10. The people we surround ourselves with are imperative to our spiritual growth. Spirit-Led from Romans 12: 13-18. We must allow our church to be led by the Holy Spirit. Self-Fed from Romans 12: 19-21. We must learn to feed ourselves from the table of God’s Word. Sent from Romans 12: 36-40. An active thriving and growing church is one that is sent into our community.
My prayer is that 2023 will see us make sustainable change, independently as well as corporately, for a better future for our church.
– Pastor Mike
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