The great challenge for both churches and individuals is to live a life of faith. The Kingdom of God is
received by faith.
John Wimber, the founder of the Vineyard movement, often used to teach that faith is spelled R-I-S-K.
The great temptation facing churches, particularly if they've been around for a couple of decades, is the
same temptation facing middle-aged adults: to ease up, to resist change, to play it safe. In short,
middle-aged people and established "successful" churches shy away from "life on the edge."
If life were an Olympic sport, most churches and individuals would choose curling any day over ski
jumping or skeleton. All of us want to find a place in this world where we can rest on our laurels and not
have to risk. "There remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God" (Heb. 4:9), but it is not in this life!
In this world and in this life, we are required on many occasions to put a great deal at risk in order to
purchase the pearl of great price.
Here is the choice continually facing us as a church and as individuals: to play it safe and miss the
fullness of the Kingdom, or to place ourselves at risk (that is, to sacrifice current levels of comfort,
finances, relationships, etc.) in hopes of finding the Kingdom. As a pastor, I am continually struggling
to personally live a life of risk, and to lead a church of security and comfort-loving people into the
thrill of risk-taking. Throughout our history, God has called Vineyard Columbus to walk up to the top of
the ski jump and push off.
Here are some of the ways that we have been invited to risk so that we might experience God's Kingdom more fully:
About a decade ago, one of our leaders gave us a historic prophetic word that "God was going to require
this church to give away its best!" At the time, everyone nodded in agreement because giving away your best is
not particularly threatening in theory! It's only when God requires you to give away your best in practice that
it becomes frightening. Over the years, giving away our best has meant that we've sent some of our strongest
leaders out to plant churches around the world and around the state in order to extend the Kingdom-Andy and Kathy
Saperstein (Central Asia), Tom and Deanna Parkhurst (Central Asia), Rick and Lisa Evans (Cleveland), Mark and
Barb Tindall (Philadelphia), John and Margi Moriarty (Pickerington), Jay and Danielle Pathak (Denver), Tom and
Karen Pauquette (Grove City), as well as many other church planters and long-time friends and leaders. Now, Danny
and Penny Meyer, long-time pastors and dearly loved friends, are leaving to plant a church in Sunbury, Ohio.
At each point along the way, God has more than supplied for our loss. We have regularly discovered as a
church that you cannot out-give God and that Jesus' statement, "Give and it will be given to you, pressed down
overflowing into your lap" is literally true. But it is still scary and causes us pain and grief every time we
are asked to open our hands again and to give away our best.
For the last several years, God has spoken to me and to us about the need to be a more racially diverse
community. The reason for this is not because of some attempt to imitate a politically correct agenda. Rather,
the Kingdom of God demands not only the announcement of vertical and horizontal peace won for us at the cross of
Jesus Christ (Ephesians 2:13, 14), but also the modeling of racial reconciliation as a testimony and witness to
the principalities and powers (Ephesians 3:8-10).
Reconciliation-between the races, as well as between marrieds and singles, old and young, parents and
children, spouses who are at odds-proclaims to the principalities and powers the wisdom of God in planning the
cross of Jesus Christ. But reconciliation, especially racial reconciliation, is incredibly risky in our culture
and even in our church because it comes with a price tag! One cannot pretend that we are all the same or that we
all have the same preferences, likes and dislikes. But if someone else's preferences are going to be
accommodated, it may mean that I may have to sacrifice my own preferences.
This past week I preached about the effect of worship music on opening or closing the doors to increasing our
diversity. Now, I have no particular agenda regarding whether we change one song in a set, or introduce a new
instrument, or have a certain number of people of color participating on our worship teams. And I am deeply
committed to maintaining our historic value of non-performance, non-hype, and intimacy in worship. I love our
worship teams and have found Christ over and over again in our music.
But I had a most interesting response to that message. I received about thirty communications, oral and
written, from African-Americans, who unanimously appreciated my willingness as a white pastor to acknowledge
their presence in the congregation, and to be open to considering a few changes in our worship music.
I also received many positive and warm emails from white and Hispanic attenders (virtually everyone identified
themselves in their emails). But I also received two shockingly ignorant and profoundly racist emails. Indeed,
I could not believe that someone would actually send such outrageous comments to a pastor. Of course, these
emails did not include the person's full name.
In short, venturing out in America regarding the issue of race is risky business. It is easy to applaud
racial reconciliation in theory (as we did with giving away our best); it is much harder to embrace this in
practice, when it is going to require at least some level of change.
Risk-taking also involves welcoming and accommodating the work of the Holy Spirit in our midst. Entirely
predictable, completely controlled groups, seminars, and worship services are very much like Olympic curling - no
one is going to get hurt in the process. But welcoming the manifest presence of the Spirit and accommodating
healing, deliverance, prophecy, and tongues is always guaranteed to upset someone.
But this is the nature of life in the Kingdom. We cannot be good followers of Jesus and have everyone in the
world be happy with us all of the time. By its very nature, the Kingdom of God challenges and threatens us. And
yet, speaking to you from the deepest place of my being, there is nothing I want more in life than the fullness
of God's Kingdom. I want to be part of a church that has as much of God's reign and rule as he is willing to
give to a group of people. I pray for and long for it all: myriads of people being saved, churches planted
across the globe, people leaving secure careers and safe "middle class" existences to spend their lives on Jesus,
racial diversity, the power of the Spirit, the next generation being passionate for Jesus.
Are you a Kingdom person? Is your life's goal to see more of God's Kingdom? If it is, I invite you to join me at the top of the ski jump.
