Changing the World by Partnering With Jesus

One of the things that I love about the Vineyard is that we believe that it is possible to change the world. It is easy to become cynical, to believe that nothing ever changes. In many churches, hope for world change died generations ago.

I was recently reading my favorite theological journey, Sports Illustrated, in which Bono made this comment about the cyclist, Lance Armstrong: Most people don't believe that changing the world is possible. Lance is one of those people who not only believes world change is possible, but is doing something about it. [By the way, Lance Armstrong has made a commitment to raise over $1 billion for new cancer research. He is well on his way to achieving that targeted goal.]

Of course, we who are connected to the world changing power of Jesus Christ should be most hopeful about the possibilities for our future. We have also lived through a period in which the Christian church has led the way for massive social change. The Civil Rights movement was born in and sustained by the church (for a great book on the spiritual roots of the American Civil Rights movement, check out Charles Marsh's The Beloved Community). The fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of Soviet domination of Eastern Europe was largely a product of the efforts of Pope John Paul II and the Roman Catholic Church. It was from the church that the Filipino Revolution and the recent Orange Revolution in the Ukraine sprang.

But if we are going to partner with Jesus in changing our world, we have to understand the world we are living in. It says in 1 Chronicles 12.32a,

1Ch 12:32 from Issachar [came], men who understood the times and knew what Israel should do-

The men of Issachar apparently distinguished themselves from those around them by understanding the times in which they lived. Jesus rebuked the people in his day by telling them that they knew how to predict the weather, but they didn't know how to interpret their own time in Matthew 16.3b,

Mt 16:3 …You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.

How shall we interpret the times in which we are living? What is one of the major signs of our time?

If we are going to partner with Jesus for world change, our church has to fill the gap left by government cutbacks. The fact is, government at all levels has simply run out of money for social programs. Government deficits are a trend that will only increase over the next several decades. The national debt is growing by hundreds of billions of dollars every year. The amount of discretionary money available to the government is shrinking rapidly. In President Bush's most recent budget, the Pentagon is about the only winner. Most domestic programs have been cut back, or held absolutely flat. At the State level there have been enormous cuts in social services including money for the disabled, Medicaid and Medicare, and assistance for our schools.

What this means, is that churches like the Vineyard need to fill the gap that the government used to fill. Society's ship is sinking and there is an all-hands-on-deck alert that is sounding. This is a time to grab our buckets and start bailing.

Vineyard has an enormous opportunity to plug the huge social service hole through our Community Center. Almost every politician on the political right and the political left has been saying that non-governmental organizations are the wave of the future regarding social services. For example, public schools a decade ago, used to be indifferent at best and absolutely hostile at worst, toward the church because of the "wall of separation between church and state." But now, public schools are throwing their doors open to churches like ours. They are saying to us, "Come and help us anyway you can! If you want to tutor our kids, we will send them to you. If you want to teach ESL (English as a Second Language) to the parents of our children, we will help you advertise your programs. If you want to do a college day fair for our high school students, offer GED classes, provide recovery groups, do dance, music or art lessons for our students, we will advertise those things for you."

The Vineyard's posture towards our community is this: We want to be the best friend our community has ever had. We are not at war with the mayor's office, or the public school system. Rather, we want to come as servants and friends to be a blessing to the community around us.

Do you know that when we open our Community Center at then end of September 2006, we are going to have the only community center on the entire northeast side of Columbus, which is an area with a population of 400,000 people?

Small group leaders: Pray with your group about where your group can serve in the Community Center on a regular basis.

Church members: Seek the Lord regarding where you can volunteer in our Community Center to serve and befriend someone in need.

By building our Community Center, Vineyard Columbus has made a deliberate choice to reject cynicism and to choose to hope for world change. We are declaring with our gifts of money, and with our offer of time and service, to believe that world change is possible in partnership with Jesus Christ.

I would like to introduce Will Shearer, who has recently been hired as the Community Center's Executive Director. Will has been attending the Vineyard since the very beginning of 1999 and for most of that time has been particularly involved in small group leadership and cross-cultural missions. He is married to Noelle, who is a worship leader at Vineyard. Will and Noelle have been married for six years, and they have three children - Jude (4 1/2), Joella (almost 2), and Jordan (7 months -- Will and Noelle brought their adopted son Jordan home from Ethiopia at the end of April). A native of Marysville, Ohio, Will is currently a partner in the Columbus office of Baker & Hostetler, where he has been practicing business law since graduating from the University of North Carolina School of Law in 1994. He received bachelor's and master's degrees from Clemson University, where he was captain of the Varsity Golf Team. Will joins Kerry Davis, who is the Pastoral Director, in leading our Community Center.