How To Protect Our Church
MESSAGE DISCLAIMER: Most of this message material was taken from a sermon Rick Warren (Saddleback Church) preached to his core leadership. This sermon fit right in with what our church is (was) going through at the time. I used the manuscript from his "Leadership Lifter" series.
I want to get very practical with all of you tonight. I want to talk about something that is very important to the heart of God and that is unity. Unity is absolutely essential to reach any kind of achievement. It’s needed in families. To have a happy family, you have to have unity there. It’s needed in business. Employees must learn to get along. It’s needed in government in order for the government to get anything done. Our government can be brought to a standstill whenever the different parties cannot get along. On a football team, players have to be unified in order to win and just putting guys in the same jersey doesn’t automatically make them a team as you very well know.
But especially in the church, there must be unity for God to be able to work and for the church to become all that God wants it to be.
When you join NCC (some of you will be doing that next week) you signed or will sign a membership covenant. One of the things you agree to is that you will protect your church by promoting unity. Unity is a key theme in the Bible. The Bible talks more about unity than it does heaven and hell. It is up to EVERY member to help protect the church’s unity. Churches are made up of people and believe it or not there are no perfect people. So people get into conflict with each other so we need to learn how to deal with it.
First of all let me talk to you about the importance of unity in the church.
1. Jesus prayed for it. John 17:20-26
The world will be won to Christ when the church is one. It is key to reaching the unchurched.
2. Remember, the church is a fellowship. Fellowship is not something we do but something we are. Acts 2:42 (PH) “They continued steadily learning the teachings of the apostles and joined in the fellowship.” Since the church is a fellowship if you destroy the unity and harmony of the church you destroy the church.
3. We are commanded to make unity the top priority. Ephesians 4:3 “Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bonds of peace.” One of your primary jobs as a member of this church is not only to be involved in ministry but also promote peace. Whatever it takes!
4. Any attitude that causes disunity is sin. We need to make sure we are regularly checking our attitudes.
5. Unity is a witness to the world. John 13:34-35 “Jesus said, ‘By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, that you love one another.” When a church loves each other there is unity and harmony. Visitors will walk into the service and say “There’s something going on in here that I want.”
Bill Hybels, the pastor of Willow Creek Community Church just outside of Chicago makes this statement. “If you create a loving community, first time seekers will sniff it and say “I want in.” (www.sermoncentral.com)
The neat thing is that we don’t all have to be alike to maintain unity. We can be from different backgrounds ethnically, vocationally, and still walk arm and arm. We don’t have to all come out of the same mold. What draws us together is our common love for Jesus Christ. I thought it was so cool when months ago we had someone visit our church with spiked purple hair! We want people to come tattoos and all!
6. God blesses the unified church. Acts 2:46-47 “They had all things in common..they were all of one heart…one accord..And so the Lord added daily to the church.” God can help but bless a unified church. God is looking for warm fellowships to place new Christians where they can be nurtured. I am glad God has chosen NCC to be one of those places. I want to continue to see that happen. You cannot stop a unified church. God will be able to do so much with us.
I’ve gone through that fairly quickly because that doesn’t apply to you. It applies to me and the other elders and staff. We need you to pray for us.
Now I want to spend most of the time on what YOU are supposed to do.
First of all Scripture identifies at least 7 reasons why people leave the church.
1. Some people leave because of illness. In a church of any size there will be people who will get sick and will not be able to come to church. We need to be ready as a church to take the church to them. Matthew 25 Jesus says, “I was sick and you visited me.” We need to be ready to do that.
2. Some people leave because of job transfers. In Acts 18:1-3 we see that tent makers by the name of Priscilla and Aquila had to leave. In fact their moving around (their job transfer) led them to plant three different churches. People come and go all the time. One out of seven people changes jobs annually. Theoretically we could have 100% turnover rate in our church if people moved out. The church loses on average 15-25% of membership every year. What does that mean? We have to reach at least that many people each year just to keep up. This is a reality we have to live with. It breaks my heart to see families like the Shifletts go. But it’s the nature of the beast.
3. A third reason people leave is fear of accountability. Some people hop from church to church because they are afraid of having to be held accountable for their lifestyle. People like that love to attend large churches to hide.
4. A fourth reason is worldliness. People leave the church because of personal worldliness. Another name for this is “backslide.” It’s a very common reason.
5. Divisiveness. People leave the church when they disagree on different things. We can’t expect people to have 100% agreement in the church. It’s silly to expect that. Churches have actually split over deciding the color of the carpet for their building! Even great Christians like Paul and Barnabas disagreed. We can walk arm and arm with each other without seeing eye to eye. We don’t have to agree on everything. Romans 16:17 says “I urge you bretheren note those who cause division and offenses contrary to the doctrine which you learned and avoid them. For those who are such do not serve our Lord Jesus Christ but by smooth words and flattering speech deceive the hearts of the simple.” Satan will use whatever means he can to break up the church. We need to be ready.
6. Another reason is unresolved personal conflict. This could very well be the number one reason why a lot of people leave the church. They just don’t get along with somebody. Now, let me ask you something. In your family do you have problems? Disagreements? Yes you do. Since the church is a family WE WILL HAVE DISAGREEMENTS AND PROBLEMS. Sometimes Amanda and I strongly disagree with each other. But I am committed to her. It’s not going to lead to a divorce. I think people need to learn how to handle conflict without getting a divorce. Too many people want to divorce their church. It’s the easier thing to do. But they go to another church and find out it’s not perfect either. You’re never going to find the perfect church!
7. The happiest reason people leave the church is when they’re sent out to minister. It’s a great reason. Every church should be sending people all over the world spreading the gospel. The church shouldn’t be judged by how many people are sitting in the seats but by how many we are sending out.
TRANSITION: Keeping these things in mind, now let’s look at five ways to maintain unity in the church, what you can do as a member and leader here at NCC.
1. Maintain an attitude of acceptance
Romans 14 is a classic passage on accepting other believers in the family of God. Verse 1 says “Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters.” I would encourage you to read this entire chapter. What you will find as you read that is Paul is saying
* Don’t major on the minors. We need to accept people where they are and not where we want them to be. We don’t insist that everybody agree on every minor detail. There will always be “disputable” matters so we need to maintain an attitude of acceptance. Aren’t you glad we’re not all alike? God loves variety. So, we can agree to disagree on some issues. If it is an essential matter then we will need to come up with a resolution.
2. Focus on our common purpose together as a church
1 Corinthians 1:10 (Living Bible) “Let there be real harmony among you so there won’t be any split in the church. I plead with you to be of one mind united in thought and purpose.” That is what it is to produce unity in the church-a common purpose. That’s why we want every prospective member to go through our Class 101. We want you to know up front where we are headed as a church. We have a common purpose. We are intentionally trying to reach the lost in our community. But we are doing it in a different way than a lot of other churches are in this community. From the kind of music we play to the kinds of things I preach on…it’s all because of our purpose. We need to understand too that our church is not going to be for everyone. But we are committed to helping whoever we reach find some Bible believing church to belong to even if it is not ours.
3. Control your tongue
Refuse to gossip. You want to know how to cause major problems in a church (or family)? Gossip. It’s like an uncontrollable wildfire. So, when someone comes to you you need to have in the back of your mind a filter, a grid, and when someone shares something with you you need to judge it real quick and say, “Is this a legitimate concern? If it is, who do I direct them to? And if it is gossip just say, “Stop.” I’m not going to listen to that. The Bible says gossip is sin and when you listen to it you become partner in it. Ephesians 4:29 says, “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth but only what is helpful for building up others according to their needs.”
What is gossip? Gossip is when you’re sharing a problem or criticism with someone who is neither part of the problem or part of the solution. The Bible says that you and I need to control our tongues. It’s a mark of real maturity. A gossip is purely immature.
4. Support the Pastors and leaders
Hebrews 13:17 “Obey your leaders and submit to their authority. They keep watch over you as men who must give an account. Obey them so that their work will be a joy not a burden for that would be no advantage to you.” This verse is a very scary verse for me. Not the obey leaders part but the part that says I will be held accountable for you. I will stand before God one day and give an account for how I watched over your souls. The other leaders of this church are going to be accountable for the direction of this church.
With accountability comes authority. God has given some authority to pastors and leaders to make decisions, to lead the direction of the church. But with the authority comes the accountability one day. I covet your prayers. The other elders, pastors and leaders covet your prayers. If you are leading a ministry you are going to be held accountable.
5. Practice God’s Method of Conflict Resolution
Matthew 18:15 gives us the proper procedure in handling conflict. You need to know where this passage is. As a matter of fact you need to memorize these verses. God has a way he wants us to handle conflict. “If your brother sins against you, go and show him his faults just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you’ve won your brother over. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along so that every matter may be established by the testimony of tow or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or tax collector.” Sometimes people will come to me or maybe people have come to you and say, “I have a problem with ___.” You and I need to say, “have you talked to them.” “I will be happy to talk to you after you’ve talked to them first.” We need to learn to go directly to the person we have a problem with. If that doesn’t work take one or two others along. If they still don’t repent then we bring it up to the entire congregation. After that doesn’t work we treat him as an unchurched person. How do you treat an unchurched person? You love them!!!! But they shouldn’t have membership responsibilities. They’ll need to be in the word.
I realize that I have gone through an awful lot of information. But this is very important stuff for us to get a handle on as a church. It’s not a matter of if problems happen but when. When they do come we need to be ready to respond in a Christ-like manner. As we close tonight I am asking that we commit to doing whatever it takes to maintain unity in our fellowship.
Conclusion idea(s): Close with reviewing your church membership covenant and or close with celebrating the Lord’s Supper. We did both at the conclusion of this message and it was very powerful.
