How can a small church make a difference?

How can a small church fulfill its obligation to help the poor when its resources of money and volunteers are limited?  An answer that is often not fully utilized is to partner with other local churches to pool resources.  First Baptist Church of Franklin has been a part of Mustard Seed Missions of Venango County since its founding in 2012, in part because it offers us a chance to make a difference in the lives of far more people than we could ever hope to achieve on our own.  In its first two years, Mustard Seed Missions, a non-denominational para-church ministry, has had over 280 clients referred to it by the Human Services Department of Venango County.  The only reason why this organization can hope to help so many is that it receives both funds and volunteers from dozens of churches throughout the county.  On our own, we can only help a few people, in cooperation with other Baptist churches, we could help a few more, but when we open our minds and hearts to the idea of working with any and every Christian Church in our midst, the work for the kingdom truly multiples beyond our expectations.  How can your church make a difference?  Step One: Stop thinking of it as your church and remember that it’s His Church, and so is the Methodist Church down the street, and the Catholic Church across town, and the Presbyterian Church outside of town…

Sermon Video: Athaliah chooses power over children - 2 Chronicles 22

How does someone who values human life, from conception until natural death, understand the thinking of someone who is convinced that abortion is an “act of love”?  In a new book called Pro, Katha Pollitt asserts that abortion is a social good for women, men, and children.  Where can we begin to unravel the thought process that leads to such a conclusion?

                In 2 Chronicles 22, the reign of Ahaziah, son of Jehoram, only lasts a year before he is killed alongside Ahab’s son Joram by the agent of God’s wrath against Israel’s wickedness, Jehu.  The kingdom of Judah has plummeted from its moral high-point under Jehoshaphat with the murderous reign of his son Jehoram and grandson Ahaziah.  Now, in the wake of Ahaziah’s death, his mother Athaliah (Ahab’s daughter) decides to take over the throne for herself and proceeds to attempt to wipe out any remaining descendants of David that had survived Jehoram’s killing of his six brothers and other relatives.  Even though God preserved Ahaziah for the sake of the line of David, it now appears that Athaliah will finish the job.  How can a woman turn against her own children and grandchildren and choose to murder them for the sake of power?  The darkness of the heart of mankind is a truly frightening thing when it destroys the natural bonds of love and protection that we expect from a parent and turns them instead into the total disregard for human life that Athaliah shows here.

                At this point in the story, modern man’s willingness to treat human life as expendable seems to be in keeping with our history, unfortunately.  When the children are about to be murdered, however, one of their aunts, Jehosheba, decides to risk her own life to act as she hides the year old Joash from Athaliah’s henchmen.  From that point on, Jehosheba and her husband Jehoida, a priest of the temple, hide the child for the next six years from Athaliah.  Where do they keep the only surviving heir of the line of David safe?  Within the temple of the LORD. 

                How do we as Christians respond to the threat against the innocent posed by abortion and euthanasia?  The political process cannot be our primary response, as it may never bear fruit and doesn’t help those vulnerable today.  We must commit ourselves, as a Church, to supporting the young pregnant girl, the exhausted parents of the special needs child, and the family wracked by end-of-life issues, we must offer concrete support to anyone we know in such a situation, and also support the organizations that are helping within our communities (such as ABC Life Center, here in Franklin) with our money, time, and prayer.

                We cannot understand how anyone could think of life as something to be discarded when inconvenient, but human history is full of examples of people doing just that.  We can, and must, do our utmost to protect the weak from those who, like Athaliah and Katha Pollitt, have decided that some lives don’t really matter.

To watch the video, click on the link below:

Sermon Video

Sermon Video: Jehoram abandons the LORD - 2 Chronicles 21

When the families of the pious king Jehoshaphat and the idolater Ahab came together in marriage, Jehoshaphat’s son Jehoram with Ahab’s daughter, the resulting union was disastrous for the kingdom of Judah.  Instead of following in his father’s God-honoring ways, Jehoram followed the path of Ahab, leading his own people away from the LORD and “prostituting” themselves with false gods.  In addition to his failures as a spiritual leader for his people, Jehoram also desecrated the good name of the house of David by murdering all six of his brothers and other relatives besides in order to secure his throne, a throne that had been given to him as the eldest as a matter of custom.

                How does a child of such a good man as Jehoshaphat end up being so wicked?  Such thoughts are deeply troubling to us, as we lack any real answer beyond falling back upon human freewill.  If not for the promise of God to David, a promise that could not be revoked because God is faithful even when his people are not, the house of David was not destroyed, even though the actions of Jehoram brought judgment upon himself, his family, and his people.  Jehoram was afflicted with a painful disease that killed him after two years, his sons and wives were captured by an invading army and killed, and his kingdom suffered from that invasion as well.  In the end, Jehoram died, “to nobody’s regret”, without the honor done to the previous six generations of his family that had ruled over Judah.

                The story of Jehoram is a cautionary tale, a tragedy that reminds us to never take for granted that our spiritual and moral values will be those of the next generation, each person must still decide for himself or herself to follow the LORD.  Also, Jehoram’s downfall reminds us of the true consequences of sin, something we perhaps take for granted as a people forgiven by God, but something we should not for the wages of sin are still death, even for those washed by the blood of the Lamb.  Lastly, we need to hold out hope for those who have lost their way, for people who have known the grace of God but walked from it, perhaps our continued prayers will be the vehicle through which God’s grace finally reaches them. 

To watch the video, click on the link below:

Sermon Video 

An article I wrote about Mustard Seed Missions

It was pretty cool to see ABCOPAD (our denominational region, American Baptist Churches of Pennsylvania and Delaware) feature an article I wrote about Mustard Seed Missions.  The newsletter goes out to a lot of churches, hopefully this will spur them on to take a chance on inter-church cooperative ministry and also look into what sort of church-government cooperative efforts might be available to help the poor in their area.  We've also recently had the joy of seeing a Mustard Seed inspired effort begin in neighboring Mercer County, and a new one about to start up in another neighboring county, Crawford.  God is good, his people can do awesome things for the kingdom when they work together.

ABCOPAD newsletter

When warnings go unheeded

“No marvel that hardened sinners are not frightened from sin and to repentance by the threatening of misery in another world, which is future and out of sight, when the certain prospect of misery in this world, the sinking of their estates and the ruin of their healths, will not restrain them from vicious courses.”  This is from Matthew Henry’s Bible commentary, the passage he’s commenting upon is 2 Chronicles 21 where King Jehoram is confronted by a letter from the prophet Elijah predicting woe to him personally and to his kingdom because of his exceedingly great wickedness (he murdered his six brothers).  Henry is correct to note that the consequences of sin are not wholly relegated to judgment after death, we see what choosing to embrace evil does to humanity day after day.  The truth that virtue is its own reward, and your sin fill find you, out is clear for anyone willing to look at it, but ignored by those whose hearts are unwilling to admit their error and seek God’s forgiveness.  This is clearly a flaw in our fallen human nature, something that we will always have to strive against, and the reason why Plato’s simply solution of educating everyone on right and wrong is insufficient to create a better world.  In Plato’s mind, “to know the good is to do the good”.  Sadly, as Henry correctly points out, there have always been people willing to ignore what they can plainly see.  As it always does, grace rescues humanity from itself when God intervenes, first through sending Christ to make the way possible, and now each time when he calls through the Spirit to break through our resistance and blindness.  The warning of future judgment is still necessary, and the pointing out of present consequences still appropriate, but we also need to remember that such things will not always be sufficient to turn the sinner from his/her self-destructive path; there but for the grace of God go I.