TO OBEY GOD IS LIFE

Last Sunday at the Vineyard we had an amazing Baptism Celebration with up to 25 adults and young people being baptised! The sense was, that the Kingdom had broke in and the cool part was people being born again into the Kingdom.

What was it that triggered this great morning with 11 people signed up to be baptised and then 14 spontaneous baptisms and 2 people coming to faith. There was a great sense of God among us and a sense of expectation; experiencing the Holy Spirit leads to greater expectation.

Through my talk to introduce baptism and through the stories we heard, was one common theme. There was no hype or feeling of high emotions as people told their stories what was evident was the central theme; Obedience

Two Assumptions and Three Assignments (Gen 1-3)

At the creation of humankind, two things are assumed about the man and the woman in the text. The first is that God was in an intimate relationship with them. The text tells us that God had planted a garden east of a land called “Eden,” which would be fed by the waters that flowed from that land. God set Adam in Eden to serve God and protect creation. Adam walked intimately with God. God walked freely with him in the garden (with nothing in-between them).

The second assumption is that humankind, created as male and female, were equally as intimate. The text says that they were “naked and not ashamed,” metaphors for Intimacy. On the basis of these two assumptions, the man and the woman are given three more assignments.

The assumptions: The sovereign, omnipotent Creator had created humankind to walk intimately with him and with one another.

The assignments: On the foundation of those two assumptions, human beings were given three assignments by God: to multiply the image of God through the bearing of children, fill the earth with that image and rule the earth as God’s ambassadors.

The stipulation: The only stipulation God placed on the man and the woman was that they were to obey him. The specific test of their obedience was that they not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. As is seen in the narrative with the serpent, this obedience was based in faith, faith that God’s Word was true and God’s character was trustworthy. The honour of God’s very Name (to use Exodus language) was at stake.

The reward for obedience: While no specific reward is described or explained in the text, you could assume that it would be the fulfilment of all that God had purposed. This could be seen as the outcome of being able to eat from the tree of life as often as they wished. To obey God is life.

The consequences of disobedience: If the man and the woman ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, God told them that they would surely die.

John Wimber used to say that ‘We want to grow up before we grow old’. The way that we measure maturity is the length of time it takes you to obey. How quick we can give our yes to what the father is doing is a sign of how mature we are. God is showing up in the Vineyard, we are seeing teenagers come to faith, our family support worker is seeing favour and openness as she steps out and offers prayer. We are hearing God speak through the prophetic/words of knowledge on Sunday celebrations, seems to be more clarity and people are responding.

“Our job like experienced surfers is to recognize a wave of God’s spirit and to ride it. It is not our responsibility to make waves but to recognize how God is working in the world and endeavour to join Him”. Rick Warren.

What can we learn from Sunday?

When we step out in obedience God favours us with his presence and the Kingdom is ushered in. Our job is to obey, risk (step out in faith) and see what God does.

We need to be aware of the manifest presence of God among us and respond. This is not just about Sunday mornings but our Monday to Sunday.

What does the manifest presence of God look like and how do you respond. How long does it take you to respond to the Spirits promptings?

Let’s catch the wave!

Vineyard Essential - Generosity

When I came into the Vineyard 11 years ago it was like I had come home. I loved the intimacy in the worship, loved how the talks/sermons were practical and applicable to everyday living, I grew up on a diet of deep teaching, you know, the deep as in you don’t have to do anything with it. I loved that The Church had a heart for the poor, that everyone gets to play and through all this and more there was this thread often not spoken about but demonstrated big time called generosity. I was impressed by how generous they were and if I'm honest my mind was sometimes offended, which really said more about my heart.

Generosity is a Vineyard Essential, it’s a vital ingredient to Kingdom living. The most important thing we can do in our lifetime is to bring the kingdom of God to earth; your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Matt 6:10 (NIV). One of the ways we usher in the kingdom is through generosity I'm convinced the greatest evangelism in our culture is ridiculous, outrageous generosity. I often hear people say we need to get back to the first century church, well take a look at how they viewed their stuff and money.

All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them all. There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need. Acts 4:32-35 (NIV)

Church, you and I are simply signposts pointing to the King and His Kingdom; The Kingdom calls us to live generously, love generously; I think it leads to emotionally tough questions, questions like what do we do with what God has given us? As followers of Christ shouldn't we have a very different approach to your lives? The reality of the Kingdom is that we not called to be consumers, the essential core as followers of Jesus is that we are to be sowers and investors.”

This isn't going happen overnight this is a radical renewing of the mind, living right side up in an upside down world. The only way we can do this is to be intentional, taking the risk of investing—sowing. I'd encourage you to begin the journey of using your stuff & money to usher in the Kingdom and see how remarkably free your life becomes.

Why shouldn’t I consume everything right now? If you have used your stuff, opportunities and money to signpost the Kingdom then the reality is that someday on the other side of this dust ball of a planet called earth people will welcome you, people that you might never lock eyes with on this side. In the Vineyard we really believe that everybody spends their forever somewhere. If you get this you will see money matters because people matter. Use your opportunity, your time and money and make friends who will greet you someday on the other side.

This is not about tithing, it's about surrender. The only time that someone turns down Jesus' call to come follow is when it was connected with money and the heart. Generosity is not the exception to the rule but the essential to living the Kingdom life. There is no joy in consumption, there isn’t much value in collection but there is incredible joy when you catch this and view money through this lens that it’s a tool that can change lives.

Crash 2010

For the last three years, on the second week of August we serve our communities through an event called CRASH. We kicked it off in August 07 with about 20 people committed to serve for a week, thinking back on it now, these guys really worked hard. it wasn't pick a project or choose a place to serve according to your gifting and passion, it was all hands on deck, everyone did a kids club each day, everyone hit the streets and housing areas to give away free stuff. In the evening we would sit in the Vineyard telling stories of what God was doing and imagining what would happen if we created a servant culture within Vineyard Church Dungannon, what would that look like, what impact would it have?

I'd love to explain why we do CRASH each year from a conversation we had during that first CRASH in August 2007. It was a Thursday evening and about eight of us set around two sofa's and a coffee table in the corner of where we do Church and began a conversation:

We always thank God for all of you, mentioning you in our prayers. We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labour prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. For we know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you, because our gospel came to you not simply with words, but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction. You know how we lived among you for your sake. You became imitators of us and of the Lord; in spite of severe suffering, you welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit. And so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. The Lord's message rang out from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia—your faith in God has become known everywhere. Therefore we do not need to say anything about it, for they themselves report what kind of reception you gave us. They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead—Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.

1 Thess 1: 2 - 10

Lord's message rang out from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia—your faith in God has become known everywhere. Therefore we do not need to say anything about it..What is so exciting that it rings out into our community? We began to tell stories of what God was doing when we walked among our community but we also began to dream and paint stories of what could be, dreams exciting enough that the Message of the Kingdom would spread like God gossip from town to town, village to village, street to street. Here at Vineyard Church Dungannon we are still asking the question, exploring possibilities and serving opportunities; is there something exciting that rings out into our community that points to God?

Paul tells us this Church saw people who followed pagan gods become passionate followers of Christ. He describes them as the model Church so what was their program and what was their struture like? They had none, I've discoverd that we program what we don’t have in our culture, and as for the structure there was none but there is belief, a heart, soul, conviction, ethos, passion.

We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labour prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Never has the Church today been better resourced, trained, deveolped, skill and informed and with all this we have embraced all sorts of ideas, implimented programs and written many, many books and enrolled in trainging and equipping events but what if we are ignoring what we need and more importantly what society around us groans for; a people who live by faith who are known by love and are givers of hope. Sounds very simplistic when you read but hey so does reading your bible and praying to grow in God.

On Sunday the 8th August we launch our fourth CRASH, this year we have over a hundred people crashing forward with faith, hope and love to see God's message ring out not only in Dungannon but throughout Ireland and beyond. We have our kids club every morning (you get to choose that one now) we paint homes, garden, giveaway free stuff, wash cars(FREE), pray for people on the streets, each evening we have a youth event from 8 - 10pm. Its all happening this year and it happens when a small group of people devote themselves, throw the servant towel over their arms and GO.