The Cross for the World
I just returned from a trip to our nation’s capital, and I came away with a greater respect for our founders and the ideals that they wanted us to live out. Here are some of those ideals as spelled out in the Declaration of Independence:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Our founders put it all on the line for a set of ideals which they may not have lived to see come to pass. They knew that to prepare the way for these ideals would cost them everything, not just in money, but in honor and in their very lives. Here is the way they said it:
“And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”
In Washington D.C., we encountered stories of sacrifice, honor, hardship and courage for the sake of an idea - an ideal from which we have benefited. I was amazed at the utter selflessness with which our ancestors endured all kinds of hardships to give us what we so often take for granted.
What if we approached the kingdom of God and indeed even our local congregation with that same kind of sacrifice? What if the Great Commission and the Great Commandment so captured our hearts that we would, “mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor”?
If that happened, I think we would see a picture of a New Testament Church! Instead, what we usually see is a consumer driven church where the comfort and entertainment of current members are paramount.
How different that is from the life Jesus modeled and the life Jesus called us to live. Notice the admonition Jesus gave those who aspired to follow him:
“Then he said to them all, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it. What does it profit them if they gain the whole world, but lose or forfeit themselves?’”
I still see that kind of living, though it is rare. I see people who serve the poor and our youth and children out of a true sense of calling. I see people give, not out of compulsion, but because it is part of living as a disciple. I see people teach children, youth, and adults because they want to pass the faith along to others. I see people serving on committees and teams doing work behind the scenes for the sake of the ministry of the church.
These acts of service and sacrifice are necessary for the church to move forward. It reminds that just as Jesus suffered and died to inaugurate the kingdom, you and I will need to suffer and die to implement it. As N.T. Wright succinctly reminds us, “Love will always suffer.” If we love God, the church, children, the poor, the lost we will suffer for their sake.
It is time to see the ideals of the kingdom implemented. It is time to suffer and work so others can know the God we love and serve.
Blessings,
Alan
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Alan Cassady serves as Senior Pastor at Navarre UMC, and has been at the church since 2011. When he's not preaching and teaching, he enjoys sci-fi movies and FSU Football. Read more about Alan here.
Why I Chose United Methodist and Itineracy
“So when the apostles were with Jesus, they kept asking him, ‘Lord, has the time come for you to free Israel and restore our kingdom?’
He replied, ‘The Father alone has the authority to set those dates and times, and they are not for you to know. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.’”
I went to seminary at Asbury Theological Seminary, which is not Methodist, but Wesleyan. United Methodists was the largest denomination present of the student population. I had classmates who were also from the Nazarene church, Salvation Army church, American Orthodox Church, Free Methodist Church, and many other Wesleyan traditions. One common question I got from people who weren't United Methodist was why I wanted to be an Elder in the United Methodist Church and be a part of the Itineracy system.
What is the Itineracy?
I'll start by explaining what the Itineracy system is. The Itineracy can be defined as:
“a distinctive pattern of deploying clergy for service in United Methodist congregations.”
In other words, it's our appointment system where Elders (or those of us who have accepted the vows to preach and serve the sacraments) are appointed to churches every year. The thing that is most commonly misstated is when a person's appointment is to a new church or charge, people say, "He/She was reappointed," when a person moves. That is true, but every pastor that year was reappointed.
You see, our Bishop appoints every pastor every year, whether it be to the church he/she is currently serving or to a different church. No matter what, the person is appointed. The language that is more accurate is that the pastor was appointed to a new church or moved.
Why Did I Choose this System?
For so many, when you look at the system from the outside, it seems stressful and it feels like there's no rhyme or reason to things. But, I love our system. The reason I love it is because our Bishop looks at every church in our conference and prays about where God is leading the conference as a whole and each individual church. Then, he asks God for direction in where pastors should be in the coming year. He then speaks to his District Superintendents (D.S.) about the churches and pastors in their districts and how they are all doing.
This system reminds me that my work in the local church is important, but it is also a part of something bigger. The vow I took at commissions is to go where God sends me, when he feels it is time. Our system relies on the lay persons in each church to help carry the spirit of the church through the years and to guide us.
Transition
Bishop Graves, our resident bishop, spoke these words in his message to our conference yesterday,
“I know for those moving and for those churches receiving a new pastor, this can be a stressful time. But instead of allowing the anxiety to overcome us, what would it look like to focus on the opportunity we have to live into God’s call for our personal ministry and for our churches? Change is always hard but it also presents a unique chance to start fresh and positively impact our local churches.”
You can watch all of Bishop Grave's message here. I'm praying for my future and your future. I'm praying that God will bless Navarre and bring forth new leaders through this time of change, helping the church stay strong. Ultimately, I'm praying for God's Kingdom on earth.
Blessings,
Faith
Faith Parry serves as our Associate Pastor, and has been at the church since 2015. When she's not preaching and teaching, she enjoys documentaries and TV. Read more about Faith here.
The Cross for Humanity
And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.
Because of the privilege and authority God has given me, I give each of you this warning: Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us.
Romans 12:1-3, NLT
Fish Love?
When Christ died, he died according to the scriptures, because of the love he had for us. He knew we couldn't love him unless he loved us first. God wanted a relationship with us and he knew that we couldn't ever properly learn how to worship him without first being able to learn how to love him with true love.
We love all the time though, right? Rabbi Abraham explains above that we love so that we can get something in return. God loves because he has created us, and has given a portion of himself to us. All God asks in return is that we love him back and worship him. But we have repaid him with worshiping other things life: ourselves, success, power, money, perfection, etc.
““Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?”
Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.””
This week, we are looking at how the revolution that Christ started when he died and rose from the dead has effected all of humanity. He has changed the world. I hope you'll join me as we join Christ in this Revolution. See you Sunday!
Blessings,
Faith
CLICK HERE for Faith Notes
Faith Parry serves as our Associate Pastor, and has been at the church since 2015. When she's not preaching and teaching, she enjoys documentaries and TV. Read more about Faith here.
We Hate Change
Change is Inevitable
Change is one of those things that is inevitable. People hating change is also inevitable. Sometimes I wonder how we can get through life without hating everything but then I remind myself that some people actually go through life hating everything. I try not to be that person, but I’m not always successful. I worked with a guy who loved to say growing things change. He wasn’t wrong, a tree that’s growing is going to change size and shape as it grows, but the snarky version of me that others rarely see would always think “dying things change too, and this change is going to kill us”.
Even trying to find some sort of constant is almost impossible. The ocean is in a constant state of motion, eroding shores, water levels rising, even the tides change all the time. Mountains are about as close as I can come to thinking as constant but given enough time earthquakes and rain will even change how the mountain looks. Everything changes whether we like it or not.
The Railroad
In the early 1900’s the transportation industry was ruled by trains. Railroad tycoons almost monopolized the whole industry and it looked like nothing was going to beat trains. That is until cars came along, and then a few years later planes took off (I couldn’t help myself there). The train industry hit it’s peak in 1916, and then slowly faded to a mere shadow of it’s former glory. New companies emerged like Ford and Boeing that revolutionized and changed the face of transportation in America.
What would have happened though if those original railroad companies would have remembered why they existed? Well, their business was to move people and products from point A to point B, but somewhere along the line they got in the business of running a railroad company. I might have lost you there, I know it sounds like the I just said the same thing but there is a fundamental difference between trying to move things from point A to point B and running a railroad company. The first one is what we would call the mission, the second one is what we would call the method. If the early railroad companies would have always tried to move things efficiently we would now have car and airline companies called Amtrak and Union Pacific because those modes of transportation are more effective in most situations. Instead, they did their absolute best to manage the railroad company that they had built. But with a decreasing demand for trains, increased regulations, they went from a $6.3 billion industry in 1929 to a $3.1 billion in 1932.
Church's Mission
The mission of the church has always been to go and make disciples. Sometimes in the midst of all the changes we try to cling or hold on to the ways that we have made disciples in the past. I remember open air tabernacle meetings and week long revivals. There were the campus crusades with the Billy Graham movement. In medieval times there were just crusades trying to make sure the Christian sites remained Christian and not Islamic. Now we have digital Bibles, we can watch youtube sermons and listen to podcasts, or even listen to our churches sermons online.
Our methods have changed a lot over the years. The people who are leading have changed. And at moments like this it is really easy to try to hold onto the past and do what we can to maintain our church. But unless we focus on the mission of the church, unless we continue to put our focus on making disciples, we are trying to run a business and not living out the Gospel. Change is hard. We don’t like change, but when you have an encounter with God you are forever changed and we want to see people’s lives changed. If we ask them to change everything to follow God, we have to start getting a little more comfortable with our own changes.
Nathan Persell serves as our Youth Director. When he's not leading devotions and playing basketball with teenagers, he enjoys disc golf and bike riding. Learn more about Nathan here.
Revolution
For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.
1 Corinthians 15:3–5 (NRSV)
This Sunday is Easter, or as I prefer to call it, Resurrection Sunday. Many people will flock to churches all over the world who have not been in church for quite some time. There is something special about the day that even entices nominal or cultural Christians to make an effort to attend.
If you are looking for the most important day to celebrate as a Christian, this would be it. Notice, that the Apostle Paul says that the fact Jesus’ resurrection is of “first importance,” and he is correct.
In the remaining verses of 1 Corinthians 15, Paul tells us why Jesus’ resurrection is of first importance; if it didn’t happen then our faith in Christ makes no sense. Without the resurrection, our faith is a fairy tale or worse a hoax.
In the opening verses of his letter to the Romans, the Apostle Paul says that Jesus was, “descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be Son of God with power… by resurrection from the dead” (Romans 1:2–4). Jesus’ resurrection was God’s stamp of approval on all that Jesus said and did.
The Resurrection
The resurrection also demonstrates that God did something important in Jesus’ death on the cross. By taking upon himself the penalty of the sin of the world, Jesus released us to be who God created us to be all along.
It is very significant that Jesus was crucified on Passover rather than the Day of Atonement. These two Jewish holy days are important, but for different reasons. The Day of Atonement emphasizes forgiveness; the Passover emphasizes the Jews’ release from slavery to be God’s ambassadors in the world.
Easter is about atonement in a sense, but it is more about freeing us from the bondage of sin so we can be God’s ambassadors in the world – that is the Revolution! On the cross, God inaugurated a plan for the rescue of the world and the establishment of the kingdom of God. The Revolution continues when we personally join in and become God’s co-workers in the restoration of the world.
Blessings,
Alan
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Alan Cassady serves as Senior Pastor at Navarre UMC, and has been at the church since 2011. When he's not preaching and teaching, he enjoys sci-fi movies and FSU Football. Read more about Alan here.