Why should our churches be different from all else around us? Because we are graced. If you believe that you are saved by grace, nothing about you that merits God’s favor, only His gift in Jesus, then grace is for all. You don’t own it. The institutional church doesn’t own it. God gives it freely. In my sermon for the “Multi-Ethnic Symposium” I spoke about the importance of our graced lives and churches being different from all else around us. From that sermon:
“Contrast the rhetoric of the last presidential election. In a national survey of over 10,000 educators, 90% of respondents said that the election had a negative impact upon their schools. “40 percent had witnessed episodes in which minorities and other marginalized students were targeted, intimidated or harassed” (New York Times, January 22, 2017, Sunday Styles, 8). Concordia Seminary intends to be a safe place where the Body of Christ puts out big arms, welcoming arms to all people. We strive to provide pastors and deaconesses and continuing education and other resources that help the church be different than anything else people experience in their communities and contemporary culture.
“God intends for our congregations to have a different kind of reputation from other groups, other organizations, other value systems in our world. May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.”
If this seminary, if your church disappeared tomorrow, would anyone in your community notice?
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