Sunday, January 28, 2007
19 Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. 21 In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. 22 And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit. (from Ephesians 2, NIV)Today was a big day for our church family, one I tauted as a day where we'd reveal our theme for 2007 (yes, I know I'm a few weeks slow, but I have my reasons). This year, the Ocean Springs Church of Christ is going to focus efforts on being CONNECTED to one another.
I took a big chance this morning in combining ALL of our classes for a special class after the morning worship assembly (the big chance was with all the kids who LOVE to go to class as well as with all the parents who LOVE for their kids to go off to class). Both my sermon and the special class focused on the text above from Ephesians, but during the class we actually built a church from these verses!
We began with Jesus as the cornerstone (box), and next to Jesus we formed a foundation of the apostles and prophets. Then, everyone who is a part of our church community, from the youngest to the oldest, built on this foundation by adding his or her box. On our individual boxes, we wrote our name and the gift we bring to our church community (for example, I put "teaching" as my gift to offer). After everyone had labeled & decorated their boxes, everyone came up one at a time, spoke their name & gift into the microphone, and then placed their box on to our "building" (which you can see in the picture above behind Rebekah & Brynn).
I tried to establish the point that every brick is important in a building; thus, every person and his/her gift is vital to our church community's well-being. And I hope that this lesson - and the fact that it will continually stand before us this year - will be a memorable way of reminding us of this particular vision.
I wish I could say this was an original idea. Instead, I read about the idea in one of Marva Dawn's lectures, but I immediately fell in love with it's match to our church family's needs in 2007. We desperately need to be CONNECTED.
It is interesting to consider what lies before us in 2007: There are members of our family that weren't here this morning - we need to add them to our building. There are new folks who will become a part of our church family this year - they will be added to our building. There are babies yet to be born that will be added to our church community this year - they will be added to our building. On the other hand, there will be those of us who will move away this year - their boxes will be removed, autographed by all of us, along with our sad good-byes. There will probably be others who, for whatever reason will choose to distance themselves from our church community - sadly, their boxes will need to be removed, too. And given the track record from the eight years I have been a part of this family, I suspect there will be a few who will not live to see 2008 - I will most probably be carrying a box or two to a eulogy this year.
2007 will be an interesting year, I'm sure. But I fervently hope it will be a year where the Ocean Springs Church of Christ will see itself more "connected" to one another than ever before.
I think it's a really neat and clever idea. One that only folks like you can make happen.
Thanks for sharing. I was looking forward to seeing what all the boxes were about. GREAT idea!
Hope it works out there!!!!
I definitely plan to keep constructing (and deconstructing) our wall, and it seems everyone caught the vision of the possibility of adding so many boxes that we have to come up with a new plan!
I want it to become a familiar part of who we are & a way of incorporating more tangibly new folks into our family.
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