Church on the MOVE – Creative
Sycamore Creek Church
September 16, 2012
Guest Preacher: Mark Aupperlee
John 1:14-18 , John 3:16-18
Good morning! My name is Mark, and I’m a volunteer here at Sycamore Creek Church. I started attending at Sycamore Creek a little over six years ago, and pretty quickly I got involved with volunteering here by helping with set up in the morning. Actually, I’m still on a set up crew. Join me on the first Sunday of each month. It only takes about 45 minutes. After a while, I also got involved in a small group. Then I became a member of our church. Then I started leading a small group. Then I became a leader of all the small groups and joined the leadership of the church. Then I started giving messages on Sunday mornings! Phew. It’s been quite a journey. I would love to tell you that all those things have been easy, but it hasn’t been easy and it’s still not easy. It’s at times very hard. This summer, in the midst of a time when things were difficult, I asked myself, “Why? Why am I doing this? It’s hard!!”
In that moment of crisis I realized with incredible clarity that the reason I participate, volunteer, and lead in our church has to do with the type of Jesus-following community we’re trying to be. The type of culture we’re working to create. I’ve encountered, experienced, and grown in my relationship with God in incredible ways through Sycamore Creek Church . . . and I want to be a part of offering that to others. I want other people to be blessed through this church, through the community we’ve created, the way I have. I am firmly committed to the church that we are, and the church we can be: Curious, Creative, Compassionate. I am committed to the difficult work of continuing to be part of a creative community.
I define creativity as three things: “to imagine, experiment and make things happen.”
Living this out is difficult. Trying new things and being willing to hold loosely to the way things are is work. We tend to want the familiar, the same, the comfortable. You’ll notice comfortable isn’t one of the three words we think characterizes our church. As people, we will drift toward “the way we do things” because it’s the “way we’ve always done it,” and we’ll drift toward routine and ritual. Those things are comfortable. Trying new things, being creative isn’t. And in the midst of being creative, that experimenting part of creativity, some of our new things won’t work. Being creative is a willingness to fail. As a church, we believe we are “creative in all we do.” We imagine, we experiment, and we make things happen. This morning I’ll explore the basis for that and how we’re doing it.
When I was in high school I was not very creative, especially when it came to girls. I was an awkward high schooler with no idea what I was doing with girls. I didn’t know how to be creative. I had imagination! I did make some attempts to try different approaches, to experiment to “make things happen,” but it never worked out too well. My senior year I met and started hanging out with this wonderful girl. Her name was Jana. I really liked Jana, but I had no idea what to do about it. Well, then one night at a basketball game we got asked by a friend if we were dating. Oh boy. Here was a chance for creative thinking. I could work this to my advantage! Or not. Being the wimp I was, I asked Jana afterward, “What did you think of what our friend asked about us dating?” (That was a relationship punt!) Well, thankfully Jana had more creativity than I did and more guts. She fielded my punt and creatively gave the ball back to me. She experimented and said, “I’m interested if you’re interested.” On the outside, I was calm and cool in the face of that phrase and I responded, “I’m interested. Let’s date!” On the inside I was doing a celebratory dance! (I won’t subject you to my bad dancing . . . picture good dancing in your mind.) “I’m interested if you’re interested.” I can’t tell you how much I love that phrase!! Jana essentially said to me, “I’m interested, are you?” She made the first move and I just had to respond.
That story connects with me because it’s the beginning of an important relationship for me. It’s part of the love story in my life. My guess is that in some way it plucks at each one of you. It may make you smile. It may bring up memories for you. It may bring up longings. That’s because within each of us is a desire for love. It’s a desire that leads us into romantic relationships. It’s a desire that draws together families. It’s a desire that drives friendships. And it’s a wonderful desire. But it’s one that keeps us hunting. We never quite get enough from those relationships. Those relationships always are messy. There is always this feeling that there must be something more.
That’s because there is.
The Bible tells us that in the beginning we were created to be in a relationship with God. And in the beginning we were in that relationship. Then Adam and Eve, the first humans, made a move away from God in disobedience and distrust and the relationship was broken. It’s a decision that was made then and echoes still today as we make that choice ourselves. Throughout the first part of the Bible, the Old Testament, God reaches out to people. He cultivates a relationship with a person, Abraham, that develops into a people, Israel. And those people continually disappoint him. God works through judges, kings, and prophets, continually trying to woo people back to him. The problem is, none of it really works. There continues to be this broken relationship with God that leaves people without true life. There continues to be something missing.
Then in the New Testament God completely changes everything. Let’s read about it in John 1.
Two quick things before we talk more about this Scripture. First, a quick clarification about some of the language. John loves this “word.” Word! What or who is Word? . . . Jesus! John also loves his “light.” What or who is light? . . . Jesus!
Second, a lot of you may have read or heard this scripture before. Don’t shut down on me and presume you know what I’m going to talk about. Allow yourself to have fresh ears and a fresh mind.
The Word was first,
the Word present to God,
God present to the Word.
The Word was God,
in readiness for God from day one. Everything was created through him;
nothing—not one thing!—
came into being without him.
What came into existence was Life,
and the Life was Light to live by.
The Life-Light blazed out of the darkness;
the darkness couldn’t put it out.
There once was a man, his name John, sent by God to point out the way to the Life-Light. He came to show everyone where to look, who to believe in. John was not himself the Light; he was there to show the way to the Light.
The Word became flesh and blood,
and moved into the neighborhood.
We saw the glory with our own eyes,
the one-of-a-kind glory,
like Father, like Son,
Generous inside and out,
true from start to finish.
John pointed him out and called, “This is the One! The One I told you was coming after me but in fact was ahead of me. He has always been ahead of me, has always had the first word.”
We all live off his generous bounty,
gift after gift after gift.
We got the basics from Moses,
and then this exuberant giving and receiving,
This endless knowing and understanding—
all this came through Jesus, the Messiah.
No one has ever seen God,
not so much as a glimpse.
This one-of-a-kind God-Expression,
who exists at the very heart of the Father,
has made him plain as day.
John 1:18, 14-18 (The Message)
There are two things we learn about creativity from this story. First, that creativity is rooted in the past, the familiar. John starts his book the same way Genesis starts, “In the beginning.” He uses the roots of the past, imagery that the people of his day would have been very familiar with. They’ve heard about God as creator. They know the story of God’s relationship with people. John weaves in these familiar elements of creator and the relationship with God and goes on to talk about Moses and the law. John draws on the familiar, the known, to bring out a radical new truth.
We live in an often rootless culture, in that everything is about right now. We don’t always appreciate the past and the roots it can provide. If you wanted to tell someone what it means to be an American, what would you do? You can start with what’s currently happening, but at some point you’d need to build upon our past. You’d at least go back to tell about how we got our independence. You’d tell about how we were formed as a nation and about the threats our nation has faced, the wars we’ve fought, the disagreements and injustices we’ve endured, and then you’d build to the present and the future. In order to talk about the new truth of what it means to be an American, you need to acknowledge our roots, our past. John taps into this to start his book. He uses the familiar, the roots of who the people are and the past they know, to introduce a radical new truth.
The second thing from John 1 is that we are introduced to a radical new truth. What’s that radical new truth? That God became one of us!! As verse 14 says, he moved into the neighborhood!! Wow! This is like no other God, ever. This should blow our minds! This is CREATIVE!! The God who is CREATOR, who created creativity, became one of us. He brought His love to us. He didn’t just wait for us to come to Him, but He made the first move on our behalf. Look at other world religions and there is no other God like this. This is the only God who became a person and sacrificed and humbled Himself on our behalf.
From our perspective, this seems unimaginable, doesn’t it? To become a baby! A tiny, needy baby! To live as one of us! To DIE for us! To offer us unconditional love and grace! Sending Jesus to the world is sometimes called the New Testament gamble because it is so creative, so different than any other religion or God, and it seems crazy. At times this whole concept is so crazy, so mind-blowing that we gloss over it and put it into a neat little box. It’s so hard to get our heads wrapped around the mystery of it, that we don’t fully appreciate it.
This mystery, this incredible thing of God becoming one of us, why did He do that? What was the reason?
This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn’t go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person’s failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him.
John 3:16-18 (The Message)
God is essentially saying to each of us: “I’m interested, are you?” He makes the first move on our behalf to make the relationship right, so that we might have whole and lasting life. We’re living in brokenness and God offers us a way out.
So, there are two things or ideas we get from these passages:
- The new always is rooted in the past.
- The God of creativity loves us in unimaginable ways.
All too often, this message of God’s love for us doesn’t reach us. We might get it up here, we might know the words, we might even be able to talk about it, but we don’t KNOW it to be true.
I’ve given you words and some thoughts that engage your mind. We’ve heard this too many times though. That second point is often words on a screen, a speaker talking, or words on a page. We may be able to repeat them and know them, but we don’t really experience those words to be part of our reality. I have a video that I hope will help us experience what unimaginable love is. In this video there is a dad who loves his son in unimaginable ways.
Here’s an introduction to what you’re about to watch:
“A son asked his father, ‘Dad, will you take part in a marathon with me?’ The father, despite having a heart condition, said ‘Yes’. They went on to complete the marathon together. Father and son went on to join other marathons, the father always saying ‘Yes’ to his son’s request of going through the race together.
One day, the son asked his father, ‘Dad, let’s join the Ironman together.’ To which, his father said ‘Yes’ too.
For those who don’t know, the IRONMAN is the toughest triathlon ever. It takes place in Hawaii. The race encompasses three endurance events of a 2.4 mile ocean swim, followed by a 112 mile bike ride, and ending with a 26.2 mile marathon along the coast of the Big Island. Father and son went on to complete the race together.”
The son in that video was born with cerebral palsy. When his dad runs and swims and bikes with him, the son feels normal. What a gift from that father! It should remind you of the gift you’ve been given. The gift of Jesus Christ that allows you to be whole again and to have a restored relationship with God. Through Jesus Christ God says to us, “I’m interested, are you?”
At SCC we know that love of God and God’s love is the foundation for who we are as a church: Curious, creative, and compassionate. We know God’s love and we seek to share it with the world. We use this word creative because it not only reflects who we are and who we are trying to be, but it also reflects the God whose love we trust in ourselves and share with others.
I’ve been building toward this main point: At Sycamore Creek Church we are creative in all we do because God was creative first. Ultimately, God’s creativity, His creation, is about us being in a right relationship with Him. Creativity reflects our creator. But honestly, being creative as a church doesn’t matter at all, it’s not even worth doing, if it doesn’t point us as a church and others outside the church toward God. We can’t separate creativity from the creator.
How are we doing that at SCC? How are we sharing creatively God’s love?
It’s a two-part process that involves loving God and loving others through staying true to our roots, our past as a church, while undertaking that creative process of imagining, experimenting, and making it happen.
At Sycamore Creek Church we have a mission: To ignite authentic life in Christ. We not only ignite life in Christ though, we also fan and grow the flame of life in Christ. We do that through a three-part process: Connecting, Growing, and Serving. We associate connecting at SCC with our worship services. They are how most people get connected with our church and with God. We associate growing and serving with small groups.
Looking at those two areas, worship services and small groups, you can see how we are creative in sharing God’s love. Those two areas are rooted in who we are as a church, they have stayed true to that mission of igniting authentic life in Christ, but they also have changed. We have taken some risks and tried some new things with worship services and small groups. We will continue to do that. If you want to come back here in 50 years and have everything about the way this church operates the same, you are in the wrong church! God is unchanging, but our world, God’s creation, changes. We will creatively change too so that we might be more effective in sharing God’s love with others.
First, small groups. We have not that long ago made an effort to link our small groups with mission. We imagined a community where we are outwardly focused, where we are not just sending money out to meet needs, but we are going out ourselves and involved with the community. This is rooted in our church having a culture of mission and going out to reach new people with God’s love. Now we are experimenting with how that might work. Our small groups have committed to a periodic mission that they do throughout the year during their small group time. We think that when we do this, we creatively share the message from God, “I’m interested, are you?” Our small groups still provide accountability, encouragement, prayer, and knowledge. But we’re imagining that we could pair them with another value and passion in our church and we’ve been working to implement that.
Second, worship services. One way we’re being creative in our worship services is through location. We have a huge goal in creatively sharing God’s love with others and that is to offer worship services at 7 different places on 7 different days of the week. That’s huge! That’s way out there. We have the imagination for that, but for now, we’ve been experimenting by focusing on adding one new location, Monday nights at Grumpy’s Diner. We’re making it happen one venue at a time. This change, this risk, this new thing is both an extension of our roots as a church plant, but it also mirrors our God who creatively came from heaven and went into our neighborhood. We are taking our worship service outside this building and bringing it to a neighborhood. It’s both a part of who we are as a church, and it’s also a new direction. We’ve imagined it, and now we’re experimenting to make it happen. Through the satellites we are creatively sharing God’s love with the Lansing area!
At SCC we are a church that looks around us and we see that something is missing. We recognize that need, that thirst for God’s love. We see it in each other and in the people around us, and we seek to creatively share God’s love. Jesus, the personification of love said to come to Him and never be thirsty. We are committed to being creative because God was creative in His love of us. We practice creativity by staying true to who we are as a church and as followers of Christ, rooted in the past, but with the flexibility and the courage to imagine and to try new things so that more people might encounter and experience and ultimately worship God. Through our actions, we bring the message of God and His love to people: “I’m interested, are you?”
I guess the final question is: “I’m interested, are you?
Questions for Small Groups
Each week we provide discussion questions for small groups that meet regularly to discuss the message for the week. Want to find a small group to join? Email Mark Aupperlee – m_aupperlee@hotmail.com.
1. Describe a time when trying something new worked or didn’t work.
2. Have you ever creatively shared God’s love with someone? How did it go? If you haven’t, why not?
3. Read John 3:16-18. What do those verses tell you about God’s love?
4. How can the small group pray for you to creatively share God’s love?
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