In my message in Hebrews 11:32-40 last Sunday I made reference to an illustration in a sermon preached at Harvest University by Pastor James MacDonald. It concerned a catapult, and went like this as I preached it in the 9 AM service:
God has no struggle here. He sees them as men of faith. And he proves again that he has more grace than I do. I don’t know about you but I need more grace toward people. Anyone else want to confess that? That you need more grace toward people? People frustrate me. You know at Harvest U last week Pastor James delivered a great message on Wednesday morning and I think that was the message where he suggested that in the church budget we should set aside some money to build a catapult. You know who is going in the catapult, right...? You put difficult people in the catapult and launch them in the general direction of Emmanuel Baptist or some other place. I figure we could reach Emmanuel from here. Maybe Mapleview if it was a big catapult. (It’s not in the notes. Stick to the notes. Stick to the notes). I need more grace towards people. I mean, I would like to think about this for a moment: if God approves someone and sees their faith despite their flaws, and if I want to be like him, then I ought to see people for their faith and not often for their flaws, right?
When Pastor James used the story, his point was that there are always people in our churches who are perpetually dissatisfied and too many pastors spend too much of their time trying to appease such people. The reality is that such people will never be satisfied no matter how much time you spend with them. Their appetite for your time and energy is inexhaustible. Others in your church who might need your attention, don’t get it as a result.
This has been a big issue for me as a pastor: spending so much time trying to make people happy about my leadership or about the church. And I have sought, in recent months, to crucify that people-pleasing need inside of me. The Apostle Paul’s own struggle has been helpful to me in that especially when he wrote to the Galatians, “For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ” (Galatians 1:10 ESV). So I have come to the place where, in all things, I want to please Christ even if that means that some people might not be thrilled with me.
Back to Sunday morning’s message. I was using the illustration of the catapult to show how challenging people can be in the church and how I need grace to deal with them in a better way. I suspect, of course, that most, if not all, of us struggle with having grace for one another at times. Let me say it again, the point I was making in the sermon was the need for more grace in my life. I’m hoping everyone understood that.
But let me give a bit more context to the whole thing Pastor James was talking about because it, too, is a way we must show grace to one another. What we all need to hear is that Harvest isn’t for everyone. I’m okay with that. I hope you are too. I have, on many occasions, publicly esteemed my close relationship with Pastor Rick Buck at Emmanuel, Pastor Carey Nieuwhof at Connexus and Pastor Jay Davis at Mapleview. I love what God is doing in each of these churches and celebrate the diversity in our ministries. They reach people we won’t and we reach people they won’t. Together, I believe, we represent the cause of Christ well in the city of Barrie.
If I believe that, then I must also believe that some people who are currently attending Harvest may not actually fit with who we are as a church. That’s cool. My desire for the Church as a whole supersedes that of this local church. My greatest desire is that Christ-followers would be bringing glory to God by actively engaging in serving God and serving others, fully involved with their heart in a local church that teaches the Word of God and lifts high the name of Jesus. And so, if there are certain people in our church who might fit better elsewhere (and who, to be up front about this, have been exhausting to us), our hope is that “launching” them to another Bible-teaching church nearby would be a blessing to them, to us and to their new church.
And that, in fact, is among the most grace-filled things I can do: helping someone who is frustrated here at Harvest, find a fulfilling place of belonging and service in another gathering of God’s people.
So, lock and load…and to him be glory!
Todd