SIGN ON FOR YOUR FUTURE

Isaiah 43:14-21

Text: Vs. 18-19

September 18, 2005

170^th Anniversary

First Baptist Church, Lafayette, In.

Some one has said, “We have nothing but the present time and the anticipation of a future. That future, however, remains clouded.” As most of us live our lives we do enjoy the present. That is evident when you look around us and examine or evaluate the way we live and the values that influence our living. But it is the future that captures us and holds our attention. We want to know what tomorrow will bring, so we engage in all sorts of activity, all the way from Palm Reading to chasing every Forecast we can get our hands on. Songs are composed about the future. Books are written about the future. Motion pictures are made about the future. We hang on any word or action that might have the potential of helping us to understand the future.

A daily activity that many enjoy is to check the weather forecast for each day. I am one of those people. I want to know, not only what will happen that particular day, but also what about the next day and the next few days after that Now we all know that weather forecasting is about as certain and each one of us becoming millionaire by the time we reach age 50. Yet, if you are like me, you want to know. I claim it helps me to plan, but I must admit it more than likely curiosity.

First Baptist Church of Lafayette is celebrating its 170^th anniversary. Congratulations are certainly in order. One hundred and seventy years of ministry and a great, great history. An anniversary like this one causes us to look back over the past, to lift up the memories, and to celebrate what has happened over all those years. Your Fellowship Hall decorated with pictures attests to that celebration. At the same time an anniversary such as this one also causes us to look to the future; albeit a clouded future. Where are we going? What is going to happen to us? Do we have a direction in which we are traveling? Or are we just wandering and responding to every whim and way which confronts us? What kind of church will we be 10 years from now; 20 years from now? Will those who come after us, remember what we have done for this congregation?

Because life is ALWAYS lived forward, rather than in reverse, the call of faith is to the future; to tomorrow. We are called to what can be. In Egypt Moses came to the people and instructed them in the preparation and the eating of the first Passover Meal. He, then, gave them the challenge to be ready. TOMORROW we leave Egypt. TOMMORROW we will move towards God’s promises. TOMORROW!! TOMMORROW!!

Many, many years later God’s people were in captivity in Babylonia. And again the word comes to them from God. It was delivered through the prophet Isaiah. He says: Israel, the Holy God is calling you to be God’s Holy People. God says, I will break down the bars of your imprisonment and set you free for your future. Behold, I am doing a new thing. I am making a way in the desert. I am bringing streams of water to the wasteland. I am giving a drink of water to my people, my chosen people, a people I formed for myself, that they may proclaim my praise. Forget the past. Forget the former things. GET READY!! I AM DOING A NEW THING.

That is, I suggest to you, always the challenge that is before us and it is God’s message to you on your 170^th anniversary. We, the church, are God’s people and the Spirit of God is continually coming to us and saying: Forget the past. Get ready. I am going to do a new thing. And I am going to do it through you. Claim what is to be and join with me in doing this new thing. I am establishing a new kingdom, a kingdom possessed by the heart. This kingdom is not geography. It is not political. It is not power or fame or position or status or wealth. It is of the heart and you shall be my people who enable the coming of that kingdom on earth.

That’s the challenge for this 170^th Anniversary and WHAT A CHALLENGE IT IS!!!

The challenge is always to turn from memory to HOPE. We want to cling to memory; to the familiar. We know what has happened, what works and what didn’t work. We are comfortable with what is familiar. Don’t give us the new. We don’t know if it will work and it often changes everything that is familiar and comfortable us. Don’t mess with the Worship Service. Don’t give us new teaching methods. Don’t reorder the priorities around here. Don’t change the old, old story. What has worked in the past is OK. We don’t need change. Change bothers us. Everything becomes unfamiliar. What’s this business of having to be relevant to today’s world? Let that world become relevant with us. What was good enough for Paul and Peter is good enough for us. LEAVE IT ALONE. So goes our dialogue about an effort to respond to the future that will more than likely produce change.

God’s people were living in a foreign land when Isaiah brought his word. By force they had to change where they lived, how they lived and everything that was familiar to them. They had been taken captive and forced to live in a new home in Babylonia. They lived with foreigners. They couldn’t sing the Lord’s song in this new land. In loss of faith; in spiritual depression; in lack of vision; in loneliness for the familiar…..they tried to find the crumbs of their faith. WHY DID GOD DESSERT THEM AND LEAVE THEM IN SUCH A PLACE AS THIS? Then, God’s message came: BEHOLD, I am going to do a new thing. Is it possible? CAN GOD DO SOMETHING NEW IN SUCH A PLACE AS THIS? Marginally at first, but then with gradual awakening, their spirits were stirred. God had not forgotten them. God was going to do a new thing. A few, at first, were chosen to return to Jerusalem. Then a few more and a few more. Gradually, the people were being permitted to go back to the sacred city, the City of God. God WAS doing a new thing.

Let me add one more thought before moving on. When these early returnees got back to Jerusalem, they didn’t find all of their homes and buildings in tack, just waiting for human life to show up again. NO!!! Instead, they found devastation like New Orleans and Mississippi. Everything that was anything was torn down and in rubble. The city that was so beautiful, that shined like a jewel in the sun and moon light was wasted and in ruin. This was the new thing God was doing??? They were being called to rebuild. What kind of future was that? Is that what tomorrow is bringing to us? Everything is different. Nothing is the same. In despair they returned, but in the midst of that despair they found their resolve. They caught of vision of what Jerusalem could be again and they went to work. They rebuilt the city and their faith sustained them through all the changes.

That’s what happens when we exchange HOPE for memories. If we cling to the memories, maybe giving us some comfort, we will not be equal for the future. It is the future that is before us and God is calling us to rise up and possess it.

Madelyn Blair grew up on a farm in the Carolinas. It was a humble beginning for her. She joined with other members of the family to work that farm and contribute to the well being of the whole family. She never did feel that life gave her a bad turn, however. She was not content to think or say that this was all there was to life. She remembered her grandmother who came to America as a teen. She married the man of her dreams and they raised a large family. Madelyn’s grandmother told her children and grandchildren to dream of what life could be and go out and make it happen. That is what Madelyn did. She received her education and entered the work force. There she did her job with energy, expectation and hard work. Soon she was elevated to larger responsibilities. She became a positive force within the company she worked for.

Someone in a critical position learned of her and liked that kind of worker she was and the kind of person she was. So, she was hired by the World Bank and her first responsibility was to get six warring units in that organization to work together and to try a new approach of sharing information. She was a success and because of it, she was appointed to be Division Chief in the organization where she had 57 employees working with her along with a 12 million dollar budget. From there she went to be Research head for a large university in the western United States. Finally, she realized she had the gifts, the ability, the experience and so she started her own company to do consulting, communication, information finding, envisioning, designing learning experiences and research. She says her company is dedicated to helping clients turn their visions into reality. She is future oriented and challenges all who wish her services to look at that future and approach it with confidence and boldness. A motto that has great meaning for her is “Dreaming with our feet on the ground.”

Well, where does that leave First Baptist as you celebrate your 170^th anniversary. Will you go through this celebration, soaking up the memories and then return to normal life again? Will you take a look at yourselves and cite all the weaknesses that you are experiencing as a congregation, and then say, “But we can’t do anything?” Will you wallow around in the “Woe is me” syndrome and look at other churches enviously wondering why they are doing so well? It seems to me you have a couple of major assignments that you need be about. Possibly you are doing them and if that is so, let me congratulate you and urge you on. But on the chance you are not let me tell what those two assignments are: (1) You need to take a good long look at who you are; what your strengths are; what your weaknesses are. While you are doing that make a quick perusal of your recent history and note what this congregation has been doing. Keep those things in the front. At the same time look at your community here in Lafayette. What are the obvious needs here? Of those needs which ones are ones that a congregation like yours could tackle in part or in whole. Step One is just good analysis work and will provide you with information that you need in order to move on to Step Two. (2) The second step is envisioning. You are God’s people here in this congregation in Lafayette, Indiana. The scripture says that God always comes to point us to the future. What is God calling you to be and to do in these days? Not 10 years from now, but now, 2005 and soon to be 2006. God has not backed away from challenging God’s people to look at and move into the future. If nothing about the future is challenging to you as a church, then God help you.

One of the messages that our General Secretary of the American Baptist Church, USA is challenging us in these anxious days is a CALL TO RADICAL DISICIPLESHIP. The church of Jesus Christ was not planted in Israel and the Roman world by people who came home after work each day and sat down and watched television until it was time to go to bed. They didn’t just go to worship on Sunday, sing a few hymns, listen to some music and yawn their way through a boring sermon. They became RADICALLY convinced that Jesus was Lord and that Jesus was calling them to share and spread the gospel. WHAT ARE YOU DO NOW TO SHARE AND SPREAD THE GOSPEL??? That’s the haunting question, but it is at the heart of RADICAL DISCIPLESHIP. Jesus calls us to give witness to his love and forgiveness in a world that doesn’t understand that love and forgiveness. Jesus calls us to develop a spiritual life that is fed by the springs of God’s spirit, welling up in us. Jesus calls us to become lights in a world that really prefers the darkness.

What will First Baptist of Lafayette look like in four years? What will be the focus of your ministry that year? Now is the time to envision---to listen to the Spirit of God and the call to be God’s people for this day. DREAM ABOUT YOUR FUTURE? WHAT COULD GOD BE ASKING YOU TO DO NEXT YEAR AND YEAR AFTER THAT? LET YOUR DREAMS BE EXPERIENCED AS THAT WHICH YOU ARE REACHING FOR AS YOU MOVE INTO THE 171^st YEAR OF YOUR HISTORY.