This is MY Church–Connect

We recently spent 6 weeks going through a sermon series entitled, “This is MY Church.”  During this series, we asked a couple of questions.  The first is what could happen, what would God do in and through our church if we united together?  We talked about reaching the lost, sending missionaries all over the world, meeting real physical and spiritual needs in our community, impacting our children, and more.

The second question was what would it mean for each one of us to be committed, united together at The Grove Church? What would be required and expected of me? We put this in the context of what would happen if we switched our mindset from The Grove Church is where I go to church to The Grove Church is MY church.  This is my place and I will do whatever it takes to help accomplish what God has for my church.

During this six week series, we looked at 6 actions that we each to which we needed to be committed to have this kind of attitude.  These 6 actions will ultimately form our new membership covenant and every new member will be taken through these 6 actions as they are making their decision to make The Grove Church their church.  The 6 actions are–Connect, Give, Serve, Pray, Protect and Invite.

I’m going to take some time this week to review these six on the ol’ blog to help us, whether we go to the Grove or any church, focus on the things that we need in order to join with our church in accomplishing the mission that God has given your church.

The first is connect.  We need to connect in 3 ways.

Connect with God–This is obviously our most important connection.  Before we even begin thinking about what God has called us to do, we need to make sure that we have a solid connection with God.  Jesus said that the greatest commandment was to love God with all that we are.  The Bible also makes it clear that the depth of our relationship God determines the kind of life that we will have.  We need to be people who are consistently connecting with God.  We need to pray each and every day and throughout the day.  We also need to take time to listen when we pray.  Is God speaking? If so, what is he saying. We also need to be reading the Bible every day.  There is a richness in God’s word that points to the character of God and helps us know who it is that God has called us to be.

Connect with your church during worship service–This may be the most simple of all requirements to be a church member–”Umm, you should like come to the weekend worship service.”  Nothing incredibly novel here, but we believe that it needs to be said and said boldly.  Being a part of the weekend service is key to being connected to your local church.  It is the time where the whole church comes together to celebrate what God is doing, worship together, serve together and hear from God’s Word.  Hopefully you experience more than just a talk about the Bible.  Our hope is that you will hear a fresh word from God that is for the church, both for the church as a whole and each individual person.  Make the service a priority.  Everyone goes out of town on occasion, but let’s have a mindset that says, if possible, I will be at our weekend service to worship with my people and hear how God might want to challenge me from His Word.

Connect with your people in a small group–Finally, we also all need to be connected in a small group.  There are limitations on what can happen in a weekend service.  While it is the best place for worshipping with other believers and hearing from God’s word, it is not designed to be a place where your personal questions can be answered.  If everyone had a couple of questions and we tried to answer all of them, worship services could turn into a 24/7 operation. It’s also not the most convenient place to share your struggles.  While there are a few exceptions, I’m sure, there are not many people who would enjoy sharing their sin struggles with the church as a whole.  For those two reasons and many more, we have small groups.  These are places where if you have questions, there are people to help you find answers.  There are also people who know you that can celebrate with you and mourn with you and pick you up when you fall.  Small groups are a place where you can know people deeply and you can be deeply known.

Life is too hard to be tried alone, and it is possible for us to be alone even in a crowd of people.  The first step that we need to take is to be connected–with God, with worship services and small groups.

Listen to the series at Grove Podcasts