And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love. – Ephesians 4:11-16 (NASB)

As a combat veteran who has lost Soldiers, Memorial Day has a special meaning to me. One of my favorite things to do over the Memorial Day weekend is to watch war movies with my son. You may think this is odd for someone of my background, but the activity goes well beyond watching the movies. It is more about an activity that my son and I share and enjoy together and have done so almost every year I was home for the holiday from the time he was young(er).

One of the movies I really enjoy is The Great Escape. The movie is about a true event where British aviator prisoners broke out of a German World War II POW camp specially designed and staffed to prevent such an escape. One of my favorite things about the movie is how every character has a specific role. There was the “Tunnel King” responsible for supervising and digging the tunnels. There was the “Forger” responsible for providing escaping prisoners with papers needed to move about in Germany. There was the “Tailor” who manufactured escape clothes and disguises. There was the “Surveyor” who had to determine the best path and length of each tunnel. There are a host of other characters and roles as well. One of my other favorite things about the movies is how each one has to fulfill his role for the escape to be successful and each role depended on each person’s talents.

The idea of roles and gifts is not a new one, and it is definitely not a new one for the Church as mentioned in the verses above. In my last post I mentioned how we were blessed last year with numerical and spiritual growth and the blessings seem to be continuing. I believe one of the reasons we are experiencing the growth is because of how the elders and ministers in our leadership team fills a role based on our gifts. I serve with two other amazing elders as my shepherds and we each bring something different to the eldership. In addition to our responsibilities to shepherd God’s children, I am the organizational leader constantly struggling to figure out how to lead the organism known as the body of Christ. One of my fellow elders is both creative and organized and was the best Youth Deacon I have ever seen. If I am struggling with how to make something fun or creative, I go to him. My other elder is the quiet one and a “man of the people”. In a wealthy suburban mostly white-collar part of the world he brings us “Analogies from the Ranch” and the porch-step wisdom of the worldly man become saint. The three of us combined with our pulpit minister and another minister we are blessed with combine to make a pretty effective team, thanks to be to our Lord. It is as if we are indeed “being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part” as we try to serve His Church, our families, and our community.

I will leave you with some thoughts. Have you ever considered the gifts each one of you in your team brings to the roles you fill? Have you ever taken this into consideration along with our “checklist” of qualifications for elders when selecting new ones to serve? Is each individual working toward fitting and properly working together? My guess is if you are in a growing congregation then you are asking yourselves these questions frequently and probably doing much more.

May your blessings exceed mine today and every day.

-DEM

What then is Apollos? And what is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, even as the Lord gave opportunity to each one. I planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth. So then neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but God who causes the growth. Now he who plants and he who waters are one; but each will receive his own reward according to his own labor. For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field , God’s building. (NASB)

Fifteen months have passed since I last blogged. I have missed it. My blog up until now has been focused on the lessons I’ve learned and tried to apply to the role and concept of a Biblical shepherd. While that journey will never be complete, I am hoping to take this blog in a new direction, if only I can figure out how to do it. Stay tuned.

In the meantime, much has happened in those 15 months for me personally and publicly. I finished management training and am now an entry level manager with a national car company. My daughter finished her high school junior and senior years and will graduate this Thursday before attending university in the fall. My wife has been recognized as Nurse of the Year in her department. My son has completed EMT school. Both of my parents have been diagnosed with cancer and are undergoing treatment. We have moved to a larger home so we can host visitors to our congregation. And these are just the things that come to the top of my head. Many things have happened and God has been there every step of the way with us.

Something else that happened is both the numerical and spiritual growth in our congregation. We summarized the events of 2013 and published an annual report for the congregation so they too could see how they contributed to the work of the Kingdom. The report highlighted several accomplishments for Glorifying God over the year. Here are some examples.

Our Quilting Ministry distributed 20 quilts both locally and abroad. We revamped our Children’s Ministry to make it more like our VBS once a week. We established a milestone and involved entire families in our first Leadership Training for Christ (LTC) Convention. We held our bi-annual Teen-Elder Retreat, annual Youth Camping Trip, and a host of other fun and spiritually rewarding activities. We planned, prepared, and hosted our first area-wide Ladies’ Day in years. We spent the year becoming more deeply involved with God’s Word through our Book of the Year, the Gospel of Matthew, and more than half the congregation took advantage of our new House to House (H2H) Ministry (i.e. Small Groups) to grow closer together.

We participated in God’s mission to create disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:19-20) in our local community and the community of believers abroad. We had friends join us in our annual “flag” football game and get muddy at our annual luau, handed out over 2,000 water bottles during the Douglas County Parade, distributed 777 scarves and thousands of glow sticks at our booth at the Castle Rock Starlighting, and began our unique Brothers in Arms outreach. We supported missions around the world and in our own country from Angola, Belize, Guatemala, Scotland, France, and Mexico to Arizona and Michigan.

I firmly believe because of we were faithful in a few things that God is blessing us with more. The details above are just a portion of the fruits of our labor. As a result, in a time when many congregations are stagnant or declining God has blessed us with numerical growth, as our attendance grew from an average of 190 to 240, including 13 new Christians. We are also financially healthy in a day when many of our fellow congregations have to slash budgets. He blessed us with financial growth and your offerings made us financially healthy. You can feel the excitement in our worship assemblies which are alive with a positive momentum you can feel.

All of this is for naught if we forget the verses above which remind us it is God who gives us the increase. 2013 was an exciting year. So far 2014 continues along the same lines and we are striving to fulfill God’s vision for His Church, our families, and our community. If you haven’t done so or even if you already did, I invite you to reflect on God’s blessings for you and I pray they have been better than what I have experienced.

May your blessings exceed mine today and every day.

-DEM