Sam loved going to the hospital. There was just something about it. The floors were always clean. The care and attention was always lovely. And you could get room service at almost any time. So Sam devised a plan. He would move into the hospital. One day he showed up at the emergency room and said he had a lot of pain in his side. They wheeled him in for an exam and battery of tests, but they couldn’t find anything. He kept complaining of so much pain that they decided to keep him over night, at least to watch him. 

The next day the doctors and nurses came back, and he complained of pain in his side, but also in his back. They ran more tests, but couldn’t find anything. He managed to watch a movie and eat a chicken sandwich between tests. It was a lovely day. Again, they kept him overnight. Day by day Sam complained of pain in this part or that part of the body and so they kept him in the hospital, day after day. 

One day a U-Haul showed up at the hospital and movers began to unload his belongings in his room, a big-screen television, his family photos, and a nicer couch for comfort. He made himself quite at home, and all the while, kept saying how much pain he was experiencing. The doctors and nurses grew quite concerned about him, but couldn’t quite narrow down what was wrong. And so he stayed, until one day, he grew old, and passed away.

Why do we go to the hospital? To get better. We don’t go to the hospital so we can stay there forever, but so that we can grow healthy and strong and continue with our lives. A church is like a hospital. It’s a place where we welcome sick people, help them heal, and send them out to look for others. True, we keep welcoming them back for a weekly check-up, but with the goal of creating healthy flourishing human beings.

Today, we’re finishing our series on Church Accountability & Discipline. At its core, this series is about helping sick people get healthy again. If you’re sick with sin, we’re here to help you recover and help others. That’s what it means to be brothers and sisters in Christ walking a pilgrim journey together. We pick each other up when we fall. We take each other to the Great Physician, to Christ Jesus, when we’re sick.

But what if you’re not a part of this church? Or you don’t even consider yourself a Christian? Why listen? I’ll give you three reasons: 

If you’ve ever had conflict in your life, or experienced a broken relationship, you need to know when it makes sense to put that relationship back together again. I think this sermon could help. 

We all need a restored relationship with God, whether you’re the most religious person in the world, or you don’t even own a Bible. I want to tell you about that as part of today’s message. 

To be a Christian means to be part of a church community. If you’re interested in becoming a Christian, you need to understand the church is more than a social club, it’s a hospital, and we want to see sick people made whole again. That’s our purpose.

The goal of accountability and discipline is restoration.

The goal of accountability and church discipline is to restore those who have wandered off the path, those who are sick. Remember our foundation verse for this series? 

Galatians 6:1-2 (ESV) Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. 2 Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.

The Greek word for “restore” has a lot of depth to it. One of restore’s meanings is “to knit together.” Think of a fishing net with a rope line that has begun to fray and fall apart. The line’s unraveling weakens the entire net, making it less effective. To restore that net is to take that rope and knit-it back together and weave it into the body of nets (Matt 4:21). The other lines in that net no longer says, “That rope isn’t one of us” or “that line doesn’t really belong here.” No, the restored line is an important part o

Pastor Sam Kim of the Intercultural Mission Church in North Andover joined us for this morning’s sermon. Pastor Jonathan has appreciated Pastor Sam’s mentoring and discipleship in his life, and is excited to introduce him to the Cornerstone church family. The general idea of the Acts 6:1-7 sermon is this: By the Holy Spirit, the early church was able to change for those they loved, as the Son of God changed (fully God to fully God and fully human) to share His kingdom and kingdom work with those He loved. Please check out Pastor Sam Kim’s YouTube channel.

You can watch the full service on Facebook or the sermon only on YouTube.

What do you do when someone you love has a runny nose? You shove a Q-tip up their nose! But before-covid, what would you do? You’d hand them a tissue. That’s it. Maybe you’d say, “Your nose is running. Here’s a tissue.” But what if they don’t want to wipe their nose? What if they don’t realize they’re sick?

You could forcefully wipe their nose with a tissue, like I do with my son, who by the way, is getting better all the time at wiping his nose. You could pray for them, “Lord, would you help them see their need to wipe their nose?” You could encourage them to go see a doctor, “I think you should talk to a doctor. They might have something to tell you.” Or if it get’s really bad, you could setup a surprise medical intervention. “Hey, how’d we get to the doctor’s office? Might as well stop by and say hello!” 

When someone you love has a drippy nose, you want to help them out. Church people get sick too, not just physically sick, but spiritually sick. We get spiritual runny noses. By that I mean… we get stuck in sin. Our hearts get sick and we need a brother or sister in Christ to offer us a tissue. We need them to turn our attention to Jesus, and the price he paid on the cross to forgive us of our sins, not so that we can continue sinning, but so that we can be forgiven and made new.

Today I want to talk about 5 steps the Bible gives us to offer our brother or sister in Christ a tissue. We want to restore them and see them healthy again. Two weeks ago we talked about the first step. 

Step 1. Prayerful self-examination and discernment.

We looked at Matthew 7:1-5 and James 4:1-3 and reviewed how important is to get real with yourself before you get real with someone else. We talked about four categories of sin we should address: the sin dishonors the name of Jesus, damages your relationship with them, is hurting others, or is hurting them. 

Remember airplanes? Remember what it’s like to travel places pre-covid? Before the flight takes off, what do the flight attendants do? They run you through a pre-flight safety check. They tell you where the exits are, where the life vests are in case of water landing, and that the oxygen masks will fall down if needed. What do they always tell parents? Put your mask on first; before putting a mask on your child. They don’t want you to pass out before you can help your child. Take care of your own need; then help those you love.

Before we ever wipe someone else’s spiritual nose, we need to make sure we can breathe. We deal with our own sin before dealing with another’s. Once we’ve got our own mask on, and have a renewed and restored relationship with Jesus, by all means help a fellow believer out, but first let’s deal with our own sin. Step 1. Prayerful self examination and discernment.

Step 2. Private one-on-one conversation.

Now we come to the Scripture where Jesus himself explains how to do accountability and church discipline.

Matthew 18:15 (ESV) “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. 

Accountability starts within relationship. Jesus calls a fellow believer here a “brother.” This isn’t a biological brother or sister, but a Christian one. The word brother suggests commitment and relational ties. Siblings care for each other. It takes time to develop relationship, not just with the purpose of correcting, but out of genuine love for one another.

Having a genuine relationship helps us be gentle when we correct one another. Our foundation verse says to restore those caught in sin “in a spirit of gentleness”(Gal 6:1 ESV). Jesus tells us in the great commandment to “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Mark 12:31 NIV). If we’re to take that same command and apply it to correction, we’re to correct others as we’d like ourselves to be corrected, graciously, gently. 

Your nose is drippy. You have a cold. Your spouse, who is so attentive, notices and says, “Here, let me grab you a tissue.”  You expect th

Do you ever just want to say “thank you”? Or as my son likes to say, “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Today I want us to direct our hearts to the heavens and say, “Thank you! Thank you Father for what you have done for us! Thank you for what you have done for us and our families and our church!” 

On a Monday morning in late May 2012, Monica and I walked into a class at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and sat down, not knowing that God was going to change our lives. That class was called Church Planting and Growth. We’d signed up because we’d heard the Discipleship & Evangelism class was terrible, and we’d heard this one was much better. God was just moving us where he wanted us. All that week we learned what it meant to start a new church.

We created pretend proposals in class. Our little group brainstormed what it would be like to plant a church in Salem. One of our outreach ideas was to host outdoor yoga sessions to readings of the Psalms. Nothing like a psalm of lament to stretch your thighs. Another group came up with a church called “Nurch Church” which was supposed to be really loving and caring. You’re nurtured at Nurch Church! 

Our big assignment was to study a real community, with real needs, and create a church-plant proposal. We had no intention of planting a new church, but if we were going to do the research, we wanted it to make a difference. So we asked Monica’s mentor, Pastor Dana Smith, if he might have a suggestion of a community we should study. He was pastor in Chelmsford, but lived in Westford, and asked us to study Westford.

Later that summer we drove around Westford looking at yards and houses and businesses. We drove right down Graniteville Rd., but missed this church building. We had to turn around to see it. We interviewed local Westford residents and at the end of the summer we wrote our church-plant proposals. We presented our findings to the Immanuel elders at their summer retreat. Then we got married and went back to school. 

And that was it… Except God was working in other places. A mom who lived right down the street was praying for this church when they drove by, asking God to revitalize it. That’s Karyn Tang. Another woman was attending a Bible study at this church, Westford Bible Church. She didn’t know it but God was preparing her to help start the church again. That’s Mary Ethier. 

Across the country in Minnesota the Conference Minister of a small denomination called the CCCC, the Conservative Congregational Christian Conference, was praying for one of their smallest churches, a church with around five people left in it called Westford Bible Church. Ron Hamilton was praying God would use this church to rebirth a new church in a suburban New England community that needs Jesus.

Monica and I attended a church planting conference that next spring and met Ron. When I told him we’d just studied Westford, he said, “Interesting. Interesting.” God was on the move. That summer Immanuel Church, where Pastor Dana Smith served, called me to be their Associate Pastor, and six months later Westford Bible Church approached Immanuel about taking the building to replant a new church in Westford.

Isn’t God amazing? Today I want to take time to remember what God has done, and say thank you.

Thank you Father.

Our Scriptures gives us Psalms to help us thank our Heavenly Father. Psalm 100 is for a whole community of people to give thanks. It’s not like a tiny thank you card I write and send off. It’s like one of those big thank you cards everyone signs. Everyone says thank you.

Psalm 100 is a Psalm of thanksgiving. The Hebrew literally says a “sacrifice of thanksgiving.” It’s my prayer that this sermon and our worship service would be a sacrifice of thanksgiving to God. That we’d give back to him something out of all he has given to us. 

What are you thankful for? Maybe it’s something personal. The Lord gave you a new job, or a special relationship, or a new family member. Maybe it’s church-related. You’re

Hurricane Sally just hit the southeast—Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, and Georgia. It toppled trees, flooded streets, and damaged houses. One news station reports, “More than 500,000 people have lost power.” Another estimates it will cause $2-$3 billion in damage.

But did you know that termites do approximately $5 billion in damage to U.S. homes each year. Stephen Mansfield says, “Statistically termites do more damage in America than massive storms.” He adds, “Storms get the media. Termites quietly work away.” Apparently, “Termites damage approximately 600,000 homes in the U.S. each year.”

It’s easy to see the damage a storm does. It’s much harder to identify the work of termites. It’s much easier to see someone else’s sin. It’s much harder to see my own. Their actions are like a storm. So obvious. So damaging. My actions are like termites, hard to see, invisible, but potentially much more destructive. Before we deal with the hurricane out there, we got to deal with the termites in here.

I need to get real with myself before I can get real with others.

I tried to become a Marine Corps officer when I was in college. During the vetting process I hid that I was getting allergy shots. They wouldn’t have looked at me if I’d told them so I lied. It got to the point where I went down and took my medical tests, and when I finally went in to see the last doctor and sign all my paperwork, I confessed. I’d come to a point where I realized that if I couldn’t lead myself, I couldn’t lead others. The same is true for accountability and discipline. If we can’t get real with ourselves first, we can’t get real with others at all (Resolving Everyday Conflict). Jesus said it like this.

Matthew 7:3-5 (ESV)

3 Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.

Before we can ever help someone else with their sin, we need to recognize our own. It’s not that I can’t help them see their sin. I just need to see my own sin first. If I don’t, it’s like trying to give directions blindfolded. “Check yourself before you wreck yourself!” Back in the 1970s Nationwide had a break-check slogan encouraging their people to get their car’s breaks checked out. Their sign said, “Check it before you wreck it.” Jesus said it first.

Matthew 7:1-2 (ESV)

“Judge not, that you be not judged. 2 For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you.

In other words, judge yourself, before making a mess out of judging others. Elsewhere in the New Testament we’re told to use discernment, hold others accountable, and even as a church body to judge others (Matt 18:15-20). Good and fair judgment is what church accountability and discipline are all about. 

That’s different than the kind of self-righteous judgment this passage is describing. We cannot be unfair hypocritical judges who call out the sin of others while not recognizing our own failings. We need to first confess our own sin, get right with the Lord, and then we can prepare to talk with another about their sin. Take your blinders off before you try and take someone else’s off. King David prayed this Psalm as a way of asking God to deal with his heart.

Psalm 139:23-24 (ESV)

23 Search me, O God, and know my heart!

        Try me and know my thoughts!

24 And see if there be any grievous way in me,

        and lead me in the way everlasting!

If you’re thinking about gently correcting someone else for their sins, I’d spend some time praying this Psalm and asking, “Lord, please open my eyes so I can see how I have contributed to this problem.” (Resolving Everyday Conflict p. 57). I see two ways I might contribute to the problem.

1) I might be too easily offend

Last week I introduced our new sermon series, Accountability & Discipline, and talked about why we hold each other accountable, even up to the point of church discipline. Sin is real. God is holy. And we need to take that seriously. Today I want to talk about another, very serious, part of church discipline—and that’s the church body. To kick this very important discussion off I thought we should all stand up and participate in theologically rich song. Go ahead and hit play. Play Head Shoulders Knees & Toes (Speeding Up) by Super Simple Songs – Kids Songs (1:53).

Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes

Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes

And eyes and ears and mouth and nose

Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes

Thanks for singing along! The Bible calls the church, a local church like us, a body. That’s right. A living breathing body. So what part of the body are you?

Are you a head? Are you good at thinking critically, planning, offering words of wisdom?

Are you shoulders? Are you a work-horse? Just point me in the right direction and I’ll do it?

Are you knees? You’re a prayer warrior. You fight the spiritual battle. Will you pray for us?

Are you toes? Your feet take the gospel message wherever Jesus wants it to go. Are you toes?

Maybe you’re something I didn’t mention? You are hands? Or the church belly-button? Instead of being the church sexton you’re the church belly button! I want that job. To provide smelly lint wherever you go! Where do you fit into the church body? Do you feel like you’re an important member of the body? You need to know that…

You matter to the church body.

If you know Jesus, and you come regularly, you are an important member of Christ’s body.

1 Corinthians 12:21-27 (ESV)

21 The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” 22 On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, 

Whether you function in an obviously important role, you’re the eyes of the body, or a less obviously important role, you’re the finger nails of the church, you matter. We all have something to give. 

23 and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, 24 which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, 

We care about everyone in our church. It doesn’t matter if you’re the pastor, the preacher, the worship team leader, the treasurer, or a greeter. There is honor in what God calls us to.

25 that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. 26 If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together.

When we see ourselves as one cohesive church body, it brings unity to our church and ministry. We show our unity by caring for each other, even when it’s difficult. We show our unity by suffering together. When one experiences loss, a parent dies, a miscarriage, we all suffer. And when one is honored, when one does well at work, or get’s recognition for their service, we all rejoice. 

27 Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.

We are the church body. We are a family. Do you know you matter? Do you know how important you are to this church? You don’t need to be the preacher or on the worship team to matter. 

This illustration is one of my favorites. Did you know that Redwood trees are some of the oldest and tallest trees on earth? Some of them were here when Jesus was born, 2,000 years old. They grow 200 to 240 feet tall and 10-15 feet wide, with the tallest of them all, Hyperion, coming in at 379.7 feet tall. The Statue of Liberty is only 305 feet tall. Did you know “their roots grow horizontally instead of vertically and intertwine with one another”?  A 300 foot tree will only have roots that only go down 6-12 feet but

This summer my son started doing something that’s really cute. We’ll ask him to pick up his toys, or take a few more bites, or get his shoes on, and before he does any of those things he’ll ask us a question. Do you know what it is? “But… why?!” He throws his arms open wide and with the deepest look of sincerity a two-year old can muster he asks, “But… why?!”

That’s probably the first question we are asking when we start talking about today’s topic. Today’s topic, which I will be teaching on for the next couple weeks, giving us a break from Acts, is a sensitive issue. It can be inflammatory, provoking, uncomfortable. The topic is accountability and church discipline. 

Here’s a simple definition of accountability and church discipline. Accountability is the process where one Christian gently corrects a brother or sister in Christ who is sinning, and if they don’t listen, brings another Christian, and then if they still don’t listen, brings it to the whole church body. Accountability can lead to church discipline but is not the same thing. The act of church discipline is when the church body formally rejects the confession of faith of the one continuing in sin. The church no longer affirms their Christian faith, no longer offers them communion but continues to call them to repentance. I’ll unpack and explain more on accountability and discipline as we go along, but hopefully this helps define it for now. 

Do you feel something when I talk about church discipline? What wells up inside you? Feelings of confusion, “What is that?!” Feelings of dread, “I’d rather not talk about that!” Or maybe mixed feelings, “I understand the need for it, but I hope we never have to do it.” It’s okay to feel uncomfortable when talking about church discipline. It’s not a fun conversation, but it is a necessary one. 

I don’t remember the first time I heard about church discipline. Growing up as a pastor’s kid I’d sometimes hear about how this person or that person was asked to leave the church, but I didn’t know why. It wasn’t till I started working at the church that started Cornerstone, Immanuel, that I heard about church discipline regularly or saw anything that resembled it. So I don’t have much hands on experience on this topic. What I know comes from my time in seminary, my time at Immanuel, reading and studying, and from talking it over with other pastors and our Elders. 

So why are we having this conversation? Back when we were planting Cornerstone our leadership team recognized that we needed to have some guidelines for church discipline. Instead of writing out the guidelines then and there we kicked the proverbial tin can down the road. We listed a few bible verses in our By-Laws and codified that the Board of Elders would create a policy for how to do it. That was 2015 Jonathan. A tin can just came flying out of the sky and hit 2020 Jonathan in the head.

Immanuel Church, our parent church, knew our intention to eventually write a church discipline policy. Earlier this year when we approached their leadership about purchasing the building, they said they’d love to have the conversation, but would like us to finish our church discipline policy first. Having done church discipline themselves, they knew how helpful these guidelines would be.

At first I can say that I didn’t have a good heart-attitude about it, but on this side of things I’m really grateful Immanuel asked us to do it. It made us get it done, and not take forever on it as sometimes policy writing can really drag out. What I think we created is not only faithful to Scripture, but is pastoral and kind. I’m actually kind of excited to share it with you. This sermon series is meant to introduce what’s in much of the policy before we actually share it, to explain it from the Bible first. 

To get us started I want to answer my son’s question, “But… why?!” Why do accountability? Why do church discipline? This actually provokes a bigger question than we might expect. “But why?’ actually

Today I want to start with a Scripture passage that promises how things are going to be one day. This promise comes from the book of Revelation, the last book in the Bible. It shows us what the final day will look like when Jesus returns. It shows us a great multitude of different kinds of people from all over the earth singing and praising God.

Revelation 7:9-10 (ESV)

9 After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, 10 and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”

Have you ever imagined what this will be like? Like, will there be different pockets and sections of people singing together. Like, in one section the baptists will be singing hymns wearing suits and ties, their hands in their pockets but smiles on their faces? Right next to them I imagine a church from Africa, the women dressed in colorful African dresses. They’re dancing and singing and the kids are jumping up and down. Maybe there’s a section of monks from the middle ages who will be chanting, and a Portland section where everyone is wearing skinny jeans, brimmed hats, and are swaying in the wind. I’ll be in the pastor section in the far back with my tambourine missing the beat. 

We’ll probably be all mixed together, arms around each other’s shoulders, all dressed in white, singing songs from different countries from different times and places. You’ll finally get to try that ancient Gregorian chant you’ve always wanted to sing. John paints a picture of a beautiful multi-ethnic mega-church. We are all gathered around the bloody Lamb who laid down his life for us, Christ Jesus, at the center accepting all our praise from all these people from all around the world. 

Why does John gives us this picture? Why did God show it to him and to us? So we could say, “That’s nice! Can’t wait to get there!” or to inspire us? I think John gives us a glimpse of what the church will look like then to influence what it looks like now. It’s meant to inspire us to work towards it, to help create it, to experience a little bit of heaven’s diversity in the here and now.

We’re going to spend this week and the next couple weeks going through Peter’s vision of eating the unclean animals and I hope and pray that it will inspire us to work towards becoming a more diverse multi-ethnic church that looks just a little bit more like that final church in Revelation chapter 7.

I’ve been working through a class called Race, Class, and the Kingdom of God to see if it’s something I’d like to lead us through this fall in our Christian Education hour. In the third session the speaker, Elena Aronson, puts up a picture of her church. It’s a beautiful picture of white and black families, young and old, all together. In this picture, she says, there are both homeless and millionaire, people from all social and economic places. But she also says the diversity of their church body didn’t happen without hard work. 

At their church they have something called the 75% rule—“If you’re comfortable more than 75% of the time, then we’re doing something wrong.” In other words, “If you’re comfortable more than 75% of the time, that means your cultural preferences are winning over everybody else’s.” So if the kind of prayers that are prayed, worship songs that are sung, and sermons that are preached make you feel comfortable more than 75% of the time, then your likes are setting the agenda. That’s convicting. That tells me my cultural preferences almost always win out—starting with the preaching. 

If the goal is a multi-ethnic culturally diverse church, which we see in Revelation and in Acts, then we need to re-consider some of our cultural preferences. I believe God wants to begin to peel back our cultural preferences so that we can experience his kingdom and his

Do you all remember January 1st? It had so much promise, didn’t it? A brand new year. A brand new decade! We had New Year’s Resolutions! We had hopes and dreams for our families, our careers, and our church. And then what happened? Covid-19 happened! Covid happened and everything stopped. Life was completely disrupted. Most of the time when we think about disruption, it’s a bad thing, like the DOW dropping a thousand points or wildfires destroying half of Australia. But sometimes disruption can be good. 

When I was growing up we had these big brown book sets where you could go and look up any subject. Want to know about iguanas, airplanes, or the planet Venus? Just open up one of these big brown books. First you had to find the book with the right letter, “I” for iguana. That could take time. Once you found the right book with the right letter you had to navigate to the right page. Sometimes the article included a picture. Do any of you know what we called these big brown books?… Encyclopedias!

What disrupted the encyclopedia? What came along and completely destroyed this old method of storing knowledge? Wikipedia! When I was in college we were not allowed to cite Wikipedia. It was not a scholarly resource, and I still think that’s true. But this website came along, offered a free worldwide crowd-sourced encyclopedia full of information about iguanas, and airplanes, and the planet Venus, and it completely disrupted the old way of doing things. Bye-bye $1,000 encyclopedia set! “Still, Encyclopedia Britannica published its final volumes in 2012, after 244 years of circulation.”

Disruption is not always bad. It can be good. Just ask Wikipedia. It’s okay to disrupt bad things, but we’d prefer not to have good things disrupted, like being able to walk. A man named Aeneas was born able to run and jump and play. But one day something happened. Maybe he fell sick or had an accident. He became paralyzed and bedridden. Aeneas’s life was completely disrupted. Maybe he wondered if he would regain feeling in his legs, but days turned into weeks, months into years, and eight years later he was still bedridden, still not able to stretch his legs, kick his feet, or wiggle his toes. Over time the disruption turned into the new normal. 

Did you know that when God created the heavens and the earth everything was good. It was like January 1st. Creation was full of hope and promise. But sin disrupted that. The serpent tempted humankind and humankind chose ego and self and messed everything up. Eternal life disrupted. Do you feel the echo of that disruption in your own life? If you’ve ever felt sick or sad or angry, if you’ve ever been cheated or lied to or lied yourself, if you’ve ever known regret or shame or guilt, you’ve known that first disruption. Days turn into weeks, months into years, centuries into millenniums, and disruption turns into the new normal. Death and sickness are natural, right? That’s just how life is, right?

What if God told us that’s not how it has to be or is going to be? What if God told us that he has a plan to disrupt the disruption? That life disrupted would one day turn into life restored? What if God told us that he is forming little communities of disruption and sending them out into the world to restore little pockets of humanity to what we are supposed to be? 

The mission of the church is to disrupt life as we know it.

From the very beginning of the church in Acts we find the church disrupting the statue-quo. At the festival of Pentecost the Holy Spirit comes down on the gathered church, appearing like tongues of fire that rest over each one of them. They start speaking in foreign languages and it bewilders the crowd because they hear them preaching in their own language (Acts 2:4, 6). That first God-given disruption never stops.

In a narrow-minded world, Peter preaches and thousands come to Christ (Acts 2:41). 

In a world of selfishness and greed these believers form a church that practices selflessness and grac

Gordon Chinamasa

Gordon Chinamasa’s biography: I was born and raised in Zimbabwe and accepted God’s free gift of salvation in my early teens. Married to Bronwyn for 14 years and we have two daughters, Charis (10 years) and Channa (6 years). I hold a Bachelor of Theology degree from Cape Town Baptist Seminary and was ordained as a Baptist Minister in 2007. I have also received graduate seminary training at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, TX. Emphasis in my seminary studies was around becoming rich in my knowledge of God’s Word, thus I focused my studies in Biblical Languages, Biblical Backgrounds, and Old and New Testament studies. I also hold a Masters degree in Social Work from Baylor University and I’m currently a Ph.D. Candidate in Social Work at Simmons University. Over the span of my christian journey, I have served the Lord in the ministry of the local church body wherever I have found myself including Children’s Ministry Director, Youth Pastor, Sunday School Teacher, Preacher, Short-term Missionary and other ministries. Currently, I serve at Immanuel Church in Chelmsford, MA as an Elder.