Scott's Thoughts

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Ever since we went multisite in early 2019, I’ve noticed that it’s easy to get into the weekly Sunday morning groove in a way that can result in missing some of the FCC forest for the campus-specific trees. It’s nobody’s fault; it’s just physics—frequency of being in one place versus another place. So the more “time in” with multisite, where we intentionally maintain “small campuses that feel like family” (fccgreene.org/multisite)—a wonderful benefit and blessing of our strategy—the more I’ve noticed the drawback of easily forgetting there are two other campuses and a whole bunch more people. I frequently hear people talk about the whole from a relatively narrow frame of reference. Now, again, it’s just normal human experience to reduce reality down to one’s own experience. But that’s part of why I’ve noticed the relative importance of gathering together as a church in one place.

[Which reminds me—though I should never go public with such unfinished things—I’ve got a half baked GQA (“Great Questions Answered,” see fccgreene.org/introtogqa) called “Biblical/Theological Underpinnings of 1 Service Everywhere (1SE): Why A Single Gathered Assembly at Each Campus Matters,” where I suppose a version of said title in question form needs to happen before calling it a GQA?! I’ll keep working on it along with the other 10-11 half-baked GQAs with which I’m all-too-slowly wrestling. Btw, Part 17, there is a mostly-completed GQA being posted today re evidence for Jesus’ death and resurrection. I’ve mentioned and linked it below.]

Anyway… the basic point (I’m eventually wanting to make!) … is that there is great benefit in being together in one place, to see that God’s mission for His people is bigger than any one of us, any one campus-specific gathering, and all campuses combined. Our All-Church Easter and Christmas services are illustrative reminders that, even in a broken and sinful world of thorns and thistles, God’s church will not be prevailed against (Matthew 16:18) and that there is encouragement in gathering with the body of Christ (Hebrews 10:24-25). You see, part of why we gather is not just for nostalgia or visibility but because our physical gathering images the embodied gospel—Christ came, lived, died, and rose bodily—and He will gather us bodily to Himself again, when multisite becomes no-site because it’s all in the presence of Christ (Revelation 7:9)!

Btw, here’s an H7 Story recapping this past Easter Service at Tusculum University!

If “recovery” is simply a mental stand-in for a 12-steps program for those struggling with substance abuse, as people traditionally conceive, re:gen isn’t that. (And truly, according to that definition, that’s not “recovery” either.) Do some at re:gen have such struggles? Yep. But that by itself is an inaccurate way to communicate what re:generation recovery truly is because, substance abuse or not, re:gen is essentially all about a deep and grace-filled recovery from sin—the sin of others and our own—and we all have such struggles, period.

This is why, for us, re:gen is our main discipleship program. (For some of you who are new to us, you probably need to read that again. We believe it is so important that we require it for leaders. See our Leadership Pipeline: fccgreene.org/lp.)

To make this re:gen-as-discipleship point, check out the verbiage from our website, fccgreene.org/regen: “Re:generation is Bible-based and gospel-centered discipleship training focused on deeply understanding new life in Christ by applying God’s grace. … It uses a small group recovery model to lead through the process of deeply applying the gospel of God’s grace to all areas of life using these 12 Steps:
Steps 1-3 – Realizing Your Need for God’s Grace: Admit, Believe, Trust
Steps 4-6 – Receive God’s Grace: Inventory, Confess, Repent
Steps 7-9 – Respond to God’s Grace: Follow, Forgive, Amends
Steps 10-12 – Regeneration Because of God’s Grace: Continue, Intimacy, Regeneration.

Re:gen is essentially hardcore training in spiritual growth with a consistent dose of theological truth throughout. By working through these Biblical steps in authentic community, you can not only learn about the power of the gospel, but you can find freedom from substance abuse, codependency, pornography, eating disorders, depression, fear, control, emotional/physical/sexual abuse, same sex attraction, anger, obsessive thoughts, and any other personal struggle, whether your own sin or the sin of others against you.”

Friends, re:gen is our church’s common vocabulary for understanding the gospel of grace, is a means of experiencing the freedom of deeply-rooted identity in Christ, and all y’all need it! (And just to be clear, I’m not suggesting anything I’m unable to legitimately recommend—I’ve been through it 3 times!)

Biweekly Brown Bags & Bibles Podcast — On our biweekly Bible and theology podcast, where Elder Mark Liebert and I “break down life’s biggest befuddlements with Biblical basics,” we are in a series on world religions, new religious movements, cults, and lately, denominations. We’ve recently covered Roman Catholicism and Protestantism, Anglicanism, Lutheranism, Presbyterianism, Methodism, and Baptists. We’re up to episode 140, so there’s quite an archive of resources available to you. I was encouraged by someone who emphasized BB&B as a helpful resource just this week: “Brown Bags and Bibles is an amazing resource and I am very thankful for it. Also, the FCC app is great. Thank you for your hard work on both, it is super appreciated.” Check it out on the app under “Watch,” under “Resources” on fccgreene.org, and on the normal socials (FB & YT).

Weekly Bible Study Podcast — Over a year ago, as part of aligning kid, student, and adult curricula around each Sunday’s sermon content, every Thursday we post a 30-min podcast where we work through the coming Sunday’s sermon text. We hope this will help anybody and everybody, of course, but especially leaders of Life Groups, 180 Small Groups, and Kids Small Groups/Classes as they prepare for the coming Sunday’s lesson/content (as well as helping Staff.) In case you haven’t noticed, we’ve begun regularly rotating some of our young leaders and seminarians. Also on the app under “Watch,” under “Resources” on fccgreene.org, and on the normal socials (FB & YT).

Life Group Discussion Guide — In case you haven’t noticed, the “Life Group Discussion Guide” in the Worship Guide each Sunday (and on “Sermon Guide” on the app) reflects a sermon-themed way to facilitate discussion that leads to application. (I say all the aforementioned because we’ve tried a couple other ways over the years and some may not know we are back to the sermon-specific LGDG as of about 6 months ago.) Life Groups Leaders, while I’m not unaware that some groups occasionally veer from the LGDG, please, for the sake of those in your Life Group and for the unity of the body, make this Discussion Guide the bread and butter of your Life Group discussion. Creating a culture in one’s group of submission to God’s Word is one of the most important things you can do for your peoples’ spiritual growth. (And also don’t miss out on having your people in your group pray for one another. Did you know that studies of small groups in churches show that the most important element for long-term health in a small group is prayer!? Don’t skip it.)

On the App: “Sermons” and “Media” (on the “Watch” tab) Reveal Many Resources — Small detail, but I’ve noticed a few folks who didn’t know where to find a couple things. To find a bunch of audio/video resources—sermons, Weekly Bible Study, Brown Bags & Bibles, weekly Pulse videos, Sunday recaps, re:gen Fireside Chats & testimonies, Marriage Ministry teachings, etc.—go to the app, choose the “Watch” tab on the bottom, and here’s what some miss: then choose either “Sermons” or “Media” on the top. Boom, you’re in. I heard a couple folks within the last couple weeks who said something like, “It was like a whole new world of resources I didn’t know existed!” Yeah, that’s why I’m telling you (see “people churn” above.) And, btw, on the app, you can watch or listen, and also, most of the above is on the normal socials (FB & YT).

Frankly, ever since we lived in AC World, i.e., the world “Anno/After COVID,” as a church we have been experiencing massive “people churn.” (At least that’s what I’ve been calling it.) “People churn” is when half of a church is always new within the last six months, and it’s now the normal state of just about every church in America larger than 50.

Because of this, I feel the need to occasionally reiterate this: At First Christian Church, our non-negotiable first priority is to be good at making disciple makers. Lots of churches are good at lots of things but too few are actually good at the people growth business—making disciples who make disciples. For us, first and foremost, we keep at top of mind and heart the imperatival command that comes from Jesus in Matthew 29:19-20, the “Great Commission”—make disciples. (The main verbal command is to “make disciples.” That command is described by 3 the verbal nouns (“participles”) of going, baptizing, and teaching.)

As a result of people churn and our disciplemaking mission of Helping People Find and Follow Jesus, I want to flesh out 3 practical implications and highlight 1 question.

(1) Just because you don’t see it yet doesn’t mean it isn’t already there. — When people wonder why we don’t do a group/ministry for a particular need or demographic that they care about or with which they may have experience, we often say something like, ‘We don’t do that for a few main reasons. One, we already have too many programs and the more we add, the less we achieve our main goal of making disciplemakers.’ Terribly few churches are actually good at producing spiritual producers and we want to be really good at it. ‘And two, because that actually happens in [insert FCC program here], where we [insert further explanation here.]’ In other words, just because you don’t initially see it in the way you’re used to doesn’t mean it’s not there or there isn’t a good explanation—just keep looking.

(2) If you don’t buy in to “The Big 3,” you will eventually become disconnected. — At FCC we are designed, from the ground up, to reinforce the Biblical habits of Engage in worship, Serve on the team, and Connect in a small group. Now, you may not want to do those. You may think there are better ways. You may have experienced different methods in different churches. But this is how we are designed, and we’ve thrown all our eggs in The Big 3 basket. If you are only occasionally engaged in worship, and you aren’t serving or connecting, you should not expect something we tell you that you shouldn’t expect. I know it sounds harsh, but it’s true. We aren’t designed to accommodate another vision. We’re designed to produce producers.

(3) We transform culture by transforming individual people where we have relationships with them. — While there are many good things we could be doing as a church, nothing is more important and more fruitful for the sake of our community and world than making disciples, period. If you want to have a positive effect on the world, buy into the local church and develop the relationships you already have. The mission isn’t somewhere else; it is where God has already positioned and gifted you. Changed hearts and minds that are about Jesus’ sacrificial love for the world is the only way to develop those around us to be long-term community producers.

Q: Are you a disciplemaker? — I’m just gonna let this sit there for you to answer with the Lord in prayer. If you’re not making disciples who make disciples, (As if there is such a thing as an unfruitful disciple in the Scriptures?!), then what is it about Jesus’ command to do so that you aren’t understanding?

Prompted by a couple recent conversations with FCC parents who are concerned about their children having declared personal allegiance to an alternative to Christianity and because I increasingly sense the need to provide credible evidence for deep Christian faith, I wanted to give an overview of the evidence for the physical death and resurrection of Jesus. (And yes, I’m a couple weeks late. But because Jesus is still resurrected, it ontologically and eschatologically still applies.)

In case you are clueless about this “GQA” thing, let alone what it stands for, (as I suspect is true of 90% of those reading this,) here’s a link to the way-too-long-and-convoluted “Intro to ‘Great Questions Answered’”.

Sun, May 4, 11:50 AM: Here’s a link to the current (and still-slightly-unfinished Google Docs) version of the GQA re evidence for death and resurrection. Forewarning, about the last third is still in unScottified first-draft mode. (Specifically, everything from “Not A Culturally Invented Messiah” to the end.) That means the verbiage may be stilted and lacking nuance, the footnotes/citations may be wrong, and there are a couple things I wanted to include but haven’t gotten to yet. I.e., I haven’t gotten through to quadruple-checking everything like I usually do, (which sounds like a good thing, but it’s actually a tyranny with which we dorks live.) Anyhoo… am shooting to be actually done with the whole thing by EOD Mon, May 5, at which point all this dumb disclaimer stuff will go away and it will be posted as its own non-GDocs article.