Who We Are


10/30/2011 - Community of Grace



Not long after we moved to this area to start Valley View Community Church I was in a hardware store waiting in line to buy some light bulbs as I recall. And while I was standing there I got into a conversation with someone and mentioned that I was new to the area. They asked me what brought me here and I said that I was going to be starting a new church.

Well, as soon as I mentioned the word "church", the man at the cash register went ballistic. He didn't wait to be invited into the conversation. He just bullied his way in and said in no uncertain terms that, "The last thing this town needs is another blankety blank church. I've had it with the church." And he went on to say how he'd been hurt by the church and why the church is no good and why he'll never go back and yadda yadda yadda.

Well, at that point a woman standing nearby also jumped into the fray. And she went on to say why she hadn't gone to church in years. She had been through a divorce and the church wanted $1,000 before they would let her come back! "And no church is worth that kind of money," she said, "at least not to me." So she bagged the church.

And as I walked out of the hardware store I thought to myself, "Wow! What was that about? All I wanted to do was buy a couple light bulbs." And I could tell right then that starting a church for people who don't go church was going to be a lot of fun ... and a lot of hard work.

I wish I could tell you that that was an isolated conversation. I wish I could tell that that was the only time I've ever heard anybody bash the church. But the truth is I've met a lot of people over the years who feel that way. There are lots of people who have been hurt by the church and are down on the church. There are a lot of people who've bagged church and don't see one good reason why they should ever come back.

And then there are also a lot of people who go to church, but don't really understand what the church is about. They think that the church is the building. And if it's a big building, it's a big church. And if it's a little building, it's a little church. If it's a nice building, it's a nice church. And if it meets under an oak tree or in a barn or in a YMCA like we did for years, it can't really be a church, can it?

A few weeks ago I was talking to a woman who said, "You have a beautiful church. It's such a beautiful church." And she went on and on telling me how beautiful our church was which was kind of her and I really appreciated it, but the problem was she had never met the church. She had only been in our building once, but she had never seen the people, you, the beautiful people who make up the church.

What is this thing called the church? Is it a building and a piece of property? Is it is a business where we pay for goods and services? Is it a blankety blank place that hurts people and makes them never what to come back? And more specifically what is Valley View Community Church? What are we about? This morning we begin a new three-part series called "Who We Are: Do you recognize us?"

It's a series that's going to unpack our new mission statement that we introduced on Vision Sunday last month. Valley View Community Church desires to be a community of grace impacting our world through life in Jesus. That's who we are and that's what we're about. And over the next three weeks we want to dive into it and talk about how that mission gets accomplished and what that means for you and for me.

And we want to do that through a variety of voices. So this series is being team taught because Valley View is a community. It's way more than one voice. So today, Brad De Forest and I are going to share some thoughts on what it means to be a COMMUNITY OF GRACE.

Valley View is a community. That's our middle name because that's what the word "church" means. Our English word "church" comes from the Greek word ekklesia. It simply means "a called out group or an assembly of people." That's it. Nothing in the word even sounds religious.

The church is people. It's not a building. It's not a business. It's not a denomination. Jesus didn't die for a building or a business or a denomination. Jesus died for people. And the church is made up of the people who have been called out of this world to represent Jesus Christ.

WE are the church which is why we don't have the words "Valley View Community Church" on our sign out front. That just reinforces that the building and property are Valley View and they're not. WE the people are Valley View Community Church. And if others want to know more about us they can go to our website which is printed on the sign.

The first time the word "church" appears in the Bible it comes off the lips of Jesus who says in Matthew 16:18, And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.

The "rock" that Jesus is referring to here is not Peter, but Peter's statement two verses earlier when he says that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God. Jesus is the foundation of the church. That's why we say in our statement that we are a COMMUNITY OF GRACE impacting our world through life in Jesus.

So the church is people. And as we move through the New Testament we see the church referred to in a variety of ways. It is called the Bride of Christ. It is called the Body of Christ. And it's called the Family of God, a family where we relate to one another as brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, sons and daughters.

The first church viewed themselves as a family. For many of them believing in Jesus had come at a great price. Some had been disowned by their biological families, dead and buried. And so many of them became closer to other believers then they were to their own flesh and blood. That was true then and it's true for many of us now.

And when they came together, as we come together each Sunday, they came together to spur each other toward love and good deeds. That's what we read in Hebrews 10:24-25, And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, 25not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another - and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Meeting together as a community is vital to our identity as a church. We need to keep each other encouraged in our journey with Jesus. So the church is a community. We don't go to church. Instead, we commit ourselves to being the church.

I love what Rick Warren says, "While becoming a Christian means to commit yourself to Christ, being in community means to commit yourself to other Christians who make up the body of Christ."

We are a COMMUNITY OF GRACE. "We are ordinary people overwhelmed by God's outrageous love, grace and mercy who try to share that love, grace and mercy with those around us every day."

God's grace has rescued us once and for all from the penalty of sin and from the fear of death and the separation from God that sin causes. God's grace rescues us every day from the power of sin and the bondage it can bring to our lives. And God's grace will one day rescue us from the presence of sin when his kingdom finally comes and his will is done on earth as it is in heaven.

And so in our Imagine a community statement we say that we are a community of grace where everyone is accepted and respected and their journey valued, regardless of their background, beliefs or place in society. We extend the same love and grace to others that God has extended to us through his Son Jesus.

Introduce Brad

Valley View is a community of grace. Okay, so now you may be asking "What does that mean? What does that really look like?"

For me the best analogy for understanding what a community of grace looks like is as an extended family. And as Bruce has already pointed out this analogy is biblical. It's how Jesus saw the church community, it's how the early church saw it. Church is like a family.

"Brothers and sisters ..." A phrase used by followers of Jesus for hundreds of years to refer to fellow believers. Jesus started it in Matthew 25:40 and Paul and the other leaders in the early church ran with it. This phrase is found something like 120 times in the TNIV translation of the Bible.

I suppose the wording sounds a little dated, maybe the phrase is a little out of vogue in today's church, but I think the relationship and community it portrays is at the core of what God sees for the church.

The community I see represented in the New Testament is far from the modern day, incorporated, membership based, packaged organizations we see all around us today.

To me the church community should be more like a family than an official association, organization or business. This needs to be my mindset when I look at church.

When you think of church more as a family than a non-profit 501c(3) organization or building it changes how you react and interact with others.

When you think of church as a community, as family, rather than a place to go on Sunday mornings, it changes how you view Sunday morning worship. It feels less like a musical performance and lecture and more like a family gathering.

I'm sure it is safe for me to say, every one of us has had experience with extended families. We are husbands, wives, mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, grandparents, cousins ... and in-laws. We are part of a family, a community. And it is not an ideal perfect community, is it? It is tough, it is complicated, and isn't all joy. But it is family, there are responsibilities, and God has put you together and desires for you all to flourish and grow together.

Well, just like family, church community is complicated, and not always smooth, and like family we shouldn't walk away when church, when our community, isn't the way we think it should be.

How many times in your own families and extended families have you had to rely on grace and forgiveness to stay together and functional?

When we walk away in the face of personality differences, disagreements, politics, musical styles, or even a different overall vision of the church, we all miss out. We miss out on spiritual growth. We miss a chance to live out grace.

We shouldn't be looking for perfection. Just like we shouldn't expect perfection in our families, in our children, in our spouses, we shouldn't expect it from a community of believers. The expectation of perfection is destructive. It can destroy relationships and community.

The Body of Christ is much more than any one church. I believe no one local church can be the Body (the Church, the Bride), perfectly, completely. It is not possible in a broken world.

Another analogy or picture that has helped me better understand church community is the "living stones" imagery found in 1 Peter, chapter 2. "Living Stones...being built into a spiritual house."

Just picture a stone house in your mind. You have many individual stones chiseled and shaped to fit together with each other and form one complete house.

The stones are us as individuals, the stone house is the church, and God is doing the work. A spiritual house is being built out of the lives of those who follow Christ. The church is being built, not of stone but of lives, living stones. There is also a key alignment stone at the corner of the house. A cornerstone. Jesus! As we come to Jesus and submit our lives we are changed and shaped to correspond and relate to the others around us. If we isolate ourselves we prevent this 'shaping' from taking place. Community is essential to spiritual growth. Each one of us is unique and we are worked together into one community. Just as grace has bridged the gap between the believer and God, grace helps to build up and hold the community together. As we are 'shaped' we are also being aligned with Jesus the cornerstone. Each unique stone fits tightly with the next coming together to form one strong and solid house.

If we walk away from community when we bump up against each other, when something doesn't function like we expect, we miss an important part of growing into what God wants us to be. We miss living as a community of grace. We miss having some of our issues dealt with, some of our sharp edges rounded off. God uses others to make us grow and if we just walk away every time things are not the way we think they should be then we miss out on growth. We all miss out.

For me personally, when I think back on why I was attracted to Valley View, why my family settled into this community, and why we have grown personally here, I would have to point to this very part of our new mission statement. Valley View is a COMMUNITY OF GRACE.

Questions of the Week

  • Why do you think we emphasize the fact that the church is not the building? How does understanding that the church is a community of people shape the way that we think about life together?
  • How would you define "grace"? What connection do you see between the ideas of "grace" and "community"? What are some ways that we can practice grace in our community?
  • What are some of the ways that the church is like a family? How is grace important to being a family? What about commitment?
  • How can we at Valley View demonstrate the idea of being a community of grace? What are some practical ways that we can show grace to one another?