(religious music)
- Hello, Willow Creek,
how's everybody doing today?
I said how's everybody doing today?
We are so excited for this weekend.
This is Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Weekend
and we are gonna honor him in our service
as we worship our Lord and savior.
We're so glad you're here with us.
You can put your hands together like this.
We taught you this song a couple weeks ago
and Patrice is gonna lead us, here we go.
♪ Clap your hands, all you people ♪
♪ Clap your hands, all you people ♪
- Come on and let me see you
clap your hands like this.
(audience claps)
♪ Clap your hands, all you people ♪
♪ Clap your hands, all you people ♪
♪ Yeah ♪
♪ Lift your hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Lift your hands in the sanctuary. ♪
- Come on and give our
God a wave offering,
can you do that for me?
♪ Yeah ♪
♪ Lift your hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Lift your hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Our God is worthy to be praised ♪
♪ Shout to God with the voice of triumph ♪
♪ Shout to God to with
the voice of triumph ♪
♪ Can I get a good hallelujah ♪
♪ Yeah, yeah, yeah ♪
♪ Shout to God with the voice of triumph ♪
♪ Shout to God with the voice of triumph ♪
♪ Glory to your name ♪
♪ Oh ♪
♪ This is what we come to do ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Sing, everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Sing everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Come on, everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Lift your hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Lift your hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Oh, lift your hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Lift your hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Come on, lift your
hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Lift your hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Lift your hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Lift your hands in the sanctuary ♪
♪ Shout to God with the voice of triumph ♪
♪ Shout to God with the voice of triumph ♪
♪ Shout to God with the voice of triumph ♪
♪ Shout to God with the voice of triumph ♪
♪ Shout to God with the voice of triumph ♪
♪ Shout to God with the voice of triumph ♪
♪ Shout to God with a voice of triumph ♪
♪ Shout to God with a voice of triumph ♪
♪ Whoa, this is what we come to do ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Sing everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Come on, everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Oh, everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Sing, I can't stop praising ♪
♪ I can't stop praising ♪
♪ And I won't stop praising ♪
♪ Won't stop praising ♪
♪ Come on, everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Sing out, can't stop praising ♪
♪ Can't stop praising ♪
♪ And I won't stop praising ♪
♪ Won't stop praising ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Come on, everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Because he's been so good ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Praise the name of Jesus ♪
♪ Praise the name of Jesus ♪
♪ He's my rock ♪
♪ He's my fortress ♪
♪ He's my deliverer ♪
♪ In him will I trust ♪
♪ Praise the name of Jesus ♪
♪ Oh, everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Because he's been so good ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ He deserves all the glory ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Has he been your provider ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Has he done anything for you ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Come on, everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Everybody praise ♪
♪ Yeah ♪
♪ We give you all the glory ♪
♪ We worship you, our Lord ♪
♪ You are worthy to be praised ♪
- Come on church, let's
lift it up and sing,
we give you all the glory.
♪ We give you all ♪
♪ The glory ♪
♪ We worship you, our God ♪
♪ You are worthy to be praised ♪
♪ We give you all ♪
♪ We give you all ♪
♪ Come on, lift it up ♪
♪ The glory ♪
♪ And we worship you today ♪
♪ We worship you, our Lord ♪
♪ You are worthy to be be praised ♪
♪ Come on, we say we
give you all the glory ♪
♪ Let's lift it up, come on ♪
♪ Everyone sing this night ♪
♪ We give you all ♪
♪ The glory ♪
♪ We worship you, our Lord ♪
♪ You are worthy to be praised ♪
- Yes, God, you are worthy of our voice,
you are worthy of our praise,
sing it out, you are worthy.
♪ You are worthy to be praised ♪
- Yes God, you deserve it
all, you deserve it all.
Sing it one last time, you are worthy.
♪ You are worthy to be praised ♪
(audience applauds)
(religious music)
♪ There's no running from you ♪
♪ Your love is present everywhere I go ♪
♪ And I will hold to the truth ♪
♪ That you're the God
who won't ever let go ♪
♪ Oh ♪
♪ Even in the fire ♪
♪ I am sure ♪
♪ I'll sing it through the night ♪
♪ You are good ♪
♪ And hope is not lost ♪
♪ Jesus, you are here with us ♪
♪ Mmm ♪
♪ Hope is not lost ♪
♪ Jesus, you have overcome ♪
♪ I will lift up my eyes ♪
♪ To look beyond the
storm that surrounds ♪
♪ And I will fix all my sight ♪
♪ On the one in whom
my salvation's found ♪
♪ Even in the fire ♪
♪ Sing it out ♪
♪ Even in the fire ♪
♪ I am sure ♪
♪ Sing it through the night ♪
♪ Sing it through the night ♪
♪ You are good ♪
♪ And hope is not lost ♪
♪ Jesus, you are here with us ♪
♪ Hope is here ♪
♪ Right here ♪
♪ Hope is not lost ♪
♪ Jesus, you have overcome ♪
♪ Hope is not lost ♪
♪ Hope is not lost ♪
♪ Hope is not lost ♪
♪ Jesus, you are here with us ♪
♪ Yeah, yeah ♪
♪ Hope is not lost ♪
♪ Jesus you have overcome ♪
♪ Jesus, you're my protector ♪
♪ In darkness, my defender ♪
♪ Let our hope come alive ♪
♪ No one can stand against you ♪
♪ You can't stop the
light coming through ♪
♪ Let our hope come alive ♪
♪ Amen, church, yes ♪
♪ Let all the strongholds come down ♪
♪ No fear, no shame, no more doubt ♪
♪ Let our hope come alive ♪
♪ Darkness can't stand against you ♪
♪ You can't stop Jesus, our rescue ♪
♪ Let our hope come alive ♪
♪ Hope is rising ♪
♪ Jesus, you are here with us ♪
♪ Lift it up, church ♪
♪ Hope is rising ♪
♪ Jesus, you have overcome ♪
♪ Hope is rising, hope is rising, yeah ♪
♪ Hope is rising ♪
♪ Jesus, you are here with us ♪
♪ Oh ♪
♪ Hope is rising ♪
♪ Jesus, you have overcome ♪
♪ Yeah ♪
(audience applauds)
- Oh Jesus, Jesus, let our hope rise.
Let our hope rise today
in this very moment.
We can look around at
our world and we can see
problems and struggles
and division and strife.
But God, let our hope rise
today as we fix our eyes on you.
Jesus, we believe that you
don't simply have the answer,
that you are the answer.
Would you let our hope rise today?
When we say God, when we say that we hope,
it's not that we wish for something,
we hope because we have faith,
because we have confidence,
we put our hope in you and
we believe that you are here
with us, that you have already overcome.
God, that is why we fix our eyes on you,
so good God, would you speak to us today?
We will open our eyes,
we will open our ears,
we will open our hearts to you.
And would you speak to us?
We want to be a changed people,
we want to be a changed church.
And we want change in our world,
we pray this all in the
powerful, powerful name of Jesus
and all God's people said?
Amen, amen.
(audience applauds)
We are so glad you're here with us
as we continue on in our service.
You can go ahead and take your seats.
- Good evening, church, as Matt said,
we're so glad that you
plowed through all that snow
to make it here tonight,
give yourselves a round of applause.
(audience applauds)
And we're especially glad that you're here
because this is the time
of the year where we
as a church and we as
a nation, we celebrate
and commemorate the life
of someone that I believe
is more than deserving of the honor,
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Can we give him a round?
(audience applauds)
Yeah, and most often we
celebrate him as the dreamer,
the one that dreamed of
racial reconciliation.
Or we celebrate him for
the one that had the vision
of going to the mountaintop
and seeing the promised land,
rarely do we ever get a
glimpse of what it was like
for him to go through the
valley, rarely do we ever
get a glimpse for him what
it was like to be wide awake
but be living your worst nightmare
and I'm glad that God is
the one that gives us dreams
and visions, but I'm also
glad that God is the one
that's with us in the valley.
(audience applauds)
(somber rock music)
(phone rings)
- [Man] Listen, we're tired
of you and your mess now.
If you're not out of
this town in three days,
we're gonna blow up your house.
(phone slams)
(somber music)
- [Martin] I had heard
these things before,
but for some reason, that night,
it got to me.
I started thinking about my
dedicated and loyal wife.
She could be taken from me.
Or I could be taken from her.
I thought about a
beautiful little daughter
who had just been born.
For the first time, I realized
something could happen to me.
(somber music)
I felt myself faltering.
And growing in fear.
I was ready to give up.
I tried to think of a way
to move out of the picture
without appearing a coward.
Something said to me, you
can't call on Daddy now.
You've got to call on that
something and that person
your daddy used to tell you about,
that power that could
make a way out of no way.
The words I spoke to God that midnight
are still vivid in my memory.
Lord, I'm down here
trying to do what's right,
but Lord, I must confess
that I'm weak now.
I'm losing my courage.
I'm at the end of my powers.
I have nothing left.
(somber music)
It seemed as though I could
hear the quiet assurance
of an inner voice saying, Martin Luther,
stand up for righteousness,
stand up for justice,
stand up for truth, and
lo, I will be with you,
even until the end of the world.
I heard the voice of Jesus.
Saying still to fight on.
(somber music)
I want it to be known through the length
and breadth of this land,
that if I am stopped,
this movement will not stop.
For what we are doing is right.
And what we are doing is just.
And God is with us.
(audience applauds)
♪ Oh sweet architect ♪
♪ Bones are heavy and my soul's a mess ♪
♪ I can't find my address ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Oh sweet architect ♪
♪ I've been lonely
since the day you left ♪
♪ Come find my address ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Yes we've got deep love ♪
♪ But it's a deeper ocean ♪
♪ Dear God, help us keep floating ♪
♪ Some choke ♪
♪ But some panic ♪
♪ See some got a boat ♪
♪ But most haven't ♪
♪ Dear heaven ♪
♪ You know we're trying to make it ♪
♪ But dear heaven ♪
♪ You know it's complicated ♪
♪ Got deep love but it's a deeper ocean ♪
♪ We've got deep love ♪
♪ Oh sweet architect ♪
♪ Our bones are heavy ♪
♪ And our soul's a mess ♪
♪ I can't find my address ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Oh sweet architect ♪
♪ I've been lonely
since the day you left ♪
♪ So come find my address ♪
♪ And build me up, build me up ♪
♪ We're still here ♪
♪ And we're still breathing ♪
♪ We're knee deep with the deep needing ♪
♪ We stay brave though
we've been damaged ♪
♪ See, most got it harder ♪
♪ But some savage ♪
♪ Dear heaven, I hope
you're up to something ♪
♪ 'Cause dear heaven, just
can't be for nothing ♪
♪ We're still here ♪
♪ And we're still breathing, yeah ♪
♪ We're still here ♪
♪ Oh sweet architect ♪
♪ My bones are heavy ♪
♪ And my soul's a mess ♪
♪ I can't find my address ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Oh sweet architect ♪
♪ See, I've been lonely
since the day you left ♪
♪ Come find my address ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ I'm crying, please ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Oh, I need you to build me up ♪
♪ Please ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Oh sweet architect ♪
♪ My bones are heavy
and my soul's a mess ♪
♪ Can't find my address ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ Oh, sweet ♪
♪ Oh sweet architect ♪
♪ I've been lonely
since the day you left ♪
♪ Come find ♪
♪ Come find my address ♪
♪ Build me up ♪
♪ Build me up, build me up ♪
♪ We shall overcome ♪
♪ We shall overcome ♪
♪ We shall overcome ♪
♪ Someday ♪
♪ Oh, deep in my heart ♪
♪ I do believe ♪
♪ We shall overcome ♪
♪ Someday ♪
- Let's stand together and sing this.
♪ Even through the fire ♪
♪ I am sure ♪
♪ I'll sing it through the night ♪
♪ You are good ♪
♪ Sing it one more time, church ♪
♪ Even in the fire, I am sure ♪
♪ Sing it through the night ♪
♪ Sing it through the night ♪
♪ You are good ♪
♪ Hope is not lost ♪
♪ Jesus, you are here with us ♪
♪ We put our trust in you ♪
♪ So we can say ♪
♪ That hope is not lost ♪
♪ Jesus, you have overcome ♪
♪ We have overcome the world ♪
♪ Lift your voices ♪
♪ Hope is not lost ♪
♪ Jesus, you are here with us ♪
♪ With us ♪
♪ Here with us ♪
♪ Hope is not lost ♪
♪ Jesus, you have overcome ♪
(audience applauds)
- Let's pray together.
Spirit of the living God,
I feel in the room today that
there is some of us
that life has told us
that we should lose hope.
That we should abandon it
for one reason or the other.
And yet Jesus, your
words, your lasting words,
to your disciples, was to take heart.
Even though the world has problems,
even though the world has danger,
even though the world has disappointment,
even though the world is full of sin,
your encouragement was take heart
because you have overcome the world.
And for those of us that
believe the words of Jesus,
we take comfort in that.
And God, thank you that even now,
those of us in the room
or those of us watching
that may not quite believe
in the words of Jesus,
that there's still comfort,
that there's still hope.
That hope will never be lost
because hope rose from the dead
Jesus, we thank you for
your presence with us.
And even though we have things
to fix on our side of heaven
we can rest in the confidence
that you have overcome
the world, that you
reign, that you're strong,
that you love us, that you are with us
and that you are for
us, you'll never leave.
We say thank you for that.
Lift our hearts to you, we
lift our hands and our voices.
Thank you for your presence with us.
We say this prayer in the mighty
name of Jesus, amen, amen.
(audience applauds)
Thank you all so much for being with us
and for standing and singing
and for weathering the cold.
It's like super duper cold
outside and so we're all brave
people for being here, now
I know that there's no place
that you would rather be
than church right now,
but if you could pick up church
and take it to a warm weather place,
right, I want you to turn to the person
next to you and tell you
where you would take church
in a warm weather climate.
(crowd murmurs)
- Well, good morning, Willow
Creek Community Church.
- [Crowd] Morning, Steve!
- That was awful, good morning,
Willow Creek Community Church.
- [Crowd] Morning Steve.
- Yeah, welcome to you watching online
and welcome, we got two special groups.
Our Elevate ministry
is in the room with us,
welcome, Elevate, yeah.
(audience applauds)
Glad that you're here with us.
And our student impact
ministry is over here,
high school students, welcome.
(audience applauds)
Nice that you guys are with us,
so glad you're here and if you're new,
if this is your first time at our church,
you're our honored guest
and we hope you have a great experience.
We'd love it if after the
service you stop by out
in the lobby our welcome
center, just stop by there,
go, hey, it's first time,
we'd love to meet you,
answer you any questions
you got and tell you
a little bit more about our church.
And I want to do a few family
church updates real quick
before we move into the
message and first I want
to update you on giving from last year.
Many of you have been
asking, hey, financially,
how did we end 2018?
So a little background on
this, many of you know this,
we shared that from January til November,
we had a significant deficit that built up
and this was our revenue
target versus actual giving.
The gap was 3.25 million
going into December
and we brought this to your
attention, we said church,
if you just prayerfully
consider, could we all work
to close that gap and
in this you'll notice
multiple months last year we
did not meet our revenue target
during the month, well,
December, good news,
December, we actually met revenue
and above and beyond that,
we actually exceeded it
by $2.1 million, yeah,
it's good news, yeah.
(audience applauds)
Now some of you math majors out there,
though, you know that
2.1 does not equal 3.25,
so how is this good news,
well, here's the good news.
Two things we look at, one is
giving and our revenue target,
the other's expenses,
September, we said to the staff,
hey, be very wise with your spending,
if it's not mission critical, hold on it
and the staff did a remarkable job
and so as we kinda tallied
up all the receipts
from the end of the year,
we realized they underspent
our budget by over $2 million
which gave us a surplus
last year of 1.2 million, this is, yeah.
(audience applauds)
Which means we got through
one of the toughest years
in our history and we didn't
have to touch our cash reserves
which is awesome, yes.
(audience applauds)
And the person we need
to thank is God himself
who's the great provider, yes?
(audience applauds)
So can we say a prayer of gratitude now?
Yeah, God, you have
been guiding this church
all the years of its life.
God, once again, this
last year, you provided,
God we see your hand and we say thank you.
God, we'd ask this.
Would you keep guiding
us, we're looking to you.
God, guide us and shape us,
change us, do whatever you need
to do in us to be the
church you need us to be.
God, we look to you as the provider
and you've been the good provider,
thanks for how you've
provided for individual
and families and for our church.
And God, we commit ourselves
to you and it's with gratitude
that we said this prayer
in the name of Christ,
amen, amen, amen, yeah.
Now with that in mind, volunteers,
if you want to come forward
to receive our offering, yeah.
Now if you're new, don't
feel any pressure to give.
We're just grateful that
you're here, but volunteers,
come forward, you can start
to receive the offering.
While they do that, I want to
tell you another fun update.
We've been trying as our
church, it's a big church,
we want to help you get
to know people at church,
build community, help each
other grow spiritually
and so we knew that we
needed to launch a lot more
small groups and our
group ministry came up
with an idea that we
had on Wednesday night
and it was this, they
wanted to recruit as many
small group leaders as they
could who weren't leading groups
and 90 people were vetted who
agreed to lead small groups.
Men's groups, women's, singles, couples,
all different kinds, we invited
you in the congregation,
if you're not in a group
but you'd like to be in one,
join us Wednesday night,
and Wednesday night,
this is a little video
we shot of what happened.
Not only did we meet
in the Activity Center,
we had so many people we
had to open up other venues
and over 700 people got
connected into small groups
Wednesday night, which
is an awesome thing, yep.
Now if you go hey, that's
great, I wish I could get in it,
two things, stop by the
Welcome Center, say hey,
I'd like to get into a
group, we'd love to add you
to the number or go online or to our app
and just you'll see their group links
and just sign up and go hey,
I'd like to get into a group
and we'd love to have
you join us for that.
I want to give you another
update and this one's
in regard to the elders of our church
and I'd like to welcome
in all the congregations
of our church, in
August, many of you know,
that the elders at that
time made a decision
to step down and to resign,
they realized that our church
needed a fresh start to
move into the future.
So we started a brand new
process on how to select elders
and we formed an elder
selection committee to create
that process and the
elder selection committee,
this is a whole new group,
this was 24 individuals
from all across the Willow family.
16 of them were volunteers
at different campuses,
six of them were staff,
none of them senior staff
and two of them were elders and these 24
crafted the process together
and it started in September
when we asked you as the congregation,
would you nominate
people that you respect,
that you look up to, but who also live out
the Biblical characteristics
describing an elder?
And you did, you nominated over 100 people
to be potential elders, by far
the most we've ever gotten.
The elder selection committee then created
this process where they
had multiple interviews,
they had different
assessments, all to assess,
did they have the right
skills and competencies
and giftedness that we need
to lead us into the future.
One thing you need to know is
the elder selection committee
determined that in order for
any candidate to move forward,
all 24 of them had to be in
agreement to move them ahead.
In December, we presented
to you the finalists
and this is where we
invited you to partake again
and just said, would you
air any concerns you had
about the process,
today, it's my privilege.
We've installed the new elders
and they've already met,
actually, and these are the
names of the new elders.
Of our church, and it's
very good news, yeah.
(audience applauds)
Now.
The elder selection committee,
again, they served our church
quite well, they crafted
one final update to the congregation.
They said if you've got any questions
about the process they went
through, you can read about it
in the update, it's on our website,
but I've got a group of thank
yous that I've got to make
on behalf of the church,
first off, to the elder
selection committee, I
just want to say thank you
on behalf of the whole church
for the hours and hours
you put in to serve us and
to select these elders.
You did a fantastic job,
thank you for how you served us, yeah.
(audience applauds)
I then want to say another
thank you and this thank you
is to our previous
elders because in August,
when that group resigned,
they didn't stop working.
They worked diligently from
August to the finish line
to ensure a thoughtful handoff
to the new group of elders
and again, you served
our church quite well
so thank you for finishing your term well.
(audience applauds)
Third, I want to thank the 100 candidates,
100 people were nominated.
They weren't all selected.
Each of these people
from what I understand,
just said open handedly,
we love our church, we love
God, if we can serve the church
we will, but open handedly
will enter the process.
I just honor you for your
willingness again to just say,
if God will have me, I'll do
it, thanks for your willingness
to submit to the process,
thanks for your open handedness
You're some of the best people at Willow
and we're so grateful
for you so thank you.
(audience applauds)
Lastly, I owe you a thank
you, the congregation.
You did this thoughtfully and prayerfully.
The number of times you
reached out to me to say hey,
we're praying, we're
praying, we're praying,
we're praying that God would
guide us to the elders,
that meant just, thank you and
on this, I want to say to you
keep praying, if ever, these
elders need your prayers
now more than ever,
they're getting up to speed
to understand our church
which is a complex church
and they now have the
great task in front of them
to lead us forward into a new day.
And so with that in mind, I'd
love to say a prayer for them
so would you join me?
Yeah, so God now, we bless and
commission these new elders.
God, would you guide
them, would you give them
great wisdom and discernment,
would you give them
the courage to say yes
and to say no to things,
God, would you knit them
together into a new team?
And God, our prayer is years
from now we look back and go,
you led us to the right
people at the right time
to lead us forward, God,
bless them and their families
for the sacrifice they're
making, we pray this
in the name of Christ, amen, amen, amen.
Hey, one more thing I want to highlight,
next weekend we're kicking
off a series called
the Journey through John,
we're gonna be reading through
the gospel of John in our homes
and then teaching about it
at all the aspects of our church.
We're gonna be handing
out four different books
over the next couple weeks
from little kids on up.
Those of you who have
kids in Promised Land,
you can pick up their books
when you pick them up.
Elevate, you'll get yours
next week at Elevate,
Impact, you will get
yours next week at Blast.
But adults, we're giving you yours.
(audience cheers)
Yes.
(audience cheers)
Yes.
(audience laughs)
This is the adult book, adults,
grab yours on the way out
today, it doesn't start
til a week from tomorrow
but grab one, it's free, it's for you,
and I'd just ask you to
commit to reading it.
Next week, we will kick off the series.
Mike Breaux will be teaching,
which I know you're gonna love.
He's gonna be back with us next weekend.
Tied to this, we not
only want you to read it
as individuals, we'd love
to get you into a group
to talk about it, so if
you would like to get into
a group, you can see the information here.
You can text this number, text
the word group to this number
and we'll work to get you into group.
Also, I want to speak
to those of you online.
Some of you, you watch online
and you're in different
parts of the country, if
you'd like to get into group,
we're gonna try something
new, just email this,
email tv@willowcreek.org,
just say hey, I'd like to get
into a group, we'd love
to test an online group
for those of you who are
part of our church online
but today, we have a guest speaker
who is going to challenge your thinking
and I think really bless our whole church.
Eugene Cho's with us so
would you give a huge
Willow welcome to Eugene
as he joins me on stage?
(audience applauds)
- Hey, good morning, everyone,
it's so good to be back
in sunny Chicago.
It is sunny and
although it's a shock to my
body because I just flew in
from South Africa doing some work there,
it was 95 degrees, so to go from 95
to I think 10 or so degrees,
but God is good and gracious.
Hey, a couple things that
I wanted to share with you.
You know, a few years ago, I
think about three years ago,
I had one of the greatest, I
think, privileges and honors.
I was invited by Dr. King's family,
his daughter, Dr. Bernice
King, his youngest daughter
and their family gave
me the special privilege
and invited me to speak at
Ebeneezer Baptist Church
on MLK Day about three years ago.
It was the greatest seven
hour service I've ever been
a part of, seven hours.
And in that seven hours,
they gave me 10 minutes
but I learned so much
during that time and so
there's gonna be a couple things
that I'll be sharing today
on this MLK weekend at Willow Church
and I'm really excited
and privileged to be here,
but I want to just also share with you,
can I give you a heads up
that parts of today's talk
is going to be a little uncomfortable?
It's gonna be a little challenging
and I think that's okay.
Because the gospel, it both comforts us
but it also ought to
disrupt us a little bit.
We need both for our hearts and soul.
Sometimes, I feel like
in the western context,
we're so moved and compelled and attracted
to a gospel that comforts
us and we altogether
sometimes neglect the
gospel that challenges us.
So my prayer is that the
gospel, the Holy Spirit
might do both for us but there's
going to be a couple things
today that will make you
feel a little uncomfortable
and if that's the case,
then go ahead and talk
to Pastor Steve.
(audience laughs)
His email is
whatwouldjesusemail@gmail.com, okay?
Now if you have your Bibles with you,
we're gonna refer to the
gospel of John, chapter four
and we're gonna read verses
one to 10 at this time,
so John chapter four verses one to 10.
Now Jesus learned that
the Pharisees had heard
that he was gaining and
baptizing more disciples
than John, although in
fact it was not Jesus
who baptized but his
disciples, so he left Judea
and went back once more to Galilee.
Now he had to go through Samaria.
So he came to a town in
Samaria called Sychar,
near the plot of ground Jacob
had given to his son Joseph.
Jacob's well was there,
and Jesus, tired as he was
from the journey, sat down by the well.
It was about noon.
When a Samaritan woman came to draw water,
Jesus said to her, will
you give me a drink?
I'm sorry, his disciples
had gone into the town
to buy food, the Samaritan
woman said to him,
you are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman.
How can you ask me for a drink?
For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.
Jesus answered her, if
you knew the gift of God
and who it is that asks you for a drink,
you would have asked him
and he would have given you
living water.
Amen.
Now
I want to begin by first sharing something
about Dr. King and then
we'll get into this text
and my hope and prayer is that you and I
will be learning and being challenged
by four practical points from our passage
as we reflect on the word of
God and also on Dr. King's life
but let's first talk
about this larger point
that I want to make about Dr. King.
Today, nearly everyone loves
Dr. Martin Luther King jr.
He's universally loved and respected.
He's among the most
admired people not just
in the United States but
actually all around the world.
Just this past week I
mentioned to you that I was
in South Africa, his name
came up on several occasions.
And it's really interesting
because you and I
all know that we're living
in a very polarized,
contentious political
landscape in our nation
but you are going to hear
people from all side,
all political parties,
convey their admiration for Dr. King.
Now this is a good thing,
it's not bad at all
to have a day, tomorrow, a federal holiday
to celebrate his life, his leadership
and his legacy, to have
churches across the land
including Willow, honor
this servant of Christ.
This Pastor and this prophet, it's indeed
a good and beautiful thing.
I want you to know that as
a fellow brother in Christ,
I'm so encouraged that
you as a body of Christ
that you're choosing to honor
him and to honor the God
who deposited that
dream into this servant.
But it's really important
that we take a moment
to understand that time has a tendency
of softening the edges about a person.
Or about an event or
about an entire movement
as you witnessed in that
video that we shared
earlier during service, in other words,
as human beings, we have a temptation
or a tendency to domesticate
or placate or producify
or Disney-ize certain things.
Dr. Cornell West, who
happens to be a professor,
at Harvard University, he
calls this process, quote,
the Santa Clausification of a figure.
This is why in today's
landscape as we reflect back
on Dr. King, we sometimes
forget, neglect or altogether
forget how unpopular
and even hated Dr. King
was during his time.
He was hated.
In 1966, which was the last
year that the Gallup polls
measured King's influence in society,
it showed that 63%
saw Dr. King in a very negative light,
a very negative light,
which is a stark contrast
to today where over 95% of society
have deep respect and reverence for him.
So before we get into the sermon,
we need to understand that Dr. King
was deeply misunderstood.
He was vilified, rejected, accused,
lest we forget, he was threatened
and harassed, bullied, beaten, bombed,
stabbed, jailed, 29 times.
And ultimately killed.
This is why
that even though perhaps
there's something within us
that wants to have a fuzzy
Dr. King celebration weekend,
we need to take a moment to
pause and assess the cost
of his faithfulness to the
dream that God deposited
in his life, today and
tomorrow on MLK Day,
let's be honest, you're
going to have a lot of people
sharing social media quotes from Dr. King
and again, it's good,
but I think herein lies
the conundrum, the tension, the dilemma.
What I'm trying to tell you
is that if we're not careful
as we embellish the past,
it's possible that for you and for me,
as we're talking about issues like justice
and reconciliation, those were the things
that Dr. King was about
because they were the things
that they believed was
also part of the whole
gospel message of Jesus Christ.
That Jesus saves but Jesus is
also at work in a broken word
redeeming, restoring,
re-reconciling the world
back unto God and as Dr.
King is talking about justice
and I want to take a
moment to just give you
a very simple working
definition of justice,
to pursue justice which is
what the Bible encourages us
to do, to pursue justice, is
to consider that which has been
wronged or broken and
severed God's creation,
God's intention, for human
flourishing in this world,
justice is to right that
which has been wronged.
That's the work of justice.
When we speak about reconciliation,
we speak about division
and disconnect that exists
in our relationship with God
and also our relationship
with fellow humanity
so the call and the
ministry of reconciliation
is to pursue that reconnection
with God and with one another.
Now in the Christian world and at Willow,
let's just be honest,
don't raise your hands
but if I were to ask you
a rhetorical question,
how many of us love
justice, all of our hands
should go up, and of
course, as Christians,
how can we not love justice?
If I were to ask you who
here loves reconciliation,
all of our hands should rightfully go up,
but I think this is the
conundrum and let me say this.
It's quite possible
that we're more in love
with the ideas of justice, more in love
with the ideas of reconciliation,
let me go here, it's a little
uncomfortable, it's possible
that we may have Jesus on our lips
but we're more in love
with the idea of Jesus
than actually following Jesus.
That's discipleship.
That's the call of what it means.
Now when we're speaking about
justice or reconciliation,
here's what I want to tell you.
Everyone loves the idea
of reconciliation period.
Until we realize that
reconciliation involves confessing,
confronting, truth telling,
repenting, dismantling,
forgiving and bridge building.
This is why it's surely easier
to be about the ideas of certain things.
This is the unique distinction of Dr. King
and this is what God is calling
each and every one of us
to pursue, this is why Jesus himself says
count the cost, carry
your cross, and follow me.
Now let's dive into our scripture passage.
We're not gonna have the
time to be able to do
a deep study of it, but I
want to turn your attention
to the fourth verse in the
gospel of John chapter four.
It reads very simple.
Now he had to go through Samaria.
Obviously, he refers
to Jesus, so now Jesus
had to go through Samaria.
Let's pause for a moment.
Jesus didn't have to do anything.
Because he's Jesus.
That's really important.
That means that any time
Jesus does something,
says something, he's giving
us a glimpse of his heart,
his character, he's giving
us a vision and imagination
of the kingdom of God.
Now why does Jesus have
to go through Samaria?
Now it's not recorded in the scriptures
but in my imagination,
he has a conversation
with the disciples that goes like this.
Jesus says to the disciples, hey,
disciples, we have to go up north.
And we're going to go through Samaria
and the disciples respond
by saying are you crazy?
Are you insane?
Now why?
Well, we have to study
a thing called maps.
I don't know if you know what a map is,
but in our digital
technology, I love maps.
Now this is more of a
simplified map of the region
in which Jesus lived and
conducted his ministry
so as we read in John four,
Jesus and the disciples,
they're in the Southern
region called Judea.
Jerusalem is in the Southern region.
The Bible tells us that
they needed to go up north
so I want you to imagine in Jerusalem,
if they needed to go
up to Cana in Galilee,
you don't have to be a
rocket scientist to know
that the quickest way
from point A to point B
is a straight line.
Look at the stage for a second.
If I want to get to that
light right on the edge
of that stage, I would
simply take a direct line
and it would take me about eight steps.
The problem during the times of Jesus
is that folks that were
traveling north South
and vice versa, they rarely
traveled in a straight line
because there was a large
chunk of land called Samaria
occupied by a group of
people called Samaritans
and there was deep hostility and tension
between these two groups of people.
Now it's very complicated but
it begins from Second Kings
in the Old Testament in
chapter 17 with a tension
that continues to brew and grow and fester
and it's not just for a day.
It's not just for a week,
it's not just a month
or a year or a decade, it
festers for generations
upon generations upon generations
to the point that when
Jesus arrives on the scene,
there's a reason why
several of his stories
involve Samaritans, why?
You see, Samaritans, they were considered
by the Jewish people as dirty.
Unclean.
Inferior.
Half breeds.
Contaminated, lesser than.
They dehumanized them,
they otherized them,
they villainized them
and it continued to grow
and grow and grow, this is
why, listen carefully, Willow,
this is why Jesus says, you know what,
we have to walk through
Samaria because I'm here,
not just to give nice
convenient comfortable sermons.
I'm here not just with
my words, but literally
in my very walking, I want
to dismantle structures
and institutions and injustice
and I want to give people
a vision of the kingdom of God.
Where we'll break down barriers of hatred,
of racism, of prejudice and
instead to bring up faith,
hope, love and reconciliation.
You get this, Jesus had
to walk through Samaria.
So the question that you and
I have to ask ourselves is
are there still Samarias in our world?
Are there still Samarias in your own heart
or your own mind?
Are there Samarias in Chicagoland?
Are there Samarias all around us?
Because as followers of Jesus
and I know Willow Creek enough.
I've been here enough to know
that you care about justice.
You care about the heart of God.
You care about compassion.
You care about reconciliation.
This is where it gets
a little uncomfortable,
is it possible that for me,
perhaps for some of you,
that we're more in love
with the idea of Samaria
than actually walking through Samaria?
You see,
we can talk about
Samaria, we can sing songs
about Samaria, we can have
a conference about Samaria,
we can have high church liturgy,
we could do choirs about Samaria,
we could strategize and theologize,
we could hashtag about Samaria,
you can do all of these things
and still not walk through Samaria.
If I'm losing you and it's quite possible,
I'm not sure, let me give
you a modern metaphor
to kind of drive the point here.
Here's the modern metaphor.
I love exercise.
As you can tell by my physique.
(audience laughs)
Cameras, zoom in on my
muscles, no, don't do that.
Now you're laughing because
something doesn't seem right.
This is not necessarily a
professional athletic body.
The truth is, I don't love exercise,
I love the idea of
exercise and they're two
very different things, in
fact, I had a gym membership
for over 10 years.
I got a gym membership many years ago.
It was a great deal, it was
our local neighborhood gym,
$9.95, what a steal.
A few months later, this
big conglomerate company
called 24 Hours acquired
that particular gym
and by government acquisition laws,
they had to grandfather
my rates in for life,
what a deal, so for 10 years,
I went to the gym once.
(audience laughs)
Don't judge me.
(audience laughs)
Some of you are thinking too late.
My wife and I, we have a
treadmill in the basement
of our home.
It's nice.
But it's covered by coats
and jackets and blankets.
Somehow, my tablet downloads,
I actually subscribed
to health and fitness magazines.
It doesn't mean that I read it.
We have apparatuses at
our home that has or ends
with the word buster, like thigh buster.
Buttocks buster, ab busters.
Do you know, hold on for a second.
Whoo.
I just did 20 pushups.
(audience laughs)
Do you know how many calories you lose
thinking about exercise?
(audience laughs)
You see my point?
James in the New Testament,
that's why James says,
faith without works is dead.
We can talk about justice
and reconciliation,
we can talk about Samaria, the
reason why I so deeply admire
Dr. King is that he counted the cost.
And he said, I'm still
going to go through Samaria.
So what does this mean for you and I?
Well, there's four things
that I'd like to submit to you
for your consideration, for
your prayer and wrestling,
four things that I think will
help every single one of us
on some level or another.
Here's the first one, the
first one is that we need
a theology of justice.
Now don't be scared by the word theology.
The word theology isn't
something that we do
in an ivory tower, theology,
what we believe, based in
scriptures on the life of Jesus,
guided by the Holy Spirit, it
informs the way that I choose
to live my life, I want you
to realize that every single
one of us as followers of Jesus, we need a
Biblical robust theology of justice.
Now, let me give you
an example what I mean.
On this
pulpit, I want you to use your imagination
and pretend there's a box right here.
This box represents God.
Now I know you're not
supposed to put God in a box
but just stay with me.
Here's a box and inside the
box represents the attributes
of who God is.
If I were to extract love
of out of God's character,
you would be furious because
how can we speak or know
of God without knowing the love of God?
It's impossible, incongruent,
for us to think, speak,
worship God without also
speaking about the love of God.
If we were to extract grace,
out of God's character,
the only reason why you
and I are able to be here
on this Sunday morning
is because of the grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ.
If we were to extract holiness
out of God's character,
I know that maybe in our modern culture,
we feel uncomfortable speaking
about the holiness of God.
In the Old Testament Isaiah,
in his human limitations
as he's trying to articulate
the holiness of God,
the only thing that Isaiah
can do is just repeat himself.
You are holy, holy, holy.
So my question to you,
my question to the church
is what happened in the
history of the church
that we extracted justice
out of God's character
and called it an agenda?
An issue?
Sometimes in the church,
I'll be speaking about
God's character, God's
commitment to justice
because when you read the
scriptures, Old Testament,
there are so many verses that
speak about God's commitment
to justice, for orphans and
widows, for those who are
foreigners, for those who are hurting,
God's commitment to these things.
When you study the New Testament,
clearly we see Jesus
embodying those very things.
You see, justice matters
to the heart of God
and therefore, it must matter to us.
It's not a secondary
issue, a tertiary issue,
a peripheral issue, it's
not just a conference
or one weekend service,
it's not an accessory
that you wear when it's
warm or cold outside.
Justice is part of our discipleship
because it's part of the character of God.
This might be a good
time for someone to clap.
(audience applauds)
'Cause it's so important.
(audience applauds)
Isaiah 61:8, I, the Lord, love justice.
Micah 6:8, what does
the Lord require of you?
Seek justice, love mercy,
and walk humbly with God.
Here's the second thing,
relationships matter to Jesus
and therefore must matter
to the people of God.
Now these conversations about
justice and reconciliation
are actually very, very profound and deep
so we're just kind of giving
you a surface teaching
but I really believe that
one of the most profound
and important things that you and I can do
is to build relationships
with other human beings.
Including those that don't look like you,
think like you, feel like you
and I'm gonna go there,
even vote like you.
The church has the capacity,
last month I had the
privilege of being with you
at Willow and we celebrated communion.
Can you imagine a communion at a church
where we had a line for
the left and the right
and a gluten free option
for the independents?
(audience laughs)
The church has the
capacity to do that which
our larger culture cannot do.
And it begins by our humility
to engage in friendship
and relationship, let
me give you an example.
In 2014, there was a horrific
shooting of a gentleman
by the name of Michael
Brown, it was in August,
it was such a horrific
and painful situation.
During this time or after this situation,
there was a survey taken
about the landscape
of relationships in the United States.
Now this survey while
imperfect 'cause all surveys
are not perfect, it asked
the question of a 100 friends
scenario of each person
to assess their circle
of friendships, so for example,
in a 100 friends scenario
the average white person
has 91 white friends,
one each of black,
Latino, Asian, mixed races
and the others were unknown.
The average black person
on the other hand has 83
black friends, eight white
friends, two Latino friends,
zero Asian friends, what's up?
(audience laughs)
Three mixed race friends and
four friends of unknown race.
For Asians, they actually
came out as one of the most
insular groups of people,
so think about this,
we're having conversations
that are so deep and profound and painful
and we're not actually
engaging it with people
that we have any sort of
friendship or relationship with.
That's the challenge.
I'm not suggesting that
relationships are going to solve
all things, but Jesus who
performed amazing miracles,
healings, teaching to thousands
upon thousands of people,
it stuns me that some of
the most profound glimpses
of his ministry was across a meal.
At the well.
Looking at each person to say, I see you.
To say, you are created
in the image of God
so here's this woman, the Samaritan woman
who's been an outcast, judged, vilified,
likely she's that person in that village
wherever she went, people
began to whisper about her.
She's this horrible person,
she's so unfaithful.
Think about all of those
horrible adjectives
that we might use and Jesus
comes and speaks to her
with both truth and grace and offers her
the living water himself.
Don't discount the power of relationships.
My encouragement to you,
if Willow is your church,
don't just come and go,
don't just be a consumer,
don't just look at church as
a 90 or 100 minute service.
To know, to be known,
to share your stories,
to listen to stories, to
empathize with other people's pain
and joy and together aspire
to be the people of God.
Here's the third thing,
the third thing is this.
Hearts must change, but so
must structures and systems.
Now I'm gonna invite
some friends, actually
the worship team, to come on stage
and if they could just
come on stage behind me.
And as they come up, I want you to know,
let me explain to you what
I mean by this because
a lot of folks have a hard
time with this particular
encouragement that we
can apply in our life.
When I speak to Christians about justice
or reconciliation, the most
pervasive response I get,
is well, Eugene, if hearts change, then
injustice will disappear.
Now in some ways, I agree, we should pray
that hearts will change,
that men, women and children
would come to know Jesus
the Christ as their Lord
and savior, but I sometimes
think that we can be so naive
that we don't understand that
sin not only wreaks havoc
in individual lives, the Bible
speaks about principalities
of power and darkness that
create systems or structures.
So here's a clear example,
like prostitution,
human trafficking is an
industry in the world,
it's a system that's just
egregious and disgusting
and sinful so you might say,
well, if we change someone,
the whole thing might
disappear and I would say,
that's too naive, now.
I want to share a picture
with you and let me just first
give you a warning, it's a very
uncomfortable, painful image
and it comes from the 1920s
to '30s from the Jim Crow era.
This was the very thing that
Dr. King was fighting against.
Okay, I'm gonna set that up.
And here's the image.
But notice the pain and the
irony of the words Jesus saves.
That this would happen in a church.
And that we would actually
perpetuate dangerous false
theology to therefore prove our viewpoint.
Now let me give you another
example to kind of maybe
help you understand what
I mean by structures.
So you guys clearly know
these three brothers,
we're so grateful for the ways
that they serve the church
through their musical talents and voices.
Let's just say that the four of us
are not yet believers of Jesus.
But as we gather together,
what ends up happening
is that we're going to
create a way of doing things,
our friendship, our
conversation, our language.
When human beings gather
together, we create
what anthropologists call culture.
Think about hospitals and
leadership and education
and schools and the imagination goes on.
Now if we're honest,
what ends up happening
is that I will create
a way of doing things
that most often benefits me
because that's what humans
do, me, myself and I
so imagine the four of us,
we're kind of gathering together
and we're creating some sort of a system,
some of it might be good,
but some of it might actually
not be God honoring,
so you might say, well,
it's a heart issue, so
here's Matt, beloved Matt,
we know that he's right
now pre Jesus, a sinner,
he's a Patriots fan and the list goes on.
(audience laughs)
And so here's Matt.
(audience laughs)
And you will say, well,
if he just accepts Jesus,
well, praise God, he accepts
Jesus, but what happens
is that even though he's accepted Jesus
and Marshall's accepted Jesus
and Lonnie's accepted Jesus,
is that we've actually
created certain things
and some of it might not be God honoring.
This is why hearts change but
we have to have the courage
to look at our systems
and structures, Laurie,
can you just come forward for a second?
So we'll say, you know
what, something feels
a little off about this.
It's just all men.
Something feels incomplete
because it doesn't give us
a more fuller picture
of the kingdom of God
and so we're so glad that
Laurie comes to also know Jesus
but let's put her in the back.
But man, we're so grateful
that we support women
and elevate women, but take
care of weddings and events.
Whoo.
But something feels a little off.
Cindy and Patrice, can you
guys come forward as well?
We have some more women,
that's great, but just go ahead
and stand in the back.
Something feels a little off.
And as we're talking about Dr. King
and the beloved community,
you don't have to look far,
in the scriptures, we have a
glimpse in the kingdom of God
where all tongues, all
ethnicities, all tribes,
all people will come to know
Jesus Christ if they place
their trust in Jesus Christ.
And so I'm so grateful,
brothers, if you guys
can come forward as well but at this time,
let's go ahead and just
become this beloved community,
can you just stand wherever you guys want?
And here is the thing.
We need every single person here.
We cannot be the church
without women and men.
(audience applauds)
We cannot be the church without
reflecting all the diverse
cultures and languages
of Chicagoland and beyond
because God is able to do that
which might seem impossible
in our culture and society.
So listen, folks,
God sees every single one of you.
Willow needs you.
Thank you for being here.
Willow needs every single one of you.
Let's give them a big round of applause.
(audience applauds)
And folks, let me close
with the fourth point
and it's this, we long for transformation.
We long for transformation,
this passage in John four is
a story of transformation.
This woman who was
marginalized, ostracized,
had several strikes
against her, Jesus sees her
and she's transformed
by the grace and love
of our Lord Jesus Christ
and what does she do?
It's so captivating, she
doesn't just keep it to herself.
She goes back to the very same
village that ostracized her.
She's the greatest, the
most underrated evangelist
in church history, her village,
many people come to know
Jesus as Lord and savior,
professes that Jesus
is the living water.
And I am so grateful because
Jesus sees this woman
and sees every single one of you.
That's what we need today.
If you believe that Jesus
is the hope of the world,
stand up right now.
If you believe that he
is the great healer,
for a broken hurting world, stand up.
If you believe that Jesus
is the great reconciler,
stand up.
(audience applauds)
If you believe that Jesus
is the way maker, stand up.
And here it is, listen.
If you're standing up,
then stand up for justice.
Stand up for righteousness.
Stand up for truth.
Stand up for the gospel of Jesus Christ.
God bless you.
(audience applauds)
(religious music)
- Yeah, can we thank Eugene
Cho for, yeah, great job.
(audience applauds)
Yep.
So here's the challenge
and this is the question
every Christian, every time we gather,
this is what we talk about.
Are you gonna be someone who just hears it
or are you gonna be someone
who puts it to work,
who does it?
Only you can answer that,
only you can go can go yep,
I want to live this
out, tomorrow's MLK Day,
I hope during the day
you'll take time to reflect
a little more, that you
might want to just read about
the beloved community that he describes
and just do a little deeper
dive, you might just go hey,
here's one thing that Eugene talked about.
I got to do a little more work in that,
but I challenge you, don't
just let this be a nice talk.
Let it be something that
changes how you think
but more importantly, how you live, yes?
As you walk out, yeah,
we're gonna be giving you
these books, adults,
grab one of these books,
Elevate, you'll get yours next week.
This starts a week from
today, so don't start tomorrow
unless you're an
overachiever, but can we pray
and then we'll go, God
this is our prayer, father,
father, this is our prayer.
(religious music)
God, we want to live this out.
We don't want to just be
followers who go nice idea.
We don't want to be people
going wasn't that just
a nice sermon,
God, we want to be people
that actually puts it
to work in our lives and our church.
So God, would you give us
courage and discernment
to see our life as it is
and to make the changes
necessary to live this out?
God, might we be the first
to invite another into our
communities, say, join
us, I'd love to have you.
Might we be people who listen, who hear,
who seek to understand, and
God, might our church over time
and week after week continue
to reflect more and more
of your dream for our world,
God, that's our prayer.
That's our prayer, so God,
continue to have your way in us.
We pray this in the name of
Christ and everybody agreed
and said, amen, amen,
amen, great to be with you.
Have a great Sunday and we'll see you back
next weekend, blessings everybody.
(upbeat music)
♪ Yeah ♪
