I’m only posting this because some people have asked how they might help out…. The gracious and generous people of Community Church of the Hills supports 2/3 of my salary. The other third comes out of a “Designated Fund” at Hope Chapel Hermosa Beach which ends in July of 2018. My wife works as a
See if you can spot the odd one out: earthquakes, floods, tornadoes, terrorism, domestic violence, war, droughts, God’s blessing, cancer.
Of course, “God’s blessing” is the oddity. Yet, there are many who would believe the entire list fits together in perfect harmony. Ignorant people think that the devastating things that are happening to this nation are nothing more than Mother Nature doing its own thing. Hmmm, do you think that “Mother” may be in a bad mood?
Pastors say it all the time when assessing their flock. Church members try to avoid sounding braggadocious when speaking about it. Christian leaders warn never to make this your focus.
What am I talking about?
Have you ever heard the phrase: “It’s not about the numbers.”?
I’m here to say it is about the numbers.
Because numbers are souls.
I do understand and wholeheartedly agree with Jesus when he declared, …”I will build my church….” I trust him to do this. He brings the people and my focus should not be on how many come each Sunday. Still, numbers matter.
This is what Charles Spurgeon said about it:
Q: What’s the size of U.S. churches? (From Thomas S. Rainer)
A: First, big is not necessarily better. A church with more people in attendance is not necessarily more faithful than a smaller church. Second, some churches are in very sparsely populated areas. There may not be 350 people in a five-mile radius (though every community still has people who need to be reached).
We are a nation and continent of smaller churches. And though we have far more small churches than large churches, there is a big migration of people from smaller to larger churches. In other words, many of the smaller churches are getting smaller, and many of the larger churches are getting larger.
Here is a simple depiction of the number of churches at three different levels:
Keep in mind that the upper 10% tend to include more of the growing churches, while the lower 90% tend to include more of the declining churches.
(Do numbers really matter? Spurgeon says yes and so do I. Read by clicking here.)
Attendance at Community Church of the Hills since I became pastor August 30, 2015 thru present:
Can an LGBTQ Person Be a Christian?
On July 6, 2016, my wife and I celebrated our 20th anniversary at the Cheesecake Factory in Austin and was waited on by a very gracious and professional server named Trey, who told me that he had good news: that he was getting married soon to his boyfriend. My wife and I said, “Congratulations.”
I wrote a post about the incident and it blew up! (Read it here.) Though the vast majority of my Christian friends understood what my intent was, there were a few who missed the point entirely. What was my point? To be gracious to a member of the LGBTQ group. Christians for too long have made a big deal of homosexuality as if that was the only sin that mattered and believers have been an absolutely horrible witness in this post-Christian society with their judgmental attitudes, pointy fingers and furrowed brows. I understand that some may not want to say “Congratulations,” but don’t I have that right? That was the point. (By the way, if it should ever happen again, I will probably say, “I wish you well.”)
Flash forward one year. The Facebook app called “On This Day” reminded me of this post from a year ago. Of course, I posted it again. This time though, I tagged a few of my Facebook friends who are LGBTQ. Wow! Not only did I get clobbered by the judgmental Christians again, (no surprise), but also from the community I was trying to be gracious to. They also entirely missed the point, saying I was publicly shaming our server, that I was judgmental, and a few even used some family-unfriendly words and blasphemous memes to make their point.
So much for tolerance and inclusiveness.
I consider myself to be a friend to all. I want Jesus to be reflected in everything I do. Still, I fall short as everyone does, but my over-arching purpose for writing that post and re-posting it, was to demonstrate what I consider a better way to reach those who disagree with what I believe. I also try to do this with a good dose of humor. I’m not mad at anybody. I hate no one.
The big question, I suppose, is this: Can a person be LGBTQ and a Christian?
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