Here we are in 2024, Happy New Year!
Today we are going to begin to introduce the refreshed vision for ANCC. It’s not a radical change, but is aimed at taking what is good and moving it forward to what is great.
Story: About 350 years ago a shipload of travellers landed on the northeast coast of America. The first year they established a town site.
The next year they elected a town government.
The third year the town government planned to build a road five miles westward into the wilderness.
In the fourth year the people tried to impeach their town government because they thought it was a waste of public funds to build a road five miles westward into a wilderness. Who needed to go there anyway?
Here were people who had the vision to see three thousand miles across an ocean and overcome great hardships to get there. But in just a few years they were not able to see even five miles out of town. They had lost their pioneering vision. With a clear vision of what we can become in Christ, no ocean of difficulty is too great. Without it, we rarely move beyond our current boundaries.
Helen Keller was once asked the question: “Is there anything worse than being blind?” “Yes," she replied, having eyesight but no vision.” Vision is the ability to see what others can’t. Vision is able to see beyond the norms of each day to the possibilities of tomorrow.
We have been on a journey the last 12 months. During the first half of last year I was asking lots of questions of people in the church, but primarily what do you love and what, if anything, frustrates you about ANCC? We took the leaders away for a day, our wider leadership team although I tend to call them ministry leaders. We really dug down into what our values were, what our vision is, and what should be our priorities around that.
Today I will be sharing our findings, what we believe is the Lord’s leading and what happens next. This is a refresh! It is time to move forward. During this year we will be sharing more on the main themes.
But first, let’s ask ourselves a couple of questions.
Does the Bible Say we Need a Vision?
The Bible has a lot to say about having a vision for life:
Proverbs 29:18: Where there is no revelation, people cast off restraint; but blessed is the one who heeds wisdom’s instruction.
The Hebrew word for revelation or vision here is “hazon,” which is not the ordinary word for something seen.
Rather, it indicates a revelation from God, such as the visions that the prophets experienced. It has to do with a word from God, a revelation from God, a revelatory word.
Habakkuk 2:2: Then the Lord answered me and said:
“Write the vision, And make it plain on tablets,
That he may run who reads it.” (NKJV)
Then the Lord replied: ‘Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets, so that a herald may run with it.” (NIV)
A vision kept to self is not a vision, it needs to shared, to be made plain, so that others will run with it too.
For me, a vision declares how big we think or God is!
1. Why do we need a vision?
Our text says what happens when a people lacks vision, when revelation from God is infrequent – “the people perish, they cast off restraint,” the NIV says.
We see though that to have vision means we live differently. To have no vision means people throw off restraint - they live for themselves. To have a vision means you live for something, in our case Someone, bigger than ourselves.
We cannot ask God to bless what they’re doing rather than seeking a vision of what God is blessing and getting in on that. That’s why we need a vision.
2. What is Vision?
Just what do we mean by vision?
Duke Ellington, the late jazz musician, composer and renowned band leader was once asked to provide a definition of “rhythm.” He responded, “If you got it, you don’t need no definition. And if you don’t have it, ain’t no definition gonna help!”
Hopefully vision is not quite that elusive. In fact, if I can adapt what Ellington said slightly it may help us understand one reality regarding vision: Once you have it, you know it, but when you don’t have it, you know you need it but aren’t sure how to get it.”
In that light, let’s try to define it further for our use. George Barna gives one of the most detailed definitions of vision when he says: “Vision for ministry is a clear mental image of a preferable future imparted by God to His chosen servants and is based upon an accurate understanding of God, self and circumstances.”
3. What is Our vision?
If I say to you that when I arrived here I was unsure. Not because ANCC is a bad church or not moving forward, but because around the building and on our website, we have publicised three to four different things as being the reason we exist. Clearly that leads to double-vision.
Can I also say that whilst I share over these next few weeks, we will also have different opinions of what our core vision should be, but two visions equals division.
So, before we get into it, let me share a little of what I discovered just by talking and mainly listening to you all, church people when I visited.
What you love:
- Preaching
- Kids, youth, OBC and Sunday School
- Multi-cultural
- Caring, loving, family feel
- Staff team
What frustrates you:
- Lack of volunteers
- Tag preaching
- Lack of planning
- Racially divided
- Lack of students
How do you grow a church? People will often start where there are perceived weaknesses, frustrations, and spend time on that. Really the way to grow something is feed what is good, and weed what isn’t.
With this information the Ministry Leaders, elders and I went and had a day to reflect and dig deeper into our values. I really wanted to see if their values and dreams married up with what the ANCC family were saying.
There are so many, many things that churches could be doing. So, part of the exercise was to really focus ourselves, to trim down from nine or so values or priorities, to just four! That means discipline! That takes some doing, because then you have to decide what really are the essentials of church life, rather than just including every good idea!
At the end of the day we were left with four areas. These will form the theme of our preaching, direction and, dare I say, budgeting over the next phase of development here at ANCC.
They are…
Mission:
Discipleship:
Worship:
Legacy:
Mission: Reaching out with the Good News, both home and away.
Discipleship: Teaching and equipping people to become more like Jesus.
Worship: Facilitating authentic worship where everyone is invited to encounter the presence of God.
Legacy: Nurturing and investing in our children, teenagers and young adults - the future church today.
Mission: Reaching out with the Good News, both home and away.
Matthew 28: 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Some have said to me we send so much money overseas, to missionaries and missions organisations, that we don't spend enough here. We will unpick missions more this year, but can I say the money we spend here is ‘hidden’ because it's not labelled as ‘mission.’ Put another way, we send X amount overseas, but everything else is spent here, locally, on mission.
Beyond that we need to see that everything we do here is part of the mission to win people for Jesus. If we are not reaching out, home and away, we are not fulfilling the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20).
Missions drives us out of our comfort zone. It puts us on the footing of advancement. Which means, if an activity or resource ceases to fulfil the mission, it may well get cut!
The comfort zone is where dreams go to die.
Discipleship: Teaching and equipping people to become more like Jesus.
Matthew 28: 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Every not-yet Christian needs to become a follower of Jesus and every follower of Jesus needs to become a disciple.
To be a disciple is to be more like Jesus, moulded and formed by Him.
This is a process, and will include various courses, teachings, small-group involvement [more of this next week], personal study and so much more. It is a life-long process, is not instant, and needs attention and progress.
Remember baby-steps are still steps.
Discipleship is to do with the maturation process, the ongoing sanctification, of a Christian.
It is not age related! Maturity does not always come with age, but with the acceptance of responsibility (Ed Cole). That is why you can find you have mature young people, immature older people and vice versa.
Where you grow the most is where you invest the most.
Worship: Facilitating authentic worship where everyone is invited to encounter the presence of God.
Matthew 28: 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Teaching what Jesus taught is to do with the two great commandments found in Matthew 22: 37-39: Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’
We mean by this statement our corporate worship. ANCC is a worshipping church! Aren't we grateful for having Aaron on team and such gifted musicians and singers?
Yet, when I come to church, the worship I bring is not their responsibility. Which I why we talk of ‘facilitating authentic worship.’ That means we create the space in our services for us all to encounter the living God.
We are a Pentecostal church! We believe the Holy Spirit should move in our midst, move us to greater heights and depths pf His love and presence.
This does not always mean we will sing our favourite songs, or sing our favourite style.
It means we bring willing hearts, worshipful hearts, to give to God. Which is why we want as many people as possible here on time when we begin! It’s not for our benefit, but yours. You’re missing out on amazing God-moments if you're not here for worship!
Legacy: Nurturing and investing in our children, teenagers and young adults - the future church today.
Matthew 28: 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
This emphasis is making sure young and new Christians start out well, with great foundations.
One of the most appreciated areas in church life was the children, youth and young adults area. So, we have called this ‘legacy’, not because it is all future based, but because they are the ones who will carry the baton beyond us. They are the church today.
I can recall years ago in this church older people praying (some of you are still here) for more kids, more youth, more young adults, to carry the church forward. They are an answer to prayer!
We want to make sure that they, with their unique pressures in life, are strong christians.
Now, if you’re like me and a bit older, you might think; what is there for me in all this? It’s not fair, it's ageist. Can I say, all four areas cover you too:
You are on mission,
You are a disciple,
You are a Worshipper.
But in legacy, you need to be an investor! You have so much to give to the younger generation! We will continue to love and look after our older members and the vulnerable, but do not think for one minute that your decades of loving and serving Jesus should be wasted. I call on you all to help the pastors and elders to invest in those who are just starting out!
A Vision Tag Line:
Once we had landed on our priorities, we then had to think through what our vision statement would be: if you are asked why does ANCC exist, what would the response be. Something simple, the warps up these four priorities?
Why we are here: To make Jesus known to everyone, everywhere.
This will begin to appear on our notice boards, website, welcome packs, everywhere.
We love Jesus and know that He changes lives, because He has changed our lives. We invite everyone, everywhere to meet Him and allow Him to transform their lives too.
Wrapping this up:
What a glorious future we have as a church! We believe the Lord is leading us forward. We are truly called into His service and to march into the future with expectancy and heads lifted up.
Onward, Christian soldiers.
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