We did it!

Though our Reaching Team has been inspiring us to “LovePaducah” for some time now, Saturday was our first attempt at a church-wide team approach to penetrating Paducah’s neighborhoods and centers of community life. And we didn’t stop at the city entrance sign, but sent one team all the way to Mayfield. Here are some photos, but I’m limiting the ones I’m posting so that the identities of those with whom we engaged are protected.

Well done, church family! And a special thanks to Dr. Van Sanders for lighting a fire in and through us.

As we met our neighbors and made many new friends, it seemed like every encounter was a divine appointment, and that the Lord truly had gone before us to open just the right doors of conversation – and just the right opportunities for loving people in the name of Christ. Among other highlights of the day, we made friends with some Somalis who have opened the door for our church to help them learn English.

How do we love Paducah? I’ll offer just a few suggestions, and invite yours.

1. Pray for God to remove from us all concern over building a personal or corporate “empire” that exalts us (or our congregation).

2. Pray for God to heal us of any jealousy over the success of another congregation, that we might recognize that there are more than enough people in need of grace to keep us all busy.

3. Pray for the tact to be able to honestly deal with sin, and real sin issues that dog the lives of our neighbors, without coming across as those who don’t also need the constant love of Christ.

4. Pray for the grace to say five nice things about Paducah before offering a single word of critique. (As we learned Friday in theory and Saturday in practice, our city is fast becoming more multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, and transient. How cool is that? If we despise these trends, we will miss the missions moments – and miss the heart of Christ.)

Our missional love for Paducah must be a long-term commitment to care. Walking with our neighbors and friends for the long haul. I agree with Pastor Tim Keller, who recently closed out the “Together L.A.” event, that Christianity offers us all an “infinitely better identity” than that which is offered by the pervasive culture. But you and I won’t get a chance to draw our neighbors into that gospel good news if we walk away (or sequester ourselves in protective comfort).

Now if I had to add a #5 to my “love list,” it would be this: Pray for the wisdom to be willing to separate tradition from truth.

Sometimes you and I are not the church that we should be today because we’re so determined to be the church of our fondest memories. Though we know that those memories are seldom entirely accurate, we cling barbarously to our spiritual past as if our refuge is only there. Christ our Refuge is not only there, but He is here (John 8:58): “I AM.”

Christ is here. Christ is now. Here and now, we need His freedom and grace.

I wish I could tell you that I choose freedom and grace every day, but I don’t. You can all too often find me on the spinning gerbil wheel of pride, people-pleasing, and playing church.

Donald Miller, with whom I do not agree on every subject (nor he with me, I’m sure), makes an excellent point when he says in regard to all of the deeply ingrained habits that comprise our church-ianity: “I do all of this, not because I want to live scripturally, but because church culture has a certain rhythm. And when you have marched to this beat since infancy, it is difficult to break free from.”

Ouch.

Beloved in Christ, we must be willing to lay aside the comfortable in order to take up the call.

Pastor Brannin Pitre says in regard to all of our life-killing baggage of self: “Let’s leave that behind and make the church the church it’s supposed to be.”

Pastor Charles

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Jesus (Mark 12:31)

I look forward to seeing you tonight for the kickoff of our first COMMUNITY CONNECTION weekend. Dinner starts at 6:00.

The Christian gospel, rightly understood, is wholistic. (I understand the other spelling, but I’m trying to purposefully emphasize “whole.”) The gospel reaches out to people as whole people. It does not single out just spiritual or just physical needs and speak to those in isolation. The gospel loves the whole person.

The gospel good news is also cross-cultural. It transcends even the highest walls that separate people – all created in the image of God – from each other.

So our gospel outreach as First Baptist Paducah will always involve evangelism, but it will simultaneously – as we are led by the Holy Spirit – include social concern, economic development, and matters of justice (each as an expression of loving our neighbors). At some point I’ll tell you about my time in Haiti after the last major earthquake, and just how powerful was the church’s impact simply by helping to provide clean water and proper sanitation in the name of Jesus.

Like most American churches, we have a sizable distance to travel in terms of reflecting as a congregation the God-ordained beauty of an integrated gospel fellowship and witness. We pray as Jesus taught us, “Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven …” If we really mean that, then we should also want our local assembly to mirror the loveliness of multiple ethnicities and languages and cultures. This is the picture of the church for whom Christ died and for whom He will return!

We want to see as many people as we can impact transformed by the love of God in Jesus Christ, and then to see those people respond positively to God’s call upon their lives to share the gospel of Christ with others.

We may never be as much the resplendent tapestry of black, white, brown, yellow, rich, poor, urban, suburban, educated, uneducated, classical, and cutting-edge as we would like. But we can do our best to honor our Lord from within a gracious Christian community where reconciliation and unity are valued. “We love because He first loved us” (First John 4:19). This will not be as much a program as it will be a matter of the heart.

So please consider moving out with me into the various neighborhoods of our fine city with the open arms of Christ. The power of grace and truth (John 1:14) are unstoppable.

Pastor Charles

 The confluence of the Ohio and Tennessee Rivers.

The nation’s largest inland navigable water system.

Southern hospitality and charm.

The largest city in the Jackson Purchase region.

Median age: 41.4 years.

One of only two cities named in Hooray for Hollywood.

         A lively “underground” musical scene.

“Quilt City U.S.A.”

The 78th largest media market in the U.S.

Designated by UNESCO as the world’s 7th City of Crafts and Folk Art.

Boasting a highly successful symphony orchestra serving a 5-state region.

Business, medical, educational, and entertainment center for a quarter million people.

Paducah.

Home.

Would not Christ have us love the city that we call home? I think of Jeremiah 29:7 and God’s heart that the Jewish exiles pray for the prosperity of their city. How blessed we are to be able to enjoy the same privilege of prayer, and to do so in a beautiful place where we have chosen to live and to raise our families!

You’re probably more than aware of the changing face of Christian missions. The mission field is no longer “out there” – it is here. Are we willing to open our arms to the people here?

In just a few days we’ll be hosting our first COMMUNITY CONNECTION weekend. Please consider this a special invitation from Pastor Russ and myself to join us here at First Baptist Paducah at 6:00 this Friday evening (April 17) for a special dinner … and a chance to begin a refreshing dialog about loving Paducah.

Our special guest for COMMUNITY CONNECTION will be Dr. Van Sanders, who will help us wrap our minds and hearts around the unique opportunities for Christian ministry that Paducah affords. We’ll focus our attention particularly on unreached neighbors, ethnic minorities, and other people groups who can far too easily fall off our radar screens.

Saturday morning’s activities will include going out in teams into strategic neighborhoods for prayer, service, and relationship-building.

And then on Sunday morning, our church family will come together for a single worship service at 10:15. (Sunday School for all ages at 9:00.)

Don’t miss COMMUNITY CONNECTION.

Because this is home.

Pastor Charles

We are proud to share this Easter sermon from 1 Corinthians 15 by Pastor Charles!  Click here to listen or download (Recorded live at First Baptist Paducah on April 5, 2015): 2015.04.05.WeShallAllBeChanged.1Cor15.CharlesMoore

By now you’ve likely learned of the Al Shabaab terrorist attack in Kenya. 147 are dead on the Moi campus of Garissa University College. At least another 79 are injured. Somali Islamists have extended their broad swath of terror in Africa by snuffing out young people, and specifically those young people who claimed to be Christ-followers. In the prime of their lives, our brothers and sisters have been gunned down in this brutal assault on humanity. It’s the country’s deadliest attack since the bombing of the U.S. Embassy in 1988.

One news report I read labeled the atrocity “senseless and barbaric.” What explains such evil on Planet Earth? Does evolution account for it? Does “survival of the fittest” make any sense of atrocities like this?

No. An accidental human race not only exposes the foolishness of its proponents, but it robs its adherents of any vestige of purpose when tragedy strikes. If evolution is true, there is no redemption. There is no hope. There is no Easter on the horizon.

Today is Good Friday. Why do we call it “good” when so many of the events that we recall today were bad? After all, it’s the day of Christ’s brutal execution.

We call it “good” because Christ’s death on the cross was the fulfillment of God’s eternal plan. A plan to pardon human sin. A plan that was, and is, good. By way of a cross, God took the greatest injustice ever perpetrated in all of human history and transformed it into the world’s only hope (First Corinthians 15:3).

Psalm 85:10 sings of a day when righteousness and peace will kiss each other. That was Good Friday. The “peace on earth” announced to the shepherds when Christ was born would come by suffering and a cruel crucifixion.

Was it undeserved suffering? Yes and no. Christ did not deserve it. We did.

Like the description in yesterday’s news report, the cross was barbaric. But that’s where the comparison fades. For the cross was anything but senseless. As a matter of fact, the cross of Christ is the only thing in the universe that makes perfect sense. It was the moment of the kiss.

It was love in action. Grace under fire. Reconciliation on enemy soil. Peace where there was no peace.

We can almost hear the words of our Lord Jesus (Luke 23:34): “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

“Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your king is coming to you …’” (Matthew 21:5).

We’re entering into that wonderful time of the year when we approach, in our mind’s eye, not just the cross of Christ – but also His glorious empty tomb! But there are a number of important days between now and Easter morning, and we must make the most of each of them. To that end, I want to remind you why Palm Sunday matters.

In London, England, Charles Spurgeon (not Dickens) preached a sermon based on Christ’s Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem (the historical and Scriptural origin of Palm Sunday). Spurgeon’s message was delivered while the American Civil War was erupting here, and I share with you an excerpt from that day’s sermon: “There was an expectation upon the popular mind of the Jewish people, that Messiah was about to come. They expected him to be a temporal prince, one who would make war upon the Romans and restore to the Jews their lost nationality. There were many who, though they did not believe in Christ with a spiritual faith, nevertheless hoped that perhaps he might be to them a great temporal deliverer, and we read that on one or two occasions they would have taken him and made him a king, but that he hid himself. There was an anxious desire that somebody or other should lift the standard of rebellion and lead the people against their oppressors. Seeing the mighty things which Christ did, the wish was father to the thought, and they imagined that He might probably restore to Israel the kingdom and set them free.”

Spurgeon rightly discerned in his analysis of that first Palm Sunday that – for many if not most of the participants – the main point of the moment was missed. The redemption for which the crowds of people longed was a salvation that Jesus never intended to provide – at least not in ways that aligned with most people’s expectations.

How quickly we settle for a substitute plan! A cheap gospel! A personal agenda! A works righteousness! A system of any kind that puts me back in the driver’s seat! A temporal encounter with “goosebumps” instead of a lasting encounter with the Lamb!

Beloved, such deadly detours can divert us when we misunderstand the nature of the kingdom of Christ. It can become for us all about politics, or all about moral reform, or all about social justice, or all about our private “quiet time” …

Stay tuned for this Sunday’s sermon at First Baptist Paducah, as I will attempt to answer the critical question, “What is the kingdom of God?”

Don’t miss the real Palm Sunday. The King has come. And, just as He promised, the King will come again.

Last night our church family enjoyed the privilege of celebrating the faithful ministry of Jason and Tammy Williams. Thank you, Pastor Jason, for allowing us the opportunity to show you how much you are loved, and how much you will be missed.

As I was pondering all of the affirming things that could be said about Jason, this one rose to the top of my heap: Jason is a man of the Book!

Jason loves God’s Word. He desires to live by and to teach with precision God’s Word. He desires to lead his family according to God’s Word. And Jason counsels and ministers by the precepts of God’s Word. “Scripture alone” drives Jason’s heart and his passionate service for our Lord Jesus Christ.

Psalm 1:1-3 captures Jason well: “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers.”

Thank you, Jason, that you did not want the glory to be yours. Even in your official farewell, you wanted all praise reserved for the King of kings and Lord of lords. Thank you.

Because you are a man of the Book, Jason, I know that First Baptist Paducah can look forward to many reports of many good things that Christ is doing in and through your life and ministry. I pray our Lord’s most precious and permeating blessings to be upon you, Tammy, Hannah, Joshua, Sarah Elizabeth, Abigail, Caleb, and Daniel. Always.

Pastor Charles

We blog. God laughs.

I should never have written that part about the weather having “turned a corner” in the direction of spring. So I suppose I’ll never be accused of being a prophet (at least not in that sense).

Anyway, digging out (again!), we move on. I thought I’d focus on a topic that to me is warm and sunny no matter what.

Growth Groups.

Last Sunday night we completed a month-long pilot Growth Group so that those who are prayerfully considering serving as leaders or facilitators could get a taste of a model for in-home, small-group discipleship. About 25 of us enjoyed the time of bonding and pondering en masse how the Lord might use Growth Groups to bless our church and community. It was wonderful to be together for such a special purpose.

We’ll soon announce plans for a major launch of a plan to salt the Paducah area (geographically and spiritually) with small groups aimed at building the body of First Baptist Paducah, advancing Christian maturity, and creating missional tentacles into the lives of our neighbors and friends. Please join me in prayer that Christ will be exalted in the hearts of many through a ministry that has the potential to revolutionize how we “do church” (First Corinthians 9:22).

If we are to be faithful to our Lord in this generation, we must reach reach the Millennials, who are often skeptical of the traditional and institutional church. Here’s a great opportunity to knock it out of the park in terms of demonstrating the love of the body without the cultural handicaps of “church building” or “you must come to us” or “you must look like us” or “you must sing like us” or “you must act like us.”

Stay tuned. The best is yet to come.

Early this morning I opened the car door at the dry cleaners. The icy wind cut through my legs like a knife. Aaaaaaargh. Enough already. Single digits be gone!

But, I’m giddy to report, I think we’ve turned a corner. It’s entirely (as in, 100%) sunny outside my office window, and the forecast for Tuesday is 65 degrees. Yes, the weather icon for that day includes a lightning bolt, but I’m all for a little thunder and lightning if we can also enjoy the 65 degrees. Spring is no longer a distant hope, my friends. When I see you Sunday, we can officially bid each other a “Happy March!” February was brutal – the coldest since the dawn of weather records in Paducah’s history – but it’s nearly over.

So how’s your walk with Christ? Maybe you’ve taken a bit of a winter hiatus in your spiritual pilgrimage. That kind of thing can slip up on us, you know. Just as we can throw dietary caution to the wind and eat our way from Thanksgiving through the New Year – and well beyond – sometimes it’s easy to lapse into a bit of spiritual laziness during the season of crackling fires and long winter naps.

Unfortunately, however, spiritual laziness can leave behind more unwanted residue than even fudge and frosted cookies. So, if that describes you, consider this is your personal call to action: GET BACK IN THE RACE!

Joel R. Beeke, president of the Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, writes: “The Christian life is a race. Through the gospel, God summons us to sustained and persevering effort. He empowers His children by grace – free and undeserved blessing through Christ. But He does not carry them to heaven on flowery beds of ease. Faith is a living, athletic grace. God’s mercy motivates Christians and energizes them to press on and overcome great obstacles. Christ blazed the trail before us. He now calls us to follow Him to the end (Hebrews 12:1-2).”

“But, Pastor Charles, you’ve been calling us to rest in Christ!” Indeed I have. And the word today is not in contradiction of that. We find our identity, purpose, value, and passion for all of life in Christ. We stand on faith alone, but not on a faith that is alone. Our faith in Jesus Christ is accompanied by purposeful living for His glory. So get back in the race.

During the brunt of the last winter storm that was mostly snow (instead of ice), I laughed out loud when I drove by the car (just a few blocks from the church) in this photo that I’m sharing with you today. Look familiar? It’s how some of us feel right now.

But, by faith, we are not bogged down. We are not snowed under. We are not stuck in a ditch. We are not unable to reach the finish line. Instead, we choose to pursue “with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”

So go ahead and face that trial of yours head-on. Embrace it as a tool in your Master’s hand for your eternal good (and nothing less). Smile in the face of that hurdle that you’ve been asking God to remove. He will, in due time.

But for now, just get back in the race!

You may remember that I’ve always enjoyed the preaching of the physician from Cardiff, Wales, who ended up as pastor of Westminster Chapel in London. Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones received his M.D. in 1921, and experienced a profound conversion to Christ sometime between 1921 and 1923. He was a profound thinker and a lover of God’s Word. Lloyd-Jones longed to see “a great spiritual awakening” in his day. After a series of “disappointments” that put him right where he was supposed to be (and isn’t that always the case?), he preached in London for thirty years. Dr. Lloyd-Jones’ preaching was precise, logical, and passionate. Thousands were drawn to Christ through the Westminster pulpit.

Among many dimensions of his preaching that I have admired is Lloyd-Jones’ insistence upon our need for the work of the Holy Spirit in and through us. He talked about Light and heat. Word and Spirit. Logic and fire.

We all agree, at least theoretically, that dead intellectual orthodoxy is insufficient to save. Without Christ there is no hope. Without His Spirit there is no power to change a single life. Lloyd-Jones believed that the only cure for evangelical compromise (which is sure to come without this) is revival. And Lloyd-Jones understood real revival to be nothing less than a miracle sent down from God. Ian Murray in The Fight of Faith records Lloyd-Jones from 1959: “During the last seventy, to eighty years, this whole notion of a visitation, a baptism of God’s Spirit upon the Church, has gone.”

Some of us may disagree with the nuances of Lloyd-Jones’ understanding of “the baptism of the Holy Spirit,” but surely we must agree that revival is a pouring down of the Spirit into the lives of Christ-followers who would be otherwise powerless and joyless in their Christian service. Talk about a cure for spiritual depression! Like Lloyd-Jones, we know there is something sorely lacking when the church becomes “barren institutionalism.”

My heart really resonates with this piercing observation from The Present Future: Six Tough Questions for the Church by Reggie McNeal: “There is a dimension beyond planning that is critical for us to understand. We can settle for our imaginations, our plans, and our dreams. In fact, I think the North American church has done just that. We have the best churches people can plan and build. But we are desperate for God to show up and to do something that only he can get credit for.”

Specifically, how might you and I begin to pray for the glorious fruit of Spirit-drenched revival in our day? HERE’S WHAT I WOULD PROPOSE THAT WE OFFER UP AS OUR FIRST REQUEST: That we might know in all its fullness the love of God for us in our Lord Jesus Christ! I’m going to ask you to read this passage, aloud, every day for a week: Ephesians 3:14-21. Would you join me in taking up that simple but powerful challenge?

I’ll close with a story by Thomas Goodwin that’s included in Lloyd-Jones’ Joy Unspeakable, and I pray that it will bless you as you delight in Christ’s amazing love for His own (and that includes you).

“A man and his little child are walking down the road and they are walking hand in hand, and the child knows that he is the child of his father, and he knows that his father loves him, and he rejoices in that, and he is happy in it. There is no uncertainty about it all, but suddenly the father, moved by some impulse, takes hold of the child and picks him up, fondles him in his arms, kisses him, embraces him, showers his love upon him, and then he puts him down again and they go on walking together.

That is it! The child knew before that his father loved him, and he knew that he was his child. But oh! the loving embrace, this extra outpouring of love, this unusual manifestation of it – that is the kind of thing. The Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are the children of God” (Romans 8:16).

As the doctor-turned-preacher reminded us, we need the Holy Spirit, and to be “carried not only from doubt to belief but to certainty, to awareness of the presence and the glory of God.”