After enjoying the holiday Monday off, I'm back to work this morning. (Wait a minute... Monday is my regular day off anyway. Nothing special there!) Below you'll find the audio sermon from our Independence Day service at Church Requel this past Sunday. First, I thought I would share a couple highlights.
Our attendance was down pretty significantly Sunday night. I don't think we topped 40. Six months ago I remember reading Nelson Searcy's book, Fusion: Turning First Time Guests Into Fully-Engaged Members of Your Church, and laughing with him as he described how through his remarkable leadership he grew his church from over a hundred on opening day to 35 people. It now looks like I've done the same. I remembered when reading Searcy's story thinking that such a drop in attendance must have been a catastrophe.
Now that we've been there and done that, I believe this weekend was anything but a catastrophe. Sure, it would have been great if more folks showed up. But the ones who did come seemed to appreciate the service. We enjoyed it. God was honored. We were reminded of some important truths. And we had the chance to worship together freely. And the air conditioning worked splendidly on a very hot day.
I know it probably sounds like I'm just being optimistic for the sake of optimism, but I told our small audience that I wasn't deterred. In fact, I remembered distinctly that we only had a dozen people in our living room last 4th of July weekend. So, in point of truth, we tripled in size this past year!
Weekly I receive an email from StartCHURCH, who helped us get Church Requel up and running last year. The title of today's email was: "Why Many Pastors Quit on July 5th!" Here is an excerpt:
For many pastors the Monday after July 4th is a very depressing day. That is the day when countless pastors feel the most abandoned by God and by the congregation. Though the reasoning is not clear, it seems that we pastors, from the day we say "Yes" to God's call, associate His blessing on our life with the size of the crowd and the offering on Sundays...which is why many pastors want to quit the Monday after the fourth of July!
What happens when July 4th falls on a Sunday? Every time the 4th of July falls on a Sunday, churches all across America experience the lowest attendance of the entire year. After all, it is the peak of the summer break and most families choose to finally take that weekend and do something they have not done all summer; get away! That may be a good thing for the family, but it is usually a bad event for a pastor.
Fortunately I was prepared for this in my own mind. In my previous job, the senior pastor would regularly ask me to preach the first Sunday of every July. He knew the attendance would be down and so he always began his annual study break at the beginning of July. He also knew I would be thrilled to preach no matter what. The same is still true for me - still thrilled no matter the size of the crowd!
A second highlight is a private one - a small laugh at myself that I thought you, the reader, might also enjoy. I have become accustomed to taking my watch off and placing it on the table where I preach. But Sunday night, because of the angle of the lights, I couldn't see my watch no matter how I angled it. About halfway through, controlling my own panic at not knowing how much time I had taken, I glanced up and saw a big, round clock on the back wall staring back at me. No one knew it but me (I never stopped, paused or even grinned on the outside), but inside I was cracking up. Obviously I'm still becoming accustomed to our new venue at Ontario Christian Fellowship.
Here is the audio sermon. Since we were conducting our service on Independence Day, it seemed like a good idea to launch from this concept of freedom. Christians also need a declaration of independence... from self. In this sermon, we examine four ways we gain F.R.E.E.dom from self. Join me in this audio sermon as we study Philippians 1:27-30.
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