OPEN

 

What does the word ‘open’ mean to you? Like language itself, it is like any word in which the meaning only comes from the context in which it is used. A word, any word, may also depend on who is using this word. Depending on the age of the child, there are some words he or she uses that only a mother can understand. Open could be an adjective, a verb, an imperative, or a predicate. The word open, has at least 12 different meanings, some of which I will point out, most I will not, and one that I will focus on because it is prophetically important for where we are at as a church in this crucial time.

 

WHAT OPEN MEANT IN 1968 TO ROD LAVER

It wasn’t that long ago when all major sporting events were closed to professionals. This applied to the Olympics, and to tennis – which for a long time were both reserved for amateurs. In 1962, Rod Laver was the world’s best amateur tennis player. In that year he did what very few tennis players have ever done – he won the Grand Slam. This meant that he won the French Championship, the Wimbledon Championship, The U.S. Championship, and the Australian Championship – all in the same calendar year. But despite his number one world ranking and the glory of what hardly anyone else had ever done, he had basically earned no prize money for all his hard work. At the end of 1962, Rod Laver decided to turn professional, and join with the other world’s top tennis players on the emerging professional tennis tour. Laver was a bit stunned though when he joined this professional tour and was unable to win a match! But over the next five years on the professional tour, Laver began to dominate his opponents. Then something spectacular happened in 1968.

In 1968 open meant that Rod Laver was again able to play in each of the Grand Slam tournaments when each tournament changed their player admission to be open to professionals. But perhaps to Rod Laver in 1968 open meant that he could do what no other man in the history had been able to do – win the Grand Slam for the second time! ‘Open’ in 1968 for Rod Laver meant that was open to make history.

 

WHAT OPEN MEANS TO A DENTIST

When a dentist says “Open” he or she is issuing a professional instruction to their patient. 

 

WHAT OPEN MEANS TO A LOCKSMITH

Open to a locksmith is a professional goal when they are called in to deal with a faulty lock. 

 

WHAT OPEN MEANS TO A SHOPKEEPER

To a shopkeeper open means the opportunity to pay their utility bills, their insurances, their staff wages, their mortgage, their children’s school fees, and to cover the cost of replenishing their stock. 

 

WHAT OPEN MEANS TO A SAILOR

 It is one of the delights of a yachtsman to glide across the waters and to sail into open seas powered by nothing but the available breeze. For the early explorers, such as Columbus, Cook, and Cortez, who sailed across open seas in search of adventure and fame. Today, it is the day-in-day-out duties of every merchant sailor to freight their ship’s container-cargo across open seas to their international customers. 

 

WHAT OPEN MEANS TO THE OUTGOING PASTOR OF A TASMANIAN CHURCH

Be open is the appeal of the pastor-preacher to his hearers so that they might experience the power of the gospel, the infilling of the Spirit, and the presence of the Lord in their worship. Be open is the pastoral appeal for people to be inclined for what the Lord might do in them.

When I was a teenager I had a visiting evangelist lay his hands on me after I responded to his appeal to come forward for prayer “…if you want to baptised in the Holy Spirit.” “You may not understand all that the Scriptures says about it, but be open to what God by His Spirit might do in you!” And so I did. I went forward in the little Apostolic Church building in Coxes Road, Norlane (Geelong), one Wednesday night, and was prayed for. That night my world changed. I was open to something that I could see in Scripture, even though I didn’t quite understand it.

To the evangelist, open meant the possibility of a miracle happening. Sometimes this miracle happens when someone is open to the gospel and they are then converted to faith in Christ. Sometimes this miracle happens when a young teenager is open to coming forward in a small church which leads to the Holy Spirit baptising him in a Pentecostal experience.

Sometimes let’s be open is an appeal for someone to open to the new thing, season, mission, chapter, that God might be about to do. This is where we are now at as a church. Many of us are praying for God to call a new minister as our church’s new pastor and leader. This will be a new experience for many in our church. This new pastor will be different. Perhaps he will try new things. My appeal to you is to be open. Be open to who God will call. Be open to how he will go about his ministry and calling. Be open to how young or old he might be. And perhaps most of all, be open to what God is going to do in our church’s next and new chapter. 

Your Pastor,

Andrew

Let me know what you think below in the comment section and feel free to share this someone who might benefit from this Pastor’s Desk.

ALTOGETHER ODD!

Odd people are the ones who follow Christ. ‘Odd’ in this sense means, strange, different, uncommon, abnormal. If you weren’t already odd when you became a Christian, you have certainly become odd since following Him! But there was a time when being a Christian wasn’t that odd. People used to refer to their first name as their Christian name because this was the name given to them at their christening. Biblical expressions like, ‘turn the cheek’, ‘go the extra-mile’, ‘seek and you will find’, were part of everyday conversations, not just Sunday conversations. When a man and a woman co-habited without getting married, they acknowledged, in common parlance, that they were ‘living in sin’. Associated with this was that nearly all weddings, even of non-church goers, happened inside a church, because it was understood that marriage necessarily involved standing before God and seeking His blessing. But in the last few years, Christians have become increasingly faced with the choice to either ‘shut-up and go with the flow’, or become increasingly odd. 

¶ But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
First Peter 2:9

Christianity had a very odd beginning. It was birthed at a time when the prevailing world power, the Romans, ruled the known world with an iron-fist. The law of the land, with some minor exceptions, was that all people had to worship Caesar and the Roman gods. Christians refused to do this. They were odd. The Roman world prized might and power. Christians prized meekness and serving others. They were odd. Romans treated women like second-class citizens – certainly not on an equal footing with men. Christians regarded women as worthy of respect and dignity and men as bearing the greater responsibility to protect them. They were odd. Romans gathered together for celebrations of debauchery and indecency. Christians gathered together for a celebration of their love for the Christ. 

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
John 13:34-35

 I think we must be odd! I am not primarily describing us – I am challenging us! We must become odder ! 

“Too many of our churches function as secular entertainment centers with religious morals slapped on top, when they should be functioning as the living, breathing Body of Christ. Too many churches have succumbed to modernity, rejecting the wisdom of past ages, treating worship as a consumer activity, and allowing parishioners to function as unaccountable, atomized (disconnected particles) members. The sad truth is, when the world sees us, it often fails to see anything different from nonbelievers.”
Rod Dreher, THE BENEDICT OPTION, 2017, Sentinel Publishers (Penguin Random House), New York, page 102

I sometimes hear Christians refer to the ‘real world’ as if they are describing a reality outside of the one that Christ has gifted us, His Church, to see and be. But how many of us realise that living as a Christian in the community of a church is the real world? We present a grand vision of reality to a world who thinks we are quite odd. Our vision is one of the enthroned Christ as the One who laughs at the schemes of the silly people who think they could de-throne The Seated One with their silly redefinitions! All the while, these silly people continue to ache and hurt, and blame The Lamb for their pain. The very thing they need for their healing – a loving community of brothers and sisters who are bound by love for Christ and His healing Word – is the very thing they think they have to despise and destroy. How odd.

“Christians often talk about ‘reaching the culture’ without realizing that, having no distinct Christian culture of their own, they have been co-opted by the secular culture they wish to evangelize. Without a substantial Christian culture, it’s no wonder that our children are forgetting what it means to be Christian, and no surprise that we are not bringing in new converts.”
Rod Dreher, THE BENEDICT OPTION, 2017, Sentinel Publishers (Penguin Random House), New York, page 102

We should be an odd church. We can be a church that is different to how people are normally treated. We can be a church where our critics enter and something odd happens to them. We can be a refuge from a world where people hurt and ache. Not only do we not want to be like the world, those who have come out of the world do not want us to be like the world either!

I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one.
John 17:15

As we prepare for our Month of Care, consider how you might show an odd act of kindness for a brother or sister in Christ. A cup of coffee. A chat. An evening meal. A breakfast. A lunch. These are things of oddness that make a church community so unusual, so different, so strange, so odd. 

¶ Let brotherly love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body. Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”
Hebrews 13:1-5

Your odd Pastor,

Andrew.