Vineyard Church | Weekly Update November 13th, 2024

adam greenwell billings churches billings vineyard church legalistic mark mark 2 pete scazzero replenish rest sabbath sabbath day vineyard Nov 13, 2024

This past Sunday towards the end of the message, I gave a quote from a pastor-turned-author, Pete Scazzero. In his book The Emotionally Healthy Church, Scazzero says this:
"The Gospel says that you are more sinful and flawed than you ever dared to believe, yet you are more loved than you ever dared to hope because Jesus lived and died in your place."

This quote lands… It always lands each time I read it, but HOW it lands depends on how much I need Sabbath rest and how far my faith might have wavered at a given time. The first time I read this quote, “more sinful and flawed” resonated in my mind and took hold of my emotions. What I realized about those times is that I can be a legalist sunuvagun when I am wavering in my knowledge of who God is and who I am to Him.

The legalist in me turns the sabbatical rhythm, the 6+1 one that I have been on about for weeks, on its head. When the awareness of my own depravity drives me, the loudest voice I hear is the voice of my own deficit rather than the voice of God. If the purpose of the “1” of 6+1 is to recharge, reset, repair, and refill, this is not an effective entry point.

Last week, we brought Jesus into the discussion in this way:
23 One Sabbath day as Jesus was walking through some grainfields, his disciples began breaking off heads of grain to eat. 24 But the Pharisees said to Jesus, “Look, why are they breaking the law by harvesting grain on the Sabbath?”25 Jesus said to them, “Haven’t you ever read in the Scriptures what David did when he and his companions were hungry? 26 He went into the house of God (during the days when Abiathar was high priest) and broke the law by eating the sacred loaves of bread that only the priests are allowed to eat. He also gave some to his companions.” 27 Then Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made to meet the needs of people, and not people to meet the requirements of the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is Lord, even over the Sabbath!”- Mark 2:23-27 (NLT)

Over the next few weeks, we will take a crack at how sabbath accomplishes the recharge, reset, repair, and refill. To be effective in creating this rhythm we have to start with a self-evaluation of our posture towards the sabbath. Are we trying to be good, attempting to behave to fulfill a requirement, or are we approaching the Sabbath as a tool that God created to serve us and replenish us?

For me, I have to deal with Scazzero. I have to hear about my own depravity, of course… But I have to hear about my flawed and sinful self from the perspective that my sinfulness led to an expression of God’s love that set me free of all of that so I can fulfill HIS desire, to be in relationship with me. This is not about being good but about being His.

When we allow the legalism to die when we can accept our sinfulness as an entry point to forgiveness and live for the will of the Father that intended me, created me, chose me, became like me, died for me, and then filled me with His Spirit, sabbath serves me as I serve Him.

Adam Greenwell
Pastor
Billings Vineyard Church | www.billingsvineyard.org

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