Each year at my church we have a special day called Celebration Sunday. We take the whole day to do nothing but highlight and celebrate all the great things our God has done in our midst over the past year. It’s a ton of fun. We’ve done things in the past as big hanging streamers and balloons and batting beach balls around the room. We’ve handed out party hats. Everybody went home this Sunday with a cookie (and some of the kids left armed with several cookies to the…delight…of their parents). I’m not going to try and put the whole transcript for the service on here because I’m not the only one who spoke, but I do want to share some highlights and the video of the service with you because I think what’s going on right now in my church is pretty exciting. If you are local and don’t already have a church home, we would sure be glad to have you join us. Without further ado, then, here is Celebration Sunday.

I’ll let you watch the video for the rest, but here’s the final thought I shared with the congregation. In the book of Acts, a follower of Jesus named Luke writes about the beginning of the church and its initial growth and spread across the Roman Empire. It all started when the Holy Spirit descended on and filled the group of 120 disciples—not too many fewer than we have in the room this morning—just as Jesus had promised He would. Filled with that incredible source of spiritual power, Peter went out and proclaimed the first Gospel sermon to the group of curious onlookers wondering what all the commotion was coming from the room where the disciples were gathered. In response to this Spirit-empowered presentation of the Gospel, people began turning their lives over to Jesus by the thousands. It was a wild time. 

Right after telling this incredible story, Luke offers up one of his summary statements about what life in the church was like in those earliest of days. He says this starting in Luke 2:42: “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and signs were being performed through the apostles. Now all the believers were together and held all things in common. They sold their possessions and property and distributed the proceeds to all, as any had need. Every day they devoted themselves to meeting together in the temple, and broke bread from house to house. They ate their food with joyful and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people.” 

It’s this incredible picture of a group of people sold out for Jesus and enjoying the sweet fruits that come from living the life of Christ together in a community that is united around nothing else but Jesus. Look at all of the things they were doing together to make all of this possible. They were committed to growing together in their faith; to being the church together. They saw and took part in God’s doing incredible things in their midst and in the community around them. They loved one another and cared for one another with a spirit of graciousness and sacrificial generosity. They rejoiced together at what God was doing—at all the “wins” He was leading them to experience together.

And what was the result of all of this? We don’t have to wonder. Luke tells us. “Every day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.” Imagine that. Every single day there were new people following Jesus because of the Spirit-empowered work of those believers. Friends, that’s our goal. That’s the direction we are heading. We want to see new people following Jesus every single day. Are we there yet? No, we’re not. But we’ve added almost a third of our average worship attendance in the last year. Since Covid we’ve added at least two-thirds of that number. The community we are experiencing and rejoicing in together on Wednesday nights at the Gathering Place is incredible. The love and care this body has for one another will blow your mind when you experience it if you haven’t already. We’ve already gone too long today or we could just keep rejoicing together at more “wins” God is leading us to experience together. 

As we keep pursuing becoming more and more fully the church our God has created us to be, we will keep experiencing more and more of the kinds of kingdom-advancing results the earliest church was seeing. That is our goal. To be fully a place where anyone can connect to grow in Christ and reach out for His kingdom. As we do that, His kingdom will indeed keep right on growing and advancing in our midst and beyond to the glory of God. 

I’m really not sure why YouTube decided to make the thumbnail image the same one as we had for last week. I switched it myself yesterday morning. We also had some sound issues. We seem to have tech gremlins in our building on a pretty regular basis. Listen to the kids choir because they are cute. Fast forward to the speakers because their stories are powerful. Stay tuned in for a full unpacking of some of our wins over the past year. And have a great week!