The Church of Tomorrow, Revisited
This past Sunday I revisited our church vision- it’s become an annual thing now!
As I approach the end of my fourth year as pastor of Northside Drive, I’m thinking about the future of our church. I’ve latched onto a phrase from former pastor Forrest Lanier, "The Church of Tomorrow." I think it fits us perfectly. We are a church that strives to be what churches should be. We seek to be open and welcoming- truly loving and affirming. We seek to be relevant, speaking with humility about everything we see in the world around us. We work to discover a hopeful word- both for us and for all who are listening.
This isn’t easy work and discouragement is hiding around every corner. But we lift each other up, we remind each other why we are here. From Triple E events to Bible Study, from Touching Taliaferro with Love to Holy Happy Hour, we are building a come-and-see community that does what churches are meant to do.
In my sermon, I reviewed the six points from the vision I presented last year: (1) clarify our vision, (2) focus our energy, (3) stabilize our finances, (4) share the message, (5) showcase our passions and (6) be ourselves. To these I added one more this year: mine the depths of our faith. We can only offer to others what we ourselves possess. We must be attending to our inner life. We must do the work of nurturing our faith.
As I said on Sunday, the church of tomorrow is a church of life, a church of resurrection, a church of revitalization. With Easter Sunday just around the corner, let us discover together the new life of our faith- for ourselves and for our lives together.
Scott Hovey
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