New Year, New Hope

This has been a long year.

A year of uncertainty.

Struggle.

Pain.

We've watched the virus take countless lives.

People we knew.

People we loved.

Jobs have been lost.

Businesses have shut down.

And churches have been forced to close their doors.

We've witnessed division on an unprecedented level.

Cities filled with violence.

Streets filled with protesters.

And we felt the sting of racism.

The deep heartache of hate.

There have been times where it's been difficult to see the hand of God.

But even in the darkest of moments, He has been there.

Faithful, present, powerful.

As a new year begins, we stand on a simple truth.

Those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength.

They'll soar on wings as eagles.

They'll run and not grow weary.

They'll walk and not grow faint.

We don't know what this new year will hold.

But we know that it's held by a God whose mercies are new every morning.

This is where we place our trust.

This is the truth on which we stand.

This is our hope for the new year.

And so Nathan and I wanted to spend a little time with you guys really looking back a little bit this past year and looking forward to this next year.

And one of the conversations we were having was about really this was a year that was full of lament and full of difficulty.

I mean, the there's psalms, yeah, there's psalms that are called Psalms of Lament.

There's a whole book called Lamentations, and so I think that's stating the obvious, Nathan, that this has been a tough year.

Yeah, for sure.

I don't think 2020 was the year that anyone expected it to be.

I mean, I remember when we crossed over, we took a bunch of college students to Passion.

We did the whole big New Year's Eve kind of celebration at uh the um Mercedes-Benz Arena, and you know, there's what, 50,000, 60,000 people in that room, and who would have ever thought that just two months later, like everything would be shut down?

And like we were thinking the biggest year, biggest decade, like gonna be a great thing, and then yeah, absolutely.

And so not the way we wanted it to happen.

Um and and so it it it's it's been a difficult year, and and I think it it's stating the obvious that that that COVID is probably at the center of that difficulty.

Um, but it's also been a difficult year with um uh with what what our world has faced, our country has faced with racial injustice and um uh being in an election year.

Um, I mean, just a lot of man, tough.

It's been tough on relationships, it's been tough.

Um you know, uh how do we relate to one another, um, especially even with people that may disagree with us.

Um, but there's been a lot of blessings this year.

Yeah.

Yeah, for sure.

I mean, there's a lot that we can celebrate as a church family.

I mean, you know, I mentioned Passion.

I mean, I think we ended up taking close to uh 50 kids, I think, with Passion this year, which was pretty remarkable.

Um we had uh a women's conference, first time we ever had a women's conference back in January with Thrive, and then uh we had our big weekend for United weekend for our student ministry, and uh man, that was something really remarkable.

That'll probably go down as probably one of my favorite memories in Church at the Grove history, um, just that special weekend.

I agree.

Uh I think the number of students that were involved, uh 300 plus, and then the number of volunteers and people that invested their life.

Um a lot of people may not know that that came uh that came on the heels of some pretty difficult things going on with young people in our community, some suicides and yeah at Social Circle High School we had uh two students that took their lives uh I guess at the end of January, beginning of February, which seems like an eternity ago.

Right.

And um, and so then we had the United Weekend a month after that.

And you know, I mean I remember talking and kind of leading up to United Weekend and talking to volunteers and just through prayer and stuff, thinking, man, this is gonna be a way and an opportunity for God to break down some walls and some barriers in our community.

And I feel like he did that.

I feel like there was lives that were brought together, healed, and transformed through Jesus um throughout that weekend, and it was pretty remarkable.

Um, I mean, that Sunday after United Weekend, um, you know, the end of the weekend, um, we kind of had a spontaneous baptism moment at Social Circle, and uh had I think 15 uh students that uh chose to be baptized that day.

So that was remarkable.

I mean, like I said, just an incredible uh memory, probably one of my favorite things.

And we've been baptizing students all year, really, as a result of that weekend.

We we've experienced um the blessing and the fruit.

Um but that was an interesting weekend because it was March 6th, 7th, and 8th.

Yeah, and it was the la that Sunday that we baptized those 15 students was the last Sunday that we met.

And I'll never forget um coming in together as a staff and beginning the conversation talking about what we're gonna do for Easter.

We're we were involved in Easter planning, yeah.

And and then over the next that day and the next couple days, um, we were faced with the same decision that that churches all over the country, all over the world were were dealing with, and and we didn't meet again.

We met online for the first time that Sunday.

The next Sunday, yeah.

Because I can remember um I got a phone call from one of the churches that we partnered with at United Weekend, and it was the Wednesday before United Weekend, and he said, Hey, I've got a parent that's asking me about COVID and if we're still gonna do the United Weekend because of COVID.

And I just remember thinking, I just remember laughing and going, Wow, I mean like why would we not?

Like, didn't think it was a big deal whatsoever.

And then I think it was that Wednesday after the United Weekend that NBA, I think, shut down.

That was kind of the first big deal, and uh, and as a result, we made that decision, I think, Saturday morning not to come back that Sunday, and so we were scrambling, trying to put things together and get cameras going and stuff because we had never really done live stream before, and so COVID pushed us into the online world in a in a new way, in a greater way for sure.

And uh, and yeah, and then we were online.

We thought when we we had the conversation, we were thinking maybe we'll be online for a week or two, come back, yeah, and uh, and obviously that was not the case.

Everything changed, and I and I will say so so so, in the midst of lamentations, in the midst of difficulty, God has blessed us tremendously.

Um uh we uh we are one of the churches that that it has invested heavily uh in our church at the very beginning and throughout the life of our church, uh, and I I'll say their uh the name of the church on, you know, it's North Star Church.

Um they they coached us and they invested heavily financially in the into us helping buy equipment.

And then we had some uh church um family uh people in our church that said, hey, we'll match that.

I I don't know if they want to be known.

I think sometimes they want to be anonymous, but they said, Hey, we'll match that.

And the Lord provided us with the ability to invest heavily in the equipment that has provided us to this day the opportunity to do ministry online.

Yeah, which has been, I mean, pretty incredible.

I mean, online world is definitely a new uh new frontier for us, um, but it's been cool to see how we've connected uh with families outside of the people that were coming physically that just live in our community that have now started watching online.

Um we've got uh families that live in um you know like downtown, kind of towards downtown Atlanta, inside the perimeter, um, that they watch every single Sunday.

I got a message from them this past week saying, man, we really enjoy watching the services.

We've got an older gentleman that um watches every week from Oxford, and I don't think he's ever physically attended.

And um, we had a young girl, actually in a family.

We baptized a young girl who first came to Church of the Grove through online, right?

Exactly.

She we we we ended up having a conversation uh with her after she had been worshiping with us online and she she wanted to know more about Jesus and came to Christ, and we baptized her.

Um a lot of people don't know that we have uh we have a family in in the Houston, Texas area that that that considers us their church home.

And so uh Rick and Barb, uh they're a special family that have been a part of us really for years, and so um I mean and man, there's a lot to be thankful for when it comes, when it when we think of the opportunity we've had uh to do ministry um in spite of the COVID limitations.

And so God is really, really worked.

Let's talk a little bit more about some of the other other blessings we've seen.

Um we mentioned United Weekend.

Uh we may throw uh we may give people a chance to look at a video.

Why don't we watch that right now, in fact?

I want to talk about this kingdoms of who we were.

I'm ready for all of them to become one created out of the dirt.

I'm willing to become one of them in order to save them.

I want to talk about that Jesus tonight.

I want to talk about that king tonight.

It is, that's incredible.

Just to see watch those students worship without any hesitation or anything holding them back, just the reckless abandonment to the presence of God is such a blessing.

Um, the summer was tough because uh our students, our high school and middle school students weren't able to go to camp.

You know, we we had some great ministry that happened over the summer.

Um we weren't able to do our traditional summer jam, but man, thanks to to Katie and and Chelsea and and and the leadership in our student in our children's ministry, um, we were able to do an online summer jam with our children.

Yeah, camping edition, and that was fun.

We had uh Dylan and Austin uh doing Rocky and Bullwinkle, I think were their names, and uh man, just a fun, fun thing.

And it was so cool because I think we had uh over 140, 100 over 160, 160 uh kids that took play, took part in um the online uh summer jam program.

Doing it at home, uh camping in their backyard, doing events, doing stuff in their backyard.

And that's what's really encouraging to me, like even in light of all the stuff that's happened with COVID, it it's really pushed um discipleship to not be happening at a building and a church, but really it's been happening on the family level.

And so it was so cool to see us helping resource some families to actually disciple and talk to their kids about Jesus at home and trying to equip the parents in that process.

And so that was so encouraging, such a huge win with SummerJam this year for sure.

Well, and and and to continue to, man, to be thankful for our children's ministry leadership with Katie and Chelsea and Madison, and um they've been making packets every week for these families who are worshiping at home and and and worshiping online, but having activities for their kids and doing that discipleship at at home.

Um one of the blessings, Nathan, has just been how God has blessed us financially.

And I and I and I know um you know there's a weight that that I carry, that you carry, and some of our leadership, our elders carry.

Um man, and I'll be honest, I've I've shared this with the church, I've shared this with our staff.

Um those first few weeks were difficult times to think about how um uh financially this COVID situation might affect our church, but man, God has been amazing and through the generosity of our people.

Yeah.

I mean it has been really incredible.

I mean, to think that you know, we didn't meet for 15 or 16 weeks, I think, straight throughout the summer.

And uh and yet this this year was really probably our as far as my memory, my recollect, my recollection, probably the best summer financially that we've ever had as a church.

And so it's been so encouraging to see the families and the people in our church that are um, you know, they've been blessed and they want to pour out and make sure that their church family is able to continue to pour in and invest in the community.

And we've been able to do that even in light of COVID.

It's definitely canceled some of our plans, um, but we've still been able to invest and connect with people and serve our community in just new and different ways.

Well, and we've not had to, we we we didn't have to cut one penny from from the support that we provide.

Local ministries, some of the church plants that are that are um places like Haiti and Dominican Republic and and you know our church in New York that uh that really we really went through a difficult uh season.

We were able to continue to support them.

And um well, and not not to mention just continuing to support, but through the faithful generosity of the people at Church at the Grove, we've been able to like make larger donations.

Like this past summer at Fish, uh we did the Fish for Kids program.

I know in Social Circle we were delivering lunches.

I think we delivered probably because they extended the summer lunch program to you know when people were at home from school.

And I mean, I think we we delivered probably close to 10,000 lunches or something throughout the summer, which is pretty remarkable when you think about it.

But we were also able to make a$5,000 donation to help uh sponsor fish in that program specifically.

Uh we were able to give uh a large donation to the Pregnancy Resource Center here in Walton uh to help them, and so in light of the generosity that our people have continued to just pour blessings on our church, our church has in light of that has been able to bless others and bless other ministries in our community in a bigger and greater way than we had even originally planned.

Absolutely.

And one of one of my favorite things that we've done over the life of Church at the Grove every year is what we call Shop with a Hero, which takes place during the Christmas season.

And I remember um in the summer um concerned whether or not we were gonna even gonna be able to do uh Shop with a Hero.

And so we um I I want to say props to uh Walmart and the manager of Walmart for being open to that, allowing us to continue to make plans.

And so on December 5th, we were able to minister to over over a hundred kids and provide for their Christmas, and then we probably had 55 or 60 um local heroes from different departments and even military uh personnel that that shop with those kids, and and then we were able to be a part of another shop with a hero in Monroe uh where we supported it through volunteers that wrapped gifts and and and were part of that.

So it's been a even even as we moved into the end of the year, God has blessed us with the opportunity to minister.

Yeah, for sure.

And I think uh I think we have a video of Shop with a Hero too.

So just take a minute and just remember what happened just a few weeks ago with Shop with a Heroes, and I'm gonna do it.

I mean, it's incredible.

Every single year, it's incredible to be a part of Shop with a Hero, but especially this year, it just seemed like such a special and unique uh time just to serve some of those families, and they were so grateful for the blessing of Shop with a Hero and just our church family.

It was a pretty remarkable.

Well, I I noticed uh Nathan that you had a uh a t-shirt that that I think someone gave you as a gift that had the word pivot on it.

Explain the uh the what the significance of that word related to this year.

Yeah, so um I mean that's that's been the the word of the year for us as a church uh staff.

I mean, that we are just constantly faced with pivoting.

Uh we make plans and uh God kind of laughs at those plans and says, uh, no, that's not the direction you're gonna go.

You need to move in this direction instead.

And so uh yeah, so we're pivoting quite often.

In fact, I think Katie uh said that she had heard somewhere that you shouldn't make plans more than 30 days out, um, just because things were so con quickly changing every single week, it seemed like.

And so pivot was kind of the name of the game for us this year, just to be flexible and uh just to realize too that that God is up to something.

Even in the midst of all the chaos, even in the midst of all the I mean, let's see, let's just call it trauma of the year and um just the the weight of everything that's happened this year.

Man, I feel like God has been at work um just in our church family with some of the things we just named, but just in a lot of individuals.

I mean, it's just been so cool to see followers of Jesus that are living for him in this season, thriving in the midst of all that's gone on around us.

Right, absolutely.

I I loved how we we we we had to pivot and and change a lot of our teaching and preaching plans, and we um we we spent some time uh really uh uh you know talking about how we had to choose joy in a time that it was really hard to choose joy and and had a we had to take captive our thoughts and and and so um we we we had a savior, we had a series called Jesus, the unsaved savior.

Yeah.

Um one of my favorites was the 23rd Psalm where we walked through that just verse, uh one verse per week, and um, and then in the book of Daniel, in a year where we're faced with a lot of political unrest to be able to dive into scripture.

Yeah, uh I don't want to pat ourselves on the back, but I think I think preaching was the best it's ever been this year.

Well, I don't know if people would agree with that.

Preaching in social circle has probably been better than it's ever been uh at Church at the Grove this year.

Um, and and here we are uh at the end of the year, and I know uh both of us have been talking and and sharing, and even just in some of our conversations about being able to uh to provide for some needs at the end of the year, some benevolence needs and for.

some I mean just uh uh food um um uh helping people with some basic needs for for their utilities and stuff and and because of the generosity of our church we've been able to meet some needs.

Yeah and I I think I can't remember a year especially this time of year you always get benevolence calls you always have people that have needs either from Christmas stuff or you know just general utilities or whatever it might be.

But I feel like this year more than any other year in the past we've had more of those phone calls.

But the great thing is we've been able to say yes to probably 95% of those phone calls and just say yes we can help you with this bill yes we can help you with Christmas presents and that's been such an encouragement and a joy that our church gets to play a significant role in helping people that are in need in our community and follow the way of Jesus by helping the the poor and the downtrodden so well and and and so that leads the the talking about the way of Jesus that leads a little bit in what what are we expecting for next year?

What are we excited about for 2021?

I mean let's talk about some of the things that we're looking forward to this next year.

Well as soon as we cross over the new year every all the 2020 stuff goes away right exactly COVID comes to an end's done at midnight on December 31st it's all good news moving forward um I wish that was the case um but sadly um we'll still bring a lot of 2020 stuff in at least for the foreseeable future in with us to 2021 and um in light of that though we we want to be able to practice and follow the way of Jesus this next year.

That's one of the big things we're kind of leaning towards and pushing towards as far as Sunday morning stuff goes.

And so uh we're gonna have a few weeks where we kind of cast some vision around that um in the new year in January and then we're also gonna have uh uh we're gonna pretty much teach through the Sermon on the Mount uh pretty much the entire year um we're gonna kind of break that down in uh in sections and in verse by verse kind of content and I'm so pumped about looking at Matthew 5, 6 and 7 uh throughout the entire year.

I mean it's been it's a game changer for me this past year and uh just following Jesus's methods and ways and his teachings is a is a game changer in our lives.

And so I'm excited about that content that's coming.

I know we're we're we're looking forward to another season of prayer and fasting um as we go into the year and um which we'll kick that off January 4th so we'll have uh we'll come back to church Lord willing uh we'll be back to church um on January the 3rd and uh then that next day that Monday we'll kick off 21 days of prayer and fasting where we're gonna be calling people to to really start to um to start the new year off in the right way just pursuing the Lord depending upon him and just looking to him to to be our guide and our leader in this new year.

And so I'm really excited about that.

We did that a couple of times this past year this year in 2020 and uh man it's just always such a sweet time where the Lord just kind of refreshes us.

We think of fasting as something that brings weakness and it does but at the same time it also brings us great strength and our weakness he has made strong and so I'm looking forward to that that season in January.

Well I am too and I and I I want to encourage our church family um even in the midst of of everything we're going through man it is so easy to forget really why we're here and it's it's we're here um obviously we want to bring glory to God we want to make it all about Jesus but our mission statement says that we're here to reach people far from God and to lead them to become followers of Jesus.

And so so we we might think we're limited with that but we're really not there there's that we've got to be creative in how we invite people we can invite people to come worship with us in person but we can also invite people man to come to churchatthegrove.com that can be an easy front door man invite people to join us online.

I've had some neighbors where they're not quite comfortable getting out but man I've invited them to watch it on online and they've even asked hey are y'all doing Christmas Eve streaming and doing Christmas Eve online and I said absolutely I don't I think some sometimes we say this and we it it becomes something that we say a little bit um uh automatically but but I really believe the best is yet to come yeah and and so that God's got something in store for us um and and so this is a scripture that the Lord put on my heart um that comes out of 1 Corinthians chapter 2 and it's verse 9.

1 Corinthians 2 · chapter mention

It says but as it is written what no eye has seen nor ear heard nor the heart of man imagined what God has prepared for those who love him.

That's good.

And so I I think God um has something that is so far beyond what we could even imagine or or think I think of the the verse in Ephesians 320 where he talks about that.

Immeasurably more yeah immeasurably more than we could uh think or imagine.

And so uh I would encourage our church um uh to to move into this next year with anticipation with expectation even in the midst of of some of the hurt some of the pain some of the brokenness man let's move and let's see God do an incredible work we might even want to consider the fact that we need to pray for some of our sister churches in the community a lot of them are shut down a lot of them um are dealing with some difficult uh issues related to COVID and so we need to pray for our sister churches in this community yeah yeah I think um yeah you're absolutely right and I think that the Lord is still on his throne I think he is still on his throne um he is ruling and he is reigning he is sovereign that none of this is taking him by surprise and that he's wanting to even use this COVID season and this past year to further his kingdom and have his people live on mission for him.

And so as you say the best is yet to come but I think that the the harvest is plentiful.

I mean I think that I think that there is a harvest that awaits us as a people as a church even in the community where we live to see a great number of people wake up to the realization of who Jesus is and that he wants to work and move in their lives.

And you know as Jesus said pray for more laborers.

Right and what we need is our church family to get behind that idea that God wants to use them right where they're at to still be a missionary.

And I think that that's been one of the the tendencies in this season because of all the social distancing and stuff it's kind of like well I can't I can't talk to people I can't invite people to come to church with me because they're gonna say no because of social distancing and in some cases that's true but God's still wanting to use this season in a powerful way and use his people to accomplish the mission that he's given us to reach people far from God and lead them to become followers of Jesus.

And so encouragement would be that who can you invite, who can you share your faith with who can you tell your story to to see if they will turn and follow Jesus and put their faith and trust in him and him alone absolutely so why why don't we close this time because we know people are watching they might be sitting in their deny around the uh the table whatever it is and and and they're probably going to be having some meals over the new year time together.

Why don't you have some conversations as couples and as families um maybe even with your friends how can God use you as we move into this next year 2021 to help fulfill the mission that God's called us to which is to make disciples and so can we pray?

Can we close this time in prayer?

Let's pray together Father we um God we we look back on this year and it was a year full of of lament but as we look through scripture that's nothing new we we we have a broken world that we live in we have uh we see throughout the story of scripture uh where people have encountered and endured difficult times we even think of the history of of our world where there have been plagues and there have been um seasons where uh where people have had to deal with difficult times wars and and and and calamity and and uh natural disasters and so regardless of that we know that we have a God who's in control and God despite the difficulty we've had you are still on your throne and you still have called us to a mission and that mission centers around making you known to other people so that you might be glorified even more.

And so I pray Lord for the conversations uh between uh couples and family members and friends over these uh these the remainder of these uh these next few days as we enter into 2021 would center around how we can be Jesus to the people around us.

And so Father we ask you that you would work and that you would uh move and in in ways that would be only explained by the power of the Holy Spirit.

And so Father we thank you for your goodness and your graciousness even in the midst of difficulty we ask all these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen