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Sep
20

God on the Sidelines - Ryan's Story

Posted by sklein    0 Comment(s)    Add a Comment  comment-icon.png

My father’s career caused us to move every few years during my childhood.  In every new community we settled in my parents were adamant about finding a church home. We grew up attending weekly Sunday school classes, were baptized and confirmed.  Yet, as a high school student I chose to attend a different church as I found a personal connection with another  worship community and my parents were fully supportive of my decision to follow Christ outside of their church. While I was active in my faith but it was often a secondary priority even during those years.

Fast-forward through my undergraduate, my twenty and thirty-something years, a hectic career and more cross-country, career-induced moves and I lost a connection to a church community altogether.  My spirituality played second fiddle to my lifestyle. I attended church on occasion, but I didn’t fully embrace the spirit of worship.   I shoved God to the sidelines  and called him in to my game only when I deemed fit.  During trying times my faith would swell somewhat and then slowly dissipate when life returned back to regular programming.

When my father fell critically ill I dropped to my knees begging God keep him alive – he was too young to die. I bargained with God to keep him healthy long enough to survive a heart transplant.  Days dragged to weeks.  Weeks turned in to months.  I couldn’t fathom why with all the medical advancements and brilliant medical minds why his illness was so labored and not improving.  Eventually the tone in my prayers changed from pleading for God to heal him to quietly asking God to shed mercy on his ailing body and surround him with comfort and peace .   It was those shifts in my prayers that I realized God had been present all along – He’d been waiting for me to realize my faith should be a priority again and that only way I was going to make it out of darkness was with Him in the Captains’ chair in my life.  It hit me like a ton of bricks. I had been selfish for so long not making faith a daily priority and in my darkest hours I realized God never left me even when I walked away from Him.

It took the journey of my father’s belabored illness and eventual passing to remind me God is merciful, never leaves us and sheds comfort on us.  On Father’s Day of 2014 just 4 weeks after we held my dad’s hands as he transitioned on, I decided to formally join this church community.  I had been attending as a passive visitor, again moving through my hectic life but not embracing my faith.  I chose Father’s Day Sunday in honor of my dad and because I knew in his last moments with us he was at peace, filled with the Holy Spirit and accepting of it all. In some way I like to think that the end of my father’s life provided me the most wonderful gift – connecting back with a church home and re-launching my faith.

The Access services, music, interactive sermons and accessibility of it all has provided me a safe place to come worship.  I don’t feel vulnerable and I don’t feel like one of thousands in a congregation.   I feel connected and focused and free to be me – scarred with life’s mistakes and disappointments but full of blessings and hope.  Dark events often lead us to dig deep inside and realize we’re never been alone and don’t ever have to be.   Access reminds me that my journey in faith doesn’t have to be alone.  And, it reminds me that my faith is more than just on Sundays.

Ryan Schultz, FUMCR member and ACCESS attendee

Sep
14

From empty space to worship space

Posted by rrindfuss    0 Comment(s)    Add a Comment  comment-icon.png

Our church's photography team snapped this photo on November 2, 2014. That Sunday we held an Access worship service in a tent on an empty, grassy field where our Worship and Arts Center is today. We imagined the transformation of that empty space into worship space.

This fall will mark the conclusion of the 3-year "Imagine" capital campaign to fund that transformation. The scripture from which we took the "Imagine" name, the prayerful process that led to our church expanding its facilities, and the unforeseen changes in Richardson since that time all testify to a God that imagines far more than we can.

Before building plans or the Imagine capital campaign came into being, our church had spent months praying, "God how do you want us to grow in our ministry to our community?" We felt God affirming what was happening with Access and other ministries in the church and leading us to expand the facilities that facilitated those ministries.

When we began formalizing those feelings into building plans I recall thinking, "Wow! This is far more than I would have imagined on my own." I think others felt similarly, because when we moved to begin the capital campaign we drew the Imagine name from a prayer in Ephesians 3 that refers to God as the one "who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine."

After the building process began and years after the prayers that initiated it, Richardson began a period of explosive growth that continues to bring new people to our community. Back before we could imagine the changes in Richardson, I believe God knew the people that were coming and imagined our church helping them grow in their faith and service to others and used the opportunity of our prayers to set us on a path to have expanded facilities with which to do that.

As we conclude our Imagine capital campaign this fall, I hope you will continue to imagine how God can use you and our church in service to our community. I hope that you will pray that God will lead you toward positive impacts that you can't yet even imagine. I hope that you'll invite new people to become part of our church and all it's doing in our community and world. And as you've done in such a faithful way through the capital campaign I hope that you will continue to give of yourself through finances, time, energy, study, worship and service so that the things only God can imagine will come into being through us.

I'm looking forward to worshipping with you at Access on Sunday! Shandon and her team will welcome us with smiles and hugs, we'll celebrate our 3rd graders with a gift of a Bible, Julie will preach on being rooted in scripture, and Eric and the Access band will bring us into the presence of God through music. I can't wait to experience it with you!

In Christ,
Rich


Rich Rindfuss
Access Pastor
First United Methodist Church Richardson

Sep
07

God and hurricanes

Posted by rrindfuss    0 Comment(s)    Add a Comment  comment-icon.png

In the aftermath of Harvey and with Irma bearing down, I've had some conversations about how God is involved with hurricanes. A couple people shared that they've been told God is using hurricanes to punish people. But that explanation contradicts what Jesus said and ignores clear guidance he gave to his followers in the aftermath of tragic death.

Matthew 5:43-45 relates the following:

43 "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous."

Jesus says that God sends both the sun and the rain equally on good people and bad people. God doesn’t separate out good weather for good people and bad weather for bad people. Jesus' point is even bigger, though. He’s saying that God shows love both to people that are good and to people that are bad, and that’s how we should live too.

In Luke 13:1-5 Jesus refers to two episodes of tragic death and counters the common explanation for why they occurred:

1 At that very time there were some present who told [Jesus] about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.  2 He asked them, "Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans?  3 No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did.  4 Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them-- do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem?  5 No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did."

In one case the Roman governor, Pilate, had apparently killed Jews while they were offering sacrifices as part of their worship of God. In the other case a building had collapsed killing 18 people.

The common wisdom of the day said that good people don’t suffer; therefore, these people that died must have been worse people than those that survived. Jesus didn’t say why these people died beyond the fact that someone chose to be a murderer and a tower fell down. What Jesus did say clearly is that these people didn’t die because they were worse people than any others, and they didn’t die because God was punishing them. Instead Jesus told his listeners to shift their focus away from judging other people as being good or bad, deserving of suffering or not. Instead Jesus told them it's far more important to focus on their own actions and being the people God wants them to be.

I hope you'll join Eric and the Access band, Shandon, pastor Julie, and me on Sunday as we continue recalling who God wants us to be in our "Rooted" sermon series. This week we'll read a story Jesus told comparing faith to seeds planted in different soils. I grew up on a farm surrounded by corn, so Jesus' story brings some particular images to mind, and I'll share those. We'll also celebrate the Lord's Supper. It's going to be great!

See you Sunday!
Rich


Rich Rindfuss
Access Pastor
First United Methodist Church Richardson

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