Sunday School 10:00-10:45
Worship 11:00
Our Mission
A journey often begins with excitement, optimism, and the hope that the way traveled will be happy and rewarding. We often expect that the journey will be difficult at times, and that it will have its fair share of trouble, but we begin with the belief that we will be able to face those challenges. After all, who willingly begins a journey if he has reason to believe that the way will be miserable, lonely, and end in failure?
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Unfortunately, for many people the road of faith and of recovery from our brokenness often turns out to be a lonely road. I cannot tell how many times I've heard some version of the following:
"It's really hard to get sober in your home town."
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"It seems like the people who are the hardest on me are the one's I thought would have my back."
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"No matter how much I've changed, it feels like everyone still only sees me in light of my past."
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"I thought that if I gave my life to Jesus, then I'd feel more welcome in church."
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"What do I have to do to get someone to invest in my life?"
It's ironic: by definition the Church is not a museum for gilded saints, but a hospital for broken sinners. In Jesus' day, Luke (5:30-32) tells us that the religious leaders "complained... saying, “Why do You eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus answered and said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.”
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Jesus' friends and followers were the kind of people who weren't wanted or appreciated by the 'churchy' people of their world. To put it simply, they were people with baggage... lots of baggage. They had checkered pasts and sketchy resumes. They often were well-meaning but unlearned, trying to do right but never seeming to fit in.
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More than that, many of them were people who'd given up on themselves and didn't think there was any hope of improvement until Jesus came along and gave them a new life.
For a great many of us, this has been our experience of the Church...
...But it shouldn't be. Ever.
A Place for New Beginnings
The journey of faith is a life that is not meant to be lonely. It's guaranteed to be hard; Jesus tells us that. "Take up your cross and follow Me" is not an invitation to an easy road. Jesus did not die to make our lives comfortable; He died to make our lives meaningful. He died that we might have life, and have it abundantly. That abundance He promised is a life of meaningful usefulness, where we carry one another's burdens, find likeminded people who understand us, and walk with people who are living out lives of honesty.
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The mission of our church is to be a place where honesty and repentance are lived out in an atmosphere of grace and understanding. There is no one who doesn't have a past. There is no one who is without sin. There is no one who isn't broken. And there is no one who can survive and thrive as a Christian who lacks support and encouragement.
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Lazarus did not raise himself back to life (John ch.11). Jesus did that for him. And when He ascended to Heaven, Jesus committed His resurrection ministry to His Church. We aim to be a place where people who have been raised to new life will help breathe life into one another - a place where no one walks the road alone.
A Place for Sharing Burdens
There are lots of congregations for people who think that they have it together. They don't, but just thinking that we have it together makes for a certain fakeness to a congregation's life together.
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If we're honest, deep inside most of us are a mess. And if we're honest, the idea of getting our lives in order is totally overwhelming, so overwhelming that there are times that we just kind of freeze up and don't even want to get out of bed. We start the journey of faith with optimism, but the more we see how much work we have to do the less hopeful we feel. What we need is a group of fellow travelers, people who know what it's like to feel what we feel, fear what we fear, and struggle with what we struggle.
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The mission of Berry Church is to be that gathering of fellow travelers. The mission is to be a church where brokenness and honesty are the norm, not the exception. The mission is to be a fellowship where we can be encouragers and be encouraged, share our experience, strength, and hope with one another so that together we can walk this journey successfully.
So here's the question:
Do you want to be a part of that kind of church? Do you want to turn this vision into a reality? Would you like to be a part of a congregation that is a place where honesty, burden-bearing, and brokenness are the norm rather than the exception? To put it differently, will you join us in building a community where we don't do church, but rather will be the Church?