Face to Face

Hey everyone, my name is Eric. Hey everyone, my name is Eric, and I’m the pastor at the Stilwell United Methodist Church, and I would like to welcome you to our online worship this morning. Thank you for joining us.

Thank you for being a part of this together during this extreme, strange, and new and changing dynamic time we’re in. It’s good to set apart time to worship our creator, the one who loves us. So this morning we’re going to have our worship service.

We’re going to pull in a lot of pieces, people recording from home. We can’t do it with everybody gathered together at the church, so we’re just going to do the best we can and worship God. This morning we have a great worship service planned.

We invite you to check out our website. I gave you a raw cut from the first time that we put together this odd thing of people recording things on their phones and sending it in, and then we put it together with what I had, and then we throw this worship service out there on Sunday morning. Six years ago.

I was a lot older back then. I’m younger now. Wait a minute.

Six years ago, that was, those are some, how many of you love those memories of six years ago when that hit? And the CDC called us into something called self-isolation. How awesome was that? It was a weird time. Not only did that all happen at once, but when you have kids, guess what happened? The schools shut down too, and they sent them home.

And so here we all are all of a sudden. At the church, I’m trying to transition, figure out what tech we need, change over our meetings for the first time in my ministry where we’re doing them online through this new silly thing called Zoom. And it worked a lot better than a lot of the tech in the past and working towards live streaming and doing other things and figure out how we can worship when we are apart.

And so the boys would, came home and it was, it was fun because we’re working on these transition at church and the boys are home and Colin was a first grader when all that happened. And it was like, I didn’t even feel like I could leave to go to the bathroom or we weren’t going to get anything done. So finally I was like, okay, keep practicing on this.

And I ran, I went down the hall, went to the bathroom, came back and he was on the floor playing with his cars. It was the most burnt out I’ve ever been in ministry in my life. It was a time that was tough to do.

We got the technology up to speed. We transitioned to this new way of life, but the ramifications of it still impact the world today. I’ll just be honest with you.

If we have a choice of meeting on Zoom or in person, guess which one I pick? In person. I, do you know how hard, it was so hard for me to do that because a lot of people would rather, if they’re going to talk with you, rather record it so they don’t have to look at your faces. But unlike them, I, I don’t know, I have to see your faces.

For me to really feel like the spirit is working. I see your faces. And if I see this, I know what’s going on.

So face to face makes a difference. Now we’ve been talking through First Thessalonians with Paul and how he started the church in Thessalonians, was there for about two weeks, got, ran out of town. And then they’re going, well, I wonder if the church survived.

I wonder if the church survived last week. We found out how awesome it was that it survived. Now what he did was he had been wanting to go see him, wanting to work with him, but the only one who could get away to go see him was Timothy.

And it says in, in verse 17, but since we were torn away from you brothers for a short time in person, not in heart, we endeavored the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face because we wanted to come to you. I Paul again and again, but Satan hindered us. So Timothy had gone back to Thessalonia, found out the church was still alive and he came back and he had this good news and they had so much to be thankful for because of Timothy’s in-person visit.

There were no rumors anymore. Timothy saw it with his own eyes. He witnessed this.

He worked with them. He loved on them and he saw that the church was strong and he came back and reported to it. And it’s not an endearing quality, but when I read this, I believe Paul was really jealous that Timothy got to go and see the church in Thessalonia, the Thessalonians.

And I believe that he celebrated and gave thanks that Timothy saw him face to face, but you can see in what we have here that made him long to see them more, knowing that. Will you stand as you are able? We’re in chapter three of first Thessalonians. We’re going to go down to verse six and read through 11.

But now that Timothy has come to us from you, he has brought us the good news of your faith and love and reported that you always remember us kindly and long to see us as we long to see you. For this reason, brothers, in all our distress and affliction, we have been comforted about you through your faith. For now we live if you are standing fast in the Lord.

For what thanksgiving can we return to God for you, for all the joy that we feel for your sake before our God as we pray most earnestly night and day that we may see you face to face and supply what is lacking in your faith. Now may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus Christ direct our way to you. The word of God, inspired by God, for the people of God.

Thanks be to God. Amen. You may be seated.

There’s so much in this scripture right here. They obviously had, Paul didn’t say these words, but he had an attitude of gratitude. He was so thankful for the report he got from Timothy.

So thankful that the church was still alive and prospering. Did you know you can shorten that and just say prospering? It was so alive and prospering. It was an amazing report that set Paul and Silas and Timothy to write this letter of thanksgiving to God for these people whom they only had a little bit of time with.

He said that in verse 17 that we read before, he said, we were torn from you brothers for a short time. We were in person and not just in heart. They were together.

There was just something powerful about being together in person and worshiping God that they were so amazed with. But now that Timothy has come from you, he’s brought good news of your faith and reported us and it reminds us that we long to see you as you long to see us. Again, he talks about how they have distress and affliction but have been comforted through their faith.

He says we live knowing you are steadfast and here’s where he talks about thanksgiving. For what thanksgiving can we return to God for you for all the joy that we feel for your sake before our God as we pray most earnestly night and day that we may see you face to faith and supply what is lacking in your faith. What thanksgiving can we return to God for you? How can we be even more thankful than this? We would love to pray with you face to face.

We would love to be with you. We would love to see how God is working in you personally. Now he says directly that the reason that he could not go and Silas couldn’t go and others couldn’t go is that Satan had hindered us.

That has something to do with the conflict they had in Thessalonica and the conflicts they were having in other places but it wasn’t just because he couldn’t find room for them on his calendar. It was because Satan had blocked their path. And it wasn’t time for them to go yet and they were working on that.

But there’s something about this koinonia this fellowship that they had that is even more amazing. How many of you like having dinner with friends with family? I hope the hands stay up since thanksgiving is coming up. The fellowship you have when you’re around other people and you spend that time sometimes people you only see a few times a year sometimes less some of them you may not have seen for a long time.

The fellowship you have which koinonia is the greek for fellowship but there’s an additional feeling to it that is bigger than just hanging out with other people. It’s about the deep bonds you have together and Paul was so thankful to them for that but it’s but it’s even bigger than that. In the verses that Dana read in exodus 33 we see some of my favorite verses in the bible.

Moses had gone to the tent of meeting and he would go outside the city and he would go to the tent of meeting and he would meet with God. Now while he was at the tent of meeting the whole city would stand up because they would see the cloud of presence of God over the tent of Moses and they would stand up and stand outside their own tents and just watch how cool it was when Moses was in the presence of God. And we get this picture just like when Moses went up on Mount Sinai the people were there on the ground just going well there’s not much we can do till Moses comes back.

And the cool thing about this with meeting God well there are several things it says Moses met with God face to face as a man would his friend. A face to face with God was something unique and it was like hanging out with a friend. Moses longed to spend that time with God and God loves spending that time with Moses.

But here’s the little twist at the end that I love too that it says when he got up and went back to the camp Joshua the son of Nun was still there but he didn’t leave the tent. So Moses wasn’t just worshiping God alone that he was there with Joshua. There’s something powerful about worshiping God about learning about Christ about growing closer to God while we grow closer to one another that is more a fuller definition of quininea that when we meet face to face.

Now if we were all zooming or if we were on Facebook or YouTube or whatever else and worshiping this morning does it feel connected? You know it’s the same spirit it’s the same thing it’s tough to feel that connected and with that technology and everything that happened six years ago I mentioned that it still lingers on. This last week I was talking to a group of pastors and especially a family life pastor that I talked to for quite a while and he said we have to face reality and I read this too but it’s more interesting hearing this from someone who sees it with families that families are more segmented segregated and isolated than they have been and we have a reality to face that that all is taking place. Now segmentation means that you have smaller pockets of people and the communication is limited and very controlled between the different pockets as in you only may see a few people and outside of that you don’t.

He said segregate well he didn’t say this but the definition of segregation is that there are barriers and it’s stricter of keeping one group apart from the other. Now those barriers can come up today because of what we’ve learned about surviving with self-isolation I’m getting some feedback am I doing that? Okay it’s just up here. Self-isolation which means when we are isolated when you’re isolated it’s remote and minimal contact with each other now because of technology that’s easy to do.

Now sometimes we can be hanging out with every other people but if everybody has their own device it’s a little different being in the same room seeing each other face to face but this is our focus is not the same thing it’s not what koinonia is but experiencing koinonia and fellowship and being face to face together is what Paul was so excited and thankful for and longed for he prayed day and night that they could be together again and it’s not just being together like yeah I remember those Thessalonians they made the best pizza I’ve ever had. It was more of a situation like being together they worked hard it wasn’t easy but they worked hard for the gospel and the fruit of that gospel continued and it was so amazing that they worked and toiled together that together with the power of the Holy Spirit it was better you know how last week Paul said you received the word from us not as our own word but as the word of God that it’s God that when we have a bond together in the Holy Spirit through God that is more powerful than anything we can do on our own no matter how great we may be no matter how much we don’t mind being by ourselves we also need each other even if you’re an introvert we still need each other we still need to spend time together learning about God worshiping God growing together being face to face being the church of God and enjoying all that last night we had a car ride with with the boys and has normally happened in that car ride they started going at each other and I called it not as it was but as the reality I wished it was and I said I love that you two can hang out together you can build each other up you can show each other how much you love each other you can be there for each other and Colin looked at me and he said dad that is the exact opposite of what we do with each other but what we’re called to do when we’re face to face is not nitpick on each other not judge each other not hurt each other but Hebrews 10 25 says and let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works not neglecting to meet together as is the habit of some but encouraging one another all the more as you see the day drawing near think about that when you’re not together think about what you can give thanks for when you get to see other people think about how you can encourage them and build them up and when we’re together how we can bond in the Holy Spirit and why it can be so amazing that’s a lot to give thanks for and that is why God builds the church up not with people who are all the same but with people who have God as the center and build around who God is and build a ground what God has called each of us to do to trust in God and to know that he is the ground of who we are as a church as God’s people as a community in Christ we praise God for that let’s pray almighty God thank you thank you for your presence thank you for your presence that strengthens us thank you for the hope that we have in Jesus Christ that we can see one another thank you for in-person time with your Holy Spirit that we can spend together thank you that we can see each other’s faces and know that you are bearing fruit when we spend time together thank you for helping us to continue to learn to love you more to love each other more and grow in faith every day thank you God that we can be face to face in Jesus name amen.