Good morning everyone! My name is Insoo Kim and I am the assistant pastor here at the Hyde Park Vineyard Church. If you are joining us for the first time this morning, we are thrilled to have you here with us. If you would please take a minute to fill out the connection card that is in your bulletin, this will help us to know how we can better serve you. You can drop it off at the Welcome Table on your way out and grab a free worship CD or a mug as a small gift to you from us. And for those of you that graduated this week, congratulations! I hope you will make all of us proud with what you do with the rest of your life. And if this is your last week, we are really going to miss you! Thank you for letting us be your church while you were here. I hope and pray that you will find a great church wherever you end up and keep serving God with your whole life.

This week, we are concluding the five-week teachings series entitled, “The Church that Works.” On week one, we learned that the Church that Works is a church where everyone regularly takes risks to introduce people to Jesus. On week two, we talked about the importance of digging deeply into the heart of God in worship, prayer, and the Word. Maybe some of you will remember the sponge that I used to demonstrate how we give out of what we’ve been given. And that if we try to give out of what we don’t have, we’ll grow dry, weary, bitter, and will burn out over time. So we need to be a people who dig deeply into the heart of God in worship, prayer, and the Word. On week three, Jonathan Purifoy taught on how we need to be a people who give sacrificially of our time and resources. And last week, he taught on serving God with the spiritual gifts and abilities that each one of us have given, that in order for us to be the church that works, every one of us needs to recognize that we have something unique and vitally important to offer. In order for the church to function properly, we all need to not just serve, but serve in areas for which God has uniquely gifted us. And so we come to today, the final week of the series. The Church that Works is a church where everyone loves out loud.

Please bow your heads with me in prayer and invite God to come and speak to us, to awaken our senses to his voice, touch, and leading. I will also pray for the offering.

My wife Angela and I spent a little bit of time this week watching the news on television. And you know, the news is like half entertainment and half just utterly depressing. Some of you will be happy to know that the movie, Oceans 13, is now out in the theaters.

I guess they had some big premier in the River East Theater here in Chicago with George Clooney, and Matt Damon, and I guess whoever the rest of the 13 are. That’s pretty cool! I know some of you have been following the news on Paris Hilton very closely.

You don’t have to raise your hand. You know who you are. I have no idea why she was in jail to begin with, but apparently, she somehow got out of the jail after spending like three days there because of some medical condition. And then, I guess on Friday she ended up back in jail. Poor, poor, Paris! Oh, and I bet some of you here were thrilled that the Anaheim Ducks won the Stanley Cup.

And some of you have no idea who the Anaheim Ducks are or what the Stanley Cup is.

Sometimes, the news can be very odd and even hilarious. Here is one actual news clip from the Associated Press:

ROSEMONT, Ill. - Donald Stephens spent more than half a century at the helm of this Chicago suburb. Now, less than two months after his death, some say an eerie likeness of the late mayor's face has appeared in the peeling bark of a 50-foot sycamore.

The image is fueling speculation and wonder in the village of 4,200 residents — the town Stephens is credited with transforming from a tiny enclave of just a few dozen people to a bustling community with one of the nation's largest convention centers.

"He told me, you screw things up, I'm gonna haunt you," said Bradley Stephens, the mayor's 44-year-old son who was appointed to complete his father's term. "When it starts talking, we're all in trouble."

The tree, outside a health club, was twice slated to be torn down. It was saved each time because Stephens intervened.

Now, it's guarded by a barricade, and a single candle placed by well-wishers stands nearby.

But not everyone is convinced it looks like Stephens.

"I see Jesus," said Cathy Sansone, the membership director at the health club who says any resemblance to the late mayor is simply the "power of suggestion."

The news can be quite entertaining at times. But the news can also be utterly depressing. Angela and I also learned on Wednesday that a teenage girl leaving a Target store in Kansas was abducted by someone who was probably hiding in the backseat of her car.

This was Wednesday. We learned on Thursday that they found her dead body. We learned on Friday that they arrested the guy they believe was responsible.

We also saw on the news that a 20-month old girl and a 3-year old girl drowned to death in a pond 100 yards away from their home because their babysitter was sleeping on the job because she was drunk.

And so it went, on and on, story after story of murder, abduction, rape, divorce, violence, hunger, nuclear missile tests, ethnic cleansing, corruption in the government, the war in Iraq, and on and on and on…

After just 30 minutes of watching the news, my heart ached for the world. I hurt for the people, shocked in disbelief of what we, human beings, are capable of doing. The world seemed so dark, so full of evil, so helpless. So in need of a hero. So in need of a Savior. My heart ached.

And in this place of despair, anger, hopelessness, I felt God impress upon my heart a question: Insoo, what will you do about it? What will you do about it? You can simply turn off the TV, look the other way, or simply pretend that it was just some sketch on Saturday Night Live. Or you can choose to do something about it. So what will you do about it? And that is a question that I want to pose for us this morning. Church, my brothers and sisters in Christ in the Hyde Park Vineyard Church, what will we do about it? What will the church, the bride of Christ, do about what we see around us in our world, a world full of evil, pain, sorrow? Church, what is our response? And it is precisely to answer this question that that we are talking about the church that works.

The church that works is an idea, a dream, an experiment. It begins with the notion that the church is not the building or the name. It is the people. All the people in various points in their spiritual journey with different stories to tell and experiences to share. It is the people divinely brought together by God to fulfill a purpose that can only be achieved as we all realize that who we are and what we have to offer is absolutely vital to the fulfillment of our purpose as a church. Together we can accomplish incredible things!

And here is where I believe it begins:
Small Things Done with Great Love will Change the World!

This is where it starts. This is how it begins. God has given us the awesome and incredible, and quite frankly, impossible, mission to change the world. And this starts here. Small things done with great love will change the world!

I think it was Mother Theresa who coined this term and really lived this out. What this hurting and broken world needs is not simply a better government. The answer to the problems in America is not the democratic or the republican or any other party. The answer is not found in the prestigious academic institutions of this world. The answer is not found in more sermons. What this hurting and broken world needs is authentic expressions love, love without borders, love without agenda, love that is real and tangible. What this hurting and broken world needs is for you and I to get off of our lazy bums and LOVE OUT LOUD!

The church needs to talk less and do more. The church needs to get out of our comfortable seats and join hands with those who are being persecuted, abused, and abandoned. The church needs to love out loud. And I believe this is what Jesus was talking about in Matthew 25:31-46:

When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. 34 "Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.' 37 "Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?' 40 "The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.' 41 "Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.' 44 "They also will answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?' 45 "He will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.' 46 "Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."

For far too long, the church, let me be a little more specific, the evangelical, Bible-believing, Jesus-confessing, church has done too little to meet the practical needs of this hurting and broken world because we’ve gotten so obsessed with what happens after you die, that we forgot to love people on this side of eternity. For far too long, we’ve been giving the poor, the homeless person Bible tracts when we should have been giving them food and shelter. For far too long we’ve said too much and done too little. For far too long our love hasn’t been loud enough for the world to hear this incredible message of grace, mercy, forgiveness, freedom, healing, life, abundant life that ANYONE can receive if they would simply put their trust in Jesus. Often times, the biggest obstacle between God and men has been the church. And I believe the church will have a lot to answer for when we stand before the Lord.

Let me make thing one thing clear before we continue. I am NOT saying that we stop sharing the Gospel or water down the claims of Jesus. I am NOT saying that we stop standing for what is true and right. I am NOT saying that we become just another social organization. What I am saying is simply that we need to stop treating people like they are some project for some class. I am simply saying that sometimes the most powerful way that we can proclaim the Kingdom of God is to quietly demonstrate the love of God in tangible ways that people can understand. I am simply saying that what we say must FOLLOW what we do. All through the Gospels, the life and the ministry of Jesus clearly gives testimony to this truth. Jesus both spoke the words and did the works of the Father!

Friends, I’m not pointing fingers at you. I, myself, am guilty of this. I, too, have loved more with my words than my actions. And today, I want to change that. Today, I want us to change that. Today, I want us, the Hyde Park Vineyard Church, to start loving out loud because small things done with great love will change the world! Let’s look at what this really means.

SMALL THINGS…
Jesus says in Luke 16, “If you are faithful in little things, you will be faithful in large ones. But if you are dishonest in little things, you won’t be honest with greater responsibilities.” I think we often lose sight of little things, the small and humble beginnings. We often lose sight of the fact that great companies and great organizations like Microsoft, Amazon, and even The University of Chicago, all had very small and humble beginnings. Usually they start out with just a handful of people, with nothing more than an impossible dream and an unrelenting resolve to make it happen. They pursued these visions with passion, as if their very lives depended on it.

Sometimes, the biggest things in life are quite small. With the small act of washing the feet of his disciples, Jesus thought them what it means to love and serve with humility. With the small act of asking for a drink of water from the woman at the well, Jesus showed her that he gives water that not only satisfies the body, but also the spirit. With the small act of showing kindness, Jesus showed a prostitute a new life. And they were never the same again!

And if you could ask any of them if small things matter, what do you think they will say? So, church, we are going to start with small things.

Summer of Service
Starting on June 30th, we are going to launch the SUMMER OF SERVICE. Starting on June 30th, every Saturday morning from 10am till noon, we are going to shower the people of Hyde Park with small acts of love. We are going to start very small. We are simply going to pass out bottles of water and tell people that we are doing this simply because we want them to know that God really loves them. We want to just serve the neighborhood and the students and just love on them with the love of Christ in small but meaningful ways. We are NOT doing this to promote the church. We are NOT doing this as some publicity stunt. We simply want to love our neighbors without ANY strings attached whatsoever. We want to point people to Christ, and not to some church or organization. And if they happen to visit our church because of what we do, that will be awesome. But that is not the primary goal of what we are trying to accomplish with the SUMMER OF SERVICE. We want to simply love people exactly where they are at with simple acts of kindness, in hopes that this will be just one more thing to help them realize that there is a God who loves them so very much! And the rest is really up to God! We will meet at 10am pray together, and depending on the number of people that show up, either break up into groups, or have everyone serve together in one team. We will do this for about 90 minutes and meet back at the office at 11:30am. We will debrief and then pray and be done by absolutely no later than noon. We want to honor everyone's time.

Habitat for Humanity
In the theme of the "SUMMER OF SERVICE" I am also working to organize one day a month during the summer where we will take a team of people from our church to go serve alongside of this great organization that builds homes for low income families. We are doing all of this simply to show the love of God in small but tangible ways. So let's do this together. Please join me in this great endeavor.

DONE WITH GREAT LOVE…
Jesus said in John 13:35, “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” In 1 John 3:18, it says, “Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.” And it is this love that must spill over from the walls of our church if we truly desire to see the world change. There is a world of difference between doing things with great love and doing things out of duty and obligation. You know what I’m talking about right? Things done out of great love looks and feels very different from things done merely out of responsibility. Whether it’s the flowers that you get for your wife or girlfriend, or maybe giving a friend of yours a ride to the airport, or how you talk to a homeless person on the street, people will sense right away if something is genuine, done with great love. But, for so many of us in the church, we have grown such a bad taste with trying to be salt and light in this world, that sometimes the only motivation we have is duty and obligation. “Well, I guess I have to do this because apparently this is what a Christian is supposed to do!” This is what it sort of looks like, I believe, for most Christians.

Maybe you go to church and you hear a story about evangelism and we need to share our faith. Usually, the first reaction is, “Oh, not this again!” Right? You don’t have to feel embarrassed about it. We’ve all been there! I’ve been there! But then you get a little excited. And you think, “I’m going to give it another shot, here!” So what do we do first? We pick our victims. Who can we try this out on? Who’s safe? Who can I experiment with, so if it doesn’t work out, things won’t be awkward between us the next morning. So we pick our victims. And then we spend a few days “praying” for the person, which basically means that we’re trying to muster up enough courage to actually approach this person. So you walk up to this person during lunch one day, and maybe you invite this person to church or to a house group or maybe some other gathering that we have. And they don’t feel quite comfortable with that yet, so they say, “Um. No, thanks! Um. Maybe next time.” And you kind of smile and nod your head, and do you best to back paddle out of this strange situation. And you both stand there, feeling very weird and awkward, and you’re kind of staring at your feet wondering when is this torture ever going to end? Finally you go home. You take a long shower and go to bed that night thinking, “Man, I hope I met my evangelism quota for the year because that sucked!” And you just give up on the whole thing for a while. And after a while you just begin to feel guilty because in your heart of hearts, you know that this world desperately needs to experience the love of Christ. We know we should but we don’t know how. And everything feels so fake and awkward. And I think that’s where most of us are, right?

It really doesn’t have to be like that. First and foremost, I think loving out loud begins as we recognize that our understanding of what it means to be a Christian needs a little tweaking. And here’s what I mean by that. It is not US versus THEM. It is not us, who are Christians, versus them, everyone else in the world. We are all major characters in this story, this journey called life. Some of us are just maybe further along in our journey towards God, but we are all in a PROCESS. Just because you confess Jesus as your Lord and Savior doesn’t mean you get to start point fingers at other people. We are all in a process. Honestly, I believe there are many people who are not Christians who have a closer walk with God, in many cases because they haven’t been taught how to be religious in some church. It is not us versus them. We are all in this together. Understanding that should cause to approach this whole thing differently. Because then, we are not saying, “Will you cross this line to join us on our side right now?” But instead, it becomes, “Would you mind if I walk alongside of you for a while in this journey?” Which would you respond to? Why should we expect any different from others? So first, let’s realize that it is not US versus THEM. We are all in this together. We are all in process.

As we share the love of Christ, we are not trying to have people join our church. And people will ask us that. “Why are you really doing this? You’re trying to get me to join your church, aren’t you?” And our answer is, “You are more than welcome to join us, but we are doing this simply because this is how Jesus lived his life. We just wanted to tell you today that God really does love you. And if you can just let that truth sink in for just one second, we believe that your life will never be the same again!” Small things done with great love will change the world.

WILL CHANGE THE WORLD!
Jesus’ last command to his disciples in the book of Matthew is this:

All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore, go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.

Christ’s command to his disciples, to us, is nothing less than the complete transformation of this world. God, ever since Adam and Eve, has been in the business of redeeming all things. He is redeeming this world from pain, from violence, from murder, from abduction, from death. God is redeeming this world. And he has chosen us, to partner with him in making this happen. This is an awesome, incredible, and quite frankly, an impossible task for us to accomplish. There is simply no way that we can do this. But we are not alone. Christ has given us his Holy Spirit and he has been and is even now, working on the hearts and minds of men, to bring redemption, salvation, hope! Small things done with great love will change the world!

Can you imagine what would happen if just even a handful of people really bought into this notion, if they really believed this stuff, if they were absolutely consumed with this passion to really love people without any strings attached? Can you imagine what would happen if we had just 5 people like that? If we had 20 people like that? What if we had 50 people like that? Can you imagine what would happen if we had 200 people like that? We can touch not just hundreds, but thousands and thousands of people with the love of Christ. Can you imagine being asked in the streets, "What kind of Christians are you?" Or "What kind of a Church are you?" And with all humility and love we can answer, "We are Christians who really believe that small things done with great love will change the world!"

READY, FIRE, AIM!
The world will know us by our love in action; not what we say but what we do. We may make mistakes at times. We may not always be prepared to give an answer for the hope that we have within us. We may not have the best understanding of the Bible or theology or doctrine or church history. But still, the world will know us by our love in action; not what we say but what we do.

Friends, may you risk regularly to introduce people to Jesus.
May you dig deeply into the heart of God in prayer, worship, and the Word.
May you give sacrificially of your time and your resources.
May you serve faithfully in the area of your gifting.
May you live passionately in both word and deed.
May God use you to bring hope and healing to a broken and hurting world!

Galatians 6:9 says, "Let us not become weary in doing good, for in the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up." People will easily forget what they are told about God’s love. But they will never forget an experience of the love of God!

Friends, small things done with great love will change the world! Let us pray!