Lego Church #1

Six and a half years ago God blessed Kimberly and I with a son, Joshua.  Having Josh in our lives has brought many wonderful things into our home:  laughter, life, and love.  T-ball, take home papers, and toys.

One specific category of things that Josh has brought into our house the past few years is Legos.  Thousands of them . . . literally.  For most every occasion (birthday, Christmas, etc.) since 2009, Josh has gotten at least one Lego set.  If you have children, perhaps you can relate to life with Legos.  When the package comes home and is opened, there is a neat and easily identifiable pile of 50-300 Legos that can be assembled into something awesome — a Star Wars spaceship, a fire station, even a working diamond mine!  Each package comes with scores of diverse pieces of differing colors and design that alone look odd, but together look beautiful.  The secret to the Lego’s success is the “bump” – that little ridge on the top of the Lego that allows it to easily join together with other bricks according to design.

The fascinating phenomena of Legos is that alone, they are somewhat ugly and a nuisance.  Alone, the bricks become obstacles to avoid with the vacuum cleaner or when walking to the bathroom in the middle of the night.  Alone, they have little use.  However, together, they can make most anything.

I share all this with you today, because Sunday at Wildwood we are kicking off our new series entitled “Lego Church: Built to Be Together.”  This 8 part sermon series will take us through the high points of the book of 1 Corinthians.  This letter, penned by the Apostle Paul in the first century to the church he helped plant in the town of Corinth, is one of the strongest extended sections of Scripture that focuses on the unity Christians have with one another in Jesus Christ.  It seems that over time, the Corinthian church members had become increasingly focused on how different they were from one another . . . and had used these differences to develop wedges in the church.  Some were dividing over their socio-economic class.  Others were dividing over their practice of spiritual gifts.  Others were dividing over their insistance on living a “free” but rebellious life.  While still others were dividing over allegiances they had to particular church leaders.  To this diverse group, the Apostle Paul writes and draws them back to the unity Christ purchased for them at the cross, and the big plans God has for them as they are built together in Him.

In a sense, Paul was reminding them that they were a Lego Church . . . though diverse, different, and even (dare I say) ugly on their own, they could be beautiful together.  That was their design.

So, make plans to join us at Wildwood this Sunday, June 16 as we kick off our 8 week series on the book of 1 Corinthians.  This week, we will be focusing on 1 Corinthians 1:10-16 and 3:3-9 as we see the cure to division arising out of allegiances toward certain human leaders.  Hope you can join us this Sunday in either our 9:30 or 10:50 service.

PLUS:  Check out this short video showing you another way to get your family involved as we kick off this series.  Thanks!