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Jun 22 2017

Last Sunday I shared a story of being used as a tool in God's hands. No, not one of the tools pictured or any kind of mechanical instrument at all. I was another kind of tool entirely.

On Sunday I said that Christians must practice their "superpowers" - like prayer - because without practice they can hurt rather than heal. I shared how early in my ministry I placed my hand on the shoulder of a woman and prayed over and over for all kinds of blessings for her. I knew this woman's last name, and I had heard a first name used with that last name. I thought it would be extra powerful to pray for this woman using her first name, so again and again I used the name I had heard as I prayed for all those blessings. After I finished, the woman explained to me that she and another woman shared the same last name, and I had been praying for the other woman – the new wife of her ex-husband. Years later the woman explained that she had managed to continue being around me, because at that time God had been trying to teach her to be humble, and she saw me as a tool in God's hands.

Tool: (noun)

1) A guy with a hugely over-inflated ego, who in an attempt to get un-due attention for himself, will act like a [donkey], because, in his deluded state, he will think it's going to make him look cool, or make others want to be like him. (urbandictionary.com)

If you've ever found "tool" to be the best description of you, know that God can still use you. The Apostle, Paul, wrote that we have the treasure of Christ within us, but we are fragile clay jars. He writes, "But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us" (2 Corinthians 4:7). God constantly works on growing us to be more Christ-like, but I take great hope from Paul's writing that God understands we're ill-equipped to represent Christ. Or, to put it another way, I take great hope that God understands that sometimes the tools God has to work with are tools.

I hope you'll join us Sunday at Access. We'll worship God with prayer, giving, and terrific music from the Access band. And our Hero Central sermon series will continue with "protect your secret identity."

Have a great weekend!
Rich

Rich Rindfuss
Access Pastor
First United Methodist Church Richardson

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Jun 15 2017

The knock on my car door window startled me. I was about to pull out of the Micro Center parking lot and hadn't noticed anyone nearby. I rolled down my window and saw a thin woman in her late 50s. She held a bag from the store. As the wind disheveled her long, graying blonde hair, she explained that her car wouldn't start. "I think it might be the alternator," she said and asked if I could help her with bus fare so she could get home. The excitement of having just purchased a USB Bluetooth dongle (version 4!) put me in a generous mood, and I gave her a $5 bill. Best-case scenario, she used it for bus fare, and my five dollars directly impacted and improved another person's life. Even as a pastor, when I give to the church I don't often see such an immediate impact. At the end of this post I will ask you to give to our church to help balance our income and expenses going into the summer, but before I do that, I want to share why giving to the church has the power to impact and improve far more lives than many other kinds of giving, and I'll do it with a story of how another 5 dollars helped bring dental care to a rural village in Africa.

There's a book called Growing Strong in God's Family on my bookshelf. It cost about $5, and my dentist and I worked through it together years ago in a class at church. While God didn't work solely through that book, it played an important part in strengthening my dentist's faith, keeping him open to discerning God's call, and encouraging him to go when the opportunity arose to travel to Africa and provide dental services to a rural village. And when the people of the village asked him to speak about his faith, he drew from what he had learned from that book.

When we give to the church we create opportunities for God to transform people. Those transformed people then impact the world in amazing ways. Giving to the church provides worship services, clergy and staff, spaces to meet, curriculum to study, and opportunities to serve that all bring people in touch with God. Giving to the church enables it to serve as an incubator where God transforms people, inspiring and empowering them to make a positive difference in the world and multiplying the impact of the giving.

I'm so grateful for your giving and the way it is enabling FUMCR to facilitate transformative encounters with God. This past week 600 children have learned about God in Vacation Bible Camp, made possible by facilities, curriculum, and over 200 volunteers, each with their own story of how God worked through the church to inspire them to serve. School children and teachers in South Africa are having facilities constructed and expanded for them by a team from our church this week. Last week we hosted a worship service where our own Pavielle Jenkins was commissioned in one of the final stages of her ordination as a pastor. Last year members of our church were instrumental in expanding prison ministry to a new facility where they will be conduits for God's Spirit in transforming the hearts of prisoners. Thank you for making this and more possible!

As we head into summer, our finance team has shared with me that our actual income is lower than our budgeted income. Can you help us eliminate that gap, so that we can continue to do everything we had hoped to do this year to create opportunities for God to transform people who will change our world for the better? One-time gifts are helpful, and annual pledges tied to recurring gifts are absolutely amazing for the gifts themselves and for the predictability they provide for planning our ministries. Click here to give and/or pledge.

Thank you so very much for your generosity and all the ways you make our church such a wonderful place to serve!

I hope you'll join Pastor Julie, worship director, Eric, the Access band, and me this Sunday as we continue our Hero Central series of sermons with the second lesson Christians can learn from superheroes: practice your superpowers!

In Christ,
Rich

Rich Rindfuss
Access Pastor
First United Methodist Church Richardson

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Jun 9 2017

This past week our church hosted an Annual Conference with about 1300 people representing every United Methodist Church in North Texas. Two hundred blue-shirted volunteers from FUMCR shuttled people from parking lots, gave directions throughout hallways, provided snacks during breaks, served meals, and more. Marveling at our volunteers one conference attendee asked Shandon, our Assistant Director of Welcoming Ministries, "How do you do this?" Shandon replied, "We ask people to help." The next question surprised Shandon and revealed something important about the culture of our church – something for which I'm incredibly thankful.

After Shandon replied that we get volunteers by simply asking people to help, the conference attendee asked, "How do you get them to like what they're doing?"

The people and culture of FUMCR are special. When our church engages in ministries that depend on volunteers (i.e. everything we do), you step forward with a heart to serve, and you do what you do with a spirit of visible joy. Our church's mission statement begins, "With open hearts and minds we Welcome people for Christ". That conference attendee saw that put into action. Access gets its name from Romans 5:2 and the promise that Jesus gives everyone access to God's grace. You make that promise concrete in the joyful, helpful ways you make people feel welcome on Sundays. The welcoming spirit of God that you convey to others is one of the reasons I'm so grateful to be part of this church. Thank you!

Let me offer a word of welcome to you and your friends to join us for Access worship this Sunday as we begin a fun new sermon series called Hero Central. Paralleling our children's Vacation Bible Camp that begins Monday, we'll look to comic and movie superheroes for lessons we can learn from them for the everyday heroic endeavor of living a Christian life. Sunday we begin with something common to superheroes and many of us: the tragic backstory.

Kids and adults, feel free to wear a superhero costume! After the worship service we'll have a green screen to get some awesome photos!

In Christ,
Rich

Rich Rindfuss
Access Pastor
First United Methodist Church Richardson