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Do We Have to Talk About It?
by Justin Gingrich|February 7, 2020

Whenever Christians start talking about “sin” many of us cringe. We have seen Christians “decrying” the evils of sin, when really they’re just expounding upon their own personal prejudices or sensitivities. Often those who talk about sin are far less interested in actually discussing the dangerous reality of sin, and far more interested in shaming or excluding others. This leaves many of us wishing we could just not have the conversation. Yet, the Bible talks about sin often – Jesus warned against it (Matt 5:29), God says it’s dangerous and destructive (Gen 4:7), Paul claims it even leads to death (Rom 6:23). So why does the Bible talk about sin? And why is it so dangerous?

In Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, Harry is wandering around Hogwarts when he comes across the Mirror of Erised (which is “desire” spelled backwards). When he looks into the mirror he sees “the deepest, most desperate desires of his heart” fulfilled and reflected back at him. Which of course for Harry means seeing himself reunited with his long-deceased parents whom he has never really known. When Harry’s pal Ron looks into the mirror, he sees himself outshining his older brothers to whom he has always felt inferior. But alas, the reflections are only an illusion! They aren’t real. The mirror will never actually produce what their hearts desire, it produces only an illusion. Dumbledore eventually warns Harry about spending too much time in front of the mirror. He tells Harry that the mirror must be hidden because “men have wasted away before it, entranced by what they have seen”.

Dumbledore recognized the dangerous, destructive nature of the Mirror of Erised, that is why he chose to hide it. He knew it would never actually bring about what one desired. It could only bring about an illusion. It could only drive “men mad from not knowing if what it shows is real or even possible”. Sin operates very similarly to the Mirror of Erised. Sin forces us to live in an illusion. When the serpent deceived Adam into eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, he did it by suggesting that Adam would be “like God” (Gen 3:5). Unfortunately, that was a lie, an illusion. Disobeying God by eating the fruit did not give Adam the result he wanted.

But that’s how it works, sin starts in the imagination and tricks us into thinking we can get what we desire by indulging in it. It tricks us into thinking we can get – justification through revenge, security by ignoring our neighbor in need, contentment from a life of greed, satisfaction through manipulation and dishonest gain, peace by way of war, happiness by always putting ourselves first, self-worth by putting others down, or sexual and relational fulfillment through extramarital affairs or pornography.

Revenge, manipulation, greed, bloodshed, violence, selfishness, pornography and slander, just like the Mirror of Erised, will never actually give us the results we want. We only think they will. But that is a lie. James tells us in 1:14-15, “Temptation comes from our own desires, which entice us and drag us away. These desires give birth to sinful actions. And when sin is allowed to grow, it gives birth to death.” And so like those in front of the Mirror of Erised, like Adam in front of the tree of good and evil, we live in a fantasy with the illusion that indulging in sin will bring about what we desire. When we do this, we are “enticed and dragged away” as sin brings death to our souls and our hearts.

So why is sin dangerous? Because it tricks us. It forces us to live in an illusion – to live a lie. But praise God that when there is sin, there is even more grace (Rom 5:20)! The grace of Jesus saves us from our sin and its lies. The early Christians had a beautiful word for this – recipiscentia – which literally means “coming to one’s senses again.” When Christians were saved by grace, or recipiscentia, they were freed from the illusions that sin had brought about in their lives. As they came to their senses, they realized life and salvation could not be found in the places they were accustomed to looking for them in – power, control, wealth, domination, imperialism, sex, male superiority, classism. Life and salvation came to them through Jesus. He was now their source of life. And as John tells us, He is the source of all life. He is not an illusion. So when our hearts are directed towards Him, they are directed towards the Truth, towards the Light, towards Life (Jn 1:3-4).

Why Are We Named Restore?
by Justin Gingrich|January 21, 2020

Want to Know Why We Are Named Restore?

To understand why our church is named Restore, it is helpful to understand where we are in God’s story. Such a story can be roughly summarized into three different chapters (Yes, I’m about to try and summarize the story of the Bible in this email. But don’t worry! It’s not as lengthy as one might fear!).

Chapter One: Creation
The beginning of this story that we are a part of starts in Genesis (Gen 1 & 2). God builds Himself a home in the Garden of Eden and then, in an act of love, He places us at the very center of it (Gen 2:8;15). What this tells us is that from the very beginning God wanted to be with us, to share His life with us, to love us, to be close to us, to walk with us, to be our friend (Gen 3:8). He invited us into His home.

Chapter Two: Brokenness
We were created and placed in the garden to live in harmony and peace with one another and with God. But then something happens, in the famous story, Adam and Eve listen to the serpent who deceives them into eating fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (Gen 3:1-6) – something God had told them not to do because they would certainly die (Gen 2:17). God knew that if humanity chose its own path by eating the fruit, evil, death and brokenness would inevitably follow for everyone (Rom 5:12-19). Immediately Adam and Eve begin to blame each other for their mistake, mistrust between people began that day (Gen 3:12-13). Yet, even here God was graceful. He comes to talk to them about their decision, not as an angry, vengeful God, but as a caring and concerned friend (Gen 3:8-11). He covers their shame (Gen 3:21). Then in a beautiful promise to Adam and Eve declares that He will undo what they have done that day (Gen 3:15). Someone will come. Someone who will redeem, renew and restore.

Chapter Three: Restoration
After death and brokenness enter the world, God in His love for us and for this earth, begins to work things together to restore all things (Jn 3:16). We know from Chapter One that this earth is His home and that He built it to be with us. We know from Chapter Two that humanity chose a path that was not part of God’s plan for them, and so brought in death, destruction, abuse, conflict, mistrust and sin. But remember that promise from Chapter 2? That promise was fulfilled when Jesus was killed on a cross and three days later rose from the dead. He went from death to life. A change, a reversal, a renewal has started in Jesus first and is now beginning to spread to the rest of creation. When death was forced upon Him, Jesus overcame it with life. But it was not just death that Jesus came to reverse – Jesus came to reverse the values of our hearts. Jesus showed us how to pursue compassion instead of self-preservation (Matt 5:38-42), sacrifice instead of power (Jn 13:1-5), humility instead of pride (Jn 6:38), love instead of hate (Matt 5:43-48), and acceptance instead of judgement (Jn 8:9-11). Jesus is called our “cornerstone” or “first fruit” because a cornerstone is the first stone that is laid down when constructing a building before all the rest of the bricks are laid (Eph 2:19-22), and the first fruit is the very first to be reaped from a harvest where many more will follow (1 Cor 15:20-26). Jesus was the first to reverse the process of death and to bring compassion peace, love and humility to people around Him. The restoration of all things started with Jesus.

And that’s where we come in to the story. We are in the middle of Chapter Three – the restoration! The work of Jesus continues in us, His church. He will eventually return to complete the work that He started all the way back in Chapter One, but until then He has tasked His church with bringing about the restoration of all things and of all people.

And that’s why our church is named Restore! Our church name reminds us of where we are in the story and that we are a part of the story, this story of restoration. It reminds us that He is restoring all things, and all people – the guilty to grace, the shamed to dignity, the doubters to discovery, the abused to justice, the outsiders to embrace, the addicted to freedom, the hopeless to purpose, the anxious to stillness. He has tasked us with doing this great work (Matt 5:13-16). Eventually the world will be restored (Rev 21 & 22). Love and peace will once again rule and we will live with God and in harmony with one another.

Want to Know Why We Are Named Restore?

To understand why our church is named Restore, it is helpful to understand where we are in God’s story. Such a story can be roughly summarized into three different chapters (Yes, I’m about to try and summarize the story of the Bible in this email. But don’t worry! It’s not as lengthy as one might fear!).

Chapter One: Creation
The beginning of this story that we are a part of starts in Genesis (Gen 1 & 2). God builds Himself a home in the Garden of Eden and then, in an act of love, He places us at the very center of it (Gen 2:8;15). What this tells us is that from the very beginning God wanted to be with us, to share His life with us, to love us, to be close to us, to walk with us, to be our friend (Gen 3:8). He invited us into His home.

Chapter Two: Brokenness
We were created and placed in the garden to live in harmony and peace with one another and with God. But then something happens, in the famous story, Adam and Eve listen to the serpent who deceives them into eating fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (Gen 3:1-6) – something God had told them not to do because they would certainly die (Gen 2:17). God knew that if humanity chose its own path by eating the fruit, evil, death and brokenness would inevitably follow for everyone (Rom 5:12-19). Immediately Adam and Eve begin to blame each other for their mistake, mistrust between people began that day (Gen 3:12-13). Yet, even here God was graceful. He comes to talk to them about their decision, not as an angry, vengeful God, but as a caring and concerned friend (Gen 3:8-11). He covers their shame (Gen 3:21). Then in a beautiful promise to Adam and Eve declares that He will undo what they have done that day (Gen 3:15). Someone will come. Someone who will redeem, renew and restore.

Chapter Three: Restoration
After death and brokenness enter the world, God in His love for us and for this earth, begins to work things together to restore all things (Jn 3:16). We know from Chapter One that this earth is His home and that He built it to be with us. We know from Chapter Two that humanity chose a path that was not part of God’s plan for them, and so brought in death, destruction, abuse, conflict, mistrust and sin. But remember that promise from Chapter 2? That promise was fulfilled when Jesus was killed on a cross and three days later rose from the dead. He went from death to life. A change, a reversal, a renewal has started in Jesus first and is now beginning to spread to the rest of creation. When death was forced upon Him, Jesus overcame it with life. But it was not just death that Jesus came to reverse – Jesus came to reverse the values of our hearts. Jesus showed us how to pursue compassion instead of self-preservation (Matt 5:38-42), sacrifice instead of power (Jn 13:1-5), humility instead of pride (Jn 6:38), love instead of hate (Matt 5:43-48), and acceptance instead of judgement (Jn 8:9-11). Jesus is called our “cornerstone” or “first fruit” because a cornerstone is the first stone that is laid down when constructing a building before all the rest of the bricks are laid (Eph 2:19-22), and the first fruit is the very first to be reaped from a harvest where many more will follow (1 Cor 15:20-26). Jesus was the first to reverse the process of death and to bring compassion peace, love and humility to people around Him. The restoration of all things started with Jesus.

And that’s where we come in to the story. We are in the middle of Chapter Three – the restoration! The work of Jesus continues in us, His church. He will eventually return to complete the work that He started all the way back in Chapter One, but until then He has tasked His church with bringing about the restoration of all things and of all people.

And that’s why our church is named Restore! Our church name reminds us of where we are in the story and that we are a part of the story, this story of restoration. It reminds us that He is restoring all things, and all people – the guilty to grace, the shamed to dignity, the doubters to discovery, the abused to justice, the outsiders to embrace, the addicted to freedom, the hopeless to purpose, the anxious to stillness. He has tasked us with doing this great work (Matt 5:13-16). Eventually the world will be restored (Rev 21 & 22). Love and peace will once again rule and we will live with God and in harmony with one another.

Advent
by Justin Gingrich|January 21, 2020

Advent Can Be Celebrated Only By Those Whose Souls Give Them No Peace

Those words were written by German theologian and pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer from his prison cell only months before he was hanged by the Nazis for his involvement in an attempt to assassinate Hitler. Bonhoeffer’s life was full of unexpected turns that never worked out the way he hoped – he lived out twelve years of his life in constant conflict with the Gestapo after being cutoff mid-sermon for warning his congregation about the “Fuhrer concept”, many of his theology students were killed in the war, his parents’ house was destroyed in an allied bombing raid, he only saw his fiancé one hour a month while in prison (and never had a chance to marry her), his orchestration of an attempt to assassinate Hitler had failed, and he was executed only ten days before the Third Reich collapsed.

And yet, Bonhoeffer lived with an unshakable peace. During Advent, in one of his final letters to his fiancé, he wrote, “I used to be very fond of thinking up and buying presents, but now that we have nothing to give, the gift God gave us in the birth of Christ will seem all the more glorious.”

He compared the Christmas season to life in prison by noting that in both “one does this, that, or the other – things that are really of no consequence” while waiting with hope to be rescued. He realized the “emptier our hands” and “the poorer our quarters” the “more clearly we perceive what is truly essential” – that is Christ has come for us, He lives in our hearts and nothing can take that away.

This holiday season many will find themselves discouraged. We are barraged with Christmas stories and Hallmark movies with happy endings full of “Christmas miracles”– families are reconciled and reunited, love is found, the illness is cured, Santa is real, Buddy Elf finds his dad, McClane rescues his wife and knocks the bad guy off a roof (See what I did there? It is a Christmas movie.), Charlie Brown’s Christmas tree was the right one after all – and it’s easy for us to feel like we should be happier, our life should be more complete, our relationships more whole, our work more meaningful. It’s easy to be more aware of our own incompleteness because pictures and stories of completeness abound everywhere (most of which are not actually true or exaggerated, by the way). All the ways we have tried “this, that or the other” in life and found them to be of no consequence may be fresh on our minds.

Bonhoeffer would say that the more incomplete we feel, the more our hearts are driven towards our ultimate hope – life in Jesus. When we are broken, waiting, or helpless, we can see and know His love most clearly. When that happens, we realize that it is Jesus and His love for us that really truly matters. This Christmas, let our ultimate unshakable peace be found, not in “Christmas miracles”, our accomplishments, health, progress or even family (although those are all things to be grateful for), but rather let it be in the fact that we are #neveralone. That Jesus has come and lives in our hearts. That He has gone to any length to be with us. He is our unshakable hope. Being loved by Him, sought by Him, and restored in Him is something that can never be taken away, even if nothing else in our life has worked out the way we thought it would.

Grace Restores Us
by Justin Gingrich|January 21, 2020

I’m not in the right state of mind, I just
wish I had strength to admit it.

— ``Liar``, The Acadian Wild, 2015

This is the chorus to one of my favorite songs by the trio folk band The Arcadian Wild. When I listen to the song, I think of grace. Why?

Because one of my favorite theologians wrote “grace restores nature”. What he meant was, grace restores things to the way they really are – it restores us to who we really are.

You see, we live in a world that has been shaped by brokenness, pain, death, emptiness, deceit, conflict, and abuse (just to name a few). As such, each of us has learned how to live and exist in such a world. The only problem is we weren’t originally made to live in a world shaped by all this death and brokenness.

So we adapt.

As we learn how to protect ourselves or do what we need to survive, we often develop parts of ourselves that aren’t really who we are, but we feel that they keep us safe, so we keep them around. For some it’s obvious, like with addiction – sex, work, booze – we feel safe as long as we know we have something to ease the constant since of unsettledness we live with and distract us from the pain we’ve experienced. For others, it may be more subtle as we learn to hold everyone else at a distance, afraid that letting someone in would mean being hurt all over again. Or we rely on anger or control to avoid being disappointed or get the outcomes we want. Some of us remember words that were spoken to us that devalued us or minimized our worth – so we spend our whole life pursuing perfectionism in order to prove them wrong. If we were to ever slip up in our careers, relationships, public image or parenting then those words spoken to us may have been true we fear. To avoid that, we cling to perfectionism, hoping that when we achieve perfection, and as long as we remain there, it will somehow reverse how we really feel about ourselves or how others approve of us.

The challenge is that many times these parts of us can also become self-detrimental and self-destructive. As a pastor, I often have a chance to sit with others as they process the consequences of their self-destructive tendencies. And I know if they were ever to listen to mine, the list would be long.

The good news is that grace restores us to who we really are. Who we were before all of this happened. Before we learned to protect ourselves. Before we knew shame. Before we knew fear. And what freedom there is!

I’m not sure who the words of this song were written to, but I often allow them to frame how I pray for the grace of Jesus to restore my own life —

“I need you to see through my act, to tell me I’m wrong, to take off the mask, or else I’ll be left in the lie.

I’ll deceive my way straight to demise. ‘Cause I’m not in a right state of mind. I just wish I had strength to admit it. My stubbornness will put up a fight, but I don’t deserve to win it.”

In fact, in 2 Peter 1:4, God gives us His own “great and precious promise” that the grace given to us through Jesus will restore us to become “partakers of the divine nature” and “escape from the corruption that is in this world because of sinful desires.” Meaning when grace restore us, instead of living a life shaped by the shame, fear, wounds and pain brought about by a broken world, our hearts become shaped by the things of God – love, peace, compassion, humility and grace. We become who we were really meant to be – the beloved of God, precious children in His image, worthy of love, respect and dignity.