Building Something and Pumpkin Risotto
The other day I came home from work, and one of my sons was outside with wood and a drill.
I asked, “What are you building?”
He said, “I don’t know, but I need to build something.”
I went inside and told Sarah, “Did you see he’s building something outside? Where did that come from?”
She said, “He was watching videos of people building stuff and didn’t want to just watch other people do it; he wanted to build something himself.”
At The Chapel, we firmly believe that Jesus is God’s Son who showed us how to live and love, and then laid down His life so we could experience true life. He is our Lord and Savior, God and King, High Priest and Friend, and our Rabbi.
Now, in the Christian tradition, we don’t talk too much about Rabbis. But the idea is that a Rabbi is a teacher, someone who helps you wrestle with the Scriptures and grow in your faith and knowledge of God. To be a disciple means to be a student or apprentice under a Rabbi.
That doesn’t mean you show up to class on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, listen to a 50-minute lecture, write a few papers, take a test, and call it a day. In Jesus’ time, you followed your Rabbi. You learned their ways. You wanted to be like them.
As I’ve said before, you want to follow so closely you’re covered in the dust of your Rabbi.
That’s why when Jesus calls His disciples, He says, “Follow me.”
He didn’t say, “Namedrop me at social gatherings,” or “Include me in your social media bio,” or “Use a bunch of language associated with me,” or even “Wear a symbol of what I died on.”
He said, “Follow me.”
Then throughout His ministry, He showed them what that looked like, how to follow Him, become like Him, and live out His ways.
After He was killed and raised from the dead, defeating sin and death, He gathered with His disciples and gave them what we call the Great Commission.
He said, “Go and make disciples of all nations.”
Meaning: create more followers in Jesus’ way, more people becoming like Him and living out His ways.
Then He said, “Baptize them and teach them to observe all that I have commanded you.”
That word observe can be translated keep, obey, do, live out, or even keep watch or guard. In other words, everything Jesus taught, demonstrated, and called us to live out, we’re to do, and help others around the world to do the same.
Jesus never wanted people standing on the sidelines watching others live out faithful, obedient lives at a distance. He wanted all of us to live them out, to be like my son, who didn’t just want to watch others do it, but wanted to do it himself.
He invited all of us to embody His ways, for the glory of God and the good of others.
Over the past month at The Chapel, we’ve been talking about what it looks like to live out the things Jesus did, the rhythms and practices that marked the early church.
We’ve talked about how we want to be:
A community of true, whole rest in a culture of unintentional, slow-paced apathy, or unnecessary busyness through the practice of Sabbath.
A community of communion and conversation with God in a culture of distraction and escapism, through the practice of prayer.
A community of reliance on God in a culture of indulgence and self-gratification, through the practice of fasting.
A community of justice, mercy, and reconciliation in a culture of injustice, division, and entitlement, through the practice of service.
This Sunday, we’ll begin four weeks focused on wrestling with Scripture.
I’m incredibly excited to help us learn what it means to let Scripture inform our lives and form us into people who are more like Jesus.
Because if we don’t wrestle with Scripture, it’s easy to weaponize it, to use it to support whatever position we already hold, or to dismiss it as outdated and meaningless.
Our hope is to be a community of relentless obedience to Scripture in a culture of biblical manipulation for self-justification, through the practice of knowing and studying Scripture.
Now, a confession: I really like Star Wars, but I’m not a diehard lover of Star Wars. Like I’m not getting a Star Wars tattoo or anything, but I will certainly watch the movies.
I’ve seen all the major movies and many of the shows, but I don’t keep up with every side story, crossover, or new character arc.
Recently I was talking with a friend who had never seen any Star Wars movies. I said, “You don’t have to watch them all, but Rogue One is a great movie, in fact one of my favorite movies… though you kind of need to watch a few of the others for Rogue One to make sense.”
He said, “Okay, maybe I’ll watch them. How many are there? Like three?”
“No,” I said, “there are the three originals, three prequels, three sequels, three spin-offs, more than a dozen TV shows, animated series, video games, comics, books, and more…”
He stopped me mid-sentence: “Never mind. I’m out.”
I get it, it’s hard to catch up on 50 years of Star Wars. It’s easier to just not care or let someone else tell you the story or quote “Luke, I am your father” with no real context or understanding…funny thing is…the quote isn’t even “Luke, I am your father”, though most people assume it is. The quote is actually, “No, I am your father.” But most of us don’t know that because we haven’t spent time trying to know, understand, wrestle with, study, and memorize…because that takes work.
But that’s not how you truly appreciate something. Also, you don’t have to watch all of those movies and shows today.
You appreciate it when you put in the time and do the hard work over a lifetime.
The same is true with Scripture, which is much more important than Star Wars. And wrestling with scripture is hard work.
It takes time to read it, sit with it, understand the culture and context, who wrote it and to whom, and then let it work in us and through us.
It’s certainly easier to let someone else tell you what it says, or misquote it out of context or simply just not engage with it at all, but that’s not how you grow in your faith. We grow when we’ve spent time trying to know, understand, wrestle with, study, and memorize…that takes work.
You grow when you put in the time and do the hard work. Also, you don’t have to do it all today; you study over the course of a lifetime.
So that’s what we’re going to continue to do, together.
Funny enough, right after that conversation with Sarah, my other son asked if we could prep dinner. He didn’t want chicken nuggets or pizza. He wanted to make Pumpkin Risotto with goat cheese and walnuts topped with a balsamic drizzle, you know, what every 12-year-old craves for dinner.
He wanted to make it because he’d watched a chef prepare it at school as part of a mentoring program. He’d seen it done, but he wanted to do it himself.
So we worked together, combing through the recipe to make this savory fall dish.
Y’all, it was unbelievable. But that’s not the point.
The point is, he could have just watched someone else. He could have thought, “That’s cool.” But he didn’t stop there; he made some himself.
Our faith is meant to be lived out. It’s meant to be participated in.
We’re not meant to just watch Jesus do stuff and say, “That’s cool.”
We’re meant to learn what He does, what He says, what He teaches, and then do it.
So I hope you’ll join us this week and every week as we live out the faith that Jesus demonstrated.
If you’ve been gone for a while, out of town, out of the rhythm, or any other reason, you’ve missed out, we would love to see you back this week. There is no better time than now to step back into following Jesus in community.
A few updates and celebrations that I think you’ll love:
- A few weeks ago, we baptized 12 people at the beach, dedicated two little ones, and celebrated with a beach bonfire. It was amazing.
- We’ve launched our Chapel 101 classes to help people know who we are and take steps toward becoming more committed to our church community. So far, more than 40 have participated, and over 20 have taken that next step.
- This past Sunday, we celebrated all of our mission and outreach partners, nearly 20 organizations proclaiming the good news of Jesus in word and/or action, living out the ways of the Kingdom. We gave away 100% of what came in that Sunday to support ministry work to transform the world.
- Our youth group and kids ministry are growing, and we’re seeing families take deeper steps in faith.
- We launched a new round of Chapel Communities where people gather regularly to pray, read Scripture, reflect, and be refined together.
- And we’ve had more people serving, from Sunday mornings to weekday workdays, helping this place thrive as a beautiful local church that strives to know and follow Jesus so that others might do the same.
- Sarah and I have now been here for five full years, and we are blown away by what God has done in and through this community. We can’t wait to see what He does in the next five.
Check out all that’s coming up, and as always, let me know if you need anything at all.
Read on to see all the other great things happening around here:
- Sunday Morning Worship
- We are kicking off our Scripture Experiment Series this Sunday at The Chapel. Join us at 10am for worship while we take a look at why studying the Bible is important as followers of Jesus.
- Tuesday Noon Prayer
- Every Tuesday, we gather for live worship and self-guided prayer.
- It’s a time to sit quietly, pray thoughtfully, listen carefully, and see what God might have for you in those moments. Come and go as you need.
- Bible Studies
- Men’s: Wednesdays, 8:00 AM at The Chapel
- Women’s: Wednesdays, 9:30 AM at The Chapel
- If you can’t make it in person, Sarah and I are continuing to release our weekly podcast, teaching through Scripture together. Chapel Study Notes on our normal podcast, The Chapel at Seaside. Stream wherever you listen to podcasts.
- Chapel 101
- Small gatherings this fall to learn more about our mission, vision, and how to connect more deeply.
- After years of prayer, writing, and refining, we’ve created The Chapel Guide—our roadmap for those who call this place home.
- Each gathering includes conversation with Sarah and me. Our dates have pretty much filled up at this point, but we’ll send out some more dates soon!
I am super grateful for y’all. Please let me know any questions you have or if you need anything. I hope to see you this week as we continue to wrestle with the scriptures together.
Blessings,
Andrew