
Loving Your Neighbors

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At Our Core

A focus group accepted the challenge of narrowing the core values after receiving input from over 100 people at Wesley Chapel. It was easy to reduce the list of 35 to 12 but it was really hard to go to four. We quickly started out of the gate with the first two: godly and biblical. After much debate we began to take a second look at godly and realized that the Pharisees would have also considered themselves godly and biblical. We asked the question, “What did Jesus have that the Pharisees did not?” Compassion, kindness, gentleness, and patience were some of the answers that were also on the list of possible core values. Then someone said, “Christ-like” and we knew that this core value was all of the other values that we had been wrestling with.
We soon decided on Christ-like, Biblical, Loving, and Community.
We introduced them to the congregation in January of 2018. Core values keep us grounded on what is important and describe the type of church we hope to be. I share them with you again this month as a reminder.
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Everybody Welcome

Outside the church was a sign that had the church name, the times of service, the name of the pastor and the message “Everybody Welcome.” I thought what a wonderful gesture to be welcome everyone. As I continued driving down the road I began to wonder if it was true. Was everyone really welcome or did they only welcome people who looked like and thought like the people who went on a regular basis? Would they welcome a child molester? Would they welcome a transgender person? Would they welcome someone with tattoos? Would they welcome the refugee from El Salvador? Would they welcome the town drunk? Was everyone really welcome?
Then I began to think about Wesley Chapel. Is everyone really welcome at Wesley Chapel? Every Sunday I say, “grace and peace to you.” Are we really willing to extend grace to all people and accept them for who they are in whatever condition they are in?
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