WE ALREADY HAVE WHAT WE NEED

Exodus 35:1-19

Shortly after God gave the delivered people of Israel the Ten Commandments, God told Moses to begin the construction of the Tabernacle, a kind of portable temple where the people could gather to worship and offer the sacrifices God had commanded.  It was a very big undertaking -- definitely not a weekend handyman project.  It was a God-sized job.

The outer wall surrounding the courtyard of the Tabernacle was a rectangle measuring seventy-five feet by one hundred fifty feet.  It was constructed of seven and a half foot high fine white linen panels suspended between acacia wood poles plus the gates.  Just for the walls, it would take over 3,000 square feet of linen.

The Tabernacle tent was forty-five feet by fifteen feet and stood fifteen feet high.  It would require 1,350 square feet of fabric per each of the four layers to cover the structure.

And there were the precious gems and metals.  The project would need 2,204.85 pounds of gold; 7,584.38 pounds of silver and 5,338 pounds of copper.

And it all had to be designed to be portable, because it moved with the people from place to place, just as the presence of God did.

To build the Tabernacle today in this economy would cost  $57 million.  Zowie!  That would be one heck of a capitol campaign!

In mainline churches, we're bemoaning the fact that things just aren't the way they used to be.  Being a member of a church and a follower of Christ has dropped low on the list of people's priorities and values.  The local church has many competitors for people's time and their resources.  For many of us, if God called us to take on a project the size and cost of the Tabernacle today, we'd throw up our hands in despair.  We couldn't do it because we don't have enough ... money, time, skills, people.

Too often, in the church today, we operate in an economy of scarcity.  Our focus is on what we don't have and what we can't do.  As a result, we turn inward and go into survival mode.  We lose our missional vision and our ability to dream of  God-sized dreams.  Instead of excitement, new ideas are met with murmuring and grumbling.

The problem is that this doesn't stop God from calling us to big, God-sized ministry and missions or asking us to step out and take risks.

God invited all who were willing to participate in the building of the Tabernacle.  Instead of grumbling and murmuring, the willing spirits among them brought forth all the materials that were needed and offered their skills and talents in weaving, metal working, carpentry and more.  God chose two men who already skillful workers, Bezalel and Oholiab and, through the Holy Spirit, gave them special knowledge of design and of every skill and craft.  They would head the planning, training and the supervision of the crafts people.  

You may ask, and I certainly did, how it came to be that these former slaves had all those expensive materials in their possession?

Exodus 13:33-36 tells us that God made sure that the Israelites didn't leave Egypt empty handed.  Before they left, Moses had told them to ask the Egyptians for silver and gold things and clothing.  God saw to it that the Egyptians felt quite generous toward the people and so readily gave them what they asked for.  Taking advantage of that, the people of Israel picked the Egyptians clean.

In the economy of abundance of the Kingdom of Heaven, God had provided everything the people needed to build the tabernacle.  They already had what they needed.

As the church, maybe we already have what we need to take the next step into God's future for us.  The challenge before us is to not obsess over what we don't have and what we can't do but to celebrate what we do have and to seek what God wants us to do with our resources.

Recently, our church leadership participated in an exercise in preparation for setting our 2015 goals.  First, we celebrated.  We shared stories of what God has been doing in our church.

Then we listed what we do have.  We started with our greatest strengths as a community of faith.  Next, we brain stormed our resources, things that ranged from the skills and talents of our people to our building to our many prayer warriors.  We were very surprised at what we actually had available to us in addition to God and the resources of heaven.

(I recommend you try this with your church in small groups.  Then display them for everyone to see.)

God continues to call our churches to God-sized ministry in what seems to be times of scarcity.  I believe that God operates in an economy of abundance.  And I believe God has already provided everything we need to to the next step, whatever that may be in each church.  

Rather than seeing only what we don't have, let's celebrate what we do have and follow the blessings into God's future for us.