Look Out!

“Look Out!” I was probably 11 years old when I heard those words. I was playing left field in the Little League's “Fall Ball” league that played baseball about the time the Playoffs and World Series was happening. In fact, I had just caught my very first pop fly, and it was beautiful. (It was not that I had not had plenty of opportunities before, I just couldn't seem to make that daggone ball get in and stay in my glove!!) So there I am, happy as all get out that I had actually caught the ball, when someone yelled, “Look Out!”

When you hear those words, most of the time someone is trying to change your focus to something you have missed or overlooked. Someone wants you to see something that is coming right for you. Such as when your wife sees those brake lights ahead, while you are too engrossed in the story that you are telling, and she yells, “Look Out!!” Well, that day, what I overlooked was the fact that the 3rd baseman didn't think I could catch the ball. (In fact, that opinion was based on all the experience up to that point!) So, when the ball was popped out to the left field, instead of staying and letting me try to catch it, he begins running as hard as he can to the spot where the ball was coming down. Which happened to be the spot where I was (amazing, huh?) standing there with my first caught ball. Which happened to be the exact spot where he put his shoulder into my chest and we both went down. Yikes!

“Look Out!” is almost always an exclamation to draw our attention to something we might be overlooking. Next month, I will be preaching a series of sermons designed to draw our attention to something we might be overlooking. The series is called (surprisingly enough!) “Look Out!” and it will be all about us becoming an externally focused church. It will be all about us refocusing our attention and energy to those outside our church. It will be all about looking out!

It is no coincidence that this series is starting at the same time our first stage of restarting falls. In this first stage, we are going back to the bare minimum, and building back all our processes and programming from the ground up. In November, we are only be going to have Sunday Morning Worship Services. We are going to work on those a little bit, and try to make them as excellent as they can be. From there, as we gain a sense of who we are, and where we are going, we will build our processes and programming from a sense of mission and vision. Trust me, this is going to be an exciting time, as we rethink how we are going to 'do church'.

So, I invite you to join me on this journey in November, to “Look Out!” and see, as Jesus said, that harvest (in Denton) is ready!