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Message Summary
In this Vision 2023 message, Pastor Phillip Santillan turns to Mark 4:26–29 and the danger of drift. He recalls a 1979 sightseeing flight that crashed into a volcano in Antarctica because of a two-degree error in its coordinates. Drift happens so slowly you barely notice it, but over time it carries you far off course, which is why Proverbs urges us not to get sidetracked. Churches drift too, and Phil admits Clarity has drifted one degree.
He first explains the church’s newly worded statements. The mission, what God has called Clarity to be, is a community of gospel-centered people increasingly learning to submit all of life to Jesus as master and savior, repurposing their rhythms to join God’s mission in the world. The vision, what God wants to accomplish through the church, is gospel transformation everywhere we go, every day we live, with everyone we meet. Phil has seen God do this over ten years, as video testimonies from people who found community and faith at Clarity show.
Yet in recent years the church has grown smaller, as people moved away and visitors stopped coming, and it has not seen people come to faith and be baptized. A mentor pointed Phil to Jesus’ parable of the growing seed. The kingdom grows because of the seed, not the farmer, who does not even understand how it grows; as commentator Bruce Barton puts it, our job is to faithfully sow, trust God and look for signs of life. Then the mentor asked: if the power to grow is in the seed, why would a farmer see no crop? Phil knew: the church had forgotten to scatter seed.
Phil confesses a little pride. He had looked down on churches that worked hard at inviting their communities, believing, as he still does, that Jesus builds his church without postcards, events or even buildings. But another pastor noted that although no single campaign seemed to work, the seasons when his church was intentionally invitational were the seasons God brought visitors. Clarity’s early years were the same: people rarely came because of a mailer, but the church was planting seeds, and God grew his kingdom. Marketing is not the seed, Phil clarifies; the point is joining God’s mission, since many neighbors do not know the church exists. So the church needs to course correct one degree, becoming persuasively inviting and proactively welcoming, and Phil asks for the congregation’s help to know how.
First, he asks members to repurpose their resources: for the coming year, to give to the general fund rather than the building campaign, to increase their generosity, and, if they do not yet give, to begin giving something regularly. He deliberately left marketing out of the budget so the church could take this step together. Second, he asks them to repurpose their rhythms, helping fully resource kids ministry, worship, the cafe and setup for a season, so visitors experience the best of the church’s simple rhythms. If God is not done using Clarity to reach more people, Phil invites everyone to join this vision.