Matt Chandler - The Long Game

If you have your Bibles, go ahead and grab those; we’re going to be in Song of Solomon, Chapter 7. We’re going to finish up our series on marriage that we called «Captivated,» and so we’re going to wrap that up in our time together today. I have a couple of things I want to do before we dive into Song of Solomon, Chapter 7. The first is to say that although our church is primarily made up of young married couples, there are several thousand singles that join us every weekend, and they are all over the map in their singleness. Some of them are vowed singles; they plan on being single for the rest of their lives, using their lives to make disciples, be a part of the Kingdom of God, and see that being single creates space for them to really commit themselves to that. Then we’ve got quite a few who say, «That isn’t my gift. I don’t want that gift. If God tries to give me that gift, I’m going to try to return it. I’m just waiting for my person,» and if you could preach on that, it would help me. We also have widows and widowers, as well as those who have been divorced. So, there are several thousand people who are sitting in this three-week series on marriage, kind of wondering what this has to do with them. I want to acknowledge that.

This past week, I read something that I thought was really good; I’m going to borrow it from a book by a man named Peter Scazzero (I think that’s how you pronounce his last name). What he said is that, as we’ve been discussing, marriage is a picture of Christ’s redemption of the church, His bride, signifying God’s pursuit of the church and the ransom of His people. We are called as the church the bride of Christ. I know some of you brothers don’t like that language, but your wives and daughters have to deal with being called «sons of God» throughout the Scriptures. So, as I say, there’s enough in the book to offend all of us, right? We are the bride of Christ. One of the things that Scazzero noted in his book is that marriage illustrates the depth of God’s love. What he meant by that is that when I think about being married, I have my person, and now that I have my person, while it limits the breadth of my love, it deepens it. My love is one-on-one. Lauren is my person; I don’t have others. I have Lauren. My heart, my mind, my creativity, my energy, and my vitality go to this woman. In doing so, we communicate to the world and to one another the depth of God’s love.

On the other hand, singleness presents another picture because we know from the Word of God that the love of God is not just deep but also wide. Singleness portrays and shows the breadth of God’s love because if you’re single, you don’t have a person; you have a community. As you love that community, made up of friends, family, and co-workers, you express the breadth of God’s love. The church and the world need both pictures. So, if you’ve been listening to this series as a single person and thinking, «If marriage is a picture of Christ redeeming the church and buying His bride, then what is my singleness?» I believe Peter is onto something; you are communicating the breadth of God’s love to the world.

Now, the second thing I want to do is honor and celebrate a group here, and I want to explain what they did and why we are going to do that. The Village Church, being the size that we are, has a communications department. Most churches don’t have communications departments; we actually do. If you think about the Exodus workbook, the videos we showed—that’s all our creative team creating these things because we’re after the whole person, not just the mind, but also the senses and the heart. We want the whole person to gladly surrender to Christ. Art tends to engage places that go beyond our intellectual capacities and stir our emotions. About a week and a half ago, the DSVCA awards were held here in Dallas, featuring a large number of successful creative advertising agencies, both big and small, throughout the Metroplex. Consider organizations like American Airlines and various large organizations with their creative teams here. The only church represented at the DSVCA was The Village. One of the things I love about them is that they don’t give out participation trophies. So, I see you giggling, and I appreciate that you are with me. «Hey, you didn’t win a game this year, but you know what? Let’s celebrate that. Here, hang this on your wall as a reminder of your defeat.» What I mean by that is…