In a Peanuts cartoon, Lucy demanded that Linus change TV channels, threatening him with her fist if he didn’t. “What makes you think you can walk right in here and take over?” asks Linus.

“These five fingers,” says Lucy. “Individually they’re nothing, but when I curl them together like this into a single unit, they form a weapon that is terrible to behold.”

“Which channel do you want?” asks Linus. Turning away, he looks at his fingers and says, “Why can’t you guys get organized like that?”

I don’t know about you, but I think there’s real wisdom in that little joke! As a church, being united is so important! Not that we’re gonna beat anyone up the way Lucy might, but there is real power in unity.

This weekend (June 1) is our first Sunday with a new worship schedule. This Sunday, we begin worshiping together. This Sunday, we begin a new phase in our journey of discovery—discovering who we are, who we can be, who God is calling us to be; discovering together God’s future for our church!

This coming together as a single worship service really has nothing to do with worship styles. Sure, there will be conversation, discussion, maybe even some tension, over the styles of worship that we’ll be experimenting with. But worship style is not the important thing.

What is important is that we are together, united as we move into God’s future for us. We certainly won’t always agree on whether we liked everything about a given worship service—but that would be true even if we all leaned one way or another in terms of worship style.

Instead, let’s focus on what we do agree on: 1) God loves us; 2) God has redeemed us through Jesus; and 3) the reason we, the church, exist is to give God glory and make God’s presence real to a hurting world.

I can’t imagine that any of us would disagree with that! As we move into the future, let’s focus on those things, asking God to help us live out those realities in our lives as we worship, serve, give, and love in every aspect of our lives.

–Pastor Markus Watson