by Rob Caudillo
While attending the recent National Pastors Conference, one of the speakers told of his trip to the zoo with his son. When they arrived at the Impala exhibit, one of the zoo staff was telling how this animal has the ability to jump straight up into the air an amazing 30 feet and bound forward with leaps of 30 feet at a time. This is how they escape predators in the wild. 
Someone in the audience asked, “How was the zoo able to keep the Impalas in their current enclosure with only a three foot high fence?” He answered, “When the Impala is young we make them believe that they cannot jump over a three foot high fence. And then as full grown adults who could easily clear a ten foot, twenty foot or twenty-five foot high fence, they believe that they are unable to jump over this three foot high fence. This allows us to contain them in this enclosure instead of having them leaping all over the zoo, which is good thing.”
After this experience, he found himself thinking about the church. And he said he thought to himself, “Here is this magnificent animal which has been created with the ability and potential to do what only an impala can do. But because the animal believes it cannot do what it can easily do, it is limited and penned in by this small three foot high fence. What about the Christian Church? What causes the church - the community of believers and followers of Jesus- to be limited and restricted? What is the church’s three foot fence which prevents the church – the body of Christ – to not live up to its full potential and design?”
What great questions – questions about the design of the church and its created potential. These are significant questions to think about regarding the church – its created abilities and potentials which only the church can be and do. And what might be the “three foot fence” which prevents or causes the church to not live up to its fully designed potential and nature? So what do you think? What do you believe to be the church’s design and its potential? And what do you see as any limiting three foot fence(s) before the church. How you and I answer those questions can and will impact Marcus Whitman Church. What you and I believe as to what the community of faith at Marcus Whitman can be and do or what the church isn’t and cannot do will have an impact on our church’s purpose and potential. So what do you think?
The writer of First Peter wrote,
“But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people
belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you
out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now
you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have
received mercy.” 1 Peter 2:9-10(NIV)
Peace,
Pastor Rob