Listening to our lead pastor, Ron Barnard, this past Sunday as he preached his message,
an interest sparked in my mind that I’ve never had before exactly. It was actually Redemption Sunday, a holiday created by, recognized by and celebrated by 828 Church, our church. The 828 in the church’s name comes from Romans 8:28, which reminds us that, regardless of the occurrences and circumstances in our lives, God causes them all to work together for our good– our meaning those who love God and who submit themselves to His purposes for them. The holiday, Redemption Sunday, is the Sunday each year closest to August 28 (8/28). When Ron and his team launched 828 Church in February of 2015, there was a deeply personal reason for their settling on that name.
In 2006, Ron saw that a little boy who was crossing the street was walking into the path
of an oncoming pickup truck. Ron darted (my word, not his) into motion to hopefully save the little boy. He did save the kid, but sustained very serious injuries himself as the truck hit him.
Lying in the ditch with a shattered femur and several badly damaged vertebrae, Ron woke to his wife, Karen, praying for him. He was soon airlifted and taken into surgery. Long story short, Ron survived literally getting hit by a truck but with some major challenges ahead of him. He still endures significant back pain today (and definitely can’t dunk a basketball anymore).
But here’s the 828 connection. Ron soon realized that, even though getting hit by a
truck was in no way a good thing in itself, God caused many good things to come about by
working his accident together with other factors at play. For example, the driver of the truck
that hit Ron (I believe his name is Tony), a self-proclaimed atheist up to that point, put his faith in Jesus Christ as he saw the faith of Ron & Karen and the undeniable protection God provided for Ron and for the little kid. Also, God gave Ron many opportunities to tell the story about how a guy can get hit by a truck, live to tell about it and continue to be used by God to help people spiritually and physically. Many people have come to know Jesus and many have benefitted from Ron’s pastoral ministry, myself included. Because of his story of redemption, Ron eventually became known as 828 Ron. Naturally, the name of the new church he would lead would be 828 Church.
As he does every year on Redemption Sunday, Ron preached a masterful message about
how God redeems everything for all of us in Christ. (Watch that sermon below.)
After hearing Ron’s message, I noticed that aforementioned spark in my mind. After the sermon was concluded, my wheels continued to turn all afternoon about the idea of redemption.
From an economics standpoint, redeem means converting something valuable into
something useful. God redeems not only the things in our life; He actually redeems us. He
considers us of great value, but we can be infinitely more useful to Him once He redeems us. He converts us into being supremely useful for His divine purposes. That’s what happens when wesurrender to Him and put our trust in Jesus Christ. We’re born again. The old is gone (the condition we had before we became supremely useful), and the new has come (now given the Divine Spirit who births in us a very useful new love for God and for people). We’ve been converted, redeemed.
A hundred dollar bill, in itself, is useless to us. But when we redeem it by purchasing something useful – converting it into something with one hundred dollars’ worth of
usefulness – it’s been redeemed. That’s us. We’re the ones who, because we’ve been
redeemed, love God back and embrace the purposes He has for us. What’s cool is that He
doesn’t stop by redeeming us, but He continues to redeem everything for those who have
allowed Him to redeem them. He redeems all things for all the redeemed. This week we
celebrate that. Happy Redemption Week!
And we know that God causes everything to work together for those who love God and are
called according to His purpose for them. – Romans 8:28