The name Joe Coute probably doesn’t mean anything to you but it means something to me. And, more importantly, it means something to God. You see, Joe was a faithful servant of God in a local church in Vallejo, California. You’ve never heard of him but I’d like to take this opportunity to introduce you to him and why I chose to write this article.
I was raised in a nominally Catholic home. My parents took us to church and catechism class every week in the Catholic Church but the Lord meant nothing to us. We never opened a Bible in our home. Jesus was a concept not a person. We did our religious ‘duty’ every week because you were supposed to if you said you were Catholic.
Joe Coute was a friend in the community. His daughter played softball with my sister so our families crossed paths multiple times per week. We didn’t know anything about the personal life of Joe or the fact that he knew the Lord Jesus Christ as his savior. We just knew him as a fellow softball parent. Until one day when Joe invited us to his church.
Joe asked us to visit Community Bible Church in Vallejo where he attended. For us, church was church, so we went not expecting anything monumental or different. The service that Sunday was radical for me. The people sang songs, but they sang them passionately as if they cared and it meant something to them. The preacher got up and opened the Bible telling us what it said, what it meant, and what we had to do. It was so authoritative, God was speaking through this man. This was very different than a homily given by the priest. I was hooked, so was my sister, and I had to go back week after week to hear the Word of the Lord.
Long story short, it was some time later that I came to know Jesus as my Savior and I understood Him the same way Joe did. My sister did the same. She married a godly man and has raised two boys who love the Lord and confess His name. By God’s grace, I married Angela and we have endeavored to bring up our children in the fear of the Lord as well. Who would have thought that the teenager known as Mark Scialabba would actually grow up to become a pastor leading a church? All this happened because of one man’s simple act: inviting people to church.
You see Joe is not a pastor, he is not an elder, he is not a famous speaker. He is a faithful servant of Christ trying to do what the Lord wants him to do in his local church. He invites people to church because he knows that is the place where they will hear the gospel and hear of the salvation found in Christ. He wants other people to know Christ the way he does. Joe just passed away on January 29th, the day before this writing. Hearing of his passing made me want to write this article.
Joe entered the joy of his Master with a resounding ‘well done’ spoken by the Lord. Why? Because he was faithful. He was faithful to obey Christ and follow the Great Commission mandate given to us in the simplest way he knew possible: just inviting people to church. And that one act of obedient faithfulness sent ripples through the ages that has had many glorious repercussions. My sister came to know Christ, her home was a Christ-centered home, and now her boys will lead Christ-centered homes. I’m grateful to be able to say the same thing. And then think of all the individuals the Lord has used me to impact throughout my years of pastoral ministry. All of that generational advance of the kingdom of Christ began with an invite to church. It makes me wonder, ‘how many other people did Joe invite to church?’ And what were the effects of that?
Jesus didn’t call us to conquer the world or do the biggest things possible. He called us to be faithful. And one simple act of obedient faithfulness like inviting people to church has had profound effects on the kingdom of God. Do you wonder, how could the Lord use your faithfulness if you were to just invite someone to church? What would be the ripples in the kingdom of God of that one simple act? Are you excited to find out? You don’t have to be a ‘famous’ Christian to be great in the kingdom of God, you just have to be faithful. To the world, Joe Coute was a nobody, to the kingdom of God he was indispensable for his faithful obedience to the Great Commission. May the same be said of us as well. Maybe we can start with inviting someone to church.