Love Jesus, but not the church (the Institution)

I ran across a fantastic article on the out of ur blog on people loving Jesus, but not the church (the institution).   Here’s the link to the full article.  http://blog.christianitytoday.com/outofur/archives/2008/03/they_like_the_c.html#more

At the end of the blog, there were some really great questions.  The first is questions we typically ask in the church, and then the second is maybe an alternative question that maybe we should be asking instead….

Not: How do we grow the institution?
But: How do we grow people?

Not: How do we motivate people to serve in the church/institution?
But: How do we equip people and release them to serve outside the church/institution?

Not: How do we convince more people to come?
But: How do we inspire more people to go?

Not: How many programs can the church start?
But: How many programs have other churches started that we can help support?

Not: How many people have a committed relationship with our institution?
But: How many people have a committed relationship with another brother or sister in Christ?

Not: How do we make people dependent on the institution for their growth?
But: How do we equip people to grow independent of the institution?

Not: How much revenue can the institution generate?
But: How much revenue can the institution give away?

Not: How many buildings, pastors, and programs are necessary for the institution to have maximum exposure in the community?
But: How few buildings, pastors, and programs are necessary for God’s people to have time and energy to engage the community?

Just a couple of thoughts on these questions……I personally like the emphasis on relationships/community.  So when people invite people to our church, I prefer to say we are inviting them into a community, not a “church”, inviting them into a relationship with us and hopefully with God.  Also, like the focus on what happens outside the walls of the church.  This really is the measure of success for the church….what occurs in our homes, at our work, in the community, in our city.  Also, like the idea of not being dependent on the church, but our goal is that we grow and mature to send people out of the church into the community.  Yeah, pretty cool questions………

 

The Path of the Cross

On the surface, the path of the cross did not make sense.  As Jesus was entering Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, the reactions were mixed, the expectations varied, and even Jesus wept knowing that the Jews did not understand the situation.  The message of the cross was a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles.  As we reflect upon this upcoming season, what is our understanding of this path of the cross?  Who is this Jesus and what is the meaning behind this sacrifice? and what are the implications for our lives, this story of the cross?  I want to share just a few thoughts over the next few days in preparing our hearts for this season of remembrance and celebration.

There are times in life when we wonder if God really loves us.  Sometimes we look around at our circumstances, our life, our careers, our relationships, and it does not quite meet our expectation.  But what if God has already given us everything that we need?  What if the greatest gift has already been given, but we are just looking for something else?  Adam and Eve had everything in the garden of Eden and yet the one thing they could not have, that’s what they wanted.  Was God not good to them?  Did God not love them by not allowing them to have any fruit off of that one tree?  Has not God already demonstrated His love to the fullest extent possible?  God has shown his love for us in that while we were still sinners (in rebellion against Him), Christ died for us.  He loved the world so much, that He gave his one and only Son.  Christ loved us and gave himself up for us.
 
Do we see this as his fullest expression of love?  Are we looking for more?  Why?  What are our expectations of God?  The measure of God’s love for us is both in the extent of the sacrifice and also in the degree of our unworthiness to receive it.  This is love, that God sent Jesus to die for us in giving away what was most precious to Him.  This is love, that in our worst state, in our rebellion against Him, He loved us as we are, not as we should be because we will never be as we should be.  That love put Jesus on this path of the cross……
 
“They spit on him, and took the staff and struck him on the head again and again.  After they had mocked him, they took off the robe and put his own clothes on him.  They they led him away to crucify Him.” – Matthew 27:27-31

 

Impacting the Next Generation

Recently we have been having a lot of conversations about children and the role of the church and the role of the families.  So much of our own previous conversations about children’s has focused on our Sunday programming, yet there is so much more to it than that.  We have taken a posture of looking at the adult’s spiritual journey more holistically, looking at it from the perspective of the everday and what that spiritual journey and community looks like.  We have been doing the same with our kids ministry and have been rethinking and re-imagining what that might look like. 

For one, the Sunday program is a support to the parents for their spiritual development.  The primary role belongs to the parents.  So we have been asking as part of our children’s ministry, is how can we create venues, offer training to equip parents, and look at different options to help parents throughout the week to be the primary spirtual voice in the lives of their kids.  This is church without walls!  This dialogue has been pretty exciting!  It has been pretty cool to really take a deeper look at this and realize that much of our attention is shifting (or rather creating a balance) between our Kid’s program and the rest of the week.

We also had a great dialogue how we are not o’kay with the fact that most of those who serve in children’s ministry are the moms.  Where are all the dads in this?  I confess that sometimes I rely on LeeAnn so much for the spiritual formation of our kids in what she does at home, but is this right?  Is this what God had intended.  We have absent dads because of work, but are we also having absent dads in the leadership of the homes?  hmmmm….so the question is, how can we have the fathers more involved in guiding the children in the programs serving our children.   Should be interesting how this unfolds……

Finally, if we want our children to also embody the values of the church as a whole, Christ Community & Cause, how are we doing this?  Are the kids having a safe environment to wrestle with God, to worship, to know Him, to develop community with one another (deeper relationships with parents!!), and a heart for those in our world, to really develop a heart to serve, and to reach out to one another and to our world.  Sometimes we like to shelter our kids from certain realities of life, but these can be great teaching moments to develop compassion and love for those who need Christ, and for those who don’t have much. 

So, we are on this journey, this path, to seek out what this looks like.  We have started making some changes and are excited to see so much room for creativity in the things that we do!  I’ll continue to post various things as we try them out and allow God to work through us in this area.

 

Weekend Retreat

Just came back from a short weekend retreat hanging out with the leaders and their wives from our church.  We had an awesome time sharing, praying, encouraging and hanging out together!  It was something that was much needed for LeeAnn and myself as well as for our team.  It was a reminder to us just the craziness in our lives…….our families, our work, our church and the need that we have to leave town, to get away and to spend some significant time away to spend connecting deeply with God and with each other.  Some of the highlights for me…………

Faith.  We spent a lot of time in prayer and talking about our dependence on God and reflecting upon His grace, His goodness and His faithfulness.  It was a reminder to me of this journey that we are on.  It is a journey that requires an incredible amount of faith, one where the challenges, the mission, and the path before us is way beyond us, but that is where God is at work in us, that is where others see God’s hand in all things.   I was reminded that a lot of times people can see what we do for God, but we must pursue what only God can do, so that others can see what only He can do.  Yeah, it was really good for us to remind ourselves that “without faith, it is impossible to please God.”

Laughter.  We had a really good time.  Saw a side of others that I had never seen……also expressed a side of me that others probably had not seen.  This is where we say……what happens in Conroe, stays in Conroe…..so that’s all I have to say about that.

Deeper.  As leaders, as friends, as brothers and sisters in Christ, as family……we got deeper.  Deeper with Jesus, deeper with each other.  Praying, laughing, sharing, confession, teaching one another, affirming, crying, venting, forgiving, playing,  eating, serving one another…….all these things brought us closer together.  All these things encouraged us in our journey of faith….and there were some pretty deep moments of worship.  Yeah……God is good. 

 

Fortune Cookie Theology

Last week, we hosted a couple of exchange students at our house for a week.  They are from Hong Kong and are studying for a semester at University of Texas Dallas.  When they were here, we were thinking…….ok….they are probably craving some good Chinese food, give them something good to eat before they become your typical starving college student, right?  So we take them to this authentic Chinese Restaurant up here in Plano.  Food’s alright…..order some wonton noodles and some other stuff.  Anyway, come time to pay, they bring out the bill and some fortune cookies.  The students take a hard look at the cookies and turn to LeeAnn and say, “what’s that?”  They had no clue what fortune cookies were!!!!  LeeAnn proceeded to tell them what they were, then they pulled out their cameras, took pictures of them, and then asked where they could buy some so that they could get some for their friends!   That is so beautiful!  What we think here in the U.S. is part of Chinese culture, really was created by our American marketing schemes.  And yet over time, we assume that it really is part of the original culture of China.

We can do the same thing in church.  We have what we call a church culture or what we perceive to be true “biblical” church.  We have some friends who are missionaries in Africa and they said that when you walk into a church (at least where they are working), in a really rural part of the country, they have pews, hymnals, choirs, choir robes, and everything else.  We have taken our mode of church and cookie cuttered (is that a word???) it in Africa without any consideration of their culture! 

So when we think about church here in the U.S., we have to ask ourselves, what truly is biblical and what is cultural?  What things have we ingrained in our mind that if they do not exist, then we no longer have church?  In our own journey, we have discovered that there is a lot of freedom in the way that we can do church (church without walls) and that maybe we have been limiting God’s expression and the intent for what He wants to do through the church.  We are re-imagining the time, the location, the form, the structures, the role of staff, and seeing that there is much beauty in thinking outside the box.  God is more concerned with our heart.  He is more concerned with our love for Him.  He is more interested in us loving one another.  Yet we tend to put our focus on other things……things where we really have to re-evaluate and see if that is important in God’s eyes.   

Anyway, fortune cookie theology…..is our church biblical or is it really American made?  What do you think?

 

Christmas Shoes

There are moments in life which you reflect on and it causes you to pause…….We heard of the passing away of someone’s father earlier this week right before Christmas.  It was strange, because the night of the passing, I drove by their house and prayed for their family.  It is strange because as I think about our family, we are celebrating, we are enjoying our time together as a family, watching out kids laugh, play around the house, play with their new toys, and yet there are other people who are going through real difficult times at this season.   And each year that rolls around is a reminder to them of a time of grieving, a time of sorrow.   In my heart, I ache for this family…I can’t imagine the conversations, the tears, the struggle that was occuring the weeks before Christmas and what is going on this week as they prepare for the funeral.  I pray for healing, I pray for mercy, I pray for grace as they adjust to life without dad.  I caught just a glimpse of some of their possible struggles in the movie, Christmas Shoes……..

I am reminded of the tension that we live in.  A time of knowing that one day there will be no more tears, pain, sorrow, or death, but living in that tension that that moment, that time is not yet.  I am reminded to pray, pray for others, and cling to the promise that His grace is sufficient for all of us.  We don’t understand, nor do we pretend that we can, but that His grace is enough to sustain us even in the most difficult times of our lives.  Below is NewSong’s (the band) video on the Christmas Shoes……..

 

Paradigm Shift in Evangelism – Ken Fong

Here is a quote from Ken Fong of Evergreen Church in So Cal recently in Leadership Magazine….

“The old paradigm of evangelism was a transactional sharing of the gospel. I would try to get people to intellectually agree with me. But the new paradigm is different, an approach in which I invite you to walk alongside me, examine my life, and see evidence of the truth, and hopefully there will be something compelling that you see. It’s a no-strings-attached invitation to enter my life as I follow Jesus.”

Makes me think hard about what people will see if they examine my life, if they truly enter into the very depths of my life, and if they walk alongside me, what will they truly see?  Will they see something that is compelling that reveals this intentional, authentic, radical pursuit of Jesus or will they see someone who just knows a lot about the bible, a lot of stuff up there, but nothing has changed within the depths of my soul?  Is it compelling enough that I tell others that I attend church every week?  Is it compelling that I tell others that I tithe 10%?  Is it compelling that I know the bible and study it every day?   I think that this statement not only challenges our mindset on what evangelism looks like, but also makes us take a serious look at what following Christ is all about. 

 

Introduction

Here I am…….stopped blogging last year.   Just didn’t get around to it, but thought I would give it another shot.  Used Xanga previously, but giving wordpress a try.  Anyway, will just share some thoughts about life, faith, culture, and other things…….