Interruptions

"We interrupt this broadcast . . ."  That means something significant has happened and we should stop what we are doing and pay attention.

Often God interrupts my day and when He does I have no choice but to stop what I am doing and listen to what He has to say. Well I do have a choice but once God interrupts us can we really choose to ignore Him?  I mean if I call Him Lord does that not mean that He can and should interrupt my day and expect me to stop what I am doing and listen to what He has to say!  Think about it.  How silly is to call Him Lord and when He interrupts we tell Him 'hold on', or worse 'no'.  I have heard Charles Stanley say (and correctly I might add) "you kaint (southern for can not) call him Lord and say no.  To call him Lord is to say yes."

Anyway back to the interruption.  I have been asking God for the past four years, "God what do you want Grace Church to look like?"  I believe it is important that as a church we follow God's agenda and not our own.  Admittedly the struggle is distinguishing between our agenda and God's agenda.  I find that often we like to project upon God the things about church we like, because after all surely God likes the things we like.  The Holy Spirit spoke to me that the question I have been asking is not broad enough nor does it fully reflect his heart.  The better question is, "God what do you want Ventura to look like?"

Now I am still trying to unpack the full meaning between the two questions, but so far here is what I have.

1. The first questions is inward focused on Grace, the second question is outward focused on Ventura.  This means that the first questions seeks to address the issues (good or bad) inside the church where as the second seeks to address issues in the city. It is hard to be salt and light to Ventura if the focus is inward.
2. The first question seeks to maintain what we are, the second question seeks to influence the city.  What I know about churches as a system is that churches are currently producing exactly what the system of the church is designed to produce.  It does not matter what we 'say' we want to produce, the system will produce what it produced yesterday.  Another way of saying this is that churches will continue to produce what they are currently producing unless there is an intentional intervention into the system of the church. As long as our question is, "God what do you want Grace Church to look like" we will continue to be what we were yesterday.  However by asking the question, "God what do you want Ventura to look like" the system of the church is being changed to produce something different.  This leads me to my third observation.
3. The first question often leads to competition, the second opens up the kingdom.  In a previous blog I mentioned my conversation with Kevin where we talked about how churches often get caught up competing with each other by having the best programs in the city.  The focus is on building a better or just as good a church as the one we seek to model.  The second question focuses on influence.  How can we as a church influence the people who live in Ventura to be open to the transforming power of the gospel?  How can I as a follower of Christ be the hands and feet of Jesus to those who live in Ventura?  How can I love them so that it opens their eyes to the great love the Father has for them.

What all this boils down to is that God is showing me how to be missional.  I am learning that being missional is not an event or project but a way of life.  Being missional is a lifestyle!  God is calling me, dare I say He is calling each of us, to be missional.  I find this troublesome because it means that I and the church can not continue to be what it has been in the past.  

I wonder what would you be willing to do today that would allow someone else to know that you love them because Jesus loves them.  I hope you have found this interruption as troublesome as me.

". . . let's never return to our regularly scheduled programs."

Christian Commodities?

I met Kevin at Starbucks.  Over the months we would have short conversations where I learned that Kevin is a Christian and Kevin learned that I was a pastor.  I asked him one day if he would be willing to have lunch with me to discuss his thoughts on the state of the church.  Kevin is in his late 20's and is married.  I was really excited to hear his heart.

In our conversation Kevin stated his disillusionment with the church.  He believes that the church is to self absorbed.  He estimated that most churches spend 80% of their time, energy, and money on self sustaining activities.  He believes the church should spend that 80% on the community.

As we talked we discussed how the church has developed an "attractional" model for doing ministry.  Attractional means the church's primary question is, 'what can we do to get people to come to our church'?  This makes the church think in terms of competition.  We seek to discover ways that will get people to come to our church verses the other church in the city.  To accomplish this our church must have a great children's program, or youth program, or (fill in the blank) program; and if ours is better than theirs all the better.

In short we see people as commodities, and churches compete for the right to own them.

That lead to his point what if the churches in America stopped thinking attractional and started thinking missional.  What if churches stopped spending 80% of their resources to build or maintain themselves, but instead used that 80% to love their community.  Could the church then have an impact on the issue of drug abuse?  What would it look like if one church decided they would go where the drugs are and begin to love people.  Not condemn them, but love them as Jesus would.  What would it look like if christians would simply be willing to heal those who hurting by meeting them where they are.

What if we stopped seeing people as commodities to opportunities.  Opportunities to love them as God loves them.

My conversation with Kevin was very encouraging.  I think Kevin's vision for the church is worth heading.  I think it would also be important to tell you that Kevin is a PK (preacher kid) and holds a MDiv.  Kevin has spent a lot of time in the church during his life and he offers some very good insight.  I hope you have enjoyed meeting Kevin as much as I have.

Metal or Mental Idols?

The Bible warns us to not make an idol for ourselves of anything in heaven or on the earth.  Imagine what would happen if in your church service this Sunday someone brought a metal idol into the church and declared, "here is the god of the Bible that I worship".  Just thinking about that I get a sickening feeling in my stomach.

Yet I am forced to realize that if I were to take the mental image that I have of God and forge it into a metal object I will have the same sickening feeling.  Not because I have tried to define the greatness of God into a simple metal object (which would be wrong and impossible to do), but because my mental image of God is limited.  Now the crazy thing is this mental image assumes that everything I think about God is accurate.

What if some of the things I think about God are not accurate?  What if my mental image of Jesus distorts his nature so much that I find myself worshiping a mental idol that is not anything like Jesus at all.  For example is Jesus really an effeminate all inclusive guy who never seeks to upset anyone but would prefer that everyone just get along?  Or is Jesus more like the one who confronted the sin of the religious leaders, did battle with demonic forces, and died a bloody horrible death to pay for my sins?    Having one or the other of these images (or a hybrid of the two) creates a Jesus in my mind that I fall in love with, creates expectations from Jesus, and expectations from others who claim to follow Jesus.  When two people get together who have two different mental images of Jesus it is easy to see why conflict is soon to follow.  Each person holding onto their idols and seeking to convert the other to worship their idol.

BUT, what if each person agrees to destroy the false mental idols that have created and instead allow  scripture to determine who Jesus really is.  What if christians chose to follow the Jesus of the Bible and not the Americanized Jesus?  What if christians fell in love with the Jesus of scripture instead of the mental idol that more closely reflects who they want Jesus to be.

"You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.  You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand [ generations] of those who love me and keep my commandments." (Exodus 20:4-6)