5 Stories that Answer Your Question About My Church

A student of mine, finally breaking past that professor-student barrier, casually asks.  A friend tosses the question out over dinner, months absent from my weekly routine now sitting accepted at my side with bowls of soup and love.  And an acquaintance at the market, someone from the old story caught off-guard, wants to be polite.  We get the question from diverse places, "How is the church plant going?" And to that question I never know what to say because I think the question is really a different one all together.  How is it thriving in my soul?  How is it changing the way I experience God?  How is it a place you might venture into?  

We are planting a church, just a year old this week, in our town, or more specifically from our living room.  It's a small venture at the moment and yet in every way, as C.S. Lewis says, "The inside is bigger than the outside."

When we're asked, "How is it going?" or, "What kind of church are you starting?" we don't share numbers or dates, measures that are irrelevant to our present vision. We don't give locations and times as if we're only the church part-time in certain places.  We tell you stories.

As we join with the greater narrative of God, that one begun 'in the beginning' to rescue and restore all things, we find that delineating the church from the other domains of our life becomes an impossible surgery to perform. We find that the answers about our impact and mission and viability are intermixed with our accounts of common, daily life with neighbors and with our group and with the 'other.' These are our stories that will answer your question.

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After I released my students from class on Monday, my life-giving part-time job mentoring future shepherds, I stopped in at the tea shop where my friend works.  Her swearing-in to the state bar was that afternoon and acknowledging important days can be done with a surprise hug. We had walked with her during her last stressful semester of law school. She'd arrive for core group with her notes in hand, having her husband quiz her on the drive over. I'd helped her find a space in the seminary library for a change of scenery during her bar studies.  We'd prayed together the night before the results came out and rejoiced, distracted and dizzy, in the morning to see her name on that laudable list. And Monday was the day her title would change.

The church comes into your labor to share the joy of what's coming.

When I was done working that Thursday during my sons' fall break I went to my friend's home where they were playing.  But instead of rounding them up to go with "thank yous" and "I appreciate its," I sat down in the chair and gathered her small daughter up in my lap and we talked about the kitties in the window.  My friend crept out on her errand while I was present with the kids, familiar and usual; they never knew she was gone.  We were trading off that day: my sons with her while I worked a few hours and then I stayed with all while she met with a teacher. A year ago the distance between our homes wouldn't have allowed that. But this summer they moved into our neighborhood.

The church moves into the neighborhood and splits the load of life.

During a weekend in May we gathered in an ample mountain home and dreamed.  We, our kids, and our dogs spilled over the sofas in comfortable company and made welcoming lists upon which no scribbled idea was bad. We talked of missional ventures, finding the acute suffering, relational ideals and worship. Thereto, sorry and shy, we named what we were not drawn to and nearly whispered it, the elderly.  Yet, four months later when we picked up steam in our service to the community, we gathered at a trailer park and painted the eaves of the smiling gray woman, pulled the weeds of the retired shuffling feet, cleaned the gutters and bagged the leaves where those looking through the windows grow dim. And then we returned again. And soon we'll serve them Thanksgiving dinner.

The church lets Jesus lead them where they are afraid to go.

When she saw the pain in my eyes and the fear of the future she said, "We'll take care of you." For months she did just that with income and presence. Sometimes it looks like she's commanding the universe to bend to her will but when we kill our assumptions and move into the depths of her heart we see she's running for her life after Jesus. She lined up work and a partner for my husband.  Then took her hands off and let it roll.  When that partnership changed, another friend took the reigns.  His faithful pledge to our community sprang forth in an interview and bloomed into a new job for my husband. And now these friends, together, knowingly smile at their creativity that elicited the income that frees us to do the beloved work, that which we can't not do.

The church enters the tension to give food to the hungry and set captives free.

When we met him, he was rough around the edges but fighting for a different kind of life. The record of his life was long with rap sheets and alarming detentions.  But friends said, "God has other plans for him." So we stuck close for this entire year; listening with accepting ears, offering affirming words, working alongside his frustration and doubt, living lives of compassion he could receive.  The other day, he asked a question far more important than any other we've received so far. "Is there room in your church for someone like me?" Yes. And there's room in the Kingdom of Jesus too.

The church intentionally lives so that others will ask.

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I love that you ask me how my church is going, but I know that you're really asking, cloaked and curious. "How is your life with God?"  My answer is this: come with us and give yourselves to the stories and then you'll know just how much bigger is the inside than the outside.

Called Together

The togetherness of the Christian community... grows from a deep sense of being called together to make God's compassion visible in the concreteness of everyday life. -- Henri Nouwen

It's a Sunday rhythm that's old and yet new.  When he pulls the sheets aside and pushes into the morning cold, he prepares himself for his weekly practice of solitude.  These are the mornings, coffee and journal and table by the window, that do the strong work of letting him listen and bend and become.

For years he's played this rhythm, this quiet practice that forms him; sometimes sermons and scripture, sometimes writing what his dyslexic, studied mind puts in order.  But a year ago he set the practice aside, using that time instead to take a group of friends deeper into expressing gospel-lives.  And still, he came home full.

Today, those friends now sent to do for others what was done for them, he goes alone again to his place by the window, his coffee and computer, his Christ calling him to come away.  And I wonder what he will miss the most.

Going it alone in our spiritual development has a place. At times the silence is when the Voice is loudest.  But going with others is the epitome of church, of body, of Trinity.  I love the passionate cry I hear from so many today, "I don't want to go to church. I want to BE the church." Amen and amen to that.  But being is not exclusive of gathering because the gathering is what shapes our being.

In this season for us, which is both post-church and pre-church, we personally don't gather often.  Oh, we do community, team build, share meals, dream -- yes.  But we don't sit worshipful and reverent, symbols and song, no table or word or testimony.  We don't enter into sacred, or send with a blessing.  Not yet.  What we do is good.  But it's not everything.  And I can't decide if I miss the rest.  The Spirit evader in me says, "No. Not yet."

But I know that when it seems that community binds, in those same moments it also builds. The church is a people we become, and that becoming can only fully happen in messy unity, not controlled individuality. When we focus on what makes us different -- what we like and don't like, how we learn or don't learn -- we push away from body, away from community.  We essentially say 'but' instead of 'and' which is, of course, the point where all dialogues come to an end.

We do not gather for our own purposes, even for our own learning. We gather to create a picture for God of a people moved and changed by him into oneness. And we gather to create a picture for the world that unity in diversity does have a place.  Together we put hands and feet to the renewing work that Christ is already doing.

Gathering as a church in worship is a spiritual practice, like prayer and confession and fasting and service. Practices are habits and rhythms that conform us more closely to the image of Christ. We are challenged to express God's worth in ways that are not comfortable to us; sing when it's not our gifting, be still when we'd rather wander, use language that is not our mother tongue. And we also learn to be forgiving with how others squirm and wrestle and balk.  It's less about us than we think.

Growth is personal but never private.  That big word, sanctification, happens in the context of community --  that state that only exists when we make known our most monstrous ways, our failures and fears and fallacies. The church should call good things out of us, and salve the shame.  As a body it offers the legs for the journey, the voice for the call, arms for lifting, new eyes to see.  Corporately we become what we cannot become on our own. 

A person dedicated to God should move in ways consistent with his character. His character is love, truth, generosity, grace, patience.  These are not traits that can be lived in isolation.  Love is relational; grace needs a recipient; patience can only abound in a crowd of diverse and growing "others."  When we walk away from the community of the church, we walk away from the practice of God.

So, today we'll find a way, he and I, to go and gather.  And while it's not the same -- the people unknown, the culture foreign -- we do speak the language.  We do know the Christ that calls us all together.  And while it's not the community I knew or the community I'm building, it's still the very rhythm -- old and yet new.

Third Sunday of Advent

Tonight we are halfway through the season of Advent. Being just a month, it feels like a pretty quick sprint.

Two weeks ago we lit the first candle, the Prophet's Candle or the Candle of Hope and we considered how even just a little light chases away the darkness.  How we, like the prophets, sit in this middle space between what God has done in sending Christ the first time and what he will do in sending him again.

As we relight the first candle we read another prophecy of Jesus spoken of in Zechariah 9:9

Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!
Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem!
Behold, your king is coming to you;
He is just and endowed with salvation,
Humble, and mounted on a donkey,
Even on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

Last Sunday we lit the second candle, the Bethlehem Candle or the Candle of Promise and we considered how God's promises were kept in the coming baby in Bethlehem -- the ruler over Israel, the shepherd of his flock, strong and majestic who secures life for us. (Micah 5)

Prophecies aren't just predictions, they're promises from God himself. Jeremiah 3 tells us of one such promise:

5“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord,

when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch,

and he shall reign as king and deal wisely,

and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.

6 In his days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely.

And this is the name by which he will be called:‘The Lord is our righteousness.’

And now, already, we're halfway through.  In this season when we all have pushed through our own stories -- the end of semesters, the frigid cold, the shock in these last days -- have we also been pushing into the hope and the promises of God in this season? The year is ending and celebrations are impending.  Are we just pushing through, or pushing into?

It's a bit of a balancing act to walk through a season in both a state of reflection and celebration. And we feel that tension tonight. We've had food and drink and conversation. The white elephant gifts and the cookies and desserts are patiently waiting. But first we're reflecting, because without the reflection, the celebration is shallow. We don't do the reception without the wedding; the wedding gives us the substance for the reception. The reflection gives us the reason for the party.

So it seems to be the perfect night to talk about joy and, traditionally, this third candle is the Shepherd's Candle or the Candle of Joy.

Joy is a bit of an unnatural thing. We know the state of our world, of the hearts of people. We see what we do to one another -- and sometimes it seems there's no good reason to feel joy. Yesterday was the one year anniversary of the slaughter of the children in Connecticut. It's only been a year. Friday was the shooting at Arapahoe High School.  In our neighborhood. We are not far from darkness. 

Somehow in order to breathe, to persevere, through the darkness we live in we need something to be the guide. And that's what I think joy is for us. I don't think it ever strays too far beyond reach. In the middle of contentment joy is there out loud, like paint on the walls. But in the middle of trial, it's there, hidden, padding the floor where we lie down in grief. Deep and steady and settled.

Having a sense of joy is somehow attached to our sense of something greater than ourselves. In short, joy is the steady push toward trust in God. Which means that it doesn't always have to be happy, just thankful or hopeful. It isn't something we reasoned into being, it is something we express through faith.

I looked to the scriptures to ask, "Am I far off? Does it seem to say that joy is not happiness, that it is more present than we acknowledge?" And here is what the scriptures told me: Joy is our strength (Neh 8:10), it is God's presence with us (Ps. 16:11), it is an apt answer (Pr. 15:23), it is justice done (Pr. 21:15), it is a gift from God (Ecc 2:26), it is the perfection of beauty (in the city of Jerusalem) (Lam 2:15), it is a fruit of the spirit (Gal. 5:22).

My definition came a little clearer and a little wider.  Yes, it is a steady push toward trust in God, that is our action in pursuing it.  But in feeling joy I have to say that it is a finely sharpened pleasure or trust. I feel joy when I sense that what is right is what is happening.

The shepherds experienced this joy. Luke 2:8-20:

In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is the Messiah, the Lord.

The two hours I had to wait on Friday was long. My son called me from inside his school. He was the first to tell me of the shooting, my son who was in a neighboring school now in lock out. While we talked, I was first alarmed and then calmed that I would have all three of them back that day. But I had to wait to make the family right again.

Imagine waiting hundreds of years before things would be made right, before a promise would be fulfilled. Before a voice would be heard crying in a stable. Before my sons were present with me again. When we finally get what we're waiting for, we hug it so tightly and cry tears of joy. Tears of joy is an appropriate response when in a moment of tension, things are made right.

This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.’ And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying,
‘Glory to God in the highest heaven,
and on earth peace among those whom he favours!’

Glorifiying and praising God for making good on a promise that had been repeated for centuries is an appropriate response. The singing and the shouts are a fitting reply. The receiving of guests and gifts and banquets and dinners and celebrations are how we welcome that which is now our right reality.

When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, ‘Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.’ So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.

Contemplation is an appropriate response to joy. When that which you've trusted in guides you into fulfillment, stepping back and considering how that story emerged is right. And the shepherds' final response was to take their experience back to their home and share their joy with others, because joy isn't something that happens to us but something we carry with us.  And, in the darkness, maybe it's the something greater that actually carries us and tells us that all things will be made right.

But to the degree that you share the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing, so that also at the revelation of His glory you may rejoice with exultation.  - 1 Peter 4:13

His glory came in that newborn baby. It's time for Joy.

Blessing:May the God who gives you a hope and a promise, give you joy as you follow him in ever brightening days and may you seek to join him in making all things right and spread his joy in strength and justice and beauty.

First Sunday of Advent

Tonight we begin our Collective.  I have the honor of giving the first words.  It seemed appropriate to leave them here as a marker, a remembrance of a first moment.  There will be moments for dialogue, silence and light. Thanks be to God.

It is fitting that we are beginning tonight. That we are beginning a community on the day when traditionally the church begins its new year called Advent. The Jewish New Year, the High Holidays Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur were in September.  The secular New Year is coming, and the academic new year is well underway. 

We mark these special days with special celebrations. The Jews celebrate by blowing the shofar and casting off what's left in their pockets. We all celebrate our calendar New Year in Times Square or Paris with champagne and fireworks and kisses at midnight. In August or September we begrudgingly celebrate with new notebooks and routines and maybe coffee to get the brain working.

Tonight we celebrate Advent with light. We are now in a season of darkness. The leaves are fallen, the time change is behind us. We are well into the season of sleep and rest, of hard freezes and snow and are are fast approaching the longest night of the year, just days before Christmas. It is fitting to celebrate Advent with light.

This is a traditional symbol of Advent: a wreath of greenery with four candlesticks surrounding one pillar candle in the center. In the northern hemisphere the wreath is evergreen, which reminds us that we are eternal beings, that we are no longer without life in us. The circle is a symbol of eternal life, God's unending love, or even the long time when people lived in darkness waiting for the coming Messiah, the light of the world.

And then there is the light. In Advent, candle light is our symbol of hope. The use of light reflects what Luke’s gospel says about the advent of Christ:

Luke 1: 78-79 ‘By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.’

Advent means, “coming.” We progressively light the candles, one each week as a way to mark the passage of time while we wait for the advent of Christ at Christmas. We come together in these weeks before Christmas as a way of expressing our anticipation for what God will do, and to give a faith-filled expression that we believe not only did he come the first time as a babe in a manger, as a suffering servant, as a teacher, a savior, a redeemer and risen Lord – but that he will come again to rescue and redeem everything.

Advent finds us caught in that middle place. We have seen the work of God and we are looking forward to that work completed.

The candles in the wreath have meanings that differ depending on the tradition you journey from. The colors may be purple and rose or blue. Ours are white, purely out of preference, because white seems to be a color of hopeful expectation, but maybe it means something different to you. The focus is not on the candles, but on Christ who is our light.

The candles for us won't stray from the traditional meanings: all are geared to unfold the story of redemption through the coming of Jesus. The first is the Prophet's Candle or the Candle of Hope.

“The prophets were people who stood on the borders between heaven and earth, between our present time and God's future time. They came to know God so well (a very painful experience, as some of them discovered) that they could discern the shape of his plan: to rescue the world through the sufferings of his chosen one, his anointed, the Messiah."

“They knew that God had more grace coming – grace that would rescue people from where and what they had been, and would give them a wonderful, glorious new destiny and hope.” (N.T. Wright)

There are over 300 prophecies from the Old Testament that point us to Jesus and that we can actually see him fulfilling in the gospel narratives. Tonight we'll just read one from Isaiah 60:1-6:

1 Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.
2 For behold, darkness shall cover the earth,
and thick darkness the peoples;
but the Lord will arise upon you,
and his glory will be seen upon you.
3 And nations shall come to your light,
and kings to the brightness of your rising.

4 Lift up your eyes all around, and see;
they all gather together, they come to you;
your sons shall come from afar,
and your daughters shall be carried on the hip.
5 Then you shall see and be radiant;
your heart shall thrill and exult,
because the abundance of the sea shall be turned to you,
the wealth of the nations shall come to you.
6 A multitude of camels shall cover you,
the young camels of Midian and Ephah;
all those from Sheba shall come.
They shall bring gold and frankincense,
and shall bring good news, the praises of the Lord.

Isaiah gives us both of the stories, both the darkness and the light. And he describes – this is what it will look like when the light comes. He had a foot in both worlds and knew this is what we need and this is what it will look like when our needs are met.  But we can't rush right to the light. We wouldn't even want to unless we were made aware of our darkness.

When we come into Advent we are confronted with darkness.
No candles are lit yet.  We are still sitting in it.

What would be exposed in your life if light were to hit it? That you are only concerned with your immediate interests? That you believe you are somehow unfit to carry hope for the future? That you live under a suffocating blanket of doubt regarding faith? That really as close as we are, we’re strangers and you don't really want to know what it means to be a good neighbor? That you tell yourself untruths about your worth and our identity?

That's the darkness. That's the need. That is actually what the prophets spent much of their time exposing. They knew the light was coming and they said, “Knowing this, do you still want to hang onto that?”  What would the prophets speak to you?

In the passage in Luke the darkness is chased away by the tender mercies of God.

In the passage from Isaiah the darkness is chased away when a great community of people gather together around the unifying Lord.

What would chase away your darkness? What would light look like for you? [Light the Candle]   Would tender mercies look like a friend who could listen and help you sort out your true self, from your false self? Would it look like being freed from addiction and temptation by the renewing of your mind? Would it look like a progressive movement toward character and away from just trying to be good? Would it look like a chance to be a part of a great community, perhaps this one, that walks together toward the light of Christ? Would it look like drawing more deeply into love, more deeply into trust?

What do you need to hear from God, what do you need Jesus to be to chase away that darkness?

God doesn't leave us in darkness.  While he meets us where we're at and loves us in spite of all things we've said and done and been, he continually moves us into light.  When he created the world, it all began in darkness and because God has always been, he somehow was there existing in that darkness, just as he is with you in yours. 

But he also began by giving light.  And then in the next act of creation he diffused the atmosphere and condensed the water down into ocean so that light could be more clearly seen.  And then on the fourth day he created the sun, moon and stars... a little more light, and a little more and then some more. It doesn't take much to dispel darkness, but God does more than push it aside.  He overcomes it. 

John 1:1-5

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4 In him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

In John's passage, what chases away the darkness that existed before the creation of the world is the Word, the God that made all things, the God that came to the world as the light of men offering life.  Jesus is what light looks like.

We gather here tonight not to count down the days before Christmas, but to enter into life with Christ. We don't participate in the “coming” of Christ as spectators, but as those who, like the prophets, live with one foot in the world and one in the kingdom of God. We don't come and say, “Come, Lord Jesus and take us straightaway to peace” instead we say, “Come, Lord Jesus and end our darkness.”

You go tonight in the way the prophets did, knowing what God has done, and knowing what he wants to do. You go knowing that God has more grace coming – grace that can rescue you from where you've been and what you've done and grace that will give you a wonderful new destiny and hope.

Community Prayer:

The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. 

Captivated by the darkness, we ignore your glowing ember. 

Intimidated by the glare, we hide from your warmth. 

Confused by the shadows, we misunderstand your vision. 

Compelled by the light, we embrace your promise. 

Jesus, source of light, remind us again that you burn and beckon in our darkness, even here, even now. 

Come, Lord Jesus. End our darkness.

Ending Blessing:

By the tender mercy of our God, may the dawn from on high break upon us, to give light to we who sit in darkness and to guide our feet into the way of peace.

What's Next

The day we said it out loud it was a sunny Thursday mid-afternoon, just days before summer ended, weeks since our ministry had come to its confusing stop.  The house was quiet when the phone call came for him.  Regardless of who was really on the other end, all he could hear was the Almighty saying in the subtext, "Do this.  Just say you'll do it."  It was a kairos moment we'll never forget.

When he hung up the phone he took a deep breath and looked at me.  "What if we just say we're going to do this?  What if, from this point on, we make all of our decisions through this filter?  This is now who we are and what we do?"

"I was just waiting on you," I said.

We said the words out loud, sat in the silence of the turning page, blinked long blinks, took deep "yes" breaths, clasped hands and took the afternoon walk to our son's school to pick him up.  Breathless, we shared the sidewalk while we repeated, "O.K.  ok."  As if by agreeing over and over again we could move more deeply into this commitment, quick-dry cementing our feet into a new path.

We were planting a church. 

We are.

The neighborhood looked different.  The houses were now the homes of potential friends, of partners in-waiting, of missional community, intentional service.  The air was thinner, fresher.  I couldn't for the life of me think what had made me cry for weeks on end when suddenly hope was wrapped around me, moving me from the old to the new.

Our first phone call on that walk was to a friend, "We have an idea about what's next. We want to talk to you."  And the very next day we met and shared and invited and he said, "yes."

And the Father has paid close attention to us.  Each week, in quiet moments or over coffees or stuffed in envelopes full of cash and gift cards in the mail, we sense his presence and his deep "with-ness."  We're sitting back and watching him work.  We're amazed and humbled and ever so grateful.

This is right.  This is real.

We are church planters.

It's not where I ever thought I'd be. It's not what I thought I came here to do.  But leaning harder and harder into this new thing I can see how it came to be.

How that first church plant -- that one that we snuck away from our city for a day to attend their leadership meetings in secret -- was the training ground, the season for learning.  We know how to shut down an old work and begin it anew with joy and promise.  We know the steps and the way to invite and pray and plan.  It made our hearts beat fast and broadened our scope of what the kingdom looked like.

And then there was that second one, the one we didn't plant, but found while it was months young.  We were in our own season of groping and wandering but we committed ourselves to those new-creation people for the duration, no matter what, to experience what true living in community looked and tasted like.  But we know how to grow into an unconventional space and let worship happen even there.  We know how to let go of our second-level beliefs to make room for more at the table. Those friends got under our skin, held up our arms, and let us change right before their eyes.  Maybe we were the neediest people there, or maybe we were the lives punched full of holes through which the light could shine in all directions.

And then we came here to a people we found ourselves loving with intensity -- even now still.  In the past four and a half years I've seen him become a wonderful shepherd, jotting notes to himself to follow-up, sitting together over countless coffees, bringing the drunk fiance in to sober up on the couch and locking away the gun, writing the letters to the courts, inviting the next person and the next person to dinner in our home, to homegroups, to advent prayers.  He loves these people.

And I remember how I didn't even hesitate to dress to appear in court with the friend who was sentenced to jail time, led away in handcuffs.  And how I tenderly cooked the meal for the couple who lost their baby at birth and took it to their white, trembling, empty hands.  The Bible study I began with fear that grew me into a teacher.  All the "yeses" to the "Can I stop by?" questions.  I chose this home to host groups and guests, for its proximity, for its commonness, for its extra bedroom.  I've never seen this life as mine.  It always, always belonged to others.

We've moved through our seasons of learning to plant, of living in a community that was planted, and now of loving the people we're supposed to plant with.   This is no surprise to God; it's what he's been in the course of doing for a very long time.

One step at a time, we begin a new life of obedience with a new community of friends doing a new thing in Denver.

He was just waiting on us.