thechurchblog

If you’re been following the story of Crossroads Church, you’re familiar with our vision to be the church for the portion of our population that has forsaken all things “church.” These are people who would be out of place in a “normal” church — even one as dynamic and open as some truly are. We connect with these people through our relationships at work, school — any place where we have an opportunity to have influence with another person just by “being there.” Ultimately, we seek to build relationships with people that will(hopefully) show them the way to Christ — but that don’t depend upon their accepting or rejecting Christ. Sound confusing? In a nutshell, if our new friends reject Christ, that’s okay — just as long as they don’t reject US in the process. If we’re not rejected, we’ll have another chance to show Christ to them in the future. To prevent the tragedy of losing such a relationship, we need to understand what genuine love and acceptance looks like. A key point in this is realizing that before God wants people to be good, He wants them to be SAVED. After all, good fruit cannot be produced by the old nature. In other words, don’t condemn the actions unless you’re committed to healing the heart. But perhaps most importantly, we’re seeking ways to understand how pure, undefiled love can be promoted in all our relationships — not just those within the Church.
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Shame on you. Shame on me. Yes, we’re all sinners in a fallen state, so shame shame SHAME!! Actually, one of the coolest things that Jesus did (besides providing for our eternal salvation and fellowship with God the Father in heaven) was take away our shame (see Romans 9:33). Shame is “the painful feeling arising from the consciousness of something dishonorable, improper, ridiculous, etc., done by oneself or another.” So, shame is a feeling. Well I can understand how there is no shame in being a sinner in the eternal sense, but what about the daily stuff that goes on in the life of a believer?
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One of the goals of Crossroads Church is to be able to take the church to the people, not just wait for the people to come to the church. We do that by being ministers at our jobs, at school, in coffeeshops, etc. Jesus regularly held meetings where the people were. We need to do the same — and get over our hangups regarding what constitutes a “legitimate” meeting of the church.
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People are tired. They’re tired of working for unappreciative bosses (supervisors, teachers, pastors, etc.), tired of wasting time on repetitive tasks, tired of having to work a job to make a meager living. People are tired of the way things are — and they wish things could change.

I’ve had the chance to talk to a large number of people as part of the process of planting this new church. Many seem interested in the new church — but often because of the simple fact that they’re tired of their old church. (Lots of them have in fact been through several churches in their past.) They’re tired of “not getting fed,” tired of “too many glitzy programs,” or even tired of “spending so much money on staff and buildings.”

You know what I’m tired of? I’m tired of lost people going to hell.
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As part of the process of starting a new church, the topic of how we intend to raise up leadership always comes up in discussion when we talk with folks about how things have been going. Now, there are the usual “pat answers;” such as, “Our leadership is comprised of elders who are qualified according to what the Bible says in 1 Timothy chapter 3 and Titus chapter 1.” While these principles are undoubtedly true, we feel that a few more qualifications need to be true as well.
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Continuing on with observations and ruminations from the Acts-29 Boot Camp, I’ve been camping on the concept of what makes church attractive to the masses. We’ve done it all at my church, tried everything to keep people interested in coming and relating to the church in their everyday lives. Some ideas have worked, some haven’t. The common thread is that we are constantly looking for the “next idea” – the next big thing that will keep people interested in the things of God. What if the “next big thing” is just preaching a big Jesus?

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This was the title of the first talk of the evening given by Dr. Ed Stetzer. As I mentioned in the last post, Dr. Stetzer is a relatively young guy, but he has a vast experience in the world of church planting, having been involved in it since 1988 (I was still in high-school then).

Missiology is simply the study of missions. The word “missional” is used a lot these days, especially in the context of the Emerging Church. It means, quite simply, to act in and be identified in missions. Just like the word “adversarial” means to act as an advisary. As for church planting, it is a missional endeavor in that church planting is a true venue for people to ask the hard questions about missions.

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You’ve all seen them – beautiful, intricate, painstakingly hand-crafted ships in bottles. They reflect the skill and talent of their craftsman, and not just anybody can build them. But as anybody who has seen one being built, or has tried to build one on their own knows, you don’t build the ship inside the bottle, you design it, fabricate it, and perform much of the detailed finish work outside the bottle. You then fold it up, squeeze it through the opening, pull the magic string, and “poof!” your ship snaps into place. Once this is done, the only way to get the ship out of the bottle is to break the bottle.

Is this a fitting analogy for how churches are built in America these days?
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Of all the promises in the Bible, I think Psalm 37:4-6 is my favorite.

Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him and he will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.
Psalm 37:4-6 (NIV)

As a worship leader, I want my “cause” to flourish. That is, I want to be able to lead people to worship the Lord in the services I help with – every time we meet. I want them to experience a personal encounter with Jesus as if He were in the room with us. However, I sometimes get too caught up in that aspect of worship – and I end up focusing on the crowd rather than the Lord. Worse than that, I want to be the one to do this. I want to be the one people come to after the service and say, “That worship REALLY moved me. You are SO awesome, Dave. Wow – how do you do it every week?” Even as I type it, I know how ridiculous that sounds.
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Douglas Adams, in his book “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” pokes more than a little fun at religion. He describes the “people” in the galaxy as being rather proud, definitely enlightened (and deceived at the same time) – and all around just plain goofy. Now, don’t get me wrong – I am a fan of the “Hitchhiker’s” series – and I find the humor and satire somewhat refreshing. I do believe that when Adams pokes fun at religion, he is poking fun at us – reminding us not to take ourselves too seriously. He also pokes fun at politics, bureaucracy, the British, construction workers, social functions – the list goes on. He is one of the heros of our cynical world.
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