Lincoln Brewster's Power of Your Name.

I hope we all can understand that bringing God's Kingdom to earth is in fact, at least in part, our responsibility. Jesus teaching on how we are to treat each other is quite clear. With love, grace and compassion.

Our Role "In Christ"

This is a quote from Larry Crabb. Author of Soul Care, Connecting and others.

"You need to look at people as ones who bear the image of God, who are profoundly valuable. Your message is not to judge them, to get them to stop smoking, to get the rings out of their ears, or even to get them to stop having affairs. That isn't the message. God is not looking to moralize the world; God is looking to restore the world to Himself, and the result will be morality. People are so desperately hungry for someone who cares, for someone who's interested. When's the last time you told a story and people listened to you all the way through? I mean, who cares when you tell somebody that you've been to the hospital? Nobody's interested in hearing the details for half an hour. I'm convinced that if we learn to appreciate people and take them seriously, our success in personal evangelism will double."

"God's Calling us to do that which he does, to care deeply for others. Our world needs almost nothing more than it needs us to genionely care for one for another. Not everyone will adopt this example, the question is will you or I?"

"Lord, set a passion in my heart to care for people. Shape my heart into one that cares deeply for others."

All I can say is AMEN!!

Really?

Interesting Video from a UK version of American Idol. Check out the video HERE and post your reactions.

Do you know of Jesus Love for You?

Brennan Manning is one of my favorite authors and speakers. Check out this video and let me know what you think?

The End of Christian America by Jon Meacham

Interesting article in Newsweek today. I will be posting some comments on the article in the near future, but I am interested in your comments/insights!

You can check it out HERE

First Gathering of Missio Dei

WOW! what an amazing first gathering. 52 people gathered to share a meal and worship together. It was all I had hoped and then some. We gathered in grace and honesty. We focused our attention upon the belief that God's Kingdom is real and now. This reality gives us the opportunity and responsibility to extend the love and justice of God to ALL of those with whom we have contact.
We created a "suspended space" where we suspend all of our judgements about all of those gathered with us for our time together. Judgements of other's race, gender, social status, political ideology, theological understanding, etc. with the hope that if we can suspend it for a couple of hours on Sunday, perhaps we can life this way every day!
We left with the belief that God's community of people are both gathered and sent. We can't remain in our own comfortable little world of blessings but must be a condiut of this blessing to the world. So we go into the world in which we live to perpetuate good, consistent with the life, love, teachings and provision of Christ. To help those who are hurting. To be good stewards of what God has entrusted to us.

The questions we are asking are consistent with a video you can watch HERE. Here am I, Send Me.

So, Missio Dei begins!

Bartender

Here is a link of me singing the Dave Matthews song, "Bartender" with Derek Johnson and Erik Bondo playing guitar backup. Hope you enjoy!
Find it here.

Last Sunday At Wenatchee Nazarene

Yesterday was my last Sunday at the church at which I have pastored for the past 6 years. I have attached a tribute that was recorded by Donavon King Here. Check it out.

The Missional Church

Here are a couple of great videos that explain very well the missional approach that Missio Dei is taking.

To look at Tim Keller's video click here
about 4 minutes

To look at Michael Frost's video click here
about 55 minutes

Post by Oliver Phillips

THIS IS MY DESIRE FOR MISSIO DEI in the often unknown and misunderstood Wesleyan tradition.

Six Things I Discovered about John Wesley (1703-1791)
Oliver R. Phillips
Having recently read a scholarly work by Irv Brendlinger entitled ”Social Justice through the Eyes of Wesley,” I have garnered a renewed thirst to glare back into the life of this extraordinary man. Wesley was undoubtedly a man before his times who almost singlehandedly brought an end to the practice of slavery in Europe and America. There seems to be an information gap regarding the passions of John Wesley. All too often the emphasis has been on his convictions about the need for the second work of grace and personal piety. There is substantially more to Wesley than the personal salvific motif.
1. Wesley’s visit to the United States (1736-1738) exposed him to the indignities and inhumanity of slavery and the slave trade. This exposure became foundational to his later advocacy on behalf of the abolition movement.
2. In 1773 Wesley published a tract entitled “Thoughts upon Slavery,” 53 pages, which became a stinging indictment on the practice of slavery. For the remaining years of his life this document was his clarion call to end the practice of slavery.
3. On February 24, 1791, days before his death, Wesley sent a letter to William Wilberforce (anti-slavery fighter) in which he wrote “O be not weary in well doing! Go on, in the name of God and in the power of His might, till even American slavery (the vilest that ever saw the sun) shall vanish away before it.”
4. Wesley contrasted from his contemporaries in that, while they were tolerant of the practice of slavery and opposed to the slave trade, Wesley was opposed to both the practice of slavery and the slave trade as well.
5. Isaiah 58:6 was an important passage to Wesley. As such, he was unequivocal – “… works of mercy are to be preferred. Even reading, hearing, prayer, are to be omitted, or to be postponed, ‘at charity’s almighty call,’ when we are called to relieve the distress of our neighbor, whether in body or soul.”
6. Wesley condemned the temptation to withdraw from the affairs of society. He said “The Gospel of Christ knows of no religion but social; no holiness but social holiness.”
These are merely a few characteristics of John Wesley that I missed in my studies. I’m glad for this holy reunion. What about you? THINK ON THESE THINGS!

Revelation on the go!

I was reading this week in John 2, where Jesus took a hand made whip and drove the money changers out of the temple. Ever heard the story? There are many things that came to mind as I was studying this particular story. Why does John place this story in the beginning of his narrative, unlike Matthew, for instance, who places it after Jesus' entry into Jerusalem following His triumphal entry the week before his crucifiction? Does this mean He did this twice? Perhaps. Or why does Jesus, whose story in one of peace and forgiveness, show so much "anger" in this story? I mean, he doesn't just find a whip laying around, He takes the time to make one! Kinda strange. He seems to be deconstructing the sacrificial model of worship that God's people had followed for so many generations. When asked for a miracle to show He had authority to do this, He says, "tear this temple down, and I will rebuild it in 3 days". In this statement, the underlying inference, that no one got, is that Jesus was going to replace their sacrificial system of worship with a once and for all sacrifice, for all people, for all time.
All of these are parts of the story, but something stood out to me that I had never seen before. There are 2 things that are in this story that show how current things that are seen and/or heard, may not be understood right now, but given light later. When Jesus drove the people and cattle et al out of the temple, the disciples remembered a scripture they had heard earlier but never got till now. " Zeal for my house will consume me"; a messianic Psalm. The other is of Jesus statement referenced above, "Destroy this temple and I will raise it again in three days". Again, they didn't get it at the time, but after Jesus was raised from the dead, the disciples remembered it and that gave life into their believe in scripture and in Jesus.
We live in a modern world that is so desperate for answers. We seek unyieldingly for them. We read scripture and want to have what it means right now. Is it possible that scripture is self revealing through life, instead of the mental gymnastics that we go through? What if we began to read God's word this way. Instead of a tech manual, like a life breathed word that reveals itself to us in the context of our lives. Love to hear your thoughts about this.

Peter Rollins interview on the Emerging Church

I find this to be a fascinating discussion which enters us into some discussions that are needed. Check it out here and hosnestly discuss your thoughts.

The Gospel?

We have heard this term used so often and understand it to mean "Good News". If familiarity breeds contempt?, (the more familiar you are with something, or someone, the more apt you are to find fault with it) then perhaps we need to take a fresh look at what the Good News is about.
So, here is the assignment. In your own words, tell us what you think the "Good News" is in the cultural context of 2009 America.

The end of the road begins again!

I have been on a journey that has taken some interesting twists in the past several years. Serving at the Wenatchee Church of the Nazarene has been a tremendous blessing. It has taught me a great many things about who I am and who I am not. As this revelation has become increasingly clear, I made a decision to follow God's leading which included resigning my position as the lead pastor of the Wenatchee Church of the Nazarene and begin the formation of a new faith community in Wenatchee.
This new work is being named Missio Dei and in the posts that follow, you will see some of the vision that is being formed as we move forward. I am grateful for the continued prayers of people as we seek to follow God as He continues to guide us!
So, as I stand here at the end of one road, I am awakened to the reality that God has not led me to a dead end. Where there is nowhere to turn. At the end of one road, there is another that begins again.
This is the hope in which we have in Christ. To live as a person of hope, does not always mean that things in which we hope will happen exactly like we think! Many times, when we lose hope, it is because things are not happening according to our expectations. This is why Jesus was left alone on the cross, because this messiah was not doing things the way they expected. The Kingdom that He was establishing was not as they thought it should be. But Christ was doing something signifcantly beyond their expectations. I love that.
So what does that mean for me. I have had many hopes and expectations that have not been realized. But my hope, rightly directed, is in Christ himself and not the expectations I have for the way He will work things out. My hope is in Him, and it is time for me, at the end of this road, to begin walking down the new road that begins again.

The reckless raging fury of the love of God

Brennan Manning writes in his great book, The Ragamuffin Gospel, “Creation discloses a power that baffles our minds and beggars our speech. We are enamored and enchanted by God’s power. We stutter and stammer about God’s holiness. We tremble about God’s majesty…. And yet we grow squeamish and skittish before God’s love.”
Why is that? We seem to acknowledge that God’s power, holiness and majesty are universal constants of God’s nature and character but somehow we can so quickly narrow His love to a limited few chosen ones. That He dispenses love and withholds it at His own bidding. Like, His love is there for the taking. All you have to do is accept it and you can have it.
It doesn’t seem to require an act on our part for His power or holiness or majesty to exist. It just does. I wonder if our problem might just be in an error in our definition of love. In the Greek, there are many words. Phileo is a love of friendship and camaraderie. That kind of love is limited to the context of relationship. We love our friends and phileo (love) is not dispensed to those we don’t know. It requires relationship. It is the same for eros (love). It is the love between lovers the root of the word erotic. It is the stuff from which babies are made. Again, it requires a relationship to be dispensed.
Ah, but then there is agape (love). This is the love of God. It is the love that is dispensed by God upon the whole world with no regard to our response to it. It comes completely without conditions. I don’t think we can really wrap our heads around a love like this in a world that is so filled with conditions.
Just for a moment, I want you to strip yourself bare of anything that you think could possibly come between you and God’s love. Your behavior or rather misbehavior. Your thoughts or rather impure thoughts. Your worthiness or rather unworthiness. A love that would say,” right in the middle of your wrong doing, before you even knew of its existence or My existence, I LOVE YOU!”
That is a love that is extended to the prostitute on the streets of Las Vegas and to those gathered in worship on a Sunday morning church service. It is extended to those who have mistreated us and/or the ones we love and to the one who walks in honesty and truth and generosity.
Maybe this is at the heart of our problem. We cannot conceive of extending love outside of the context of relationship, especially those who don’t do the things that would seem to make them worthy of our love. It seems so reckless. seems so dangerous. It may even seem to us that if we extend love to someone whose life is steeped in such "wrong doing", we are endorsing their behavior. Because, of course, it is our job to point out people's wrong doing so they can repent right?