GO...

I'm up...2:39am...couldn't sleep!!! I've officially been ruined. My ideals crushed and religious boundaries smashed to tiny fragments. By what you ask? Well, God of course being the source, but a cat named Alan Hirsch, the means and instrument in God's hands. What ideals have been crushed? What boundaries have been smashed, you ask? Well my view of the church and our call in this world and specifically in the city of Oakland. Let me tell you what happened:

So yesterday, at our Oakland City Church (OCC) staff meeting we were dreaming out loud about our neighborhood groups and their connection to the church. And as we're dreaming I'm working from my basic paradigm of how we get people to come to church. The goal is to get them to come to us, from wherever they are, we need to bring them to us. So the neighborhood groups were a means to an ultimate end. Get them to us!!! But as we're wrestling with the goals and purposes of our neighborhood groups, Josh (Pastor @ OCC) puts on a YouTube clip by Alan Hirsch (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNUR2csmR5M&feature=related) and i hear this world & life changing statement: Don't Plant A Church, Plant A Movement!!!

He uses this image of the starfish and its reproductive power. That if you a cut a single starfish into 10 pieces you would have 10 new starfish. Do the math and be amazed. But the math is not the key, the reproductive power is!!! Each starfish, no each cut off piece of the starfish has the ability to produce a whole new starfish!!! And he points this reality to the church and the lost being won and discipleship happening in relational ways. That each believer has within himself (by God's Grace in, through and because of Christ) the ability to reach out and reproduce himself (i.e win new people to Christ, namely his/her network). Yes, each follower of Christ can produce more followers of Christ. We contain unlimited reproductive power within us. And that clarified for me our purpose for neighborhood groups, for the church itself and my role as a pastor, to help others reach their unlimited reproductive potential. Ephesians 4:12 says, that God has given the minitsry gifts to the church for the purpose of equipping the saints for the work of the ministry to build up the body of Christ. So it's helping people see more of Christ, so that they can help other people see more of Christ, who will help more people, who will help more people...That's a movement yall!!! Getting people to go, to be mission minded and to reach others for Christ!!! Each of us, in our families, our neighborhoods, our jobs, and our networks.

So he said don't plant a church (where people just come) but plant a movement where people go. Yes they come back to continue being equipped and strengthened, but they come back with others, who go and bring back others, who get strengthened and go and bring back others. So our journey becomes this constant going and coming. Jesus says, come unto me all that are heavily burdened and I will give you rest. Then he says, Go ye therefore unto the world and make disciples. Then he says, come unto me - worship, pray, confess, sing, preach, praise & study. Then he says, Go - love, serve, encourage, and disciple others! Then he says, COME...Then He says, GO!!!

Let's Go Family!!! Oakland is waiting on us!!!

Some additional notes from sermon yesterday

The teaching from this week is up.

Faith is the first command and most common command of Jesus. It may seem impossible to command faith - as impossible as it is to command love (Mk 12:30-31) - but Jesus says that this is the most crucial step.

Faith is the only way we can know we are hearing Good News - good news, as opposed to good advice, can only be received by trusting. Faith here is something a lot like humility.

Faith is the only we can enter the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom is the great inversion. God uses the weak of the world to redeem the world (1 Cor 1:26-31). The king Himself leads by serving. But we are impressed by power and impatient for results. Our instincts are off when it comes to the way the kingdom works - so we need to proceed by faith. We need to trust God's ways more than we trust our own.

Quote from Reinhold Niebuhr is helpful here. "Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. "

Faith is the way through the wilderness. There are lots of voices out there that speak louder than God's voices - each of them telling us who we are and what we should want. Faith is focusing not so much on our own sinful desires or actions (of which there are plenty) but on what God says.

This is why we do Bible study, church etc... not to make an experience happen or to gain credit. We do it to hear God's voice more clearly, to ground our faith.

Two Articles

An article I read this week helped me to wrestle with this idea. Bridges concludes that the gospel of grace by faith is for everyone, including Christians.

As I see it, the Christian community is largely a performance-based culture today. And the more deeply committed we are to following Jesus, the more deeply ingrained the performance mindset is. We think we earn God's blessing or forfeit it by how well we live the Christian life. Most Christians have a baseline of acceptable performance by which they gauge their acceptance by God. For many, this baseline is no more than regular church attendance and the avoidance of major sins. Such Christians are often characterized by some degree of self-righteousness. After all, they don't indulge in the major sins we see happening around us. Such Christians would not think they need the gospel anymore. They would say the gospel is only for sinners.

For committed Christians, the baseline is much higher. It includes regular practice of spiritual disciplines, obedience to God's Word, and involvement in some form of ministry. Here again, if we focus on outward behavior, many score fairly well. But these Christians are even more vulnerable to self-righteousness, for they can look down their

spiritual noses not only at the sinful society around them but even at other believers who are not as committed as they are. These Christians don't need the gospel either. For them, Christian growth means more discipline and more commitment.

Bridges concludes: "So I learned that Christians need to hear the gospel all of their lives because it is the gospel that continues to remind us that our day-to-day acceptance with the Father is not based on what we do for God but upon what Christ did for us. I began to see that we stand before God today as righteous as we ever will be, even in heaven, because he has clothed us with the righteousness of his Son. Therefore, I don't have to perform to be accepted by God. Now I am free to obey him and serve him because I am already accepted in Christ (see Rom. 8:1). My driving motivation now is not guilt but gratitude."

Also liked this article.

Immersed in God. Immersed in the World.

This week we are looking at the the first preaching of the gospel of Jesus. In Mark 1:14-15 it says; "The time is fulfilled. The Kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the gospel." The word that has really grabbed me (although almost every phrase in this text could be a sermon) is this word 'believe'. Faith, trust, belief obviously comes up a lot in the New Testament and I am aware of how little I understand it's importance.

Reading on this, I was reminded of C.S. Lewis' discussion of faith in Mere Christianity. He writes:

“I am not asking anyone to accept Christianity if his best reasoning tells him that the weight of the evidence is against it. That is not the point at which Faith comes in. But supposing a man’s reason once decides that the weight of the evidence is for it. I can tell that man what is going to happen to him in the next few weeks. There will come a moment when there is bad news, or he is in trouble, or is living among a lot of other people who do not believe it, and all at once his emotions will rise up and carry out a sort of blitz on his belief. Or else there will come a moment when he wants a woman, or wants to tell a lie, or feels very pleased with himself, or sees a chance of making a little money in some way that is not perfectly fair: some moment, in fact, at which it would be very convenient if Christianity were not true. And once again his wishes and desires will carry out a blitz. I am not talking of moments at which any real new reasons against Christianity turn up. Those have to be faced and that is a different matter. I am talking about moments where a mere mood rises up against it.

"I was assuming that if the human mind once accepts a thing as true it will automatically go on regarding it as true, until some real reason for reconsidering it turns up. In fact, I was assuming that the human mind is completely ruled by reason. But that is not so. For example, my reason is perfectly convinced by good evidence that anaesthetics do not smother me and that properly trained surgeons do not start operating until I am unconscious. But that does not alter the fact that when they have me down on the table and clap their horrible mask over my face, a mere childish panic begins inside me. I start thinking I am going to choke, and I am afraid they will start cutting me up before I am properly under. In other words, I lose my faith in anaesthetics. It is not reason that is taking away my faith: on the contrary, my faith is based on reason. It is my imagination and emotions. The battle is between faith and reason on one side and emotion and imagination on the other.”

I am particularly struck with how he connects faith and reason, not as enemies, but as allies.

Faith and Reason

This week we are looking at the the first preaching of the gospel of Jesus. In Mark 1:14-15 it says; "The time is fulfilled. The Kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the gospel." The word that has really grabbed me (although almost every phrase in this text could be a sermon) is this word 'believe'. Faith, trust, belief obviously comes up a lot in the New Testament and I am aware of how little I understand it's importance.

Reading on this, I was reminded of C.S. Lewis' discussion of faith in Mere Christianity. He writes:

“I am not asking anyone to accept Christianity if his best reasoning tells him that the weight of the evidence is against it. That is not the point at which Faith comes in. But supposing a man’s reason once decides that the weight of the evidence is for it. I can tell that man what is going to happen to him in the next few weeks. There will come a moment when there is bad news, or he is in trouble, or is living among a lot of other people who do not believe it, and all at once his emotions will rise up and carry out a sort of blitz on his belief. Or else there will come a moment when he wants a woman, or wants to tell a lie, or feels very pleased with himself, or sees a chance of making a little money in some way that is not perfectly fair: some moment, in fact, at which it would be very convenient if Christianity were not true. And once again his wishes and desires will carry out a blitz. I am not talking of moments at which any real new reasons against Christianity turn up. Those have to be faced and that is a different matter. I am talking about moments where a mere mood rises up against it.

"I was assuming that if the human mind once accepts a thing as true it will automatically go on regarding it as true, until some real reason for reconsidering it turns up. In fact, I was assuming that the human mind is completely ruled by reason. But that is not so. For example, my reason is perfectly convinced by good evidence that anaesthetics do not smother me and that properly trained surgeons do not start operating until I am unconscious. But that does not alter the fact that when they have me down on the table and clap their horrible mask over my face, a mere childish panic begins inside me. I start thinking I am going to choke, and I am afraid they will start cutting me up before I am properly under. In other words, I lose my faith in anaesthetics. It is not reason that is taking away my faith: on the contrary, my faith is based on reason. It is my imagination and emotions. The battle is between faith and reason on one side and emotion and imagination on the other.”

I am particularly struck with how he connects faith and reason, not as enemies, but as allies.

This week we are looking at the the first preaching of the gospel of Jesus. In Mark 1:14-15 it says; "The time is fulfilled. The Kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the gospel." The word that has really grabbed me (although almost every phrase in this text could be a sermon) is this word 'believe'. Faith, trust, belief obviously comes up a lot in the New Testament and I am aware of how little I understand it's importance.

Reading on this, I was reminded of C.S. Lewis' discussion of faith in Mere Christianity. He writes:

“I am not asking anyone to accept Christianity if his best reasoning tells him that the weight of the evidence is against it. That is not the point at which Faith comes in. But supposing a man’s reason once decides that the weight of the evidence is for it. I can tell that man what is going to happen to him in the next few weeks. There will come a moment when there is bad news, or he is in trouble, or is living among a lot of other people who do not believe it, and all at once his emotions will rise up and carry out a sort of blitz on his belief. Or else there will come a moment when he wants a woman, or wants to tell a lie, or feels very pleased with himself, or sees a chance of making a little money in some way that is not perfectly fair: some moment, in fact, at which it would be very convenient if Christianity were not true. And once again his wishes and desires will carry out a blitz. I am not talking of moments at which any real new reasons against Christianity turn up. Those have to be faced and that is a different matter. I am talking about moments where a mere mood rises up against it.

"I was assuming that if the human mind once accepts a thing as true it will automatically go on regarding it as true, until some real reason for reconsidering it turns up. In fact, I was assuming that the human mind is completely ruled by reason. But that is not so. For example, my reason is perfectly convinced by good evidence that anaesthetics do not smother me and that properly trained surgeons do not start operating until I am unconscious. But that does not alter the fact that when they have me down on the table and clap their horrible mask over my face, a mere childish panic begins inside me. I start thinking I am going to choke, and I am afraid they will start cutting me up before I am properly under. In other words, I lose my faith in anaesthetics. It is not reason that is taking away my faith: on the contrary, my faith is based on reason. It is my imagination and emotions. The battle is between faith and reason on one side and emotion and imagination on the other.”

I am particularly struck with how he connects faith and reason, not as enemies, but as allies.

Strange Recommendation

So - not sure if you have heard of Nick Cave. Lead singer of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. Goth/Rock/Punk/Pop/Murder Balladeer - and Australian. Not many equivalents. On my research into Mark, I came across this amazing introduction he wrote to a recent publishing of the King James version.

Here's an excerpt: One day, I met an Anglican vicar and he suggested that I give the Old Testament a rest and read Mark instead. I hadn't read the New Testament at that stage because the New Testament was about Jesus Christ and the Christ I remembered from my choirboy days was that wet, all-loving, etiolated individual that the church proselytised. I spent my pre-teen years singing in the Wangaratta Cathedral Choir and even at that age I recall thinking what a wishy-washy affair the whole thing was. The Anglican Church: it was the decaf of worship and Jesus was their Lord.

"Why Mark?", I asked. "Because it's short", he replied. I was willing to give anything a go, so I took the vicar's advice and read it and the Gospel of Mark just swept me up.

Here, I am reminded of that picture of Christ, painted y Holman Hunt, where He appears, robed and handsome, a lantern in His hand, knocking on a door: the door to our hearts, presumably. The light is dim and buttery in the engulfing darkness. Christ came to me in this way, lumen Christi, with a dim light, a sad light, but light enough. Out of all the New Testament writings - from the Gospels, through the Acts and the complex, driven letters of Paul to the chilling, sickening Revelation - it is Mark's Gospel that has truly held me."

Intro to the Gospel of Mark

This Spring we are teaching on the gospel of Mark – the earliest story of Jesus of Nazareth. The experience of Jesus coming into their lives had changed everything for the early Christians and they were still reeling from the impact. Who was Jesus? He was clearly someone of immense power and authority – so much so that his followers often found themselves asking ‘Who is this?’ Yet at the same time he seemed to go willingly to a death that any other person would have avoided at all costs. Why did Jesus die? And what of the claims about his resurrection? What do you do with a person like this?

Mark’s story is a mix of history, biography and drama. But it doesn’t fit any of these perfectly. So Mark makes a new name for his sort of story. He calls it a ‘gospel’ which simply means ‘good news’. It’s not simply interesting history nor is it a ‘go and do likewise’ moralistic tale. A gospel is an honest reflection on the crisis that Jesus created. It is not a story with easy, moralistic answers. It doesn’t spell everything out. It allows us as the readers to make our own personal response. Is Jesus who he says he is? And if he is, what changes for us? Whether you are hearing these stories for the first time or the fiftieth, the same questions are asked of us.

As we teach through the book, we will not be giving good advice for living, good moral teaching or a new religious technique. We won’t be talking so much about us and what we should do. The story is about Jesus; who he is and what he has done. That’s the good news as Mark saw it – that Jesus came “not be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Mk 10:35).