As You Go...

Today a few of us from the church plant went out with Jude. We decided to walk since the day was beautiful. As we were walking a young guy by the name of Raymond started talking with me out of nowhere. Turns out Raymond just moved into the area and is looking for a job. We invited Raymond to come to Starbucks with us and was surprised that we did so. After coffee, we went back to Jude's place to hang out. On the way, we picked up some job applications for Raymond at the different business on Euclid Avenue. Raymond expressed interest in coming to the dinner on Friday night. Raymond is another person who we never planned on meeting. He just sort of appeared! God has a way of encouraging me through these type of "divine interruptions."

Hey Jude

Here's a poem from my new friend Jude who has muscular dystrophy. We met Jude on our evangelism visits and he has been hanging out with us. Jude's poetry shows the rawness of his feelings and emotions. He will be performing at Common Grounds, June 5th, 8pm during open mic.

Gravity

Up: in the air, in the chair, in my lap, in the clasp of my hand.
Down: to the ground, beyond my reach, between these feet, beneath this seat.

So quickly, things fall below me—
It’s not supernatural…It’s just GRAVITY.

Gravity—When all I want is to stay awake, it weighs on my eyelids like some unwelcome blindfold; like I needed to be told, “Bedtime…lights out I say!”

Gravity—What gives you the right? You wouldn’t let the fighter rise to his feet, they had to call it in the 8th. You still try to get the best of people, you try to keep them down, even though they’ve tried to turn their lives’ around. That ain’t right!

Gravity—You’re the reason toothpaste dribbles down my chin after I’ve already changed and am ready to go. Now I can’t, now I gotta face the daunting task of putting on a fresh change of pants. I can’t go out with white spots on my crotch. You never know what people might think. Thanks a lot, gravity, now I’ll never make my escape.

Gravity—You keep me bending, you keep me reaching, you keep me doubled over. I’ve done many a face dive because of you - right to the floor - while I waited patiently for my turn. I bit the dust, took a spill, suffered rug burn…on my forehead.

Gravity—You asshole, remember the time when I came home with a Tiffany and we were so close to bed, but without my strap on I succumbed to the floor instead. I’ve fixed that now – at least – started wearing my seat-belt all the time.

Gravity—A million times my book fell, my Discman dropped, batteries lost. How many times will you make me rinse off silverware? Could you delay me any more? Spilled drinks, over-turned ashtrays, dinner-go-plop – what the hell? - do you really think I can operate a mop?

Gravity—You sick son-of-a-bitch, always taking up all my time. Whether you’re swallowing my cell phone, making off with my money or causing the arching of my spine, it’s always turning a smile to frown.

Gravity—What purpose do you serve anyway? Without you things would always be up in the air, just how I like it. Gravity, sometimes I wish you’d just stay the fuck away from me.

Starbucks In The Park

My life is filled with more than just bland chicken breast and canned tuna but also Starbucks Iced Coffee! I knew that Great Harvest Bread is hard to turn down when conducting our evangelism surveys but I thought an added thing, like free Starbucks would be helpful. Peter White has the hook up at Starbucks and since it is my second home (the manager, Laura, sees me 4-5 times a weeks) I thought we had a good chance of getting a good deal on drinks. Peter put in the order for us wit getting iced coffee for our day at Woodland Park. Peter told me that instead of paying full price they would give it to us for half price. I was thrilled! Surprisingly when I went to pay the barista today she told me not to worry about it. The manager donated 80 cups of iced coffee, half/half, syrups, and cups for free! I was blown away. We didn’t know what we were getting ourselves into today. I told Brady, Alicia, Lacy, and Ron that this is an experiment. We went out there, started off in prayer and developed a game plan. The funny thing it is pretty cool how plans change while your playing the game. We took turns “manning” the table and going out in pairs to engage the people. We met several people today and had a few significant conversations. After about two and half hours at the park. I wanted to thank the group by going out for ice cream. We piled in Alicia’s car and took of for Graeters. After our trip to Graeters the team was ready to do more visits! I was praising God for people who are willing to get out and do the work of evangelism.

Will Hunting

Friday night we hosted our second dinner in the new house. By the end of the night we had 25 people show up and many first-time guest. We praise God for the work he is doing in our midst. God is bringing people to us from all walks of life like Antonio, Ben, Jude, and Jimmy! The evening ended with Jude reciting some of his poetry for us. He definitely has a gift.
We followed the dinner up with an “after party” at Alicia’s parent’s house. Her parent’s were out of town and we broke out the board games and ping-pong. I know we are a wild bunch. It was cool to get to know some of Alicia’s friends. One of them was a police officer for UK’s campus, his name is Pete. I asked Pete if I could do a ride around with him next week. I figured what better way to learn about the needs of the community than to roll with a cop. At the very end of the evening, Antonio, who usually is pretty quiet told me he had an awesome time. I was blown away by a comment so mundane because of who it was coming from. First of all Antonio is a great man, but a man of few words. It was nice to see him enjoying himself and feeling embraced by the community. Guys like Antonio have impressed me because he has been willing to go visit with us. Antonio is still pretty new to the church, might not have the education or socio-economic background that others do but is willing to do the work that very few people are willing to do…get out of their comfort zone and be a laborer in the harvest field. The guy even went out with us in the rain!!!

All it takes is a willing heart to serve God. When I was in seminary I almost forgot that. People would get so caught up in reading textbooks about evangelism or living in community instead of actually putting into practice what they are reading. Sometimes I think people hide behind books. I’m tired of the talk and hype that books bring. I know you can learn a lot from books and of course it is great to read but if faith without works is dead than reading without acting is also death. When I was thinking about this today the movie, Good Will Hunting, starring Matt Damon and Robin Williams came to mind. Here’s Will (Matt Damon) who is a genius that can quote every book ever written. But Will doesn’t know what life is really about behind what he is reading. I know this is a long quote with some expletives but I think it’s right on to living a life that is integrated.

Sean: So if I asked you about art, you'd probably give me the skinny on every art book ever written. Michelangelo, you know a lot about him. Life's work, political aspirations, him and the pope, sexual orientations, the whole works, right? But I'll bet you can't tell me what it smells like in the Sistine Chapel. You've never actually stood there and looked up at that beautiful ceiling; seen that. If I ask you about women, you'd probably give me a syllabus about your personal favorites. You may have even been laid a few times. But you can't tell me what it feels like to wake up next to a woman and feel truly happy. You're a tough kid. And I'd ask you about war, you'd probably throw Shakespeare at me, right, "once more unto the breach dear friends." But you've never been near one. You've never held your best friend's head in your lap, watch him gasp his last breath looking to you for help. I'd ask you about love, you'd probably quote me a sonnet. But you've never looked at a woman and been totally vulnerable. Known someone that could level you with her eyes, feeling like God put an angel on earth just for you. Who could rescue you from the depths of hell. And you wouldn't know what it's like to be her angel, to have that love for her, be there forever, through anything, through cancer. And you wouldn't know about sleeping sitting up in the hospital room for two months, holding her hand, because the doctors could see in your eyes, that the terms "visiting hours" don't apply to you. You don't know about real loss, 'cause it only occurs when you've loved something more than you love yourself. And I doubt you've ever dared to love anybody that much. And look at you... I don't see an intelligent, confident man... I see a cocky, scared shitless kid. But you're a genius Will. No one denies that. No one could possibly understand the depths of you. But you presume to know everything about me because you saw a painting of mine, and you ripped my fucking life apart. You're an orphan right?
[Will nods]
Sean: You think I know the first thing about how hard your life has been, how you feel, who you are, because I read Oliver Twist? Does that encapsulate you? Personally... I don't give a shit about all that, because you know what, I can't learn anything from you, I can't read in some fuckin' book. Unless you want to talk about you, who you are. Then I'm fascinated. I'm in. But you don't want to do that do you sport? You're terrified of what you might say. Your move, chief.

Billy Idol Gets It

Friday afternoon a few of us with the church plant went to Jude’s house for lunch. We enjoyed hanging out with Jude and learned more about his story. We asked him to come to Friday night dinner and he said that he would. As we were in the middle of conversation we heard a knock at the door. Jude asked the person to come in. It was a sharp-dressed black man in a suit. Jude told him he was with friends and to come by later. Jude turns to us and says that this guy always comes by unannounced despite Jude asking him to call before he comes over. I asked Jude who the man was and he said it was a Jehovah’s Witness. I looked over at Brady and winked because I was telling him the other day how we can learn from JW and Mormons. Major cults as Mormonism, the Jehovah’s Witness, and some New Age groups have been “busting at the seams” when it comes to growth. U.S. News and World Report recorded the following:

“Today the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, better known as the Mormon Church, is one of the world’s richest and fastest-growing religious movements. Since World War II, its ranks have quadrupled to more than 8.3 members worldwide. With 4.5 million U.S. members, Mormonism already outnumbers Presbyterians and Episcopalians combined. If current trends hold, by some estimates they will number 250 million worldwide by 2080 and surpass all but the Roman Catholic Church among Christian bodies.”

Part of the reason for this growth is they still believe in visiting from house to house. The scary thing is that before there were Mormons and Jehovah’s Witness, there was Methodism! So what’s my point? My point is that before one could be ordained as a Methodist minister they would have to answer some tough questions. In paragraph 336 of the Discipline there is a section on the Historic Examination for Admission into Full Connection. There are nineteen questions asked by the bishop to those that are seeking ordination in an annual conference. These questions are to be engaged in a prayerful manner before being answered by the men or women. However I find it interesting that something as historic as these questions can be reduced by some bishops as only a ritual and not normative for the society we live in today. I believe these questions are not ritual but something that must be committed to by every person who vows to carry them out. Question 15 is “will you visit from house to house?” I think we need to return to something that has received criticism and be willing to do what others are not willing to do. It may look different depending on the context and setting but there is something about it that’s still effective.

Surveying The Land

Before I started the actual “planting” of the church I looked at demographics of the Woodland Park/Chevy Chase area. I have access to Claritas and Percept data but I wanted to also send out “spies” to get the real picture of what ministries look like in the community. I have wanted spies to survey the community similar to the story in Joshua 2 where Joshua secretly sent out two spies from the Israelite camp to survey the land. We have recently started the survey portion of our visits this past Monday. We have already noticed that a majority of our visitors were receptive and remembered our introduction with the bread. It bought us a little credibility right off the bat with our second visit to each receptive house. I have gone out the past few days with my Western NY buddy, Brady. It is exciting to see Brady discover a gift and passion for evangelism that he might have not known was there. Brady’s zeal and excitement has been uplifting for me. Two main encounters stick out where we went in the people’s houses and stayed for a while. The first was Ben, who works at UK’s physical plant. Ben seemed like a friendly guy who invited us in his home for about 35 minutes. Ben desires to go to a church that is right in the community where he sees his neighbors and people he works with. It was great to see that he understands the theology of a church for the community maybe even better than I do.

The second encounter was with Jude, a guy we met the other day. Jude admitted he is skeptical about God because of things he has been through in his life. I am going to lunch with him Friday and he is coming to our community dinner.

Please pray that some of our visitors show up to our dinner on Friday!

Bittersweet

For the past 5 years or so I have been apart of one of the greatest churches in Lexington. God has used The Rock/La Roca UMC to shape me in ways I never expected. The relationships that have formed whether they are with youth, the elderly, Hispanics, or Africans will last a lifetime. I have had people step up and be my family, especially during the last year and half going through a gruesome divorce. I have some people who have stuck by and supported me. During the past two weeks I have felt God calling me in a challenging way. God has been asking me if I am really willing to be “sent out.” I have to admit, leaving the Rock is leaving my comfort zone. I know that the Rock supports me and is my sending agent, however it is still a difficult process. If I’m not willing to go across town than how can I be willing to go across the world?
I will miss many things at the Rock but I know that being obedient to God, even as scary will be worth it.