Love Your Community

A few months ago I had an idea.

What if instead of having our regular Sunday morning worship service we instead served our community? As followers of Jesus we often talk about how church isn't just a place that we go to, rather it is a community of people passionately sharing, doing, and being the good news. Yet I think we seldom actually live this out in practice. So what if instead of setting up shop and expecting people to come to us, we instead took church to the people?

And Love Your Community was born.

Today our church gathered at a park not for a service, but to serve. We didn't stay together for long as we went out in several different teams to bless our community. One team picked up trash in the park, one team passed out water at the park, while another team passed out water at a local train station and in downtown Aurora. One team cleaned the windows of storefronts for free, while another team had our little ones hand out snacks and water to kids in the park. There was also a team of men who fired up the grills as we would conclude the day with a cookout, to which we would invite others from the park and community. We didn't advertise the church. We didn't even mention we were a church unless asked. We simply wanted to love our community.

Here are three reflections from the day:

1. Just because its free doesn't mean they want it. Many people received bottles of water, while many also weren't interested. I lead the window cleaning team and we offered free window cleaning to about seven businesses before someone accepted. In fact the first two businesses we cleaned actually tried to pay us, even after we had insisted our service was free. I find this interesting. We live in a culture where nothing is free. There is always a catch and there's always a cost. This inevitably spills over when it comes to blessing someone. The blessing itself can be seen as a gimmick, and even if it isn't its just assumed that the right thing to do is pay so we're all even. As i think more about this, I am reminded that grace is free. Jesus offers us grace, unmerited favor even though we're messed up sinners. We want to pay for it ourselves, make things even, and may even suspect the whole grace thing is a gimmick...but it isn't. I hope that today there were a handful of people, who if they experienced anything from us, that they experienced a small lesson on grace.

2. We enjoyed the favor of all the people. One of the beautiful characteristics of the early church described in Acts 2 was that they enjoyed the favor of the people. This was a reference to the people outside of the church, those who weren't yet Jesus-followers. By and large the church today doesn't enjoy the favor of the people. Christians are often seen as angry, hypocritical, and judgmental. As we began our cookout many people from the park and community began to join us, as they had been invited throughout the morning. Families, groups of friends, and even individual kids. It was moving to watch our church sit with these strangers, offer them something to eat, and talk with them. As our new friends left they sincerely thanked us and I am hopeful that at least the roughly 25 people who ate with us walked away with a more favorable image of the church, at least for today.

3. We had some church today! One of the things I tried to stress in promoting this event was that we're still having church. Its not just church when we show up to the theater to sing songs and hear a sermon, but its church just as much (if not more) when we go and serve together. Inevitably I'm sure some still saw this as a Sunday where we weren't having real church and they stayed home. To be honest as I was driving to a park at 9AM on a Sunday morning it felt weird, and there was a part of me that felt like I was a youth group kid skipping youth group to go to a rated R movie. As our window cleaning group was heading back I shared this with them saying, "it felt weird to not go to church today." Dominic, a ten year old on our team, responded "But we did go to church." He was absolutely right!

It was a great day and when I arrived at home my heart was full. I was so proud of our church and how they seemed to so effortlessly get into this and have such love and compassion for their community. I am blessed to pastor such an incredible group of people and believe that Jesus will continue to use us as we partner with him to be agents of redemption and hope in our community and world!

An Experience in Circuit Riding

The 1800's have often been referred to as "The Age of Methodism." One of the key elements of this movement were the circuit riders. Circuit riders were preachers who would travel by horseback from town to town, and city to city, preaching revivals in various venues.

This practice continues today somewhat as many preachers travel all over the world to speak at various venues, however unfortunately without the force and impact of the 19th century circuit riders.

While I do not for a minute claim to be an experience itinerant minister, I feel as if I've had a taste of this in the past few weeks, as we've spent a considerable amount of time in the car away from home. Here's what we've been up to:

Durley High School Camp:

On June 18-20 I spoke at a High School camp in Greenville, IL. The theme for the weekend was "Run to Win," and I spent some time walking through the story of Jonah with the students, and how we all have this propensity to run from God. As a creative response to one of my messages I invited campers to bring their shoes to the altar as a symbolic commitment to "turn in our running shoes." It was awesome to see an altar full of shoes! All in all, it was a great camp with a great staff and I would love to go back.

Resolution Church:

I had to leave camp early to return for church on Sunday morning to be officially installed as the Lead Pastor of Resolution Church. Our superintendent came and performed a brief installation service and anointed and prayed over us to pastor this church. It was a meaningful experience, moreso than I had expected. I preached a Father's Day message titled, "The Dad Who Stands in the Driveway," looking at the father in the Prodigal Son parable. Since then I've begun a series titled "Unstoppable," which is an eight-week series walking through the book of Acts.

Young Teen Camp:

I recently returned from Young Teen Camp at Sky Lodge Camp in Wisconsin. I direct this camp and have been doing so for five years. It is my favorite week of the year as many close friends join me in planning and leading this camp, and we get to witness 150 junior highers respond to God. This year our theme was "BIG," as we focused on how big God is and yet how this big God desires to be actively and intimately involved in our lives. It was an amazing week as at least 11 kids made first-time commitments to following Chirst, and the altar was full almost every night often even without invitation. Most Christ-followers begin their spiritual journey in the context of youth group or camp. What happens during this week matters!

This next weekend I will be heading up to Waukegan, IL to perform a wedding for a girl who was in my youth group. Her and her soon-to-be husband are great people to who love Jesus, and I am proud of them and honored to serve them in this capacity.

I may not be a modern day circuit rider but I do recognize that God has given me opportunities to minister in several different contexts, and often times I still don't understand how I got to this place in life and ministry. In many ways, I still feel like I've stumbled into this gig, but I'm humbled to know that God is using me, and though it may outwardly small and significant to me at times I trust that the Holy Spirit is doing some stuff and that gives me a sense of fulfillment in life!