God uses simple things

Nearly every day at 5:00 pm, missionary to Malawi Althea Meyer commits her time to hospital ministry with a team of faithful workers, and they have witnessed the radical impact Jesus makes on both young and old alike. Faced with a rising number of critically ill patients in Malawi and the challenges of ministering in government-run hospitals, Althea and two of her friends rallied others to become the southern Malawi Hospital Ministry.

At their first meeting, the women assembled care packages containing a bag of sugar, soap, and a packet of snacks for 60 patients. They prepared a message and then arranged to visit the ward for children needing special care.
On one occasion, a boy named Pedro arrived at the hospital as an emergency case. He had been playing on the banks of the river that runs through his village, and had just scooped up a handful of water when, suddenly, a crocodile emerged and snapped at his right arm. The animal was successful in the attack and came away with most of the boy’s lower arm.

After Pedro’s surgery, Althea noticed the fear in his mother’s eyes. Though he was in pain, she would not go near her son. Althea soon learned the mother believed her son was bewitched and the curse might pass to her if she touched him. Pedro needed his mother’s assistance if he was going to survive, and her attitude just had to change.
Children’s workers began ministering to the mother, helping her to understand Pedro’s condition and his need for her. They also explained the truth of the gospel, which demonstrates that if there were a curse on Pedro, it could be broken in Jesus’ name. The mother was so desperate in her fear and need that she grasped hold of the gospel message and was set free.

Throughout the following eight months, she stood by Pedro as he struggled through a series of reconstructive surgeries and a lengthy recovery. During this time, Pedro also came to Christ and he and his mother eventually left the hospital with faith in the Lord, new life, and a miracle.

Through simple things like baby dolls and soap, the love of Christ is reaching hundreds in impoverished countries like Malawi. These women took a small first step and God changed the life of an entire family.  What simple, practical things can you do in your own community to exemplify Christ’s love? 

Image via: babasteve

Speak the truth: Michael Spencer

This is a great read by Michael Spencer from his new blog “Jesus Shaped Spirituality”.  I highly recommend reading through his writing.

Over the last year there has been major transition in his life, chronicled in his more famous blog internetmonk.com.  His new place to write is result of it all coming down to the amazing teachings of Christ.

Read the following blurb from today’s excellent post.
“There are many Christians who would look at our multi-cultural ministry and criticize us for being too open to people of different color and culture.

But what are they really saying? That Jesus sent his disciples out to form a suburb? We all know better. The only way to stay safe in our subcultural comfort zones is to change Jesus to suit our “lifestyle” concerns.

I’ve learned in my life that when Christians speak of Jesus you must ask some basic questions.

Are they speaking of Jesus as he really was, or as they imagine him to be?

Does this Jesus bless and approve of a privileged status for one group, color, denomination or nation?

Does this Jesus call us to discipleship or simply preside over a way of life we’ve come to call the “Christian lifestyle?”

Does this Jesus cross barriers, or does he send us back to hang with our own kind?

Does this Jesus have a mission, or just a moral agenda?”

Read more questions on his website.

He’s had some soul penetrating quotes lately too:

I want some integrity and authenticity before I hear what you’ve got to say about all the things God has told you to say. I don’t want to have to deal with the hard truth of life AND the sudden discovery that what the church told me was pretty much a lot of spin.

When the church tells the truth, the church is really helpful. When it chooses to pump out “religious” versions of various popular myths, the church can make things worse.

We have to begin to think differently about our faith.  It can’t be a belief system that locks us into “christian club” meetings but instead one that gets us out into the streets.  Being the church in parks, like Mars Hill OKC did last week. Then even being friends with people we might get in trouble by religious leaders for hanging out with.

It is time to shake the current faith community up, it is time to wake up and see the needs around us.  We must realize, this life isn’t about pleasing self, but is ultimately about pleasing God.  What pleases God?

James 1:26 - 27
“26 If any one thinks he is religious, and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this man’s religion is vain. 27 Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” 

A Call and Commitment To The Urban Core

I wanted to share with you a write up done by Stacy May regarding the V360 effort here in Oklahoma City.

Oklahoma City: A Call and Commitment to the Urban Core
Forbes magazine recently named Oklahoma City the country’s most recession-proof city. Forbes cited a strong housing market, decreased unemployment and growth in agriculture, energy and manufacturing as contributing factors to its economic health. This is good news for residents of Oklahoma City. And it’s good news for a team of church planters who are passionate about bringing spiritual revitalization to a city that’s thriving economically.

From the inside out
City Catalyst Lance Humphreys attended the initial Vision360 meeting in Orlando in the fall of 2006. Lance wanted to participate in Vision 360 because he believes God wants to transform cities through the church in a way he hasn’t seen in his lifetime. He left the meeting asking himself, “What is God already doing in our city as it relates to church planting?”

Meanwhile, Executive Director Ben Nockels, and his wife Shannon, were living in Colorado Springs when God began to speak to their hearts about the importance of church planting. God led them back to Oklahoma City where they launched Mars Hill Church. “It was never about planting a church,” Ben says. “It was always about planting multiple churches. We knew this was not about our church plant, but about serving the entire city.”

From the beginning Lance and Ben had a sense that the urban center of Oklahoma City was to be the focal point of their efforts. They had observed the physical rebuilding that took place in the center of the city following the Oklahoma City Murrah Federal Building bombing in 1995. “The inner city became the focal and rallying point for renewed faith in our city,” Lance says. They longed for and believed that spiritual revitalization could take place just as economic revitalization had. And they felt the spiritual revitalization was going to take place from the inside out. “If we could impact the urban center then we could impact the entire metropolitan area,” Lance says.

Ben agrees: “Starting with the most forgotten, under-resourced and broken kids is going to be the avenue to really transform our cities.”

With a heart for the poor and broken, they started moving forward with a vision for their city that transcended what any one church could do alone.

Step by step
The following steps were key to launching Vision360 in Oklahoma City:

Narrow focus - The decision was made that for the first five years the team was not going to do anything that didn’t impact the city center. They felt that area was where the Lord had asked them to begin and they strived to keep their vision focused specifically on that area. This led to success in bringing both board support and financial support.

Networking - They built a relationship network with two groups of people that were already involved in church planting: young church planters and established churches who had a history of reproducing or had the capacity and heart to reproduce. “I began by building relationships with church planters in the urban center,” Lance says. “A core of five young church planters and myself began to dream about what it would look like to replant the church in Urban Oklahoma City.” Invitations - In the past six months Lance and Ben started inviting business and city leaders into the process. “We have aggressively pursued church leaders and business leaders who already demonstrated a buy-in to the vision,” Lance says. “We’ve gone after the people we want to work with. We’ve met individually with pastors we wanted to be involved with.”

An Education Strategy
Like many urban settings, Oklahoma City is a mix of racial and ethnic groups, wealth and poverty, youth and families.

The Oklahoma City vision includes identifying the 15 most vulnerable, at-risk schools and launching churches within those schools. The at-risk status is based on free and reduced lunches, academic scores, volunteer base, etc. Each school is the gathering place and the built-in missional focus. “Kids are a gateway to parents, parents are a gateway to families, families are gateways to neighborhoods,” Ben says. “And what are cities made up of but a system and network of neighborhoods?”

They are currently in the process of identifying the vulnerable communities, working with school board members, and determining how they will begin to recruit and train church planters to go into those communities.

Business Leaders
A team was pulled together from a cross-section of the city including young entrepreneurs and more established leaders. The first fundraising event took place in late February of this year and was hosted by the former mayor of Oklahoma City in his own home. The response was fantastic and there are 20 members currently on the board. The first official board meeting took place on June 5.

“When I moved back to Oklahoma City we began meeting people,” Ben says. “Many of those people have been strategic in getting Vision360 off the ground. We met as friends and those friendships turned into partnerships. There is a real clear sense that God was at work long before any of this came about.”

Church and technology?

Technology is one of those topics that I love to hate. Personally, I am a technoholic. I have all the new gadgets, I keep up with the new releases and I help people pick the shiny overpriced plastic gizmos they also “need”.

That is my personal life though. So what if I have a clock that says “Atomic” on it and keeps time magically. I’ve actually seen the thing make up for daylight savings time by swinging the hour hand around until it was correct! So what if I have game consoles, TVs, computers of all operating systems (except windows) and little machines that tell me where to drive. All of that really doesn’t matter because it is my personal life, right?

Now in my ministry life, I’ve become much more of a technophobe. I’ve stripped out what I’ve deemed “unnecessary”. The large TVs, the booming sound system and all the accouterments that go along with being a modern / postmodern church.

I’ve probably tipped a bit on the extreme sides in my personal life and in my ministry experience right now too. There is a wide gap. One that should probably not be there.

So what is the church’s technological responsibility? Is it to have free wifi so the people can connect while in the church building? Is it to have a great light show with all the newest concert touring gear purchased with tithe dollars? Is it to have a projection system that rivals local movie theaters?

I’ve really been thinking about it lately and I’ve realized the only tech that should be purchased is tech that helps facilitate people into knowing and loving Christ more. What I mean is this, it should help you reach people more efficiently.

Technology that the church “needs” is the kind that is almost transparent to the cause. The new gadgets and gizmos shouldn’t be what is pointed to or highlighted, they should just assist you and your church family in reaching others.

Does your church need the new HDTV (or insert any gadget here actually)? Ask yourselves this question. “Are we buying this to COMPETE with a church down the road or is this going to facilitate reaching people in a more effective manner?”

I’m curious to see what you all think about this topic. Does your church overuse and overspend on technology? Do you have any tech tips that are a necessity though?

Image via prakhar