How to Change the World With Fruit Punch

I have some interesting conversations in my work as a highschool chaplain. Yesterday I had a good one with one of the teachers at school about cultural differences. It came about because she wanted to support the chaplaincy program by putting on a morning tea and inviting the other teachers. For me that would have meant buying some bikkies and cordial and cracking out the plastic cups; for her it meant treating us all to a feast, with home-baked cakes and Anzac bikkies, exotic fruit platters, lamingtons, secret-family-recipe fruit punch, and so on.... My one job was to provide a table, and my contribution gradually looked more and more pitiful the more food she brought out.

"This is amazing!" I said, as she thinly sliced some limes to place in each glass. "You've done this before."
"Oh, you obviously didn't know that I'm married to a Samoan," she explained. "This is every Sunday for me." And she went on to tell me about some of the other differences between our cultures.

One part of the conversation that particularly stood out to me was when she talked about how they do funerals. In Samoan culture - or at least where her family is from - family and close friends come from all over to stay with the bereaved family, to be with them, help them grieve, support them, cook for them, look after kids, help them talk through the pain and share stories of life shared and lost. Not just for a week though. This could go on for months, she said. And there's no polite avoidance of the painful topics. In her family, people will doggedly persist with the hard questions until they're honestly answered and then can be worked through together. By the time everyone has gone home, the bereaved family is well-and-truly working through their grief and learning to live again despite their loss. It's the responsibility of the oldest in the family to be there until everyone else has gone, however long that takes.

This comes as quite a contrast when compared with how the western world typically operates. Yes it's messier, yes it's more complicated (imagine 20 people living in your house for a month!), yes it's in-your-face, bare-your-soul honest - but as this teacher talked all I could think was "This sounds a lot like Jesus." When I read the gospel stories, I feel that Jesus' home culture seems more like Samoa than America or England.

If you were to use only a few words to describe the way of life that Jesus showed to his disciples, "hospitality" would have to be one of those words. Take Easter for example. On Easter Sunday Jesus beat death for all time, forever altered history by guaranteeing the awesome hope of the gospel, and became the king of the universe. And then he returned to spend a little more time with his followers. Everything had changed, and Jesus now had all the power in the universe at his disposal. What would he do? What would he show his disciples? What would he tell them to do? If you read the stories, it's a little underwhelming how it played out. Jesus had a meal with his disciples. He walked along a road chatting with some confused friends, then joined them for dinner at their place. He went fishing with his mates, and cooked breakfast for them on the beach. Ordinary, everyday things, simple things, hospitality things - the kinds of things he'd been doing with them all along.

Everything had changed on a cosmic, eternity level. But on the practical, everyday, human level the plan was still the same. God was communicating to us "These simple things really are important. Just keep doing what I showed you!" Share life together, eat together, walk together, laugh together, grieve together, learn together, and help more people to do the same.

It's not rocket science. But Jesus knew that simple things like this really do have the power to change the world. So may we take some cues from our Samoan friends, and from Jesus himself, and learn to live our lives with more and more depth and generosity, honesty and compassion... and more lime-garnished glasses of secret-family-recipe fruit punch.

The Four Spaces of Belonging

Here's something I've found helpful for thinking about mission, networks, relationships and community: The Four Spaces of Belonging. The ideas come from Joseph Myers' book "The Search to Belong," about the ways that people connect. And here they are....

First there is the Public Space. This is a large-scale shared experience, where you feel you are part of a great number of people on the same wavelength, but you are still free to remain anonymous if you choose. E.g. A shared worship experience in a big church, a footy game, a movie theatre, a forum for Commodore or Mac owners, St Paddy's Day...

Next is Social Space. This is where we cluster around a common interest or focus (e.g. a BBQ, local pub, workplace, school event, party or function). Here you connect on a superficial level, sharing snapshots of yourself - who I am, what I enjoy, where I live, where I work... This is a natural space to be introduced to new people, ideas, invites - a great springboard to the other spaces.

A little more intimate is our Personal Space. This is a smaller group of our friends and family, close work colleagues, mums group, etc. Here we know each other well and share more privately, reflect together on faith, share our lives, pray for one another, care for one another. Jesus had this connection with his twelve disciples.

And finally there is our Intimate Space. This is only shared with a few people - our spouse and one or two close friends. These people know us as we really are - the good and the ugly. In this space we feel safe and secure to share the naked truth about ourselves, what we think, what we struggle with - the deepest parts of ourselves. Jesus shared some things only with his closest friends - Peter, James and John.

The idea is that healthy community is a combination of all of these spaces, not just the deep, intimate ones. So you're in danger if you're connecting in the public space but not anywhere more personal. And you're also missing out if you connect in deep intimate relationships but avoid larger settings where you might run in to new people.

Churches have tended to view the deep, personal settings (like accountability groups, one-to-one discipleship and mentoring) as the places where spiritual growth happens and so have worked to push people towards the inner spaces. Myers calls us to value each of the four spaces equally and recognise that God is active in shaping us at every level.

What about you? Which spaces do you feel most comfortable? Are there any that you're missing out on? What changes could you make so you can find a sense of belonging at every level?

Our Church: Small and Simple

If we can't fit in a home, we'll start another group.

Small, simple groups have many advantages over big congregations (which is why big congregations work hard to get everyone into a small group!). Here are just a few....

Community. It's easier in a small group to get to know the other people, do life together, and look out for each other. Small is easier for food and conversation. Small groups grow community more naturally – you don't have to work so hard on community; the struggle is trying to avoid it! You can't go unnoticed in a small group - you are involved whether you like it or not. Small church becomes like a family or team more easily than an organisation.

Simplicity. Practically, small, simple churches have many advantages over more complicated ones. They are much easier to start up, sustain and adapt. Many more people could run a home group than could run a big church, which means we could potentially grow many more churches by using simple church thinking. Pastors of big churches have to be extraordinary. The bigger the church, the more exceptional the pastor must be, and if a pastor finishes up, it can take months to find someone else for the role. Simple churches, on the other hand, can be run by more everyday people, because there are no teams, programs, strategies, administration, services, sermons or staff to worry about. Any problems can be worked out by the group together, with extra wisdom from outside experts wherever needed. And small groups are much more flexible if changes are required. These are some of the reasons why simple church expressions might be an effective way forward for the church in Australia.

Mission. This flexibility means that small churches can more easily reflect the surrounding culture, work their way into existing communities and influence them from the inside out. Smaller groups can connect more individually with people outside the church, although this generally happens more slowly. Jesus compared the kingdom of heaven to a mustard seed, which slowly grows into a not-particularly-large weed-like bush that is very difficult to get rid of and tends to pop up all over the place.

Large churches with many ministries require many people to keep them running, and the best church members gradually spend more and more of their time on the church community (services, home groups, playgroups, music teams, camps, leadership, youth/men's/women's/children's ministry and so on) - which can sometimes lead to spending less time with the non-church people in their life. Simple church recognizes that everyone is already a part of various communities (work, school, uni, mums groups, sports teams) and we try to encourage members to connect with the people in these communities better, to be Jesus where they already are.

Our church has only one official get-together a week, so as to make room for real life: dinners, coffees, BBQs, sports, picnics, family days, school prayer groups, fishing, community festivals, watching the footy, and so on....

Discipleship. Churches have for many years recognised that discipleship happens best in small group settings where there is space for conversation. People grow at different rates and God is doing something different in everybody's life, and the best discipleship adapts to these changes as they come. A small group conversation allows for personal questions (try sticking your hand up during a sermon to clarify something or offer a different perspective!) and provides the space to relate Jesus' message and way of life to people's individual lives - to their particular work setting, family environment, personality, skill set and to their own dreams for the world.

There are just a few to whet your appetite.

Rain, gluey kids and simple church

I don't know if you've ever tried to have a conversation with someone in the middle of a kids festival before. Strangely enough I've found myself in this situation quite a few times - twice even in the last week. The first time wasn't planned though. It was meant to be a relaxing conversation with a friend at the peaceful Powerhouse cafe overlooking the Brisbane River. Turned out the Powerhouse was in the middle of their big school holiday festival. Look out for it next time if you've got primary-aged kids. Give it a miss if you want a quiet conversation. And maybe check the weather too, like we didn't.

Still, in between dodging little kids with gluey hands and trying to stop the rain from diluting our cappuccinos, we managed to have a conversation worthy of the cheerleader tag. The gentleman I met with has been involved in starting a simple church group over the last year or so. When I say "simple church" I mean it doesn't have organised services or paid staff. It's a small group of people who are keen to follow Jesus and are flexible in how that might look for them. Actually, sometimes I wonder if "simple" might be a bit misleading. My church lately has been having quite a few of our Jesus conversations in amongst rain and gluey kids.

The group that my Powerhouse friend belongs to call themselves "The Assembly of Grapes," which in itself is telling.

There are a few of these around and they all look different depending on the people in the group. One of the key aims of Postcard Radio (the people I work with) is to find these simple church groups and support them however we can. It can feel lonely in these small groups sometimes, especially for leaders. It's a different way of operating than the normal church way and sometimes you can feel like a bit of a lone ranger. There are a lot of people on this journey though, and some really good ideas are being tried and experimented with. We'd like to help pass around some of these ideas and stories if we can.

If you are in a simple church group in QLD, please let us know! We'd love to know what groups are around - so we can support and encourage the groups and facilitators, and also to help individuals connect in with some of these like-minded people.

On a different note to finish, here's something that stuck in my head from my rain-soaked friend last week: "I think that much of the time the church is answering questions that the community isn't asking. We need to spend more time listening to people. Like the catholic priest who started out his ministry by setting up a couple of chairs at the local shopping centre, and just sat there. Most of the time he sat by himself, but when some crisis events happened people were lining up to talk."

Listen to your neighbourhood, like Michael Frost talked about in the last video I posted. Sit there. Have the coffees. Get amongst the families and kids. Find out the questions people are really asking.

Listen to your neighbourhood!

Here's a clip well worth a watch. Michael Frost talking about mission in the neighbourhood.

State of Origin and the Gospel

Just to preempt those sermons being prepared for this Sunday: the State of Origin is not like the kingdom of heaven.

Over to you, commenters.

Our Church: Names

No mission without names

The second thing we care about (and these are in no particular order) is "No mission without names." We're working with actual people, not hypothetical ones.

Our church and mission adapts to suit the actual people we connect with. Our church changes depending on who is in it, because each person brings something different - ideas, gifts, interests, life situation, outside connections, life story etc.

For example, we don't have a children's ministry. We just try to help Lily become more like Jesus, and Isla, and Abby etc – the same as we do for each of us in the church. There are some things we do specifically with all the kids together, but overall it's different for each of them, they're all at different stages, and we acknowledge that parents are the most important spiritual influence in their children's lives. We don't officially have a children's ministry as such. We try to support the parents in whatever ways we can.

Jesus Dream Short Course

Why is Jesus so important? What on earth was he on about?

Last year I became friends with a guy who wanted to know more about Jesus. I didn't want to just give him a book about it, and I thought the best thing would be for us to lock in a time each week, have a coffee, and go through one of those new-Christian discussion guides. But when I looked at what was available, I didn't find any that I thought would work well for an everyday Aussie guy - especially someone who hasn't grown up in a church (which is most Aussies now).

The ones I found were either too long (who will commit to a 10week religious course?), too impractical (watching a 40min sermon is not a normal thing for non-church people), too advanced (using theological concepts that are only familiar to people who've grown up in church) or misrepresented Jesus or the gospel. Some I felt just started in entirely the wrong place for non- church people (like calling for a commitment in the first session or starting with "you're a sinner" - which Jesus never did).

In the end I thought I'd just start the conversations myself and see where it went. In the process, through the conversations, questions and inevitable extra research by me, I ended up discovering a lot more about Aussie culture and about Jesus and his way of life. Most of all, I've discovered that Jesus and his way of life fits our culture to a T. He's the kind of guy that Aussies - even Aussie males - really respect.

So this year I've put together my own short course on Jesus that aims to fit Aussie non-church culture better. It starts where Jesus himself started, by calling people to dream with him about a new world. A better world of beauty and colour, free of pain and disaster, full of hope and light, creativity and passion, food and fun. It was a brilliant place to start, by a brilliant, visionary, revolutionary leader. So I figured I couldn't do better than start there myself. Jesus' dream is something we can all relate to.

This short course looks at Jesus' dream, his inspiring way of life and his amazing story. It's in six sessions for small groups or individuals.

After months of writing, editing and formatting, it's finally available on the iTunes iBookstore. Here's the link to the ePub version (which will work on most devices). And there's also a version specially designed for iPads.

http://itunes.apple.com/au/book/jesus-dream/id565908659?mt=11

Please go and check it out! I'd love to hear your thoughts. There's even a sample chapter there for free. And if you're using it somewhere other than Australia, I'd be especially interested to know how it goes. Thanks!

Church Size

From Lloyd Pietersen's "Reading the Bible After Christendom"....

"I am privileged to belong to Bristol Peace Church, a small group of currently six people, who meet every Sunday at 5.00pm... At the heart of the liturgy is Bible study and this is followed by a period of prayer informed by that Bible study; we then conclude with a meal together... As eating is central to our ecclesiology, we are committed not to grow beyond a number that can fit round the meal table. Further growth would result in breaking into two groups...."

Ha! My church is twice the size of yours Pietersen.

Pastor Irene's Manifesto

Here's another part I loved from Eugene Peterson's The Pastor. I post these kinds of things so I can get back to them easily!

Peterson was facilitating a class with a group of soon-to-be-starting pastors. After a few days together, he asked one young lady who'd been quiet what she was thinking. This was her response, which Peterson called Pastor Irene's Manifesto. I want to make it mine too.

"When I get a congregation, I want to be a patient pastor. I want to have eyes to see and ears to hear what God is doing and saying in their lives. I don't want to judge them in terms of what I think they should be doing. I want to be a witness to what God is doing in their lives, not a schoolmistress handing out grades for how well they are doing something for God.

"I think I see something unique about being a pastor that I had never noticed: the pastor is the one person in the community who is free to take men and women seriously just as they are, appreciate them just as they are, give them the dignity that derives from being the 'image of God,' a God-created being who has eternal worth without having to prove usefulness or be good for anything. I know that I will be doing a lot of other things too, but I might be the only person who is free to do this.

"I don't want to be so impatient with the mess that I am not around to see the miracle being formed. I don't want to conceive of my life as pastor so functionally that the mystery gets squeezed out of both me and the congregation."

School is...

"School is a building that has four walls - with tomorrow inside."
- Lon Watters

Simple Ideas for Simple Churches

It's not always beneficial to run like a large church.

I preached at a little church recently that had about 15 people in the congregation. If you've ever facilitated a small group in a home, you'll know this is a great size group! You can have some amazing discussions with different perspectives, eat meals together, connect with the kids fairly easily, and build some great friendships along the way.

If they ran it like a small group, this church would have been alive and thriving! But somehow they felt they needed to run it like a traditional large church. They had Sunday morning services, with the pews all set up in rows, notices at the beginning, the correct amount of hymns, and sent the kids (all three of them) out the back to Sunday school while I preached to the rest.

I have no problems with this way of doing things, but is it the best way for a small church?

As a result, this little church felt like they weren't doing a very good job, but the reality is, this group of people is one of the most lovingly unified, generous churches I've ever seen. They really care for one another, and they're giving all they've got to make a positive difference in their local community.

If you're a small church, my advice is: don't try to run like a large church. You don't need to. Make the most of the amazing opportunities you have. Have meals together (a great place to gradually introduce non-church friends to the rest of the group). Get rid of the pews and have multi-perspective discussions instead (rather than hearing from just one person behind a pulpit). Get involved in each others' lives. Care for each other. Enjoy the strong friendships, from the smallest kids to the oldest grandparents - this is so much more difficult to cultivate in larger congregations.

There are HUGE benefits to being a small church. Don't miss out by trying to be something else!

There Are No Scraps of Men

Great talk, and an incredibly worthy idea, by Alberto Cairo, a physiotherapist in Afghanistan.

Ordinary Mission

"One of our ambitions is to take the idea of gospel ministry as the primary preserve of the professionals and 'give it back' to the masses."
- Tim Chester and Steve Timmis, "Everyday Church"

Amen brother! And here's some more...

"One of the key benefits of everyday mission is that it enfranchises each and every one of us. Everyday mission requires everyday missionaries rather than superheroes of the faith. We need to recapture the sense that gospel ministry is not something done by pastors with the support of ordinary Christians, but something done by ordinary Christians with the support of pastors."

Preach it. I'd definitely recommend reading the rest of this chapter if you can get your hands on the book. Tim and Steve talk about how this can work in everyday life with everyday people. Some really simple practical ways to bring the kingdom of heaven into the lives of the people around us, and ways to grow a church community that does this together.

Someone is welcome to borrow my copy of the book if you like. Just let me know!

"It's not complicated, though, of course, living differently by grace is never easy. God has not equipped us all to be big personalities with multiple gifts or oratory that draws the crowds. But through the death of Christ and the faithful work of the Spirit he has empowered us all to live such good lives that others are drawn to Christ. However you 'do' church, let it be nothing less than the people of God on mission together. We are a city on a hill and a light to the world."

Different

"The church as an alternative community can make a powerful witness when it chooses to live differently from the dominant society at just a few key points. An important task of the church is to discern what are those key points at which to be different from the world."

- Lois Barrett, quoted in "Everyday Church," by Tim Chester and Steve Timmis

Things I've Learned About Community from Postman Pat

1. Get outside
2. Every problem is everybody's problem - everybody gets involved to help
3. Everyone has different skills - Oh no! Pat's slid down a hill! We need farmer Bob and his tractor! (and the Policeman comes too of course)
4. Children are just as important and needed - "Quick Lucy! Ride to the post office and get farmer Bob! Well done Lucy"
5. Once you've fixed the problem, celebrate together too!
6. Small communities grow better community
7. It takes a village to raise a child - all the adults look after all the kids
8. Enjoy your work, enjoy your community - "Pat thinks he's a really lucky man..."
9. Smile and be friendly to people - "Everybody smiles when he calls to greet them"
10. Deliver things personally - Pat doesn't have to knock on the door or ring the bell, but he does. You get the feeling email doesn't play a huge part in this community

Leaving the Church

Just read a great article written by Micah Smith for Relevant Magazine, commenting on the many many young people who are walking away from church. Read the whole article here if you want to. Here are some of his thoughts...

"There is no shortage of examples in which relationships are critical to the way of Jesus. What happens though, is that when we’re burned by the Church, or when we get exhausted or bored, we flip through scripture and determine that God never endorses a Sunday morning worship service, anyway. “Great,” we think. “I’m off the hook. I can quit this thing and not technically be in any trouble.”

"The problem comes when walking away from the Sunday morning service means walking away from people. From God’s people. From the endless beauty of a common knowledge of a greater good. From people who will serve with you, pray with you, believe in you and fight for you. At the end of the day, the mystery of the Church isn’t a worship song or a sermon. If it is, then sure, walk out of the building, load up your iPod with church podcasts and worship bands, and never look back. But the reality is that sermons and songs aren’t all that you give up when you walk away. You also sacrifice a community of believers.

Rain Rain Go Away

It's really quite uncanny. It seems every time we have a community BBQ it rains. The idea is to put on a free BBQ for the community, to make friends and help people get to know some others in their area. We've been trying to do it on the first Sunday of every month, but the current score is three BBQs from about seven attempts. Not a very good average.

It's bizarre. We'll have three perfectly fine weekends in a row, and then the weekend of our BBQ will be wet wet wet. Same thing has happened this month. The last few weekends haven't been too bad, but then I look at the radar for tomorrow and it looks pretty certain that we'll be rained out again.

Haven't we had enough rain now God? It doesn't bother me so much. I mean, it only affects our little BBQ. No great loss. But the colossal amount of water you've sent in our country so far this year has produced devastation and heartache for some of the other people around us.

Not to mention the unbelievable amount of other major tragedies that have already occurred in the few weeks we've had so far this year. As well as the widespread flooding, there've been powerful tropical cyclones, earthquakes in Christchurch, bushfires, intense political turmoil in Libya and Egypt. What are you doing, God? Where are you? What's going on? We've had enough tragedy now for the next 10 years. Enough now, please. Father, let your kingdom of peace come to our broken earth.

And let it be today.

Brisbane Floods, and Where is God?

A couple of weeks ago there was major flooding in my city and the surrounding areas, and in fact in an unbelievably large portion of the eastern states of Australia. Some towns are still waiting to see if their river banks will hold. The sheer amount of water is inconceivable, and the effects have been devastating. Many people have lost loved ones, and many more have lost their homes and businesses. And as if that wasn't enough, in the last few weeks a great number of these have since found out that their insurance doesn't cover this kind of flood.

If you entertain the notion of God (whether you believe there is one or not), it doesn't take long before the questions start rolling in...

If there is a God, why didn't he do something? Is he really all that powerful? And if he is powerful, is he really all that good? What kind of person would allow people to suffer like this?

I do believe that God is good and that he loves us immensely, and thankfully the Bible does have some answers for these questions.

First, the sad reality is that there is suffering in this world. Earthquakes, floods, tsunamis, bush fires, AIDS, SIDS and cancer are all part of the world we live in. Unfortunately, that's just how this world is. And it affects all of us, whether you believe in God or not.

This would be utterly demoralizing if that was the end of the story. But thankfully it isn't.

The incredible hope of the Bible is that one day God will restore this world. One day God will rebuild it and transform it into a more beautiful, more amazing, more life-giving universe. The Bible promises that in this new world there will be no more crying or pain, no more anguish, no more suffering, because the old world will have passed away. Not only that, but our own bodies (of those who belong to God) will also be restored and transformed - no longer subject to sickness, decay, cancer, or even death itself. One of the writers in the New Testament, Paul, describes this transformation as being something like that of a caterpillar to a butterfly. And those who have already died will be resurrected and given new life and a new body too. I can't wait for this new world, and new way to experience the depths and greatness of it. This is hope.

And what about in the meantime? Do we just wait it out, suck it up, and suffer through this world? Absolutely not. There's hope for right now too. Jesus' life and message when he was on earth was that this new world - which he called the kingdom of heaven - is even now breaking into our world. While the complete restoration is still in the future, the process has already started. It started with Jesus. Practically, he lived it out, and showed others how to live it. Things like love, grace, forgiveness, beauty, joy, mercy, compassion - heaven breaking in. And when we live like this, we're bringing light into the darkness.

But even more than that, Jesus' resurrection was the inauguration of this new kingdom of light. Easter Sunday was the start of an entirely new week. Yes, Jesus died, like we all do. But he then defeated death, and God resurrected him, wonderfully transformed. Now death means nothing to Jesus - it has no power whatsoever. He was the first to be resurrected - and all who believe and live this truth will follow later - and right now he is the reigning king of this world. Just think for a second about the implications.

And right now we can build for this kingdom, helping it break into this world. Jesus told us to pray for God's kingdom to come, on earth as it is in heaven, and now we can join with God to be the answer to that prayer. The restoration has begun. Yes, there is still darkness, tragedy and pain, but that's not all there is. Heaven is breaking in.

Many people who've lost homes in the last couple weeks have said while they were shocked by the damage, they were absolutely stunned by the generosity, compassion and selfless hearts of the thousands of people who came to help them get back on their feet again. Over 22,000 people flooded into Brisbane with mops, buckets and spades, from all over Australia and New Zealand - to help out their neighbours and friends - but more often to help complete strangers. Thousands of volunteers had to be turned away because there were just too many.

In the midst of pain, there can be breathtaking beauty, overwhelming love, inconceivable generosity. God is not absent, and he is not uncaring. He is building a new world, and it's already begun. Look for it, pray for it, see it breaking in, be a part of bringing heaven more fully into earth. And live in hope for that day when God will completely restore everything.

Good

I love the last chapter in Rob Bell's book, Velvet Elvis, about the restoration of the world, and how the church joins with Jesus in bringing this about. If you can get a hold of it, I encourage you to read the whole chapter. 

Here are some of his thoughts....

"To be a part of the church was to join a countercultural society that was partnering with God to create a new kind of culture, right under the nose of the caesars. These Christians made sure everybody in their midst had enough to eat. They made sure everybody was able to pay their bills. They made sure there was enough to go around. The resurrection for them was not an abstract spiritual concept; it was a concrete social and economic reality. God raised Jesus from the dead to show the world that Jesus is Lord, and it is through his power and his example and his Spirit that the world is restored...."

"...so many passages about the early church deal with possessions and meals and generosity. They understood that people are rarely persuaded by arguments, but more often by experiences. Living, breathing, flesh-and-blood experiences of the resurrection community.... To the outside world, it was less about proving and more about inviting people to experience this community of Jesus' followers for themselves...."

"It is when the church gives itself away in radical acts of service and compassion, expecting nothing in return, that the way of Jesus is most vividly put on display."

This is why generosity is such a big part of what we're doing in this community - whether or not people become Christians because of it. This is the heart of God and the way of Jesus, helping people to experience the kingdom of Heaven, right here, right now.

"I am learning that the church is at its best when it is underground, subversive, and countercultural. It is the quiet, humble, stealth acts that change things." I love this idea of the underground, subversive church.

"I am learning that the church has nothing to say to the world until it throws better parties. By this I don't necessarily mean balloons and confetti and clowns who paint faces. I mean backyards and basements and porches. It is in the places we live and move with the people we're on the journey with, that we are reminded it is God's world and we're going to be okay.... The images Jesus used were of banquets and feasts and celebrations. What do we do at parties such as these? We eat and talk and dance and enjoy each other and above all else, we take our time. What does Jesus do almost as much as he teaches and heals? He eats long meals. As Christians, it is our duty to master the art of the long meal."

Surprisingly, this subject of meals has been covered quite a bit in books I've been reading lately! - In Living the Resurrection, Eugene Peterson points out that enjoying meals with his disciples was one of the first things Jesus did after his resurrection - clearly showing that this is to remain a key part of the new community. And in Eats with Sinners, Arron Chambers speaks of it as one of the most important ways to share the heart of God with people outside the church. Eating with people is good for your health, in every possible way. We'd already decided that eating together was going to be a major part of our church, but it's sure nice to hear these thoughts echoes by theologians, and by Jesus himself. That's my kind of church!