Think about it, the Church at large has lost its cultural role of leadership, and is largely untrusted by the people that surround it. Through years of gimmicks and sales pitches the Church has placed itself in the marketplace as a business who’s goal is to attract people to it, just like any other other business does. So, the church is also untrusted by the marketplace and is assumed to have selfish intentions in most of it’s interactions. Now, I recognize (and pray) that this is not the case and that this is in fact a misunderstanding that the general public has, but it is there none the less.

So, I recommend more transparency within the Church. When we talk to people we must be real, letting them know that we struggle too, that we are often frustrated, eager, tired and hungry as well. We need to let people know that it’s ok not to have every answer to every question in order to take part in the Church, because the Church is full of other imperfect people too. We must show people that our strength is not within ourselves, but that our strength is in Christ, and that left to ourselves we are pathetic at best.

The people of the Church must be willing to remove their mask of perfection, exposing the pain and difficulty endured in this imperfect world, so that people can see what a miracle the redemption of Christ is and His promise of something greater to come. Only then will the public see the power that lies in the Church and be drawn to her. No marking piece can do it, just you and me, the Church.

So I have been thinking more and more about the community of believers, the church. It is more than an organization, more than a group, more than a community, it is the Bride of Christ (and the body of Christ) that is only fully lived out in community.

So many people get caught up looking for God’s direction for them, I see it all the time, “what does God want for me?” They pray, they read the Bible, but they never talk to the rest of the Body of Christ about it.

The scripture is clear, we know it part and we prophecy in part (1 Cor 13:9). By myself I see a piece of what God has for me. I may see a big piece, but any way you slice it, I’m convinced it is only a piece. I believe that the brothers and sisters that make up the body of Christ hold the other pieces, and it is only through them that I can dream of coming into the fullness of who God wants me to be.

This is an unpopular idea in modern American Christianity because Americans are notoriously, unashamedly, and sinfully (confession on my part) independent.

The fact is, if we are seeking after the fullness of God, we must not only find him on our own during a “quite time”, we must also find him in the creation that bears His image and is being conformed into His likeness, namely the Church.

I need my church so that I can come into the fullness of who I am in Christ, I love that, I’m proud of that, I’m humbled by that.

So, when Jesus was asked about the greatest commandment he quoted that. I’m pretty sure the Jews did a much better job of loving God (during the good times that is), within the law, than we can guess. Probably better than many Christians today in my estimation.

The Old Testament Law served  a purpose and should never be undervalued, as is often the case. A study of the Law will not place a believer in bondage, but increase our devotion as we recognize that Christ is the ultimate fulfillment of a very complex law. He is the perfection of it. The Law in the past was to point out sin and to bring a deeper devotion to God. The Law today should still do that for us, though we are not bound to it in the same way.

So, where does this leave us spiritually? I think it brings us to a place of asking God for something and expecting the answer before we finish asking. I think it makes us impatient with God and therefore it makes us more reliant on ourselves. I think it makes us spiritually weak. And, I think that for far too long the Church has bent itself and its teaching to suit this type of mentality.

When is the last time that you heard a teaching on fasting? When is the last time that you were asked by the other people in your church body to fast together in order to see God do great things. Fasting is the most basic form of delayed gratification (self denial), it is Biblical and arguably expected of all those who follow Jesus. And yet, Christians rarely talk about it and practice it even less.

Here’s the rub, God acts on His timetable, not ours. Therefore, there are times in life that we need to realize that we are not going to be immediately rewarded for our faithfulness. In fact, I would argue that often there will be long times of waiting on the Lord to bring us into the things that He has for us. Those times may be long, suspenseful, and even painful, but there is purpose in it all.

If we are constantly looking to have our needs met the moment we realize there is a need, and if God delays, we are likely to stop waiting on God to meet that need all together. This is where we get into trouble, by getting ahead of God and His plan by flailing ahead with our own.

So, here is my encouragement. Learn to deny yourself, to delay gratification. Maybe that means fasting from food for a day, maybe it means fasting from something else, like TV or facebook. But, whatever it is, it is imperative that we all learn to deny ourselves so that when God’s call to us goes against our natural inclinations (as it often does) we will be ready to deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow.

We live in a culture where it is increasingly less permissible to speak into a person’s life without having a relationship with them. What that means for you and I is that the strategy of barely knowing someone and then asking them if they know Jesus is becoming less and less effective, meaning that we now need to get into the trenches, spend time with sinners and pour into their lives.

Think about the example of Jesus, He spent so much time with prostitutes, sinners and drunkards that He was called a wine bibbler by the religious right. He spent so much time with sinners that they mistook Him as one.

So, while I recognize that we have to be careful of the company that we keep in terms of how we are influenced by those around us, I firmly believe that Christians need to get out into the world and make friends. Go to non-Christian concerts, go to bars, go to the mall, go to the park. Meet people there, get to know them because you actually care about them and then share Jesus with them for that same reason.

Its time we got out of our comfort zones. Its time to go from 90% of our friends being Christian to 60%. It’s time to move out into the world and make an impact.

You can’t keep sinners and arms length and wrap them in the love of Jesus at the same time.

1. It’s not about style, it’s about substance.

Ever noticed how plain www.google.com is? There is nothing flashy about it, just a simple search engine that does what it does better than anyone else. That is why Google is #1, because they do what is important better than anyone else, proving that substance has more value than style every day of the week (and twice on Sunday).

Over the last  several decades there have been several fundamental shifts in the way that American’s approach church. Probably the largest unnoticed shift (and the most disturbing one) is the shift from preferring substance to preferring style. Most Christians love Pastors because they are good teachers (style) not because they are Holy men (substance). Most Christians love church services because they like the “feel” of the meeting (style) not because they are deeply connected to that local body (substance). Most Christians get excited about Christian books that make them feel good (style), not books that challenge them to greater Holiness and relationship with God (substance).

I fear that too many believers have settled for a Christianity that is more about them than it is about Jesus and that a preference for style over substance is the primary outcome of that. Caring about style appeals to a person’s selfish nature, caring about substance makes us set aside our selfish nature and focus on Jesus alone, because He is the substance that we need.

2. Focus on what you do best, then find ways to do it better.
   Google is the best at almost everything that do (in my opinion). But, just because gmail is the best web mail client doesn’t mean that they have stopped developing it. All of google’s products are constantly improving, there is never a time that they are not working to make everything they do better.

   Every church, large or small, mega church or house church, has things that they do particularly well. Often the tendency with this is to say, ” We are doing ________ well, so now lets focus on _________ .” But instead we should be asking how we can take what we do well, and make it better. It is never healthy to set something aside because you think you have it down pat, that would be like a quarterback deciding that since he has made it to the pros he no longer needs to practice. That guy won’t be a pro for long. We need to constantly ask God how we can take the gifting that He has given our local body and grow in it.

3. Don’t do anything that takes away from your core value.
   Google has gone from a simple search engine to a vast number of services. But, each of those services compliments or extends their original purpose, which is a web search engine. This seems like an obvious idea, but unfortunately I see churches making this mistake all the time.

   Every church has core values. For example, when I was planting a church one of our core values was building deep community. However, even though that was a core value I found myself getting bogged down in “church work” and not having time to call and stay connected with people, thus taking away from our core value of community. I have seen this very thing happen in every church I have been on staff at, the goal gets pushed aside for the immediate need that is only slightly related to that goal. It is not healthy and does not help the Church produce fruit.

4. Don’t do too much too fast.
   Google was one of the leading search engines before they started expanding their services.  In church, it’s really easy to get excited about what God is doing and get ahead of ourselves. I have done it over and over again in my life and can tell you, it doesn’t get you anywhere.

   An old African proverb says, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” It seems to me that there are a lot of Christians and churches out there that are going fast and are headed for burn out. I think the better approach is to go slow, bring people with you, and go far. It’s time that we stopped looking at building the church through the lens of what we can accomplish is 20 years. It’s time we started building up a Church that will grow and last for 1,000 years.

5. Do something that no one has done before.
   Google didn’t set up a search engine like all the others; they created one that was different and more effective. When they created Gmail they didn’t do web mail like everyone else, they were innovative and creative, making it better than everyone else.

   Almost every church I have ever seen has approached church in this way: “What is ______ church doing that is effective, and how can we copy that here?” That is not healthy. A better approach is to look at your unique church body and your unique community, ask God what unique things He wants to do there, and then do that. Innovation for a community is as simple as asking God what to do, and then doing it.

I have great hope for the Church. I think that God is shifting many things among His people and helping us to rethink many of the assumptions that we have long held. I pray you will take this post and measure it against scripture, weighing what has been said, and that it might challenge the thinking of some. Be encouraged, google offers web searches and a few other fancy features, the Church offers the truth. I pray that we can learn from this secular example and push forward into our communities with the greatest gift that we can offer, Jesus Himself.

As I have written before, we are now living with a family in Lawrenceville so that we can become healthy again. So far, this is going really well, and I’m really glad to be here, surrounded by deep community with people that are never to busy to stop and ask how we are doing or what is really going on.

This move has been really powerful for me because the deep community we experience on a daily basis now sits in stark contrast to where I was a year ago. Even though we had many dear friends helping us with the church plant, that time was still very lonely and painful for me. I often felt like it was me against the world rather than our church body coming together as one to do great work. I felt like the church rose and fell on me, and ultimately it did. But now, we are a part of a community of believers whose lives are so intertwined that it takes a decent amount of work to feel lonely. And, it’s even harder to think of my life as me against the world, or that my life is really about me at all.

Living in community has helped me to embrace one of my most dear beliefs, that our spiritual journey is a walk best taken together. This idea flies in the face of American individualism, but it’s true, only through rich community can we really become the follower of Jesus that we are called to be, there is simply no other way.

So, all of that to say, here’s to putting an end to the hardest year of my life so far.

Tonight begins Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. This is a time to reflect on past mistakes, repent and make amends. The next 10 days leading up to the next Jewish Holiday of Yom Kippur are a time to search myself, see where I have gone wrong, repent, and change.

I am looking at this as an ebenezer, a memorial established in remembrance of what God has done. For me and my family, God has led us both into and out of the hardest time we have ever had. Now that time is finished, and by His grace we are recovering. I am continually excited about what the Lord has for us and have no doubt that our lives will continue to be anything but ordinary and boring.

For the few of you that still read my blog, thank you, I am humbled to be able to offer what little teaching or wisdom I might posses. I hope that my journey has, and will encourage you to continue on your journey, knowing that we are walking toward the Lord together.

You see, I am a part of a House Church and love it. I talk of it often and because what we do is so different from other forms of church I tend to think about church structure (as it relates to scripture and life) a lot. It was this tendency that Marc addressed. He basically said, “look Adam, it’s great that you are a part of a church body that functions Biblically and is healthy, but stop getting caught up thinking about one structure or another and start thinking about what is really important. Meditate on Jesus, on how to draw closer to Him, on how to share Him with others and on how to disciple others.”

Instant conviction.

Marc helped me to realize, I spend way to much time thinking about the structure or form that the Church takes, rather than really learning how to be the church in the world. And I also realized, this is a tendency that I have had for a while. Before thinking about church structure as it relates to House Church I was thinking about it in terms of Contemporary Church. Before that I thought a lot about the different forms of worship, wasting time considering the values of contemporary worship against traditional worship.

In the end, these things are probably worth having an opinion about, but not worth dwelling on, reading books about, and constantly blogging about, at least not at this point in my life.

So, for a time such as this, I am reminded that I need to continually deprogram. I don’t need to think about God through the lens of Traditional Church, I have already deprogrammed from that. I don’t need to think about God through the lens of Contemporary Church, I have already deprogrammed from that. And, no matter how tempting or easy, I don’t need to think about God through the lens of House Church. I need to think about God through the lens of my relationship with Him.

I know Him through my knowledge of Scripture, experience in worship and conversation in prayer. I recognize that His Spirit is alive and abiding in me as I abide in Him, and in that recognition admit that no one form, no one denomination, no one idea or man can lay claim to the full knowledge of an infinite God.

So, during this time in my life I am committing to viewing God through the lens of my eyes and scripture, nothing more, nothing less. I am exploring, deprogramming and growing. I love it.

Today I went to the Wailing Wall (directly behind me in the picture). What struck me the most was the dedication that the Jewish people have for the scriptures. During my time here I have seen Jewish people reading the scriptures over and over with a great deal of dedication. It convicts my heart to watch them pour out their heart to God while being moved by the scripture and know that there are days that I have trouble reading any of His Word at all.

I am convinced that if Christians had the same dedication to the scriptures that the Jewish people have, our churches would be busting at the seams and our spiritual lives would be richer. I think its time for the Church to start doing some serious reading, being a Biblical lightweight just won’t cut it anymore.

(Jerusalem is in the dead center of the picture, then slightly to the right is a small valley, the Valley of Kidron, then to the far right of the picture where you see a small tower is the Mount of Olives.)

But, I think the thing that really hit home to me today was while we were sitting at Gideon Springs (The Spring of Harod). This was the spring that Gideon and his army camped at in Judges 7:1. I even drank from the spring like his men in verses 5-7, I’m not saying how I drank it .

One of the things from this passage that our guide made come alive was the way in which God works through the least of these time and time again. In chapter 6 verse 15 Gideon says that he is of the tribe of Manasseh, one of the poorest tribes of Israel, he was from the weakest clan in the tribe, and he was the least of his clan. He was the poorest of the poor of the nation, and yet God chose to do great things in and through him.

I see this all through the Bible, from Joseph being sold into slavery to Jesus choosing the most unlikely men to be His disciples. Over and over again God uses the least likely, most obscure characters to do amazing things.

It makes me want to be the under dog trying to take on the world. What about you?

Check out yesterday’s photos here.

Check out today’s photos here.