So here’s What I’m thinking presently & praying about:
1. F. Chan recently announced he’s leaving his church in order to move his family into the inner city of L.A., or Thailand… praying about which I think. He was broken by the comfort of being a super-star pastor, and decided he was not living enough like Jesus lived. He shared his and his wife’s longing to hear the words “Well done” from the Father, and how very very short this life is.
2. Francis Chan, Matt Chandler, Shane Claiborne and some other speakers were used by the Spirit to break me & Molly at Exponential. I wept several times while throughout the conference. I repented of loving pleasure, comfort, and feeling safe more than I loved Jesus & those He came to bless—the least of these. I learned that, come judgment day, the only questionnaire we’ll have to face is Jesus asking these questions: “I was hungry, did you feed me? I was naked, did you clothe me? I was in prison, did you come and visit me? … I was a little kid w/o a loving family, did you play with me and show me love? … I was RC & Becky (homeless couple) sitting under the elm tree outside of Walgreens… did you talk w/ me and pray for me? Did you ask me how you could love me? … I was the in the group of homeless guys who gather outside of your church meeting-building. Did you ignore me on your way into your programs, or did you smile at me and get to know me over the past 18-months until you could truly say with conviction that you had love for me (a story told by my pastor yesterday)… I was a group of 18 to 24-y-o kids (America’s orphans) aging out of the state’s foster care system w/ no family or viable community of people to network with, did you help me and ask how you could get me up on my feet as an adult? Did you pray for my emotional healing? Did you give up your silly little comfortable townhouse in the heights neighborhood, and move into a little worse-end of town so that you could love me as an R.A. in an ugly apartment complex? Did you? Or did you love your fleeting comfort, your pseudo feelings of safety? Did you value MY Dream above the so called “American dream”?...
3. I recognize that with all my programmed ministries within the walls of the church, I am less like the good Samaritan, and more like the Levite who stepped over the man in need, so that he could get to church. I also realized that I had wicked pride built up in my heat over choosing an intentionally multi-ethnic, poorer neighborhood church to attend, rather than a cool, and popular, rich, suburban church. I’m glad we are there, mind you, but I realized that it’s far too easy to presume that we’re doing the will of God in the church building’s neighborhood, simply because we drive up on Sundays and Wednesdays, and hide inside the walls of the church—I realized there’s nothing different about this than if I were to walk inside the walls of a rich, white church in West Little Rock…. If all I’m doing is ducking inside the building to do some programs, then I’ve missed the heart of God. If our church truly wants to impact the community it’s in, then members of the church will have to live in the community. Instead of asking ourselves where the best elementary schools are in the city, and move to that area and buy a house, we have to ask where the worst one is, and move there so that we can know Jesus in that school, and fight along w/ our neighbors in order to improve it.
4. If God continues to lead us, we’re planning to move into an old apartment complex in an area that some might deem “the hood’ in order to know Jesus in the lives of ‘the least of these’—1 block away from our church in the 72204 zip code area—the most crime-ridden in Arkansas. Yes, we’re a little scared. But I long to treasure Jesus over comfort.
6. If/when God makes a way for time & expense, I’ll pursue seminary online through either Liberty U, or Moody Bible Institute.
7. Please pray for us toward these ends. Thank you very much.
Some quotes from Exponential:
“Some pastors do have to be called to the rich, white church… but too many of us presume that’s it’s us.” -- Matt Carter, Pastor of Austin Stone church
"If the world were 100 people, 67 would be far from God, 20 would be living in extreme poverty" – Ferguson
“How can we worship a homeless man on Sunday and not serve one on Monday.” ~ Shane Claiborne
