At this point I can say it:  “We’ve been here in Chicago for a full year.”

Its a completely new place from our previous home of Abilene, TX where Katrina and I met and grew to love each other and our Father in such amazing ways.  The sights, the smells, the sounds of the city fill my senses even as I write this in one of my new favorite coffee shops.  I sit back for a moment to reflect on all that has happened in the last year, and what this work here in Chicago is all about.

This is a movement.  In a culture that says that we must live alone, live for ourselves, breed racism, injustice, apathy and violence in our hearts – this is a movement of love.  Against religious abuses and elitism, we invite people to enter a Family of grace.  Where they can receive and give grace with everything they have.  Where they have a place at the table with God.  This is the Church – the Family of God.

This work is about an invitation to join that movement.  So often the great movements of God have been swept up and kept behind the doors of the seminary, or within a certain socioeconomic class.  But this dream is about crossing boundaries with the good news of God.  Going from rich to poor and back to rich, from black to white and all the colors of God’s rainbow, from coffee shops to barber shops to Polish bakeries to corporate offices and brothels.  This invitation calls out the adventurer in all of us – to cross the chasms and rivers that separate us in this city, and reimagines the city as a mission field to be discovered.

This movement is taking us into the New Age.  Jesus spoke of this “coming age,” one very much available and experienced now, but yet quite elusive and mysterious.  A new age unique to (but not mutually exclusive of) the popular term out there today.  It is a new age of sanity, even in the midst of chaos, an age of family in the midst of fractured tribalism and competition, an age of missional living – actively participating in the mission of God to embody the New Age in our everyday lives.  Yearning for the revolution, and then going to do the dishes and clean the toilet.

This movement aims to saturate the city – every nook and cranny – with the news that this New Age has truly come.  It’s bigger than any church, any personality, and truly bigger than any geographic locale. (but hey, ya gotta start somewhere!  And what better place to shine than in a dark place?)  Authentic communities of faith from every tongue, tribe and neighborhood in Chicago is our strategy, with the goal being the complete transformation of a city from top to bottom.

All this doesn’t mean we don’t live without fear and stress.  I am seeing a pattern: we are given a new insight from God, and then are systematically attacked by the Evil One.  In a faulting, wounded way, we’ve spent the last year planting and resourcing new churches, making friends, getting jobs, and inviting others to join the movement of Christ.  We’re so thankful to be a small part of what God is doing here.  We know that it is because of the love and support of so many that we’ve made it this far.  We’ve seen multiple house churches started, a network of faith worship together, and people come to faith in God.   As I reflect on our year, maybe the hardest of our adult lives, two words come to mind… It’s happening.

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 4th, 2009 at 12:14 pm and is filed under Chicago, God's Economy, Gospel in Action, Kingdom of God, Missions, Network Developments, Personal Reflections, Purpose, Saturation Church Planting, Urban Living. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.