Godgrown

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  Mark 8:05 am on June 1, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

  Moving In, Moving On 

  When do you know its the right time to move on?  In developing healthy communities centered on Jesus, a “community developer” or “church planter” has an interesting relationship to the church he (or she) is planting.  He is both a part of the new community, and yet at the same time, he is very much different.  He is meant to move on – to take the risk that the fragile and humble group that has gathered around Jesus is ready to withstand the harshest of times, and whats more, to charge forward against the gates of hell.

  Many times the best thing a church planter can do for a church is to leave it – not out of anger, spite, or revenge for some past misdeed, but out of an interest to remove a sort of scaffolding to truly let the building be what it is to become.

  At times I’ve felt a little like a grandma (I know, weird.)  By this I mean that after a new couple has a child, often a grandparent will stay with the couple to help out around the house, teach a little bit of technique to sooth an infant’s cries, and simply be a loving presence.  However, there comes a day – when Grandma returns home – and that’s when the real adventure begins.

  The apostle Paul found this an extremely useful strategy for developing a faith community – to get out of the way!  For Paul, he was in and out in as little as 9 days, and as long as 3 years.  Similarly, Neil Cole describes in Organic Leadership that mentors and church planters should MAWL their proteges – MAWL stands for:

  • M – model
  • A - assist
  • W – watch, and finally…
  • L – leave.

  It is that last one I have the hardest time with.  Leaving.  I never fully trust that the group can survive without me.

  But as I write those words, what kind of perspective is that?  Why do I think its up to me to keep some flywheel spinning, once its been spun?  I’ll get my hand cut off trying!

  Maybe a little humility and bravery is needed.  Maybe part of what it means to see a vibrant family of Jesus in close reach of every person is not thinking that the family has to get it all right for years on end before the scaffolding can come off.  Could it be that things actually work better through strategic absence of a leader rather than persistent, suffocating presence?

  

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    Katrina 7:23 pm on June 1, 2011 Permalink

    Mark – nice post! When the human “leader” fades out, the true Leader appears…

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  Mark 12:09 pm on January 11, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

  Truly Hearing God is Doing Something About It 

  Just because God speaks doesn’t mean you’ll be able to hear him.

  In reading over Isaiah 48, I was reminded that in Hebrew, there is no distinction between listening and obeying.  There is no way to simply listen to something without responding.  If you listened to someone, and didn’t do anything about what you heard, you didn’t actually hear anything.  You were deaf.  You could either obey or disagree, but you couldn’t simply brush it off without a response.

  18 Oh, that you had listened to my commands!

  Then you would have had peace flowing like a gentle river

  and righteousness rolling over you like waves in the sea.

  This echoes true in the Jews’ response to the words of God – God was speaking, but they didn’t “hear” him, meaning they didn’t do anything in response to God’s voice.

  This also rings true in the way Jesus spoke of his disciples’ relationship with Father God.  ”My disciples are those who hear my words and put them into practice…”

  This is a noticeably missing piece to the prayer of Christians in the West.  Few Christians pray…or at least, no more prayer than the occasional “Help me get through this, God, and I promise, I’ll call more often!”  And even fewer Christians listen for God’s voice in prayer – something I’m becoming more and more convinced is essential in a healthy relationships with God, and the starting point to any significant mission on earth.

  But even if you do pray, and you do listen for God’s voice, how often do you actually put what you hear into practice?  Might God’s silence in your prayers this morning be because you did not listen to what he had to say yesterday? Think about the last thing you DID hear him say, and go out and be obedient to that.  It may just get the two of you talking again…

  Hearing and doing…for the Hebrew-speaking Jews, these two ideas were inseparable.  If only we could recapture a fraction of this conviction again today…

  
   
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  Mark 8:47 am on August 11, 2010 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Articles ( 50 ), CMA Resources ( 2 ), CO2, Life Transformation Groups, LK10 Community ( 3 ), micro ( 2 )   

  Micro Rhythms 

  

  Our Micro is really blossoming in some wonderful and formative ways.  (Read more on the Micro Layer.)

  It began with going strictly by the LTG brochure you can read all about on CMA’s website, 25-30 chapters of God’s Word each week, 10 character-conversation questions (accountability) and praying for the “sojourners” in our lives.  We then tossed in some material from CO2 (Church of 2), learning to tap into what is going on in “my heart, your heart, and God’s heart.”  We found both of these structures helpful and we flow pretty seamlessly between both of them.

  We read plenty of God’s Word. We use YouVersion.com‘s free, customizable Reading Plans to stay in sync with each other – each day reading the same Scriptures and dwelling in the Word – letting God speak to us as we cultivate a spirit of “listening prayer.”

  We check in with each other…as close to daily as possible. At the end of our reading and journaling, we take 5 minutes to write an email to the group – writing what we thought about, prayed about and heard from God during our reading.  It gives us a daily “check-in” opportunity, even when we are not meeting up with each other in the flesh.  When we meet up once a week, we don’t have to spend all our time going over the minute details of our life because we already know!  Instead, we check in spiritually -

  “What are the deep issues of your heart, today?” “What are you hearing from God?  What are you doing about it?  How can we help you?”

  We usually have more than enough to share with each other!

  We confess sin to each other. Each week we ask, “Is there anything we need to confess today?”  Sometimes its sin that is shared, other times its a testimony!  When sin is confessed, the others listen closely to the one confessing, and when everything is said, they respond by saying,

  “I hear what you are saying.  You’re right – this is sin, and wrong…but God forgives you.”

  Hearing these words is like salve to the soul…

  We pray for harvest workers and for the lost in our city. We meet at 9:00am-10:30am each week – and at 10:02am our cell phone will chime reminding us to pray the pray we read in Luke 10:2 - “Pray to the Lord who is in charge of the harvest to cast out workers into his harvest field!” We take a few moments to thank God for what he is doing in Chicago, and to plead that God open up the hearts of those we know who are searching for truth.

  After 9 months – this is what our Micro looks like.  It has embedded within it the seed of a faith community – and while our group may not look exactly like others that start, our rhythms can easily be passed on and re-molded in countless ways.  Have you thought of trying it?  It’s AWESOME!  More and more Micros are starting in our house church network all the time, and I believe it makes us healthier.

  I wouldn’t give up my Micro for anything – it is a chance to be real.  It is a band of brothers.  It is the core and starting place of mission.  It is life transforming!

  

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