It’s 7:48am on Sunday morning. I looked out my window and I saw no people up and down the boulevard. It was a strange sight. Jen and I are getting ready to go to our third Christian Associates staff conference at the DeBron Conference Center in Holland. This will be our third. Two years ago Jen and I were fresh off the jet and still trying to figure out what it was like being in Europe for the first time. And trying to navigate being new to CA. Last year I was a part of the worship team and was running around doing music all the time. When I did get a free moment after working with the band I could never find the guys and never really felt like I connected with people. And on top of this Jen had her short haircut and was a bit not herself.
This year I am excited about a few things. One, every year God does things internally with me and I’m looking forward to seeing what that may be. Two, One of the authors of a really really great book called The Shaping of Things to Come will be a main speaker (the last two years the speakers have been people from within CAI…which is a good thing, but I’m looking forward to hearing from this guy). Three, Klaus and I have planned a football (soccer) tournament and I’m excited to play with my friends from CA. The last two years we’ve not played much sport, so I’m glad that this year will be different.
I’m taking my iSight to the conference and I’m planning on doing some updates via video…so check out the blog this week and you may get to ‘see a little taste’ of Staff Conference.
I took this quiz that I found on the blog of Joshua Case. I came out as Captain Jack Sparrow…seeing as Johnny Depp’s inspiration for this character was Pepe LePue and Keith Richards, I am concerned for myself…I do like that William Wallace was number two though…
You scored as Captain Jack Sparrow. Roguish,quick-witted, and incredibly lucky, Jack Sparrow is a pirate who sometimes ends up being a hero, against his better judgement. Captain Jack looks out for #1, but he can be counted on (usually) to do the right thing. He has an incredibly persuasive tongue, a mind that borders on genius or insanity, and an incredible talent for getting into trouble and getting out of it. Maybe its brains, maybe its genius, or maybe its just plain luck. Or maybe a mixture of all three.
Note: This is not a commentary on the practice of churches across the world and I don’t intend to say that ‘we do it right and others do it wrong’. God is bigger than any form of the Church and I believe that He uses them all despite their differences. I do believe that we should do our best to be true to mission of God (function), regardless of our different forms and in that way, God will be honored in our unity.
The mainstay of many churches around the world is the weekend worship service. In the western world we have become so busy that we want to try and ‘do’ our church time in one shot. The idea of a weekend service has been around a really, really long time…dating back to the Roman Empire in the 6th century. It’s no wonder that many people define Church by the way its weekend gatherings are held!
At Vintage we are attempting something different*. As we have many different times and ways* for the body to get together for encouragement, study, prayer, and community we don’t have the same need to try to fulfill the responsibilities* of the church in one time. At Sanctuary we have one goal in bringing everybody from Vintage together: To encourage the worship of God. At this monthly time, we don’t just have an extended time of singing, but we are hoping to use this time to redefine what worship is…worship is when a person’s entire life is attuned to who God is and in turn constantly seeks how He wants them to live. We do this through prayer, encouragement through scripture and teaching, meditation, singing, communion, and some talking around the tables we use. Every time of Sanctuary is different. We set the room up different. We take communion in a variety of ways. We have a different order every time…and we are trying to keep it simple.
On the outside this may appear to be ‘a normal service.’ But there is one main difference: We are doing out best to keep the attention of the night on worshipping and connecting with God. We believe that an experience with God will bring about life-change that is beyond anything a human could produce. We are not trying to pass on a ton of information to people that has the potential to become more self-serving than God-focused. We are simply doing our best to keep people’s eyes focused on Jesus and who God is. We never want people to leave saying, “Wow, the speaker/band/media/ambience was so good…” We want people to leave saying, “God is good.”
This last Sanctuary felt very much like our old ‘house Sanctuaries’ at the Gerken’s, but was probably the closest time to fulfilling the hope of what Sanctuary is! We set the room up in a round. Used one amp for the guitar and vocal so that they could be heard. Used no mics for the people sharing. Spent a good amount of time meditating on scripture. We had a time of sharing what God was speaking to people. I left saying…”God is good and His presence was honored.”
Honestly though, Sanctuary is the most anomalous ‘thing’ that we do at Vintage. It is unlike everything else. We are still hoping to make this time more and more fruitful in encouraging the worship of God. We don’t have it figured out…but I think we get closer every month. Pray that God will continue to give us wisdom in how to create a time that will bring Him the most honor.
*Different in form, not in function or belief
*We also have dinner parties, connector events, 3′s, discussion groups, home groups, and other random gathering times. We don’t just have these as a supplement to Sanctuary not ‘doing it all’, but because we believe that all of these time are valid expressions of the Church. I’ll talk about all of these things in other posts.
*I believe that the Church has specific responsibilities to the Body itself. There is an entirely different aspect that is the Church’s responsibility to God. Here’s my list:
-To mentor both new and long-time believers in the way Jesus taught us to live
-To teach the Bible
-To provide opportunity to do good works
-To foster community (not just in the ‘we see each other in the parking lot or foyer at church’ way, but to create space for genuine, messy, life-on-life living)
-To set an example to all believers how the mission of God (redemption of all that is His) is practiced
-To create space for worshipping of God in community (I guess that kind of is the big one that covers all the rest.)
We found out at our last ultrasound that we are having a little girl! We went to our appointment so excited to find out. When he went to check the sex I actually saw what needed to be seen before the doctor said, “C’est une petite fille!” Jen was sooo excited as she had thought that it was a girl all along…I thought it was boy, but I am no less excited! I can’t wait till she’s born! It will be so fun be a little girl’s daddy! I know Jen is going to be a great mom to a daughter as well! She had a good model.
As I was sitting in the office my mind was already going to what life will be like in a world of pink, dolls, dresses, and putting make-up on daddy…and playing with my hair if I have any left! I grew up with balls, video games, guns, and wrestling, but I am excited about making the change to something new! If this one is anything like her mom I am in for a fun (and fiery) time!
I am now noticing cute little girls all over the place! On the metro, in the park, on the sidewalk! In my past I haven’t really connected with girls until my niece Avery. For some reason, she loves me…and made my heart melt. I think God knew that I was going to have a girl and he gave me Avery to show me how much fun girls are. It’s fun having a special bond with her and I’m really excited to have a bond like this with my own daughter!
As we speak (hypothetically) Jen is diving into the world of online baby gift-registration. The pink has begun…’how fun is that?’ as girls say!
With our upcoming trip to the States I have been thinking a lot about Vintage…our church here in Paris. I have been thinking about how different it is from the type of church that I grew up in and how different it is from any other church in Paris. We’re not just different* in little ways, but in big things like: We don’t have a weekly Sunday service and we don’t have our own building…not even offices! Both of these things are typical of most churches in the States and are often defining characteristics of what people would even call a church.
I do want to say a few things in preparation for the next posts. Before we left the States I always thought it would be so cool to be a part of an ‘organic church’ that celebrated church as all times believers got together…and it is really cool…but it was an adjustment for me. Especially, learning how to lead in this environment. I discovered how much I like control and how little I trusted God, which I have spent much time working on since being here. After all the books I read, I was finally putting into practice what I had dreamed of. And I must say, living Church as a lifestyle among community is really fulfilling. Frank and I were talking about 4 months ago about church stuff and I made a comment that there is a cool church in Riverside that I used to ‘go to’. He looked at me and said, “Do you think that anyone can say they go to Vintage?” We laughed because it’s impossible for people to say that they go to our church. For one we are more of a network of smaller events and one small group doesn’t represent all of Vintage. And second, when you choose to define church by its people (like we have) then is it possible to go to it? When you define a church by its events then you can go to the events, but have you really gone to Church or a church event?
These are questions that have left me with a desire to tell the story of our church and the how’s and why’s we do what we do. There have been people who have visited us here in Paris and said, “Are we ever going to go to a real church while I’m here?” or “I haven’t been to church the whole time I’ve been here.” I understand why they would say that…we are doing something different* that doesn’t make sense to everybody…and that’s ok. We are here starting Vintage Church for the sake of people in Paris who don’t go to church, never have been to a church service, have misconceptions of what church is, and don’t trust ‘religion’. A church that they would attend and trust would most likely be completely different than a church that works for somebody who had gone to church their whole life in the United States…or maybe even Europe.
In the next few days I’m going to spend some time blogging about Vintage church and the things we do that make up our church. I will call these blog entries “Redefining Church – Dinner Parties” or “Redefining Church – Sanctuary” or whatever the specific ministry event is. I am wanting to give you a glance at what it is that we do here and why. I know that I won’t give complete descriptions of all that we do because if you can’t ‘go to’ our church…how could I come close to writing all there is about it?
*I want to clarify that when I say different I don’t mean in function or belief, but in form.
It’s time for another post that means nothing and has no real substance…but needs to be blogged. For some reason I have been incredibly clumsy the last week or so. I pride myself on being careful when I walk and making sure I don’t take unplanned steps…but not this week.
It started at the Lebanese restaurant. I’ve been in there a hundred times, but this time was different. Due to how often I frequent the establishment (amazing food and I like the guys that work there) I know the staff. When I walked into the door I made eye contact with the manager and was walking toward him to shake his hand…when the base of their sign jumped out and tripped me. Immediate pain. As I tried to regain my balance I put my foot down really quickly…too quickly in fact. The front of my sandal caught the ground and catapulted me towards the manager…who caught me as I was trying to get my balance. I hit the sign hard enough with my shin to leave a piece of skin with some hair on it just chillin’ on the sign. I looked at the manager and said, “Un moment” and walked outside to ‘walk it off’. I took a few seconds to get some fresh air and then headed back in. My embarrassment the first time around kept me from noticing everybody watching me, but this trip it was evident that my Italian-football-player-like flop into the restaurant attracted quite a bit of interest. My friend Mo who works there came running up the stairs and told me that the manager (who caught me) told him that “his American friend had hurt his leg.” Mo insisted that I put some ice on it and sit down…He insisted…He’s Lebanese…they insist sometimes…and it was very nice of him. He sat me at a table with two other Lebanese men who were having lunch. Awkward. American young guy makes scene and falls into restaurant. Bleeds. Sits with strangers while icing injury in shame. To top it off…Mo found a band-aid that was so big I could have parachuted with it. I told him that my leg was to wet to put it on at the moment, but I really didn’t want to wear it as I was handing out ‘cool points’ left and right.
Since then…I have tripped three other times on stairs. Once after playing basketball…going up stairs. Once on the escalator while trying to pass a guy…And tonight after a picnic on the river…going up stairs in front of a bunch of people carrying our grocery cart full of stuff. Certainly not a graceful week…
My shin is healing up nicely from the Lebanese restaurant incident…the next time I go in there I’m going to put that massive band-aid on my leg and limp in there like it’s still really hurt…just to give them something to laugh about…if I’m convincing enough maybe I’ll get some free baklava out of the deal! I’ll let you know…
I don’t know how, but since moving to Paris I’ve been had the chance to meet a lot of really cool people. People who I would have certainly never thought that I would cross paths with. Yet, God uses these chance meetings to encourage my faith and give me new insight into life as a Christian and following Jesus. This last week I’ve been able to spend some time with a guy named Gordon Pennington who runs a media consulting firm called Burning Media. His story is on the website, but his future is what makes this guy so cool. Gordon is a committed Christian guy who is using his vast knowledge and skill in marketing to advance the Kingdom of God. He is the first person to admit that marketing is often used to sell things to people that don’t need them and is fully aware of the many woes there are behind marketing strategy and he raised good questions about these issues. Such as: What is our place as Christians in giving in to marketing? What should be the Church’s response to marketing? What can the Church do to bring justice to unethical business practices? How can we resist marketing in our culture and see truth?
The thing about Gordon that I really enjoyed talking about was culture. I am a wanna-be sociologist and I love the subject. I read what I can, but it was a treat for me to talk with somebody who is in the process of writing a book that I would read. We talked about what shapes culture and why culture is what it is. We talked about what it will take for the Church to influence a culture that has given itself over to media and marketing. A culture in which the products (music, movies, cereal, shoes) that the public use are dictated by big business.
In all of our conversation about this there were two things that stood out to me. One is the reality that people are used to personify products. As a Christian this is convicting to me. Each one of us is a breathing, walking, talking personification of who Jesus is and was. Advertising companies go out and find a celebrity that will represent their product in order to give a product some sort of person-hood. Jesus comes and chooses us, abnormal and broken people, to remain on earth and be His person-hood. Life is the best way to represent any product. We as Christians must do the same.
The second thing was that to truly influence culture we have to show that our God is capable of changing lives and showing up in ways that only He can. I used to think this is how I lived my life…I would say, “If God doesn’t show up things aren’t going to go well.” Since moving to Paris I feel like I have stepped back from this attitude. I haven’t adopted or dreamed many ‘God-sized’ goals that I have acted on. I do think that we are surviving and thriving here only due to the grace of God, but I need to be real with myself and say that I could be living my faith more boldly. The best tool that we have as Christians are the times when we have done our best, it wasn’t enough, and God came in and redeemed a near disastrous situation. I feel like I need these times…it is both a drug for us that keeps us dependent on God and a powerful display of who God is.
Some Christians that I know reject the idea of marketing and advertising…and I am among those who do…depending on the product. I have no problem doing our best to use the tools that God has given us to make Himself known. I am more than happy to admit that the product that my life represents is beneficial to every person who will receive it. I will do whatever I can to make Jesus and the Kingdom of God known.
As a Christian I need to be weary of the times when I find myself giving in quickly to culture and sacrificing the calling of God. I would be a liar if I said that I haven’t had my attention too fixed on things that really aren’t that important. This is an area that I need to repent of.
I guess that is the point of this post…To share with anybody who reads this that I am looking for new ways for my life to ‘advertise’ (not the best word) the right things and for my life to avoid giving into the wrong things.
