If you have a few minutes and you’re in the mood for a good laugh, please check out Nate Schlomann’s blog.

What is risk?  I ask this in the context of a life lived for the mission of Jesus (this being defined by the Great Commission).  I realize that with God there is no real risk.  All takes place under the banner of His sovereignty, and if we are obeying Him then we can trust in his provision in our lives.

What I’m writing about is what should we be willing to risk? Better yet even, what should we be risking for the mission.  If we look at the book of Acts, we see the apostles and first century believers taking unbelievable risks for the sake of Jesus.  We specifically see Paul constantly risking life and limb to spread the message of the Gospel throughout the world.  He had to trust in God providing odd jobs (he made tents) and donations from faithful churches to feed and clothe him.

So how should we live?  How “responsible” should we be?  Are we trusting God enough?

Has anyone else noticed the amount of name dropping that goes on in blogs?  I know I’m a beginner at blogging, but I find it interesting that many popular bloggers seem to try and fit as many links to their friends blogs, sometimes pointlessly, into their posts.  I’m not trying to ruffle any feathers or anything, but could someone explain this?

I’m guessing it is to increase the traffic to their buds blogs or to raise their technorati rating or whatever, but is this the point?

I’m just curious….

If you know where that phrase actually comes from, then you possibly grew up in a family that was was obsessed with 70’s country music as I did. Now that I have the comedy portion of my own personal welcome back party to the bloggerdom, let us get down to business. Most people apologize for not blogging for an extended period of time, but not I. I had to make choices over the past few months as to how to spend my time, and my little blog just didn’t make the cut. Perhaps a time in my life is coming when I can spend a tenth of the time that others spend on their blogs on mine, or maybe that is as much of a pipe dream.

To update everyone on where I, and conVerge Church are on our path to world domination (maybe I should say evangelization instead). We are now well into our Summer Series. There has been much confusion and possibly even criticism (gasp!) over what we are doing this summer. A few months ago, Nate and I decided that over the summer we would experiment. What if we stripped down the formalities and rituals that we take part in for a brief time, and simply come together and be the church? What if we were to gather, share meals, pro-actively create environments where the people of conVerge are almost forced to have conversations that could lead to relationships? What if we could do this during the service? What does a service even look like?

Those are just a few of the questions I have been asking myself over the past few months about “services.” I still believe in them, and even believe they are the best way to formalize a church. I do think, that at this point in the infancy of conVerge that we have done something that has actually brought about friendships and conversations that wouldn’t have taken place without this move.

“But how are you preaching the Word?” you might ask. Well, on a few of the nights I have brought 10-15 minute talks about the passage of Scripture our missional communities are in (our communities are spending the summer in Ephesians). Also, once a month we are coming together to partake in the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper. This is a time of reflecting on the death of Jesus and the reconciliation that He brought us through it.

So what are we doing? To sum it up, we are trying to be the church instead of going to church. I don’t think this is the model of church that I would ever do on a full time basis, but maybe sometimes people need to strip away the formalities to form relationships. If the church doesn’t make it happen, it probably never will. I think that’s where being the church can really start. I love the freedom to experiment, and I hope I never lose it.

I have neglected my blog for the past few weeks, and have no excuse other than lack of time.  I would like to say though, that when people excuse themselves from doing something because they did not have enough time, what they are actually saying is that they did not either a) desire to do one thing over another thing they felt more time efficient or b) are lazy and are using their time unfruitfully or c) are terrible at time management.  c) may actually need to be combined with b), but I will leave that up to you to decide.  I would though, at this time, like to list a random list of things that are going through my mind this morning.

1)  I love the C(c)hurch

2) I visited Richmond, VA yesterday and was overcome with excitement for this fall when we make the move to plant conVerge Church in Charter Colony.

3) No one said it would be easy, and Jesus actually said it would be hard.

4) Jesus wasn’t as nice as my flesh would have liked Him to be.

5) People that wear formal attire to church have no clue what the term missional means.
6) God has been really convicting me of so many things this week.

7) I am scared of the message I’m sharing out of God’s Word tonight.

That’s all for now, and I hope to see you tonight.

We faced a decision a few months back.  We were continuing to begin our movement towards a church plant in Richmond as well as all working jobs and attending college or seminary.  We were making connections, talking to professors, rearranging our lives, and trying to learn what it actually meant to live Missional lives.  We had two Bible studies that met every week and studied Scripture, prayed for each other, and talked about being Missional.  We had formed a community of people that cared for each other, prayed for each other. 

There was only one problem with what we were doing though.  We were constantly talking about being Missional, but none of us were actually being Missional.  The system that we had set up, and most of the students studying for “church ministry” have set up is a system of theorizing and vision-casting for a few years down the road for when they will begin to obey the commands of God concerning Missional living.  We felt, and they feel, that we were on a “time-out” from being on the mission of Jesus while we were learning everything that we could about Jesus in a classroom. 

There are some problems with this though.  Let it first be understood though, that I am a champion of education.  I am college educated, have one Masters in Pastoral Counseling, and am currently earning a Master of Divinity degree in theology.  I am not advocating that people should not be educated.  I actually advocate the opposite.

What I am advocating is urgency for living Missional right now, wherever you are, and in whatever circumstance you are.  In Matthew 28: 19, 20 we find one of the most heralded verses for the New Testament church, but also, one of the most misunderstood.  For the sake of the reader, I will not cover every aspect of this passage.  What I will lay out are some key things that need to be taken from this verse, especially for those preparing for “ministry” right now. 

There are four basic actions commanded in this verse.  Those four actions are: go, make, teach, and trust.  We are to “go” in the authority of Jesus, “make” disciples, “teach” them to obey, and “trust” that Jesus will be with us to the end of the age.  I believe that the order they are laid out in that verse is very significant to how we live.  Most followers of Jesus currently follow a system that uses those concepts in a reverse order.  We follow this pattern: trust, teach, make, and go.  The problem is that in that order, it becomes completely self-centered.  We spend a while learning to “trust,” then we get people to “teach” us what is right and what we should do, then we have that person “make” us into disciples, and then we consider “go”-ing on the mission to reach the world.

The main problem with that is that it is in the wrong order.  It also usually becomes very self-centered, which will usually take people right off of mission, and people get swallowed up by the “thorns” of this world (cf. Luke 8:7).  By thorns, I mean the cares of this world (career, family, material possessions, romance, etc.) swallow them up and they never make it to “go.”

Yesterday began church planting emphasis week at LU. Had the awesome opportunity to hear Nelson Searcy, pastor of The Journey Church in Manhattan, NY, speak in a class on church planting. The stuff they have done in NYC so far has been phenomenal. It was interesting to hear him talk about all of his experiences since their launch in 2001. They are currently averaging a little over 1,000, and meet across the street from Madison Square Garden! What a location!

Ed Stetzer spoke in LU’s campus church last night. It was awesome. It appeared that God worked in the lives of a lot of the students. He spoke from 2 Corinthians 5:16-21. 3 of His points were all about Being on Mission, people mattering to God’s mission of reconciliation, and living differently. Those sound very familiar to me for some reason.

Seriously though, it was an awesome night. We went all over campus today on our lunch break handing info cards about conVerge to students. If you got one of those cards we hope you contact us or just check us out.

Last night, conVerge launched in Lynchburg.  At around 6:40 pm people started showing up and by 7:05 pm there were 112 people there ready to hear about exploring a mission and forming a plan! We asked God to move, and He did it in a major way!

I’m not the same person I was yesterday when I woke up.  Today, I woke up a little differently.  I woke up with different thoughts and different desires.  There is something amazing about obedience that leads to mission.  It does something to your life with God and people.  It changes it and brings it into a place that brings God glory, and makes you love nothing more than giving Him glory.

It starts today.  Today we have to realize that life is different and God has brought that difference.  That life has changed, but God has done the changing.  His mission is the focal point, and that is the greatest life to live.   conVerge church is now a reality, and the mission is right in front of us.  There is no turning back.

In Genesis 41 Joseph is in prison in Egypt for a crime he did not commit. He then gets the miraculous opportunity to interpret a dream for Pharaoh that no one else can seem to interpret. The basic meaning of the dream is that there will be 7 years of harvest, which will then be followed by 7 years of famine. Upon this interpretation, Pharaoh appoints Joseph as second in command of all of Egypt in order to prepare them for the coming famine.

There are a few things that this passage brought to my mind last night…

1) Every person has gifts from God.

I am a firm believer in this. Throughout Joseph’s life, he had a great number of choices to deal with. All of them seemed to be within the context of situations that were harder than anything I have ever had to deal with. Most people latch on to spiritual gifts that cause them to thrive. God showing Joseph dreams and the interpretations of dreams caused trouble for him right off the bat. This gift was the entire reason he was sold into slavery. It took him away from his family and faith, and placed him in a land with pagans to serve as a slave. Joseph, though, never ceased to allow God to use him. When the going got tough, Joseph got tougher. He is the ultimate example of perseverance.

2) Reaction to hardship shows trust in God.

The issue is how those hardships are handled. They can either be handled with trust in God’s providence, or with the failure of not trusting God and giving in to the desire to lose hope. Joseph faced ridiculous adversity in his life, yet you always see his trust in God to be unwavering. At the end of the journey in Genesis 50:20 he looks back on the suffering that he faced and proclaims, “…God meant it for good.” This is a life that was spent trusting God. He faced the hard times, and through it all, trusted enough to keep risking.

3) God wants you to lead where you are.

It is not typical for most Christians to seek leadership within the ranks of pagans. That is exactly where God took Joseph to secure Israel’s history. God places us in strategic situations at the most strategic times in order to advance His Kingdom. We constantly seek to get ahead for our own gain, or to get out so that we can retreat behind the walls of the church. Instead, God is often telling us to engage the culture we are in because that is how He wants to grow His Kingdom. Lead where you are!

4) God’s sovereignty works through the choices of man.

We don’t normally wake up in the morning and ask what choices we will be making today will play directly into God’s plan. That is what happens. The question to ask in this story though, is what if Joseph had made other choices. He had a choice to make with Potiphar’s wife (Genesis 39). That one decision led him to the prison, which lead Him into Pharaoh’s presence. His decision to choose right over wrong, and to choose the hard way over the easy way led directly into God’s plan.

There is surely much more to take from this amazing story, but those are just a few things that God showed me. This Sunday, conVerge church is seeking to help people use their gifts, to trust God, lead where we are, and to further His kingdom and sovereign plan through making strategic choices. Pray for us.

I have had zero time this week to keep this updated as I would like to. This Sunday marks our launch service here in Lynchburg and we are all working feverishly in order to get everything in order for that. This Sunday, January 27, 7 pm, @ Crosspoint Church conVerge church will launch its first service.

Yesterday my wife and I had the privilege to go to Richmond and spend time talking to 4 Church Planting Strategists for the Southern Baptist Conservatives of VA. It was pretty awesome to be able to share a little of our vision for what we want to do in Phase 2 of conVerge in Richmond. We will hopefully be finding out very soon what role they will play in helping us plant the church in Richmond.

There is still a ton of work that needs to go into this Sunday, and then we get to turn around and get to work on the second worship experience scheduled for February 10. I am so excited to see what is going to happen that i can hardly contain it!