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Most Christians are afraid of the dark

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A while back Jeremy wrote:

If the church wants to join God in storming the gates of hell, in defeating the darkness … We must find the mean places, the dark places, the dangerous places, and take the church there. We must go to the greedy, the liars, the cheats, the thieves, and show them generosity, truth, and honesty. We must find the places that even the cops won’t go, and go there with Jesus instead. Where do the most murders occur? Where do the addicts and prostitutes hang out? Let’s meet there.

Why Don’t We Enter the Darkness?

Most of us are afraid.

We’re afraid that we’ll be harmed physically.

We’re afraid we’ll catch a disease.

We’re afraid we’ll get dirty.

We afraid we’ll be robbed.

We’re afraid people will want our money or our stuff.

We’re afraid that somehow “those people” will break through the walls we’ve built around us, tug at our heart strings, and we’ll end up giving them our money, stuff and time.

Dwell in DarknessWe’re afraid we’ll be contaminated by their sin.

We’re afraid we’ll stop seeing their sin and start seeing them.

We’re afraid we might start loving them, sin and all, but we think we’re supposed to hate their sin.

We’re afraid we might learn to like them.

We’re afraid we might remember that Jesus loves them, but it is our arms Jesus uses to wrap around them.

Why Do We Think They Will Come to the Light?

My wife and I had moved. We visited a church service at a local church. One of the men confronted me at the front door. “We believe men should wear suits and ties to church to show respect to God.” I wasn’t wearing a suit and tie. I told him I didn’t believe that way, and went in anyway. 

At another church, an elder told me, “We don’t want people attending here until they get themselves cleaned up. We don’t want couples coming here who are living together but aren’t married. We only want good Christian people here.”

Why would anyone want to “come” to church if those are the attitudes they find? The people who most need to hear won’t come near. We make certain of that. Why would anyone have even the slightest interest in going any place where they know they won’t be accepted?

What’s The Answer?

Jeremy’s answer is simple. “We must go” to them — to the adulterers, prostitutes, thieves, tax collectors, Gentiles, sick, needy, poor, greedy, selfish, and to all who dwell in darkness.”

It is safer, warmer, less-threatening and more comfortable to keep our distance from those who dwell in darkness. But if we really do follow Jesus, if Jesus really is our Good Shepherd, need we fear evil? Is Jesus with us or not? 

Perhaps the question I must really ask myself is “Am I with Him?”

If I’m with Him, I don’t need to be afraid of the darkness. So go with the sinners are. Don’t be afraid. Jesus will go with you.

So don’t be afraid of the dark. When you’re with Jesus, no sin can harm you.

There is so much need in the world!

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Ten Signs Your Church Doesn’t Understand Mission

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church mission failHow can you tell if your church doesn’t understand it’s mission?

Sometimes the signs are pretty obvious that the church really doesn’t want to reach out and love others. But other times, we just don’t recognize the attitudes and behaviors which indicate a failure of our mission to be Jesus to the world.

Here are ten things you might hear in a Sunday service which will clue you in that your church leadership fails to grasp our mission to enter the dark and dangerous places of this world with the Gospel of the Kingdom or the fact the church is something we are, not something we attend.

(Note: In my first church, I said almost all ten at one time or another.)

  1. At the beginning of the service: “Well, let’s go ahead and get started. Hopefully more people will show up. Let’s begin by praying for those who are home sick or still on their way.”
  2. At the beginning of the service: “I guess the bad weather outside is keeping people at home.”
  3. At the beginning of the service: “I guess people are taking advantage of the nice weather outside and going to the lake.”
  4. During the prayer time: “Father, we pray that you would bring the people of our community to Jesus and help them to believe the gospel.” (Churches generally pray about this more than they do it.)
  5. During the opening prayer: “God, we invite you into our presence today.”
  6. At the beginning of the prayer time, you hear “Father, we come into your presence today…” (What? Is He only in church?)
  7. During the call to worship, there is an invitation to “leave your worldly cares behind.”
  8. During the opening welcome, you are told that “This is a safe place for you and your family.”
  9. During the opening welcome, you are invited to “Relax and enjoy your time. Get your batteries recharged.”
  10. In the announcements, you learn that there is a budget windfall, and to make the church more attractive to the community the board is trying to decide between repaving the parking lot or repainting the building.

There are dozens of others. Feel free to add to the list by leaving a comment below.

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The Refuge in Denver

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the refuge communityIn a previous post, I mentioned that I visited The Refuge in Denver, CO. They describe it as a home for spiritual orphans, a place to gather hope.

Here is some of what I learned about “how” they do things at The Refuge. I don’t share this with you so you can copy it in your context, but simply to show you what others are doing around the country.

Main Meeting

Their “main meeting” is on Saturday night at a grange hall which they rent. The building is rather run down, but that is okay with everyone, since following Jesus isn’t about having nice buildings.

Since I was not able to attend one of their main meetings, I asked what they were like. Everybody told me that they were never the same. Sometimes they sat in rows. Sometimes in chairs around tables. Sometimes they sang songs, but not always. Sometimes there was a sermon, other times a group discussion.

One thing they do every meeting is communion. But even this is out of the ordinary. Those who come take turns providing the “elements.” In most churches, the elements consist of grape juice (or wine) and an unleavened wafer. But at the Refuge, the elements can be anything. They have used coffee and donuts,coke and pretzels, chips and salsa, and milk and brownies.

Frequently, after the meeting, many of the people get together for a meal, but I didn’t get any details on how this works.

Weekday Houses of Refuge

They currently have two Houses of Refuge, which function like a house church.

Kind of…

They meet in a home, and consist of a meal and some sort of group activity or discussion. The night I was there, we had lasagna. There was also coffee and dessert.

After about an hour of eating and chatting, we moved to the living room and sat on couches where we introduced ourselves (for the several new people that were there), and then discussed that the way of following Jesus was not upward mobility, but downward mobility, into the muck and messiness of life.

The discussion was facilitated by Kathy Escobar, but she is not always the facilitator. As with most everything else at the Refuge, leadership is shared. I was told that they often pick a theme to discuss, and then take turns over the next several weeks or months leading the discussions.

Near the end of the discussion, Kathy also passed around a sign-up sheet for people to bring food for the future gatherings.

Leadership at The Refuge

Currently, there are four co-pastors at The Refuge. They do not believe that there should ever be a single “senior pastor.” These four co-pastors do receive a tiny, tiny income, but nothing that anyone could live off of. I don’t know amounts, but I doubt it comes to much more than an average honorarium.

And the co-pastors are not “pastors” in the way most churches think of them. They seem to be closer to organizers or administrators of the church. When someone has a need, rather than call around asking everyone for it, they call a pastor, and the pastor organizes a way to help meet that need. Certainly, they also provide vision and spiritual direction to the church, but they are not the only ones who speak, or do ministry in the church.

Ministry at The Refuge

Many of the people I talked to spoke of the community they have fond at The Refuge. Most have never experienced any sort of community like what they have found here. I saw this first hand and sensed it as I watched them interact. In many ways, they are family. They are not perfect, but love each other anyway. They laugh together, cry together, and live life together.

As such, this is their ministry, and it is a compelling ministry for those who see it. I know I was drawn to it.

They also provide opportunities to reach out with love to other hurting people in the wider community. I heard some people talk about a service opportunity in a low-income apartment complex, and a few other things, but ultimately, their ministry seems to be each other.

When you are real with each other, as the people of The Refuge seem to be, this ministry is more than enough, and also draws other people in who are longing for communal love like this.

What do you think about all of this? Is it still too “churchy” for you? Are they not “churchy” enough? What do you think about how they have communion and co-pastors? Are there any other questions you might have? 

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The Refuge in Denver

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House of Refuge in Denver
The House of Refuge occasionally offers dinners to the community.

I got to hang out at a The Refuge last week in Denver, CO. It consists of people who gather together to live life, and help each other through the messiness and pain of life.

The night I was there, some people from The Refuge met at the house of Jose and Kathy Escobar. After eating a meal, we sat around the living room and talked. The topic for the night was that most of us try to improve ourselves by climbing the moral ladder, but to really experience community with God and each other, we need to climb down the ladder back into the failures and stinkiness of life. The mess of life is where God meets us, where we meet ourselves, and where life really begins.

Kathy recently wrote a book about this, which explains what it means to follow Jesus on the downward path into pain, doubt, and darkness. Her book is titled, Down we Go, and I recommend you read it.

One of the amazing things for me about the group is not just the fact that people were there from a variety of backgrounds and beliefs, but that some of the people had moved from other parts of the country just to participate in a community like this.

People are starving for community, and it is not often found in the traditional church setting. There are most likely people who hunger and thirst for relationships right in your own neighborhood. This is one of the reasons it is so important to get to know our neighbors (as Sam Riviera has been pointing out — and who previously wrote about The Refuge).

We are trying to do this sort of thing in the neighborhood we recently moved into, and hopefully, as we get to know our neighbors, we can build relationships with them that will allow us to help them (and be helped) through the messiness and stinkiness of life.

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Do you like rain? Imagine being homeless in the rain…

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homeless manThe cold rain streams down my window as I sit in my warm and dry home, yet hot, wet tears stream down my cheeks as I watch the rain.

I love the rain, especially since we need it so much in Southern California. But I am not crying for the rain.

I am crying for the people I love who must sit in the rain, soaking wet, with nowhere to go and nothing to cover themselves.

Recently my wife and I distributed a car trunk full of tarps, sweatshirts, sweaters, pants, blankets, food and other supplies to the homeless living in San Diego. But our meager supplies fell far short of meeting what they need.

This morning the temperature is fifty degrees. Fifty isn’t all that cold unless you’re soaked to the skin sitting on a wet sidewalk in the rain. Sitting under a tarp helps, but not everyone has a tarp. Some are sitting in the rain, shivering.

Blood on the Sidewalk

Many of our Christian friends are afraid to go with us to buy and distribute clothes, food, and tarps to the homeless. They’re afraid to go to the inner city and mingle with the poor, the bikers, the gangs. They blanch when we tell them of the times we have stood on still-wet blood stains on the sidewalk where someone was murdered during the previous night. (I think this has happened five or six times.)

Sometimes we’re afraid before we go. For some reason we’re never afraid when we’re there. We see beautiful people, who are in the middle of life’s messes.

To Show The Love of Jesus

My friend who does not follow Jesus, who loves the homeless, the poor, and our gay friends wants to go with me today. She is trying to take off work for a couple of hours to join me. We’ll buy tarps and then hand them out.

When the homeless ask who we are and why we’re doing it I’ll say “I follow Jesus and we’re here to show the love of Jesus.” Then I’ll ask their name, and ask what they need. My friend will write it down in my little notebook.

Sometimes I pray with them there on the sidewalk, in the rain. Sometimes they ask about Jesus. Sometimes they bless me, at God’s bidding. I bless them in return.

We’re safe, warm, and dry. But are they?

There is so much need in the world!

And YOU can help.

Fill out the form below to receive several emails about how to love and serve the poor and homeless.

(Note: If you are a member of RedeemingGod.com, login and then revisit this page to update your membership.)

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