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.
We would really like to see both their Wednesday night and Saturday night events. We’d love to hear more about the Refuge and how they differ from a traditional church or a house church.
It was so good to meet you, Jeremy! Sam, c’mon over! We might have more dessert than dinner sometimes, but hey, that’s how we roll… :0). We all eat. The conversations are plentiful and gorgeous.
I wish you great joy and love in the journey downward!
I will. It’s just a matter of when, but I plan to come. Say hi to Kathy for Kay and I.
I might be able to make it back there in a few weeks. We’ll see…
Thanks so much for the book recommendation. . . never heard of it before but am now looking forward to reading it. For those who find something of Christ there, would recommend learning about and praying for brothers and sisters who are faithful altho persecuted. IMO, they may be the clearest display of Christ in the world today. Knowing them and their stories has been an encouragement to me in my walk. Thru all they go thru faithfully and with genuine joy and peace, they show that Christ is possible, for us.
In John 15, Jesus is calling his disciples to love others, as a command. And then in vs 16 says, “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit…” That word “go” is the greek word ‘hupago’ which means ‘to lead oneself under, to sink out of sight’. It’s the call to the cross in the hard ways of love that the Lord calls us to. But it also yields genuineness in ourselves and with others, genuineness in the Lord. Have found that this command to go, to lead oneself under, is hard to the flesh but practical to my spirit and growth in the Lord.
The Refuge reads like a place where you can find such genuineness along with community. Thanks for the post.
“Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.”