Without A God-Breathed Vision People Lose Hope and Die

Purpose

We are a community of followers of Jesus Christ, committed to live by faith, to be known by love, and to be a voice of hope.

Equip for Mission

Christ gifts the church with apostles (extend the gospel), prophets (know God's will), evangelists (communicator of the gospel), pastors (nurture and protect), and teachers (understand and explain) with the responsibility to equip (disciple) God's people to do His work (Ephesians 4:11-16).

The Mission of God: The Inward Journey

Our large gathering in community is a time of worship, celebration, stories of God's activity, gifts of the Holy Spirit, encouragement, teaching, giving, Holy Communion, water baptism, Children's and Jr. High (Road 678) Community Groups, etc.

Community Groups are the central discipleship arm and primary vehicle to accomplish our vision. The essential purpose of smaller communities is the practicing of love and trust and the growing into Christlikeness in a space of intentional grace.  Community Groups help us learn about and experience the incredible love of God, which helps us in turn to love Him and ourselves.

The Mission of God: The Outward Journey

Loving God and ourselves helps us to love our spouse, children, family, neighbors, co-workers, and others around us. God calls us to love others and to go into all the world to make disciples. The mission of God leads us to be good stewards of creation and involved in God's justice (Luke 4:18-19; Isaiah 58; Matthew 25).

Great Quotes by Henry Nouwen

Prayer:   "To pray, I think, does not mean to think about God in contrast to thinking about other things, or to spend time with God instead of spending time with other people. Rather, it means to think and live in the presence of God. As soon as we begin to divide our thoughts about God and thoughts about people and events, we remove God from our daily life and put him into a pious little niche where we can think pious thoughts and experience pious feelings. … Although it is important and even indispensable for the spiritual life to set apart time for God and God alone, prayer can only become unceasing prayer when all our thoughts - beautiful or ugly, high or low, proud or shameful, sorrowful or joyful - can be thought in the presence of God. … Thus, converting our unceasing thinking into unceasing prayer moves us from a self-centered monologue to a God-centered dialogue."

Attractional:  "Jesus refused to be a stunt man.  He did not come to walk on hot coals, swallow fire, or put his hand in the lion's mouth to demonstrate that he had something worthwhile to say."

Leadership:  "Christian leaders cannot simply be persons who have well-informed opinions about the burning issues of our time.  Their leadership must be rooted in the permanent, intimate relationship with the incarnate Word, Jesus, and they need to find there the source for their words, advice, and guidance."

Power and Control:  "It seems easier to be God than to love God, easier to control people than to love people, easier to own life than to love life..."  "The temptation of power is greatest when intimacy is a threat.  Much Christian leadership is exercised by people who do not know how to develop healthy, intimate relationships and have opted for power and control instead.  Many Christian empire-builders have been people unable to give and receive love."

Name-Calling:  "Words like 'right-wing,' 'reactionary,' 'conservative,' 'liberal,' and 'left-wing' are used to describe people's opinions, and many discussions then seem more like political battles for power than spiritual searches for the truth."

The Scene of the Crime

Recently I had the opportunity to go back to the scene of the crime.  While the details are private, I will say it has been one of the most important experiences of my life.  It wasn’t the actual location mind you.  But the events that I am processing felt exactly like it. My heart was literally at the point of breaking as I was reminded of the sounds, the smells, and the sites.  Everything was familiar to what happened 33 years ago.

The hardest part was processing the emotions of what it felt like God abandoning me.  Why was He allowing me to experience such raw emotion, pain and suffering?  Why was God allowing me to experience an event that echoed what I had experienced so long ago? Why was He allowing, even leading me to the scene of the crime.

It was interesting to go back.  All the raw emotion of so long ago felt like it was sitting next to me.  And as I looked into that space, in many ways I felt nine again.  Yet much of life had changed.  I was not the same scared little boy.  As I looked around the room, Jesus was there, sitting with me.  And as I listened to his voice, He reminded me of five of the most important words I could hear.
“This does not define you.”

Suddenly it made sense.  I had to return to the scene of the crime to discover that it did NOT define me.  I had to experience the raw emotion to discover that it no longer held me captive.  And once I discovered that, the burden lifted.  It was redeemed.  And when the scene of the crime no longer held me captive, the present no longer held me captive.  It literally altered every facet of the present moment.

Hope reigned supreme, no matter what happened.

By Jonathan Brink

Our Church's Worship

"I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me" (Matthew 25:40).

Tucked away in an alley off a dingy street in Calcutta is a very nondescript doorway. I was a bit uncertain that it was even the right place. But that humble doorway, through which I was warmly welcomed by the Missionaries of Charity, also became an entrance for me into an understanding of worship that is branded deeply in my mind and heart.

Mother Teresa was probably not someone you would have thought as a worship consultant to your church. However, as you retrace with me that conversation in 1988, I think you might just discover an insight that, if put into practice, could deepen your life of worship and increase the sense of God's pleasure in it.

After presenting her with simple gifts - a booklet I had written, and two popular worship recordings - 'Give Thanks', with Don Moen, and 'Glorify Thy Name' with Kent Henry. I exuberantly described what I saw going on internationally in the area of worship. "It's a worldwide revival of joy," I reported. "God is clothing His people with garments of praise!"

Surely, I thought, I would declare the good news of what God was doing, and introduce these faithful servants of God to a greater and more glorious worship! Her eyes were kind, but unimpressed, as she pushed back the cassettes saying that they didn't have any music players. They had chosen to live without such distractions.

I thought to myself "How can you be a worshiper and not be able to keep up with all the new songs!" I was daunted, but quickly regained equilibrium and tried again. I was curious about how the Missionaries of Charity worshiped? "What kind of music do you like? What kind of instruments do you use? Do you like faster or slower songs?"

No instruments, I learned. Their early morning worship times were very reverent, and prayer was more prominent than singing. A chance of a lifetime conversation, and I was blowing it. It's like we were speaking different languages. I desperately recalled the words of my friend who had invited me to India and had helped set up this meeting. He had said to me "Ask what worship means to her?" So I did.

Finally, we connected. Her eyes brightened as her answer went something like this: "If you really want to bless the Lord and pour out your love on Him, He has told us how to do it." And then she quoted Jesus' words in Matthew 25: "I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me."

She said that when the Missionaries of Charity minister to lepers from the streets of Calcutta, they do it as an act of worship to Jesus. She challenged me with these words: "If you really want to lavish your love on God, pour out your life on the needy."

"Mother Teresa," I said, "would you pray for me that I would be a true worshiper?" She answered, "Only if you'll pray for me first that I would be one too." We prayed for each other. The picture is on my refrigerator.

On my flight home, somewhere between Delhi and Frankfurt, I came across these words in Hebrews 13: "Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise - the fruit of lips that confess his name. And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased."

With such sacrifices - vocal praise and acts of mercy and generosity - God is pleased! I thought, "What a great title for a worship conference: 'With Such Sacrifices!'"

Just like the cross of Christ is vertical and horizontal... and just like the two great commandments - to love God and love your neighbor - reach upward as well as outward, so the true worship of God has two components: spoken praise to Him and selfless service to others. One without the other is an incomplete expression of worship.

So what would Mother Teresa have said to help the worship in our churches? Maybe her words would go like this: "You mustn't think worship only happens when you are singing; it happens also when you're serving others. Until we are vitally connected with those our Lord call 'the least of these,' we are not yet the worshiping churches He is looking for. Until we find delight in serving the insignificant - the children, the powerless, the prisoners, the unborn - God's pleasure in our worship is incomplete."

So if you're part of the worship ministry in your church, and it's all starting to feel a bit empty, maybe it's time to cancel the regular worship band or choir practice and find out where the "least of these" are so you can tell Jesus just how much you really love Him.

 Author Unknown

Interesting!

It seems like the church in the last couple of decades is at possible risk of spending more time entertaining than equipping people for God's mission. We are highly vulnerable to a fixation with technological savvy and "cool" communication. This can often become a substitute for the Holy Spirit's power in our lives and in our pursuing a lifestyle that incarnates Jesus' ministry and power. We have a growing passion at New Hope for Jesus Himself, the Kingdom of God, and a pursuit for cultivating disciples as Kingdom agents on mission.

Worship

We should jealously guard God's glory in worship. It is not about us! We ought to be sensitive to the issue of showmanship verses worship. Worship is to be Christ-centered, not human-centered. Whenever the focus becomes the music or being trendy, cool, or gauging the experience by emotional responses rather than the glory of God, it should make us feel uncomfortable. We must value the activity of the Holy Spirit in our midst during worship and the importance of being sensitive to God. We can come to worship with an expectation to meet with God rather than putting on or experiencing a show. Worship is about an audience of One! May there be a strong "encounter" in worship - the people of God, in the presence of God, pouring out the praises of God.

Training Center for Love

Church is not so much an institution, but more of a training center for love - loving God, loving ourselves, and loving others (Matthew 22:37-40).