Last week a team from North Way Christian Community went on a mission trip to Honduras. I had the opportunity to go to Honduras last summer for research on my doctoral dissertation, so I know first hand how transformational the experience must have been for the team that went on this trip. The time spent in Honduras is life changing! Today several people who went on the trip shared with me about some of the amazing things that God did through this group of people from our church while in Honduras. God moved in many ways, and lives were impacted both with the people living in Honduras and with the people from Pittsburgh who went on the trip.
I am greatly encouraged by what God is doing globally, and I am also greatly encouraged by what God is doing in Pittsburgh. I have reached out to the people who went on the Honduras trip because I really want to connect them with what God is doing in Pittsburgh as well. Sometimes in the church we notice a tension between global and local missions, but there really is no difference to God. God is on mission to redeem every part of this world all of the time locally and globally, and he has chosen the church to accomplish his mission during this particular period of history. Global outreach is valuable, and local outreach is valuable. The point is that when we join God's mission to reach people in need in this world, we grow closer to Christ.
The big secret in living the countercultural Christian lifestyle in America is that the spiritual high or "feeling" that we get when we go on mission trips and serve the poor abroad... we can experience that closeness to God or "feeling" all of the time. I mean every single day of our lives. God designed us to live in his mission to reach the world all of the time, whether it's through volunteering locally where ever God has planted us or in our vocations or with our families. The world encourages us in America to be upwardly mobile and distance ourselves from people in need with our lifestyles, but the radical nature of the gospel of Jesus Christ encourages us to be downwardly mobile and give ourselves away relationally with marginalized people. God takes the things of this world and flips them on their head, and that still applies to modern day America. As followers of Jesus, we can find great purpose and meaning in life through living missionally all of the time... locally and globally.
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Prayer-focused, Cross-cultural, and Missional
This morning I gathered to pray with several people who have committed to praying for North Way East End every Saturday morning at 7am. The time together is always unique because there are so many details to launching a church campus and new prayer requests arise on a daily basis. One of the things I am committed to as a pastor is that our church will be built on a foundation of prayer. Many churches and church leaders talk about prayer being important, but they fail to emphasize prayer or model it for people and so corporate prayer can become lost in the shuffle.
I've also been intentional about building cross-cultural community in the East End, and Pastor Freedom and I have been out in the community each week building relationships across cultures. I've been encouraging the staff and elders at North Way East End to go out of their way to emphasize authentic relationships across cultures. I wouldn't say that we have "arrived" at being cross-cultural by any stretch of the imagination, but we're making good progress toward that goal. Many church leaders like to talk about being cross cultural, but I want to actually be a cross cultural faith community.
Another emphasis of North Way East End is that we are a missional church community. That means that we serve the poor and marginalized people in our city and across the world. We serve people outside the walls of the church well beyond Sunday mornings. We gather together to worship on Sundays so that we can go out and impact the world in every sector of society and across socioeconomic boundaries. As a pastor, I spent a great deal of my time this week with people living in desperate poverty in the inner city. I also spent a significant amount of time with business leaders who steward a lot of resources throughout the course of the week. Many churches like to talk a lot about serving the poor and being missional, but our leaders in the East End are working toward following God's lead to make this a part of everything that we do at the church and in our city.
Prayer-focused. Cross-cultural. Missional. These are key foundations of the North Way East End church, and we are seeking to live them out in the city so that God will be glorified. We are just starting in the process, and we have a long way to go. We are, however, off to a promising start in these areas!
I've also been intentional about building cross-cultural community in the East End, and Pastor Freedom and I have been out in the community each week building relationships across cultures. I've been encouraging the staff and elders at North Way East End to go out of their way to emphasize authentic relationships across cultures. I wouldn't say that we have "arrived" at being cross-cultural by any stretch of the imagination, but we're making good progress toward that goal. Many church leaders like to talk about being cross cultural, but I want to actually be a cross cultural faith community.
Another emphasis of North Way East End is that we are a missional church community. That means that we serve the poor and marginalized people in our city and across the world. We serve people outside the walls of the church well beyond Sunday mornings. We gather together to worship on Sundays so that we can go out and impact the world in every sector of society and across socioeconomic boundaries. As a pastor, I spent a great deal of my time this week with people living in desperate poverty in the inner city. I also spent a significant amount of time with business leaders who steward a lot of resources throughout the course of the week. Many churches like to talk a lot about serving the poor and being missional, but our leaders in the East End are working toward following God's lead to make this a part of everything that we do at the church and in our city.
Prayer-focused. Cross-cultural. Missional. These are key foundations of the North Way East End church, and we are seeking to live them out in the city so that God will be glorified. We are just starting in the process, and we have a long way to go. We are, however, off to a promising start in these areas!
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
New Programs in the City
Today I had the opportunity to meet with a young person who has some great ideas about programs designed to impact at-risk youth in the inner city. These particular programs involved sports and leadership, and the curriculum was very promising and well researched. This individual wanted to meet with me to talk about how he might be able to implement the program in Homewood. I told him that I thought the program was much needed in my neighborhood, and that no doubt it could help a lot of people. However, there are already several other organizations doing similar sports-related outreach in Homewood. Also, he didn't really know anyone from Homewood so he wasn't quite sure where to begin or if the programs would be effective.
We talked for a while, and he had a humble spirit as he asked me about the work that I do with at-risk youth in Homewood. He listened as I shared some of my journey of serving in the inner city over the past six years... my failures and break throughs. I encouraged my new friend that struggling urban neighborhoods can definitely use outside programs and resources, but the outside support needs to be implemented very carefully. I encouraged him to set his program/curriculum aside and go to Homewood and spend time in the neighborhood getting to know people. I offered to introduce him to some gatekeepers into the community who might be willing to let him in. Also, I encouraged him to identify and appreciate the assets in the inner city... including sports outreach programs that have been operating in the neighborhood for years. I mentioned that he might just want to spend months, maybe years, in the neighborhood getting to know people before he started to implement any programming. That's what contextualization and asset-building are all about. Outside programs can be very effective when partnered well with inside and already established programs. Relationships are also important, and the goal of the programs should lead to transformation and empowerment in building on the assets that are already in the community.
I may have overwhelmed the young man I met with today, but I really encouraged him to stay the course and work toward helping people living in struggling urban neighborhoods through sports outreach. I hope that from today on he will give himself away to people in need, and that he will do it through partnerships and relationships that will be sustainable and empowering for years to come. Sometimes good intentions can cause great harm, and sometimes the slow process of transformation is more about consistent relationships with people over time than it is about some program that's brought in from the outside. Still, cities are complex places that require a complex response from people who are trying to help out. Both insiders and outsiders are needed to bring about positive change in the city.
We talked for a while, and he had a humble spirit as he asked me about the work that I do with at-risk youth in Homewood. He listened as I shared some of my journey of serving in the inner city over the past six years... my failures and break throughs. I encouraged my new friend that struggling urban neighborhoods can definitely use outside programs and resources, but the outside support needs to be implemented very carefully. I encouraged him to set his program/curriculum aside and go to Homewood and spend time in the neighborhood getting to know people. I offered to introduce him to some gatekeepers into the community who might be willing to let him in. Also, I encouraged him to identify and appreciate the assets in the inner city... including sports outreach programs that have been operating in the neighborhood for years. I mentioned that he might just want to spend months, maybe years, in the neighborhood getting to know people before he started to implement any programming. That's what contextualization and asset-building are all about. Outside programs can be very effective when partnered well with inside and already established programs. Relationships are also important, and the goal of the programs should lead to transformation and empowerment in building on the assets that are already in the community.
I may have overwhelmed the young man I met with today, but I really encouraged him to stay the course and work toward helping people living in struggling urban neighborhoods through sports outreach. I hope that from today on he will give himself away to people in need, and that he will do it through partnerships and relationships that will be sustainable and empowering for years to come. Sometimes good intentions can cause great harm, and sometimes the slow process of transformation is more about consistent relationships with people over time than it is about some program that's brought in from the outside. Still, cities are complex places that require a complex response from people who are trying to help out. Both insiders and outsiders are needed to bring about positive change in the city.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Reflecting on a Prison Fire in Honduras
Many people have been asking me if I heard on the news about the prison fire in Honduras where over 300 people died. That news really broke my heart for a variety of reasons. I had the opportunity to spend a significant amount of time in youth detention centers in Honduras last summer interviewing inmates for my dissertation and implementing the LAMP mentoring model in cities in Honduras. I heard heartbreaking stories from the at-risk youth that I interviewed and visited with. I was thankful for the acces that I had in the jail, but it was definitely a rough environment. It hurt to see so many young people locked up in difficult conditions. Then again, it breaks my heart that so many people in America are locked up. America has the highest incarceration rate of any country in the world! The conditions in American prisons may be better than the conditions in prisons in places like Honduras, but I am troubled by any large amount of people losing their freedom and their lives.
People need to be held accountable for their actions, but having been involved in working with at-risk youth for many years now I have seen first hand how broken the system is. In the detention centers I spent time at in Honduras, the young people were overcrowded and they were not receiving an education or many other basic things needed to succeed in life. In America, we spend huge amounts of money to build jails and there are many, many adults who work professionally in the system. When I go to court with the young people in Homewood, the first thing that strikes me is how many adults are needed in the court room just to deal with one offense... including judges, prosecuting lawyers, defense lawyers, probation officers, clerks and administrative staff, and more. It costs way more to lock somebody up than it does to proactively intervene in young people's lives before they get in trouble, and yet the majority of money aimed at heading off crime grows on the reactive end through the courts and incarceration systems.
As Christians, we should be greatly disturbed by what happened with the prison burning and hundreds of people dying in Honduras. As Christians, we should be greatly disturbed by so many young people dying violently in America even with the highest rate of incarceration in the world. And still... we see things on the news and it does not affect us. We go on living our lives like that stuff doesn't really matter. That stuff matters to God, though. All of it. And he wants his church to do something about it. That's why faith-based mentoring initiatives like LAMP in Homewood and in Honduras are so crucial... because these programs organize the church to make a huge impact in the lives of at-risk youth before they die violently or become incarcerated. Christians should let our hearts break for brokenness in this world, and then we should all go and do something about it for the sake of God's glory. What will we do with this prison fire in Honduras? Will we let our hearts break, or will we keep flipping through the channels? It's our choice, and God is paying attention.
People need to be held accountable for their actions, but having been involved in working with at-risk youth for many years now I have seen first hand how broken the system is. In the detention centers I spent time at in Honduras, the young people were overcrowded and they were not receiving an education or many other basic things needed to succeed in life. In America, we spend huge amounts of money to build jails and there are many, many adults who work professionally in the system. When I go to court with the young people in Homewood, the first thing that strikes me is how many adults are needed in the court room just to deal with one offense... including judges, prosecuting lawyers, defense lawyers, probation officers, clerks and administrative staff, and more. It costs way more to lock somebody up than it does to proactively intervene in young people's lives before they get in trouble, and yet the majority of money aimed at heading off crime grows on the reactive end through the courts and incarceration systems.
As Christians, we should be greatly disturbed by what happened with the prison burning and hundreds of people dying in Honduras. As Christians, we should be greatly disturbed by so many young people dying violently in America even with the highest rate of incarceration in the world. And still... we see things on the news and it does not affect us. We go on living our lives like that stuff doesn't really matter. That stuff matters to God, though. All of it. And he wants his church to do something about it. That's why faith-based mentoring initiatives like LAMP in Homewood and in Honduras are so crucial... because these programs organize the church to make a huge impact in the lives of at-risk youth before they die violently or become incarcerated. Christians should let our hearts break for brokenness in this world, and then we should all go and do something about it for the sake of God's glory. What will we do with this prison fire in Honduras? Will we let our hearts break, or will we keep flipping through the channels? It's our choice, and God is paying attention.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Living in the City
Moving to the Homewood neighborhood of the city of Pittsburgh has opened up a lot of conversations and interest about moving to the city. Just this past week, I had several people ask me about what it's like to live in the city. These friends asked me to help them think through what a move to the city might be like for them. These discussions usually involve things like safety, but at the end of the day moving the city has much more to do with calling. I grew up in the suburbs, but God called me to live in the city as an adult. I believe that God has plans for all of us in his mission to redeem the world, and for many of us those plans will involve living in the city. God is rapidly urbanizing the world. Over half of the world's population now lives in cities, and that percentage will only continue to grow throughout this century. Christians intent on making a Kingdom of God impact with their lives in today's day and age should really be engaged in urban ministry. Cities, even with all of their complexities, are where people are headed and where Christianity is growing like crazy. That is why I serve as a pastor in a city... because that's the best place to join God's mission to reach the world. When my suburban friends ask me if they should move to the city, I always encourage them to do so. Cities can be intimidating, but the pay off is huge in terms of God working through us to reach people with the gospel message of Jesus Christ. There is nothing wrong with the suburbs or rural areas, and many good people are called to live there and advance the Kingdom of God in suburban areas. Still, by being intentional about engaging in cities Christians can really make a huge impact with their lives.
Friday, February 10, 2012
We Have Occupancy!
Today North Way East End passed our city inspection and we officially have occupancy in the ministry center. Tomorrow morning at 9am we are looking for volunteers to help with cleaning the theater space that has been under construction all week with the new technology equipment installation. Come on out and join the fun if you're in the Burgh.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Settling into my Calling
The past couple of weeks have been amazing! I'm settling into my calling as an urban pastor. I am loving connecting with all of the folks that God has brought into the new North Way East End church. To me, ministry is about relationships, and I am building tons of new relationships with people. Yesterday, I met with the North Way city staff and I was greatly encouraged by the people that the Lord has brought together to lead potentially thousands of people closer to Christ in many different ways. Today I'll be hitting the streets of Homewood. I'll be walking to meet with a pastor in Homewood to dream about how our churches may be able to partner to advance the kingdom of God in the East End. I love walking in my neighborhood because I never know what unexpected experiences God will bring across my path. That's the best kind of ministry! I'll be walking right through a corner close to where one of my mentees lives that is filled with prostitutes and addicts. Maybe God will give me the opportunity to show the love of Christ to somebody? I'll probably run into a bunch of kids I know from the neighborhood when I'm walking back from the meeting, and they'll catch me up on their lives and everything that is going on in the streets. Then I'll drive to Wexford in the suburbs this evening to meet with the LAMP leadership team, some of the most amazing leaders in the city of Pittsburgh. We'll be dreaming together about how we can work together to mobilize the body of Christ to make a huge impact in the city of Pittsburgh one child at a time through mentoring.
Suburbs or city streets. Addicts on the corner or bankers stewarding millions of dollars on behalf of Christ. Pastors or kids in schools. Church staff meetings or visiting with neighbors. The office or the open air. All things in life belong to God. All people are made to be in relationship with God, and I get the great privilege of leading people closer to God no matter where they live or what they are all about. Yes, urban ministry is filled with many challenges. But, I love the unexpected nature of my calling and the challenges that come with it because there is great joy in following Christ in the city with reckless abandon. I'll be giving up everything that the world has to offer today in order to embrace the radical message of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It's going to be a good day!
Suburbs or city streets. Addicts on the corner or bankers stewarding millions of dollars on behalf of Christ. Pastors or kids in schools. Church staff meetings or visiting with neighbors. The office or the open air. All things in life belong to God. All people are made to be in relationship with God, and I get the great privilege of leading people closer to God no matter where they live or what they are all about. Yes, urban ministry is filled with many challenges. But, I love the unexpected nature of my calling and the challenges that come with it because there is great joy in following Christ in the city with reckless abandon. I'll be giving up everything that the world has to offer today in order to embrace the radical message of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It's going to be a good day!
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Grand Opening
The grand opening of the North Way East End church last Sunday was absolutely incredible! God showed up in amazing ways, and God was glorified! The worship experience was powerful, the biblical message really impacted people, and people really connected with one another. On a personal level, it was a meaningful day for me. I love to be a part of advancing the kingdom of God in cities, and I love Pittsburgh, so it was great to be a part of God doing something new in the city of Pittsburgh. Our church is going to be cross-cultural, and we will continue to contextualize the gospel of Jesus Christ in the urban context of the East End of Pittsburgh. We are a missional church congregation that impacts the world throughout the week. We are a church focused on prayer as a foundation for everything that goes on. We are a church of relationships, not programs. And most of all, our focus is on glorifying God in the city. If we keep our focus on God, then things will work out according to his purposes. I love this calling!
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