As of this morning at 8am THE CITY community church has officially been green-lighted for launch!
After extensive presentations with the church-plant team of Hill Country Bible Church during the last several weeks and 8 months of prayer, evangelism, building a Core team and connecting within the community, I met with the elder board this morning for a final presentation.
The elders of HCBC Northwest had just a few more questions today and have joyfully given us the green light to launch THE CITY. Having officially welcomed us as launching a new daughter church these men laid hands on us to pray for us trusting that Jesus will indeed build his church in Austin.
I am so excited right now and I am honored to serve Jesus in the great city of Austin!
Friday, May 30, 2008
Monday, May 5, 2008
LET THE NATIONS BE GLAD!
I know it's been a while since I have updated you guys on the progress of our CORE team. And some of you are wondering if it is still just Robby and Crystal and Andrea and I. Well I told you about Todd joining our team and moving to Austin but I really need to update you on all the new individuals making this new community of Christ followers in Central/Downtown Austin a reality.
Last night we had a CORE team meeting and we had people from 7 nations sitting at the table. It is crazy but in a very real way we are seeing a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, multi-generational team take shape to reach the city of Austin.
Just last night we had people from Canada, El Salvador, South Africa, Mexico, Brazil, USA, and Germany. And that is just our CORE team. In addition to this we had a law-professor from Israel attend our small group and a young man of Chinese ancestry.
I love it!
Last night we had a CORE team meeting and we had people from 7 nations sitting at the table. It is crazy but in a very real way we are seeing a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, multi-generational team take shape to reach the city of Austin.
Just last night we had people from Canada, El Salvador, South Africa, Mexico, Brazil, USA, and Germany. And that is just our CORE team. In addition to this we had a law-professor from Israel attend our small group and a young man of Chinese ancestry.
I love it!
Jesus Alone
As I mentioned in my last post, I had the privilege to be sent by HCBC to a conference in NYC. Thank you to the team that deemed it appropriate to invest in me through this conference and thank you to the people of Hill Country Bible Church for their gracious support of the ministry I am a part of!
The theme of the conference was DWELL based on the passage in Jeremiah that speaks about the remnant of the Jewish people in exile to dwell in the city and seek it's welfare. But in my opinion the title could have just as well been Jesus alone.
Each speaker in his own way brought church planting in our urban centers back to this one theme: JESUS ALONE!
CJ Mahaney spoke about humility (he has a great book out on this topic: click here) which really speaks about laying aside my pride and self-will and the need for me to let Jesus have preeminence in everything. Mark Driscoll spoke of "dwelling in the text" the idea of loving Jesus passionately and loving him through being in His word. He spoke of the dangers of being in the word for the sake of a sermon or a good marriage or good parenting or even a good church. But the bottom line is that we must read the Bible because we love Jesus passionately and we encounter Him in scripture. To put it succinctly: You have to know and love Jesus and in order to do that you have to in scripture often and intentionally. JESUS ALONE!
Darrin Patrick asked the question, "do I have non-christian friends" but we might as well phrase his question am I being like Jesus to the people around me? Do I love them and care for them individually just as Jesus loved and cared tax collectors and prostitutes? Living missionally or living like Jesus: JESUS ALONE!
Tim Keller spoke several times in typical intellectual Keller fashion (I loved it...), but his key message was about the elements of the Gospel. Tim distilled the Gospel to it's core message naming three core elements: Manger - Cross - Crown. Jesus' Incarnation, His Death and His Exaltation! JESUS ALONE!
I want to keep that mindset always before me, planting a church is hard work, and it it exhilarating and it is fun and stressful, but ultimately it is about JESUS ALONE! He is worthy of all my efforts, and making the church all about Him and His glory is naturally create a church concerned for people's welfare, the poor, social justice, civil rights, environmental issues, etc. but not as ends in themselves but as natural byproducts of people making it their primary aim to love and exalt JESUS ALONE in everything they do!
The theme of the conference was DWELL based on the passage in Jeremiah that speaks about the remnant of the Jewish people in exile to dwell in the city and seek it's welfare. But in my opinion the title could have just as well been Jesus alone.
Each speaker in his own way brought church planting in our urban centers back to this one theme: JESUS ALONE!
CJ Mahaney spoke about humility (he has a great book out on this topic: click here) which really speaks about laying aside my pride and self-will and the need for me to let Jesus have preeminence in everything. Mark Driscoll spoke of "dwelling in the text" the idea of loving Jesus passionately and loving him through being in His word. He spoke of the dangers of being in the word for the sake of a sermon or a good marriage or good parenting or even a good church. But the bottom line is that we must read the Bible because we love Jesus passionately and we encounter Him in scripture. To put it succinctly: You have to know and love Jesus and in order to do that you have to in scripture often and intentionally. JESUS ALONE!
Darrin Patrick asked the question, "do I have non-christian friends" but we might as well phrase his question am I being like Jesus to the people around me? Do I love them and care for them individually just as Jesus loved and cared tax collectors and prostitutes? Living missionally or living like Jesus: JESUS ALONE!
Tim Keller spoke several times in typical intellectual Keller fashion (I loved it...), but his key message was about the elements of the Gospel. Tim distilled the Gospel to it's core message naming three core elements: Manger - Cross - Crown. Jesus' Incarnation, His Death and His Exaltation! JESUS ALONE!
I want to keep that mindset always before me, planting a church is hard work, and it it exhilarating and it is fun and stressful, but ultimately it is about JESUS ALONE! He is worthy of all my efforts, and making the church all about Him and His glory is naturally create a church concerned for people's welfare, the poor, social justice, civil rights, environmental issues, etc. but not as ends in themselves but as natural byproducts of people making it their primary aim to love and exalt JESUS ALONE in everything they do!
Friday, May 2, 2008
New York City
I spent the last three days in New York City, and I must say that I fell in love with this behemoth of a city. I have been in major cities all over the world, Berlin, Moscow, Taipei, Calcutta, Delhi, Sao Paulo, Hong Kong and Mexico City to name a few. I grew up in Frankfurt Germany, no small town by any stretch of the imagination, and I live downtown Austin, but this city is on an entirely different level. New York defines metropolitan, it is jam packed with people from every nation on earth and it captures the imagination of people the world over. While I've travelled the world I had never been in this amazing city and I must say until you've seen NYC you haven't lived (alright that is a gross overstatement, but hey I'm trying to make a point).
Four of us from Austin were in NY for a conference on urban church-planting put on in collaboration between Acts 29, a church-planting network out of Seattle started by Mark Driscoll (pastor of Mars Hill Seattle), and Redeemer Presbyterian, a church in Manhattan led by Tim Keller. The conference was called Dwell and had an incredible lineup of speakers, including Tim Keller, Mark Driscoll, CJ Mahaney and Darrin Patrick. More on the conference in another post...
The sessions ran from 9am to 9pm and we did our best to see the entire city between 9:30pm and 2am. Seeing the Statue of Liberty, Ground Zero, Times Square, Rockefeller Center, and Central Park in person for the first time was an incredible experience. We walked for miles taking in as much as possible. Ground Zero was eerie and impacting even 7 years after September 11th, while the view from the top of the Empire State building is still edged in my mind.
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