the encounter

Are you infected? Wanna be?

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For #justicefriday ::

Greg shares about JustOne and the origins of Laundry Love People…

Lots of good stuff in there. Well worth the 25 minutes.

You can read my notes from watching it the first time.

What’d you think? What notes did you take? How will you take these ideas and apply them in our community?

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From #thenines event, Skye Jethani asks, “Where does our legitimacy (in ministry and leadership) come from?”

So many good points. So worth the nine minutes.

If we were to take the things we measure our success by and apply them to the ministry of Jesus — a lot of times we’d have to conclude that he was a failure.

Quite often in ministry, people were leaving Jesus rather than coming to him. By the end of his earthly ministry there was no one left. He was abandoned by everyone. And yet his ministry was a success because he was completely faithful to his father….

We’ve got to get our attention off the tangible outcomes of our ministry as being evidence of our legitimacy and root it in something deeper. That something deeper is exactly what Jesus rooted his ministry in. Jesus said that his bread — what sustained his life — was to do the will of his father…

Jesus had his identity rooted in the fact that he was the beloved son of the father.

How different would our ministries be and our souls be and our joys be if we disconnected our legitimacy from the outcomes of our ministry and instead rooted our identity and legitimacy in the fact that we are sons and daughters of our loving father?

So where does your legitimacy come from? Is it the outcomes of your ministry or your identity in Christ?

Read more about the Daisy Cutter Doctrine.

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As a follow-up to our discussion about rethinking church at the Men’s What-a-Study last week, this week I asked the other guys what their church would look like if they removed all their prejudices from the past and started with nothing but their knowledge of Scripture and a blank sheet of paper.

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We had a great time this morning during with our encounter living room group. Lots of good conversation and application in what Jesus means in Matthew 5:38-42

“Here’s another old saying that deserves a second look: ‘Eye for eye, tooth for tooth.’ Is that going to get us anywhere? Here’s what I propose: ‘Don’t hit back at all.’ If someone strikes you, stand there and take it. If someone drags you into court and sues for the shirt off your back, giftwrap your best coat and make a present of it. And if someone takes unfair advantage of you, use the occasion to practice the servant life. No more tit-for-tat stuff. Live generously.”

Here’s the video we watched to spur some of the conversation…

It’s easy to talk in generalities about how we should react to strangers or the homeless or customers, etc. But the real application comes when we talk about those closest to us.

How does this change the way we relate to our spouse? Or our kids? Or our neighbor?

Reminds me of Paul’s instructions in his letter to the Philippians…

If you’ve gotten anything at all out of following Christ, if his love has made any difference in your life, if being in a community of the Spirit means anything to you, if you have a heart, if you care— then do me a favor: Agree with each other, love each other, be deep-spirited friends. Don’t push your way to the front; don’t sweet-talk your way to the top. Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead. Don’t be obsessed with getting your own advantage. Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand. – Philippians 2:1-4

So what did you learn during your morning discussions? Or what stands out to you now?

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