i have returned. i'm gonna start doing some of my deeper faith sharing stuff here. stuff specifically related to fellowship and the walk. also some things which i might learn in church or other places down here in LA. hopefully it will encourage or provoke encouragement and thoughts. blog your own posts and thoughts. it's really nice having a team blog when a bunch of people participate and spur on discussion.

(unlike some lumps blogs, my blog isn't directed exclusively towards lumps peeps, so i'll spill some of those thoughts here, a space which is. perhaps some of you can join me here too.)

i'll probably post here at least once a week...so you can know for sure that they'll be some regular new content here.

the search for a spiritual home

it's been a nice, yet inconsistent journey down here bouncing from church to church. i'm now ready to try to attend one place (or two) on a consistant basis. it's really hard to figure out when there are so many factors to consider. i think i was before looking for just the hands down, best preaching...solid stuff to spur me on at the start of my week (as much as pastor jeff did).

i think looking for a place with the intention of just being fed can be problematic, since it can be easy to fall into the selfish feed-me trap. when you have that mentality...it's easy to just hop from place to place b/c there are always places that can feed you better in some way. it's the competency syndrome. better teaching. better worship.

it's really hard to do a hit and miss...hit and run sunday type of approach to check out a church. i think now that i'm starting to make a concerted effort to explore the church life (such as via small groups), then you can start to learn more about a church thur the people who go and worship there (which is really what the church is about...the body). it's exciting and exhilirating if you can find a group of believers who connect to you, whose passions resonate with you, and whose faith you can see lived out and actively transforming them. lumps was that place for me. i'm narrowing down my search down here. sometimes you just have to persevere and stick with it. even roll up your sleeves to get involved and serve. (which can be a hard thing to do when you're an AC student.)

the heart of a fellowship

so i've just started to engage in discussions to help re-kick off the school fellowship. i've been around fellowship groups for a while now and have been involved in leading/planning thru different life cycles of a fellowship group. something i've learned is the value of community, particularly one united and bonded together a common purpose.

i also have the idea that fellowship groups should complement the sunday church experience. so sometimes if teaching and corporate worship are the focal points of sunday times, that perhaps there are other church activities which should be elevated on the non-sunday times...all for the bigger goal of creating a balanced dynamic of glorifying god in our lives amidst and with his body, the church.

in the past for lumps we've tried to do everything...practically doing so much that we could be self-sufficient as a church disconnected from the rest of scbc. looking at it holistically, that wasn't a good balance and things began to suffer. usually sharing, application, and prayer times are the things which are needed most for the balanced experience, yet end up getting shafted. i think fellowships are particularly susceptible to this when the planning gets into auto-pillot mode. when vision leading takes second place to week by week scheduling and planning. (so watch out guys!)

i had a nice chat with someone from a mosaic group which i visited tonite...about his past dillema in choosing a church. he was going back and forth between the exact two that i was deliberating between, for the exact same reasons. he had a point when he reminded me of the need for real-faith-life application. to be able to recognize it as something needed and necessary in the church, particularly when we're called to be change the world for god's kingdom. i agree with him that an inbred church with really solid teaching fails to live up to the call for the church if it does not go out.

it's kinda weird...but i think a tiny tiny part of me might be a little apprehensive to find some new thing (church, person, vision, etc) down here which will cause me to stay down here for good. but that shouldn't be the case, particularly in following god and how you can be used/grown in your particular season and period of life.

posted by gw at 12:33 AM

Ok.

posted by AlfDaBruin at 11:46 AM