Mess and Grace

You don’t have to hang around LFA for long before you hear someone talking about our desire to grow into a healthy spiritual family. It is a lovely goal and certainly one that is at the center of God’s heart and work in His people. Jesus Himself, just hours before the cross was to be his, asked the Father to bring Jesus’ followers into a unity that more closely reflected the way God Himself functions as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

I love this and I aspire to live as a better brother to others. I know many at LFA who have embraced the same dream and I believe many more individuals who are ready to join this wonderful party. 

However, like a long journey to a preferred destination, there are some switchbacks and potholes along the way to a robust spiritual family that we should acknowledge and common to the process and be prepared to meet. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in his classic work, Life Together, simply shared that if a person wishes to become part of a true spiritual family, that person will need to set aside their own dreams of what that would like and embrace the mess and grace of doing life together.   

So, I’ve been thinking a bit about the bumps and potholes that will be part of our journey together at LFA. Over the years I’ve become aware that becoming a spiritual family is messy, hard work for any who want to live into it. The pathway to spiritual family needs to be intentionally trod and requires heavy doses of trust, reflective listening, intercession, commitment to work through things, the grace of forgiveness, and just lots of time laughing and eating together.

May I encourage us to not over idealize what spiritual family looks like but rather trust the effective intercession of Jesus and then engage, with grace, the participation with Father that graces us to become, see, and live into the heart our Savior envisioned for His spiritual family. 

Let’s talk about it. The adventure awaits.

—George Davis

*Please be advised that this blog represents the views, opinions and beliefs of the writer and does not necessarily reflect those of our church leadership or denominational affiliation.

The God Who Spoke the Ebb and Flow of Water

On my best days, I am quite confident that the God who spoke the ebb and flow of water, air, nature, and the cosmos is altogether trustworthy to hold and shepherd the seasons of my simple life. But there are those other kinds of days. Days when my faith must hunker down under full-scale bombardments of doubt and discouragement. Days when holding to the goodness and veracity of God takes all the determination and good confession I can muster. Days when I wield the sword of God’s Word with tired hands and steely grit.

While I often label the easier days as my “best days,” perhaps I have it perfectly wrong. When I arise from faith’s foxhole, and I see my true faith in the light of day, I know that those are my real “best days.” It is in those days that I see the difference between what I think I believe and the steel of faith that He has grown in me over time. I get to see how deep my trust in my Father, who orchestrates the seasons of my life, truly runs, and I am encouraged, yet challenged, to keep growing for I am weak, but yet I am stronger than ever before.

I have sometimes thought, and heard from others, that God, in effect, is too busy to see and act in in the small details of life. But I refuse to succumb to the cynicism of doubt even when my battles are fierce and seem darkest to my soul.

God lets us know, in His word, that He counts the hairs on our heads, cares for us more intimately than He does nature, saves our tears in a bottle, dries our tears, speaks specifically to willing hearts, knows us within our mother’s wombs, lavishes love on us, comforts us, and effectively prays through us when all we have is incomprehensible groans. He also tells us that He sees us, searches our hearts, works within and through us, names us in intimate ways known only to us, and celebrates our overcoming victories. See for yourself as you engage His Word. It’s all there and more. 

Thinking about it, I will choose to call all my days – all of them - my best days. I will press on into the love and purpose my Father has for me. I will remain on the path toward greater faith and trust in His care and love for me. I choose to call all my days, best days, and I will continue to grow in steely confidence that the one who invented seasons knows my seasons and is carefully tending me as His beloved child.

We have come into an intimate experience with God’s love, and we trust in the love he has for us. God is love! Those who are living in love are living in God, and God lives through them.

I John 4:16 (The Passion Translation)

—George Davis

*Please be advised that this blog represents the views, opinions and beliefs of the writer and does not necessarily reflect those of our church leadership or denominational affiliation.

This is Community

Last Saturday, some people from Living Faith spent a good part of the day working on a community garden project in Millville. It was truly a collaborative effort as you can see from this partial list of organizations that provided materials and people.

#hollycitydevelopment

#impactharvest

#millvillepd

#millvilledepartmentofrecreation

#livingfaithalliance

#RiseAndShineMinistries

#DrMartinLutherKingCenterinNewtonville

And people who actually live in the 4th and Vine neighborhood.

What really touched me is the way we worked together and the joyful, hopeful moments it produced.  It felt like community.  It was community. It felt like people seeing and caring for one another.  It was hopeful. And it inspired my soul.

Likewise, in our Sunday Service, the words and testimony of Larry and Leslie Baruffi, moved me to remember the powerful way intentional relationship building, over a period of time, creates opportunity to simply share our Savior with others so that they can discover how wonderful He is.  

In the same service, Darren Shelburne of Young Life shared the pressing need of adolescents in Cumberland County to discover Jesus through caring relationships and introduced us to the moving words of the Young Life Founder, spoken two weeks before His death. 

There are times when one just needs reminders to pay attention to the things that matter most. The gaggle of attention-stealing thoughts and activities in our lives amazingly conspire to fog over how what we do in service to our most treasured values.  

So, would you receive a gentle reminder to consider what are the values that you most dearly hold and how are you doing in actually pushing away the clutter to live the main things in service of our Savior?

Why not seek out, join, and prioritize your time to get to know community leaders and their efforts to seek the welfare of the city?  If you need help with this or know someone I should meet, please let me know because nothing would make me happier than to see LFA renew her place in building up our communities!

Why not connect with Sarah Bates to see what you can do to build relationship with the children and families that grace our Living Faith community? 

Why not connect to Dan and Holly Matro to see what you can do to support their efforts to build relationships that grow our youth in Christ?

Or my brother, Angelo as he builds Treasure Seekers or Summer ministry opportunities?

A final thought:

I just noticed how often the disciples got up and went somewhere to reach others (NIV uses the word “went” 75 times) - that’s a lot of God’s people going!

Empower us, as your servants, to speak the word of God freely and courageously. Stretch out your hand of power through us to heal, and to move in signs and wonders by the name of your holy Son, Jesus!  As they prayed the earth shook beneath them, causing the building they were in to tremble.  Each one of them was filled with the Holy Spirit, and they proclaimed the word of God with unrestrained boldness. Acts 4. 29b-31, The Passion Translation

- George   

*Please be advised that this blog represents the views, opinions and beliefs of the writer and does not necessarily reflect those of our church leadership or denominational affiliation.

On a Pilgrimage

In some parts of the world the concept of going on a pilgrimage to a shrine or holy place is quite familiar. Unless you count the use of favorite vacation spots or going down the shore, the idea of going somewhere far away for spiritual pursuit is a concept largely lost in our culture.   

But…

listen to what happens when people set their heart to tread unfamiliar highways in pursuit of God.

How lovely is your dwelling place,
    Lord Almighty!
My soul yearns, even faints,
    for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh cry out
    for the living God.
Even the sparrow has found a home,
    and the swallow a nest for herself,
    where she may have her young—
a place near your altar,
    Lord Almighty, my King and my God.
Blessed are those who dwell in your house;
    they are ever praising you.[c]

Blessed are those whose strength is in you,
    whose hearts are set on pilgrimage.
As they pass through the Valley of Baka,
    they make it a place of springs;
    the autumn rains also cover it with pools.[d]
They go from strength to strength,
    till each appears before God in Zion.

PSALM 84:1-7 NIV 

Where do the highways take us?

Although the psalmist was thinking of pilgrimage to Jerusalem, it is interesting to note that the translators adjusted the actual words to the context of going up to Jerusalem. They are more literally translated along the lines of the roads within their hearts.

What lands do these roads pass through? The valley of tears (Baka). What happens when we pursue pilgrimage? Those places become springs that form pools of strength that lead us to more strength.

Where do we end up?

Like the sparrows around the temple building, we find a home with our God. Our pilgrimage delivers us to a place our hearts have sought to go. But, it is still a pilgrimage – a willingness to go somewhere with our Beloved, a cost and energy expended that changes everything.

Some believers, regardless of church, cultural predilection, or geography have their hiking boots on and ‘looking for a city whose builder and maker is God.’  I’ve worn out a few pairs of “shoes” but I’m not giving up.  I know where the place of blessing is, and my beloved is there.   

Looking for some trail mates who will hear the invitation and will join the triumphal procession as we go up to our blessing and inheritance, changing our tears and those of others, along the way.

If you would like to chat more about it – send me an email!

—George Davis

They Call it Murmuration

It is the beauty of starlings flying in close proximity to one another.  If you've been lucky enough to see it in person, it will fill you with wonder and a sense of joy. They are a pulsating, shape-shifting, work of living art. Scientists  have been observing and trying to grasp how starlings fly in such tight formations without falling from the sky, victims of many mid-air collisions.

Some have suggested that there is some telepathic signal that the flock gets from one leader. Through the years, advances in technology have given us a better picture of what is going on.  

I recently read a small article at the website, Howstuffworks (https://animals.howstuffworks.com/birds/starling-murmurations.htm), that caused me to think about the implications for Spiritual Family. In his post there, John Donovan gives us the results of a study that may have unlocked the secret of our little friends who paint the sky as they swam for protection in the evening. He quotes researchers who said,  "In a flock with 1,200 birds, it is clear that not every bird will be able to keep track of the other 1,199 birds, who is keeping track of whom?” He then goes on to explain that “Italian physicists used more than 400 photos from several videos to find out, plotting the position and speed of birds as they flocked. From that, they built a mathematical model that identified the optimal number of flock-mates for each bird to  track.

Turns out the magic number is seven: Each bird keeps tabs on its seven closest neighbors and ignores all else. Considering all these little groups of seven touch on other individuals and groups of seven, twists and turns quickly spread. And from that, a whole murmuration moves.”

Mario Pesendorger, a researcher at Cornell, draws three points that are causing me to think about my relationships and how I think of spiritual family. He observes:

“individual birds are concerned with only three aspects of their flight and the flight of those around them."

An attraction zone: "Which means, in this area, you're going to move toward the next guy.”

A repulsion zone: "Which means, you don't fly into his lane, otherwise you both fall.”

Angular alignment: "So you got to kind of follow his [a bird's neighbor] direction.”

“Depending on how you change those three parameters," Pesendorfer says, "you can get everything from those barrel-looking baseballs that you get in ocean fish, to loose-looking insect swarms, to highly, highly organized fish swarms and murmurations. All in those three little parameters.”

So, how do the insights gained from the study of murmuration help us as spiritual family?

Simply put, it might encourage us to consider deeply that, as a church, if we want to paint beautiful pictures on the chaotic skies of our current culture, we would do well to identify that smaller family of strange birds with whom we will fly in close proximity and mutually support. Finding them, doing life together, enjoying one another and letting Father build a network of families out of us.

Perhaps, then, we can enjoy liquid and mesmerizing flight for all to see.

—George Davis

*Please be advised that this blog represents the views, opinions and beliefs of the writer and does not necessarily reflect those of our church leadership or denominational affiliation.

Would the World Notice if the Church Ceased to Exist?

(By Nate Howard)

Imagine...

Tomorrow, you awaken to find ShopRite has disappeared — along with every other grocery store! What if the police department was no more? What if, heaven forbid, chocolate ceased to exist? What if technology as we know it, including the internet, cell phones, even electricity, vanished without a trace?

It’s hard to imagine survival without life’s so-called necessities. But here’s a more challenging question: What if all Christian churches disappeared? What if Living Faith Alliance disappeared? Would it make any difference if we didn’t exist? Would anyone notice?
God imagines His church to be a world-changing church — that our presence would be felt, that people would know we exist. God said, "I made the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah cling to me, that they might be for me a people, a name, a
praise, and a glory." (Jeremiah 13:11)
God intends the life of Jesus in His people to significantly alter the world. That’s what we want as well. We’ve set the course of LFA to be in pursuit of the life-changing presence of Jesus, impacting
South Jersey one life at a time.
The 5-year goals we have embraced (see the front cover) describe the kind of impact we imagine, not just as one church, but as a number of networked churches — call them church plants or multisite.
We want to engage our world, intentionally talking with our friends about the Gospel, experiencing the joy of watching them become Jesus followers, connected in true community, living a
purposeful life of mission.

Look again at the graphic. Do you see the five essential practices we intend to grow in? It really does start with you and me. So as we begin this new year, the questions facing each of us are:
‣ What values need to shift in our life?
‣ How must we change?
‣ What will God need to do in you and me for us to become the
church God envisions?

I hope you can see there is an urgency that each of us connect with
God. That’s why we are beginning 2015 with an all-church week of
prayer. Please use this guide to enter in to the life of your church.
Set aside this week and let your faith rise to grasp what God has
for us.

“I will if” vs. “I will because”

(By Nate Howard)

God is forever reshaping us, like an expert potter. And since God is very relational (think: Trinity), one area in which He is continually attempting to change us is the basic way we relate to each other. Here’s an example to think about. In relationships, is your posture, “I will because” (which is covenant thinking) or “I will if” (which is contract thinking)?

When I’m in the mode “I will if,” I’m looking to the other person to meet certain conditions and IF he/she does what I require, then I WILL act on their behalf. It’s like we have this unwritten contract, I WILL be good to them IF … 

When I’m in the mode “I will because,” I’m not looking first to the condition of the other person (if they are good, bad, worthy, unworthy, etc.). Rather, I look elsewhere, like, perhaps, to my promise to them, or my promise to God. Then, I WILL be good to them BECAUSE my eyes are on something other than them — I do that because that’s my covenant.

I believe if you look at most troubled relationships, you will find “I will if” thinking. Let’s change that and become a church that cooperates with God’s reshaping agenda of the way we do relationships! And I WILL stay in relationship with you, not IF you meet my expectations, but BECAUSE He has called us to be together.