My Mom... and 3 Prayer Requests

While my mom is not perfect, she is committed to following Jesus with her life.  She is committed to learning, growing, and playing the role God has called her to play in life.  As a child she taught me in Sunday School, mission friends, and more Vacation Bible Schools than I could ever count.  But more than that, she taught me about missions in our home.  I remember learning about Annie Armstrong, Lottie Moon, Jim and Elizabeth Elliot... all from my mom.  

I remember praying for missionaries and I remember seeing my mom pray for missionaries.  I remember giving to missions.  I remember giving pennies, that led to dollars, that led to generously giving to support those doing a work in places I could not go.  My mom taught me what it means to "go."  She taught me that it started with Jesus' "Great Commission."  She laid the foundation and I'm so thankful for that.

But more than just teaching me about missions, my mom has always supported me in missions.  When I wanted to go serve down at the Texas/Mexico border in high school, she supported, prayed (and probably paid) for me to go.  When I wanted to go spend a month serving on University campuses in Washington and Oregon as a college student over Christmas break... my mom supported and encouraged me.  When I wanted to go to China for a month to serve Jesus, my mom was excited to help me learn and prepare.  When the trip had to be changed at the last minute because of the SARS epidemic my mom didn't pull the plug, she let me follow the Holy Spirit through an open door that led us to Greece.  

When I told my mom that Kelli and I were starting a process that would take us oversees permenantly... she told me she may not come visit (love her honesty), but that she was thankful and excited to see us go where God called us.  Finally, when God shifted our direction and I told my mom we were moving to inner city Tacoma (and I know she researched all the things mom's research about inner city areas), she supported and prayed for us all the more.  My mom gives to support us, she prays to support us, she travels to support us... my mom is a BIG reason why God is doing what he is doing and has done what he has done in and through my life. I just pray Kelli and I can follow in the foot steps that she and my dad have modeled for us.  I love you mom and I am SO thankful for you!

Happy Mother's Day!

Pray BIG:

1) Please pray for Jason Downing.  Jason served with us as an intern 3 years ago and he arrived in Tacoma yesterday to plant his life here and help us saturate our city with the gospel.  Pray that Jason gets settled, finds a job and that God helps him learn to be the church with us!

2) Please pray for our Mother's Day gathering and the work of the Holy Spirit leading up to it.  God has given us the opportunity to bring in a photographer to do family pictures for our church this Sunday.  We are opening it up to the community and encouraging people to invite friends.  Please pray that our people will invite and their friends and family will respond.  Please pray that God will use the invites we are sending home with all the students in 4 elementary schools this week!  Pray that God brings people to hear the gospel and that they respond!

3) Please pray for a young family in Texas that is sensing God's call to move their lives to Tacoma.  They sense that they could fill some leadership needs that we have and they are working through the "go" process with their church.  Pray for clarity and wisdom as they seek Jesus on this!

Seeing the past. Believing for the future.

I'm tired.

Part of that is because I've been working out with a friend and he starts at 5am.  But in reality, there are moments, days and weeks where I realize how exhausting the last 3 years have been.  However, in those same moments God allows me to reflect on the past, on the adventures that have led to the exhaustion, and it always reminds me of how worth it his mission is.

Three years ago Kelli and I moved to Tacoma with a clear vision to see our city, starting with our neighborhood, saturated with the gospel.  But I'll let you know a secret... we had no idea how to do it!  As I think back, as I look back and see the past, here are some of the things that God has done...

-15 days after we moved-in to our first Tacoma house (on the corner of 19th & L) God gave us the 2 most precious gifts we could have ever received... Jagen & Rylan.

-Over the course of the next 6 weeks we spent most of our time in the NICU with the kids as God started to grow a Bible study into something that would one day become a church.

-During those early days we experienced a lot... fights outside our Bible studies, dropping off members of the group and knowing that they weren't going home... they were finding a side walk to sleep on, shootings, salvation, growth, rebellion, fear, joy... more emotions than I can really even explain.

-We adopted Tiffany into our family... a 17 year old broken, homeless, lost floundering and desperate child.  We opened our hearts, our home and our life to her and through the pain of her year with us, I don't regret it at all... she will always be a part of our family.

-We shared the gospel.

-We saw salvation.

-We started small groups.

-We watched small groups die.

-We served.  A lot.
     -parks
     -Rescue mission
     -block parties
     -low income housing
     -our neighbors

-Our people began to crave corporate worship so we started gathering a couple times a month.  It was not great.  But even still, God got the glory.

-We were hungry for leaders & God began to provide.

-We didn't want a building.  God gave us one.

-We've married couples.

-We've even buried a husband and father.

-We've baptized.  We love the baptisms.  Changed lives shouting out loud who they are identifying themselves with is a beautiful thing.

-We re-strategized... From Community Groups to Intentional Communities. Not just semantics but a real change in how we lived as the church together.  We wanted to live on purpose.  Together... but for others.  God blessed.

-We've seen growth. Spiritual & numerical.  We've seen decline.

-We've been hurt.  We've been encouraged.

The last 3 years of our lives have been absolutely unreal.  We are exhausted yet so full of energy.  How do I explain that apparent paradox?  I really can't.  It's simply the Holy Spirit doing what the Holy Spirit does.  In our weakness he makes us strong.    So what does the future hold for The Pathway?

The short answer is, "only God knows."  But that's somewhat of a cop out.  Although I don't know exactly what God has planned for our family and our church, I believe it involves radical life change, multiplying disciples and a movement of his Spirit that will bring God so much glory we can't even imagine.  I believe he wants to take the core of people he has been building over the last several years and use us as a foundation piece, a spring board for the gospel to go places in our city that it would never go without them.  None of this will be because God needs us or we've done anything to deserve it.  However he plays out the future it will only be because of his great mercy.

But God promises us that with even small faith he can move mountains.  He says if we delight ourselves in him he will give us the desires of our heart.  I don't know what's best.  God does and I will always submit to his will.  But the desire of our heart is to see the mountain of lostness in Tacoma MOVED by faith in Jesus Christ the righteous.  We are believing that God can do this going forward.

Will you keep believing with us?

March into April Update

Ministry is definitely not a sprint... it's a marathon.  But in the midst of the marathon of church planting we have realized an occasional sprint is necessary and helpful.  That is what March into April has been for us.  We've asked our church to work extra hard, to put in extra time, to be extra intentional as we have prayed for the Holy Spirit to ignite an extraordinary spark in Tacoma that would send the flame of the gospel rip-roaring across our city!

As we approach our last March into April event this Saturday I want to give you a brief update on what God has been doing but I also want to remind you that as we slow our sprint we are still in the midst of the marathon.  What does that mean?  It means we're not stopping our call to make disciples in Tacoma and we hope that you will not stop praying for the gospel to take root.  God is far from finished and we want to continue to approach him confidently, asking him to bring spiritual awakening in our city.

Community Dinners-- We kicked off our month of outreaches with 2 Community Dinners at a local hot spot called  Masa.  A couple things stood out to me.  First, we were praising Jesus for the turn out at the first dinner.  The place was packed and conversations were great.  You could just sense that God was up to something and that the right people were in the right place at the right time.  Second, the next dinner was anything but packed.  The sign-up for that dinner was smaller but we also had a lot of people simply not show up.  I'd love to give you some intelligent and insightful answer as to why that happened... but I simply don't have one.  God knows.  What I do know, is that our people did not slow down.  They continued to go out of their way to make conversations with folks, make them feel welcome and show the love of Jesus to them.  All in all it was a good start.  But would people come back for the next event?

Pre-launch gathering @ Franklin-- Most of you know that on Easter Sunday we launched or worship gathering at a new location.  We decided to do a trial run the week before which happened to be the Sunday after our Community Dinners.  We were not anticipating many people from the dinners to come to worship the very next morning but that's exactly what happened.  We had quite a few people come and worship with us that first day and it was an awesome day.  We had been down to around 60 in worship and that first Sunday at Franklin we jumped up to 80!!!  Praise God for new people hearing the gospel.

Community Fun Nights-- We hosted Community Fun nights on the Friday and Saturday before our Easter Launch at Franklin.  They both had average attendance.  It didn't blow our expectations out of the water but again, our church took ownership of the mission, engaged new folks in conversation and demonstrated the love of Jesus.  The highlight of that weekend was our Good Friday Worship Night at Franklin.  It was after the Community Fun Night and our worship leader Donna planned and led it.  I told multiple people that it was definitely the best thing our church had ever done.  It was powerful worship and it was focused on the cross.  It was just what we needed after a couple weeks of exhausting outreach.

Easter Launch-- One of the things I tried to remind our leaders is that although Easter has so much potential for folks to hear the gospel and connect to the church, we cannot look at Easter as the finish line.  Easter is merely a launching point for making disciples.  We did a lot of publicity (a lot for us) leading up to Easter and we had our highest worship attendance ever... 103!  But two things stood out that were behind those numbers.  First, there were tons of folks from our March into April events... that's the point right?  Second, we had challenged our church the 6 weeks leading up to Easter to pray for 2 people they were going to invite.  As I walked around introducing myself to people and asking them how they ended up coming to worship, so many told me they were invited by one of our church members!  That is mission in action... praise to Jesus!

Tacoma Goest to the Movies-- So this was the one that was destined to be a disaster if not for the merciful intervention of our Savior!  Right in the midst of March into April we slipped away to Texas for a wedding of 2 of our core team members.  It was amazing time and we spent some extra days visiting with many of our amazing partners.  Somehow in the midst of it my brian was got fried and I thought the movie was 2 Saturdays away.  I got sick at the end of the trip and when I was finally home in bed that Friday, I somehow realized that the movie was the next day!  We had done a good job of communicating the correct info to our March into April guests, but I had not communicated anything to our church.  I put the word out fast & our church responded.  We had a great turn out to go see opening weekend of the movie "42."  Well, more potential disaster loomed as we found ourselves sitting in the theater for an hour and a half before the move ever started... technical difficulties.  By God's grace no one was upset and only 3 people had to leave.  That hour and a half turned out to be wonderful.  I got to meet and talk to so many people I did not know and would not have been able to talk to without that time.  God knew what he was doing even when I didn't!

"Building a Budget" Workshop-- This Saturday is our final event and so far the sign-ups have been strong.  This is outside the box of anything we've ever done before but we're excited about it for the relational opportunities and the practical help it will bring.  We believe that stewardship is part of discipleship and we're excited to have David Bragonier, a financial professional from California coming in to lead this for us.  Please pray that everyone who signed up, shows up and even more people come. We are also having a childcare issue so pray that God works out those details!

Last but not least... While all of these events are incredible, you know that our heart is to be the church.  How does that happen?  First of all people need to experience authentic biblical community... we call it Intentional Community.  We were able to relaunch 2 IC's the weeks following Easter and we were also able to launch  2 brand new IC's!  The turn out for those gatherings have blown us away.  People are hungry to learn, hungry to grow and they are craving discipleship!  The second thing we desire is to see people place their trust in Jesus!  So far we have had 2 public professions of faith this month and we are asking God to open the flood gates.

Thank you so much for your prayers.  Please keep it up.  The Holy Spirit is at work and we believe he is no where near finished!

Easter is NOT the end...

I listened to Andy Stanley's Easter message yesterday and it was way better than mine (surprise, surprise!).  Thankfully, the same Holy Spirit was at work in both our gatherings!  Stanley described the moments and days following Jesus' crucifixion.  Hope was lost.  None of Jesus' followers... not Peter, not John... none of them were sitting outside the tomb on Sunday counting down the moments till Jesus would walk out alive.  Instead they were mourning.  Instead of remembering Jesus' teachings, his promise to rise again, they were broken and afraid.  They believed the crucifixion was the end.  Oh how wrong they were!

You know the rest of the story.  On the third day, Easter Sunday, the women went to the tomb and found nothing but grave clothes and an angel.  Jesus was not dead.  Jesus was and is ALIVE!  And because Jesus rose from the dead, Easter was not the end, it was just the beginning.  The same is true for us today.  So many of us pastors, especially us church planters, view Easter as the pinnacle.  If we can just put on a great show...  If we can just send out the perfect mailer...  If we can just come up with a catchy sermon title.  We put so much effort into this one day.

Why?

Well, for good reason I think.  Easter celebrates the day that changed everything!  Easter celebrates and commemorates the day Jesus rose from the dead.  That's a big deal.  And if we can leverage that day and it's popularity in culture to maximize the number of souls that will hear the gospel, I'd say that's well worth it.  But remember the lesson the disciples learned.  Easter is not the end.  While our mission starts with the gospel, our call is only completed when disciples are making disciples.

And that's the challenge I'm personally facing.  I'm trying to remind myself as hard as we've worked, as much as we've poured out, this past Sunday was NOT the end.  It was only the starting point for making disciples who make disciples.

As we gathered together on Easter Sunday morning it was amazing to see as many folks gathered for our pre-service prayer time as we had attending our gathering just a month or so ago.  There was a buzz of excitement.  We were in our new location (praise God for that), our volunteers had their new shirts on, it was resurrection Sunday!  Then I took the greeters around to show them their spots and go over their jobs and people began showing up.  We saw some old faces, but we saw so many new faces.  People had invited friends and family to come and hear the story of the resurrection.  Connections that began at our Community Dinners and continued at our Community Game nights were coming to fruition as people walked through the doors.  God was answering our prayers.

To be perfectly honest, there was nothing extraordinary about the worship gathering on Sunday.  We sang, we taught the Scriptures, we fellowshipped.  But the Holy Spirit was not only there, he had been present and working for some time.  He had been preparing hearts, challenging mind-sets, working to bring the unchurched into the body of Christ.  It was amazing.  We had a record attendance on Sunday and don't get me wrong, I'm incredibly excited about that!  But what I'm more excited about is the fruit that has come from Sunday... because remember, Easter is not the end!

During the response time on Sunday a teenage boy came and told me he wanted to give his life to Jesus.  A first time guest cam and told me he had always heard a message of "works" taught.  This was the first time he had heard a pastor preach on "grace."  The Holy Spirit was moving on resurrection Sunday but that was not the start.  The Holy Spirit has been at work for some time and is continuing to work in ways we see as well as ways we don't see.  And the fruit is coming.

Tonight we re-launched our Intentional Community.  We had been gathering all of our IC's together the last 3 weeks and tonight was the first time we met separately again.  If Easter was not the end, what would God do through our IC?  Would people really respond to the call to be the church instead of simply attending church?  Well, when I got home about 15 minutes before go time there were already multiple people at the house.  By the time it was all said and done we had at least 15 adults and at least 10 children gathered in the name of Jesus, fellowshipping, praying and talking about the life changing power that comes from the resurrection.

Easter is NOT the end.  Our call is to make disciples.  As we continue saturating Tacoma with the gospel and striving to live effectively as Intentional Communities, we are clinging to the belief that the Holy Spirit of God has gone before us, is with us and will continue to move and work long after we're gone.  I cannot wait to see what God has in store for our city.

In the midst of it...

We are in the midst of all that we have been praying for and asking for your prayers on over the last several weeks.  March into April launched with our Community Dinners this past Friday and it was an unbelievable success.  The first dinner was packed out and there were so many solid conversations and a ton of interest in the church, Jesus and future events.  The second dinner was significantly smaller but there were still so many great connections.  Please pray as we follow up with these contacts that they would attend the rest of our March into April events and that gospel conversations and life change would follow.

Sunday was our first worship gathering at Franklin Elementary and somewhat of a trial run for our Easter launch in this new location.  I can't believe how well things went!  To have more space was enough of a blessing by itself.  But add on top of it that so many people showed up to help set-up and serve was a testament to how our church is taking ownership of itself.  There were no major technical difficulties, the band was awesome and our kids ministry had double what it has been having.  We had tons of new faces both from the community dinners and personal invites.  It was an awesome day and a great start to this new phase in the life of The Pathway.

Somewhere in the midst of the crazy full weekend we had a team of college students arrive from First Baptist Concord just outside Knoxville, TN.  They came ready to busy their tails and serve like crazy.  They basically have two missions while they are here.  First and foremost they have spent a ton of time on the campus of the University of Puget Sound and it has already sparked open doors that we've never had before.  One of the students, our former intern Sarah Joseph, had a freshman approach her because he wanted to share his faith with her.  He was blown away that she was there for the same reason and he was so thankful to know that we as a church have been praying for him and his campus.  The team's other mission is to saturate the area around Franklin with the gospel.  They are going door to door, passing out invites to our Community Fun night, telling people why they are in Tacoma and looking for every opportunity to share the gospel.

How can you pray while we're in the midst of March into April?
1) Tonight we are sponsoring a concert at a local hot spot for college students.  Pray for a great turn out and for lots of gospel conversations.

2) Tomorrow is Community Fun Night #1 at Franklin.  We were able to send home flyers with every student at both Franklin and Delong Elementary inviting them to the fun night and to our Easter gathering.  Pray that both are well received.

3) Pray for Community Fun Night #2 at The Spot on Saturday night.  Pray for great fun and tons of gospel opportunities.

4) Pray for our Easter gathering.  Pray for our worship team as they lead.  Pray for me as I preach the gospel, specifically about how Easter changes the rules for us all.  And pray for our people as they've been challenged over the last week to invite at least 2 people to come to our Easter gathering.  Pray for the harvest because I believe God has been equipping us to receive it!

Thank you for your prayers and for all the ways you are involved in what God is doing here in Tacoma!

Sensing the potential... acknowledging the obstacles

As always I want to try and be as transparent as possible with all of you who read this blog.  The fact that you're reading it at all is strong evidence that you pray for us here in Tacoma and for that I am eternally grateful.  So this week I'm going to try and let you in on what's about to go down here in Tacoma.  All in all I'm incredibly excited, undeniably nervous and extremely curious to see what exactly God has in store for this church and our city over the course of the next year and specifically the next month.

Most of you know that we are about to enter into an incredibly intense time.  This Wednesday we start our second ever Gather to Scatter campaign as a church.  This is a basically a time when all of our Intentional Communities come together for 3 weeks to cast vision, build unity and gain excitement before we scatter back out across Tacoma for the express purpose of being the church together and reaching people all over the city.

We're also getting ready for what may be the biggest transition our church has ever gone through.  As most of you know, people don't always like change.  That being said, our church has been unbelievably faithful over the course of our short history to trust my leadership as I seek to follow the Holy Spirit wherever he leads.  A short time ago it became obvious that the Holy Spirit was leading us to move our worship gathering out of The Spot and into Franklin Elementary school.  Franklin is just off the Hilltop but still in the heart of central Tacoma.  It is an amazing facility with welcoming staff and the potential to receive the growth that we are asking God to bring over the next month.

Potential is the word of the month for us.  Gather to Scatter has the potential to unify The Pathway in a way that we have never seen before.  The move to Franklin has the potential to allow us to receive more unchurched families and individuals than we ever have before.  We have a mission team coming to serve with us at the end of March that will be focusing much of their time on saturating a local university with the gospel.  With that effort brings the potential to see God connect us with college students for the first time in 3 years.  We have been praying for these college students for almost 4 years.  Could this finally be the time we connect?  Potentially it could be!

March into April is what we're calling our spring outreach and it has the potential to be HUGE!  By the grace of God we have once again been able to host 2 community dinners at a local restaurant.  We will be following that up with 2 family fun nights, a Good Friday worship night, our Franklin launch, a community movie day and a community financial seminar.  We will have countless opportunities to share the gospel and simply to make friends with the lost and unchurched in our community.  During this outreach we will be scattering our Intentional Communities back out into the city and we will be launching multiple new IC's.  We will be launching our worship gathering on Easter Sunday with the potential to connect with countless new families just because God has made people more willing to come to worship on Easter.

Who will you bring? Finally, we have the opportunity... the potential... to see everyone in our church invite and bring 2 people to Jesus through our Easter worship gathering and IC.  We have been challenging our church every week to pray about who they will bring to Jesus through the opportunity that the Easter season affords.  We're doing so many public outreaches but there is nothing with greater potential than a personal invite to a friend or family member.

To be honest our numbers have dipped over the past several months.  We are currently averaging just over 60 people in worship and around 45 in our weekly Intentional Community gatherings.  But we believe there is GREAT potential to see the harvest we have been praying for start to be gathered in a big way through March into April and Easter Sunday.  We are asking God for big things.  We are asking God to save souls.  We are asking God to change lives.  We are asking God to show up in a God-sized way.  And you know what?  We believe he will!  I believe he will.

Potential? Yes.  Obstacles? Absolutely.  I could list a million obstacles but let me just share two and ask that each one of you who reads this blog commit to pray that God would obliterate these obstacles and bring all this potential to a Holy Spirit empowered reality.  Obstacle number one is Satan himself.  We know Satan is real and we despise him.  We are praying in the name of Jesus that despite his best attempts to lead Tacoma down a road to destruction, that God would use us and other Jesus-centered churches in our city to bring the gospel with grace and power!

The second obstacle is US. That's right, we are the obstacle.  Those of us who claim Christ but aren't willing to lay our lives down. Those of us who claim the name Christian but aren't willing to lay aside our comforts and desires, who aren't willing to sacrifice our schedules, who aren't willing to reorient our lives around the gospel.  We can be one of the greatest obstacles of all.  I would ask that you pray for the people of The Pathway.  Please pray that we would be so filled with love and compassion that we would do whatever it takes to see Tacoma flipped upside down by the gospel and that all this potential would begin to be realized!

March into April

Once again I have failed at my attempt to communicate weekly with you via this blog.  With all my best intentions it is still a struggle to keep you as up to date as possible on all that God is doing in Tacoma, what we have planned and how you can pray.  Hopefully I can accomplish those things through this post.  Thank you for being patient with me as you pray for The Pathway and please don't ever hesitate to call or email if you want a specific update.

First and foremost I cannot believe it is already February 26th.  2013 is flying by and God is doing so much.  To be perfectly transparent the year started off slow and frustrating for The Pathway.  Our involvement waned through the holidays and the new year.  Our worship gatherings were sparse in attendance and our IC gatherings hit a lull as well.  But the one thing God kept reminding me is that life is hard, full and you cannot experience the fullness of the mountaintops with out faithfully pushing through the difficulty and dryness of the valleys.  During the last couple of months we have experienced a great amount of Spiritual warfare as a church.  I think this is tough for me as a pastor because I view the church as my spiritual children.  I would much rather undergo the attack myself than to watch the people of our church endure persecution and tribulation.  That being said, it has also been unbelievably encouraging to see the church be the church.  To face challenge in the name of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit.  To support each other through the trials and attacks and begin to come out stronger on the other end.

We were blessed to celebrate baptism in February.  We baptized 4 and celebrated what it means to be a new creation in Christ.  It has been awesome to see the Lord moves in the lives of these individuals over the last couple of weeks and to see their faith grow and solidify.

As you know The Pathway's ministry Hub is called The Spot and it is a place God has generously allowed us to use for the past 2 years.  Well, we have been wrestling with an obvious call to keep using The Spot but the reality that we are like a fish in a bowl, every time we grow to the size of the bowl our growth is stunted.  We need to find a worship gathering spot where we can receive the harvest that we believe God desires to bring.  With that wrestling came God's answering.  He has generously provided us a way to keep The Spot for all the day to day ministry that flows through it, but move our worship gatherings to Franklin Elementary, a school in the heart of central Tacoma that will allow us to grow and begin serving and sharing Jesus with a new neighborhood while continuing to serve and share Jesus with the Hilltop through The Spot and our other Intentional Communities.  This transition is a challenge and we are praying that it is one that goes smoothly an spurs the church on to reach more friends, more family members and more neighbors for Jesus.  The transition will happen March 24th but our official launch will be Easter Sunday March 31st.  I can barely contain my excitement and I am in awe of how God has put the pieces in place.

In the midst of all this we are going out into the harvest fields through our March into April outreach.  Just as we did last year it will kick off with two community dinners and will be followed up with multiple outreaches that will allow us to not only serve our community, but build relationships in the process.  Pray for me and our church that we would keep the big picture vision in mind of why we do this... that is to make disciples of Jesus!  Please pray for the harvest to come.  Please pray for strength, energy and perseverance.  I've listed our March into April schedule below.  Please mark your calendars and pray that God would do exactly what God wants to do!  We love you all and thank you for the role you play in The Pathway!

March into April: Schedule
Saturday 3/23-- Community Dinners  @ 5pm & 7pm (Masa on 6th Ave.)

Sunday 3/24-- First Worship Gathering @ Franklin Elementary

Friday 3/29 & Saturday 3/30-- Community Fun Night
     March 29th @ Franklin
     March 30th @ The Spot

Sunday 3/31-- Easter Worship Gathering @ Franklin Elementary

April-- Launching new Intentional Communities

Saturday 4/13-- Tacoma goes to the movies

Saturday 4/27-- Community Financial Seminar