It's Not Crisis Yet...But It's Getting There

God could be creating crisis in my spiritual life and leadership. He does this pretty regularly and it usually ends up creating crisis and chaos in my life and ministry. Now, before you think that's a negative thing, let me say, "it isn't". It was through crisis that I became a Christian, met my wife, went to Dallas, and became a part of Crew. It is through crisis that God tends to do his best work in my life.

Also, notice I said that God "could be" creating crisis. I'm only the morning after evaluating some of the spiritual life at Crew. So, it may just be me dreaming of ways to change things for the better. I've always said early on that Crew would be a place that wasn't afraid to change things...radically. Mediocrity and status quo will kill us. But here are questions I'm asking this morning: Is our community really a community? Is transformation really happening? Are people on the ragged edge of life in the Tri-state really being loved, served, and connected to Jesus?

I might be jumping a little ahead here, but it seems like we have succeeded in connecting some folks to Jesus Christ for the first time. A great thing and I praise God for that. God has used Crew to get some folks who've dropped out of church excited about following Jesus. Again, awesome. We've stripped Christianity of a lot of cliche and false assumptions in order to practice a real relationship with Jesus Christ. Yeah for that!

But...Could there be something more? Could there be this ENTIRE lifestyle lived with Jesus and with other Jesus followers? Would we work jobs in order to love people and live the way of Jesus Christ alongside them? Can we do church in such a way that a true community of faith emerges? A place where deep friendships really are deep? Can we live lives in a way that we seep into the cracks and crevices of culture in order to redeem the world through the gospel of Jesus Christ? And is that happening at Crew?

What if we revolutionized how we lived Christianity in Huntington? What if our worship on Sundays wasn't a worship event, but a place where we came and sang songs to Jesus, creatively shared our gifts to serve and encourage one another, honestly talked about life, and read the Bible (I mean it. I'm talking about sitting and reading the entire book of Exodus in one sitting). What if we did that sitting around like in a coffee house or a living room or back yard? What if the Bible was taught and preached in this setting? What if...?

See what I mean? I feel crisis coming, but a good one. One that will make a difference. Oh no...I'm getting excited.

Blog(s)

Did I tell you I was going to blog or what?! But after my last blog I was reading some other blogs and stumbled across a great article about the Emerging Church. Crew gets labeled as an emerging church or as a church doing some things that emerging churches do. Whenever someone familiar with the emerging conversation hears me speak, they usually ask, "Are you a part of the emerging church?". I hate that question! They probably ask me that because I've sounded sarcastic, jaded, cynical, or I cussed. I'm emergent enough to know that I hate labels. But I thought some of you might want some info on what the emerging church is and get an honest evaluation of it. This article does the trick as an intro appetizer:

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2007/february/11.35.html

Let's Try This Again

The picture to the left is of me kissing one of my best friends in the whole world: Bruno Giamba. He's a guy who knows how to live with all he's got. I want to live like that. But it comes with a struggle for me. I end up living all or nothing. If I want to work out with a four day routine at the YMCA, but know I'll only have two days available, then I don't work out at all. If I want to read through the Bible in a year, but crater by Leviticus then I end up scrapping the whole pursuit and just study a specific book of the Bible. If I can't blog every other day with the tenacity that I want then before I know it, I look up and 2 months of a blogless existence have come. This had been called a "blogabatical" by a friend of mine (Check out his blog: Caffeinated Joe).

I've been reading more blogs lately. I've also been getting some insight on writing blogs. This has gotten me more excited. Whether it makes this a better blog is still to be determined. Here are some things to be looking for as I come out of my "blogabatical":

• A move away from a devotional bent to a controversial bent.
• A move away from generic musings to a specific journal.
• A move away from basic pics to more artistic forms.
• A move from less frequent long entries to more frequent short ones.

In a sentence, this isn't going to be Josh from a pulpit with a megaphone. This is going to be Josh around a table with a cup of coffee. More coming. Soon. I promise?