The Great Invitation
The last few weeks have been a crazy kind of whirlwind…
3 weeks ago I got to go down to Orlando with my dad for a few days to go to a church planters conference called Exponential… heard some really good things while there and it was very cool to download as I was hearing and thinking about things with dad. Dad is 72 and is still going to places in order to learn things even though he could have been teaching on the main stage. A posture of humility and of learning should always be a part of our DNA as long as we are here on assignment!
I came back to Buffalo just in time to be a part of the first Regional CCDA Conference at the Buffalo Christian Center. What an amazing weekend we had! Dr John Perkins was incredible!
Dr Perkins spoke in the morning our of Romans 12:1,2 calling it the “Great Invitation.”
… we are to give our bodies individually and collectively.
… we would rather have the world than Jesus.
… we need (church) to be raising up Justice Leaders.
… we have an apartheid church and the Gospel will burn through prejudice.
… the church (city/suburban) has become a commuter organization.
… we don’t know that we need each other.
…. we need to return back to God’s Word.
… it’s obedience to what God says that ignites God’s power in our lives and churches.
… God’s redemption is unconditional – God’s blessings are conditional!
… we need to “de-colonize” the Gospel and release it to the world both by WORD and DEED!
… we are afraid to take up His invitation because we love the World to much.
Just a few of the “nuggets” that Dr Perkins had to share with us.
At Renovation we have been talking about what it means to be a church that is more than “in” our city or just “against” our city and how to keep from becoming “of” the city… but how do we be a church FOR our city.
It has been an awesome few weeks of discovery and discussion but it has also been convicting and challenging and hard to hear. I think when we as Christ followers really begin to talk and think and position ourselves to take the Great Invitation that Dr Perkins challenged us with we see that there is nothing easy about it. And we expose what is truly in us and what is not.
This week we will continue to talk through being FOR our city as we look at the example of Jonah that we started this past Sunday.
