Thursday, December 7

10 days of vision...

Mark Nelson at 6:39 PM 8comments

8 Comments

at 10:04 PM  Unknown said...

I just have one word, lobbyists.

 

at 10:55 PM  Mark Nelson said...

Amen, brother Mathias...

 

at 2:25 AM  John said...

Mark, I've just discovered your blog, good stuff here. Now, my comment.

Immersing ourselves (as Christians) into our neighborhoods and communities is growing increasingly difficult in this 21st century culture. Our society has isolated itself to the point that human-to-human contact is rare. Walk down the street or even through the grocery store and most of the time you see people plugged into their iPods or on the cell phone. It's hard to strike up a conversation there. It's even hard to meet your neighbors anymore. My neighbors dog is in my yard more than he is. The average American comes home from work and plops down in front of the tv or the internet and that is where he gets his companionship. Real relationship are messy, complicated and require time.

My church here in NE Oregon has made several attempts at inviting neighbors to our church, they send their kids, but don't make the commitment themselves.

 

at 1:44 PM  The Anonymous Human said...

I agree with John, it's hard. But I think part of that is our perception that it is the 'church's' duty to tell our neighbors about Christ. It's hard, but not impossible.

 

at 3:48 PM  Anonymous said...

I think we're too hard on ourselves on this one. It's okay to be less than a full-time grassroots activist and be true to this ideal. I think it just means to love where you live in every sense of that phrase. Face it: people are going to screen calls, build fences in their yards and listen to their iPods. That includes me and you, too, and that's not a bad thing per se. We need to be able to forge places of privacy in our lives. But we can seek to look at what do in our work, worship, leisure, and relationships and find out how those things are interconnected, as well as how we can be better stewards, realizing that, like it or not, there really is no private ownership on final analysis. Everything we "have" and do is about conscious, decisive stewardship. I think the key to this one is a lens--new eyes--not necessarily a position on a board or going door-to-door with petitions. Are there needs not being met within our sphere of influence and, if not, what can we do with what we have been given to meet those needs, be they physical, mental, emotional, spiritual?

 

at 9:13 PM  Anonymous said...

This seems like it will be the hardest to actually accomplish of all the ones you've listed so far. God knows I'm lousy at it... I've never even met my next door neighbors on one side.

But I think for you guys to stay on mission and reach the folks you're wanting to reach, this will be essential. If you have a core group of mostly middle class suburbanites / johnson bible college bubble dwellers, seeing this become reality in the bearden community is going to take some doing. Not to sound pessimisstic, I can just see this taking some work.

We're all just so BUSY all the time, and then the time we do have for church type stuff, it seems like we mostly spend that time either consuming or else serving in a church building or at a church event. You're talking about going another mile...

Something I am noticing in my generation is a strong BELIEF in this kind of thing... we love the idea of this stuff... we're all for it... we go see "Invisible Children" (and add them to our top 8 myspace friends), we buy U2 records so we can support Bono, we maybe even write a check... but when it comes to actually doing anything... well, somebody else will have to do that because I have no time. I've probably met 100 people who are passionate about Invisible Children but all anybody seems to be doing is "Raising awareness". That's good for awhile but I wonder for how long?

Just me thinking out loud... I don't think I mean this to sound quite as pessimisstic as it does... sorry.

I've enjoyed reading these... I am excited about Crossings and hope I can get out to visit sometimes. The website looks great too... you guys knocked that one out of the park.

 

at 8:37 AM  Anonymous said...

One of the reasons why we see this as the most difficult ones is because of our limited view of where God dwells. We have a tendency to think that God is not in our neighbors house because he or she or they are not believers. I have learned, and am continuing to learn, that God is in all the places where i think he isn't and if i don't go there; 1. Who will? 2.I might just miss out on something huge God is doing.

I agree that it is hard and that we are all busy and all have stuff going on in our private lives or whatever. However I hope that we don't settle with putting a cork in that holy bottle of discontent trying to errupt inside of us. For many of us allowing the cork to be removed brings a holy explosion of the Holy Spirit and things in our lives get turned upside down and suddenly we don't know what to do with ourselves, I speak from experience.

May crossings be a place where our bottles are shaken up, the corks are removed and we act upon the overflow of the Holy Spirit, immersing ourselves in the places where God is and wants us to go.

 

at 4:15 PM  The Watson Family said...

Well, I think this means exactly what it says. Not only do we immerse ourselves in the person of Jesus or our indivdual interests but we see ourselves as part of our community at large. We see ourselves as part of its life blood caring about the vitality of the whole and not just the individual in the room down the hall or down the street. I have a sense from the above comments that people think this is hard. It is but not in practice but in commiment. To be immersed in the community is to view our surroundings with a Kingdom perspective.

Not to plug a book but Brian McLaren's new one titled The Secret Message of Jesus is great on this point.

 

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