Groups – The Nexus

In this second part of our conversation, What’s Next, we took a look at how the ideas of growing and reaching and help give us clarity in terms of our next steps now that we understand our identity a bit more fully. Keep reading to see how these can guide us.

Get Moving

Well, last week, after spending the previous four talking about our God-given identity as a church, we began a new conversation seeking to answer the question, “What’s Next?” So we know a little better than we did before who God made us to be. What are we supposed to do with that? What are some of the things we can be doing now to start moving us down the road in the direction of becoming fully that church? Certainly we’re not going to get there all at once, but what are the steps we can take now no matter who we are and where we are in order to start the ball rolling in that direction? Perhaps to ask that another way: How can we begin adjusting our behavior as a body in light of who God made us to be such that even if we’re not fully that church yet, we’re putting ourselves in a place to begin becoming that church? Read the rest…

This past Sunday as we continued our conversation about who God made us to be as a church, the next key element of our identity is growth. Keep reading to see how growing people has always been a part of God’s approach to humanity and how it is, could be, and should be fleshed out in our community. Thanks for reading.

Growing Stronger

Growth is natural. As it was nearing the first summer Lisa and I spent in Virginia, we decided we wanted to plant a garden. Neither of us really had any idea what we were doing. We got some help and advice from folks in the church who were themselves avid gardeners, but much beyond help with the plowing of a 30 by 60 plot in our backyard, we pretty much did all the work ourselves. We planted way too much. We wound up spending almost every evening and Saturday morning pulling weeds and picking produce (and trying desperately to give away the hundreds of squash and zucchini and cucumbers we had). We canned more green beans than would fit in our meager pantry. But, by the time it was all said and done, we had successfully grown a pretty nice garden. Here’s the funny part, though, and if you’re a gardener you know this to be true: The work we did had almost no impact on the actual growth of the garden. Sure, by pruning and pulling weeds and spraying for bugs and watering when it got dry we might have extended the life of the plants and increased the size of the harvest, but there was not a single thing we did to cause the garden to grow save putting the seeds in the ground. Once they were in the ground and covered with dirt, the rest happened all on its own. Again: growth is natural. Read the rest…