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FUSION IN WORDS
Words are important--but they don't tell the whole story. In fact, podcasts, webpages, blogs, they are all valuable, but they are not vital. What is vital---relationships. Relationships, not the ones in which we control how much others know us---or those we hide behind facades. The relationships that are vital are the ones that push us out beyond our comfort--ones where vulnerability is evident. We don't get these relationships via websites, podcasts, and blogs. We can only find them in stepping into a world that becomes real--although threatning--it's a risk we are made for. So, take our words as descriptors of the way we hope to live. But if we do not live them---and they are merely ideals, then we are not community but dreamers.
The following are a few of the words that resonate with us are: Holistic, Incarnational, and Spiritual. There are more words we celebrate . . . but these may capture most of everything we value together as a shared people.
HOLISTIC – seeing the bigger picture---that everything effects everything else. We especially wrestle with the depth at which God would effect every facet of our lives. We live in a city/region that once was known as the “Bible Belt”. It’s a culture where church buildings dot the landscape and much of the population is familiar with God-speak. However, we see that as a harmful thing---being familiar enough believe it’s “right” in God’s eyes---doing what is polite, moral, and conservative. This Bible Belt culture is wayning, slowly, but it’s moving toward a greater sense of lostness.
We are here to live out lives that alter the balance toward a new way---one holistically impacted by God.
"To clasp the hands in prayer is the beginning of an uprising against the disorder of the world." --Karl Barth
SPIRITUAL – spirituality is en vogue. The more mystical you can be the more intriguing and mysterious. We see this growing search for spiritual fulfillment toward a more Eastern mysticism as a genuine reaction to the rational modernism that has driven much of the west for a long time. But we see as spirituality that has it’s power in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We see a spirituality that includes Meditation, Prayer, Solitude, Disciplines, and Shared Experiences that is defined by intimacy with God and rooted in a historical faith.
We believe the spiritual life with the One True God is the one we were created for.
INCARNATIONAL – We believe that we carry Christ with us---just as Christ came in the flesh (incarnation). We are to live out a life reflecting or incarnating Christ to all people. We, as a community of Christ followers, are not only to live out a life with God—but to represent God to our world. We do this in love. We do this in power.
God,
may our community never merely speak words---let us live them . . .
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