Gathering

So often we view life as what will one day be. Soon I'll have enough money for . . . if only I had enough time to . . . when I move to . . then I will . . . We spend so much time thinking about what could be, and what isn't, that we miss what is. Life is a journey. It is a process. Our journey is filled with adventure, boredom, tragedy — it is a story finding its way through life. Every church has its own journey. Our journey is painted with texture.  
   
Vision  
In most of the great stories we know, the starring role, the central character had a vision.   A vision to conquer, to explore, to win, to be the best, a vision to discover something or find someone.   A vision gives passion direction.  We will be, we must be a visioneering church.  Our initial vision is to create and shape a community of thousands of Christ-followers that experience God, and live on mission.  Our hope is to live a full life, enjoying the blessings of God, while staying engaged in the culture and that people would partner with us because they are drawn to the compelling love of Jesus.  

Worship
Decades ago, an archbishop described worship this way, The submission of all our nature to God. It is the quickening of conscience by His holiness; the nourishment of mind with his truth; the purifying of imagination by his beauty; the opening of the heart to his love; the surrender of will to his purpose - and all this gathered up in adoration, the most selfless emotion of which our nature is capable and therefore the chief remedy for that self-centeredness which is our original sin and the source of all actual sin. You are a worshiper. I am a worshiper. Author Louie Giglio defines worship this way, Worship, in essence, is declaring what we value most. As a result, worship fuels our actions becoming the driving force of all we do. Worship is the activity of the human soul. Everyone has an altar, it may not be something you see in our living rooms, then again, it may, but it exists most assuredly in our minds, hearts, and souls. When we fail to express worship to our Creator, both privately and publicly, we live with a disrupted spirit. There is a nagging sense that something is not right. An intimacy lost. Satisfaction fleeting. Purpose and direction undiscovered. The expression of worship is the smile of the soul.

Freedom  
Freedom.   It is a word we don't often pay much attention, unless we are celebrating a patriotic holiday, or maybe recently watched a Mel Gibson movie. Yet it is at the center of life.  It may be God's greatest gift.  You see to live is to be free. God's artistic creation of the world recounted in Genesis chapters 1-2, describes a world of freedom.  The villain of this story, disguised as a serpent, deceived our ancestors and as a result, mankind traded freedom for bondage.  Yet God in his loving fashion offered a new way to freedom.   He inserted Himself onto the pages of his own story and Jesus, His son, spearheaded a rescue operation by sacrificing his life so that we could be free.  For the ones who have received this freedom, there is a sense of destiny, a calling, and a purpose that resonates within.   We must not, we cannot, wait for life to show up at our doorway.  The mission lies before us, not in the comfort of what we know, but in the faith journey of what we don't.   If you are enslaved to the lies of disrupted culture, find freedom.  If you have been set free, become what you were meant to be.  
   
Relationship  
Though man was created, relationship was not.  Relationship has always existed.  The fellowship of the Trinity has always been.  Relationship sits at the core of natural and supernatural existence.   The most powerful connecting word for these relationships is love.  The sacred scripture reveals that our primary actions should center on this connection.   John Mark records Jesus’ words, …so love the Lord God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence and energy… Love others as well as you love yourself.  The human condition is depicted by loneliness.  People want to be loved.  By involving ourselves in their interests, their struggles, their lives, we will have an opportunity to serve as a spiritual companion.   This must happen individually and collectively.  Love equals belonging.  Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand. -Margery Williams "The Velveteen Rabbit" 
   
Faith  
Erwin McManus boldly writes about the role faith plays in our journey.  The center of God’s will is not a safe place but the most dangerous place in the world! God fears nothing and no one!   God moves with intentionality and power.  To live outside of God’s will puts us in danger; to live in his will makes us dangerous.  Too often the church has attempted to clean up spirituality by enforcing extra-biblical suppositions.  The result has been a clouding of the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit is the presence of God placed in his followers.  Too often people trust an institution, or even other people for life direction.  While it is appropriate to ask others for information, advice, and wisdom, we must understand that this grid of thought will always contain flaws.  It cannot be perfect, while in contrast, the Spirit of God is an all-knowing guide.  Trust in interpreting the past, living the present, and preparing for the future, must express itself through belief and hope in the unseen reality of God. We may experience fear, apathy, and laziness, but these are all subplots to what is really going on.  When we fail to live by faith, we refuse to believe that God is big enough.    

Formation  
The name of our church derives from this context of process. John, quoting Jesus, his best friend and mentor, wrote this, The thief [villain] comes only to steal, and kill, and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.  Imagine gulping life everyday rather than sipping it.  Our journey will be difficult, strewn with losses, marked by scars, and missteps.  That same journey will also be filled with celebrations and victories and smiles.  One thing is constant.  The presence of a person.   The only person more cunning and powerful than the villain.  This heroic Warrior God is loving and shaping us.  This is a process.  It takes dedication.  It takes desire. As a church we will equip and teach the mind of God in print - the Bible - so that spiritual formation will occur.  
   
Mission  
…You are here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world.  God is not a secret to be kept. We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a hill…Now that I have put you there on a hilltop, on a light stand, shine!  Keep open house; be generous with your lives.   By opening up to others, you’ll prompt people to open up with God, this generous Father in heaven. - Matthew, disciple and personal friend of Jesus.  Our purpose is to guide men and women into a discovery of the person of Jesus Christ.  By adding value to their lives serving them, and speaking to them directly of the epic story that they unknowingly are apart of, we believe their lives will be eternally transformed.  Jesus is so compelling, how could one not want to surrender to his creative design?!  
   
Church  
God’s design for his followers and their relational connection is called the church.  Its purpose is to fulfill his divine mission.  The initial surrender to the person of God progresses into an understanding of this divine mission.  The biblical passage of I John chapter 5 begins with this tremendous declaration; Every God-begotten person conquers the world’s ways.  The conquering power that brings the world to its knees is our faith.  The villain of the human race, once an angel named Lucifer, now a devil named Satan, has twisted much of the culture in which we live to value bondage over freedom.  It is difficult to discern, as the matrix of this world has attractive wrappings.  Our only success lies in an understanding of the sacred thoughts and directives of God written in the Bible, and a deepening of our relationship with this supernatural Father.  Closeness in relationship comes from intelligent understanding, a fellowship of resolve with other followers, the daily exercise of faith-belief, and an incessant giving of ourselves to the mission of loving others to the person of Jesus.  
   
Service  
When we contemplate the life of Jesus on earth, it is impossible to shake his compassion for broken people.  He modeled with his life and taught relentlessly that he was here not for the healthy, but the sick.  The church will not impact culture by condemning but by loving.  Entrenched in our DNA is the need to serve, to give of ourselves.  I am not saying it is currently our natural compulsion, but before evil infected mankind, it was.  What the afterlife has waiting for us, is not just pretty streets and angels playing music on clouds, but an eternity of serving.  [The satisfaction] of serving, when done with a pure heart is a little taste of heaven on earth.  The Bible encourages us to esteem others more highly than ourselves.  When we really give of ourselves we find much less self-pity and much more gratitude. We think sometimes that poverty is only being hungry, naked and homeless. The poverty of being unwanted, unloved and uncared for is the greatest poverty. We must start in our own homes to remedy this kind of poverty.   –Mother Theresa.  

Partnership with Journey Ecclesia equates to a church experience of service in all shapes and sizes.  Much of the beauty of the church is found in our diversity - our ethnicity, our personality, our talents and gifts.  These will not be chiseled to meet someone’s preference for conformity, but will be celebrated as the sovereign blueprint of God.  
   
Family  
We recognize that living in our local and national culture offers both blessings and challenges.  One of those challenges includes understanding the dynamics of relationships in the home.  Understanding, for instance, the culture of adolescence, contrasted with childhood and the adult community.  We have much to learn from the untainted innocence of children and the bold exploration of teenagers.  Our children are not just our tomorrow, they are our today!  They are our most precious of all gifts, and so we will not burry them in childcare, their contribution to the kingdom will not be discarded, but we will channel their zeal, and explore with them the mysteries of God, allowing them to shape our awe and spur our enthusiasm.  Journey Ecclesia is not a church speckled with programs to rescue your children from the world but a church where your children are equipped to flourish righteously in it.  We refuse to enable our kids; we refuse to dumb down the expectations and adventure offered through Jesus.  We will love and empower our children to imprint their world today, believing that by doing so they will stay engaged tomorrow.  
   
Culture  
Author Ron Martoia defines culture as "The sum total of the ways we express ourselves and relate to each other in the institutions we build to express ourselves and relate to each other".  We believe the movement of Christ on the earth, revealed through his followers, the church, is at the center of human existence.  The world is peripheral to the church.   Jesus explained that the church is supposed to be salt and light in the community.  We are not to cluster in our buildings, protective castles to defend ourselves from evil.  Instead we are to use our minds to embrace the truth and dialogue with those searching for it.  We must engage the battle as soldiers, protected by frontal armor only, not willing to retreat.   And with our lives we are artisans, displaying the creativity of God in our differences and uniqueness.  We choose not to disappear from culture but to shape it.