Open Mike

Inquiring Ministry Partner

One of our Core Motivations at Lake Forest Church is to "Welcome who Jesus Welcomed - people who've given up on church, but not on God."  Now we all know that a church can say that it welcomes people into their fellowship, regardless of where they are on their spiritual journey.  But what the church does in relationship with what I call 'spiritual explorers' is where this is real, or is just a way for a church to feel good about themselves verbally, while actually being a same ol' same ol' exclusionary spiritual community.  Which would not be okay for a church that claims to follow Jesus, based on the extreme openness and inclusion Jesus exhibited in the single day of his ministry I taught about last Sunday  (go to  http://www.lakeforest.org/sec/resources/sermons/, to listen to the sermon or even better, watch the accompanying video of a 'spiritual explorer' who calls Lake Forest 'my church').

So a while back I made up a way for us to concretely symbolize our hospitality to spiritual explorers.  Its for someone who is investigating what they believe about God, and who takes that investigation to Lake Forest, feels at home, and even goes through our membership class.  But at the end of the class says 'I am growing spiritually at Lake Forest, I want this to be my spiritual community, but I don't believe what you believe about Jesus at this point (like that he's God, or resurrected from the dead).'  A man was saying exactly that to me over lunch at the Atlanta Bread Company.  Well, instead of saying 'you can't belong to Lake Forest,' I decided to say the opposite, 'you're welcome to stay in process regarding your faith journey as long as you need to at Lake Forest, and we still invite you to belong before you believe - come on in, let's do life together.'  I did so leaning into a snapshot of the early church I had just read in the New Testament.

The membership I offered to my friend that day is as an 'Inquiring Ministry Partner,' using the word the Apostle Paul used to describe some people who worshipped at the church in Corinth (I Corinthians 14:23,24), 'inquirers.'  We currently have 35 'Inquiring Minsitry Partners' at Lake Forest Church - which makes me supremely happy as a pastor (there are a few differing reasons why people can choose this type of membership).  Why?  Because it concretely states to me we are in fact 'welcoming who Jesus welcomed' into relationship.  No strings attached, no judgment or second-class citizenry foisted upon inquirers, just simply a straight-forward comfort with, and naming of, the reality that we are not all at the same place in our faith journey at any given point, but lets travel together.

If you go to Lake Forest, know this is true of our church and is supported by our Elders.  It is quite a drastic differentiation from other churches, especially those that are evangelistic in a revivalistic, 'say yes right now!' sort of way (which isn't all bad, but doesn't fit how God works in everyone's life).  How can you make this MORE TRUE of us?  And can you hold the tension in your mind that being this type of church doesn't mean we don't care about 'discipleship' or you aren't a 'deep Christian' because you share fellowship, at a membership level, with Inquirers?  I can.  If you are a leader at another church, how can you advocate for a reality such as this in your fellowship?  If you are one of my denominational leaders - oops, sorry I never asked permission to broaden the category of membership!  I'm asking now.  This is an example of what I mean when I call Lake Forest an 'emerging,' or 'experimental' church.

I briefly mentioned this subject last Sunday and one of our LFC peeps who lives this out well, Chad Larabee, sent me this oh-so-confirming story.  So I'll close this posting with Chad's words and story:

Mike, Love the idea of Inquiring member.  At my former church, I still remember with anguish a one on one elder “interview” following the membership classes.  It was with Charlie… an inquirer or seeker… when he said, 'I just don’t understand what the big deal is with Jesus.'  We talked about Jesus and a plan to discover him through reading, questions, etc… I then explained in as gentle terms as possible that joining as a member of the church would violate his and the church’s integrity and so was not allowed.  I suggested he keep coming and continue in his investigating, but not to join right now.

 

I never saw him again at church after that day.  It crushed me and I followed up several times afterwards, but eventually he just didn’t return my calls.  His name was Charlie… and I fear he never darkened the door of a church after that, or worse just stopped wondering about God.  I think he would still be participating if we had an Inquiring Member status.  My heart still breaks for Charlie and anyone who walks away because their searching was dashed because of a “membership” or a “look” or an “inappropriate word”… Inquiring membership is a GREAT idea. -Chad L.

The Battle To Define Us

The fresh words we are giving to Lake Forest Church's mission is to:  "Love people as they discover and live out their role in God's story."  What do we mean by God's story?  Here's a powerful glimpse of what God's story is, and what it means to us.   One of our community group leaders (Mark Denning) passed this along to me:

"May God give us the faith, therefore, to walk as pilgrims…strengthened by an assurance that this passing age…will never win the battle to define us. It is God who provides us our narrative and tells us our story, for it is His story, the history of redemption, the divine drama according to which humanity was made and then lost, found and then remade in the image of a second Adam, Jesus Christ, whose faithful obedience insures our acceptance by God and whose glorious resurrection guarantees our own."  -From the book Dual Citizens: Worship and Life between the Already and the Not Yet by Jason Stellman

The Kingdom of God is a Party

¹ Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying: ² "The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son...9 Go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find.' Matthew 22:1,2,9

Then the angel said to me, "Write: 'Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb (Jesus = the sacrificial lamb of God) !' " And he added, "These are the true words of God." Revelation 19:9

May you find joy as a Christian, that Christ is in you, you are in Christ, therefore wherever you go is a joy-party celebrating the living presence of the Groom.  As Jesus said, "How can the guests of the groom mourn while he is with them?"   Matthew 9:15

May your life be experienced by others as a forestaste, signpost, and invitation to the Great Banquet.

Building

Quote from an unamed elderly country preacher. "The first two years of a church plant, God wasn't building a church.  He was building a pastor."    Through the crucible of pain and suffering.  Like my Leader.

The first two years of 'planting' Lake Forest Church broke me down, exposed my flesh patterns of making life work according to my own coping mechanisms, threw me upon the grace of God.  May your life now be more about building YOU than the THING you imagine.  How is God building you?

Honor those Who've Honored You

Recently, my inner voice said I was waaay overdue honoring someone who had given great honor to me.  So I setup this Wednesday's lunch with David and Marilyn Chadwick.  Angie and I toured them around our church building for the first time, then we introduced them to the joys of living near the lake and ate outside at the North Harbor Club.

David is the Sr. Pastor of our mother church, Forest Hill Church www.foresthill.org in the South Park area of Charlotte (45 minutes away).   It's he who gave permission, generous funding, key people, and church-wide support for our little church launch of 42 people, 11 years ago.  Other key leaders at Forest Hill also 'made it happen.'  In the end it was David and Marilyn's general spirit of generosity, and passion for the multiplication of the gospel through more outreach-oriented churches, that created the space for us to launch in October 1998. 

I tried to say over and over during lunch, 'thank you, I'm grateful, I'm proud to be associated with you, thank you for your ongoing example, what can i learn from you?'  I also passed along our original Core Group's same sentiments.

I loved catching up with David and Marilyn on all the important things happening at our momma and poppa church: a focused mission partnership in Africa as well as one in uptown Charlotte, emphasis on discipleship in small groups for everyone in the church, people coming to faith consistently as they grow into a multiple-thousands church, AND the congregation just gave generously, through a capital campaign, to something that will never touch them!  They 'gave away' millions to build three other Forest Hill campuses that will make more and better followers of Jesus in different parts of Charlotte.  Wow - that's selfless generosity.

Its important to honor those who've honored you, bless those who've blessed you.  How about a quick email or facebook message today, honoring someone who honored you.  A boss, mentor, someone who gave you your first break, etc.