Love our City | Serve Our Community

Refuge Church Easter Celebration

Our mission at Refuge is simple. We desire to love God, love people, and love our world.

When we do we will actively engage in displaying and declaring the good news of Christ's kingdom so that those who are still far off from God can come to find their place in the family of God.

This Easter we will celebrate that good news of Christ's death and resurrection. As part of that celebration, the Refuge family is gathering and inviting others to gather for an Easter Egg Hunt and Fun Day on Saturday, April 19. This day is a simple and tangible way we want to love our city and serve our community.

I invite you to attend and serve. You can help provide pre-filled eggs for kids' age-graded hunts.  You can serve by being a parking attendant, assisting registration, volunteering at a game station. You can invite by extending an invitation to neighbors, friends, and coworkers. Especially consider those in your world who are disconnected from a church and those who do not yet have a personal relationship with God through Jesus.

For information on volunteering, providing eggs, or for any additional information, please contact Nanette Merritt at emtnanner@me.com.

Sunday, April 20 is Easter Sunday. It is still true that many individuals who do not attend church regularly will go somewhere on that Sunday. A simple invitation to Refuge may be all they need to join with us and hear about The Greatest Story Ever Told. Invite Cards available this Sunday at the Next Steps Table (but you don't need a card to invite).

Hope of the World

Billy Hybels, founding and senior pastor of Willow Creek Community Church in Illinois, said, "The Church is the hope of the world."

The Church is the hope of the world because the message of hope has been entrusted to the Church. As Jesus prepared His disciples for His return to the Father in heaven, He gave them this sacred trust of displaying and declaring the good news.

Only the gospel has the awesome power to radically, fully, and eternally change lives. The gospel alone provides forgiveness for disobedience, mercy for the rebel, and grace for the undeserving. And only the Church has been given the great task and inexpressible joy of displaying and declaring to the nations this gospel of Jesus Christ's death and resurrection.

God's plan is always best and perfect. He never makes a Plan B. Plan A has always been that His followers, ever-faithful, would make disciples of all nations, advancing His kingdom into all the world and increasing His kingdom by increasing the number of worshipping followers of Jesus.

If the Church, you and me as the followers of Jesus Christ, are the hope of the world because of the good news we have to give, then every day the Church is either the world's hope or the world's doom.

We will be the hope of the world because we are faithful to carry the light of the gospel into all dark places.

We will be the doom of the world because we find it more convenient to stay than to go and choose to keep the hope we've received to ourselves rather than share with a world in need.

Are you living to display and declare the good news of Christ's kingdom as a hope-giver to the world?

A Choice Will Be Made

Today a choice will be made. You and I, along with every one in the world, will make that choice. It is the choice of who or what we will worship and serve.

Our land is flooded with idols. Hindus may erect idols in their homes and shops with the heavy aroma of incense burned to these gods. Dare we judge and criticize them and others without scrutinizing our own lives and culture.

We may have fashioned our gods of other materials, but they are gods no less. Whether the god of money, sex, pleasure, power, position, relationships or some other, we live with countless gods we have created by our own hands. These we worship and serve as if they are suitable substitutes for the True God. That is by definition an idol—a God substitute.

 God is jealous for His own glory. He permits no substitutes or rivals. He expects complete surrender and whole-hearted devotion.

Joshua came to the end of his days and he implored the people to make the choice.  He said, “Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.”

There is a choice to follow Jesus that comes as a conscious act of the will decision in which we place our faith and trust in Him alone to be rescued from sin and restored in relationship to God. Yet every day there must be the decision to worship and serve Him alone. Every day idols must be identified and torn down. Every day my own desires must be put to death so they do not obstruct the path to follow Jesus.

Jesus told every would-be follower the cost was high. “You must deny yourself, take up your cross daily, and follow Me.”  The choice will be made today and every day. You will make the choice whether purposefully or by default. You will worship and serve Him or you will worship and serve another.

What will you choose today?

Take a Daniel moment:

1. Praise God that He alone is worthy to be worshiped and served.
2. Celebrate that God is the all-wise and only true God.
3. Ask for God to identify the idols in your own heart.
4. Pray for yourself to be nailed to the cross with Christ that nothing in you would hinder your following Jesus or get in the way of God’s work and mission.
5. Surrender yourself to worship and serve Jesus today.
6. Repeat tomorrow.

Power and Offense

History is His story.

God's story is one of a tireless work and mission to rescue the deeply broken by the unimaginable love demonstrated through Jesus Christ who died in our place for our sin in order to eternally rescue and restore us.

This is the good news (gospel) of God who is the story's sole and supreme hero. God entrusted His story to Jesus' followers with the instruction to make it known to every nation. We are never to lose it in a cluttered culture, leave it in favor of something more favorable to us, or change it to make it fit our wisdom or fit more easily into our life and the lives of others.

This story is one of both great power and great offense.

The Gospel of Great Offense

The gospel is the good news of God's redeeming work but it is not received by all as good news. When speaking to a crowd, Jesus began teaching about eternal life. John records that Jesus said to the crowd that only those who eat His flesh and drink His blood have eternal life. Jesus didn't intend that the people literally begin taking out knives and sharp objects to remove His flesh to eat and cut Him so they could drink His blood.

The Bible teaches that Jesus Christ suffered and died, allowing His body to be broken and His blood to be poured out for the forgiveness of our disobedience and rebellion. Only those who trust in His suffering, death, and resurrection have the promise of eternal life. Unless we consume His sacrifice as everything we need to have life we cannot live at all.

Jesus could have said what He did a different way, but He chose His words carefully because He wanted no half-hearted, thrill-seeking followers. He got the response He expected. Many were so offended by this message of the gospel that they walked away to never follow Jesus again (John 6).

The gospel is offensive. Followers of Jesus must never forget that our good news is perceived as offensive by the world apart from the work of the Spirit in the heart. We must also live to give no offense in anything except the gospel.

The Gospel of Great Power

The same gospel that offends so many possesses great power to rescue humanity from despair and destruction and give hope and restored life. The Scriptures declare that the gospel of Christ's kingdom is the only thing that has the power to rescue God's enemies and make them His sons and daughters.

When the Spirit of God descended in power upon the followers of Jesus in Acts 2, they immediately went into the streets and the marketplace to declare the gospel to those gathered in Jerusalem. Peter and the others began to tell of how Jesus suffered and died and then rose again. Not all who heard believed. But a great number of 3,000 believed and then took the next step of following Jesus in baptism.

The gospel is the power of God to bring us home and make us His forever. Followers of Jesus cannot find or invent a greater power or better message. We must live allowing the gospel to work powerfully in our sin-sick lives, as well as in the lives of others.

Reaching People

When it comes to the church--both new churches and churches of some years--our mission has always been and remains to display and declare God's story of how our deep brokenness was met with unimaginable love in Jesus in order to eternally rescue and restore us. This message will offend those who are repulsed by its message, while it will transform those who humbly surrender and believe.

Churches who are faithful to God's story will find not all will like their message, which makes reaching people a long and difficult mission at times. Yet those same churches who communicate well in both life and word this gospel will see God's power bring change lives beginning with our own.

The gospel is a message of both great power and great offense. And this message is the story the world needs.

Refuge Church | Our Message: Available Here

Team Effort

For years it has been reported that in most churches 80% of the work is carried on the backs of 20% of the people. In truth, this could be more optimistic than reality (some suggesting that it is more like 90/10).

Why this is true cannot be reduced to one single issue. Reasons range from a person diffusing responsibility to others around them to the selfish pleasure of merely seeing church for what one gets rather than what one can give.

Individuals sometimes do not volunteer because they got "burned out" trying to do too much or because they don't like the way things are being done. Others have so flooded their schedules and the schedules of their family that they simply do not believe they have the time to give. Still others simply have never come to realize that God has gifted them for the benefit of His church and the advancement of His mission.

The beauty at Refuge Church, since we are a church plant and have known from the beginning this is a team effort, is that we are certainly above the 80/20 margin. Even so there are still areas where volunteers are needed, still individuals who haven't yet connected in an area of serving, and still blessings individuals are missing out on until they choose to take the next step of volunteering/serving.

These are specific areas where you can connect and be blessed in serving at Refuge Church, as well as meet needs as we serve together to fulfill our mission.

Kids Ministry
We believe at Refuge Church that no one is too young to begin hearing and learning about God's love and encountering Jesus personally. Our youngest ones at Refuge Church aren't just tagging along with adults, they are here for us to display the gospel and declare the hope of Jesus Christ.

Areas to Serve: Early Childhood on Sundays or in our Kids Worship on Sundays.

Set-up and Take Down
Sometimes being a portable church we get a sense of what the Israelites experienced in the wilderness. Each week we set-up our worship, kids, guest services, and next steps areas.

Areas to Serve: Set-up Team or Take Down Team.

Guest Services
Every week we typically have first time guests. We strive hard to think about the guest experience from the moment they pull into the entrance till the moment they leave the campus. Reports show that 87% of guests do not return for a second time. When a guest returns for a second time they are significantly more likely to continue coming. Guest services focuses on first impressions, greeting, and assisting guests who are unfamiliar with things we take for granted (where are the bathrooms, where do my kids go, where is the worship area).

Areas to Serve: Guest Services Set-up, Guest Services Greeting/Guest Reception

Worship
We were made to worship and worship is the most important aspect of who we are individually and at Refuge Church. We want to continually create an atmosphere of worship and lead individuals to behold and worship Christ.

Areas to Serve: A/V Team, Worship Team, Creative Team (for worship and message series)

Connections
We want to strive to create better connecting points for guests and regular attendees at Refuge Church. 
The primary way for individuals to connect and belong in community is Refuge Life Groups. Additionally, we want to create periodic times in 2014 for connection among different Life Groups and for connection among all Refuge Church. We hope to have quarterly men and women's connection times, along with periodic lunches following our worship gatherings.

Areas to Serve: Life Group Leader, Life Group Host, Connections Coordinator (men and/or women)

Ministry and Administrative Assistance
As resources allow, our goal will be to have a ministry and administrative staff assistant. In the meantime, volunteers who have interest in taking tasks that arise would free pastoral staff to focus on primary areas of responsibility.

Areas to Serve: Office tasks, data entry, ministry projects, local mission partnership outreach/planning


As we advance forward, there will be other needs that arise. But when everyone sees the work and mission of Refuge Church as his or her work and mission, everyone will find his or her place of volunteering and we will see the beauty and power of God working through a team (body).

If you are not currently volunteering and would like to be connected with the Ministry Team Leader of any of these areas, please email me at Justin@refugenc.org or Chris Leader at Chris@refugenc.org.

Shadrach the Bird

I had an African Grey bird when I was in college.  His name was Shadrach and his stay with me was short-lived (that's another story). But he stayed long enough that I learned what the word repeat really means.

African Greys are  medium-sized parrots from the rain forests of West and Central Africa.  The African-Grey is regarded by many experts as one of the most intelligent birds in the world. 

Shadrach's mimicry amazed me. He would repeat the words I said over and over to him with precision of both the words and the tone of my voice.  At other times, he would seek to mimic the tone of others including my sister-in-law.

It wasn't until I had spoken the word or phrase to him numerous times that he finally picked it up.

Richard Nixon had a good quote.  No, not the "I am not a crook" quote.  He said, "You know, when I'm tired of hearing it, I know my staff has gotten it. And when my staff is tired of hearing it, I know the press corps has gotten it. And when the press corps is tired of hearing it, I know the nation has gotten it."

As we put in place foundational pieces upon which the life and ministry of Refuge Church will be built, there are foundational truths that will be repeated over and over again. That isn't an apology but a promise.  For I, like most, can easily become distracted and lose focus of not just the what, but, more importantly, the why.

One of the most important statements I will repeat is our vision/mission statement.  This statement encapsulates not only why I believe Christ led us to begin this new work, but also how we desire to do this. 

We want to be a church that displays and declares the good news of Christ's kingdom to individuals near and far.

Refuge Church is the work of God to display and declare the good news of His kingdom to those of every tribe and nation, beginning where we are, for His ultimate glory.

We desire to accomplish this vision by leading individuals to connect in a relationship with Jesus Christ, belong in community with other Christ followers, and serve the world by displaying the gospel in action and declaring the gospel in word.

This is our focus and 'why' Refuge Church began.  This is our mission and purpose in God's redemptive plan.  This will be repeated a lot, along with a number of other key principles and truths for Refuge Church. When we are tired of hearing it, then we may have only begun to accomplish it.

Flow

The Encounter Series at Refuge Church continues to look at the lives of regular, ordinary people like us coming face-to-face in a life-changing encounter with an extraordinary, all-surpassing God.  

In the latest message from Isaiah 6, we looked at how Isaiah saw God high and lifted up.  His majesty filled the temple.  His glory floods the earth. His power shakes the foundations and his character is pure and holy.  

When Isaiah encountered the majestic, glorious, all-surpassing, transcendent King, his response was appropriate.  "Woe is me!" Compared to the devil, I'm great. Compared to others, I'm good.  Compared to God, I'm ruined.

Isaiah declared the woe of seeing himself in light of who God is.  Encountering God for who He really is allows us to see ourselves for who we really are. We see His holiness and our wretchedness.  We see His transcendence and our lowliness.  

Seeing himself for who he really was led Isaiah to recognize what he deserved.  "Woe is me, for I am ruined."  I'd paraphrase it this way, "Woe, I'm going to die."  Isaiah's sin in the presence of God's holiness led to a reality check that death was deserved.  There was no reason to try to hide and definitely no reason to try to make himself appear better than he was.

What comes next is just breathtaking! God doesn't recite the list of Isaiah's sin.  God doesn't lecture him for hours about his shortcomings.  Isaiah is already fully aware of his gross disobedience and his deserved death.  Instead, God cleanses him with a coal from the sacrificial altar and declares to him: "Your iniquity is taken away and your sin is forgiven."

The one who deserved death, received life. The one who had committed offenses had them removed.  The one who had failed to meet the standard of God's holiness was forgiven. 

This is powerful but it is the story of the gospel. Christ was sent by the Father, wrapped in human flesh to die the death I deserved. Instead, I who deserved death received life.  And not just any life, but the life of the One who died my death--abundant, eternal, joyful, full life.  My iniquity was taken away and my sin forgiven because Jesus Christ died and rose again in my place.  "This is mercy, this is grace, Jesus in my place."

Immediately God asks: "Whom shall I send and who will go for Us?"  Enter Isaiah, a redeemed man, forgiven of sin and extended life instead of death.  His hand thrusts into the air and he volunteers before he even knows what God is asking, what it will cost.  "Here am I. Send me!"  With passion and eagerness, Isaiah surrenders to go wherever God wants, to do whatever God wills, to whoever God plans because he has received so abundantly and graciously.

We were never meant to be reservoirs. We were meant to be conduits.  We who have received much should give much. We who experience the blessing of God's mercy, grace, and love should then be the means of that mercy, grace, and love flowing out into the lives of others.

When I was speaking to students once, I mentioned this very truth.  Where are the grateful people of God who remember what they used to be and how God's mercy and grace altered their lives?  Where are those who have received so freely from Christ who are so freely giving and pouring out into the lives of others?  Then I said, "Too many Christians have become reservoirs instead of conduits. I'm praying if that is us, God will bust some holes in our dam so that we spring some leaks."

My prayer for Refuge Church today and always: "Here are we. Send us!"  May we display and declare the good news of Christ's kingdom to others near and far until the day we see Jesus face to face.

Connect :: Belong :: Serve

This blog revisits last week's blog post on the Refuge Church mission in order to expand on it briefly as I take a look at how we accomplish this through Refuge.  The follow-up posts this week will examine our worship, life groups and serving (cause I know you have questions about all three). But for now we return to the overarching mission.

Our vision/mission at Refuge Church is to display and declare the good news of Christ's kingdom to individuals near and far.  How this practically looks in the life of our church can be summed up in three words: Connect :: Belong :: Serve.


Connect ::

The greatest need of every human heart and life is to connect with God in a relationship through Jesus Christ. In displaying the gospel and declaring the gospel of reconciliation and hope, we desire to lead others to connect in this eternal relationship. As a result, we live to worship and make famous the glory of God.

Belong ::

All people, whether Christian or not, are made to live in community with other people. As the old saying goes, "No man is an island unto himself."  Better yet, no man was made to be an island unto himself. Connecting in a relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ enables us to enjoy and belong in community with others as we were intended. 

Serve ::

Christ came not to be served, but to serve. In serving others, we fulfill the second greatest commandment to love others as ourselves.  In this we display the good news of Christ's kingdom as we seek to declare the gospel (good news) of Christ's message of salvation and hope. Serving should be purposeful and intentional, for Christ came with purpose and intent to serve our spiritual need (forgiveness of sin in order to connect with God) and our physical need (restoring all broken things to Himself).


Refuge Church exists to display and declare the good news of Christ's kingdom to individuals near and far, by leading others to connect in a relationship with God, belong in biblical community, and serve the world for the fame and glory of God.