Embrace

I am sure a lot of you are glad we will no longer be focusing on that word, but I have enjoyed it. We have one more week to examine our three books, "unChristian, The Emotionally Healthy Church, and Exclusion and Embrace." It has been a good journey, and I think it has started the conversation in the right way. Hopefully we have learned a little bit about disagreeing, learning, and growing together. We are going to be moving on to some (very) controversial topics, and it will be really good if we are able to disagree in peace.

Some things that we are looking forward to this week:
1. We have a bank account! So we can start tithing to our new church. Make checks payable to Refuge Community Church, and just try to give them to Chad in a discreet manner. This will enable us to do things we would like and use church money instead of always having some individual pick up the tab. We may also have some operating costs eventually, and it will be good to have it for that.
2. We need to get a website up and running soon. Once we have check cards and stuff, I will get with Chad to start the process of setting up a website.
3. I would like us to continue searching for a place to meet. The Ethiopian church Don was thinking of is in Aurora. That is not necessarily a bad thing, but it is not ideal. So since we have some time, we may look into some other venues.
4. We talked about the grieving process in the Emotionally Healthy Church this week. Then I found out today that a friend who recently left the mission was found dead in a hotel room. Talk about difficult. I am trying to think through it today, but it is kind of strange. I've never had a friend die before.
5. We finished "embrace" in Volf. Let me encourage you again, if you haven't begun reading this, do it. It is a difficult read, but it is 100% worth it. I love talking theology of any shape or form, but to me, this is the most practical theology imaginable.
6. This Wed we are having a Jeopardy night at the Arnold's house this week. 7 pm. be there. I will spill the beans on one category "Harry Potter."
7. We are looking for some type of service we can do as a community this month. I believe we will help one of our neighbors. Desiree has made a connection with her and she could use some strong backs.

Is there anything I've missed? As we continue this journey together, let us continue to pray for one another, spend time with one another, and just generally have a good time.
Chris

Ethiopians

That's right. Ethiopians. Hopefully we have found a temporary facility. My thought is that we can beg and borrow a place to meet for about a year, and then hopefully sometime in 2011 we will be moving into our own place. There are a couple I would like to see us investigate, so we will see.

There are a few other things we talked about the other night. One thing is doing some roundtable meetings in the community. I really think that this can be a good way to get some interest in who we are and what we are doing. Tanner brought up the idea to do some things at local coffee shops, I think that is a great idea. I think it would also be a good idea to do something at Denver Seminary and maybe Colorado Christian before we start, and then regularly at local universities after we start. I really need some people to help initiate some of that though, I feel like if we set the pattern of me doing most of this stuff, then that may be a pattern that we keep for the long haul. Not upset at all or saying anyone has dropped the ball, but I do want everyone to understand my reasoning for not planning all of this myself.

Some other things we talked about:
1. Chad shared that our early tithes will amount to about 750 a month. Hopefully that will be plenty to do the basic stuff we want to do.
2. Chad will be checking into some pros and cons of various banks for us to go with.
3. We talked about how the common perception of Christians is that they are anti-homosexual, from the book "unChristian"
4. We discussed having an upcoming game night. We need to figure out what games we want to play and where at. It will be Wed, Oct 21st.
5. I would like to monthly have some sort of game/fellowship night, and some sort of service project that the whole church participates in. This can really help our church body in more ways than we might think. We do not want to overprogram, but I do think we can make these things good servants.
6. We talked about how weakness and vulnerability can help us in our ministries, from the Emotionally Healthy Church.
7. WE talked about Exclusion and what it means. Let me encourage you to continue to evaluate ways in which you exclude others in your life. The main part of it was Cain and Abel. In addition, there is an important difference between judging and exclusion. It is acceptable to judge a specific action as evil, and not exclude the person who commits it. That is something I think postmoderns really struggle with.

If I forgot anything let me know. We are hoping to have a website up and running before too long. Love you guys and am excited about the change that God is bringing among us and among Denver!