tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-234978222024-03-14T01:53:08.135-06:00Jordan BunchReflections on King Jesus' Reign breaking deeper into my life.<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.comBlogger61125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-13081649114849289932013-03-26T17:03:00.001-06:002013-03-26T17:03:30.498-06:00The Politics of the Kingdom of GodIt's called the, "Kingdom of God" for a good reason. The word Kingdom means a political realm or territory under the control of a King. Jesus knew exactly what he was doing when he called it a Kingdom. He was setting Himself up against Caesar, who was the most powerful King in all of the world. Jesus took a hard stand. He called people away from one government to another. Away from one King, in order to follow the REAL King. <br />
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Sounds like preacher language I know. Sorry about that. <br />
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So why have people who claim to have taken on citizenship in Jesus' Kingdom begun to care so much about the the politics of the country they live in? Jesus made it clear that he stood in opposition to all other Kingdoms. So why then would we expect for other Kingdoms to follow the way of Jesus. <br />
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Why would we try to get laws passed to hold others to the standards of our King? <br />
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Why do we protest each time our values are not represented by our country? Come on, you don't really think this is a "Christian Nation" do you? Lets get real. To be a Christian is to follow Jesus. Can a nation follow Jesus? Besides that, about 12% of Americans are currently a part of any local church. <br />
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We should fully expect that the values of Jesus' Kingdom would not be followed by our nation. We must learn to accept that. Move on. I don't care if its Gay marriage, or abortion, or anything else. We cannot expect our government to follow Jesus. And when we do, and we protest and shout and eat fried chicken sandwiches and post angry meme's on Facebook we remind America why they left the church long ago. <br />
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So chill out. Expect America to make decisions you don't agree with and move on. Do what Jesus did. Love the God with everything you have. And love your neighbor as yourself. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com21tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-19247559111490627212012-11-20T23:24:00.001-07:002012-11-20T23:24:26.914-07:00The Kingdom of God is like Disney World.Some people say...<br />
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The Kingdom of God is like Disney World! <br />
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Others say, The Kingdom of God is like Six Flags!<br />
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While others say, The Kingdom of God is like a rock concert!<br />
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And still others say, The Kingdom of God is like the Super Bowl!<br />
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But the King of this Kingdom says, "[No], the Kingdom of God is like a mustard seed." <br/><br/><div class="separator"style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis9V3c2tDyfYxuE9KVHHrYeSIrOqm4NhsbX2T8NHWLkfrF7rLkPNfoDYHOPhxuBGKd6l7vgGxpdyXESGlew0Km3VUwiI0QNn9QQniESbhotB5S_ViTyWWaA5ZosajAgqFON_sI/s640/blogger-image-1441862136.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis9V3c2tDyfYxuE9KVHHrYeSIrOqm4NhsbX2T8NHWLkfrF7rLkPNfoDYHOPhxuBGKd6l7vgGxpdyXESGlew0Km3VUwiI0QNn9QQniESbhotB5S_ViTyWWaA5ZosajAgqFON_sI/s640/blogger-image-1441862136.jpg" /></a></div><b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-61303565568650451332012-09-17T22:11:00.002-06:002012-09-18T05:31:57.715-06:00Open Apology Letter to the members of the Institutional Church of America<br />
Dear American Institutional Church members,<br />
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You must know something about me. I've struggled with the sin of pride since I was in high school. I'm around so many encouraging people that it was hard not to get hyped up on myself. It got a lot worse when I came to college. Everything I did (except my grades) seemed to be overwhelmingly successful and people kept praising me for it. And my massive head kept growing.<br />
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I've come a long way in the past 4 years in shrinking this ego, but I have come to the realization that in one major way a lot of shrinkage still needs to happen. And this is where my apology comes in. <br />
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You see its really hard not to jab and critique the church when you are a seminary student. Believe it or not, you are actually required to do so quite often if you want to get that expensive piece of paper that says you smarter than you actually are. (all it really says is that you are a glutton for punishment)<br />
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Here's where I went wrong...<br />
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1) I used social media as an outlet to express my frustrations. These things are better left to personal conversations with trusted friends and mentors. (Thanks to my best bud Brent Bailey for teaching me that).<br />
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2) When I did that, I sometimes did it in a way that made it sound like I thought I was better than them because I was doing something different. The reality is, the Lord has called me to something that he may or may not call you to. You should do what the Lord calls you to, no more, no less.<br />
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For these things I am genuinely sorry. I'm sorry I hurt you. I'm sorry I said things you weren't prepared to hear. I'm sorry I was not careful with my words. I'm sorry I did not have these conversations in person. I'm sorry I didn't always do it out of a motivation of love. <br />
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I'm sorry.<br />
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Okay, hopefully at this point you've found it in your heart to forgive me. If not, go check out Luke 6:37, hopefully that will change your mind and you'll forgive me ;-)<br />
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Now that you've forgiven me, lets get to the good work. The work of unity. This was Jesus' dying prayer (John 17:20-21). So if that was this important lets get to it. Unity does not mean conformity. It means that despite our diversity and unique characteristics we will love, encourage and support one another. I'm not going to ask you to come and do things your way just like I don't expect you to do that to me. What I do hope is that we will come together, listen, and do what Jesus wants us to do. <br />
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Lets be prayer partners. Lets be dreamers. Lets be friends. Lets be neighbors. Lets share meals at the table together. Lets share our lives with each other. Lets join together in the good work that God is doing to reconcile all things and all people to himself.<br />
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Lets challenge each other. Lets grow together. Lets share prophetic words with each other that make us better followers of Jesus, and lets do it out of love for each other and for the Body of Christ. Lets love and celebrate our differences and the way our unique design contributes to Christ's body and grows His Kingdom. <br />
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I want to learn from you. And I hope I have something that you can learn from as well. <br />
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Let's be friends. Because I think Jesus wants us to be.<br />
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Thanks for forgiving me,<br />
Jordan<br />
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Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com23tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-79447520849758764522012-05-10T20:53:00.001-06:002012-05-11T15:04:40.859-06:00Missional Church Part 5: A DreamThis is part five of the series. Make sure you read parts one-four first to get the full picture.<br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><b>A Dream</b></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I have a dream.<br />
I have a thirst for this dream that cannot be quenched by anything less than Christ Himself.<br />
I have a vision for a church without walls.<br />
A church that is as mobile as the wind.<br />
A church that multiplies like rabbits in the Spring.<br />
A church that loves each other more than family.<br />
A church that walks in humility.<br />
A church that gives good news to the poor.<br />
A church that proclaims freedom for prisoners.<br />
A church that gives sight to the blind.<br />
A church that sets the oppressed free.<br />
A church that proclaims Jesus’ reign over the powers of the world.<br />
This is the same dream that Jesus has for His Church and we must settle for nothing less.</div><b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-79419930476866258132012-05-10T20:53:00.000-06:002012-05-11T07:52:10.008-06:00Missional Church Part 4: A Small Taste of Hope in a Baby ChurchThis is part four of the series. Make sure you read parts one-three first, or else you may find yourself lost.<br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><b>A Small Taste of Hope in a Baby Church</b></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I am part of a very young organic church that meets in our apartment and various other homes. We began two years ago, but slightly less than two months ago we birthed two churches out of the one. So the church I am currently a part of is only a few months old. We are very much still a baby church. But the exciting thing about babies, is that they have such amazing potential, especially when nurtured well under the reign of Jesus.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">We are organic and we are simple. We are a community of daily fellowship. We make time for each other throughout the week to intentionally spend time growing our friendships and blessing one another. Jesus is our Supreme authority. He is the master of ceremonies anytime we gather. We make abundant space for His voice to be heard. We are also led by the priesthood of all believers. Everyone has equal voice in our community when we gather. No one preaches, instead all share from their hearts and share what God has been revealing to them throughout the week. There is no overhead cost because we don’t have a building or any paid staff. Our tithes are used instead to bless the lives of those God puts in our lives in service of His Kingdom. Each of us are in very unique and different places in life and thus spend much of our time in different contexts. We encourage each other to constantly be paying attention to what God is doing in our own contexts and to be bold in our participation of that work in order to more fully participate in God’s mission to reconcile all things to Himself. When we gather, we then share our stories with each other. We like to ask the question, “what has God been doing in your life over the past week?” It is vital that we share these stories with each other to better understand God’s mission and our part in it. We are still a baby church. But like all babies, we offer great hope. We offer a hope of what Christ’s Church has the potential to become.<br />
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And that is good news.</div><b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-69684974019918132192012-05-10T20:43:00.000-06:002012-05-10T20:43:26.655-06:00Missional Church Part 3: A Practical Missional EcclesiologyThis is part three of the series. Make sure you read parts one and two first, or else you may find yourself lost.<br />
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<b>A Practical Missional Ecclesiology</b></div>
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If the Church has become so corrupted, where is the hope? Fortunately, we serve a God that always has a plan for redemption. His plan, of course, is the same as it always was, to lead His church. Our job then becomes to step out of the way, release the control, and allow Him to lead His Church. Here a few practical ways to do that.</div>
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1. Sell your church building. Church buildings are expensive. They take up a tremendous amount of resources that only hinder Jesus’ mission to set captives free, heal the sick and especially give good news to the poor. They stifle Kingdom growth and encourage the idea that Church is about a weekly gathering.</div>
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2. Sell your homes. Sell them, and move into a neighborhood together. If you want to reorient your lives in such a way as to be able to daily commune with one another physical proximity is key. It is this kind of sacrificial love that will blow the people of the world away and show them who Christ really is. They will desperately want to know this kind of love and to know the source of your love for each other, Christ.</div>
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3. Stop practicing with the worship band. Instead, use that time to love your neighbors. Don’t worry, you already sold the building, so you don’t have all of those people to impress anymore. Use your spare time to look after the widows in your neighborhood. Teach the kids across the street who’s dad has been in prison most of their life how to throw a baseball. Cook a meal for the single mom next door. Throw a block party in the front lawn to get to know your neighbors. I promise you, Jesus will be honored more through this than making sure the worship set is perfectly executed.</div>
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4. Listen to your neighbors. Ask them questions. Be vulnerable with them so they can be vulnerable with you. Find out what injustices are happening in your neighborhood. Find out who needs to be set free. Discover who needs healing. Then pray for the King to do what He promised He would, to bring healing, freedom and good news.</div>
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Take a step of faith. Let go of the control. Invite Jesus to lead His Church. Then watch as the Kingdom of God breaks in in ways you never imagined possible.</div><b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-75096742055611807552012-05-09T17:30:00.000-06:002012-05-09T17:30:47.543-06:00Missional Church Part 2: What Must ChangeThis is part two of the series. Make sure you read part one first, or else you may find yourself lost. Also, remember, part 3-5 are coming, so don't lose hope after this somewhat depressing post. The fire purifies and makes us stronger.<br />
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<b>What Must Change</b></div>
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The earlier description of Church and Mission may seem foreign to most Christians. If you asked most people what their congregations mission was they probably wouldn’t quote Luke 4:18-19. They might say something like, “to be God’s community front porch” or “to serve God through word and witness.” (Yes I actually got these off of a few church websites) While these may sound good on the surface level, they are not what Jesus set out to do. The issue here is not bad mission statements. This is just a reflection of many things that have gone wrong in the Church since the Emperor Constantine institutionalized the Church in an attempt to steal control away from Jesus and have it for himself. There are many issues we could discuss here, but for the purpose of this blog I will focus on three.</div>
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First, institutional churches are led by a few individuals. The model of leadership for these churches is a top down structure where a few individuals (or in some cases one person) makes decisions that effect the entire direction of the whole community. The members job then is to trust that the leader(s) is(are) working under the guidance of God or some special knowledge that they obtained during seminary and to just go with whatever they decide. This is more like a business model than a Scriptural model. When Paul wrote, “<i>[Jesus] is the head of the body the church... in everything He has the supremacy</i>” he truly meant that Christ has the complete supremacy. This means that your pastor, priest, bishop or Pope are simply members of Christ’s body and should be looked at as no different from any of your other brothers and sisters in Christ, because <i>“You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession."</i></div>
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Secondly, institutional churches are centered around a weekly gathering. This is also not a Biblical model for Christian churches. There clearly was a weekly gathering for the churches as described in the New Testament, but they were also clearly not centered around this weekly event. They were together in each others homes daily. They shared everything in common. They lived life as a family with each other. This is the vision God had for His Church from the beginning, because it is who the Triune God is in His very nature. God is community. As God’s people, we are called to live deeper into the lives of each other, not to simply show up for singing and a lecture once a week. If all church is, is a weekly gathering, the pressure is on. You better make it one hell of a gathering (pun intended). And this is exactly what Churches are doing. Highly trained, educated, and skilled people put 100+ man hours per week into preparing for an hour to two hour gathering to make it a top notch experience each week. Jesus did not come to earth and sacrifice Himself to a torturous death to get His people to put on a good show once a week.</div>
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Finally, most churches are so focused on their own growth as a congregation, that they show little or no concern for the Kingdom of God. Let me give a few points to support this bold statement. The average church plant costs $200,000-300,000 in the first 2 years. The average mega-church has a yearly budget of $5 million. And the average mega-church pastor is paid an annual salary of $147,000. It is no wonder that these churches are so focused on their own growth as opposed to Kingdom growth. They have a lot of bills to pay! And the pastor is highly rewarded for His success in growing His audience. This is why you drive around a town like Abilene and see a church on every street corner. Statistics show that 80% of church growth is transfer growth, not converts. This is because most institutional churches only care about growing their own congregation, not about growing the Kingdom.</div><b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-86161889834133874362012-05-09T07:26:00.001-06:002012-05-09T07:46:15.560-06:00Missional Church Part 1: The Relationship of Church and MissionI am setting out to write a 5 part blog series on "Missional Church." In part one I'll discuss the relationship with the Church and God's mission. In part two we will take a broad look at what must change in most of our churches. In part three I give a few practical missiological steps your church can take to get started in the right direction (beware, they are gonna be tough). In part four I share a bit of my own experience in Missional Church. And in part five I'll cast a vision for you that really gets me pumped! So without further ado...<br />
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<b>The Relationship of Church and Mission</b><br />
Most of my life I never gave a second thought to the meaning of “church.” I wonder how many Christians are like me. How many of us have stopped to think, “Why are we all doing this? What is all of this about? What is the purpose of the Church? Where did we come from? And what does God want us to be doing?”<br />
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Six years ago, I began a journey asking these questions to myself and my Christian brothers and sisters. In this blog post I will attempt to answer these questions according to what I have found in Scripture, and in my journey trying to discover Jesus’ reason for establishing a Church.<br />
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In order to why Church and Mission are inseparable, one must first understand who God truly is. We must understand that God in His very nature is community. The Father, the Son and the Spirit are one fellowship. They share everything in common. Yahweh is One God in three distinct Persons. The three live in perfect union and love with each other. This is why God created humankind, because it is His nature to love, to be in fellowship and perfect unity. <br />
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When He created humankind, He set aside a specific people (Israel) that He called His own and said He would bless the entire world through them. As God sent a blessing to Israel, so they would be his advocates to the world by passing the blessing on to the Nations. Unfortunately, God’s people continually turned their back on him despite the blessings. Yet He continued to pursue this love relationship with them. Eventually, He did so through His Son, Jesus, that was sent into the world as a missionary to bring His people back into this love relationship. Then as the Father sent the Son, the Son sent the Spirit to the Church to empower them to be full participants in God’s mission.
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It is through this understanding that we see that God is a missionary by his very nature. Mission belongs to the Trinity, and as such is a gift that the Trinity gives to the Church. Our great example of course is the first ever missionary, the King Jesus Himself. It is through His example that the Church understands God’s mission. For a great understanding of what this mission will look like, we look to what many scholars call Jesus’ inauguration address.
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<i>“The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
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Jesus makes it clear that God will continue the work of blessing the world through His people as He blesses them. And this is exactly what we see Jesus doing throughout His ministry. He proclaims good news to the poor, freedom for prisoners, gives sight to the blind, sets the oppressed free and proclaims the good news of His Kingdom reign. This is God’s mission, nothing more, nothing less. And this is the responsibility of Christ’s Church: to proclaim good news to the poor, freedom for prisoners, give sight to the blind, set the oppressed free and proclaim the good news of Jesus’ Kingdom.
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<b><br /></b><b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-4016695787941169482011-08-09T00:03:00.001-06:002011-08-09T00:03:03.503-06:00Neo Pentecostalism<br /><br /><center><a href='http://photo.blogpressapp.com/show_photo.php?p=11/08/08/5875.jpg'><img src='http://photo.blogpressapp.com/photos/11/08/08/s_5875.jpg' border='0' width='200' height='163' style='margin:5px'></a></center><br />A few events over the summer have gotten me thinking a lot about this great movement sweeping the globe right now. For those of you that have no clue what I am talking about let me briefly explain. <br /><br /><b>Defined... Or at least described</b><br />The largest and fastest growing religion in the world is currently Christianity. The fastest growing sect/denomination/movement (insert your favorite term here) within Christianity in the world today is something most scholars are calling "Neo Pentacostalism" or "Neo Charasmatic." This is a hard term to define for several reasons. <br />1) Most people/churches who are part of this movement do not claim this title. <br />2) These churches look very different from city to city, country to country. <br />3) Many of these churches still go by their former name (Baptist, Community, Bible, even some Catholic churches, although this is rare). <br /><br />There are a few things that are true of all (maybe I should say most) New Pentecostal churches that can help us identify these groups. <br />1) A very high view of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and of the Holy Spirit himself. <br />2) A very high value is placed on evangelism. <br />3) They believe they are a "New Testament Church" in the since that their beliefs and practices are largely based off of the book of Acts and the outbreaking of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. Hence the name. <br /><br /><b>My Intentions</b><br />Ok, so by now you may have a few of these churches in mind, or maybe (highly likely) you are even a part of one of these communities of faith. Let me make my intentions very clear. I am not here to advocate for or judge against any particular faith community or movement. My intention in writing this is to help paint a picture of what I have observed, experienced and researched myself in order that some may learn something that may help themselves or someone they know live deeper into the heart and life of King Jesus. <br /><br /><b>Ground Rules</b><br />So anytime there is a big movement in any given religious group there are positives and negatives. If you don't believe this you might as well stop waisting your time with this blog. All movements are started by or at least managed by people. People have flaws. Movements have flaws. It's simple math. <br /><br /><b>The Good</b><br />It's always good to start with the positives. <br />1) An amazing number of people are coming into relationship with Jesus through this movement. <br />2) People in this movement take their faith very seriously. They are very bold about their faith. <br />3) People in this movement are finding thriving community through their church families who are part of this movement. <br />4) The Spirit is often manifesting himself in amazing ways in these communities. <br />5) There is a very high respect for the Scripture in this movement. Particularly in the book of Acts and in some of the Old Testament prophets writings. <br /><br />I think most of us could agree that these are all very good things that this movement has brought to so many people. I for one am thankful for these things. <br /><br /><b>The Bad</b><br />Like I said, there is good and bad in every faith community. Lets just be honest and own it. (See previous posts to see how I have owned my faith traditions failures and successes.)<br />1) There are a few significant leaders in this movement that hold way too much weight in what happens in faith communities across the US. This also trickles down from the US to other nations due to missionary efforts. If we look at recent history we see that movements like this that had one or 2 central charismatic leaders typically crumble and leave horrible aftermath that Christians will be trying to cleanup for generations to come. (Think Kip McKean) I pray that this does not happen, but I dare say that no one man should ever hold as much of a burden as Bill Johnson out of Redding, CA does. I often hear young people talking about Bill Johnson as if he was the next best thing to Christ himself and talking about his church in Redding as some sort of Christian Mecca. It is hard to see anyway that this can end well. Again, I pray I am wrong because if I am not, things will get very ugly. <br />2) All too often a sense of pride finds it's way into these circles. This pride is largely based on the manifestation of the gifts of the Spirit. Those not experiencing the manifestations of the Spirit are often ostracized and made to feel inferior to the others. This leads to individuals either leaving the community to find a place to belong elsewhere or faking a manifestation in order to be accepted. <br />3) The Holy Spirit often is given more attention than Jesus himself. This would grieve the Spirit deeply. Everything he does is about pointing back to Jesus. He never draws attention to himself, but only to Jesus. <br /><br /><b>Closing Thoughts</b><br />So here's what I hope you can take away with you.<br />1) Stay humble. What you believe now probably isn't exactly what you believed 5 years ago and it's probably not exactly what you'll believe 5 years from now. It's possible that you are wrong. So be humble and know that your way of doing things is not necessarily the best way of doing it. <br />2) Be cautious of people who like to start ministries titled "insert name here ministries." Its an easy to see marker that they are struggling mightily with pride. Don't blindly follow anyone. <br />3) If the people around you talk about the Spirit more than Jesus, gracefully remind them that Jesus is the King and all of life in His Kingdom is about loving, honoring and serving Him. The Spirit's job is to help us do that better than we could on our own. <br />4) Let's all get along. It was Jesus' dying wish on the cross that we all live in unison with one another. The least we can do is give him that. <br /><br />Grace and Peace. <br />Jordan<br /><b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-1841381312681091132011-05-09T20:46:00.004-06:002011-05-09T20:52:08.868-06:00The Inevitable vs. The Choice<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVh1kzZjOrygznhGjn76AirTPxgEVfTLWr40liH3hF0bv2R4tAFLvSQ4_NkMmhlxT8ouiqqWggEBOKzj2xXkdsgqYLldNw-aOWYZytNrxWIKviMeD30hjXAGXmNRugzRTmV_Of/s1600/IMGP4145.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVh1kzZjOrygznhGjn76AirTPxgEVfTLWr40liH3hF0bv2R4tAFLvSQ4_NkMmhlxT8ouiqqWggEBOKzj2xXkdsgqYLldNw-aOWYZytNrxWIKviMeD30hjXAGXmNRugzRTmV_Of/s320/IMGP4145.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5604914505001861602" /></a>Context is really inevitable isn’t it? You can choose your context to be sure. Regardless of where you are in life you are simply in a context. This is a fact of life you cannot escape. This seems obvious and overly simplistic. Yet it is key to understanding where and how to move and interact with the world. <br /><br />Some contexts you get to choose, others are chosen for you. A baby is born into a particular context. I was born in the United States of America. Dallas, Texas to be more specific. Even more so, I was born to Clint and Belinda Bunch, an upper-middle-class, white, well-educated, republican, Christian, Church of Christ family. This is not the context I choose. I was simply born into it. There is nothing I can do to change the fact that I was born into the Bunch family. <br /><br />My friend Tony was born into a very different context. Tony was born in the South Bronx. He’s not sure who his dad is, and to be honest, his mom isn’t sure either. He imagines he looks like his dad, because he looks nothing like his mom. He was born to a lower class, single-mother, atheist family that was just trying to make ends meet and help her son survive in a dangerous school system. Tony didn’t choose his context. He was simply born into it. There is nothing he can do to change the fact that he was born into the Williams family. What a strange world we live in. Some people are just lucky I guess…<br /><br />Yet there was One who had the opportunity to choose His context. And it should be obvious which one He would choose right? Clearly He should choose the Bunch family. If you get to choose one, go with the Bunches. Am I right? Yet the One I am discussing, didn’t just get to choose to be a Bunch or a Williams. He had the opportunity to choose any context He wanted. Not bad huh?<br /><br />Being that this One happened to choose the 1st Century AD to be born, you would think He would choose to be Caesar right? I mean, if you’re going to choose you might as well go big. <br /><br />For some odd reason, He didn’t choose Caesar. He didn’t choose any royal family at all. In fact, He went the way of an illegitimate child of teenage girl who couldn’t afford one night in a motel. Why would He choose such a life? I mean, I’m no genius. But the answer is really clear that you’ve got to go with Caesar on this one!<br />One must wonder what Jesus of Nazareth was thinking when He choose Mary. He must have had something special in mind. Surely He had to have had a trick up His sleeve. The truth of the matter is, Jesus chose to intentionally place himself in the specific context of an unwed teenage girl so that he could best show his love to the world. It is out of the lowest class on earth that Jesus chooses to enter the world, because it is a sign of a new Kingdom coming. A Kingdom where everything is backwards and Jesus is King. The first are last and the last are first. Mourning is turned into dancing! Weakness is strength! The blind can see and the lame dance the streets all to the glory of the Most High King!<br /><br />This is Good News for the poor! But what about me? I was born into the Bunch family. It was a context I didn’t choose, but if everything is backwards in this new Kingdom then that means I’m last. <br /><br />Yet maybe all contexts aren’t chosen for you. After all I am an adult now. I choose where to go to college. I choose who to marry. I choose what job to take. Now, maybe a lot of these decisions were effected by the context that I did not choose, but that doesn’t mean I can’t still choose a new context, a new Kingdom. <br /><br />In this new Kingdom all of the citizens are madly in love with their King. They radically abandon the ways of the world in order to pursue relationship with Him. They put all of their effort into becoming like Him in every way. As a follower of Jesus, intentionally placing oneself in a specific context that will best allow them to show their love for others is often over looked. We weren’t able to choose from birth, but as adults we are able to choose our context. <br /><br />So the question becomes, will you choose to be first, or last?<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-87519066922089268362011-05-05T17:12:00.001-06:002011-05-05T17:12:25.714-06:00How to renew the Church?“The renewal of the church will come from a new type of monasticism, which has only in common with the old an uncompromising allegiance to the Sermon on the Mount. It is high time men and women banded together to do this." -Dietrich Bonhoeffer<br /><br />- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone 4<br /><b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-47251099159984841372011-02-20T19:58:00.005-07:002011-02-20T20:08:33.585-07:00Action/Waiting Room Ethics<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglVF50j64roR9ySn99NWzW5EZDnrCKAQFj2sISM3LVLYaa7Oqj1rE_X80R7BV5yO0NI1lUjMV-QSPStuLLZR3ke3jnmUNOCixM0ev3s3xvB965uAQNDtB00SlJidD87h3xlpHS/s1600/photo%252811%2529.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 239px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglVF50j64roR9ySn99NWzW5EZDnrCKAQFj2sISM3LVLYaa7Oqj1rE_X80R7BV5yO0NI1lUjMV-QSPStuLLZR3ke3jnmUNOCixM0ev3s3xvB965uAQNDtB00SlJidD87h3xlpHS/s320/photo%252811%2529.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5575974106661592898" border="0" /></a><br />Two weeks ago my little sister got very sick so I took her there around 9:30PM. She is better, no worries…<br /><br /><p>Most of the time we were waiting was fairly inactive. There were several things I noticed as I looked around. I noticed a few husbands taking care of sick wives. A mother with her grown daughter. A grown daughter with her aging mother. A few families, one of the members was sick and the rest showed up. No one seemed to be by themselves. Until one man walked in alone.</p><p><br /></p> <p>He was a rough looking Hispanic man in his late 20s. About 5′8” 200 pounds, he looked like he used to be an athlete, but obviously wasn’t anymore. He seemed to have been hardened by the neighborhood that he may have grown up in. Wearing baggy jeans and a dirty tanktop to show off his many tatoos. His head was shaved clean and he had a swollen and bleeding eye. I assumed this was why he came in…</p> <p><br /></p><p>He started pacing back and forth in the room. He must have been trying to keep his cool by the look of anger on his face. A few minutes went by and another lone woman walked in and made a B-line to the phone that sat on a side table. She quickly picked up the phone, sat down and began to dial a number, making sure to keep her head low. The Hispanic man noticed her presence quickly and his anger was brought to rage at her sight. He started yelling profanities at her and telling her to leave quickly. The security guard behind the glass moved over to the window quickly to observe, but she seemed frightened herself.</p><p><br /></p> <p>The woman wouldn’t say a word, and didn’t budge, trying to make her phone call. The man grew louder and angrier. He started to yell for the security guard to remove her. It was at this time that he had his back to me and I could see the real reason he came to the ER. He had a golf ball sized gash in the back of his head, covered in blood.</p><p><br /></p> <p>The security guard appeared to be in shock. She didn’t know what to do so she just watched in silence, as did everyone else in the room. When he saw that the security guard wasn’t going to meet his demands he took matters into his own hands. He grabbed her by the hair and raised her up out of his seat. He then began to shake her head and tell her “get the f*$# out of here!”</p> <p><br /></p><p>When I saw that the security guard was not able to do her job I stood up in her defense. My blood was boiling, similar to the way it is now as I recall this event. I stood up, looked him in the eye and said, “You let go of her!”</p><p><br /></p> <p>He quickly moved all of his anger from the woman to me. He started yelling profanities at me, asking if I wanted to “take this outside.” I could think of no words to say that would be helpful. So I simply stood my ground and looked him in the eyes. I had already succeeded at my task anyways. The woman was not being harmed anymore. As he continued his threats 2 security guards came around the corner and escorted him outside.</p><p><br /></p> <p>Afterward several strangers asked me to recall the story from my perspective. So I preceded to tell the story over the next few hours to my new friends in the ER.</p><p><br /></p><p>Its situations like this that call one to question things like, when is it wrong to be meek? When is being a peacemaker better? Or is it ever? What would I have done if the man had attacked me? Or if he hit the woman? Would I have moved in physically then? Was Jesus a pacifist? Or would he have stepped in physically to defend this helpless woman if things escalated?</p><p><br /></p><p>Life is tough.<br /></p><b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-10924941179611441212011-02-13T22:25:00.003-07:002011-02-13T22:34:27.369-07:00What is the Emerging Church?<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtWNQwVb1BYemk1a5306L5ERHeBAoExXU_W4E6MVNwrvttKv004yj9qUJO-QL2Lz7n505ARynqzdJ93Wei-xzAAmluIauaAevuR_Z4Y1GgX461QuTYszx_TXUznxiMxXTHDmit/s1600/IMGP2320.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtWNQwVb1BYemk1a5306L5ERHeBAoExXU_W4E6MVNwrvttKv004yj9qUJO-QL2Lz7n505ARynqzdJ93Wei-xzAAmluIauaAevuR_Z4Y1GgX461QuTYszx_TXUznxiMxXTHDmit/s320/IMGP2320.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5573413296986791666" border="0" /></a>The Emerging Church is a fairly hot topic in many evangelical circles these days. This topic brings more childish banter out of the religious far right than any almost any other I can think of. I must also be fair to say that, those on the religious far left have used this expression of church as a sort of covering for an "anything goes theology."<br /><p>Both are equally unhealthy. The Emerging Church is tough to define. Even the more prominent leaders of this emerging movement have a tough time defining it. I am by no means an authority on the subject. But it is a movement that I have been paying close attention to for the last 4-5 years. I have also been participating in a few expressions of church that most would define as “emerging” in the last year. Using both personal experiences and research I will attempt to briefly define the "Emerging Church" at the end of this post.<br /></p><p>Let me tell you about a few of my experiences first...</p><p>I lead a monastic community in Edward’s Hall made up of 10 freshman and sophomore’s that have committed to a monastic rule that we developed together. This rule includes: daily time in silence/solitude, reading the sermon on the mount 3 times a week, fasting weekly, daily time in conversational prayer, weekly meeting with monk brothers, a soul friendship (church of 2 or 3), and bi-weekly coaching.</p> <p>I am also part of a simple church that started in August. We meet together in each others home. Eat a meal together with the Lord’s supper. Each person has an opportunity to share their hearts with one another and say anything else they would like to share with the community. We then have a time of listening together and then we usually spend some time encouraging and building one another up. It has been amazing to become part of a community that not only shares several hours once a week with each other, but is deeply invested in one another’s lives on a daily basis.</p> <p>Given my experience in these forms of “emerging church” and many readings of other’s experiences I would like to give my best shot at a definition. Here it goes...<br /></p> <p>“The Emerging Church movement is a conversation centered around reforming Christ’s Bride by blending ancient traditions with Post-modern cultural expressions in order to become a community that represents the Gospel of Jesus, and the life of a particular local.”</p> <p>What do you think of this definition? Or maybe a better question would be, what do you think of the idea of this kind of church?</p><b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-42886212968398719792011-02-07T13:32:00.000-07:002011-02-07T13:33:31.816-07:00The Conversation ContinuesI’m having a difficult time keeping up with this blog after all. Largely in part to my newest hobby. You can check that out at Bunchphotography.blogspot.com I am really having a blast capturing the beauty of the creator on camera. <br /><br />However, I do have a renewed plan for keeping up with this blog, as I feel it is vital that we speak to the issues I am beginning to address here... AND several of you have encouraged me to do so. I’m glad that you feel these topics are important. I do too, and I want to continue to help articulate what I know many of you are experiencing and feeling in the church today. Stay tuned… and please keep the conversation going through the comment section.<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-7784397542302736752010-12-22T23:07:00.000-07:002010-12-22T08:58:24.968-07:00The Forgotten Ways - part 4<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuMOE-WQmjOhw08eYZeactaHWWe6paZpgT4rE3oaaPNM12ytqHCo1PHhCo99-yvB3xxs53FB7v-oJvs-q502xes1s-REMf4IWf_DI-0CUffD8dOYJPJzwyWtJY3z82IgbVfyRr/s1600/the-forgotten-ways-by-alan-hirsch2-196x300.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 196px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuMOE-WQmjOhw08eYZeactaHWWe6paZpgT4rE3oaaPNM12ytqHCo1PHhCo99-yvB3xxs53FB7v-oJvs-q502xes1s-REMf4IWf_DI-0CUffD8dOYJPJzwyWtJY3z82IgbVfyRr/s400/the-forgotten-ways-by-alan-hirsch2-196x300.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5553536118878292578" /></a>At the heart of it all is Jesus. “For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. “<br /><br />Hirsch is often asked why he think the Chinese underground church has experienced such rapid growth. He responds, “if one is willing to die for the faith, one has gone beyond easy believism into the realms of genuine faith and love for God.”<br /><br />Recently I was at a Church Planting Movement conference. David Watson, the main presenter said that in the Chinese churches they generally ask an “extra” question when someone is being baptized. “Would you be willing to die for Jesus?” They ask this question because it is a real possibility that they will be asked to lay down their life for the King. <br /><br />Hirsch says that in order for the Chinese Church to survive within the context of persecution they have to rid themselves of all unnecessary impediments. This includes: the institutional conception of ecclesia (assembly or church), condense and purify their core message (Jesus is Lord), adopt a more cell-like structure, rely heavily on relational networks. They also must remove all of the traditional interpretations and theological paraphernalia in order to stay under the radar.<br /><br />This causes me to question if it will take this kind of persecution for the western church return to its core message and theory and practice. What does it really look like to make Jesus Lord? Lord of your entire life? What would it look like if the Church really made Jesus the Lord of everything they were about?<br /><br />Hirsch says that at the heart of all great movements in Christian history there is a recovery of a simple Christology. He is the initiator of the New Covenant, and He, Himself is the New Covenant. Thus discipleship (becoming like Jesus) lies as the central task of the Church.<br /><br />“The greatest proof of Christianity for others is not how far a man can logically analyze his reasons for believing, but how far in practice he will stake his life on his belief.” <br /><br />We must lead God’s people not from a place of honor and demanded respect, but rather from a place of inspiration. If we want to help lead the church back to its true leader, Jesus, we must stake our lives on the statement that Jesus is our Lord. And if you take a hard look at the Gospels while doing this, you will truly be an inspiration and be able to lead from that place.<br /><br />According to Hirsch, “Inspirational leadership involves a relationship between leaders and followers in which each influences the other to pursue common objectives, with the aim of transforming followers into leaders in their own right. It does this by appealing to values and calling without offering material incentives.”<br /><br />He says that the quality of the church’s leadership is directly proportional to the quality of discipleship. So I leave you with this question. Who are you discipling? And who is discipling you?<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-17458537792964308522010-12-22T23:05:00.000-07:002010-12-21T23:13:58.708-07:00The Forgotten Ways - part 3<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg989rqq6Q06SDv2JBOLlzNUHP51iS0euQSgTZeYV9DbOtO64PZ2Lvgx96mOcZhArDYY9iVTq5_BfkEQvZ3Aq7hpDZQMPVsOFDITXOwBJ84fjGjM2L9sedi85hKQyXkDobSxtCF/s1600/the-forgotten-ways-by-alan-hirsch2-196x300.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 196px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg989rqq6Q06SDv2JBOLlzNUHP51iS0euQSgTZeYV9DbOtO64PZ2Lvgx96mOcZhArDYY9iVTq5_BfkEQvZ3Aq7hpDZQMPVsOFDITXOwBJ84fjGjM2L9sedi85hKQyXkDobSxtCF/s400/the-forgotten-ways-by-alan-hirsch2-196x300.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5553384637688388914" /></a>“How will we ever find a better cure if at each critical moment we always opt for the traditional treatment?” ~Alan Hirsch<br /><br />Hirsch and many others (including myself) often find themselves thinking about how we (the church) are actually further away from “getting the job done” than we were at the end of the third century. By getting the job done I mean Jesus’ great commission. “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”<br /><br />If you skipped that last quote because you’ve already heard that a million times go back and read it. I included the first and last sentence that most leave out on purpose so that you would see that they key here is Jesus. It is not about the work that we are doing. It is bookended by the fact that this is something Jesus will be leading. This is vastly important to everything the church does.<br /><br />The point here though, is that we ask the question, “why are we further away from getting the job done?” Yet we fail to question our “mode of the churches engagement” as Hirsch puts it. He says that we typically aim at adding or developing new programs. This is just a surface level issue. Hirsch paints this picture more clearly for us by saying that when Apple Computers want to continue to progress their technology they do not simply create newer better programs. In fact they rarely do this at all. Instead, they rethink the operating system and the hardware. If they get this right, then they may think about developing new programs, but they largely lead the programming up to their customers! Thus, the app store.<br /><br />The church could learn a lot from Apple. If we can get the hardware (mode) and operating system (leadership structure) right, the people will do the programming. And they will do it for free because they love the result. Just ask Wikipedia about that. Or Google. Or Firefox… you get the idea. They will become more engaged and passionate about this work than anything else. This is because God made us in his creative image. <br /><br />“Far too long historians have accepted the claim that the conversion of the Emperor Constantine caused the triumph of Christianity. To the contrary, he destroyed its most attractive and dynamic aspects, turning a high-intensity, grassroots movement into an arrogant institution controlled by an elite who often managed to be both brutal and lax.” As soon as Constantine sought to control the church and handed the reigns to highly paid educated men, the Church ceased to be a movement of Jesus followers and became an institution of spectators. <br /><br />According to Barna in 2001 there were 111 million US Christians without a local church. This number is much higher 10 years later. This should cause us all to question our mode of church. If the Christians don’t even want to be a part of it, why should anyone else?<br /><br />No amount of candles, perfect music, entertaining sermon or drama will bring the lost to your church. “I therefore present the same challenge here to the emerging church and the established church: if you don’t want to be another church fad, don’t just make the service and spirituality suit a postmodern audience, start at another place – put the M[issional] in the equation first, the E[merging] C[hurch] will follow.”<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-24329823312879911602010-12-21T16:50:00.002-07:002010-12-21T16:51:23.334-07:00The Forgotten Ways - part 2<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgk9U6CZQy2bNw3NycWUznIwj5FnPG-uc_OWu0cJg2oEPEwvmc-IEK5UAZAeDrR30gGZ_t6WBUFn7GZpOK-gB1fFaWzE4gU9Tt5SsM9WlLqtnt2NdFviSPL3PdN3zR9wNsP2G11/s1600/the-forgotten-ways-by-alan-hirsch2-196x300.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 196px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgk9U6CZQy2bNw3NycWUznIwj5FnPG-uc_OWu0cJg2oEPEwvmc-IEK5UAZAeDrR30gGZ_t6WBUFn7GZpOK-gB1fFaWzE4gU9Tt5SsM9WlLqtnt2NdFviSPL3PdN3zR9wNsP2G11/s400/the-forgotten-ways-by-alan-hirsch2-196x300.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5553287326892429906" /></a>“If you want to build a ship, don’t summon people to buy wood, prepare tools, distribute jobs, and organize the work, rather teach people the yearning for the wide, boundless ocean.” <br /><br />This is really the way I have come to approach life in the communities to which I belong. I’ve never been big on telling people what to do. In fact I probably lean too far into the abstract and I imagine that might be a little frustrating for some who I coach. <br /><br />I am a vision caster. I am not a prescriber. I hope all of my readers hear that well when I write. I never want to push my methods of church and life on anyone. Rather I want to cast a vision in their hearts of what a full life in Christ might look like for them and their community. I hope to do it in such a way that it becomes their hearts deepest desire to live that vision out. I have full faith in the Spirit of Jesus Christ to work out the methods and details. <br /><br />However, I do think it is important to share with the church how Jesus has historically created the kind of amazing movements that I spoke about in part 1. I think it is important to study how the methods used during these movements created space for Jesus to lead His Church and to see how powerful a movement can become when the leader is Jesus and not any man, or group of people. (I am not arguing for anarchy, I will address this issue specifically in another post).<br /><br />Alan Hirsch says that 95% of evangelical churches subscribe to the contemporary church growth strategies in spite of the fact that there are very few reports of success with these strategies. In the same way that we should pay attention to the methodology that does seem to work, shouldn’t we pay attention to that which clearly doesn’t work. I would like to contend that the reasons these church growth strategies don’t work is because they quench the Spirit. They are led by people who cannot let go of control, and so they setup a system that requires their presence to function. <br /><br />Don’t believe me? Try this… imagine what would happen if your preacher and song leader slept in on Sunday morning. What would happen when the church gathered together? What would you do? I will leave it up to your imagination to what would happen, but this is what I mean by control. If the absence of one or two people would stop anything significant from happening, I think there is something seriously wrong with your methodology. I think that if this is the case, Jesus is probably not leading that church. <br /><br />This may sound too harsh. <br /><br />For the record, let me say that I believe the Lord works in and through all things, good or bad. I believe that the Lord has done amazing work in the lives of millions of individuals through the institutional church. I am in fact a product of that and I am very grateful for my faith heritage. Yet I believe there is a more faithful, holistic, and fruitful way to live in community as followers of Jesus. And it is to that end that I dedicate this blog, and for better or worse, my life.<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-27543333168660315842010-12-20T15:44:00.009-07:002010-12-20T23:35:28.388-07:00The Forgotten Ways - part 1<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDoYw39v0Ey8zGDPOVgfh7y1c0b1PUUTUGaf5QxSVtKcC4WVQs2g0dm-PzH2OHWG-_3IKhxItywRhERbr6o4p_NsxxhHyBTEg0QfhfKJOsjXbXRcBar-8FjxeBEKVkmInwdDus/s1600/the-forgotten-ways-by-alan-hirsch2-196x300.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 196px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDoYw39v0Ey8zGDPOVgfh7y1c0b1PUUTUGaf5QxSVtKcC4WVQs2g0dm-PzH2OHWG-_3IKhxItywRhERbr6o4p_NsxxhHyBTEg0QfhfKJOsjXbXRcBar-8FjxeBEKVkmInwdDus/s400/the-forgotten-ways-by-alan-hirsch2-196x300.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552899537583586002" /></a>When you are in seminary you read a lot of books. Some are good, some are hard to stay awake through, others change your life forever, and some just give language and vision to the things you already believe to be true. This falls into the last category for me. Although this is a read that could certainly fall into the "change your life forever" category for some who haven't thought through these ideas yet. It was the most helpful thing I have read thus far in graduate school. I would like to spend some time unpacking it for you. This will take several posts, but its something I think may be very helpful to some of you as it was to me.<br /><br />I would first like to say, Alan Hirsch is a practitioner. This is helpful to know. He's not one of these guys who only works in the theory world. These theory voices are helpful, but its hard for me to take them without a grain of salt when they haven't staked their lives on their ideas like Hirsch has. Practitioners have not only thought deeply about their ideas, but they are living them out in the real world with real people and have the ability to see real results... good or bad. So remember this as you read the following posts (or better yet if you have time, read the book).<br /><br />Hirsch lays a foundation by saying, "There are primal forces that lie latent in every Jesus community and in every true believer." He calls this <span style="font-style:italic;">missional DNA</span>. He says we should ask the western church, in light of our current situation, "Will more of the same do the trick? Can we simply rework the tried and true Christendom understanding of church that we so love and understand, and finally, in a ultimate tweak of the system, come up with the winning formula?" I sense a bit of sarcasm in that there seems to be an obvious answer to the question. No.<br /><br />Hirsch argues, and I fully agree, that we need a whole new vision of reality, "a fundamental change in our thoughts, perceptions and values especially as they relate to our view of the church and mission." <br /><br />He spoke about how the early church did something absolutely incredible that makes no sense to most westerners as it went against all odds to grow into the most significant religious force in the Roman Empire in only 200 years. In the year AD 100 there were as few as 25,000 Christians. In AD 310 scholars say there were over 20,000,000 followers of Jesus. And just imagine their cultural climate... They were an illegal religion. They had no church buildings. They had no New Testament. They had no professional paid pastors. They had no programs or seeker services. AND They actually made it hard to join the church! So how did they grow from being a small movement to the most significant religious force in the Roman Empire in 2 centuries?<br /><br />Hirsch says that this is not a freak historical event. He gives the example of the underground church in China. When Mao Tse-tung took power and purged the church, killed/imprisoned all the leadership, took control of the buildings, etc. there were only 2 million Christians in China. Since then there are now more close to 100 million! They have no professional clergy, no official leadership structure, no central organization, no mass meetings yet despite (or maybe because of) these things they have grown like no other movement the church has seen since Constantine came to power. Hirsch says, "I can only suggest that they found it in themselves… this potent coding (missional DNA) is placed within them through the work of the Spirit and by the power of the gospel in the community.” They simply needed a situation to force them to find that which was already in them. <br /><br />Thank you Mao Tse-tung. You tried to stamp out the Kingdom of God in China. But you cannot stamp out the Spirit's fire. When you try, it simply fans the flames. 100 million Chinese flames and counting.<br /><br />Stay tuned for more on The Forgotten Ways...<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-82661676818221700882010-12-18T13:02:00.005-07:002010-12-18T13:18:58.712-07:00Pirate Monks (Changes part 2)<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkidNNz6fDEOnoIKDZaKGgCg639-BRu1QwWBoAzWpvAnwREXn-uhZ2ZCmP1tiSfuFmYLp5sjDfrqf1IlKHtOjuUdzE2r35nTqALaXQVGOjoMhGQwwGrYiRIyDjqE1pHuGoqvf4/s1600/changes.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkidNNz6fDEOnoIKDZaKGgCg639-BRu1QwWBoAzWpvAnwREXn-uhZ2ZCmP1tiSfuFmYLp5sjDfrqf1IlKHtOjuUdzE2r35nTqALaXQVGOjoMhGQwwGrYiRIyDjqE1pHuGoqvf4/s400/changes.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552115267636934706" /></a><br />This is part 2 of the Changes series. If you didn't read part one it would make a lot more sense in that context, so you should go do that first...<br /><br />Part 2 is about the "new monastic community" I started in Edwards Hall this semester. It is a group of 10 students at ACU that all live in Edwards. 8 freshmen, 1 sophomore and 1 junior. I was thrilled yet nervous about initiating and leading this community, “Pirate Monks.” I wasn’t sure if there would actually be anyone that would be interested in making this kind of commitment, nor how I would be as a leader of this type of community. Yet I was determined to be faithful to this call that the Lord put on my heart.<br /><br />Pirate Monks has been a truly a phenomenal expression of covenanted communal discipleship. Ten students committed to a spiritual rule that I thought impossible for college students. They are committed to daily conversation with the Lord, the 10:02 prayer (a prayer for more harvest workers), a soul friend relationship, weekly fasting, reading the Sermon on the Mount three times a week, and meeting with all of their monk brothers every week. They have been far more committed to these rules than I could have ever imagined and it is transforming them deeper into the image of Jesus day by day. <br /><br />Next semester I am going to begin meeting with them one on one for 30 minutes every other week for coaching. This is something I wanted to do from the beginning but it was difficult to find the time. I think it should be easier at the beginning of the semester to get it going. I also think this will be helpful in one of my seminary courses as we are learning how to be a better life coach. I think it is important to partner education with practice. This should be a good way to combine these two things. <br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOs2haU8rl761Yb_fee9IokQxS60EIeO0xS27ay5Zs5ZubGN9NT_hoKWARMJYEwYtELyZXG5Eih3sgBvsTyMF3Fcdr_x9oy5vOnc9geQ6CsHKOZ2LvoDikchCRWt3XMceT1g8K/s1600/PirateMonk.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 220px; height: 220px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOs2haU8rl761Yb_fee9IokQxS60EIeO0xS27ay5Zs5ZubGN9NT_hoKWARMJYEwYtELyZXG5Eih3sgBvsTyMF3Fcdr_x9oy5vOnc9geQ6CsHKOZ2LvoDikchCRWt3XMceT1g8K/s320/PirateMonk.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552118854958856834" /></a><br /><br />If you are interested in keeping up with more about the Pirate Monks you can visit my other blog that I am beginning that is strictly about that community... piratemonks.blogspot.com<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-34894052608336690482010-12-16T12:34:00.007-07:002010-12-16T13:12:36.199-07:00Changes (Part 1)<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPwMbXuV3tfGion9Oskysewli5XJLwZfgPrIE3QXlMetew5OL4xKr6bb1TiyZc4gv_8fXguA692kCd780g6T6pOoFE_A92-gcF4_-9GXDhLfYKI-GDB4uFkMtadvLxDZ72HJko/s1600/changes.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPwMbXuV3tfGion9Oskysewli5XJLwZfgPrIE3QXlMetew5OL4xKr6bb1TiyZc4gv_8fXguA692kCd780g6T6pOoFE_A92-gcF4_-9GXDhLfYKI-GDB4uFkMtadvLxDZ72HJko/s400/changes.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5551366004432516562" /></a>This semester was one that had huge potential from the onset. Sara and I made some big decisions this summer and last spring that we knew would spark some really great outcomes this semester. We were leaving our comfy mega-church to participate in what we felt like was a more faithful expression of what we believe the Lord desires his church to be. We moved into a different residence hall and I became a full time employee at ACU. And I was planning to start a new monastic community in the residence hall. So as you can imagine, we were thrilled to get things underway.<br /><br />The next series of blogs will be about some of these changes mentioned above. I would love to hear your thoughts and comments on some of the work the Lord is doing in and through these changes... First things first. Here is the reflection of our change in our expression of the gathered church community. I would also like to throw a disclaimer out for those that know the congregation we were a part of. My descriptions about this particular place, are not indeed about this particular place exclusively. They are more a reflection on our experience of institutional churches. This just happens to be the one we were a part of. Thus I refer to it as "comfy mega-church." I simply use this pseudonym so that those who are there can know that I am truly not attacking them in any way. Hopefully you can find some humor in this.<br /><br />Let's get started... Because of all of the unique ways that we were planning on making transitions this semester we had really great expectations. Expectations about what it might be like to leave comfy mega-church, and what a simpler form of church would look and feel like.<br /><br />We had mixed feelings and strong convictions about this change. We believed that we could no longer contribute to the dualistic and consumeristic institution that we had been part of for the last 5 years. The Lord was calling us to something more holistic and faithful to the Church Jesus died to give flight too, something that looked more like the New Testament church. We also hurt knowing the relationships that we would undoubtedly leave behind. Even though I was tied deeper into the community at comfy mega-church because I was on staff, Sara expected to experience the most pain due to leaving the people. I expected to break ties without any consequences or ill emotions (this was foolish). I was simply excited about the change to become more intimate with our new house church community. I was excited about the change to become more like Jesus through the relationships in our house church that went deeper than many had become at comfy mega-church. <br /><br />The transition from comfy mega-church to the house church has not exactly gone according to our plan. We stuck to our convictions and what we felt the Lord calling us to do, but “the detox” as I have affectionately called it, has been far more painful that I expected. During the first month of the detox I experienced an extreme amount of “emotional flux.” I felt lonely and detached often. I really felt like I had lost a big part of who I was as a human. When you work in a large "successful" church for several years and grow a ministry from next to nothing to the size of the campus ministry when I left, you tend to gain much of your identity from this position. Everyone knows you as the campus ministry guy and when you’re good at it, you like that mantra, as unhealthy as it my be. The difficult part was that I expected to simply jump into intimacy with the people in our house church. I did my best to really jump into it by being as open as I could through both the things I shared with the group, and the honesty of emotion in which I did it. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as easy as that. Others in the group still had a lot of things going on and hadn’t felt the same convictions about stepping out of institutional church (several were and are a part of institutional churches, and thats okay it just slows down our progress a bit because of time constraints). This made it all the more painful. However, I learned that you simply can’t jump into relationship. It takes time and I am beginning to see these relationships form in meaningful ways. <br /><br />We have come a long way in the last 5 months however. Much faster than I really even thought possible, even if I wanted it to go faster. I really feel great about where our house church is going. Sara and I had Rosten, Ben, Emily, Laura and KT come over this Sunday morning to cook breakfast, eat, play wii and hang out with each other. This is the kind of thing I want to do on a more regular schedule to help our relationships flourish. It is really great to be in community with people that you can play with and truly invest spiritually and otherwise with. Its actually a really rare combination to find both in the same people. We are beginning to see this and it is a blessing. <br /><br />Like I said this is part one (of 3 or 4 to come in the following days). I haven't even gotten rilled up yet. Talk to ya then.<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-9556833493143905102010-12-09T18:43:00.008-07:002010-12-09T19:06:29.744-07:00When Jesus is Everything<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5nrsVnVBnB6uY6G4GztdtCKliXecg_7_ZEi_JpM5yv19uB8MNsmVTd8P2ijITLVW2g9kHz_kFm-inTj3DuSSZBZpytVtN5Kal5vpp8TTHWP46ECzwHH4w6gB5tsaZ9M1kogt6/s1600/avatar.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 360px; height: 239px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5nrsVnVBnB6uY6G4GztdtCKliXecg_7_ZEi_JpM5yv19uB8MNsmVTd8P2ijITLVW2g9kHz_kFm-inTj3DuSSZBZpytVtN5Kal5vpp8TTHWP46ECzwHH4w6gB5tsaZ9M1kogt6/s400/avatar.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548863417041075874" /></a>Do you ever wonder what it would be like if when the church you meet with gathered together you literally did nothing that wasn't directly praising Jesus? Do you ever wonder what it would be like if everyone had a place to share their heart and life with everyone else in the room? Or what it would be like if people specifically pointed out how they have seen Jesus at work in your life, and they could do so honestly because they know you so intimately? <br /><br />Because that's what happened when the church gathered at my brother Kent's house tonight. Sara and I had to show up a tad late because of work, but from the moment we arrived all of our friends were gathered together in the living room meditating on the Lord Jesus. When we sat down we each took the bread and spoke to each other how we had seen Jesus in the lives of other individuals in the room. We did this for about 45 minutes, praising Jesus for the work he was doing in and through each of our sisters and brothers in the room as we shared the bread with each other. It was beautiful. The church was doing what it was designed to do when it is gathered. Build one another up and worship Jesus. <br /><br />We then shared the wine as we spoke directly to Jesus telling him why we love Him and why we are thankful for him. I shared tears as I was able to express to the church how deeply I am in love Jesus for being able to call him my brother, best friend and King. Each person, regardless of gender, ethnicity, age, economic status, speaking abilities, etc. shared their voice and their life with everyone else in the house. The Lord was glorified and the Body of Christ was built up. <br /><br />Praise be to our God and our King, our Brother and our Friend, our Great Master and Humble Servant, our Savior and Lord, the Ruler and Creator of both Heaven and Earth, Jesus Christ. All glory to Him in the Church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations for ever and ever. Amen<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-25840787809822975732010-12-08T16:07:00.008-07:002010-12-08T16:38:25.108-07:00More Church Rants<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXTT4qGU3RZpVE7Rbki9Sgixq_qL7zJO-xjbnUD-MExKumlct6SiSRUI9geUZKPGd9iQ71KHqDFD6GPGxU5Q5OEvfDkcGRsDSAAB7QePI2gYUS8ks1yB2XpYh1bLdfOnrozG89/s1600/loser.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXTT4qGU3RZpVE7Rbki9Sgixq_qL7zJO-xjbnUD-MExKumlct6SiSRUI9geUZKPGd9iQ71KHqDFD6GPGxU5Q5OEvfDkcGRsDSAAB7QePI2gYUS8ks1yB2XpYh1bLdfOnrozG89/s400/loser.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548452746256833218" /></a>It seems the Lord is stirring up a lot of things in the hearts of several of the people closest to me in regards to the institutional church. And I don't think its just my influence on them that is bringing them to this place. Sure, I am pretty (insert extremely) frustrated with a lot of things happening in the Christendom world. But I am doing my best to allow my friends to go on this journey for themselves in the same way I did. I am trying to be a good friend and partner with them as they experience these frustrations. I am asking them questions to help probe thought and give language to the things they are already feeling and experiencing. It seems the deeper that they go into the leadership of the church the more frustrated they get. I think this is because they are getting to see the roots of the problems, not just the surface level things that the average church-goer sees.<br /><br />To be honest, I really think the whole system itself is flawed. No amount of program tweaks will solve these issues. I read a book recently that I will probably be blogging about a lot in the near future and beyond. Its called "The Forgotten Ways" by Alan Hirsch. One of the things he says is, "Most theories about congregational life are flawed from the start because they are based on an institutional and mechanical worldview... such a worldview is not biblical. Instead, it is fatalistic and self-serving because the goal is to fix and preserve the institution for as long a life as possible. Such a worldview allows one to focus on mere organizational and institutional survival rather than following Jesus onto the mission field for the purpose of fulling the great commission."<br /><br />This is the root of the problem for most churches. They exist, not for the sake of the world, nor for the advancement of the Kingdom of God (although they may use this language, in most cases it simply isn't true), but rather they exist for their own survival as a single church. The community is not about me. And it is not only about us, it is also for the sake of the world. For the advancement of the Kingdom of God. <br /><br />So why are so many churches spending so much time trying to get the people that left their church because the preaching or singing sucked and just went down the road to the other church? Who cares!!! Stop worrying about transfer growth! Its not about you! Its not about your church! Its not even your church in the first place. Its Jesus' church. So stop pretending like you run the show. Step aside. And let Jesus lead his Church!<br /><br />CAN I PLEASE GET AN AMEN?<br /><br />For anyone who may be wondering, I do love the Church, Christ's Bride. I do not indeed love the institution we have been trying to keep surviving since Constantine made it the law. But I LOVE Jesus' Bride. After all, I am a part of it.<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-43917245918261061802010-12-07T14:27:00.009-07:002010-12-07T15:02:46.936-07:00By This All People Will Know<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhueagYRZ5gPNA-RrPv8Z1CD3V60emCr0IKD0qWiDAnxU5-hy1DlkbPVofxDUH5L75WFNXd2FVUnaWdsAlpryl9UPE6XJqQw31t9kLOvgffDnFn_538nTszB9fzmmMxPe8_3_A6/s1600/Allergy87.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 225px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhueagYRZ5gPNA-RrPv8Z1CD3V60emCr0IKD0qWiDAnxU5-hy1DlkbPVofxDUH5L75WFNXd2FVUnaWdsAlpryl9UPE6XJqQw31t9kLOvgffDnFn_538nTszB9fzmmMxPe8_3_A6/s400/Allergy87.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548061362760966754" /></a><br />I got tested for allergies today. Probably a good thing considering I am allergic to the following: Juniper trees, Virginia Live Oak trees, Mulberry trees, White Ash trees, Pecan trees, Mountain Cedar trees, Wheatgrass, Redtop, Bemuda, Orchard, Fesque, Ragweed, Pigweed, Lamb Quarter, Kochia, Russian Thistle, Sagebrush, Marsh Elder, Cocklebur, English Plantain, Cat, House Dust, Mites, Molds and Mildews. Just to name a few... Or actually all of them that I now know of...<br /><br />Each time I go to the doctor I think a few things. <br /> <br />1) This sucks. <br />2) I'm so glad I have a job that gives me good health insurance. <br />3) There are a LOT of people that dont have insurance and doctors are expensive!<br /><br />What would it look like if the church was our insurance policy? If church was the kind of community that pulled all of their resources to take care of each other. What would that say to the world? Jesus said, "By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”<br /><br />Or what if we had faith enough that the Lord would heal us if we would just ask. <br /><br />Still thinking... Not sure where to go from here. Any thoughts?<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-28106487232952443432010-12-07T10:25:00.003-07:002010-12-07T10:32:05.448-07:00A Vision for the Church<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://godspace.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/mystic-way-fo-evangelism2.jpg?w=223&h=345"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 223px; height: 345px;" src="http://godspace.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/mystic-way-fo-evangelism2.jpg?w=223&h=345" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />Elaine Heath describes the current state of the church in the US as being in a "dark night of the soul." She says there is no guaranty that we will come out of the dark night any better. And while I agree that there is no guaranty, I am very hopeful of the things to come for the church in North America because of men and women, who, like me, are fed up with the churches status quo and yet are passionately in love with Jesus. I believe it is precisely this dark night that is raising up men and women across the country that say no to legalistic and judgmental expressions of Christ’s church. These people will say yes to making space for Christ to lead His Church the way that He so chooses. These people will go into the dark places of the world armed with love in one hand and peace in the other, befriending the spiritually hurting, dirty and dying. The love of Christ will be so obvious among these lost people that they will find themselves falling in love with Him as they participate in His work even before they believe in Him. Authentic families of Jesus will be raised up from out of the mud and the mire and they will truly look like the people of God. They will be radical. They will be holy. They will look a lot like Jesus. And this world will never be the same.<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23497822.post-83385060186711677852009-04-01T09:13:00.002-06:002009-04-01T09:17:14.287-06:00National April Fools Day PrankIn 1985 Sports Illustrated published a story about a new rookie pitcher who planned to play for the Mets. His name was Sidd Finch, and he could reportedly throw a baseball at 168 mph with pinpoint accuracy. This was 65 mph faster than the previous record. Surprisingly, Sidd Finch had never even played the game before. Instead, he had mastered the "art of the pitch" in a Tibetan monastery under the guidance of the "great poet-saint Lama Milaraspa." Mets fans celebrated their teams' amazing luck at having found such a gifted player, and Sports Illustrated was flooded with requests for more information. In reality this legendary player only existed in the imagination of the author of the article, George Plimpton.<br /><br />People will believe anything... In fact, check this one out. Wanna grow your own spaghetti anyone?<br /><br />In 1957 the respected BBC news show Panorama announced that thanks to a very mild winter and the virtual elimination of the dreaded spaghetti weevil, Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop. It accompanied this announcement with footage of Swiss peasants pulling strands of spaghetti down from trees. Huge numbers of viewers were taken in. Many called the BBC wanting to know how they could grow their own spaghetti tree. To this the BBC diplomatically replied, "place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best." <br /><br />I gotta try that!<br /><br />Try not be fooled to bad today!<b>Jordan Bunch</b>http://www.blogger.com/profile/13980748950651703085noreply@blogger.com9