Real Beauty

The highlight of my day was visiting an elderly home-bound member of our congregation. Her body was crippled and her speech slow from a stroke, or a series of strokes, years ago. Her mind, however, was sharp and crisp.

Scattered throughout this tiny apartment in the assisted living facility she calls home were pictures of children, grandchildren, and of her beloved husband Bill. It's been more than nine years since he passed away - nine years since she was held in his arms. They were married in 1946 when she was just a freshmen in college.

It was the way she talked about him now, in the present, that struck me. She kept saying over and over "Oh, how I love Bill... I love Bill so much."

In my world obsessed with appearance and in a culture that idolizes youth, I saw real beauty today in the life of this woman. Thank you Sarah for that gift.

Great Airports of the World...not

“Great Airports of the World is not a book that you’ll find on anyone’s coffee table,” Reggie McNeal said yesterday.

I’m at Fuller Seminary taking a class called “Missional Leadership” with Reggie McNeal as part of my Doctor of Ministry degree program. Yesterday Reggie was talking about how the shift between being an internally verses externally focused church is all about the destination.

Airports are not doing their job when airplanes and people are trapped in the terminal. After all, no one hops on a plane to take a trip to an airport! We use airports to get to the places we want to work, play or meet certain people. That’s why no one will ever make one of those fancy coffee table picture books called Great Airports of the World. Airports are not the destination.

In a “church-centric” (vs. “kingdom-centric”) view of the Christian life, the institutional church is understood as the destination. In this view, the objective is to see how many people we can get to come to our church. And so we create programs and jazz up worship to attract the crowd. A kingdom-centric view of the Christian life understands that God is establishing a kingdom on earth and God is using the church to accomplish it. As others have said, “The church does not have a mission. The mission has the church.”

A friend of mine at our church said to me the other day. “Steve, I used to think the point was to try and get people into our church. Now I think the point is to get people out of our church!” My friend Josh isn’t looking to get rid of cantankerous church members. Rather, he understands that the church is in the service of our great missionary God who has a mission to bless and redeem the world God loves.