Icon #1 - Truth

At Axiom Church we've chosen 4 core axioms that direct and compels us as a growing "household of God". We've designed icons to help us remember and explain what is moving us forward. Out first icon is Truth. The great story of God's intentions for the world, His hopes for partnering with us and the invitation to live under His rule are what guide how we read the scriptures and what we invest our everyday life in. This is the first icon and its account.

“Truth is an epic story of a King determined to partner with humanity”

The story of humanity starts with God purposely creating us to work along side him; together serving, caring for, and cultivating the world. Under God’s generous and gracious leadership, humanity is intended to bless the world on his behalf. But Satan, the enemy of this world spreads the lie that “God is not good, his rule is oppressive and that his love cannot be trusted fully.” To this day we continue to buy that lie and heartache enters our ongoing world through our choices.

But we believe God has not abandoned his human project to decay. God loves what he makes and so he will not give up on it. As part of his original intention, God is inviting people back into partnership to join his restorative mission in this world.

We are convinced all our good and honorable longings for this life find their ultimate fulfillment in Jesus who mysteriously is God in the flesh. Through submitting our everyday lives to King Jesus we can again partner with God, be secure in his love and work towards reconciling with each other. At Axiom we work to form community that is compelled by this epic story; living under the Kingship of Jesus through acts of love, peace, sacrifice, wisdom and selflessness.

Simplicity

So I’m a rookie-practicing church planter. I’ve been a pastor in different settings and cities for the last 14 years but starting a church out of nothing certainly makes me feel like I’m in a different ball game all together. Even though I’m wet behind the ears as an official church planter there are some core values that I’ve stood on over the years to create a trajectory of spiritual vitality. With all the ministry fads and tools that have been waved under my nose I’ve always pursued loyalty to the principle of simplicity. One of our church community’s early non-negotiables is simplicity. I recently told another pastor “I don’t know much but I know it will stay simple.”

This issue of simplicity is even more sensitive with the “dechurched” - (those who likely have a significant affinity towards Jesus Christ but for some reason have found current expressions of church irrelevant to their everyday life) and “unchurched”- (their only understanding of church is from a distance; TV preachers, politics, best-selling books and maybe family history). As an insider to the church world, I perceive we’ve projected an image that church is complicated; growing in Christ is a set of complicated classes, caring for our neighbors requires a complicated approach, getting on board with the churches mission is a complicated membership process and community is a complicated program to sign up for.

Simplicity is always under assault. I remember when I first began songwriting I would hear a great song on the radio and hear all these cool sounds, beats, breakdowns, guitar licks and vocal acrobatics. I then felt like I had to somehow mash them into every song I was working on. What I ended up with was always a wannabee song that wasn’t memorable or moving, even though I included all those slick components. Then when I was 23 at a songwriters session in Nashville I heard a hero of mine, John Foreman say “obsess over the melody, forget the other stuff, push away all the bells and whistles and stick with a simple and strong melody” That statement changed and simplified my songwriting permanently.

Most churches function like a songwriter throwing everything they can into the mix of their church hoping that it comes out making a beautiful noise. The end result is often that people are busy in programs, money is spent on ministry stuff, Christian cliques are championed but the core of who we are and where we are headed is lost in the clutter. Jesus, Missionality, and Community often get relegated to a corner with all the complication.

The honest reality is some people are drawn to simplicity and others are turned off by it. I have a suspicion that some are looking for fresh air in their church life. I was so jazzed recently when I overhead someone say “I just want a large dose of Jesus, a community to share my life with and a mission to pour my heart into.” Now that’s simple but not stupid. Contrast that with those who might be turned off by simplicity looking for: a great worship band, a captivating preacher, an exciting children’s ministry, a cool building, a woman’s ministry, a men’s ministry, an active single’s ministry and a counseling ministry. I’ve ministered in these buffet settings; the drift that happens is slow and steady. It becomes seriously difficult to keep the vision front, center and accessible.

I believe that simplicity in our church expression might eventually be birthed out of necessity. I foresee that potentially the economic recession might prevent us from offering so many program options, with great facilities staffed by numerous paid professional pastors. It might force us to permanently widdle down church ministry to the lean essentials.

I’m not advocating for sloppy, boring or mediocre church. I’m advocating for pushing back the millions of program options and instead intentionally developing, excelling at and funneling people towards the essentials. More is not always better or always healthier.

When I spent time in Kenya I bumped into a growing and vibrant brand of Christianity that genuinely shocked me when I encountered it. Now I’m sure there is a temptation to not see anything transferable from a 3rd world culture like theirs but I wouldn’t want to be so arrogant as too brush them off as spiritually underdeveloped. It was their intense focus on worshiping Jesus, developing families and sharing the hope of Christ with neighboring tribes that dominated their gathering. A young and frail indigenous pastor in Kenya glared at me and said “we’d rather not have your U.S.A shopping center church, you could probably learn a bit from us.” I think he was right... keep it simple.

What Does It Mean To Be Human?

What does it mean to be human? I used to think that the more human I was the more sinful I was. My definition of being human was closely associated with sinfulness and rebellion against God. To be human was not a good thing. Being human equaled being “fleshly” or “worldly”. I think that is why so often preachers like to emphasis the Holiness of God more than the Incarnation of God in Jesus. Here is the question; do we become more holy the less human we become?

My answer… no. Humanity was and is God’s idea. There is a mysterious splendor in the concept of being truly human, this is what I believe Jesus precisely portrays and declares with his life, being and teachings. Jesus was and is the definition of what it means to be fully human. Jesus is God’s original thought of what it looks like to be in the flesh. Jesus reclaimed the fully human life that affirmed a new sense of identity and dependence on God. It was stated from his own mouth that “I do nothing except for what the Father does (Matt 27:50)”, “as I am loved by the Father so I love you (John 20:17).” and “the Father has sent me (John 15:5).” These are powerful identity markers; declarative statements of how Jesus sees himself. Jesus self-awareness of what made him fully human is completely on display. Jesus operational mode was; intense inner connectedness to the truth that he was loved by the Father, sent into the world by the Father and given direction by the Father. Jesus sense of self is God-centered not self-centered.

The enemy of this world wants to convince us that to be fully human or “fully you” is to be self-made, consumed with stuff for yourself, independent, grasping at control over your life and utterly concerned with how people perceive you. This was the trickery in the Garden of Eden. God’s rule about not eating from the tree had little to do with “just obey me”. It was more about God’s intention that humanity find their source of self, fulfillment, provision, vocation and governance in Him alone.  Instead Satan told the fattest ugliest lie, “to be human is to be self-reliant and independent of God”.

Jesus did not come to eradicate us but to call us out to a new way of being human.  Jesus inaugurated the beginning of an ever increasing way to be you. Despite a lot of church publicity it doesn’t come from the rejection of pleasure or self denial; this only leads to guilt, condemnation and legalism. What Jesus is doing is challenging us to “remain in him” as he remained in his Father (John 15). According John 15 this is how our lives will start to bust forth fruit as it was intended to.

Our humanity needs to be recalibrated under the Leadership and Lordship of Jesus. It is when we willingly submit our lives to his loving care, sense of commission in the circles around us and directives to make choices as He would, that our lives make sense and bear much fruit. This what I believe Romans 13:14 means when it says “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”  This is a new way to work, relate, spend, and live. To stay under Jesus governance, direction, and love is a constant tweaking, refocusing and realignment. When you live life from this place you know and feel and potentially might say out loud “so this is what it’s like to be fully human."


(A.D.D moment here but this is why we need connected Christian community so bad, to show us a mirror and nudge us back under Jesus love and rule, because we slide out of this place of self-awareness so easily on our own).

Two good books to read that touch on this are Abba's Child by Brennon Manning and The Great Omission by Dallas Willard.

Leading From a Still Soul

Leadership is often viewed by the masses as an opportunity to move people in a certain direction or to accomplish a certain task with a group. The end goal is often about being productive. Within the church that productivity translates into equipping people to do the work of the ministry. As a leader inside the organized church for the last decade there is a sly temptation upon my soul. You see, being a visionary and a strategist I want to see us climb mountains, grow stuff, step over blockades and mission new frontiers but the temptation to lead and respond from a dark place in my soul is always there.

With people comes opposition, negative feedback, vision confusion, obstinate attitudes, slowness in retention and straight up personal critique. These often feel like arrows at our identity, our mission, our calling and our leadership proficiency. So the natural tendency is to steamroll over people who voice concern or to demonize them in our mind as “against us”. It’s easy to see people who slow us down or call our methods into question as obstacles in the way of the mission.

That’s why I’m slightly (emphasis on slightly) uncomfortable with using the war motif in association with doing ministry. There is a lot of pontificating going on in literature that frames ministry in battle terms. If we are honest this approach appeals to baseline impulses in us to defend ourselves and respond out of anxiety and anger.

Leadership challenges offer souls sessions or clear opportunities to face our real selves and to navigate why we are triggered by opposition, feedback, confusion, questions, and critique. It is convenient to blame, shame, get defensive, become argumentative and squash the reasoning and case presented to us by a brother or sister in Christ. The dark place in our soul screams “they are rejecting you,” “your incompetent,” “your useless,” “your better than them,” “no one understands you,” and “they’re not with you”. These emotions, thoughts and knee jerk reactions then become part of the self-concept and the “lens” through which we lead others. It leads to all kinds of gross misinterpretations and assumptions. Inconsequentially it becomes very hard to hold onto high caliber leaders and to woo people to follow you into unknown kingdom territories.

Leading out of stillness is a spiritual discipline and a probably the most important homework for a pastor/leader to press into.

A Key Issue in the Church of the Future.

Check out this short but great little article on Multi Ethnic Churches.
The Theology of Multi-Ethnic Church | Out of Ur | Conversations for Ministry Leaders

The America we live is quickly becoming and is a mash up country of different cultures. How do we build a kingdom community where ethnic preferences collide. Does one ethnicity have a trump card? This has great implications on worship styles, leadership approaches and family structures. To me the most obvious effect of ethnic diversity is on what kind of hermeneutic we use when reading the scriptures.

It's important to understand that around the globe people read very differently; they interpret, apply and ask different questions than white westerners do. Truth is defined differently around the globe and the globe is at our doorstep. In the West we are Rationalist, asking "can we argue this, then it must be true", in the North of the globe they are often Pragmatics asking "will this work, then it must be true", in the East they are Renewalists asking will it bring change, then it must be true" and in the South they are Communalists asking "is it good for all us, then it must be true". The American church of the future will have very different challenges if it wants to be hospitable in its mission to the cultures around us.