AC3 VB201 GLS Final Update

Check out this video blog with Rick and Dan as they talk about the Global Leadership Summit and what our role in that will look like this year. Enjoy!

Constructive Connections-Part 13

Muddied Hands

Constructive Connections is a fiction series.  They are beginning tales of how each person is crafted by God to fulfill a purpose, to enhance the narrative of life.  By contributing unique talents to serve one another, a tower God calls us to construct begins to form for His joy.

“Hey Harper, what’s your shirt say?” 14 years old, Mason, asked me in the kitchen today.  He had on a hoodie, ripped baggy jeans, and plenty of attitude about how his mom had “made” him come help in the kitchen tonight.  

I knew the boy could read, but I read it out loud anyway, “Says: ‘He restored me’.”  I remember when I ordered it online a couple of months ago, the artwork was cool; a painted pair of ragged hands reaching up-rugged rough hands, working life hands.  And there was one bright spotless hand reaching down; the forgiving hand.

“So…is it like a God shirt?”  he said with a smirk.

My gloved hands were covered in meatball mess, while Mason’s were clean and clearly holding tight to the cell phone in his sweatshirt pocket.  My 4-year-old son Charles has a security blanket; apparently there’s such thing as a security-cell. “No, not a ‘God Shirt.’”  I stopped and thought about what kind of a statement I was making by wearing my favorite black tee.  How could I explain?

Do I tell him?  Would this kid actually listen as I told him of my life as an only child; one who fought for attention from my folks?  Should I tell him of the long list of trouble I got into when I was his age, with individuals camouflaged as friends?

Do I tell of the ways I failed?  How when my need for attention was not met by my wife Ramona, I found attention from someone else?  Do I reveal the agonized sound of my best friend’s heartbreak and how it wrecked and ripped at every fiber of my being?   

Do I tell him of how I almost lost my life?  Would he listen to me yammering on about how I saw my moral failure as something I wasn’t in control of; that it was everyone’s fault, not my own?

Do I tell him how I let my family, my treasure, fall away from me?  When I told of my heart being packed up, along with my wife and son, as my body watched it all drive away to live without me across the country; would he comprehend?  Would he get it?

Maybe I could tell him about when I got broke.  About the time I found myself in men’s group at our church; the church where my wife and I met, the church where we looked like Christians, had the membership card, wore the t-shirt, but forgot to let Jesus (or anybody else for that matter) into our problems.

Then I could tell him about the time I confessed to everyone I hurt; especially to Jesus, who I claimed to follow.

Suppose he might understand why I left my job, left my home, why I gave up that sinful man, to reclaim what God had freely offered me once more…hope.

I wonder if this youth just sees a man rolling meatballs and labels it inconvenience, or chore, or boring.  I wonder if he could recognize my pure joy knowing my son and wife and I are in the same house again.  No, it isn’t where we sleep, it’s our church home; it’s where we are awake. Providing a meal for family, sisters and brothers in Christ, is something that is done effortlessly.  If he understood, maybe, just maybe, he’d take his hands out of his pocket to open the cans of spaghetti sauce.

“It is not a God Shirt, Mason.  It is a statement of who I owe my life to.” I rolled another meatball.  “I wrote a life story I was not proud of. God and I are writing a new one.”  I held up the meat covered gloves, “These hands were so dirty. But when I reached,” I took off one of the gloves to reveal my clean left hand, “He cleaned me up, because he loves.  He absolutely loves…me.”

He brought me out into a spacious place; he restored me because he delighted in me.

2Samuel 22:20

Written by Jennifer Love

Who is AC3? Love the Church

Fill in the Blank

“The Church is just a _____” ; you can fill in the blank and it probably has come out of the mouth of one or more people in a religious debate.   I cannot blame people for what they say, and I even see that some of their points are valid. There are all too many examples of churches doing wrong.  With the scandals, hate disguised as Jesus’ Word, and historical wrongs that still play out today, ALL leading to the divide that has caused so many to fall out of love with the church.  

Others I have conversed with have argued not against the church as directly; their argument is more about not “Needing” the church to be a good Christian.

So, what does my defense sound like when faced with all of these real accusations and attacks on the church?

First, we have to look at the attack on church failures.  It is unfair to look only at the wrongs church has done. How about the humanitarian efforts that have come from Christians doing church right? Without the church medical treatment, food distribution, shelter, and compassion for the poor would be nonexistent in some places around the world.  As for the haters who use scripture out of context; haters are gonna find a way to hate, even if it means misquoting the Bible.

The world’s media love to highlight the failings of the big “C” church, but just as with most things in this world the majority is not what gets air-time attention.  It is the few that stand out; the weakness of one pastor that destroys a church, the extremist holding a sign stating “You are going to hell!” whom the media loves to call “Fundamentalists” (True fundamental Christians spread love not hate).  But these make the broadcasts, because the ones who get it right are not deemed “news worthy”.

Now about not needing the church?  We are called to gather: “For where two or more gather in my name, there am I with them” (Matt 18:20).  We are not meant to be alone, we are called to love one another. We are called to love the church, not the organization or the building, but the people.  Fact: There are 59 “one another” commands in the Bible, I leave you with this question: How do you “One Another” if you don’t gather?

-Written by Christian Love

Who is AC3?-Love God

Who is AC3?

Love God-

Imagine for a moment what it looks like for you to love God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all our strength and with all your mind. What do your neighbors, co workers, friends, immediate and extended family see?  Does your life look any different in your imagination as it appears in your day-to-day life experiences? For me, there is a clear distinction from my life before I accepted Jesus as my savior and my life after my conversion. But, that's not what I am really talking about. I am honestly evaluating my life against the lens of who I am for God. I am frankly asking myself how can others tell that I love God? More importantly how do I see in my core that I truly love God with all my heart, soul, strength and mind? Does my life reflect my deep love for Yahweh in ways that are profound?

Just last week I thought I could squeeze into my already packed day a quick workout at the gym. I was trying to manage my mental to do list with limited time to really get the things done that I sought to accomplish. When things were not going the way I anticipated I began to spiral into a frazzled and frustrated form of myself. Have you ever been there? My heart was distracted and my mind in chaos and yet God in His perfect timing corrected me, gently and lovingly in the form of service. I was rushing down the hall and a woman rushed by me even more frazzled than myself. She was really  in need of help. And she needed that help immediately. Two things were evident: no one else was available and this was not the kind of help that would be easy. She needed the type of help that requires time, effort, compassion and love. So there it was friends, the profound moment when my own timetable became irrelevant and God pressed upon my heart to love my neighbor as myself. I was obedient to His prompting. These revelations help me to see that I really am different. “But, if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in Him. Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did.” 1 John 2:5-6  Only through the Father may I have the heart and strength to love extravagantly. Loving God with my all my heart, soul, strength and mind looks like Jesus and how He calls us to live everyday.

The process in which we grow more like Jesus has a fancy word, sanctification. As we grow in our faith and in our disciplines we embody the word Christian- which from this past weekend’s sermon means to be little Christ. I move forward in my growth in my relationships with the people whom God places in my life. I find that with the form of grouping I can love God in ways I never would have imagined a decade ago or even just a few years ago. But, in stepping out to look more like Jesus I am surrounded by many who are doing the same thing. Growing in profound ways that show others that the church isn’t a building but the bride. My groups challenge me to speak truthfully, walk faithfully and love the church in beautiful ways.

I will add for the sake of transparency that I am hesitant to admit how often I find myself caught up in things that don’t feed my soul and distract my mind. The things of this world that tie up valuable bandwidth, things such as my never ending laundry, my constant drive to declutter our home and my desire to be productive and seen as worthy. All of the chaos created by me or thrust upon me robs me of opportunities to just love God with my soul and with my mind. I tend to become preoccupied  by circumstances and not what truly matters, which is HIM. As I am growing in my spiritual disciplines I do find myself more and more stopping to sit in His presence. I regroup my scattered thinking and rest in HIM. I pause to revel in His abundant blessings.(John 10:10) I am sustained as the Lord draws near to me when I cease to run ahead of Him or lag behind Him but instead choose to rest in Him. How do I do this? Like Dan suggested in his teaching on the topic, I come to HIM and glorify my Father in Heaven. I have my go to scriptures that recalibrate me back onto the narrow way. I sing songs of praise. I call out to Him and in my pleas for mercy He feeds my soul and calms my mind. I confess, repent and love Him with all my heart, soul, strength and mind. And in those moments of honest and heartfelt devotion I discover I am loving God in profound ways.

Forgotten God-Week 3- Holy Spirit 101

Let me confess:  I don’t know what I’m talking about.  When we’re talking about what God is like, (and the Holy Spirit being key to understanding Him) no one does.  We’re talking about something – some-One – so utterly beyond us, that we’re just scratching at the edges of a profound mystery.

Imagine a single ant trying to understand humans as we lumber over an anthill in the woods.  The Ant might form some rudimentary idea about a human from your boots crashing nearby, but could it even begin to comprehend detail?

• What we are?
• How we’re similar to the ant? 
• How we’re different?     

       - No way.

UNLESS…

Unless what?  Unless we could directly reveal information about us to that ant.  How?

• Maybe someday we could inject it directly into its tiny little nervous system. Or:
• Maybe, if we became an ant, we could communicate something its own rudimentary language.

But, to do either of those things, we’d have to simplify, right?

-First, we’d have a very short time to do it in, we live 75 years, an ant lives 75 days!

-Second, the ant has no capacity for complex thought, it has 250,000 brain cells, compared to our 10,000 million.

• So we’d have to pare down the information.  Lots of info would forever be a mystery to the Ant simply because the Ant has no capacity for all the information – it would fry its circuits!
• Remember, Moses – got to see God’s “back”, not his “face”.  Isn’t that the same?

Now, do you believe God is as far above us, as we are above ants?  At least, right?  So how can we know any detail about what God is like?   The same way the ant could know about us: IF and only IF the higher Being stoops down to reveal itself.

QUESTION:  HAS GOD DONE THIS?

We believe he has; throughout history, climaxed in the Incarnation and Resurrection of Jesus from the dead.  So Christians believe that the ant analogy actually happened. God stooped to reveal himself to us.

But not everything about himself.

Moses, who received some of this Revelation, said:

Deut 29:29  The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this law.

As we talk about the Holy Spirit this month, let’s admit always, there’s secrets here we’re never going to understand.  They belong to God, and we can NEVER access them, because we’re ants.

-BUT, there’s things that have been revealed.  Like ants we’d never know these things on our own.  But once revealed by a source we trust, Moses says, it belongs to us, and we can KNOW it.

It’s not just dry doctrine, either.  Tozer once said, we will live up or down toward the vision of what we think God is like.  So, we should seek to get to the edges of the secrets we can’t know and ask, what can we know?  What has God revealed?   Because believing it and cherishing it, will change us.

SSo first God has revealed that there’s only ONE of him. Deut 6:4: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord  is one.”  This might be a “duh” for you, but it’s a shock to Israel, immersed as they were in a polytheistic world.  But after God saves them, He reveals there’s a God above all other gods.  Who existed BEFORE the world.  One all-powerful Architect. One Source and Father of all creation.  One.

uBut secondly, Jesus revealed that God is a “COMPLEX UNITY”.  And after Jesus promised the Spirit, his apostles and all subsequent Christians have noted the more than 200 times an entity known at the SPIRIT of God is talked about all over Moses and the Prophets.  Jesus brought what was cryptic and secret out into plain view:

John 14:16-17:  And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever— 17 the Spirit of truth.

Emphasis on “another”.  The Spirit is not the Father and the Spirit is not the SON…but the Spirit is equally God.  So Three. God is one in BEING, and three in PERSON.

Let us then, never forget, the Spirit is personal.  As such He can speak and guide and he can remind.  

-He can be lied to: Acts 5:3-4

-He can be grieved: Eph 4:30

-He can lead us: Gal 5:25

-He can be insulted: Heb 10:29

-He comforts: Acts 9:31

This is a person!  And this person is God, along with the Father and the Son.  As a person, the Spirit of God cares deeply about you, about conforming you in the Image of Christ.  And when we resist His refining work, we do grieve Him deeply.

Doesn’t that put a finer point on the relationship we have with the Counselor, inside?  I believe if we believe the Spirit was really God and really a Person, we would care more deeply about the Holy Spirit’s grief.  And if we did, there would be fewer fights, squabbles, gossip in the church. Fewer divorces, fewer splits, fewer moments of entrenched unforgiveness… why? Because we’d care more about the Spirit’s grief, than our own.

Gal 5:26: “Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.”

-Written by Rick Thiessen

Constructive Connections-Part 12

Parable Queen

Constructive Connections is a fiction series.  They are beginning tales of how each person is crafted by God to fulfill a purpose, to enhance the narrative of life.  By contributing unique talents to serve one another, a tower God calls us to construct begins to form for His joy.

What a reflection.  Golden wig, pink fairy wings, polka dot clown pants, and blue sweatshirt with “Save the Unicorn Lamas!” screaming across my chest.  Mam-Maw would be pointing and laughing her pretty little grey-haired head off, askin’ me, “What did you sign up for this time, Dra-Mona?”  When I was six, I had an ear-splitting rant-trum (like a tantrum, only I had my reasons and made them known for all to hear) at the Save-A-Lot grocery store.  Ever since my passion ignited regarding obtaining that particular cherry fruit roll up, I lost the name Ramona and was dubbed “Dra-Mona, the reigning Drama Queen” by my loving family.

My 4-year-old Charles and I moved to Washington after some real-life drama exploded on our front lawn.  My husband of 10 years decided I wasn’t all that and had a girlfriend on the side. I thought it fitting to leave his possessions on the lawn with a large Sharpie sign, “Free to any 6’5, size 13 shoe real man!”.  Yah, I got a temper. All that was left when he came home was a few of his bowling trophies and his reading glasses.

Being a single parent has been the hardest challenge of my life.  I had Mam-Maw to look to for direction the first few years of Charles’s life, but now I feel like I’m going solo.  Well, there is also my ex-husband, Harper. He followed us up here to the Northwest a few months after Charles and I moved.  Harper showed up on our apartment doorstep with a basket of fruit, introducing himself as my new neighbor. Sure enough, he rented an apartment a stone’s throw away; and believe you me, I was tempted to throw that stone!    

Harper and I didn’t do much for reconciling before we left Tennessee; that’s not my way.  If he was brazened enough to do the crime, it was not worth takin’ the time. Sure enough, Jesus kept trying to get my attention.  I understand that we need to be forgiving, but I just couldn’t do it. My heart was full of the rage of being wronged. I had seen it enough times in other people’s lives to understand why I wasn’t ever to take back a cheater.  Even if he was the father of Charles. Even if he had been my best friend from the time we were 8 years old. Even if he sent me letters, flowers, fruit, and all the rest. Cheatin’ was cheatin’ and there was no forgiveness in me.

But then it was Harper who was the one who found the church preschool.  “Charles needs to find Jesus in this mess of what we did to upset his life.”  Oh, yeah, I heard it too and called him out.

“We did?  Are you serious?”  My crossed arms and unbelieving eyes said it all.

“You and I both needed to come together, but you were busy.  I was busy. Busy became life and we must’ve forgot to schedule each other in.”  He wasn’t wrong, I guess. I was occupied being Charles’s mom; I might have forgot Harper also had to be part of the whole parenting process.

I met Amy at my son’s preschool.  She didn’t even have kiddos, but she was doing what she loved; teaching sticky-crafts.  We became fast friends, bein’ we were both from the South and had accents to make any Washingtonian stop and say, “Oooo, I just love how you talk!” I was thankful to meet Amy when I did.  She was light in the dark of bitterness.

Amy and I attended a women’s retreat recently and I found out I wasn’t the only one who had trouble with that whole “forgiving” thing.  There were a few divorcees in the group and a few that talked about putting their marriages back together after separation. Their testimonies about how God was their strength through all of the bumps and bruises of life was inspiring.  But what I took from the weekend wasn’t about the endin’ or mendin’ of marriages. It was about the slowing down; praying for God to show me what part I had to play in the offence. Guess that is when Jesus got a hold and showed me the reflection of the drama I had allowed into my life.

I sat down with a group of ladies to play a game during the evening at the retreat.  We got talking about life as we pondered which letters would fit the triple word score space.  I was telling one of my silly stories from childhood and the ladies laughed so hard they dabbed at tears.  Someone said, “I think I could listen to you read off a grocery list and be thoroughly entertained!” I smiled and something in me stirred.  “Have you ever thought of acting in the dramas at church?” she asked.

Now I know who was responsible for the stirrin’; that Holy Spirit.  Then I felt somewhere deep within, not audible, but just a feeling: What if I changed my focus of unforgiving angry, and put that negative…oomph into the telling of a story?  Jesus was keen on story telling. Picturing Jesus weaving tales of thieves, rulers, and farmers to the people he met along the way must have been the best method to get his message across.  People can watch a play and relate to the characters, they can read between the lines of the story being told. Tales of being mistreated, life decisions made in the name of justice, and the such, all lead to the redemption or the ruin of character.  

Looking out into the audience, I see in the middle row a familiar face.  Anger wanes as I realize the importance of changing the focus of anger, applying energy to creativity, and entertaining a smidge of forgiveness.  

And I also realize how humility plays out in this crazy zany parable we are acting out for the church today, and how hard it is going to be to get the image of me in this ridiculous getup out of my head!  

Jesus spoke all these things to the crowd in parables; he did not say anything to them without using a parable.

Matthew 13:34

  

Exciting News!

A Pathway for Vocational Ministry

As a non-denominational church, AC3 stands independently. In other words, organizationally speaking, there is not an authority outside Allen Creek to which we are accountable. Of course as leaders and as people we are all accountable to God (Romans 14:12). But responsibility for day to day operations, establishment of mission and vision, preparation of teaching materials, church discipline, finances and evangelistic efforts fall to men and women from inside the church family of AC3.

This provides us great freedom. As a church we can be very “light on our feet” and the decision-making process stays very close to the people whom the decisions directly affect. There’s not a lot of “management”. It also means that when insuring we stay aligned with historic, Biblical faith, we must be doubly aware and intentional about how teaching and decision making authorities are conferred. There is no one else but “us” to decide if someone is qualified “to teach”. (2 Timothy 2:2)

Our Elder selection process reflects the sobriety and weight we give to this responsibility. Since there is no “higher authority” for approval, the process is extensive, detailed and very thorough.

In recent years, our attention has turned to a similar leadership role: that of pastor. A technical case can be made that “pastor” is not an office or position in the church. While it’s true that the term “pastor” is not used in the Bible for a specific position, Paul does mention “…elders who direct the affairs of the church well are worthy of double honor, especially those whose work is preaching and teaching.” It’s from this (and other) Biblical references that we see the role most people refer to as pastor emerging, and it’s from this passage in particular that we see a precedent for vocational (paid) positions.

AC3 has an Elder selection process that has served us well for nearly 25 years. But how do we select a “pastor”?

First: Don’t worry. No one is leaving! But the pastoral staff IS aging, and consideration must be made for the next generation of “teaching elders”. Without denominational oversight, it was up to the existing leadership team to develop a process as robust and effective as the elder selection process for the welcoming of new members of the pastoral staff.

We think we’ve done that, and we want you to know about it. If you would like to read about in detail, just click HERE.

Following is a brief summary:

Candidates for vocational ministry must complete a 4-step process before they are eligible to be considered for ordination at AC3.

  1.    Affirmation. The church body must recognize the giftings, character, and capacity of the individual. This recognition is codified in the following 4 steps:

1.    A formal interview with the pastoral staff.

2.    A formal interview with the Elders.

3.    Submission of (2) written references from AC3 members.

4.    Submission of (2) written references from Christians outside AC3.

  2.    Academics. Candidates must have successfully completed Bible school training from an institution recognized by AC3 Pastors and Elders.

  3.    Apostolic Succession. The completion of Bible School studies must result in that institution awarding a license to the candidate under their by-laws. This connects the candidates training to an unbroken line of training extending back to the Apostles.

  4.    Apprenticeship. Candidates will serve under the direct supervision and mentor-ship of existing AC3 pastor(s) for a minimum of one year.

Completion of these 4 steps results in the candidate meeting basic qualifications for acceptance as an AC3 pastor, but does not guarantee it nor guarantee a paid position.

It is hoped that this monumental step is seen with great joy! It was motivated, in part, by conversations with AC3’rs who expressed a longing to serve this church vocationally, and that is a huge encouragement. It speaks to the hope and expectation that what God has begun at Allen Creek will endure far beyond the direct influence of those with whom He started!

Philippinas 1:6 “And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.”