Summer Schedule!

I'm very excited that this coming Sunday we are beginning a four part sermon series that we're calling "Mission-tudes": Attitudes for a Missional Church!

As we move through the series we'll be looking at the mindsets we take to being FULLY ENGAGED in the work of SERVING our community and discern the ways that God can use us as individuals to accomplish His larger kingdom goals. How many of us are aware that our own "personal" healing is directly connected to the way we become poured out for others!

Summer certainly "heats-up" for many of our families. Schedules change and become busier for some as they make room for vacation, summer sports, seeing loved ones, and sometimes just plain relaxing! We encourage everyone to stay connected this summer by worshipping with us on Sundays! Your presence alone is a HUGE encouragement to people. Not to mention the words of life that are spoken as we minister to each other on Sunday mornings. Sunday is my favorite day of the week because I get to be with all of you!

Our summer Small Group schedule will change just a bit to give people time for some of the other activities they will have. Read the panel on the left to see what small groups and activities will be offered over the summer. For those who like the Sunday schedule best, John Gilbert continues his Sunday School class just before worship in our children's area. Jo Chilcutt is leading an exercise class on Tuesdays and Thursdays that can help you get into that bathing suit! Check out some of the other groups as well and find one that works for you!

Finally, think of someone that you know who would be a GREAT FIT for our church family and begin praying over how you might invite that person to join us on Sunday mornings! We've been blessed with an incredible, loving, nurturing (and increasingly missional!!) family of faith! Let's expand God's influence into the lives of others by leading friends into an encounter with Jesus through worship at Promise Church.

See you Sunday!

Jay

One at a time...

It is tempting in the current political and economic atmosphere to think in grand sweeping strokes. To get the economy "jump-started" our leaders have moved from greasing the wheels of "micro-economics" to large infusions of money in Keynesian "macro-economics." The idea is this. If you spend very large sums of money in certain sectors of the economy you will see a "trickle-down" effect as those sectors hire laborers, purchase goods, make investments, and so on. Those laborers then hired will use the money from their jobs to purchase goods, homes, cars, etc. which will all in turn begin moving the larger economic spin-wheel. If you spend the money in the "right" areas then that may serve as "investment" for all of the other areas (like manufacturing over financial services, green tech over carbon fuel tech). Well, that's the theory at least as it is cast in a grand vision of mobilizing the country back toward prosperity.

As I was praying this morning, I began with asking God to move in large and powerful ways - in our country, in our city, in our church. What came to me as I prayed were the faces of dozens of individuals each with their own circumstances and stories. I was moved to begin praying for each one of them even though I knew that would consume the hour we had set aside for our Morning Prayers.

This struck me as a prophetic picture of how the church functions so entirely different from human institutions. The church is concerned with individuals growing deeply in their relationship with Jesus and their "Abba, Father" relationship with God. Large and grandiose visions or large and grandiose churches aren't bad in and of themselves - but they are never a replacement for intimacy and connectedness and especially how the Spirit works healing, grace, and love inside of those intimate relationships made up of individual people.

Each of these individuals has a story and a history. They have hurts and joys. They have people they love. They have people they fear. They have hopes and sorrows; they have areas of trust and areas of mistrust. They all have mothers and fathers, some are mommies and daddies themselves. Most go every day to some kind of work and look to that work to provide for their needs.

It may be that as our attention is drawn in the political sphere and by the media to the larger equations, that the function of the church will be to remind us of God's love for the individual person and God's plan for each of us. In scripture and throughout history, God's BIG plans have always begun with a small group in an out of the way place - well away from the cities and people that represented power and influence.

What this means for you and me is that there is important work to do. While highly educated people figure out complex economic equations, you and I have a very important, very purposeful mission of love. And this mission isn't some grand evangelistic scheme. It is quite simply to love our NEIGHBOR as ourselves. It's to love them like Jesus loves them and to invite them to join the community that authentically celebrates and lives that love.

And this happens one person, one story, one decision, one life transformed at a time.

Blessings!

Pastor Jay

Worshp 3/1/09

Church - Jackson police and authorities are recommending that no one travel this morning do to icy road conditions. We will not have worship this morning at Promise Church. We encourage everyone to enjoy the day with your family and spend some time in praise and worship at home. If you know of anyone who has been adversely affected by the weather conditions please let Susan or me know at 668.9840 so we can arrange assistance.

Blessings and enjoy our gift from God!

Jay

Thicker than Water...

My mother, father, and I returned home to their house in New Orleans yesterday morning around 4 a.m. after a long drive to Houston for the funeral of a close family friend.

Usually I find myself on the officiating end of funerals. This time I was part of the congregation - listening, singing, and looking for a reminder of God's presence and hope through loss and heart-ache.

One has to be intentional to be able to see God when they're hurting. It doesn't come naturally to us. And that's where the support and encouragement of others becomes so vitally important. It's when we can't see and don't feel that others can do the seeing and feeling for us until our vision clears and our hearts cease to ache.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote in his famous book, Life Together, "The physical presence of other Christians is a source of incomparable joy and strength to the believer." He wrote these words as the German government of the thirties became increasingly antagonistic to any Christianity that resisted Nazi power. For Bonhoeffer, community wasn't optional, it was the very life-blood of the Christian experience.

Listen to what Bonhoeffer says as he looks for encouragement and support realizing that his own Christian witness may put him at odds with the culture of his day (and ultimately result in his execution in 1945). "God has willed that we should seek and find His living Word in the witness of a brother, in the mouth of man. Therefore, the Christian needs another Christian who speaks God's Word to him. He needs him again and again when he becomes uncertain and discouraged, for by himself he cannot help himself without belying the truth. He needs his brother man as a bearer and proclaimer of the divine word of salvation. He needs his brother solely because of Jesus Christ. The Christ in his own heart is weaker than the Christ in the word of his brother; his own heart is uncertain, his brother's is sure."

When our emotions become so overpowering against the backdrop of life's pain that we can't think or even pray clearly, it's our sisters and brothers in Christ who pray us through, perhaps even think us through.

My vision for our church is to be this kind of community. We are bound together not by history or tradition or doctrine or even always by "agreement" - we are bound together by Jesus himself who transcends (and infiltrates) all these things. Not a bad binding that. Truly the blood of Christ is thicker than water.

Snow Day!

Yesterday's snow day was a welcome blessing. Susan, Neeley, and I had a chance to go outside and sled down our "hill" in our backyard. Afterward, Susan spent some time getting caught up on school work and I had a chance to do some studying that I'd been putting off and spent the rest of the time playing with Neeley. It was one of those random, unscheduled "free days" that the Lord occasionally drops your way to remind you that your scheduled life isn't as important and necessary as you might be tempted to think it is.

While a snow day is unscheduled, our Sunday morning time at church is something we can actually look forward to. One writer on the subject worship has called Sunday morning worship a "holy waste of time." She's using the phrase tongue-in-cheek of course. But the idea is that from the world's perspective there are a lot better things one might be doing than singing, praying, fellowshiping, learning, and encountering God.

From my perspective, there is nothing I'd rather be doing on Sunday morning (or Monday morning, Tuesday morning, Wednesday morning...) than standing in the presence of the Lord. It's in His presence that anything and everything else I might set my mind to do receives its meaning and purpose. Without that time with God, nothing (for me, at least) can really have much direction or place. It's behind God's leading that our lives receive any hint of significance.

If that's true - and it certainly is for me - I want to be intentional about the way I approach my day of Sabbath rest. There's preparation I can make spiritually. There's prayer I can offer so that my heart is ready to receive God's gifts as I worship Him. I can begin working on my "worship-attitude" early in the week so that on Sunday I'm ready, I'm expectant, I'm hopeful. If being in the presence of God means anything to me at all, then what would my week look like if it were completely oriented - all week long - to that time that I would be able to stand with hands lifted high in the presence of God and with God's people? If you aren't receiving anything in worship is it because God isn't pouring out or is it because a place at the table of your heart hasn't been prepared for Him?

Something to ponder. Something to pray about.

Blessings!

Pastor Jay

Chrysalis Weekend!

A Chrysalis is the time in the early stage of a butterfly's development where they are cocooned as they form their wings for flight. It's a vulnerable time for the butterfly as it undergoes significant changes. It's a place that is completely nurturing and formative. Inside the cocoon, the butterfly has everything that it needs...but is NOT the final stage of the butterfly! The purpose of the nurturing, formative stage is so that the butterfly can fly!

This weekend, Dale and I will be at Camp Clark Williamson with close to fifty youth and adults for a weekend of re-connecting with God. The focus of the Chrysalis (and the Emmaus) weekend is developing a clear understanding of what it means to live in God's agape-style love. For many of the youth, it will be a time they will remember for the rest of their lives. Dale and I have seen young people visibly and tangibly moved by their encounter with God on the Chrysalis retreat.

Please pray with us over this weekend that the retreat be a powerful encounter with God! We covet your prayers and intercession for our leadership of the retreat, for the fertile soil of the heart into which good seed will be planted, and for the young men themselves to which we will be ministering - that they will receive EVERY good gift God has for them this weekend.

As I write this, it occurs to me how the process I've just described resembles so well what we've experienced at Promise Church! The Lord has given us an amazing season to get to know each other and create a safe and nurturing place for healing and community-formation to take place. He's cocooned us in some respects. But the sense that I and several of us are getting now is that the time has come for us to FLY!!!

That's exciting to me because it means that all that the Lord has been doing in the life of our church has been purposeful. It has been directed toward our RELEASE to minister in FREEDOM! As you pray for us this weekend at the retreat, include our church in your prayers, if you would. That we seize our divine opportunity to take flight and become the amazing church God has created us to be!

Blessings and favor in 2009!

Pastor Jay

THIS WEEK @ PROMISE CHURCH!

I want to thank Lindsey Patterson for the wonderful worship we had this past Sunday! The Northside High School Vocal Ensemble did a fantastic job of providing our Carols for our Lessons and Carols service. Some have suggested we make this an annual tradition! It was that good!

We've had someone generously give the church some money to do some radio advertising this week, at the first of the year, and then again around Valentine's day. The ads can be heard on Rock 92.3 this week during drive time slots in the morning and the afternoon. I thought I've give you a preview of what the Christmas ad says...

This is Pastor Jay Hutchens from Promise Church. As the song goes, "Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year." I enjoy the time spent with good friends, the giving and receiving of gifts, and watching my children bound down the stairs on Christmas morning. All of these things add to the joy of the season. But that joy wouldn't be complete without the presence of Jesus Christ. You see, we can spend time with friends or give or receive gifts anytime, anywhere. But what makes it so special for me is knowing that in living the love of Jesus, I'm actually living for a much larger purpose in this world than simply myself. And it's that larger purpose that keeps me going even when life gets really tough. Do you have a larger purpose for your life? If not, we'd like to invite you to join us on a journey of discovery this holiday season at Promise Church. You can check us out on the web at www.promisechurch.info.

A number of people have mentioned to me how influential our radio spots were initially in their decision to come to Promise Church. We're blessed to be able to do this again for the next couple of months! It's exciting to be able to talk about Jesus on a primarily rock-n-roll station!

This coming Sunday is called "Christmas Sunday." What better way to approach Christmas Day than to begin the week in worship and celebrate what Jesus continues to do in our lives every day.

See you Sunday!!

Pastor Jay