The Rythm of the Refuge

As we continue to live out the light of the world on these streets, we are going to live out the following rhythm: Up, In, and Out.

Up: To worship and glorify the Father. To sit before Him in His throne room and revel in who He is and what He wants to do through His sons and daughters.

In: We want to develop character within each other as a community and within our own lives. This will be fully matured as we live out life together in strong community. Living life together, sharing things, not clinging to things of this earth, and let go of things that ensnare us, whether those are material or spiritual things.

Out: We want to be out among the world looking for diving appointments or persons of peace where God has just orchestrated a time and place for us to point people to Him as we love on our neighbor.

We see this rhythm lived out through Christ as He would often spend time with the Father, either alone, or with His disicples, we also see how he would spend time with His disciples teaching them and walking with them and sharing all things. This is where the disciples learned things like faith, hope, and love. We also see how Jesus would take His disciples into the battle and release them to live out the power of God. This is where their faith was tested and grew as they would see the signs and wonders of God. They would see these things and it would simply drive them to go back to the Father and worship Him and testify of His goodness. And as they celebrated in His goodness, they would than be driven to live life with those who they had in common and develop a closer walk with the LORD. As they grew closer with the LORD, their faith would grow to simply produce more fruit for others to taste of. This is the rhythm of the refuge. I can’t wait to see it unfold.

last saturday

well, two groups came down to be apart of the work downtown. it was a high school group from church of the servant and a college group from Southern Nazarene University. It went really great. The high school group spent the morning picking up trash, cleaning up the alley, and we swept for the first time a knew corner. The best part of the sweeping of that corner was that we have almost made it around an entire block. But the radical thing about the sweeping and the cleaning was that the entire day, there was no homeless people on that corner, except a brand new guy…this guy was awesome though…i started about 3 hours after we had cleaned the street and this guy was sitting down on the ground chugging his beer. The cool thing was when he saw me coming with my bucket and trash picker-upper, the threw the can, his beer went all over the side walk that we had just cleaned…when i saw this, i was sooo stoked…his anger towards the light was apparent and it gave me so much motivation…the thing that i would want to mention was that i never had seen this guy, i was on the other end of the block, so it wasn’t like i was coming right next to him and making it look like i wanted him to leave. you see, it isn’t that i want the guy to leave or that i don’t love him. Quite the opposite actually. The thing that i know about our role right now is still the same which is one of my newest slogans that i share with people about the homeless population: idleness creates idols and idols creates idleness. This is what motivates us to share with them or model to them the liberating element of being active, either in work or serving.

The college group from SNU did a knock out job organizing the bottom part of the refuge. we went though all the items that have been donated and brought to order what many people have given to us.

thank you guys for coming and being an instrumental part of this work as we continue establishing our base downtown.

Again, to share with you what we are trying to do…

1. Be the light and expose darkness

2. Model the life of Christ to lives who have been enveloped by the life of selfishness. Knowing that Christ came to deny self, we want to model what a life is like that is a living sacrifice.

3. Share love with homeless, prostitutes, gang members, drug dealers, pimps, etc. by serving them…not with stuff, but by relationships. We would say that discipleship comes from relationships, and those relationships will be fostered when we do community and accountability well. And we can only do these two things well through Christ Jesus

more photos of the block party

click here to see photos

some old stuff from the Genesis to Revolution a couple of months ago

Click here to be launched into a slide show of pictures during the Genesis to Revolution

block party a success

man, i was just soooo blown away…so much of me cannot stand event like the block party when they are just focused on giving stuff away and enabling people to stay in their homeless stuper…one of the scriptures that i have been wrestling with is the imfamous prodigal son parable.  Considering the condition the prodigal son was in was when he started to consider home and the blessing it was to be in the father’s house.  i wonder how many prodigals are out there that are kept from reflecting back to the times they walked and talked and hung with the Father, and their condtion of emptiness and living for self has brought them to need for change.  but along comes a good and well intentioned individual who has a desire to feed the prodigal, when actually, the prodigal needed discipleship.

The church has one commission…to go make disciples.  The problem with “programs” or feeding organizations, or anything else is that there is very very little discipleship.  The word disicpleship has come down to two things for us at the refuge…those two things are accountablility and community.

ok, well i don’t want to get started, and i need to focus back on the block party and how it was successful…main reason why it was a homerun…it was based upon relationships, not about enabling…it was a way of inviting the homeless people to engage instead of enable.  Yes, we fed, but we brought them in close into small groups and had them talk with one another.  Typically, when you feed the homeless community, they get their food and flee and/or go eat by themselves.  Yes, we gave away socks, but we washed their feet too.  Yes we gave them photos after a hair cut, but we also had phones available for them to call home…and like Jesus, who would tell someone after He had ministered to them, He would say, now go home and tell your family what you have done.

Future ideas for the years to come…smaller but spread out block partys…our ultimate goal is to see community developed within communities around the city.  the reason for this is to develop a sense of neighborhoods and community within each other.  where neighbors know neighbor and serve each other.  We are really fighting for two things…to love God and to love our neighbor.

That is all for now…

here are some photos of the block party 2008

click here for photos

if you are reading this and have photos please email them to me so that i can post them.  thanks

block party 2008

we are getting started this week to prepare for another block party.  we are about to see several hundred believers crash with a population that is without much…but mainly relationships.  it is going to be soo fun to see how the bride of Christ engages with all of the neighbors of the refuge.

be in prayer that God would pour out His Spirit during this time as use us to be light and salt.

they are coming to us

there has been a huge shift lately, where the homeless population is really really getting excited about us and what God is doing with us down there.  It has been awesome to see how the homeless people are really approaching us lately asking us to help them.  typically, helping them means praying for them and seeing God deliver them from their stuff that is ensnaring them.  so many are dealing with such deep issues it isn’t easy to help them with much success.  but we are really seeing the power of God become super real down there as we are praying over people.  it has been so fascinating to watch and difficult to translate on to this blog.  the things that are coming about are more than numbers and quick fixes, but it seems more like a movement of the heart in the community down there.

God’s Grace is Being Poured Out

Last week, as Refugees, we prayed and fasted for a day.  we ended breaking fast together as a community and than rode bikes around town celebrating in the good things that he has been doing.  we know that with the grace that we have been given, we know that we are in a season of much fruit.  and with much fruit being poured out, we didn’t want to get caught up in the things of ourselves.  so as a community of believers, we wanted to lay down our own self, and continue pressing into the things of God.

the heaters were ordered today

yes, if you have been following the story of the refuge, you would know that the heat has been an issue…as you may have heard, we have been given favor with the city to move in as long as each room meets the necessary standards of code.  which this is good news.  it means that we can concentrate on 1 room at a time instead of 25 rooms.  so, we ordered the heaters for all 25 rooms and have begun re-wiring the building to support the electrical demands.  with the heat the final leg in this journey, we are starting to see light at the end of the tunnel.  thank you for all of your prayer and patience in this journey.