Reasons 234 and 235 that, contrary to the insistence of our really good friends in the Northwest, there is no way that Seattle is the least-churched city in America:
1, they have an FM Christian radio station named SPIRIT 105.3.
2, you can buy Testamints at the checkout counter of the grocery store.
Neither of these things would ever, ever exist in Boston or anywhere near it. Ever.
John here. I’ve crawled out of my cave of solitude and books to deliver this to you via world wide web. I hear kids these days are really into it with their intranet and video arcade games and their British Knight shoes and their board games and the likes. Carmen Dei’s new song. We’ll be debuting it this week at worship but just wanted to give you a heads up. By the way, can I say how lucky we are to have ridiculous musicians like Chris, Nick, and Laurel. Every time I introduce new stuff these folks pick it up at light speed. Very rare in the music world. I take it for granted. I’m truly thankful for the gifts God has given them. If any of you other 7 Milers are musicians but secretly hiding give me a holla lest I find out your holding back on us and you have to have a meeting with uncle nun-chucks. Yeah dats what I thought. Kidding. Does anyone have nun-chucks though? If so that is AWESOME.
“Reconciliation in Real Time” (Temp title, sounds like an indie movie. I like the idea of reconciliation being accomplished and being in history, in real time, once for all, not some esoteric, philosophical thing but an event with eternal consequences.)
Silent Lamb breathes not but a whisper.
Blood and Spit disguise his face.
Crown of thorns. Wooden cross. Nails and splinters.
Pierce the one who took our place.
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Silent lamb breathes not but a whisper.
Mocking crowd Hail “Crucify!”
Pain endured for the joy set before him.
All things through him reconciled.
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We feed ourselves on every word that God breathed out,
Shadows of the Son in each line. (Temporary line…but I sorta like it)
Weaved throughout the story of redemption is the suffering and glory of Christ.
God didn’t stay in the heavenly realm but he made himself nothing and took our sin upon himself.
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Sin so small in our eyes that we figure. Senseless murder waste of life.
Sin so huge in our eyes may we see it. The Son of God was crucified.
Sin so small in our eyes that we wonder, “Divine abuse from on high?”
No! We were made at one reconciled to the Father. The wrath of God was satisfied.
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We feed ourselves on every word that God breathed out,
Shadows of the Son in each line.
Weaved throughout the story of redemption is the suffering and glory of Christ.
God didn’t stay in the heavenly realm but he made himself nothing and took our sin upon himself.
Here is a run down of texts that are helping to shape the Jesus Biographies preaching…
According to Plan, Goldsworthy (redemptive story of the Bible comes alive, well done)
Hearing the Old Testament in the New Testament, Porter (really good sections on typology)
The Right Doctrine from the Wrong Text, Beale (Gordon Hugenberger is wicked smaht)
Tinity Festival 2007 – Stories of the Older Testament (Awesome, awesome, awesome look at OT biographies previewing Jesus biography. When the Reformed dudes get it right, they get it really right)
A House For My Name, Leithart (great overview of redemptive themes throughout the Old Testament)
Preaching Christ in Genesis, Greidenhaus (Genesis getting you ready for Jesus, loved it)
The Book of Joshua, Nicot (standard commentary, helpful)
1 & 2 Kings, Leithart (a Gospel-centered take on the ‘books of Kings’, loved it)
Elijah, Swindoll (written from the assumption that Aesop inspired the Bible, everything moralized, just terrible)
A Commentary of Jeremiah, Brueggemann (Haven’t cracked it yet, he is uncomfotably/dangerously liberal in his view of inspiration, but is supposed to also bring great insight into the OT, gonna give him a shot)
This Spring’s Seven Mile Road Marriage Prep Track kicked off last night. (Can I call it Spring when there is 15 inches of snow falling?)
Really, really excited about grounding Alex, Cynthia, Dave, Sarah, Sean, and Christina in a deep, rich, Biblical vision of what their marriage can be for God’s glory and their joy. Night one is always intense, but good intense, as we consider just what God is getting at when He unites a man and a woman in marriage. Wow.
Be remembering their guys in prayer in this season.
Incredibly, Grace and I are married 13 years this month. Here’s a picture from our courtship, which I handled not so well, but God was gracious. And He continues to be so, even though I inch along in my understanding of marriage and my love for my wife.
Yes, that is a polk-a-dot shirt.
One of the incredible joys of pastoring Seven Mile Road over the last few years has been doing it on team… serving beside other ‘oxes’ carrying the glorious weight of the task with me. I could fill the blogosphere with ways that I have received from Kevin and Ajay as friends, brothers, pastors, colaborers. The last two weeks I spent without either of them around and I didn’t love it. Ajay, of course, is in Philly for good. Kevin was gone leading a team on a trip in Kenya. Sooooooo glad he is back. So excited about calling more men to ox it up with me in service to our community.
(Nope, that is not Kevin in picture, but I adore Bridget and missed her as well!)
Today I was on tv. (If you are on a tv show that less than 500 people will ever see, does it count? I say yes.)
Here is the back story. A local high energy Malden woman (You would love her. Hi Karin.) is throwing an event where on one Sunday afternoon the city will be invited to do 15 minute tours of the houses in worship here in Malden. Since we don’t ‘have a church building’, we don’t fit too easily in their plans, but she was gracious enough to invite us anyway. And then, for some reason, she chose us and 2 other communities to be on a local tv show. Not sure why I got the call…
But I went.
It wasn’t an easy decision. I am against polytheism in all its forms, and events like these are basically polytheistic pep rallys. “Religion/spirituality/faith are all really the same thing, whatever your preference is doesn’t matter, it’s a better world if we all are a part of the faith community of humanity in some way, blah, blah and blah.” It is fascinating to me, but millions believe this to be truth. What is so ironic is that it is a narrow, specific, particular truth claim that disguises itself with the inclusive sounding name of universalism.
But we also love our city deeply, are constantly in prayer that God would extend grace to many here, and do not want to miss an opportunity to lift up the person and work of Jesus whenever we can, especially on television if given the opportunity. And so we went seeking to love our neighbors and be like Jesus and give voice to His Gospel.
Some reflections on the show…
1, for whatever reason, I have been given the Barack Obama/Rob Bell gift. (Not on their level, but same gift.) It is the gift where, almost no matter what you actually say, 90% of people respond by saying, “Wow, what a great communicator. I really connected with him. I could listen to him all day.”
This gift is both a blessing and a curse.
It is a blessing because God indeed gifts people to be His preachers, and while content is king, he condescends to us in giving us people who can communicate that content in ways we can receive. This is an undeserved, incarnational grace He has given to sinners. In every generation and nation he contextualizes His offer of salvation through indigenous, gifted preachers, so that people can respond and be saved.
It is a curse because sometimes people can be so mesmerized by your delivery that they cannot ‘hear’ the content. It is a curse because you can draw big crowds while communicating heresy really coolly. It is a curse because people will not stumble over the Gospel you preach because its package is so palatable… ‘but he was such a good communicator.’
Case in point was that there was a gracious guy from the Unitarian Universalist church (Hi Joe, good to meet you) that is a community that preaches the all-religions-are-equal and we’re-all-just-fine-in-the-end gospel. Joe said to me after the show, “I love your message.” I said, “Really?” I was honestly surprised me. How can he love my message? I talked about the person and work of Jesus for sinners, about how my Morrocan neighbors and I disagree on truth and Scripture and God and the meaning of life, about how I long to see people converted to faith in Jesus. All of these convictions should be offensive to a UU guy. Joe should have been in a fistfight with me: I was calling into question everything they assume to be true at his parish. But he loved my message because I talk well. This is scary to me.
2, our Morrocan friends know the real deal. They are willing to be a part of these ecumenical gatherings because it is bringing a legitimacy to their organization. But they are not buying the ooey-gooey all faiths are equal stuff. Their eyes lit up when I spoke of how I extend grace to my neighbors even though I disagree with their faith claims and want them to see the light of the Gospel of Jesus. They get that disagree part. They want the world to be Muslim, every last one of us submitting to Allah and the Koran. They are not pretending that we’re both right. I appreciate that.
3, I cannot believe the grace that has been extended to me. I said something like, “Look. I am the last dude who should be leading the planting of a church. I am a 30 year old white American who grew up on South Park, Saturday Night Live, the Simpsons, and every other secular, sacrcastic, skeptical show. My government school taught me that I evolved from a monkey and that man was the measure of all things. I should be sleeping late and playing basketball on Sundays. I should not be anywhere near a ‘church.’ But the good news of Jesus and His Gospel and His truth changed my life. Religion is not interesting to me, but the life, joy, peace, and forgiveness that were poured out on the cross, that is a totally different story.” Thank you gracious Father for throwing my eyes open to see.
I love the cities just-north-of-Boston. I weep that church after church has nice architecture and organs but no people because Jesus was thrown out long ago. God is justified in ‘extinguishing the candles’ of these churches. But judgment is never the end of His story. Grace inevitably follows. May God raise up 2 new Spirit-empowered, Jesus-centered, Gospel-embracing churches for every 1 that dies.
Many we be one of the millions.
A quick update on the last 6 months at Seven Mile Road:
We are growing bigger.
You Bruins fans know what a hockey stick looks like: real slight curve along the bottom of the stick and then a sharp incline up the handle. The last 6 months have been sharp incline territory for us, as shown below.
Average attendance in most recent month: 114
Average attendance six months ago: 86
This Sunday: 126
Six month ago Sunday: 78
Relative to other places in the U.S. these numbers are paltry. But we are in Massachusetts, in a hall that seats 130-140. And so space is an issue. The consensus here so far has been that, while we love the idea of one church/multiple locations, the shoe size of our main site needs to be double what it is or more before we can pull that off. (Notice in that link that our good friends at Vintage 21 are moving to a second site now that there base site is at 700 weekly.)
And so our priority is to find a location that can gather 250-300 souls in worship of the Triune God each week. That task looms monumentally before us with really high space costs, limited parking, a general disdain for ‘religion/church’ in our culture (among building owners anyway), and the relative youth of our congregation. But we trust that if Jesus is planting this church He can find space for it.
Best of all, I am convinced that the reason for the growth is simply the power of the Gospel and the Bible and Scripture and preaching and liturgy and community… nobody is coming for the light show or the coffee or because they are predisposed to church.
We are growing smaller.
Everything typed above means jack squat if we are not making disciples. Sunday attendance ranks #11 or 12 on the ‘important metrics for missional health along the Seven Mile Road.” (I just type that part first because I am an idolater at heart, I suppose.)
Super exciting is that we have a fifth soulcare community off the ground with nearing 14 Seven Milers participating in it already. This one is in Beverly. (Can you imagine people drive from Beverly to be a part of the Road? Cool.) This means that between our 5 smaller communities there will be over 60 people committed to following Jesus, loving their brothers and sisters, allowing themselves to be shaped by Scripture, confessing their sins, sharing their lives. That’s a big number for a church that is just hitting 120 in attendance. And it doesn’t include kids, meaning it’s more like 60 in smaller communities out of 100 adults on a Sunday, 60%. I bless God for His grace in sending us leaders and hosts willing to put their blood, sweat, and tears into making disciples here.
Everything is getting more complicated.
Seven Mile Road is led exclusively by ‘tentmakers’… which is Biblical jargon for “people who work a day job (like making tents, say) to provide for their families and lead the church for either part-time or no pay. While there is totally nothing wrong with full-time staff, our model in this economy so far has been to keep payroll costs minimal while getting the church jumpstarted. We love the model.
As we grow, however, it becomes harder to keep the pace. And so we need more leaders being shaped for more ministry so that the load can be shared and effective Gospel work can be done. And we are not just talking more checks to deposit or more classes to teach or more emails to send out. We are talking more sin to be worked through, more gossip to be confronted, more tough conversations with abdicating dads, more time spent working through hard stuff people are enduring, more opportunities for misunderstanding. More sheep always means more wolves. And that means more work.
And so we are definitely at a point where we need to call more pastors, and also introduce more ‘tracks’ shaping more people for leadership at Seven Mile. We have ideas for 2 other tracks (in addition to the Pastor Track) that need to get off the ground.
We need to keep mission before us.
One mark of recent growth is that is has been 60% or more folks who were looking for a church. It was on their radar. That can be dangerous (hate church hoppers if they are simply there to take up seats and observe rather than join the mission), but it can be awesome as well… people who just need to be plugged into a Gospel-centered, missional church for their souls to come alive.
But we are not jazzed up about only growing because people looking for a church find ours. We also need to be scattering our people just-north-of-Boston to light the joint up and draw people to Jesus. Mission always leaks, and so we need to be diligent about ways that we are extending God’s grace to us out into this world.
As we face the next season, the uncertainties abound. But hey, that should be the fun. The Gospel is true. I am pretty sure that Jesus has many in this city who are His. I love the idea of being one of the Spirit-empowered communities sent to that harvest.
Here is the study guide we set up to walk everyone through this next preaching season at Seven Mile Road. Enjoy.
Here is the basic intro to where we are going in this next sermon series commencing on Sunday…
On the day of His resurrection, the risen Christ joins two of His disciples who are solemnly walking the seven mile road home from Jerusalem to Emmaus. Not recognizing who He is, the pair engage Jesus in conversation about the awful events of the past three days. Jesus listens quietly as they forlornly share about the great prophet from Nazareth, whom they had hoped was the Messiah, being condemned and crucified just outside Jerusalem. Perplexing them even more is a wild report that some of Jesus’ followers had visited His tomb and found it empty.
What could it all mean?
Rather then responding with a shrug of His shoulders, Jesus levels a rebuke. He insists that they should have known that the Christ would pass through suffering to glory. They should have anticipated Jesus’ death and resurrection.
They should have seen it coming.
That same night, Jesus shares a bread-and-fish lunch with His disciples. Halfway through the meal, Jesus begins to teach, opening their minds to understand the Scriptures, adamant that every word of their bible was prefiguring the events of His Gospel. The Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms all tell the same story: the Christ would die, the Christ would rise, and the nations would be saved.
In other words, the Old Testament is the biography of Jesus.
The Jesus Biographies preaching series at Seven Mile Road is designed to help us understand one of the ways in which this is true. It is not only the events, institutions, prophecies, and offices of the Old Testament that prefigure what Jesus would accomplish in the Gospel.
It is also the biographies.
In one sense, the Old Testament is a fascinating collection of eclectic biographies: Adam, Abel, Abraham, Amos, Ahab, just to name a few of the a’s. And yet Jesus maintained that, in another sense, the Old Testament is a single biography: His. And so we would expect that many of the stories of Old Testament saints would be getting us ready for the story of Christ.
And that is exactly what they do.
For the next 18 weeks we are going to study the biographies 18 different Old Testament characters. And in doing so, we are going to see, over and over again, that they were readying us for suffering and glory of Christ.
Here is the basic feel of the artwork for the series. Remember those composition books you had to write stories in in 4th grade? Since we’re going with a narrative theme of tying in the stories of Old Testament lives with the Story of the suffering and glory of Jesus, we’re going with the composition book theme…
As we move into a new series, we’re also going to be introducing some new songs that will aid in our corporate response to the Word and sacrament and Gospel. We’ll post lyrics and mp3s as we go so you can show up on Sundays ready to go.
Here is one of those new songs called Overcame. We have tweaked the lyrics some, so here is what will actually be singing on Sundays…
OVERCAME
Written by Jon Egan, arranged by Seven Mile Road
VERSE 1
Seated above, enthroned in the Father’s love.
Destined to die, poured out for all mankind.
God’s only Son, perfect and spotless one.
Became the Lamb, atoning for all we’d done.
(Now) All authority and every victory is Yours. 2x
CHORUS
Savior, worthy of honor and glory.
Worthy of all our praise.
For You overcame.
Jesus, appointed for suffering and glory.
Awesome and great is Your name.
For You overcame.
VERSE 2
Glorious surprise, the Savior is crucified.
Then risen again, securing eternal life!
(Now) All authority and every victory is Yours. 2x
REPEAT CHORUS
BRIDGE
Sin is overcome by the blood of the Lamb
And the truth of this testimony: Jesus has overcome!
Death is overcome by the blood of the Lamb
And the truth of this testimony: Jesus has overcome!
We will overcome by the blood of the Lamb
And the word of our testimony: Jesus has overcome!
REPEAT CHORUS
TAG
This is my story! This is my song!
Praising my Savior all the day long…
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