Missio Lux Missio: Dinner for the Marketplace

Scot Sustad: Giving his initial vision

Jeff Rogers from Kiros Walter: Leader of the One Institute Steve Cockram from 3dm

Thursday night was a picture of the opportunity that Missio Lux gives for everyone to live out their missio (mission), the unique kingdom role that God gives to all of us.

Last night, Scot assembled 30 marketplace leaders all together for a dinner. This dinner was the result of a vision that Scot had almost one year ago when the Lord showed him that he was to bring strategic leaders together to meet one another; learn from one another and to allow kingdom relationships begin to form.

Scot invited Jeff Rogers, head of Kiros Ministries in Seattle, a key connector for the Marketplace to speak. Jeff pointed to many in the room and spoke about their contribution, and then mentioned key national leaders who have come to Seattle because they have heard of the movement happening here. The movement is God's people, all of us, being used to break forth revival in our area.

Next Walter from the One Institute spoke. Walter spoke of a big disappointment in his life that God used to help birth the One Institute which helps identify and equip young entrepreneurial leaders to use their full gifts and talents for the kingdom.

Steve Cockram from 3dm spoke during dessert. He spoke about the triangle of information, imitation and innovation that takes place during discipleship. We have traditionally focused too much on information in the Church, but Jesus did all three: he taught, but he also called his disciples to "follow me and I will teach you through experience....imitation. As we discover our unique calling and style, we are able to innovate and put our unique mark on those that we are discipling.

Scot ended by inviting those present to join him in the discipleship journey by joining a huddle. He passed out gifts: two pictures of a harvest (with a challenge to give one away to someone that we are praying for), and a Building a Discipleship Culture book.

It was an amazing evening and I saw there in great pleasure as I watched the vision of Missio Lux move forward. It's great to spend our missio funds to help the poor, and Missio Lux has many who do that; but it's also a strategic use of funds to bring those that have the potential to use their financial and relational capital to mobilize others to participate in God's great kingdom purposes.

After Scot was finished making his invitation, a man from the boomer generation stood up and said that he had never seen such a thing happen. He noted that a 28 year old had assembled them all for a delicious dinner, good wine, gifts and a challenge to come into the adventure of discipleship. He blessed Scot by his great wisdom and maturity.

We ended the night by praying and blessing one another.

The Blessing Over Scot

One Huddle Hosts the Taster Meals

I was stressing about how the meals that we committed to make for the Taster would be prepared and served. I decided to pray about it and God gave me a brilliant answer! He showed me to ask one of my huddles; so I asked the Wednesday morning women's huddle.

One of the women was the organizer point person; another picked the menu and helped shopped; another made fabulous to die for desserts; a couple of others came to the Taster and prepared lunch.

When I left for the Taster on Tuesday morning, I had the supplies out for the "huddle caterers" to use. I didn't think of everything, but gave them invitation to use whatever they could find that was helpful.

When I walked into our home Tuesday evening, most of the guests had already arrived. It was a gift to see our house with candles burning, flowers strategically located, a station for drinks, and the counter full of delicious food presented in a tasteful way.

This is hospitality in action. These women in my huddle have been to our home so often that they feel almost as if it is their home. One of the guests saw one women open our refrigerator and it made an impression on the guest that she was so comfortable that she could open the frig to take what she needed.

I believe that hospitality is one of Jesus' most important gifts to the world right now. It takes us into a different space with one another and it leaves a lasting impression of being invited, included, welcomed and valued.

Thanks, Wednesday huddle for your terrific hospitality to the Taster!

Celebrating the 3dm Taster

It was a gift to see it all come together. Picking Steve Cockram up at the airport; praying together before the Taster as a team, watching the expectant guests come through the door. It was worth all the effort it took to bring it to this point.

One of the best gifts of 3dm is their ability to take the Bible and make the concepts from it simple to remember. They say that the Bible is simple, but hard. Simple to learn, but hard to live out. We have made the Bible seem complex but easy.

Understanding the Bible from the lense of covenant relationships and kingdom partnerships helps us to know that God values us as his children and as his kingdom partners. We also realize that Jesus only spoke the word "church" two times in all of the Gospels. One time in regards to church discipline and the other when he told Peter that he is the rock on which he would build his church.

But, from start to finish, Jesus invited, he trained and equipped, and he sent his disciples. Jesus spent the majority of his time investing in 12 ordinary men; recognizing that his imprint on them would multiply to the ends of the earth.

Jesus also spoke the culture of the day. He told stories in themes that people could relate to. We don't live in an oral culture any longer; everything is visual.

As we take the simple themes of Scripture and match them to shapes; they come alive.

I saw the lightbulbs go on over and over through the Taster as we explored the Dual Triangles of Covenant and Kingdom, the Learning Circle for processing what God is saying to us and how we are responding, the Triangle which illustrates a balanced life, the semi-circle which points us to the rhythm of rest and work and the grid of invitation and challenge.

The next step for those that attended the Taster is to be invited into a huddle for coaching, and to join a Learning Community. Please pray for Missio Lux as we determine how God is moving us to engage our next step!

The Tree of Life: Our New Life as the Family of God

This fall we explored the inner soil of the tree of life, along with the root systems and how the tree grows with fertilizer, sun, water and special care by the Gardener.

This winter we are focusing on the trunk of the tree as we consider how we live in relationship with our Heavenly Father and one another as the Family of God.

The key passage for our development as children of God is in Romans 8:14-17: “For all who are being led by the Spirit of God are children of God. For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption by which we cry out, "Abba! Father!" The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.”

I can think of so many adopted children that have the experience of knowing that they were REALLY WANTED by the parents who adopted them. Sometimes, however, the thought that the ones who created them, their birth parents, who gave them up, overshadows the reality of being desperately desired.

I wonder if sometimes we as God’s children live in that place too. We find that it’s easier to consider how our earthly parents disappointed us than to remember how powerful God’s invitation to his family truly is.

We have a real life example of this in Missio Lux.

We heard of a young woman who was struggling with an extreme family situation. Her mother had just died and she was taking a bus for over an hour each way to get to school. The school was seeking a family who would provide a home for her for the last eight months of her senior year.

A family within Missio Lux responded with an invitation for her to come and live with them.

They decided that they would treat her as a “real daughter” not just as one who was living with them temporarily. They left sweet notes on her pillow at night, took her to school and work each day, invited her to their social gatherings, and even took her with them at Thanksgiving to a visit with extended family. She got sick and the family took her the dr and nursed her as she recovered on the couch for almost two weeks. This girl was receiving love beyond anything she had ever experienced; she was living out the Spirit of Adoption in action.

However, it proved to be too much for her. It turns out that she had fabricated the whole story of her mother’s death; in actuality the mother was in prison for a short period. One day the girl just disappeared from her aunt’s house and went to live with the family from Missio Lux. Her aunt and mother never knew where she went.

I believe that as she experienced a glimpse of the true family of God; she sabotaged it because all her old messages of being rejected, neglected, and unprotected were in so much contrast that she had to blow it up. The family ended up discovering that her circumstances were vastly different than they had been told. In reality, everything about her story was a lie.

This may seem like an extreme example but I wonder how many still live out of the place of the orphan/slavery spirit rather than discovering the vast love and provision of our Heavenly Father who adopts us into his own family.

Exploring our adoption into the Father’s family is a key development part of our faith. When we truly experience the love our Heavenly Father, we are forever changed. His love sets us free from our previous experience as an orphan.

This week, I invite you to spend time meditating on the Romans 8 passage.

Ask your Heavenly Father what it means to be adopted into his family. Take time to consider what life in his family can be. Ask him to bring you into the full experience of his adopted family.

I end with Paul’s prayer in Ephesians: a prayer that he prayed for all of us that have followed after him. May it become increasing reality in your life.
“For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever! Amen.” Ephesians 3:14-21

Missio Lux Hosts a 3dm Taster this Week!

This is an exciting week for Missio Lux. We are hosting a Taster for ministry leaders to "experience a taste of 3dm."

We have taken a team of 5 to South Carolina 4 times over the past 20 months to learn from 3dm, and to discover their structure of huddle, missio community and celebration that is helping equip churches and leaders to walk out the two themes of the Bible: Covenant and Kingdom: the Great Commandment and the Great Commission!

It's a gift to be able to invite ministry leaders from this area to discover 3dm too. It's a lot closer to come from Seattle or even Spokane than to take the really LONG journey to South Carolina.

I am looking forward to introducing Steve Cockram to many of my Covenant friends and other ministry leaders from this area. (Steve and his family are in the picture).

I am most looking forward to introducing Peter Sung, the Director of Church Planting for the Covenant and my boss, Kurt Carlson to huddle, as it has made such an impact in our lives in Missio Lux.

One woman that has experienced life transformation through huddle. She came to Missio Lux a broken woman, just moving out of a very painful divorce. However, in the atmosphere of huddle, she has grown by leaps and bounds....able to hear God's voice and pray it for others; her desire and love for the "trunk" (the people of God) is huge and she shows it in tangible ways, and her passion to share what's taking place in her life with her friends and neighbors and just about everyone she meets, is overflowing.

My dream is for this life transformation story to be all of our stories, across all churches, denominational lines, and across the US and the world. As we discover what Jesus is asking us to do, and then do it; it changes us.

Just Like the Hams

Written by LaurieBunnel:http://www.laurieonlifestyle.blogspot.com/

I'm still processing some of the things I learned through the recent food packaging event where we packaged 40,000 meals for the Children of the Nations and also collected donations for the local food banks. When you take on a God sized challenge (and believe me a small volunteer team coming up with over $10,000 and getting over 200 people on board in less than a month was a God sized problem) it is a great chance to see God show up and do His thing. In fact, we've had quite a few opportunities like this with Missio Lux. Again, this time, I keep thinking "it is just like the Easter hams."

You see, when we were going to host our first Easter banquet with the poor and disenfranchised in Occidental Square of downtown Seattle, we only had two past experiences to go on. The first time we were there we planned to serve about 250 meals off our BBQs, but the line of hungry people kept getting longer. We ended up running back to various stores for more and more food until we had provided 1,000 meals!

So needless to say, when we didn't know what to expect for the first Easter, a couple of us (namely Rosemary and me) were a little concerned that we made sure we had enough food. I will never forget the night in Pastor Tamara's living room when Rosemary was asking, "How many hams do we need?" I was doing the math in my head: if a ham serves 20 people then for 1,000 people we would need about 50 hams. The questions started: "Do we buy them?" "How many hams will each person actually bring?" "Will we have enough?" But I remember Tamara was getting more and more frustrated with the level of detail the conversation was taking and she put an end to it when she said very frankly, "God will provide the ham" and moved on to the next topic.

At the time I thought she was more than just being a little irresponsible, I thought she was a little bit nuts. I must admit I fretted over the ham. I made sure I bought two to bring and someone else dropped one off at my house. However, the morning of the event my family was busy packing up balloons, tables, signs, and other items, but no one even thought about the ham. Guess what? We had SO MUCH ham! It was as if the ham was multiplying right in the warmers. At the end people were going home with extra ham and food was taken to the local shelters. When I got home, opened our refrigerator and saw those three big fat hams it was as if God was saying, "Do you trust me now to provide what is needed?"

Well at our food packaging event it was clear that God provided. First the money needed rolled right in ahead of schedule as people's hearts were stirred and many missio communities committed their funds as well as individuals making generous donations. As the day approached it became very apparent that we had no control over two things in particular, the weather and the number of people who would come to package meals.

For days before the event the weather was forecasting snow on our big day, then lots and lots of snow. In Seattle when it snows a few flakes the whole city shuts down. We were nervous the morning of the event when it was snowing. Tamara and I prayed (as I'm sure lots of other people did too)and it stopped. Later it started again, and we prayed, the sun came out. Then just a couple hours before we were supposed to start it really came down in big fluffy flakes. So we prayed again and low and behold it stopped. We were so thankful the snow storm didn't start until the next day! I would not have believed it if I didn't see it myself.

The best part was that even with the threat of snow, many people were faithful to come and volunteer and also invite friends and neighbors. In fact, we had EXACTLY the number of people we needed to pack those meals. A few more would have been too many extra people. A few less and we would have had a hard time finishing the job in the allotted time. The participants were amazingly enthusiastic and it was an amazing time!

What God sized challenge are you faced with? Are you trusting that there will be enough ham?

Freedom Goes Forth

I blogged last week about the past weekend: we had signficant events in two of our foundational ministries: Healing and Recovery.

When I woke up Friday morning, I had the same level of anticipation that I had on Christmas morning when I was a child. I knew that the coming weekend would be a gift. Friday night the Healing Prayer Training, Weekend 2 took place: Unlocking the Key of Emotional and Inner Healing.

Part of the joy for the weekend was the combination of the people that were assembling for the training: my dear friend, Terri Parzybok from Living Free Ministries, our sister healing ministry in Denver was flying in with her friend, Terri who is part of the leadership team for LFM.

Several women were driving in from Helena, MT where Muffie and I did a women's retreat in October. The team from Mt. Vernon came down in mass, ready to be healed and to learn to be a healer of others.

Others who are from Seattle came in with the same look of expectancy that I woke up with earlier that morning. We knew that the Lord was going to be present with us and that he would touch us in ways that go beyond our normal experience. The faith in the room was already really high in expectancy of the Lord's healing power flowing forth, because everyone had experienced it at least once before.

I love what happens when we assemble in an atmosphere of faith. It's such a privilege for me to be able to teach about healing when it seems that everyone is like a little bird with their mouth propped open to drink it all in.

It was over too soon. When we stood in the circle at the end Saturday afternoon and lit our candles (representing that we are missio lux: a mission of light to the world), and told what we were leaving behind and what we were taking with us...no one seemed ready to leave.

But, we knew we must leave because we only get to keep what we give away. We have a mission to go and help others stand in the freedom that we have received.

Sunday, despite it being the exact time of the Seahawks playoff game, we had a housefull of people ready to hear teaching from Terri Parzybok from Living Free Ministries. She helped all of us, myself included, pray in greater faith for physical healing. I kept getting texts through the morning of people that had physical needs so we were able to bring those requests and many others to the Lord for his healing power to be released.

I have some friends who have a baby that was born very prematurely. Her name is Svea Lucia. Lucia means "light" in Swedish. That morning the drs. determined that she was coming down with pneomonia. We stood and prayed and proclaimed the truth that Jesus is the healer, that by his stripes we are healed (Is 53). Right after we did this and I was texting the family about our prayer, the sun burst through the heavy cloud cover, shined right in the room for about 1 minute and then disappeared again.

I later got a text from Svea's parents that the temperature was down and that there were no signs of the infection!

The weekend ended with the Martin Luther King holiday celebrating Celebrate Recovery's 3 year anniversary. We ate a delightful meal while I looked around the room and saw a lot of men, and some women, who were sitting together eating as meaningful friends, because they have walked out their recovery together. They are finding freedom as they look towards God and teh support of one another to live a lifestyle like Jesus and 12 steps.

When the large group time started, we worshipped to the original music of the Rag Band who have faithfully come each week for 3 years to bring worship to CR, and then three of the key leaders gave testimonies. They were full of pain becoming freedom as they took intentional steps towards freedom.

Intentionality is the key word. Everything that took place last weekend was people "INTENTIONALLY" gathering to pursue that which Jesus died for and promised to us "If we continue as his disciples, we shall know the truth and the truth shall set us free."

The "if" is our part. If we continue to pursue Jesus and his truth, we will live in freedom. It's a partnership with him: we intentionally come seeking his truth and healing, and he comes and brings healing and freedom.

It was a good weekend....I am grateful to be part of all of it.