We will not be getting together at Mountain View Academy to worship God this Sunday. Instead, we’ll be getting together in our LTGs (small groups) to hang out, watch the Super Bowl, and eat food together. Invite friends and have a good time. If you’re not part of an LTG, use this as an opportunity to check one out. Check out the LTG page for details and more information about each of the LTGs that are currently running.
Our passage for this morning is a really familiar one: Luke 2:1-7, the birth of Jesus Christ. There are a few things about it that I think are easy to skip over because we’re so familiar with it.
The first is that this Jesus is Joseph and Mary’s first born child. For those of you who have kids, think about the time when you were having your first born. Recall the feelings. All that anticipation. All that excitement. And yet, at the same time, all that fear. All that anxiety. Joseph and Mary were likely an emotional mess.
The second is that the trip from Nazareth to Bethlehem, that trip that they took late in Mary’s third trimester was an 85 mile trip through some steep inclines. And if you’ve ever ridden an animal, you know that that’s still a physical exhausting mode of transportation. Think of the time when you were late in your third trimester. How far were you able to walk? Jospeh and Mary were physically exhausted. They were running on fumes.
And lastly, Bethlehem was Joseph’s “own city”, verse 3. Though it’s unclear whether Joseph’s parents were still alive, it’s almost certain that Joseph still had close relatives in Bethlehem. And considering Middle Eastern hospitality, it would’ve been inconceivable for Joseph and his new family to stay the night in some random barn as it’s portrayed in many of our Christmas pageants and plays.
Joseph and Mary likely stayed in one of his relatives’ home as did many of his other relatives, hence, why there wasn’t enough room for their entire family to sleep. With everybody coming back to their hometown to be registered for the census, there was likely a family reunion in the house where Joseph and Mary stayed. There’s music, dancing, massive amounts of food, laughter, and hugging. Jesus is getting passed around the room from family member to family member. And at the end of the day, after the party’s subsided well into the night, Joseph and Mary lay him down in a manger, a step below the living area but under the same roof.
There is very little that’s silent about this night. Very little is calm. And there’s little sleeping in heavenly peace.
If anything it’s a chaotic night. They’re emotionally and physically exhausted before they even get to Bethlehem. And when they do get there, they’re greeted by Joseph’s extended family who are excited to see the new addition to their family.
But Jesus is there with them. And for that reason, one of the lines from Silent Night rings true. It was a “holy night”. Being holy isn’t about being composed and calm, about having it all together with your sins properly managed. Being holy is about being with Jesus, abiding in Him.
I know that many of you are in a place right now where you feel like life is too chaotic to be connected to Jesus. Well, our relationship with Jesus is a two-way street. Jesus reaches out to us as well. Jesus loves you.
But will you notice? Will you notice Jesus loving you in the midst of the chaos of your life?
To notice, consider group life, being part of an LTG. When we live life alone, in seclusion it’s all too easy not to notice Jesus. Our spiritual vision gets near-sighted as we just live through the routines of our lives. But as we share about our lives, chaos and all, others in our LTGs can speak into them revealing Jesus at work in it. And as we pray together through the chaos of our lives, we can tangibly feel Jesus ministering to us through His body, the Church.
Discussion Questions:
31 Then he went down to Capernaum, a town in Galilee, and on the Sabbath he taught the people. 32 They were amazed at his teaching, because his words had authority.
33 In the synagogue there was a man possessed by a demon, an impure spirit. He cried out at the top of his voice, 34 “Go away! What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”
35 “Be quiet!” Jesus said sternly. “Come out of him!” Then the demon threw the man down before them all and came out without injuring him.
I had a message prepared for today (that I’m really looking forward to sharing), but I’m going to table that until next month b/c Leslie and I wanted to share with you some ways that God has been leading us.
The late Ralph Winter, director of the USCWM, once said this: Don’t do what others can and will do, if there are important things that others can’t or won’t do. I love this quote b/c it highlights our willingness. Leslie and I’ve come to see that “I can’t” really often means “I won’t,” and that is a willingness issue. Willingness is a function of faith in a loving God; it’s a function of love for God; a function of hope in God. We’re learning that a lot in life is about willingness. But strangely enough, willingness is thoroughly underemphasized in the Christian life. Quite frankly, we don’t value it as much as we ought to. Instead, we value giftedness, expertise, or experience. But willingness is more important than all of these! These are some of the spiritual realities that I taught the Ethiopian refugees in Dadaab. And they gladly received it from me – even though the giftedness, expertise and experience were not that high in me. But I was willing. And God, because of what He was wanting to do, not only set it up (me of all people trying to launch a movement of the Holy Spirit in Africa!), but He also made it part of my incarnational message to them. I was living proof that willingness made one a Mighty Warrior in the Kingdom of God (I will talk more about this in the future when I share about spiritual authority and walking in the supernatural).
The Lord has been bringing us to a place of greater willingness. Leslie and I are willing. We don’t want to say, “I can’t” to God anymore. Or “I won’t.” We want to say, “Yes, Lord” and “Of course, Father!” This, in fact, is how baylight was founded in the first place when God picked out me, a discouraged and insecure seminary student who believed the lie from satan that I was a failure and would never amount to anything in life; God called this shell of a young man who lost intimacy with Him and confidence to serve to plant a church in the Bay area with Ted Kim — some guy I hardly knew. We all heard. And we all were willing – despite the cost of living out here, despite being told that we will not succeed as pioneer planters. We heard and obeyed because we were willing and wanting to thrill the Father’s heart.
This spirituality of willingness has been part of the original DNA of baylight from the beginning, and as we were calling people to join us on the adventure, it was our willingness to hear God and obey the baffling call out to the Bay area that drew the John and Brea Asburys, the Dave Changs, the Jason Kuos, and others. And not surprisingly, you have turned around and both encouraged and challenged us in this area of willingness. I think of the Jere Kwans who gave up a good living to respond to a prophetic word to enter vocational ministry. I think of the Lee Otts who passed up an MBA at MIT — something that few of us would ever do! — simply because God asked him too. I think of the Steph Chans who were willing to lead with authenticity, the Brenda and Nathan Carlsons who were willing to spend Sunday mornings giving food and drink to day workers despite having no previous training or experience with Hispanic culture. I think about the LTG that was willing to respond to a crazy prophetic word to assemble disaster kits to love their neighbors, the LTG that was willing to listen to God to tell them what they were to buy at Safeway for an elderly couple. The stories abound of so many of you who have caught and lived this same willingness.
We have tried to model that God-thrilling willingness for you in the last few years. When God asked us to sell our beautiful house in Sunnyvale, we said, “Huh? Ok…yes, Lord.” People thought we were crazy; and our parents thought we were making a big mistake but with a good heart. But we KNEW God was behind it, so we were willing to sell despite the [then] downturn in real estate. It was soon after that time that God told us he would be asking us for our job next. He told us we were on year three of a five-year journey – after which we would become “bold voyagers.” The first anchor that needed to be lifted to set sail was the house, the next one was our job here at baylight. A house and a job are good things [please don't hear us wrong!]; they ground us and provide security. But in our case, the Lord was wanting to set us out to sea — that is the the natural design he had for us.
So after having spent over a year and a half in prayer, the Lord has shown us that that time is soon approaching for us. And we wanted to let all of you know and hear from our own mouths that we believe God is calling us to be bold voyagers in half a year’s time. So come March, Leslie and I will be moving out of the Bay area and fully transitioning out of traditional pastoral ministry so we can pursue global missions. And we are going to begin doing that by moving to Globe, Arizona – a small, depressed copper mining town an hour and a half East of Phoenix where we will pursue Kingdom transformation in a holistic and reproducible way along with a few other families who are also willing. We will share details more in the future and in person, but it involves starting shared local businesses as part of mission, starting a base camp as a discipling and sending base, mission to the Apache Reservation, and reproducing these “apostolic base camps” throughout the world – Africa most likely first.
This is NOT a lateral move or even a ploy to go where the grass is greener. There literally is no green grass in the desert of Arizona! We love it here. And, in some ways, we have everything that most people want here in the Bay Area. All our family here in one place. A spiritual family that we never ever before experienced in Chicago. Job security and benefits. And a full and vibrant life. Yet God is calling us out of a lot of this wonderful security and out of the very thing we are well trained for (church ministry) in order that we can be more authentic to the convictions that we’ve come to hold – convictions like the Kingdom of God being not just about great programs in churches and more Christians in more churches, but about the presence of God transforming every layer of society – political, social, economic, educational, etc.; convictions like God REALLY being life-and-death committed to bringing all his lost children, lost coins and lost sheep home again as His A1 priority; convictions like church being 24-7 and a spiritual family – a “who” not a “where.” We want to test out these convictions and not leave them up in our minds but follow them through in life with the desire to experience Jesus more fully. And as I referenced earlier with the ship imagery, our natural design in Christ is to be people who start things as an apostolic and prophetic pair; we are foundation layers who long to make ministry and inroads possible for those who don’t know Christ. We are to be outliers on the edges of ministry — doing things that won’t always be visible or make sense. Only in the last three years have we come to a fuller-orbed grasp of this natural design.
There is a lot of HARD work ahead; what do I know about running a small business? What do I know about farming land (something we hope to do)? I am completely out of my element. And there is a lot of transformation we’re going to have to endure to live life more simply and to relate to Jesus and do mission in new ways. We are fairly certain we will work harder than any period in our lives to date. We are terrified and yet strangely excited at the same time b/c we are realizing that we are about to set sail — just like God has designed us to.
We wouldn’t have been able to do any of this if it weren’t for so many of you here. You have been our spiritual harbor and port — a place where we have been so well cared for and loved, a place where I entered as a discouraged shell of a person. And God has brought healing to me here at baylight where I NOW know what I am made for, and I am asking God for HUGE things that I never before would have dreamed possible. Many of you have prayed for me, journeyed with me, shown love to me and given me the grace and the space and the trust to be able to journey deeper into God’s design for us — even though the church seemed to be heading into unchartered territory that at times even looked cultish and insecure. I will always remember you guys for playing that role in such a pivotal time in my life. You have given me the freedom to grow into the man God has made me to be.
I believe one of the strengths of baylight is that we are a harbor port that heals people and sends them into new places. BayLight has healed so many already, and we’ve sent so many out already. For as small as we are, God has given us lots of influence through the quality of lives produced, the quality of people sent out, and the depth and reach into people groups we have consequently pioneered. Consider me as living proof of that. And, so, I believe it is part of God’s special natural design for baylight to be a place that heals and a place that sends.
There is more to share — some of which we can handle in a Q and A time to follow, but we hope we can share more from our heart face-to-face with all of you over the next half year. We love you and thank you for your investment in our lives.
I’ve had conversations with a few people now regarding the statistic I shared last Sunday: That 5.3% of the San Francisco Bay Area’s population are Evangelical Christians according to a study done in 2000.
Here’s the link to the website for the organization that did the research.
During the sermon, I submitted that such a statistic should make us pause to think of the way that we live as Christians here in the Bay Area. Specifically, that we should see ourselves as the Israelites did during the time of the Babylonian Exile. During that time, the prophet Jeremiah had a word to the Israelite people saying that they are to be invested in the place they found themselves in and that they’re to practice shalom in the midst of the people there. The passage is quoted here.
After having some good conversation with individuals, I thought it would be good to open up the forum to the greater public. What do you think? How does this make you feel? Do you agree or disagree? Any objections?
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