It is interesting that when we were trying to start The Bridge we went to many traditional churches looking for help, but most I could not even get in to see the pastor. We even had a big article in the paper about us starting this new church, yet we had no one show up to encourage us or help us from other churches. Now that we have opened a tattoo shop in our building we get all kinds of people wanting to help us understand how wrong we are. Again I will say most of the comments we have received have been positive, but the negative ones I find humorous. It seems to me if the same amount of energy was put in to helping churches start we would have a revival sweeping the land - the only "help" I have gotten was to correct me rather than actually help.
We have hundreds of new christians growing in Christ that were won by us being all things to all people so we may win some. We have dozens of people that say they were Christian, but were not being discipled or growing that are now challenged regularly and are growing in Christ. We have people serving that are not even welcome in most churches - they don't look right, smell right, talk right for most churches. The people that make up The Bridge, "Bridgebuilders", know they are loved by Jesus because they have felt His love through His people and now they are loving others as Christ loved them.
Another interesting thing is about the "helpful people" that want to school us in proper churchiness. It is no wonder the church in America is in such a bad state. While I am accused of picking verses out to support what we do the naysayers literally pick one verse completely disregarding the immediately previous verse to "prove" their point. There are so many complaints about us using our building for "non-sacred" events and referring to the building as the church it is saddening. The most basic of sunday school classes teaches the church is comprised of the people which is called the body of Christ. We are sorely uneducated in the basics of biblical theology. I completely respect the people that disagree with what we are doing and how, but don't try to twist the bible to defend your emotions. One of the first questions I want to ask of those that want to criticize is what are you doing to expand the kingdom? A quote I have read is something like this "I prefer the way I am doing things to the way you are doing nothing."
I know the excitement about this most recent move at The Bridge will die down. There may be other things that happen to create excitement in the future, but we will not fall to the temptation to be sensational for publicity. I am thankful that God is moving in Genesee County, not just through The Bridge, but many churches are reaching the lost here. I am grateful to be used by Him. I am thankful for the responses of those that disagree with us and promised to pray for us. I am particularly grateful for all those that believe in what we are doing and are jumping in to make a difference.
Monday, January 23, 2012
Monday, January 9, 2012
Church
I have continued to be given interview offers this week. I am excited about the opportunity to share what we are doing and talk about the relevance of the church today! The majority of negative feedback we have received, which has not been nearly as much as the positive, has been based on the mistaken notion that the building used for meetings for discipleship and worship are special. I hope to challenge that thinking and the church in America to stop wasting the resources God has given us by letting millions of sq ft of prime space sit empty all week so it is clean and available for use on Sunday. Pray that we make a positive impact on the many people that will continue to hear about what we are doing and maybe start to see the church as relevant rather than hateful.
Friday, January 6, 2012
Tattoos
Wow!!! Front page article about The Bridge having a Tattoo Parlor in our building has turned into quite the media frenzy. Few things about this - We did not open Serenity Tattoo for publicity, rather to change lives beginning with the artists, their clients and apprentices and spreading from there. Many positive posts from all walks of life - love to see some "getting it." Some negative posts that fall into 3 categories - 1 being Leviticus 19:28 which says not to cut yourselves or make permanent marks - 2 being Jesus clearing the temple in Matthew and 3 being the church is a place for worship not tattoos or other stuff.
The first one is really simple - Lev 19:27 also says to not cut the hair at your temples or trim your beards and that chapter contains many cultural/ceremonial prohibitions based on what the local idolaters were doing and trying to make sure the Israelites were distinguishing themselves from them. Anyone that wants to say that one verse is a prohibition on tattoos must also condemn ear piercing, shaving, and many other currently acceptable practices. Using that verse to condemn tattooing is pure ignorance of good bible study.
The second issue of the temple cleansing is a reference to Jesus running the money changers out. Again poor bible study leads to this thought. The money changing and market place going on was people telling the worshippers that they had to exchange their money for temple money at a markup and their animal sacrifices for better animals at a markup before they could worship. This turned the temple into marketplace of thieves. We are not telling people they must give money to worship - we actually tell first time attenders to not give. Second issue on that is we have no temple, Jesus changed the covenant from the old temple covenant to a new covenant of the Holy Spirit and direct communion with God through Jesus' sacrifice. The church is not a building or location it is the body of Christ comprised of his followers/disciples.
This also addresses the third issue of the building being a place of worship. For far too long the church building has been considered sacred when Jesus made it clear by tearing the veil from top to bottom at His death on the cross there is no physical sanctuary for us to meet with God in. We now come directly to the Father through the Son. The building is just a building that God has entrusted to us to be stewards of. The church has been very poor stewards of the property God gives it by leaving it empty and unused during the week. The building should be used 24 hours a day to serve the community and bring glory to God (which occurs by loving people as well as worshipping God).
The only other real issue raised is linked to the temple cleansing thing and that is that we are in this for money. All the staff and most of the bridgebuilders laugh at this! Our per capita giving is a third of most dying churches due to the financial position of most of our attenders. My low mileage car has 168,000 miles on it, the house I live in with 6 people is 900 sq ft., none of our staff get a regular salary, we barely pay our utilities bill each month and keep the heat low except during services, we paid half down on the building because an outside donor gave us the money to do that. We live at the edge of financial brokenness because we trust God will provide and he always does. Our only debt right now is on the building we just purchased and that will be paid off within 4 years.
Hope this clears some things up. Love the attention this is getting because it is already drawing some unreached people in to check it out. God will get the glory.
The first one is really simple - Lev 19:27 also says to not cut the hair at your temples or trim your beards and that chapter contains many cultural/ceremonial prohibitions based on what the local idolaters were doing and trying to make sure the Israelites were distinguishing themselves from them. Anyone that wants to say that one verse is a prohibition on tattoos must also condemn ear piercing, shaving, and many other currently acceptable practices. Using that verse to condemn tattooing is pure ignorance of good bible study.
The second issue of the temple cleansing is a reference to Jesus running the money changers out. Again poor bible study leads to this thought. The money changing and market place going on was people telling the worshippers that they had to exchange their money for temple money at a markup and their animal sacrifices for better animals at a markup before they could worship. This turned the temple into marketplace of thieves. We are not telling people they must give money to worship - we actually tell first time attenders to not give. Second issue on that is we have no temple, Jesus changed the covenant from the old temple covenant to a new covenant of the Holy Spirit and direct communion with God through Jesus' sacrifice. The church is not a building or location it is the body of Christ comprised of his followers/disciples.
This also addresses the third issue of the building being a place of worship. For far too long the church building has been considered sacred when Jesus made it clear by tearing the veil from top to bottom at His death on the cross there is no physical sanctuary for us to meet with God in. We now come directly to the Father through the Son. The building is just a building that God has entrusted to us to be stewards of. The church has been very poor stewards of the property God gives it by leaving it empty and unused during the week. The building should be used 24 hours a day to serve the community and bring glory to God (which occurs by loving people as well as worshipping God).
The only other real issue raised is linked to the temple cleansing thing and that is that we are in this for money. All the staff and most of the bridgebuilders laugh at this! Our per capita giving is a third of most dying churches due to the financial position of most of our attenders. My low mileage car has 168,000 miles on it, the house I live in with 6 people is 900 sq ft., none of our staff get a regular salary, we barely pay our utilities bill each month and keep the heat low except during services, we paid half down on the building because an outside donor gave us the money to do that. We live at the edge of financial brokenness because we trust God will provide and he always does. Our only debt right now is on the building we just purchased and that will be paid off within 4 years.
Hope this clears some things up. Love the attention this is getting because it is already drawing some unreached people in to check it out. God will get the glory.
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