John 1:14 - Tenting Ourselves

Last summer about 30 members from our congregation joined members from several others and invaded Panama on a 10 day mission trip. They cared for basic medical needs, worked on construction and building projects, and nurtured children, and preach the resurrection simply by being the incarnational presence of Christ in a handful of villages in Panama. Strange things happen to you when you set aside your own needs, desires, and comfort (all things our Western culture tells us to value as of first importance) to "look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others" (Phil. 2:4).

About one month after that trip, several families were together talking about their experiences, when a mother of two girls (a teen and a pre-teen) asked, "Why can't we do something that here, right in our own community?"

So, tonight approximately 40 people from our community of faith have pitched our tents (literally) in our neighborhood community. Outside, covering the church parking lot and grounds, we have pop-ups, campers, Winnies, and tents of various sizes, shapes, and colors. For the next week, the church will be our home, but not as a nice, sanitized shelter in which we can hide from the world around us. This is going to be the place where we are remember that we are the ekklesia, the "called out" people of God, who are an apostolic or "sent" people. For the next week we will be serving our community by visiting the sick, hurting, and lonely, by helping with yard work, building and roofing projects, and by touching people with the love of Christ.

I have to admit that it is one of the craziest, oddest, most peculiar things I have seen a group of people do. But then maybe this is getting us pointed in the right direction. We have been called to join in ushering in the reign of God through the power of the Spirit, which is at work in the church. And here we are, a strange, peculiar people. Tenting ourselves right off of one of the busiest streets in our area, in the midst of our community, and bearing witness to the great apocalypse that broke into the world through the cross and has broken into and transformed our lives.

Pray for us this week, as we seek to be the Second Incarnation in our community this week.