A Church Rising Up Out of the Culture

A Church Rising Up Out of the Culture

No-Perfect-People-AllowedOne of the books that we have referenced in the formation process of NineSevenZero Church is John Burke’s, No Perfect People AllowedThere he described a type of missional church that resonated with our hearts and our intentions – A Church Rising Up Out of the Culture.

“This is…not a church for a post-Christian culture, where Christians huddle up behind the fortress walls and make forays outside into the messy culture, but a church molded out of a post-Christian people ~ an indigenous church, rising up out of the surrounding culture to form the Body of Christ!”

Craig Whitney of Emerging Leadership Initiative expanded on what this “out of culture” church looks like saying,

“In the simplest of terms, raising up a church out of the culture is what happens when ordinary people are introduced to Jesus and begin to follow him together. In biblical terms, think Corinth. In modern terms, think missionary. In post-modern terms, think messy ~ as unreserved grace is expressed in a community of radical transformation.”

It is this missiological perspective that has helped us create a frame of reference that is another strand of the DNA of NineSevenZero Church. We have not purposed to create another church for church folks and simply rearrange the flock in our communities. We want to be different kind of church. A church for people who aren’t attracted to “normal” churches, who aren’t interested in the Christian sub-culture, or have been hurt by the church in the past.

We live in a valley where a large percentage of the young adults (20 and 30 somethings) have checked out of church or know nothing of the Christian faith. We live in a place where 42 percent of the population aren’t involved in any church and of those who do have a faith preference 23 percent have decreased their involvement in the last ten years. This large and growing segment of our valley doesn’t see the traditional, institutional church as relevant or valuable to their lives.

We intend to engage the unchurched through active service in our local community, an emphasis on personal, meaningful relationships, and a compelling call to live for something larger than themselves as a disciple of Jesus. Instead of asking people to retreat into a Christian safe house, we intend to commission them to live as Jesus lived in the midst of their culture and to be world-changers.

While we see our weekly gatherings as an important part of our worship, fellowship and a front door to NineSevenZero Church, we’ll place our greatest emphasis into developing life-changing, missional small groups with the goal of multiplying them throughout the valley. Our goal is for NineSevenZero to be a different flavor of church that will attract, engage and release people to reveal and expand God’s Kingdom in the 970 area code. But to accomplish these goals the people of NineSevenZero Church must:

  • See our culture through Jesus’ eyes. Passionately reaching out to and embracing those who do not know that God loves them and that Jesus died for their sins.
  • Live as Ambassadors of God’s Kingdom and aliens in a foreign land. Ever mindful of the gulf between the Kingdom and the culture we live in, and always seeking ways to build bridges that support and encourage migration.
  • To be known like Jesus was – “a friend of sinners.” Extending God’s grace and compassion to those around us by actively serving those in need, offering genuine friendship to all, and embracing the messiness of people’s lives as we welcome them into God’s family.
  • To be an authentic community of faith as a testimony of the coming Kingdom, like a city on a hill that all can see. To do life, work, ministry, and spiritual development in the context of genuine, accountable community.
  • To facilitate and encourage the real and ongoing transformation of each believer’s mind, heart, spirit, and life by cooperating with the work of the Holy Spirit.
  • To humbly and with love, boldly present and proclaim the truth of the Gospel and the Word of God, all while trusting the Holy Spirit to work in the heart of man, the sufficiency of Jesus’ redemptive work on the cross, and the just judgement of God in all things.

May NineSevenZero Church be recognized as a people were “unreserved grace is expressed in a community of radical transformation.”

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