As most of you are going through the How People Change curriculum and undoubtedly facing some heat from the sensitive topic on Sunday, Mark has provided additional information and resources on the Pastors blog.

Foundry:

Historically, a foundry was a location where tools and weapons were forged and fashioned. It was a place where iron would sharpen iron, which corresponds to the biblical concept of community (Prov. 27.17).

As Mars Hill¹s one-day educational program, Foundry fosters community and spiritual refinement through one-day (Saturday morning) classes.
Participants can take the content beyond the classroom setting using an optional study guide, provided for further individual study, family devotions, and/or Community Group discussion. Foundry is open to members and church attendees.

EVENT:

If you are interested in better understanding Jesus in the Old Testament, there¹s an important event on the Mars Hill calendar for you.

On October 6 at the Ballard Campus, a course called ³Emmaus Road: Seeing Christ in all of Scripture² will be offered.

Luke 24:27 ³And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he [Jesus] interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself²

Just as Jesus taught the disciples on the Emmaus Road after His resurrection to see himself in the Old Testament, this class will lay the foundation of the overarching Biblical story, studying Jesus in the Old Testament and our role within God¹s story.

This Saturday seminar is a great opportunity to grow in your knowledge of Jesus and to gain a broader view and respect for the story of God found within the Old and New Testament. Come by yourself, with your Community Group, or with your family for this valuable teaching seminar.

Schedule for the day:

9:00-9:45 Big Picture Overview (Pastor Gary Shavey)

9:45-10:15 Seeing Christ in the Old Testament: Garden of Eden

through the Exodus (Deacon Greg Joines)

10:15-11:00 Seeing Christ in the Old Testament: Conquest through the

Church (Pastor Bill Clem)

11:15-12:00 Breakout:

Track A: Christ in the Wisdom Literature (Pastor Zack

Hubert)

Track B: Christ in the Psalms (Deacon Andrew Pack)

Track C: Christ in the Prophetic Literature (Deacon Wendy

Alsup)

12:00-12:30 Conclusion (Pastor Bill Clem)

Here¹s the link to register.

https://www.sporg.com/pom/registration?cmd=event_info&event_id=93902

Leaders,

Read this post by Pastor Dick. This is an opportunity for the people in your group to serve not only the church, but the city by providing hospitality to families that need to hear about Jesus.

-I am so excited about this new season at Mars Hill with the expansion to the multi campus model and Ballard being the training center in which to send from. This affects each ministry as we raise up leaders, trained teachers and volunteers to fill positions now in their communities reaching their neighbors. As you know Wedgwood launches in Oct. and the Eastside and downtown are soon to become realities, therefore, we will be sending many trained people from Ballard to these campuses.

The fact that we are on mission is exciting and the fact that so many people come to Mars Hill because they believe in the mission of seeing lives transformed for Jesus in and around the city of Seattle is nothing short of miraculous. But part of sending trained people out is filling those now empty spots. We are sending up to 50 trained people (just in Children’s ministry) in the next few weeks and months and therefore need those who are committed to the Ballard campus to step up and fill the holes of those who are being sent. I write this for Children’s Ministry but in reality every ministry is sending and every ministry needs people to fill these positions. If you are on mission with us the easiest way to find out about the needs and opportunities in the church is to go to the serve desk in the main foyer as it is a one stop shop of ministry opportunities in the church. If you see yourself serving the little MH culture please email  renee@marshillchurch.org

Pastor Dick McKinley

Children’s Ministry Pastor

Should community be a safe place?

I often hear it said that to have a healthy growing community groups ministry, the groups must be a safe place for believer and non-believer alike. And to this point I agree, that the community of God should be a place that is welcoming to all comers, hospitable and loving. and in that sense very safe.

But what are people really saying when they say they want their community to be safe?

I fear that many equate safety with comfort. Defining a safe group as one where I can be myself.not judged but excepted as I am, “judge not, lest ye be judged”.right?

Sounds great. but wait. what if “myself” is a gossip. or a liar, or ungrateful, or self worshiping. Should a Community Group be a place where I am free to be those things in a safe environment? Have we not been called to spur one another on to good deeds. to encourage and rebuke one another so that we glorify Jesus with this fleeting life? (Hebrews 3:12-14)

My wife and I experience this as we prepared to go through the HPC curriculum with another couple. We experience some trepidation as we prepared to expose ourselves in that community. Our fear was not because we did not trust or loving friends. It was because, in that community, we could guarantee discomfort from the exposure of our sin. Should we have dismissed this community because it was un-safe?

If safety is comfort then I pray our groups are never safe. To be comfortable with your sin is to be dead to the work of the Holy Spirit (John 16:7-9). In authentic community, I cannot hide my sin for long because, inevitably, pressure and time will expose it among a group of people who truly care and love me. In such a community, I am forced to confront, confess and repent of my sin. This is painful, unsettling, and certainly not safe by the standard of comfort. Safety is not in that I will not be challenged to live a life worthy of my calling to Christ, but it is in that it will be done in love from a brother or sister that is, or has, walked through that same fire. Ultimately, there is no safer place then in the arms of Christ, to whom this process points and draws us.

Considering the non-believer, it is unfathomable to me that we can believe it is safer to be left in a state of death and decay, dangling over the flames of hell, then to be confronted with the life-giving message of the Gospel. This is rarely a comfortable confrontation with the living the God, but how desperate is their need to be saved from the destruction they are hurtling toward. Yet we hold our tongue for comfort? Unfortunately we are often deceived that what would be safe (God) is dangerous (uncomfortable) and that which is dangerous (damnation) is safe (comfortable). (Isa. 5:20).

My encouragement to you is to embrace the danger of living in authentic community. Look forward to the work God is doing in you and through you as part of a community. Embraced discomfort for a greater joy, Sanctification.

My prayer is that groups will be a place where we encounter God, and challenge one another to glorify Him. That’s not safe. That’s community.

At the Transformation Series conference about three weeks ago Paul Trip did some work out Hebrews chapter 10 that I have been noodling on since that weekend.

[(nōōd'ling) to contemplate, meditate, think about.]

The concept is not new, and most of us are quick to pay it lip service.

The concept: Christianity is meant to be lived out in community.

Ground breaking I know. Probably not the first time you’ve heard this proposition, but have you ever noodled on it?

We are created in the image of the Trinitarian God who exist in community. “Yes, yes” we nod our heads in agreement. yet few of us willing seek out encouraging, rebuking, exciting, fun, painfully authentic community in our church. I am convinced that the majority of Christian hear this proposition say that you could, may, might benefit from, living out your faith in community. The reality however is that this is not a suggestion. There is an expectation in this text that we live in community (Heb. 10:22-25). In fact, verse 25 is a rebuke to those that think they don’t need to be apart of it. As Mr. Tripp indicated, this is not a call to attend a church service, but to live life together in a meaningful way that exposes our sins, encourages us in faith and draws us closer to Christ.

As I sat in my office this week I was posed the all too familiar question: Why do you think people avoid community? If I had a nickel .

Just to give you background, we currently have approximately 1/3 of our Sunday attendees in Community Groups including ½ of our members.* Respectable numbers by church statistical standards, but far from the expectation of Scripture and to what I believe God is calling us. *This does not include other legitimate forms of community.

So why DO people avoid community?

One reason, and I believe the most significant, is that in authentic community our sin is exposed. We can keep up appearances at work, a family function, or a barbecue. but if we are in a community of believers who take scriptures like Hebrews 3:13 seriously, we cannot hide for long. We all sin, and as John 3:20 outs us, we “will not come into the light for fear that [our] deeds will be exposed.” We fear light like a 32 year old actress fears HDTV. In reality, however, it is this exposure that gives us life. “This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.” (1 John 1:5-7)

Unfortunately too many of us have believed the lie that darkness is better then light. In the deepest parts of our regenerate hearts we want communion with God and fellowship with each other… but we have been deceived by the promise of comfort that does not bring peace. My challenge is to live in the light believing the promise of my faithful God that the shame of being exposed will be worth the joy of glorifying Jesus.

So let us live life together, willing to be pruned by God through His Word and His people for the purpose of glorifying Jesus… and don’t forget to bring your sunglasses.

Some of you may be wondering what was up with the tags on our last round of rosters. I have fielded a few questions and responses to the new tags and it seams that some clarification would be helpful. So let me lay out what we are doing, why we are doing it, and possibly the most important. what we are not doing.

What we are doing:
Lets start with what I am talking about. On the latest roster (Census) form there was a section called Tags, with following options:

Men Only
Women Only
Singles-college
Singles- career
married-young
married-seasoned
Kid Friendly
meals

With instruction to tag all that apply. The purpose is to describe your current group not define your current group. By describing the group you are merely saying this is who is here, you are not restricting it to other demographics. You may only check one box if that is all that applies, however most groups will be made up a mix of people from different life stages and will check multiple boxes. So of your group is ” women only”, you would check that box but also check the boxes that describe the women in that group, single, married, ect.

Why we are doing it:
Tags serve a couple of purposes. The first is to help us understand who is in groups and who is not. We can simply look at this information to determine what life stages are engaging in community.
The most significant reason however, is to help us to assimilate new people into groups. If a single mom with kids is looking for a group, the tags help us quickly identify what groups are set up to welcome kids. As well, if an older couple is looking to mentor young single folks they may look for groups that have those particular tags. The reality however is that most people are looking for a community of people feeling the same pressures and having the same interest as themselves. That is a reasonable desire and although we would love to see groups that are made up of folks that span across different life stages, we realize that is not always attainable.

What we are not doing:
We are not attempting to separate or define groups by these tags. If groups naturally develop an affinity identity we are not going spend energy trying to “diversify” that group, however, and our expectation is that any such group would still be open to people of any life stage.

So. please take the time to check the tags that apply to your group so we can better help plug people into the community of Mars Hill Church.

As Mars Hill hovers around six thousand people attending on a Sunday and a growth rate that doesn’t show any signs of slowing down, I often ask myself what our legacy will be. It’s a fair question. I ask the same question about my own family, it only seems natural to ask it about my spiritual family. As the new Mars Hill mission statement indicates, the legacy of Mars Hill will not be how many people came to hear the gospel, but the depth to which that gospel penetrated their lives. This is why Community Groups exist.

Community groups are the vehicle through which Mars Hill Church gathers to live life for Jesus in and among the city: knowing culture, loving people, and seeing lives transformed for Jesus through authentic relationships.

It is our purpose to see lives transformed by integrating all areas of life and faith, developing relationships to live out love for Jesus in community, and to see expressions of gifts being used to further the kingdom of God within the city, ultimately manifesting in the salvation of unbelievers.

Here is how Community Groups integrates with the mission of Mars Hill.

Living for Jesus
As a diverse community of believers, the common thread that brings us together is our love for Jesus. Whether through prayer, Bible study, service, or fellowship, we seek to bring Glory to Jesus.

Building a City within the City
Community Groups are small gatherings of the church within the city. These groups reflect the character of the borough where they meet and seek to develop a relationship with the local culture through service and hospitality.

Knowing Culture
As our culture longs for authentic relationship and connection, Community Groups provide a place where we can deal with the realities of life. Groups reach out to neighbors with an understanding of the needs and desires present in their neighborhoods.

Loving People
We love one another by sharing in life’s struggles and victories. We heed the scriptures by encouraging one another and calling each other to repentance as we deal with sin. We love the city through acts of service and through hospitality to those who visit our groups.

Transforming Lives
As stated before, transformed lives must be the fruit of our labor in groups. We endeavor to see all areas of our lives submitted to God and exposed to the light, so that we glorify Jesus though our whole lives. We seek to see non-believers become believers, believers to live in freedom, and for all our members to live lives in the Spirit as God intends.

Christianity is intended to be lived out in community. Our goal is to see every member and person who calls Mars Hill home to be connected in meaningful community. That is not to say that Community Groups are the only way that this is accomplished but it is the primary way for most of us. As one of your pastors I encourage you to find a Community Group to plug into and join the family if you haven’t already. If you need help finding a group you can stop at the Community Kiosk at your campus or email community@marshillchurch.org. In addition, it will take many more leaders and homes opened up to accommodate the needs of Mars Hill. If you are interested in leading a group or opening your home you can stop by the kiosk or email leadership@marshillchurch.org.