From RefugeeMemphis.com

In Athens the Apostle Paul found an altar with an inscription to an unknown god. As he preached the gospel of Jesus to the Athenians he chided them for worshiping an obscure god with no name. How much better, Paul explained, to worship the true Lord of heaven and earth. In fact, Paul described God as orchestrating the allotted times of our lives, and even the boundaries of nations. As we see the international crisis today unfold, we might ask, Why does God work in this way?

Paul answers: So that people everywhere “should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each of us.” (Acts 17:27, ESV).

Recently God has redrawn our “allotted times and boundaries.” He has led us to a new season of ministry among refugees, whose boundaries have certainly been upended!

Last month, we prayerfully chose to step away from a ministry and an organization that we have loved like family since 1983, The International Mission Board. Increasingly, Mark was spending half of his time in Richmond, Virginia — making work with internationals here unsustainable.

Learn More

Do you know what happened October 31, 1517?

Find out when you read Albert Mohler’s article below on the history of Halloween and an appropriate Christian response.

WEDNESDAY • October 30, 2013

From AlbertMohler.com

WEDNESDAY • October 30, 2013

Over a hundred years ago, the great Dutch theologian Herman Bavinck predicted that the 20th century would “witness a gigantic conflict of spirits.” His prediction turned out to be an understatement, and this great conflict continues into the 21st century.

The issue of Halloween presses itself annually upon the Christian conscience. Acutely aware of dangers new and old, many Christian parents choose to withdraw their children from the holiday altogether. Others choose to follow a strategic battle plan for engagement with the holiday. Still others have gone further, seeking to convert Halloween into an evangelistic opportunity. Is Halloween really that significant?

Well, Halloween is a big deal in the marketplace. Halloween is surpassed only by Christmas in terms of economic activity. Reporting in 2007, David J. Skal estimated: “Precise figures are difficult to determine, but the annual economic impact of Halloween is now somewhere between 4 billion and 6 billion dollars depending on the number and kinds of industries one includes in the calculations.” As of 2012, that total exceeded $8 billion.

J.D. Payne has written a helpful book on migration and ministry among diaspora population segments.

Check out my review of the book at The Gospel Coalition.

Strangers Next Door

J. D. Payne | Review by: Mark Morris

J. D. Payne. . Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press 2012. 206 pp. $15.00.

In light of projections from early census data, Michael Cooper of The New York Times reported on December 12 that very soon the United States will no longer be considered a nation consisting of a majority and multiple minorities. He insists the new census data points to the United States becoming a “plurality.” “The term ‘minority,’ at least as used to describe racial and ethnic groups in the United States,” Cooper writes, “may need to be retired or rethought soon.” Cooper explains that by the end of this decade “no single racial or ethnic group will constitute a majority of children under 18. And in about three decades, no single group will constitute a majority of the country as a whole.”

No doubt J. D. Payne’s Strangers Next Door: Immigration, Migration, and Mission comes at an appropriate time in our nation’s history. The book effectively informs Western Christians—particularly North Americans—about God’s kingdom activity as it relates to the movement of people across the globe. An ethnographer, a demographics guru, or an urban strategist might consider Strangers Next Door a mile wide and an inch deep. I would argue the breadth and depth is just right for the American audience. Read More

I have had the joy over the past four weeks to teach a World Religions course at Victory University. What a privilege to interact with 27 students regarding their own faith in Christ in light of a study of Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, several cults and new religious movements.

We began our course with Christianity, taking a look into what it means to be an effective cross-cultural worker for Christ. So far we have studied ancient religions of Iraq and Iran, Judaism, and we are about to dig into Hinduism. We hope to visit a Hindu temple this weekend.

We are reminded that God reigns supreme.  He is Lord of all. He is the one true God and there is no other before Him.

Each of us who knows Christ has a responsibility to know what we believe, understand what others believe, pray for them, learn effective cross-cultural Gospel communication, and give an answer for the faith we have in Jesus. This knowledge of Christ is faith that requires a response. A lack of response, is actually a response with clear results.

My growing concern is that we Christians don’t even know what we believe, much less, how to relate our own faith with people from another religions.

Find out, today, what it is that you believe and in whom it is that you put your faith.

That All May Hear

Mark Morris

God is doing a mighty thing as churches in the Northwest come together for solemn assemblies. Scott Brewer recently challenged pastors to consider what God might do in them and in their congregations through such sincere and heartfelt gatherings. The following article is from Baptist Press.

Posted on Dec 8, 2010 | by Erin Roach

In response to a challenge from Scott Brewer, president of the Northwest Baptist Convention, pastors and lay leaders at the annual meeting went forward to pray about initiating a time of repentance and renewal in their congregations. Photo courtesy of the Northwest Baptist Convention

REDMOND, Wash. (BP)–A pastor in Washington state led his congregation to observe a solemn assembly this fall, to repent of sins and seek God intensely — and lives were changed. Now he is challenging other churches to throw off the grip of worldliness and set aside a day for repentance and renewed commitment.

“I’m absolutely convinced that if there is not a significant awakening in the church, we’re in serious trouble,” Scott Brewer, pastor of Meadowbrook Church in Redmond, Wash., told Baptist Press.

“We are well past answers found in new strategies and new innovations and the best that we can produce. I think by and large, our churches are void of a manifest sense of God’s presence that results in His empowerment of the mission,” Brewer said.

Though his idea for a solemn assembly grew out of a personal retreat with God a year ago, Brewer said he was encouraged by the call of Southern Baptist Convention President Bryant Wright and other SBC leaders for churches to observe a solemn assembly in January.

“It basically served to confirm in my own heart something I felt like God was up to, not just in our region but across our country,” said Brewer, who is serving a second term as president of the Northwest Baptist Convention.

Once he believed God was leading him to initiate a time of solemn assembly at Meadowbrook, Brewer took the idea to fellow church leaders and they began having prayer and confession time during their meetings. At a fall retreat, Brewer presented the idea again and led in a preliminary solemn assembly.

The pastor taught on the holiness of God for four Sundays leading up to the church-wide event.

“Some of the remarks initially were more questioning about why I was giving so much attention and emphasis to sin and to holiness and to confession,” Brewer said. “I just kind of kept pressing forward, saying I think God wants us to continue on this note until He’s through, whatever that looks like.”

As the date of the solemn assembly, Oct. 16, drew nearer and people got more of a sense of what they would be doing, some were eager.

“They were like, ‘I can’t wait until this. I just feel like God’s going to do something special in my life.'”

Others were fearful of the idea, he said.

“They were like, ‘I think you’re going to ask me to do things I’ve never done before. I’ve been a Christian for 10 years and I’ve never confessed any sin to anybody. Why are you asking me to do this?’ That was a little more of the minority, but to their credit they were honest about it and then they showed up, overcoming their fears,” Brewer said.

The congregation averages 200 people on Sundays, and 67 adults participated in the solemn assembly on that Saturday in October. Brewer said more people would have come if childcare had been provided.

“It was a pretty strong percentage. It was higher than I anticipated,” he said of attendance.

Another obstacle for some, he said, was the length of the event. Church leaders had asked that participants commit to the entire five hours.

“I began the day with a brief reflection on Joel 2 and introduced the whole idea of a solemn assembly. After that, I invited everybody to engage in a private exercise of going through 20-something questions that kind of probed their life about whether they were in alignment with God on this or that or the other,” Brewer said.

“After close to an hour of that personal time, we reconvened. Then they got with a prayer partner of the same gender and basically spent the next 45 minutes in confession with one another, verbalizing what they had written down in the private time.

“It was the first time that the majority of them had ever had verbal confession with a trusted other on sins like that. It was pretty powerful. When we reconvened after that, I had everyone get into their small groups that they meet with every week, and in a similar fashion, they went through a Scripture text that had them praying for one another and confessing their sins to one another,” the pastor said.

Brewer had asked the group to fast for a day and a half before the solemn assembly, and they broke the fast with the Lord’s Supper during the gathering. Then they ate lunch together.

“Following lunch, we finished the whole time in an emphasis on what God has done with us individually and collectively with other churches. Basically, I cast a vision for being a catalyst for other churches and a catalyst for something that God might be stirring across our convention and across our town. At the point of commitment, everyone — 100 percent — stood in commitment to be faithful to follow God in that way,” Brewer said.

Katie Harris, who participated in the solemn assembly at Meadowbrook, told Baptist Press that the questionnaire at the beginning led her to realize she was “just a really busted, broken person.”

“Outwardly, I may have seemed like I was leading a good life, but inside I was harboring hurtful sins,” she said.

Harris had struggled with anger and jealously following a miscarriage, and it wasn’t until the solemn assembly that she realized those were sins that were separating her from God.

“That realization and following confession were like a huge weight being lifted off my shoulders, and I knew God led me to take part in the solemn assembly as a way of starting my emotional and spiritual recovery from our loss,” she said. “Over the following days and weeks, He kept working in me and speaking to me through others.

“I feel like without my experience at the solemn assembly, I would’ve been oblivious to His promptings and kept trying to put on the happy facade I’d been wearing for months. Now, the anger, bitterness and jealousy are gone. Instead, there is peace in my heart because I took that time at the assembly to fully examine myself for all that I am, and not just what others see of me,” Harris said.

Anna Delapaz, another church member, stayed at home with her children while her husband attended the solemn assembly, but God nevertheless spoke to her about getting her heart right.

“I really had to lay down a lot of things in my heart as far as selfish things, as far as worry and anxiety, and just step out in faith,” Delapaz told Baptist Press.

“… What I got from the idea of the solemn assembly was it was not just a purging of our selfish things or our internal checks but it was also for us to walk in His power and start seeing where God is answering prayers that maybe we’re not seeing,” Delapaz said. “It’s about being able to start walking in a faith that may be very uncomfortable for us. We’re seeing it. I’m seeing a lot of people start to wake up to sort of a new phase of what’s going on after all of this.

“For me, it’s been about really walking in His power. It’s not just an emptying but a filling up to be able to reach others. It’s not just about ourselves. It’s for others as well,” Delapaz said.

Brewer presented the idea of a solemn assembly during a Northwest convention executive board meeting earlier this year, and at least a couple other pastors led such events in their churches. They told their stories at the convention’s annual meeting in November, and Brewer told about Meadowbrook before issuing a challenge for pastors and lay leaders to initiate repentance in their congregations.

“I received 42 commitment cards from pastors that they would be pursuing the Lord individually in this kind of way as well as leading their church into a solemn assembly experience and to partner with other churches in their area,” Brewer said, adding that he is following up with those 42 and inviting others to join the emphasis.

In a video posted on www.pray4sbc.com, Wright, the SBC president, said the call to solemn assembly “is about returning to our first love of Jesus Christ.”

“In our convention, in our churches and our lives, we have allowed materialism, we’ve allowed hedonism, workaholism and busyness, technology obsession, all kinds of other interests of the world to just invade and, really, become bigger priorities than the priority of our relationship with Jesus Christ,” Wright said. “We need to fall in love with Jesus again in a new and fresh way. We need to return to our first love.”

Wright’s call was affirmed by members of the SBC’s Great Commission Council, which is composed of the heads of the convention’s entities. They issued a letter in November asking Southern Baptists to repent and come before God with a contrite heart.
–30–
Erin Roach is a staff writer for Baptist Press. To see Baptist Press’ initial story on the call for churches to engage in a solemn assembly in January, go to http://www.bpnews.net/bpnews.asp?id=34079.

Did you realize that three fourths of the world are oral communicators by choice.

50% of the adults in the United States are primarily oral communicators.

58% of the USA High school graduates have never read a book after graduating from High School.

42% of college graduates never read another book after graduating from college.

So what do we know about oral communicators?

• Oral communicators can learn as well as literate people and their memory is superior to the average literate person’s memory. The problem is not one of learning but it is the presentation format through which info comes to them. Info must come to oral communicators through stories, parables, poems, music, songs, and other formats.

• Most literates mistakenly believe that if they can outline the information or put it into a series of steps or principles, anyone, including oral communicators, can understand it and recall it.  Most oral communicators do not know how to process outlines, etc.

The point?  Most of the world prefers to learn through auditory means.  They like to hear stories and proverbs.

So what does that mean for people who can read?

It means that its time to simplify. It’s time to start from the beginning, from creation and tell the stories as they are recorded in God’s word. Most of the world is waiting for us to tell God’s stories to them.  Here’s one to start with.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.  Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.  And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.  God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness.  God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning — the first day.
And God said, “Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water.”
So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so.  God called the expanse “sky.” And there was evening, and there was morning — the second day.  And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so.   God called the dry ground “land,” and the gathered waters he called “seas.” And God saw that it was good.  Then God said, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.” And it was so. The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning — the third day.
And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth.” And it was so. God made two great lights — the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars.

God set them in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth, to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good.  And there was evening, and there was morning — the fourth day.  And God said, “Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky.”
So God created the great creatures of the sea and every living and moving thing with which the water teems, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth.”  And there was evening, and there was morning — the fifth day.  And God said, “Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: livestock, creatures that move along the ground, and wild animals, each according to its kind.” And it was so.  God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.  Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.” Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground — everything that has the breath of life in it — I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.  God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning — the sixth day. Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array. By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work.  And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.

Many of you have asked, so Mark who are these non-traditional churches that you work with? Someone recently sent me the answer.

It’s a combination of cool, relevant, contemporary, and profound, transparent and well…cool.

Check out this video because it articulates it for me.

This may be your church.  If it is, then you are my people.

See video.

Here’s a local news report about two churches, FedEx Pilots, and a motorcycle club who are making a difference in an under-served community in Memphis.   As Easter approaches, it is a good idea to ask if our lives reflect Christ who died and rose for us. While the following article is from a secular news source, the churches and the believers involved saw a community need and took action. Makes you ask, what am I doing to make a difference and point people to the living Lord Jesus Christ in me?

Taking Back Our Neighborhood: Manassas baseball field

MEMPHIS, TN (WMC-TV) – The baseball team at Manassas High School began play on a “field of dreams” this week.

Teamwork between some caring FedEx pilots, a motorcycle club and two Memphis churches resulted in a home run for Manassas High baseball players. “It was a great idea to be able to give something back and to give these kids a home field to play on,” said FedEx pilot Lamar Washington.

Until Monday, Manassas had no home field advantage because it had no home field. “We played all road games,” said Manassas baseball coach Dennis Paden.  “We didn’t even have a facility to practice.” The field began to take shape when FedEx pilot Eric Lampelay’s wife began clearing rocks from a field with Oasis of Hope, a ministry of Hope Presbyterian.  Lampelay told co-pilot Washington, who brought his motorcycle club to help rake up the rocks. “There’s a lot of interest and guys are always looking for an opportunity to do something good in the community,” Washington said.

Volunteers from Hope Presbyterian and Bellevue Baptist Church graded the fields.  They donated sod and clay for the infield and pitcher’s mound. On opening day, Lampelay threw out the ceremonial first pitch. At long last, the Tigers of Manassas took their home field against the Pharaohs of Raleigh-Egypt.

“It’s just a blessing that we finally got a field,” said Montrail Brown, Manassas baseball player.  “It’s going to draw a crowd, and more people are going to play.” Paden said the field was a blessing for all involved.

“It’s blessed the people who’ve built the field as much as the kids on the receiving end,” Paden said.  “It really has been something magical.” The Manassas Tigers won their first game on their home field in the bottom of the 7th inning.

Copyright 2010 WMC-TV. All rights reserved.

Since December 14, 2008 Pastor Kelvin Bowen and myself have been working together as black and white pastors in a new church plant. Kelvin is the senior  pastor and I’m his associate.  Both of us came together having worked on two separate church starts, but after prayer and soul-searching, God showed us that we had the opportunity to do something unique together in the city where Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated.  God has drawn together a core group of about a half dozen white folk and about 2 dozen black folks. Each Sunday we will have from 40 to 60 in attendance and each week is a great blessing.

Since December 14, my visual, social, and spiritual perspective has undergone a transformation.  For example:

• I can’t figure out why there aren’t more white folks that are serious about doing church as one with African Americans.
• Congregations and even denominations have been divided over style – yet styles of music and worship, even style of preaching and style of church administration just doesn’t seem so important any more.
• Tradition is being redefined.  It’s hard to talk about traditional church since there are so many different definitions of ‘tradition.’ To think that people are church shopping to find their preferred tradition or style of preaching and music. So, we have each had to learn to adapt to styles of preaching, fellowship, worship, and polity that are a blend of each of our traditions.
• Fellowship is deep.  I’m too accustomed to lots of shallow relationships in church.  Amazingly people of different cultures are growing increasingly in unity.   The bond of love is strengthening each day.
• Vision is expanding. Surprisingly, our view of our city and the world changes when we worship and work and fellowship as a multicultural body.

Since December 14, I have grown shockingly aware of the fact that nearly all the Church Planting, or Church leadership, or Mission conferences that I frequent are dominated by one race or another. The speakers and the participants are 99% from one race with only a token representation from another culture.  It’s strange that I didn’t notice this church and conference segregation until the body of believers with whom I am one, has changed my daily perspective.

So what’s the solution?  I’m asking the Lord.  Lord what is the solution?

What’s God telling you? How can the body become one?

If you are still thinking about Compassion vs. Conversion then it may not make sense to talk about mapping and missions. There are many things that I have heard with regard to mapping and the Great Commission. One is, “if you define the task with great specificity, you take God out of the picture.” Another is, “If you define the greatest needs and place them on a map, you are not looking at the places where God is really working.” Yet others have articulated that the showing the work God has done through churches and mission agencies on the map give glory to God for his working in our world.

When we look to Scripture and see the story of the one lost sheep, we see Christ’s compassion for those who have no Shepherd. The willingness to go to where there has been no witness and go to where people are lost shows the compassion of Christ. At the same time, across the globe are people in various stages of growth in their relationship with God. Staying attuned to the various needs of the varied people groups allow us to tailor our ministries and trainings to share and disciple.

Mapping the Great Commission has been the heart of the World Missions Atlas Project (www.worldmap.org). Knowing where the church is and where it is not allows us to develop different strategies of ministry based on their segment of society and their exposure to the Gospel. This includes understanding the level of Bible translation, the level of literacy and prevalence of orality within the culture, which people groups have been exposed to the gospel and which ones have had no church planting. Together with all this information Churches, missionaries, and agencies are better equipped to find the areas where their gifting match needs nearby them and around the world.