Generation Axis Blog

Getting Real about Kingdom Impact

In conversation with leaders in Axis, one question that keeps surfacing is "What does a win look like for our hub?" How do we really know that what we're doing is succeeding, is making a difference in people's lives? Personally, I've been asking similar questions--Where am I most useful to the kingdom of God? Am I stewarding my gifts well for the greatest impact?

So here are two stories from my life that make me think about these questions from a different angle:

1. The Crystal Lake East hub launched in August, and we had a pretty great turnout from the beginning. A lot of people came to check it out--some stayed, but some felt like it wasn't quite what they needed.  When someone stops coming, I wonder how we could have served that person better, what we might do differently, whether we're making the impact we hope for.  One person in particular came consistently for the first season, but then faded away. About a month ago, he showed up again and we see him every week. Recently, he checked in with a lot of honesty about how God leaned on him to get back into community and used our hub to draw him back. For all these months, we weren't even aware that God was using us.

2. Last night I got a message on Facebook from a friend I haven't seen in almost ten years. I only knew him for a season in college and while I thought he was really keen for that season, we really just knew each other through some mutual friends. As we caught up a bit about our lives, he mentioned that he still has a note I wrote him--complete with stick-figure drawings--that encouraged him in a hard season. I've long since forgotten that note, but God was still using those moments long after I had moved on.

The thing about impact is that we only sometimes see the fruit of our efforts. Some days we spend all our energy working on some big kingdom mission for God and what he will use most from that day is that one moment at Target where we offered kind words and a smile to the cashier. We won't always know how much this moment means. I'd wager we rarely see the whole picture.

I'm not saying we shouldn't ask where the "win" is or look for signs of fruitful impact. But I am saying that we sometimes won't see what God is using, and what we think of as failure might be a really important piece to the puzzle. The best "win" might be showing up in each moment with our hearts open to His leading, trusting that we don't need to see the end result in order to have significance.

Let's live as if our every moment has impact.

I Corinthians 3:6-11:
I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase. Now he who plants and he who waters are one, and each one will receive his own reward according to his own labor. For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, you are God’s building. According to the grace of God which was given to me, as a wise master builder I have laid the foundation, and another builds on it. But let each one take heed how he builds on it. For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

Who is your story for?

 

 

    I love a good story.  As a kid I was a voracious reader, devouring books as though they were Hostess Swiss cake rolls (by far my favorite “banned” treat as a child).  My favorite part of meeting new people is getting to know their life story, and then, as I get to know them better, learning how that story has shaped and formed them.  In my younger days I used to wish for a different story, one with more adventure, grit and danger.  I have a pretty picture perfect life story.  I’ve been incredibly blessed with two loving parents, family and friends that make life good, and virtually no major disaster or drama.  I was a goody two shoes who played by the rules, which was easy because I was never really tempted in the first place.  The closest I ever came to drugs was when the smelly kid pulled out a bag of weed on the bus home in 9^th grade.   I immediately joined every possible after school activity to insure I would never have to take the bus again.   Dork. 

    Anyway, the white picket fence suburb I grew up in gave me a story that is tame, and safe and would never inspire a made for t.v. movie.  I always found myself daydreaming big dramatic moments.  Even my conversion to Christ took about three years longer than it needed to because I kept waiting for that “moment.”  Something akin to God speaking to me while being held hostage in a bank robbery.  Telling me that he would spare my life if I promised to finally give it to Him.  A moment that ended with me sharing Christ with the bank robbers who then gave their lives to Him and let all the hostages go.  You know, no big deal….dork.

    I think that’s why I love Paul’s story.  Oh the drama and excitement!  My overactive imagination could not have written it better myself.  You have this hardcore Jesus hater, on his way to relentlessly hunt down the people of “the Way,” struck blind as he hears the voice of Jesus.  By the time God restores his sight he is not the same.  Saul became Paul.  He is now in the temples, preaching that Jesus is the son of God.  He has become like those he once hunted.

    I love in Acts 22 when Paul speaks to the Jews who are trying to arrest him.  He clearly shares his story with them, boldly telling of what Christ did to him, for him and through him.  Paul was the perfect person to share this testimony to this group of people because of who he was before Christ changed his life.  He was once like them.  As Saul, he would have been in that crowd, calling for the death of the one who proclaims Jesus as the Messiah.  If anyone’s story had a hope of softening the hardened hearts of this crowd it was Paul’s.  The scene makes me imagine a modern day picture of Bill Maher attending some atheist convention as a changed man, sharing with the crowd his and God’s story, impacting them as only he could.

    It also makes me wonder whom my story is for.  Tame as it may be, it is the story God and I share and it has potential to impact someone.  Who is your story for?  Does your story contain parts you are ashamed of?  Segments you wish you could edit out?  I’m sure Paul cringed when he thought of the damage he caused while he watched Stephen being stoned to death.  I’m sure he would have liked to gloss over why he was on the road to Damascus in the first place.  But who Paul was is what makes his story so compelling.  What Christ redeemed and saved in you is what will give hope to others.  And if you’re like me, wondering if you would have a greater impact if your story had a bigger rock bottom moment, or some crazy loud message of hope and redemption…well, there are so many people who’s lives haven’t been so rocked to the core that they have no place to turn but God.  Maybe those people need to hear how God works in the mundane moments of life and woos ordinary people in ordinary ways.  Maybe those people need help becoming aware of the voice of God in the tamer moments of life.  You are unique.  God has worked uniquely in your life.  Who can be impacted by your unique story?

 

Written by Colleen Powell who is a former Willow Intern who has a passion for God and his Kingdom. She resides in Oak Park with her husband and serves as a Youth Pastor, Speech Coach, and Mentor. 

 

In But Different

 The word Christian certainly gets thrown around a lot.  We have Christian t-shirts, Christian candy, Christian action figures, Christian cruises, Christian hunting, even Christian Ultimate Fighting teams.  And I find myself wondering, "What makes these things Christian?"

All this was triggered when I went with some Axis Chicago leaders to hear a smart guy named Gabe Lyons speak.  Gabe is the co-author of UnChristian and has done a lot of research regarding perceptions of Christianity.  One of the questions that he asked us is whether we thought America was no longer a Christian nation.

That got me thinking, "What makes a nation Christian?  What makes anything Christian?"  To me a Christian is someone who is committed to getting out of the way and allowing God to change the world through their life.  Someone who recognizes the fact that they are broken, lost, and in need of help from God.  Can a book be that?

As I was thinking about all this I was reminded of the great New Testament author and early church founder Paul.  Paul did not make money from ministry.  He often would not even ask for money as he traveled around the world starting churches.  Paul made his money as a tentmaker.

The question that came to mind is this, were Paul's tents Christian tents?  Did he inscribe the flap with Scripture verses or market them to missionaries on the go?  No!  He just made tents.

In my opinion the American church today is caught in a culture bubble so large that many hardly see the light of day outside of it.  American Christians walk around with Christian books under their arm, Christian t-shirts on their back, Christian music blaring in their iPod.  They play basketball in Christian basketball leagues, go to Christian counsellors, make their friends at Christian small groups, and hope to find their life-partner at a Christians singles event.  Christians have their own concerts, days at amusement parks, schools, favorite politicians, and tv shows.  Literally everything found in the world has been brought inside the Christian sub-culture solely by adding the word Christian before it and I think it is killing the American church and American Christians.

In our effort to not be "of the world" we've left it!  We've become obsessed with finding whatever is cool in culture and re-creating it (often times badly) inside our own culture so we can feel hip, cool, and progressive.  Really we are just letting culture dictate the church instead of truly engaging with culture and finding our own identity in it!

In our effort to become relevant to culture we focused on making poor counterfeits and have now become irrelevant. We need to leave the Christian sub-culture behind and actually engage with people.  We should care more about engaging the person, the individual, through relationship than showing them that their is a "Christian" band that sounds just like their favorite band out in the world.  People don't need their world Christianized, they need to be told that their is a beautiful hope that helps infuse the life, the world, they know with such beauty that it cannot be resisted.

Now I know much of this is not applicable to all of us but what I want us to ask ourselves is this, are we engaging and truly living in the world around us?  Do we value our co-workers as much as our friends from our missional communities?  Do we have any friends that live entirely outside the Christian sub-culture?

The way to change the world is not to become like it but to live in it.  That goes against everything the Christian sub-culture is about.  

So join me.  Let's leave the bubble and live in the world but different from the world.

Income Inequality vs Opportunity Inequality

“ ‘Count off seven sabbath years—seven times seven years—so that the seven sabbath years amount to a period of forty-nine years. Then have the trumpet sounded everywhere on the tenth day of the seventh month; on the Day of Atonement sound the trumpet throughout your land. Consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you; each of you is to return to your family property and to your own clan...“ ‘The land must not be sold permanently, because the land is mine and you reside in my land as foreigners and strangers.

 Throughout the land that you hold as a possession, you must provide for the redemption of the land. 
 “ ‘If anyone among you becomes poor and sells some of their property, their nearest relative is to come and redeem what they have sold If, however, there is no one to redeem it for them but later on they prosper and acquire sufficient means to redeem it themselves they are to determine the value for the years since they sold it and refund the balance to the one to whom they sold it; they can then go back to their own property.

But if they do not acquire the means to repay, what was sold will remain in the possession of the buyer until the Year of Jubilee. It will be returned in the Jubilee, and they can then go back to their property. 
“ ‘Anyone who sells a house in a walled city retains the right of redemption a full year after its sale. During that time the seller may redeem it If it is not redeemed before a full year has passed, the house in the walled city shall belong permanently to the buyer and the buyer’s descendants. It is not to be returned in the Jubilee.

 But houses in villages without walls around them are to be considered as belonging to the open country. They can be redeemed, and they are to be returned in the Jubilee. -Leviticus 25 (Excerpts)

I am sure you are wondering why I am starting off with such a huge passage from the exciting book of Leviticus but it came up in my reading plan today and something in it caught my eye.

Leviticus is a book full of many of the laws that God wanted the Jews to follow and this passage is looking at a thing called Jubilee.  It occurred every 50 years and debts were overlooked and homes were returned to their owners.  At least that was my understanding until I looked a little closer.

It says that if a poor person sells his property and cannot find someone to purchase it back for him it should be returned to him at Jubilee.  The basic idea behind this is that we rent the land from God so no one of us should own it.  And property was really about what the land was used for.  So instead of purchasing the land a person would purchase the right to use the land, live on the land, until the next Jubilee.  Then it was returned to the original family.

EXCEPT, homes that were sold in walled in cities.  These could be redeemed (bought to give back to the original owner) within one year but after that the property was not to be transferred back, not even at Jubilee.

Why this difference?

 I think it has something to do with opportunity and wealth.  See, I don't think God is against wealth, just an uneven distribution of it.  Many people point to Jubilee as an example of how God wanted a very equitable society but I think more than monetary equality what God really wants is opportunity equality.

Homes in walled in cities were just places to live, not opportunities to take care of yourself and family like a plot of land outside of a city.  Outside of cities people still lived on the land and grew crops.  So what I think this passage is really getting at is that God wants everyone to have the opportunity to take care of themselves.  It seems He doesn't really care about the property itself, or He'd want the walled in cities to be included in Jubilee, but the opportunity.

We live in a time of great income inequality.  Take for example The Waltons, the family behind Walmart.  Their net worth is somewhere around $90 billion.  The bottom 40% of Americans, all 120 million of them, have a network around $95 billion.  The top 1% of our country controls roughly 1/3 of the nations wealth, more than the bottom 90% combined.

This income inequality is not the only problem though.  The real problem is that this income inequality has lead to opportunity inequality.

I think we could all agree that a white kid from Lake Forest has very different opportunities than a Latino youth on the West side of Chicago.  Wealth redistribution alone will not solve that problem but I believe that the reason God wanted some redistribution was to provide for opportunity redistribution.

A family who had their property returned to them at Jubilee still needed to work it to gain anything, it wasn't a handout.  We need to help provide opportunities for all people to succeed.  We need to support equal education opportunities, small business loans, and laws that prevent discrimination.

What God intended was not to deplete the wealthy in one big handout to the poor, what He intended was to ensure that everyone had an opportunity to better themselves, provide for their family, and in turn ensure that the poor were taken care of.

The problem of income inequality in this country is great but the greater problem is one of opportunity inequality.

Let's Note Hide It & Let's Be Generous as Well...

Let's Not Hide It & Lets Be Generous As well... from Axis on Vimeo.

wait...don't skip this one!!!

wait...don't skip this one!!! from Axis on Vimeo.

Four Sundays that could change your life!

FOUR Sunday Mornings that could change your life! from Axis on Vimeo.

Finding the Place of Rest

I have a love/hate relationship with technology.  I have allowed it to affect the quality of my life while I love the fact that I can quickly stay connected with those I care about.  We live in an era where something is screaming for our attention 24/7 with a constant drone of input.   Email, text, voicemail, twitter, facebook, google alerts…we are all facing a addictive syndrome that a former Microsoft VP, Linda Stone (now Social Computing Group) termed CPA – Continuous Partial Attention.  CPA is being in a constant state of hypervigilance and high alert.    

 

Stone states, “With continuous partial attention we keep the top level item in focus and scan the periphery in case something more important emerges. Continuous partial attention is motivated by a desire not to miss opportunities. We want to ensure our place as a live node on the network, we feel alive when we're connected. To be busy and to be connected is to be alive..... Speed, agility, and connectivity at the top of mind...Now we're over-stimulated, over-wounded, unfulfilled.”

           

I think it is reasonable to assume that in the midst of all the energy and time to stay connected and scan for new information, we have lost the ability to be ‘still’.  Thomas Merton is known for his statement that if we are not comfortable being/resting in Christ we ‘do’.  He makes a profound observation.  If we really do not trust that our needs will be taken care of by God we feel the need to 'help him out' with our activism.  If we really don’t believe that God has our best interests in mind we will not feel the freedom to relinquish our work and rest in His presence. 

 

That is where the discipline of Sabbath keeping comes into the picture. God designed the Sabbath as a rhythm for our lives to balance the six days of work. It is more than just resting, it is a time to seek that which nurtures our souls, fuels our delight and intimacy with Christ. It is resting with God.  For each person the Sabbath will look quite different. 

 

My husband Ray, and I started thinking this through and found that our Sabbath, Sunday, was often a day filled with teaching and ministry activity.  Consequently, we were doing some form of work throughout the week without a defined period of spiritual and physical rest. Wayne Muller writes in Sabbath, “If we do not allow for a rhythm of rest in our overly busy lives, illness becomes our Sabbath – our pneumonia, our cancer, our heart attack, our accidents create Sabbath for us.” We took this wise advice and committed ourselves to choose not to take teaching engagements and ministry activities on Sundays. We have found a balance and rhythm emerging in our lives that has been physically, emotionally and spiritually enriching (I only wish we had done this a long time ago!). On Saturday evening we discuss what we feel that we need on Sunday for rest and restoration.  Some Sundays we may stay home from church (or go on Saturday night) and spend the day in solitude, reading and praying.  Other Sundays we may go to church and spend time with friends afterwards who we can count for spiritually nourishing conversation. Each Sunday is quite different.  We see a strengthening and refreshment emerge from these days that puts the rest of the week in a wonderful perspective and see the worries of the week slip away for moments of true joy to emerge. 

Our Friend Andrew Marin

Friend of Axis, Andrew Marin, recently did the below interview with TheOoze.com around some thoughts from his new book.  Andrew is one of those guys that gets it.  He gets what it means to live missionaly in his community and he has done a tremendous job of radically changing the conversation between the GLBT (gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, transgender) community and the church.  We had him join us at one of our In The Hot Seat events back in the spring and he's becoming a good friend to Axis.  So be sure to check out his blog and to buy his book Love Is An Orientation.  And if you missed our conversation with him you can listen to it here.

thailand_2

hey axis. hope yall are doin well. here is another update from thailand!

for update number one, if you didnt catch it click here and read THEN come back and read this update so things make sense :)

so the other night. our last night of ministry in Phuket we started the night just like any other. went through the ministry and it was good. 1am rolls around and we were already planning on trying to hang out with some of the girls at 2am when they get off of their shifts at their bars to go eat or go to the beach with them til whenever. so 2am rolls around and we start going to pick up the girls. before 2, God really put one of these girls on my heart... Apple. one of our group's had been working with her and i only met her really briefly once but God was telling me to pray for her so i did and i made her one of my prayer cards. we went over to her bar and i walked up to her (her back was facing me) i tapped her on the shoulder and said hi and she turns around and she is just crying standing there. i ask if shes ok and she said yes but obviously was not. i hand her my card and i say that God put her on my heart and i came to see how you were doing. and with tears running down her face she asks with such sincerity "will you buy me for the night so that i can leave here" [if you would like to take one of these bar girls out for the evening you need to pay a "bar-fine" to get them out of the bar] so pretty much without hesitation we come up with 300 baht (9 dollars) and i hand it to her and she gives it to her boss and there we have it. we bought a girl for the night. thats just the beginning!

  we go to another bar that another of our groups frequent, and we go to pick up a girl and we find out that she had just been bought for 2000 baht (60 dollars). we are so bummed but we just had to accept that this was their life and God was up to something. Gloria and the girl were crying so hard and it was a sad goodbye. then we picked up kong (who my team has invested in and who i shared the gospel with) and we all headed to the beach (230am) and about 20 min later.. the girl who was bought for 2000 baht SHOWS UP! im like what the heck! the dude who bought her felt bad bc she looked sad and he let her go! and she came to us! how sweet is that! praise the Lord for that. thank you Jesus. that right there just shows how faithful God is in this ministry. we sometimes just have to let go of what is on our hearts and watch God do what God does with it. so beautiful.

so we all just are hanging out on the beach till all hours of the night. im sitting there and talking with apple. getting out of her whys shes down at the bars and why she was crying and all this stuff. she just opens up to me with all this crazy stuff in her life. a recent insanely sad story  im just speechless. then God just opens my mouth and starts speaking all this truth and life and love and honor and respect into this girl and it just felt good to do and to be apart of. because these girls know nothing of the sort. they know bad words and disrespect and dishonor and disloyalty and lies! im telling her about love and Gods love and it was just beautiful. im so stoked i got to do it.

then at 630am we wrapped up our evening and that concluded our time in Phuket. we are now in Mae Sot, Thailand working with Burmese tribes. really exciting!

live love and be blessed.

bobby bo.

 

Prague March 2009

Four people from our Axis community recently went to visit and serve the House of Hope in Prague.  Axis committed to partnering with them and completing the House of Hope community center.

Here is just a brief picture of their trip.

Prague Highlight Video_March 2009 from Axis on Vimeo.

Fight Sex Trafficking-A Guest Blog from Ann Healing of International Justice Mission

I am so excited to have a post from first time blogger Ann Healing, Director of Intern and Fellows Program for the International Justice Mission.  I am a huge fan of IJM and I'm so glad she was willing to join us.  Read her post below.

Did you know that there are nearly 2 million children who have been trafficked for cheap labor and sexual exploitation (UNICEF 2006)?  Or that, according to National Geographic in 2003, there are 27 million people in slavery (sexual slavery and bonded labor) in the world today, even though slavery is illegal? This is more than the four centuries of the Trans-Atlantic Slave trade. 

What do we do with this kind of data? In many ways, the Axis community is doing more than most. From those of us at International Justice Mission, it’s encouraging to see that you are raising awareness about the issue of human trafficking, both here in the states and internationally.   However, some of you may have the desire to go beyond raising awareness and get hands-on experience assisting in the fight against this kind of injustice. If this is true of you, consider volunteering as an international intern or fellow with IJM.

Our interns and fellows deploy for a year to one of our 14 field offices in Asia, Latin America, Africa, and South Asia.  They assist with the work of rescuing and restoring victims of sex trafficking, slavery, and other forms of violent oppression.  They also assist in prosecuting the perpetrators of the injustice, and working toward structural transformation so that the poor are protected from this kind of oppression.  Interns and Fellows work with IJM field office staff in areas such as legal advocacy and training; aftercare coordination and counseling; business relations, community relations, administrative support, project management and other special projects.

Find more information and application instructions click here.   

 

International Justice Mission from Axis on Vimeo.

Pizza in Prague

So our team in Prague uploaded this quite strange video of pizza but hey they uploaded it so I thought I'd pass it on.  They included this note and the pictures below.

SO we had pizza with some czech college students! We sang some songs then worship, played a game and then discussed the story of the prodigal son. Many of the students were not Christians. One young man was interested in attending the local church to learn more after the discussion!

Pizza in Prague from Axis on Vimeo.