Journey Church -www.yourjourney.tv
Gather encompasses everything that happens at The Journey on the weekend. It’s the catalyst that leads to spiritual growth for us regardless of where we are in our journey. If you’re new to the whole church thing, 52 Sundays a year you’ll hear the message of Jesus in terms you can understand and relate to here. If you’re a believer, you’ll grow spiritually. That’s because the passion behind Gather is to help people experience God and become or grow as followers of Jesus. It’s a simple yet powerful focus, and it’s changing lives.
- Weekend Series (our “secret sauce” for growing people spiritually)
- Stick Around (the chance to hang out afterward for conversations and camaraderie)
Connect involves everything that happens at The Journey throughout the week. It’s the relational tie that fosters spiritual growth for us, whether we’re taking our first steps toward faith or moving to another level. From the moment we begin doing life at The Journey, Connect helps us pursue friendship with others and a lasting relationship with God… because following Jesus is a team sport.
- Launch
- Life Groups
Serve represents everything that happens at The Journey behind the scenes. It’s discovering our gifts and offering them fully to God; and it’s a key to spiritual growth for us as we learn to authentically follow Jesus. What makes a church great is a whole lot of people like you being great in some area of service, both within our walls and outside of them. It’s because Serve is such an important part of The Journey’s culture that we’re seeing so much happen for God’s glory here.
- Discover
- Volunteering
- Giving
Traction Journey Church 8-24-11
| And If You’re Married
“And if you’re Married,” the sixth message of “Just Like You” from Ephesians 5, showed us that marriage is a dance – and Jesus is the one doing the judging. Pastor Mark’s version of the “Dougie” may have left a little to be desired… but we all got the message. Here are this week’s next steps:
Want to learn more about a satisfying married life? We recommend the following books: “Boundaries;” “Love and Respect;” and “His Needs, Her Needs.” This past Sunday, Pastor Mark introduced “the nines” – a challenge to every Journeyer to: invite nine people to The Journey for either Hot Seat Sunday (the 11th) or the kick-off of “At the Movies” (the 18th); pray for those same people every day at 9:00am and 9:00pm; and attend the “9/9 at 9” prayer event on September 9th at 9:00pm. You can do it! Are you gathering, connecting, and serving? To sign up for the next Launch, click HERE. To volunteer, clickHERE, or to sign up for Discover, HERE. And remember that you can give online anytime HERE. Enjoy The Journey! |
Mid-Week Reflections
This is taken from this weeks “Traction” from The Journey Church.
Amazing message this week. Hits home because I continue to live like a slave instead of embracing the freedom that God offeres.
| Don’t Go Back
This past Sunday’s message, “Don’t Go Back” (click title to go to podcast) was the final installment of Fringe Benefits. God’s people had to be reminded to give back because they still struggled with a slavery mentality. Every day, we choose to either live like slaves (by holding) or express our freedom (by helping). Embrace your freedom today! Next Steps:
For more insight into what it looks like to express our freedom by partnering with God to see miracles in the lives of people around us, Pastor Mark recommends the book “You Were Born for This” by Bruce Wilkinson. Are you gathering, connecting, and serving? To sign up for the next Launch, click HERE. To find out more about Life Groups, click HERE. To volunteer, click HERE, or to sign up for Discover, HERE. And remember that you can give online anytime by going HERE. Don’t miss the first official Sunday of summer at The Journey this weekend – and remember, two gatherings: 9:30 and 11:00. Enjoy The Journey! |
Feed The First State
The series Fringe Benefits has challenged all of us to live a life of selflessness and experience the unexpected value of helping someone else. That challenge is why we’ve begun Feed the First State. We don’t want to be all talk–we want to put feet on our words and we want to help provide food to people who are hungry. Here are the statistics:
-The Food Bank of Delaware provides emergency food for an estimated 241,600 different people annually.
-44% of the members of households served by The Food Bank of Delaware are children under 18 years old.
Through partnering with The Food Bank of Delaware, we’re going to help alleviate hunger in our community!
Here’s how you can be a part: If you’re in a Life Group, do all you can to make sure your party is a success! If you’re not in a Life Group, here’s how you can be a part:
- Go to this link to see when and where various Feed The First State parties will be happening in our community and drop off your cans of food.
- Stop by The Journey this Saturday (June 25th) anytime between 3-5pm to drop off your cans of food.
When we gather again on Sunday, we’ll celebrate how many cans we collected and how many people we’ll be able to feed as a result. Plus…we have a surprise.
“When you harvest the crops of your land, do not harvest the grain along the edges of your fields, and do not pick up what the harvesters drop. 10 It is the same with your grape crop-do not strip every last bunch of grapes from the vines, and do not pick up the grapes that fall to the ground. Leave them for the poor and the foreigners living among you. I am the Lord your God.” (Leviticus 19)
On the journey with you,
Pastor Andrew
::Andrew Wilson is the Connecting Pastor of The Journey
Mid-Week Reflections
I have been attending The Journey Church in Newark, DE for the last couple weeks. I have been impressed with the vision and mission of the church as well as the heart and passion of the pastor, Mark Johnston. So each week my goal, and I emphasize my goal is to do a recap of the previous week service. A mid-week reflection if you will to re-challenge what was heard on Sunday. If your like me by Tuesday I get caught up in the stress and busyness of life and I find myself forgetting what inspired me just a few days prior.
God Is In Your Corner::
Leviticus 19:9-10 9 “When you harvest the crops of your land, do not harvest the grain along the edges of your fields, and do not pick up what the harvesters drop. 10 It is the same with your grape crop—do not strip every last bunch of grapes from the vines, and do not pick up the grapes that fall to the ground. Leave them for the poor and the foreigners living among you. I am the Lord your God.
1. What prevents me from being taken advantage of?
- It’s the risk we take in following Jesus.
- Jesus provides protection. We are to leave the corners of our field.
- It is help for other after we harvest what we need.
- Unwise harvesters spend what they want not what they need.
2. How much is too much?
- We never ask God twice when He wants to give to us. We always ask twice when He asks us to give to others.
- We give to the point of peace.
3. Whats the best way to help?
- Spontaneous opportunity to act on.
- Must do it consistently to truly experience the blessing in the long haul.
God is in my corner so I don’t have to be.
Every time we give and serve our mind lets out dopamin. When we do good things for others we get a high it is called the helpers high.
Psalm 41:1-3 1 Oh, the joys of those who are kind to the poor! The Lord rescues them when they are in trouble. 2 The Lord protects them and keeps them alive. He gives them prosperity in the land and rescues them from their enemies. 3 The Lord nurses them when they are sick and restores them to health.
Trust God and let go of whatever you are holding on to.
Key Question: What would you do for God if you knew you couldn’t fail?
If your in your corner get out because there is not enough room for you and God.
You can check out this weeks talk HERE
::REAL CHURCH FOR REAL PEOPLE::
Pay The Price
“Don’t wish for the success of others because you have no idea the price they paid to get there.” Not sure where I heard that quote but it has rocked me several times as I think about it over the last year.
Success doesn’t happen overnight. It takes time and there is a price to pay. Too many times nobody wants to pay the price. We want instant satisfaction. We want instant success. We are so used to pushing a button and getting what we want right away. The problem that I have learned the hard way is if it is easy it is usually not worth a whole lot. There is something about fighting though your faith or working hard to achieve a goal.
I’ve always envied the success of others. I see leaders like Winston Churchill and Barack Obama in the world and I see leaders like Andy Stanley, Perry Noble and Steven Furtick in the church world and I catch myself saying I want what they have. Here’s the deal I’m not them and I will never be them. The best I can be is me. The best part about that is that is all that God requires of me. He didn’t create me to be them. He didn’t create me to experience their success or their blessings, I have my own prepared for me.
With more success is more problems on a different level. God gives us what we can handle when we can handle it. There is no way I could run a church of 20,000 people or run a multi-million dollar company. But what I can do is my best. I have had to learn the hard way. God has been working on stripping me of all pride and measure of what I valued and thought success was. God has been taking me back to the basics. Because of that I have learned an entire new respect for authority, serving and what true success in His eyes looks like.
Nobody was asking the church leaders that I mentioned to speak at conferences when they had a church of 20 people. However they trusted God, were faithful and because of that they are seeing success that is not the norm. If it was easy everybody would do it. Truth is though, whether they have a church of 20 or a church of 20,000 it is not the size of the church that matters it is their pursuit of God and how that transcends into their everyday lives and into their everyday relationships.
So the key is pay the price by doing the little things. Do what you can do. Don’t wish for the success of other because you have no idea the price they paid to get there. Just remember with others success comes others problems. Learn to enjoy the journey and not rush the season of small beginnings.
Political Religion
There is a phrase that is used by many churches all over the world. “It’s all about relationships and not religion.” I wonder what an unchurched person thinks when they hear that? I wonder what those who have gone before us think about that statement? I personally love the statement. I love the meaning behind it because I know the meaning behind it.
It truly is all about a relationship with Jesus Christ and a relationship with others. Building community between us and God and us and others. It’s a very powerful and relevant statement.
It is not about religion, or is it? I get what the statement is saying. It’s not about the politics and the rules and the regulations. It’s not about a list of do’s and dont’s. It’s not about guilting people into a relationship with Christ. However, for me I want to be careful that I just don’t throw out religion.
I work with people who are “religious” and they have questioned my thought process on this statement. Many have shared a concern that when you say it is not about religion that you close doors to share about the relationship aspect of it. Many are turned off when in one statement you marginalize potentially everything they have been taught to believe. Perhaps they are right.
So many people, organizations and institutions have spilled blood, sweat and tears all in the name of religious freedom. All of them have done that to give me the freedom to serve in a local church and share about a relationship with Jesus. Christianity is a religion. The church is a religious institution. Christ died for everyone. Christ died for those who would sit in a church and worship Him. Christ died for those who would stand outside of a church and mock Him. Christ died for everyone.
I think it is important to honor the past. I think it is important to honor past spiritual giants. True some of the things in the past have hurt peoples perception of the church and Christ today. However there is a negative past to almost every organization but does that mean you burn the history and forget where you came from? Not saying anybody or any organization does that, it’s just a thought.
For me the statement goes like this in my head: It’s about relationships and not the politics of religion. For me it is about some aspects of religion. The good parts of religion. The parts that give me freedom not the parts that keep me in bondage of rules. I’m not here to argue semantics, but it’s just a thought.
What’s your thoughts?
Do You Really Think That The Hope Of The World Is The Church?
I got asked recently by a co-worker who said, “Do you really think that the hope of the world is the church?” My first response was silence as I thought about what they were really asking and then I said, “It should be”. I have heard from various pastors over the years that the local church is the hope of the world and I love the way that sentence flows off of my tongue. However by saying that sentence I feel like I pawn off the responsibility to a building to do all the work to reach people. I leave all the effort to programs and procedures and systems. Problem is, what happens if the people in local churches all over the world either don’t know they are the hope of the world or worse have no desire to offer that hope?
Jesus was a passionate individual here on earth who connected with those who were ultimately far from him. Jesus took the time to hang out with sinners and the very men who walked with him were not the sort that any of us would have chosen to plant a church with or start a movement with. He sought out the woman who had been married 5 times and was living with a guy who wasn’t her husband and he offered grace to the woman caught in adultery and he touched the lepers and spoke gently with tax collectors. He healed those who were sick and broken and according to the world were disgusting and were better off dead. He welcomed all those with questions and insults like they were his friends.
The question that person asked me was followed up with this…did God really create an institution where one day a week people could come to a building and fake the fact that they are really hurting and broken inside and begging for hope that doesn’t seem to be there? Does God really care about my hurt and my pain and my life? Truth is we all go through stretches in our lives where we do exactly that and pretend that we have it all figured out and that our life is perfect. Smiles can only cover up so much. Truth is we are not doing God or anybody else any favors by getting up early on Sunday and putting on our happy face to only go through motions and emotions.
Many a Sunday’s have gone by in my 10 years of ministry where it was easier to answer the cliche’ question of “How are you?” with “I’m fine”, rather than reveal my heart that was wicked and broken and desperately searching for God. Now what I have gathered with those that I have talked to about this inside and outside the church world is that the world does not need to see perfect people NOT needing a savior, pretending to be something that they are not. The world needs to see broken and messed up and fragmented people who have been honest and fallen broken before the cross and are changed and been made new. I believe that is the church being the hope of the world. What can the church offer that nobody else in the world can offer…hope. Hold on to and grasp the hope that is in you today. You are the church and through you and your story you can change the world. Why? Because I really do believe that the local church is the hope of the world.
Life Lessons From Trader Joe’s
I have been working part-time at Trader Joe’s for the last three weeks and there are several things that I have noticed that I wanted to share. I am extremely impressed at how Trader Joe’s as a company is managed and operated. From the accuracy of the crew members in how they order products to eliminate massive back room storage to management and how they delegate responsibility. They truly give ownership of the store to the crew members and coach them when it is needed.
Key Concepts::
- It is more about the customer than it is about the project.
- Telling someone where to go is not as important as showing them where to go.
- How can you purchase something until you know if you like, so try it. Are you serious?
- It is all about creating a “wow” experience for customers.
It made me think about the church and it is not really any different or at least it shouldn’t be. It should always be more about people than a project or a program. Yes projects and programs bring people in but it is relationships that keeps them coming in. It is more important to lead by example than to tell people how to live. Actions will always speak louder than words. There are different churches for different people. I love the idea of trying out a church until you find the one that you feel connected to that you can serve in and grow in. Jesus was not boring and neither should the church. There should be an obvious sign that a church is growing and excited and passionate about what they are doing. When people walk in they should be in “wow” of the creativity, passion, excitement and commitment.
I’ve watched people walk in to Trader Joe’s and spend a ton of money not just for the product but for the experience. I wonder if people would be willing to invest whatever it took to enjoy their experience in their church?
“People” People
Teddy Roosevelt said, “The most important single ingredient in the formula of success in leadership is knowing how to get along with people.” Were told in Proverbs 27 to be diligent to know those around us. I learned in college the 10 ideas to becoming a “people” person and since it was a Baptist school at the time, all of the ideas start with the letter “R”.
.
.
- REACH out to people.
- REMEMBER a person’s name.
- RECOGNIZE a person’s potential.
- REQUEST information about them.
- Be RESPECTFUL.
- RELATE on their level.
- Be RELIABLE.
- Give REASSURANCE to people.
- Be a RESOURCE for people.
- REQUEST their help.
As I read through that list I thought there is at least one missing. RESPOND. People want to know just as much about you as you do about them. There is a certain level of transparency that is required of a leader if the people they lead are to trust them. There is a level of understanding that people need to have that lets them know you are just like them.
When you ask good questions you will see what they really care about. You’ll find out about their future dreams and goals. You’ll find out about what they cry about or what they sing and laugh about. To do this you must become a good listener and when the time is right you must become a good responder.
There are at least 10 things to discover about someone in order to have a better understanding of them and this is a two way street.
- Their background
- Their present situation or station in life
- Their personality
- Their spiritual gift (s)
- Their natural abilities
- Their dreams for the future
- Their hurts -past and present
- Their joys -past and present
- Their priorities
- Their key influencers as well as who their friends are
Remember as a leader “you must care more about who they are than what they do.” -Perry Noble. You can have good people skills and not be a good leader, but you cannot be a good leader without good people skills.
As a leader use your head to gain knowledge of people. As a leader use your heart to demonstrate a concern for people. As a leader use your hands to help people. As a leader use your life to connect with people.
People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. Everybody wants to be someone. Everyone needs someone. Take the time to discover the potential that others do not see in themselves and point it out to them. Be real with people and let them into your life.
