January 2006

I decided to take the ViaRail (the train that connects across Canada) for my business trip to Montreal this week. There’s wi-fi acccess onboard and the image of the voxtropolis login screen with the train station came to mind. It’s amazing what humans have done to stay connected.

There is something about being on a train. There’s a sense that you’re multitasking because you’re travelling, yet it’s incredibly relaxing. You’re presented with moving sceneries of nature, cities, and loved-ones hugging as they re-connect at each stop. It also really helps when you’re being pampered in 1st class with your every need met… swordfish and filet mignon were on the menu today, incredible.

Here’s a picture from of the city from my hotel suite. It’s interesting how in the dark, you can only see what the light hits…

Whatever you think of Joyce Meyer (one of our top 50’s in my previous post), she helped rally 40,000 people across India to pray and reflect on Christ. Â

I’m a minority myself, attending an ethnic church, yet something wierd inside of me still thinks ‘wow, they worship our Lord too’…

I absolutely believe the Scriptures when it talks about every tongue, and tribe, and nation, worshiping God… I just don’t think i’ve come even close to experiencing the full richness and beauty of it all. I wonder when that day will come…

The church report’s released their annual top fifty again…

Although it always piques my interest and there are plenty of people i respect on this list, it always distrubs me to think that there are followers of Jesus spending their time doing this.

And how does Dr. Phil keep making this list?

A few articles i’ve stumbled upon recently.

Article from the American Spectator thinks that 2006 might be the worst year for Jesus since 33 A.D. with reports that he was a stoner and the release of the Da Vinci Code movie.

In Italy, someone’s taking Jesus to court. He’s being charged with impersonation!

The above photo of the Lord’s supper by fashion designer Marithe Francois Girbaud was banned by Milan. I’m not sure why people were so offended. Can’t skinny white models come to Jesus as well? Sometimes we think Jesus only came for the outcast, the lame, and the poor. He also came for the popular, the socially beautiful, and the rich (ie. Matthew the tax collector).

and to go a bit further… if the world was nothing but a bunch of skinny white models (to sterotype, I know every individual is much more than that),

wouldn’t Jesus, as the God who reaches down to live and die amongst us, also have come as a skinny, white, model?

Dr. George Hunter III in Church for the unchurched, has listed ten features of “apostolic congregations�

1.     They take a redundant approach to rooting believers and seekers into Scriptures.

2.     They are disciplined and earnest in prayer, and they expect to experience God’s actions and response.

3.     Compassion for the lost and un-churched is non-negotiable.

4.     They actually obey the Great Commission�more as a warrant or privilege than mere duty. There main business is to make faith possible for the un-reached people in their community. Evangelism of the un-churched is not merely one of many more or less equally important ministries of the church.

5.     They have a motivationally sufficient vision for what people as disciples can become.

6.     They are congregations that adapt to the language, music, style of the target population’s culture.

7.     They are congregations that labor to involve everyone into small groups.

8.     They prioritize the involvement of all Christians in lay ministry for which they are gifted.

9.     They receive regular pastoral care from specific people who are gifted at shepherding ministry.

10. They engage into many ministries specifically designed to the un-churched.

I’ve been waiting for ages to find a new home for my reflections… and looks like here it is. It’ll be a while before i fully transition… (I’m waiting for the blogger->voxtropolis migration tool) as for now i’ll just be fiddling with features with random posts.

Until then see A Disciple’s Journal for the archives.

 Thanks so much to those who have worked so hard to put this all together!

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