Journey to The Journey

Roughly 9 months ago in preparation for our study over the book of Revelation I started reading books regarding various Christian views on Scriptures dealing with the end-times. Over that span of time I've blogged book reviews in an effort to be able to promote/recommend worthwhile readings for those who may want to dig a little deeper while we're in Revelation. With that said, this is the last end-time review before the Revelation series begins this March. However, at some point after the series kicks off I'll blog about my primary commentary & teaching resources that I'll be using while teaching through Revelation.

Church plants and planters can often be stereotyped as just angst young people who want to do things different, look cool while they’re doing it and rage against the proverbial “machine” (or typical church experience in this case). Church planters probably all think they’re the ones that will get “church” right unlike their piers in the surrounding communities, right? Church planters want to be revered as trendsetters or as more relevant than any inferior ministry near by, right?

In a nutshell, this hope had two different angles. First of all, we prayed that The Journey could be a church for people who have never had a church before in their life. In this neck of the woods there aren’t that many people who have never been to church. Almost any and everyone I’ve met can at least share with me a time in their childhood in which grandma used to pick them up on Sunday mornings or for a week of vacation bible school in the summer. However, there are a ton of people in our communities who have never had a church to call home in their adult life for whatever reason.

This is the second of four posts celebrating answered prayer and the work of God and The Journey. Last August we prayed that The Journey would be a place where Scripture was held as our highest court of authority.

This week, leading up to our Vision Sunday & Business Meeting, I wanted to take some time to celebrate how by the grace of God we’ve seen these hopes come to fruition.

"To wear material crosses as an ornament, to place material crosses on churches and tombs, all this is cheap and easy work, and entails no trouble. But to have Christ's cross in our hearts, to carry Christ's cross in our daily walk, to know the fellowship of His sufferings, to be made conformable to His death, to have crucified affections, and live crucified lives, - all this needs self-denial; and Christians of this stamp are few and far between. Yet, this, we may be sure, is the only cross-bearing and cross-carrying that does good in the world. The times require less of the cross outwardly and more of the cross within." - J.C. Ryle