A Church Within A Church

May 5^th, 2008

There’s something happening in Bend Oregon.  On a warm Sunday evening  a lively crowd is gathering at a thing called “Journey”  This is going to be a special night, I can feel it- we’ve invited a special guest tonight, and I can already feel His impact before things even get started.  Something in the air is electric and a sense of energy surrounds us.  This special guest is about to rock our world tonight.

Journey was birthed a few years ago from the idea that our church needed somewhere for the college age kids to hang and learn about Jesus.  A bible study if you will.  It started with barely enough students to count on one hand, and they met every Sunday evening in a living room.  Soon, more students came, and it grew to the size of a small football team, and the meeting place was moved to the lounge area at our church. Fast forward now three years, and we have moved from the coffee lounge to our old sanctuary to the new (larger) sanctuary which seats about 700 people.  We’re not there.  Yet.  Lord willing though…

Journey is a church within a church.  We’re kind of like the younger sibling that’s a little too loud to bring out when the guests arrive.  Our music is loud, we come in shorts and flip flops, and we have long hair tattoos and piercings.  And we love Jesus!  We raise our hands, get our knees, yell out an amen, and give full on, sold out, surrendering type of worship to Jesus!That’s one of the greatest things about Journey - the authenticity and rawness.  There is only one rule:  It’s all about Jesus.  That’s our tagline, or mantra, and when it’s realized – it’s awesome.  We sit around tables because we don’t like pews or rows of chairs. We light tons of candles because its cool and we can.  We believe in community, and getting to know one another.  We don’t have a polished band, although the potential raw talent here is phenomenal, we don’t have the theatrics, the lighting, the budget or the stuffed shirts.  It is a come as you are atmosphere, where we don’t put on a big production to lure you in – we send our (His) people out in the streets full of excitement and passion to let the Holy Spirit leak out of them on to others.  The result is real people sitting down in a safe environment to listen to a potentially very dangerous message. 

Journey is a community.   Sorry, I know that’s the overused Christian-eese buzzword, but it’s really what we’ve become.  We’re not a community because we have similar tastes, but the same passion - to love Jesus.  We love to go out and engage our local culture!  Bend is small, by city standards, about 70,000, but still very diverse, and the need is as great here as in any other city.  There is about 6 months of winter here so the need to help the homeless is greater here than in a warmer climate.   Yes, there are still 4 seasons in Bend: Winter, June, July, and August.  Once a month a handful of us goes to the Shepherd’s House, a homeless shelter, and put on a dinner, some worship songs and I preach a short message.  We also do the same for Bethlehem Inn, another homeless shelter.  Once a month we prepare and serve them a nice hot breakfast.  We have a heart and a real compassion for the homeless and the needy.   We fill up garbage cans placed around the service on Sunday nights with things like toiletries, socks, gloves, hats, etc.  then distribute them to the needy in the area.  We are also involved in other community projects.  This summer we saved quarters for a few months, then disbanded to all the local laundry mats and paid for everyone’s laundry.  The conversations that stemmed from that were nothing short of authentic and real.  Some loved it; some thought we were some kind of Jesus freaks.  It was awesome.

And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ Matt: 25:40

Keith Kirkpatrick is the one who really birthed Journey a few years back.  There are not many men I know of who have the passion Keith has for Jesus.  It’s contagious, it’s real, and it’s stinking awesome!  Keith is our pastor, and he is an up on your toes, energetic, speak the truth in love pastor.  He is really a God send.  Trust me your not clock watching when Keith is speaking.  We cover topics that our relevant to our culture, as well as topics you may not hear at your traditional “church”  We spent almost 8 months on the book of Revelation that was a “journey” in and of itself.  Some churches are ‘afraid to even tackle that book, or are so Left Behind, that it’s just a big scare you into believing tactic.  How awesome is it to know the end game result and be part of the winning team.  Team Jesus! 

Broken, confused, alcoholic, homeless, they’re all here.  We welcome anyone that wants to have their world rocked by Jesus.  Our doors are open to all.  And it can get messy.  That’s when you know you’re being effective.  We send out a van every Sunday night to a couple of homeless shelters, and have some homeless friends from a camp not far from our church show up.  We have teen agers, grey hairs (like me) and everything in between.  It’s bound to get interesting with that crowd.  We have had people walk up to the stage during worship and flat out stare down the worship leader, all the time wondering what will he do next.  Pretty trippy if you’re the worship leader.  A homeless man lay down on the floor weeping and praising God in front of everyone.  And just the other week I noticed a man from the streets reaching into a plastic bag in the back.  Drugs?  No, he was just rolling a smoke for later.  I just sat back with a smile on my face thinking to myself…this is where Jesus would hang out if He were walking through Bend tonight. 

The special guest I talked about at the onset was the Holy Spirit.  He showed up big time.  The night was May 5^th, 2008.  We were going through Revelation and before the teaching Keith and I were talking about the night ahead.  The message was on the wedding feast, and that one day we would be singing and praising with the greatest worship leader of all time.  Jesus!  How cool is that gonna be?  The thought of people not knowing Christ and not participating got me thinking.  We need to pray for those people tonight.  Pray like we mean it.  In the upstairs maintenance room was a piece of Styrofoam about 3 feet by 6 feet.  I said to Keith “we should take this Styrofoam board and have people write the name of anyone they know who is not saved on it, and let’s pray for them.  That night the worship music was incredible.  Moving.  During the course of worship that night, a long winding line of people formed waiting to get to the “prayer board”.  When the night was over there were over 250 names written on that board!   That board rocks!   We bring that board out for every service now, and people can and do go to it on their knees and pray for those names.  The really cool thing is that we see Jesus at work.  We are starting to cross off names now in a big bold RED marker.  They no longer have a place there.  They are redeemed!  Can I get an amen?! 

There is a fire that has been lit here in Bend, and it’s starting to roar.  It is so exciting to see what happens when people put Jesus in the drivers seat, take their hands off the wheel, and let Him drive.  I am so excited to see where He will take us next.  Our vision / goal is to move to our own building in the fall of ’09.  Keith and I have been scoping out buildings, but it’s a timing and even more so, a money thing.  There is an old warehouse building that we would love to move into, but that would be a huge God thing.  Not saying He can’t do it, so we will continue to dream BIG.  The building is a very large and would hold probably about 800 or so.  It’s run down, grungy, and right across the street from the local strip club.   What a cool place to plant a church. 

Going forward I meditate on this:  “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding.  In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.Proverbs:  3:5&6