http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs en web@southridgechurch.ca Copyright 2010 2010-03-16T13:52:50+00:00 http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/the-journey/ http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/the-journey/#When:13:45:41Z For the last month or so, I’ve had some thoughts rattling around my brain. (It’s unusual, I know.) They were inspired by Jeff’s challenge to our community on Vision Night to “be the church we’ve become,” in particular by using 2010 to grow deepening in our discipleship. Since Jeff is away, baking in the hot Mexican sun, I figured this would be a perfect time to throw some of my thoughts out there for your consideration. “When the cat’s away…” as they say. This particular challenge, which stemmed from concerns shared by some in our community that they don’t feel like they’re “getting fed” on Sunday mornings, has caused me to reflect on a book I read a few years ago, called The Critical Journey. In the book, the authors explore the typical patterns of spiritual growth. What captured my attention is that, according to Hagberg and Guelich, it is only in the very first stage of spiritual maturity (of six) where “getting fed” (gaining information from leaders and mentors) is actually the bottleneck to spiritual maturity. To these authors, it is only those in the infancy of faith who are dependent on feeding on information to grow deeper in their discipleship. “Being fed” is only one, short, early phase of growing deeper in following Jesus. In more mature stages of spiritual growth, it is active participation in the give and take of relationship and engagement in a life of service that accelerate a person’s spiritual growth. This seems to be consistent with the way the writer of Hebrews sees the issue. In Hebrews 5:11-14, he challenges his readers to grow beyond their spiritual infancy, including their need to be fed, to become the (mature, adult) teachers of biblical truth that they could and should be! I have to say that this has been my experience in my own journey. As someone who loves to learn, and has earned advanced degrees in theology, I can definitively say that information has never been the bottleneck in my growth. In fact, my seminary years, when I was learning the most, were some of the driest spiritual times in my life (a all-too-common reality in theological education). To be perfectly frank, the more I learn, the more I long for experiences like Lent and for opportunities like 24/7. These are times of active engagement in the spiritual journey that engage my spirit rather than just my mind, that inspire me into active participation in the life of Christ, rather just than a passive education in the truth of Christ⎯to apply what I know about Jesus in order to actually become more like Him instead of merely knowing more about Him. In this, I feel like I am growing more, even through my Lenten failures, than I ever have through a lifetime of Sundays and seminary. So, this is my challenge to you. “Therefore, let us leave the elementary teachings about Christ and go on to maturity,” (Hebrews 6:1). Let’s commit to a more mature, more holistic, more comprehensive strategy for growing into spiritual maturity, one that is far less worried about “getting fed,” and far more interested in moving from listening and reading to reflecting and conversing, and ultimately to serving and teaching, so that we can grow truly deeper as disciples.  Remember: the word ‘disciple’ meant ‘apprentice’⎯someone who only learned about someone in order to ultimately live more like them! Inside Scoop 2010-03-16T13:45:41+00:00 http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/the-t-word/ http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/the-t-word/#When:11:55:03Z Out of respect for people who are new to a faith journey and/or super skeptical about churches and money, we’ve made a habit of encouraging newer people at Southridge to “not feel obligated to give” and to “just let the bags pass by”.  I love when that announcement gets made because I feel like there are few things more disarming than letting people know that we’re not in it for their money. In the emphasis though, I somehow wonder whether we’re robbing God of something - never mind robbing ourselves as well.  In Malachi 3:9-10 God says to His people, “You are under a curse—the whole nation of you—because you are robbing me.  Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house.  Test me in this,’ says the LORD Almighty, ‘and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it.”  In these verses God talks about the spiritual significance of what’s called ‘tithing’.  Yet somehow in our church culture - out of respect for newer people - we’ve reduced ‘tithing’ into some sort of a four-letter word.  But verses like these make me wonder what we’re robbing ourselves of by doing that. For clarity: the word ‘tithe’ means ‘tenth’ and refers to one-tenth of all of God’s stuff that He temporarily entrusts to us.  To give back merely one tenth of your income is recognition that God has, in fact, given it to you.  It’s also an act of obedience to Christ, seeing as tithing was not just commanded in the Old Testament but commended by Jesus in the New Testament.  Tithing is an act of faith, trusting that God will provide for your needs from 90% of all He’s given you.  It’s an act of discipline, living within the means God’s made available to you rather than over-extending yourself beyond them.  And perhaps most importantly, tithing is a team commitment: God intends tithing to be directed towards your local faith community.  When it comes to other ministry supports, the meeting of other practical needs, and other fund drives: biblically speaking those are to exist over and above the basic ten percent of your income that we’re pooling together as a church. I want to encourage you to consider whether you’ve been robbing God and robbing yourself of experiencing His full blessing in your life in this way.  If you’d like some support in growing in tithing, take advantage of our monthly finance drop-in where, on the first Monday of every month at our Glenridge location, our Financial Stewardship Team will be available to provide counsel on budgeting, debt-reduction and other financial issues. And after any Sunday morning service at any location, a member of this team would be happy to connect with you to offer help and provide your with resources.  E-mail Tim Arnold at tarnold@southridge.cc for more information.  And if you want some help in structuring your tithing, contact Kathy Van Driel at kvandriel@southridge.cc to set up direct withdrawal in order to make the discipline of tithing more manageable. The truth is: if we’re going to be the church we’re becoming, we can’t do it without a widespread commitment to tithing.  Mathematically, the stats say most believers give a small fraction of a tithe - and then pretend they give more.  Unfortunately though, this math doesn’t add up to Southridge changing the world.  And spiritually, we’ll never experience the blessedness of what we’re becoming without the financial faithfulness to claim the dare of God in Malachi 3. So let’s turn tithing from a term we avoid to a word that’s synonymous with experiencing the faithfulness and blessing of God in extraordinary ways! Inside Scoop 2010-03-10T11:55:03+00:00 http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/lets-go/ http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/lets-go/#When:17:27:32Z I want you to do something with me… Right here, and right now.  Click this link and sign yourself up for GO10: Inside Scoop 2010-03-02T17:27:32+00:00 http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/vision-night-follow-up/ http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/vision-night-follow-up/#When:14:04:40Z This past Sunday was an amazing day for our church family!  In the morning, we gathered across the region to learn how to express love through genuine patience and kindness.  Then in the evening we came together as one church for a special event.  Not only did we unite as affirmed members for our Annual General Meeting (the materials of which you can pick up at the Welcome Centre at any location) and enjoyed the Olympic hockey game on the big screen, but we worshiped and celebrated Vision Night⎯something that is becoming an annual tradition of sorts to reflect, encourage and inspire us to go for it with God together. We learned that from God’s perspective, 2010 at Southridge has less to do with becoming more (i.e. launching more locations) and much more to do with now being what we’ve become as a multi-site, multi-anchor-cause-championing restorative movement for Christ across the Niagara Region.  And we acknowledged that in addition to going deeper in fulfilling our strategic plan’s ‘5 Heartbeats for the Future’ (now entering Year 2; for more about the heartbeats, see our 2009 Mid-Year Report), there are 5 primary challenges facing each of us at a personal level: To go deeper in our prayer reliance⎯building Christ’s church in the supernatural power that only He can provide To go deeper in our understanding of discipleship⎯growing beyond the need to be fed by others and developing the capacity to spiritually feed ourselves To go deeper in our financial faithfulness⎯claiming the dare of God to abundantly bless those who consistently practice the discipline of tithing To go deeper in our trust of each others’ motives⎯believing the best in one another as we keep short accounts on misunderstandings To go deeper in our gratitude for what God has invited us into⎯choosing to appreciate the immensity of God’s love that has included us on His team to win trophies of His grace in our community As we process where God is leading us together, I’d love to hear your reactions to the event.  What did God specifically say to you?  What are you most excited about when you look ahead at 2010 for Southridge?  What challenge are you taking most seriously? Let’s hear some banter… How was ‘Vision Night’ for you? Inside Scoop 2010-02-23T14:04:40+00:00 http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/vision-night-2010/ http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/vision-night-2010/#When:13:08:34Z Just so everyone is aware: this Sunday evening is a huge night in the life of our church family.  At 6:00pm we will be hosting our Annual General Meeting, which serves as an opportunity for those who have officially affirmed themselves as church members here at Southridge (which you can still do at http://www.southridge.cc/membership) to provide an important check and balance of accountability as we affirm the term renewal for a couple of our Elders and approve this year’s operating budget. But that’s only a warm-up for the main event⎯our annual ‘Vision Night’ at 7:00pm!  This worship service is an event like no other and it is open to everyone. We will take time to celebrate the year God has given us as a church and we will dream and commit together to the kind of year He has in store for us in 2010.  It was at last year’s Vision Night that we first imagined becoming a multi-site church, and now, just one year later, we’re celebrating 3 locations across Niagara!  So you won’t want to miss the seeds of imagination God might want to plant among us this weekend. So members: we’ll see you in the Glenridge auditorium at 6:00pm for the AGM.  And for our entire community: we hope you’ll join us there at 7:00pm to celebrate Vision Night together. Oh, and one more thing…  If you’re considering other ways to spend your Sunday evening that include Olympic hockey game-type options, we may just be able to accommodate a win-win for you that includes both the excitement of Vision Night and the final two periods of the Canada-USA game on the big screen in the auditorium… :) See you there! Inside Scoop 2010-02-19T13:08:34+00:00 http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/the-southridge-top-ten/ http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/the-southridge-top-ten/#When:12:02:05Z A couple weeks ago I posted asking people to send their ‘Southridge Q’... that is, their questions related to anything and everything about our church.  And one of the questions that surfaced, which I know a number of people have asked before, involves knowing areas of need that require volunteer action.  That’s why last week I wanted to debunk the myth that people aren’t needed around here and encourage people to attend the Glenridge Volunteer Information event last Tuesday. But in the spirit of providing even more clarity on this commonly-asked question, I figured I’d take the David Letterman approach and provide a sense of Southridge’s ten most pressing volunteer needs along with contact information.  So here’s a 2010 version of the ‘Southridge Top Ten’: 10. Reception and Administrative Assistance: answering phones and providing ongoing assistance to the administrative needs of our church as well as supporting ministries in specific tasks or projects.  Contact Vicky Giles at vgiles@southridge.cc. 9. Anchor Cause Development: participating with our identified partner ministries and helping determine our church’s eventual ‘piece’ in supporting single-parent families and seniors & widows.  Contact Annie Duross at aduross@southridge.cc. 8. IT, Technical Support and Website: investing computer, web and tech-based skills in strengthening our infrastructure and growing the capacities of our website.  Contact Arran Fraser at afraser@southridge.cc. 7. First Impressions: providing a warm and welcoming environment that contributes to peoples’ sense of belonging through ministries like Parking, Greeting, Ushering, Café, and Welcome Centre.  Contact Vicky Giles at vgiles@southridge.cc. 6. Prayer: supporting our Sunday services and providing prayer for people afterwards as well as praying for specific individual needs and/or interceding on behalf of our church in big-picture kinds of ways.  Contact Carrie Jones at scjones@vaxxine.com. 5. Communications: helping develop a strategy for informing more people in better ways about all things Southridge, as well as using various media arts to present information in a variety of forms.  Contact Jeff Martens at jmartens@southridge.cc. 4. Facility Set-Up: ensuring our Sunday services are equipped through setting-up and tearing down portable gear at our rented facilities in Welland and the North End.  Contact Kris Warkentin at kwarkentin@southridge.cc. 3. Life Group Leaders: encouraging people to connect and grow through their relationships with one another by coordinating hospitality and facilitating spiritual conversations.  Contact Jeff Jantzi at jjantzi@southridge.cc. 2. Children’s Ministry: building into our next generation through a variety of Sunday morning opportunities including Nursery, Toddler, Pre-School, Large Group teaching & programming and Small Group discussion leading.  Contact Rick Zwiers at rzwiers@southridge.cc. And the number one Southridge volunteer need is…  [Imagine the drum roll… :) ] 1. Cleaning: enabling our facility to enhance our capacity to welcome and include people through tidying, vacuuming, washing and maintaining, particularly the public areas of our facility.  Contact Kris Warkentin at kwarkentin@southridge.cc. So there you have it… The 2010 version of Southridge’s top ten ministry needs… maybe not representing everyone’s unanimously agreed-upon order but at least paints a picture of some of our ministry pressure points.  I hope this is helpful to you and also hope, if you’re not involved in what God is up to around here in a way that makes the most of the gifts and passions He’s entrusted to you, that this would be one way we can support a greater degree of fruitfulness and fulfillment in our people.  After all: we need everyone’s help to help everyone, so thanks in advance for helping! Inside Scoop 2010-02-16T12:02:05+00:00 http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/we-need-your-help/ http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/we-need-your-help/#When:15:16:07Z It’s one of the great tragedies in our church today. And while it’s not crisis-level or unity threatening, it still affects the overall health of our church. Sadly, I hear it regularly… The sense of not being needed around here. I suppose at one level it’s a credit to the fantastic efforts of everyone who is already involved. The early morning sacrifices of our worship band members and technical people and the week-in, week-out dedication of our kid’s ministry workers have demonstrated such consistency and reliability that we actually give the impression that things are ‘taken care of’. It seems like, when things are working reasonably well, people get the sense that everything is already under control and that their help isn’t necessary. But I want us to be clear this week that nothing could be further from the truth. Theologically, scripture teaches that we need everyone’s help to help everyone. In passages like Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12 and Ephesians 4 the Bible describes the church as a body that requires the contributions of every single part in order for it to be healthy and to optimize its restorative capacity in the world. In fact, 1 Corinthians 12:21 specifically says that body parts can’t say to other body parts that they’re not needed. Every single part of the body of Christ is necessary in order for the body to work well. Practically, we’re in a season where that’s more critical to understand than ever. Having just relocated a couple hundred of our people to Welland, and on the verge of transitioning another few hundred to North End St. Catharines, we’re about to offer three distinct ‘feeding stations’ each Sunday morning across the Niagara Region. And considering God designed the church to function more like a potluck family reunion than a one-way restaurant, each of these locations will require the active support of every single one of us if they’re going to thrive. Do you get what I’m saying? If new people who’ve never known Jesus are going to be gripped with His message of grace, it’s going to take all of us working together to do it. If people are going to grow in their faith — learning and growing through the community we provide — it’s going to require all of us as a community to participate in providing it. And if new needs are going to be met, seeing single parents and neglected widows or senior citizens wrapped with Christ’s love, it’s going to require all of our arms outstretched to reach and serve them. In short: every single one of us is critically needed around here. So I want to highlight a very important event for us this week. On Tuesday, February 2 at 7:00pm in our Glenridge auditorium we’re going to host an information night and volunteer fair. We’ve hosted this kind of event in both Welland and the North End in preparation for our location launches to help people understand the myriad of places to plug in and serve specifically on Sunday mornings. And knowing the net effect that sending people to two new locations will have on Glenridge, we want to provide an opportunity to make people aware of all the places where our time, energy, gifts and commitments can make extraordinary differences in the life and health of our community on Sundays at Glenridge as well. This event is a no-strings-attached information night. And even for those already involved on Sunday mornings, it’s a great opportunity to see what’s involved in our weekend services and just how much work it takes to make Sundays happen. It will definitely alleviate any impression that people are not needed around here! So I’d encourage and challenge you to check out this event on Tuesday night. Explore the opportunities to serve in this next season — in First Impressions, Kid’s Ministry, Facility Support, Tech, Music and other areas. Allow yourself to become part of the potluck meal that God serves each weekend. And allow yourself to experience the thrill and significance of being used by God as part of something greater than any of us could be on our own as we band together as parts of His Body and allow Him to reach and serve a lost and broken world through us. To me, it’s an incredible privilege to be a child of God through Jesus’ work. But what’s even more profound is the idea that God would actually want to include me as a partner of His in His eternity-altering plan for the Niagara Region. And the cool part is: He wants to include you too. And He wants to include all of us together in this adventure we call Southridge. So make a point of checking out our Glenridge information night and volunteer fair. Because one’s thing’s for certain: you are needed around here! Inside Scoop 2010-01-30T15:16:07+00:00 http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/whats-your-southridge-q/ http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/whats-your-southridge-q/#When:13:57:39Z I hope you’re enjoying our ‘Q’ series and the 24-7 resources that supplement it.  It’s been a great start to the New Year to re-calibrate our understanding of what God says about Himself so we can project His true character on our lives in ways that shape our lifestyles, instead of the other way around⎯allowing our life circumstances to project an image of the divine that shapes our (incomplete or inaccurate) experience of God. My question though, as we’re spending this month drilling into some fundamental questions about God, is: what are people’s fundamental questions about our church?  Do you have questions about Southridge⎯what we’re about, who does what, or why we do what we do? One of the aims of this blog is to foster two-way dialogue, and although I can’t type very quickly, I’d love to take time to reply (and allow others from our leadership team to reply) to questions you have about our church. So in the spirit of the ‘Q’ series, what’s your Southridge ‘Q’?  What are your questions about our church? Looking forward to hearing from you! Inside Scoop 2010-01-27T13:57:39+00:00 http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/first-things-first/ http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/first-things-first/#When:13:01:18Z Hey Everyone… I hope you’re enjoying 2010 so far and are experiencing all that God has for you in this New Year.  There are so many things I could update you on in this first blog post of the year: gratitude for all that God did through our ‘What Are You Waiting For?’ Christmas production, thankfulness for where our year-end financial numbers seem to be landing, excitement as our North End location prepares to launch, and so much more.  But I thought I’d approach this first post of the year in a ‘first things first’ kind of way.  So here goes… Please pray. Please pray often.  Please pray intensely.  Please pray for our church, for our people and for our leaders.  Please pray for our church’s children, students, marriages, families and seniors.  Pray for health.  Pray for strength.  Pray for guidance, for comfort, for direction and for hope.  Pray for protection, for provision and for unity.  Please pray for our church. As well, please pray for our surrounding community and the needs we’re sensing God wants us to meet: pray for the homeless, the single parent and the senior or widow who finds themselves alone.  Pray for those far from Christ to find Him and be found by Him and for the broken to find healing and wholeness through Him. When it comes to Southridge in 2010 though, whatever you do, please pray. I say this for two simple reasons: The stakes of what our church is involved in demand unceasing prayer: Ephesians 6 refers to ministry as a spiritual battle — one where hearts, souls and lives are being won or lost for all eternity.  And as the scope of our ministry continues to grow, the intensity of the battle only escalates, so it’s critical that we’re resourced appropriately for the mission God’s involved us in. The fruit our church seeks to bear is only possible through prayer: Not only does Jesus teach that apart from Him we can do nothing (John 15), but Psalm 127 explains that unless the spiritual resources that only God can provide are what’s driving us, the temporal resources we seek to pool together are in many ways wasted investments. If you want to take prayer one step further in your life, contact Carrie Jones⎯one of our church’s Elders who has been involved in quarterbacking our church’s Prayer Ministry for the past few years (scjones@vaxxine.com).  She can help direct you to get involved in praying during our Sunday morning services or praying for people after them, praying for the sick and those in need during the week, or interceding on our church’s behalf in bigger-picture ways — praying for things like our future, for clarity of direction or unity in relationships. At the very least though, let’s not be the kind of church that solely depends on one single ministry in order for prayer to be a reality in our community.  As a church we’ve so often said that we’re about fostering a lifestyle of full devotion far more than merely inviting people into participating in programs.  So let’s add our prayer lives to the mix in this regard. 1 Thessalonians 5:17 encourages us to “pray continually”.  And in a ‘first things first’ kind of way, as we move forward together in this adventure of a lifetime we’ve been allowed to be a part of called Southridge, I want us to be crystal clear on the one commitment from each of us that will make the single greatest difference in our lives and ministry in this next calendar year. More than your time, your talents, your treasures or your personal touch, your prayers — frequent prayers, sincere prayers, grateful prayers and expectant prayers — are the single greatest gift you can give our church this year. So thanks in advance for praying together this year… God knows we desperately need it. Happy New Year everyone!   Inside Scoop 2010-01-19T13:01:18+00:00 http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/budget-development-time/ http://www.southridgechurch.ca/blogs/post/budget-development-time/#When:14:01:31Z Hi friends, With only 2 months left in 2009, it is time to start thinking about the 2010 Southridge Budget.  Whether or not finances are your thing, check out the video below to see how you can play an important role in the development of our annual budget. We’d love to see you at our first Budget Development meeting on Wednesday, November 11 from 7-9pm! Inside Scoop 2009-10-30T14:01:31+00:00