We retreat to escape the daily grind, enjoy focused time with God, evaluate our lives from a godly perspective, deepen our bond as believers, and to model Christ love to others.  This weekend will be packed with fun, prayer, testimonies, scripture, quiet time and plenty of opportunities to Savor the Moments of Grace

It’s the 2010 All-Church English Zone Refuel Meeting!  It's time to refuel and get ready for the Small Group semester!  Even though there are two locations for this Zone Refuel event, the meetings will be held simultaneously on Tuesday, August 31,2010 from 7-9 PM!

Our North Zone Refuel Meeting will be held at New Life Lakeview located at New Life Lakeview located at 2958 North Damen Ave in Chicago, IL 60618.  Our South Zone Refuel Meeting will be held at New Life Cicero located at 3601 South 61st Ave in Cicero, IL 60804

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact EJ Lyon by phone at 773-388-0637 or by email at ejl@newlifechicago.org.

To register online, CLICK HERE

We now have two teenagers in our family! Our 13 yr old daughter joins our 14 yr old daughter as our 2^nd teen. Some people roll their eyes and make discouraging comments about the teen years but we know that God can work in young people! Both my wife and I came to Christ as teens and I’m glad to be working with our youth at New Life Midway. It’s time for our all-church Youth Retreat on May 14-16th. The theme is “Live on Purpose”. This should be a great time! Pastor Joshua and the team from Melrose/MontClare are leading the teaching while Pastor Matt from Little Village is leading the games. 7th graders thru High School—sign up on line under the “Current Events” section of this website. Adults can apply to be a Chaperone. Don’t miss it!!!

Everything that's living is growing. And everything that's growing is fed and watered. Healthy disciples take responsibility for their own spiritual growth by having a plan. Now is a great time to make a spiritual plan for the new year. Here are some helpful links to get you moving: Bible reading plans:

• From Zondervan: http://www.zondervan.com/Cultures/en-US/Product/Bible/Plans.htm?QueryStringSite=Zondervan. I'm using the 3 year reading plan with the kids beginning on Friday. Love that it keeps going back to the Gospels as it takes you through the whole Bible.
• If you use YouVersion on your smart phone (which I HIGHLY recommend), it comes with a great 1 Year Bible reading plan built in.
• From NavPress: http://www.navpress.com/dj/content.aspx?id=138

Guidance on making spiritual plans:

• http://jrvassar.posterous.com/planning-an-intentional-devotional-life-for-2

Help with memorizing Scripture:

• http://www.discipleshiptools.org/apps/articles/default.asp?articleid=57761&columnid=4184

And when you fast...

In Jesus' mountainous sermon he utters this simple phrase to introduce some brief teaching on the spiritual discipline of fasting. Speaking into an especially religious culture where fasting (abstaining from food for a set period of time) was regularly practiced among the spiritual "elite" he gives concrete direction about how to fast.

But what is easily missed is that short introductory phrase "and when you fast". By that simple phrase Jesus expresses fasting as a practice that his followers would engage in.

As a church we practice fasting both privately and together. Beginning on January 3rd we'll be fasting together for 21 days.

If you'd like to get your heart, mind and body ready for this fast, I'd encourage you to read a free pdf edition of John Piper's book A Hunger For God. I'm reading it (off my Blackberry) and its stirring my heart to be ready for the fast.

Col.3:14a, “ . . . put on love, . . .”

After a church meeting one Sunday in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, some kids were running around in the church yard.  Some had ventured outside the fence.  One boy's Mom called him and he immediately came.  This surprised me (especially as it was THAT kid).  She told him to put his coat on for it was cold out, so right away he held the end of his sleeve in his hand and assumed the position – the universal salute of a kid submitting to having his coat put on by Mom.  He had a thoroughly Biblical world view, I thought.

Mom dressed up her boy and told him to go play but stay where she could see him.  Wow.  This struck me as profound.  I need to be like that toward my Father.  I need to immediately obey, and come when He calls me.  I need to submit to Him dressing me -- “Put on Christ,” the Bible says, “put on Love.”  I need to enjoy myself, but stay where He can see me (or rather, where I can see Him).

What does it mean to be child like (as opposed to childish) before God?

Matt. 18:1-4 At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” And calling to Him a child, he put him in the midst of them and said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.  Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

Verse 3 “like CHILDREN, ” but verse 4 “like THIS CHILD.”  Even among children there was something unique about this particular child.  What?

1. Jesus called and the child came to Him.
   
   
2. He evidently trusted Jesus.
   
   
3. He obeyed, but not out of ambition to be great – simple, immediate obedience.
   
   
4. He was with the Lord.
   
   

Kingdom greatness is humility like THAT child.

Recognize greatness in such a child – submissive, obedient, dependent, relaxed in Jesus' arms. Here is both rest and work, sabbath and service -- achieving Kingdom greatness by resting in Him (His yoke is easy and His burden is light).

I'm blessed with five, awe-inspiring children. They teach me what it means to be like a child. I admire their tremendous capacity for JOY.

Many years ago, Vicky was about three, we were living in Calcutta.  In the “winter” we were visiting a cooler place in the Darjeeling hills.  She didn't have any warm clothes so I went and bought her a little sweater that buttoned up the front.  It was clean and crisp and wrinkle free – she looked so sweet in it.  I could have wrapped her in a pillow case or something, but I wanted her to be both warm AND smartly dressed.  She wasn't so excited about the practical necessity of a sweater, but I also got her a little bag of potato chips with an exciting message on it.  I told her “Look Vicky, it says 'special surprise inside!'” (a sticker or something).  She started ecstatically dancing around, clapping! “Oh! A SPECIAL SURPRISE! I'm so HAPPY!” she said.  It doesn't take much to evoke joy in kids.  They come ready for it.  A parent learns how to work this and delights in seeing kids have fun.  I may be wrong in transferring my own attitudes toward kids onto God, but I think His heart is like that toward us.

JOY.  I want to be ready for Joy.  The cold weather is coming.  Bundle up.  Look smart.  God has treats and special surprises in store for you.

I want to encourage you to come to the Lord like a child.  Grab your sleeve.  Get your Love on.  Then enjoy yourself, but be sure to stay where He can see you.  Do your service WITH JOY, with Him.  That amounts to greatness and real achievement in His Kingdom.

I have noticed that when my kids walk with me and they don't know the way or they sense danger, then they slip their hands into mine.  When disoriented, stick with Dad.  This is a lot more comforting than getting directions or looking at a map – just stick with Dad and you don't really need to know the way.  Stay with Dad and you are guaranteed to arrive at Dad's destination.  Sometimes they don't even care about the destination, they just want to be with Dad.  Kids can enjoy the day with Dad armed only with a general sense of where we are going.  They don't need a lot of explanation or a detailed schedule.

By contrast, if we haven't got a certain and compelling knowledge of God's will, we Christians tend to look at things that can be seen: these conditions, those circumstances, this logic, that result.  Instead of falling to our knees many of us turn to our lists of pros and cons.  But we really only have two things to guide us: 1- our own desires (we'll find reasons to support them), and 2- the often hidden will of God. Sometimes the two coincide, and sometimes they clash.

We'd do better to treat the search for God's specific intentions as a fresh opportunity to fellowship with Him.  This is the wisdom I have learned from young children – when disoriented, stick with Dad. Enjoy being with Him.

When our Mongolian friends are on a long journey, they take delays in stride because they are focused on enjoying the journey.  The trip is a series of interesting experiences.  Enjoy the fellowship.  Take in the changing scenery.  Eventually we will get there.  Westerners like me think of the trip as an inconvenience that must be endured in order to reach the destination.

Certainly God gives wisdom and direction (Jn. 15:15), but does He want us to rush off by ourselves just because we know the way forward?  It's much better for us to seek out the God Who hides Himself (Is. 45:15).  Then we can enjoy the changing scenery of our journey with Him, and begin to appreciate unseen things – the promptings of His Spirit and the most valuable things:

• The influence of a godly leader
  
  
• The impact of a word spoken in season
  
  
• The power of an act of kindness
  
  
• The liberation won by forgiveness
  
  
• The mystery of eternal rewards

May the Lord guide us all in New Life and make us fruitful . . .'as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.' (2 Cor. 4:18)

This past Saturday our Lakeview and Lincoln Park locations had about 35 people serve with the Lakeview Food Pantry.  This was just one of the many opportunities we’ve had to serve together as a church.  After the event two of the volunteers approached me and talked to me about how wonderful an opportunity it was to be able to bag groceries and then deliver them to the people.  They were touched emotionally through the experience and want to do it on a more regular basis.  Other people’s eyes were opened for the first time to the needs in our community that they didn’t know about.  Lakeview and Lincoln Park’s communities are very wealthy and sometimes it’s easy to not see the need. 

I think it’s good to get out into the community and to see that even though we live in a very wealthy area there are still people here that are in deep need.  As Christ followers we’re called to serve those in need and as we serve we have the opportunity to show the love of Christ to others.  Sometimes it can be in a tangible way serving at a food pantry.  Other times it is intangibly praying for someone you’ve met while delivering food for them and learning about their specific needs.  As we serve in the community we are given the opportunity both tangibly and intangibly to make a difference.

This past year we have been developing how we organize opportunities to serve.  At the beginning of the year we started to experiment with a concept called Second Week Serve.  The experiment involved consistently presenting opportunities the second week of each month to help create a rhythm that people in the church got used to in plugging in to serve.  Every second week of the month we provided new and ongoing opportunities for New Lifer’s to get involved.  We also developed a logo to help promote it:

 

Over the first six months of implementing this concept we saw many New Lifers desiring more opportunities to serve throughout the entire month.  At this same time we as a church were preparing for our all church serving project on Saturday June 6 called Serve our City.  This project involved organizing about 600 volunteers to serve in various ways throughout the city of Chicago.  We also developed a logo to help promote this event:

After the successful all church outreach we decided that it was time to put Second Week Serve to rest and since June we now have been promoting serving opportunities throughout the month with the Serve Our City logo.  Lincoln Park and Lakeview people have continually jumped in to serve in tangible ways when opportunities have presented themselves.  It’s a joy to see people serve with Christ’s love and desire to be out in their communities serving others.  What I’ve seen in my own life as I’ve served in the community is that I’ve grown more compassionate towards others and have grown in my relationship with Christ while serving others.  I have also seen people come to know Christ through our outreaches and even some people that signed up to serve were drawn to a relationship with Christ through it. 

We’re currently in the next phase of our outreach planning and we’ll be recruiting teams of people from Lakeview and Lincoln Park to help plan and promote various outreach opportunities to the church.  What we’ve seen is that there are a number of people that are plugging in and desiring to serve but there are also many people in the church that have passions for various ministries in the community and would be willing to help organize and lead teams of people out into the community throughout the year.

I’m excited for this next season of outreach at New Life.  I believe that God has brought us to the point where we’re ready to move forward with the next phase.  The church has consistently rallied together to help people in the community and as more and more people have the opportunity to serve more and more people have experienced what it means to Serve Our City.

One of the greatest things about living and working overseas is meeting fascinating people from all over the world..  Our organization in Mongolia, JCS, has missionaries from 19 countries.  A couple of years ago I met an Australian guy named Dave Andrews.  He is a fine Christian man with a wonderful sense of humor who thinks Great Thoughts.  He writes books. The really impressive thing about Dave is that he does things in addition to thinking and writing.  He is passionately active doing things about injustice.  Like God, Dave hates sin and injustice.  For him, the great commission is all about correcting false notions of God.

God is Good.  But most people are looking for evidence on this point.  How might they find it?

Christ Jesus “. . . gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds.” (Titus 2:14).  The evidence of God's goodness is in the self sacrificial nature of His children, their service to others in the name of God, their compassion in the power of the Holy Spirit.  An act of love motivated not from the resources of human nature, but from the heart of God is impressive.  This is the kind of thing that resonates with fallen human beings.  Inwardly they may be asking, “Who cares about my issues here and now? Who helps me? Who is self sacrificial? Who tells the truth? Who knows my name and all about me, and yet still cares?”

Jesus' people are zealous for good deeds.  This is how the general public can tell that God is good.

We NewLifers are busy with good deeds.  It is, however, ridiculously easy to be distracted.  All it takes sometimes is to NOT FEEL APPRECIATED.  All it takes is an offensive comment.  All it takes is a presumptuous demand, and we Christians can be at each other's throats.

The other day I was feeling very annoyed with someone.  I wanted to disobey God and do something unkind.  Wasn't there some special allowance to retaliate, especially if you are in a bad mood?  If a fellow “missionary” does something really irritating and unChristian, wouldn't it be OK for me to just smack 'em?  Do I have to walk in the Spirit, and “be at peace with all men” in this case?  Can't I behave according to human nature if somebody is really, REALLY annoying?  I was looking in the Scriptures for some kind of disclaimer.

I couldn't find one.

Instead I found that I'm not supposed to grow weary in doing good.  I decided to ignore the enemy's ranting and get back to work demonstrating that God is good.

It is my prayer that many souls would find ample evidence of God's goodness in the concern and action of NewLifers – in Chicago or Mongolia or wherever.  May we all get busy, as Dave Andrews would say, “restoring the reputation of God in the eyes of the confused.”  God is good.