CityFellowship | Union Square NYC

[I was going to do this one as a video blog, but I need a shave and my hair is sticking sideways so I'll write you a transcript instead.]

There’s a part where Jesus says “Love one another as I have loved you” and “by this the world will know that you are my disciples…that you love one another as I have loved you!” The point is that Jesus’ love is a little different from the way we usually do friendships. The way we usually do friendship is we find people who are fun or make us feel good or are “easy to talk to” or good for us in some way. “Friends” are usually people we can lean on or are useful to us on an emotional level…but Jesus has a different concept of friendship. Continue Reading »

We’re having a prayer meeting in two Sundays, November 23rd. We’re not planning anything fancy, just getting together to pray at our regular time Sunday morning, 11:11. Here’s why I think this is so important: Our church is an experiment. Every church is an experiment of sorts, but I think this is true of our church especially. We wanted to know what would happen if (as much as possible) we got rid of everything unnecessary and focused our attention on the things that really matter: loving God, loving people, His Word… What can happen if people live purely by faith?

I’ll tell you what happens: Great ideas that start with faith get sidetracked. Our sin, pride, and personal ambition get in the way of God’s plans for us. We become focused and fixated on the things of this world (that we know are less-important) and lose focus on God’s presence, His character, His mercy, His Gospel. We go on for ages apart for the sweetness and power of knowing His presence. And what’s worse, we go on in a low spiritual state, completely satisfied with ourselves…

This is us. What we need to do is humble ourselves, admit what’s wrong, and repent. God can’t resist when people humble themselves, confess their sin and turn to Him. Martin Luther said “All of life is repentance.” This is the one thing we need to get good at doing. And this is why the prayer meeting is so important. Not that one meeting will change your life, but I pray at the very least it will put a God-shaped dent in your soul…and mine. Let’s connect with God, live by faith, learn to hear His voice together. So I look forward to seeing you this Sunday - but I’m asking you to make an extra special effort to come and pray with us on the 23rd.

What a great week it’s been for our country! Not only did we get the chance to elect a supremely capable and qualified president but we were able to renew the idea of America as a country built on ideas and (dare I say) hope rather than fear, and race, class-ism and political maneuvering. It reminds us that this country is worth fighting for, not just the people of the country and its security, but the very idea of America is worth fighting for. But before we go forward we need to assess our role in America. I mean “our” role as in the role of people like us, believers who hold to a higher authority, an even greater government with God as king. Continue Reading »

Life is not like in the movies. Cops don’t pick off DNA from dust particles off sneakers to solve a crime, and two people don’t fall in love through the typical well worn story lines (although I’m partial to Jane Austen inspired romantic comedies). The difference with real life is that it can be more boring to watch (if you’re watching someone else’s life) but it’s more fun to live out (characters in movies are miserable most of the time, and only happy at the ending - fun to watch, but I wouldn’t want to live that way). So here are five things single people often don’t do - but should - in finding a mate. Continue Reading »

It’s sometimes easy to miss the point of things… Many of the best people go through life wondering what *the point* of it is. In High School English students struggle and fake answers to what the point or the theme of a book or a poem is. In graduate school students sometimes use critical statistical analysis to try to determine the point of a piece of writing. All this to say that it’s easy sometimes to miss the point of something.

I think the point of life is to connect with God. I get a little depressed when I’m in a “good” church meeting (a meeting people think was “good”), where people are happy, but there’s no evidence of connecting with God.

Connecting with God is always odd, it’s by definition “supernatural” so it tends to do things to people: When Hannah connected with God (in 1 Samuel), she got over a period of deep depression almost instantly. When Isaiah encountered God, he lost his pride almost instantly. When Jeremiah encountered God he became courageous in his preaching. When the early church encountered God people started to love people they had nothing in common with. These were all different marks of people connecting with God. And so the question is “Are you connecting?” Is there evidence that God’s mercy has broken into your soul? Or are you looking for a happiness and satisfaction apart from this? In which case you might have missed the point.

It’s easy to sell out Jesus when it comes to politics.  So easy, in fact, that very few people reading this would know what I’m about to say.  Conservatives believe that the future is in jeopardy because we are losing sight of good things from the past.  That is why they want to “conserve” things past, they want to make sure that what is good and true that people once knew will continue to bless the future (the enemy is “corruption” of former glory).  Liberals (from the Latin liber meaning “free”) look hopefully toward the future because when they look to the past they see its sins: genocide, racism, white man’s burden, economic and social oppression, ignorance.  They want to free us from our past and hope for a better more enlightened future (the enemy is a desire to hold on to the past).  Conservatives say past=good, let’s go back, to “small town values” to a time before we had enough people to have large cities.  Liberals say past=sin, let’s move forward to a bright future free from the shackles of our past ignorance.

So which side would Jesus take?  Continue Reading »

I mentioned the second one on Sunday, so I thought I’d list them here. All the recent studies of how people become “happy” points to the same basic set of ideas: that things like money are important if you’re in a financial crisis, but money doesn’t actually add to happiness otherwise. Instead a happy life comes from having three basic things: Continue Reading »

Sorry for the change of plans last Sunday. We’re back to normal for this week. So see you in Union Square!

We’ve been displaced for tomorrow’s worship at the last minute! So change of plans.

Instead of our regular meeting space, we’ll be meeting at: 12:12 @ Baruch College 24th & Lexington.
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* You will need to sign in at the door and tell them you’re with “Grace Fellowship.”

[We'll be meeting in a conference room in "B1" one floor down from the entrance. Take the stairs one flight down and you'll see signs pointing to the room.] If you have any trouble call me at 646-232-6697.

Afterwards we have the gym all to ourselves from 2-5, so wear your sneakers and bring a change of clothes (if you want). See you!

So here’s something that I’m terrible at doing: encourage people. For some reason I feel shy about saying good things. It’s much easier to say neutral things, or mildly critical things. But the Bible doesn’t say we should criticise each other daily (constructively), or be neutral to one another, but “encourage.” Maybe it’s because the Bible knows what behaviorists have been pointing out recently, that people learn a lot better from positive reinforcement than negative ones. Instead of criticizing people for their mistakes, it usually works much better when people are complemented for what they’ve done right. See, criticism will make you try not to do that wrong thing, but it won’t actually help you to do the right thing. Oftentimes criticism just encourages people not to get caught. But encouragement actually points people in the right direction… Continue Reading »