Reforming Church: the beginning

You may want to read the introduction here. Reforming Church: the beginning.

When I was newly 22, I took a vision trip to L.A. for spring break. Back then I was getting ready to graduate from college, and I had a holy passion for sharing the gospel and changing the world. I thought God was calling me to missions. I was a student at Auburn University, and I loyally attended the Baptist Campus Ministry (BCM) where a great love of the gospel, discipleship, and global missions was given to me. We regularly had guest speakers, and one of those speakers came to share about Tentmakers – a project of the North American Mission Board (NAMB). One of the speakers was an NAMB employee, and the other one was a man who lived in L.A., and they were seeking students to come to L.A. to be tentmakers. If you are unfamiliar with a tentmaker, it comes from the example of Paul in the bible, who was very literally a tentmaker by trade and a missionary by calling. Hmm, there is a lot God says to me in the detail, but perhaps I’ll come back to that.

This is how I found myself in L.A. at Mosaic Church with Erwin McManus in Los Angeles of spring break of my senior year of college. I loved every thing about L.A. It fueled my passion for diversity. I spent the week living between two homes, but mostly I stayed with an Asian woman who worked for the city of L.A. in engineering. She toured me around and showed me what I could do if I got a job with her, as I was graduating in civil engineering – with an emphasis for water / wastewater / hydrology / environmental influences. This type of thing was not uncommon for me to do as I had spent my summers as a missionary both my sophomore and junior years. Staying in strangers homes had become normal.

There was a gaggle of girls that I hung out with that week. I saw some touristy places in L.A. I visited a mosque, walked by the Christian Science reading room, where a spirit of pure evil poured out onto the street (what I am saying is I felt the demonic forces residing there), ate the craziest foods – my first Korean and Vietnamese, walked past the Mann’s theatre, walked the Hollywood walk of fame, visited China town, and the latino street market. I kid you not, it was love at first sight. With all my heart, I would have moved to L.A. in a heartbeat. The touristy bit was one day of the six or seven I was there.

Too, I visited Mosaic Church, sat in Erwin McManus’s office, went to church at Club Soho, where they were planting a church at the time. Again, I loved my time there, I loved the people, but one thing kept me from running to L.A. One thing alone. It is only now that this one thing haunts me and drives me to my knees in humble repentance. It was the fact that the church allowed members to set up tables outside the sanctuary and church building and sell their own goods as well as books that made me hesitate and stop.

Truth is I have doubted many of my decisions and even as I write about L.A. and how intriguing she was to me, I fill up with desire for her, but I have never doubted not moving there. As sure as many kids my age in those days were selling all their possessions and leaving their mamas and papas to get to Mosaic Church, I knew Mosaic Church was not where God was calling me. Now this memory comes calling, whispering, shouting that perhaps this would lead to something I would have to raise up and say, something I would have to do today, and that’s why I began here.

Updated: it is important to note that I now go to a church where books are sold in the lobby at cost or discounted and that’s okay with me for the most part.

photo credit: Nick in exsilio via photopin cc