Becoming Human- from Christmas Eve Sanctuary service

[Tony] If you were to ask my parents, they would tell you that I am afraid of babies; maybe in the same way parents are afraid to bring their kids into a china store. The smaller the child, they would tell you, the more fervently I will avoid interaction. It is a fear that is two-fold, and maybe some of you can relate: first, it is a fear of the immediate presence of a child's complete vulnerability-- so small, so fragile, so precious, and so not mine-- but most of all, so dependent, and so in need. The second face of my, potentially irrational, fear is the gripping reality of my own inadequacy-- the fear that, even if I could give every ounce of myself, a child would still need more from me, a fear of not knowing what to do when who knows what happens, or gets lost, or gets hurt, or comes out-- a fear that what I have to give is not enough to offer.
There was something about this child, about the way that He looked at me, that caught me off guard. There is something in the way a baby will look into your eyes that seems to speak gently, but clearly to something inside of your own heart that cannot ignore the words: "Hello. Yes, I am here. Yes, I am very real. I can be hurt. I can feel alone. I can know joy. This is what I am. This is all I am. You are all I have. I cannot live without you. I will be yours. I already am yours. How do I know if I can call you mine? Do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me? Will you care for me? Will you comfort me? Will you keep me warm? Can I show you that I am frightened and know that you will protect me? Is it okay if I change your life? Is it okay if you become someone different than who you are now? Can I surprise you? Is it okay if I need you for the rest of my life? Do you need me? How will I know that you are there? How can I show you that I need you? Is it okay if this isn't easy? Would you believe me if I could tell you that you won't regret this? Will you talk to me? Will you sing to me at night? Will you hold me? Will you pick me up? Will you hold me? Do you love me?"
This child was in love with me even before I picked him up and held him. His need of my love was love. When I picked Him up; when He allowed me to hold him, something happened. I felt a vastness within me that I didn't even know was empty, become flooded. I became a child. I learned a love that was new and real and terrifying and irresistible. It was only while I held Him that I was able to truly love him, because it was only while I held Him that I was truly vulnerable. I began to ask the same questions, allowing myself to surrender to His answers-- "Am I doing okay? What do you need? Can I make mistakes? Where will you take me? Where should I take you? Do you love me?" If an almighty God can become a man, I would need Him to be a child first. In order for me to have a relationship with Him, I would need to know that He could love me like a child. This child is the Christ-child, yes, but this child is also fully human. My relationship with this child has grown much like He would slowly grow in front of His own parents. I was only able to start a relationship with God if He too became a child, because there is where my walk needed to start. He met me where I was and He walked with me from there. I was a child and He met me as a child— fragile, dependent, and so human.

Prayer Walk!

[Tony] Ryan and I have recently started incorporating prayer walks into our lives. We have gone on a handful of walks together so far and would like to have others join us. The idea of infiltrating the neighborhood with a body of people in prayer is a powerful and beautiful image of the Kingdom. We are planning a prayer walk on Monday night, Dec. 1st, at 8:30. We will meet at the house and then set out for the streets in prayer. Please join us! A prayer walk allows you to interact with God while also interacting with the world you are praying for. If you have never done a prayer walk before, I encourage and challenge you to try it. We will pray for our neighbors, for each other, and for anything and everything that may be on our hearts. Bring warm clothes and open hearts!

Fraternity

[James] Words from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Life Together

"I have community with others and I shall continue to have it only through Jesus Christ. The more genuine and the deeper our community becomes, the more will everything else between us recede, the more clearly and purely will Jesus Christ and his work become the one and only thing that is vital between us. We have one another only through Christ, but through Christ we have one another, wholly, and for all eternity."

Open Units NOW!

Hello faithful blog readers! I want to bring this to your attention so that you can consider this or at very least spread the word. There are two units open and available ASAP here in the church. One is a two bedroom and the other a three. The units are going for $875 and $1,000 respectfully. Both units contain really incredible aspects of the church architecture including stained glass, wood floors and really nice updated appliances. Plus you'd be living next to us! His price has come down recently due to the inability to find good tenants. I know that each of my roommates would love to have kingdom minded people living among us. We have met a few of the other neighbors around us recently and we are getting so excited about this community.

Find a roommate or two and make it happen. If you are interested let one of us know!

Poetic City

[Tony]Its different for me here, living in the city. Instead of crickets and the wind outside of my window, I am learning to fall asleep to the constant drone of the interstate. The sounds here have become comforting. They are a constant reminder that this place is alive, that I am alive, and that humanity, in its endless string of tiny victories and errands run, is alive and always up to something.
My windows stay open in the fall-- the cold air helps me sleep. I like to wake up to the cold breath of the morning; the kind of air that snaps at your bare feet and makes you want to wear layers of clothes and drink thick hot coffee before a shower. I am still growing to accept the wake-up call of children being loud in the street, indulged in their playground games. I am still learning to not be alarmed at the sound of people talking outside of my window in the earliest hours of the morning. I am embracing the sound of pulsing car stereos as evidence that there is a culture here, and identity that is shared and that I will one day identify with.
I find that its harder to be romantic here in the city. By romantic, I am not referring to the Hollywood love stories of roses and chocolates, instead I am referring to the romantic that drives you to admire nature, to describe the normal in flowery and succulent language. Its harder to pretend to be an intellectual or to wear some scholarly or poetic façade when there is little to be defined by the abstract poetic imagination. Wordsworth would hate it here. Those poets of the sensitive heart, who bend words to bleed the sounds of their illusions would be lost. Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, Shakespeare, Frost, Emerson, and Thoreau would find themselves alone in a place that had little use for their sonnets, symbolism, and pentameter. They couldn’t write about the way forests of fall red trees look like God’s blushing cheeks. They couldn’t personify some rare and beautiful flower or the color of the sunset or compare them to the colors of their lover’s eyes. They may decide their inspiration comes from the boarded windows of a lifeless foreclosed home, or maybe dedicate an ode to a stop light. But I feel their words would have still been too arrogant for this place.
Yet, there is a poetry here. It seems to walk to more deliberate beat of a bass line and drum tap instead of the melody of a mandolin. There is a mystery to be discovered here, but it may be less focused on the inward eye and more on turning outward to see your neighbor for the first time. In order to find the romance here, I am learning to see through a different lens. I must abandon my artist and poet eyes and exchange them with the eyes for a community. Its then that you see the smiles of mischievous children and fall in love with them. Its then that you catch the beauty of a simple greeting, hear angels singing from a corner church, and appreciate the sanctuary of a quiet prayer for a city.
I have seen joy here that I cannot quite comprehend and I have seen pain here at levels far beyond the words of books. I feel that I am severed from the quiet and stable world of Caribou Coffee and local newspapers. The people here don’t seem to need coffee. The idea of a lazy Sunday morning with a cup of joe, a newspaper, bacon and eggs and sleepy hellos does not fit completely. I watch as my neighbors seem to have mastered their chaos. It’s the chaos that seems to be the coffee, keeping everyone moving, engaged, excited and dramatic.
Love and hate here are raw and unwrapped. I hope to become as raw and unwrapped as that.

CAT update

[James] CAT woke me up this morning to kindly let me know that he needed out. I let him out to do his thing and decided to leave him roam for a while. I am sure he will find his way back here soon. He slept the whole night last night at the foot of my bed.

Neighbor mugged and moving to Prescott

[James] This morning as I was doing some laundry, I ran into our next door neighbor Matt. He and his family have been in the process of moving for about a week. I offered to help him with some things today if he needed it, which led to my first tour of his place. He, his wife and their 3 children have lived next door for a couple years at least but have now made the decision to move. A couple months ago Theresa was home during the day when she heard some people outside roughing around. It sounded serious enough that she felt that she should call the police. When the police asked where the disturbance was coming from, she decided to peak her head outside to see. When she went outside she discovered several youth to be the source of the commotion. One of them asked if she was calling the police, to which Theresa replied, yes they are on the phone right now. The girl rushed over to her and started taking swings. Theresa was able to dodge the throws of two girls and in fact ended up injuring one of them as she tried to defend herself. Within moments almost a dozen other youth from the area rushed out and were joining in. Theresa was actually forced to the ground as kids began kicking her head against the ground... She suffered a pretty severe concussion which made her sick for the next month. Theresa's father insisted that they move to a safer location. Even thought this was the first physical encounter that they had experienced, it was to be the last. Matt say's that they have enjoyed living here in this neighborhood and that they have felt relatively safe here for the most part, but once was too much.

Matt and Theresa have found a place in Prescott where they hope they will be able to raise their children in a safe and nurturing environment. I can't say that I blame them.

Each day it seems we learn something new about the neighborhood and the people. Today it got serious. We roommates can often have an ideal picture of what this is supposed to look like, but it is so important that we realize that we aren't there yet.

Hood Cat pleads for Sancturay.

[James] So, this evening we had some company over. And in the midst of the company Tony discovered a new friend out on our front porch. It was a small cat that seemed to be looking for some warmth and maybe a free meal. Well, it might not be a person, but we know that God cares for the smallest of the creatures right? So, "CAT" is living with us, at least for the night. We let him out and he followed me around for a little bit and then he wound up at our front door again.

So far he has enjoyed milk, water, oatmeal, a can of tuna and a few tostito chips. He is extremely inquisitive and he has found his way all around our house. CAT has made himself right at home, on our laps and on our couches. He seems perfectly content here. I'd like him to hang around, but I am not sure we boys are going to be responsible enough to do the cat food, litter box, and vet stuff. Maybe we will just let him in every once in a while. I mean after all, he might just be someone elses' lost pet.

We'll keep you posted on CAT's situation.

When it Rains it Pours

[Dan] First update from this roommate. Ekklesiah house's last one to be informed of the blog. Anyway, last night I was in prayer as my girlfriend Sarah and I had had a faith related fight, so I began to pray for myself and her to get understanding on each other's sides, praying that this would be resolved today. After truly opening myself I realized that I had others in my life that I hadn't closed issues with. I wrote a page long apology facebook message to a friend of mine from college that was scared about where my faith was headed at the end of college (it wasn't on the right track to say the least of things.) She wrote her message of concern almost a month ago and was wondering if I was getting back on track or not like I said I was going to. Well, time management never was a strength in mind and I told her what one of my elementary school teachers told me. "Better late than never, but better never late." I also was inclined to pray for a friend of mine in high school, so I contacted her and she let me know what was going on in her life.

Not the most exhilirating read I know, but I figured I would write something once to develop discipling to write in future.

Love, Love, Love.

Learning Community

[Tony] A few people have asked recently why there hasn’t been any posts lately. In response, first off, thank you to all of you who actually are taking time out of your busy lives to catch up on what may be going on in ours. Your thoughts and prayers are a blessing we could not go without. To put it simply, I respond by saying that we are still moving in. When I say this, I do mean it on a literal level, in that we are still trying to fill some large empty floor space with some furniture around the house and we haven’t even started the daunting task of trying to cover at least some of the miles of wall space we seem to have here with some art that speaks to who we are. However, in saying that we are still “moving in,” I also mean that we are still very much in the process of learning how to live with each other. The last month or so that we have been roommates together have been better than I ever could have imagined. Ryan, James, Dan and I seem to mesh seamlessly. I have found that now that I have had a month to live with them, I get anxious if I don’t see them for a couple of days. I would compare it to listening to or playing music (for you fellow musicians), in that after a few days without music, you start to crave it, you look forwards to when you will get to listen or play it again, it becomes a normal part of your life, leaving days without feeling kind of awkward in a way. The short times when we are all together have been rare and short lived lately, but we make the most of them when given the chance. In those times when we are all here, with nothing to do (at least for the moment), we are usually all in the same room. We are still getting to know each other. We are still learning each other’s likes and dislikes, each other’s quirks and habits, and each other’s gifts to the community God has blessed us with.
During times of prayer, God has told me that we need to spend a lot of time with each other right now. We need to take every opportunity we have and use them to grow and strengthen out relationships. The foundation of out community and its potential influence on our neighborhood will depend entirely on the strength of our relationships together. We must grow together as friends, as roommates, and most importantly, we must grow together in our faith. A community built on faith must grow together in that faith. Even though each one of us has our own unique story about our own walks with God, we now also share a new story which we will walk together. This story is just beginning. This is the story of a community, and just like we each have our own unique stories, this community will have its own story and its own walk with God. Right now, we are learning to walk again. We are building the strength of our faith legs by taking on aspects of our faith that we have not ventured into yet. We have only begun baby steps, learning slowly and patiently what it means and looks like to live in community. We are asking ourselves new questions; questions like, what does it mean to own in a community? Should all of our food be shared or should we just have certain community groceries like butter and condiments? These might seem like simple questions (which they are), but asking them now will lead us to all new answers. Just how attached are we to some of the things we think we “own.” What if someone breaks in and steals our things? Do we get better locks and an alarm system to simply make it harder for reality to find us? Or do we start here and now with letting go of our things to the point where our first instinct would be to love a person who would steal our things?
The phrase “honeymoon period” has been used a couple of times to label what stage we are at right now. God is not asking us to do any monumental acts of community engagement. He is simply asking us to learn how to be a community with each other. Our near-sighted goal right now is to learn our own discipline. We are mapping out each other’s schedules to determine the opportune times to become disciplined in our times of prayer, worship, discussion, and interaction with each other. God has made it very well known to us that our living here and with each other is His doing. God has shown us that this house is a gift with a purpose. We were given this place because God chose us to pursue the purpose He has with it. Knowing this, we also know that God will show us how and when we are ready to be a community outside of our own walls. We rely completely on God’s direction here. We rely on your prayers and we rely on the love that we have for each other and the love that we share for God.
Our posts will continue to come. Just know that for a while they may share a common theme of our learning logistics. If you have any ideas or advice for us about our mission here or about community living, or simply want to be involved in the little things that are happening now (and the bigger things down the road), don’t be afraid to email us at ekklesiahhouse@gmail.com. Keep us in your prayers!

The Supreme Council of the House of Jacob in a Radiohead t-shirt

[Tony]After 180 on Sunday morning, I decided to come back to the pad to relax. I initially had a strong desire to take a righteous nap before Sanctuary, however, I also felt God asking me to use my time to go wandering. So, I gave God my feet and started walking. I actually had thought a few days earlier that it might be in my own interest, and the interest of those of us here in the house, to get involved in a church community here in our neighborhood. So, I began my walk hoping to come across a church close by for us to try down the road. I walked down the street, and immediately walked by a church called “the Supreme Council of the House of Jacob.” There were a whole bunch of people outside who were dressed up in suits and dresses and I almost walked straight in. However, since I hadn’t even walked far enough to not see my own bedroom, I decided to keep walking. I walked a few blocks, through some houses, parks, and around Dayton’s Bluff Elementary School. Oh, how the hood comes alive on Sunday afternoons. People were out walking, like me, saying hello as they walked by. There were a whole bunch of people out exercising in the football field and as a rounding the corner and heading back to my house I noticed that some of the people who were outside of the church were sitting across the street listening to the football game. I decided to start a conversation and asked them if they went to the church I mentioned earlier. They said they were and started talking all about it. They told me it was a non-denominational Christian church, asked me where I was from, where I went to church, if I was trying to find a new church home, and then told me that they had a service starting at three o’clock. Then they insisted that I come in with them. Keep in mind that I was wearing blue jeans, a Radiohead t-shirt, and a baby blue bandana while they were wearing suits and ties. I asked if I would be okay and they told me that I could wear whatever I wanted. So, I went inside and sat by my new friend who told me to call him “Bonzo.” To say the least, I got my fair share of attention when I walked in with Bonzo, considering the blue jeans and Radiohead t-shirt and the fact that I was the only white person in the entire congregation. The worship that was happening was so alive and electric. People were dancing in the aisles and singing as loud as they could for their God. There were only a select few song books floating around, but as soon as people noticed their new visitor, the song books started migrating my way. I sang with them and I clapped and swayed with the rhythm and then I listened to the speakers. At the end there was a time for members of the church to “testify” before the congregation. The last person to testify finished his prayer with this praise “Dear God we thank you for bringing us a new visitor. He didn’t know any of our songs but he was trying so hard to sing with us and praise you, so we thank you for bringing him to us today.” Then he looked at me and said “Brother, would you like to testify today?” To say the least, I was not ready for that one. I hesitated for a second and then told him that maybe I would in a few weeks but first I wanted to get to know them. Bonzo leaned over and told me that that was a good answer. After the service a whole bunch of people came over and introduced themselves and told me to come back with my roommates, which I fully intend on doing ….

Hood Steals Emergency Fire Extinguisher... No Fire Reported

[James] Well, my brother called it. He told me that the first thing that would be stolen from our house was the emergency fire extinguisher that I keep on the roll cage of my Jeep. It is strapped in, but not locked in place. This morning I woke up to realize that there must have been a terrible fire that required the use of my fire extinguisher. I am so glad that I was able to assist somebody in this desperate time of need. The fire extinguisher meant little to me, and if anything was of mostly pure aesthetic value. Many off roading vehicles keep a fire extinguisher to put out engine fires.

I know that no one would just steal something like this for fun or for the mere fact that they could... right? I wish now that I could place 100 fire extinguishers on the sidewalk next to my jeep with a free sign. Because apparently there is a great need for them. hmm....

Seminary

[James] After a God-series of events, I was led to return to school this fall. Although this is something that I had always wanted to do, I didn't think that it would be happening so soon!

On Monday I had orientation at Bethel Seminary where I will be completing my Masters or my Masters of Divinity over the next 3 or 5 years, respectfully. I couldn't be more excited about this opportunity to learn, to grow, to be challenged and to be surrounded by life minded/hearted people. I know that it will most certainly stretch me, pull me, tear me, but I pray, it won't break me. As a pastor I know that this will give me so many awesome tools for ministry.

My concentration is a major entitled, "Master of Arts in Ministry and Community Leadership." I was so happy to hear that my first two courses this fall were to be "Church History" and "Compassionate Urban Ministry." Being in the classroom, studying the Christ centered hope of Urban Ministry and living it out each day will be one of my greatest journeys!

So be praying for me as I begin this radical endevour. It will be by His strength that I proceed.

"Ekklesiah" a language history lesson

[Tony] The name Ekklesiah has become both symbolic and personal here in our new home. We have dubbed our home with the name “Ekklesiah House,” which is a term based closely on the word “ecclesia.” If you were to look up the word “ecclesia” in a dictionary you would find two definitions which seem vastly different from one another. The first definition will probably be related to a division within the government of ancient Athens. The ecclesia, to Athenians, was “ the political assembly of citizens of an ancient Greek state.” The ecclesia was an organized gathering of Greek citizens who assembled in accordance with their respective states to discuss political issues, leadership, laws, etc. This was a political function and was essential to the statehood governmental system of the Greeks. Ecclesia was also a term that applied to Roman politics before, during and after Jesus’ life. In his book Jesus for President, Shane Claiborne spells the word “ekklesia,” and illustrates its influence in Roman political systems: “Ekklesia: A local public assembly within the greater Roman Empire, much like a town meeting. These assemblies bestowed citizenship, discussed local political concerns, assigned ’elders’, and offered prayer and worship to Caesar. There was no separation of religion and secular political business.”
The word “ecclesia” also carries with it another connotation that seems unrelated to the first, however, compared in a social context, their relationship is not only important, but as Jesus has shown us, dangerous to the survival of the other. The second definition of “ecclesia” is “a church, either as a building or a body.” This was a word that applied to another assembly of people who were followers and supporters of their own sets of laws, rules, traditions, values, and politics. This body of people was the church. In the earliest period of the church, followers of Jesus showed that their ecclesia was just as political as the ecclesia of the Roman government (check out the Book of Acts if you want a few examples). This definition of ecclesia clashed dramatically with the first. One definition represents the power, authority and culture of the Roman government. The other definition represents followers of an ultimate authority and a set of rules and culture that follow the will of God instead of aligning with the will of the Roman government and its leaders. Claiborne defines this body of followers as follows: “Ekklesia: word used for the early church. ’Emphasizes that the followers of Jesus were called to participate in their world as local communities of an alternative society to the Roman imperial order.’ Bestowed alternative citizenship and assigned elders. Though it discussed its own political and religious concerns, it was understood as separate from, and in contrast to, the state and the other ekklesiai, their politics, and their religion.”
The key words of the second definition are words like: “alternative,” “its own,” “local communities,” “separate from,” “in contrast to.” Given these two definitions and knowing that both operated and were used within the same language at the same time in history implies the drastic social contradiction that was at hand. Here, in our own home, in our own time, we believe that this social contradiction is still very alive. We believe that we have a choice of which authority we subscribe our allegiance to. We believe that their Rome is our America. We also believe that our lives, our actions, our beliefs, our values, and our desires resemble which kingdom our allegiance lies. We have slightly altered the word again, in order to personalize it, to make it our own, and in turn, to be able to more closely relate to its meaning. “Ekklesiah” has become a symbol of our function here in Dayton’s Bluff. “Ekklesiah” is a place in which and through which followers of Jesus embody the values, politics, culture, and society of God. In comparison to the culture we have become a part of, we hope that our devotion to divine authority offers others an “alternative” to what they know without God. We hope to separate ourselves from the idols of our culture- from our pursuit of money, power, pride, self indulgence, and so many other common goals which our dominant culture has taught us to pursue. We pray that we will be a contrast to the desires of our culture here. We pray that we will be light in times of darkness, that we will be a voice in and for the silent, we will be a community in an economy of self-fulfillment, our love will be paralyzing in the ears of hate as it manifests, we will replace guns with shared meals, replace greed with jubilee, and replace our idols with worship of God. “Ekklesiah” is the embodiment of an alternative, separate, and intrinsically different way of life that is devoted to allowing the spirit of God to work through us by dying internally to our desires to subscribe to the ways of the Rome we need to separate from. When separated, Ekklesiah will spread like mustard seed through a garden, or like yeast through bread. I leave you with a visual example of what we pray we will be in our new home and community.
--- take a cup and fill it with water. The water inside the cup is made up of a collection of hydrogen and oxygen atoms (two hydrogen atoms to every one oxygen to be exact!). These atoms together make water molecules that become the water inside the cup. Without contamination, the water is clear as every molecule becomes part of what collectively becomes the water you see. If you take a drop of that water out of the cup, what is left inside is that same as before, just less of it. However, if you replace that drop of water with a drop of food coloring, a single drop will transform the appearance and structure of the entire cup of water. It is still water inside the cup, yet the water looks different and is different from its original state. Now, if you take a society of people who live their lives according to a general set of cultural values, then you have a society that will look like whatever those values are. Like the hydrogen and oxygen, if the values of your culture are money and power, then together a culture is formed that resembles those values. But, if you put one drop of something else into that culture, something that is fundamentally different, something that looks different, lives different, and submits to an entirely different set of values, you will change the appearance of the entire culture, like the food coloring did to the water.

We hope to be that food coloring here.

First visit from the 5-0

[James] We were all plesently surprised by the front page article in the Dayton's Bluff newspaper this week. There, in full dress standing in front of his own new squad car, was a very familiar face...

One of the greatest perks so far here in Dayton's bluff is the fact that one of Ryan's and my best friends from high school is a police officer here on the East side. Mike McNeill has been with us from our later years in high school, drama with girls, late night hysteria, my move to Montana, his time serving in Kosovo, our transitions into adulthood; including his marriage and the beginnings of our full time careers, and then now, with our move here. Even though Mike strongly discouraged us from moving in here from the beginning, after a surprise visit yesterday he started getting excited about us being in the area. But even be it that our place is so fun and full of life, it doesn't remove us from the lives around us and the risks that we are taking.

Last night Mike stopped by again later on his shift. He informed me that he was outside by shining his spotlight in through our window. Ryan and I jumped with greater joy than Mr. Rogers when Trollie came through his little door. Kelly, Ryan and I stepped outside to hang with Mike. We were sitting and shooting the breeze until he was notified that there was a gun shot reporting just two blocks away. He jumped into his car and Dukes of Hazarded it out of here. It turns out that someone did get grazed by a bullet. The shooter ran off on foot succesfully evading the officers. After Mike returned, we all shared a mix of laughs in thinking just how cool it is that Mike has grown from being the one being pulled over by cops for our games and wrestless behavior to patroling riots, arresting people and keeping peace in a neighborhood such as this. But at the same time it was a reminder that living here is not all fun and games.

I am so excited to be able to see Mike more and to serve side by side with him. Even though we work in two different capacities, our house's hope is similar to that of the laws. I am not sure yet how the neighborhood will respond to us being "in" with the cops, but I'd rather be friends of the law than foes. Time will tell how this will all play out or for what greater purposes God has for us. I can say that it's prettay shweet having a police officer lookin after us.

In the beginning...

On September 1st of 2008, four guys from the city of Cottage Grove Minnesota moved into an apartment on the bluffs of downtown St Paul. After moving back from college, each of the four lived with family for the purpose of convenience, frugality, timing or just lack of better options.
That was until God began to stir a dream in our hearts...

[James] After college I heard the phrase, "Welcome to the real world." more than I cared to. It's as if college life was some fairytale that we all have to wake up from eventually, as if living in community among friends and peers is just a phase, as if being a part of active and alive fellowship was unrealistic, as if learning, being challenged and living with a purpose greater than ourselves were all causes that you only get to be a part of between the ages of 18 and 22. Well, maybe I am just one of those boys that doesn't want to become a man. It is entirely possible that one day I will wake up and realize that I have been the last to jump on the "real world" band wagon and it is my time. But for now, I know that I am more alive and filled with wonder, purpose and passion than I have ever been.

Moving to Dayton's Bluff was only partially intentional but fully divine. There is no doubt in my mind that the reason I could not find another housing situation for the past 6 months was that it is all part of a greater plan. There is no doubt that having three amazing brother's of mine willing and able to live in this place, at this time, is all part of a greater plan. There is no doubt that the reason I happened to stumble across this amazing remodled church for a reasoable price in an absolute ideal location is that it is all a part of a greater plan. And to top it all off we arrived here to discover that the name of our housing complex was "The Ecclesia Apartments"...