by David Docusen | July 20, 2012 | Uncategorized
I moved around a lot as a kid. It seemed like every 18-24 months we were moving into a new home or apartment. It wasn’t until I moved to Uptown Charlotte that I started to realize the benefit of just moving into a community and then sticking around for a while. I have gotten to know the ins and outs of the neighborhood. The shortcuts when there is traffic. The best place for Dara to send me out when her recipe unexpectedly called for an egg.
I also have seen the annoying side of staying in one place. My neighbors see our ups and downs. They see our imperfections, our family disagreements and my “morning face” when I take out the trash. But something crazy has happened with having the same neighbors: we’ve built lasting friendships in spite of our idiosyncrasies and our shortcomings. We have been able to share some pretty cool moments along the way and also walk through some pretty hard stuff, too.
When I was younger, I didn’t have to get close to my neighbors because I moved so much. But now, I’m sticking around long enough to realize that we are all walking through ups and downs together. They aren’t going anywhere and neither are we.
I am so grateful for the fact that we’ve found a neighborhood and just settled in to the community. I am so grateful for our wonderful neighbors that put up with the energy that is found in the Docusen home with four kids under the age of eight years old.
I think that these same type of challenges and benefits are true of when you are searching for a church family. Let me explain…
You will never experience the fullness of a church community if you are only willing to stay for a bit. True community is found when you start to walk through things. When the shiny stuff wears off and the new car smell is gone. When you stay after a disagreement. When you learn to stick around even after being offended. When you learn to confront in love. When you realize that conflict is a part of life – even in the church community.
For all that are searching for a church home, please remember this: you’ll never find a home until you’re willing to move in and stay for a while. I want to see our community continue to grow and thrive. But I want a real community, not one that just looks good from the outside.
As my neighbors can tell you, we’ve seen the good, bad and ugly of each other’s lives. And we are much, much better off because of that reality.
by David Docusen | July 19, 2012 | Uncategorized
I think it’s so important to pay attention to the “ifs” in God’s Word. God created each one of us, but he wants our love and devotion, not mindless obedience. So to accomplish this, he gave us a powerful reality: the power of choice.
We don’t have to love him. We choose to love him.
We don’t have to follow his commands. We choose to follow his commands.
We don’t have to live to please him. We choose to live to please him.
With these choices, we become the deciding factor of what type of life that we will live. All throughout the Scriptures, there are calls to God’s leaders that go like this:
“If you listen to what I tell you and follow my ways and do whatever I consider to be right, and if you obey my decrees and commands, as my servant David did, then I will always be with you. I will establish an enduring dynasty for you as I did for David, and I will give Israel to you.”
This passage is found in 1 Kings 11 as the kingdom is being torn away from King Solomon and handed to a man named Jeroboam. This is a powerful moment, because King Solomon was given an “if”, as well, when the kingdom was given to him. God promised to be with him if he followed his commands. But he went astray and allowed his earthly desires to infect his leadership.
We are given the choice to follow God. We’re not robots. He has written his love on our hearts, but we have the choice to reciprocate that love. As you go about your day today, will you choose to love him? Will you choose, again, to obey his commands? They are for your good, even the hard stuff that you have to walk away from to follow Jesus.
If you follow Jesus, you will be free.
If you follow Jesus, you will have joy in spite of circumstances.
If you follow Jesus, he will lead you to all the good he has prepared.
We’d all do well to pay attention to the “ifs” in the Bible. The choice is yours. God’s promise is that he will always be with us, provide for us and lead us. If we choose to remain in him.
John 15:5-7 – 5 “Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing. 6 Anyone who does not remain in me is thrown away like a useless branch and withers. Such branches are gathered into a pile to be burned. 7 But if you remain in me and my words remain in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted!
by David Docusen | July 19, 2012 | Uncategorized
I had the privilege of sharing the story of Center City Church with Lindy Lowry from Exponential (a church planting network resourcing church planters across the world). It was such a wonderful opportunity to think through, process and respond to what God has done in the past two years in our church family.
I am so grateful what God has done at Center City. It’s a story of his people responding to a simple call: to honor God and make disciples at home and across the world. If you want to check out the story, click here. Also, if you are a church planter, I highly recommend putting Exponential on your radar for resources and their yearly conference in Orlando, FL.
by David Docusen | July 17, 2012 | Uncategorized
In one of the most powerful and poignant moments in the history of our church, Pastor Steve Witherup described to our church family how the lives of followers of Christ are disruptive to the world around them. The following is a transcript from July 8, 2012.
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Language is a powerful thing. Every speech act is an attempt to interpret, communicate or describe something that we all know is actually bigger than the words themselves.
When seeking to communicate some thought or describe a thing we are passionate about, we search for certain words that just cut deeper; words that sink themselves a bit closer to the core of our being in an attempt to bring about a concreteness to our understanding.
Certain descriptive words, more than others, seem to have that ability – not only do they communicate, but they inspire. The hearer finds themselves feeling compelled to respond in some fashion to the thought that was communicated.
So how do we describe this new life that we find in Christ? Of course many different words can be used to describe the life that a true belief in Christ produces; but as we are challenged this week by Pastor David to live in a way that puts faith in action through simple practical acts of kindness performed within your community – within your circle of influence, I wonder if we could land on one word to describe this Christian life as a way to inspire us… as a way to focus our mind to imagine what restored humanity in Christ just may look like.
You see, as we become vulnerable and entrust our worship to our Creator God; as we experience Him deeply; as we encounter Him intimately, what results is that our very life becomes a poetic, doxological expression that is DISRUPTIVE. That is not something we often hear, but I believe that the Christian life is not one of concession. One of the most powerful, ‘felt’ ways to describe the Christian life is to call it…DISRUPTIVE
Not disruptive by way of force, by flexing muscle, by pulling out swords, by seeking to seize power or by being unruly, seeking to simply be the loudest voice in the room; but through the subtle, absolutely beautiful way that the mere presence of…
love has a funny way of disrupting hate
the way that compassion disrupts hurt
that kindness has a way of disrupting anger
truth has a way of disrupting deception
hope has a way of disrupting despair
embrace has a way of disrupting dissension
generosity has a way of disrupting greed
freedom has a way of disrupting oppression
gentleness has a way of disrupting aggression
joy has a way of disrupting sorrow
unity has a way of disrupting division
mercy has a way of disrupting vengeance
forgiveness has a way of disrupting bitterness
a life of self abdication has a way of disrupting self absorption
true beauty has a way of disrupting ugliness
dignity and value have a way of disrupting worthlessness
the way that light has funny way of disrupting darkness
Ultimately all of that can be summed up in the truth of this statement; life has a funny way of disrupting death. To many of us that sounds backwards because we are all currently existing, and within that existence there is a nervousness, a worry that death will show itself to be a disruption to our existence.
That mentality, I believe is backwards. For too long we have equated existing with life and have feared the disruptive force of death. In the Biblical narrative we read of the fall of man told in Genesis 3. It is here where we see the origin of mans attempt to produce an autonomous, meaningful life apart from his Creator. What results is ugly; a culture of death, characterized by oppression, exploitation, deception, greed, aggression and despair. In John 10 we read that the forces of evil seek to maintain this culture of death and that culture is where so many of us find ourselves living, working, playing.
However, that is not the end…John 10 goes on to tell us that the work of Christ is to disrupt this culture of death and offer abundant life.. true life.
We believe Christ defeated sin and death and desires to make all things new; that the resurrected Messiah breathed life into our mortal bodies and called us to live in a way that announces this renewal to all creation.
So do we, possessors of new life, now seek to simply best survive within the culture of death… or do we disrupt it?
I truly believe that when we encounter our creator, understand his love and salvation, and allow our life to become the beautiful poetic response it was always intended to be.. then it will not be us that fears death disrupting our existence, but the culture of death will tremble with fear and anxiety as we see with our very eyes the way in which life has a funny way of disrupting death.
by David Docusen | July 16, 2012 | Uncategorized
I’ve been on a quest lately to learn how to *correctly* play golf. One of the guys in our church, Brendan Gielow, is a professional golfer and he has taken on the challenge of fixing what I’ve been doing wrong my entire life on the golf course.
He was trying to teach me how to “read a green” the other day. For those that aren’t into golf, this is when the golfers get down on one knee and stare at the green, calculating how much the putt will move left or right and how hard they need to hit it.
I missed a putt (badly) while he was working with me. Brendan said to me, “Why did you think that was going left?” I said, “Because I looked right at the hole and it looked like it was breaking left.”
He backed me up and said, “Read the whole green. Look at the way it starts high on the left side and ends low on the right. When you are putting, you have to look at the whole green.”
This was a great tip for my golf game, but I was thinking about this idea in relation to Bible reading. So many times, we just crack open the Bible and read what is directly in front of us. We don’t take into context the fact that these are real stories, from real people that lived in the real world.
Here’s a tip for your Bible reading: read the whole story. If you decide that you want to read about the book of James, do a few things:
– Start at the beginning of the book.
– Research who wrote the book.
– Ask yourself, “who was this written to and why?”
– And then read from left to right through the entire book.
The Bible is not just intended for quotes and bite sized truths. It’s an all encompassing story that is intricately intertwined through it’s entirety.
Don’t just focus on the hole, read the whole green. That tip will help you grow in your relationship with Jesus and quite possibly even lower my golf score.
Here’s some great study tools that will help on your journey:
Life Application Study Bible
Fire Bible (for teens and students)
How to Read the Bible for All It’s Worth (Gordon Fee)
