September Breakfast Recap

Another great time of donuts and discussion. Big thanks to Rich for hosting our South Tacoma Ministers breakfast this month at his church (Evangelical Reformed) and providing the donuts (from a donut place around 84th and South Tacoma Way, good stuff).

Our discussion this morning landed in two areas; the role of personal devotion in our lives and ministry and a discussion on the Luis Palau's 'Season of Service' in Portland. While limited in time, I was encouraged by how deep we were able to get in both of these discussions.

In regards to personal devotion, we shared some of our personal history with them, what role they played currently played in our lives, and where we might like them to be. One of the tensions that was named by more than a couple of folks was the tension betweend doing devotions because you were supposed to versus doing them because they were satisfying a hunger to be with God. We agreed that there is an art to finding the sweet spot of devotions. Another tension raised was the question of how to find space in the midst of raising kids. I felt a great amount of empathy from the folks whose kids are older than mine. I also invited the group to check in with me next month to see how I've navigated the desire to spend more solitude time with God. (I think I can expect at least Jeff to hold me accountable).

Our other discussion centered around an article in the Oregonian newspaper (http://www.oregonlive.com/hovde/index.ssf/2009/09/christian_volunteers_good_work.html) about the effects of Luis Palau's coordination of a Portland wide church effort to simply serve the city. THey called it a 'season of service.' We all agreed that there were a lot of appealing and impressive things about this joint effort; its collaborative nature, the fact that it met physical needs and the fact that they started by simply asking and listening to what the leaders of the community expressed as their needs. However, we also raised the question of whether this group went to far in divorceing the verbal message from the physical acts. This generated some good discussion that I think might be good to pick up on in the future. One side of the continuum says that we should 'preach the gospel and use acts of compassion as necessary.' On the other side sits the belief that we should 'do the the gospel and use words as necessary.' We all sit somewhere in the middle on this continuum, some closer to the first and others closer to the second. It was good to be able to talk about this even though we differ.

In conclusion to this second conversation, we agreed to think and pray about the question, "Is God leading us to ask the leaders of South Tacoma (civic, educational, business, etc.) what big or small things might they need help with?" I look forward to continuing that conversation. In addition, Rich handed out an article called "The Problem is the Problem" which might also help with some of our discussion.

At the end of our time, it was good to have more than a couple of minutes to simply pray for each other, our congregations and our community.

Our next meeting is set for Wednesday, October 14th at 8:30 at John's church Green Pastures on 66th and Clement.

See you then, Ken