Easter At the Mission

At New Wine we are trying to do things differently.  Our emphasis is on cell church life and living our faith out in our neighborhoods.  We have not abandoned everything or "thrown the baby out with the bathwater".  Our Sunday Celebrations, however, is NOT the main thing we do.  We try to make the larger gatherings times of sharing and celebration.  There is the sacraments.  There is the proclamation of the Word.  But we also encourage the "Prayers of the People" to be more of a community experience inviting congregation participation not just a liturgical exercise.  We also make time for the sharing of how we see God moving in us and through us.  And though we are more informal than your average liturgical church we sometime pull out the stops and "dress up" in vestments for the high feast such as Easter.  (Check out Dave's new stole in a picture of Easter Sunday service from Mexico - De Colores!)

Easter 2012 was full a great music, thanks to Anne Robinson, Deb Kulchar and Mike Robinson.  We had several good testimonies of God's provision and blessing shared.  But for me, the highlight was the sending forth of one of our newer members, Tim Goodrich, as he heads out east to apprentice as a shoe maker in Philadelphia.   We stood him in our midst and laid on hands, anointed him with oil and sent him out with our blessing.  Tim recently started coming to New Wine and immediately his gift of "invitation" was apparent in that every week he was bring guest with him.  He is such a great example of one who leads and invites in a very natural way.  Tim has been a leader/pastor in a church previously and sees the Lord using him down the road again, but in the mean time he learning the dieing art of handcrafted shoe making.   We hope to continue to support and stay connected with Tim even though he is out east.  Perhaps we can help encourage him on his way to church planting in an urban setting some day down the road.

Thursday Jim Sartor and I had a chance to meet with about 20 church planters down in Troy at Kensington Church.  This mega church has on staff  a future thinking church planting coach Alex McManus.  I love going down there bimonthly for brain storming session as we think together with Alex's help about what we are doing and how we are doing it.  I was blessed yesterday to have Jim go with with me and we sat at a table with 3 other people from a new work in Flint called The Bridge.  I am always challenge and encourage after my time with others who are planting churches, and even better when they are doing it in my neck of the woods!   I am going again May 17th.  I hate going alone so if you are free come join us and be stretched!