Here a recap from the last Catalyst session we had a couple of weeks ago. This past Sunday was a special Remembrance Day service and we did not have a session.

This was part 4 of 4 in the Social Justice series, titled “We Can Do Something”. 

There is a always a question that people ask themselves when they encounter the issues of social justice.  They see the issues, the needs, the hurts etc  and wonder what could I, one person do?  God uses some ordinary people to accomplish some great things….just open the Bible read a few narratives, see where these people came from, were called out from.  Then read the beginning of the Book of Acts, specifically Acts 1:8.

These were the scriptures we used in the session:

Ephesians 2:10, Micah 6:8, Isaiah 1:17, I Peter 3:15, I John 3:17, Matthew 23:23, John 10:10

• Seeking justice is the task of bringing the truth and power to bear on behalf of those who are oppressed.
• There are roles for everyone to engage in Social Justice
• Pastors, Teachers etc…need to be teaching about the God of Justice. Teaching about the authority of the Word of God, to know God’s passion for justice.  They can show us how God can use everyone to meet the needs of social justice.
• Frontline workers…live in the communities where the victims of abuse live. Living and working among the poor.
• There are so many gifted, talents of people that can help meet the needs of the oppressed, Christians that are trained as police officers, nurses, doctors, lawyers, business, politicians, cooks etc.  These talents and skills can be used to help meet the needs of these people in situations not just in places around the globe, but in the neighbourhoods and communities that they travel to work in everyday.
• Poetry, art, music, video, these are creative talents that can be used to help capture and tell the story to others to show what is happening.  To help bring awareness and attention.
• No matter what talent a person has, God can use it to help someone in need.

We ended the session and the series with the following two scriptures:

Luke 10:25-37, Matthew 25:31-46

The next series starting next week is based on the book by Francis Chan, called “Crazy Love”.

Getting this post out late.  Been meaning to get to it all week.

This past Sunday we completed session 3 of 4 that we are doing in Catalyst on Social Justice.

We talked about hope. 

With everything that we have talked about in regards to Social Justice and all the issues and problems ongoing in the world. There are 4 aspects of God character that we can trust in: (I am listing the scriptures we used for each aspect/trait)

1. Justice – Isaiah 30:19, Isaiah 61:8, Ecclesiastes 4:1, Psalm 10:13-14, Psalm 11:5-7, Jeremiah 9:23-24, Psalm 146:5-20
2. Compassion – Psalm 145:9, Exodus 3:7, Exodus 22:26-27, Psalm 9:9-12, Psalm 12:5, Lamentations 3:36, James 5:4, Isaiah 53:3, John 11:33-35, Acts 1:8
3. Morals – Isaiah 59:2+16, Jeremiah 5:28-29, Jeremiah 21:12, Amos 2:6-7, Zechariah 7:8-12, Luke 11:42
4. Rescue – Psalm 10:13-18, Psalm 35:10, Psalm 140:12, Jeremiah 20:13, Luke 4:18

Stayed tuned for the Facebook Event announcements for the Catalyst Meet-Ups. 

This Sunday we close out the series….next series on the horizon, Crazy Love, based on the book by Francis Chan.

This past weekend there was no Catalyst due to the installation service of Bishop Hanscom and Pastor Jeremy. It was a great service to be a part of today.

We are half done the series on Social Justice.  2 down and 2 more to go.  This upcoming weekend we will be back at it. Also, it should the first Catalyst Meet-Up.  This is where members of Catalyst will gather somewhere in the city and discuss the topic we have covered in the Sunday Catalyst gathering. The meeting place will be announced Sunday and through the Facebook group.

I am also planning the next couple of series…the next series will be based off the book by Francis Chan, “Crazy Love”, this book is amazing. The following one may be based on txt messaging, and Facebook/Twitter DMs…..where I will take questions from Catalyst throughout the week and preCatalyst and answer and teach based off the questions. 

This past Sunday AM we had our first meeting of Catalyst.  We are rewinding the Social Justice series from 2008, as we never completed that series.  I spoke the first message again, this time however, I added more ideas on how being Apostolic means social justice takes on quite a significance.  If you examine scripture from the Psalms, to the words Jesus spoke, actions that Jesus did, actions and behaviours of the Apostles…social justice is important; very important.  In fact, I would say that when you are engaged in acts and needs of others, the “least of these”…it allows for you as an individual to connect with what the spirit of Christ is already doing in that situation.  We dove into more of this, and will continue to explore the subject of Social Justice…the goal is not just to be studying, talking…..but to take it to a new dynamic.

This week, we will be speaking in the AM again, and plan for the first meet-up of Catalyst the following week.

I also announced that every 2 months to 1.5 months, we will be having Catalyst At Night gathering in the main sanctuary on Sunday evenings.  This is not a break out session or service, but rather we are going to brand the evening service as Catalyst At Night.  I will be speaking, and we will be adding some additional elements from Catalyst.  Should be good. 

Finally getting around to recapping this past Sunday…really should do these recaps on Sunday night, they would probably be better. This week has been pretty busy, 2nd week at the BMX track prepping for the opening this coming weekend.

We had a unfortunate situation this past Sunday, one of the elder’s that has been part of Faith Apostolic for many many years was in the hospital.  I was wondering what was going on when I did not see his car in the lot and his wife was inside when I went into the building.

I stopped by to visit Bro. Briggs in the hospital in the afternoon before the PM service. His blood pressure was way down and he had an irregular heartbeat.  He was feeling better when I saw him, but was very tired.  He is in his late eighties…needs prayer.  He told me he was checking his watch and was thinking it was almost time to head to church.

In the AM service, I started a new series called, “Unstoppable”.  I talked about 3 basic items that would make the vision of the church, any church for that matter, unstoppable.

• Being a church where everyone is welcome.
• Being a church where everyone is needed
• Being a church where everyone is changed.

In the PM Service, I started a different series for the next few weeks for the evening.  I talked on Social Justice.  It matters to God that justice is served. The great miracle and mystery of God is that he calls you and I to be part of what he is doing in history.  We are his hands and feet.  We are to demonstrate Christ’s love to all the world: to disciple the nations, to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to heal the broken and even rescue the oppressed.

If we are going to sing, “All the children are precious in His sight,” we better mean that.

For those that are abused, beaten, kicked, neglected, told that they are not of value, not good enough, we share Christ’s saving love on the cross and the servant love of our hands.

Tags: Justice, Unstoppable, Social Justice, Jesus Christ,

The past little while we have had sporadic Catalyst sessions. Whenever we are in Ottawa for Sunday morning service, we have Catalyst.  The last time we had Catalyst was November 2, 2008. We have been continuing the Social Justice series, here was my last post on those sessions.

What we were also working on at the conclusion of the “God is Green” series was a proposal to the Board of Directors of the church.  We had planned for having it in place for the board meeting in September.  However, we did not meet that goal.  So, we are still working behind the scenes with some of the members of Catalyst to get this proposal together.  Hopefully, in the next while we will have the all the information we need to make it more of a formal proposal.  Then we can submit to the board and go from there.

Tags: Catalyst, God is Green, Social Justice, proposal

Here are a couple of recaps from the past couple of Catalyst sessions we have had:

10/26/2008 - In this session I took the message that I spoke on in Cornwall earlier in October on being a Citizen on a New Kingdom. Wasn’t actually the complete same message, as in Catalyst there is more 2-way conversation as I speak.  II tried to fit it into the series we had been doing on Social Justice before our extended break. There was lots of conversation, questions and not everything was responded to by myself; this was good. After the session one of the young men that was there said he wants to have a sit down and discuss something that he is working on via his job at a Health organization.  This sounded interesting, can’t wait.

11/02/2008 - This past Sunday I spoke on “Hope in the God of Justice.”  I wasn’t feeling the greatest in the class. Again, lots of good dynamics in this session.  The biggest point I made here is that those that are oppressors know that the biggest battle is in removing hope.  Those injustices utterly depend on the inaction of hopelessness.  The biggest reason people do nothing is that they feel that they will not make a difference.

We then went through many scriptures that as Christians we can have a hope that has the power to prevail against these injustices.  That the center of our hope is Jesus Christ and He is a God of Justice.

“Injustice occurs when power is misused to take from others what God has given to them, namely, their life, dignity, liberty or the fruits of their love and labor.” (Gary Haugen)

Psalm 10:13-14, Isaiah 61:8, Psalm 7:11, 11:5-7, Jeremiah 9:23-25, 22:15-16. Matthew 23:23, Proverbs 28:5, Micah 6:8, Psalm 146:5-10

Tags: God, Justice, Injustice, scriptures, Gary Haugen, Cornwall

Here are the past 2 recaps for Catalyst.  This recap will work good as the topic spanned two weeks. The topic was about preparing ourselves in dealing with issues of Social Justice. As Gary Haugen (International Justice Mission - IJM) writes in his book, “Good News About Injustice”

There are two ways we can grow into engaging the reality of injustice of our world.

(1) develop a compassion for people suffering injustice by looking through the eyes of others who see this injustice first hand. (Week 32)
(2) prepare ourselves to help people by looking at them through God’s eyes, that is through his word (Week 33)

Week 32

We need to be able to develop compassion for injustice even when the injustice is out of sight and out of mind.  It is not always going to be right before us, or we will not always be viewing it through the media lens.  However, we need to remember what we know. (Hebrews 1:11, Hebrews 13:3, Galatians 2:10, Collossians 4:18)

We need to remember these as if we were the ones suffering the injustice ourselves.

I used some examples from the IJM to describes some different issues.

• Child prostitution
• Abusive Child Labor
• Slavery
• Murder and Corruption
• Abusive police and forced prostitution
• Detention or disappearance without charge or trial
• State-sponsored torture

When we read or see it through the media lens or first, second or third hand accounts etc…we cannot allow it to become a point of defeat. Rather we need to remember that Christ has overcome the world.

“Jesus calls us to a moment of honest reflection. Do we really want to move to a new place?  Do we really want to stand before a needy world free of all hindrances of the heart? Do we really want to see the world with the heart of Jesus and the courage of his Spirit?“(Gary Haugen)

Week 33

This past Sunday I talked to Catalyst about getting into the Bible and reading about injustices that the ancient scriptures talk about. 

Job 24:2-4, 9-10, 

Psalm 37:14

Isaiah 3:14

Lamentations 5:11-13

Ezekiel 22:29

Joel 3:3

Amos 1:13

After reading scriptures like this we should not be surprised about the kind of world we live in.  Christ came into this world….and the Word tells us that he is with us always, (Matthew 28:18-20)

In Week 32, I used the following Franciscan blessing…Craig Groeschel closes his book “It” with it…

“May God bless you with discomfort at easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships, so that you may live deep within your heart.

May God Bless you with anger at injustice, oppression and the exploitation of people, so that you may work for justice, freedom and peace.

May God bless you with tears to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, and starvation, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and to turn their pain into joy.

And may God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in this world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done.”

Tags: Catalyst, social justice, compassion, Franciscan blessing, Craig Groeschrel, Gary Haugen, IJM, International Justice Mission

I had forgotten that I was going to start using the week number to label the posts for the Catalyst Class.

This past week I spoke on the series Social Justice. We started with topic of “Seeking Justice.”

I went through some scriptures that spoke on how God does not like injustice and how seeking justice is something that God’s people would be involved in.

It was a good session, not many questions this week. Maybe it was the huge Family Day BBQ that was waiting outside.

Everyone seemed to be very attentive so that was good. I talked about some recent examples of injustices, from Rwanda - which is close to home as we have lots of Rwanda church members that lived through that situation - to Dafur, to South Africa - one of the young ladies in the session mother has talked to me how when she was growing up her family fled the country of South Africa to Zimbabwe.

I made mention when talking about Rwanda that when I was reading the book by Romeo Dalaire, “Shake Hands with the Devil” and watched Hotel Rwanda, that I the honor of baptizing a lady from Rwanda. It was an amazing experience. On Sunday morning after Catalyst ended, I had the opportunity to baptise another lady from Rwanda.

I ended the session with the quote from Gary Haugen,

“For the little Filipino girl
abducted into prostitution, for the Pakistani boy chained to a weaving loom,
for the Latin American widow pushed off her land and even for the African
father rotting in his prison cell without a charge or a trial, we share
Christ’s saving love on the cross and the servant love of our hands.” (Good News About Injustice”)

This upcoming Sunday I will be speaking in Catalyst on the new Social Justice Series. The topic I am going to be speaking on is “Seeking Justice: God’s Compassion. Commandment, and Commission.”

I am really excited about this series. This Sunday morning is family day and we usually have a few more people attending as well.

We are having a session this week for Catalyst. We have only had one session in the last month. We are starting a new series which we will be in for quite some time. The series will be on Social Justice. I will be using material from International Justice Mission and Sojourners.

I am going to introduce the series tomorrow with a video clip and some open discussion. The clip is the full video from Alicia Keys, “Keep a Child Alive”. A portion of the video was seen on Idol Gives Back this year.

Also, tomorrow night I am going to Cornwall to speak in a daughter church there. I am going to be speaking on being missionial in our communities, breaking through the Christian subculture.

Here is an good article to read from the New York Times.

“Taking Their Faith, but Not Their Politics, to the People”

(Hat Tip: Don Ryan)

Tags: NewYork Times, Faith, Politics, Evangelical

This looks to be a good read.  The blog at Mountain Equipment Co-Op. 

Ethical Sourcing & MEC

The store here is Ottawa is on the other side of the city for me, I have been meaning to make my way out to the story to pick up their water bottles that do not have the chemical bisphenol A. Which Canada has recently taken action on, see article here.

Tags: mec, Mountain Equipment Co-Op, Ethical Sourcing, blog, bisphenol A, Government of Canada

I ordered the following book, “Good News About Injustice”, really looking forward to diving into this one. I have a bunch of other books waiting on the shelf to be read, but this is one I am starting when it arrives.

Gary Haugen is the President and CEO of International Justice Mission.