Last week I published a couple of posts centered around the theme of vision and imagination. I found it ironic to recount the crazy advances in technology which allowed me to have a video conference meeting with a teammate in another state, while sitting in a car outside a coffee shop.
What if this kind of technology was used for kingdom advances?
What if shifts in our strategies and tactics will actually open us up to multiplication, rather than addition?
What if our normal blinds us to new possibilities?
What if the Parable of the Sower is not talking about farming? It amazes me how many people in the church who are taken back to that detailed analogy want to call into question the farming abilities of the guy in the story. “He needs to learn how to recognize good soil so he doesn’t waste so many seeds!” is the way some people verbalize their criticism. “Any fool ought to know that it is wasteful to sow seeds on the path!”
What if the purpose of the parable drives the makeup of the story? While you can easily identify which soil is packed path, which is shallow because of bedrock (might be a little harder to see) and which is thorny (if they have already sprouted), this is not so easily discerned just by looking at people.
The book of Acts tells the stories of households which we are not surprised there is a big harvest: good reputation people like Cornelius and Lydia. But God’s grace sparks the imagination of new possibilities in the hearts of others like the jailer, too. Then there are the stories in the Gospels like Demoniac and the woman at the well. Maybe we need to spread the seed of the Gospel more widely than we have in the past!
You actually erect grain bins from the top down! The top band of round panels are bolted together in a big circle. Then the triangular shaped pieces which form the domed top are assembled on that ring. After that is completed, the whole structure is jacked up tall enough to assemble another ring under that top ring. After this is completed the jack cables are moved from the bottom of the upper ring to the bottom of the lower ring. Now everything is jacked up enough to repeat the process. You keep repeating until the bin is at the desired height. Last of all the metal structure is connected to bolts which secure it to the concrete pad.
Building a grain bin is a good analogy of counter-intuitives (it goes together different than you probably picture from the description). It is much easier to visualize Disciple Making Movements from inside one than it is only imagining what they might look like.
Praying and Fasting
what is being learned. Like Cornelius, Lydia and the Philippian Jailer, these people do not come to faith by themselves. They want their household (social network) to know God and fall in love with Jesus, too. They want this badly enough that they share what they are hearing with others, week by week.
From the Desk of John King 