Who is City Life Church?
When the purposes of Jesus are being followed, the person of Jesus is easily found! What does that mean? It means that Jesus loves being found in places where people are pursuing values that He adores. We are convinced that four of those values are: diversity, ministry, generosity, and community.
Diversity…our warmest welcome. In 2017 (Rupp Arena in Lexington, KY) the Kentucky basketball fans set a world record for the loudest indoor crowd noise at 126.4 decibels. What a great lesson for us…being together amplifies our voice! And for our church, we don’t want to be loud for the sake of being noisy. We want to be loud for the purpose of being heard. Jesus values diversity because when His church is diverse, we learn how to speak to people from all different walks of life. So let’s collaborate with one another. We don’t have to agree on everything to work together as a church family. Let’s celebrate one another. God made each of us in unique and wonderful ways, which means we have a responsibility to cherish the image and likeness (Imago Dei) that is in every person. And lets’ consider the possibility that we all have blind spots in our points of view, our character, and our ideas. Homogeneity or sameness can be a trap because living in an echo chamber never challenges our false thinking. Come add your unique voice to ours!
Ministry…our best effort. While Paul’s famous words in Ephesians affirm that we are saved by grace through faith and not by works, Paul immediately points out that we are saved in order to DO the WORK God has prepared for us in advance. That will take – and deserves – our best effort. We must not forget Jesus’ words when He said that He did not come to be served but to serve and to offer His life as a ransom for many. This means we never look more like Jesus than when we serve! The idea of every person having a meaningful contribution to make in serving others spiritually was a completely foreign concept in the first century. That kind of responsibility was reserved only for priests and other formal spiritual leaders. Jesus completely dismantled that cultural norm. One of Jesus’ favorite words was “whosoever.” He has a task for each of us. There are people whose journey of finding Jesus is waiting on you to do the work that will reach them. Will you join your best effort to ours?
Generosity…our boldest gift. Believe it or not, one irresistible feature of the early church was simply its members’ use of money. Explosive fireballs wasn’t the only miracle in Acts 2. There was also the miracle of a community that chose to live in selfless solidarity and sacrificial charity. Biblical generosity is living below our means so that all may have the means to live. And remember, we aren’t supposed to wait until all our needs are met before we give to help others. As we read in those first few chapters in the book of Acts, we find all kinds of people represented. We find people from various socio-economic backgrounds. Some had much, some had little. But all gave generously and sacrificially. Too many people are caught in the “keep up with the Joneses” trap. At City Life, we want to inspire one another to keep up with Jesus! Living a generous life meets both practical needs for others and spiritual needs for ourselves. And both help the world find Jesus. The more we look like Him in deed and in heart, the more easily He is found in our city. Let’s bring our gifts together!
Community…our strongest bond. Connectedness was quite literally a key definer of the way first century Christians lived and served Jesus. And when we read in Acts that God added to the church daily, there is no doubt that the loving community the early church in Jerusalem had become was a vital part of their witness. We believe God is trying to each us through the history of the Jerusalem church that when every church’s bonds grow stronger, their witness for Jesus grows louder! Consider this, a Harvard study in Feb 2021 found that 36% of US adults are dealing with serious loneliness as a result of not having relationships where they feel a person truly cares for them. Loneliness isn’t just a modern problem, it is a human problem. Meaning, those bonds of affection seen among early Christians resonated deeply with people then too. People have always needed a group of people to love them, to listen to them, to care for them, to inspire them, and to have the opportunity to do all those for others in turn. The people of God existing as a family with God will always be a community whose bonds demonstrate to the world the kind of love Jesus Himself promises to give. Come build that family with us!
When the purposes of Jesus are being followed, the person of Jesus is easily found…so let’s make Jesus easy to find in our city…our loudest witness!