Christian Challenge at MSC

Just came across this blog post about Mars Hill Church in Seattle, WA (Home of Boeing and Microsoft…) It looks like this is a church that both embraces the culture of the city it is in, but hold strict biblical values at the same time.

Driscoll and his Mars Hills followers epitomize the mounting evangelical youth movement in America. Within this movement lies something as old as America itself, and as terrifying and alluring as anything Orwell predicted; something that is at once political, emotional, deeply anti-intellectual, and more galvanized than you can imagine. I call this population of fierce young evangelicals the Disciple Generation.

The Disciple Generation is an ever-growing population of people ages 15 to 35 who are equally obsessed with Christ and with culture as a means to an evangelical end. People within this age bracket are defined by a shared culture, whether Christian or secular: if you own an iPod, know Green Day is a band and not a Nader rally, and ever considered getting a tattoo, you’re probably within the boundary. This is an age group whose transgressive actions — regardless of faith or demographic, whether in the form of an inked bicep, high school detention, or a fundamentalist credo — are easily slapped with the label of rebellion.

I like it… Check out the site below.

Mars Hill Church at Salon.com

Edit: Check out the music section of their homepage at www.Marshillchurch.com if you’re in need of some new tunes… Their bands (yes, plural) are pretty good, with lots of originals. I mean, what else would you expect from the indie band capital of the world?

It helps orphans in Venezuela or something…

The Christ Center offers free coffee and Wi-Fi to anyone who wants it.  No one will come inside for free coffee…  Today I decided that if no one will come inside, I will take the free organic, free trade coffee to the people.  So I set up a table, cups, awning, and even bought donuts.

Then I waited.

and no one came.

It’s not like I’m in an alleyway away from traffic.  I’m on a busy street where tons of people park every day.  I’m across from one of the biggest parking lots on campus.  People walk by.  It happens. There were probably 40 people who walked by in the hour and a half I was outside.

I gave away two (2) cups of coffee.

One of those was to a person who already knew about the Christ Center. She told me she liked the idea of giving it away on the street, then went away to her class.  She is a nursing student, so
she must be busy.

The other person I gave one to was a friend of mine from when I was still a student.  He asked about why I was doing this and gratefully
took a cup and a donut.

No one else did.

As I was reading Blue Like Jazz, the chapter about Grace, and came to a realization; People look at grace like they look at coffee.  Even if it is free, even if it helps orphans, even if it is taken out of the scary building and given to them freely with sweet treats on the side, they don’t want it.  BUT they will go and pay $4.37 for a Starbucks Latte in an hour anyways, even if something better was available for free all along.

People are so sceptical of “free” that they will overpay for something inferior.  This is kind of how it is with God.  People are so sceptical of His free grace that they will reject it for something lesser that requires more work.  Mormanism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Catholics, even some of the people in my own church are so wary of God’s “free” grace that they have to create a price to pay for it.  They will pay in works or worries way more than God wants, only to get something less than God offers.

The two people I actually gave coffee to are a great example too.  One already knew that the coffee was good.  She’d had it before.  She was on the “inside.”  She didn’t need to be told it was worth it, and that free is better.

The other I had a relationship with.  I wasn’t some random person offering something for nothing.  He took my coffee because it was from me, and he trusted that I wouldn’t be giving him something that was bad.

Figure out these metaphors for yourself.  Leave a comment about it.  Be a part of the discussion.
Coffee…. God…. Hmmmm….