A New Way of Being the Church - Steve Bruns

Welcome to the Lookout Weekly Podcast.

Church of the Lookout is in Boulder, Colorado, and our vision is Jesus abiding in his presence, growing in his family, and living on his mission to transform the world with awe-inspiring love.

Visit us online at the lookout.church.

Hey, good morning, friends.

Everybody, let's stand together.

Real quick, before I introduce my friend, he's going to be bringing the word today.

The scripture says in Psalm 118, this is the day the Lord has made.

Let us rejoice and be glad.

And I'm going to say it again.

This today is the day the Lord has made.

Let us rejoice and be glad in it.

So I want you to find somebody around you.

Tell them you're glad to see them this morning.

Welcome them to church.

A couple things to know.

First of all, if you're missing all of the junior high high school faces in the room, it's because they're all at camp this weekend.

We got about 25 students at camp down in Woodland Park area.

They'll be coming back tomorrow.

Let's continue to pray for them as God leads.

Let's ask uh just ask the Lord to meet them exactly where they need to be met.

And we can't wait to hear some testimonies when they get back.

This morning I actually have the privilege of welcoming and introducing to many of you for the first time our some friends who hail from Stravangar, Norway.

Um Steve and Anna Kristen bruns down here in the front row.

And uh yeah, absolutely.

We'll do a we'll do a proper welcome here in just a moment before Steve comes up.

Um but I I gotta give you some introduction here.

Uh for those of you who don't know Steve and Anna Kristen.

About five years ago is when I met Steve.

It was actually after one of our Sunday morning services.

Um many of you know Lois Sturgeon down here in the second row.

Um and uh she she looks she she she looks like she looks like a sweet woman, but she is fierce.

When she when she prays, she you gotta look out, okay?

And uh and she can get up to some uh some mischief and she likes to connect people.

So what happened is after a service, she came up to me and said, Hey, you must meet uh Steve and Anna Kristen.

Um they're here today after the service.

And so and she went to Steve and said the same thing.

And so Steve and I uh we we found each other and and and out of our obligation to meet each other, um, because Lois told us to, and we do whatever Lois tells us to do.

Because she's one of the mamas, and that she's been here, what, 30, 34?

How long have you been here, Lois?

Since the beginning.

Okay, so we're we're pushing 35 years or so, 30 over 30 plus years.

So again, we do whatever Lois tells us to do, okay?

And uh and she said, you must get together.

So I got together with Steve, and he started telling me about um, first of all, his history, and he'll probably share a little bit.

He was an intern here at this church back in the 90s before moving to Norway under James, Pastor James Ryle.

He was an intern here at the church, and later on would move go to Norway and launch a ministry called Agenda One, which you're gonna hear about as well.

He was telling me about this ministry that goes to uh cities all over the world, and what he does is um they they gather pastors from different churches in a city, they pull them together, lock them in a room for a few days, and say, We're gonna pray until God shows us what to do for the city, and we're gonna work together.

A little a little softer than that, but essentially the idea is um gathering leaders from different churches and saying, God, what are you doing?

How can we learn from each other?

And how do we work together to make disciples in the city?

And he he said, What do you think?

Would something like that work in Boulder?

And I said, I don't know.

I said, I think we should try it.

He's like, I don't know if it could work.

I wouldn't be the guy to pull together, and I don't know how we're gonna get all these different church leaders who all have different things going on and different calendars and schedules.

I don't know how that's gonna happen.

So we kind of parked it there, but a month later, a month or two later, Steve calls me and he says, Hey, by the way, I got all the pastors on board.

Are you guys in?

And uh, and I kid you not, um, it happened just like that through a connection after connection.

It was really directed by God.

God opened doors and made it happen.

And uh and and and what happened was out of 2019, I believe it was, so just a handful of the local churches in Boulder started to meet together, us included, um, uh in Essus Park, and we started to pray for each other and to learn about each other and to collaborate for the sake of the city.

And and we're thankful that today we are in such good relationship with so many of the churches and we're for each other.

We champion each other, we resource each other, we give money to each other, we support each other's ministries, we do worship nights together, and it has gone on and on and on, and it's all because of the seeds and the faith and the favor God has given to Steve and Anna Kristen to champion this not just here, but all around the world.

So I want you guys, I've invited Steve to come and speak and give us a little bit of a global perspective, encourage us today.

But I want to give him a proper lookout welcome today.

Can you guys help me welcome Steve and Anna Kristen today?

Thank you, Luke.

Okay.

Wow, I guess we're going to pitch together today, right?

Why don't you introduce us before we get going here?

Yeah, this my name is Anne Christin, and this is my husband Steve.

And I'm Norwegian and he's an American.

We live in Norway, Stavanger, not Stavanger, but Stavanger, Norway.

And we participate at this church in 99, 2000.

So we're so glad to be back here, and it's so nice that you have welcomed us this way, and thank you, Luke, and the whole church here.

So I'm gonna give the word to Steve.

Okay.

Sure, thank you.

That's great.

Well, we really appreciate it.

I mean, it's it's a great honor for me to be asked to speak at this church.

Um, this church has meant so much to me and my family for decades.

Um, this little history here, my parents started going way back in the late 80s, 90s, probably, when it started, or in the first part when James Wilde was pastor here.

Um, my mother had a real renewal here that really changed your life.

And she was involved in this church, the fellowship with the women here meant so much to her.

Um, my sister here had an encounter with God that changed her life.

Uh, my oldest brother who lives in Norway also tells that you know, he and his wife, their marriage was restored through um uh the ministry of promise keepers, which also grew out of this church here.

So, I mean the the thankfulness I have to this church goes way deeper than just being able to come to some good meetings here, meet some nice people.

Um, like you mentioned, 99, 2000.

We were here for a year with our family.

Uh, we got four kids, by the way.

Maybe you can show them the picture up here.

Uh we got four kids there back then.

The two oldest boys were five and seven.

We had the baby, the girl, and uh now they're all growing up.

Um we have two kids in law and four kids.

Do we have the um uh PowerPoint?

The second picture.

We'll try to make it work here.

Um there we go.

That's that's our family.

Um so if you remember the kids from '99, they've changed a bit since then.

But but um it was a it was a real blessing to be here that year.

I was um go back a few steps.

I was born in Japan.

Um, I moved to Boulder in 1968, uh, nine years old.

That was when the hippies were all over the place here, and it was an entirely different city than it is now.

Uh um I grew up here from when I was nine until I was uh 18, and then moved away to school.

Um I forgot to say, by the way, also my brother's here today visiting two of my cousins with their family, so we're really happy to have you guys here too.

Right.

So my brother and I moved here together in 1960 with our two other siblings and our parents.

But but Boulder has a real special place in my heart and in our family.

Um when I was 18, I moved to Boston to study music.

That was my first passion back then.

And uh after four years, I was able to move to Norway and get a job over there as a professional musician.

So I lived there for since 81, working as a musician in the symphony orchestra, playing percussion.

And in the year 99-2000, Anna Christine and I decided we wanted to spend a year in the States.

And the year we had in this church was transformational for us.

Both of us had had personal renewal, growth, new insights, uh, new faith.

And during that year, God called us to change direction in life.

So after we went back to Norway, I resigned my job in the Symphony Orchestra and started working full-time in our church.

And one thing that to another, I'm now leading, as you mentioned, this Agenda One Network, which is uh working with church leaders all over the world.

And this by God's amazing grace, we're in a position now to be able to really see and be part of amazing things that God is doing in this world, much larger than this here.

So um uh as you can imagine, I'm I'm more than and than average uh interested in in churches.

I love the church, I love the church, and and I love being part of what God is doing in his church.

And and my prayer for this day today is that all of us will have a little bit larger picture of what the church is and what it can be in this world.

So, Lord, I just pray right now that you're gonna use these words, these reflections, these stories to open all of our hearts, our minds, so we can see a bigger perspective of what you are doing in the world today, Lord.

Thank you, Jesus, that the church is yours.

Thank you that you are building it, you were working through it, through each one of us, not just here, but all over the world.

So, Lord, let us know more today about what you were doing and what you want to do in the future so we can be part of that and give these minutes to you, Lord.

Amen.

Okay.

Um a question to start with.

What do you think when you hear the word church?

Look at the picture.

What do you put in the frame where that question mark is?

What is the church?

What is a church for you?

Good.

Um my picture of church, of course, started with my my childhood, my upbringing.

We went to church every Sunday.

Um church was uh the place we we gathered once a week to worship God, to pray, to meet the other Christians.

As I got older, I went to a youth meeting in the evenings too.

And and church was important for me because that was both the people that we met there, and and that's where I had a chance to grow as a Christian.

It meant something to me as a kid.

I really wanted to follow Jesus.

Um, and and and a church was the place it happened.

But for me, church was very much centered around, the idea of church was centered on a building, on a pastor and a youth leader, centered on programs and activities that the church arranged for me to go to.

The church was something I went to, right?

We went to church on Sundays.

I go to church on Sundays, we all say that, right?

So the church was something I went to.

When I was 18, as I said, I moved to Boston and I did some church shopping there the first uh few months and tried to find a place.

I never really found something that I felt at home with.

So gradually I just kind of left that church thing behind.

And for me, when my faith was so much tied up to the church that I went to, when I left the church, there was a lot, there wasn't so much left of my faith.

Gradually, you know, it was it wasn't important to me.

It was it was still there, maybe, but it just kind of drowned in all the other things I was passionate about.

So the danger for all of us in having a church that we go to is that we don't go to the church, where is the church then?

I moved to Norway, like I said, in 1981, and I met a group of young Christians who didn't go to church, but they had this vibrant fellowship.

They were there were musicians, they had a group, I was started playing with them, traveling around, and and I just I I it was it kind of shocked me.

I kind of came in the back door because all of a sudden I saw Jesus in a new culture.

It didn't look anything like the culture I'd left.

But there was something there.

I I had in a way said no to Jesus.

Actually, I said no to the church.

But I kind of put Jesus in that box over there, and all of a sudden he surprised me because he met me out of the church.

He met me in a new context, a new culture.

And what I saw there really attracted me.

I wanted to be part of this.

So I guess you say it came back to Jesus when I came to Norway.

I didn't really come back to the church, I came back to Jesus.

And then all of a sudden I discovered that, well, the church maybe that's something different than what I grew up from.

Maybe the church is something different than what I said no to when I left Boulder.

It's been a fascinating journey since then.

I met Anna Christine and she was going to this this fellowship called Emi IMI.

And um this wasn't really a church, I guess I guess you'd say.

It was more of a fellowship.

Uh in Norway they have the very liturgical high church where you go on the Sundays, and that's where they have communion and baptism.

And you have these fellowships that kind of meet together.

Uh, and and these fellowships have a have a real heart for sharing the gospel.

And this fellowship that I we we begin in, EMI, the passion was really to see, to meet the both the spiritual needs of our city and the physical needs of our city.

From way back, we have a tradition, we have a heritage of meeting the needs of the people around us, whether it was building uh homes for children with their parents way back or are meeting the needs of the uh the elderly, the single moms.

How can we meet the cities?

And of course, to share the gospel so people in our city would know who Jesus was, come back to him and let him be their Lord and Savior.

So that was the fellowship I came.

It was very radical, it was pretty small, and it was just doing lots of fun things and that appealed to us.

So we were part of this church, building this church.

What happened was during the 80s, into the 90s, um, we were we met this the whole charismatic revival.

We started seeing great things happen.

People started coming to the church, and gradually it became a very large church.

It wasn't just a radical group of people anymore that were trying to change the city, but it was a church where people came on Sunday to go to our services and and bring their kids and the Sunday school, and to we had, of course, a bigger staff and a building.

All these things started to kind of grow without us really planning it.

When I started in the church in 2001, we were just building this enormous building in our city, which is a gift from God.

But we found ourselves in 2001 in this enormous building with about a thousand people coming, all kinds of great activities and programs, and kids' ministries, and youth ministries, and out on the streets doing the great things.

And we had to kind of stop and say, Well, is is is this where we're supposed to be?

Was this what God called us to do?

Because what we started to notice as a leadership was some of the things that were core to us weren't really happening.

But at first, we weren't really reaching out to new people.

Everyone was coming to our church, but there were mostly Christians coming in there because it was a great place to be on Sundays.

But very few people were meeting the Lord through our ministry because so much of our focus was on ourselves, our ministry, our building, our staff, our finances, our budget, our church service.

It was all about us.

And of course, we wanted to reach out.

So we did alpha courses and we did ministry in the streets, we did things in the jails, so we were out there, but at the same time, we kind of felt as a leadership, we've we felt we were losing our direction.

We were becoming too much involved in the organization of it and not really living the life.

It was a time of soul searching.

We tried different things, and in the middle of this, we were invited into this network called the European Church Planting Network.

Started because Phil Anschutz, a rich guy here from Colorado, Wyoming, saw that the church in Europe was dying.

So here's a million dollars, go plant churches in Europe.

So we were part of this movement.

So we were meeting together with other churches all around Europe.

They were kind of in a similar position.

Felt like, hmm, it's not quite going there.

The church in Norway is was dying.

I'm sorry, the church in Europe was dying.

It was getting less and less.

It was becoming less relevant.

It was Norway's, I'm sorry, Europe was becoming more and more secular, kind of like where the US is going, but way before, right?

So what are we gonna do?

We came together with a lot of churches, church leaders from around Europe, and together with some really good leaders from the States, they came to help us into a process not just to teach us what to do, but to start to ask the right questions.

Ask different questions than we were asking before.

And and through this, we started talking about the missional church, a church that understands itself as disciples making disciples.

A church that doesn't just gather people but equips them and sends them.

How can we change our mindset?

So this process we started there at ECPN um was really important for us um as a church in our in our process.

And it it it actually radically changed us.

Um let's let's put it this next slide here because uh I want to spend some time just thinking about the the great commission that Jesus gave us.

We know that Jesus came, he was born, lived his life, uh, gathered disciples, taught them, went to the cross to die for our sins, um, was crucified, rose up from the dead, and went back to heaven.

But what did he leave us?

What did he leave his disciples?

Matthew tells us that the last thing he said to his disciples before he left, after the crucifixion and resurrection, was this what we call the Great Commission.

And let's just read through this now and think what did Jesus actually tell them to do?

It says here, Jesus came to them and said, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

And surely I am with you always to the very end of the age.

The first thing is this is all about Jesus, right?

Our vision is Jesus.

I have all the authority, I'm with you every day.

But he says, go and make disciples.

What does that mean to go and make disciples?

Jesus didn't say go out and plant churches.

Jesus never said start if Jesus said, I'm going to build my church, it's not up to you, right?

Jesus didn't tell us to go out and share the gospel and save people.

That's a part of it.

But the main theme was making disciples.

How do we understand that in our lives, in our churches, in the world today?

Um the next slide here.

Uh when Jesus um said to Peter after his confession that on you, on this rock, I will I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not uh prevail over it.

Jesus said very clearly that I'm going to build my church.

This was his business, this was his idea, this was his dream.

We get to be part of what he is doing.

And the word church in this case, he doesn't use it very much.

When he used the word church, the word is ecclesia in in Greek, which means a gathering of people.

Right?

So from the very beginning, Jesus was talking about building his church, about building the body, building the people.

Paul talks about the body of Christ, right, where Christ is the head.

So from the very beginning, the church was not intended to be an institution.

It was not intended to be understood as an organization.

It was intended to be a family, like you said, people living their lives together, right?

So we started to work with these ideas of what a discipleship.

What does a disciple really mean?

And we got this great tool that you guys also know, the triangle, right?

A definition of what a disciple is.

Of course, a disciple is someone who, like an apprentice that follows another person.

A disciple is someone who follows Jesus and wants to be like him, live like him, act like him, speak like him, think like him.

And one way we can understand the life of Jesus, what he lived, Jesus lived his life in three three relationships, right?

Up to the Father.

The most important thing of all for Jesus was to be together with his father.

He didn't do anything else except what he heard the Father do, right?

And then Jesus built a family.

He gathered these people around him, not just the disciples, but this large group of men and women.

He called them his brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers.

He built a family.

And then, of course, Jesus was out there to meet the lost, to meet the broken, to meet the sick.

He was in the world, building relationships with the people there.

So these three relationships kind of define what it means to be a disciple.

And this is what you guys have in your vision statement, right?

The presence of God, the family of God, and being on God's mission together in the world.

So this gave us a framework, I guess you could say, to understand what it means to be a disciples, but also what does it mean to be a church?

Because our assignment then as church leaders is to help people live in these relationships, to help people to grow as disciples.

Um not just to, I said, to gather them and feed them, but but to send them and to equip them.

Like Paul says, um, he says to the the the point of These gifts he's given us was to equip his people for works of service so that the body of Christ may be built up.

So our call as a disciples together is to equip each other to live the life Jesus is telling us.

One of the pictures we use in this is the difference between feeding sheep and equipping disciples.

Very often we as church leaders think that we have all these sheep coming on so that we have to feed them, right?

Prepare a good sermon, give them the truth, help them to meet their needs, which of course is true.

But the main point is not to feed the sheep, it's to equip the disciples and send them out to be the church where they are.

It's the same thing we do, but maybe it's trying to understand what our calling is, what our goal is.

What's the difference?

It starts with the way we think.

New ways of thinking lead to new ways of actions.

For us in our church, it was kind of changing the idea of just promoting just just um trying to hear the word of God and speaking it to the church, to thinking, well, we have to help each person into a living relationship with God.

The goal is not to teach them, the goal is to bring them into relationship with Christ.

For instance, we were going to have a, we felt called to really go into the a time of trying to hear the voice of God.

How can we understand what God is saying to us, the prophetic?

But instead of us as the leaders listening to God and sharing it with them, of course, the main idea was we have to help each person in our church to be able to hear what God is saying to them.

The kids, the young people, the adults, the new believers.

How can we all understand what God is saying to us and share it with each other?

So helping people to live there, not just feeding them, but giving them what they need to feed themselves.

The fellowship.

We changed the focus from just inviting them to activities in the church.

We canceled most of our activities.

We started meeting more and more in the homes, going out together, living life together outside of the church.

We have what we call house churches, which meet in people's homes, come together around a meal table, both with people from the church open for their friends and neighbors.

We share life together.

We we uh share the word of God together.

It's it's not a church service, it's life, it'd be life, right?

Where we also have to have the Lord's Supper on the table.

We've seen so many beautiful relationships being built up in these ways.

People that come into the church, maybe they haven't been to a service before, they've been in the church for a year, right?

But it starts in the homes, in the fellowship out there, and then bring them together on Sundays to convene here.

During the pandemic, this was essential for us in our church.

That's how we lived our lives for two years in the house churches.

And of course, on the mission, too, there's a difference between thinking, okay, how do we bring all of our people into this mission program?

Or how can we instead equip them to live their lives where they are?

We ask the question, who are you sent to?

Who has God put on your heart?

The people around you, your family, your friends, your coworkers, your neighbors, and who has God sent you together with?

Who are you going to live off this mission to life on?

And instead of trying to bring them into our activities, we try to release them into doing the mission to life where they could every day live as salt and life in their workplaces, neighborhoods, schools, homes.

So the thinking was essential for us.

The mindset change from gathering the sheep and feeding them on Sundays to instead of thinking, our call is to equip them and send them to live their life every day as the church in their homes wherever they are.

In the middle of all this, uh something really interesting happened.

We, for the first that we decided that, okay, well, we've learned in this ECPN was so good we have to share it with others.

So we started gathering other churches together in our little tribe and doing the same process with them.

Coming together a couple times a year, the leadership teams meet church, trying to ask new questions, working around the tables.

What does this mean for us?

How do we make disciples?

What does the mission look life look like with our place in our church in our town?

And then helping each other to stay in a process and keep growing in this missional direction as a church.

It took off.

God blessed it.

More and more churches want to be part of this movement that was starting in in Stavanger and throughout Norway.

And then about a year after, we got a phone call from our pastor.

He had gone down to Thailand to visit some missionaries we'd sent out and said, Steve, you and Nana Christi have to come down and thought agenda when in Thailand.

Sure, I said, I'd love to.

I always say yes.

Maybe I shouldn't.

But so we went down to Thailand to meet a bunch of Lutheran pastors in these churches that had been planted by Scandinavian missionaries, Norwegian, Finnish missionaries, and tried to take them into the same process that we had learned.

We start working in a direction of building a missional church, changing the mindset, the focus, and sending people out.

The first time was crazy.

We came down there and we just didn't know what to do.

We were totally helpless because we discovered very quickly that God does not just work the same in every culture.

And we had to listen to them much more than teach them.

We had to work together to find out what God has for them.

Let me see here on the right page, go here now.

What happened then through through Agenda One was as we started doing this in Thailand, uh we learned to take it into a new context, make it very simple using the simple tools, and we found a tool that worked well also with people who have no education, not just the pastors and theologians, but the housewives, the farmers.

And this started to spread.

Now, by the grace of God, we're working with churches from 21 different countries, mostly in um in uh in Asia, but also in Africa, uh in Europe, and in North America.

We're in Cuba right now.

We've been working here in Boulder.

So let me see, go back on the right slide.

I'll just leave it here.

Um so what happened then as we were as we were growing, then um we we saw this network being formed that we weren't just doing leadership training, but people who are part of this found a commonality, they found common vision, common values, and wanted to walk together.

So we gather these people now, both physically and in Asia, uh, once a year.

We do online gatherings, we have all these people coming together, celebrating each other, sharing testimonies.

And this global family is growing up with many different denominations, church backgrounds, cultures.

But the common thread is this how can we be the church?

How can we make disciples and make disciples?

How can we impact our communities, the presence of God, the family of God, being on the mission of God together?

So it's been a lot of fun.

Um, yeah, next slide from Thailand.

Maybe I mixed them up here.

I want to tell you about these people here.

The man on the left, his name is Unchan.

He's a pastor within the uh Lutheran church in Thailand.

When they met him the first time, we met a very liturgical church.

It was just like coming from the church in Norway to a church service in Thailand, except a different language.

He had the same robes they used there, the same liturgy, the same flowers.

They even had someone that sent a pulpit from Norway, a wood pulpit from Norway down to Thailand.

So we could stand there in the pulpit and preach on Sundays, right?

It's just this strange thing happening.

It's like I was, okay, somewhat doesn't make sense.

It was great.

I loved it.

At the same time, I was wondering, is this what you called us to do, God?

And on the one hand, God has been blessing this work, he'd been blessing On John's ministry, and he has a real heart for uh sharing the gospel.

And he'd been out, he was in a little city in East Thailand, he'd been out in the villages sharing the gospel in many places, and many had come to faith.

The only problem was in this system that we'd built up, everything was dependent on the church, the building, the pastor, the sacraments, having to be there on Sunday because it didn't have a framework for any kind of real growth.

To build a new church, you had to have money from Norway to build the building, you had to send a pastor out to Bangkok for four years to educate them and ordain them.

So then you had the church to start in one little city.

But how could he do this?

Well, what happened was he came to this first gathering and uh he brought along some of his people with him.

Among the others is this lady named, no, go back again.

This lady named Tongsa that I'm standing with there.

Tongsa was a farmer's wife, had no education, but she'd been saved and had a real heart for the Lord.

And her dream was how can we share the gospel with all these kids in my village?

She just had a passion for the children.

But but she'd been praying for years.

God, send a missionary to our village.

God send the pastor to our village.

Come so we can share the gospel with these people, right?

Because the problem was that the pastor had so many people, he never had a chance, he didn't have a chance to get out there.

These people were so poor, it was a hard time for them to come to the church on Sunday.

They couldn't afford to take off for a day and come to the church.

So it just wasn't working.

Something was wrong.

So we were there at this first gathering and trying to communicate and just feeling, you know, didn't know what we were saying.

But one thing we were able to get out was the idea of making disciples, right?

That we're called to make disciples, to help people live in this relationship, up to God, into the family, out to the world.

And then we said, well, making disciples just means helping others to follow Jesus.

So who can do that, right?

Can can a child who's inviting his friend to church, is he making disciples?

Of course, right?

Can can a new convert who's inviting his friend, telling his sharing his testimony to the friend, is he making disciples?

Yeah.

So I said, okay, well, everyone can make disciples, right?

Okay, everyone can make disciples.

Repeat after me, everyone can make disciples, everyone can make disciples.

Repeat after me, I can make disciples, I can make disciples.

She believed it.

Something struck on her.

She said, Well, wait a minute, I can make disciples.

I don't have to wait for the missionary, the pastor.

I can make she asked her pastor Onja, can I go back and start sharing the gospel with the kids in my village?

He said, Of course.

I'll help you, right?

So she got some material, some ideas.

She started, she and another woman started gathering the children, telling them Bible stories, singing songs, doing the stuff, you know, just having fun games.

And pretty soon this group of kids started growing.

And kids started coming to the Lord, right?

They believed in this.

She shared her faith with this whole group of young kids.

And as they grew up, they became teenagers.

They were sharing with others.

After a short time, the parents started coming and listening because they saw what was happening to their kids.

And the parents were coming to the Lord.

And this lady with no education was all of a sudden pastoring a whole church in a village.

One John saw this.

Some pastors would have been threatened because they're losing control, not him.

He thought, wow, this is good.

We gotta do more of this.

So he started bringing the other villages where he'd shared the gospel and saying, Hey, how can I help you to start a church in your village?

What do you need to gather your friends and share the gospel there and helping them?

So within a couple years, there was this whole network of churches growing out of this, right?

And when they when they came into the village on this to the city on the Sundays, there was hundreds of people there.

It was a growing, vibrant church because they had understood we're called to make disciples.

And anyone can do that.

It was so amazing because we saw kind of a confirmation.

God put a stamp on this.

Okay, this these truths work.

And it came not because we came really to teach them, we came to ask questions together.

We discovered that God works differently in every culture.

One of my biggest challenges was understanding that God is not Norwegian.

He's not American either.

Did you know that?

God is not American, you know?

We can meet God.

I was talking to you this morning about your short-term mission, right?

And we found out when each country we come to, we see God working in a different way in that culture.

So what do we do?

We can't just come in and teach them theology.

We can't teach them church planting skills.

We have to walk together with them, ask the questions: what does it mean to make disciples in your culture?

What does it mean to be the church in your culture, in your village, in your city?

It's the same way here in the States, in every different subculture we have, there's a new way of being the church.

And this idea just started to unlock all these possibilities to find out, wow, God's doing so many amazing things.

And our goal is not to try to decipher them and put them in boxes.

Our goal is to be part of what God is doing.

Let's see the next slide here.

Tanon, he's the pastor of one of the largest churches in Bangkok, uh, probably the most influential church leader in Thailand.

He's planted 60 churches throughout the country and in the U.S.

among Thai speakers, and a brilliant speaker, so tens of thousands watch him online every Sunday.

He's an amazing man, but through God's working, we got connection with him and started to see, how can we help you?

How can we put wood on your fire?

How can we help you to succeed more than what you're doing?

He started looking at these at these principles we had, the triangle, and he said, Wow, that's so simple, but it's so deep.

One of the things he discovered was he was he had been working all the time out of duty.

He had been pushing and driving.

He tells us that, you know, there was 1% of the population in Thailand are Christians.

So all this time he was pushing himself, pushing it.

We've got to reach the other 99.

Come on, we've got to work, we got to do new programs, new ministries, new all the things he was doing.

He was burning himself out.

But he understood, wait a minute.

I'm not just called to go out and save them.

I'm called to be a part of what God is doing.

It starts with receiving, it starts with my identity as a child of God, more than just a pastor, more than a worker for him.

So for him, the identity was the key.

Um, the people I know in Thailand said his preaching changed.

They heard his preaching online, all of a sudden he was teaching these things in a way that people really were met by them.

And you see now this amazing growth happening in his church and across the church in Thailand.

They're seeing growth happening now.

It's only 1%, but they're so excited because there's always new people coming to Christ.

You see the arrow's going up.

He's an amazing man and great to be part of what he's doing there.

Let's look at some more pictures here.

Um, through some connections in the Norwegian missionary uh organization we're part of, we're invited to come to the West African country of Mali.

I don't know if you know much about Mali.

It's a Muslim country, very few Christians.

Uh right now, the country's torn apart by you know warring factions, uh, Islamist uh militants and civil war.

It's a terrible place to be.

But before the country closed down, we were able to come in and work together with some leaders there.

This man named Adam Abbas is part of the Fulani tribe, which is a large tribe throughout many parts of Africa.

It's a Muslim tribe.

They're the ones who brought Islam to Africa way, way back.

Uh they're very, you know, very strong, very warrior-like, and and always they're also a um nomadic people.

Well, when Adam Aba met this teaching, he said, Wow, this is interesting.

For years we've been training pastors and building churches.

Our problem is we're nomadic, so they don't really stay there.

And when the war comes, you have to move, the church is gone, right?

But he says, This here, anyone can do this.

You see, he's holding a triangle, a little wooden triangle that they made.

And it says, This is what I'm teaching now.

It's discipleship, because this can go anywhere.

Well, this man is now sharing this simple message, which has been, of course, adapted to their culture all over Mali.

The white people can't be there anymore.

They can't go outside of the capital, but he can go anywhere.

They've actually gone into neighboring countries and different areas where it's you can be killed for sharing the gospel, right?

But they're seeing the church grow.

The simple ideas, the simple ideas of discipleship, the simple tools and principles.

Um, one other amazing thing they're doing is they're gathering tribes that are actually killing each other, they're at war with each other.

But the Christians from these tribes are coming together in agenda one learning communities and building fellowship, saying, How can we bring the kingdom of God to our country, to our our different areas?

And they're building this sense of unity now among the church there, which is just breaking all the boundaries.

This man is amazing.

We learn so much from hanging out with these people.

We move on here.

Um next picture.

A man we know in Nepal.

Uh, I don't if you I don't know how much you know about the church in Nepal.

There's an amazing revival going on now, but there's also a lot of persecution.

You can be jailed or even killed for sharing the gospel, trying to convert someone who's um uh Hindu.

And there's a lot of challenges for the church there.

Uh what Solomon, his big testimony, is how Agenda One has been bringing different churches together.

Before it was very much the confessional lines, the you know, Pentecostals did this, the evangelicals did this, but now they're coming together and seeing how can we support each other, how can we meet the needs of our community, showing pictures when the flood scheme, how they were out there as a church together, meeting the needs, rebuilding the homes, bringing food to people who were uh who were who were hungry.

So they're they're they're using this this principle now, just like you're saying in Boulder, bringing the churches together.

What can we mean for what can we, how can we help our our city, our our our district, our country to meet the Lord in the kingdom of God?

Keep going here.

Um one of the things we meet too is is persecution.

And some of the people we work with are really heroes.

Uh the man you see here, um, we never show his face because it's he's in danger all the time.

This man was uh grew up as a um as a Muslim.

He was a radical uh Islamist.

He um had been out there persecuting the Christians, and he met a man who lived his faith in a way they started to ask new questions.

Well, he came to the faith as a young man.

Uh the other Muslims tried to kill him at least twice.

He should have been dead, but by God's grace he's still alive.

And now he is living out and sharing the gospel in many ways.

Um, most of his extended family has come to the faith, even though he's still, you know, taking challenge.

He says that, well, people see my life, they see what I'm doing, the fruit of it, so they'll let me be.

They won't they won't bother me anymore.

But still he knows the dangers are all the time.

We had an interview with him just recently.

We asked him, um, why do you keep on doing it when it's so dangerous for you?

He said, The thing is, I believe that my life is in God's hand.

So my promise to God that I will do what God leads me to do.

Even if people want to threaten me or kill me or torture me, it's okay.

It is okay.

I am ready for that.

Still, until my last breath, I will continue to follow Jesus as my Lord.

Right?

These are the kind of people we meet that challenge us so extremely because for so many of us, faith is so easy.

The Christian life is so easy to lead.

But here are people that are willing to sacrifice everything for the sake of Christ.

And they're sharing the gospel also in unity.

This man is bringing together the NBB churches, the Muslim background believer churches, the previous Muslims who believe in Esau and Jesus, together with the traditional churches and the other other people groups, other um groups in the country in Bangladesh, where they're now coming together in agenda one-learning communities, building relationships, working together.

How can we learn from each other?

How can you help us to share the faith with Muslims, right?

So it's it's amazing things going on that we just are just kind of being part of, facilitating.

Um, one more picture here.

This woman is an amazing woman.

Um she was um born into a Buddhist family, but she had an uncle and aunt who were Christians.

Um, at a very early age, her uncle and aunt took her to church, and she went to the temple with her parents.

She says that when we went to the temple, I experienced fear.

When I went to the church, I experienced the peace and the love of God.

You said at the age of eight years old, she experienced God's embrace.

Like God just embraced her and hugged her.

She felt this love that just touched her life.

So she says, I want to be a Christian.

Her parents said, No, you can't be.

So her parents did everything they could to keep her from doing this.

It ended with that she decided, well, I have to follow Jesus more than my parents.

She actually left her family and went to live in an orphanage that her uncle, the pastor, had because she wanted to be able to praise Jesus, to worship him, to know him.

So an eight-year-old girl choosing an orphanage because of Jesus.

Down the road now, both her parents have become Christian, both family's Christians now.

There's amazing things around the country.

But this woman has grown up with a sense of um calling, of identity.

She knows who she is in Christ.

When she made Agenda One, she fit right into this.

Now she's leading her work in Thailand.

She's also traveling to other countries, uh, other nations around the world, uh, sharing her testimony, sharing about Christ.

And one thing she's doing is raising up women, like she says here.

She's seeing that in Asia so many women are held down, and there's so many discussions about theology.

Where do the women fit in?

Well, when we're talking about discipleship, there's room for everybody.

Whether you're a woman or a man, no matter who you are, that's a place for you in this picture.

So she's now an amazing leader who is raising up new leaders all the time.

Okay, um I could talk more, but my time is running out, I see.

I just want to kind of start a goal for a landing here.

Um my dream, like I said, for today, my prayer for today is that we can see a bigger picture of what the church is.

If it really is true that Jesus is the one who is building his church in the world today.

If it really is true that the church is the body of Christ, where Jesus is the head.

What do we sing today?

That um uh right, nothing can stop uh the love of God, the refrain of that song, Lion and the Lamb, right?

Who can who can stop the Lord Almighty, right?

Of course, nothing can stop the Lord Almighty.

But if it is true that we are his people, if it is true that he is doing his will in this world today and invites us to be part of that, what is possible then?

Just think about it.

What can God do?

If we have God's perspective on the church, see his dreams, his plans for the church, what does that mean for us?

What does it mean for my life?

If we really understand that a church is not a place I go, that I am the church.

I am part of this amazing movement of disciples that is transforming the world.

It means that I can have a purpose with my life, I can have a goal with my life, I can be part of something greater.

I can mean something to the people around me, my family, my friends, and my coworkers, the salt and light, God working through me.

What does that look like?

What does it mean for our local community, our our local um church community here at the lookout?

If it really is true, that each one of us are disciples of.

Changing the world, transforming the world around us.

What can happen?

Do you believe it?

What does it mean if we really take this seriously?

What does it mean for our cities, for our districts here?

What are the problems facing Boulder County right now?

What can the church mean for mental health?

What can the church mean for loneliness, isolation?

What can the church mean for all these young people who are confused about who they are and where they're going?

What can the church mean for homelessness, poverty, right?

I mean, God can do anything.

God has an answer.

Jesus has an answer for this.

What can it mean for our country, for our nation today?

If the church, the church.

There's only one church in the US today.

You know that, right?

There's only one church in Boulder County.

There's only one church.

We're all part of the body of Christ.

We meet in different places.

Meeting together in their own summer crazy, some are somber, whatever.

That's the way it is.

That's wonderful.

But even though we have different expressions for church, we are all one church.

What would it mean if the church of the United States today understood who they were?

If they could rise up and be the body of Christ here.

What happened with the polarization of the country today?

What would you just do about that?

How could the church today be the answer to the challenges of our country?

What would this world be like?

God isn't American.

He's not Italian is not Nepalese.

God is God that He's working, showing himself to each culture together.

We can do incredible things.

What about poverty?

We can end wars, right?

The church has anything everything it needs.

Between the kingdom of God and this world.

We pray it every time we pray the Lord, Lord, let your kingdom come, let your will be done on earth as in heaven.

Do we take that seriously?

That can happen.

That's the dream.

As we finish now, let's just take a moment and try to let's just pray to God right now.

He will open our eyes.

So diverse, so many different different expressions, uh, so many different cultures together, Lord.

But together we all show a different part of who you are.

But let us see more about how you see your church.

Let us see how we can play a role in what you're doing in this world today, here locally in the district, internationally of the world.

But thank you that we're a part of this amazing movement of disciples making disciples.

This amazing uh wave of of uh of what you're doing in this world that can that can change everything, Lord.

Lord.

Take away the blinders.

Take away the boxes we put up.

Let us come out of our cocoons and spread our wings and fly.

Let us be part of the church as you were building on this earth, Lord.

Don't let these all these barriers we put up, um lack of expectation.

Don't let them stop us, Lord, from being part of your transforming work in this world today.

We want to be where you are, we want to be part of what you were doing.

So come, Lord Jesus, speak to us, invite us into what you have for us, each one of us.

In the name of Jesus.

Amen.

So good.

Yeah, let's uh around the room, just let's keep our eyes closed for a moment.

I think there's an invitation here.

Um you know, as Steve was sharing today, my prayer is that for all of us here today, that there would be something that would provoke you from the inside out.

And just through hearing a story of somebody saying yes in Thailand, from hearing the story of obedience in Mali, or this young girl who at eight years old made a decision that shaped the rest of her life.

There's something that happens when we hear the testimonies of of individuals saying yes.

And I know in this room, all of us, I shouldn't say all of us, I would say probably most of us have we we know that God has called us to make disciples, but sometimes we can either get distracted or let fear or insecurity or let the concerns of this world keep us from our yes to him.

And my prayer this morning is that as we hear these stories, we say to ourselves, we say to God, God, send me where you want to send me.

Use me where you want to use me.

Let me be a part of what you're doing and show me the ones to whom you've sent me.

So, in your own words, if that is your prayer today, just in your own words, could you verbalize that?

You can even whisper it, maybe.

Whisper that to God.

God, I want to be a part of what you're doing.

Thank you for inviting us to be a part of what you're doing.

And also, I believe that we're in a time and a season where God is really wanting to unlock new dreams in the hearts of his people.

Sometimes it's hard to even know what I do in Frederick?

What do I do in Longmont?

What do I do in my neighborhood or my workplace or the places that God has sent me?

What do I, how do I even see the region through the lens of the eyes of Jesus?

And I just I believe that one of the things that we are to pray into and receive in this season is a new imagination for kingdom realities that's not just born out of striving, it's born of the Spirit.

He wants to unlock new kingdom dreams.

I believe it.

And it starts with us asking for them and welcoming them in.

Before this service, Fiona Vickers had a word about dreaming with God.

I'm gonna invite Fiona to come up here for a second.

I just believe this is important for us to pray into.

So, Fiona, would you share with that?

Share with us what you hear today.

Thank you.

Um I I believe some of us have uh forgotten how to dream.

Some of us have been so disappointed that we don't even dream.

But I want to say to you, why don't you turn that disappointment into fulfillment and dream with God?

I believe God wants us to dream with Him.

Some of us have been dreaming for years and we're still waiting.

But God showed me, it reminded me of the caterpillar, the life of the caterpillar.

You know, there's the little egg.

None of us are a mistake.

We were all born for a reason.

Out of that little egg comes the little tiny caterpillar.

And he, it's like us, you know, as young Christians, and we eat and we grow and we feed on the word of God, and we come this nice big, confident caterpillar, and we go about our business.

But there's something in that caterpillar that tells it it's now time to become a chrysalis.

And some of us just are plotting through life, but God has got more for us.

He's got more than just plotting through life, we're more than just a caterpillar.

But in that chrysalis, that caterpillar becomes like a liquid, a goop.

And some of us feel like we are just walking in a goop, we are just getting nowhere, there's no purpose in our life.

Why was I born God?

Do you know what's going on in my life?

Why is this happening?

And we just like the caterpillar, the caterpillar thinks it's going to die.

But guess what?

It's going to fly.

And I want to say that all of you, we can all fly.

We do not need to listen to the words of the enemy that there's nothing for us because God wants us to fly.

No matter what you where you are in life or what you're doing, you can choose to fly.

And but something happens in there.

Because I mean, if we were to cut that open, that little chrysalis, the butterfly, it would not live, it would die.

And some of us we want to push through, and we're not waiting on God's timing.

But guess what?

If it's premature birth, there's not going to be the life.

But something happens in that chrysalis, and it's known as imaginal sales.

The caterpillar was not aware it had these imaginal sales in it, and so they become individual sales, waking up, wakening up, then they multiply, they multiply, then they resonate, and they're talking to each other with the same frequency.

And you see, the caterpillar's immune system wants to kill off these imaginal sales, but you can imagine, just like the church, come on, you can do it, you can do it.

We encourage one another, and we are not going to die, but we are going to live and do what God has called us to do.

And and so those imaginal sales become a butterfly.

So, church, I just want to pray for you.

Okay, all right.

If you all want, we'd like to stand.

If you don't, that's fine, but why not stand?

And I just want to pray over as church that God would waken up the imaginal sales in each of us, that we can imagine and dream with God.

What does he have for us in Boulder?

What does he have for us as church?

What does he have for us as individuals?

What lives does he want us to touch in our jobs?

Because the butterfly, the butterfly goes from person from plant to plant, from flower to flower.

We can go from situation to situation and pick up and drop off.

We can bless others.

So, Father, I just pray that everyone here can imagine and dream with you what you have for us, that we can fly with you, we can be as disciples, going dropping off all the things that you teach us and show us, bless others, bring others into the kingdom and rise up and fly with you because nothing is impossible for you.

So we just thank you, God, and just say, come in a new and a fresh way, God, to each of us.

Those of us who have forgotten how to dream, let us dream again.

Those of us who think it's not worth dreaming because it never comes into fruition.

God, speak to those of us and rise up again because we can dream with you for whatever it is that you have for us.

So, God, I just bless us as church.

I bless us as individuals, I bless us as your people that we can go and fulfill all our purposes and plans that you have for us in the name of Jesus.

Amen.

Amen, amen.

Let's sing here.

Even when I don't see it, you work in.

That is who you are.

That is who you Thank you, God.

Jesus, together we thank you that your gospel is bearing fruit all over the world, that your good news is still good news.

Your good news is good news to us.

Your good news is the news that unearths lies, that unearths shame, that that dismantles depression and anxiety, and we thank you that your good news is going and it goes and it goes and it goes, and we are caught in the current of your river, Lord God, that will just continue to go and go and go.

And so today, God, we say yes and amen to all of your purposes.

I thank you, God, to awaken dreams, to awaken imagination, to awaken obedience, to awaken boldness, Lord God, and I thank you for boldness to fill our hearts, to fill our lips, to fill our minds, Lord God, that what you have spoken to us and what you have done and shown us of your goodness, Lord God, that it doesn't have to stop with us, God, but you've invited us to be a part of what you're doing.

So I thank you for faith, just as much faith as we leave as we did when we were worshiping, Lord God, that as we go, we go in the strength and the peace and in the kingdom of God.

We say, Yes, Jesus, you are worthy of our lives, you're worthy of our praise in Jesus' name.

In Jesus' name.

Come on, everybody say it.

Amen.

Somebody lift a shout to the name of Jesus this morning.

Come on.

It's good.

It's good to be a part of God's family, his global family, right?

So I want to bless you this morning as we go.

We're gonna have our ministry team, our prayer team.

They're gonna be up on the sides of the stage, maybe even on the sides of the room.

You're gonna see some people with tags.

These people are willing to pray with you.

If you have any physical conditions in your body that you need healing from, either sickness or disease, maybe a pain in your shoulder or maybe even in your neck, come forward and get prayer.

We believe that Jesus loves to heal.

If you want to talk to somebody about a relationship with Jesus, these are people that you can trust.

And listen, if you have kids, just go grab them from the kids' ministry, bring them back up, and uh and be in part of your conversation.

And if you haven't visited our prayer room yet, you go take go visit the prayer room.

Just follow signs when you get to the lobby and it'll take you all the way to the third floor.

You can continue to encounter the presence of Jesus.

And I just want to bless you this morning.

May the Lord bless you and keep you.

May He make his face to shine upon you.

Maybe He be gracious to you and give you rest.

Go in the peace of the Lord this morning.