About a year ago, I told you our story about the sunrise Easter gathering that sprung up in our neighborhood. As a reminder, I have included a portion of that blog post below.

In that post I wrote: "Last Sunay was Easter. It was a big deal for Christians around the world. And rightly so!  It is the day Jesus rose from the dead and unleashed His life and hope and powerful truth that is redeeming the world still today.  Christians gather in churches everywhere for Easter services.

"For my family, Easter Sunday started a little differently this year.  Instead of starting Easter in a church we started in an open green space by our home with about 55 neighbors from all over Westover Park (our subdivision down here in League City, Texas).

"Just before sunrise, we set up our lawn chairs facing East.  As the first streaks of sunrise started painting the sky, we began a time of quiet worship with the words of the angel at the empty tomb (Matthew 28).  We thanked Jesus for what He did and for what He is doing for us still today.  We sang and prayed and blessed each other.  We had the little children present their "resurrection eggs" (plastic eggs with a little item in it that helps retell the events of Holy Week).  We then had a brief message reminding us that Jesus is alive and on the loose in Westover Park and that we, as neighbors, can encourage each other to live in the reality of that good news... especially when life gets hard and hectic. The whole thing took about 30 minutes.  It was interesting to see how much excitement and reverence there was among the neighbors who gathered.

"Afterwards, about half of the neighbors then went to their own church services.  But for the other half of the neighbors, this was "church".  They had no other church services to go to on Easter.  I realized afterwards that if they had not come to the neighborhood gathering, they would have missed Easter and the good news that it brings.  We even had a couple people who were out for their morning exercise come by and join in!

"The sunrise was spectacular and God granted the miracle of keeping the mosquitos away.  But what struck me the most was how eager people were to do this... to connect with neighbors in this setting... to cross this line together... to gather for more than food and fun, although that is always a good time too.

So a year from last Sunday, what would it take for you to have a similar Easter gathering in your neighborhood?  Easter 2013 is March 31.  What can you do starting now to be ready to have a gathering of neighbors remembering and giving thanks for the death, resurrection and ongoing activity of Jesus in your neighborhood?"

As you know, a year has nearly passed since last Easter. March 31 is now a little less than a month away. How might you invite your neighbors to come togehter for a simple gathering?

Here are a couple of tips:

1) Keep it simple: the point of the gathering is not to imitate the big celebrations of your local congregation but to invite neighbors to come together to be reminded of what happened on the first Easter and give thanks to Jesus.

2) Keep it small: we didn't intend to have so many people. Word just spread. We invited a few who invited a few, etc.Start with a few invitations and see what God does.

3) Keep it short: brief is better than long. Better to have a brief devotional gathering and a longer time of hanging out and conversation afterwards. Wouldn't you rather have them talking about how cool this was than how long it was?

3) The format is not as important as the gathering: inviting people to come together to ackowledge the resurrection of Jesus from the dead is the big win. Whether you have a devotion, a Bible reading, a song, a prayer, use Resurrection Eggs (see the link below) or all of the above, remember the most important thing happening is the gathering of friends around the empty tomb.

4) See if other neighbors want to help: Don't be a Lone Ranger. Invite others to help with the gathering.

So, it's not too late to do this. Last year, our gathering happened when a neighbor brought it up to us on the Tuesday evening of Holy Week!

Pray, knock out a simple plan and start getting the word out: Your place, Easter morning.

Conctact me if you have any questions I can help sort out with you. This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

 If you are interested in finding out more about Resurrection Eggs, you can go to this link, http://shop.familylife.com/p-1717-resurrection-eggs.aspx

I have a good friend here in Houston named Jim Spivey who is always saying important things. He's not trying to be profound. In fact, he usually has a silly grin on his face. It's just that he has been undone by God's grace. And with that grace has come a radical rethinking of... everything.

All that to say, I really appreciate Jim's perspective.

His perspective has been redone by the reality Jesus speaks of when He says, "Whoever loses his life for Me will find it." It is only through our authentic death that we break into life that is authentically new. That process is not simply a theological statement Jim believes to be true. Jesus actually has done that to Jim. Has broken Jim. Killed Jim. And now Jim lives in a whole new reality of God's grace. That's why Jim KNOWS it is true. That's how Jim can trust the power grace has so completely. In the end he has found it is the ONLY thing that really works.

And now he has dedicated his life to helping others discover and live in this grace, too. Not just the theologically accurate grace we often (and should) proclaim from our pulpits. Not just the grace that gets us forgiven and gets us to Heaven. Grace starts with forgiveness and salvation. But it offers more.

Grace when allowed to have its full permeation into us offers transformation. It heals. It restores. It reconciles. This grace is hard, though. It is freely given. But it is hard to receive and believe this deeply because we are so used to shielding ourselves from how much and how deeply we still need grace. That's why grace goes this deep only as we are broken down. It is as we die to ourselves, as we come to the end of ourselves, that we eagerly drink deeply of who Jesus really is and what He is really offering us... and through us what He is offering to everyone.

And isn't that our mission? Graced to be Grace to others.

Saving grace, yes. But grace that, by the Spirit's power, continues to press in. Grace that is powerful not just because of what we say, but because of who we now have become through Him and His grace.

Safe Christians who are nicely churched seem to have less capacity for this. We want order. We want things to be behaved and neat. We get angry or worried if this is not happening. When the true nature of humanity rears up, we respond by wanting to "fix" people or pass laws to control people. But, in the end, BEING grace is the only thing that really works.

Imagine what would happen if each person of grace became grace to the people who need grace around them.

So, why do I choose to focus on the unique power of grace today?

Because the events of Newtown, Connecticut show how screwed up the world is and how far it is from grace.

That brings us back to Jim.

A couple days ago Jim shared a text conversation he had with a friend. It went like this:

Friend: "The world is on fire, people are divided and hateful, and it seems that we have fully succeeded in doing any terrorist group's mission to ourselves and one another. It is a pain- and fear-filled space in which there is little room for love."

Jim: "Untrue. Love prevails, always. I am evidence of that, and here I am."

Friend: "No argument there."

Jim: "And because of the persistence of the problem, you can notice and ask a new question. Instead of 'Why is the world so messed up?', while unconsciously being the answer to that question, you can ask, 'Where is there evidence of love?', and more consciously and consistently BE the answer."

Jim finished up by saying, "When we endlessly complain (or worry) about things, while doing nothing to make the world any different, we totally reveal ourselves and can often poison innocent others. And when we desperately try to "fix" things, we frustrate ourselves and can often hurt innocent others. By simply "being" the difference we want to see - boldly, consistently, and out in the open - and leaving others alone, free to make their own choices, we frequently inspire others and stand for them as encouragement and hope, calling forth their best."

Hmmmm...

See what I mean?

A profound understanding of the real power of grace vs. the power of our anger, worry or desire to "fix" people.

Be the change you seek.

Be grace.

In the end, it is the only thing that really works.

This is our mission.

P.S. Some of us who want to BE grace, will hesitate because we want do something important for others and, truth be told, do it perfectly. This quickly paralyzes us and inaction is the result. Here are a couple of quotes I have picked up over the years that may help you:

“It’s better to do something imperfectly than to do nothing flawlessly.”

“All the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than a single lovely action.”

“What you wish you could do for many do for one.”

I learned the lesson early and the hard way.

Don't confuse activity with accomplishment.

I had been a pastor for just a few years.  But good things were really starting to pop.  Attendance in worship was growing and growing pretty quickly.  We had gone from 100 people in worship to 200 and now were quickly approaching 300.  With that came all kinds of other demands on me (I thought) for visiting new guests, starting more new member classes, figuring out the assimilation riddle, topping the great sermon last Sunday with a better great sermon this Sunday. Sprucing up the facility.  I wanted to be sure every service and every gathering was "perfect" so that we made the best impression on everyone who came.  I wanted to be sure everyone wanted to come back.

I was giving all I had.  I was giving all my time and emotion to the ministry.  I was giving all my energy to the ministry.

My wife didn't see me much except at church.  My little daughter wondered why daddy was always angry.

I wasn't angry.  I was intense.  I needed to get back to the ministry.

Then one day it happened.

I realized all this activity was unsustainable.  And worse, I started wondering what it was really accomplishing.

It was early in the new year, maybe 1991 or 1992.  January or February.   I had recently crunched the numbers for the previous year's statistics. I was feeling pretty good. We had grown by more than 60 people in weekly worship attendance.  Easily the biggest growth spurt we had ever had at that church.  But then I read an article about a church in a nearby city that had grown by more than 600 in weekly worship attendance in that same year.  What?!

I remember thinking, how does that happen?  I can't work any harder.  I am giving everything I've got and more. I can't imagine what it would take to gain 600 in a year when it took all I had to gain 60.

In that moment of discouragement and realization I believe God gave me a gift.  I suddenly realized that simply chasing higher attendance numbers wasn't capable of fulfilling me.  It would only empty me out and leave me exhausted year after year.  In that moment I realized that what mattered in ministry was not having higher attendance numbers than other churches, but seeing changed lives in human beings.

In other words, satisfaction wouldn't come from having a higher attendance number to gloat over once a year, but being able to tell the stories of changed lives year after year.

I remember that insight giving me a feeling of relief and freedom but also a sense of "oh-oh."  I had created all these moving parts to attract people.  Lives were being changed but not necessarily because of all the moving ministry parts.  I had to start to look carefully at everything we were doing and start to tease out what was just activity and what was accomplishing our true goal: changed lives.

That's when I started to learn the next lesson:

Pruning produces fruit.

Pruning is very counter-intuitive.  It doesn't immediately make sense to cut off healthy greenery in order to produce more fruit.  But we have to decide.  Do we want more greenery or do we want more fruit?  We have to decide because the plant can only produce abundantly one or the other.  It takes too much to produce both abundant greenery and abundant fruit.

In our lives it works the same way.  We only have so much to give.  Do you want lots of greenery, lots of activity, lots of moving parts or do you want lots of fruit?  You can produce one or the other but you can't produce both.

That's Jesus' point in John 15 when He teaches on the vine and the branches.  He is saying that the Father already has this question figured out. Fruit is what is desired so pruning is what is necessary.

Greenery exhausts you.  Fruit multiplies you.

Prune off greenery and you focus the strength of your life into the production of fruit.

As someone once said, "Less is more."  Whoever that was stole it from Jesus.

So what should I prune off?

Before we start chopping stuff out, we need to be clear about where the fruit actually comes from.

I learned that lesson the hard way, too, from a real apple tree.

When we first move to Michigan in 1989, our little house had a mature apple tree in the front yard. It was a beautiful tree. The trouble was it had been left to grow unpruned for several years.  It had a wonderful shape and lots of greenery but very little fruit.

I didn't know much about apple trees, but I knew that they needed pruning to produce fruit.  So one Saturday I commenced pruning.

Several hours later I had a whole pile of pruned branches lying on the ground and essentially a stump left for an apple tree.  My wife came out and was horrified by what I had done.  I assured her this was good for the production of fruit.  She knew pruning was good for the production of fruit.  She was not so sure that what I had done to the tree could properly be called "pruning".  "Hacking to death" seemed to fit the present situation better.

As usual, she ended up being right.  It was years before the poor tree recovered.  And the next year, you know how many apples we got? I kid you not.  One.  We had one apple produced out of that poor tree.

l understood the general concept of pruning.  I did not know how to prune.  Pruning is not just hacking stuff off.  It is knowing where the life of the tree is flowing from and focusing that flow of life so that the tree can produce abundant fruit.

So before we prune, where is your life flowing from?  How has God already designed you to thrive?  What brings you refreshment and strength?  Who fills you with joy, insight, creativity, peace, patience, kindness, self-control?  Don't prune those sources.  Prioritize them.

What's on my list?

• Unhurried time with Jesus.  (I talked about "unhurried time" in last week's blog.)  Remember when Jesus said in John 15, "I am the vine and you are the branches"?  The longer I am on the earth, the more I realize Jesus was spot-on with that insight (surprise, surprise).  When I work, I work.  But when I abide with Jesus, He works.  Do the math on that one.
• Unhurried time with my spouse and kids.  Spending unhurried time with them does not necessarily mean hours and hours.  It does mean "unhurried" though.  It is only in this way that I receive from them what the Father had in mind when He gave me them.
• Unhurried time with a few friends who are on the adventure, too.

These are the tap roots of my life-strength.  When life is flowing through these sources, fruit is abundant and oncoming in my ministry.  I am not exhausted.  I am overflowing. I am fulfilled and fruitful.  That's how God designed me.  I don't prune these things.  I prioritize them.

With that clarity, I can then begin to look at what takes life away from me.  What are the sucker branches in my life that divert life and blur my focus?  These then become candidates for pruning.

(By the way, when you are doing your own evaluating, be careful.  Just because something is hard or even unpleasant doesn't mean it doesn't lead to life.  Pruning is a discipline that requires maturity.  Its goal is abundant fruit not just an easier schedule.)

"I don't have time for this!"

As we conclude this series of blogs, when I talk with people about time and pruning and prioritizing, at the end of the conversation they often summarize how they feel with a discouraged comment, "This all sounds great, but I don't have time for this."

It's the problem of time.

"I don't have time" for unhurried time. "I don't have time" for unhurried time with Jesus, my spouse, my children, a few close friends.  "I don't have time" for refreshment. "I don't have time" for joining Jesus' mission.  "I don't have time" for discipling.  All I have time for is hurrying.  All I have time for is being busy with activities.  All I have time for is keeping up.  All I have time for is exhaustion.

I'm starting to be old enough to call your bluff.

The problem isn't your time.  The problem is your choices.

When you are tempted to say, "I don't have time for this!" Replace those words with these, "Then why do I have time?"

"Then why do I have time?"

Now listen to Jesus, your spouse and your kids.  They already know the answer.