Church Without Walls

February 1, 2012

CHURCH WITHOUT WALLS :: Urban Village Church’s calling to deepen inclusion and seek justice — particularly to become a multi-ethnic, multi-racial church and to serve the urban family.

In Mark 12:29-31, Jesus shared the most important commandment: Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.

After months of congregational conversation and discernment beginning in Summer 2011, Urban Village Church collectively felt called by God to deepen our inclusion and to serve the urban family – and to do so in a bold and relevant way. After all, God consistently and repeatedly challenges us throughout the Bible to broaden our understanding of who our neighbors are.

• Micah 6:8: “God has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”
• Galatians 3:8: “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.” 

WHERE WE’VE BEEN

We knew that much would be required from all of us in this challenging, intentional, audaciously divine project: listening and speaking, unlearning and learning, prayer and action, radical dependence on God, and Christ’s love for each other in the process.

We also recognized the all-encompassing, challenging work of inclusion. While our goal is to live out and constantly improve radical, Christ-like inclusion at every level (heart > church > city > world), we first sought candid conversation, reflection and prayer with Urban Village’s leaders. The diverse Strategy Team deeply discussed and amended our thoughts, seeking affirmation and input from the Rev. Candace Lewis and the Rev. Paul Nixon (both church planting strategists), Urban Village Staff, and Site Teams for conversation, feedback, and amending.

WHERE WE ARE NOW

After five months of conversation and exploration, the Strategy Team offers this foundation on which to move forward:

• This collective calling of Urban Village Church is not a one-year “program” but the emergence of a total new way of being and doing as a congregational culture/church planting movement for the future.  Our plans cannot be solely programmatic but must be extensive and sustainable.
• This calling is so important, so messy and hard and right and good, that we can’t walk naively into it — we don’t want to do harm to anyone as we seek good for everyone. Similarly, this calling is so important, so messy and hard and right and good, that we must actually start it—we can’t fall into the trap of talking ourselves into not moving.
• A crucial undergirding of this project of transformation requires us to address and overcome the inherent barriers and injustice in us, our church, and the world — which are expressions of the deeper and underlying condition traditionally called “sin.”
• A life dedicated to inclusion could begin its transformation at many places. After much discussion, the Urban Village Leadership, Staff and Strategy Team  recommend beginning our calling with an exploration of race, ethnic and cultural inclusion and our current personal and societal barriers to such inclusion.
  • America’s journey with racial diversity and struggle against racism are still relevant today, in ways perhaps unique to other national contexts. Given the stark visibility of this condition, we felt first called to bring all together to share, reflect, pray, and act to dismantle racism (both individually and systemically) as a keystone of our broader inclusion calling.

Even with all that conversation and hard work, we realize that we are still only at the beginning. We have sought to be very intentional, honest, and open to diverse perspectives, and yet we know that with seismic callings like this one, there is never a “good enough”—we can always do better but we can never be perfect.

OUR BOLD, INCLUSIVE & RELEVANT CALLING

We are called by God to be a church—both nurturing home and challenging spiritual launch pad—that includes people diverse in race, ethnicity, culture, gender, sexual and gender orientation, socioeconomic background, politics, theology, and life experience.

We are called to love God with all of our being and to love our neighbors as ourselves. Our neighbors include people who are different from us.  This love is not theoretical but practical.

We are called to a life-long commitment—not a one-time initiative. We invite all people to join this challenging salvation journey and to take proactive responsibility for the process. Everyone is responsible.

We are called to hold together the belief that all people are created in the image of God with the commitment to overcome the inherent barriers to fully living out that image. While there are many barriers (again, individual and systemic expressions of the underlying condition traditionally called “sin”), we believe that addressing the particular problems of racism and economic injustice will be a means toward the goal of a total congregational culture fueled by grace/inclusion/action/change for all people, in every sphere of life: heart > church > city > society.

WHERE WE’RE GOING

The true life force of this calling to build a church without walls is you, the Urban Village Church community, with the guidance and power of the Holy Spirit. Your participation and feedback are essential to understanding and identifying issues and opportunities to further infuse inclusivity into our culture and all that we do. We are committed to bold, inclusive, relevant courses of study and action beginning this Winter.

As such we invite all of you to join us on Sunday, February 12^th, following worship at every site for an All-Community Gathering. We will discuss in more detail our approach and some exciting opportunities and things we have planned through the year, including retreats, sermon series, small groups and personal reflection programs.

We are excited to begin this transformative work and know changes will happen most fully with all of us in this together. For none of us is as good as all of us. We are the body of Christ.

If you have questions or dreams, we hope that you will join us on February 12th to share them! You can also email us at info@urbanvillagechurch.org before then. After Feb 12th, there will be more information on our website, including programmatic details, opportunities for continued questioning and ideation, point people and feedback loops, and more.

In the name of Jesus, who makes us one,

Christian Coon & Trey Hall, Lead Pastors

The Urban Village Church Strategy Team

The Urban Village Church Staff

 

 

Children’s ministry job openings

Urban Village Church is seeking creative, organized, and energetic individuals who have a passion for children’s faith formation to apply to become one of our Directors of Children’s Ministries.

The successful applicant will have a heart for God, a heart for children and families, and a heart for being a part of a staff team that’s leading a new and exciting church in Chicago.

The position requires skills in volunteer recruitment and training, curriculum development and selection, and administrative oversight. The Director of Children’s Ministries for our Downtown location is 15 hours a week and will also include some attention to our Wicker Park worship location. The Director of Children’s Ministries for our Andersonville location is 10 hours a week. Salary is based on individual’s experience.

For more information and/or to apply for the position, contact Christian Coon, chris@urbanvillagechurch.org. Applicants are encouraged to send a resume and reflections on your approach to children’s ministries.  Ethnic minorities are strongly encouraged to apply.

What Urban Village Church is for

**Digested from our 8/14/11 All-Community Gathering, a snapshot of our community’s commitments, culture, and passions.

WHAT URBAN VILLAGE CHURCH IS ABOUT
1. Core values
• Bold: rooted in the main thing—the Gospel
• Inclusive: bringing down the walls
• Relevant: faith is about living differently/doing something

2. Multi-site, and here’s why:
• Evangelical: sharing the gift that we’ve received/are receiving
• Flexible/reinventing: attentive to cultural change and the subsequent need to reshape our strategy
• Equipping: raises up, equips, and sends forth new lay and pastoral leaders

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE PART OF URBAN VILLAGE?
All are invited to be a companion on the journey, regardless of starting place or pace. At Urban Village, these practices/experiences (the 3Gs) are signposts of commitment:
1. GATHER: commit to gather regularly in worship
2. GROW: commit to grow spiritually through small groups & to build relationships with others
3. GIVE : commit to offer your gifts, passions, and financial resources (we are all challenged to move toward a tithe, or 10% of our financial income) to serve the world

HOW IS URBAN VILLAGE CHURCH ORGANIZED/HOW DO WE HOLD TOGETHER
1. Site teams: responsible for local/indigenous ministries at each site, including invitation and neighborhood outreach, the nuts and bolts of worship (greeting, hospitality, set-up, etc.), congregational care (reaching out to those who may need emotional or spiritual support), and social/community life.
2. Strategy teams: responsible for total culture ministry, including administrative tasks, big-picture visioning, and checking in to see how we’re doing.

EMERGING PASSIONS AND MESSAGES THAT GOD IS GIVING URBAN VILLAGE
1. We are a community of diverse people seeking to be more racially and generationally diverse.
2. We are community that wants to serve the urban family (in the many senses of “family”).

March with Urban Village Church in the Pride Parade!

UVC seeks worship/band leader for Andersonville site

Urban Village Church—a bold, inclusive, new multi-site congregation in Chicago—seeks a band leader/worship leader for our third site, to launch Sunday mornings in Chicago’s Andersonville/Edgewater neighborhood on October 16, 2011.

S/he will be someone who can pull together a band from nothing, loves playing and singing with others (volunteers), and has organizational skills to manage lots of loose threads.

Urban Village Church is very committed to diversity. We strongly encourage all qualified applicants, especially people from racial/ethnic minority groups, to apply.

Our ethos is bold, experiential, fun, welcoming, and eclectic. We are not looking for a rock star or diva but for a very talented someone who enjoys leading people in the countercultural joy of singing *together*.

Basic responsibilities (12-15 hours a week, with potential for more as the church grows):

1) recruiting and overseeing a great *volunteer* band (instruments and vocalists) for each diverse service;

2) choosing, preparing, rehearsing and leading all music;

3) organizing all related stuff (a/v, set-up, rehearsal scheduling, charting, publicity, etc.)

The ideal candidate will lead strongly on guitar and vocals (if you play something else, too, let us know) with a broad musical range:

• folky/bluegrass/acoustic updates of traditional Christian hymns (think Sufjan Stevens);
• contemporary worship music (think Robbie Seay, Chris Tomlin) that gets at both personal connection with God and the community call to make the world a better, more loving, more just place.
• contemporary Black Gospel, R&B
• pop/rock from U2 to Indigo Girls to Ron Sexsmith
• ability to put down the guitar and teach people to sing an old spiritual a cappella, maybe even with different vocal parts.

Interested or know someone who might be? Send an email to info@urbanvillagechurch.org with ALL of the following: (1) a description of your style, repertoire, and experience; (2) a short resume including 3 references and their contact information; and (3) three-five audio or video links to samples of your music/music leading.

The Spiritual Gift of Texting

There are close to 20 spiritual gifts listed in the Bible, but, as much as we keep searching, we haven’t found one that includes texting.  But that doesn’t mean we don’t need (and appreciate) folks who like to text!  We’re looking for folks who’d be interested in sending brief texts to people who visit Urban Village for the first time.  Interested in being on our text team?  Contact Christian at chris@urbanvillagechurch.org

Ash Wednesday on the Streets

Ash Wednesday (this year, Wednesday, March 9) is the beginning of Lent, a season of  self-examination and spiritual honesty. Whether or not you’ve observed it before, you know it’s Ash Wednesday when you see some people walking around with charcoal smudges on their foreheads. The dirt smudge is actually a little cross of ashes: a reminder that we are finite, that each of us has only a short stretch of time on this good earth, and that we should therefore live it well.

This year we’re taking Ash Wednesday to the streets. Instead of inviting people to a church building to share in worship, we’re remembering that relevant Church happens in the midst of the real World. So we’ll be offering ashes (and invitations to Urban Village Church) on the street, at various intersections and at different times throughout the city. Find a location near you and join us before work, at your lunch hour, or after work. It’s come and go throughout the hour. Look for the “Doing Church Differently” signs.

ASH WEDNESDAY SCHEDULE:
7:30-8:30am at the Damen Blue Line station in Wicker Park
 
8:00-9:00am at Daley Plaza (south side of the plaza, near Clark and Washington)
 
12noon-1pm at Jackson and State (southeast corner)
 
12noon-1pm in front of Columbia College (600 S. Michigan)
 
5:30-6:30pm at the Belmont El station in Lakeview
 
5:30-6:30pm at the Berwyn El Station in Edgewater

For more information, or to help out, email trey@urbanvillagechurch.org

Lent Blog Project

“Lent serves as our annual invitation to come closer to God.  It provides a time to look at our lives and ourselves so we can identify the obstructions that keep us from God.  Thus Lent offers a gift of time and a promise of closeness.  It gives us time to see our current state of affairs in complete honesty.” – Sarah Parsons (A Clearing Season: Reflections for Lent)

Growing up, Lent was not a time for me to immerse myself in the deep waters of spiritual practices for the sake of becoming closer with my God.  Rather, it was a time where I knew I could go get a filet-o-fish sandwich at McDonald’s for only a dollar.  Lent, as the tradition of spending the forty days before Easter in intentional devotion and reflection, was a foreign and odd ritual to me.  But this year, really for the first time, I have committed myself to participating in the Lenten tradition, and I am excited that the opportunity will come within the community that is Urban Village Church. 

For Lent 2011, Urban Village Church will be posting a daily devotional on the church Blog, so that during these upcoming forty days (Sundays are not included), each of us can have the opportunity to reflect as individuals and as one body.  These daily devotionals will revolve around themes of spiritual practices in light of the greater social issues around us.  Bible verses, personal meditations, news articles, book excerpts, and whatever else possible will be used in order to help us draw nearer to God and to the pain and suffering of our brothers and sisters both near and far.  But truly, the hope is that Urban Village Church as a whole will be part of this process so here are ways you can get involved:
1.  We are looking for people who can commit to posting devotionals on the blog on certain days.  In the effort to create a truly community driven project, this is a great opportunity to get involved and aid in the ministry of others.  All are welcome whether you can commit to posting once or ten times.  The dates will be March 9th-April 23rd.

2.  Write reflections or leave comments in response to the daily devotionals.  The blog has a space for comments and we would love for people to share their experiences throughout this season.

3.  If you would like to receive daily e-mail reminders to check the blog during Lent, let us know!

For any questions, or if you are interested in posting devotionals and would like to receive further information regarding that process, or to sign up for e-mail reminders, contact tim@urbanvillagechurch.org.

Urban Village Church growth stats

A quick digest of the information shared at our February All-Community Gathering:

1. Worship Attendance–After a nice start for our launch downtown (we averaged 120 adults in worship last April), we dipped a bit over the summer, which we expected.  We started climbing back a bit and were averaging 90 in worship in September and after launching our second site in Wicker Park, we were worshiping 167 in November.  This is a key figure for folks who wonder why we start additional sites.  It would have been very difficult to be worshiping that many people if we had stayed in one site.  Since the beginning of 2011, we’ve stayed at about the same number, but are showing promise of increasing.  We broke the 200 barrier in February, which continues to feed our optimism and hope. Questions? Email chris@urbanvillagechurch.org

2. Small groups participation–It has been a great year for groups and retreats at Urban Village!  We’ve grown from 33 distinct individuals participating to 191 – a 473% growth rate.  And, our rate of participation has increased significantly as well, from 44% to 80%.  These are exciting numbers because they speak to countless conversations, laughs, prayers, and relationships being formed.  Thanks be to God and you! Questions? Email anne@urbanvillagechurch.org

3. Financial generosity–Our general budget is $300, 000 a year. When we started Urban Village Church, we received a grant from The United Methodist Church for 1/3 of our budget for the first three years of ministry. This means that by Fall 2012, we need to be completely financially self-sufficient through the giving of the congregation. It’s exciting to let you know that as of the end of December 2010, only 9 months after launching weekly worship, 60 households (singles or couples) pledged $205,000 for 2011! The amazing generosity of this still-emerging community puts us in a very good place to continue growing and funding a ministry that changes lives. Want to make a regular or one-time gift toward this ministry? Visit  http://www.newchicagochurch.com/give/

Questions? Email trey@urbanvillagechurch.org

An announcement from Anne Williamson

Dear Urban Village Community,

After much deliberation and prayer, my husband, Todd, and I have decided to move from Chicago back to our home state of Indiana.

This was not an easy decision for either of us and, in particular, me.  I love this city and will miss so many things about it.  What weighed most heavily in this decision, however, was all of you; I am going to miss our Urban Village community most of all.  Serving you as Pastor of Discipleship, and before that as Student Pastor, has been one of the richest experiences of my life.  It has been a true privilege, gift, and joy.

The salary I raised last spring was for a year of service at Urban Village.  I had imagined all kinds of possibilities post this year, most of which involved staying in Chicago and continuing at Urban Village.  So, in many respects, I was surprised when I found myself saying “yes” to Indianapolis.  Surprised, in no small part, due to the fact that I don’t actually know what this move will bring career-wise, community-wise, you-name-it-wise.  But, even this is somewhat familiar territory.  In trying to live life guided by the Spirit, I more often than not find myself on paths that twist and turn, paths where I don’t exactly know what is around the bend.  So, I am leaning into trust once again, hoping and believing God is not done with me yet.

I am thankful to be continuing at Urban Village through Easter time.  As soon as this move was decided, Trey, Chris, and myself began thinking thoughtfully about the transition.  These next few months will allow me to continue to build, with you, a solid foundation for discipleship at Urban Village.  I will get to organize the next round of small groups and create resource and reference materials, among other things.  My vision for discipleship at Urban Village has always also been Chris and Trey’s; so, though I am not done yet and very much looking forward to the time remaining, I am also excited to see how it grows and develops after I am gone.

Thank you for sharing your stories and lives with me and, to many of you, for imagining and creating and serving with me.

In love,

Anne